Buddha Nature

A Seminar Given at Karme-Choling

March 1973

 

Introduction

This is the second talk (talk #1 – Mahayana Buddhism) in Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche’s seminar at Karma Chöling, a historic moment in the transmission of Buddhism to the West. These teachings were given at a time when authentic Buddhist masters were introducing not just theoretical ideas but an entire way of life—one that demanded profound self-inquiry, discipline, and a willingness to move beyond conventional notions of spirituality. This was not a passive introduction to Buddhism as a philosophy or a religion; it was an experiential transmission of the Dharma, an invitation to engage directly with reality itself.

In this session, Trungpa Rinpoche shifts the focus from the foundations of Hinayana and Mahayana to a central theme in Buddhist thought: Buddha-nature—the innate, awakened potential within all beings. This is a critical turning point in the Mahayana path, moving beyond renunciation and self-discipline into a recognition that our very dissatisfaction, our struggle, and even our neurosis are expressions of enlightened mind itself. The realization of pain, which in the Hinayana approach serves as a stark confrontation with samsara, is here transformed into a deeper insight—one that reveals the intelligence, warmth, and luminosity already present within us.

Trungpa Rinpoche challenges the tendency to see spiritual progress as an escape from suffering. Instead, he invites us to recognize that the very act of struggling with life, the discomfort of ego, and the restless dissatisfaction we experience are signs of our Buddha-nature pushing through. He describes it as unborn, unobstructed, and non-dwelling—not something we must manufacture but something that is already present, often obscured by our habitual search for security and permanence.

This talk also touches on an essential paradox: while Buddha-nature is innate, our ego co-opts it, distorting enlightenment into another project of self-preservation. The sense of wanting to be permanently secure, permanently awakened, or permanently at peace is itself a grasping mechanism—one that turns the natural openness of Buddha-nature into another form of imprisonment. The challenge, then, is not to chase after enlightenment as an achievement but to relax into what is already there.

One of the most striking aspects of Trungpa Rinpoche’s teaching is his insistence that enlightenment is not a myth or an abstraction. It is real, immediate, and already expressing itself—even in our confusion, ambition, and struggle. The Mahayana view is not one of condemning our current state but recognizing that within even our most misguided efforts lies the very seed of awakening. This is why, as he references the great teacher Taranatha, everyone carries within their heart a perfectly produced image of the Buddha—beautifully made, cast in gold.

 

Talk #2: BUDDHA-NATURE

Yesterday we discussed the inspiration which comes from experiencing the spark of intelligence or enlightenment in us. Discovering that potential seems to be one of the fun­damental characteristics of the Mahayana approach. We have already looked into the feelings of inadequacy, pain and confusion and seen them as neither good nor bad, but as a workable situation. I suppose we could say that in our day-to-day life we find that the search for pleasure, either materialistic or spiritual, is no longer convincing. There is something behind the whole thing. In other words, there is a sense of dissatisfaction and a sense of continual strug­gle.

We consider that experience of dissatisfaction to be the discovery of the first noble truth or duhkha. Discovering pain and its universality, realizing that pain is constantly there, is also discovering buddha-nature. The very reali­zation is not stupid or ignorant, but intelligent. So the nature of the struggle that we go through is the expression of enlightened mind. The bad news in itself is good news. That potential for discovering pain is fundamentally intel­ligent and basically warm — those are the two components of that instinct.

Discriminating awareness allows us to look at situations of life critically or hopefully, even to the point of search­ing for spirituality, the ultimate goal. And warmth is there even though we may condemn ourselves as being bad or weak or confused. By its very nature, that condemnation is an expression of warmth, strangely enough. There is some sense of ambition in that often, condemning ourselves is the ul­timate hope; by looking at ourselves critically we expect something good will come of it.

Those virtues of intelligence and warmth may be entire­ly spiritually or psychologically materialistic but, never­theless, the very driving force, the very existence.of such potential is the buddha-nature operating. The realization of that potential is entirely dependent on the realization of pain, which becomes a kind of crutch, a stepping-stone that we can start from. But still it is an embryonic po­tential. It is embryonic because it is a glimpse of hope, rather than an actual experience of complete hope, hopefulness.

The great teacher, Taranatha, talks about the embryonic awakened state of mind being eternal, solid and permanent. His approach has been challenged by others, who say that that is ultimate ego, not the experience of real buddhanature. They say that it is precisely the function of ego to be ambitious, to strive towards achievement, and to try to associate with a solid, positive, hopeful situation. It is true that buddha-nature could be regarded as ego. The reason the enlightened mind becomes ego is that a sense of security has been imposed on it, a feeling that you will live forever. So from that point of view, ego is purely a lot of attitudes which have been imposed on buddha-nature. Buddha-nature and basic sanity have been exploited and used as backing to reassure us of our existence, to reassure us that we are secure and healthy, that we will never experience death. On the other hand, if there is no sense of permanent security, no sense of using buddha-nature as a pawn or of maintaining a relationship with simple-minded hope and fear, then buddha-nature becomes just simple straightforward buddha-nature, or enlightened mind. So on the whole, the attitude toward enlightenment is obviously something very solid, some­thing very continuous, something extremely definite without any mistakes.

There are all kinds of attributes of tathagatagarbha or buddha-nature. To begin with, it is continuous and solid because it is unborn. In other words, it doesn’t have to be given birth to by effort or preconception, in the sense that giving birth to a child requires a father and a mother. In this case, parents would be synonomous with preconceptions, something already existing which conditions further situ­ations. Buddha mind or enlightened mind is not dependent on that, so it is unborn, and therefore it is unoriginated.

Another attribute is that it is ’unobstructed; Its flow cannot be prevented by any causal characteristics which depend on karmic chain reactions. So it is free from karma. Your intelligence, your restlessness, does not need nursing or securing. It is constantly, intelligently critical of pain or whatever; the restlessness is unobstructed and it does not need to be nursed. Another attribute is that buddha-nature does not dwell on anything, which means that we can­not categorize it as being associated with.good or bad, plea­sure or pain. Enlightened intelligence shines through both pain and pleasure.

In other words, the Unconditioned Cognitive Mind that functions in our Basic Being is the True Enlightened Mind. There’s nothing very obscure about this. It has nothing to do with a mystical experience or anything like that at all, but it’s just functional, simple, direct, intelligent, sane, pragmatic, and so forth. That seems to be the basic point about buddha-natures this restless mind is the buddha-nature. Because it is so intelligent, it is restless. It is so transparent you can’t put any kind of patch or any kind of mask over the irritation. If you do, the irritation still comes through. We can’t hold the irritation back or mold it into a comfortable ego style anymore. The purpose of ego is to search for permanent, solid comfort of some kind. This might cost a lot in terms of sacrificing and inflicting pain on ourselves temporarily, but we think that hopefully, we will finally achieve that ultimate comfort or security. And each time we begin to acheive it, something else goes wrong.

In the tantric literature, buddha-mind is referred to as a lamp in a vase. The vase can be broken or the imper­fection of the vase can be seen because of the light that is shining out from inside. In the Mahayana literature, the popular analogy refers to enlightened mind as the sun and ego’s security as the clouds which prevent the sun from shining through. So the idea of buddha mind is not purely a concept or a theoretical, metaphysical ideal, but it is something extremely real that we can experience ourselves. In fact, it is the ego that feels that we have ego. It is ego which tells us, “My ego is bothering me. I feel very self-conscious about having to be me. I feel that I have a tremendous burden on me, and I wonder what the best way to get rid of it is.” All those expressions of restless­ness that keep coming out in us are the expression of buddha- nature, the expression of unborn, unobstructed and nondwelling.

It is said in the Guhyasamaja Tantra that all sentient beings are good vessels for the Mahayana teaching; nobody is excluded. Therefore, one should take delight, cheer up. In one of his opening speeches, so to speak, the Buddha discusses which vessels are appropriate to receive the teach­ings — who could be excluded; who could be included — and he concludes, “Let everyone come and join. Invite everybody.”

This approach of seeing buddha-nature as all-pervading is one of the basic threads of the tantric approach as well. The upsurging energy of “awake” is the energy that one should use and transmute in the tantric teachings.

Taking the Bodhisattva Vow is acknowledging that you have a great many family characteristics, characteristics of the family of the Buddha. You are acknowledging that potential. In other words, any kind of ambition that we might have in our life situation, such as trying to main­tain or advance ourselves, could be regarded as an expres­sion of enlightened mind. It has been said that even the most vicious animals have the instinct to take care of their young and be loving to them, which is an expression of buddha-nature. I don’t necessarily mean that people have a glimpse of buddha-nature. Rather than a glimpse in terms of viewing something, the experience may be a gap. That’s the exper­iential situation which comes out of seeing through the veils of ego. But whether we have a glimpse of it or not, there is still the pure functioning of the buddha mind occurring in us all the time. It occurs in the most bizarre, cheap and confused styles we might present, as well as in what­ever extremely profound, dignified and wise experiences we might have. Both extremes are the expressions of buddha- nature.

I think that one of the foundations of the Mahayana approach to life is the realization that samyaksambuddha, the.completely perfect enlightenment, is no longer a myths it is real. For the Hinayanlst, enlightenment is pure myth. First one has to attain the arhat stage which is a stage of absorption, and from there one has’to advance to the en­lightened attitude. But in the Mahayana approach, as Taranatha puts it, everybody carries in his heart a perfectly produced image of the Buddha, beautifully made, cast in gold. Everybody has such an image in his heart. That seems to be true. It’s very real — delightfully real. And the unreality of it makes it more real.

So that, we could say, is the groundwork of the great vehicle. Before you think big, you have to think real. That seems to be the starting point of the lion’s roar, or the proclamation of Mahayana. It has to start with that faith, the conviction that nobody is condemned or confused.

Discussion

Question: Take, for example, sitting down to read a book on Bud­dhism. We’ve come to the book through confusion. We don’t understand our life, so we pick up the book and we start reading. Are you saying that the impulse to try to find greater clarity or truth which prompts us to pick up the book is in itself enlightened mind coming through?

Rinpoche: Yes. Whether you understand it or not, the very attempt is it.

Question: Then where the ego would come in, in reading the book, is in adding something on or trying to get things all sewn up?

Rinpoche: Ego’s approach is the mentality of the lucrative, the profitable: “I should be getting something out of this book, otherwise my effort is wasted.” It’s an unrealistic, sort of business-like mentality. If things don’t make sense then your search is wasted.

Question: You said that the ego is buddha-nature.

Rinpoche: Yeah.

Question: Could you also dwell on your ego without having buddha-nature involved?

Rinpoche: Well, if you’re trying to separate them, that is the work of ego. The very project becomes ego’s project.

Question: But it could be checking on yourself?

Rinpoche: Not necessarily checking. Buddha-nature is the very existence of the driving force. The impulse to go forward is the buddha-nature. But maybe any kind of afterthoughts are ego. The first impulse, the first clear driving force to test or experience is buddha-nature.

Question: Did I understand you to say that seeing ego as buddha-nature depends on your attitude?

Rinpoche: That’s right.

Question: If your attitude is that there is nothing good in ego, that there is no buddha-nature there — is that all ego?

Rinpoche: If you begin to have such an attitude, then that is an affectation laid over the basic sanity, which becomes neurosis. Trying to make things better is an attempt to make things solid by means of your attitude.

Question: What would be the attitude that would bring forth buddha-nature?

Rinpoche: I suppose we could say having no attitude, just being simple and straightforward.

Question: Does it become dangerous for a person to believe that he has had a glimpse of buddha-nature? At what point does trust in the heart become dangerous?

Rinpoche: It could become dangerous if you begin to use it as a credential, as a way of expanding your power either over yourself or over others. The same thing applies to any kind of practice. If practice is just pure, direct practice, that seems to be very simple; but if one’s practice becomes somewhat heroic, connected with finding definite proof, then it is dangerous.

Question: Rinpoche, you said that the impulsive afterthought is ego, while the immediate thought is buddha-nature. How do you distinguish between the impulsiveness and the spontaneity?

Rinpoche: To begin with you could say impulse is not spontaneous. It may seem spontaneous, but it doesn’t have the relaxed quality of spontaneity. The impulse comes out like a sneeze, as the result of some pressure. Whereas you could say the spontaneity is like yawning; it has less pressure; it takes its time. The glimpse of buddha-nature is not violent, where­as the impulse is very violent; it’s desperate.

Question: Is the impulse buddha-nature?

Rinpoche: No. The spontaneity is buddha-nature.

Question: Then the impulse is ego?

Rinpoche: Yeah.

Question: What you react to first, then, is the ego?

Rinpoche: Not necessarily. Impulse never reaches the first stage; impulse always trails behind. Impulse is never up to date. It is the rebound. First you see, then you react. Impulse never comes first hand. It’s a reaction.

Question: Well, then what’s restlessness? Didn’t you say that was buddha-nature also?

Rinpoche: If there is a general dissatisfaction, a restlessness, that is very accurate. It sounds as though buddha-nature is somehow intermittent.

Rinpoche: Well, the restlessness is the sharpest and most immediate situation being experienced, whereas buddha-nature is something you can’t catch hold of and put in a container. That’s why it is associated with light.

Question: That raises the question of whether it flashes in at one point and not at another, or — ?

Rinpoche: No, it’s constantly happening. I mean, it’s so much so, that it’s constantly happening. Ego doesn’t have a chance to register it. It’s constantly ahead of you — you being ego at this point. It is constantly ahead of you.

Question: So you are continually dissatisfied?

Rinpoche: Yeah, the intelligence is shining through.

Question: Could you relate this with the image of falling? You once talked about our situation as being one of constantly falling. Does buddha-nature contradict that feeling of having no ground at all?

Rinpoche: That seems to be the whole point: Buddha-nature brings the realization that there is no ground.

Question: But it doesn’t seem like you’re seeing any thing.

Rinpoche: Well, it isn’t seeing, really, in terms of reporting back to your brain or anything like that. It isn’t seeing — I don’t known what word you could use. The word “jnana” is more “knowing,” but you don’t even know. That’s very dif­ficult. I suppose we could make a distinction between look­ing and seeing. You see first; you look afterwards.

Question: Could you say that buddha-nature sees that there is no ground because it sees ego? It sees that the ego is there, and sees that ego keeps coming up, over and over again. So the simple wisdom of buddha-nature is always up against the effort of the ego to make some big problem out of it?

Rinpoche: Well, buddha-nature is not regarded as another kind of cognitive mind functioning. It is part of your cognitive mind, but it supercedes your cognitive mind. It naturally sees the fruitlessness of struggle, as well as encouraging struggle in order to prove its fruitlessness. The whole thing is sort of an automatic, inbuilt, natural situation, which is trying to wear itself out. In other words, without buddha-nature, ego cannot exist. Ego is constantly teased by buddha-nature into activating itself. So either it is perpetuating itself or wearing itself out.

Question: Why do we have to concern ourselves with this? I mean, it seems to happen spontaneously as we go along. If we’re practicing and learning and becoming more aware of our ground­lessness, why do we have to discuss the buddha-nature? I don’t understand that.

Rinpoche: I don’t know. Well, we find ourselves questioning our­selves, and that is saying the same thing — why do we question at all? But that in itself is a question.

Question: Rinpoche, what does it mean to be a member of the Buddha’s family?

Rinpoche: Well, it means to realize that you have potentials, to realize that you are subject to condemnation, that you have tremendous potential already.

Question: Subject to condemnation?

Rinpoche: Yes, in the sense that you are hopeless. There’s no gap.

Question: Rinpoche, when you talk about having no ground, it seems to imply that there are no rules; it seems to bring in confusion.

Rinpoche: No rules?

Question: No rules about what to do, really, or about whether the thing you are doing at a certain moment is good or bad. It seems very confusing; it seems as though it leaves you hanging on a cliff.

Rinpoche: Well, that seems to be the whole point — you don’t have any reference point to hold onto. And that fear is the fear of losing ego. But losing ego doesn’t mean that you wouldn’t know how to brush your teeth or make a cup of tea. In fact, you would probably do those things better. It’s quite fearful, even in theory, and the experience is going to be even heavier.

Question: Rinpoche, if an individual is not into Buddhism, or a path, or whatever — he’s a businessman and he’s restless and ambitious to make more money, to make his life better, but he’s not aware of his ego or of duality — is his rest­lessness still considered a. spark of intelligence, or buddha- nature?

Rinpoche: Yes, I think so, in the long run. That seems to be what’s happening in this country already. In fact, this whole question has come up as a result of that restlessness. I mean, your father, your great-grandfather, and your great- great-great-grandfather, were all preoccupied with building a brand new world. So they built it and then the whole thing turned around. In fact, we could say that our talking about this subject is a result of those people putting in their effort. There were no missionaries, there were no people proselytizing these ideas in the country. The country it­self awoke to this situation. So, I suppose it might take a long time for people to realize their buddha-nature. The businessmen might have to freak out — but still, the cost is not wasted. It might take several lifetimes to come about, but still — (laughs).

Question: Rinpoche, how about the case of traditional societies that seem to go along their leisured way and don’t change very much, societies in which people seem content to do things the way their forefathers did them?

Rinpoche: Generally, you can’t have an ideal solid society oper­ating for thousands of years. I suppose you could say Tibet was close to it. When I left my country recently, it was still a medieval society. But then force from the outside thrust us out. Since we didn’t make any new discoveries, somebody else made a new discovery of us. We were pushed out. So there’s no such thing as a permanent traditional society. There cannot be — as long as people desire to be comfortable and happy. I suppose the more speed there is, the more buddha-nature comes through. We could say that.

Question: If we are aware of the buddha-nature, isn’t that a type of security in itself?

Rinpoche: Well, I don’t know which way it goes. If we are aware that we have a buddha-nature, that is security; but we are also aware that we might lose our ego by being involved with the buddha-nature, and that is not security. Knowing that you cannot witness your own burial is quite uncomfortable.

Question: Isn’t there a paradox here? You’re saying that buddha-nature and ego are interchangeable. Isn’t there some dif­ference?

Rinpoche: I suppose you could say the fundamental idea is like a healing wound. When your wound is healed, the scab falls away, but the scab is also part of the wound as well. It’s something like that.

---