The Lama can be relied upon

We should not expect our teacher to be able to know what we are thinking.  The Lama can be relied upon for something different: to know the meaning of liberation, and the meaning of confusion.  The Lama can be relied upon to see the student’s particular patterns of liberation and confusion, and to work with them.  

p148, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4  

Being our own enemies

When we accept confusion as the rich ground from which clarity can be discovered, we can cease being our own enemies.

p197, Tracts of the Sun : An Earth Orbit of Vajrayana Expressions.  Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2022, ISBN 978-1-898185-28-4

Change the world

We can definitely change the world – but the problem is that we often seem unable to smile.  When chaos manifests in our lives we can smile – which is the cure for resentful confusion. 

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

There is no life-dissatisfaction appeals tribunal

   When we start to find some event in life painful or when we have experienced a series of calamities, it is helpful to avoid involvement in the ‘unfairness game’.  If you say: “This is unfair!  I don’t deserve this!” you only succeed in increasing your pain. It would be better to side-step this frustration and confusion, simply by saying: “This is what is happening”. There is no consumer-protection society in the sky to whom you can appeal. There is no life-dissatisfaction appeals tribunal where you can demand: “Life isn’t what I expected, I want my money back!” This is it. This is what we have. Fair or unfair, our situation is what it is, right here and now: in any context you can imagine…  It is the texture of your experience, and you cannot disown it. You can only ‘try’ to disown it, by creating a more complex level of confusion around it.’

p92-93, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

You can either be irritated or you can be irritated

Many people—but only honest people—find spaciousness irritating, and would prefer the claustrophobia and snugness of deranged density.  The simplicity of acknowledging spaciousness requires precision.  Precision does not allow the seeming safety of woolly-edged spin-doctoring.
We enjoy a soupçon of confusion, in which to establish the experiential ground rules from which non-duality can be seen as the unobtainable godhead.  Non-duality is irritatingly possible – because it is our authentic nature and somehow, being reminded of that, is irritating.  So … you can either be irritated or you can be irritated.  It is entirely up to you.

p69-70, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

The force of illusion

Enlightened intention arises out of the experience of the singular field of reality and because of this, it manifests methods of understanding itself which are reflections of our sense of dividedness.  This enlightened intention employs the strategy of the apparently separate spheres of being, as a means of communicating the nature of reality to those who have become confused by dividedness.  So; within the view of Tantra, this portrayal of division is an aspect of the skilful means that destroys divisiveness.  Tantra uses the force of illusion itself, to destroy illusion.  Tantra functions in this way, because the energy of delusion is none other than the play of our own enlightenment. 

p55, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4

What does it mean … to ‘approach Tantra’?

Approaching Tantra is what you’re doing now!  Tantra is not separate from the stream of reality that you are living all the time.  Especially when you allow yourself to enter into confusion – when you regard that as workable ground.  And when, the workable ground is one in which the ‘working’ itself is indeterminate.  That is very much the ground of Tantra. This is what you could call living the view. 

p118, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4

Confusion

No one enjoys confusion, but as long as we cling to our dualistic vision, we will always translate not knowing as ‘confusion’.  We don’t like confusion because within the space of confusion definitions become vague and intangible.  That makes us feel insecure.  Accepting or relaxing in that insecurity is in itself a practice. 


p143, Roaring Silence: Discovering the Mind of Dzogchen, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Shambhala, 2002, ISBN 1-57062-944-7  

Vajra-romance

The elements are the symphonic texture of vajra-romance.  They are also the cacophony of neurotic attachment.  The cacophony however, only exists in terms of duality, because from the point of view of the infinite purity of the phenomenal world – symphony and cacophony are undivided, and it is this fact which makes vajra-romance an immense opportunity.  Even within our confusion we partake of the realised state.  
Nondual reality sparkles through every aspect of our being and the Khandro Pawo Nyi-da Mélong Gyüd is a key to direct knowledge of this state.  For the khandro and pawo each point in time is a pivotal point – a point at which the elements can be allowed to become ballet, or a point at which form-attachment cripples any nuance of movement.

p230, Entering the Heart of the Sun and Moon  Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen,  Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-3-3

We have to begin with that which presents itself

One begins with the accidental nature of what is occurring—and accepts that as the nature of one's current reality. 
We do not have to begin with clarity, because clarity is inherent in every situation.  We simply have to begin with that which presents itself.  This will include our mistakes and the mistakes of others.  It will include errors, omissions, miscalculations, appropriations, misappropriations, faux pas, indiscretions, and oversights . . . 
Clarity is a groundless experience, but one that we can only realise when ground and groundlessness are realised a non-dual.  When we accept confusion as the rich ground from which clarity can be discovered, we can cease being our own enemies. 

p3, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

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

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

Remain with the taste of confusion

"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"

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