Designing your future self

0:00Welcome to Kadampa Podcasts. These podcasts offer practical solutions to daily challenges and help guide us to a happier and more peaceful state of mind. In each episode you will find an extract from a teaching given by one of various Kadampa Buddhist teachers worldwide. All these teachings are inspired by the profound wisdom of Venable Geshikal Sanghiata Rinpoche, a Buddhist master for our time. We hope you enjoy listening. Everyone here has a vision of who they want to be. You have a vision of being somebody who is maybe less distracted, less stressed, more confident, more positive. And I believe that all of you came to this class today because you have a vision of who you want to be.

1:02And you feel that somehow this class, somewhat your learning is going to help you realise that vision for yourself, move closer to that vision for yourself. If you didn't have that vision, you couldn't become that person. So in tantric meditation we visualise the person who we want to be. We imagine becoming right now the person who we want to be. And this vision, this imagination is very important because everything begins in the imagination. So in this book, eight steps to happiness.

2:02Geshikal Sanghiata, he explains how our imagination is what creates our reality, the relationship between your imagination and what appears in our reality. He says, how is it possible for something that exists only in our imagination to become a reality? It is a remarkable quality of the mind that we first create objects with our imagination and then bring them into our everyday reality. In fact, everything starts in the imagination. For example, the house we are presently living in was first created in the imagination of the architect. Your she then made a design on paper which acted as the blueprint for the actual building. If no one had first imagined our house, it would never have been built in reality our mind is the creator of all we experience.

3:11All external creations such as money, cars and computers were developed independence upon someone's imagination. If no one had imagined them, they would never have been invented. In the same way, all inner creations and all Dharma realisations, even liberation and enlightenment, are developed independence upon the imagination. Therefore, for both worldly and spiritual attainments, the imagination is of primary importance. So, at an external level, we see clearly everything begins in the imagination, this temple, the chair you are sitting on, the clothes you are wearing. How many things will you use today that began in somebody's imagination?

4:14What percent of things you are using today began in somebody's imagination. It is quite phenomenal actually when you think about it. But it is not just external developments that begin in the imagination. Also, inner developments begin in the imagination because becoming the person who we want to be begins in our imagination, begins with a vision of who we want to be. And we can only grow to the extent we have a vision for ourselves. So, if your vision is to become somebody who can sleep properly at night or be a little bit less distracted, that's as far as you can grow because that's your vision for yourself.

5:16So, it seems important that we have a vision for ourselves that relates to our highest potential, not a vision that maybe limits our growth and limits who we can become. So, in tantric meditation, we create a vision for ourselves which relates to our highest spiritual potential, it identifies with our highest spiritual potential. So, I was thinking how all, whenever we want to create a new identity for ourselves, that that identity begins in the imagination.

6:17So, like think of a job in life like where does the identity of a plumber or an electrician or a nurse or a doctor begin? Where does that identity begin? My identity as a monk, okay, I didn't go to sleep one night and wake up in the morning wearing robes, like what the heck happened there? How did that happen? I first did imagine what it would be like, imagine sort of the identity and what the life would be like and maybe my mindset and the environment where I would be. So, I played it out in my imagination first and then I made the decision to get ordained and go through the process of ordination and then this identity came into existence.

7:30The fact is, is that it began in my imagination. So, if you want the identity of a particular role in life, maybe a married person or a parent or a retired person who lives in the Bahamas or something, that identity begins in the imagination. But when we, so it feels like through life we have many identities and we may be change our identity many times. But what we've never done, at least so far, is become someone who is free from problems and free from worry. So, my parents lived in England, so they had the identity of living in England and my dad wanted to have the identity of a retired person in Spain and for 20 years he imagined that.

8:43He imagined living in Mahaka, you probably don't know where that is, it's on the coast, the southeast coast of Spain, sunny most of the year round because when you're from England it rains a tremendous amount and he and my mother sort of fantasized about that. And then after 20 years of working he eventually managed to arrange his finances and moved to Spain, finally he reached the identity of a retired person in Spain. But then after a while they started to notice problems in that world, that retired identity, during the summer months it was just too hot, unbearably hot.

9:45And then there was the mosquitoes too. And then I, so we shared that their next door neighbor got about four dogs, small dogs that barked all the time. So completely destroying my parents a piece of mine, it would drive them nuts, okay. And then my parents after a while were, I want the identity of living back in England again. Yeah, I wanted to jump to a new identity because this one, maybe not working as well as I thought it would, we need to change our identity. And so they went back to England, back to the English, still retired but maybe that different identity. But then even that world is not perfect because they, their next door neighbor who's a semi-detached, they can hear him shouting through the wall, it is part, now they're often falling out with one another, she leaves him and then she comes back.

10:48And then she leaves him. And every time I Skype with them, they're like, this is the seventh time she's left him. Come back again and he sort of drinks a bit. Then he comes around knocking on the door and asking my dad for advice. And my dad's thinking, I need the identity of being back in Spain again or something, you know, you need to move again. So, you know, sometimes it can be like this, I want the identity of a married person and then we get to that identity and maybe thinking, gosh, I wish I had the identity of a single person. It's not always the case, but you can be running away, we run towards an identity, we think, this is the right place for me, you get that identity, but still run happy in ourselves, you know, we want to maybe switch it out slightly. And what would have said is that we are, we're moving identities a lot, but we've never become somebody or have the identity of someone who is completely free from problems, you know, really experiencing genuine happiness.

11:57And he said, that's possible because we all have Buddha nature. It is possible to create and live such an identity. But that begins in the imagination. It begins in the imagination, it's definitely possible because people have accomplished this. There's no doubt over the thousands of years since the time of Buddha Shakyamuni, millions of people, we can say, have put his instructions into practice, trained in meditation, in loving kindness, compassion and wisdom, and created an identity for themselves that is happy and free from problems. And that is because they've trained their mind, they've controlled their mind, their identity is based upon a very controlled mind, a very peaceful mind. So it begins, so we have that potential, no doubt, all of us have it, any negative minds that you have, remember they're just impermanent, we look to that right at the beginning of this class.

13:11If you can reduce them a little bit, you can reduce them a lot, you can reduce them completely. So have confidence that you can transcend all limitations, it's just practice. But the way to bring about that in a transformation swiftly is to identify with that potential and imagine that we become that person, okay, identify with it, imagine that we become that person. So, going back to the architect, if an architect that presents a builder with a plan, right, and that drawing began in the architect's mind, but the architect won't hand the builder a napkin with a rough drawing on. If you handed a builder a napkin, said, this is my plans, the builder say, I'm not quite detailed enough.

14:16And we have to imagine what that house is going to be like, and even walk through it in our imagination, do you think some people walk through the house before it's built? If you're good at visualisation, you can do that. Sometimes you may go to the local DIY place and they can now mock it up, can't they online or they use a computer to help us with our imagination. But so first of all, it begins in our imagination, we can imagine walking around the new home that we want to bring into reality. And we imagine ourselves in that home. We may even imagine what we're wearing. You walk into the bedroom, you think, I think I'll wear these kind of pajamas in this room. We may imagine the kitchen where the cook is going to go and where the cabinets are going to go. And then you have a clear design in your mind of exactly what you want to bring into reality.

15:22And that's the blueprint of what we want to bring into reality. And then of course if we offer a clear blueprint to the builder, they know exactly what to do. So it's the same with respect to our bringing our true nature, our true identity into reality. We first need to walk that through. What would that look like if you realised your potential? What would that feel like? What would that look like to be completely free from all limitations? To be free from all stress, free from all worry. And have a good heart towards everyone who you meet. Imagine the effect you would have upon the world. And the world needs people like this. There's a lot of craziness in the world, isn't that we look on TV? Oh my god, it's crazy. But if we realise our potential, we can offer our greatest contribution to world peace.

16:28If you feel inspired by this podcast, then dive deeper into timeless wisdom of modern Kadampa Buddhism by following the link in the episode description. We look forward to reconnecting with you in the next episode of Kadampa Podcasts.