I am deeply saddened
By our endless bewildered planning
In this inescapable ocean of samsara.
Give up worldly actions.
Emulate the lives of siddhas of the past.
I offer the benevolent aspiration
That I lead all connected to me to freedom.
..practices like this are—to use English colloquiasm—they are not off the rack. They are tailor made for you as an individual. You, as an individual, were known by Guru Rinpoche and Yeshe Tsogyal when they composed these texts. Your needs and abilities were taken into consideration. That is why Yeshe Tsogyal said, “All beings in the future who are interested in these treasures will all be those who have established a karmic connection with them in the past. Therefore, have joy and confidence. These words of mine are more precious than gold.” We find these words in the autobiography of Terchen Barway Dorje and in the great biography of Yeshe Tsogyal discovered by Taksham Nuden Dorje as well.
I have allowed a little bit of printed information about Terchen Barway Dorje to be circulated, but I have never spoken one word about my predecessor in a public setting. It is not because I am ignorant of Terchen Barway Dorje’s life or of his teachings, or that I have failed to understand their true meaning or the nature of things. It is out of respect and devotion for my root guru, the Sixteenth Gyalwang Karmapa, that I have sought in all of my teaching and traveling only to serve his activity and his teachings. I have, therefore, been extremely careful to abstain from anything that could by any stretch of the imagination be conceived as self-aggrandizement or self-promotion.
