Infinite Love and Perfection of Wisdom

Infinite Love and Perfection of Wisdom

In opening and openness of heart there are typical signs. Some people get so high on love and bliss that they stop caring about everything else and stop using their mental discrimination. In terms of the three basic characteristics this means overdoing aliveness/love with the expense of knowing quality. Then there is a subtler form of this which I have a story of.

Couple of years back we had a special guest at our center in Finland. He was American lama who had really extensive training in vajrayana and hinduism but in the last 15 years had really diven deep into heart through teachings of Irmansyah Effendi. He spoke much the same way like Alex, "Top and bottom collapsed together, and exploded with infinite love in the heart.". 

I was really impressed by our lama friend's energetic skills. He had been a direct stdent of Dudjom Rinpoche and was trained since the age of 7 by him, so he got his skills down... but he was impossible to talk to. He would go on and on and on for hours on end, until people literally walked away. He was completely convinced that the heart path he followed was significantly better than any buddhist path he knew, and he knew all of them, though had not perfected his vajrayana practice. Listening him, I was like, "Oh really? And how many buddhas and rainbow bodies this path has produced...".

The problem was that he kept bypassing his emotions, always going back to his safe place in the heart when his own emotions started coming up. He had gotten really good at that, like the moment some dirt started showing up he had already shifted back to his safe place of immense and infinite love. It was nice and cute but completely pretentious, an ego trip. We had planned a course that he would teach at our place but the situation was so bad that I had to cancel it. He had mahasiddha bhumis open too.

I understand from my own experience of many years of professional kriya yoga practice which had really strong flavour of love, how great love feels for someone whose heart has been kicked in by the world and people who were supposed to love you. It is amazing and useful to a degree... but that's not the whole story of our mind/psyche and neither it is the whole story of practices.

The three characteristics are excellent guideposts.

It is curious that buddhist dharma describes perfection of wisdom or prajna paramita as a mark of buddhahood. Perfection of wisdom is born out of completing the whole vipashyana process, that is, realising emptiness of all phenomena. This is the first stage of buddhahood, perfection of the first 10 bhumis, hence arriving or abiding on the 11th bhumi, if you will.

Vajrayana buddhism is very particular about different bodies, like nirmanakaya, sambhogakaya and dharmakaya. In hinduism they never really made such divisions even if they discuss Shiva (dharmakaya) and Shakti (sambhogakaya) principles. Buddhism is very insistent on this point and it has both pros and cons. The con is that because most practitioners are unable to stabilise knowing awareness (rigpa), they misunderstand the meaning of emptiness. You know, mosts buddhists don't look like they enjoyd life very much. Ha. I think the constant discussion about the empty nature of this and that, and me and other makes buddhists go a bit lifeless and boring. But, emptiness itself is far from lifeless and boring. Good side of separating bodies is that at least theoretically it brings much more clarity than without the separation. I think that it is because of this very emphasis why buddhist practitioners are much more succesful in their practice than hindus are, at least based on what I know. And having said that the division between bodies from the point of view of big picture or dzogchen is completely artificial. I see it as a pedagogical tool because it helps with the learning of it but purity of emptiness is not all there is to buddhanature. There is also light and colours, like there is in all life. This is something that only dzogchen teachings talk about.

So, again speaking of three basic characteristics of the natural state, there is a good reason why clarity or knowingness of given more emphasis in the beginning until rigpa become stable with the opening of the 11th bhumi. Looking at our lama friend's and Alex's cases, even such advanced practitioners who have all bhumis open can apparently be mislead by the samsaric experience of infinite love. It is precisely because of this why buddhism is so much more successful in yoga. I base my statements about success and failure of paths on bhumi analyses (OHBM).

Heart and it's ability to feel love is very meaningful but without clarity it leads astray. Again, buddhahood comes through perfection of wisdom, not through perfection of emotion, such as love.

-Kim Katami, 4.9.2019

Open Heart Sangha,

www.en.openheart.fi

Not Having A Lineage By Thinley Norbu Rinpoche

Not Having A Lineage

By Thinley Norbu Rinpoche

from Magic Dance

"Some people think lineage depends on a teacher. Especially some easterners believe that westerners cannot have lineage because they are not linked from birth to a spiritual teacher. Unless we are nihilists and believe only in the visible, we cannot judge the spiritual qualities of someone who has no visible teacher in this life. If someone takes water from the tap because we have not seen them take it from the source, is this reason to say it is not water? On a pilgrimage, pilgrims need a guide at first, but when they know the path, they can go alone. In the end, just because they have no visible guide, we cannot say they do not know the path. Of course, for most people lineage depends on a visible teacher and in general if we can find a good teacher it is necessary to have a guide. But according to the Buddhist tradition, if we believe in karma, we believe that because some people had a visible teacher in previous lives and have experience with the pure essence of their elements, they can be reborn to become enlightened without depending on a visible teacher in this life. Even if we have one hundred teachers, when we separate from our natural mind, we have broken lineage. Even if we have no teacher, when we are connected to our natural mind, we have true Wisdom Mind lineage."

Chatral Rinpoche doubting Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche

Chatral Rinpoche doubting

Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche

A few days into offering these empowerments, I met Chatral Rinpoche. His appearance was striking: he wore coarse felt garments and had a prominent nose and a Khampa bearing. Our conversation began like this:

"You, lama! Where are you from?" he demanded brusquely.

"I am from Nangchen.”

"From where in Nangchen?"

"I am a descendant of Chokgyur Lingpa.”

"I've been to Tsikey and I didn't see you there.”

"I didn't always stay at Tsikey.”

"Then where are you from? Out with it!"

"Chokgyur Lingpa's daughter, Konchok Paldron, had four sons one of whom

was my father.”

"Hmmm ... hmmm ... I had heard that you were supposed to be the nephew

of Neten Chokling. I know him from Dzongsar, where he came to visit Dzongsar Khyentse, but I've never heard that he had a lama nephew. Now I hear that our Dudjom Rinpoche is receiving the Three Sections from such a nephew, and we all know that plenty of these so-called Khampa lamas come here to Central Tibet to try out their various tricks. So, I was wondering if you were just another one of them. Hmmm...”

He was staring at me with his big eyes glaring the whole time.

”A lot of Khampa lamas come here and cheat people by giving empowerments to which they have no lineage."

Dudjom Rinpoche, who was sitting right there, broke in and said,

”It was I who asked him to give this transmission."

And soon they began to crack one joke after another, during which Chatral

Rinpoche turned to me with a smirk and said,

”Okay, I guess you are not a fake after all. You can go ahead and give him the empowerment then."

- From Blazing Splendor, p. 304, Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche

Eating meat by Shenpen Dawa Rinpoche

Eating meat

by Shenpen Dawa Rinpoche

(Dudjom Rinpoche's son)

Many, if not most of us, eat meat. I’m going to share some important

understandings regarding the eating of meat. Essentially we are eating one of our parent sentient beings. An animal has lost its life to feed your life. You need to remember this. Before you eat, be grateful that the animal has given its life for you. Renew your determination that by eating this meat you will practice well and dedicate all the merit to the animals. It is customary to first offer the meat — even the whole meal — to all the buddhas. Don’t just start eating. What you are eating becomes blessed when you offer it. Then think about all the positive things you will do, all the strength you will have by being nourished with this meat, this food. Dedicate the merit from this positive activity to them.

Eating meat has different meanings depending on your level of development.

For ordinary practitioners, giving gratitude and merit to the animals is the only thing they can do. Advanced practitioners bless the meat and it immediately turns into nectar. Even more advanced practitioners see that meat they are eating as part of their yidam. In that process, the animal receives total liberation. Literally, eating the meat is a blessing. When a great sage or extremely realized practitioner eats meat, it is not meat. It is liberation because this person has the power to liberate. To our eyes, it looks like he is doing something negative, but, in fact, what appears as negative is actually extremely positive.

When eating animals, be satisfied by consuming larger ones. That way, one life feeds many people. Why would you want to eat small animals, like small shrimp, twenty, thirty or forty of them at a time? A lot of lives are sacrificed in one shrimp cocktail. Believe me, all these animals living in the world, in our universe, are here to balance our ecosystem, not just to feed you. The animals are not in the world so you can eat them. We eat them out of necessity. If those animals disappear, it will unbalance the ecosystem. On the other hand, you need not worry about overpopulation of animals: nature will always rebalance the ecosystem through a cycle of balance and change.

Some of you are vegetarians or vegan for your health. Not everyone can be

vegan or vegetarian. It depends on what four generations of your ancestors have been eating. Only then can you change the habit to be a vegetarian. Until then, it is not in your blood system to become vegetarian. In an earlier time, we were all vegetarians.

That changed once we tasted the blood of animals. Our habitual system changed. If your ancestors were meat eaters and all of a sudden you change to being a vegetarian, you are diminishing your health. At the beginning, you will feel light, light headed, and weightlessness. Later, this will become total weightlessness. Eventually a sickness displays the imbalances in one’s air or lung. Yes, from the point of view of not taking life, it is good not to eat meat, but from the point of view of health, it may be essential to eat meat. (source)

Then particularly as practitioners when you are eating meat, have respect for the animal that has died and laid down its body for you.  Dedicate the merit. As you see the meat, dedicate it. There are different ways of eating meat depending on the level of your practice. The first basic level is to feel sorry for that animal that has laid down its life for you and that you are now partaking. Say, “whatever karma I get by taking this meat, may the strength I get from this being’s life be put into practice so that I can dedicate it for the benefit of others. Thank you for your gift. It is a gift that allows me to survive. I will put it into practice and I will dedicate the merit for all parent sentient beings. Thank-you for giving me that potential strength.” This is the least you can say when you eat the meat. If your meditation is a little bit higher than this then you transform the meat by the syllables Om Ah Hung. Purify by the three syllables and see the meat as nectar. Don’t see it as meat. Have respect for flesh and blood. It you want to go one step higher, as your Yidam, (main practice deity) you consume that meat as a means of liberation. You see it as a wrathful Buddha’s display that is now in front of you. For this the three satisfactions must be present; first, the satisfaction of the being you are consuming; second, the satisfaction of the Mandala; and third, the satisfaction of yourself as Yidam. Apply these satisfactions at this moment. Then, as Yidam, a wrathful Buddha, consume and liberate that being. Make sure you are able to liberate the being that embodied the piece of meat you eat. So then, to be clear here for this, the Mandala is satisfied, you are satisfied and the animal that has been killed is satisfied. Three satisfactions must come together.  This will only be possible once you have accomplished your Yidam practice to a certain extent. (source)

Dudjom Lingpa & Heart of Great Perfection

Dudjom Lingpa &

Heart of Great Perfection

Although I practiced in that way, when I encountered even a minor issue, I would lose my own grounding in the nature of existence and revert to ordinary states. For example, when I was alone and naked in the wilderness, if I were to become frightened when various ferocious animals and savages let out terrifying roars, I would be no different than an ordinary person. In that case, there would be no way I could be liberated in the intermediate period by way of such meditation. But with heartfelt faith and reverence I prayed to my guru, the Lake-Born Vajra, “Please grant me right now practical instructions for handling such circumstances!” Falling asleep with immense devotion, in a dream I had a vision of Orgyen Dorjé Drolö* appearing from an expanse of blazing fire and light, and he chanted the lyrics of this Hūṃ song: [479]



*Orgyen Dorjé Drolö refers to Guru Rinpoche, Padmasambhava



Hūṃ Hūṃ! Supreme being, Vajra of Pristine Awareness,
Hūṃ Hūṃ! do you understand the common thread of the three realms of saṃsāra
Hūṃ Hūṃ! as dualistic grasping at the apprehender and the apprehended?
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Do you understand both the object and the subject
Hūṃ Hūṃ! as two thoughts?
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Do you understand the joys and sorrows of this life and future lives
Hūṃ Hūṃ! as delusive experiences?
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Do you understand daytime appearances, nighttime appearances, the physical world, and its sentient inhabitants
Hūṃ Hūṃ! as experiences of light and dark?
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Do you understand the joys, sorrows, environment, and friends of this life
Hūṃ Hūṃ! as dream experiences and delusive appearances,
Hūṃ Hūṃ! and know that they are equally unreal?
Hūṃ Hūṃ! As vast as the physical world and its sentient inhabitants are,
Hūṃ Hūṃ! they do not extend beyond the expanse of space.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Although space has no periphery or center,
Hūṃ Hūṃ! it does not extend beyond the expanse of pristine awareness.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Buddhafields and excellent buddhas
Hūṃ Hūṃ! are the face of your own ground, the nature of existence.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Do not mistake the buddhas as being autonomous.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! I shall cut off the errors of the māras above.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Enemies, demons, bad companions, and your surroundings
Hūṃ Hūṃ! are delusive experiences of conceptual, dualistic grasping.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Do not regard them as anything other than reification.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! I shall destroy the errors of the māras below.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Daytime and dream appearances
Hūṃ Hūṃ! are reified and clung to as names and things. [480]
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Even though you know emptiness for yourself,
Hūṃ Hūṃ! do you understand thoughts as aspects of your own nature?
Hūṃ Hūṃ! While you understand all of saṃsāra and nirvāṇa
Hūṃ Hūṃ! as the primordial expanse of the absolute space of the ground,
Hūṃ Hūṃ! do you understand them as nondual displays [of pristine awareness]?
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Appearances of these creative expressions slip into the essential nature of uniform pervasiveness,
Hūṃ Hūṃ! releasing themselves into that expanse.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Do you understand that there is no practice of meditation?
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Inwardly there is the bondage of grasping at the “I.”
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Outwardly there is grasping and clinging to objects.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Meditation in between is immaterial.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Do you understand that the gateways of
Hūṃ Hūṃ! outer and inner conditions obscure the face
Hūṃ Hūṃ! of the Great Perfection of saṃsāra and nirvāṇa?
Hūṃ Hūṃ! First, by investigating, understanding will come.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Next, by meditating, experiences will arise.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Finally, by resting, realization will come.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Once realization has occurred, it is nondual with simultaneous liberation.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Objects and subjects together
Hūṃ Hūṃ! are awakened in the mother’s space of the great expanse.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! My emanations and I
Hūṃ Hūṃ! have never been separated.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Their essential nature is the illusion of my own creative expressions.
Hūṃ Hūṃ! Like the dissolution of the apparitions of an illusionist,
Hūṃ Hūṃ! they are nondual in absolute space. Phaṭ Phaṭ!

With those words he became nondual with me, and an experience arose of my great appearances pervading all of saṃsāra and nirvāṇa. From that time onward, [481] due to this sign, I knew that these were pith instructions for collapsing the false cave of appearances.

To expand on this just a little, (1) seek out the source of names, (2) destroy grasping at the permanence of things, and (3) collapse the false cave, which is primordially liberated within your own mindstream, by knowing and realizing all of saṃsāra and nirvāṇa.

1. Seek Out the Source of Names

By investigating and analyzing the tenacious grasping of saying the name “I” and grasping at the thought “I am,” you find that the basis of designation of everything—including the flesh, blood, and bones, throughout the exterior and interior of the body, and from the crown of the head down to the soles of the feet—is nonobjective and empty. Then continue to expose the error by also seeking out each of the specific names of the head, feet, arms, joints, and so on. As for the way to investigate all manners of establishing names and conventions in the external environment, by seeking out the name house, for example, in terms of its exterior, interior, upper, and lower areas, and its clay, stones, and so on, it disappears by itself. Earth becomes pottery; and the names of the upper and lower sections of stones, the tops and bottoms of trees, and so forth naturally disappear from where they are, and through transformation and modification they become water mills, stoves, pillars, and beams. Water becomes tea, fire becomes the flame of a butter lamp, air becomes a gust in a bellows, and so on. Reveal the fallacy in each of these cases that the bases of designation of such transformations, cessations, and disappearances [482] cannot be ascertained.

Translation by Alan Wallace