Being human

Dzogchen is unique in that it deals with the fundamental experience of being human at the most essential level of perception.

p186, Tracts of the Sun : An Earth Orbit of Vajrayana Expressions.  Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books Worldwide, 2022, ISBN 978-1-898185-28-4 

History

History was composed of what happened and what was sensed – what was ordinary and what was extraordinary. The important factor to bear in mind about history—in the Vajrayana sense—was it’s subtle function in terms of perception. 

p164, Goodbye Forever Vol III, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books Worldwide, 2023, ISBN 9781898185666

Hallucination

The idiocy of buying into prevalent conditioned perception and relating to arbitrary ideas as if they were truth – is that we can make no sense of the world as it is. We relate to the world more-or-less as an hallucination. 

p213, Warp and Weft of Wonderment, Ngakma Mé-tsal, Aro Books Worldwide, 2024, ISBN 9781898185680

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  

An unequivocal effect

Practitioners whose experience of the non-dual state has had an unequivocal effect on perceptions in daily life, are people who are no longer subject to sulkiness, sullenness, and surliness.

p19, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

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  

Transparent to ourselves

 

The experience of meditation practice is essential as a means of realising the view.  It is only within the development of the meditational experience that we become transparent to ourselves.  When we become transparent to ourselves, we can witness the mechanics of stylised perception – and only then can we free ourselves from restriction.

p49, Tracts of the Sun : An Earth Orbit of Vajrayana Expressions.  Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2022, ISBN 978-1-898185-28-4 

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

Perception

To live the view is to be open in perception – open to seeing emptiness and form at play.  This is something which cannot be constructed and imposed.

p352, Tracts of the Sun : An Earth Orbit of Vajrayana Expressions.  Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2022, ISBN 978-1-898185-28-4

Karma disappears

The actual meaning of karma is habituated perception and response – which is to say: how we interpret information, objects, situations, or persons dictates how we respond to them.  Karma disappears as soon as the perception-mind-of-karma disappears. 

p94, Shock Amazement: The four naljors and four ting-ngé’dzin from the Dzogchen series of the nature of Mind.   Khandro Déchen and Ngakpa Chögyam,  Aro Books Worldwide, 2018, ISBN 978-1-898185-45-1 

The most subtle aspects of our perception

Light and sound are the most subtle aspects of our perception, but we should not take the words ‘light’ and ‘sound’ too literally. Light and sound simply equate to a level of experience, and to a manifestation of energy that can be pointed at by those words. It is simply that our sense faculties of smell, taste, touch, and cognition are not adequate as vehicles to open up that realm of experience.

p17, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

Moments of magic

In spite of our compulsion to distance ourselves from the texture of our experience, we do also value the qualities of immediacy and spontaneity. Most people can remember moments of magic in their lives; moments when their consciousness was naturally expansive. Moments when there was a feeling of spaciousness – when everything unfolded with a sense of wonder and ease. This is possible when we have unguarded moments – moments when we forget to mix in our pre-structured concepts with what we perceive.

p32, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

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

Like walking through a minefield

   Life is a little like walking through a minefield – you never know when you might step on something—a circumstance of your life—that will explode a programmed pattern of perception.  If the cause is not encountered the reaction will not occur.  One of the principles of the monastic path is to regulate the secondary causes—in terms of life circumstances—as much as possible to avoid triggering unhelpful reactions that deepen patterning.  The tantric path however says: ‘Bring it all on!’ so that you have the opportunity to transform distorted perception and response into enlightened perception and response.

p169, Illusory Advice Ngakma Nor’dzin and Ngakpa ’ö-Dzin, Aro Books, 2015, ISBN: 978-1898185-37-6 

Naked perception

     Rigpa is naked perception – a naked flame, which burns with or without fuel.  It is naked in the same sense that an unsheathed knife is naked.  Rigpa is pure and total presence.  Stripped of referential clinging to the illusion of duality, mind is self-divested through bare attention.  The essential reality of what exposes itself, is simply as it is. 

p29, Shock Amazement  : The four naljors and four ting-ngé’dzin from the Dzogchen series of the nature of Mind.
Khandro Déchen and Ngakpa Chögyam,  Aro Books Worldwide, 2018, ISBN 978-1-898185-45-1

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

Perception

No-one else is responsible for how we perceive the world.  We accept and reject society’s influences and the influences of our parents and friends on our own terms.  We fabricate our own perception, and unless we discontinue the process and de-structure our perception, we’ll merely continue to be repressed by our personal totalitarian regime.  The responses we make to our environment will remain the same and we will attract the kind of circumstances which match our perception.

p51, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, ISBN 978-1-898185-06-2

The 'Law of Karma'

Awareness means relinquishing the police state of karmic-vision and assuming personal responsibility.  Karma is the sum total of our perception in all it’s excruciating intricacy.  The ‘Law of Karma’ is different from externally enforced societal law, because ‘karmic law’ is directly consequential and self-implementing.  We perceive the world in a certain way, and react to it in accordance with that style of perception.  This is what is meant by karma.  There’s no injustice in this kind of ‘law’ apart from the injustice to the non-dual state perpetrated by karmic patterning. 

p51, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, ISBN 978-1-898185-06-2

Fresh, and somewhat fabulous

Infinite variety isn’t particularly predictable or unpredictable according to non-dual perception.  When perception and field of perception are undivided, there’s no need to relate to phenomena as either predictable or unpredictable.  All phenomena are unified in the compassionate quality of their arising, so there’s no sense in which anything has to be approached with suspicion.  There is no plan that needs to be made.  There is nothing that has to be taken into account.  The arising of phenomena is simply delightful.  Infinite variety has the quality of continual surprise in the sense of wonderment.  But this wonderment has nothing to do with anything being either expected or unexpected. Phenomena are simply fresh, and somewhat fabulous. 

p136, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4