Question: Would you please share what was the interaction between you and Lama Yeshe that had the most transforming effect on your mind – the interaction that transformed your mind the most?
Answer: I understand. Well, it’s very curious because I could count the number of conversations I had with Lama personally on my two hands in the years I knew him – very few. My main relationship with Lama was from my side, in my practice.
But the interactions I did have with him, I always had the experience of Lama sort of out of the blue saying just a few words that had like the effect of an atomic bomb on me. It was always so direct, and so casual, so out of the blue: he’d just say some small word that would blow my mind
Because of my relationship with him – I saw him as the Buddha, I wanted to be like him, so I practiced every day developing devotion for him in my meditation, developing pure view – just a few casual words were enough, you know? I mean, small things, like a tiny exchange, you know, would be very powerful for my mind.
I didn’t have these long conversations with Lama – I never had one long conversation with him. It was always like out of the blue, seemed like, but very powerful and very packed.
I remember one time with Lama, in London one year and I was serving as attendant for a few days. Back then I was bossy and angry and I’d fight with people and cause problems and I had all this self-pity: “I’m a bad person, I’m hopeless, I’m no good.” Mainly I couldn’t control my mouth! And I’m still bossy!
So there was Lama and I was telling him something and I remember kind of my self-pity, and all he said was, “There’s nothing wrong with your heart, dear, it’s just your behavior.”
It blew my mind! You see, in the Buddhist view, they make this huge distinction between your behavior – and that means the actions of your body and speech – and your mind. But according to our modern views we just think I’m this one big lump of me: we don’t make this distinction, we don’t have those levels of practice. When we think of spiritual practice, we just think of meditation – we don’t think of controlling the body and the speech. You understand me?
That was just so powerful. I suddenly realized, “Oh, there’s nothing wrong with me, it’s just how I behave.” It was a liberation, because I’d always think I was hopeless.
You see, our body and speech are the servants of the mind, and we first have to control them. Then the mind has the space to change.
“There’s nothing wrong with your heart, dear, it’s just your behavior.” It was hugely powerful! His words were always like that for me – they were very direct, very powerful, and they were very short. It wasn’t a conversation, it was just like, boom, you know? Do you understand?