What is Buddhism?

Buddhism is a statement of our intrinsic goodness; and the possibility of discovering that intrinsic goodness.  This is the simple answer, but complex questions can arise from that.  Giving a simple answer is not always that simple.  When I use the word goodness, I am not using it in the sense of nicey-nicey goodness, or piety, or sanctity, or holiness – ‘goodness’ here relates to complete value. This goodness is the goodness of freshly baked bread; the goodness of seeing a field of sunflowers; the goodness of birth and death; the goodness of being present. There is a basic goodness, a basic sanity with which we can connect. We have that – we simply need to allow ourselves the non-referential space to find it.


Aro Encyclopaedia Index: Ah, but I was so much older then – I'm younger than that now. Ngak'chang Rinpoche interview 1993 

Living the View is Refuge

The theme that runs through the levels of Buddhist Refuge is the refuge of no refuge.  Through practice we come to understand that there is no state or object that can give us safety from the neuroses of our own minds; that the only way we can be liberated from conditioned perception and response, and the confusion that arises from our attempts to separate emptiness and form, is to aspire to the enlightened state.  This confidence and Refuge can only remain alive and of use to us through practice  Living the View is Refuge: recognising the frustration and irritation we experience as opportunities for realisation, as much as the joy and love. 

Aro Encyclopaedia Index: Refuge by Ngakma Nor’dzin Pamo

The sparkling-through of enlightenment

Enlightenment is our natural state, and so it is not surprising that it manifests from time to time. Unenlightenment is the constant activity with which we engage. We have to work at it all the time. So when life circumstances intervene, in terms of short-circuiting this continual effort, we experience glimpses of realisation. These glimpses can radically change people’s lives, but it is a hit-or-miss affair to hope that life is going to ‘do it for you’ when the time is ripe. You have to cooperate with the sparkling-through of enlightenment by disengaging from referentiality and continuing with presence of awareness.

p122, Roaring Silence: Discovering the Mind of Dzogchen, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Shambhala, 2002, ISBN 1-57062-944-7

Taking responsibility for being ‘the one who makes the first move’

  As an awakened-mind warrior, one takes responsibility for being ‘the one who has to forgive’. As an awakened-mind warrior, one takes responsibility for being ‘the one who makes the first move towards better relationships.’ As an awakened-mind warrior, one takes responsibility for being ‘the one who does not become angry in the face of those who are locked in neurotic patterns’.

A mother forgives the child who drops his dinner on the floor. She acknowledges her child’s incapacities. Her generosity provides instantaneous forgiveness. Her generosity provides opportunities for her child to acquire greater motor skills.
In this way the awakened-mind warrior develops infinite generous capacity to act for the benefit of everyone and everything, everywhere.

Aro Buddhism: Generosity - a teaching by Khandro Déchen

Tantric Ordination

The ngakphang tradition is colorful, individualistic, and highly heterodox. The ngakpas and ngakmas, are the ordained, robe wearing members of this tradition. They are neither ‘lay’, nor ‘monastic’, nor ‘in between’ and defy all attempts to pigeon-hole them into the neat and tidy categories of authoritarian institutions. They are a parallel stream of practice to that of the better known monastic sangha, and represent an opportunity for western people to establish the highest possible commitment to the Buddhist path without having to become celibate.

Aro Encyclopaedia Index: The Ngakphang Tradition, Ngak'chang Rinpoche 

Life will seem more infused with energy

It is not always easy to be kind, but it is also not that difficult because kindness flows naturally from our beginningless non-dual nature.  So if we remind ourselves constantly to be kind, we constantly put ourselves in closer contact with our primordial non-dual state. There is also something in the activity of kindness that has an effect on us. 

When we make the effort to be kind, we may find that it becomes increasingly effortless. It may begin to flow naturally, and make us glad that we can experience such warmth and openness. A truly kind act is an act of pure appropriateness and therefore whenever we are kind , there will be an element of appropriateness. Life will seem more infused with energy, and there will seem fewer obstructions. Kindness simplifies situations.

Aro Encyclopaedia Index: Kindness: The power of the awakened mind warrior, Ngak'chang Rinpoche 

The open-mindedness and kindness of lovers

The lover's open-mindedness equates with wisdom inasmuch as lovers cannot remain lovers if they become closed-minded with each other.
The lover's kindness equates with compassion inasmuch as lovers cannot remain lovers if they entertain the possibility of causing each other pain or distress.
Kindness is elicited by the kindness of one's lover, and one's own kindness achieves reciprocal responsiveness: kindness escalates and becomes addictive.  Through the self-orientation of our grasping, self-orientation loosens of itself, and dissolves within the fluidity of the needs perceived in one's lover.

p147, Entering the Heart of the Sun and Moon  Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen,  Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-3-3

Romance lures us into spiritual practice

Desire habitually promotes self-seeking.  The desire which drives romantic pursuit is no exception to this – apart that is, from the fact that something else occurs.  When we are drawn to the person we desire for ourselves – we communicate our desire to the one we desire.  In so doing – we are unsuspectingly drawn into spiritual practice.  The practice, into which we are enticed, is that of wisdom and compassion.  We begin to display unusual open-mindedness and uncharacteristic kindness – but what is more extraordinary, is that we feel inexplicably unthreatened in so doing.

p146, Entering the Heart of the Sun and Moon  Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen,  Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-3-3

Desire promotes the spiritual qualities of wisdom and compassion

Samsara presents opportunities for realisation – simply by virtue of samsara's failure to function.  Samsara is a self-defeating self-frustrated cycle, which is unsuccessful even within its own terms.  Because duality cannot function successfully within its own parameters – it cannot help but provide opportunities for realising nonduality. 
As soon as we seriously examine samsara – we begin to find it somewhat implausible; and that, is an intriguing discovery.  The Nyi-da Mélong (a Dzogchen tantra from the Aro gTér) takes this intriguing discovery as one of an array of interwoven themes.  The Nyi-da Mélong explores the texture of romance from the perspective of the manner in which desire itself promotes the spiritual qualities of wisdom and compassion.

p146, Entering the Heart of the Sun and Moon  Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen,  Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-3-3

Tantra illuminates the nature of romance

Vajrayana enables us to appreciate romantic relationship as containing immense potential for sensating with precision and passion – for living with pristine panache.
The potential inherent within the experience of loving and being loved expresses itself as the subtle oscillation of: pleasure and pain; hope and fear; gain and loss; meeting and parting; and, acceptance and rejection.  The energy of adoring and being adored is a communication which teeters on the brink of realisation – balanced between nondual consummation and consuming delusion.
Tantra illuminates the nature of romance in terms of how it functions as both spiritual potential, and potential neurosis.
p145, Entering the Heart of the Sun and Moon  Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen,  Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-3-3
  

The twilight language of Tantra

  Language is simply a vehicle, and with Tantra in particular we speak of twilight language – language that bridges the known and unknown.  When we speak of Tantra, somewhere along the line, the intellect has to get left behind.  When words are used in this way, there's no choice but to feel the meaning.  There is magnificent spacious passion in Tantra, that gives birth to poetry of the most powerful kind – the poetry without poet.  Actually that's too constricting a statement.  What we're really talking about is the poetry beyond poet and no-poet – the instantaneous explosive nature of meaning.

p26, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4

Confidence allows divergence of view without hostility

  Tolerance doesn't involve smoothing over all the differences, it means seeing the differences, and allowing them to be there without making any damming judgements.  Tolerance actually means having real confidence.
Divergence of view is possible without there having to be hostility.  If you have confidence in your own path, you don't have to denigrate other paths.  You don't have to shore yourself up by dismissing other systems – that is simply not necessary.
So let us by all means disagree with certain views.  But let that not make us angry or violent!  Let us also have the good grace to acknowledge the benefit there may be in systems that employ different concepts.  We could in fact approach this thing with great gentleness and humour!

p24-25, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4

Contradiction but no conflict

   There's only a problem, in the contradictory nature of different paths, if you fail to realise that their differences lie in the difference between their bases (where you begin).  Their bases are different because the relative capacities of individuals are different.  This means that what is a useful method for one person, could merely be an obstacle for another.  Once you have a fundamental understanding of this, it becomes very simple.  Then, not only will there be no conflict between different vehicles of Buddhism as to how and when they are presented but; you'll also come to understand the methods of any religion. 
This is the true basis of tolerance.  

p23, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4

Inequality and active compassion

 We're all equal in the sense that we are all enlightened.  Then, we're all unequal in our experience of clarity or confusion.  In the ultimate sphere of existence there is no difference between people.  But in the relative sphere of existence there are relative differences between people and that can function usefully in terms of active compassion.
Say that a child acts in a spiteful way towards you.  You recognise that he or she has limited capacity to understand the outcome of their acts and how they're understood in the adult world.  It means you can make a lot of allowances for them.  It means that you can be kind.  You can be tolerant.  You can be forgiving.
It's all based on understanding; understanding that someone has less capacity; less intelligence; less insight; more pain; more confusion – whatever is the condition of the person.  If you know that someone is in more pain than you are, you can let go of any animosity that might arise in relation to what they do.

p19-21, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4

Avoiding confusion and sectarianism

It is important to have a broad view of the teachings of all schools of Tibetan Buddhism.  If you come across contradictions, then you avoid confusion by remembering that there are different vehicles and styles within the schools that each have their functioning principles.  Through this means you cannot possibly develop a sectarian view.  All the schools are magnificently suitable vehicles for liberation of beings, and at the level where it actually matters, they all have the same essence.


p226-227, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4

We can laugh at our compulsion, fearfulness, and wilfulness

 Through the development of spaciousness, our patterning can become totally open and transparent.  We can view perception.  We can recognise intention.  We can motivate responses.
When our patterning becomes transparent, we can laugh at the compulsion of our desire, at the fearfulness of our aversion, and at the wilfulness of our stupidity.  Every moment becomes an opportunity for freedom and realisation.
Ultimately, finding presence of awareness in the dimension of the moment is the experience of non-dual emptiness and form.

p150, Spacious Passion Ngakma Nor'dzin, Aro Books, 2006 ISBN: 978-0-9653948-4-0

I can be the good person who is disapproving of the bad habit

The more you try to force thought out, the more of a problem it becomes.  The more you disapprove of your own neuroses, the more of a problem they become.  The time to disapprove of them is if they are hurting others; and then in the moment.  But one does not go into punishing oneself for having them at other times.  If one is aware that one has patterns, then one has to say, I need to have some awareness while this pattern is performing.  If I punish myself for having the pattern whilst I am having it, then this actually acts as a screen which hides the neurosis – I can be the good person who is disapproving of the bad habit.   That means I never get to see this habit, this neurosis, because I am too busy being the person who is disapproving of it.  This is actually a way of maintaining the neurosis.  The only way I see through a neurosis is to be with it. This is a great value of silent sitting.

Aro Encyclopaedia Index: Compassion - Questions and Answers.
Ngak'chang Rinpoche. 

Multiplicity and Divergence

 
Buddhist nonduality allows multiplicity and divergence.  At the level of emptiness – we are indeed all one: your emptiness and my emptiness—the emptiness of everyone—is the same.  However – emptiness is only one aspect of reality.  The other aspect is that which continually arises from emptiness: form.  At the level of form – we are certainly not all one, we are different.  Nonduality is the inseparability of this sameness and difference.

p23, Entering the Heart of the Sun and Moon http://arobuddhism.org/books/entering-the-heart-of-sun-and-moon.html, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen,  Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-3-3 

Relationship with the teacher in Vajrayana

  The relationship between teacher and student is fundamental to Vajrayana.  Within the theatre of this relationship you can become transparent to yourself, and through becoming transparent, your constricted sense of being is liberated.
Devotion to the Lama enables the student to be empty in relation to the Lama.  This allows the Lama to conjure with the form of the student’s neuroses to mirror them, so that they become transparent for the student.
If one is open to receiving transmission, then a great deal can be achieved in such moments.  Huge shifts can be made in an instant.  This is only possible within a relationship based on confidence in the teacher and openness in the student.

p59 and 62, Illusory Advice Ngakma Nor’dzin and Ngakpa ’ö-Dzin, Aro Books, 2015, ISBN: 978-1898185-37-6 

Vajra commitment

 Vajra masters may accept students’ vows of vajra commitment – but imposters to vajra mastery can only steal the loyalty of those they dupe. Those who are duped only need to recognise they have been duped, in order to be free of those who merely pose as vajra masters.

Vows can only be broken when they have been entered into with authenticity. Deranged poltroons may pronounce two people married – but their pronouncements carry no weight in either religion or law.

Vajra masters are the living embodiments of Padmasambhava and Yeshé Tsogyel, like our own Lamas Kyabjé Künzang Dorje Rinpoche and Jomo Sam’phel Déchen. We, on the other hand, are not vajra masters – and cannot be viewed as vajra masters. We are merely convivial vicars of Vajrayana – and nothing we say need be taken too dreadfully seriously.

Aro Encyclopaedia Index: Vajra Masters - The Body, Speech, and Mind of Vajrayana  སྔགས་འཆང་རིན་པོ་ཆེ་ / མཁའ་འགྲོ་བདེ་ཆེན་

Vajra monarchs

Vajra masters may be the monarchs of their kyil’khors – but their majesty is never haughty, arrogant, imperious, or desirous of droit du seigneur. Vajra monarchs are vastly wealthy in terms of appreciation of the phenomenal world and therefore have
no desire for excessive conventional wealth.

Vajra masters may be accomplished in karmamudra – but they reserve their skills for those disciples whose experience of the non-dual state pervades their practice, rather than for those who are merely young and conventionally beautiful.

Aro Encyclopaedia Index: Vajra Masters - The Body, Speech, and Mind of Vajrayana  སྔགས་འཆང་རིན་པོ་ཆེ་ / མཁའ་འགྲོ་བདེ་ཆེན་

Vajra masters, crazy wisdom, and wrathful Lamas

 Vajra masters may manifest crazy wisdom – but their ‘craziness’ is never prurient, predictable, hackneyed, clichéd, trite, or crass. Yeshé ’cholwa (Wisdom Chaos) is the inchoate efflorescence of primordial wisdom.

Vajra masters may be divine madmen—or divine madwomen—but their ‘madness’ is never self-oriented, self-indulgent, self-aggrandising, or self-obsessed.  sMyon Heruka (Mad Sainthood) is freedom from the bureaucracy of institutionalised experience.

 

Vajra masters may be wrathful – but their ‘wrathfulness’ is never peevish, irritable, surly, petulant, or aggressively impatient.  Wrathful Lamas are never serene in public and sadistic in private.

 

 

Aro Encyclopaedia Index: Vajra Masters - The Body, Speech, and Mind of Vajrayana  སྔགས་འཆང་རིན་པོ་ཆེ་ / མཁའ་འགྲོ་བདེ་ཆེན་

 

Non-duality as the term is used in Buddhism

 
Buddhism is not a theistic religion, so it does not have to deal with issues of ‘creator’ and ‘created’ and whether they are divisible or indivisible.  Duality and nonduality are concerned with being and not-being – with existence and non-existence.  That is why we speak of emptiness and form rather than ‘creator’ and ‘created’.
In terms of meditation we speak of the nature of Mind, and that which arises as being non-dual.  In terms of the ‘meaningfulness’ of eternalism and the ‘meaninglessness’ of nihilism – nonduality allows meaningfulness and meaninglessness to be simultaneous facets of reality.  Meaning arises out of meaninglessness, pattern arises out of chaos – and they are undivided.  

p22-23, Entering the Heart of the Sun and Moon http://arobuddhism.org/books/entering-the-heart-of-sun-and-moon.html, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen,  Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-3-3 

Pattern and Chaos

  The fabric of existence is a fluxing web or magical manifestation web of infinite dimensions.  Existence is a fluxing web whose threads are the energy of emptiness and form—of existence and nonexistence.  The style or pattern of individual existence sets up tremors in the web of which individual existence is a part.  One cannot ‘enact’ without affecting everything and, at the same time, being affected by everything.  Pattern affects patterns, creating further pattern.  Pattern evolves out of chaos and becomes chaos again.  Pattern and randomness dance together—ripples in water extend and collide with other extending ripples, a fish leaps to catch an insect, a wild goose takes to the sky, the wind blows, and a child throws a pebble into the lake. 

p82, Roaring Silence: Discovering the Mind of Dzogchen, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Shambhala, 2002, ISBN 1-57062-944-7

Kindness, motivation and intention

In our practice of kindness we should learn—first and foremost—to keep our noses out of other people's motivations.  Verbally assaulting others with self-righteous zeal is a grave sickness of spirit.  Certainly people act in ways that are worthy of criticism – but who are we to think that we have the authority to stand in judgement?  It doesn't actually matter if we are right or wrong in our judgement.  It is our motivation that is in question.  Motivation and intention are primary in Buddhism.

p59, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, ISBN 978-1-898185-06-2

Grinning at chaos

If your practice of shi-nè (letting go of addiction to thought) facilitates the experience of emptiness, it will also facilitate the capacity to grin at your own chaos—and if you can grin at your own chaos, then you will have authentic pervasive compassion for the chaos of existence.  You will discover your innate goodness and that will naturally pervade the world.  Primordial goodness is that which grins at the illusions of the dualistic predicament—so sit and learn to smile.

p241, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

Happiness is not accidental

Everything either occurs or does not.  That would appear to be a fact of nature.  Happiness, however, is not accidental.
To be happy, appreciate the sense fields and attempt to live more fully in the moment.  Do not complicate your experience with concepts.  Employ concept less than vision.  Employ concept less than hearing.  Employ concept less than tactility.  Employ concept less than fragrancing.  Employ concept less than savouring.

p239, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

Painful emotions

Painful emotions are maintained though the process of thinking about them.  We continually regenerate our painful emotions by intellectualising about them – rather than experiencing them at the non-conceptual level.  The only way out is to let awareness find itself in the dimension of whatever emotion has arisen; and to experience it purely.  When we are able to let go of justification we are no longer as involved in maintaining the integrity of our self-image.  When this neurotic involvement is reduced, the energy of anger is no longer coloured by the need to prove our existence through the manifestation of aggression.

p145, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

Non-dual anger

When ‘subject-object dichotomy’ dissolves into space, anger can no longer exist as anger but transforms into total clarity.  This clarity dispassionately reflects all that it sees.  Nothing is left out.  Nothing is added.  We see the whole picture in all its vibrant detail.  Non-dual anger is unconditioned clarity.  It is displayed by the brilliance and calmness of water.  The undisturbed surface of water perfectly mirrors the sky.  The crystal clarity of undisturbed water is incapable of bias or distortion. 

p145, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

Khyil-khor is a wonderful dancing energy

The Tibetan word for mandala (Sanskrit for ‘grouping’ or ‘association’) is khyil-khor.  Khyil-khor is a totally interpenetrating energy.  It is not possible to exclude anyone from your khyil-khor or to be excluded from anyone else's. 
Ultimately, every being is part of your khyil-khor.  Everyone and everything is linked with your field of energy; and you are linked with theirs.  Therefore it is vital that we recognise this, or that we work towards this recognition. You cannot really ever feel comfortable in your own skin if you are attempting to be exclusive.  It is not appropriate, or accurate, to exclude anyone or anything; because that would be attempting to do something that is not possible.

p105-108, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

The arts are bodhicitta

To be involved with the arts is to be involved with all beings – because all beings are endowed with sense fields which perceive the arts.  It is not simply the arts as they are commonly understood: it is the nature of artistic perception which is entranced by the totality of phenomena.  The arts are self-manifested – and any artist who understands this sees art in everything and everyone.  An artist sees all beings as artists.
This understanding of art as bodhicitta is central to the essential Vajrayana of the mahasiddhas.

p176-177, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

The possibility of joy

Cowardice is the belief or faith in the possibility of survival – of the body, or of some aspect of  existence to which we adhere.  It is also a lack of appreciation for oneself which comes from a lack of appreciation for others – and a lack of appreciation for the wider context of being human.  When the need to survive takes precedence over appreciation – cowardice is born. 
You could try another approach—but be warned it is far more threatening: Always put the possibility of joy before the need to be safe.

p134-135, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

Emptiness, clarity, and spontaneity

  Spontaneity is acting in the moment, in accordance with what exists in the moment.  But this in no way implies acting without consideration of the future results of one’s acts.
For an act to be truly spontaneous, it has to spring from emptiness.
Spontaneity is the empty clarity that totally accepts the patterns that are perceived without being conditioned by them.  There is no sense of strategy or manipulation according to concepts of self-enhancement or self-fulfilment.

p100 and 101, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4

Treating the two imposters just the same

We need to accept the success or failure of whatever we do with a sense of wryness.  We need to treat these two imposters just the same.  With the discovery of experiential space we can let go of the emotional investment we put into all our plans and efforts.  Things actually become easier when we allow ourselves to play with our situation, rather than having to take it totally seriously.  The lightness of this approach is a manifestation of our developing clarity.

p90, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

What we actually are

Awareness is the uncontrived, unattached recognition of the experience of movement – the movement of the arising and dissolving of thoughts in the continuum of Mind, the appearance and disappearance of phenomena in the vastness of intrinsic space.  There is only the sheer exquisiteness of this movement.  This is what we actually are.

p87, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

 

Tantra as the way that rejects all referential co-ordinates

Tantra is very much the ‘middle way’ that characterises all Buddhist vehicles.  The ‘middle way’ might be better translated as: ‘the way that rejects all referential co-ordinates’ – ‘the way that doesn’t seek to locate itself in known or knowable territory’.  This is the way that doesn't hold any kind of position or stance for establishing a fixed definition of being.  It doesn’t say: ‘I am here because that is there’; ‘I am now because I was then, and so I will be in the future’.  It doesn’t say:  ‘I think therefore I am.’  In fact – it simply rejects all ‘therefores’.

p9, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4

The difference between kindness and compassion

Compassion means more than simply being kind.  Compassion—or active compassion—is how we usually translate bodhicitta or changchub sem.  Compassion includes kindness, but kindness is but part of the spectrum of compassion.
Compassion includes appreciation, admiration, pleasure, wonder, enjoyment, and communication—fierce, florid, and fecund communication.
Compassion is openness to infinite pattern and to embodying any aspect of that pattern for the benefit of everyone, and everything, everywhere.

p130-131, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

The emptiness and form of romance

Trust and respect are the emptiness and form of romance.  This means that you must listen to each other with open minds and open hearts.   You both need to feel valued and appreciated by each other – even for your perceived foibles and weaknesses.  Foibles and weaknesses must become endearing.  Having chosen each other you can now only celebrate every aspect of each other.  The only way forward, for any couple, is to find more and more to love and cherish within each other.

p31-32, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

Humour and the hell of being a practitioner

The hell of being a practitioner is the state in which we begin to see through our neuroses, and yet we continue to afflict ourselves with them.
It can only stop through clarity and, to have clarity develop, we need humour.  We have to accept that we are both the dyed-in-the-wool neurotic and the practitioner who is trying to let neuroses go.  That is comical and we have to be fairly light-hearted about it.  With sufficient humour, we can simply be the space that lets these two lunatics dance.

p78-79, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

Tantra is not concerned with seeking extremes

In the West, Tantra has seemed very tempting to the emotionally and intellectually wild.  This has been especially true among those who have inferred indulgence in full-blown hedonism to be the path.  However, although there is some connection with hedonism, with its characteristic quality of not holding back, this view is seriously lopsided.  Tantra is not concerned with seeking extremes.
It avoids utilising experience of any kind as a means of concretely defining the nature of reality.

p8-9, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4

Cheerfulness

If we cannot laugh at ourselves – we cannot laugh with others or cause others to laugh.  Laughter is a gift – and causing laughter is an act of kindness.  Laughter requires space – space to see the ridiculous in our situations as beginninglessly enlightened beings who create the illusion of duality.  That is really rather funny.  It is also rather sad, tragic – but that very paradox is what puts us at the pivotal point of the precious human rebirth.

p47, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

Just be in the present moment

In the practice of shi-nè—remaining uninvolved—if thoughts come and go, simply allow them to lap like the tide.  If you get caught up in a thought-story and lose the presence of your awareness in the movement of breath –  just return to it as soon as you become aware of having drifted off.  There is no need to get angry or irritated with yourself – these reactions are just opportunities to indulge in referentiality.  Maintain an open, humorous and relaxed attitude.  Expect nothing.  Be attached to nothing.  Reject nothing.  Just be in the present moment. 

p83 and p85, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

The empty nature of sensation

Tantra doesn’t exclude hedonism, but neither does it encourage it.  It is very much the ‘middle way’ that characterises all Buddhist vehicles. 
Tantra is not concerned with seeking extremes – even though extreme sensation can be cultivated as a powerful aspect of the path.  Fundamentally, Tantra neither seeks extremity nor avoids it.  The intrinsic power of any sensation becomes manifest through our realisation of its empty nature. 

p8-9, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4

Refuge

Refuge – what does the word mean in terms of dharma; and what does dharma mean?  Dharma—or chö—means as it is.  As it is is actuality, and to ‘take refuge’ means to establish confidence in actuality.
To take refuge is not to seek safety and assurances. It is to acknowledge that any form of security is illusory.  The pursuit of security is the root of our dualistic dilemma. To live this view in every moment is the goal of practice.

p85, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, ISBN 978-1-898185-06-2

Open perception

When we open our perception, we do not feel constrained to anticipate events or people’s possible reactions.  Because our perception has opened, our responses naturally begin to flow from that free source, and motivation becomes less constricted by the need to establish ourselves as solid, permanent, separate, continuous and defined.  We become able to relate to life as it actually is.

p33, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, ISBN 978-1-898185-06-2

Letting go of our addiction to the thought process

The discovery of space begins with shi-nè.  Shi-nè is the practice of letting go of our addiction to the thought process. 
 
There is no special breathing technique.  Just let your breath flow as it will.  At first you should simply find the presence of your awareness in the inward and outward movement of your breath.  If thoughts arise do not try to block them.  Just let them be.  If thoughts drift away do not detain them or grasp at them.  Just let them go.  Rest your attention in the movement of your breath.  If thoughts come and go, simply allow them to lap like the tide. 

p38 and p85, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

Responsibilty and kindness

What then does responsibility mean in the Buddhist sense of kindness?  It means that we are not separate from our world, or anyone in our world.  We cannot say of anything ‘This has nothing to do with me’.  We are not separate as beings.  This idea of connection is subtle, because our connection can take any form.  Only our innate kindness—liberated through meditation—can guide us to respond accurately.

p63-64, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2

Tantra is the energy of being

Tantra is the energy of being; but we experience that energy through dualistic filters.  In this way we divide ourselves from the actual texture of our experience.  We divide ourselves through our attempts to re-construct reality, whilst we’re in the process of perceiving it!  It’s a ludicrously impossible task.  But; it’s a task in which we’re almost continually engaged.

p8, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4

The open dimension of being

The structure of thought, the convoluted geography of our personalities, the world of ideas is complex and subtle.  If we put ourselves in the position of thinking about the way we think, we have a tricky situation to say the least.  We are obviously limited in our thinking, by our style of thinking.  So; something apart from thinking needs to look at thinking.  But what could this be?  Buddhism describes this ‘something’ as the open dimension of being.  It is the discovery of space.

p38, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

Confusion

When you accept that sense cannot always be ‘made’, you can begin to appreciate space. We are all confused.  If we were not confused, we would not need to practise.
We need to be willing to remain with the taste of our confusion as the texture of life and allow it to be the random pattern of our everyday lives.
Confusion is merely the recognition of the amorphous quality of an existence which does not obey the protocol of samsara.

p18, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7