Perception

When we open our perception, we do not feel constrained to anticipate events or people's possible reactions.  We stop registering every being by our perceptual sonar in terms of our preconceptions.  Perception then begins to expand.  We are led naturally towards the liberation of our responses.    

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

How we see what happens

The circumstances which befall us in the world are—generally speaking—the random functioning of the universe.  So merit is not what happens to us – but how we see what happens.  If we have kindness-Mind we initiate kindness-action – and kindness becomes the way in which we perceive the world. 

p81, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2  

Assume kindness

It is important to observe ourselves and understand our condition.  It is also important not to observe others with a judgemental eye because we probably have no conception of their condition or motivation.  It is always better to assume that other people have kind motivation – especially when they are acting in ways we would not act.  We all see the world in different ways – and so it is not possible to judge someone else’s actions or words on the basis of our own way of seeing.

p73, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2  

Continually breaking through

Becoming a Buddhist is a process of continually becoming a Buddhist – of continually breaking through limitations and conditioned perception.

p86, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2

The basic ground of being

The essence is empty.  The nature is clear and unimpeded.  The energy is free of all barriers and is boundlessly compassionate.  We have arrived at what is known as the kun-zhi – the basic ground of being beyond duality and non-duality.

p102, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2

It’s actually quite funny

The vow to lead the extraordinary life of the changchub sempa is the determined commitment to practice, not for ourselves – but for all beings.  We make the vow to renounce the atttainment of nonduality until all beings realise their nondual nature.  It’s a paradox.  In fact it’s actually quite funny.  The expansive good heart and open warmth we generate through our intention, projects us inevitably towards our goal – through the practice of giving up our goal.

p80-81, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2

The imaginary illness

Kyabjé Düd’jom Rinpoche said, “Sentient beings see Buddhas as sentient beings – but Buddhas see sentient beings as Buddhas. This disparity causes Buddhas great irritation – and that irritation is known as compassion or pure appropriateness.”  The Lama gives us skilful remedies for the imaginary illness of dualistic derangement in order that we discover for ourselves that our illness is imaginary. 

p97, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2 

Playful as ever

Our relationship with the external Lama is the interplay of our nondual mind with the nondual mind of the Lama.  It is a Vajrayana game of ‘hide and seek’ in which the Lama is trying to persuade us that we are not dualistically deranged.  The game has been going on for so long that it should be tedious – but the Lama remains as playful as ever.  It is this playfulness that is known as compassion.

p97, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2 

Every experience

The khandros and pawos are our environment: the earth, water, fire, air, and space which manifest as the conditions in which we find ourselves.  When we realise that the entire phenomenal world is the dance of the khandros and pawos – every experience becomes a teaching.  Every experience becomes the possibility for liberation. 

 p99, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2 

Practitioners’ best friends

Khandro and pawo are the female sky-dancing and male warrior aspects of the nondual state.  We discover the khandro principle when we begin to discover our spaciousness.  We discover the pawo principle when we begin to discover our innate compassion.  The khandros and pawos are the circumstances of the path – practitioners’ best friends.

p99, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2    

What matters

It does not matter how many teachings we may have attended.  It does not matter how many empowerments we have received.  What matters is how kind and open we are becoming.  

p92, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2 

We have to let go of what we are

Dying means letting go of self-image and self-conception.  We have to let go of what we are and open ourselves to what we can un-become.  From a Buddhist point of view it is unbecoming not to un-become.  In order to un-become, we must let go of security and find the security of insecurity.  We must discover the freedom of insecurity in which security and insecurity dance as nondual display.  If we cannot let our past preconceptions die we have no future, and cannot experience the present.  Unless we can die, we cannot be alive in the moment – and the moment is all we ever have.

p87, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2

Simple, blunt, uncompromising

When we commit ourselves to practice and to opening, we commit ourselves to change – and when we change, we die.  We have to die in order to change.  If we cannot die we cannot change.  This is a simple, blunt, uncompromising statement of fact. 

p87, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2

Worthwhile just as we are

We have ideas about ourselves—about how we should be or could be—and we want other people to believe those self-images.  We also want the Lama to believe these self-images.  The problem is that as long as we want the Lama to believe our self-images we will never begin to practise.  We will never take the first step.  If we wish the Lama to accept us as being better than we are – there is no hope of anything apart from stagnation.  Once we have shed inhibition about dropping self-image however, the situation can improve radically.  We can then realise that we are fundamentally good – and that our goodness surpasses notions of worthy and unworthy.  We can be worthwhile just as we are.

p153, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

Earth, water, fire, air, space

    Earth is the nondual quality of solidity and intangibility.  Water is the nondual quality of permanence and impermanence.  Fire is the nondual quality of separateness and inseparability.  Air is the nondual quality of continuity and discontinuity.  Space is the nondual quality of definition and lack of definition.  As soon as we attempt to split the qualities and adhere only to the form qualities of the elements, we create samsara.  The form qualities of emptiness cannot be split from the emptiness qualities of form.

p27, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2

Life teaches us moment by moment

    Everyday we are presented with opportunities to expand our hearts and disinhibit our innate kindness.  Everyday life is also the perfect place to observe how we are, because life teaches us moment by moment – whatever we feel in response to anything shows us the pattern of our perception.  In this way, if we are open enough and are honest with ourselves, we can learn a great deal about the way our energies are constricted.

p67, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2

The only perfect morality

   The only perfect morality is awareness.  The only perfect morality or ethical position is awareness, because all actions which spring from awareness are choiceless pure appropriateness.
Kindness is as close as we can ever come to a moral approximation of awareness.  Having a good heart goes further than anything in terms of empathising with the nondual state.  

p49, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2

Warriors and cherry blossom

 In a battle, warriors have to act in reaction to everything that presents itself.  Warriors do not run away in fear. They do what must be done—without hesitation—because that is the nature of the life they have chosen.  The Samurai of Japan compared the nature of their lives to cherry blossom.  A pretty image isn’t it?  Actually it’s quite blunt.  Cherry blossom falls at the slightest gust of wind.  It drops from the twig at the slightest touch – so the life of the samurai is as precarious as cherry blossom.  It takes a heroic sense of humour—a fearless whimsicality—to feel yourself balancing on that existential razor’s edge. It is however, the most solid unshakeable foundation for nondual action.

p79-80, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, ISBN 978-1-898185-06-2

Meditation as civil disobedience

Meditation is our only our weapon against the repressive regime of karma and it constitutes civil disobedience in the form of passive resistance.  By allowing the development of experiential space through the practice of shi-nè—according to the four naljors—we discover our own intrinsic awareness.  The four naljors of Dzogchen sem-dé are the ultimate crimes against the ‘law of karma’ and are punishable by realisation – the final revolution and overthrow of the legal system.

p53, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, ISBN 978-1-898185-06-2

Our own judge, jury, and prosecution

We actively feel the environment – seeking out anything which will justify our perception as being accurate.  This is karma – and this is the law we’re trying to break through meditation.
Karma is entirely how we perceive the world – moment by moment. So the ‘law of karma’ is not just law – it’s the entire legal system.  Our perception is the legislation and our responses enforce it.  We’re our own judge, jury, and prosecution.   

p52, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, ISBN 978-1-898185-06-2