The Vajra Parrot Squawks!

I've commented on something similar before on here. Other eminent, and infinitely more qualified bloggers and practitioners than myself, have written more authoritatively elsewhere, for example, but this is something I want to share.

If you think that little red men or green ladies, or yellow beings with more arms than you can shake a stick at somewhere up in space are beings that a) exist just like you see in paintings on temple walls and b) are just waiting to grant your cute little requests and heartfelt desires then maybe you should a) get baptised and go to church instead of reading your sadhana, because you are, in fact, a pseudo-Christian or b) learn more about Buddhism.

I understand that people want to help when they feel powerless in situations, this is no bad thing; but sentimental, ego-aggrandizing and spurious offers of supernatural agency really are not worth the airspace they are given. I mean what is, "I'm going to ask Vasudhara to give you those winning lottery numbers" actually going to achieve? If you can't do anything, then don't promise bullshit. In the same way it's better to say something like, 'I'm sorry you're going through this', if someone's going through hell, or 'if you need someone to talk to, I'm there' than advise someone that somehow, your little quasi-magical parlour tricks are going to make a difference. They won't.

In fact, the only difference it's going to make is impair your chances of ever being able to help someone in the way you claim, because you will remain in your little comfort zone, walled off from reality.

It appears that many earnest Buddhists just miss the point. They look at thangkas and think of some beautiful/wrathful pie-in-the-sky figure separate from themselves when they should understand that they are just looking in a mirror. Thangkas are mirrors: they are a reflection of nothing other than your own mind; the yidam reflected in paint on canvas, which you claim to practice, is the method to recall and live this reality. There's nothing magical or supernatural about it.

Likewise, thinking pious thoughts, when you mistakenly practice a sadhana, in some bizarre form of wish-fulfilment or ego-tripping, isn't going to do much, other than reinforce the mistaken view that you're somehow someone more than you are, who is capable of achieving more than you can deliver.

If you are the sort of practitioner who spends hours every day abiding in the natural state, with pure samaya and observance of your vows, then maybe we're talking about a different animal, someone who maybe able to shift some dust when they promise it. If, however, you are the sort of practitioner who abides, like me, on the internet or coffee house, wasting time, then sitting down when you feel like it to whistle through a cutesy little pecha in a half-hearted quest to discover the eternalistic Dharmic feel good factor, then .. it's just a joke, really. A sad joke.

If you want to help someone then practice. Refine your mind and achieve the siddhis. Be a caring person. Be good to the earth. Care for all beings. Help people with concrete, real assistance, not with offers of vague supranormal assistance that you cannot actualise. Be authentic.

One other thing. A fundamental thing in our tradition is the dedication of merit. This is what we should all be doing. All the time. With every good thought or action. I've seen pujas in action where, if you'd swapped the image of Chenrezi for a cross, you'd have thought you were in an Evangelical prayer meeting. Long lists of unrememberable names of unknown people read out before anything had started. And the point is? Surely better to dedicate whatever positivity is generated after merit has been accumulated. Otherwise it's like giving a doggie bag to fido before you've even reserved a table at the restaurant. Nonsense.

We dedicate merit to all sentient beings, maybe with a specific intention: for someone who suffers, to friends and relatives who are sick or in difficulties, for example. This achieves results. I think it's best to bite one's tongue before one offers to pray to little red men or multi-limbed gods or goddesses who don't exist.

Clarify your view and your intention; practice; then dedicate the merit and be a good Buddhist and not a parody of what a Buddhist should be.