Live as best as you can in the five lifelong precepts, praised by the Buddha as the basis of lay life. Take the eight one-day precepts at times and guard them dearly.

Contemplate a precious human life, death and karma. See that you are in a clearly unstable situation, not knowing where you are going to get reborn, and completely under the control of previously created karma. We do not know how in the world it is going to ripen, we realise that we need to seek guidance, and so we seek guidance from the Three Jewels.

Refuge means getting clear in our minds the traditions we are following, whose teachings we are following, and having a very clear idea of where we are going spiritually.

While it is so easy for us to say, “I take refuge in the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha,” actually taking refuge means understanding deeply what the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha are, why they are reliable sources of refuge, and why it will benefit us to rely upon them. To understand this, we should do some study and learn the qualities of the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha.

When I was a baby Buddhist, I had a little bit of understanding but not very much. I remember one of the senior Tibetan monks in Kopan coming into the office one day and I remember him saying, “When these people hear about the miraculous and wonderful qualities of the Three Jewels, they will definitely take refuge.” I remember thinking, “Not me.” Just hearing about wonderful qualities, for me, does not necessarily inspire faith. I must know how it is possible to develop those qualities, and then I can have faith that some people do. This is just the way my mind thinks.

In Buddhism, faith does not mean blind faith. It does not mean blind acceptance. There are three kinds of faith. With the first kind, we admire the qualities of the Three Jewels. With the second, we aspire to gain those qualities ourselves, and the third kind is based on confidence that the path is possible from some understanding of it. Faith, also translated as trust or confidence, is something that grows in us and has causes. We have to create the causes for it. It is not something that we just say, “I have respect for my teacher and my teacher said this, so I believe it.” Those are called “modest faculty” disciples, who accept teachings because somebody else said so. If we want to penetrate more deeply, then we have to investigate for ourselves.

For me, refuge really grew. I took refuge early, but it is something that grew over the years and is still growing now. We may take refuge in a ceremony, the official thing that makes you a Buddhist, but the refuge is really something that we learn about and deepen our understanding of until we become the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. First, we realise the Dharma. Then we become an Arya Sangha. Lastly, we become a Buddha. But it is a process that grows until we become the Three Jewels ourselves, in our mind stream.

“365 Gems of Wisdom” e-book is out now!