2SPnm9ZVc

194 THE TIBETAN BOOK OF LIVING AND DYINGself-cherishing is the best protection in life, but in fact theopposite is true. Self-grasping creates self-cherishing, which inturn creates an ingrained aversion to harm and suffering. However,harm and suffering have no objective existence; whatgives them their existence and their power is only our aversionto them. When you understand this, you understand thenthat it is our aversion, in fact, that attracts to us every negativityand obstacle that can possibly happen to us, and fills ourlives with nervous anxiety, expectation, and fear. Wear downthat aversion by wearing down the self-grasping mind and itsattachment to a nonexistent self, and you will wear down anyhold on you that any obstacle or negativity can have. For howcan you attack someone or something that is just not there?It is compassion, then, that is the best protection; it is also,as the great masters of the past have always known, thesource of all healing. Suppose you have a disease such as canceror AIDS. By taking on the sickness of those suffering likeyou, in addition to your own pain, with a mind full of compassionyou will—beyond any doubt—purify the past negativekarma that is the cause, now and in the future, of the continuationof your suffering.In Tibet, I remember hearing, there were many extraordinarycases of people, who when they heard they were dyingof a terminal illness, gave away everything they had and wentto the cemetery to die. There they practiced taking on the sufferingof others; and what is amazing is that instead of dying,they returned home, fully healed.Working with the dying, I have experienced again and again,gives all who do so a direct opportunity to practice compassionin action, and in the situation where it is probably mostdeeply needed of all.Your compassion can have perhaps three essential benefitsfor the dying person: First, because it is opening your heart,you will find it easier to show the dying person the kind ofunconditional love I have spoken about, and which they needso much. On a deeper, spiritual level, I have seen again andagain how, if you try to embody compassion and act out ofthe heart of compassion, you will create an atmosphere inwhich the other person can be inspired to imagine the spiritualdimension or even take up spiritual practice. On the deepestlevel of all, if you do constantly practice compassion for