We Own Nothing…
Nothing is owned by us. Everything will be given, taken, lost, abandoned or forgotten in the end. We came into our current lifetimes with nothing and no matter how much we accumulate, we leave with nothing. So wouldn't it be wise that in between, we develop no real attachments or put so much emphasis on the material?
We need material items, but not for the false security they give us but the tool they can be to further the goals of others and one's own spiritual progress. If materialism is truly used in that fashion, then it should be ok…meaning it will not cause you sufferings.
Trust the Three Jewels, be firm with your commitments by contemplating death daily, hurt no one, be honest, be kind to those around you first, then extend out, respect your guru to the utmost and engage in your daily sadhanas with great conviction. Be aware that your time will be up soon. It's important to do something useful for others in your life so that you will never end up bitter. Bitterness arises from knowing we have done nothing that has affected anyone in our lives. Start something now…better now than waste time feeling sorry for yourself or trying to elicit empty praises from others…
All is empty, arises from it and dissolves into. Therefore all imputed phenomena will decay, it is just a matter of time. Denial of it, causes great unnecessary sufferings. Don't deny anymore….
Tsem Tulku
During one of my recent talks at Kechara House…
Nothing is accomplished in one day…the bigger the project, the more the obstacles…but the obstacles you suffer is for others…so suffer it without suffering…Tsem Tulku
Wonderful message Rinpoche.
Thank you Rinpoche so beautiful !
Great teaching Rinpoche
Thank You Rinpoche for Your wonderful reminding message again!Thanks
Thank you always!
Thank YOU Rinpoche.. that was exactly i felt weeks back.. I felt that I was wasting my time. Lost and wanted to do something meaningful in life and had wonder what was my mission on earth. Even sitting at my workstation was a waste of time earning a salary keeping myself alive without meaning to it. I really felt that this message is special to me. Thank you.
Rinpoche’s writings always come at the time when I needed the most!
Your blog is so precious for whom have not the possibility to come hear your teachings. Thank you very much Rinpoche, you are so kind to share your wisdom with all of us.
“Nothing is accomplished in one day…the bigger the project, the more the obstacles…but the obstacles you suffer is for others…so suffer it without suffering…Tsem Tulku”
This is really true, thank you to remind us that !
Much love
Tsetchi
“Bitterness arises from knowing we have done nothing that has affected anyone in our lives”. This sentence brings back some of my memories from the past. In the past I have always wondered why some people feel bitter and unhappy all the time. I myself had such experiences from time to time but could never put my finger on the real cause. There are people who go through their whole life without finding out why. Recently, Rinpoche told us a story about a dying man who was angry and bitter about his life from one of the books he read. All he could do was to be angry but he didn’t have a clue why he was angry or how to get out of his angersome state. As a result he was in complete misery. A psychiatrist who counseled him soon saw where his problem lies and suggested that maybe he should do something for others. He remembered there was a church nearby that need air-conditioning to be fixed and being an electrician by profession, it was something he could do. The church was simply too happy to accept his service and in the process of doing that his anger subsided. He finally found peace because he felt a sense of worth doing something for others. A few months later, at his death bed he said to the psychiatrist, “thank you for saving my life”. This is a lesson to us that life is simply not how long we live but rather it is the meaning we put into our lives in service of others. Otherwise, bitterness will be the inevitable result if our lives
This is a powerful teaching for me. At the present , most of us do not have the merits to grasp the meaning of Wisdom teaching.
Rinpoche is always so skillful in giving the dharma in the manner we can relate and understand.
How true is it that at death we leave everything behind and therefore nothing truly belongs to us. If we know how to use our knowledge, position and wealth to bring meaning and happiness to others, then we have acquired the real wealth.
You don’t have to be a Buddhist to understand Rinpoche’s teaching because what he teaches is universal. If we put his teaching in the conduct of our daily life, I think we shall be happier and more free.
We own nothing. Excellent. It’s such a shame that we need time to fully realise this, since the realisation would rid of of our fears and insecurities. Most of our fears are rooted in the idea that we might lose something (status, face, money, assets, people, our current life…), but if we can let go and realise that nothing is ours to lose, ironically, we seem to gain so much more than what we think we already have.
Even Bill Gates, or Steve Jobs – very rich men with “secure” lives – can’t take what they’ve accumulated with them after they’re gone. Nor can they carry their reputation even from this life to the next, so really, why are we so attached?
For me, real wealth, real value lies in using what you have to benefit others. As Morrie Schwartz once said: “Giving makes me feel like I’m living.” We know it’s true anytime we give a gift to someone – their pleasure and joy brings us more pleasure by our giving than what we get by receiving.
We own nothing, but we can give everything.
Kind regards,
Sandy
I love this post – these three words mean so much – “we own nothing”. From our childhood, we are taught the difference between mine and yours. This is mine, therefore it is not yours. We are taught to accumulate things, material rewards for good behaviour. Material things become evidence of our ‘good’ behaviour, therefore we are lulled into the delusion that the more material things we have, the better people will think of us.
35+ years later, i find that it’s all false! Rinpoche’s post explains so clearly that everything we perceive that we own, we actually do not. I know extremely rich people who hoard and keep their money so tight that they don’t even spend it on themselves! Rinpoche has explained that in reality, they are suffering from poverty because even when they do have the resources, they do not spend it and live like paupers so they might as well not have any money.
The old adage “Money is the root of all evil” is inaccurate. The real quote is “The love of money is the root of all evil” because money itself is neutral. It is neither good nor bad, but it is what we do with the money and what we would do in order to get money that is the evil or good.
Rinpoche says, “Bitterness arises from knowing we have done nothing that has affected anyone in our lives. Start something now…better now than waste time feeling sorry for yourself or trying to elicit empty praises from others…” I love Rinpoche’s teachings because not only do they give me insight into the right way of thinking but also the method to counter previous wrong views.
What an incredible teaching to bring the most profound aspect of Buddhism ( emptiness) within the grasps of ordinary deluded students like me.
For those who have studied the Lamrim, Rinpoche’s ahort treatise here basically covers all the essential points of the Lamrim – the 3 principal aspects of the path.
We own nothing -is about renunciation of one’s attachments to worldly pleasures and things.
Taking refuge, contemplating death, being kind to others, not hurting others,reaching out and doing something useful for others in this life – is about cultivating compassion and bodhicitta.
Ultimately all imputed phenomena will decay as their nature is empty of inherent existence – is about the correct view of emptiness.
Wow Wow Wow.I am going to print this out and frame it and put it on my shrine and have another copy laminated to put in front of my pc to reflect daily.
Conveyed in simple language even a 10 year old can read…but if practiced, we will have total liberation! Rinpoche, I am in awe of this teaching. Short, straight to the point, no big jargons, only deep meaning that is impossible to deny. I recall in one of Rinpoche’s teachings before…Rinpoche asked if we would spend so much to redo a hotel room if we were to stay there for just a short while? What we should be focusing on is to work on our minds as that’s what we will be taking from one life time to the next, irregardless of what outer form/body it takes on.
Thank you Rinpoche for this teaching. I will contemplate on this until there is a change in my mind.
We won’t know what will happen in the next second, it can be good or bad, it’s all depends on our karma. Many people fall into the trap and blind folded with the material attraction, having comfortable life, enjoying high technology entertainment, etc. Without realizing it, the moment when they die, they cannot take what they have with them, hence; they become nothing but carry with all the negative karma they created in this life.
With all these material attraction, people tend to get strong attachment to it and created a state of mind for them to be selfish or lazy. We generally don’t have the care quality. So what we have left? NOTHING!!!!!
What most important for us now is to generate care and showing kindness to our close one, initially might be difficult or fake, but after sometime of doing it, it become a habitual and eventually it will be within us.
I’m sat here now with tears in my eyes, that all is impermanent was again brought home to me yesterday when Raymond had to make a one way trip to the vets. Little Gina and Zoe have been wandering around looking for him, How do you tell a dog their friends gone?
Everything gets left behind or leaves us, all passes in the end.
I ‘know’ all this and yet all the teachings are to me is a bucket to catch the drips from a leaky roof, when will i use them to fix the tiles proper…
Go be nice to someone while you still can.
Terima Kasih Rinpoche!
‘Nothing is owned by us. Everything will be given, taken, lost, abandoned or forgotten in the end. We came into our current lifetimes with nothing and no matter how much we accumulate, we leave with nothing. So wouldn’t it be wise that in between, we develop no real attachments or put so much emphasis on the material?’
This is a hard fact for most of us to face and it is from experience that I have to say that this is tough to accept after spending a lifetime thus far being ingrained that this material world is all there is to it…
So I recall the Dhammapada…aptly reflecting Rinpoche’s teaching
‘The fool worries, thinking, “I have sons, I have wealth.” Indeed, when he himself is not his own, whence are sons, whence is wealth?’
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/dhp/dhp.05.budd.html
But Rinpoche gives us the hope and reminder here:
“Trust the Three Jewels, be firm with your commitments by contemplating death daily, hurt no one, be honest, be kind to those around you first, then extend out, respect your guru to the utmost and engage in your daily sadhanas with great conviction. Be aware that your time will be up soon.
It’s important to do something useful for others in your life so that you will never end up bitter. Bitterness arises from knowing we have done nothing that has affected anyone in our lives. Start something now…better now than waste time feeling sorry for yourself or trying to elicit empty praises from others…”
Sadhu!
This post is a very important reminder for so many people, me included that there is nothing really here for me to hang on to and to focus on something that would be more lasting like mind transformation. Because of that there is not much of a reason to keep pursuing temporary pleasures that bring me to nowhere at the end of the day.
However the key point here is that material items are to support spiritual practice as its the point that most people miss and subsequently develop the wrong perception that having material wealth is wrong and kinda avoid it. Now i shall think twice about buying those stuffs, and make sure that it benefits me spiritually as well….
Just these three words are so amazing…. WE OWN NOTHING. Everything we have now will be given, taken, lost, abandoned or forgotten in the end. I will trust the three jewels. I only can take them with me after I die. I cannot take anything when I die. All the money that I can grasp in my hands will dissolve, my loved ones will dissolve, everything will dissolve into emptiness. We only take our mind. We cna keep the three jewels in our minds. So we end up getting to keep them. YAY! I like thes two paragraphs as they pose a deep meaning towards me :
“All is empty, arises from it and dissolves into. Therefore all imputed phenomena will decay, it is just a matter of time. Denial of it, causes great unnecessary sufferings. Don’t deny anymore….
And
Nothing is accomplished in one day…the bigger the project, the more the obstacles…but the obstacles you suffer is for others…so suffer it without suffering…”
These words are so beautiful. They make me want to shed a tear….
Many of my friends say they understand Buddhism but they dont nor try. They say they are Buddhists but they refuse to see nor hear. I am not perfect but I try to learn and understand. People say religions are just something to scare us or change us into something we are not! How can that be?? We have a brain to think, ears to listen, Buddha Shakyamuni’s teachings survived for 2,500 years and people around the world are practicing it, easterners and westerners.
“All is empty, arises from it and dissolves into. Therefore all imputed phenomena will decay, it is just a matter of time. Denial of it, causes great unnecessary sufferings. Don’t deny anymore….”
Scary but it is the truth. When we were born, we had only our birthday suit and when we die, it’s uncontrollable and nothing material that can be brought along!
Thank you Rinpoche for the profound teaching of ‘sunyata or emptiness’. Even tho if we understand it but it will bring us no where if we not practicing, knowing and pracitcing bring us to enlightenment.
Our mind is like a monkey mind, without training we just like an untame horse whom not run follow the direction. In order to not become unhappy and bitter when we getting older, we have to start from small thing like how to make people surround us happy then indirectly we become happy, the basic to make people happy is from our love and caring, think about other and do thing for other, stop thinking about me me and me.. i’m doing thes also as i would like to become selfless.
To take and hold vows help to stop our negative habitiual. And from that we will collect merit and might b able to have wisdom to under emptiness in one day.
I like Rinpoche’s short and sweet talk highlighting all our downfalls and the needs to address them in order to avoid further sufferings for ourselves and others.
Although simple it may seem to be, it is in actual fact a corpus of teachings which includes a lot of logical debate for one to be able to realize the meaning of emptiness. But on a practical level, this is possible because if we’re to understand the meaning behind the nature of reality, we’re really going round and round with our discontentment and is leading us no where.
the only solution is for us to snap out of ourselves and be able to face what is really before us and acknowledge what needs to be fixed in order to move on. Life’s short, let’s not play the game of chasing the wild, it’s not worth it.
I came into this world with nothing, all full of gooey stuff. The nurse checked me and wrapped me up into a little bundle (not so little mind you as I came weighing in the largest of 3 siblings); my parents cared for me and brought me up. Where would I be without them and my family members? What I have today is all because of them. Yet when I leave this world, I take nothing with me. Everything will be “returned” to whence they came from. I have to learn to detach myself from all material things as I will not be able to bring them with me.
I love this teaching very much. I think back in my past and realize that this teaching is very true. Previously, I indulge in lots of expensive things, these things made me very happy but only for a while. I have come to realize that was happening because I was buying these expensive things for very personal and selfish reasons. They were basically used to fuel my ego and I was very attached to them. Sometimes, instead of making me happy, they even caused me suffering. The funniest bit is now I understand that all those expensive things that I own are basically flashing moments going by. The latest model in the Ferrari line up becomes second best after two years and an antic after four. It’s a neverending chase. These are things that we will not be taking with us when its time to go.
After going through some of Rinpoche’s books and teachings, I have to come to realize that it is not the things I own or owned that made me suffer or happy. It was my perception of them and the motivation I had to own them that gave me a particular result. It is now apparent to me that everything we own can generate happiness or suffering for us. If we get our motivations right, our belongings can generate goodness and happiness to others and in return, we will also have goodness and happiness. To me, it is because I have learned that everything thing we are means nothing if its not to benefit others.
Having realized the goodness of dharma, I will use my resources to practice and spread dharma. Maybe expensive things will have a better meaning to me in the future.
Wee Liang
“It’s important to do something useful for others in your life so that you will never end up bitter. Bitterness arises from knowing we have done nothing that has affected anyone in our lives “. This is very powerful teaching. My experiences tell me that peace arises within us when we can benefit others.
However, most of us including me that our awareness is not there. Everyday we wake up, we would still do things for ourselves, and create more attachment, hurt people, angry, unhappy and so…………
Therefore is good we can visit this blog everyday to learn, to practice and to grow. Whatever teaching in this blog is helping us to look for happiness and peace and is free. Lots of people out there are paying money to attend courses to solve their problem and yet this blog is free. We should encourage more people to visit it.
Thank you Rinpoche.
This message by Rinpoche is really how we should live and lead our life daily. We should never be too attached to some form of materialistic items. Craving and indulgence will eventually brings destructions upon ourselves. Being too uptight about what we own and do not own created more negativity in our mind by doing so we become angry very fast , very selfish and miserly.
It doesnt brings happiness to ourselves nor any happiness towards peopl we love. Our friends and people that come in contact with us will avoid us and in the end me might eventually leave this world without any peace. Our sufferings continues in to our next life.
Whatever we own and have now is only temporary. We should always learn to let go by learning the ways to do so & comtemplating it through the buddhadharma of 4 Noble truth.
Dear Rinpoche,
Thank you Rinpoche for posting up this precious teaching. But like what Wan said, if we don’t practice it, it just becomes nothing anyway. This teaching has made me realize that throughout my life, I have been very selfish; always thinking how to get the things that I want in life thinking it will give me happiness and security. This teaching has made me realize that the more I do that the more I end up becoming disappointed, frustrated and angry when I did not at the end of the day get what I wanted. But honestly it caused me more suffering then happiness, and because, yes it is true, you cannot even take a penny with you when you die, so what are we really wanting and protecting since we own nothing? Our ego and insecurities? This was basically it for me. I am not perfect and 100% free of this suffering, but I find that the more I let go, the more lighter I feel and things become easier.
Rinpoche has always taught us that having wealth is not the issue here but what you do with your wealth is the key to you being happy or unhappy. Hence we have wealth Buddha – Dzambala who provides Dharma practitioners what they require to do their practice. One practice we ought to consistently do is giving and it does not necessary have to be something tangible. Even being a good listener to a friend is a form of giving, giving emotionally. Or giving in the form of serving others, providing your talents and skills to be of benefit others, letting someone win an argument is also giving. Ahhh and this is something we can all do immediately, something so simple I know but a tough one to achieve, but not impossible. It’s like catching yourself or stopping yourself from saying something back to justify or explain, and just let the other person win, this is hard, but when you do realize it and do it, you actually become a much calmer person. Besides what is there to win anyways when nothing can be taken with us at the point of death, except the results of our actions.
Yes at the end of the day, nothing is own by us! “We need material items, but not for the false security they give us but the tool they can be to further the goals of others and one’s own spiritual progress. If materialism is truly used in that fashion, then it should be ok…meaning it will not cause you sufferings.” According to the “Path to enlightenment” we could eliminate sufferings by just leaving that material world. It is the ordinary beings who suffer in cyclic existence, due to the experience of the ordinary beings who are bounded by delusions and karma. We have to create a state of renunciation from which we are to be freed from such boundage – i.e in accordance with our guru’s directives.
Never forget death is coming. Thank you Rinpoche for your wonderful teaching, when realised can save infinite beings from this meaningless cyclic existence.