Visceral teachers and visceral students

I don’t really know how ‘online teaching’ would function, realistically. There could be no transmission. For transmission to occur there have to be visceral teachers and visceral students. One has to be able to see the eyes of those hearing the oral transmission.

p347, Warp and Weft of Wonderment, Ngakma Mé-tsal, Aro Books Worldwide, 2024, ISBN 9781898185680

Transmission

In those moments I understood the nature of transmission and the nature of everything which Künzang Dorje Rinpoche had ever communicated. It was not simply the words – but the words had been a vehicle through which volumes of teaching coalesced as a seamless expanse of understanding. Rinpoche smiled at me – and filled my glass with chang. 

p157, Goodbye Forever Vol III, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books Worldwide, 2023, ISBN 9781898185666

Laughter

That there had to be both laughter and devotion or there’d be no real understanding was an entirely astonishing statement – or rather, it was astonishing to me. It hit me as transmission – because the words ignited a state of awareness. I sat there speechless for some moments.  

p157, Goodbye Forever Vol III, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books Worldwide, 2023, ISBN 9781898185666  

The vajra master

 

The vajra master provides the truest and most universal, egalitarian context.  Vajra masters see the nondual qualities of all their disciples, and allow them to receive transmission according to their individual capacities and relative constraints. 

p288, Tracts of the Sun : An Earth Orbit of Vajrayana Expressions.  Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2022, ISBN 978-1-898185-28-4

Mere indication

Mere indication means that something is suggested, and in that moment there is a whole gestalt.  Mere indication however, in terms of transmission, means that one simply hears directly.  One’s stream of awareness is ‘seeded’ with this mere indication, and there is no more to do or to think.  It is perfect in that moment.  Then … all one has to do is allow that moment to remember itself.  

p31, Entering the Heart of the Sun and Moon Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen,  Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-3-3 

Transmission of Dzogchen

I don’t think Rinpoche had any fixed plan when he started relating these wisdom-lays – apart from inciting in me an experiential grasp of ‘principle and function’.  He was to give me transmission of Dzogchen – and for that to be possible, I had to have a mind sufficiently clear of useless philosophical baggage.  Rinpoche obviously enjoyed unfurling these wisdom-lays – but he never recounted them just for the sake of telling a story.  As our time together proceeded, I became increasingly attuned to seeing the motivation of the inhabitants of each account – and, as my perception cleared, so they became increasingly vital and inspiring.

p12, Wisdom Eccentrics : Rumours of realisation as told by Künzang Dorje Rinpoche with additional tales of the unexpected.  
Ngakpa Chögyam,  Aro Books, 2011, ISBN 978-0-9653948-6-4
   

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 

Transmission

"... transmission means sharing the experience of the nature of the teacher’s mind: nothing actually moves."

Buddhism in the West, Ngala Rig’dzin Dorje, Aro Encyclopaedia