Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche Teaches at EFI

Blog, Wellness & Spirtuality | August 20, 2010

We had the tremendous honor and experience of having venerated Tibetan Buddhist teacher Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche offer a special teaching at Earthfire last month, on one of his two days in the area during a worldwide teaching tour. The teaching was on the Six Realms and human-animal relationships from the Buddhist perspective. He came to us through Dr. David Shlim of Jackson, a Tibetan Buddhist teacher in his own right. Dr. Shlim brought his most revered teacher and friend to Earthfire because of Earthfire’s teaching that each animal is a precious life and an individual being with inherent personality and worth.

In Buddhist teaching, once one is enlightened one lives in the moment without preconceptions – thus each time you meet a being, of any life form, you meet it with new eyes rather than through a lens of hearsay. What we each see is based on a great deal of our own conditioning. The Rinpoche noted that “we tend to think that what we don’t see does not exist – but this doesn’t follow – lack of perception is not a proof of non–existence”. And that applies to animals as individual beings with a soul.

Chokyi Nyima emphasized how with trust, love, and respect, we can turn this earth into heaven. He talked about how we need to think more broadly – that a shortage of trees for example does not just hurt humans – it hurts birds and animals and insects — it hurts every living thing. That we are interdependent also makes it important that we respect and care for all conscious beings — and Buddhists consider all animals conscious. He noted that we make laws to protect big and rare animals because we esteem them for being big or rare – but that it legal to kill others for fun. “That is not right. Not fair. We need to be fair. We need to help as much as we can and live as naturally as we can.”

He commented that we should not be breeding animals for pets, for human pleasure. If we do, however, we should put ourselves in their place and feel what they feel – their needs for protection, comfort, medicine. He was very moved and touched by the love and care shown between the humans and animals here at Earthfire; that they were “treated as family even though they were not actually our brothers, sisters, mothers or fathers”.

He noted that animals and humans are intelligent beings and that we can teach each other. According to Buddha, we all, humans and animals, have a basic good and loving nature and we are all capable of becoming enlightened beings in the Buddhist sense. And that with trust, love and respect, we would not hurt one another.

As the Rinpoche was talking about how we should be more attuned to nature, he looked out the door of the yurt and pointed towards the Tetons. At that same instant, Bluebell walked into his view. He cried out joyfully – “Look – a bison!” It was as if she had manifested herself for him. As if she wanted to be included and give her input into this honoring of the natural world.

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