In an interview with screenwriter Stanley Weiser, the martial arts expert and action film
star
Steven Seagal breaks his silence on his many years of Buddhist practice and addresses
criticism
of his recent recognition as an incarnate Tibetan lama.
Stanley Weiser: First off, can you tell our readers a little bit about your
background in the art of aikido—how long you trained, who your teachers were, when
you
attained the status of a master?
Steven Seagal: Well, the title of master—on paper—is something that I probably
received in the early eighties. I still don’t believe that I have attained the level
of being a master. Maybe some other people think I am a master, but in my mind I am
certainly not.
When did you start aikido training?
In the mid-sixties I started training with Ishisaka Kiyoshi.
Were you introduced to Buddhism as an off-shoot of your martial arts discipline?
Well, to be honest with you I am not sure. I was born with a serious spiritual
consciousness and for many years studied different paths. I went to Japan in the late
sixties and began Zen sitting. I visited monasteries, studying Buddhism and receiving
spiritual instruction. This was the beginning for me, the way I believed it should
be—the development of a physical man through martial arts and polishing the spiritual
side simultaneously.
You also studied acupuncture?
Right. That was the way I was originally introduced to Tibetan Buddhism. There was a
handful of lamas who had come over from Tibet. They were sick and had been tortured.
Because I was studying acupuncture, I was asked to try to look after a couple of them,
even though I didn’t speak Tibetan. We were able to eventually communicate. I learned
a little Tibetan and I became very close with them. Later on, I became involved in certain
things that are not really the kind of things that I look back on with fondness.This was
at a time when the Khampas were still fighting the Chinese and the CIA was helping them,
and because of the severe repression of the Tibetan people, I wanted to get involved.
My involvement, though, was minimal. These were the years when my interest in Tibetan
Buddhism
flourished, but my involvement in any of the spiritual endeavors and training remained my
personal
business—not secret as some of the other things were, but just private. This was at a
time when I very
much wanted to be invisible in the dharma community, for a lot of reasons. Only in the
last few months have I come out of the closet.
Can you say anything about your involvement with the Tibetan freedom fighters?
I think it is probably best if we don’t get into that. We are trying to live in a
world where we can choose the middle path and seek harmony, and I don’t want to
appear to be a dangerous revolutionary person, because I am really not. I am here on this
Earth for one thing and that is to see if I can somehow serve humankind and ease the
suffering of others.
Who was your root guru?
Basically, for me His Holiness Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche was the greatest, and now I have a
very strong devotion to Minling Trichen and His Holiness Penor Rinpoche.
There are the recent reports that Penor Rinpoche has recognized you as a tulku. Is
that correct?
Gosh, I don’t think that is the way that I would put it. There’s a very
despicable magazine that made accusations that I had bribed Penor Rinpoche and all the
other higher lamas into giving me recognition. Well, first of all, this a recognition that
people have been telling me about for more than
twenty years, people who have known me in the dharma for a long time, long, long before
Penor Rinpoche ever formalized this. It was something that I had always kept secret, and
in fact denied. So if I denied it then, why would I bribe people for it now? You see why
it is so pitiful. I don’t mind them insulting me but it is a shame that people are
scandalizing the dharma and saying bad things about Penor Rinpoche and other high Nyingma
lamas.
You are saying that for more than twenty years people have talked to you about
possibly being a tulku?
There are people who had said to me that I am an incarnate lama, or tulku. Penor Rinpoche
basically recognized me as Kyung-drak Dorje, who was the reincarnation of the translator
Yudra Nyingpo. According to Jamgon Kongtrul’s Lives of the Tertons, Yudra Nyingpo was
a disciple of the great translator Berotsana and became both an outstanding scholar and an
accomplished meditation master. Many of his reincarnations, such as the Minling translator
Lochen Dharma-shri, were able to contribute to Buddhism and it seems that he has taken
rebirth as a number of tertons (treasure-revealers).
Do you have memories of past lifetimes?
From the time that I started going to India and meditating I did start getting memories
that were fairly unclear. Just a few days ago, I was sitting with a lama and one of the
things he said to me was that you have a very good imprint of many strong past lives, and
therefore your realization will come more swiftly than some people’s.
What did he mean by that?
I can’t really explain it. But with something like ngondro, if you practice and
practice and dissolve into the emptiness with the practice and you are concentrating on
bodhicitta more than anything else, you will probably start to slowly dissolve the veil of
who you think you are into your true nature, which is a combination of all your lives. We
just have to remember them. This is where retreat is beneficial. Of course, as you
practice longer, you will develop some different siddhis. But none of them really matters.
What matters is what you do with your life.
In contrast to what that magazine had to say, whenever someone has asked me, are you a
tulku, what I
have consistently said is that I don’t believe it is very important who I was in my
last lives, I think it is important who I am in this life. And what I do in this life is
only important if I can ease the suffering of others, if I can somehow make the world a
better place, if I somehow serve Buddha and mankind, if I can somehow plant the seed of
bodhicitta in people’s hearts.
So contrary to the fact a lot of people think this recognition was some kind of sudden
discovery, it has been developing over a long period of time.
Oh, I have been doing serious meditation in my own pitiful way for probably twenty-seven
years.
That’s a long time. Are students supposed to call you any special title.
People call me all kinds of things, including four letter words. I respond to all of them.
When I walk into a room some people see a dog, some people see a cow; I am all of
what they see, it is their perception. But I do believe that buddhanature is in all of us,
even in a mangy dog lying in the gutter with fleas. That dog is Buddha to me. People can
call me anything they want, I respond to anything.
You gave a public talk in Santa Barbara recently.
I have given teachings recently. Always on Buddha’s teachings. The Dalai Lama has
said to me to concentrate on bodhicitta. This is what I feel that I would like to
do.
The Dalai Lama gave you personal instructions about teaching?
I wouldn’t say he has given me personal instructions about teaching. But he has given
me personal instruction and has invited me to come to other teachings of his. I
would also hopefully study with Trichen Rinpoche and Penor Rinpoche—these are a few
of the lamas that I think are quite sublime teachers and great masters, and I am lucky
enough to receive some time with them. Hopefully by sitting with them I will absorb some
knowledge or wisdom on how to transfer the little bit I have.
When you became a movie star, how did that affect your ego? Did it go out of control?
The teachings must have been hard to come by, considering that you were being fawned over
and/or reviled?
Even when I was in Japan, people tried to deify me, and the reason I left there was that
deification is truly a death trap. That is a reason why I kept my spiritual practice to
myself in America. I don’t think deification has been one of my biggest problems in
life because I am lucky enough to have understood a long time ago what adoration and power
really are about. I think the great obstacle was just a lack of understanding of the way.
There is a Buddhist slogan which says, "Work with the greatest defilements
first." What would you say is the greatest defilement you have had to face in this
life?
Not really understanding the difference between desire for spiritual perfection for the
benefit of all sentient beings, and feeding myself. This is where I was confused in my
youth: I thought that if I could spiritually feed myself to levels of great spiritual
attainment then I could do greater things in the world and it would be good for me and
therefore good for everyone else. I was just too ignorant and foolish to realize that the
basis we have to come from is first and foremost the benefit of all sentient
beings. This was a great obstacle for me and it caused me great suffering.
Do you think this recognition is a means to accelerating that process?
I hope so.
What meditation practices do you do?
I do ngondro, I do guru yoga, this is a great form of meditation for me. I do secret
practices that I am empowered to do.
Do you do prostrations?
Prostrations are my favorite thing in the universe. Right now I am just trying to simplify
all of the exalted practices that are probably over my head, all of the tantras I have
tried to learn, and I am just trying to concentrate on bodhicitta. Whenever I get
too esoteric into the realms of tantric stuff, I get a little bit lost. Then I find the
wisdom of my teachers when they say go back to the beginning and concentrate on
bodhicitta. I am not a highly realized being, I am not a great lama, I don’t have any
great practice. I am a very low person just trying to get to first base and the most basic
practice of a
bodhisattva. I am starting humble memorizations, meditations, and prayers.
How long do you practice for?
I don’t have a particular clock. I don’t keep track of exactly how long
I’ve practiced, but I’d say it’s usually two hours in the morning and two
hours at night. In the busy movie life of chaos and uncertain ego, where is your sense of
equilibrium?
How are you able to hold your seat in that world?
I don’t really care what other people think of me or say about me. When you ask what
gives me solace and eases samsara, it is Guru Rinpoche, the Lord Buddha and all the
protectors, dakas and dakinis. I walk forward into this town and give the little bit that
I am able to.
What other projects are you spending time on?
I want to be able to feed the children who are starving and sick in Tibet. I want to work
on projects primarily for children who are hungry and sick. We are also
trying recently to do something for people with eye problems in Tibet. Many of the
monasteries are in need of help. When that magazine said these inaccurate things
about my teachers, what they did not want to say is that I have traditionally donated
large sums of money to many different religious organizations. I have done it in
secret but it seems that what we call the press believes there is no profit in reporting
good deeds. They prefer bad news even if they have to manufacture it.
Part of this, I think, is their inability to reconcile the image of you on screen with
that of you as a spiritual man.
Acting is an art. It is supposed to be an art. One of my teachers said that art is the
mother of religion; by becoming one with ourselves and nature, one becomes one with god. I
am not saying that I am a great artist; I am probably a poor artist. But the point is I
was able through this vehicle to spread the dharma and help other religious institutions
around the world, from Jewish to Catholic to Hindu.
What do you do with all the unchecked anger that comes with working in this
back-stabbing business. As a Buddhist, how do you deal with it?
I’m human: when cut I bleed like everybody else. When this happens it is best to
bring your problems into your practice. By overcoming anger, hurt and attachment
we become stronger; you bring these before the Buddhas, before the protectors, and purify
yourself.
Your screen persona is that of the noble tough guy protecting the innocent and
downtrodden from gangsters, drug dealers and terrorists. In the characters you are
playing, you are forced to meet violence with violence. When you watch yourself on screen,
how do you reconcile the carnage
with the lifestyle of a man practicing the teachings of compassion and non-violence?
Well, I don’t think one has anything to do with the other. I think that art imitates
life and its function should be a perfect and accurate interpretation
of the way life really is, in all of its emanations. I am an artist trying to perfect his
craft, but at the same time I do have feelings about violence. I was
under a contract with Warner Brothers I could not get out of, and what they wanted me for
was the male action films. I was offered extraordinary
sums of money by other studios to do different types of movies and Warner Brothers would
not let me. Now that I’m out of that situation, this will
enable me to do the kinds of films I would really like to do, which certainly are
spiritual in nature and which will lead people into contemplation and
offer them joy.
Okay, last question. Acknowledging the inseparability of samsara and nirvana, what
would you say the best thing about being Steven Seagal is and what is the worst
thing about being Steven Seagal?
You know, I was sort of raised in Zen and I don’t really look at my life in terms of
best or worst.
I was asking from a relative point of view.
The thing I am most grateful for is teachers who have allowed me to have the little bit of
knowledge and wisdom that is now keeping me breathing.
I am grateful for the ability that I have on the screen to bring people happiness and joy
and the ability that I
will have in the future to hopefully bring people into the path of contemplation. In terms
of worst things, I
consider my worst enemies and my worst sufferings to be my greatest teachers, so there is
always another
side to these negative forces.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
