"Enlightenment is possible in this lifetime, says Gelek Rimpoche, but time is running out. We have to make the most of this rare and fleeting opportunity to wake up.

All sentient beings, including myself, have gone through continuous ups and downs, life after life, experiencing the sufferings of Samsara. The reason we keep having all of these problems is because we haven’t managed to fulfill our life’s mission.

What is our mission? In the most basic sense, we all have a desire for peace and happiness, and we all wish to be free from pain and suffering. But though we may experience happiness here and there, it is not the kind of happiness that has never known suffering. In fact, for most of us it is the kind of happiness that is based on suffering.

The kind of comfort most of us seek is a kind of stopgap comfort. We haven’t really addressed the root of suffering or developed the true cause of happiness.

We put a lot of effort into having material comforts, and on top of that we want mental and spiritual comfort. But even when we think we are working for spiritual benefit, if we dig deeply we may find that it is simply attachment—the attachment of bringing ourselves to a state of material or spiritual or emotional comfort.

The kind of comfort most of us seek is a kind of stopgap comfort. We haven’t really addressed the root of suffering or developed the true cause of happiness. Once we realize that, and reflect and meditate on it, we can begin to see the true nature of suffering and the cessation of suffering. From there, one can make the decision to seek true peace, nirvana, which means freeing ourselves and others once and for all from suffering and its causes.

Why haven’t we been able to achieve that yet? Why haven’t we fulfilled our mission? Because we don’t yet realize how important this life is. We don’t realize the limitless capacity of our human body and mind, and how difficult it is to find. We don’t have a sense of urgency because we don’t realize how easily this human life can be lost. Instead, we keep ourselves busy chasing after happiness and running away from suffering, life after life.

Many of us complain, “I have no time.” I like to call that a good, fancy, stylish excuse. Everybody likes to say, “I’m too busy,” because everybody would like to seem important. It is a great excuse that offers several benefits: you can avoid what you don’t want to do; it gives you a showbiz idea of being important; and all the important people do it, so you can include yourself with them.

Even if we have time, we put the most important thing in our life—our spiritual development—on the back burner. Our laziness is well suited to these upside-down priorities.

I refer to that as busy laziness. We experience this kind of laziness because we have a problem recognizing our real priorities. Even if we have time, we put the most important thing in our life—our spiritual development—on the back burner. Our laziness is well suited to these upside-down priorities. The sense of urgency becomes a monetary issue for us, because we live in an age where we have to pay our bills for every little thing we need. If we don’t pay our bills then not only will the bill collectors chase us, but even our electricity and water will eventually be shut off.

As spiritual practitioners, we need to balance our priorities. This means being able to balance the needs of this particular life with our long-term spiritual goals. Of course we have to manage our bills and make sure we have a place to live and food to eat. And we have to meet our responsibilities to our friends and family. But we also need to make our spiritual work a priority. If we can balance that, we are intelligent and capable. If we cannot, we are just the opposite.

But to do that, we have to convince ourselves that this life is important. It shouldn’t take too much convincing, since we already have some sense that our life is precious. We recognize this when our life is threatened, but on a day-to-day basis we tend to take our precious human life for granted. For the most part, we keep ourselves busy meeting one urgent requirement after another, and that makes us think we’re managing. But the truth is, we don’t want to think about changing our priorities. We think we’ll squeak by with some spiritual development at the last minute. For those who do have a regular practice, how many leave it until the very last thing at night or rush through it like some chore you have to finish? That’s what most people do. But the Buddha told us that unless we reflect on the rarity of this human life and how easily it can be lost, and also think about how capable we can be if we apply ourselves, we will never be able to utilize the richness of this life.

By richness, I’m not speaking about wealth but about opportunity. Our most important opportunity is that we are human beings. We may think the samsaric gods and spirits are able to do much more than us. Forget it. They are equally miserable, even more than us sometimes.

In old Tibet, we had to keep reminding ourselves that human beings can do anything. These days we don’t have to, because science clearly shows us what human beings are capable of. Human beings alone are responsible for tremendous scientific achievements, not the ghosts and samsaric gods. Those achievements are because of the extraordinary capabilities of our human minds. We really have brilliant minds. As human beings, we all have tremendous capacity. But if we don’t utilize it, then it remains weak."

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