Siddharta Gautama and Yasodhara

Yasodharā was wedded to her cousin, the Shakya prince Siddhartha, in his 16th year when she was also 16 years of age. At the age of 29, she gave birth to their only child, a boy named Rāhula. On the day of his birth, the Prince left the palace. Yasodharā was devastated and overcome with grief.

Hearing that her husband was leading a holy life, she emulated him by removing her jewellery, wearing a plain yellow robe and eating only one meal a day. Although relatives sent her messages to say that they would maintain her, she did not take up those offers. Several princes sought her hand but she rejected the proposals. Throughout his six year absence, Princess Yasodharā followed the news of his actions closely. When the Lord Buddha visited Kapilavatthu after nlightenment, Yasodharā did not go to see her former husband but ask Rahula to go to Buddha to seek inheritance. For herself, she thought: “Surely if I have gained any virtue at all the Lord will come to my presence.”

According to fulfill her wish Lord Buddha came to her presence and admired her patience and sacrifice will helped him to fulfill his wishes not in this birth but also in previous birth.

Some time after her son Rāhula became a novice monk, Yasodharā also entered the Order of Monks and Nuns and within time attained Arahantship. She was ordained as Bhikkhuni included among the five hundred ladies following the Prajapati Gotami to establish Bhikkhuni Order. She was declared as foremost in possessing the supernatural power among the nuns.

In many legends of the Buddha’s life, Yashodharā meets Siddhārtha Gautama for the first time in a previous life, when as the young brahmin Sumedha, he is formally identified as a future Buddha by the then current Buddha, Dipankara.

Waiting in the city of Paduma for Dipankara, he tries to buy flowers as an offering to the Enlightened One, but soon learns that the king already bought all the flowers for his own offering. Yet, as Dipankara is approaching, Sumedha spots a girl named Sumidha (or Bhadra) holding eight lotuses in her hands. He speaks to her with the intention of buying one of her flowers, but she recognises at once his potential and offers him five of the lotuses if he would promise that they would become husband and wife in all their next existences.

The Buddhadarma

“In one Sutra, Buddha Shakyamuni asks his disciples,
‘Suppose there existed a vast and deep ocean the size of this world, and on its surface there floated a golden yoke, and at the bottom of the ocean there lived a blind turtle who surfaced only once in every 100 Thousand Years. How often would that turtle raise its head through the middle of the yoke?’

Ananda answers that, ‘indeed, it would be extremely rare.’

“We are just like this blind turtle, for although our physical eyes are not blind, our wisdom eyes are. The vast and deep ocean is the ocean of samsara. The blind turtle remaining at the bottom of the ocean is like our remaining in the lower realms of samsara, to surface into the fortunate realms only once in every 100 Thousand Years.

The golden yoke is like Buddhadharma, which does not stay in one place but moves from one country to another. Just as gold is precious and rare, so Buddhadharma is PRECIOUS and very hard to find. For most of our previous lives we have remained at the bottom of the vast and deep ocean of samsara, the lower realms. Only very occasionally have we been born as a human being, and even with a human life it is extremely RARE to meet Buddhadharma.”

~Venerable Geshe~la in “Joyful Path of Good Fortune.”

Mettã – Loving-kindness

Loving-kindness might come easy or even natural to some people. It’s a kind of love without attachment or clinging. It’s the unselfish act of treating everyone with loving-kindness, friendliness, kindness, and compassion. Mettã Bhavana is the cultivation (or meditation) of loving-kindess. It’s the way for it to grow strong, powerful, and useful, because it brings us and everyone else deep and intense peace and happiness.

Mettã is also the strong wish for the happiness of others. For us, it also shows patience, appreciation, compassion, and receptiveness. It shows the caring for the well-being of all sentient beings. By practicing and truly holding loving-kindness, others’ happiness will also bring us happiness and joy.

There are a few different methods to meditate on Mettã. One of the more common ways is to think of one’s self, a loved one (family, friends), a neutral person (the banker, cashier), and a foe (or someone you dislike or hate). While meditating on each person, you can say something like:

May I (s/he) be free from enmity/danger
May I (s/he) be free from mental suffering
May I (s/he) be free from physical suffering
May I (s/he) take care of myself (her/himself) happily

Or you can say the form from the Cunda Kammaraputta Sutta:

May these beings be
free from animosity,
free from oppression,
free from trouble,
and may they look after
themselves with ease!

Regardless of what way or form you say it, do it! It’s important to have loving-kindness. Not just for others, but for yourself as well. It helps us overcome anger, gives us concentration, and for a healthy relationship with every sentient being.

I deal with people on a daily basis, and at least 50% of them are rude, in a bad mood, or just stupid! A couple of years ago, anyone that was rude to me, I was rude right back! My mouth was quicker than my thoughts! Sure it got me in trouble, but at the time I thought it was worth it. But what did that prove? What did me mouthing off at them do? Nothing for me, and surely just gave the person what they were probably after: attention and feeling noticed. What does loving-kindness do? It gives you mindfulness and concentration. It gives you the power to show patience and respect even in heated moments. It shows that their anger, hostility, and probably direct attempt to ruin your mood isn’t even going to be noticed because of your radient loving-kindess.

A few weeks ago I was at a gas station getting gas after I was leaving temple. As I was filling up, this older man in an old, beat up car slowly walked over and gave me this litte story how he was just trying to get down the road to the hospital to see his mother and was wondering if I had two or three dollars to spare for gas. So I went over to his pump and swiped my card. “Four dollars?” he said. I smiled and bowed my head in agreement. The man put in exactly four dollars. He thanked me at least a dozen times, and I simply just put my palms together and bowed.

Once he left, a man at the pump directly next to mine asked me why I gave him money! I was shocked as to why he even cared or if that somehow bothered him. “He could of done anything with that money,” he said. “Sir, I don’t care what he does with the money. I used my card anyway. He only asked for four dollars and he seemed sincere. Why should I say no if I don’t have to?” I replied. He then said, “Well I guess if you have the money!” As I gave him a face I replied, “Sir, by no means do I have ample amounts of money. If you were ever a college student, maybe you’d know how it feels to ever have any extra cash. But when someone’s in need of something as simple as four dollars and if I’m able to give it, then I will.”

Moral of the story: Loving-kindess can happen in many different ways. It’s important to cultivate it, use it, and spread it to others. Even though the second man asked and argued with what I did, I’d hope I at least set an example. Saying and thinking about loving-kindess is easier than doing it. Loving-kindness isn’t just something you can do for part of the day until someone really pisses you off or puts you in a bad mood. No! Use that to meditate on loving-kindess and release those negative feelings. Show other’s your compassion and understanding, and show them their negativity won’t harm you or your karma!

 

Smile and be well!

A Lesson on Forgiveness

The Buddha was sitting under a tree talking to his disciples when a man came and spit on his face. He wiped it off, and he asked the man, “What next? What do you want to say next?” The man was a little puzzled because he himself never expected that when you spit on somebody’s face, he will ask, “What next?” He had no such experience in his past. He had insulted people and they had become angry and they had reacted. Or if they were cowards and weaklings, they had smiled, trying to bribe the man. But Buddha was like neither, he was not angry nor in any way offended, nor in any way cowardly. But just matter-of-factly he said, “What next?” There was no reaction on his part.

Buddha’s disciples became angry, they reacted. His closest disciple, Ananda, said, “This is too much, and we cannot tolerate it. He has to be punished for it. Otherwise everybody will start doing things like this.”

Buddha said, “You keep silent. He has not offended me, but you are offending me. He is new, a stranger. He must have heard from people something about me, that this man is an atheist, a dangerous man who is throwing people off their track, a revolutionary, a corrupter. And he may have formed some idea, a notion of me. He has not spit on me, he has spit on his notion. He has spit on his idea of me because he does not know me at all, so how can he spit on me?

“If you think on it deeply,” Buddha said, “he has spit on his own mind. I am not part of it, and I can see that this poor man must have something else to say because this is a way of saying something. Spitting is a way of saying something. There are moments when you feel that language is impotent: in deep love, in intense anger, in hate, in prayer. There are intense moments when language is impotent. Then you have to do something. When you are angry, intensely angry, you hit the person, you spit on him, you are saying something. I can understand him. He must have something more to say, that’s why I’m asking, “What next?”

The man was even more puzzled! And Buddha said to his disciples, “I am more offended by you because you know me, and you have lived for years with me, and still you react.”

Puzzled, confused, the man returned home. He could not sleep the whole night. When you see a Buddha, it is difficult, impossible to sleep again the way you used to sleep before. Again and again he was haunted by the experience. He could not explain it to himself, what had happened. He was trembling all over and perspiring. He had never come across such a man; he shattered his whole mind and his whole pattern, his whole past.

The next morning he was back there. He threw himself at Buddha’s feet. Buddha asked him again, “What next? This, too, is a way of saying something that cannot be said in language. When you come and touch my feet, you are saying something that cannot be said ordinarily, for which all words are a little narrow; it cannot be contained in them.” Buddha said, “Look, Ananda, this man is again here, he is saying something. This man is a man of deep emotions.”

The man looked at Buddha and said, “Forgive me for what I did yesterday.”

Buddha said, “Forgive? But I am not the same man to whom you did it. The Ganges goes on flowing, it is never the same Ganges again. Every man is a river. The man you spit upon is no longer here. I look just like him, but I am not the same, much has happened in these twenty-four hours! The river has flowed so much. So I cannot forgive you because I have no grudge against you.”

“And you also are new. I can see you are not the same man who came yesterday because that man was angry and he spit, whereas you are bowing at my feet, touching my feet. How can you be the same man? You are not the same man, so let us forget about it. Those two people, the man who spit and the man on whom he spit, both are no more. Come closer. Let us talk of something else.”