Rinpoche’s Speech on 10th Year Founding Anniversary of Tong-Len Charitable Trust.

Prof. Samdhong Rinpoche was invited as the Chief Guest for the occasion of the 10th year founding anniversary celebration of the Tong-Len Charitable Trust near Dharamsala, on 19th Nov. 2014.

Mr Ajay Shrivastava, a social worker, Ms Anna Owen, the Director of Tong-Len Charitable Trust, England, sponsors from abroad, dignitaries and representatives of NGOs, schools, and other organizations in and around Dharamsala, the Students of Tong-Len and their parents, attended the anniversary function.

Rinpoche spoke about the four things needed in our life to live a happy and meaningful life, and answered the questions of Ms Nisha, an elder student of Tong-Len, who is currently pursuing a degree in journalism.

Rinpoche said, “As a student there are four things needed to live a happy and meaningful life. The First thing is to have a healthy body, and that depends on your daily diets and everyday lifestyle. If you do not have a healthy body you will not have a good life even if you are highly educated”

“The second thing is a healthy mind, or a good attitude, which is important. The attitude should be logical where acceptance or rejection of things should be based on analyzes and experiments, as the Buddha himself told his followers not to follow his words simply because he is a Buddha, a fully-enlightened being; experiment and analyze and if you think it is correct than follow it, otherwise not so”.

“The third thing is to have a right livelihood (honest occupation, pure living), a means of living that is not acquired by violence and exploitations of other people”.

“The fourth thing is to have a good relationship within the family members, such as respect to the elders and care and kindness to the younger ones. A good family promotes a good community and in this way you can have a happy life. But to have a meaningful life one should practise Spirituality (Adhyatmik; introspective pursuit of inner values) above these four things. Spirituality can be practised by everyone from any religious background and it will help you in both this life and next life”.

Rinpoche also appreciated and thanked the Venerable monk Jamyang la, of Tong-Len, for his hard work and dedication; Jamyang has single-handedly helped the slum children around Dharamshala to have a better future and life. Rinpoche also mentioned that this act is a real practice of Buddhist philosophy, a real spiritual practice.