Daily Practice: Evening Session
Before you start the evening session, you should again make an incense offering and prostrate . Those who make regular offerings to Dharma protectors can make the offering at that time as well. Then you recall what you have done during the day to check whether your actions were positive or negative. If they were positive, be joyful and offer the merit to your teacher and the Three Jewels; if they were negative, r ecite the hundred-syllable mantra of Vajrasattva to repent . As the Words of My Perfect Teacher says, the daily repetition of the hundred-syllable mantra 21 times will prevent the effects of one’s negative karma from developing or increasing. To recite it 108 times without interruption every day will purify all negative actions done during the day. It is thus vital to integrate the recitation of the hundred-syllable mantra into your daily practice.
To conclude the practice of the day, you should recite Samantabhadra’s Aspiration to Good Actions in order to dedicate merit and make vows . As you go to sleep, visualize that your teacher, or your teacher in the form of a deity, enters your heart through the crown of your head and shines inside you. With virtuous thoughts in your mind you can go to sleep.
Apart from the practices mentioned above, you should also meditate at least a half hour every day. The practice of meditation is simple. If you already have direct experience of the nature of the mind, you should pray to your teacher before resting your mind in its natural state for a while. When thoughts arise, you pray to your teacher again, alternating between praying and meditating repeat-edly for at least a half hour. If you have not realized emptiness, you can mentally rest with confidence in the view of emptiness and alternate your meditation with prayers to your teacher. Meditating in this manner allows you to quickly obtain blessings, and to directly experience the natural state of the mind or augment your realization. This is the meditation practice instructed by His Holiness Jigme Phuntsok Rinpoche while he transmitted the Great Perfection teaching at the Larung Buddhist Institute. I advise you to follow it as well.
All of these practices constitute only the basic requirements for Dharma practitioners. Keep in mind that anything positive you do, including these daily practices, should be supported by the practice of three supreme principles: good in the beginning by arousing bodhichitta, good in the middle by holding the view of emptiness, and good in the ending by dedicating . If you persist in these daily practices, it will not take long for you to transform your mind and develop further renunciation and bodhichitta.
You may think that you are so busy with your job that it is hard for you to do these practices regularly, and that it might be more suitable for you to practice at a future time, such as after your retirement. If so, you should also ask yourself whether you are guaranteed to live till retirement or to have time to practice in the future.
At the foot of Tashi Triling once lived a brother and his younger sister and their families. The sister had three lovely children. Every time my car passed her house, the children would run out and wave to me. Several years ago, the younger sister died suddenly, and the brother came to the Larung Buddhist Institute to ask me to perform a transference ritual for her. He sobbed while telling me that he and his younger sister went together to participate in their elder sister’s wedding one morning, and that shortly after their return in the afternoon, she died unexpectedly. She was only twenty-seven years old, and she did not practice much when she was alive. The only consolation for her family was that they lived close to Tashi Triling, where the sister went to turn the prayer wheels from time to time. Sadly, this is life. Impermanence will not relent, even if you are still young and want to keep living or have children to look after. So, seize the present moment and practice unflaggingly—this is what a genuine Buddhist should do.
The practices I have discussed here are all manageable even in a busy life and can be completed within an hour if performed with focus. Buddhists are people who aspire to liberate themselves and benefit others. With true renunciation, you will surely spare time to practice regardless of being busy or not. If you cannot manage to spend even an hour on practice each day, you have yet to develop genuine faith and renunciation. Without renunciation, you might practice one day and skip your practice another day. You will not be able to make much spiritual progress by the time you die, and liberation will become empty talk. No matter how much you might regret by that time, it will be too late. So, however busy you are, you must devote time every day to practice.
Daily Practice: Morning Session
When you are ready, you may start the morning session with water and incense offerings, followed by three prostrations to buddha images. Then you seat yourself on a meditation cushion in the seven-point posture of Vairochana. The seven-point posture of Vairochana is also called the vajra crossed-leg position or the full-lotus position. If you are unable to sit in the vajra position, you can sit in the half-vajra position (the half-lotus position). The vajra crossed-leg position helps the body to
