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[The Heart’s Utmost Need by Pabongka Rinpoche] is the very heart advice, or practice from deep inside the heart. This advice about death is something to think about seriously from the bottom of our heart. We are not just doing research on death, like for a university thesis. Here we are seriously thinking about our own death from the bottom of our heart.
We are looking at our own death, mainly to persuade us to practice Dharma; so that we don’t put off our practice for many months or many years or leave it for future lives. We think, “First I will do this (the works for this life), then I will do that later.” In this way we put off Dharma practice for many months or years.
It persuades us to practice immediately, so in that way, we do the practice and don’t waste our life. Otherwise, there’s the risk that not only will we waste our life, but death might come first, before the practice. There’s the danger that even though we’re wishing and planning to practice, death might come before the practice. If we don’t hurry up, death might come before the practice, and then we will miss out. I think that’s the main point.
Also, it is very useful to see other people dying, especially family members, friends or people that we know. It’s a great teaching, a great reminder to practice Dharma. Practicing Dharma is not so much chanting mantras or doing other external things. Here, seeing the death of people we know, of family members or even people we live with, really makes us look at our life seriously. Our entire life up until now has passed in distraction.
Of course, we recited prayers, chanted mantras and this and that; but the real practice of renunciation didn’t happen. The cutting of desire, of clinging to this life, didn’t happen. The actual practice of Dharma didn’t happen. Here it reminds us to look at our own life up to now, at how we spent it. We have done many activities, but we haven’t really given up the desire clinging to this life. Here it reminds us of that.
When we see even the deaths of others, of family members or people that we know, it brings our attention to the fact that in the past we haven’t seriously practiced. It reminds us that now we have to give up all that distraction or desire, which has no meaning at all. Now we really have to dedicate our life to serious practice, freeing ourselves from desire.
We should practice this continuously, day and night. Other than this, nothing else in life is meaningful. There’s nothing there that will be useful at the time of death. So, it reminds us to really pay attention to our life and to practice seriously. Here seriously has mainly to do with our mind, with the purity of our mind, with its being free from the desire clinging to this life.
So, it’s very useful to see others’ deaths, and, of course, to visualize our own death. Pabongka says that the most effective one is to visualize ourselves as dead, on the bed, then visualize all the things that usually happen when someone dies. The members of our family will come and cry. Our body will then be put in a coffin and taken to the cemetery. Before that, our breathing will change, and we will know that we’re dying and that everything will have to be left: our family, all our possessions and even our body. Everything will have to be left, and our consciousness alone will go to the next life.
This is like the tantric practice of meditating on the three kayas, in which we meditate on the dharmakaya, sambhogakaya and nirmanakaya that we’re going to achieve in the future as having happened now. In that way, we purify ordinary death, intermediate state and rebirth, and then use them to achieve enlightenment, the result-time three kayas. So, this effective meditation on impermanence and death is a little like that. We visualize that the whole process that is going to happen later is happening now, and then see what happens to our mind.
However, the main point is to persuade us to practice Dharma.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche gave this teaching on April 22, 2004 at the Mahamudra Retreat held in Mylor, South Australia. Edited by Ven. Ailsa Cameron; second light edit by Sandra Smith. You can listen to teachings from this retreat and read along with the unedited transcripts on our website. The Heart’s Utmost Need (formerly Heart-Spoon) by Pabongkha Rinpoche is freely available as a PDF produced by Piero Sirianni. You can also find this text in the FPMT Catalogue.
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