No one can control your mind unless you let them

by Gelek Rimpoche

I was personally not captured, but in Tibet in 1959, many were and put in prison, particularly, during the Cultural Revolution. And they went against tradition, against the Buddha Dharma, against religion, and they tried to challenge mind. They tried to brainwash people. Forget about religion, forget about Buddhism, forget about kindness and compassion. Everybody is for yourself, and follow Chairman Mao, and read nothing except Mao’s advice. Say nothing, except Victory for Mao. So many of my friends and colleagues and peers went through that. All of them actually have their own commitments, their own prayers, and they kept on saying and doing them.

Then, a new rule came, saying, “You can’t move your lips.” So they learned how to do their prayers without moving their lips. That’s what they did, that is the proof for how mind cannot be controlled. The more they beat you up, the more hatred will come, instead of following. For economic reasons, some people may have to lick their butt, but except for that, they can do nothing.

So the mind is something that is completely in your control. No one can buy it, no one can force it, no one can trick or twist it – maybe for a minute or so – but, the moment you know you are being tricked, you reverse. This is great freedom. That’s why you will only choose, if you know it is good. There is no reason why you have to jump in between. It is good if it makes you happy, and if it makes other people happy. If you are not too much of a selfish person. If you make yourself and others happy, then you begin to realise, it is good.

To make my story short, 2600 years history of Buddha’s teaching, if you look into it today, everywhere, wherever Buddhism took place, everywhere, it has only made people happier, and brought peace and harmony. It is not that they don’t have violence. That’s also not true. There was violence, because that is human nature, though the religion itself totally emphasises non-violence. But, a few individuals and particularly leaders, took violent steps in order to protect religion, and to protect community, and to protect monasteries, or societies. That was the excuse. But, there were not so many cases, very few. Even in Burma or Myanmar, things like that are happening and that is unfortunate. That’s not true Buddhism.

So, this has proven to give us happiness. So, I am happy and proud to be following this tradition. This is something very unique. The principles of non-violence are cherishing people, cherishing living beings. Not only not harming, but cherishing, and not only cherishing, but serving, and not only just serving, but bringing joy and harmony and happiness, and not only bringing joy and harmony and happiness now, but also providing causes for them in future.

The principle is not only non-violence, but bringing joy and happiness for all times for all people. That has become the principle of this tradition. When you are looking at it, you have a responsibility of convincing people to be helpful to themselves and not harming themselves. The reason why we all have responsibilities is because the way to bring our happiness is bringing their happiness – people’s happiness. When you are able to being people’s happiness that is automatically bringing our happiness and achievement.

People’s happiness depends on their karma. When it depends on people’s karma we cannot leave it there, saying “It’s their karma”.  We have to work together, trying to build and change within the karma of the people. Some people may think, “How can you change karma?” Some people may think, “What is karma? Karma is nothing, just hocus pocus.”

I don’t want to deal with that just now. We all know karma is not hocus bogus. It is there. Every minute it is proven within ourselves. When something goes wrong, it is because something was done wrong. When something goes right, it is because something was done right. So, it is being proven every minute. You don’t really have to go into that very deeply.

So, we try to persuade people not to engage in negativities, because negativities bring horrible results. So, persuading people of that becomes our job and responsibility. And our way of bringing happiness to ourselves is through serving others. That’s why we are saying: avoid negativities. That means actions that hurt people, actions that are brought in by a mental attitude of hatred, ignorance, and obsession. Avoid actions that are brought by a mental attitude of love, compassion, care and wisdom, will bring joy. And we have to encourage that.

In traditional Tibetan terminology this is called, "dig pong ge drub," – avoid negativities, build positivities. That is the essence of Buddha Dharma.