Mahayana Buddhism
A Seminar Given at Karme-Choling
March 1973
Introduction
The following is a profound and historically significant talk given by Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche at Karma Chöling, a meditation center in Vermont, during the early years of Buddhism’s introduction to the West. This seminar, presented to some of Rinpoche’s first American students, took place at a pivotal moment—when authentic Buddhist meditation masters were just beginning to lay the foundations for what has now become an established and diverse Buddhist presence in the Western world.
At the time of this talk, the transmission of Buddhism beyond Asia was still in its infancy. Western students, often encountering Buddhist teachings through books or fragmented ideas, were now engaging directly with a realized teacher from an authentic lineage. Trungpa Rinpoche’s arrival in the West marked a turning point in this process, as he sought not merely to explain Buddhist philosophy but to transmit a living tradition that demanded rigorous discipline and personal transformation. His teachings, often challenging and unconventional, directly confronted Western students’ tendencies toward spiritual materialism—our habitual way of co-opting spirituality to serve the ego rather than cutting through it.
This particular talk explores the distinction between Hinayana and Mahayana, two essential vehicles of the Buddhist path. Trungpa Rinpoche emphasizes that these are not separate or opposing traditions but rather different phases of an integrated journey. Hinayana, often described as the “narrow path,” begins with directly confronting the ego’s core tendencies—its clinging to self-existence, its avoidance of pain, and its habitual strategies for securing comfort. This path is unyielding; it demands that we stop seeking distractions, entertainment, or even therapeutic relief and instead face the stark reality of suffering as it is. Trungpa likens it to accepting a wound without scratching it—resisting the impulse to escape discomfort and instead learning to live with the rawness of existence.
But Mahayana, the “great vehicle,” expands this framework. While Hinayana is often characterized by renunciation, Mahayana introduces the dimension of bodhicitta—the heart of enlightenment, the innate seed of wisdom and compassion. Trungpa Rinpoche describes how this realization arises not as a theoretical belief but through the direct experience of our dissatisfaction with life. The very agitation, discontent, and yearning for something greater are signs of an underlying intelligence—a spark of awakening already present within us. Instead of reinforcing a sense of personal struggle, Mahayana opens a wider horizon: we are not merely trapped in samsara but also already awake, already capable of recognizing our Buddha-nature.
This talk, then, is not simply a technical discourse on Buddhist philosophy. It is a direct challenge to how we relate to our own experience. Trungpa Rinpoche urges his students to move beyond conceptualizing spirituality and instead to live it—to trust in their own wakefulness, even amidst the confusion and suffering of life.
Beezone
Talk #1: Hinayana AND Mahayana
The subject that we are going to be involved with is Mahayana Buddhism. It seems we need some kind of footing in the difference between Hinayana and Mahayana to clarify the basic pattern. What we’re going to discuss is spirituality in terms of a discipline and how to exercise that discipline in day-to-day life situations. This is quite different from purely discussing religious theory. I would like to make that quite clears we are discussing experience which involves a purely spiritual approach rather than a religious one. The reason that is so is that our basic ego or confused neurosis would prefer to find new crutches to support our existence. We do this by latching onto particular ideas which tend to enrich the ego’s feeling of selfexistence. Both Hinayana and Mahayana represent a process of cutting through that basic tendency of ego, which is called spiritual materialism.
From whatever angle we might approach it, still it is the same thing. The approach is not based on becoming higher, greater, better persons as such, but the approach is to discover the tendencies towards being awake which exist within us. It is an uncovering process rather than a venturing out as such. We have to realize the different techniques that might be involved, such as the Hinayana or the Mahayana, but those are different techniques rather than entirely different backgrounds. In the Hinayana approach there is a sense of working with the basic characteristics of neurosis. This is a way of cutting down the unnecessary chaos that arises from ego’s mentality. It could be called a narrow-minded approach in the sense that it make no allowances for any entertainment or therapy. So it is a direct and definite, stubborn approach: no therapy, no kind of entertainment of ego-oriented style is permitted at all.
The general approach of Hinayana takes the narrow path in order to develop an understanding of the open path, the open way. The narrow path involves experiencing that life is dwelling in pain, growing up in pain, experiencing pain. The whole process of life is wrapped up in pain because the basic tendency of ego is to yearn so much towards pleasure. By doing so we try to ward off pain and the notion of pain. But yearning towards pleasure means that the notion of pain gets a lot of attention. Consequently the pain is increased because it is being fiddled with so much, so to speak, teased so much. It’s like scratching a wound — by doing so you get it more infected. So the Hinayana way is to realize that situation and to accept the fact that you have a wound but you don’t have to scratch it even if it might itch. Relate with your wound, that you have a wound. Accept part of your bodily chaos, irritations, whatever. It’s accepting the life situation.
We just had a seminar on the meaning of death and pain which still seems to be relevant. We can’t really build the fortress of Mahayana without a good foundation. It seems important to know that the life situation is so much to the point. On the one hand we might say that the life situation is very complicated, chaotic. It’s difficult to keep up with all the problems that we go through. On the other hand, the life situation is extremely simple. It can be simplified into one phrase; ego pain. Unless we realize the narrowness of life — narrow in this case meaning that we can’t escape from those basic things, ego or the pain — we can’t have the greater vision of Mahayana, the great vehicle, at all. We have to start from one atom, one basic point, which acts as a catalyst for the larger world. Existence is based on the continual birth and death of pain, and ego tries to make that process continuous and hang on to it.
Someone told me that ten years ago he read a book on buddhism and found it extremely depressing. He said to himself, “Who wants to get into this?” and instead joined the love-and-light path. Somehow he found himself saying that again, which brought him back to the basic meaning of pain. Sooner or later we have to realize life is very simple, extremely simple. Life consists of the notion of escape, trying to avoid pain, and the notion of giving one’s existence an identity, trying to increase ego. In order to understand Mahayana and its ideals, we also have to understand matter-of- fact situations. Mahayana is the inspiration of the open way, Allegiance to the Buddha. But Hinayana is allegiance to samsara, associating yourself with samsara and relating with the samsaric process by way of renunciation. In other words, buddha cannot exist without samsara; nirvana cannot exist without samsara; being awake cannot exist without being asleep, and so forth.
At the beginning we have to realize that the view of life which consists of erroneous beliefs of all kinds led us to this point, to our search for the teaching — which could be an erroneous belief as well. We are here because we made lots of mistakes, piles and piles of mistakes. That we happen in fact to be here discussing this matter together is a result, you could say, of the right mistake or the wrong mistake. But still it’s an accident which happens to be bringing us together in this life situation, discussing the whole question of spirituality. From that point of view, spirituality is experiencing the narrowness of the life situation. We don’t have any areas to escape to, any areas in which to improvise anymore. It’s like birth — we can only come out of one channel, out of a mother’s womb — there’s no way of improvising.
Having realized that situation fully and completely, having worked on the discipline of relating with pain, impermanence and so forth, then we might have a new area to explore which is that life is not as grim as it seems, but there’s a spark of light happening here and there. The very fact that you are agitated by your life is a spark of intelligence which implies hope, hope for enlightenment. The fact that you are dissatisfied with your life is the message of Mahayana coming through.
In traditional language, that kind of intelligence is referred to as bodhicitta, which means the heart of enlightenment, the seed of enlightenment, which is always there. Instead of constantly cutting ourselves down, condemning ourselves, purely seeing the negative aspect of life situations, we come to another conclusion, which is that we are already awake. We have tathagatagarbha, which means the essence of enlightened mind, in us, buddha-mind in us. The good news. But seemingly you can’t create good news without bad news to begin with, so the Hinayana approach deliberately creates the bad news that you’re trapped, that you are hopeless, helpless, that the meaning of life is pain. The Mahayana approach, the good news, is that maybe life is pain, and you’re imprisoned in samsara, but how do you know that? If you know that, if you have some notion of discovering that, maybe there is something in you which is actually able to see that, which is good news. So from that point of view, Hinayana and Mahayana are reciprocal. The Mahayana approach is based on a sense of self-respect, a sense of openness or hope, and the Hinayana approach is based on a sense of hopelessness or narrowness, a sense that there is no other way, there are no alternatives — which is equally important.
This notion of buddha-nature, embryonic enlightenment, is one of the dominant inspirations. It is embryonic because it is still looked at with suspicion — it may not happen. It is still conditioned by the hope of becoming solid. But also buddha-nature is very pragmatic. In order to acknowledge such an embryonic situation you first have to work at awakening it. Contemplating or theorizing alone doesn’t help at all. It takes a tremendous energy boost to exercise you, to make you realize you are already awake. Maybe you are half asleep, but still you have to be awakened and have to acknowledge your buddha-nature as if you were completely awake. That is trusting in the heart — believing you could relate with yourself in spite of your imprisonment in sam- sara, acknowledging the possibility that you could still make love to yourself, you could love yourself, you could appreciate yourself.
The foundation of Mahayana is that life is workable after all. It can be handled. A certain amount of warmth and sympathy towards yourself is necessary to begin with. And it’s necessary to start with the Hinayana approach to pain first in order to develop the Mahayana. Perhaps we should stop at this point and have discussions.
Question: Is the seed of enlightenment you spoke of always alive in us or can it perish?
Rinpoche: It seems that as long as there is a question about the subject it can’t have perished. Acknowledging the restlessness of life is the seed. Seeking for pleasure, warding off pain — those little things seem to be the seed. So in other words, unless we are a robot or a jellyfish, then something is happening, which is the seed. Even a jellyfish might have it.
Question: Rinpoche, you spoke of Hinayana as being the way of renunciation, and renunciation as being the way of relating to samsara. Could you say more about that?
Rinpoche: Well, renunciation at this point is completely relating with the fact that you’re trapped in an extremely strong prison. The only way of communicating with the situation is not to try to get out, but to try to make yourself at home communicating with the things which caught you. Literally, the net around you makes the whole thing very narrow because escape is not possible anymore, and therefore a better, more pleasurable situation is not possible. In other words, renunciation is accepting that you have only one or two situations to work on. There are no other areas that you can dream up. Even if you dream, your dream is cut down. Renunciation means realizing the nuisance of yourself, in some sense.
Question: In our daily life it’s possible to experience both, narrowness and openness. What does one do? Does one simply acknowledge the experience or experience it without examination, or does one try to examine it?
Rinpoche: The first step is to acknowledge, and then, having acknowledged, you have to take some kind of leap to bring that realization to a functional level. That is to say that you feel the imprisonment in a narrow way, feel that there is no alternative in life. Life has only one track which is suffering and ego. Realizing that,you dance on the one track. So the one track isn’t purely further depression but further excitement as well, because you have no alternatives to play around with.
Question: But what if you experience both states at the same time? Do you dance with both of them?
Rinpoche: Sure. I think that’s possible.
Question: That becomes quite a confused space.
Rinpoche: Well, then explore the confusion, which is also another dance. You have something very solid happening anyway.
Question: You said something about compassion towards ourselves. How much compassion should we have towards ourselves? Are we too harsh with ourselves?
Rinpoche: Generally, we are too compassionate with ourselves. We constantly seek pleasure, try to be kind to ourselves and delude ourselves with ourselves. We try to shield ourselves from our mistakes as if nothing happened. The Hinayana way begins with the realization that everything is very serious, that you have no alternatives. You are trapped in your idiot compassion. You are trapped in your attempt to be too kind to yourself, which also creates further pain. If you become more familiar with that, and realize the alternativelessness, then you could become more compassionate. I think that is why Hinayana is important at the beginning — to realize that you can’t just treat yourself as if you were what you’d like to be. To begin with you have to cut down your indulgence. You have to realize that if you indulge yourself, that creates further pain. That realization itself is hope. It brings more encouragement. So compassion in this case does not mean creating pleasure but rather creating a sense of trust in yourself and not condemning. This can be developed if you have the relative notions for doing so.
Question: Isn’t it indulgent to try to change your situation at all? Simply geographically, or getting a better job? If you give up alternatives, do you simply stick with the boredom of your situation?
Rinpoche: Changing jobs doesn’t seem to have anything to do with it particularly. Moving from a chair to the sofa which is more comfortable, or drinking tea instead of coffee — those don’t have anything to do with the larger situation. That is, I don’t mean to say that you have to punish yourself constantly. Indulgence is the general attitude of wanting to achieve a state of solid pleasure. That’s the basic point, which is obviously a psychological approach. Trips with the physical situation don’t particularly make any difference. So it’s a question of trying to secure your being.
Question: When you talk about loving oneself more, are you talking about not judging oneself for being in samsara, not being pleasure-seeking nor being invloved in ego, but just accepting that that’s where you are?
Rinpoche: That seems to be the point. It’s accepting both positive and negative situations, whatever there is. It’s not only loving alone, but regarding the whole thing as fertile ground, as a workable situation — like a field with manure on it.
Question: You talked about trust in the heart providing the energy that stirs you towards enlightenment, but it seems very confusing finding that particular level to relate to. Some sort of an identification seems necessary and there’s always the problem that what you’re experiencing is so totally dependent on the confusion of your moods, on insubstantial stuff. I don’t really know how to get to the heart. It seems to suggest a ground.
Rinpoche: Yes, it does suggest a ground but the ground doesn’t have to be flat ground. The ground could be the current that flows through. It’s like relating with the ocean as ground as opposed to the land as ground. The dissatisfactions could be regarded as the ground. It’s like the oceans it goes up and down, but still it’s an existing situation.
Question: The only way I can relate to that is by reference, looking backwards and seeing the relationship of something to other things that have happened.
Rinpoche: That seems okay. You can’t really start with an ideal situation. That’s in fact somewhat the product of discriminating intelligence which compares grounds, and then finds that the present ground may be completely insubstantial. But still there is some energy going on that could be worked on as well. I think you have to allow yourself to have some kind of stepping-stone. It may not be as solid as you would like, but s Lill it is a stepping-stone of some kind.
Question: Rinpoche, you said a few minutes ago that it really didn’t make that much difference what the physical situation was, that the difference between coffee and tea didn’t seem that fundamental. But in the past you’ve said we were like ping- pong balls — we get bored and bounce to another thing as as entertainment for a few hours, whatever. Should we try to hold back the ping-pong ball, or does it matter?
Rinpoche: Well, it’s a question of whether you are relating with the situation as workable or whether you are taking advantage of frivolity. I think that’s one of the basic points. Frivolity could be related to as ground somewhat, but still, you shouldn’t be possessed by it, because in frivolity you are not experiencing the seriousness of the pain anymore.
Question: But might there by some point when you feel a choice?
Rinpoche: Well,you should start with the present situation rather than the possibility. That seems to be the point of having ground. The possibility is a hypothetical situation that hasn’t materialized in that particular case.