Often, many people, even after listening to explanations for decades, still do not understand them. How can this be explained in the simplest possible way? If you imagine a person or being who is the very embodiment of God, the possessor of all incomparable qualities and virtues, the lord of all worlds, who is immortal and possesses an inconceivable consciousness, who is revered by gods, spirits, demons, and humans, then you will feel the greatest respect or awe for him. You will understand that he cannot be defined or fitted into any parameters; he is not subject to definitions, that this is something inconceivable and great. And then you need to imagine yourself as such a person and simply understand that this person is you, that you have been this person from the very beginning, regardless of what your opinion on this matter may be. It is not easy to acknowledge this, because the shrunken mind, the body, and thoughts say the opposite. However, the path of direct introduction is the sudden understanding of what it means to recognize oneself as such a great being.
In martial arts there is a style in which people imitate animals in order to attain mastery. By meditating on the qualities of a cat, they acquire tenacity and can climb sheer walls. By meditating on the qualities of birds, they can make high jumps, almost fly through the air. By meditating on the qualities of monkeys, they acquire agility. Through the merging of consciousness, a genuine sense of the illusory body arises, when a person reincarnates as an animal, possessing its qualities and using it for their own purposes.
We do something similar, only we reincarnate into the absolute being, into a deity, into the state of all-encompassing space. At first this happens “as if”; we allow it as a hypothesis or as words that we hear. Then we gradually accustom ourselves to this thought in order to begin feeling ourselves to be this day and night. We completely change our idea of ourselves as human beings. Why do we need to do this? Because an ordinary human being is a being bound by karma and doomed to birth and death in samsara. But we change the idea of ourselves as human beings into the idea of ourselves as infinite space, as a deity. If we possessed such great confidence and immediately entered this state, then we would not need to meditate. However, it is said that less fortunate people, who are strongly subject to rational thinking and compelled to follow a gradual path, need to meditate until stability is attained.
Less fortunate people are all those who are not divya. It is said that in the Kali Yuga there are no divya, that is, divya are already avatars. All the rest are, at best, vira, while most people generally belong to the level of pashu. Nevertheless, by practicing, we can develop the qualities of divya within ourselves in a short time, because the practice of the natural state gives a very rapid growth of merit and of its capacity to manifest; that is, in just six or seven years a yogin can make a leap. When we say that there is neither meditation nor anything to meditate on, we are speaking of genuine experience, not of words. Verbal self-liberation is good as a practice of understanding.
An Example of an Incorrect Understanding of Self-Liberation
In Crimea, I had a student who was a novice. After having a couple of experiences of clarity during walking practice at a retreat, he began to laugh. He became so joyful that he fell down and laughed. The Dharma protector brought him back to his senses. After these experiences of clarity, he began to behave very arrogantly. He self-liberated everything at once: the precepts, monasticism, the monastery, and himself, proving with great fury what a great practitioner he was, that he had realized a great deal, that there is neither one who speaks nor one who listens, and therefore he could do whatever he wanted. He wanted to go out into the world, because he decided that now he needed to manifest his freedom and express it like a fearless lion. I blessed him to go into the world, although inwardly I laughed. Recently, a letter came from him in which he writes that he spent three days sitting in samadhi, and now spirits are bothering him, so he needs help. But following the logic he had previously proclaimed, one could say that there are no spirits, no one whom they bother, and no one to whom he is addressing the letter, if everything is a manifestation of the mind, if everything is an illusion. If you have already taken this position, then be so kind as to stick to it. But this is far from easy. You must fully accept this position and fully rely on it. Even if your bones are being crushed, you must say: “Is there really someone whose bones are being crushed? You are infinite space, so what problems could you possibly have?” But if you cannot manifest such understanding in your behavior, then you must behave very modestly, distinguishing the relative from the absolute, so as not to look like a fool later. You must understand, even when practicing the great path, that there is relative (conventional) truth and absolute truth. Therefore we say that, while practicing the absolute truth of the great path, we nevertheless diligently advance in the relative as well, without confusing them.
There is a saying: “Fearless view, modest conduct.” This is the best path; when it is the other way around, nothing could be worse. Fearless conduct with a modest view is a great mistake.
Meditative Stability and the Single “Taste”
As for meditation, when all the causes of meditative stability are present, the experience of meditation arises. Otherwise, no matter how much you meditate amid worldly bustle and distractions, the experience of meditation will not arise; that is why it is said: “Renounce worldly bustle and devote yourself to meditation.” In general, it is said that in meditation there is no difference between the practice of sitting meditation and the period after it, but if at first you do not master sitting meditation as such, you will not be able to unite knowledge, the experience of meditation, with the experience of the period after meditation.
The concept of the single “taste” is interpreted in different ways. Some say that it is the equality of everything; when you see something beautiful and something repulsive, for example the corpse of a cat or excrement, and see it as equally pure, this is said to be the single “taste.” Others say that the single “taste” is the state in which what is inside and what is outside (inner and outer space) are seen as the same. Explaining this state, Gampopa said: “The single ‘taste’ is something like this,” and thrust his arm into a rock up to the elbow, thereby showing that the body and space had become the same. Still others say that the single “taste” is when sitting meditation and meditation in everyday life are one and the same. Thus, depending on the school, there are different approaches to the single “taste.” Our approach relates to all three; that is, the single “taste” manifests in many ways.
The state we experience while walking, eating, or engaging in other activities must become even and be of one “taste” with the meditative state we experience during sitting meditation. Even if we have attained levels of meditative absorption and experienced the state of emptiness, we should carefully examine ourselves in the post-meditative period: “Do I have this state while eating? To what extent does it descend?” We must constantly try to bring all the unconscious moments of our life up to the deep state of emptiness. When we do this, it is said that we unite everything with practice, that not a single small detail remains that we have overlooked.
Uniting Meditation with Everyday Life
Even if you try to direct the stream of everyday behavior into the channel of the spiritual path, you may make a mistake and, losing your natural disposition, fall into ordinary delusion. Therefore it is said: “Divide meditation into separate sessions.” By dividing the practice in this way into separate sessions, you can apply it if you are confident that in the state of meditation you can preserve the essence. But if you do not know how to unite this with behavior in the period after meditation and maintain such a state continuously, then the method of unification will not be effective under all circumstances. If the share of discursive thinking predominates, you will not get out of the habitual rut. Therefore, in the period after meditation, the most important thing is to maintain transparent awareness always and under all circumstances. At this time there is no need to seek some other object of meditation. In the state of meditation permeated by the view of nonduality, be like a free wanderer. Paying no attention to any actions or thoughts, do not try to suppress or develop them, and maintain this state with an immediacy untainted by anything.
Various methods help to lay bare the primordial state, but when it has been laid bare, the methods must recede into the background, while the primordial state manifests and comes to the fore. This does not mean that we do not use methods, but they are always supplementary if you have discovered the primordial state. If you have not discovered it, you must work persistently with the method, even if it takes all twelve years of training. When you succeed in the method, you will certainly discover the natural state, and then it will become your main method.
Conviction in Practice
It is said that such wide-open consciousness is the pure intention of all the great Teachers belonging to the Indian and Tibetan traditions. If you cannot stop being tempted by other secret instructions besides this one, then you are like an elephant driver who, leaving the elephant at home, sets off to look for it in the jungle.
Therefore it is said: “Be convinced that there is nothing other than this.” Conviction in one’s practice is necessary. Those who have such conviction differ very greatly both from ordinary people and from ordinary monks who do not have such conviction. Thus, it is necessary to be convinced once and for all that naked awareness, inseparable from emptiness, is the highest enlightenment, to which no delusion is known, and to preserve this conviction continuously.
The second rule is called “manana.” It can be translated in different ways: “reflection,” “elimination of uncertainties.” But I would rather say that it is conviction or faith. By checking again and again, you have finally found solid ground under your feet. Although this sounds like a pun, on the contrary, it means that you lose every ground and rely on that which cannot be relied upon. But when we rely on that which cannot be relied upon, we truly become immortal, because any ground upon which the mind can rely is subject to destruction. But the unsupported state is the only place where the yogin places his consciousness.
The Dangers of Incorrect Meditation
If you do not have confidence in this method of liberation, and you simply practice relaxing meditation of the motionless mind, then you will not be able to avoid a deviation that leads to the higher worlds.
One Tibetan scholar wrote that those who practice incorrect practices of emptiness may be reborn in the animal realm. This happens because if they fall into deviation, becoming absorbed in the state of emptiness, then after some time their mind ceases to apprehend it and the brightness of consciousness fades. As a result, their consciousness begins to resemble very closely the state of ignorance, which is dominant in animals. Most likely, he did not mean that such practitioners would literally be reborn in the body of an animal; rather, he was speaking of the fact that in a future life they would have such a dim and empty consciousness (tamas).
It happens that a person can sit comfortably in meditation and remain in a state of diffusion. He is in emptiness, his mind is quite calm. And he can sit like this in retreat for two months without any particular problems. And in this text it is said that this is not the animal realm, but a deviation that leads to the higher worlds, if there is some clarity.
Liberation in Everyday Life
This method will not be effective under difficult circumstances, in the presence of passion or hatred, and will not be able to cut off the stream of karmic traces. Therefore, such a yogin will not be able to attain firm certainty. This is extremely important. Moreover, when strong passion arises toward objects of desire or strong hatred toward what is undesirable, joy from favorable events and pleasures, grief from unfavorable events and illnesses—whatever may occur—at that time the natural state manifests. Therefore, it is important to recognize the primordial wisdom of the basis of liberation.
It is said that even if a person abides in some meditative consciousness, but in everyday life has not learned to liberate thoughts, kleshas, passions, and situations, this state is not the one required by a yogin. How can this be described more simply? Even if there is a good retreat meditator, but in everyday life he behaves like an ordinary person, then this is an insufficient attainment. Conversely, even if a person does not reach for the stars during seated meditation—that is, does not enter samadhi or deep dhyana—but every action of his is accompanied by uninterrupted presence, and he can liberate all his thoughts and emotions, then such a practitioner is much more profound. Perhaps he cannot enter samadhi only because the structure of his channels and winds, due to past karma, does not yet allow it; however, he has far greater maturity. The first has some peak of awareness during seated meditation, but this state is interrupted. The second may not have such a peak of awareness or visions, but he does have an even wave, an undercurrent that accompanies all his actions. He constantly maintains this undercurrent and is like an elephant that, sweeping away everything in its path, goes to the watering place.
