Remembering the kindness of our Gurus

[vajrastorm]

In the Essence of Nectar Lamrim, p.260 and Day 8 of Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand, the following lines help us recall the kindness of our Gurus, Gurus whose sole purpose is to bring us closer and closer to liberation and omniscience, to full enlightenment.

"I have met the teachings of Tsongkhapa,
Hard to find in a thousand eons of searching,
And gained faith in the way he taught-
This is the kindness of holy tutors.

Therefore my spiritual guides
Are protectors shielding me from lower realms,
Captains to free me from samsara's ocean,
Guides to lead me to high rebirth and liberation.

Liberators from the close prison of samsara,
Clouds that gently rain the holy Dharma,
Dear friends who help me, dispelling harm,
Kindly parents who are always loving....

Doctors to cure me of chronic delusion,
Rivers to douse the great fires of suffering,
Lamps to remove the darkness of ignorance,
Suns to light the path to liberation.

In this brief life of ours, the only way we can make optimum use, of whatever time we have , is to follow the instructions of our Spiritual Guide, remembering that he is kinder than all the Buddhas, because he is the one to give us the dharma when we most need it.

[eyesoftara]

The Spiritual Guide is the root of all attainments. This means without the Guru there is no possibility of any attainments like the tree without its roots will not have an possibility of growing. Hence, based on this reliance of the Spiritual Guide we can practice to optimize our fortunate human rebirth and practice the path of the 3 scopes or Yanas and particularly the 3 Principal Aspect of the Path that is without Contradiction and contains all the teachings of the Buddha in this one short lifetime.
This is only possible based on the blessings and good samaya with the Guru.

[Blueupali]

Yes, when we remember the kindness of our gurus, then we rejoice in their attainments which helps us to have karma for the same attainments.
  I rejoice always when I see gurus of schools I have studied with, as well as when I think ofall of the pure gurus everywhere.  I often rejoice in the perfect wisdom and compassion of Buddha Shugden:) so I can accomplish his path more easily.

[sandra]

I agree that we need to practice to remember the guru kindness. This can serve as motivator to enable us to do more. To do more simply for our own good as closer to the path of enlightenment. By remembering the guru kindness, we need to slowly develop the quality equal to guru kindness. This is a way to improve ourself and always serve as reminder to us. Without the guru, without the practice, without the practice without the dharma, without the dharma without Buddhahood.

[cookie]

The Guru is indeed very very kind. His motive for being reborn again in the current life, in the form of a Guru, is to benefit all sentient beings, via teaching, encouraging, caring and creating skillful options for sentient beings to meet the Dharma and practice the Dharma in order to be Enlightened. No one else will have such pure motive to live in samasara to find ways and means to help others out of samsara. Hence, having gratitude towards the Guru and remembering his kindness is very important ! When we practice that, it will extend to all around us !

[Midakpa]

The self-born Buddha
Is a being gone to perfection;
But kinder than Buddha is one's own teacher,
Who personally gives one the oral teachings. (Five Stages)

[RedLantern]

We have been granted vows by our guru.we can collect unbelievable merit in our daily life.All these benefits we receive by living in our vows comes about through the kindness of the gurus. We can also relate the kindness of our guru to the bodhisattva vows.We can relate the kindness of the guru in a general and extensive way.All enjoyments and all the conditions necessary for us to practice dharma are embodiments of the guru.

[maricisun]

Yes. We must always remember the kindness of our Guru for he is so compassionate and kind to guide us the path to Enlightenment with all the Dharma he teaches us.
Our Gurus are also kind to have taken so many rebirths and come back to benefit all sentient beings and for us to collect merits through Dharma work.
Therefore we must show our gratitude towards our Guru and always practice Guru devotion.

[Tenzin K]

Most important is to remember with feeling the guru’s kindness and to follow his advice; then to remember one’s mistakes and confess them.

Long-life pujas purify negative karma and accumulate merits (generally speaking life can be lengthened by accumulating merit). But the best kind of long-life puja is not just the ritual but to cherish the advice, with the thought correctly devoting to the virtuous friend, and looking at the guru from one’s own side to be the Buddha and remembering his kindness; feeling regret for not practicing properly in the past and making a decision to practice better in the future: generally speaking, in the ordinary sense, to be a better person.

[dondrup]

The Spiritual Guides or gurus are the foundation of all good qualities.  This means that it is only through the gurus that we could gain the good qualities of the Buddhas.  The gurus are the ones who lead us onto the path of liberation and enlightenment.  Without the gurus, we cannot meet and practise Dharma.  Without Dharma there is no salvation for us at all.  It is the gurus who point us to the recognition of our inner guru.  We have little merits and can't communicate directly with the Buddhas.  However, we can communicate directly face-to-face with the gurus!  The guru is also the supreme field of merits for us as the guru embodies all the Buddhas in the ten directions and of the three times.  It is through the guru that we could receive the blessings of all the Buddhas.  Hence gurus are very kind to us and they are kinder than all the Buddhas.

[angelsherfield]

The spiritual guide or guru guide us to realize the inner self and mind transformation. He make us realize there is a way to end sufferings. We need to transform ourselves. I am glad that I have found one Guru. Even though I always only can see him from far in some occasions, but his talks always give us strong imprint to practice dharma in life. He gives talks even with painful backache. That is how kind of the guru. His objective is to benefit others as he still can.

[bambi]

Without a spiritual guide, we wouldnt be here and realize the potential in us, that all of us can be liberated. Without a spiritual guide, we will never be able to see the real us, the hideous person we are.
Without a spiritual guide, we will be collecting more negative karma, wasting more precious time, going deeper into samsara.
Therefore, I will always remember and be forever grateful to our Guru, for His love, kindness, compassion, wisdom and all the good qualities that He have.

[vajrastorm]

How can we not remember the kindness of our Gurus?

As Sakya Pandita (p.222, Lamrim)says:

"The merit stock gained by following the six perfections
And sacrificing head,arms, and legs for thousands of eons
Is gained but in a moment through the guru path.
Shouldn't you rejoice when made to serve him?

You get closer to buddhahood because it is that much quicker to build up  that amount of merit.
 

[pinecone]

A short quotation from Padmasambhava.

“ If one does not recognize the guru as Buddha,  one’s mind cannot be liberated by the blessing.
Therefore, one should reflect upon the qualities of the guru and make request to him.”
 
Our Guru is the one who recognize all our shortcomings and without a word of sigh nor complain , tirelessly he will guide and lead us to the correct path. As a practitioners, the best way we can repay our Guru's kindness is through putting into practice and applying his instructions and teachings. This is the best possible offering to him. May our Guru live long and may we be able to meet with our Guru life after life.

[MoMo]

As with any of our worldly possessions, the things that we treasure the most are one that hard to chance upon, obtained by either by having exerted great effort over along period or someone present to us and we placed great value to it. Similarly if we  would had contemplate deeply the Dharma knowledge that we learned, one that we benefited greatly from, one that hold us back from committing great misdeeds..etc.
None was originated from our own idea. It was the guru who had given up his own comfort to be ordained, to hold vows  and through many years of study, siting in meditation, gain the necessary realization. All these years of preparation was so to be able to imparts to us the unmistaken Dharma and in the right dosage. The guru must also have vast amount of patience take on the unreasonable reactions from students who failed to understand his kind intent which always make to challenge the student's mind and without giving up on his/her students. Shouldn't we place great value over his/her deeds of solely wanting to benefits us and remember our guru kindness?