Q: How do we let go of the attachment? We know it’s not good. But it’s very difficult to let go, any advice?
A: Many of us when we think about the renunciation, we think renunciation means shaving our head, changing our clothes, becoming a monk, becoming a nun, becoming a practitioner, becoming a yogi, going to the mountains. That’s what we think about the renunciation. But the true meaning of the renunciation is not about changing place or changing clothes. The renunciation means clearly seeing the reality of the suffering with your own mind, without listening to that person or this person, but truly examining the real cause of suffering by yourself, not based on this Mahasiddha teaching, not based on this teaching or that teaching.
Understanding the true meaning of renunciation has to come gradually. There may be some individual who say ‘Oh! Yeah！I have a clear renunciation. There’s nothing solid in the reality of the samsara. There’s nothing. Everything is an illusion. Everything is suffering.’ Let me explain to you as very simple and clear as possible. Those who are making a very urgent statement about themselves, that ‘Oh, I made a clear renunciation’. You have to be very careful, because if you make a renunciation gradually, there’s no risk. You are honest about what you are, where you reach, what you’re doing, what you’re practicing. You’re doing retreat here and there a little bit, and then at least you have a continuity of the growth step by step.
The danger of copying the Mahasiddhas is that you don’t take enough time to analyze the meaning of suffering, the meaning of samsara, and yet you listen to your ego. You are so in hurry to show to other people that you are superior, that you are unique, that you are special, that you are supreme than other human being. You have to be careful with that. Because the true meaning of renunciation comes from seeing the reality of the suffering. And when we see the reality of suffering, there’s no going back and there’s no excuse in it. That’s it. End of the line. But you made that improvement and you have more and more clarity in abandoning the bad habit, abandoning the bad attitude, abandoning all the negativity step by step, step by step, step by step. That’s how you reach closer to the meaning of being a Buddha or Bodhisattva, and so on and so forth.
But many of us nowadays, we don’t think about the meaning of suffering as a very important key. We just think about ‘Okay, what is Mahamudra? Where can I find Mahamudra? Where can I find the deity practice? Which tradition I should choose? Which lineage I should choose? I should have a guru right now!’ Little bit like you come out of one samsara and then you are trying to create a new version of the samsara to yourself and trying to listen to the ego all the time, and trying to show other people ‘Oh! Look at me, I’m perfect. I’m supreme. I’m unique. I’m so special.’ But if you check carefully, that is ego. That is still samsara. That is the same as an individual who try to buy a very expensive property to show off to the neighbor. ‘Oh, look at me, I make more money than you. I’m happier than you because I have all the properties. Or ‘Look at all the young men and a woman who is surrounded by me. Look at my fame. Look at my name.’ This is the same cause. The cause is ego. The ego and ignorance is cause of the suffering and the samsara. So therefore, if you make the renunciation practice too quick, you may be listening to the ego too much.
With love and respect
Kalu Rinpoche
Facebook live Q&A
July 12, 2020
To be continued…
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