Seeing into the True Nature of Emotions #3
by Lama Gendun Rinpoche

The text on which the teaching is based is a work by Chagme Rinpoche, a learned and experienced lama of the 17th Century.

A Cautionary Note
To abandon the five disturbing emotions is to take a less direct path to enlightenment. It is the way followed by the sravakas. But seeing into the true nature of the emotions as and when they occur is not an easy task. If we just allow ourselves to be look at the emotions one after the other as they appear in the mind in the usual way, we are no different than before. Nothing has changed. If we actually enjoy our emotions, deliberately increasing their strength until we feel completely intoxicated by them, we are behaving like someone possessed, with the result that we accumulate the karma of a demon.
It may happen too that we become the kind of person who grows more and more proud of his ability to deal with the emotions by looking into their true nature. Despite the fact that his understanding is not fully developed, he increases the power of the emotions. The stronger they get, the greater becomes his pride. Nor does it stop there. Even though he is not really free of emotional confusion, he says that he is, and sets himself up as an example to others of how to experience the emotions without getting carried away by them. Motivated by great pride, he searches constantly to improve his reputation, to be recognized as somebody very important, someone well known for his ability to work with the emotions. More and more out of control, ever more confused, he accumulates karma which grows more and more negative.

A Buddha for each Emotion
If we do manage to look directly at the reality of each of the five poisons as they appear, we recognize them to be none other than the five wisdoms. In the poison of anger and hatred we perceive the mirror-like wisdom that corresponds to the Buddha Dorje Sempa. Looking directly at the true nature of pride, we find the wisdom of equality and the Buddha Ratnasambhava. In the nature of desire we discover the discriminating wisdom and the Buddha Amitabha. If we look at jealousy we see the all accomplishing wisdom and the Buddha Amoghasiddhi. And when we look at ignorance we find the wisdom of the dharmadhatu, reality itself, and the Buddha Vairocana.
These Buddhas also correspond to the different elemental energies in the body, each of which are related to one of the emotions. Seeing into the emotion produces not only the realization of an aspect of wisdom, it also transforms the corresponding element of the body into one of the five Buddhas.
On this path we do not seek to abandon the five emotions, only to look directly at their essence or reality, upon which they are automatically transformed right then and there into the five wisdoms and we generate spontaneously the minds of the five Buddha archetypes.
This type of practice is employed by those who meditate according to the mahamudra or the dzogchen tradition.

One Medicine for all Illnesses
Looking directly at the essence or the nature of an emotion is a method which can be applied in all cases, just as we can use a single medicine to cure a hundred illnesses.
The practitioner of great capacity will use this method to flatten the emotions as soon as any of them appear in the mind. It is like placing a tiny spark into a heap of dry hay: it will immediately burst into flames and be completely destroyed. Although the original spark is tiny, it can burn away any amount of hay. Similarly, just one tiny spark of wisdom can burn away completely all the mind's confusion and the emotions associated with it, until all that is left in the mind is ultimate reality.
Those of middling capacity will use this method as follows. As soon as they detect the presence of an emotion in the mind when they are meditating, they will look at it directly with a naked glare. The emotion calms itself and releases its hold on the individual. This process is said to be just like recognizing the non-duality of waves and water. Many waves in movement, taking on a constant variety of different forms and shapes, can be seen on the surface of the ocean. and yet the content of the waves is simply the water of the ocean itself. There is no real distinction to be made at all between waves and water. Similarly, the many and varied emotional forms that appear in the mind are nothing other than the mind itself. There is therefore no reason to reject the emotion or to consider it different from the mind. The average practitioner will be able to understand this, and through experiencing directly the fact that the emotions are simply the mind, they will calm down of their own accord.
The practitioner of ordinary capacity will be able through this practice to be aware of the emotion as it appears in the mind. He will not become involved and get carried away by the emotion, which is what usually happens. It is just like someone crazy suddenly coming to his senses; free of his madness his ordinary consciousness returns. Similarly, as soon as such a person realizes the presence of an emotion, he applies the practice he considers appropriate in that particular case. Being aware of the emotion, even if our awareness is not clear enough to free us completely from it, provides the starting point for the application of other, more accessible approaches.

An excerpt from the book 'Change of Expression - Working with the Emotions' published by Editions Dzambala