Natural stability.

Recently, some Dharma friends and I were discussing the natural stability that we find when resting in the natural state and we came upon a useful metaphor that is worth sharing: that natural stability in our meditation is like the buoyancy of the body in saltwater. 

Our bodies naturally float when they are put in the correct position. When our head and lungs are properly positioned, we can find a lot of natural stability and ease in the water quite effortlessly. It often takes really simple corrections to get the body into the correct position, and then we find that we can relax into the natural stability of that state. 

It is much the same in meditation, by relying on the correct technique (such as the three immovables),  we put our awareness in the correct position to discover natural stability. When relying on this technique, oftentimes small corrections can have profound effects. We don't need to manufacture stability, or put in a lot of effort to make it happen. Rather, we are allowing the natural stability of awareness to come to the fore. 

What we are discovering in this type of meditation is our natural condition, the nature of our own mind. Stability, clarity, peaceful, satisfied, these are all qualities that are naturally present when we are resting in the natural state. By learning to rest naturally, we are not so overwhelmed by our day to day interactions. Like a buoy out at sea, we become an island of safety and a source of refuge for those who are lost at sea. 

What holds Buddhas back?

A fundamental principle in the Buddha's teachings is that all beings have buddhanature. This buddhanature is the nature of our own mind, and though it is always fully evident it often goes unrecognized. Instead of embracing the path of becoming buddhas, or being buddha (which really means the path of waking up, or being awake), we find ourselves entangled in the mess of life with all of our problems. As the Buddha says:

Noble child, all beings, though they find themselves with all sorts of afflictions,
Have a tathagata-garbha that is eternally unsullied, 

and that is replete with virtues no different from my own.

Tathagatagarbha Sutra

If the tathagatagarbha, or buddhanature, is our fundamental nature of mind, why does it go unrecognized and why we do lack fulfillment?

There are four obscuring factors that keep us entangled in the afflictions: cognitive obscurations, emotional obscurations, habitual tendencies and karma. The work of the path of waking up and actualizing our buddhanature is to untie these ropes and release ourselves from bondage. The path of liberation is the path of freeing ourselves from these shackles and actualizing the resultant state, which is our innate buddhanature and natural awakened mind.

Cognitive obscurations are obscuring factors of our understanding and view of who we are and the nature of the world around us. All of us have bias, views we hold to as true, and cultural associations that go unquestioned. The work of untying the knots of cognitive obscurations is to shine a light on the way we actually think and perceive the world around us and our place in it. 

Emotional obscurations are the five primary negative emotions: attachment, aversion, confusion, jealousy, and arrogance. Each of these emotions overwhelms our minds and is centered on me and mine. It is not that these emotions are inherently bad or can't be used for good, but that in the presence of these emotions we often go blind and function solely out of reactive, self-centered impulses. The work of untying the knots of emotional obscurations is to find space amidst the emotions, so that we can work and respond to the energy that is coming up rather than becoming overwhelmed by that energy and reacting impulsively. 

Habitual tendencies are subtle and hard to break. So much of our conditioning comes from our childhood and from our culture, so much so that we don't usually know why we do the things we do or care about the things we think we care about. Habitual tendencies are hard to break because they are the rails or ski tracks that our day to day life is built around. It is so hard to break out of the tracks, and even if we manage to escape for a moment, it is also very easy to slip back in. The work of untying the knots of habitual tendencies is to introduce a fresh fall of snow powder over the terrain, and then do the hard work of charting a new course through the fresh powder. 

Karma is our actions and the results of our actions. Karma is also hard to untie because we cannot undo the past. All of our past actions have led us to the present moment, and that is what we have to work with. The good news is that all of our current actions are creating the moments of our future, and so we can give our future self the gift of good actions that we can later enjoy. As long as we operate in this world we always have karmic conditioning and karmic relationships. Karma doesn't need to be a binding force, as we learn to work with karma on the path you can start to recognize how everything is naturally free in its own place, even if things aren't quite the way you would have liked them to be. The present is the only moment you have to work with, so work with it. 

As we loosen the shackles of these four binding forces, gradually our own true nature becomes more and more evident. Much like gold is slowly extracted and refined from its ore, so too our awakened mind is gradually revealed and made fully evident. 

A rare gift to share with the world.

 Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.

Simone Weil

Who do you care about most in this life? Who needs your help, your insight, your wisdom? How do you even begin to help those in need, the poor, the destitute, the hungry? 

Here is the secret: 

Start with attention. 

Start with being present for that person, acknowledging them, listening to them, giving them the gift of being seen. 

Attention and presence are the ground upon which change and a path to better are built. You might not know the solutions to their problems, you might now be able to see all the steps between where you are and where you would like to be, you probably don't know the next best action or the right thing to say. But you can establish that ground, you can be present and bring forth the gift of attention.  

Your presence and attention can be the ground upon which the long arc of building a better future can start to be built. 

The thing Buddhism gets right.

 Much can be said about the Buddha's teachings, about the importance of meditation, wisdom, compassion, how we are all interconnected. Of course, many other spiritual traditions share these same attributes. Here is what Buddhism really gets right:

The focus of the practice is on our own mind. 

This practice is going to take awhile. 

You are not to jump right to benefitting others and compassionate activity. You should not get lost in working in projects outside yourself. Bring the focus inside, learn to recognize your own needs, your own wounds, your own limitations. 

As you learn to open your own mind, to heal your own heart, you naturally become more open and available to others. 

You can't shortcut this step. There is no escaping this requirement, if you try to avoid it then it will always be a limiting factor in your life. 

You are the limit, and the throttle. 

Dharma Conversations Podcast

 

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Dharma Conversations is produced by the Younge Drodul Ling Sangha and aims to connect new and experienced practitioners for mutual inspiration, growth and support. Dharma conversations are some of the greatest gifts that we can offer to ourselves and others, drawing out questions that are often unanswered and unexplored. They create wellsprings of reflection and insight in our own life and practice. The conversations that we have shape how we understand ourselves, how we interpret the world, and how we treat each other. They honor the difficulty that we all face and the complexity of what it means to carry the practice into our everyday life. By listening, asking questions and sharing our own experience and struggles, we can open a doorway to meaningful friendship and a supportive community.

Join us for Dharma Conversations, where we pursue wisdom and compassion to awaken inner life, outer life, and life together.

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Here's one of our recent conversations:

Exploring Mind and its Nature

The mind is central to the path of liberation and the journey of self-discovery. The mind is simultaneously readily apparent to us and yet a mystery. It is the basis for all of our experience, and yet not understood. Understanding the mind is the key to understanding who we are, the nature of the world around us and our place in it.

In the Four Dharmas of Gampopa, we are instructed to turn our mind towards the Dharma. The meaning of Dharma can be interpreted in different ways. Dharma can mean the Buddha's teachings, but Dharma can also refer to that which is authentic or true. Dharma can also mean phenomena, or the reality of our life and experience. In this way, turning our mind towards the Dharma means looking into the reality of our own life and experience in order to find what is true or authentic. We should explore our own mind, using the wisdom and insight of the Buddha and the many great teachers that have come before us, to discern what is meaningful and true in our own life.

This practice of looking at the mind is the basis for the practice of vipashyana or insight. The hallmark of the Buddha's teachings was insight into the nature of mind and the nature of reality. Exploring mind and its nature sets us out on a journey through the landscape of our own mind in search of that which is authentic and true.

WHAT IS MIND?

Before we can understand the nature of mind, we need to understand the mind itself. What is mind or consciousness?

The Buddha's perspective on mind is particularly helpful in opening up an doorway to the nature of mind. The Buddha taught consciousness as one of the skandhas or aggregates. The aggregate of consciousness is composed of either six or eight consciousnesses, depending on whether you are following the Hinayana or Mahayana perspective. Each of these eight (or six) consciousnesses are included within our experience of mind, and yet none of them by themselves are 'mind'. The Buddha would say that there is no mind, mind itself is an aggregate of experience and we should understand it as such.

The eight types of consciousness taught in the Mahayana sutras are the alaya or foundational consciousness, the afflicted or defiled consciousness, the mental consciousness, and the five sense consciousnesses (sight, sound, smell, taste, touch). Together, these eight form the basis of our experience of who we are and the world around us.

The alaya consciousness is the foundational consciousness that forms the stream of our mental continuum. Mipham Rinpoche describes it in the Adornment of the Middle Way:

The state of consciousness that is mere clarity and knowing, which does not veer off into active sense cognition, and which is the support of habitual tendencies, is called the alaya-vijnana, the consciousness that is the universal ground. The Cittamatrins consider that this is essentially neutral, neither positive or negative. It is an awareness of the mere presence of objects and it arises in a continuity of instants. It is attended by the 'five universal mental factors', such as contact. It does not have a specific object of focus but observes the world and beings in a general, overall manner.

The alaya or foundational consciousness is this bare state of mere clarity and knowing. It is not focused or caught up in the particulars of our experience, but it is also the ground upon which our experience is created. As Mipham describes, this alaya consciousness possesses five universal mental factors which are present in any mental consciousness. These five factors are contact or sense impression, feeling, perception, intention and attention. The alaya consciousness as bare perception is aware of some thing in a general way. That thing makes a sense impression on the alaya and gives rise to a feeling or pleasure, pain or indifference. The qualities of that perception are perceived and intention directs our attention. Intention here isn't the gross intention of thoughts and or ideas, but consciousness moving towards that object and knowing it in some capacity (as attention). This bare state of mere clarity and knowing is normally outside of the experience of ordinary mind and only accessible to seasoned meditation practitioners, and yet, if we examine closely we can see this process playing out even on the level of our day to day consciousness.

The afflicted or defiled consciousness is the consciousness that interprets everything around 'me' and 'mine'. It is the narrative consciousness that is telling the story of who we are based on attachment and aversion to this confused sense of identity. Mipham describes the defiled consciousness:

The alaya, as the basis for the different habitual tendencies, is defined as mere clarity and knowing, whereas the defiled emotional mind is a clinging to the continuum of consciousness as being the self.

The experience of the alaya consciousness is interpreted through the defiled consciousness through the lens of identity. There are three main ways that we interpret or grasp to this sense of self: 1) self as independently existing, 2) self as the experiencer, 3) self as the agent of free will. We will explore those three types of self-grasping later, but any experience that we are having is interpreted through these confused notions of the self. The alaya consciousness is having some type of experience, and the defiled consciousness is 'selfing' the experience and narrating it in terms of its perceived identity. I see a lot of parallels between the defiled consciousness and what is called the default mode network by modern neuroscience.

The mental consciousness is what we normally think of as mind. It is the mind and its attendant mental states and mental objects. It is the thinking mind, the mind forming ideas and engaging in dialogue. It is the clear appearance of any of the sense consciousnesses in our subjective awareness. The five sense consciousnesses and the mental consciousness together create the entangled conception of what we normally consider 'mind'. My mind is aware of what I am seeing, hearing, feeling, thinking, touching, etc. What we are not usually aware of is how the mental and sense consciousnesses are influenced and shaped by the defiled consciousness, and the bare clarity and knowing of experience is largely foreign to us.

An important understanding is to be made regarding the sense consciousnesses and the perceived, supposedly external sense objects. The sense consciousnesses are interconnected with the sense organs and the sense object, such that they are not distinct separate entities. They arise conditionally based on mutual dependence. The key point here is that when we experience form, that form does not exist outside of consciousness as some kind of truly existing thing. It is experienced within consciousness, through this process of contact, feeling, perception, and mental formations eventually giving rise to our experience of form, but that form is not how it actually exists. This is confusing, I know, here is what Mipham has to say about our experience of the external world:

The Cittamatra approach emphasizes the fact that no matter how real and solid external objects seem, all experience of them- including our knowledge about them and their apparently objective constitution- occurs wholly within the sphere of consciousness. This carries the important implication that even if one accepts the objective existence of phenomena separate from mind, their extramental mode of existence, if such there is, is by definition unknowable. To reach beyond the mind and to experience phenomena exclusively from their side, in a complete self-contained objectivity, is as impossible as it is for us to climb out of our own skin. Indeed, the very supposition that there is a 'mind' and that there is a 'world', and that there is a separation between the two, are themselves mental events.

This is definitely controversial to the western scientific mind. We have entire fields of physics that define very clearly the laws of nature. But remember, we are not talking about if the external world exists, but rather how it exists. We take our sense perceptions to be real, to be valid and unerring and true. Is that the case? How could we possibly know? Is our perception of a tree more real than a bug's perception of a tree? But surely there is a tree there, right? What if we changed all of our sense organs, so that we perceived the entire range of energetic potential, what would we perceive then? Would that be the real world? The simple conclusion is that we can only know anything through mind, and thus we can be confident that our experience of the world is conditioned and partial. Knowing that we can open our perspective to appreciate a broader and more complex reality.

The key point of our discussion on mind is that mind itself is an aggregate of experience. It is not a thing, or a substance. Some examples of how these eight consciousnesses come together to create our experience of 'mind' can be helpful. Let's take for example someone who was born with all five sense consciousnesses operating, but at some point lost their vision. Their experience of themselves and their world would be dramatically altered upon losing their vision, and yet, they would maintain a consist narrative of who they were, their 'self' would remain intact. What happens if this person were to lose their hearing as well?  How would their experience change? How would their understanding of the world change? Would they maintain a coherent sense of self as their own mind? Undoubtedly they would.

What about when we are dreaming? Dreams are interesting because none of our five sense consciousnesses are operating and yet we can still experience the five senses in a dream. What we are seeing in our dream is not actually what are eye faculties are seeing, and yet we have clear appearances in our dreams. The experience of dreams is really the aggregate of experience of the alaya-consciousness, the defiled consciousness and the mental consciousness. The imprints or seeds of memories and conditioning factors (karma) planted in the alaya consciousness ripen in the dream state and are projected into the mental consciousness (the sixth consciousness). The defiled consciousness is still narrating the dream in terms of self, even though the self of the dream can be different that your waking state self. The experience of the sense consciousnesses in dreams arises due to our conditioned way of experiencing the world. The dreamscape is not real by any means, but a habitual perception based on past conditioning (rarely do people dream of past centuries- imagine having a dream like you were in the dawn of the agricultural era and experiencing the world through that lens, you couldn't even conceive of it).

So we have some idea of what our experience of the mind might be like without the five sense consciousnesses dominating our experience, but what about the experience of mind free from the defiled consciousness? Can we experience the mind free from the narrative of self and other, me and mine? There are many ways that this type of experience can be cultivated (certain psychedelics, ecstatic experiences, life changing events, breathing techniques, dream and sleep yogas, etc), but one of the most practical methods is through contemplation and meditation. Through contemplation and meditation we can break down the habitual mode of apprehending the self and mind.

Once we understand what the mind is, we can turn our attention to really examining the mind itself and gaining a better perspective on the nature of the mind. This becomes the focus of the practice of vipashyana, or insight.

Two perspectives on mind.

I've been playing with two perspectives on mind that are interesting to think about and examine. One is an inside-out perspective (which you will probably recognize to some extent) and the other is outside-in.

Both of these are modeled after the Buddha's understanding of the development of mind. Some of these concepts might be new, but they are all easily recognized once you get used to the layout.

First, let's consider the inside-out perspective.

We start with the (1) nature of mind, non-dual awareness and emptiness, luminous emptiness, the very ground of all. Not recognizing the empty aspect of the nature of mind, we mistake the apparent aspect as the ground of being (alaya), thus establishing the (2) alaya consciousness, or the foundational consciousness in which we conceive of a subjective self. This foundational consciousness becomes the stream of our mental continuum, in which the seeds of all our actions are planted. The alaya consciousness is accompanied by the five universal mental factors that operate in every mind (contact, sensation, perception, intention, attention).

From this alaya consciousness, we start to complete the development of the (3) eight consciousnesses. From the alaya consciousness develops the narrative or afflicted consciousness, which orients everything around 'me' and 'mine', consciousness becoming the narrator of its own experience. From this narrative consciousness comes the development of the mental thinking consciousness and the five sense consciousnesses (sight, sound, smell, taste, touch). This marks the complete development of the mind, with its division into the eight consciousnesses (alaya, narrative, mental, and five sense).

From the development of consciousness, we have the development of the (4) five skandhas or aggregates of the self. The aggregate of consciousness gives rise to the aggregate of feeling, interpreting the contact between consciousness and its object as either pleasant, unpleasant or neutral. From the feeling skandha we have the aggregate of perception, discerning the qualities of the object. From perception we have the aggregate of mental formations, involving our particular concepts, beliefs, or philosophical views about the object. Finally, we have the aggregate of form, what we see, hear and experience appearing to us through the filter of our own consciousness and all of the layers that we have added on through our processing of that experience.

It is important to understand that the five skandhas or aggregates of the self are the way that we experience the world. Our everyday experience of interacting with the world is through consciousness, feeling, perception, mental formations and forms. This is the reality that we take to exist day in and day out.

This inside-out model of the mind leaves us feeling rather stuck. Our ordinary perceptions and experiences seem very concrete and real. The subtle layers of the mind seem very remote and distant compared to the ever present challenges we face day to day. We are in a sense 'caught' at the outer layers of the mind and our experience of the world.

Let's compare this to the outside-in perspective.

The process of development is the same in this perspective, but we are orienting ourselves differently. Here everything is contained within the (1) non-dual nature of mind, luminous emptiness that is the ground of all that appears and exists. Not recognizing the empty aspect of the nature of mind, we mistake the apparent aspect of the nature of mind as the ground of being (alaya), thus establishing the (2) alaya consciousness. From the alaya consciousness develops the narrative or afflicted consciousness, along with the rest of the (3) eight consciousnesses. All of this are included within the nature of mind and are inseparable from it.

From the development of consciousness, we have the development of the (4) five skandhas or aggregates of the self. These five aggregates are all contained within the aggregate of consciousness, such that there is nothing that we experience that is outside of mind. The outer world that we are experiencing is not separate from us, but we are entangled in a web of dependent origination in which interconnected phenomena are mistakenly taken to exist separately and individually. This is not to say that there is no outer reality at all, but that reality does not exist as we think or believe it to exist.

This perspective actually makes a lot of sense. We know that some people in our life have very different perspectives on what they think is real. Which of those perspective is more correct? Is it yours? Are you sure? I think we could all agree that a child's perspective about what is real in the world is probably a little bit mistaken. But are we so much more wise than a child?

The outside-in perspective opens up doorways to fundamentally challenge and change your perspective about who you are and the world in which you live. You are what you think, as is the world. Your view, or vision, shapes your experience of reality. When you start to appreciate that all of this is the expression of the true nature of mind and the very nature of reality, you can also appreciate the potential and capacity this perspective presents.

Contemplate. Meditate. See what you discover.

Upcoming Online teachings

We have some online events coming up in the next few days and weeks.

Waking Up Humanity: Online teachings by Younge Khachab Rinpoche
April 11 at 8am PDT
Rinpoche will be offering practical advice for Dharma practitioners during these difficult times.

Tsa Lung Course
April 12 - May 3, 2020
Tsa Lung is a Tibetan healing yoga and pranayama used to purify the body. Rinpoche has advised all of his students practice Tsa Lung to strengthen our immune systems and to promote a calm and stable mind during these challenging times. This four week online course will teach you the Tsa Lung yogas and provide foundational materials for understanding the practice.

Distancing yourself.

You've followed the advice of self-distancing. You have your store of rations for another week or so. You are working from home, homeschooling, calling your friends and family from afar.

Now you are stuck with these thoughts and emotions that consume your attention.

The impulse to check the news is compelling. What are the new numbers? What is the latest advisory? What are those common symptoms again?

These thoughts are all-consuming and when we are full we are left with an unsettled feeling. Know that it is perfectly normal to have these thoughts and emotions, but that we don't need to give them all of our attention. Just like an annoying coworker, we need to continue to work with them day in and day out, but we don't need to give them all of our attention.

I've found my daily practice an undeceiving refuge in these times. Retreat from the headlines. Isolate yourself from the all consuming thoughts and the attendant anxiety.

Just sit. Connect with the natural peacefulness of the present, even amidst all the tumult.

If you cannot simply rest in equanimity, it is helpful to have something to do. I've been practicing the Iron Hook of Compassion every day. Singing the melody and mantra have a way of opening up the heart and throat at a time when it is easy to shut down and close ourselves off. Afterwards, rest in a sense of openness and ease for as long as you can.

Build these moments into your day. As many as you need. Learning to be present when you are alone is a great gift to yourself during times such as these.

March Meditation Workshop

Meditation Workshop:
Distinguishing Mind and Awareness 

***Remember this Sunday March 8 is also Daylight Savings Time***

Event to be held at the following time, date, and location:  Sunday, March 8, 2020 from 10:00 AM to 12:00 PM (PDT) Wise Orchid Taijiquan & Qigong 2002 East Union Street Seattle, WA 98122 View Map

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Join us for a weekend workshop on the foundations of the Dzogchen view and meditation. Dzogchen, or the Great Perfection, is the heart essence of all of the Buddha's teachings. These teachings reveal our own true nature in a simple but direct way. Be introduced to the unique Dzogchen view Learn how to recognize and rest in the nature of mind Learn how the practice of resting unfolds to reveal awareness Understand how we stray in the practice and how to eliminate errors in our meditation Share this event on Facebook and Twitter. See you on the cushion!

A metaphor for timeless freedom.

ཡེ་གྲོལ་
Tibetan: ye-drol
English: timeless freedom, liberated since the beginning, eternally free, already free

In Tibetan, there is a common metaphor for understanding the spacious awareness of rigpa, which is that of a thief entering an empty house. The meaning of the metaphor is that the thief has nothing to gain by entering an empty house, and the house has nothing to lose. When we have a decisive experience of resting in rigpa, or open presence, we experience the timeless freedom of that state and understand the significance of the metaphor.

Another way we can understand the metaphor for yedrol or timeless freedom is to imagine a room. The room accommodates everything that is taking place in the room, you might change the furniture around, make a mess, clean up, have fun with your family, or get in a vicious fight. The room accommodates it all. The spaciousness of the room is unchanging and ever-present. Recognize that for a moment, it's also your nature.

From the perspective of open presence, many things happen in our day. We are busy, dealing with problems and challenges. We are interacting with our families, friends, neighbors and community. We sit alone, we sit among others. We are silent, we are talking. We are awake, we are tired, we rest, we move. All of our day plays out in the spacious awareness of rigpa.

This awareness is timelessly free. It has never known bondage and yet within that space we have been tied up in knots and untied ourselves countless times. Distinguishing between mind and rigpa, we can see how this is possible. Mind goes through endless manifestation and fluctuation. Rigpa is beyond mind, it is the open presence in which mind plays itself out endlessly.

Getting caught up in mind, we struggle with ourselves and with the world around us. Recognizing rigpa, we recognize we are already free.

February Meditation Workshop

Meditation Workshop:
Tibetan Healing Yoga and Pranayama

Event to be held at the following time, date, and location:  Sunday, February 9, 2020 from 10:00 AM to 12:00 PM (PST)  Wise Orchid Taijiquan & Qigong 2002 East Union Street Seattle, WA 98122 View Map

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Tsa Lung is a Tibetan healing yoga that works with the subtle body of the channels and winds using breathing techniques and physical movements. Learn the fundamentals of the practice, how the channels and winds affect the mind, and experience how the practice calms the mind and induces a natural meditative equipoise. No prior meditation experience necessary, advanced students welcome. Learn about the relationship between breath and mind Practice the physical yogas of Tsa Lung Learn how to work with subtle objects of meditation Learn how to recognize and rest in the nature of the mind

Upcoming Meditation Workshop

Meditation Workshop:
Exploring the Mind

Event to be held at the following time, date, and location: Sunday, January 12, 2020 from 10:00 AM to 12:00 PM (PST)  Wise Orchid Taijiquan & Qigong 2002 East Union Street Seattle, WA 98122 View Map

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Share this event:

Join us for a weekend workshop on the practice of vipashyana or insight. Learn how to meditate, ask questions, engage in dialogue with other practitioners. Learn the foundational practices for exploring the inner landscape of your mind, recognizing your own true nature, and setting yourself on a journey of self-discovery and awakening. No prior meditation experience necessary, all students welcome. Be introduced to the key points of exploring the nature of mind Learn how to explore the nature of mind using various techniques Learn how recognize the innate qualities of the nature of mind Understand how we stray in the practice and how to eliminate errors in our meditation Share this event on Facebook and Twitter. See you on the cushion!

Spacious awareness.

In Dzogchen, our true nature is introduced as rigpa, or awareness. When we receive the pointing out instructions, rigpa is what is pointed out in our own experience. Awareness is not such a great translation of rigpa, because we already have a constructed meaning for awareness. That is why in Dzogchen texts you often find rigpa (Tib. rig-pa) translated as intrinsic awareness, open presence, or simply left as rigpa.

Put a cup in front of you. Notice the experience of ordinary awareness. It's something like, "I, Greg, am aware of the cup." It's very dualistic, separate, distinct. There is the subjective awareness observing a perceptually real external object. This is not what we mean by awareness or rigpa.

Rigpa is not dualistic. Take another look at the cup. This time shift your attention to the space between you and the cup, around the cup, in the cup, the three dimensional space in which the cup is suspended. Mingle your awareness with that space.

Now look up and observe the room around. Mingle your awareness with the space in the room, such that your awareness and the space are inseparable. Rest in that state. Familiarize yourself with that state of open presence.

This is closer to the experience of rigpa. Not quite rigpa because you still have reference points, borders and limits, but you're quite close. As you gain stability resting in open presence and learn how to cut through fixation and grasping, eventually ever-present unobstructed awareness (rigpa) becomes fully evident.

In Dzogchen texts, you often find rigpa referenced as ying-rig. Ying (Tib. dbyings) means basic space, objective sphere, dimension, or field of reality. Rig means rigpa or awareness. So ying-rig means the inseparability of basic space and awareness, or the union of the objective sphere and awareness.

As Longchenpa states in the ninth chapter of the Choying Dzod:

Within the single expanse, supremely spacious by nature, awakened mind equal to space is pivotal.
Focus on this key point and distill it to its vital essence;
it is the greatest of the great- wholly positive and spacious enlightened mind. 
In its very essence, it thoroughly shatters the outer confines of reality. 
Within this single vast expanse, there is no duality of realization versus its lack, 
or freedom versus its lack, but a supreme state of equalness. 

Initially, it is hard to maintain this state of unobstructed awareness because we are easily ensnared by mind. Playing a game with a red dot can be an effective call to presence throughout your day, use it to mingle basic space and awareness. Eventually, everything in the phenomenal world becomes an ornament of awareness- whatever you think, see, hear, smell, taste, feel - as basic space and awareness mingle and become inseparable in a single non-dual expanse. 

Mingle your meditation with your daily life. Familiarize yourself with authentic presence on the cushion, and then skillfully carry it out into the world. 

Call to presence.

What is reminds you to be open, available and receptive?

When you get caught up in thoughts, emotions and busyness, how do you break free from the cycle of reactivity?

Try an experiment with me.

Any time you see a red dot, recognize it as a call to presence. In Tibetan you might call this a red thigle, but for our purposes any old red spherical object will do.

🔴

Whenever you see a red dot, take a moment to see it suspended within the expanse of your awareness. Like a red orb suspended in space, ornamenting your awareness. Rest in that open, expansive presence free of elaboration. Rest a moment and carry that openness with you as you go about your day.

You will get caught up in mind again. Don't worry. More red dots await you. Maybe buy some small red stickers and put them in places that you frequent. It will be like planting seeds of awareness in a battlefield of confusion. 

Waking up can be fun, an infinite game in which everyone wins. Go adorn your world with authentic presence.  

Lucid dreaming and dream yoga.

A well known but uncommon practice of the Buddhist meditative tradition is the practice of dream yoga. Most of what you hear about dream yoga is the spectacular stories and experiences people have during lucid dreaming. Everyone has heard the tale of flying in your dreams, or exploring unknown lands, the heavens, or even the depths of the ocean. These stories are often other-worldly and quite unlike our everyday waking experience, so they are fun to hear and talk about.

I am not going to discourage you from exploring the hidden territories and landscape of the dream world. Maybe you will find something that you are looking for, or come away with some insight that you can carry with you on your journey. At the very least, lucid dreaming is interesting and fun.

Dream yoga is a practice of waking up, gaining some insight into who we are so that we can recognize our true nature and show up in the world more fully. With this understanding, using lucid dreams to go on adventures or have a good time seems a little mundane. We start to realize that lucid dreaming also provides great potential for mining the depths of our own wisdom and manifesting our innate Buddha nature in a very experiential way. There are many ways to do this, but I invite you to consider a quote by the great master Padampa Sangye:

Go to places that scare you.  In haunted places, seek the Buddha within.  

Use the practice of dream yoga to wake up. Go to the places that scare you, that bring up fear. Use that fear to 'wake up' in the dream. A Buddha is 'one who is awake', and that is what lucid dreaming is all about, knowing that you are awake in the dream and that this is a dream. 

Think about your normal experience of a dream. You are normally immersed in the plot as it unfolds and have no power or control over what happens. You just go along for the ride as a bystander and are subject to experiencing the highs and lows of this subjectively real dream world as they come. Does this sound a little bit like waking life? 

Normally, it is only after we awaken from the dream that we discover freedom and a sense of relief, "Ah, thank goodness. That was just a dream." In dream yoga, the key difference is that you wake up in the dream, knowing it is a dream. When you wake up in the dream you discover a natural freedom because you know that what you are experiencing isn't real. It can't hurt you, it can change. 

"This is a dream. This isn't real. I am free." That's a nice sort of mantra for waking up in the dream.

With this insight, going to places that scare you is a powerful way to look at what you are holding onto. What is that monster? It looks terrifying, but what is it really? Who is it that is chasing you and what are you running from? 

Waking up in those dreams allows us to look at our own confusion and grasping. It allows us to invite the hidden recesses of our mind into the light. I see you, I hear you, I understand. Those are just as powerful in the dream world as they are in the real world. 

Waking up in this way, we might ask ourselves, "What would Buddha do?" As a Buddha, what would you do?

How does our wisdom and generosity show up in the world? How do we exercise compassion and patience in difficult situations? How do we maintain an open and responsive presence when we are in the midst of confusion and overwhelm? 

These are questions that we struggle with during the day, and questions that we can continue to work with during the night. 

Go confidently into the darkness. Find the light within.

Upcoming Meditation Workshop: New Location!

Meditation Workshop:
Bringing the Mind to Rest

Event to be held at the following time, date, and location:  Sunday, November 24, 2019 from 3:00 PM to 4:30 PM (PST)  Phinney Neighborhood Center Brick Building- Room 32 (Third floor) 6532 Phinney Ave N Seattle, WA 98103 View Map

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Join us for a weekend workshop on the stages of meditation. Learn how to meditate, ask questions, engage in dialogue with other practitioners. Learn the foundational practices for calming your mind, recognizing your own nature, and cultivating your own personal practice.

No prior meditation experience necessary, all students welcome.

• Be introduced to the key points of meditation
• Learn how to bring the mind to rest using various techniques
• Learn how recognize the innate qualities of the nature of mind
• Understand how we stray in the practice and how to eliminate errors in our meditation
  

Location details for Phinney Neighborhood Center

We are located in the lower Brick building at the Phinney Neigborhood Center. Parking is available for free onsite in both the upper lot by the Blue building, and in the lower lot by the Brick building. Meditation cushions and chairs will be available for use.

Hallmark of the Buddha's teachings.

There are many benefits to meditation- increased attention and self-awareness, decreased reactivity to negative thoughts and emotions, the ability to manage and self-regulate strong emotions, and the ability to work with difficult situations in our life. Each of these benefits is significant and important for developing a healthy mind and for being self-reliant in a challenging world.

The Buddha's teachings rely heavily on meditation, but it is insight into the true nature of your mind that is really the hallmark of the wisdom of the Buddha. The Buddha saw that the key to changing our minds and living a life of great purpose was tied to realizing emptiness or selflessness, or the interconnectedness of all things. This insight into selflessness fundamentally changes our perspective of who we are and the nature of the world around us.

The experience of emptiness or selflessness is not one of loss. It is not a blank void. It is not an experience of aloneness or meaninglessness. The realization of emptiness is also the realization of interconnectedness, which is the experience of fullness. There are many signs that we may experience upon realizing this wisdom of emptiness, such as awe, connection, love, openness, oneness, ineffability. There wisdom itself is utterly beyond description because it is beyond the confines of 'this' or 'that', and 'it is' or 'it is not'.

Even a glimpse of selflessness gives rise to more openness and empathy. Openness encompasses appreciation and receptivity, creativity and imagination, as well as tolerance of others opinions and values. That openness gives rise to more empathy and compassion for others. It engenders kindness, generosity and love for others as we move about our day.

The benefit of realizing the wisdom of selflessness is that it awakens our heart and mind and gives our life a sense of direction and purpose. We can navigate the world with a broader perspective and find space for reconciliation and resolution. All of the problems in the world, all of the conflict, opposition, contradictions; they all arise from taking rigid and confined positions based on our own perspective. Selflessness opens the door to a more inclusive and integrated understanding of the world around us and our place in it. 

There are many benefits to meditation, but the benefits of insight and wisdom into our true nature are even more significant and impactful. They bring benefit not only to our own life, but to the communities and neighborhoods in which we live.

Valid cognition.

How do we know what is true?

Valid cognition or pramana is a whole branch of study in traditional Buddhist training. Broadly speaking, there are two types of valid cognition: inferential and direct perception.

Inferential valid cognition is based on reason and logic. We can come to an authentic understanding of phenomena through reason and logic. You can study a system like the human body, understand how it works, all of its parts and pieces, and develop a lot of confidence in that understanding based on examination and analysis.

Direct perception (DP) is presented as four categories, but for our purposes understanding two is sufficient: sensory direct perception and yogic direct perception. Sensory DP is valid cognition based on one's sensory experience. You can learn about the differences between cabernet and pinot noir by reading and studying (inferential valid cognition), but this understanding is quite inferior to actually tasting the wine and discovering the differences based on your own experience. Notice however, that sensory and inferential valid cognition can actually serve to deepen and refine your understanding by mutually supporting each other.

Yogic DP is a non-conceptual valid cognition that directly perceives the true nature of phenomena. This type of valid cognition is reserved for practitioners in a deep meditative state that is free from conceptual elaboration or emotional turbulence. This awareness has a lucid clarity and is completely calm. It is with this lucid awareness that we can explore the inner landscape of the mind or the play of dependent origination. Because such a mind is free from limiting perceptions or biased reference points, it is considered the highest form of valid cognition.

As a practitioner traveling on the path of meditation, it is important to understand the significance of these two forms of valid cognition. Logic and reasoning have their place in your practice, as Ju Mipham describes "giving rise to the approximate ultimate." But this is not to be confused for the actual ultimate reality, which is solely the domain of yogic direct perception.

Learning to navigate life and death.

Our days seem to be ruled by disorder and chaos. Our culture is one in which we are constantly busy in the search of becoming and being something other, continuously moving away from the present and away from ourselves in search of something better.

The world around us seems to be coming apart, and yet there is a marked sense of creation and emergent potential. All around us we see the effects of change, based on an evolution of values, tastes and desires.

Navigating this chaos and disorder can be overwhelming. Every time we think we have made progress or found a firm footing, the ground underneath us changes and moves. At one time the world changed slowly, generation after generation living much the same. Now things seem to change by the days and weeks with no 'catching up' in sight. In an effort to be more present in our lives, we struggle against ourselves and find time slipping away. No matter how much we fight against the tides of change, there is nothing to hold onto and all we are left with is fear and uncertainty about the future, our future, the future of the world and the future of humanity. In the face of change and disorder, what will we, it, and I become?

In Tibetan, we find this word bardo (Tib. བར་དོ་), which is often translated as intermediate state. Usually we talk about the bardo as the transition state between this life and the next, the liminal space of the afterlife. The bardo is an in-between state, a threshold between one state and the next. In a sense, we can understand the bardo as a doorway, in which we cross over from one life into the next. We let go of the old world, the one that we knew, and step into the new and unseen.

As a threshold, the bardo represents a liminal state in which subliminal conditioning creates our experience. This in-between state of the afterlife is simply the mind experiencing itself, or the mind experiencing its appearances. Much like a dream, we have little control over what is appearing to the mind in the bardo. Taking these appearances as our reality, we get caught up in the throes of mind and end up in a powerless and fearful state. Powerless because we have no control.

Having not trained in understanding how the mind works and how the contents of our experience are not in fact the 'self', we have no choice but to suffer the bardo. In this case, we will desparately be looking for a way out, not being particularly intentional about the conditions or motivations for our next life or the next form our life takes.

The bardo is commonly understood this way in Tibetan Buddhism, but there are actually six bardos (or liminal spaces) that we can experience: 1) the liminal space of this life (from birth to death), 2) the liminal space of dreams, 3) the liminal space of meditative absorption, 4) the liminal space of dying (from last breath to dawning of luminosity), 5) the liminal space of the luminous true nature of reality, 6) the liminal space of becoming (taking on new life form).

The essence of the bardo is this liminal, in-between state; between birth and death, waking and sleeping, inhaling and exhaling, destruction and creation, becoming and being. If you take a close look at time, you will find time itself is liminal space, between one moment and then next. As we learn to spend time in this liminal state, the bardo of the ever-present reality, we have an opportunity to break free from the machinations of mind and our experience. We have an opportunity to encounter timelessness, the eternal now of the continuously unfolding present.

In this liminal state of lucid, open presence, you experience the body, but know you are not the body. If your body changes somehow, 'you' don't change with it. There is some aspect of 'you' that is not your body. You experience sensations, but know an aspect of awareness that is not those sensations. Sensations are an object of your awareness. You might notice your perception of things, but know you are not your perception. You encounter thoughts and ideas, but know you are not your thoughts and ideas. You encounter the five senses, but know you are not those experiences of the five senses.

As lucid, open presence, you witness the contents of your experience, but know 'you' are not the contents of your experience. Amidst a sea of change, you are discovering the ground of being. But the real question is, who is this 'you'? If you look for it, where can you find it? Any chance to grab hold of this elusive 'self' results in not finding anything to hold onto. The mind as clear awareness is like water running through your fingers, there is an experience of mind but nothing to hold onto.

When we have certainty that there is nothing to find, nothing to hold onto, nothing to call 'our own', then we simply rest with that ever-present clear awareness. This is the ground from which we can reorient ourselves and choose our way forward. No longer overwhelmed by the subliminal contents appearing in your experience, you are able to respond to the ever unfolding reality rather than react out of habits and conditioning. This ever-present awareness is a vehicle for navigating the bardo of this life, the bardo of death, and the bardo of this moment. It is the basis for participating in the creation of the world, of dancing in the eternal now between the world falling apart around us and the one emerging through our individual and collective actions.

There is no awakening within the bounds of time. We awaken to eternally present clear awareness in the luminous liminal space of the true nature of reality. Furthermore, there is no one who is awakened. There is only lucid, open presence on the threshold of being, in which there is a perpetual letting go and stepping into.

This is how to navigate life and death.