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 

No one watching

It only becomes interesting when ‘nothing’ happens – when there’s nothing with no one watching nothing.  That’s what it takes to allow awareness to be what it is.  Our natural awareness only becomes evident when we let the structure of conceptual mind drop – and … it’s a long process because the habit of conceptual mind is well entrenched.  

p194, Goodbye Forever Vol. II, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books Worldwide, 2021, ISBN 978-1-898185-60-4

Anything could happen

Anything could happen.  To come to an understanding of my culture and my epoch – I had to be open to anything happening.  If I sheltered myself from the wilder side of existence – I would never be able to teach anyone to live as a tantrika in the West … when, eventually, the time came to teach. 

p147, Goodbye Forever Vol. II, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books Worldwide, 2021, ISBN 978-1-898185-60-4

Mind would abide in its natural dimension

Dudjom Rinpoche said that one must keep one’s body in equanimous stasis in order that the spatial nerves would be in natural alignment – and the spatial winds unobstructed.  If the spatial winds were unobstructed, then mind would abide in its natural dimension where the spatial essences manifest as primal creativity.

p73, Goodbye Forever Vol. II, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books Worldwide, 2021, ISBN 978-1-898185-60-4   

rLung rTa

rLung is the wind principle – which is powerful and direct.  rTa means horse – the energy which can be ridden.  rLung rTa is a sophisticated energy, which is clean, decent, honest, honourable, and committed – a good horse which can be ridden with joy.  The situation resplendent with rising rLung rTa is fresh and exuberant – but only eminently rideable once you have mucked out, groomed thoroughly, and cared for the tack with assiduous patience.

p197, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7   

Authentic existential appreciation

rLung rTa is the cheerful uplifting quality which resides as a natural aspect of our lives.  One could define it as authentic existential appreciation.  It is spontaneously present and self-created as an aspect of awareness.  When rLung rTa is present—or if we wish to encourage rLung rTa—we give phenomena the attention they deserve.

p197, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

Love what you wear

Our perspective on clothing is essentially concerned with promoting awareness and impeccability.  The principle is one of dynamic engagement with phenomena – as an aspect of pervasive bodhicitta.  You need to love what you wear in order to engage fully with being alive.  When you engage fully with being alive you shine as an example of joy to others. 

p191, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

An imposition on reality

‘Positivity’ is an imposition on reality.  You do not have to make reality positive in order to be happy.  You don’t have to do anything to be happy other than maintain open senses.  Just do what you have to do and remember to enjoy your senses.

p182-183, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7 

You will have no time for ‘unhappy’

Re looking at colours …  Include sounds, textures, fragrances, tastes, and ideational vectors and you will have no time for ‘unhappy’.  ‘Unhappy’ is what we create by turning off the senses.  It is possible to be happy by allowing the senses to be absorbed into the sense fields.

p180, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

Observe the play

‘Your neuroses’ are not separate from the ‘you who wants to destroy your neuroses’.  As long as you cling to that bifurcation—non-dual realisation will elude you.  You have to accept the entire situation or it can never be transformed—let alone self-liberated.  This situation is all we have—and there is actually no other way to proceed.  We have to celebrate the situation as it presents itself—and simply, wordlessly, observe the play.

p170, Emailing the Lamas from Afar, Ngakpa Chögyam and Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 2009, ISBN 978-0-9653948-5-7

Spacious passion

Reality and the realised state reflect each other.  To actualise this knowledge at the level of experience is the goal of developing spacious passion.  Spaciousness without passion has no possibility of compassion as an interactive quality.  Passion without spaciousness becomes blind or blinkered obsession – a completely claustrophobic view that gives rise to highly limited and limiting activities.  

p102-103, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4 

Awareness-imagery

Every aspect of the awareness-imagery of Tantra has arisen through the spacious passion of vision.  ‘Spacious passion’ means the non-dual experience of wisdom and compassion (emptiness and form).  It is the active communicative quality that is indivisible from the experience of emptiness.  The word ‘spacious’ relates to the empty or unbounded aspect of the non-dual state.  ‘Passion’ relates to the energy, that spontaneously arises from the state of emptiness, in terms of infinite variety.

p101-102, Wearing the Body of Visions, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books, 1995, ISBN 1-898185-03-4 

Cutting through conditioning

Every time you try to stare into the face of an arising emotion, you confirm yourself in the practice of cutting through conditioning.  Even wanting to start is a success.  If you begin to practice you will experience a difference in your life.  The ultimate goal is always both very close and very distant; and when one day you come to realise that the path is the goal, the concepts of failure and success will no longer have any meaning.

p242, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

Sudden glimpses

There is no sudden breakthrough that remains forever – there are only sudden glimpses.  But the glimpses encourage us to see more until, gradually, we develop the ability to integrate these experiences of unconditioned being with the rest of our life.  The process of being total in the moment enables us to embrace our emotions; and, through doing so, to discover our beginningless enlightened nature.

 p241, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

Ecstatic sensation

When you can simply be with the sensation of your emotion and experience it fully at the non-conceptual level, you will notice a dynamic reversal taking place.  The spinning energy that seemed to be generating rivulets of words and ideas has a vast still centre: like the eye of a hurricane.  From that experience of stillness it is possible to perceive that the obsessive spinning is not caused by the emotional sensation, but that it is in fact the cause of it.  When you realise the empty nature of the emotional pain, the pain dissolves into an ecstatic sensation of presence and awareness.   

p240, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

Free energy

To relinquish analysis allows you to stare directly into the face of an arising emotion.  You can accomplish this by focusing on the physical sensation of the emotion as the subject/object of meditation.  Your whole field of attention needs to be immersed in the wordless sensation of the emotion as it manifests in the body.  If you can maintain the presence of your wordless gaze, the emotion becomes a free energy.

p240, Spectrum of Ecstasy, Ngakpa Chögyam with Khandro Déchen, Aro Books, 1997, ISBN 0-9653948-0-8

The non-dual energy of emotion

To renounce one’s anger in order to cultivate a less harmful response, is the practice of Sutra.  To transform the energy of the emotion through the implementation of symbolic method, is the practice of Tantra.  Only the spontaneous experience of the nondual energy of the emotion is the practice of Dzogchen.

p58, Spacious Passion Ngakma Nor'dzin, Aro Books, 2006 ISBN: 978-0-9653948-4-0

Spontaneous realisation

To control one’s anger and refrain from hurtful words and actions in an honest attempt to be aware and kind, is appropriate practice for a Dharma practitioner.  However we must be clear this is not the practice of Dzogchen.  It is not the spontaneous realisation of the nonduality of the emptiness and form of the emotion.

p57, Spacious Passion Ngakma Nor'dzin, Aro Books, 2006 ISBN: 978-0-9653948-4-0 

Bardo

Between the consciousness of the dying physical being and the consciousness of the reborn physical being –  a dream-like state of consciousness is experienced, and this is called Bardo.  This is a disorientating or frightening experience if the consciousness has had no experience of the empty nature of Mind.  We become embodied once again and begin the process of identifying with physicality in which we ignore the nature of existence as a stream of moments of emptiness, energy, and form.  If we have any feel for the experiential nature of this continuity, we can begin to grasp the importance of engaging in spiritual practice.  Any practice that hones awareness and the ability to allow mind to be free in complete identification with the present moment will be of immense benefit.

p112-113, Spacious Passion Ngakma Nor'dzin, Aro Books, 2006 ISBN: 978-0-9653948-4-0

Sky mind, cloud mind

In our attachment to this specific physical form, we have forgotten that mind does not depend on physicality.  Through attaching all experience to the sphere of our physicality, we limit our awareness of the nature of Mind.  Practice enables us to experience Sky mind, rather than remaining trapped in cloud mind with its referential need to grasp at physical form.

p112-113, Spacious Passion Ngakma Nor'dzin, Aro Books, 2006 ISBN: 978-0-9653948-4-0