Outside of meditation, reflecting now, 2 days later … did those thoughts arise at all? Where are they? …
Are they any different in nature from the dream I had last night? Where has that gone?
They both had a sense of ‘realness’ at the time, but what substance remains of either? Both resonate, and seem to leave an emotional echo, but was either more or less ‘real’ than the other? ….
Both empty arisings ….. that echo in the present mind.
The echo of empty arisings
How do I know it is connected to those thoughts 2 days ago? How do I know I even had those thoughts 2 days ago? … my ‘recollection’ now … how do I know it is trustworthy recollection?
Frozen ice bubble
Like a dream, experiences of empty appearances … whether we call ourselves ‘awake’, or ‘dreaming’, it all has the same nature …. vivid and clear, unobstructed, and empty of all substantiality ….
This last evening, I’ve been watching seemingly endless thoughts appearing in mind, anger and revenge mostly, as in the midst of a family crisis, my ex-wife decided to pitch in with the ‘blame game’.
It’s funny this expression – pushing the buttons. The common expression is .. ‘she knows how to push my buttons’ .. meaning, she knows what to say which hurts the most, and upsets the most.
Pushing Buttons
So a rush a thoughts running through mind, which play out this amazing story of this, and that, then this then that … all running along, seemingly without any fuel or intention. It’s like a train out of control …. careering on, yet ‘who’ asked it to?
Thoughts spontaneously appear – from where?
They pop up into mind …. but where did they come from? I look at mind, and cannot see where they arise from. I look, but they just spontaneously appear, seemingly from nowhere. How can that be? How can ‘something’ come from ‘nothing’?
Well, are they ‘something’, and do they go back into ‘nothing’?
Seems like that as the rush of emotion is in full flow. But watching closely, there’s increasingly less a sense of ‘something’ arising. Like ghostly presences, thoughts ‘seem’ to appear. But do they? What substance do they have? Sure, there is a sense of emotional fullness … and bodily sensations which accompany their presence. But how amorphous they are, and how transparent. Nowhere when I look can they be found, and yet they are there. Is there an arising? Or is there not? Can’t seem to apply either term to what is, with any sort of confidence. Seems like words fall down at that point.
So whether they arise or just like apparitions ‘seem to arise’, where did they come from? Again, no sensible answer, not one that makes sense conceptually. There doesn’t seem to be a ‘where’ … a place, an antecedent. Is there ‘place’ at all, where mind is concerned?
Looking at the weather of mind
Looking at mind, and how it is …. just a different ‘weather’ today, one I’m not much used to …. but still the same mind, still the same nature, it would seem. Like watching a different football match, with seemingly different players … but it’s still just ‘football’, or has the same nature. Bad metaphor ….. but you know what I mean?
May all unskilful thoughts be the cause or occasion for awakening! May we use all adverse circumstances to awaken, and help others end all suffering.
It is the single (nature of) mind which encompasses all of Samsara and Nirvana.
Even though its inherent nature has existed from the very beginning, you have not recognized it;
Even though its clarity and presence has been uninterrupted, you have not yet encountered its face.
Even though its arising has nowhere been obstructed, still you have not comprehended it.
Therefore, this (direct introduction) is for the purpose of bringing you to self-recognition.
Everything that is expounded by the Victorious Ones of the three times
In the eighty-four thousand Gateways to the Dharma.
Is incomprehensible (unless you understand intrinsic awareness).
Indeed, the Victorious Ones do not teach anything other than the understanding of this.
Self-Liberation through Seeing with Naked Awareness – verse 4. A Terma hidden by Padmasambhava, and revealed by Karma Lingpa
Karma Lingpa
This *is* the fulcrum, the central turning point of the Dharma … the understanding of the nature of the mind, of our intrinsic awareness. All the various means and views of the Dharma all lead to this one point – to understanding directly the nature of your mind. All the meditations, all the precepts, all the philosophy, all the skilful means – all of them point back to the direct, non-conceptual seeing of how things are, of the nature of mind.
Coming home to rest in mind’s nature
All of the Dharma teachings are incomprehensible unless you experience directly your mind as it is. Not a foreign land to be reached for the first time after a long journey, our immediate sense of that land is carried with us, each step of the way, guiding us, supporting us, and infusing our sense of journey and not-journey.
Our practice derives by resting in this awareness, this nature, and permeating our activity with that resting.
So close, so easy, so immediate
The direct teachings of Mahamudra and Dzogchen continually point to how close, easy and immediate available is this nature, right here, right now ….. not far away, not something to be cultivated afresh. Our mind is like ‘this’, and it doesn’t need to be changed. Just seen. Just … Just …..
May I and all beings Awaken right now, and guide each other home!
