Discovering Buddhism at Home -FAQ

Module 10 - How to Develop Bodhicitta

Is it ok to generate bodhicitta by imagining that every sentient being was once my child instead of my mother? I don't have good feelings towards my mom.

Is it ok to generate bodhicitta by imagining that every sentient being was once my child instead of my mother? I don't have good feelings towards my mom.

A student wonders:


I have been doing the meditation for development of bodhicitta for some time now, specifically that all sentient beings have been my mothers. I have had little success with generating bodhicitta with this method. Perhaps because my mother in this rebirth did not possess the qualities that are described in the literature. She was cold and detached and projected very little warmth, compassion or understanding. . . . Once while meditating it occurred to me that if every sentient being was once my mother that in an endless, infinite number of lives that the reverse must also be true: I must have been their mother. Focusing on this idea, I was immediately able to view everyone, friends, enemies, strangers with love and compassion. I solicit comments, cautions, critiques on using this method.

Pende responds:


Tsenshab Sercum Rinpoche, a highly respected lama and scholar, once told us that we have the ability to empathize with others and feel compassion for their pain, despite the predominance of egoism, because we were their mothers limitless times. As mothers identify their children as part of themselves, egoism does not interfere with empathy. Your experience demonstrates the power of empathy in motherly love.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama said empathy is the basis of compassion. We know from the tradition that compassion is the basis of bodhicitta, and bodhicitta is the principal cause of realizing one's buddha potential - the optimum evolutionary state for all living beings.

His Holiness, while giving a commentary on the method of developing bodhicitta known as "exchanging self for others" mentioned that unlike the method of seeing all beings as one's mother, the "exchanging" method did not identify others' welfare as significant due to a personal connection (MY mothers), but rather because of a universal common trait, viz. all equally want happiness and do not want suffering.

He did not say this as criticism of the all beings as mother method, but to highlight something he appreciated in the exchanging method. Both methods are recommended by the tradition.

Pende

Tim adds:


I've often wondered why the example of other beings having been our mothers was used rather than the example of other beings having been our children in past lives. Love for children seems to come so naturally and powerfully. Well, most of the time ;-) Maybe it's because everyone in this life did indeed have a mother, but not all of us have (or will have) kids, so for some people the idea of children may be too abstract. Or maybe the relationship to children is almost too close, or too unequal. Or maybe it's just that most monks left home before adolescence and so still held idealized images of their mother and her kindness!

Yet obviously there were (and are) many children in India and Tibet who did not know their mothers, or who may not have had a very good relationship with them.

I imagine you can use whatever relationship works best for you to generate that sense of a close relationship. You might like to check out Jeffrey Hopkins's excellent book, "Cultivating Compassion." If I remember right he mostly uses the example of one's best friend simply because so many people have trouble seeing the kindness of their mothers.

On the other hand, if seeing other beings as your mother is very hard, it may mean you've found a pressure point that will help you take the practice beyond sentimentality and make it real. In that respect, hard things are often good, I think. Like little gems.

Tim

Nick Ribush comments further:


The reason it is mothers rather than children is because the order of the meditations goes: all sentient beings have been one's mother; remembering the mother's kindness in four ways (giving the body; suffering protecting baby from danger; suffering to provide temporal needs; educating); repaying the kindness...

That clearly would not work with children or, in fact, others...if you have the personal karma of a bad or no relationship with your mother, it's still clear to see the kindness of the mother by observing the human and, indeed, the animal world.

n

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