Life Practice Advice from Lama Zopa Rinpoche

 One of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s highest priorities was providing guidance to students’ requests for advice on daily and lifetime practices. We are so happy to let you know FPMT has created a new page that is based on Rinpoche’s essential daily practice and lifetime practice advice.

This is his essential advice and by following this advice, students can feel confident they are following and practicing according to Rinpoche’s heart advice.

“Rejoice! This is a happy thing, to get these practices, to benefit every sentient being, to free every sentient being from the oceans of samsaric sufferings and to bring them to enlightenment. So for that reason this advice is for you to achieve enlightenment.”
                                                                                                                                                                                        – Lama Zopa Rinpoche

  

When Rinpoche gave life advice he gave a brief overview of the practice:

“Please find my advice for your practice, what you should focus on for your life. One practice to do every day is the morning motivation, How to Make My Lives Wish-fulfilling, along with blessing the speech and daily mantras.

“It is very important to meditate every day on the lamrim and to recite a lamrim prayer every day, such as The Foundation of all Good Qualities or The Three Principal Aspects of the Path. Read it slowly while thinking about the meaning. Lamrim is what you need to actualize, no matter how long it takes. Please put all your effort there. “Probably you are doing Lama Tsongkhapa Guru Yoga every day. If so, this is excellent. If not, now you can start. Before the guru absorbs into you, stop and meditate on whatever section of the lamrim you are up to.

“One meditation that you must try to do every day is on the topic of guru devotion. If you sometimes miss doing it, that’s okay but then continue the next day. There is no question of a certain length of time for the meditation; it is up to you. Do whatever fits your schedule. Then do whatever lamrim topic you are on. Do it every day, slowly going through each of the subjects. Whatever meditation you did in the morning, keep it in mind during the day so that your mind remains in the lamrim all day long.”

These are the additional practices that one can do everyday:

“Please practice as much as you can,” Rinpoche advised us. “Life is not long and the nature of this life is that it is impermanent; death can happen at any time. Impermanence is the foundation of Buddha’s teachings, and was the last advice Buddha gave by showing the aspect of passing away.

We hope this page will be useful for everyone who wants to know what is Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s essential heart advice on what to practice in your daily life and in one’s whole life.

“Please try to meditate on the lamrim based on guru yoga. On this basis, you will get all the realizations and have the most success in your life. It is important to try to achieve all the realizations in order to actualize enlightenment in order to liberate the numberless sentient beings from samsara and bring them to enlightenment. That’s the real project or the real goal of your life.”

Lama Zopa Rinpoche (1945-2023) was the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation and community service.