How Vanessa Anne Walsh went from this
to this
The tears and the heart ache.
No hair. No makeup.
Renunciation, bodhicitta and correct view helps.
Even the Prime Minister wants to speak to me.
Copyright © Vanessa Anne Walsh 2020
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The language of love does not, in any way, correspond with the language of desire[1].
When one person, or even one being, loves another, their primary concern always lies with how to remove the suffering and pain of another. It begins, continues and ends with thinking about ways to bring pleasure and happiness to another, and will even focus upon the needs and wishes of all beings. This is not because it is trying in any way to deceive another simply to fulfill its own selfish gratifications.
Love aims to avoid creating losses for another person or being. Simply, it aims to protect the integrity, morality and self-respect of another person. Desire attempts to do the opposite. Desire does not care if damage is created in the experience of another person. It cares nothing for the self-respect, morality or aims of another.
Love aims to protect and nurture the happiness, contentment and health of people and all beings. It has no interest in trampling on the needs of others in order to bring about some superficial, short-lived and impermanent experience of satisfaction.
In my experience, the Buddha will think, devise and perform limitless actions aimed at protecting, nurturing and sustaining the happiness and fulfillment of another person. He has no commonality whatsoever in the mundane, selfish and destructive motivations of ordinary, self-possessed beings. An ordinary being, on the other hand, has no thought or care about the consequences of his self-centred actions. An ordinary being with no insight or love will, without hesitation, create suffering and misery in the mind and
experience of another. True, deep, endless love, aims to transcend the boundaries of space, thought and time. It can move beyond the limitations of the human form and reach far into the realms of space to bring peace, contentment and joy.
May all beings identify, recognize and be conjoined with the supramundane love of a Buddha. May they transcend their sufferings and recognize without any shadow of a doubt, that a Buddha can and will free all beings from their limited, miserable lives and transport them to a state of never-ending happiness, peace and everlasting joy.
[1] Desire means thirst. Like drinking salt water. A taste that cannot be satisfied.
Copyright © Geshe Vanessa Pollock Rinpoche 2015.
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This is the beginning of a story from the days and nights of Lord Buddha Shakyamuni that we hear from the sutra.
Lord Buddha Shakyamuni was walking along the road near Rajgir followed by a procession of 500 monks. Following the Lord Buddha and the procession of 500 monks was Supiya, a wanderer and his pupil Bramadhata.
Supiya was arguing with Bramadhata over the need to praise the Lord Buddha Shakyamuni. Supiya was suggesting that it’s not necessary to praise the Lord Buddha. Bramadhata, the pupil of Supiya was contesting that indeed, it is both necessary and wise to praise the Lord Buddha Shakyamuni. Supiya was a bit heated, but Bramadhata discussed that it is indeed a safe, reliable and valid action of the body, speech and mind to praise the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha.
After a while, the Lord Buddha and his procession of five hundred monks reached their shelter for the night. Lord Buddha Shakyamuni rested whilst the monks gathered to discuss the days events.
After some time, the Lord Buddha Shakyamuni approached the monks and requested politely that they please explain what they, the monks, had been discussing together. The monks said, they had been discussing why Supiya, the wanderer was fuming over the need to praise, prostrate to and value the Lord Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha.
Lord Shakyamuni spoke gently and calmly about the need to abandon following the Lord Buddha with a deluded mind. Specifically, Lord Buddha said it is indeed wrong to follow the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha with the delusion of arrogance or pride.
Copyright © Vanessa Anne Walsh 2020
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If I don’t get paid, you don’t get helped. This isn’t free. Well, if you want to get something, learn to be nice. You have $5.00, so stop being so miserly. I have been running this blog for twelve years, and no-one has been honest enough to make a donation into my bank account. PayPal only recently introduced this payment facility to this blogging service, but I gave you my bank details, so stop stealing. Hard huh? What do you want me to say?
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The word ‘diet’ has several different meanings. The Collins Dictionary defines it to be ‘the food and drink one regularly consumes’. An alternative to that is the definition given in A Kind Diet, which states that diet is “a way of living, or thinking, a day’s journey.”
The time we spend on shopping for food, planning our meals, thinking about what it is we like and do not like to eat and what adheres to the medical profession’s recommendations surrounding the subject of diet is indeed considerable. We spend many of our waking hours working out this basic survival function and the money that goes towards keeping this human body of ours in good shape and healthy is enormous. Having thought about that, and briefly looked into some popular diet trends that are heavily advertised on local media, I thought to divert away from the consumerist approach to food for a moment and consider the Buddha’s teaching on non-attachment.
One symbol the Buddha employed as a means to convey his teaching on non-attachment was the use of an alms or begging bowl. Alms are charitable donations of money or goods to the poor or needy, yet the Buddha was neither of these things, so why bother with the use of a begging bowl? The alms bowl is considered to be symbol of the monastic life or life of a renunciate, and an aid to the life of the holy and those interested in seeking the truth. Once made from clay, which broke easily, the bowls were then forged with iron for added durability.
Specifically, the alms bowl refers to the time in the Buddha’s life just before he attained enlightenment, when a young girl, named Sujata offered the Buddha a bowl of milk rice. Although the Buddha was practicing the austerity of eating only a little food at the time, he realized that to achieve the final stages of enlightenment, he would need to partake of the offering of rice from Sujata. After partaking of the meal, one tradition states that the Buddha then threw away the small amount of food left in that bowl to symbolize the Buddha’s complete non-attachment to material possessions. Another legend tells the story that the Buddha threw away the begging bowl itself into the river to symbolize the mind of non-attachment.
The point of all this is to question the validity, or lack thereof, of the attached state of mind itself. The mind of attachment is traditionally explained in Buddhist philosophy to be a mind that exaggerates the good qualities of an object and ignores it’s perhaps less apparent flaws. One apparent flaw in all objects of this world is their impermanent nature. Of the Four Seals of Buddhism, the first is that all compounded phenomena are suffering. The second is that all contaminated objects are impermanent.
What do we mean when we use the word stained or contaminated to describe states of mind and actions?
Stained or contaminated actions are actions, emotions or thoughts polluted by selfish attachment, or by hatred, greed or ignorance. Such actions motivated by these negative states of mind always result in suffering.
When motivated by an attached state of mind, we cling onto material possessions, relationships or even ideas, and fail to recognize the intransigent and impermanent nature of the object. That does not mean to say that we are not in need of food and other such things to ensure our good health. It does indicate however, that having a more open and loving attitude towards other beings is more important. Given the violent nature of our human history and past, the gross lack of regard for the lives of others and destruction of the environment and other species, it is most definitely time to act to lighten our environmental footprint and reduce our grasping towards the status symbols of the wealthy. Instead of spending big bucks on expensive living and chasing the latest fad or diet trend, I suggest that there is much more happiness and satisfaction to be gained and maintained from living a more moderate and simple lifestyle with a focus more upon ensuring a happy state of mind. If we spent more time ensuring our mind itself is in a positive and peaceful state, through the practice of meditation, this would naturally lead to a more balanced and healthy lifestyle which would not only benefit the practitioner, but others on the planet as well.
I will leave you here with a totally different interpretation of the word diet, from one of the founders of Buddhist literature and Mahayana thought. The great Nagarjuna once wrote of the Five Diets being;
The Diet of Concentration
The Course Diet
The Inner Diet
The Diet of Touch and
The Diet of Volition.
The symbol of the Buddha with an alms bowl is an important director of peace, happiness and prosperity to keep in mind as we go about our daily habit of foraging for food, drink and clothing, if in the least to try to minimize our ever-expanding impact on this precious planet.
Copyright © Vanessa Anne Walsh
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Just taking some notes, really. Do you remember The Dead Pool, starring Clint Eastwood, Jim Carrey and Liam Neeson? Funny stuff really. First of all, did you root for Clint’s character or the Mafia?
In this society, who in reality is really innocent? This is a funny turn of phrase. If we were all Buddhas, there would be no negative karmas to extinguish. But clearly, from my point of view, I don’t believe humans are that well developed. Now that is actually a good point for debate. Did we actually advance from the time of Guru Buddha Shakyamuni, or just go backwards, into a state of degradation and decline? This is what The Lord Buddha Shakyamuni referred to as the age of degeneration.
Let’s just discuss the first scene. The poor cop, just driving either to or from or where to, get’s shot at by a bunch of narcissists. Why? Does anyone ever bother to question. Doesn’t he too, in reality have a negative mind, poisoned by attachment, hatred and ignorance, jealousy, pride and wrong view? Death and impermanence is in fact, just a day to day reality for the majority of ordinary humans. Or not? Is he really a Bodhisattva (a Buddha to be) or a pure reality? Judging from the amount of shots fired towards the cop, one could refreshingly state that this is really just a load of bullshit. No-one could ever really survive such an attack. So the movie has no value, even from this early opening position. Hollywood, why are you so stupid?
But it, (the movie) was so popular in its time. Why so? Are the people, its audience really that stupid? One would have to conclude, yes. Do you have any questions? A valid cognition knows and understands of no such reality. A valid mind, a valid cognition and a valid speech, goes beyond such a degraded cycle of misery and suffering. That society, the one where outcasts live in tall buildings, that they are wildly told is some sort of icon proclaiming development, is really just a terror to the mind and body. A no mans land, devoid of spiritual freedom and validity, an encasement or shell, actually in reality just a symbol of a lack of love, happiness, inner peace and true understanding of compassion, patience, wisdom and joy.
The average person, in reality, is not smart enough to support such a structure, without having to violently resort to a great deal of negative action, of body, speech and mind. So, on this level, The Dead Pool speaks to this utterly false assumption. That such a society is a necessity to mankind. These days, false, abortive governments only seem to speak of the need for continuous growth. This places the people of such conditions under the most absurd and negative pressure.
Copyright © Bodhi Gyatso 2015
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When you wake up in the morning, you need to give thanks to the Lord Buddha, your qualified, authentic, safe, reliable and valid spiritual friend and guide, the enlightened Mahayana Guru for a the safe passage throughout the night.
How do you say, Mary?
Good Morning Buddha Shakyamuni, Your Holiness. Thank you for the good nights sleep and meditation. I really appreciate that today will be a day and tonight will be a night where I constantly create the causes for the fully enlightened state of Buddhahood. Thank you Buddha for saving me from being crushed and ruined by the evil demon of death.
Mary says, Buddha, I need to take refuge in you and escape from all the sufferings that the ignorance of a self causes. Lord Buddha, Your Holiness, please free me and all suffering sentient beings from the defilements of a deluded state of mind. Please Lord Buddha, free me and all sentient beings from the sufferings caused by ignorance, the false view of a transitory collection, the false view of an inherently existent I and mine. Please Lord Buddha, Your Holiness protect my body, speech and mind from the six primary delusions and especially wrong view.
I need to stay practicing bodhicitta motivation and rejoicing in this wonderful opportunity that the precious human rebirth offers and watching carefully my actions of body, speech and mind, with a good heart. Lord Buddha, Your Holiness, please cause me to practice virtue perfectly all day and night.
Copyright © Vanessa Anne Walsh 2020
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So, what’s it like being on anti-psychotic? Gorgeous darling, it’s so relaxing!
Well anyway sweets, I’m a mover and a shaker and I love it.
Apparently, the mental health tribunal and the mental health service have no sense of humour boys, so watch it.
From one professional to the other, what did I have to say about going from a health loving tea-toteling maniac to a swish-buckling whiskey loving honey!
Pity about the flab but hey! no but, no but no but, yeah!
Who needs to walk off the flab? Not me. I might be dead soon.
Let’s just right some wrongs concerning the way to drink whiskey.
If you have a hot clairvoyance, and don’t like sinning or non-virtuous black actions, you concentrate well on wisdom, with mindfulness, alertness and introspection, with conscientiousness, you’re in the clear. Do I keep my vows? Ya, but then lot’s of people don’t like to venture into that area.
Hmmm, so don’t be a dick and lie about things, come clear and learn the clear light mind. It’s heaps better and it overcomes suffering as well.
Copyright © Vanessa Anne Walsh 2020
For the past sixteen years I have been medicated for a disease I don’t have. I have been misdiagnosed. I do not have any illness, but I report in for monthly injections for a mental health disorder. My mother and the police and the doctors lied to the public to obtain this diagnosis about me. They said I behaved harmfully. None of the events that have been reported to have taken place concerning me ever even took place.
The first report made by my mother about me took place in 2003. My mother said I threatened her with a knife. I never even had a negative thought to hurt her or anyone else in any way. When I asked my mother why she lied, my mother said it was because she was jealous and she wanted to destroy the communities trust and faith in me as a practicing Buddhist.
I was hospitalised for a month in 2003 and medicated.
In 2013 I was arrested for making a complaint to the police. I was told someone wanted to shoot me. I was advised to ring the police. When the police arrived, they arrested me and lied saying I was being aggressive. All I was looking for was for some help to protect me against potential harm. I was hospitalised, put on a treatment order and medicated.
I went to the gp and specialist for help. I explained to Alan Molloy, a gp that people were lying. I went to my gastroenterologist, Professor Finlay Macrae. I explained that I had been behaving peacefully, but that others were trying to make me look negative. I got no help from the medical community. Instead, they repeated the lies voiced against me. They have lied and slandered my name.
Presently, the medical community have a twenty page report with content of events that never even happened, complaining about conduct I don’t actually engage in and never practiced. Even though I have always told the truth to the medical community, they refuse to honour what has actually occurred and the truth that I speak.
In 2015, my mother lied again to defame me. Anne Guest said I tried to run over her caretaker. I never went anywhere near him and had no such thought. I am on a treatment order for behaviour I don’t engage in. I am medicated for a disease I don’t have. The doctors do not care to listen to or honour the truth. This is a travesty of justice and I need legal help.
Can someone qualified in the Australian or international community honour my honest speech and rectify this travesty of justice to come to my aid and defend me? This is not what the medical and legal community should uphold, this set of wrongdoings and group of lies about a very honest, ethical and law abiding citizen.
Further comments about the benefits of His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s system of medicine over western science.
15 May 2020
I went to see Alan Molloy of Eastbound Medical Clinic regarding this problem. I reported all the facts to the case honestly to Alan Molloy. I told him what he had heard about me was nothing but slander and lies. There is actually nothing but one person’s word against me talking to the mental health service, lying and slandering my name and then forcing an arrest. The police have no evidence that the lier spoke anything but a lie. My words are being ignored. Usually the justice system says you are innocent until proven guilty. People were keen to believe that I did something wrong. In practice, in Buddhism, you are a sentient being guilty of ignorance and people sin wildly to get their way. They do not keep their vows of moral conduct and the police care little about the process of justice working correctly. They are not Buddhas. They are ordinary sentient beings guilty of acting ignorantly and dishonestly themselves. They do not check if they have been lied to and the legal system does little to protect the innocent here.
I paid twice to see Alan Molloy. Once reporting that he was being misled by this series of lies and then once to take him in a copy of the psychiatrists report. He, Alan Molloy did nothing to benefit me or to uphold the system of justice. I have a confession from my mother where she admitted to me she was lying to brake up my marriage and also because she was jealous and wanted to diminish people’s confidence in me. Alan is biased. He does not practice equanimity or the Buddhist vow. He has also neglected to practice medical science properly.
Anyway. What to do? I am being medicated and others are sinning against me. One really good solution is to just have a whiskey and diet coke and tell these idiots to go jump off the precipice into the lower realms if they like. They like sinning. They like corruption in medicine and law. Mind science is superior to western science, and when you practice properly and adhere to maintaining your Buddhist vows correctly you can see the corruption in psychiatry and western medicine and law.
Copyright © Vanessa Anne Walsh 2020
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Shakespeare’s Sonnet CXVI
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.
Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle’s compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
Yesterday I was blessed along with more than one hundred other kindred spirits, dharma brothers and sisters, to be invited to the Afternoon Tea of all Afternoon Tea’s, at Tara Institute, in East Brighton. There, we were blessed and lucky enough to listen to the remarkable words of the great master, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, whose profound insight and compassion transported each and every one of us into a sphere of peace and happiness that can only be described as truly inspiring.
Although ordinarily, when one thinks of afternoon tea, biscuits and cake come to mind, at this afternoon tea, such delicacies, although offered, one could almost say, were not required. When you attend an afternoon tea hosted by such remarkable beings as Geshe Doga and Lama Zopa Rinpoche, food and drink become virtually irrelevant, because due to the great skill of the Buddha, ordinary life just fades into insignificance as one is treated to a genuine Dharma teaching that enables one to contemplate the great truths, which although simple in both practice and theory, are taught in the most exciting and uplifting of ways by a great mind that is really like no other.
Lama Zopa reminded us all that all the teachings of the Buddha fall into two basic instructions:
Do Not Harm Other Beings, Benefit Other Beings.
Within those two pieces of advice lie a vast spectrum of understandings, interpretations, rules and possibilities, however for me, Lama Zopa’s key advice was crystallized when he said that the moment one gives up desire, is the moment one begins to experience real contentment.
He also joked about how it was really Mick Jagger who gave the best teaching in his song, (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction, through his ability to enumerate upon the downfalls of the desirous and attached state of mind.
It is funny how in life, teachers can appear to us in both virtuous and non-virtuous aspects. Lama Zopa is a true example of someone, who having overcome desire and all faults of the mind, shows others how achieving a state of liberation, peace and perfection is really possible. Not so long ago, I had an encounter of an entirely different kind, with a man full of desire, who in full flight, was able to make me realize just how damaging and disastrous the states of desire, dishonesty, manipulation and attachment can really be. Even those who appear to harm us, also have a teaching of their own to impart.
Although I appreciated the timeless and insightful truths written about love, by the western literary genius, Shakespeare, in his Sonnet CXVI, when they were read at my wedding, nearly twenty years ago, it was the great masters from Tibet who really were able to impart to me, the deeper meaning behind what it means to love another being and how important it is to ensure all our actions are imbued with a positive and virtuous state of mind.
To all my precious and dear teachers who have forever changed our world, our destiny, our karma and our minds, I offer to you my deepest gratitude and pray that one day I am able to repay your limitless kindness, which like time and space, has no beginning and no end.
Copyright © Vanessa Anne Walsh 2020