H.H 17th Karmapa Ogyen
Trinlay Dorje

Ven. Khenpo Kathar
Rinphoche

Dying, Death and the Bardo

Khenpo Karthar Rinpoche

Tape 1

What I'm going to be explaining, starting this evening, is the interval between lives, or the bardo. As most of all of you know, the best known explanation of this is the book that is called The Great Liberation Through Hearing, in the Bardo.  And that book is a very complete and precise explanation of what happens in the bardo as well as what you can do to deal with it and what opportunities there are for liberation. However, because of the book's length and the relatively short amount of time that we have available to us this weekend, I felt it would be inappropriate to start something that we couldn't finish. Therefore, the text that I'm going to use as the basis for my presentation, is an aspiration liturgy, called The Aspiration for the Bardo. And although this text also is a complete treatment of the subject, it is brief enough that we will be able to complete it this weekend.

            The liturgy of aspiration begins with a stanza of supplication and the stanza says, "Those who are our refuge in this life, in future lives and in the interval in between, our guides, the gurus, I supplicate you. Lead us who, though negative karma, mistake the projections of our bewilderment to be real, out of our wandering through the six states within samsara."

            The first point made in this stanza is that the gurus, which means in this case, those that hold us and raise us onto the path, such as the golden garland of the Kagyu, and so forth, our gurus are our sources of refuge not only in this life, but in all future lives, and even in the intervals or bardos in between lives. So therefore, you begin by supplicating them expressly and by implication, the other sources of refuge, the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, and so on.

            The request you make in supplicating them is explained in the second two lines of the stanza. What is pointed out here is that it is through the negative karma that we accrue that we wander in samsara. But our accumulation of negative karma is caused by our mistaking our own bewildered projections or appearances to be real. That is to say that the appearances that appear for us or that we experience, are functions of our bewilderment and not independent realities. It is through mistaking them to be independently existent or independently real, that we become fixated, generate kleshas, accumulate negative karma and so on. It is this that causes us to wander through and be reborn in the six states, the realms of the hells, pretas, animal, humans, asuras, and devas. So our supplication is that we be led out of this. This introduces the whole aspiration, which is concerned with the discovery of the nature of bewildered appearances. And you will see as the liturgy goes through the various aspects of the bardo, that it is concerned with the penetration of appearances and the discovery of their true nature.

            The next stanza begins with a definition of the bardo as we usually use the term. The term interval or bardo simply means something that is in-between two other things. And it will be used and explained in different ways here. But generally speaking, we use it to mean the state in-between lives. And in the next line it is defined that way: the type of existence that one has in-between lives when one has not gone to or reached the next state of birth. So we usually use the term bardo to mean just that: to mean that state that we're in after death, before the next rebirth. What characterizes that state is explained in the next line, which says, "in that state, one has no freedom or control." A being in the bardo has no ability, for reasons that will become clear, to control where they go and so forth. You are driven about by the strong force of your karma. Your karma—your previous actions—becomes the thing that controls you in the bardo, and you are driven about by it, which means that you are thrown about violently from one place to another, without your having any ability to stop this.

            Now if that is what the bardo is like, what can we do about it? That is explained in the next line which says, "Through the instructions concerning special visualizations for use at that time, may I be able to practice all the various ways of bringing the bardo to the path."

            In order to gain control over the bardo one must practice in the preceding life. In the state of the bardo, because one has no control one doesn't have the opportunity to engage in practices. So one's aspiration here is, through recognizing what the bardo experience is, to be motivated by that recognition and to pursue those practices, which will give you the ability to gain control and ideally liberation, within the bardo. Now these practices consist of specific methods, types of focus or visualizations, and all of them are ways of bringing various aspects or stages of the bardo experience onto the path. Now, in using the term bardo here in the restricted sense, where it refers to the period in between lives, it will be used in other senses as well, as we'll see: it basically has three phases. And the methods, and this will be taught in detail further on, the methods, Rinpoche said, for dealing with these, involve learning to see the particular type of bewildered projection or appearance which characterizes that phase of the bardo as dharmata in the case of the first bardo, deity and mantra in the case of the second, and the nirmanakaya or emanation body in the case of the third. And again, this will be gone through in detail later on. But that is what you are referring to when you say, "May I undertake the specific practices that will bring the bardo onto the path."

            The next stanza describes the true nature of the bardo. It begins by saying, "If you examine it or analyze it, you will see that there is no beginning or end, therefore there can be no in between." It here refers to the beginningless and potentially endless cycle of samsaric existence. If you examine existence, you will see that it is without beginning. Furthermore if you examine any phenomenon, you will see that it has no true arising. Now that which does not truly arise does not truly cease and therefore cannot truly abide in between. Or, otherwise explained, because existence has no beginning, there is no abiding state that is in between. So, ultimately speaking there is no single state that is in between two other states because none of these other states have ever truly arisen or truly occurred. So therefore, ultimately, or in the context of absolute truth, what we call the bardo doesn't exist. However as the next line points out, it certainly seems to, to the person who is experiencing it. The line says, "Nevertheless, in the context of bewilderment, it arises as a mere interdependent appearance." In the context of bewilderment means experience as we know it, when the cognition that is experiencing is obscured and therefore bewildered, when you therefore take things that do not have true or independent existence to have such existence. The mere appearance of the bardo or interval, which is itself interdependent, (it is the mere appearance of interdependent conditions in that way) appears, and because your bewilderment consists of the mistaking of mere interdependent appearances as independent realities, you therefore mistake the bardo as an independent reality. In other words, although the bardo doesn't really exist, it seems to as long as you are bewildered. For example, for although we can say that no phenomenon ever truly arises, any phenomenon we could isolate is a mere interdependent appearance and therefore is empty of true origination, therefore we can say that no phenomenon truly ceases. That which never truly came into existence cannot go out of existence, and therefore no phenomenon truly abides or persists, in between origination and cessation, since it never originated. Although we can say that, we also have to admit that we experience the appearance of origination of phenomenon. They appear to start to exist. And we experience the appearance therefore of their ending, destruction or cessation and the appearance of their abiding. Now the origination, cessation and abiding of phenomenon are mere appearances, not truly existent events, but nevertheless, we do experience them in our bewilderment as though they were real.

Now, the bardo is not just the period in between lives. In fact we can say that, as the Buddha taught in teachings, all of samsara and nirvana without exception can be included in or summarized as the bardo. Because as long as there is a state of bewilderment, as long as there is fixation on duality, as long as there is the belief in the independent existence of what is experienced and the cognition that experiences it, as long as there are all of these different kinds of categories of twos: pleasure and pain, good and bad, samsara and nirvana, that arise for us, we are in some kind of bardo or interval.

            And so this stanza concludes with the aspiration, "May I gain trust in the Buddha's teachings, that all of samsara and nirvana are in this way included in this category of bardo, which does not truly exist, but nevertheless, appears to.

            The next two stanzas divide the bardo into two aspects, the bardo of the nature, or the true nature, and the bardo of appearance, manner of appearance. True nature here means how things are and appearance means how things seem or appear. So the first stanza says, "In absolute truth, things are beyond limit and their nature is the middle." Beyond limit means beyond the limits of existence or absolute nonexistence, and beyond the limits of having a beginning and having an end, having true origination and having true cessation. The nature of things, absolute truth, is that middle which transcends all kinds of conceptual elaborations. A conceptual elaboration is any kind of concept about reality that you can come up with. The nature of things is beyond that and therefore is called the middle because it avoids any such extreme. Therefore the nature of things actually is between or beyond all of our concepts and all of our dualism. Our bewilderment starts with the fixation on duality, the duality of self and other, of pleasure and pain and so on, and it includes the appearance of duality, the appearance of self and other as separate and so forth. But the true nature of all of these things that appear to us as dual is not dual, it is beyond that. And therefore, in the words of the liturgy, it is between that. And that nature of things which is between all extremes or limits is what's called the bardo of the absolute or true nature.

            The next line says, "Everything is that, and it is everything. There is nothing whatsoever that has any nature other than this." And therefore, in a sense you can say that this nature is everything that there is, everything that truly exists because it is the nature of all things. Therefore in this stanza you end by aspiring, "May I meet or see the face of the bardo of the true nature." See the face means not to merely understand it, but to gain direct experience of it through precise instruction and the intensive practice of meditation and other methods.

            The next stanza describes another aspect of the bardo, which is the bardo of how things appear. Relative truth and, Rinpoche here defined it, the term "kunzop" which is usually translated as "relative" or "relative truth," really means, "fake." But if you say "fake truth" in English, which would be actually a stricter translation, it sounds like an oxymoron. Relative truth is called fake because when it is viewed by an undiluted cognition, it is seen to be unreal, to not truly exist. So therefore what is relative truth? It is a continuous process of bewilderment and bewildered appearances. It is continuous in the sense that it is beginningless and it has never stopped and it is a continuous process of bewilderment and bewildered appearances or projections that is also constantly gaining momentum. The power of it is constantly increasing, causing our bewilderment to grow over time. So through bewilderment we experience relative truth, or fake reality, as real. What is this like? It is like someone in the audience of a skilled illusionist. A skilled illusionist, either through whatever method or through the power of casting spells, can cause their audience to see all sorts of things that aren't there. They can cause you to see people, horses, elephants, houses, whatever you want; none of these things are there, but as long as you don't realize that, you react to them with pleasure, pain, disappointment, happiness, enjoyment, fear and so on, just as though they really were there. Our experience of relative truth is this beginningless deception by the fakery or illusion of our own bewilderment.

            Now the term that we usually translate as existence literally is possibility. And I need to interject that because of the next line and Rinpoche's comment on it. The next line says, "In this possibility, nothing is impossible." So the nature of existence, which is synonymous here with samsara, is that because it is all founded on bewilderment, it is all founded on delusion, it is all of the nature of illusion and bewildered projections, anything is possible. Any form of bewilderment, any form of hallucination can occur, just as an illusionist can cause you to see just about anything. So this stanza ends with the aspiration, "May I gain strong certainty about the bardo, or interval, of how things appear." And that means, may I gain the strong certainty, that all of these appearances, the mere appearances, the projections of bewilderment that make up what we call relative truth or fake truth, are nothing more than the bewildered projections of a mind that is captivated by fixated belief in the duality of that which does not possess duality.

            Next the text turns to a presentation of different aspects of the bardo and it divides the bardo, types of bardo, types of interval, initially into three and then divides the third of these again into three because it's the third with which we are primarily concerned here. The first type of bardo or interval described here is called the interval between birth and death and it means exactly what it sounds like it means: it means the period of time that starts with when you are born and ends with when you start to die in that life. What demarcates this interval or separates it out of the course of someone's existence is obviously physical events or physical transformations: the transformation of being born into a certain life and of that life decaying and culminating in death. Also, the experience of this interval, the interval between birth and death, is marked by physical activity and physical transformations of all sorts of appearances and all sorts of pleasant and unpleasant things that you hear and that you say. And all sorts of positive and negative, pleasant and unpleasant experiences and thoughts and so on. What needs to be understood about this first interval, the interval between birth and death, is that none of its appearances are reliable. They are unreliable because they are ephemeral; they do not last; they are constantly changing. It is a state of constant change, therefore, ultimately speaking, the appearances of this life have no more existence than magical illusions or dreams because they are mere fluctuations, they are changes, they are not the persistent existence or abiding of anything. So the aspiration connected with this first interval, the interval between birth and death, is that you come to recognize all of these appearances of this life as merely the fluctuating hallucinations of an interval or bardo.

            Now, how do you do this? You do this in the best cases by practicing intensive meditation to the point where you can rest in even placement within the direct experience of the illusory nature of phenomenon, or of the emptiness, which is their true nature. If you cannot do that, it is important at least to gain certainty, through examination, of the appearances of this life, in their being ephemeral, illusory and unreliable.

            The second interval or bardo that is described here or isolated is the interval of dream, and this is what we normally call the dream state. It consists of experiencing appearances that don't really exist but that seem to because you are asleep. Now what we call sleep is a physical state, so therefore this interval, like the other one, is demarcated by physical changes. In this case the physical change is that when you fall asleep, your senses stop functioning. You stop hearing, seeing, smelling, tasting and feeling to a great extent, therefore the images that arise in your mind take on an appearance of reality because there is no sense experience to overpower them. So in dreams, you seem to do all the things that you do while you're awake, and while you are dreaming you take these things to be really there, you think you're actually doing these things, you're actually seeing and hearing the things you seem to be seeing and hearing, but in fact, while you are dreaming, you're not seeing or hearing anything. You're not doing anything. And when we wake up from dreams, even though we realize that it was just a dream, we further fixate on the appearances of the dream by investing dreams with significance. We think, was it a good dream, was it a bad dream? What does it mean? And we solidify the illusory dream images even after we have awoken from them. So the aspiration here is expressly that all of this bewilderment connected with the dream state, its primary bewilderment, thinking that dreams are real while you are dreaming, and its secondary bewilderment, thinking that they're important after you wake up, that all of this bewilderment be removed. Now that is the express aspiration, but by implication this refers to how we experience in general, because although we can extinguish the dream state from the waking state, by the physical factor, or physical transformation of sleep, our cognition fundamentally functions in the same way: it is deluded; it is hallucinating. The bewildered appearances of dreams are easily understood by us to be unreal, once we are awake. But if you think about it carefully, the bewildered appearances of the waking state, in their unreliability, in their being ephemeral, impermanent and so on, are no more real and are just like dreams or magical illusions. So really, what this stanza of aspiration is pointing out, is that by eradicating the bewilderment of taking dreams as real, you can move toward eradicating the bewilderment of taking conventional appearances, daytime or waking appearances, as real as well.

            Following that, starting the next stanza, we come to the third interval. And it is this third interval that is usually what people mean when they talk about the bardo and therefore it is the principal subject of the rest of our text. Here, it is called the interval of possibility and it is divided into three, which is simply called the first part, the middle part and the last part. And they correspond to dying, being dead, and approaching rebirth. These are called the interval of possibility because they are the state in which the various possible rebirths can happen, as you will see.

 Now, the paths through which you prepare for the three phases of the interval of possibility are: the path of the clear light through which the nature of the first bardo is recognized to be dharmakaya; the path of the illusory body through which the nature of the second interval is realized to be samboghakaya, or the body of complete enjoyment; and the path of the nirmanakaya, where you transform the final phase of, or the third interval, into birth as nirmanakaya. So you make the aspiration initially, all summarized into one stanza, "May I traverse or complete these paths and thereby achieve liberation in these intervals." Now, what does this mean? Whatever form of meditation we may believe ourselves to be practicing, whether we say we are practicing Mahamudra, "I meditate on Mahamudra," or we are meditating on the Great Perfection, "I am a Great Perfection practitioner," or we meditate on the profound Middle Way, whatever it is we may think we are doing, what we are supposed to be doing in any of those three systems of practice, is coming to a direct realization of the true nature of all things. In terms of what that nature is not, you could say that nature is not inherent existence. In terms of what it is: you can say it is the freedom from true inherent or independent existence, and it is that which is called the "clear light." So the purpose of meditation in general is to gain the direct experience of the clear light and to gain sufficient experience to achieve liberation during the first part of the interval at death. So if you can truly realize that all things are empty of existence, true existence, then that is the path bringing liberation in the first interval.

In case that doesn't work, you also meditate on pure appearances. That is to say that from within that state of emptiness, the nature of all things, the deity arises. This may involve the deity arising from a syllable and/or a scepter and so on, and whatever deity it is, Vajravarahi, or any other, you identify yourself completely with this utterly unreal and yet absolutely vivid and clear utterly pure appearance. By doing this you gain the possibility of liberation in the samboghakaya of that deity in the second phase or the second interval.

In case that doesn't happen, you also prepare for taking a rebirth as emanation: which is to say, through the force of love and compassion, and the force of your aspirations for appropriate rebirth, to be able to stop inferior birth, inappropriate birth, and choose a birth through which you will be able to continue the path and be of benefit to others. And that is how you achieve freedom of birth in the third and final phase of the interval of possibility. So that stanza summarizes what is going to be presented throughout the rest of the text, since the text is primarily concerned with the interval as we usually mean it, the interval between lives.

Now, the text turns to the first of the three parts of the interval of possibility and this is called the first interval and it consists of the entry into the clear light at the time of death. It starts with the dissolution with what are called the elements. The elements are qualities of physical matter—solidity, cohesion and so on—and when your body starts to break down, and the breaking down of your body is what we call dying, these things start to fall apart or dissolve. Now, they are presented usually in a certain sequence as they are in this text, however Rinpoche said they don't always break down in the same sequence; there are several places in what we are going to go through now where these things can vary from person to person. There is a standard sequence that they are presented in based on the majority of processes, but they are not always the same.

            When the earth element (solidity) dissolves, you become unable to support your physical body. Rinpoche says for example this is what happens as we get older and you become weaker. That is the breakdown or the dissolution of the earth element. When the water element dissolves, you mouth and sense apertures like your eyes, and nose and so on start to dry up. You start to have a dry mouth, you don't have enough natural fluids or moisture. When the fire element dissolves, your temperature decreases and your warmth starts to withdraw from the ends of the limbs inward, toward the center of your body. And when the wind element dissolves, you stop breathing externally. Now this doesn't mean that you become unconscious yet. You may remain conscious and your consciousness is still seated within your body, but at that point you stop breathing and your pulse will come to a halt. This is one place, Rinpoche said, where the order can vary. What's going to follow after this is a three-part sequence, which precedes the entry into the clear light, that's called appearance, increase and attainment. It sometimes happens that the breathing doesn't stop until people have already experienced both appearance and increase. And we know this because individuals have described their experience of it as they are dying and while they are still able to talk, which means that they are still breathing.

            But nevertheless the classical order, for clarity and based on the majority of dying people, is that the four elements dissolve and then there is appearance, increase, attainment and then the clear light.

            When appearance dissolves, the first of the three stages that follows the dissolution of the elements, what happens is that appearances for you, what you see as the dying person, subside and become a bright, fairly uniform, eventually uniform bright whiteness or white light. That is the appearance associated with this stage. There is a cognitive state that accompanies that. And the accompanying cognitive state is that your awareness, your mind becomes a little bit vague, like mist or smoke, which means that, in this case, Rinpoche said, it means that you can sometimes focus and sometimes you can't. Now, many people experience this as they are dying before, or at least start to experience it, before their breathing stops. Rinpoche said he knew an old Lama who was dying in Darjeeling who was describing all of this stuff up to this point and a little bit beyond it, as he was dying. And also, Michael Doran of KTD definitely experienced the first stage, appearance, before his breathing stopped, because Rinpoche said that as he was dying he said, "Where is all this light coming from?" And this is not uncommon. When this happens what it means is that the dying person is experiencing what is called "appearance". Or here, the dissolution of appearance. Now, there is a third thing that happens along with appearance. It's a suppression of a certain type of thinking. The thirty-three different forms of anger, thirty-three different thoughts that are aggressive, or angry, in short all types of being angry stop. "Stop" however means that they are suppressed. They become dormant. It doesn't mean that the dying person has purified the affliction of anger. It means that the physical condition of dying has shut down the biological mechanism that supports the emotion of anger. So temporarily, anger is suppressed.

The next stage and the last phase of the dying process we'll be looking at this evening, is called "augmentation" or "increase." And it refers to the increase of the appearance of death, which arose during appearance. It has an appearance, a cognitive aspect and also an aspect of suppression or dormancy. The appearance is that the dying person sees everything go red. Before everything was white, now everything just becomes a uniform field of red. Their cognition becomes like fireflies, which in this case, Rinpoche said, means that it's sporadic, it flashes on, flashes off. Sometimes their mind is lucid and clear and focused and sometimes it's obscure. The suppression aspect is that when this stage of dying is reached, all forms of desire, lust, attachment, craving, hankering, all things, wanting, any form of that, all of it, stops. Again, it has not been purified. The forty different types of desire are merely suppressed because of the biological dying process. According to our text, most people realize at this point that they are dying. Rinpoche said, the fact that it says "most" in the text, with our understanding that the order of sequence is indefinite to begin with, means that some people will realize that they are dying. Those who realize that they are dying at this point also recollect what they have done. If they've led good lives in which they can take satisfaction, then they will start to feel happy at this point, and if they've led lives full of harming others and so on, then they can start to be terrified. Often people will at this point start to have visions of their future parents and the place of their subsequent rebirth and different sorts of events in their future life or the circumstances and so on. For example, it is not unknown that at this point, if they can still speak, butchers (butchers in Tibet doesn't mean like the guy behind the meat counter, it means the guy who kills the animals) and others who have harmed beings will have terrifying hallucinations that may indicate their future rebirth and also the sense of things coming to get them. Like they'll say, "get these animals out of here, they are going to get me," and so on.

In short, at this point, the dying person may become aware that they are dying and may also recollect their previous actions. Therefore it is at this point that intervention is of the greatest benefit. What sort of intervention? At this point, when appearance has dissolved into increase (the red appearance), the dying person's cognition can be steered, somewhat. In other words, their mind is like fertile soil. Anything that is planted in it at that time can have a very powerful effect on what happens to them in the rest of the interval and therefore in their next life. So it's at this point that it's a good idea to recite the names and mantras of buddhas or of the fathers and sons of the lineage, great gurus, and so on. Now, ideally, Rinpoche said, this means if the person, him or herself, can actually recite these things, can bring these things to mind at least, that will be the most powerful thing. Otherwise, whoever is assisting them through the dying process can intervene at this point by reciting these things with their mouth actually right next to or even touching the person's ear. And in that way, what you are trying to do is remind them of those to whom they supplicate and also you can remind them of their previous practice, instructions can be given at this point, and so on. And also, it is at this point, that the ejection of consciousness can be performed for the person's benefit with the greatest benefit, because it is at this point that the consciousness can be ejected from the body but it is still in the body, and therefore can be gotten hold of and moved.

            So this is the critical time when interventions of all kinds will be of the greatest benefit. Please recite the dedication and aspiration with the wish that through the virtue of this session that all beings, having received authentic instructions from eminent teachers, come to recognize the clear light at the time of death, and achieve the state of omniscient liberation.

end of tape 1

tape 2

Continuing from where we left off last night, we had finished looking at the stages of dissolution, the stages of dying, up through the first two of the three stages which precede the experience of the clear light, and these were appearance and increase. The third stage, what ensues upon or follows after increase is called "attainment." And attainment refers to the final shutdown or dissolving of the physical processes of the living body and this shut down or dissolution causes a corresponding set of experiences. The appearance is called utter blackness. However, Rinpoche said, in fact, it's not really the appearance of blackness, it's no appearance at all. Previously there was brilliant whiteness and then brilliant redness and now it's called utter blackness because it is the utter absence of such appearances and this is happening because the functions of the body and mind, which support or allow appearance are shutting down. The corresponding cognitive experience is that your cognition, your awareness, your mind, becomes like a butterlamp in a vase.

Now, a butterlamp that is placed in a vase may be lit and burning and therefore producing light, but none of the light will escape the vase. From outside it would appear to be just a dark vase. In the same way, there is a continued bare or mere lucidity of your cognition, but it is divorced from any kind of contact with any object such as an object that appears or an object that is cognitively apprehended. So it is a state of mere lucidity without the apprehension, either with the senses or with the cognition itself of any object. Because this is the state your cognition is in at this point in the shutdown or dissolution process, the final seven of the eighty types of thoughts stop. Previously we saw that the thoughts connected with anger, the varieties of anger, and the thoughts connected with desire, stopped. Now the last seven, which are the seven varieties of stupidity, or bewilderment, cease. And they don't cease or stop in any final sense. They are suppressed and become dormant. And as with the previous two states of suppression, the suppression is caused by the simple fact that the biological processes that support them, and enable them to arise in connection with their respective objects, are simply not functioning at the moment and therefore these thoughts stop, but they have not been purified; their tendency has not been in any way uprooted.

During this whole process of dissolution, there has been a gradual withdrawal of the cognitive faculties. And cognitive faculties here refers to the six main functions of consciousness: the apprehension by the eye consciousness of visible forms, the apprehension of sounds by the ear consciousness and in the same way, the apprehension of smells, of tastes, or tactile sensations, and of objects of mind.

            These six functions of mind or consciousness have gradually dissolved and therefore all appearances, not only visual appearance, but also auditory and other appearances, have gradually, during this dissolution process, diminished in intensity, or clarity, and then finally disappeared altogether. This is something that we can often observe happening with the dying person. Sometimes, they will say, "Come closer, you're so far away," because they actually perceive you as being a greater distance away from them physically than you are, at the bedside, simply because of what's happening to their eye consciousness. Or they'll say, "Speak louder, I can't hear you." And again, it's a corresponding thing happening with the ear consciousness, and so on.

            At this point, at the conclusion of the three-fold shutdown of appearance, increase and attainment, all of the elements of your conventional being, your body and mind, that is to say your aggregates, your physical elements and your senses, all of these have become dormant, and have temporarily, in the words of our text, entered the mandala of absolute truth. Which means that they are temporarily absent as obscuring factors. Again, they have not been purified or uprooted, they are merely dormant. However, because of their dormancy, because you are not seeing or hearing anything and so on, there can arise various hallucinations at this point. One sort of hallucination is that people who have led nasty lives, who have done bad things, will often have terrifying hallucinations of yamas or demonic beings, executioners and so on, coming to get them. People who have led predominantly virtuous lives, may have some experience of well-being, such as fleeting glimpses of very pleasant things: pleasant environments, pleasant people and so on at this point. Remember however that these appearances, because of the withdrawal of the consciousnesses, are entirely subjective like dreams. Because of their entire subjectivity, as is the case with dream images, they have no stability and can fluctuate, change from one thing to another, and in any case don't last very long.

            At the end of all of this process of shutdown, the final events that constitute death occur. What keeps you alive, that is to say, what keeps your mind biologically seated in your physical body, is a wind or energy that is called the life wind. And the life wind abides within what is called the avadhuti or the central channel of your body. Now, the conditions for your becoming a biological being were the ovum from your mother and the sperm from your father, obviously. The original seeds, which led to you as a resultant physical, biological being, are still present within your body. They are held in place by the life wind. They also contain the life wind and keep it in the body and the way this works is as follows. What's called the red element, which is the remaining seed essence of the ovum, is present during your life, while you are alive, in the center of your body, below your navel. And what's called the white element, which is the seed essence of the sperm of your father, is present in the center of your body, at the very top of your head. These things are held in place, they're held apart, forced apart, as it were, by the life wind, which fills the central channel in between them, inflating it, the way, for example, Rinpoche said, something we inflate like a tire is held inflated by the air within it. Not only does the life wind hold these things at the upper and lower ends of the central channel, but these things trapped in those places, also contain the life wind between them, in other words, keep it from escaping.

What happens at this point is that with the shutdown of everything, the last to shutdown is the life wind itself, which is the most basic factor of your being alive in the conventional sense. As it shuts down, it withdraws into the heart area. Now, what happens is similar to deflation except the central channel doesn't deflate, but the pressure within it is withdrawn. As a result, the red and white elements move for the first time. The red element rises up because there is nothing forcing it down. It rises up toward and eventually comes to rest in your heart. At the same time, the white element, that you have received from your father, descends, or falls down from the top of your head until it also reaches your heart. What ends up happening is that five things that form the essence of your being come together in one place. The most basic mind, the all-basis consciousness and the life wind, which previously filled the entire central channel and all of the potential cognitive functions, those three things, and the white and red elements, all of these five things come together at the very center of your heart, in the midst of the central channel. Because of this, when they come together you could call that the actual moment of death. When they come together, because of their doing so, because all possible types of thoughts or conceptuality are temporarily dormant or have ceased, you have an experience that is a cognitive experience, not a sensory experience, but that is in quality like the experience of boundless, clear or cloudless sky. And this is the experience of what is called the fundamental or ground clear light. What you experience at that moment, you experience not because of any meditation you may have done. You experience it because it is your true nature. Therefore it is not experienced only by people. It is experienced at this point in the death process, even by small insects. And it is experienced simply because all beings have buddha nature, and what you are experiencing at this point is buddha nature itself.

The reason you can experience it under those circumstances and the reason you don't normally experience it is that normally it is masked, or covered by thought. All thought has become dormant, has ceased at this point, therefore there is nothing masking the experience of buddha nature. That's the good news. The bad news is that unless you have trained yourself assiduously in the recognition of the clear light during the preceding life, you won't recognize it. Because everybody experiences it and obviously that isn't sufficient. What happens if you don't have any experience or have insufficient experience in its recognition is that you are kind of stunned by it. You are like a small child looking at the murals in a temple. When a child looks at a mural in a temple—and that's often a good analogy, here it's a bad analogy—they see the same colors and shapes that an adult does, but they have no way to recognize these as depictions of one thing or another. They cannot make the judgements, "This is well painted, and this is ill painted." Nor can they think this is this deity, this is that deity and so on. They are completely ignorant of what they are seeing. In the same way, if you have not familiarized yourself with the clear light during the preceding life, through practice, although the ground clear light will appear to you as it does to each and every sentient being at the moment of death, it won't do you any good. It will appear, you will experience it, you will not recognize it and it will only last a moment. You will move from that experience to the next thing in a moment. Now, Rinpoche said, moment here doesn't necessarily mean a specific unit of time, like a fingersnap or something. Moment here means the duration of an action that is uninterrupted by any other action. So for the time that you are immersed in the experience, you remain immersed in it, but as soon as, failing to recognize it, your mind emerges and moves on to something else, it's finished.

            So, what is necessary above and beyond all else, is to familiarize ourselves with the clear light, through hearing, through thinking or reflection and above all through meditation. Through understanding what will happen at death, the process that we will go through, and thereby being prepared to recognize it, through cultivating the faculties of recollection, and alertness, through meditation practice, especially through meditation practice that is based upon the profound instructions of one's guru, so that you become able, you develop the familiarity and the faculties of mindfulness and alertness that will enable you to recognize the ground clear light when it arises.

Now, you do this by meditating upon the traditions, which teach you how to meditate on the clear light: the Middle Way, the Mahamudra and the Great Perfection. In anyone of these you go through a sequence or series of practices that culminate in the ability to experience to some degree, in this life, the clear light. Now what you experience as a meditation practitioner is called the path clear light or the child clear light. It is something that is experienced through conscious and assiduous cultivation. Only through such cultivation, do you have a chance of recognizing the fundamental or natural or mother clear light at the time of death. But the aim of such cultivation, these meditation practices and these entire systems which culminate in these practices, the aim of the practice where you rest in a state free of all mental elaboration, in that way, is to gain such familiarity with the path or child clear light, that at the time of death, because you are familiar with it, you recognize the ground or fundamental clear light, the mother clear light, just as you recognize someone you had seen before.

Rinpoche said, a modern analogy that's even more apt is a photograph. There is a difference between the cultivated child clear light and the actual or ground mother clear light, just as there is a difference between someone's photograph and the person. But if you've seen a good photograph of someone, you can later recognize the person from having seen that photograph. In the same way, if you cultivate an authentic experience of the path clear light in this life, you can recognize the ground clear light at the moment of death.

            In the cultivation of meditation practice during this life, meditative state is marked by three characteristics: well being, lucidity and no thought, nonconceptuality. But the way we normally experience these things during this life is quite imperfect. It is imperfect in that it is fleeting and it is imperfect in that it is to a certain degree and not beyond that. We experience some degree of well being, some degree of lucidity and some degree of freedom from conceptualization. The ground clear light, which is experienced at the moment of death, is endowed with these three characteristics to the ultimate degree. It is absolutely and perfectly blissful or endowed with well being. It is utter and pure lucidity, and it is totally and completely free of thought or conceptuality of any kind. In order to recognize it, because being endowed with these characteristics makes it so different from our normal state of mind, you must cultivate a meditative state endowed to some extent with these three characteristics in this life.  So in this life you have to cultivate what's called a child luminosity that is a one-pointed samadhi or meditative absorption endowed with the characteristics of the ground clear light itself.

            Now the ground clear light is called the ground or fundamental or basic clear light. It's called the mother clear light. It's called the natural clear light. It's called these three things because it is the true nature of all things. And it is, in and of itself, utterly and completely pure, and has been utterly and completely pure and perfect from the very beginning. In fact, it is utterly unchanging. It is indestructible. It is unaffected by anything. And it never has changed, never does change and never will change. The only change is whether or not it is experienced and whether or not it is recognized when experienced. If you have cultivated a familiarity with the child clear light during the preceding life, then what happens when the ground clear light appears is like a child recognizing his or her mother. And this is called the meeting of the mother and child clear lights. At that point because you experience the true and natural clear light, you recognize it based on your cultivated experience of the clear light and what you previously experienced and what you experience at that moment, mix together like water being poured into water and that is the best type of liberation. It's called the liberation at the moment of death, for those of the highest capacity. And although in a sense you could call this the beginning of the interval, because it's the first interval, it's also called "before the interval." It's the first opportunity for liberation and is liberation in dharmakaya, to be achieved by those who've familiarized themselves with the clear light.

            It's important to understand that the type of liberation where someone recognizes the ground clear light at the moment of death is complete and full. It is actually the achievement of perfect awakening, or buddhahood at the moment of death. And this means that when someone achieves this, they achieve that buddhahood that has all of the qualities for which it is so renowned, not only the liberation of the person, him or herself, but the ensuing and permanent all-pervasive ability to be a consummate benefit to others in every possible way until each and every other being has likewise, achieved perfect awakening. Recognizing therefore, the value of attempting to achieve such a state of awakening and liberation through the recognition of the ground clear light at death, you should abandon all the distractions of this life. Distractions refer to all of the things with which we normally concern ourselves. Things which are either of no use whatsoever, immediately or in the long-term, or are actually destructive and negative, or at best, are of temporary and largely only physical benefit. Such things are distractions because involvement with them prevents you from engaging in the type of assiduous practice that is necessary in order to achieve this liberation and awakening. So in order to achieve it you have to abandon such distractions and abide in solitude, which means practicing in isolation, like for example, Jetsun Milarepa: remain in a state of three-fold stillness.

Three-fold stillness means that your body is utterly still. It is free from unnecessary movement of any kind and especially from unnecessary and meaningless physical activity. Stillness of speech means that you are silent. Your speech is still and undisturbed. Your faculty of speech is undisturbed by the meaningless babble of conventional speech. And stillness of mind means that your mind is in a state free of elaboration. This refers not merely to state of tranquility or shinay, but to a state of insight where your mind is withdrawn from all forms of conceptual elaboration or thought. In short, in order to experience and thereby be able to recognize the clear light, you have to cultivate a meditative state that is the conjunction of lucidity and emptiness without fixation.

Now the lucidity spoken of here is your mind's defining characteristic. Your mind is defined by the fact that you can cognize. You can experience. You are aware. So therefore we would say that the defining characteristic of your mind is cognitive lucidity. But your mind is not just mere lucidity, because it is not a substantial brilliance like that of the sun or the moon or something like that. The mind is, while lucid, utterly insubstantial. It is empty of any kind of substantial characteristic or entity whatsoever. Furthermore this lucidity and this emptiness are not two different things. They are inseparable. So resting in a state where you experience, just as it is, your mind, the union of lucidity and emptiness, and do so without any kind of fixation, which means without any kind of fixated or conceptualized apprehension, is called a state of "great even-placement." In general even-placement can refer to either the perfect meditation of tranquility or that of insight. Here it refers to that of insight. It is more than a state of tranquility because it is a state where the mind is resting completely and utterly within a direct experience of its own nature. It is therefore called "great even-placement."

Remaining within that state, you are practicing what is called, "the conduct of extreme simplicity." Conduct of supreme simplicity refers to a mode of life where you are free from the elaborations or complexities of not only mundane activities, distractions and disturbances, but even conceptual functions of mind and thinking itself. So the aspiration you make at this point, is to perfect this practice—the conduct of extreme simplicity—so as to be able to achieve the supreme liberation, liberation in the dharmakaya and perfect awakening at the very moment of death.

Now, another thing about this liberation that you must understand is that this is not something that is purely legendary. It is not the case that when we speak of this liberation we say, in the good old days, people used to achieve this, but nowadays it doesn't happen. It does happen. In fact, it happens all the time. Rinpoche said, "In my lifetime, and even to be more specific, since I left Tibet, there have been several instances of this in my ?????? [end of side one; something got lost]

Side 2

[cont.]…at the refuge camp in Buxa where we were all living. Having died he remained in state of meditative absorption for three days. Now, in order to understand what happened to him and to his body, you need to understand that he had been very sick before he died and feeble. But at the end of his life, just before his death, he sat up perfectly straight, seemed completely comfortable and at ease, dismissed his attendants, those who were helping them, said, "You all go outside and play." Asking merely for his outer robe and his meditation hat to be brought to him, he put these on and he started to do his daily practice book. He chanted the first half of it and left the second half undone and in that state, he passed away.

This was happening at a time when it was extremely hot in Buxa. And as you know, dead bodies rot and stink very quickly in hot weather. But his did not. For the three days of his samadhi, he remained seated upright, without the slightest appearance of decay, either visible or olfactory, and in fact it wasn't just the heat of the time and place, because people were offering butterlamps, as many as a hundred in the room, in which his body was left, and the double heat of that still didn't cause any kind of scent of decay. And as far as how he looked, generally speaking when someone dies, to say the least, his or her complexion is no longer rosy. But his complexion actually improved. And he looked more florid, more lively after death, than he had while he was alive.

These indications, specifically the lack of decay, the florid complexion, in other words the appearance of circulation and so on, are considered definite signs that someone has achieved liberation in the dharmakaya, and in fact, perfect buddhahood at the moment of death. Another example of this was a retreat master that I knew who in the same way passed away and he also remained seated with the same signs for the same period of three days. There was also a lama called Karma Norbu who had done a retreat at Palpung Monastery and was also a disciple of Chatrul Rinpoche. He lived in an isolated place in a small house where water was scarce, causing disputes between him and his neighbors in Nepal and yet when he died multi-colored light, like the light of a rainbow, started to emerge from his body and from his house, filling the surrounding area. It was also noticed that his body was getting a little bit smaller as time went on. His neighbors of course recognized this as what it was and felt somewhat regretful about their having fought with him in the past and they prostrated to his remains and they venerated him properly.

A lama who lived for sometime in the West, Lama Ganga, who passed away at Thrangu Monastery, after his death, remained seated in samadhi, in meditative absorption for no less than five days, and I saw that, Rinpoche said, myself, because I was there when he died. My point is that there are many instances up to the present day, of people achieving perfect awakening, through these means. And in fact, this happens so commonly that in a sense, people are so used to it that they don't even bother to report it all time. They simply say, well that's what happens if you practice dharma, that's dharma's blessing. But we shouldn't be that casual about it, because when you consider what it is, it is definite and irrefutable proof of the possibility of perfect awakening at the moment of death.

I mention all of this and comment on it at length because it's important that you understand that as bad as the times are, dharma is not affected or diminished by it in any way. We do indeed live in an age of decadence. But the dharma is not decadent. Dharma is the same as it always was. For example, the land of Tibet has suffered greatly throughout the preceding century, and yet all of the things that have happened there, while they have caused great suffering to the people and great diminishment of resources of practice, have not affected the power or authenticity of dharma in any way. The compassion of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, their blessing, these things are utterly unaffected by the circumstances of the times we live in. Therefore, dharma is always effective. It will always work. You simply have to do it. I say this because I am completely confidant that if someone practices these things properly, they will definitely achieve this result of which we are speaking. It is infallible. And I want to leave you with and inspire you with this confidence, this same knowledge that, "If I practice this, I will achieve this."

It is that simple, and it is that infallible because our basic nature is the ground clear light. That is our true being. Therefore the only other thing that is necessary for us to achieve awakening, is to familiarize ourselves with that nature through meditation on the path clear light. Now, this of course is the big question: the difference is made entirely through whether someone does or does not meditate assiduously on the path clear light during their life. That in turn obviously depends upon being taught how to do so and that in turn obviously depends on having access to a spiritual friend. If someone has no access to a spiritual friend and receives no instruction, they will not do any meditation and therefore they will not achieve liberation and awakening. But once you have access to the spiritual friend, once you have access to instruction on how to cultivate familiarity through meditation with the path clear light, you simply have to do it and if you do it assiduously enough, the achievement of liberation and awakening at the moment of death is a certainty.

            If you have not achieved sufficient familiarity with the clear light during the immediately preceding life, then you won't recognize the ground clear light. And the moment after it appears, you'll move on to the second part of the interval of possibility. And the second part of the interval of possibility is the main part of the interval. It is again what people think of when they use term bardo or interval. Previously, at the moment of death, your all-basis consciousness and the remnant of the life wind and the potential for other cognitive functions and the white and red drops, all collected together at one place in the center of your heart; if you don't recognize the ground clear light, then they separate again. And two of them    , the basic consciousness and the life wind together, the basic consciousness mixed with or riding the life wind, leave your body. They leave your body through one or another of nine apertures: the navel, between the eyebrows, the aperture at the very top of your head, the nose or ears, the mouth or eyes, the anus or urethra. From anyone of these, the consciousness, riding this wind, will leave your body. And once the consciousness has left the body, then it's not going back in. It is as soon as the consciousness leaves your body, that the appearances of the interval proper start to arise.

Now, in our text it says, "Starting from that point onward, you have the appearance of your subsequent body." Rinpoche said this is actually put this way because the text is after all very brief. In more detail, what is usually explained is that for the first half of the period of the interval, you will appear to yourself to have the body you had in the preceding life. For the second half you will appear to have the body you're going to have in the subsequent life. The reason for this is that this appearance is a purely mental body. It is therefore made from habit. You initially have the appearance of your preceding body because you have the habit of having that body. That's what you're used to. That's what you expect. On the other hand, the karma that put you in that preceding life and kept you in that life is exhausted. It was used up; that's why you died. So therefore the karmically bound habit of that life is also going to lose momentum, or diminish during the period in the interval. So therefore what happens is that initially you have a very vivid impression of having the same body you had. So in other words, you think of yourself as the person you thought you were before. Rinpoche said, for example, I would think of myself as Karthar. I would think, "I have Karthar's body," and so on. So you have that at the beginning but it starts to gets vaguer and less distinct as the interval continues and then after the middle of the interval (so if the interval is going to last for 49 days which is the usual period of time), then for the first half of that, after that first half has finished, you will start to have an initially vague and then more and more vivid impression of having your subsequent or future body.

            In either case, whichever body you appear to possess, the body has certain characteristics. Don't forget it is utterly illusory. It is like a magical illusion. A hypnotic or other hallucination. It is therefore independent. The body is independent in a sense that it is independent of physical causes. It didn't grow; it wasn't produced by anything, so it is independent of any kind of physical origin. Therefore it is independent of most physical conditions. It is also different from your present body in that whatever is particularly wrong with or defective in your present body will appear to have been restored. So for example, if one or more of your senses is malfunctioning, for example if you only have one working eye, or you can't hear out of one of your ears, or one of your legs has been removed or doesn't work and so on, you will appear, in the bardo, to have gotten that back.

Bardo beings, interval beings, never seem to have defective senses. They appear—of course they don't have physical sense organs at all, which is why this is the case—they appear to themselves and to other interval beings to have a full set of the senses of their particular species. Because it is a mental body, you can pass through solid matter the way flies can pass through a beam of sunlight. Flies will fly through, buzz their way through a beam of sunlight without being in any way impeded by it. In the same way, an interval being can fly through solid matter, even the hardest rock. It's not that they actually have miraculous powers; it's simply that they are a purely mental body, and your mind can go anywhere, do anything. It doesn't require physical or verbal effort or exertion. So therefore an interval being will actually find themselves instantly in any place they think of.

From one point of view you could say this is miraculous, but don't forget it is impulsive; it is spontaneous in the negative sense of the word. It is not under control. They are driven about by whatever occurs to them. And there is no physical body to prevent them immediately being driven to that place. Having no physical body, interval beings cannot use clothing and cannot eat food. They do however, have the habit of hunger and thirst and suffer from it, but they can't eat and drink. The only thing that they can consume is scents or smells. And they cannot be nourished by just any smell. The only smells that they can actually consume and experience as nourishment are the smells of substances consecrated to them. The best way to do this is therefore to burn consecrated herbs and other substances and edible substances together and specifically dedicate them to beings in the interval. And this is why as a regular, daily observance, and especially so, or more elaborately when dealing with a recently deceased person, we perform what's called the singed offering in the evening. And this consists of the singing of consecrated substances and other edibles and the dedication of this to interval beings and to others.

            Who can see these beings? They can see themselves and they can see one another. And a being in the interval can see other interval beings. We cannot, normally. The exception to that are individuals who have achieved the divine eye through meditative prowess and interval beings themselves also have a limited form of this. They have a certain type of supercognition that is not necessarily as good as it sounds, because again it is compulsive and impulsive. For example, they might know that something is going on such as a dharma teaching by a teacher and so on, and they might go there, but their response to it is not necessarily going to be positive.

            Once beings have been in the interval long enough that they're starting to assume the appearance of their subsequent, rather than their previous body, there are clues, aside from their appearance, in other words, what species they appear to be, but also their position, their spatial position. There are clues as to where they are going to be born. Beings who are going to be reborn in a higher state, as humans, devas or asuras, will generally be facing upward, so the head is facing toward the sky rather than the ground and will be moving upward. Beings that are going to be reborn in a lower state, as animals, as pretas, or as hell-beings will generally be facing downward and moving downward. Because interval beings have no physical bodies and therefore do not have the basis for the perception of physical light, they do not see sun and moon. They can experience an environment similar to ours and appear to be in a place, but they will see no light from the sun and moon. And their bodies cast no shadows.

 Now it is at this point, once the consciousness of the deceased person has emerged from their body, after they have failed to recognize the ground clear light, and once what is called the intermediate existence has begun, that the pure appearances of dharmata will arise. And the pure appearances of dharmata will consist especially of the appearances of the peaceful and wrathful deities. The forty-two peaceful deities, the fifty-eight wrathful deities and the pure vidyadharas. And these appear because the person's consciousness has left their body. They appear emerging from the body. Now, the way they appear to the person, although they are part of the person him or herself, they appear in front of or external to the person, as though the person and they have separated as they left the body.

They appear as magnificent deities, samboghakayas or bodies of complete enjoyment, with their respective appearances, peaceful and wrathful, very bright, brilliant and surrounded by intolerably bright light of many colors. In fact, the reason why we don't achieve liberation upon their appearance in general is the intolerable brilliance of their light. Because at the same time, five other types of light are appearing. And these five other types of light are the pathways to the five types of rebirth. The five are the six states, but in this case, because they are types of birth rather than species, the asura, or jealous gods are divided into the two beings of which they can consist in terms of species, which are in some cases devas and sometimes animals.

So the five types of rebirths are those of devas, humans, animals, pretas and hell-beings. And the lights that are the pathways to those rebirths are white, red, yellow, blue and very, very dark blue, very, very dim blue--almost non-existent, almost darkness, respectively. I asked Rinpoche is this designation of one to one in that order consistent? He said, "That's what it says here." It's not always absolutely consistent. The point is, the worst the realm, the less brilliant the light. And the reason for this is the light of the pure appearances, which can be of any color: white, yellow, red, blue green--is very, very bright. It's intolerably bright, so that we run from it. We perceive it as threatening, dangerous, destructive. The light of the six realms, the five lights of the paths of these types of rebirths, is all very soothing in appearance. They are muted and it is because we find them soothing and the light of the wisdom irritating and terrifying that we choose the soothing light of one of the six states. In fact, even worse than that, the lights of the lower states are more soothing than the lights of the higher states. That's why beings predominantly—I mean the reason we find them soothing is because of karma and so on, but that's the condition for the predominance of rebirth in lower states over rebirth in higher states. So, what you want to do if you have gotten to this part of the interval, which is like the first part of the second part, is choose the threatening, brilliant, vivid lights, over the soothing, muted ones. And, in order to do this you need to prepare for this by thinking of this during this life, that the really, really bright scary lights, the brilliant ones, are the wisdom ones, and the soothing, muted ones, are going to lead to samsara and probably to lower states.

            Initially, in fact, you will probably just see the rays of brilliant lights and not the deities. So the rays themselves, and their brilliance and their sharpness will seem to be like weapons to you. It's important to prepare for that experience. If you choose the paths of the wisdom lights, you achieve liberation in the respective realm. And if you choose the path of one of the samsaric lights, as we all evidently did, you know what happens.

            In general, at this point, because you have a mental body that seems to be the body you had in your last life—now it may have restored senses and so on, but you won't immediately recognize that it's that different—it's important to prepare yourself to recognize the signs that indicate that you're dead. Now why is that important? Because in order to choose what to do in the interval the first prerequisite obviously is knowing that you're in the interval. If you don't know that you're in the interval, you're not going to make the right choices. So what are the signs that you are in the interval? Generally it's that the signs of the interval are the appearance of sounds and forms that are utterly unfamiliar. Most of these are pretty scary and they get scarier and scarier as it goes on and you become more and more agitated, which means the chance of liberation tends to decrease over the period.

Scary sounds like a billion thunderclaps at once and forms of different sorts of beings, not just wisdom deities but also different sorts of terrifying beings, the size of huge mountains, and so on—all sorts of scary things. And all sorts of different things that you've never seen before. So the point at this point in the interval, is first of all, to recognize that you are in the interval. And in order to be able to do so, you need to cultivate a familiarity with what the signs are of being in the interval. Having recognized that, to make the right choice, to choose the path of the five wisdoms, one of the lights of the five wisdoms and not the paths of the five types of samsaric rebirth. If you don't know that you're in the interval, you won't make the correct choice and you'll just go with instinct, which will lead you towards the soothing lights and so on.

Now, at this point, as the interval experience continues, time is passing with you in a mental body. Not being in any way restrained or governed by the solidity of a physical body, your mind becomes more and more anxious and agitated. And as in life, you respond to anxiety with kleshas. Your kleshas therefore grow in intensity as the interval continues. They came become like a blazing fire that totally possesses you. You are, don't forget, blown about by the wind of your previous actions, which arise in the form of impulsive thoughts which send you from one place to another without your control. As your anxiety and kleshas increase, this becomes more and more turbulent, worse and worse. And you have less and less leisure to think about anything. You become more and more frightened and more and more saddened and the hallucinations degenerate. You start to become more and more frightened, see more and more frightening things, respond to them more and more with anxiety and kleshas and so on. You have no control whatsoever at this point, unless you have cultivated a preparation and familiarity with what's going to happen, you're simply unprepared to deal with this and you have no control over what's happening. You're just blown about and there is nothing really to help you. So it is important to familiarize yourself with and thereby prepare yourself for the experiences of this part of the interval as well.

            We are going to stop here for this morning. Understand however, that this is the point when we talk about the liberation through hearing in the bardo or interval. It is that the opportunities for liberation in the interval which occur can only be taken advantage of by someone who has heard about them and familiarized themselves with them. By hearing about all of this and by growing familiar with this, you do have the opportunity of making the right choices in the interval, which specifically means choosing the lights of the five wisdoms over the muted lights of the five types of samsaric rebirth and by making these choices, achieving liberation. So please dedicate the virtue of this session, to the achievement by all beings by such familiarity and their subsequence entrance into the paths of wisdom and achievement of liberation.

end of tape 2

Tape 3 begins

Question: Rinpoche, if we are beginners on the path and we're not maybe capable of having the ability of the body, speech, and mind or training this way, what can do to train for the time of death?

Answer: There are several things you can do to prepare for death and the interval after death. These include the accumulation of merit, the purification of obscurations, the cultivation of as much love and compassion for other beings as you can, and also regular contemplation of what will occur in the interval through studying the Great Liberation Through Hearing in the Interval and so on, preparing yourself for it by imagining what it is you are going to be going through at that time. This could also involve meditation on the forms of the peaceful and wrathful deities and the repetition of their mantras, and in that case should also include the reinforced recognition that these deities are innate to you and although they appear outside you in the interval they are not separate of you but they are part of you. Of especial importance is to dedicate the merit of whatever dharma practice you do to the rebirth of yourself and all others in Sukhavati, the Realm of Amitabha, because this is supreme among all pure Buddha realms. It is greatest in its qualities. It is also easiest to achieve rebirth in for anyone who wishes to. In that way we can insure that although we may not be capable of achieving liberation in the dharmakaya at death, we can achieve liberation in either the samboghakaya or nirmanakaya.

Question: Rinpoche you mentioned ejection of consciousness at one point in the dying process and I'm wondering if you could talk more about that and when it is done, what it means?

Answer: The ejection of consciousness refers to the practice through which the emergence of consciousness from the body of the dying person is controlled and directed. Specifically the consciousness is directed so that it emerges or is ejected out of the aperture at the top of the person's head. The value of this is that if the consciousness emerges out of the top of the person's head, even if the dying person led a rather evil existence, they will at the very least be reborn with a precious human body, and if they were a dharma practitioner, they will very likely be reborn in a pure realm. So there's great significance and advantage to this practice.

In general there are two ways that the ejection of consciousness can be achieved or performed. In one way, the dying does it for him or herself, the other way is when somebody else assists them by doing it for them. In terms of practicing the ejection of consciousness for your own benefit you need to receive the instructions and then perform the practice assiduously until the signs of having gained the ability to eject your consciousness in this way, have arisen. There are many systems of ejection practice. The most convenient for use in general is the system for ejection associated with the Amitabha cycle of teachings. When the person has practiced it to the point where the ability to eject their consciousness has been achieved, there will be physical signs of this, specifically itching or other irritation of the aperture at the top of the head and possible eruption or exuding of lymph and blood and fluids like that. Then, that person, having been trained in that way, would later on, when it's absolutely certain that they're dying, actually perform the ejection of consciousness and would be able to do so successfully. Exceptions to this are, if the dying person, although they were trained in the ejection of consciousness, has subdued faculties, where for example, their mind is dull because of medication or the illness, or if they are so terrified by death that they forget to do it. Under those circumstances they require the assistance of someone else. The assisting the person, that is to say, someone who performs the ejection of consciousness for another, needs to have practiced it him or herself, until they achieve the signs of the ability. Only thereafter will they have the ability to do it to somebody else. In any case, they perform the ejection of consciousness for the dying person at this critical moment, and it must not be done before then. It is of great benefit if it is performed at the right time. Especially if the person for whom it's performed is a practitioner, someone who trained in the ejection of consciousness, him or herself, the benefit will be certain and far greater than the benefit even of the ejection of consciousness of an ordinary person.

            It's of the greatest importance, however, that the ejection of consciousness not be performed before the death process is irreversible. If it is performed when there is still hope of resuscitation, or of the person reviving or surviving, then if you do it to yourself, it's suicide and if you do it to another person, it's murder.

Question: I have two questions. One is, you talk about the consciousness leaving the body and then after that the person in the bardo has ideas and visions of himself as certain things. Like he sees himself in the body that he used to have and he sees himself in the body that he is going to have and I'm just wondering, if he doesn't have his consciousness, what part of him is actually perceiving that.

Translator: What do you mean, "doesn't have his consciousness?"

Question: Well the consciousness leaves the body.

Translator: The person we are talking about is the consciousness.

Question: So when the consciousness leaves the body, then that's where they go?

Answer: The person is the consciousness, not the body.

Question: The other question I have is a little more personal. I'm right now caring for someone who's aged and she's experiencing lots of delusions and lots of demented experiences. And when you were describing some of the experiences and the frightening, fearful experiences in the bardo it really reminded me of some of the things that she's been going through. And I was wondering if in the dying process there isn't some sort of—something of the bardo that enters into that and also attached to I'm wondering what Rinpoche might be able to suggest that I could do for her.

Answer: Well, she's not experiencing any phase of the bardo. She's experiencing hallucinations that Rinpoche said are caused by the deterioration of the parts of the brain that are resulting in the condition. And because the condition consists of a deterioration of the channels, and so forth within the brain, it makes communication with the person and therefore helping them in a meaningful way, very challenging. So it's hard to know exactly what you can do. But she's not experiencing the bardo yet.

Question: Rinpoche, I'm still a bit confused as to when you talk about ejecting the consciousness. What part, when, at what point would you know that it's time to do it for another person? How can you tell?

Answer: The actual point at which the ejection of consciousness proper should be performed is when the breathing stops and the usual criterion for this is to observe when the pulse in the neck stops. And after that pulse has ceased, then you can perform the ejection of consciousness. Up to that point, you should prepare for it through the preliminary recitation of the names of buddhas and the various liturgical practices associated with it that prepare the person to receive the guidance, and so forth.

Question: Just one more question. Also, why is it that it's more beneficial to eject the consciousness from the upper apertures? What determines that? I'm just curious why it's the upper ones and not…

Answer: First of all, ordinarily people's consciousness never leaves from that [upper] aperture. It leaves out of one of the sense doors or the lower gates and the only exception to this, the only circumstances under which someone's consciousness will naturally emerge out of the aperture at the top of the head is if they are someone with extraordinary virtue or merit or they are someone who has familiarized themselves to some degree with the ejection of consciousness. Otherwise, it simply won't go out from there and the reason is that the departure of the consciousness from the body in that direction is the avenue to the rebirth in a pure realm. More often that not, a person's consciousness leaves out of the lower parts of their body and this is almost invariably an indication of a lower rebirth.

Question: My cousin died this past week and she's someone that was close to my family. We saw her....she was almost like a sister. But she didn't practice any of this, or was not exposed to any of this. So now she's in the bardo. I asked for a lamp to be lit for her for 49 days. And I'm wondering how I'm helping her or how somebody who has no exposure or connection to these teachings is helped in the bardo?

Answer: In such cases the intervention of someone like yourself with sincere compassion for the deceased and especially your dedication of virtue and merit to them, actually helps them in spite of their previous absence of connection with Dharma. There are many instances of this. For example it is said that even if you say the names of buddhas or certain mantras in the ear of an animal recently dead, that will prevent that animal from being born in lower states. Now that animal certainly had no connection with dharma in that life but nevertheless can be benefited in this way.

Question: My question is, what would appropriate practices be when we are with someone at the moment they die. You just suggested I think one, reciting mantras and names of deities. Are there any kind of appropriate things we can do at that moment?

Answer: Well, the type of thing you would do would depend basically upon your degree of knowledge, but at the very least you could certainly recite mantras and the names of buddhas and so on with an attitude of love and compassion for that person and that would actually help them. This type of spiritual assistance is the most important thing to do for someone who is dying, because at that point, up to that point, your primary effort is to make them comfortable and so on, but they are getting to the point where that's no longer an issue.

Question: Rinpoche, about twelve years ago, I was visiting a friend of mine in the hospital and he had Aids and as I visited with him with two other friends, he asked me to meditate with him. So I did, I just made something up which would help him relax because I knew that he was very angry because he had Aids. And so I led him in a very brief meditation, mostly with the idea…because I didn't think he was going to die right then, but as it turned out, after I meditated with him, he closed his eyes. I stepped away, and joined my friends, but I kept an eye on my friend Peter and it probably wasn't even five minutes after that I saw that he was no longer breathing. So I went right over to him and I just whispered to him--I had heard of the Tibetan Book of the Dead, but I didn't know to say anything so I just whispered to him--it's okay, don't be afraid, don't be afraid, it's okay, Peter.

That's what I did and I did that for maybe five minutes, then they called the nurse in and he was dead. And I always felt okay about that, in fact I felt very fortunate that I was right there when he died. For some reason I just felt that way. I never thought I would. Now, that's the first part, I just wanted a little response about that, if you had any insight into that.

 And now, I'm thinking about this for myself because I'm getting older and my practice is just okay. I'm not a great practitioner, yet the dharma is always on my mind and my behavior with others—I always have the dharma in mind, so I do the best I can with that. And sometimes I do well and sometimes I don't and I regret it. But now I'm faced with, "Well, you've not been that great a practitioner and this is serious. My friend said, "Isn't this enjoyable?" and I said, "Well I wouldn't call it that." And I always enjoy your teachings but I can't put the word enjoyable on this. It's touching me too closely. But on the other hand, I can imagine that if I was doing a good practice, that I could look forward to when I do die with a certain amount of confidence, that it will be an okay death. And I know that that does happen. So from that point of view maybe it could be enjoyable. Anyway, I think I've said enough. And also if there are any people around who are prepared to be with someone who is dying, I'd like to know about who they are.

Answer: To answer your first question, the assistance you gave your friend was both altruistic and caring and therefore it could only have been helpful, especially your conveyance to him of assurance and the reduction of his fear would actually have helped him in the interval after death. Rinpoche said, I can't guarantee that he achieved liberation, but what I can tell you is that by making him less afraid at the beginning of the interval, you created a greater chance for him to do well in the interval.

With regard to your second question, I'm a lot older than you are so I've got more to worry about. So, therefore this is of great concern to me too, so I'll tell you what I really think. The single best preparation that we can have for dying is to recite the mantra OM MANI PEME HUNG. If you make the commitment to yourself, "I will recite 100 million OM MANI PEME HUNGs, whether or not you complete it in this life, your having that commitment, from the day you make it until the day you die, will have tremendous benefit and tremendous effect on you. As for what you meditate on, you should always visualize above you head, either the Buddha Amitabha, or the Bodhisattva Chenrezig, it doesn't matter which and think that the deity is the embodiment in one form of all sources of refuge and especially of all of your spiritual teachers. Continually visualize them there, above your head, day and night, and resolve at death you will dissolve upward, your consciousness will dissolve upward into them, so what you meditate on, what you visualize is your teacher in the form of Amitabha or Chenrezik above your head and what you recite is the mantra OM MANI PEME HUNG. And that is the best preparation.

Question: Rinpoche, I'm concerned about the possibility of having impaired mental functions at the time of death due to medication or to illness. What is the best thing to do if this is the case? What if one's functions are so reduced like if they're in a coma and can't practice at all at the time of death, let alone for possibly ten or fifteen years before the time of their death. If their mental functions are so incredibly impaired, what is the best thing? I wonder is there any hope for them to improve their situation at the time of death or are they just left to their karma completely at that point, as if they hadn't practiced at all during that lifetime?

Answer: It's by no means the case that if you're in coma or have otherwise impaired faculties at the time of your death that this will wipe out the benefit of your practice previous to that time, but it is the case as you indicated in your question, that it will be practically very difficult to make immediate use of the practice or what you learn through your practice, because you won't be conscious. However, if a person who is in a coma or whose faculties are impaired either by illness or by medication has an attending lama at their death, then the lama will be able to communicate with them because when the dissolution or shutdown process of dying has reached the point where their mind is, although still within the body, no longer biologically seated in it, then their mind becomes independent of the physical conditions which have produced the impairment.

Usually a state of coma or unconsciousness, or a state of diminished faculties is produced by physical conditions such as damage to the brain or medications and so on that prevent brain functioning, but once the body has shut down, then their consciousness has an alertness that is independent of these physical conditions so the person would become conscious at that point, although it wouldn't be physically evident. At that point, the lama could perform the ejection of consciousness, could also communicate with the person, give them guidance and they would be able to understand it.

It's also possible that the person could at that point, where their mind has biologically separated from the body, it's possible that they could become conscious. But you can't bank on that, you can't depend on that, because it's also possible that other habits would intervene and the person's previous habits of practice might not reassert themselves. So the dependable resort under those circumstances would be to have an attending lama.

Question: Rinpoche, you mentioned before about the ejection of the consciousness through the crown and how that sometimes manifested with some sort of physical appearance. Is it always the case that when the consciousness does eject through one of the gates of the body a physical manifestation occurs and how would it occur through some of the other gates or orifices?

Answer: There is some confusion—the physical evidence, such as the exuding of lymph and blood and so on—this is not a sign that the consciousness has been ejected. It's a sign that the person has gained the ability to eject it. When the consciousness is actually ejected either from that gate or from any other, there will be no such swelling or sign.

Question: Rinpoche, how about in the case of some people who are from a different religious orientation and they have a very strong concept about that religion, and if you recite the Buddha's mantras which are very foreign to them, I heard that this would also be very scary for them because they have fear about other religions, so how would you work with that?

Answer: Well, what you say is very true. In those situations you have to do whatever you do for their benefit silently, such as the cultivation of compassion for them and silent visualizations or meditations, because if you recite the names of Buddhas or Buddhist mantras, in the hearing of someone who is a staunch adherent of another religious tradition, at the very least they are going to feel disoriented and possibly betrayed. They'll think, "Well, they are denying my source of refuge or my savior and trying to appeal to another," and that will anger them. So you have to be silent.

Question: Rinpoche, speaking of my own death, if I'm lucky enough to be able to go through it and not have it be sudden, when you're dealing with pain, I'm understanding that it's better to do it without medication and so I can be clear, but also, when I'm dying is it better to try to sit up and maintain a meditative posture, or there's also the left and right side that you lay on to prepare for death and I was curious about that too.

Answer: With regard to the use of pain medication, if someone has a very strong practice such that they, by maintaining the full clarity of mind during the dying process, they will be able to achieve liberation, then they should avoid any pain medication that will excessively dull their faculties, if possible. Otherwise, if the person doesn't have that kind of strong practice, it's better that they will receive whatever medication will alleviate their suffering. As far as physical posture at the time of death, of course if someone can, it's excellent to die sitting up straight, but most people can't because after all you are dying. So in that case, it's better to lie on the right side in the posture that the Buddha adopted at his death.

Question: Rinpoche, I had a question about the process that you described about the red and white elements and the life wind withdrawing into the heart center. When that occurs is that process an irreversible process or is that something that someone might experience during a near-death experience where the life functions appear to have ceased, but they are then revived?

Answer: The full process where all of the pressure exerted by the life wind is gone and the drops completely descend and ascend respectively to the heart and combine there, that entire thing doesn't happen unless the person has reached the irreversible stage which is the third stage of attainment. Up to that, where there is merely some weakening of the life wind and therefore there could be some movement but not the full thing and there could therefore be the first two stages of dissolution, the white appearance [TAPE 3, SIDE 1 ENDED HERE AND SOMETHING SEEMS TO HAVE BEEN LOST SUCH AS THE REST OF THIS ANSWER]

Tape 3, side 2

Translator: The first thing, I was basically just checking out because I think there were a couple of things that maybe I didn't put clearly or something. The preparation in this life for the recognition of the ground clear light does not normally consist of simulation of the process of disolution, but of the generation of a state of even-placement where the mind is immersed in what's called, "the path clear light." So it's not necessarily connected with the process of shutdown or dissolution. The border between the first and second parts of the interval of possibility, the whole dying and death process, is the appearance of the ground clear light. The appearance of the ground clear light is the fourth state of dissolution, the fourth moment. It's the actual moment of death and if it's not recognized, then one enters what we call the bardo proper.

Question: I have two questions. The first has to do with the descending and the

ascending in the central channel of the life wind at what I'm going to call the heart center and I've always thought that somehow I have to think of this in my mind as being that the central channel is symmetrically in the center of one's physical body and we know that our heart is asymmetrically placed in our body, so I just want to make sure that I'm clear that I'm thinking of, when we say, the heart, we're talking about a place in the central channel at the same level of the heart but symmetrically in the center of our body.

Answer: It means the central channel at the height of the heart.

Question: My other question is having to do with the time from the moment of death through 49 days. And I know I've heard that 49 days is a general number within which the whole process of rebirth can take place, so it's hard to pin down exactly what. There are two parts to this question. One is kind of technical: when do you start counting? For instance the first three days are said to be good to do certain practices, the seventh day, what constitutes that seventh day? Do you start counting from, one is the day you die, or the person dies? That is the first part of the question and the second part is, do most of the things when you talk about the sort of, you compared it last night to the dharmakaya, samboghakaya, nirmanakaya experience possibility, within that 49 days, do those first two, like the possibility for recognizing the ground clear light, generally happen right away in that 49 day period?

Translator: In your question, did you just equate the first two of those with the recognition of the ground clear light?

Question: No. Ground clear light I'm connecting to dharmakaya, deities to samboghakaya….

Translator: Okay, good.

Answer: Well, to answer or in fact, further obscure your first question, there are two systems for reckoning the 49 day period. One system is, if you die today, the first day starts with sunrise tomorrow. So that's day one, and then you count from then on.

The other way, and this is based on the fact that people are only sporadically conscious for the first three days after death in the bardo, as will come up, Rinpoche said, tomorrow, in the rest of our text. The other system therefore, discounts the first three days and so again, to get the three days, you start sunrise tomorrow, call that days A, B, and C and then you start day one of the 49 on the fourth day, fourth sunrise, after death.

However, these are not so much different opinions about how they should be counted, as different ways they can be applied depending upon what happens to the individual. Some people, and this is assuming that there is no recognition of the ground clear light, some people if there is no recognition of the ground clear light, become unconscious, but stay in the body and they'll remain unconscious for two or three days and then their consciousness will leave the body. For those people, it's better to reckon it with the three days excluded.

Other people, with slightly different channels, who also don't recognize the ground clear light, leave their body as soon as the ground clear light has passed. For those people it's obviously better to start counting the morning of the next day. The problem is, there is no obvious way to tell, Rinpoche said, which is happening, because although there are signs of someone recognizing the ground clear light, as we went through, there are no really obvious signs of whether the person's consciousness has remained or left after failing to recognize it. So what that means is that basically there are two customs and one or another will be applied arbitrarily.

As far as the correlation between the 49-day period and the opportunity of the three kayas, the dharmakaya opportunity, the opportunity to achieve liberation in the dharmakaya is the ground clear light. If someone recognizes that, then they will remain immersed in that for the period of their ensuing samadhi, which is normally three days but can be longer. And they're in a totally different category, I mean, they are not in the bardo and so on. Assuming that they don't recognize it, the dharmakaya window, the dharmakaya opportunity is gone, as soon as they don't recognize it, because the ground clear light will cease; they'll move on to this next stage. So the next stage is what's called the opportunity to achieve the samboghakaya….[Rinpoche interrupts here to clarify something.]

The samboghakaya window has two aspects to it. Generally speaking, the way that we classify the samboghakaya window is twofold and generally in most Kagyu presentations they are not totally sequential: in other words, window one and window two, within the samboghakaya. Obviously window here is not literal but I think it's the best word. The two things are this: the one opportunity for liberation in the samboghakaya is the appearances of spontaneous presence, which means the rays of wisdom light and the peaceful and wrathful deities. According to the Great Liberation Through Hearing in the Bardo, this goes on for several days and Rinpoche said that if you consult that book, you'll see that there is actually a schedule for what happens on what day, and there is a progressive coarsening, and therefore a greater difficulty of liberation and he says he doesn't remember the exact schedule but it is clear in the book and it lasts for a couple of weeks.

At the same time, there is the opportunity for another type of liberation in the samboghakaya and this is what's going to presented tomorrow, where the practitioner is able to arise, cause their mental body to arise in the form of a deity, in which case they achieve liberation in the form of that deity. In the Kagyu tradition, we classify both of these as samboghakaya windows and we don't think that it's first the one and then the other. The opportunities for either are more or less simultaneous.

The opportunity for the achievement of nirmanakaya begins when one is approaching rebirth and one's principal effort is in stopping an undesirable rebirth and choosing one's rebirth. But, as for exactly how long that period lasts, this brings up the whole issue of the 49-day period as a whole. The 49-day period is considered an average time or duration of the interval, the whole thing. But it's by no means certain that any specific individual, is going to remain in the interval for that long or only that long. Generally, speaking, Rinpoche said, the stronger one's karma in one direction or another, good or bad, the more quickly one is likely to achieve rebirth, to the extent that if someone has cultivated extraordinary virtue, there will be almost immediate rebirth in a pure realm. If they cultivated great evil, there could be almost immediate rebirth in a lower realm.

If someone's balance of wrongdoing and virtue is pretty well even—causing their rebirth to be less certain, the karmic propulsion to be less focussed—they might remain in the interval for even longer than 49 days. In any case, the nirmankaya opportunity is over when the person either successfully or unsuccessfully enters their next place of birth. Successfully means that they have used this period of the interval to achieve the nirmanakaya, which in this case means, that through the forces of aspirations, moral discipline, love and compassion, they have consciously chosen a rebirth that will be of benefit to themselves and others. That's what the achievement of the nirmanakaya means in this particular context. Unsuccessful means uncontrolled rebirth. In either case, that's when it ends.

Question: Rinpoche, from what you said earlier, I have the impression that your rebirth is determined largely by the choices you make in the interval state, when you see the five lights of wisdom and the five lights of samsaric rebirth. I always heard that it was your karma that determines your rebirth, so how do you reconcile this. Is is your karma that propels you to make one choice over another?

Answer: Well, that question actually brings up the primary significance of the interval. Birth is called the full ripening of karma, in other words, when you are conceived or born, when you enter the place of birth, you become locked into the results of previous actions. Once these have in that way ripened as the aggregates of a certain life, once you have a certain birth, there's not much you can do about it. You can't all of the sudden change it. It may change through adventitious circumstances, but basically you are, for as long as you remain alive in that life, limited by those circumstances and you have no choice about it.

What happens when you die, is the karma which propelled you into a certain life, which allowed you to take a certain rebirth, has been used up. Now there remains some habit for that type of life, as is evidenced for example, by perceiving yourself as having the previous body and so on, but nevertheless, the actual karma is gone. The karma which will cause your next rebirth has not yet taken effect. And because you have several different such karmas within your being, it may not even be certain which one you're going to take yet.

In a sense, therefore, when you're in the interval between lives, you are in a gap that is in between karmically determined, or karmically locked circumstances. Therefore, in between, you can, if you know how to do so, actually make some changes and make some choices, which you cannot do once you have entered the place of birth and are locked into the next life. That's why the power of a virtuous state of mind in the interval is tremendous because it can actually bring an immediate and great change to what happens to you.

Question: Rinpoche, I'm wondering what one can do when someone dies, like I'm thinking of my parents. How to stay calm enough to do practice….with some ways to think about it, because that's what I'm afraid of: I'll be too upset to be effective. I thought of going on a retreat after one of them dies to do practice and I remember Jamgon Kongtrul Rinpoche gave an empowerment at KTD. It was a shortened version of the peaceful and wrathful deities with the OM RAPASANADI mantra, and that's what I do for the people that have died in my life so far. So I'm wondering about that mantra in regards to the OM MANI PEME HUNG. And if you do go on retreat, for someone is that a good idea and how long, which practice to do? Stuff like that and how to stay calm?

Answer: First of all, Rinpoche said, he thinks the mantra that Jamgon Rinpoche gave, the short mantra for the peaceful and wrathful deities is not the one you mentioned. It's AH AH SHA SA MA HA, not the ARO PAT SAMADI mantra, but anyway, as far as the state of sadness or grief that results from the deaths of people we love, of course this happens to us. The best thing you can think when you are going through this, is to reflect upon the fact that death is natural, that everyone dies, that everyone at some point is going to die and they are not going to be here anymore. In that way that parting and separation from those we love, is simply a fact of life. And continuing in that way of thinking you should reflect upon the fact that you also, are going to die, exactly like those for whom you are grieving.

By thinking in those terms, you transform the potentially paralyzing grief into a source of inspiration. Because the best opportunity for someone to practice is when some event such as the death of one of their parents and so on, has brought impermanence vividly before their mind. And so you should think, "Well if I can't practice now, I'll be wasting the best possible opportunity."

Question: Rinpoche, I have a question regarding the death of a young infant or children. How does this work for them? They haven't been exposed to the practice. Can you explain a bit on that subject?

Translator: What do you mean? You mean, how can you help them?

Question: Yes, because it appears their life has just begun. What can you do for them?

Answer: Well, all you can do is to recite mantras such as OM MANI PEME HUNG for their benefit and in their hearing or to dedicate all other virtues you perform to their benefit and if you can to perform the ejection of consciousness for them and so on. You can't really do much more than that.

Question: Rinpoche, you were referring earlier to meditating on the clear light and I'm not sure what that is. So if you could explain that. And then I have another question and I have read and have been told often to accept impermanence and I have an idea that in the Tibetan culture there has been much more comfort and practice in knowing how to deal with this or work with this, but in our culture we haven't been able to talk about death, except for in maybe the last ten years. So many soldiers are dying; a lot of our friends are dying at a much earlier age because of illness, that kind of thing. Perhaps we need to pay much more attention to this, in that there is a certain freedom in being comfortable with the idea of death and that it is natural, and yet I don't think we are all in that place. So could you speak about that?

Answer: To answer your second question first. It is true as you say that generally speaking, people live in denial of death. We flee the concept and we are intensely uncomfortable with it. But being uncomfortable with it is actually the starting point of contemplation because whether someone is Tibetan, or American or anything else, if they become comfortable with the idea of death, so they think, "Well, death is coming, impermanence is coming, that's natural, that's okay." Simply thinking that, being comfortable with it does no good whatsoever.

The purpose of contemplation of death is not to alleviate anxiety about it but to use the approach of death as inspiration for the prioritization of practice, because it's only if the contemplation of death and impermanence causes you to realize you have no time to waste and possibly no time at all, and therefore causes you to practice assiduously, it's only under those circumstances, that that contemplation has any value or has achieved it's intended purpose. So the instruction which you have heard and read, to contemplate impermanence and contemplate death, really means to take these things to heart so that you are inspired to practice with diligence.

Now, with regard with to the contemplation of impermanence, some people seem to have the idea that if you think about death and impermanence all the time, it's going to shorten your life, you're going to die sooner because you think about death, you're attracting death by thinking about it. This is nonsense. The length of your life is primarily a matter of your karma and you're not changing your karma by thinking about death. If it were true that you shortened your life by thinking about death, then you could lengthen your life endlessly by repeatedly contemplating immortality, and we've seen that doesn't happen, so therefore we can assume reasonably that we're in no danger of dying sooner, merely because we contemplate impermanence.

As for what constitutes meditation on the clear light, I'll give you an example of it. When you are meditating upon Chenrezik, as I instructed you several minutes ago, and reciting the mantra OM MAN PADME HUNG continuously, from time to time, while reciting the mantra, rest your mind in a state, free of any mental engagement, any thought, or mental activity, and that is an encounter with the clear light.

We're out of time.

Tape 4, Side 1

Continuing from where we left off yesterday morning, we're still concerned here with the second of the three parts or phases of the interval of possibility. At this point, the interval being, the person, the deceased is, as we saw, buffeted about by the violent wind of their own karma. Here wind should be understood to be metaphoric. It's not a literal wind. It means the force of the impulses, born from previous actions, throws them about beyond their control from place to place and experience to experience. And this is the principal experience normally of the second phase of the interval: being buffeted about by one's karma in that way. The duration, or life span, since the interval state is considered a state of being, it's said to have a duration or life span, the life span is uncertain. We generally classify it as forty-nine days because that seems to be the length of that interval for most beings and is also the average length.

For the first three and a half days after death and after the passing and nonrecognition of the ground clear light—and three and a half days means here until the sunrise on the fourth day after death—for the first three and a half days, the consciousness of the deceased person is probably still going to be within their body and until the consciousness departs from the body, they're largely unconscious. They are sporadically conscious, but even when they're conscious they are still extremely confused, like someone who is strongly intoxicated or drunk. Eventually however, after the consciousness has emerged from the body, whether it does so immediately after the failure to recognize the ground clear light or after three and a half days, the person starts to have these experiences and hallucinations that characterize the second phase of the interval.

For much of the time, or some of the time in this second part of the interval, the deceased person will not know that they are dead. At times they may come to suspect it, but basically they won't have any more certainty that they are dead and in the interval than you normally have that you're dreaming, when you're dreaming. So they will be extremely agitated therefore by all of these strange things that keep happening to them. They encounter things that they've never seen before, beings that they've never seen before, hear sounds that they've never heard before, and also all of the agitation that is around them, all the rushing about and so on, because they don't know where they are and why they're there, will be extremely disturbing. They will still see those that they loved, their friends and family, and so on, and will try to communicate with them. Because the interval being does not realize that he or she, (I mean, we could call it "it" because it no longer really has gender, but that's rude so we'll say "he" or "she") because the interval being doesn't know that they are an interval being, they see no reason why when they speak to someone, they shouldn't answer them, but they don't of course because they're not visible to them. So they become frustrated and aggrieved by this, that every time they try to talk to one of their relatives or friends or loved ones, they're ignored. Eventually, they start to figure out the reason why; they start to figure out that they are dead. And once they have figured out that they're dead, they react even more strongly.

For example, when they see their corpse, their former aggregates, (it's polite to say their aggregates, but what it means is their corpse), once they see their corpse, they, for the first period of the interval, because they identify with that body so strongly, they will try to get back into it.  And they won't be able to. And they'll be very attached to it and to how it's treated. They'll be very upset of course by seeing their dead body, but also attached to it. When they see their relatives and loved ones crying and grieving and so on, that will distress them. And when they see their stuff being divvied up, people making arrangements for the disposal of their wealth and belongings, they won't like that.

Their attitude towards their aggregates, (their former aggregates; their corpse) will alter over time for much the same reason that the identification with the mental body of habit alters, so that the perception of themselves as their preceding body starts to weaken and then be superceded by the subsequent one. Initially they will be very attached to the old body, the corpse, but eventually since the karma of being in that body is already over, the habit left behind by that karma will gradually weaken, so eventually they'll start to dislike it and they will be happier when they don't see it and want it to be disposed of.

However, although they want it to be disposed of, and they don't want to see it, they are still attached enough to it that they get very upset when it is disposed of. So for example, when their body is cremated or buried or cast into water and so on, they won't like that either. That will also upset them and especially they'll become very angry when people are disrespectful to their corpse—like when they call it a "corpse." If they say, "Well that thing, it's a corpse, it's not so and so, it's just their body and so on," the way we speak of dead bodies, which we don't like. They will still have enough identification with that as their body, as part of them, that they'll be as upset by it, Rinpoche said, as they would have been if someone had said something about their body while they were still inhabiting it. Eventually, having realized that they are dead, when they see their loved ones grieving for them, they will attempt to comfort them.

They will say, "Don't worry, don't worry, I'm right here. Can't you see me? I'm right here." Well, of course, they [their loved ones] won't be able to see them, and finally they'll be so saddened by their inability to comfort their grieving survivors, that they will also start to grieve and cry and may get to the point of fainting, or almost fainting through grief and frustration. On the other hand, when they see people who aren't grieving, they'll be mad at that. Whether it's people who dislike them, who make jokes about them, or laugh or are otherwise disrespectful about them, when they are recently dead, or just don't care that they're dead and are laughing about something else or going about their lives normally, playing, entertaining themselves, they'll be very resentful of that. And they'll think, "How can they do that when I am in this state? I've just been pulled right out of my body, I'm wandering in the interval, I'm going through all of this, I can't communicate with anyone, and they're laughing and having a good time?"

And the interval being will actually feel enmity for those people, even though it may be not overtly disrespectful, it may be just that they didn't know the person, but they'll resent anyone who's going about their business as usual and not grieving, as much as they are distressed by those who are grieving. When the interval being sees the disposition of their possessions, especially those things that were particularly valuable to them or precious to them, even to the extent of seeing others make use of them, or seeing their being passed on and so on, they'll actually follow the stuff around. So the possessions of a recently deceased person are often a site where that person's consciousness will be attracted. And they'll follow the stuff wherever it is taken and very much resent it's use.

They'll think, "This thing or this stuff was worth so much to me. I put so much into it, and this person is using it up, or wasting it or destroying it and so on." This is one reason why in Tibet it was customary, soon after someone died, to offer at least a certain amount of their treasured possessions to the Three Jewels, to prevent these things being used in a way that the person would be upset by and to help them cut through their attachment to their previous possessions. Now, someone who has no instructions, someone who has not been taught how to prepare for the bardo, will experience the appearances of the interval of possibility, much the way we experience the dream state. They will have very little basis for knowing what is going on. Just as we are pretty well lost, most of the time when we are dreaming; we are at the mercy of the events that appear to be occurring, because we believe that they're real: we don't know we're dreaming. In the same way, the person, the average or untrained person, will, for some time not even know that they're dead, just as we don't know we dreaming, therefore they won't understand what they're undergoing, seeing, and hearing and will be totally at the mercy of their bewilderment and the bewildered appearances.

Therefore the aspiration says, "May I train myself in dream, which is the manner of appraisal of the path." And this refers to the practice of dream that is part of the Six Dharmas of Naropa and similar systems, in which one trains, Rinpoche said, to first of all develop the consistent ability to dream lucidly, to know that you're dreaming while you're dreaming, and thereafter to transform the dream state from impure appearances to the pure appearances, and so on. The reason why this practice exists, Rinpoche said, is largely because it is the best preparation for this phase of the interval. As long as you don't know you are dreaming when you are dreaming at night, you are not going to know that you're dead, when you're dead. So in order to be able to recognize that you're dead and in the interval, you need to be able to recognize that you're dreaming. In order to be able to transform the interval appearances, which is the principal method at this point, as we'll see, you need to be able to transform the appearances of dreams, as well.

            In order to be able to do that, you need to prepare yourself—and at this point we're really entering the main instructions for dealing with this phase of the interval—you need to prepare yourself by having a certain attitude towards conventional waking state appearances. In other words, in order to prepare for the interval, you need to gain a skill in dream. In order to gain skill in dream, you need to gain skill in relating to conventional appearances. Fundamentally, this consists of viewing, learning to constantly view, all the appearances of the daytime waking state as illusory, or like magical illusions. And this attitude of their being illusory needs to be reinforced and maintained until it gets to the point where the actual emptiness of appearances becomes an object of direct experience, where they manifest to you spontaneously and clearly, without your having to reinforce it conceptually as what they are, which is empty appearances, mere appearances, devoid of inherent existence.

So the attitude, of them being empty and illusory needs to be reinforced throughout the waking state, until you get to the point where the conceptual reinforcement, reminding yourself that they're empty, no longer becomes necessary and there is such a momentum or continuity of mindfulness and certainty, because it is not merely something you're telling yourself, it is the truth—certainty about their emptiness, that they actually appear to you that way.

So the aspiration here is, "May I reach the point where wisdom has been attained." And wisdom here has the specific meaning, Rinpoche said, of the state of mind in which you directly see appearances as the unity of appearance and emptiness. And that is the prerequisite for being able to gain mastery over the dream state, and eventually the interval state as well. Now, what prevents this? What are the main obstacles that prevent us from doing this? And these obstacles are equally impediments to cultivation of awareness during the waking state, during the dream state, and therefore and most importantly, during the interval state as well.

There are three of them, and they are called "the three thieves," because they steal from you any chance of liberation, any chance of getting out of samsara. The first of these is doubt. Doubt in this case means, for example, doubt about "Are appearances empty or not? Is this the interval, or isn't it?" And so on. Doubt will prevent the faculty of mindfulness from being strong enough and focused enough, to cut through the illusion of appearances. So the first thief is doubt. And it's doubt that causes us constantly to reenter the samsaric cycle. It's doubt that prevents us first of all, from ever having the momentum necessary to break out of it.

The second thief is fixation on reality: fixation on the truth or reality of appearances as being what they appear to be. And this is what is maintained by doubt. This is what doubt prevents us from putting a stop to. Because, as long as you maintain this fixation on the reality of appearances, whether it is during this life or during the interval after death, then the habit, all of the habits of reacting to those appearances in certain ways, through the generation of kleshas and so on, will re-arise. And they will re-arise because you think these appearances are real and therefore you react to them the way you do.

            The third thief is mindlessness. And mindlessness means lack of recollection of what it is you are attempting to keep in mind. The illusoriness of appearances, the fact that you are in the interval and so on. It is mindlessness, the lack of recollection, that causes us to keep on wandering endlessly, to be lost, to be at sea, or mindless.

            So the aspiration here is, "May I become free from these three thieves who steal from me the opportunity of liberation from samsara."

            Next we turn to the actual essential means by which one can achieve liberation in the second stage of the interval, and the reason why it is called the opportunity for the achievement of the samboghakaya. This "means" consists of the transformation of the appearance of your mental body into the body of the deity. This is why it depends upon the practice of the preceding life. Essentially, it consists of the employment, in the interval after death, and therefore must be the preparation in the preceding life, of the principal means or defining method of mantra or vajrayana, which is the most profound of all paths and does bring, it can bring, if properly employed, liberation at this point.

In detail, it consists of the perception, and in the case of the interval this will be the actual transformation of all appearances, the appearance of your own body, in that case the mental body and all other appearances, into the rainbow-like vajra body of the deity. The perception and therefore the transformation of all sounds into the mantra of the deity, the vajra sound of mantra, which is the unity of sound and emptiness. This is significant in the interval, especially because, don't forget, there are terrifying sounds, very loud sounds, like a billion thunderclaps heard simultaneously and so on, and these are so disturbing that one needs a means or method by which to alter your perception of them. And thirdly, the transformation of your perception and therefore experience of your mind itself, into the vajra mind, which is the mind that is the unity of bliss and emptiness.

So the aspiration here is that you become skilled in training in, and thereafter have the opportunity to employ in the interval these three essential points which make up the principal feature of the most profound path, the means of mantra. If these are employed, what happens is that the mental body of the being in the interval—which as we saw, is merely composed of the wind, of the life wind from the previous body, and the subtle mind, the all-basis consciousness principally—that this mental body, composed purely of wind-mind, is transformed through the interval beings perception of it, into the illusory form or illusory body in the form of the deity.

This is subsequently further purified by the practitioner immersing his or her mind in the clear light on the basis of the cultivation or assuming of that illusory body and when the illusory body in the form of the deity is in that way purified by the purifying fire of the clear light, then it becomes "the body of great unity," which is endowed with the best of all aspects. "Best of all aspects" means an emptiness that is at the same time great bliss. So here the body, the illusory or miraculous body of great unity, refers to an illusory body that is inseparable from the purifying clear light. Otherwise put, Rinpoche said, this means a body of a deity in which the deity's form or body, and the deity's wisdom are a unity, or are inseparable. So that is the final aspiration, which is the aspiration, "May I achieve the samboghakaya in this second or principal phase of the interval of possibility."

            Now the rest of the text is devoted to the third and final phase of the interval of possibility. In the second phase we saw there was opportunity for achieving liberation through the transformation of one's mental body into the samboghakaya of one's deity and this obviously depends upon assiduous practice in the preceding life and obviously having received instruction. Therefore most people, most beings who find themselves in the second interval don't achieve liberation there because they have not done the preparation or even received the instruction which would enable them to do so. So if the being does not achieve liberation in the second interval, the third interval will begin.

The difference between the second and the third interval is that the third interval is said to begin at the point where the habits from the preceding life have weakened so much, that one is starting to identify primarily with the body of the next life. As a result, one feels extremely lost and is looking for a body, looking for a place to find birth. So the defining characteristic of the third interval of possibility is that one is searching for a birthplace, obsessively searching for a birthplace. Therefore the principal practice in this third interval is choosing a birthplace and avoiding conventional compulsive birth where one is put into a birthplace under the compulsion of one's karma and karmic impulses.

At this point, one has not only lost the previous physical body, but even the habit of it has thinned out or waned to the point where one feels extremely vulnerable and lost and so you feel at this point like a traveller who has not found a hotel or place to stay. Or another more compelling analogy is like someone who in the midst of battle has lost his horse, has fallen off his horse and is trying to get back onto it or get back onto any horse. And that's the sort of urgency that you feel at this point in the interval. So it's at this point that you are particularly subject to the compulsion to be reborn.

Now, when you start to look for a birthplace, and birthplace here does not necessarily mean the geographical thing, it means the container for the consciousness. So it can mean the womb if you are going to be born in a womb, or it depends on what the species is, but when you start to look for the birthplace, there will be certain indications which can show what sort of birth you are moving toward. Those who are going to be reborn as devas or gods, when they start searching for a birthplace, find themselves amidst all of the wealth and luxury of the god realms. And they are attracted to it. They see this wealth and luxury and they like it. And they want to stay there. There will be indications of this in the body they've left behind. Someone, who is moving toward a god or deva rebirth, their body will look pretty good. It will have a fairly good complexion. It will be pleasing; people will not find their body especially repulsive. The eyes will not be gaping wide open. They'll be half-open and it will probably smell good, within, you know, the limits. And because of the involvement of devas and devis in this, there could be rainbows appearing in the sky and rains of flowers and so on. None of this in this case means the person's achieved enlightenment or liberation at all. It just means they're headed for a higher rebirth.

            Meanwhile, in the bardo, an interval being who's moving toward a deva rebirth, will see the occupations of the devas, gods and goddesses, being entertained and playing and so on. And seeing these things will think, "I want to go there." And it is actually their attachment to, their attraction to the activity of the gods, that forms the immediate condition for rebirth there. So those who are born as devas, while they are born because of their karma, the link, the actual immediate condition that propels them into that birthplace is attraction to those things.

            The second of the higher realms is the realm of the asuras. And asuras are similar to gods except they are much more violent and aggressive. So the experience of someone who is going to be reborn as an asura is in general similar to the experience of someone who is going to be reborn a deva. But they feel more aggressive and more proud. And what they see rather than seeing the entertainment and amusements of the god, they see asura soldiers putting on armor and taking up sharp weapons and attacking one another and so on. And the warfare of the asuras is very fast and constant and violent. It's like constant lightening. And they see this and this gives rise to, in the case of the gods it was attachment or desire, in the case of the asuras this gives rise to a kind of proud anger. And they think, "Boy, I've got to join in that battle." It's another form of attachment, but it's an attachment that's an attachment to battle and conflict. And so they think, "I've got to go there." And that's the immediate condition, which propels them into that birth.

            The third higher realm is the human realm. Those who are reborn in the human realm see human situations, human circumstances, such as the prosperity and wealth of humans and so on, and they are attracted to that: to the pleasures of the human realm. In particular, they are said to witness the union of their parents. And seeing the union of their parents, they give rise to intense desire for the parent who will be of the opposite sex, and intense resentment and jealousy of the parent who will be of the same sex. And in the human realm it's this combination of desire and aversion that propels them into the birthplace, which in the human case is the womb. What happens is that as a result of this combination of desire and aversion, the consciousness of the interval being dives into the body of the father, via one or another of the sense apertures. And then together with the father's sperm, ends up in the womb and the ovum of the mother. And at that point, once you are conceived, you are locked in.

            Animals are in general—and the first of the lower realms is the animal realm—so bewildered that they are reborn, you are born as an animal through a sort of compulsive or almost instinctive and very primitive reaction that is again compounded of attachment and aversion and depending upon what type of animal it is, it will be something to do with a womb or an egg, and so on. But it's similar to the human one except that it's much coarser. The emotions are coarser and the bewilderment is stronger.

Pretas, the second of the lower states and also particularly miserable animals, animals that are particularly, what we would call, low on the evolutionary thing, but animals that are primitive species or undeveloped species and pretas don't generally take birth through attachment. Interval beings don't look at the preta realm or the realm of being some form of microscopic life or something and think, "Boy, I really want to go there." That's not the way it works. In this case, what drives you into that type of birth, of course the cause is you karma, but the proximate or immediate condition is fleeing something else. You end up choosing that rebirth because there is something else that you are so afraid of that you take shelter from it in that birth. And the things that you are fleeing can be things like a violently turbulent ocean, or a forest fire or a landslide or earthquake, such as the destruction of an entire mountain, or a fierce wind that sounds like a wind that breaks up a planet at the end of time. It could also be things like hearing the sound of terrifying beings, their violent cries of war and so on. Or you could see various demonic creatures such as yakshas or fierce predators such as predatory animals and so on. Or you could be driven into the birth by a blizzard.

In short, if you are going to be reborn a preta or a lower animal, you are fleeing something and you try to get as far away as possible and you naturally flee into something that looks like a close, confining and dark space that is a shelter. So you are afraid of being out in the open—and these include things like caves, and holes in the earth, hollow tree trunks, holes in walls or buildings, in between the leaves of thick foliage. In short, you go into some kind of dark, dark space. And it is the attitude of desire for that dark space of shelter, that in reaction to fleeing from something you are afraid of, that causes you to be reborn as a preta or lower animal.

            The third of the lower states are the hell realms. Because there are very many different hell realms, the actual circumstances, which propel birth in these, can vary quite a bit. But one of the things that serve as a proximate or immediate condition for hellish rebirth is, the interval being will see a kind of attractive forest or mountainside and they'll see wild animals moving around and what appear to be hunters hunting them. They'll see this and they'll be attracted to this action of hunting. They'll think, "I have to go there, I want to take part of this and kill some too." That will pull them into the situation but as soon as they are locked into it, the whole thing will change. And the animals that are being hunted and possibly also the hunters will change into demonic beings, the servants or henchmen of Yama. Henchpersons, maybe. And these will grab hold of you, take you into custody and pull you down to hell, where they will start doing their stuff: killing you, cutting you up, doing all the things that happen to you in hell.

Other beings that are born in hell, actually especially if they led particularly bad lives, they won't even get that far in the bardo. Sometimes, even while they are still alive, as they are dying, they'll start to see, actually see the henchpersons of Yama, the servants of Yama and they'll be terrified by this and they'll die in a state of terror. Such persons, and in general those who are reborn in hell, leave behind bodies that people find unaccountably scary. They just look at their body and they feel freaked out and the body will actually look unpleasant, not just scary but also unpleasant as well.

Sometimes also, someone who is going to be reborn in hell will lose consciousness as they are dying, before the whole dissolution or shut down process is completed. They lose consciousness in reaction to the agony of death, then they faint as they die. Then they wake up unaware of course that they're dead, and they wake up after the whole dissolution process has gone through without their being conscious. And of course their first thought is, "Where and what is my body?" As soon as they think that, a body is formed and in this particular case, not all hell beings but one particular way in which beings go there, their mental body, their interval body is not like their preceding aggregate. It's a sphere, a round, globular mass, with one eye that is in the top of it. So it's like a kind of a ball, with an eye. That's what they think it is; I mean that's how they perceive it. Then it seems to be blown upward by a very fierce wind. It's blown way up on a fierce wind and then the wind stops and it falls down and it lands on this ground or surface of red-hot metal, red-hot iron. And as soon as it lands, it splatters and melts and reforms instantly into the horrific body of a hell being.

Hell beings have extremely sensitive, physically sensitive but also extremely horrific bodies. And then, as soon as the hell body has been formed, then they are apprehended by the hell guardians, the guards of that particular hell, who start to torture them and kill them in various ways. Many, not all, but many of the beings who are reborn in either the hell realms, or as pretas, witness or seem to experience themselves being led in front of Yamaraja, the Lord of the Dead, by his henchpersons and then they are put on trial with Yama as the judge, and everything they did is recounted, in other words they are charged and then they are judged and, in a state of great terror, are led into their next rebirth. This does not happen universally. This does not happen, Rinpoche said, to everyone who is reborn in those realms, but it does appear to happen to some.

Yet another proximate condition for rebirth in a hell is where, if you are going to be reborn in a hot hell, sometimes what will happen, is in the interval you start to experience intense cold and you flee from the intense cold and you think, "I really want to go to a warm place," and the warmest place your mind can find is the realm in which you are going to be reborn, and then you are born there and it's too warm. If you're going to be reborn in a cold hell, then the opposite happens, you start to experience suffering of intense heat in the interval. You flee that and you are reborn in a cold hell. So sometimes, even in the hell realms, beings are born through a kind of craving that is produced by rejection of one thing and choosing something else in its stead.

            In general you can also classify the immediate or proximate conditions for rebirth based on the type of rebirth physically from among the four types: instantaneous moisture and warmth, egg and womb. Beings that are born instantaneously, that is without physical generation, mostly the immediate condition for taking birth is attachment to the place or location. Beings that are born in a species that is produced by heat and moisture are generally cast into that birth through attachment to scent and taste. And beings that are born in either womb or egg, are generally cast into that birth by attachment to the sexual union of their parents, which forms the physical condition for that birth as well.

In this way, in any case, through various forms of bewilderment and bewildered appearances which arise in the interval, causing you to generate attachment for a mode of rebirth and therefore be cast into it, in this way, the wheel of birth after birth keeps on turning. And it never stops because each time we die, we again find ourselves compelled to and take and attach to a certain type of rebirth.

Now, that describes the situation of the third phase or third part of the interval of possibility. Next the text focuses on the instructions or means by which we can avoid negative rebirths.

The first and primary instruction is to—whatever you see, whether pleasant and attractive or unpleasant and frightening, whatever you see or experience in this point in the interval—rely upon the remedy for whatever type of reaction you would normally have toward that appearance. To rely upon the remedy of course, you must have tamed your mind, so therefore, in order for you to have any resources at this point in the interval, you must have trained yourself in the various remedies, for the various types of things and reactions to those things which are going to happen or might happen at this point, and you must have the necessary ability, you must have the ability needed to keep your mind tamed and in control under those circumstances.

So the aspiration here is, "May I therefore at that point be not separated from whatever yogic practices I am trained in." So at this point as in the two earlier stages of the interval, what happens to you principally depends upon the degree of your training and the degree of your ability to bring that training along with you into the afterdeath state. So at this point, as before, you would apply whatever your principal training in practice is. Whether it is the practice of Mahamudra, or the Great Perfection or the Great Middle Way, or the cultivation of a state of great and impartial compassion, any of these means can be used at this point in the interval.

Now there are particular means as well that can be helpful, for example the four roots or principals among the Six Dharmas. The practice of Chandali, which is called here the self-blazing of bliss and warmth and the practice of the Illusory Body, where you learn to view all that appears and everything that exists as illusory and in that way you bring about the self-liberation of the eight mundane dharmas. The instructions on Dream, where you cause the bewilderment of the dream state to be purified within the dream state itself, and the practices concerning the Clear Light, in general and specifically, through which all forms of bewilderment and ignorance, the waking state, the state of deep sleep and so forth are purified.

So, at this point you would apply whichever practice or combination of practices you are particularly trained in. For example, someone who has generated a stable practice of the generation stage, which means the visualization of deities, would at this point employ both the visualization of him or herself as their deity and also the recognition of the forms that appear to them as deities. That is to say, they not only transform the appearances but also are able to recognize the continuing appearances of deities. Normally beings in the interval do, Rinpoche said, do see actual deities appearing before them, but because they are threatened by these appearances, some of which are wrathful, and all of which as we saw before are intimidating in their brilliance, because they are threatened by these, they don't recognize them as deities, or sources of refuge and they flee from them. Someone who is assiduously trained in the generation stage may be able to recognize these and also to transform the experience of the interval into the appearance of deities along with all of their features and scepters and so on, the sound of mantras and so on.

Someone who has cultivated the practice of devotion in the practice of guru yoga at this point would principally practice guru yoga. And by visualizing their guru on top of their head and supplicating their guru for rebirth in a pure realm, could succeed at this point even in this third phase of the interval, in being reborn in a completely pure realm. This is not because gurus favor those who pray to them over those who don't. Authentic gurus have equal compassion for all beings and are utterly impartial. But the condition of the person's devoted supplication is needed for the guru to lead you to the pure realm. So practitioners of guru yoga would employ that method at this point in the interval and could achieve liberation through it.

Another factor that is important here is the moral discipline you've maintained. Those who have maintained flawless moral discipline, such as authentic monastics and so forth, in the immediately preceding life, can invoke the power of that, the merit of it, the momentum of it and so on. It will counteract the kleshas, desire and so forth, which form the proximate or immediate conditions for rebirth, and also by dedicating the virtue or merit of it to rebirth in a pure realm, they will be able to achieve that.

Another faculty is, regardless of specific technique, the power of intensive mindfulness and alertness itself can be evoked, regardless of it's association with one technique or another at this point in the interval. In short, at this point, what the person is trying to do is block the gates to rebirth in any impure realm. So the first thing you want to do in this third stage or phase of the interval of possibility is to avoid samsaric rebirth altogether and be reborn only in a pure realm, if you can, using any of the particular methods that were just described.

If, however, the force or compulsion of karma is so strong that you can't stop yourself from being reborn in samsara, then your next resort is to choose a better rather than worse birth. And the birth you want to choose at this point is one where you will be able to practice the Vajrayana and proceed toward awakening. So you choose to be reborn as a human being possessing the six elements and specifically a human being who will in that life have access to and complete the practice of the supreme path of Vajrayana.

So the aspiration here is, "May I create the excellent interdependent circumstances for the continued practice of this path."

Here, in order to choose an appropriate rebirth, you regard your taking birth at this point as an act of conscious emanation. That is to say, you achieve an emanation body in the sense of consciously choosing birth, rather than being born through the forms of karmic compulsion described earlier. You do this through the aspiration that you undertake or accept the type of birth that will be of the most benefit: the most benefit to others and the most benefit for your own completion of the path. So you choose the family, you choose the gender, race, country, social circumstances and so on, whatever you want, whatever you decide is going to be best. You may choose to be male, you may choose to be female, you may choose to be born in one place, you may choose to be born in another, the point is here you gain and employ the power of choice. In order to do this most effectively, you apply the faculties of mindfulness and alertness throughout the conception, gestation and birth process, if you can, so you do not succumb to the confusion and the bewilderment which normally fetuses undergo.

The aspiration here is to do this principally in the way that you maintain mindfulness and alertness during the threefold process of conception, gestation and birth, through applying the wisdom of the third empowerment. So the aspiration here is that you achieve a form of birth that will cause you to be happy in that life and proceed to further happiness because you use the life for the practice of dharma.

So your aspiration is to take birth in such a form that is going to be most beneficial. It could be and we saw earlier, this is usually your first resort, a birth in a pure realm, in which case you would continue from then on, unless there was specific reason to do otherwise, to be reborn in pure realm after pure realm, or through compassion, you could also take rebirth in an impure realm, such as this one, and also having achieved the higher levels, you would in any case produce emanations in both pure and impure realms. So in short your aspiration is that in the long run you be able to accomplish all forms of buddha activity, through producing countless emanations in both pure and impure realms.

Next, the text summarizes everything that has gone before and it says, "In brief, from now on, may I always prepare myself for the interval by thinking, 'This is what I will do when this happens. This is going to happen; I will do this.' And by consciously engaging my mind in this preparation, and perfecting it, not merely thinking about it from time to time, but consciously training my mind in this preparation, as soon as the particular circumstances arise, because I'm prepared I will be able to respond to them appropriately with preparedness." In that way, the text concludes, "May I train in [end of tape 4]

Tape 5, Side 1

[cont. some text is missing]

…..involves the strong inculcation of a highly motivated aspiration. This is true whether you are training with the delusion of the waking state, of the dream state, or of the interval state. For example, in order to train with the dream state, Rinpoche said, the primary factor, initially is the generation of highly motivated aspiration immediately before sleep. The aspiration, "I will recognize that I'm dreaming, while I am dreaming. Recognizing it, I will not feel fear, no matter what I dream. I will transform the contents of dreams at will. I will change one thing into a hundred, for example my body into a hundred, I will change negative things into positive things and so on." This type of aspiration, "I must recognize the dream state and I must transform it," will give you the ability to do so. The aspiration itself, the highly motivated aspiration, is the primary factor in being able to do this. It is the same for the interval. Preparation for the interval consists in large part, Rinpoche said, of learning what will happen, bringing it to mind and consciously and repeatedly preparing yourself to respond to each stage of it as it comes up with the appropriate response or remedy.

            Please dedicate the virtue of this session and all virtue accumulated by yourself and others throughout the past, present and future, to the gaining of the ability by yourself and each and every being, to recognize as they occur, the various experiences of the interval and the ability to respond to these with appropriate mindfulness and alertness, and thereby achieve liberation through rebirth in pure realms and so forth. And having achieved this, the activity by all of those liberated beings of liberating others until finally all six realms of sentient beings have without exception, achieved perfect awakening.

Questions and Answers:

Question: Rinpoche I have a question about the commitment that came up last night at the end of the empowerment, I didn't have time to eat the ten fish, but in particular you asked us not to harm sentient beings and also to avoid sexual misconduct, I think specifically if it would harm the other person. And especially since I'm single I'd like you to elaborate in as much detail as possible especially on the second of these two conditions.

Answer: Rape. Don't rape people.

Question: That's it?

Answer: Primarily, Rinpoche said that's what it means.

Question: I actually have a corollary question about the fish, joking aside. This is the first time that you've asked, at least in my presence for a life-releasing specifically. And I've always had a question about life-releasing because when you go to purchase something, earthworms for example, I looked into this at very great length and talked to scientists in Boston and everything. Of course the earthworm—this is true. The earthworms for example come from Canada and they are picked up. I'm not kidding. I researched this. One kind comes from Canada and the other kind comes from Georgia. And for them to survive in New England, obviously you have to buy the Canadian ones. If you buy the Canadian ones, you're creating the karmic preconditions for more of these earthworms to be scooped up by hardworking Canadians in the north, who pick them up and it's a sort of cottage industry. And so when you go to release these lives, you're actually putting more lives in jeopardy or so it see it seems to me. Similarly with the fish, if you buy baitfish, you are creating a market for more baitfish. And so in a capitalist economy, I can see how this works very well in a sort of more traditional agrarian economy, but in a capitalist economy, whereby buying the earthworms or the fish I'm putting more lives in danger, how do I best effect this wish?

Answer: Well, we can't protect all beings. We have to protect the ones to which we have access. And even those ones we can't protect forever. We may only be able to lengthen their lives by so much as one day. So when you buy animals that are being sold for purposes that will involve their death, whether it's their consumption as is the case with fish that are sold live or their use as bait, as is the case with earthworms, even if they only survive for one day, that's probably one day longer than they would have survived otherwise.

Question: I have a question that's clearly with the bardo teachings, the precondition to being able to do anything successfully in this experience is having a very strong meditative stability that we can develop in this life. And this is a persistent problem in my practice. This is why I read a lot; it's because I have a very hard time getting any kind of stability in my meditation. Is there any further advice or further goosing I can have that will get this to work better?

Answer: Goosing, you mean like tilting? Tweaking?

Question: I keep reading these instructions. If there's any further….maybe a big stick to hit me on the head. I know that's a sort of more zen tradition, but I just thought I'd ask.

Answer: Well, there are definitely means and instructions which will enable you to develop the type of stability that is needed to successfully traverse the interval. And, as you indicated in your question, we all want to achieve this kind of stability. It's achieved not by the practice necessarily of a large variety of techniques, but by the proper and stable implementation of any one complete technique of practice. By visualizing your body as Chenrezig, by visualizing the deity Chenrezig, and repeating the mantra, OM MANI PEME HUNG, and at the conclusion of the session, dissolving the appearance of the deity into emptiness, by these three techniques, you can achieve the necessary stability for traversing the interval, because the phase of the meditation where you withdraw or dissolve the appearance of the deity is how to cultivate familiarity with the clear light so that you can recognize the dharmakaya at death. Meditating upon your body as the body of Chenrezig, is how you can gain the ability to achieve liberation as the samboghakaya in the second phase of the interval. The repetition of the mantra OM MANI PEME HUNG, is how you can learn to view all sound, including the sounds that appear in the interval as mantra. And the motivation of great compassion with which you perform the whole practice, is the basis for the altruistic aspiration to be reborn as nirmanakaya for the benefit of others, which is the key to traversing the third phase of the interval. So doing this one complete technique will achieve everything you need in order to do this. In contrast to that, knowledge of a large number of techniques, without gaining stability in any one of them, will not bring this.

Question: Rinpoche, my question regards eating meat. I've been a Buddhist for, I don't know 25 years or something and I've never tried very hard to avoiding eating meat and it seems that maybe I should be doing that since we do live in a culture and an environment where it is possible to eat a fairly healthy, nutritious diet that excludes meat, unlike other Buddhist countries or environments where it wasn't so easy to do that. So I'm wondering if you would recommend that one should or myself should be trying, making more of an effort to develop a diet that excludes meat.

And secondly, if we are going to eat meat, a lot of us have been reading about these horrible meat factories where much of our meat comes from now, where the conditions for the animals are really even much more horrendous than they would be on a regular farm, and if we are going to eat meat if we should be trying to make sure that the meat that we are eating, even though it's passing through the requisite number of people, that it's not coming from these terrible places?

Answer: If you can stop eating meat, that would be wondrous, and I would thank you for doing so and rejoicing in your doing so. It is for all of the reasons you mentioned obviously better not to eat meat. If you cannot stop eating meat entirely, or if you find yourself travelling to places such as the other countries you mentioned where you more or less have to eat meat, then when you eat the meat, because you are making a physical connection with the animal by consuming it's flesh and absorbing it into your body, you should use the opportunity to make aspirations that that animal not be reborn in lower states. You can actually help the animal by doing this. Now I am not saying that that makes eating meat okay. I'm not saying that you can therefore think that, "Well, because I make these aspirations, there is no sin in eating meat." There is. It is very hard for me to say this because I have been unable to abandon the consumption of meat myself, so I'm not comfortable going around telling people not to meat, but if I am asked directly if it's better not to eat meat, I have to say yes.

Question: Thank you. Did you ask Rinpoche also about the meat factories?

Answer: I mentioned it and he didn't respond.

Question: Rinpoche, I have a question about recognizing the clear light at the time of death. And my understanding is that if one recognizes that, they achieve the dharmakaya, the absolute buddhahood. Now if somebody in their lifetime, like we are now, takes the bodhisattva vow, that is vowing to come back, return in physical form until all beings have achieved liberation, that's my understanding of that, so how do you reconcile these. Would that somehow be breaking their vow to achieve the dharmakaya state?

Answer: No, it's not a violation of the vow, because when someone achieves the dharmakaya, they don't abide in a passive state or a state without activity. It's not like some sort of permanent vacation. As soon as someone achieves or attains the dharmakaya, they automatically display the samboghakaya and by extension, nirmanakayas for the benefit of others. So in fact rather than being a contravention of it, it's the most perfect fulfillment of the Bodhisattva vow.

Question: Rinpoche, what kind of things can an individual practitioner do on the anniversary of someone who died and if the person will have already taken rebirth, is it still beneficial for them?

Answer: You can actually still benefit the person at any time, including the yearly observance of their passing, regardless of whether or not they have been reborn and regardless really of how long it has been since they were reborn. You can benefit them by doing meritorious things such as making offerings dedicated to them or in their name, and by dedicating the virtue of your usual virtuous activities especially to them on that time. In either case, you will be helping yourself and you will also be helping the other person. Although as you say, they will have taken rebirth by that point, one doesn't necessarily know what type of rebirth. And if they have taken an unfortunate rebirth you might be able to ameliorate their circumstances or even free them from that birth by doing virtue for their benefit.

It was not uncommon in Tibet for great lamas to be able to see where deceased people had been reborn. And they would sometimes, usually at the request of family members, determine this, and then advise the family on what needed to be done. He would say something like, "Your relative has been reborn in such and such lower state. In order to free them from this, the families should perform such and such practices, such and such virtuous endeavor and so on. Another thing that has happened throughout much of Tibetan history and still, Rinpoche said, can happen nowadays are what are called "returners." And returners are people who actually die. It's more than a near death experience. They actually die and then come back. And they've actually gone through the whole death process including the bardo or the interval, and are able, especially if they do this repeatedly, to see lower states and to contact people who have passed away. And sometimes, even if it has been years since someone has died and been reborn in a lower state, they will carry messages from them back to family, advising family about what needs to be done for their benefit and so on and this seems to be indeed effective.

Question: Rinpoche I have a question regarding the people who are on life support and they are staying for some time on life support, so there is no chance for them to recover. There's not any will left in this person. What should one do in that situation, where there are obstructions to the way a natural death would be supported, to end this suffering in the absence of a living will?

Answer: It's hard for me to answer this because, Rinpoche said, the actual affect of artificial life support, you know resuscitation and so on, on most people in the long run is hard to determine. What I can say, he said, is that if the person is a strong practitioner who has the chance to recognize the ground clear light at death, then it would be much better if they not be artificially resuscitated and their life not be artificially prolonged by life support mechanisms, because these things will prevent them from experiencing the ground clear light while they are still conscious and therefore able to recognize it. And when they eventually enter it, they'd be entering it from a state of unconsciousness, which would put them at a disadvantage.

This, however, is not really an issue with an ordinary person because an ordinary does not really have any significant chance of recognizing the ground clear light. So whether they enter it at a natural conscious death, or from a state of prolonged unconsciousness is largely irrelevant, because in either case, they are simply not going to recognize it. So for an ordinary person, it is hard to say whether or not artificial resuscitation and life support actually does them any harm, it may or may not. To give you an idea of someone for whom it was an issue, late Lama Ganga, the year before he passed away, said to me, Rinpoche said, "If I have merit, I will die in Tibet. If I can't manage that I'm going to make sure I die in India, but I don't dare die in America, because they won't let me die. They'll hook me up to these machines and I won't be able to die." Now I interpret, Rinpoche said, his remarks as a sort of indirect expression of his confidence and his ability to recognize the ground clear light and liberation in the bardo, and that's why it was an issue for him.

Question: I have a question. I heard a few stories of people who are dying and they are talking to their relatives—their relatives that were already dead for some time—and it looks like they saw them or heard them. And at which point, talking with relatives, having their presence could be helpful in our process of dying?

Translator: In other words, the dying person appears to be talking to people already dead?

Question: Yes.

Answer: Well, Rinpoche says he thinks that they are not actually seeing their relatives, that it's a hallucination produced by the habit of association with those people. Because you could actually only contact dead people when you are dead, when the shutdown or dissolution process was completed and if they are still talking then they are not dead yet. So it shouldn't be that. He thinks it's probably an appearance or hallucination that they are having through habit.

Question: And another question, what about people who are from different denominations, who have a different kind of faith, different kind of beliefs. What is the chance of their liberation and what can be done for them in order to help them with this process?

Answer: With regard to your first question, Rinpoche said, I really don't know how to answer it. If I were to answer it by saying, "No, non-Buddhists have no chance for recognition and liberation," that would be no more than sectarian prejudice on my part. On the other hand, if I were to say, "Yes, they have chance for recognition and liberation," that would be sheer pretentiousness because to make that statement I would have had to have achieved the final result of their religion and know what abilities it bestowed. So I can't answer that question.

With regard to your second question, I think you would employ the same methods that you would use for a Buddhist except you would do it discretely. So for example, you could recite mantras or Buddhist names, such as OM MANI PEME HUNG and so on and dedicate the virtue or merit of that to the person, but you just wouldn't do it so that they heard it because that would disturb them, as we discussed yesterday. These things are beneficial to anyone. Not just to Buddhists. If you do something virtuous, such as reciting that mantra and dedicate the virtue to that person, the fact that they are themselves not Buddhists doesn't in any way prevent them from benefiting from it. The purpose of dharma is to benefit all beings of the six realms, not merely Buddhists.

Question: Rinpoche yesterday you spoke about karma being used up in the interval stage, and I wonder if you can elaborate more about karma and how we carry it forward into subsequent lives.

Answer: Karma abides within the all-basis consciousness of an individual and in the case of the interval it is this all-basis consciousness combined with this subtle wind, the life wind, that goes from life to life. So that wind mind serves as the container for the maintenance and transportation of karma. I need to make something clear however. When I said that the karma of the previous life was used up, I don't mean that all of the karma that had been accumulated that had led to the previous life was used up. I meant that whatever particular karma, whatever particular imprint of action led to that particular birth must be used up when that birth is finished. But this doesn't mean that all of the other karmic imprints that are stored within the all-basis consciousness have been wiped out or used up. They are all there.

The gap that is experienced in the interval consists of the fact that while the karmas are still present within one's being, the ripening of karma is temporarily dormant. It is a time when a karmically ripened situation, that is a set of karmically ripened aggregates during one's life, is not present. The previous one has been destroyed and used up and the next one, while the karma for it is present, has not ripened yet. This makes the situation one where changes can be affected because what prevents change is the limitation imposed upon you by fully ripened karma.

In other words, once a karma has resulted in it's fully ripened or fully matured result, which is the aggregates of a particular life, not much can be done about. You're stuck in that situation. But in between lives, while you have plenty of karma that needs to be purified, none of that karma is in a ripened state yet and therefore changes can be effected.

Question: Rinpoche, my question is, how can we as ordinary practitioners, myself or others, benefit the six realms in as far as specifically emptying the lower realms, which seems somewhat, at least for an ordinary level practitioner, seems somewhat hard to grasp. How can we do that, karmically speaking, now?

Translator: When you say emptying, you mean completely, once and for all, or you mean a bit?

Question: Well, I guess what I'm really alluding to is in liturgies there is the praise that, "May the lower realms be emptied." And so when this is our aspiration, how do we begin?

Answer: Even as ordinary sentient beings there is a great deal that we can do for others. Everytime that you do something virtuous and sincerely dedicate that virtue to others, you can, through the force of that virtue and through the force of that dedication, introduce virtuous habit into that beings continuum. And that virtuous habit which is produced by or introduced by force of your dedication and aspiration, will eventually cause them to achieve liberation, first of all from lower states and eventually from cyclic existence itself.

The phrase commonly used in our liturgy, "Emptying samsara from it's depths," or sometimes "Emptying lower states from their depths," and so on, refers really to the principal aim, the principal goal, and principal aspiration of all Buddhas in their compassion, all bodhisattvas, and indeed of all who take the bodhisattva vow. But this is an open-ended aspiration in the sense that beings are limitless. So it is very difficult even to answer the question which is often posed, "whether there will or not ever come a time at which all beings have been liberated." And this remains what has been called a difficult point. However although we undertake the aspiration to bring all beings without exception to liberation, [tape change and some text might be missing]

Tape 5, Side 2

There are plenty of situations where even as ordinary and afflicted beings ourselves we can plant the seed of liberation in the being of another. For example, if you say the mantra, OM MANI PEME HUNG in the hearing of an animal that has died and so on, you plant the seed of liberation in that being. Anyone who is connected with the Buddha's teaching can do this. It does not require a state of attainment in order to be able to do this. You simply have to know that it can be done and do it.

Again, as was the case with the previous question, I can't assess whether those who are adherents of other religions can or cannot, because I just don't know, but what I can say is that is that those who have no connection to any spiritual tradition whatsoever can't do this because they had no means at their disposal to actually introduce the seed of liberation in another's being. They are those who we'd have to call truly ordinary in the full sense of the term. As unattained beings, who nevertheless have knowledge with which we can benefit others, while we are ordinary beings, we are the best among the ordinary because we have these means at our disposal for the benefit of others.

Question: Rinpoche in the U.S. we tend to so-called put pets to sleep when they are in their last day and when they are suffering a lot. How do you view this?

Answer: I don't think it's a very good thing, because it's true that animals can suffer tremendously when they're dying, and people merely wish to end their suffering. It's much better to attend and assist the animal during its dying process as much as you can, but allow the animal to die naturally rather than hastening its death by giving it the poison. People's motivation in doing this of course, is compassionate; they do it because they think that experience ceases with death, so therefore they think that the remaining experience of the animal is just going to be misery and suffering and they naturally want to spare the animal that suffering. So their motivation is compassionate. But as compassionate as it is it's based on a fundamental misunderstanding, which is the idea that experience ends with death.

The problem with the euthanasia, Rinpoche said, is that it often will precipitate a greater experience of suffering ensuing after the animal has died and we don't recognize that because we can't see it because the animal is no longer inhabiting its body, but for those reasons it's better if you can allow the animal to die naturally.

Question: Rinpoche, when in this process can a near death experience happen? And when it does, what is happening to the life wind. And the other part is, when I've read about near death experience for the most part people are saying that they see a beautiful, wonderful light and are drawn to it. But it seems that here we're saying either we're not going to recognize it or we would be so fearful of it…[transcriber can't understand the very end of this question].

Answer: Well, it seems that the common near death experience is the experience of either appearance or increase so they haven't reached the stage of attainment which is the stage where there is complete shutdown, so they are not at the point where the truly brilliant and threatening lights appear. They're experiencing the whiteness or the redness. And because it involves the shutdown of certain kinds of conceptuality it is experienced as pleasant by them.

Question: Then, so the lifewind is still within…

Answer: Yeah, its power is not entirely used up, otherwise they wouldn't be returning.

Question: Rinpoche, in the process of the lifewind and the….what is reborn, being reborn, in the modern context of scientific let's say artificial insemination or sort of your petrie dish conception taking place in a lab, how is this…. I mean I can sort of see the same process of diving in, in a lab, but the whole idea of sort of diving in through an aperture in the male…

Translator: In other words, what takes the place of observing the union of the parents and what becomes the immediate condition? What makes them dive into the petrie dish?

Question: Yes, what are the mechanics of that?

Answer: It basically works the same way, just as it works the same way physically. The consciousness still identifies the substances, the ovum and the sperm, with the same kleshas. The kleshas are not only directed at the individuals they are directed at the substances themselves, the attraction and repulsion. And it's still the same kleshas that cause them to dive in. Because don't forget that the scientific understanding of artificial insemination and so on does not include anything about the way the intermediate being enters because they can't see it.

Question: Right, but in the description it seemed like and I could be confused here, maybe some clarification, it's almost like there is something of the union between the sperm and the ovum, but it was described that sort of….maybe I'm getting confused between the dissolution of the two drops, you know at the beginning thinking there are two distinct things here. Is it that the life wind and consciousness, the all basis consciousness goes into the sperm whether it's in a petrie dish or a man's body?

Answer: Yes.

Question: I have two related questions. When a being, if a being is to recognize the dharmakaya, is then the next step that they then would be capable of choosing a rebirth in a conscious way? And related to that, how then would a tulku go through the bardo?

Answer: Well, to answer your first question, if someone recognizes the ground clear light, they achieve the dharmakaya and at that point they do what any other buddha does. They just engage in boundless activity through emanation of various form bodies, from that point onward until samsara is over. Then to answer your second question, when a nirmanakaya passes from one life to the next they basically can do it any way they want to. And want they want is going to depend on what is going to be of the most benefit to the most beings. So they are not required to pass through a conventional bardo obviously. They may decide to visit the interval in order to benefit or if possible liberate other beings in the interval and there are many stories of nirmanakayas in between lives liberating countless beings in the interval, visiting lower states and liberating beings there and so on, but although they could go to or appear in the interval, they would not experience it as a state of compulsion nor as a state of fear or anxiety.

Question: Rinpoche, how can we use the process of falling asleep on a daily basis to help prepare for the process of death. I've heard that during the falling asleep process we go through, you know, some of the same dissolution and passing through the clear light. How can we use this? Can you elaborate a little more on what exactly occurs when we fall asleep?

Answer: Well, definitely there is a connection between the process of going to sleep and the dissolution at death, and this is one of the reasons why there is the practice of conscious dreaming or lucid dreaming and so on and that is how you develop the ability for this recognition.

Question: Rinpoche the teachings you have given us about the interval of opportunity have given me a very much needed basic education because I did not understand before how these practices, for instance, of Mahamudra and visualization related to opportunities like that. And I thank you profoundly for coming to Hartford and giving us this education. And it raises in my mind the question of opportunities in the interval between birth and death. Of course one knows of stories of great lamas who achieved liberation during their ordinary lives, like Naropa, Milarepa, etc. but the practices as I now understand it, what we do, are aimed at a better chance of achieving liberation during the interval of opportunity. Do I have this right? Are the opportunities in ordinary life that are still so considerable that it's worth aiming for those?

Answer: As you mentioned in your question, individuals like Naropa, Milarepa and many others achieved perfect awakening in this very life, before death and before encountering anything like the interval. As for whether we have the opportunity to do this and to achieve the same thing in this life, in terms of external resources, we do. We have the same dharma that they have, we receive the same instructions they that received and this dharma and these instructions really exist through their kindness. So from the point of view of external resources we have the opportunity.

The problem however, is that in general we don't have the same diligence that they had, we don't have the same discernment that they had, we don't have the same faith and we don't have the same devotion. If we have these things, if we have the same diligence, the same discernment and the same faith and devotion as them, we can and will achieve the same thing they achieved. So in that sense we do have the opportunity.

In general there are said to be three results of Vajrayana practice: the best result is to achieve perfect awakening, Buddhahood, in this very life; the second best result is to achieve it at death or in the interval and that is what we've been talking about it. And then at least, one can achieve it very quickly in a succession of seven or sixteen lifetimes. And this, for example, is the purpose of the practice where you take conscious birth through aspiration in a situation where you will be able to continue Vajrayana practice. The idea is that through further lifetimes you improve, life after life, until you have completed the whole journey.

The point I'm making is that even if we don't achieve Buddhahood in this lifetime, we are still in the very best of situations, because we are immersed in a system of teaching unique among all Buddhist vehicles, which can lead to awakening so quickly. And this teaching is unique to Buddha Sakyamuni, the historical Buddha. Basically, no buddha of the past has taught this and no buddha of the future will. So we are very fortunate in that somehow we have access to teachings that even within the Buddhist traditions in the more long-term sense, are unique.

Question: Rinpoche, am I understanding correctly that when you are reborn in the human realm, you are able to know your parents at that point.

Translator: You mean, before you are born there?

Question: Yeah, when you are jumping in there.

Translator: What do you mean by "know"?

Questions: That we are able to see them.

Answer: Yes, you see them and that's why you generate the kleshas, the attachment and aversion that cause the birth.

Question: I've also heard it said that you can see a few years into your life. Is that….?

Answer: Well, in the sense that you already are acquiring a mental body that has the appearance of your future physical body and that would give you some idea, but Rinpoche said, I don't know how precise it is and I don't know if that means you would actually have conscious knowledge, "I'm going to be so and so, the child of so and so and so and so."

Question: Rinpoche, my question concerns dealing with ordinary reality, dream state and also visualization practice. Since I was a child I've had a very interesting connection with reality. At times it seems to me that I have some since of emptiness, some lasting sense and as I've developed my practice that has increased somewhat. However, I think that I've reached kind of a plateau regarding that.

At the same time I also have had a very active dream life, which is occasionally lucid, and have gained some insight from that as well. However, I seem to have a great deal of difficulty with visualization practice. It seems to me like having lucid dreaming, having a sense of emptiness, it would make sense therefore that I would be able to have some connection with visualization practice. However, to me I feel almost blind. I have some sense of it, but it's not visual. And I'm wondering on the one hand, what I'm experiencing. Do you think that I'm somehow deluding myself, that I'm somehow being trapped in my own mind or misapprehending what I am experiencing as emptiness, and the second part would be how I can increase the success with visualization practice?

Answer: Since you have the at least sporadic ability of lucid dreaming, you should try this: in a lucid dream, go to a cliff or precipice or confront something that would normally terrify you like like a predator of some kind and see if these disturb you, because you know you're dreaming. See if the knowledge that you are dreaming prevents you from any way in being afraid of these things.

Or try encountering something that you really like, something that you would really enjoy. And see if the encounter with something with which you are attached produces any kind of disturbance in your mind. If it doesn't, if the lucidity of the dream state causes you to be unaffected by frightening or pleasant images, then that's really good.

With regard to your experience of emptiness, Rinpoche says, it's very difficult simply through your mentioning it to know exactly what it is or what's going on. One thing that it could be is that you somehow had spontaneous experiences of your mind in a state of what's called "natural rest," where your mind simply just comes to a state of natural or unfabricated rest. If that is what you've been experiencing, then you should be able to apply that easily to visualization practice.

To do so, you would start with a fundament of visualization, such as for example, the syllable hrih. And generate a clear appearance of that alone, transferring the state of natural rest with which you are already familiar to the mental focus on the syllable. You should be able to generate clear appearance of that and then gradually extend it to more elaborate visualizations. If that's not what's going on, if that's not what you are experiencing, you may be experiencing a mere absence of mental content which sometimes people experience as a kind of voidness or emptiness. If it's a mere absence of mental content, then it's of no use whatsoever. It's not going to help visualization or anything else. It's just a mental phenomenon like any other.

But with regard to the generation stage in general, we all want clear visualization and we're all very concerned with it, and of course it's excellent if your visualization is clear. There's nothing wrong with that. But the actual clarity of the visualization is not the most important factor. If you can recollect that the form of the deity which you are attempting successfully or unsuccessfully to visualize clearly, is vivid but insubstantial, has the insubstantially but colorful vividness of a rainbow, if you recognize that the deity is insubstantial but vivid, then even if the image is extremely vague, then the practice is successful, because the main point of it is being practiced. It is the insubstantial vividness of the image than is more important than the degree of clarity. It's quite possible that someone might have the technical ability to generate an extremely clear image, but see it as substantial. Under those circumstances, it would be unsuccessful practice of the generation stage.

Thank you, it seems our time is up.