Tibetan_Ice

Maybe Ramana was right, kundalini does not make you enlightened nor Self realized.

There is certainly a misunderstanding that "no thought" is something to be striven for in Dzogchen. However, the goal is not "no thought" but recognizing the rigpa which encompasses all. From Ground, Path and Fruition: Wouldn't Zen's no mind be the same as being stuck in emptiness?

In 1972?

Ya. That is bogus. Reminds me of TM and the Maharishi.. When I was a teenager, I obtained instructions on how to levitate: Sit in full lotus. Visualize a white chord starting at the throat chakra, going up to the start the skull, then forward to the upper lip, then up to ajna, then back to the center of the crown. Repeat the mantra HAM. I did this meditation for a month, every day for an hour. Towards the end, my body would dissolve and a current of energy that resembled an upside down water fall appeared starting from the center of the neck, straight up the sushumna. It was a definite force, pulling upward. The problem was, when the body dissolves, you feel like you could be levitating, but you don't know for sure.. However, I could see that it may be possible to perfect that up-pulling-energy to the point where you could levitate. But, it was so damn hard and required too much effort and concentration for me at the time. I mean, I only succeeded when I tried so hard that it was like fighting for my life or some other urgent task.. 200% effort! Patanjali: http://www.swamij.com/yoga-sutras.htm

Fused, dissolved into a sun of very bright light, gone, no more consciousness, blown away.. It a meditative experience that comes and goes. When you return from it, you are disoriented and are left wondering "what was that?". I think the dharma overground calls it the arising and passing.. A&P

I'm talking Hindu yoga here, Patanjali, samadhi, concentration, effort, not Dzogchen which is the opposite.. Withdrawal of the senses is pratyahara, which is what happens when you succeed in becoming one pointed. It is very noticeable, usually after about twenty minutes of solid concentration. It feels like a wave of energy goes through the body and then it is gone, dissolved away. The technique I used is to visualize a letter, the letter "l". You visualize it and keep focusing on it. You make it real. After the senses shut off, you keep focusing on the letter with all your effort. I mention the bliss because right before you fuse into the letter, that is what I experienced. Of course, the eyes are closed and you sit with spine straight. In Hindu yoga, there are many goals. If you perform the true samyama on a flower, for example, you will learn many things about the flower. There is a whole list of siddhis that are gained from samyama on various objects, elements. The ultimate is to perform samyama on your self.. The equivalent or similar method of meditation in Buddhism is called shamatha, which also confers the siddhis..

Hmmm. This is fusing together: I am calling "becoming one with the object" fusing together. At least, that is what it feels like during samadhi.. The object gets brighter and brighter. The senses have fallen away and there is just one solid stream of attention from "you" to the object. Then the object becomes incredibly bright and clear, there is an explosion of bliss and you are gone. That has been my experience with dhyana.. For a discussion about Patanjali and all that, see http://thedaobums.com/topic/21469-patanjalis-sutras-and-samyama-questions/

You have a poor understanding of the term "rigpa" Yes, remaining in rigpa is all it takes to get you all the way in Dzogchen. However, defining rigpa as "observing thoughts without attachment" is a poor rendition of the term "rigpa". And then explaining thoughts as a form of energy, hence they are empty, is just plain ridiculous. From Ground, Path and Fruition. It says "rigpa arrives and increases until it is completely manifest at which time our consciousness is called "rigpa alone", or "dharmakaya" or "graduated to the actuality of the ground" or "graduated to the actuality of the fruition"."

You should not come into a Buddhist forum and call Ramana's "natural state" the same as Dzogchen's "natural state". Using the term "samadhi" is also a faux pas because you end up saying ridiculous statements like the one you said above. Study Patanjali and his process for arriving at samadhi. It is a practice of GRASPING. It is taking hold of a single object and fixing the mind single pointedly on it until the subject and object fuse together. AYP bastardized the understanding of Patanjali's process for samadhi, samyama and you seem to be just spouting off what you picked up there.

The tonal and natural are the terms that the fictitious writer "Casteneda" used in his books, Journey to Ixtlan, etc.. The tonal is a sort of representation of form, of all forms. One way to stop internal dialog is to flood the tonal with so many objects that it can't grasp at all of them at the same time and becomes silent. Like a wide gazing practice. The Nagual, on the other hand, is the mysterious power that lies beyond and is the counterpart of the tonal. Please remember that Casteneda created his books by sitting in a library and translating various texts into his own concoctions, so some of the principles behind his stories have a foot in relative truth, but you have to take the gum boots off first. Power spots, gazing, losing self importance, art of dreaming (looking at your hands) etc are all viable practices that have their lessons, but I seriously doubt if his art form is a true representation of shamanism. Trecko and thogal are Dzogchen practices. Trecko practice are a series of methods used to discover rigpa and train in remaining in rigpa for longer periods of time. Rigpa is a combination of "emptiness", "clarity" and the inseperableness of the two. Thogal is a "gazing" practice which monopolizes the Kati secret channel from the heart to the eyes in order to convince the practitioner that all visual phenomenon are illusory, a projection and have no absolute intrinsic nature apart from Primordial Wisdom, or if the basis is not recognized it is called "ignorance".

Have you ever read "Journeys Out Of The Body- Robert A. Monroe?

Probably one of the better books on Rigpa is "Ground, Path and Fruition" by Tony Duff. He has the usual methods, like "phat", and numerous other methods too.

From The Vajra Prajna Paramita Sutra A General Explanation by The Venerable Master Hsuan Hua English translation by the Buddhist Text Translation Society Buddhist Text Translation Society Dharma Realm Buddhist University Dharma Realm Buddhist Association Burlingame, California U.S.A.

Dear karma, I've got a list of people you forgot.

Recently, I discovered a Christian Mystic Healer called "Daskalos". I watched a video, bought a book called "Swimming with the Whale" and learned as much as I could about him. The stories are fascinating, like how at the age of 7 he healed the open wound of another young boy whom had fallen and cut his knee. Stories like how, at the age of 7, Daskalos could solve complex mathematical equations by letting a 2000 year old spiritual friend guide his hand on the blackboard. Daskalos, at the same age, could translate Latin into English.. The stories in "Swimming with the Whale" are truly mind boggling. There is a healing story about how he straightened a woman's spine by first de-materializing it, then re-materializing it in the correct position. There is also another story about how Daskalos lengthened another lady's 'short leg' to be the same length as the good leg. Daskalos teaches that we have three bodies, physical, psychical (astral) and noetical (mental) and that each of the three bodies has an 'etheric double'. He teaches that we can learn how to access these etheric doubles in order to perform healings (reaching into the body and adjusting, removing, or performing some aspect of healing). Daskalos says that 'visualization' is the major component of his teachings. Not only are the etheric doubles trained through visualization, but Daskalos says that visualization is the skill that is needed once a person dies and passes over to the astral realms, for everything in the astral realms is created by 'visualization'. One of Daskalos' practices is to visualize one's self surrounded by the colour light-blue. He has several practices which involve visualizing 'whitish blue' or 'sky blue'. You can find some information about some of the practices here: http://www.researchersoftruth.org/practice/good-health-exercise Anyway, I've been practising some of the visualization exercises with the color blue, imagining that I am floating in a sea of whitish blue or visualizing a ball of blue light at the abdomen etc.. A few revelations is that the visualization of a sky blue ball of light at the abdomen is a method of attaining the first jhana. Refer: Kasina practice Vissudhimagga.. The thing that made me wonder about all of this is that Daskalos' practices, working with sky-blue visualizations reminded me of the Kunlun warm up exercise where you visualize yourself floating in the sky upon a white lotus. Here is the practice: (it is found in book 1, book 2 but not book 3): From "Pillars of Bliss" Lama Ngakpha Dorje (Max) with Chris Tittle There seemed to be a great similarity here between envisioning one submerged in a sea of white-blue as per one of Daskalos' practices and the Kunlun warmup visualization.. So, today, I decided to do a 50 minute session of the old Kunlun warm-up excercise only. I started the meditation and made sure that all the components were in order.. The sky-blue surrounding, the white lotus, the white skin, inhaling clear white mist and exhaling blue-gray smoke. I "made it real" and kept at it. I did not influence the breathing at all, I just left it breathing normally and followed the breathing without any conscious control. At first, some distracting throughts arose but I persisted. I mentally traced over the components again and again. After about 35 minutes I was succeeding in establishing a pretty good visualization of the whole scene including the motion of the inhale and exhale along with the white mist going in and the grayish smoke coming out. Then something strange started to happen. I noticed that there was a very bright light that was starting to appear straight ahead in the sky. The light resembled an arc welder's torch or a bluish white star. The star was much brighter than the surrounding visualization. It was very hard to ignore. From my previous practice instructions with bright stars, I proceeded to ignore the star. However, it wasn't going away. It was getting brighter and brighter right in front of me, at the front of the visualized scene. It was becoming a challenge to maintain the visualization while 'noticing' that this very bright whitish glob of arc-welders' torch-like light was cutting into the whole scene. Then I noticed that my root chakra was starting to vibrate and release bliss-like sensations. Time to stop and analyse. I stopped the meditation at that point (47 minutes in). I have seen nimittas before as well as arc-welders' torch light during kundalini episodes, so I didn't quite know what to make of this new phenomenon. I got up and found my old Kunlun books and started reviewing them. Then I found this in book 3: (Kunlun System - By Max Christensen): http://www.amazon.com/KUNLUN®-System-Alchemy-Leading-Within/dp/098522360X/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top?ie=UTF8 I seem to like the idea that I was actually looking down the Kati crystal channel and that I had succeeded in doing that by using visualization. It is interesting that the practice of Thogal is from the heart to the eyes and beyond, whereas this Kunlun teaching is to open the kati channel from the heart to the crystal palace. They say that the kati secret channel goes from the heart to the crown, then wraps around the ears and proceeds to the eyes (from various high-end Buddhist books). From Kunlun System again: So, never underestimate the power of visualization.

Lots is practices involve visualization. It the first time I hear the theory behind it from a bonafide healer.. From "Swimming With The Whale": I find it fascinating because many time I have been meditating and my arms have "come out of my physical arms" and assumed a position that my physical arms were not in. It reminds me of the Hindu pictures of Godesses with four or six arms. Also, when I was a kid, someone showed me a trick where you tense a fist very tightly, then you rub the wrist, and then you open that hand very slowly. It felt like your hand is actually open, but when you look at it, the hand is still in a fist. Etheric double fun! We also used to create "monster" thought forms and place them at desks in class or on seats on the bus. It was interesting how everyone seemed to have avoided sitting at those places.

I've ordered the hard copy including another one called "The Esoteric Teachings". The latter is coming from Germany.

http://www.paul-timothy.net/pages/jesus/docs/buddhist_prophecy_phra_sri_an-thai_1954.pdf

That is not to say that there is no value in visualization. Namdak himself states that for beginners, ngondro and guru yoga are good practices.. Also, the meditation of the clear light involves visualization, as he mentions later in the book. From my current understanding, the natural state is nonduality, as it is a state which is beyond normal consciousness in which there is no subject or object (as namdak has stated). Any visualization practice involves working with the subject and object and is an act of consciousness. You have to go beyond consciousness.. From what I understand, there seems to be a few methods of working one's self into the natural state. The first is samadhi, where the subject and object fuse together and explode/dissolve. Another method is to completely let go of everything, lose interest in all sensations, emotions, desires, thoughts and visions and become a dispassionate observer only... Absolutely no "doer", no motion. Another method is to spend years of mantra repetition while visualizing the mantra, watching carefully until you see the space of rigpa that surrounds the visualizations. This is the non dual space of rigpa, baby rigpa. It is just beyond the level of "intuition". I think most people cannot just go for Dzogchen because it is too difficult to realize the natural state and stay there. Conceptual thought comes in very fast and it is hard to stay thought free unless you learn how to stabilize. It is like Tsoknyi Rinpoche suggested.. Turn your attention back inwards and in the first few moments you will experience rigpa, the point before your conceptual mind kicks in. Then, when you have a thought, quit. Try again a few minutes later. Many short attempts spaced out throughout he day will eventually grow into longer experiences of rigpa.. It's that pure fresh pristine awareness free from the conceptual phenomenon that you are seeking to stabilize in. Starting at the top, failing, then going lower to tantra, and even to sutra is one method. I tried that many times. Many times I start over from the bottom and work my way back up. At the end of the "Main practices of Dzogchen" that I keep referring to, Namdak presents clear light methods which involve visualization, the central channel etc. He even includes another somewhat dangerous method of pressing on the arteries in the neck to bring on the natural state, but it is dangerous and you could die. On another note, visualization is a great thing to develop, because, according to Daskalos, after you die and go to the astral plane, you create your environment through visualization. Visualization is one of the best abilities to develop in this lifetime. I know his terminology is somewhat non-Buddhist and a tad bit Christian, but the content is easily transferable.. http://www.researchersoftruth.org/teachings/visualization i could go on about the need to develop the ability to visualize, but I'll stop here.

This topic reminded me of a book called "Masters of the Zhang Zhung Nyengyud" - Teachings by "Yongzdin Lopon Tenzin Namdak. http://www.amazon.com/Masters-Nyengyud-Yongdzin-October-Hardcover/dp/B015X3X8YI

Hi Wells, Here is more from "The Main Dzogchen Practices" - Lopon Tenzin Namdak Rinpoche, about why Dzogchen is 'higher' than tantra. (bolding is mine)

Thanks for that.

Hi Wells, You want instructions with self-awareness? This is from "The Main Dzogchen Practices - Lopon Tenzin Namdak Rinpoche" How is that?