Author: Kadampa Ryan

Making progress when access to a center is difficult:  Why Dharma centers are important

Kadampa Ryan Making progress when access to a center is difficult

Practical steps for making manifest a center in our life

Dharma centers are important, very important.  But they arise only in dependence upon many different causes and conditions and they take on a variety of different forms.  If for whatever reason we do not have regular access to one we should take it as a sign that our job is to create the causes and conditions for one to appear in a way that we are able to easily and happily partake of it.

The primary cause for the appearance of a Dharma center in our life is the strong wish for it to do so.  If we don’t have this wish, even if we physically live in one, a “Dharma center” will not appear in our life.  To help us develop this wish, we can consider what Geshe-la has said about Dharma centers.

To begin, I would like to tell you that everybody should recognize how important Dharma centers are.  Teachers, managers and students should recognize that Dharma centers are extremely important for ourselves, our families and the general public.  Without Dharma centers, it is very difficult to maintain a pure spiritual life.  It is close to impossible to maintain a Bodhisattva’s way of life.  Without maintaining a Buddhist way of life, it is difficult to make progress on the spiritual path which gives us the real meaning of our human life.  …  With a connection to a Dharma center, we have the possibility to improve ourselves thanks to the Dharma.  Without Dharma centers, a meaningful life is difficult to find for ourselves, our family and others.  First, we must enjoy being in a Dharma center.  Then, everyone else, such as our parents, the other members of our family and our friends, will understand that we are happy, then they will rejoice for us and create a link with us.

Sometimes those who do not have regular access to a Dharma center can fall into the extreme of thinking Dharma centers are not important.  This is wrong.  As Geshe-la says, we must all recognize the importance of Dharma centers while we accept that our presently not having regular access to one is exactly perfect for our spiritual development.  Why?  Because of the opportunities not having one gives us to create the causes to have one appear in our life.

If we don’t have a Dharma center in our area, do what it takes to set one up.  Find other people in the area who are also interested in setting up a center and work with them to make it happen.  Contact the NKT office and ask them if they know of anybody else in our area who has expressed similar interest.  Write Geshe-la requesting a teacher be sent.  Invite the nearest National Spiritual Director to come give a public talk.  Start doing pujas together, even if it is just two of you (or even if you are alone).  Imagine that all of the people of your city are doing the pujas with you, making the strong request for a Dharma center to appear in your city.  Geshe-la has said his vision is for there to eventually be a Kadampa temple in every major city of the world.  This happening in our city may very well depend upon our personal wish.

There was a woman in Santa Barbara whose name was Lea.  She was all alone in her wish to establish a center, but she nurtured it and did everything it took to make it happen.  Through her unwavering wish and unending hard work, a center was eventually established in Santa Barbara.  Then Geshe-la came and did a California tour, and he wrote part of Essence of Vajrayana at this center.  Because that center was established, the Dharma came to Southern California.  From that center, eventually Los Angeles opened up as a “branch” of Santa Barbara.  Now there is a thriving spiritual community in the greater L.A. area, and this is just the beginning.  If the center in Santa Barbara did not exist, I would not be in the Dharma today.  If Lea had not had her initial wish, none of what currently exists and none of what is to come in Southern California would be.  It is said that the merit we accumulate from helping our Dharma center continues to grow for as long as the center exists.  The story of Lea and the Dharma in Southern California shows us how.

 

Making progress when access to a center is difficult:  Dispelling wrong views

Kadampa Ryan Making progress when access to a center is difficult

Dispelling wrong views about spiritual life when access to a center is difficult

It goes without saying that regular access to a Dharma center is good thing.  Geshe-la would not have worked so hard to establish Dharma centers around the world, nor implore us to help contribute to their development, if they were not supremely sacred objects in this world.  When explaining how one can nonetheless make spiritual progress without regular access to a center, there is a danger that some will misunderstand what is being said to mean Dharma centers are not important and we don’t need to make effort to make them part of our life.  Some people who do have regular access to a center think it is good if people think it is “bad” to not have regular access because then they will be motivated to overcome their “obstacles.”  Sometimes this is motivated by a genuine belief that regular access to a center is a necessary condition for spiritual progress, sometimes it is motivated by a perhaps unacknowledged attachment to people coming to the center.  Regardless of the reasons, some people are reluctant to explain how one can still make progress without regular access to a center.  I would say if one truly is compassionately motivated to help people gain regular access to a center they need to help people transform life without such access.  Why?  Because transforming our life in this way creates the karmic causes to one day have regular access.  And in the meantime, it enables people to get on with their spiritual life without grasping at “phantom obstacles” to their practice.

The first and most important thing to realize is all lives are equally empty, so they are all equally transformable into the quick path to enlightenment.  It is perfectly possible for somebody to have regular access to a Dharma center and teachings, yet make no spiritual progress at all; and likewise it is possible for somebody to never set foot in a Dharma center and make rapid progress to enlightenment.  To go one step further, all Dharma centers are equally empty.  Externally, all the trappings of a Dharma center may be present, but the members of the community lack, in Venerable Tharchin’s words, “realizations bound together by mutual love for one another;” and it is likewise possible that none of the external trappings of a center be present, but one nonetheless feels like they live every day in a Dharma center.  Some people, for example, are unable to make it to a Dharma festival.  But if during the time of the festival, the practitioner adopts “a festival mind” then everything that happens to them during festival time will be, for them, their “festival.”  Whether we have regular access to a Dharma center is, in the final analysis, a state of mind.  As soon as we adopt this state of mind, regardless of where we externally might find ourselves, we can validly experience ourselves as “being in a Dharma center.”

The difference between a qualified Dharma practitioner and a qualified Dharma teacher is similar to the difference between somebody who drives to work every day and a taxi driver.  Somebody who drives themselves around might know very well how to get from their home to their work in the city center, and they may even know a few short cuts which enable them to avoid most of the traffic.  But if you ask them how to get to their work starting from someplace else, they wouldn’t know.  An experienced taxi driver, however, knows all of the different routes one can take to get to the city center, regardless of where somebody started out.  They know all the routes, and indeed shortcuts, starting from anywhere to anywhere.  In the same way, a qualified Dharma practitioner will know how to transform the life they have led into the quick path to the City of Enlightenment, and they may even know a few shortcuts along the way; but they do not necessarily know how to transform a life other than their own into the quick path.  A qualified Dharma teacher, in contrast, is like a taxi driver that understands we all have our own unique karmic starting point on the spiritual path and so the route we each take to enlightenment will necessarily be different.  Understanding this, over the span of many years working with a wide variety of different practitioners, they become like a skilled taxi driver who knows how to get from anywhere to the enlightened city center.

Problems arise, though, when a practitioner first makes the transition to becoming a teacher and they mistakenly grasp at there being only one way – the way they just took.  As a result, the advice they give might be perfectly appropriate for somebody who is travelling the path as they have; but perfectly wrong for somebody who is beginning their trip from a different karmic starting point.  It is possible, for example, that abandoning our kids, jobs and families is the right thing to do for one person; this does not mean, however, it is the right thing to do for everybody else.  I have found that most of the Dharma advice people give is, if we check, the rationalizations we ourselves have used to make the spiritual decisions we have made.  Such thinking may be right for us, but we should be careful in assuming it is equally right for everybody else.  In a similar way, when we receive Dharma advice from our teachers or spiritual friends, we should always keep in mind that just because a certain way of doing things worked for others doesn’t necessarily mean that same way will work for us.  It is easy to become attached to what our teachers and spiritual friends think of us, and when we feel they are judging us for making what they consider to be wrong spiritual choices it hurts.  When this happens, people usually fall into one of two extremes, either they assume the teacher is right and start making choices that might not make sense given their individual context; or they assume the teacher is wrong, wind up losing faith and abandoning everything.  The middle way is to understand what the teacher is saying was right for them, but we need to check and see if what they are saying is right for us as well.

In the end, our job is very simple.  We need to do our best to make it to Dharma centers or Dharma teachings when we can, but accept our karma when we can’t.  We need to surrender our life and our karma to Dorje Shugden, our Dharma Protector, requesting that he transform our life into our Dharma teachings and wherever we are into our Dharma center.  Dorje Shugden’s job is to arrange the perfect outer and inner conditions necessary for our swiftest possible enlightenment.  Some people mistakenly believe he can only do so with our virtuous karma, but in reality he is especially skilled at transforming the ripening of our “negative karma” into our most transformative Dharma teachings.  If he can transform our worst negative karma into the path, then certainly he has the power to transform whatever happens in our life into a “Dharma teaching” and wherever we might find ourselves into our “Dharma center.”

Many of us grasp onto a fixed notion of what it means to lead a spiritual life, namely somebody who leaves behind the worlds of work and family to dedicate themselves to a life of meditation, retreat and working for the center.  It is true, this is one way to lead one’s spiritual life, one that we should deeply rejoice in; but by no means is it the only way.  After the publication of Modern Buddhism, Geshe-la said our mission now is to “attain the union of Kadampa Buddhism and modern life.”  Modern lives are incredibly diverse in nature, and all of them have equal potential to be quick paths.  Due to karma accumulated over countless previous lives, we find ourselves with some form of modern life – whatever form that might be.  Our job is to bring the Kadam Dharma into our life and realize the union of the two.  Time and time again, Geshe-la has said, “everyone needs Kadam Dharma.”  This does not mean everyone needs to become Buddhist, it means everyone can beneficially bring Kadampa wisdom into their lives.  The only way they will be able to do so is if we, the Kadampa practitioners of this world, learn how to do the same.  If we grasp at the Kadam Dharma only being practicable in a single type of life, its reach in this world will be extremely limited.  If instead we learn how to bring the Kadam Dharma into any life, we will help fulfill Geshe-la’s vision of bringing into everyone’s life.  In short, as Venerable Tharchin says, we each need to “assume our place in the mandala.”  We each have a role to play, and that role is to show how whatever life we may have (including one that does not have regular access to a Dharma center) can be a quick path to enlightenment.

Making progress when access to a center is difficult:  Motivation for series

Kadampa Ryan Making progress when access to a center is difficult

This series of posts is written for the benefit of all those who, for whatever reason, are unable to have regular access to a Dharma center and Dharma teachings.  I have attempted to gather in one place my own experience and understanding for how it is not only possible to continue to make progress when access to a center is difficult, but it is also possible to spiritually thrive.  This series is additionally written in the hope that those who do have regular access to a Dharma center might be able to better understand, accept and help those who don’t.  It will hopefully also be useful for all practitioners who wish to receive a constant stream of Dharma teachings every day.  This is not to say Dharma centers are not important, rather it is to say our understanding of them is too narrow.  Our Spiritual Guide is providing all of us without exception access to Dharma centers and Dharma teachings every single day, regardless of how the world might conventionally appear to us.

The kindness of our Spiritual Guide in establishing Dharma centers, temples and study programs around the world is unequaled.  Without this basic spiritual infrastructure we would find it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to make the journey to enlightenment.  Through his provision of these things, he has created for us magical transporters that connect our home towns to the city of enlightenment.  Gen-la Losang said Dharma centers are like Embassies of the Pure Land in this world.  Dharma centers accomplish two main functions.  First, they provide us with regular access to qualified teachings; and second, they provide a focal point for connecting with and building up pure spiritual communities in this world.  Venerable Tharchin says a Dharma center is not the bricks and mortar, though they of course matter, rather a Dharma center is the “collection of spiritual realizations of its practitioners bound together by their mutual love for one another.”   When we understand the nature of samsara, there is quite literally nothing more precious in this world than this basic spiritual infrastructure.

For a wide variety of reasons, though, not everyone has easy access to a Dharma center and Dharma teachings.  Some people simply live far away from the closest center, some live in countries where Dharma centers are not allowed, some lack the financial means to get to and participate in the center’s activities, some have family or work obligations which make it difficult to come to the center as often as they would like.  Some people have physical constraints which prevent them from coming, such as disabilities, illness or old age.  Some people have mental constraints, such as strong delusions, wrong views, or simply a failure to understand the importance of receiving teachings or being involved with a spiritual community.  Some people may simply lack the karma to be able to make it to the center, others may love the teachings but may have strained relationships with certain members of the Sangha or the institution of the “NKT.”  Some people, sadly, are simply not made to feel welcome at their local Dharma center, even though our Spiritual Guide has made it clear that the sign hanging over the center door reads, “Everybody Welcome.”  Whatever the reasons, it happens that practitioners will sometimes find it difficult to have regular access to Dharma teachings and a Dharma center.

When this happens, it can be a real problem for people.  They can come to view everything in their life that prevents them from making it to the center as an obstacle to their spiritual progress, giving rise to all sorts of anxiety, worry, inner turmoil and family conflict.  They then wrongly conclude that they cannot practice Dharma, and either postpone or even abandon their spiritual life.  It does not help that some of those who do have regular access to a Dharma center, including some teachers, lack the spiritual imagination to see how one can transform such a circumstance into the path.  As a result, those who do lack regular access can feel judged as lacking spiritual commitment or looked down upon as being spiritually lazy.  Since their teachers or spiritual friends are assenting to the view that there is only one way of fully committing oneself to the practice of Dharma, people who cannot live their life in that image continue to grasp at these constraints as inherently being obstacles to their spiritual practice.  Like old people and some other marginalized groups I have written about before, people whose access to a center is difficult “experience many special sorrows.”  In my view, all of this is completely unnecessary.

To understand why, in this series of posts I will first attempt to dispel some wrong views about spiritual life when access to a center is difficult, then I will explain some practical steps we can take to make manifest a Dharma center in our life.  I will then explain how we can receive individualized Dharma teachings through our every experience, and I will conclude by sharing some special advice Geshe-la has given us for how to receive perfectly reliable inner guidance from him every day.

Vows, commitments and modern life:  Dedication for entire series

Kadampa Ryan Vows, commitments and daily life

This series is by far the biggest series of posts I have ever done.  My goal in doing so was to clarify my own thinking on how to practice the vows and commitments of Kadampa Buddhism in the context of my modern life.  I have generally neglected my practice of moral discipline, but now I see it as the foundation of everything else.  I can only hope that those reading along have also found something useful.

I dedicate all of the merit I have collected by writing and sharing these posts so that myself and all living beings are never separated from the joy of moral discipline.  Through our training in moral discipline, may we maintain an uninterrupted continuum in all our future lives of our Buddhist path, our path to liberation, our path to enlightenment, our path of Highest Yoga Tantra, and in particular our path of Heruka and Vajrayogini.  May we all progressively take higher and higher rebirth until we attain the highest of all, full enlightenment.

 

Tomorrow, I land in Taiwan, where I will be posted for four years.  My project while there will be to go through all of Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life, and explain how I try to integrate Shantideva’s teachings into a modern life.  It should be about a four year project, one I hope to finish by the time I leave.

 

 

 

 

 

To abandon repulsion when tasting bodhichitta. 

Kadampa Ryan Vows

If we do lose our drops, we should regard them as the secret substance from the union of the Father and Mother Deities and mentally imagine that we taste them and receive the secret empowerment.  When doing so, we should abandon any feelings of repulsion.

Sometimes our drops are called our “bodhichittas.”  The reason for this is because of their central role in fulfilling our bodhichitta wish to become a Buddha.  During the Highest Yoga Tantra empowerment, at an ordinary physical level, there are people who come around and give us all sorts of different substances to eat or drink.  If we don’t know what is going on, it can all seem quite strange.  There is a part in particular where we taste some yogurt.  How are we to understand all of this?

Lama Action Vajra, the deity who grants the empowerment through whatever spiritual guide is in the room in front of us, will explain to you how you should regard these various substances and what visualizations and meditations you should engage in when you consume them.  Our ordinary eyes may see a temple or a giant tarp tent, but our wisdom eyes of our mental awareness should see ourselves in the pure land, at the feet of Lama Action Vajra, and the people who come around giving us substances as empowering deities and offering goddesses.  Just because we cannot see these things with our eyes does not mean they are not there.  There are sounds we cannot hear that dogs can, there are sights we cannot see the infrared goggles can, etc.  In the same way, there are countless different realms of living beings which are like different mental frequencies or channels that only those with the right signal receiver (namely possessing the body and mind of that realm) can perceive.  In addition to the six realms of samsara, there are also countless different pure lands.  These are actual places where beings take rebirth, and where we can go in our Tantric meditations.  As Venerable Tharchin said, “the location of mind is at the object of cognition,” so if the object of our mind is the pure land, our mind will actually to there.

When we receive the “yogurt” we should consider it to be the completely pure red and white drops of Heruka and Vajrayogini, Father and Mother.  When we taste these drops, we should imagine that their completely pure red and white drops enter into our subtle body and purify all of the drops flowing through our central body, bestowing upon our mind all of the blessings we need to attain the illusory body of completion stage and eventually the Enjoyment Body of a Buddha.  We then imagine that we experience great bliss while believing we are receiving these special blessings.

In the same way, whenever through the course of our life we lose our drops, we should mentally regard them as the completely pure red and white drops of Heruka Father and Mother, and we should imagine that we taste them and receive the secret empowerment just like during the actual empowerment.

Vows, commitments and modern life:  Masturbation and losing your drops

Kadampa Ryan Vows, commitments and daily life

It is worth saying a few words about masturbation.  In the last vow, we were advised to not lose our drops.  In many religious traditions, it is considered a “sin.”  After reading this vow, one could think the same is true in Buddhism and then we wind up imputing all sorts of Western guilt onto the act.  We construct it as this awful thing we must not do, but eventually the strength of our attachment gets the better of us, we do it, then afterwards we proceed to beat ourselves up about what an idiot we are, etc.  We become, in effect, sexual bulimics.  We repress our sexual desires until we can repress them no more, then we binge on them.  Afterwards, we feel guilty, beat ourselves up and feel like we are worthless and spiritually incapable.  All of this is unnecessary.

Does this mean we should have free reign to masturbate all of the time?  Of course not, that would be going to the other extreme. We should proceed naturally and gradually over a long period of time.  If we push beyond our capacity with this, we will quickly become discouraged with one failure after another.  Instead, we should focus our attention on identifying within our own mind the trade-off between losing our drops and our spiritual vitality, especially in meditation.  We should focus our attention on increasing the power of our spiritual wishes and aspirations through our practice of Lamrim.  Then we can proceed from wanting to do it all of the time to wanting to do it less and less.  We are not repressing our desire to do it, we are changing our desires to not wanting to do it.  If we want to do it, but through force of will stop ourselves, we will most likely just repress the desire.  If we change our desires to not wanting to do it, then we are not repressing at all.  Eventually we start to willingly make promises to increase the number of days between doing so more and more.  We keep training in this way until we are only losing our drops with our partner and in our dreams.  When we lose our drops in our dreams, the build up of tension is less and it becomes easier to not masturbate at all in between dreams.  Later, once we gain control over our behavior even in our dreams, we can repeat the process and gradually abandon losing our drops even in our dreams.

Yes, this is a long training.  Work naturally and gradually over a long period of time to change what you desire and you will eventually get there.  Don’t repress the urge, outgrow it.

 

Vows, commitments and modern life:  Is it wrong to have an orgasm?

Kadampa Ryan Vows

Never to release seminal fluid; to rely upon pure behavior. 

We should try not to release our red and white drops.  Releasing our drops interferes with our development of great bliss.

This is another vow that often gives rise to a good deal of doubt, worry and confusion.  Does this mean it is a Tantric downfall to have an orgasm?  The short answer is eventually, yes; but until then, be natural.

First, why does the release of our drops interfere with the development of great bliss?  While the drops of our subtle body and those of our gross body are not the same things, there is close relationship between them.  When we release our gross seminal fluids, it is also like opening up the floodgates and we lose a tremendous amount of our inner energy drops.  The drops of our subtle body are what give our body and mind vitality.  Losing our drops, then, functions to drain us of our vitality.  From the early Gladiators to modern day boxers, this is a fact that is well known.  Such fighters would refrain from losing their drops before their fights because doing so drains them of the strength they will need in the arena.

When we lose our drops, it does not just drain us of our physical vitality, but also our mental vitality.  Even in the early days of our spiritual training, we can notice a big difference in the quality of our meditation and insight between when we have not released our drops for some time and when we just did last night.  This is the experience of all those who have bothered to check if it is true.

Does this mean we should all become ordained, or if not ordained does this mean we should all stop having orgasms?  I asked Venerable Tharchin this question once.  He said (paraphrasing), “it is extremely difficult for those who are not ordained to do this.  Ordination provides special blessings which helps us control such desires.  But even the ordained frequently lose their drops, if not through masturbation (which weakens, though doesn’t break one’s ordination vows) then during their dreams.  Whether we are ordained or not, though, the logic is the same:  at some point our desire for realizations is greater than our desire for an orgasm, and when this happens we naturally desire to lose our drops less and less.  But we shouldn’t worry that this will destroy our sex life, if truth be told – and I speak from experience here as a child of the 60s – it makes it better.”

We should become acutely aware of the relationship between our losing of our drops and the decline in our vitality and ability to meditate effectively.  As we deepen our experience of Dharma, and in particular the lamrim, there will come a point where we start to want realizations more than we want the pleasant feelings of an orgasm.  We will see the trade-off between the two, and from our own side choose to refrain from losing our drops, even if only for a short while.  Over time, we will start to want to refrain for longer and longer, not out of some feeling that losing our drops is some “sin,” but rather we simply want realizations more.  We forgo all sorts of samsaric pleasures for the sake of gaining Dharma realizations, willingly and gladly.  Losing our drops is just one more example.

In my view, the best analogy for understanding the process by which we gradually forgo more and more samsaric pleasures is one of a child outgrowing their toys.  When my first born was a baby, her favorite toy was a Pampers Wipies box.  It was quite fascinating for her.  She could open the lid, put things in, close the lid and everything would disappear.  She could then re-open the lid and they would magically reappear!  She could then take things out and start all over again.  Like all samsaric enjoyments, gradually, though the wonder of it all wore off and she started to become interested in new, better toys like Pet Shop Pets and Barbies.  There was never a point where she felt guilty about playing with her Pampers box like doing so was “wrong,” she rather just naturally left it behind as she moved on to more sophisticated pleasures.  Now, she would never choose to play with a Pampers box for the simple reason of she has outgrown it.  In exactly the same way, as our experience of Dharma increases we gradually and quite naturally outgrow our various samsaric pleasures.  We do not abandon them because we feel guilty about it like they are some sin, rather we simply gradually leave them behind as we move on to more qualified spiritual pleasures.  We spiritually outgrow them, even such things as releasing our drops.

Within our sexual relationships, we can begin by saying we will not lose our drops with anybody other than our partner and ourself.  This can combine our refraining from sexual misconduct with this vow.  Then we can start to do it with ourself less and less, while continuing to lose them as normal with our partner.  Eventually we can get to the point where we don’t lose our drops with ourself, except during our dreams.  Over time, even that will become less and less until eventually it stops altogether.  With our partner, we can work to go longer and longer without losing our drops, training to not do so until we can no longer not.  This means longer and often greater pleasure for both you and your partner, and it means making progress with this vow.  Eventually, it is even possible where you could reach the point where you maintain an active sex life with your partner but never lose your drops.  Venerable Tharchin winked, saying, “after I did that, my sex life really took off.”

Vows, commitments and modern life:  How to generate bliss

Kadampa Ryan Vows

To strive mainly for the external and internal methods.

The external method for developing spontaneous great bliss is to rely upon a wisdom or action mudra.  The internal method is to meditate on our channels, drops, and winds.

All of the different meditations on the stages of the path can be divided into three:  those that develop our subject mind, those that are virtuous mental objects, and those that unite the two together.  The vast path develops the subject mind.  The profound path generates virtuous objects.  And the Mahamudra meditations unite the two.  The vast path according to Sutra is the first 20 lamrim meditations, from reliance on the Spiritual Guide through to bodhichitta and including tranquil abiding concentration.  The profound path according to Sutra and the profound path according to Tantra are the same, namely the Prasangika view of emptiness as lack of inherent existence of all things.  Je Tsonkghapa said the union of Sutra and Tantra is quite simply the bliss of tantra and the emptiness of Sutra.  However, when we attain this union, our realization of emptiness transforms from a Sutra-Prasangika view to a Tantra-Prasangika view.  The Sutra-Prasangika view says that all phenomena are mere karmic appearances.  The Tantra-Prasangika view says these appearances are by nature the very subtle mind of great bliss.  More specifically, they are the emptiness of the mind of great bliss appearing in the aspect of these appearances.

Ignorance, quite simply, is believing that an object can exist independent of the mind cognizing it.  We think objects exist out there, waiting to be experienced by mind.  As a result, we think changing our mind changes nothing – the object is still the object.  In reality, mind and its object arise in mutual dependence upon one another.  At a profound level, a single karmic seed pushes up against the fabric of our mind creating a subject-object pair.  If an impure karmic seed ripens, the subject-object pair will be impure; and if a pure karmic seed ripens, the subject-object pair will be pure.

From a practical point of view, however, if we apply effort to change our subject mind it will change the way objects appear to our mind; and if we apply effort to engage pure objects, it will function to make our mind more pure.  If we have an impure mind, it will cause us to see all objects as impure.  If we have a pure mind, we will see all objects as pure.  Likewise, if we engage our mind with an impure object, it will make our mind more impure; and if we engage our mind with a pure object, it will make our mind more pure.

There are two different, mutually supportive, ways of generating great bliss: external and internal.  The external methods are to rely upon a real or an imagined action mudra.  We may wonder, “why is an imagined action mudra considered an external method when the imagined action mudra is generated inside our mind?”  There are two answers.  The first is, as the above discussion indicates, we make a distinction between objects of mind and minds themselves.  All objects of mind are considered to be “external objects” even if the object known is one only known to our mental awareness.  Normally when we refer to external objects our meaning is objects that appear to our sense awareness, but more profoundly it can also include objects that appear only to our mental awareness.  The second answer is external in this context refers to outside our subtle body of channels, drops and winds.  It occurs in the gross deity body, not inside the deity’s subtle body.

It has been explained extensively in the previous posts how we rely upon wisdom and action mudras.  Here, I would like to say a few words about our channels, drops and winds.  Just as our body has different systems to it, such as the circulatory system and the nervous system, so too our mind has different systems to it, such as our gross minds and our subtle body.  Our subtle body is like the mental skeleton of the body of our gross mind.  It is comprised of a series of channels, drops and winds, all of which are described in detail in Mahamudra Tantra, Clear Light of Bliss, Modern Buddhism and Tantric Grounds and Paths.  Briefly, though, our channels are like the system of veins and arteries of our mind.  The drops are like the blood of our mind.  And the winds are like the currents that flow through the channels carrying the drops.  If our channels are blocked, the winds and drops don’t flow through, they then stagnate and imbalances arise.  From the stagnation and imbalances of this inner energy, mental sickness of delusions and physical sicknesses, including cancer, develop.  When the blockages are removed, the winds can flow freely and the drops can circulate effortlessly.  As the drops move through our different channels, we generate a feeling of bliss.  When the drops flow through our central channel, we generate great bliss.  While not physical objects, the quasi-tactile sensation of the mental drops flowing through the mental channels produces an inner experience of bliss.

In particular, it is important to understand the relationship between our mind and winds.  Our mind is likened to somebody with eyes but no legs to move.  The winds are likened to legs with no eyes to see.  When we mount the eyes of our mind onto the legs of our winds, our mind can go anywhere.  Winds and their mounted minds are inseparable.  This has profound practical implication.  It means wherever we send our winds, our mind will automatically go; and wherever we send our mind, our winds will automatically go.  If we want our winds to gather inside our indestructible drop at our heart, we merely need move our mind there.  If we can gather all of our mind there, all our winds will naturally follow.  Likewise, Venerable Tharchin says, “the location of the mind is at the object of cognition.”  If the object of cognition is the moon, our mind and its corresponding winds actually go there.  If the object of cognition is samara, our mind will remain trapped there.  If the object of cognition is the pure land, our mind will actually go there.  Since we naturally impute our I on our mind, if our mind is in the pure land, “we” will also go to the pure land.  If we can keep our mind absorbed in the pure land forever, we will have taken rebirth there and will never fall again.

Vows, commitments and modern life:  Why we rely upon an action mudra

Kadampa Ryan Vows, commitments and daily life

Never to forsake the two kinds of mudra.

When we are qualified we should accept an action mudra.  Until then we should rely upon a visualized wisdom mudra to help us to develop great bliss.

Once again, as explained in earlier posts, we are qualified to accept an action mudra once we have attained isolated speech of completion stage.  Once we have attained this state, unless we are ordained, we should accept an action mudra.  Our motivation for doing so is not attachment, but rather through the practice of relying upon an action mudra we loosen completely the knots of our central channel at our heart.  We want to do this so that all of our inner winds may gather, dissolve and absorb into the indestructible drop at our heart.  When this happens, we will naturally experience the eight signs of dissolution culminating in the full experience of the clear light of Mahamudra.  Once we have attained this supremely blissful mind, we then meditate on the emptiness of our mind of great bliss.  When the duality between our subject mind of great bliss and our object emptiness dissolves, like water mixing with water, we will have attained the realization of meaning clear light. With this powerful mind, we can quickly purify our mind of all of our delusions and their past imprints.  It is said we can even attain enlightenment in as little as three years, or even three months.  When you consider we have been accumulated deluded karmic imprints since beginningless time, this is attaining enlightenment in nearly an instant.  In one powerful blast, all of our past misdeeds are evaporated and we become a Buddha.  There is no more powerful realization than this.

The eight dissolutions are different appearances that arise as our inner winds gradually gather and dissolve into our indestructible drop.  They are explained in detail in all of our Tantric texts, such as Tantric Grounds and Paths and Mahamudra Tantra.  Normally, when our winds dissolve we lose consciousness or awareness of what is appearing to our mind.  But with training, we can learn to maintain our mindfulness and alertness as the winds absorb.  When we do so, we are, for all practical purposes, clearing away an escape route out of the dark storm clouds of samsara and into the clear light skies beyond.  Even though at present our inner winds are not actually gathering and absorbing into our indestructible drop at our heart, we can nonetheless begin imagining that they are and that we are experiencing each of the eight signs of dissolution.  When we do so, our main task is to keep our mind single pointedly on our realization of the emptiness of our mind to which the signs are appearing.  By training in this way in our imagination, we plant powerful karmic seeds which will one day ripen in our actually being able to maintain our mindfulness of emptiness as our winds actually dissolve, either at the time of death or during our future completion stage meditations.

As explained before, when we engage in union we should mentally generate our partner as a fully qualified action mudra, and while our body consciousness may be aware of one thing, our mental consciousness is aware of the two deity bodies engaging in Tantric union.

If we are ordained, we should not take an action mudra, even if we are ready.  The reason for this is simple:  doing so would bring the Sangha and the tantric teachings into disrepute, because conventionally speaking ordained monks and nuns do not engage in union.  While it is true not taking an action mudra may delay our eventual attainment of enlightenment by a few years, the price is small compared to the harm we would do to the tradition if we engaged in union despite being ordained.  Likewise, if we have a committed partner who is not his or herself a qualified action mudra, we should similarly refrain from taking an action mudra because doing so would also bring the tradition into disrepute by creating the impression that it justifies engaging in sexual misconduct.  Remember, our practice of Secret Mantra should not contradict our Pratimoksha vows.  In reality, however, this is a false concern because engaging in union with an imagined action mudra creates the karma for a fully qualified action mudra to appear when we are ready to take one.  It may seem like magic, but in reality it is just karma.

Vows, commitments and modern life:  Pleasant feelings are not the problem, attachment is

Kadampa Ryan Vows, commitments and daily life

Never to lose appreciation for the path of attachment.

Because the beings of this world have very strong attachment we definitely need to practice Secret Mantra, the method for transforming attachment into a cause for generating spontaneous great bliss.  Having found such a wonderful practice we must never lose our appreciation for it.

Attachment is the driving force of this world.  Attachment is a mind that considers certain external objects to be causes of happiness.  From this mind also comes aversion, thinking certain external objects are causes of suffering.  Because it thinks external objects are the causes of happiness, it tries to obtain them; and because it thinks external objects are the causes of suffering, it tries to avoid them.  But no matter how many objects of attachment we obtain, we never find the happiness we seek and we always go looking for new objects of attachment.  No matter how many objects of aversion we avoid, we keep encountering problems, and so there are always new objects of aversion.  If the mind is filled with attachment and aversion it will never be happy because it will keep projecting that we need to obtain and need to avoid yet more things.  This is the experience of everyone, we need only check our own life to confirm its truth.

In reality, both our happiness and suffering are parts of mind.  Therefore, their causes must come from inside the mind.  If we have a mind of contentment, we want for nothing.  If we have a mind of patience, we can accept everything.  Then nothing has the power to disturb our mind.  We can be happy all of the time.  Contentment, quite simply, is the ability to be happy with what we do have, not unhappy about what we don’t have.  Patience, quite simply, is the ability to use any adversity for our spiritual growth and the cultivation of inner peace.  These two minds are the secret to a happy life.  Possessing them makes us truly rich, even if we own nothing.

Once we have reduced our minds of attachment and aversion to more manageable levels by training in contentment and patience, then we are ready to use the instructions of Tantra to transform the residual attachment we experience into the path.  We need to be very clear on this point:  we cannot transform gross, uncontrolled attachment into the path with Tantra.  The reason for this is simple:  delusions function to make our mind uncontrolled, and attachment is nothing other than uncontrolled desire.  If we cannot control our mind, when attachment arises it will seize us and we will become a slave to its desires.  In such a state, it is nearly impossible to recall our Tantric practice, much less engage in it.  If our desire for our objects of attachment is greater than our desire to be free from attachment then it is impossible for us to use Tantra to transform attachment into the path.  This is very clear and there are no exceptions.  So we must first bring our gross attachments under control with the Sutra teachings, in particular those on contentment, renunciation and emptiness.  Once they have been reduced to manageable levels and once our desire to be free from attachment altogether is very strong, we are then ready to transform attachment into the path.  Absent this, what will likely happen is our attachment will kidnap the teachings on Tantra and then use them as an excuse to indulge in our objects of attachment.

In reality, we don’t transform attachment into the path.  Attachment is a delusion, and delusions are objects to be abandoned.  Instead, what we really do is transform pleasant feelings into the path.  There are two types of feelings we can have, pleasant and unpleasant.  We can transform pleasant feelings into the path with Tantra and we can transform unpleasant feelings into the path with the teachings on patient acceptance.  With these two, no matter what we feel, we will always have something to practice.

As explained in earlier posts, we transform pleasant feelings into the path by realizing that the pleasant feeling does not come from the external object, rather it comes from within our mind.  We dissolve the object of attachment into emptiness but retain the pleasant feelings, thus helping us realize clearly happiness comes from within and does not in any way depend upon anything external to us.  In this way, we use the pleasant feelings to dispel the mistaken illusion of external causes of happiness.  In this way, our experience of the pleasant feelings functions to destroy our delusion of attachment.  Such spiritual technology is truly priceless.

Sometimes we can be afraid of Tantra.  We know how strong our attachment is and we know how easy it is for our attachment to kidnap our knowledge of Tantra and use it to justify not ever abandoning our attachment.  So we are reluctant to even try.  This is an extreme, and an example of this downfall.  The way we protect ourselves against this extreme is to say, “I do not need to seek out objects of attachment to transform, rather as I go about my life I will naturally encounter them.  When I do so, even if I don’t succeed in actually transforming the pleasant feelings into the path, I will nonetheless try to do so.  With enough experience born from sincere effort, I will get better and better at doing so until eventually I can do so with any and all objects of attachment.”  This is a balanced way of practicing.