Khenpo
Tsultrim Gyamtso Rinpoche
speaks on Crestone, Colorado
(Talk given at Crestone on 7/23/2002)
As
my parting aspiration prayer for you all, I pray that your practice
of ultimate bodhichitta will cut through your clinging to existence
as being truly existent and that your practice of relative bodhichitta,
which is the root of performing the benefit of others, will
cut through clinging to samsara . I pray that these practices
will be like the waxing moon and will increase and increase
and that, through this, you will be of great benefit to all
of the limitless number of sentient beings.
A dharma center is a place where
many dharma practitioners can gather and practice together and
therefore it is very important. Those who work at a dharma center
and are doing dharma work will have difficulty. However much
you have to endure, that much more merit will you accumulate,
and that much more can you practice patience. However much dharma
practitioners have to endure the difficulties of heat and cold,
of hunger and thirst, or whatever might be, that much more merit
will they accumulate. Milarepa himself said, "If you do difficult
things, you will achieve something rare."
Crestone is a place where you
have at your back the Rocky Mountains and in front you have
an incredibly expansive view. Although the view is expansive
there's a forest on the mountains so there can be many different
places for seclusion. It's a place where the earth is clean,
the water is clean, and the air is clean. So it's a wonderfully
beautiful and secluded place, an ideal place to practice the
dharma. You're all incredibly fortunate to be able to live and
practice here. And especially
because it's a place where many tulkus (emanations of realized
masters) are now gathering and having retreats or building retreat
building. So I think this creates a very auspicious connection
for the teachings of the Practice Lineage to flourish here in
Crestone and for many yogis and yoginis to be born out of their
practice here.
Because we have so many different
tulkus from so many different dharma traditions building retreats
in the same place, teaching in the same place, this activity
really makes this place extraordinary. Since these emanations
themselves are building so many different retreat cabins, it
is a sign that even more emanations of emanations will come
in the future. Since the people who are building the retreats,
the lamas, the retreat masters themselves are tulkus, that is
a sign that among their students there will be many yogis and
yoginis.
Since people here help each other
when building their retreats with groups helping each other,
that is a sign that they are in harmony in terms of their samaya
and that is a conducive condition for their realization to increase
and increase. Also, all these different students of different
teachers have one common place where they have come, which also
has an extraordinary stupa of Tashi Gomang, its a wonderful
place for everybody to gather and make aspiration prayers for
world peace and happiness.
Tibet has many sacred places
because these are places where realized masters like Milarepa
and Guru Rinpoche came and practiced. Because these masters
stayed in these spots and practiced there, the places became
sacred. These places weren't sacred to begin with; they became
sacred because of the practice that was done there. Similarly,
because there are so many different emanations of masters practicing
here and building retreats here, this place, too, will become
a sacred place-a place where the air is clean, the earth is
clean, and the water is clean, a place of utter seclusion and
beauty, a place where so many tulkus have come to build retreats
and practice the genuine dharma. All of these are signs that
here the teachings of the Practice Lineage will flourish. So
all of you who are the pioneers here should stick it out and
endure the difficult work of building this place. If you do
this, all of the future emanations and the future students who
come will have it very easy and will have all the conducive
conditions for a wonderful place for practice which will be
based on your efforts and endurance here at the beginning.
When the tulkus who are in Crestone
pass away into nirvana, their blessing will grow even greater
and the blessing of this place will grow even greater. When
a tulku is still alive some people will praise the tulku and
some people will criticize the tulku. But once the tulku passes
away to nirvana then all there is, is pure vision. And this
makes their blessing increase and the blessing of the place
where they live and practice increase. So when the tulkus pass
away into nirvana, there will be no reason to criticize them
any more and everybody will have very pure vision of them and
make aspiration prayers at the places where they stayed and
lived and practiced.
In this world there are many
places where there are retreats going on and retreat houses
being constructed and people are practicing. But you have not
just one, but many tulkus who have come and build retreats and
practice here. So out of all of the retreat settings in the
whole world, this is the best! This is the most extraordinary!
It is the retreat land of the emanations! And that's why in
the future this will become an extraordinary place. The reason
why Tibet is an extraordinary land is that so many emanations
of realized masters were born and lived there. Similarly, since
Crestone is a place where so many realized masters have come
to live and practice, it will be just as extraordinary. And
when the students of these emanations practice what they have
been taught by their teachers and they become noble bodhisattvas,
then there will be that many more emanations to go around.
As Milarepa sang,
"The yogi who has reached success in emptiness/compassion,
this is the guide for cutting through complexities conventions,
is there anyone here who is able to stick to this path and
follow it through,
the one with realization, with a retinue is happy.
To gather emanations as a retinue is E MA HO."
So Milarepa sang about his students
being emanations being tulkus because they had realized the
true nature of mind. So Rinpoche asks that I sing this verse
for you. [Translator Ari Goldfield sings.] It's like that!
[Note: When Ari heard Khenpo
Tsultrim say, "So out of all the retreat settings in the world,
this is the best." he asked Khenpo several times if he meant
just good or meant the very best and each time Khenpo Tsultrim
said "the very best."]
