Sat, 04 Jul 2009
Stuck In Our Views
I've continued reading the Karmapa's book on this fine Fourth of July weekend and his comments have been very interesting and inspiring. Here is one excerpt I especially liked:
When we reach a certain conceptual understanding and our afflictions are not too active, we find something our conceptualizing mind can seize upon and take pride in. When our mind conceptualizes like this in a very solid and concrete manner, our view becomes extreme. We are convinced we have found the "right" way and we are proud of it. This process resembles how the rigid views of people caught in the mundane world are developed, Nowadays, these stubborn positions are a great problem. And they also contradict progress as it is understood in the Dharma. As we move along the path, inferior views are gradually surpassed by superior ones, until finally there is no view at all, nothing to be seized upon. Therefore, we should not go to an extreme snd cling to our position as the truth. Our view of how things are is not something to grasp with a tight fist.
I should give a little context for Khenpo Karthar Rinpoche's talk yesterday. After Tenzin Chonyi fired Byron some people saw the situation in terms of good and bad, with Byron being the good guy and Tenzin the bad. Since the end result of the controversy is that Tenzin is still at KTD and Byron is not, some people might feel that the "bad guy had won" and feel a certain anger at KTD. I believe part of the reason for Khenpo Rinpoche's talk was to diffuse this anger.
