To all or none

Working hard on understanding Dzogchen.I know ,I will decipher it
and live it.

loong

To all or none,

Text By S.Rinpoche,

One of the chief reasons we have so much anguish and difficulty
facing death, is that we ignore the truth about Impermanence.We want so desperately everything to continue as it is that we have to beleive that things will always stay the same.

But this is only Make -Beleive.

loong the messanger

Dear lisa,

Still stuck on bardo,idownloaded 6 pages from wiki on bardo.stuck on page 1,
Read and reread the text.there is a segment that Itried so hard to understand,still
can,tunderstand it.

Here is the text:one experiences a variety off phenomena.Theseusually follow a particuliar sequence of degeneration from,just after death,the clearest experiences
Of reality of whichone is spiritually capable,and then proceeding to terrifying hallucinations that arise from the impulses of one,s previous unskillful actions.For the prepared and appropriately trained individuals the bardo offers a tate of great opportunityfor liberation,since transcendental insight may arise with the direct experience of reality,while for others it can become a place of danger as the karmically created hallucinations can impel one into a less desirable rebirth.

Easy for you,but for me the learner , it is the hallucinations ,that I cannot understand mostly.

Hope you will be able to clarify this imbroglio.,

With respect
Loong

Hi Loong, I can only share how I interpret it, for whatever that is worth. 'Hallucination' is just another word for 'vision' perhaps - who knows what the original word is, since we are reading in English. But think of the darkest parts of your being - anywhere in you still attached to violence, resentments, anger or vengeance. If you have any of that left in you at death, the idea is that at some point in the death transit process, you will experience those in actual vision form. The darkest parts of you will manifest and seem real, just like dreams seem real. It takes tremendous detachment and strength of mind not to succomb to them as if they are real. But if you do, you travel through those bardos and move on.

Of course, if by the time you die, you have already surfaced and released these parts of yourself, if through walking the path you have truly transformed yourself, then these will no longer be buried in your karma, and you then in that case you will not experience these projections of your own psyche.

That is a simplification, but one way to look at it. Much motivation to practice! And to deal honestly with the parts of oneself that we often try to hide in life.

To Lisa and all.

I have found a video of 45 minutes,Called The Tibetan book of Living and Dying The Great Liberation.It explains in very simple words and images .A Lama and a young Monk doing the ceremony of Liberation and at the same time explaining all the Bardos through the dying and death and after death of a 27 year old man

THIS IS FANTASTIC.What I could not begin to understand has been revealed to me.Please go to this video and you will understand alot of truths,and specially agood portion of what Tibetan Buddhism is about.

[url]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCHh8xqMWeo[url]

Please gve yourself this pleasure.

An astonished
loong

That is fabulous Loong. Did this help you connect the mindfulness teachings you had studied before with these Tibetan teachings? Because after reading the other thread I was about to tell you to just stop reading the book if it is not adding to your path. There is no reason to explore a path that does not resonate for you. We are all individuals. But perhaps now this video has helped you get what you needed from this.

Dear Lisa,

I have to admit,that reading this book and also digging into the
Tibetan lineage,was an act of false pride.To be able to understand what that lineage stood for.To be able to communicate fullier with you.

With Thich Nhat Hanh,I was satisfied of where I was going and living.At some moments not in agreement with him ,but mostly at ease with his phylosophy.

As you wrote in another thread ,enlightenment can be found in many ways.

Thanh You Oh Sensei ;-)
loong

I appreciate this but of course never sacrifice your own path, or what is best for you. As I have mentioned, growing up I had a lot of spontaneous energetic and intuitive experiences, which like many people I 'shut down' for many years, but they are part of why the Tibetan paths appeal to me, because they incorporate those experiences into the path. But that is not for everyone.

Also, remember that 80% of Buddhism (or about that anyway!) is the same across the lineages. The basics of practice are the same. The 'goals' are the same. There is not as much difference as academics and historians make it out to be. And if you listen to the opinions of teachers such as Dalai Lama and Thich Nhat Hanh (both Mahayana teachers), they emphasize this over and over. So don't let yourself get trapped in intellectual debates (unless you can do it with enjoyment and non-attachment.)

Those are the guidelines that have helped me the most. Take it or leave it!

To all or none,
Even Buddha died.His death was a teaching,to shockthe naive,the indolent,and complecent,to wake us up to the truth that everything is impermanent and death an
inescapable fact of life.As he was approaching death,the Buddha said:


Of all the foothprints
That of the elephant is supreme;
Of all mindfulness meditations
That on death is supreme.

Whenever we lose our perspective,or fall pray to laziness reflectting on death and impermanence shakes us back into the truth:
What is born will die,
What has been gathered will be disperced
What has been accumulated will be exhausted
What has been built up will collapse,
And what has been high will be brought low.

The whole universe,,scintists now tell us , is nothing but change,activity,and process-
a totality of flux that. is the ground of all things.
SRinpoche.

Loong,' comment: Someone not having heard much of Impermanence,will,after
his passage urely be confronted with her/his impermanence.
Loong

To all or none,

Where I am in the book relates to Impermanence.The next citing
will tell it all.

THE ONLY THING WE REALLY HAVE IS NOWNESS,IS NOW.

Sogyal Rinpoche .

loong the messenger