“Whenever we meet other people, rather than focusing on their delusions we should focus on the gold of their Buddha nature.”  How to Transform Your Life, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso

In this wonderful talk on Buddha Nature, Kadam Morten shares practical advice for how to abide in and experience your Buddha nature (your potential for unceasing happiness and peace)  — at whatever level you are currently in your practice.

Buddha nature can be understood on many levels. If you have some experience with the practice, you can consider that our very subtle mind is the actual gold nugget at our heart (precious and indestructible) and the emptiness of that mind is our Buddha nature.

If you are less experienced with these understandings, Kadam Morten explains the importance of finding your own connection and entry point to the practice. Allow yourself to abide in a joyful peaceful mind – even just a little bit of a loving mind will do — this is your entry point to understanding and experiencing your Buddha nature. You can then recognize that your present experience of peace, love, compassion and joy are all indications of your potential for limitless love, compassion, wisdom, peace and joy – this is your pure essential nature, your Buddha nature, your potential for enlightenment.  Impute yourself upon it saying “THIS IS ME.”

Within that experience you are already connecting to the three jewels. You are already in Dharma, you are connecting to Sangha past and present who have all had this experience of identifying with their Buddha nature, and you are communing directly to the blessings of all the Buddhas.

How wonderful if we can take these teachings to heart, identify with these wonderful minds, and see this incredible potential in ourselves and others!