BellaOnline Forums Religion and Spirituality Buddhism The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying -S.Rinpoche

Dear Teacher,

What attracted me to this book was the fact that Sogyal Rimpoche
mentionned in his book 4 bardos ,you even answered me in another post that there were 6.Made some research and this book was given as a reference.Highly recommended by the way.The Foreword is from The Venerable Kalu Rinpoche.There is a picture of this person wearing a ceremonial Gampopa Hat.
In a little meditation I decided to give the the great lines of the 6 bardos mentionned in the book.
I beleive we are connected,I was about to post,and you are there.

I so much trust in you,you have no idea.This is new to me ,because all my life ,in everything ,I trusted myself only for learning,might it be Tennis,became a teaching pro in 2 years,
drag racing ,built my own car, everything ,semi-pro hockey as a goal tender.

Thank You for caring.Maybe ,you did not expect this,with all your other activities and involvement.

Loong

To all or None,
As promised ,here are the 6 bardos by Lama Lodo.
The first is the Bardo of Life.
The second is the bardo of the Dream state,
The third is the Bardo of Meditation
The fourth Is The Bardo Of the Process of Death
The fifth is The Bardo State After Death
The sixt,is the search For Rebirth in Samsara.

I could explain every one of them ,all 6 being written in the book.

Loong

To all or none

I had written in another post why the Bardo of death was called
of suffering death.
Here is what is written in the bardo book.

Even as death is certain, we must also remember that it is not painless.It is not like having the flame of a candle blown out by the wind or extinguished with water.Very few people are able to die with great peace and happiness,even those who have sincerely and consientiously practiced the Dharma and have through meditation,achieved great power over their own minds.
So if death is certain we must also be prepared for the consequences.How can we best face our ultimate fate?Basically,
there are 2 ways.The first is to practice The Dharma with great Compassion for the benefit of all sentient beings.The second is
to gain control of our mind through intense Devotion,
With these two,we can overcome all obstacles.

Source :by Lama Lodo

Loong the messenger

To all or none

Like I have said before,finding a small part to share with you,is quite a juggling act.
The one I am about to share with you ,is taken in the bardo section of living.lt also speaks of detachtment,bliss.

Imagine that you come home one day after work to find your door smashed open
Hanging on its hinges.You have been robbed.You go inside and find that everything
you own has vanished.For a moment,you are paralyzed with shock,and in dispair
you frantically go through the mental process of trying to recreate what is gone.
It hits you ,you have lost everything.Your restless,agitated mind is then and thoughts subside.And there 's a sudden deep stillness,almost an experience of bliss.No more struggle,no more effort,because both are hopeless.Now you have
Just to give up,you have no choice.
So one moment you have lost something precious,and then ,in the very next
Moment,you find your mindis resting in a deep state of peace.When this kind of experience occurs,do not immediately rush to find solutions.Remain for a while,
inthat state of peace.Allowe it to be a gap (bardo),looking into the mind,you will catch a glimpseof the deathless nature of the enlightened mind.

Comment from loong:The moment of bliss you may live comes from the fact that ,you have nothing to cling to,you become free of all attachments.

Loong the messenger

Dear Lisa'
I can't find where you wrote about the book on bardos ,if it had
been referred in S .Rinpoche's book ,The Tibetan.....
In the reference section ,Ven.Kalu Rinpoche,is mentionned 3 times. He is the one who wrote The Foreward,recommanding,Lama Lodo.In the Bardo Teachings book.

loong

Yes, these 6 bardos is also what I was taught, and I do know these teachers by reputation. I have no doubt it is a good book. I was asking why you were drawn to go into the bardos more yourself right now. I was curious why this feels important to you to learn more about specifically, because there are so many areas of Buddhism. I was mostly asking because it seemed to be confusing you, and in that case won't aid your practice.

But after reading what you have posted since, I think I understand now. In our path, I definitely believe we have to follow our intuition, and what we are pulled to, and some part of you is pulling you to study the bardos in more depth, so you need to trust that.

For me, the bardos are more of a template for studying the infinite states of being or awareness that we can experience. Unless you are a Buddhist academic, it is not so interesting to debate whether there are 4 or 6. I personally relate more to the 6. But I also think there are hundreds of variations within each of these. And more importantly, I think they are more interesting in terms of thinking about how they relate to our lives, rather than our deaths. We can relate to the descriptions of states in our lives - our awareness is so fluid, and we literally travel through so many states in a 24 hour period.

So for me, learning about the bardos has been most interesting in relation to mindfulness and meditation - in terms of taking mindfulness and meditation to another level. The descriptions of the bardo states help us become aware of subtler shifts in our awareness, beyond the changes in our thoughts and emotions. Our awareness - our true 'mind' - is much vaster than that.

Dear Lisa,

After working on a new thread on the 5 woman Buddhas,on my tablette,I was trying to print it ,someone comes along ,touches a button and all is lost.One hour not completely lost but....
Loong

To all or none,
However consummate our spiritual mastery may be,we are limited by the body and
It's karma.But with the physical release of death comes the most marvelous opportunity to fulfill everything we have been stiving for in our practice and our life.Even in the case of a supreme master who has reached the highest realization ,the ultimate release,called,PARINIRVANA,dawns only at death.That is why in the Tibetan
tradition we do not celebrate the birthdays of masters,we celebrate THEIR DEATH,
Their moment of final illumination.

Text by SOGYAL RINPOCHE
transcription with humblenes
Loong

Since Easter is coming up, I thought I would mention that this is what Easter is to me - it is the paranirvana of Jesus.

Dear Teacher,

I totally agree.

Loong