New to this forum and Vajrayana in general.

Introduce yourself to others at Dharma Wheel.
Post Reply
Lucent
Posts: 23
Joined: Tue Feb 12, 2013 8:57 am

New to this forum and Vajrayana in general.

Post by Lucent »

I would like to apologize beforehand because I really have no clue about.... well.... anything. However whenever I was horribly confused (I still am) I would google a question and somehow end up here. I don't know if this is the right place to put this... so if it's not please delete it. You'll have to excuse my extremely long post, but I'm not sure where else to say it... Also, I'm not sure what I should or shouldn't say. I'm very sorry for that. And thank you all in advance.

-The rest can be ignored if you are on a busy schedule as it's not very important, but there are many MANY answers that I wish to find. I apologize greatly, I do not know the proper terms for anything so please be patient with me. Thank you.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Simply put, I am extremely horribly discouraged and ashamed. I have been recently more or less converted. That's a long story that I won't go into but it happened over the course of 3 days with me converting on the second day. In these 3 days I met 3 great teachers. On the same day that I decided to follow this path I was immediately accepted as a student of one of the three teachers that were there. I'll try not to mention names because I'm not sure what their names are since they seem to use a few different ones and I mean no disrespect. It has been I'll guess a few months to half a year since I have been under his instruction. He is a wonderful teacher, very kind and extremely patient and I can't help but cry when I think of his kindness to someone as clueless and new as me as he usually didn't accept students. Even the other teacher emails me to teach me even with his busy schedule. However.... I am simply clueless. One of the other teachers there gave me a book, Patrul Rinpoche's "The Words of my Perfect Teacher", and told me to read it many times. I'm so worthless that I'm only about 60% of the way through my first time reading it and I still barely know anything. :cry:

My teacher had to go on a long trip to Asia and was going to be gone for 4 months. This just broke my heart and spirit somehow knowing I just met him and he was leaving already. I kept asking and asking if he would teach me anything which was rather selfish of me considering how busy he is. He simply gave me some prayer beads, said "He never leaves", and told me to simply say "Om Mani Padme Hum" every day which is such a simple task that I still failed at. I'm not even sure what it means and when I looked it up I can't memorize it correctly. I'm constantly letting my teacher(s) down and I feel so undeserving... At this point I'm at a complete and total loss of what to do. My teacher finally came back to the states and he's coming down here in only a month or so!!! Where should I really start, what are the "basics"? I can't waste time, he's much too busy with other matters and time with him is extremely precious to me.

And my final question for curiosity's sake is what exactly is a Rinpoche? I'm sorry that's a rather dumb question I'm sure.

Thank you all, I left out a few details to make it as short as possible. Thank you for your time and advice.

Where I live, as far as I know I am alone. I have no true "spiritual friends" other than my teacher, another teacher, and that's it. I'm just terrified for some reason. Sorry for being overdramatic.... :( I don't mean to be I'm just really new.
User avatar
waimengwan
Posts: 183
Joined: Thu Jul 12, 2012 2:16 am

Re: New to this forum and Vajrayana in general.

Post by waimengwan »

Rinpoche means Precious One, Lama's are given the title Precious One because they have the dharma in them that they can share with us. And dharma is the real thing that can bring us out of suffering and bring us closer towards enlightenment.

Actually teachers they like their students to be independent of them as soon as possible, teachers do not want the student to be attached to them. Students should instructions and they should get around to practicing it as diligently as possible.
DGA
Former staff member
Posts: 9466
Joined: Tue Jul 13, 2010 5:04 pm

Re: New to this forum and Vajrayana in general.

Post by DGA »

Welcome to DharmaWheel!

You are actually in a very good position indeed. Your teacher gave you a practice to do: read a particular book carefully, several times. Then, your teacher went away and gave you the opportunity to practice on your own. Now what? The best thing you could do now is follow your teacher's instructions: read the book again and again, slowly, taking it in carefully. That's it. All you have to do is do your best at what you've been instructed to do. Despairing won't help. Worrying won't help. Put that out of your mind and just study the text on a daily basis, over and over... That will be the best medicine.

Rejoice!
Yudron
Posts: 1087
Joined: Fri Jun 15, 2012 8:55 pm

Re: New to this forum and Vajrayana in general.

Post by Yudron »

Since you use the internet, one suggestion would be to put a sticky note on your computer and say Om Mani Padme Hung--the main mantra of compassion--every time you see the note.

This is a very precious time for you. Everything is new and fresh and full of heart. Eventually, you will know lots of stuff and you will risk loosing these qualities if you aren't careful. Enjoy this time and don't berate yourself... you are right where you are supposed to be on the learning curve. Compassion starts with compassion for yourself.
Lucent
Posts: 23
Joined: Tue Feb 12, 2013 8:57 am

Re: New to this forum and Vajrayana in general.

Post by Lucent »

Ah, thank you so much everyone! How could I not have known something that was so obvious... It's my own fault for being so impatient. Even when I took piano lessons I was told that I have an impatience problem when learning things :( I guess there are so many strange terms that I don't know in that particular book that I get discouraged when I feel like I don't understand 25% of what I read. :p I suppose that's what google's for although I forget the things I look up only a few hours after I look it up. :emb:

Yudron- I'll definitely have to try that. Once again something so obvious that I couldn't think of.

Thank you so much everyone!
User avatar
DNS
Site Admin
Posts: 5267
Joined: Sun Apr 05, 2009 4:23 pm
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada, Estados Unidos de América
Contact:

Re: New to this forum and Vajrayana in general.

Post by DNS »

Welcome to Dharma Wheel!

:yinyang:
Lucent
Posts: 23
Joined: Tue Feb 12, 2013 8:57 am

Re: New to this forum and Vajrayana in general.

Post by Lucent »

Why, thank you :D
User avatar
Grigoris
Former staff member
Posts: 21938
Joined: Fri May 14, 2010 9:27 pm
Location: Greece

Re: New to this forum and Vajrayana in general.

Post by Grigoris »

Welcome Lucent!

Read the book. Do the practices. If you have memory problems take written notes. Keep these notes because, when your teacher comes back, you will be able to ask them questions based on the notes you took.

Patience, my dear Lucent, is a virtue in Buddhism too! ;)
:namaste:
"My religion is not deceiving myself."
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE

"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
The Supreme Source - The Kunjed Gyalpo
The Fundamental Tantra of Dzogchen Semde
Lucent
Posts: 23
Joined: Tue Feb 12, 2013 8:57 am

Re: New to this forum and Vajrayana in general.

Post by Lucent »

gregkavarnos wrote:Welcome Lucent!

Read the book. Do the practices. If you have memory problems take written notes. Keep these notes because, when your teacher comes back, you will be able to ask them questions based on the notes you took.

Patience, my dear Lucent, is a virtue in Buddhism too! ;)
:namaste:
Thank you for the advice. :) I guess it's a bit pathetic I didn't think of these things before. Thank you again :D It really helps
Post Reply

Return to “Introductions”