Серия ежедневной практики, курс 10 — Мантра Чже Цонгкапы (Ганден Лхагьяма) (1998), занятие 5

[Speaker 1]
Okay, we'll start, ready? This last, we only have like half an hour, we're going to do a brief protection circle meditation. The full meditation for Lerung is different, and you have to learn that and study it.

But there's a sutra one which is very powerful, and you should learn it, okay? So, we'll go through that very quickly right now. Okay, so get ready to meditate.

It's good to do this very briefly before each session. And our sessions will probably be like three hours broken up, with rest periods in between, and, you know, to drink. I don't believe in going more than 45 minutes an hour.

I think you just get distracted. So, we'll be breaking it up, but at the beginning and at the very end of each three hours of sessions, you should do a protection circle, okay? And we'll go through that.

Also, they say in retreat or any other time, it's very important to do one as you go to bed, as you fall asleep, and then your dreams will be good. They say your mind is very vulnerable to influences, especially around two or three o'clock or something like that. It's not like you wake up in the middle of the night and you have anxiety about something, or you start to hate somebody, and then when you wake up, they seem okay.

You know what I mean? Your mind is being influenced by some kind of negativity or something. They say your mind is very vulnerable during certain hours of the night, especially in the middle of your sleeping period and towards the end.

So, it's good to do a protection circle before that. The principle of a real protection circle is bodhicitta, okay? I mean, just the active ingredient, if it were bottled, would be thinking about other people's problems, okay?

And that protects you. That puts up a wall around you, and you cannot be influenced so much. In retreat, if you get into deep retreat after two or three weeks, sometimes you get more sensitive to spirits, like you don't believe them before that.

Then you actually begin to believe them. I mean, sometimes you can see something. Like I'm not a new age person, I don't believe in Ouija boards and all that stuff, but there are spirits, they do bother you.

If you get into deep retreat, you might become aware of them slightly. You know what I mean? And then all of these things work very nicely, okay?

They don't like when people are doing stuff like this. They would rather you running around New York trying to collect money that you can die with. So, this kind of thing, they don't appreciate this kind of stuff.

So, this is actually the strongest way to form a protection circle around your mind, okay? Which is with bodhicitta, with thinking about someone else, okay? So, the whole argument about protectors is doubly ridiculous, because they're arguing about the concept of loving each other, you see what I mean?

Protectors have no power at all until you are thinking about them with bodhicitta, or they represent bodhicitta. So, to fight about them is the opposite of bodhicitta. So, it's a joke.

It must be an inside joke or something, you know? It's like arguing about what kind of non-arguing would be best for people, you see what I mean? So, anyway, the power of a protector comes from bodhicitta, how much bodhicitta you can get.

And the more... Any time you have a problem in retreat, mentally, like some kind of harassment of your mind by negative thoughts or spirits, do this practice, okay? This is called protection circle.

Okay, so we'll start. Watch your breath. Visualize a holy being in front of you, the Jetsun Kappa if you can, or one of his emanations that you feel comfortable with.

Then ask that Lama to come to the top of your head and bless you, so they start rising up into the sky and getting smaller and smaller, and into the air. And then they reach the level of your head and they start moving over your head, and then they turn around so that they're facing the same way you are. And then they settle down on your head.

They're sitting on a lotus, and on top of the lotus is a moon, and on top of the moon is this holy being. And see them very clearly. You can personalize them to what...

to the holy beings that you've met or come in contact with. If he looks a little bit like a Dalai Lama, or Ken Rinpoche is easy, or even some other person who's affected you deeply in your life. If their face has a little likeness to that, that's good.

Then ask them for their blessing, and this liquid starts, like nectar starts to come from their heart and flows down, down through their body, then comes into your head, and it's like very thick oil coming down the side of a can, and then it just works down from the top, and it's sticking to the sides, and it's the inside of your skin, and in your body, and it's spreading down, slowly going down through your body. And all of the negativities you have are like dirt, black dirt, and that liquid is forcing it down towards the bottom of your body.

This is called marnde. And all the dirt goes out the bottom of your body, and then it starts to fill up again with this nectar. So try to feel it, slowly filling your body like a cup, until it fills up to the top.

And then your whole body is clean and bright, like filled with some kind of white light. And then from your heart comes a stream of white light, and goes out to the outside of this house, and it like burns a circle of white around the house, like white light, a line of white light on the ground in a perfect circle around the house. And the white light stays there.

And then from the white light grows a white, a wall of white light, and it's like 12 or 15 feet high around this house in a perfect circle, impenetrable. And then to give the wall the power, think of someone that you know specifically who's in trouble physically or mentally, depressed or sick, and think about helping them. Directly and indirectly.

Someone very specific who needs help right now. And ask that Lama to come down into your heart, and then dedicate the goodness. Then you can relax.

We're going to cover the tomorrow morning. Going down is called Marnde. Tomorrow, when you do it, the protection, it's like a silver white.

When you do the mantra practice, it'll be five colors. And then it comes up as, it's called the Yande. De, Marnde, and Yande.

De is a rare word in Tibetan that means to drive animals before you, like sheep, you know, they move it, you know. And it means to push all the bad things out that way, and then to push them all out that way. It means to chase after something and push it out.

And Yande means going down, and Marnde means going down. First you do Marnde, then you do Yande. Yeah.

Okay? All right. So see you at two o'clock, I think.

Then from two to four we'll do a session. Then from, starting at... Four to five is Sege.

Four to five, your last Sege. Five to six... For certain people only, it'll be up to you.

Five to six, dinner. We're moving everything up and down. Yeah, five to six will be dinner.

And then at six we'll start closing the place. And when we put up the last protection marker, then silence, okay? Silence means silence.

No notes, okay? And no, you know, talking with your hands. Okay, just forget.

Yeah, you have to do your book. But forget other people, okay? It's you and your mind.

Just forget everybody else, okay? A lot of times when you take vows and stuff like that, they say, forget everybody else in the room, you know. Just forget everybody else is here.

Until next Sunday, just forget it, okay? It's just you and your own head, okay? Okay.

Satsang with Mooji Satsang with Mooji And during retreat, you know, you'll feel tired, and you'll feel sleepy, and after two days you'll say, you go into this kind of a low sometimes, and don't worry about it. Don't trust it. It all works out, okay?

So, don't believe it much, you know. You'll get kind of a low energy for a while, and don't worry about it. You have to keep going, and the mantra will keep you going, okay?

All right. Okay, we're going to talk a little more about the actual meditation. There's three parts to it.

First one is called, madag tru. Say, madag. Madag.

Tru. Madag. Madag.

Tru. Madag means impurities, tru means to wash. So, madag tru means wash yourself of impurities.

And that's what we do a full... mande and yande. So, mande, pushing the bad things out, then yande, filling up with good things, okay?

Then, this is called, mi she sel. Say, mi she. Mi she.

Sel. Sel. Mi she sel means to stop all your ignorance, like, get rid of your ignorance, okay?

Mi she means not understanding. Sel means to clear it away. And then, say, ngu drup.

Ngu drup. Drup. Ngu drup.

Drup. Ngu drup drup means to achieve achievements, okay? And that's a...

Traditionally, it's a seven-part practice. In your book, it just says there's seven parts, and it doesn't tell you what they are. So, Rinpoche, you know, 15 years later, taught the second part, okay?

So, it's not in the book. We'll do pieces of that, okay? So, the point is to, I think, strike a balance between not having the meditation go too slow, or the visualization goes too slow, where it's static, and you get bored, and you can't keep your mind on it, because nothing's happening.

And the other extreme, which is to load you up with 20 different visualizations that you... Then you get overwhelmed, and you... you know, how to say...

Some people have that experience in a documentary, you know, whereas, you know, something that would take 15 years to learn it well, and we're not going to do it here, and it's not the point. So, the point is to have a manageable visualization going on that's still powerful. So, we'll do today ma dak chu.

We'll practice ma dak chu. And then, tomorrow morning, we'll do mi she sel. And then, tomorrow afternoon, we'll do ngu du du.

And then you're on your own after that, okay? Then you have to... ngu du du.

Ngu du du. Siddha siddha. Okay.

So, there you go. Okay. So, get ready to meditate.

We'll go through the preliminaries. Waist and legs. Breathing.

Heat of the body. Send. And keep reciting the mantra, but ask Jetsun Kapha to come up to the top of your head.

Ask Jetsun Kapha to come up to the top of your head, and rest there on a lotus and a moon petal, okay? About 3 or 4 inches high. Make it very realistic, very beautiful.

Then we're going to go through the six perfections, okay? So, the first perfection is giving. And imagine near your heart anything you do which is not the perfection of giving, okay?

Things that you do that are against the perfection of giving. Keep visualizing Jetsun Kapha. Keep reciting the mantra.

And try to visualize in your heart black darkness, like soot. Things that you do that are not the perfection of giving. Things where you don't give to people the things they need, or the comfort they need, or teachings they need.

And again, be specific. Pick a few instances where you fail to give something that you could have given. Or where your attitude is just not to give.

And then see nectar coming down from Tsongkhapa's body. Down, leaking down into your body like very thick oil. And this nectar, if you can visualize, it has five colors, okay?

Is it white, red, green, yellow, blue. And kind of like the color of the moon. And it's coming down into you like a rainbow.

And it's forcing all of the dirty things down to the bottom of your body. When you get to the bottom, visualize all of them turning into some kind of evil, like scorpions, and spiders, and centipedes, ugly creatures, and black. And then they come out of your rear end, okay?

And then you visualize a big hole opens up under you. And there's a Lord of Death there. Personally, I always visualize it as like a very cruel German shepherd about double size or something.

Something very cruel, supposed to have huge jaws. They say like the Lord of Death that's holding the wheel of life. But some very cruel creature that's been waiting below the earth to take you on the day of your death.

So they don't believe there's such a creature, but you visualize it that way. There's some very cruel, inhuman animal waiting to kill you. And they imagine that it opens up its mouth and all of these dirty things, black scorpions, spiders, creatures, fall into its mouth.

And then it just sort of curls up and lays down like it's satisfied. And that has deep significance. If you practice properly, then you don't have to die.

That represents that. Then you close up the ground, and you put a double Dorje there, under you, okay? Cross Dorjes.

And that means you're going to live. You don't have to die like that. So keep doing the mantra, and then push down those things.

You should have at least a few pieces of black there, specific things that you did that you could have given to somebody, something, and you didn't do it. So you're purifying those things, getting rid of those things. And you're going to do that for the whole week.

And cycle through the perfections. Through the six perfections. So that next time you do the meditation, whether it's in that session or the next session, you use your vows.

And then the third time you do it, you use your anger. And then the fourth time you do it, you use your joy. And then the fifth time you do it, you use meditation.

And then you keep purifying yourself of things that work against your perfections. Now imagine the nectar starts filling up your body like a cup. And it starts rising.

It still has five colors. And it feels warm and beautiful and light. And changing your body to light.

And it's working up your body. And little tiny traces of the black still left, and it's carrying them up on top of the nectar. And it comes up to the very top of your head.

And then under the lotus, it's like pouring out all the blacks. The last traces of blackness are coming out. And then imagine your whole body filled with nectar, and it feels really, really beautiful.

Then with your body full, start thinking of how you've done things that are the perfection of giving. In the last few weeks or years, things that you've done that are the perfection of giving. And then think about things you could do.

And feel the nectar in your body, beautiful, light. And this beautiful, beautiful lama on your head. It could be male or female.

It could be anything. Jatakapa. In the form that comes to you.

And then think about successes you're having with the perfection of wisdom. And think about more things you could do with the perfection of wisdom. And feel the warmth in your body, and your body changing.

Becoming more like that perfect being on your head. Okay. Then ask Jatakapa to come into your body, and he shrinks and shrinks and shrinks, smaller and smaller, until he's about the size of a pea.

And drops down straight in front of your backbone, about less than half an inch. And coming straight down. Very, very straight.

And then down to the level of your heart, just less than half an inch in front of your backbone. And stays in a capsule there. And then dedicate the virtue by seeing the light go out of your body, out of your pores.

And touch other people and help them. Okay, we'll do a short moment. YIP PUR GYI CHO SHIN ME THO THAM RIG PA KUN SHIN NIN TE GYEN PA NI SANG GYI SHIN DU MIK TE NGUR BA NI ROL KUN NAM THA SHIN NA CHE BA CHUNG YIP PUR GYI CHO SHIN NIN TE GYEN PA NI Okay, take a 8-minute break.

And come back, and we'll do just a half hour. Oh, it takes time. We won't go on for a while.

We won't go on for a few days, okay? So, leave it at that. And then, maybe around Wednesday we'll do the next step.

If we get to it. Okay, so don't worry about it. Would you pause in the mantra to get the visualization?

People ask me about pausing in the mantra. I checked the text. I checked actually Pabongka Rinpoche's commentary.

And he said, if you feel like pausing, pause. Okay? So, he actually states that.

You can pause if you want to get the visualization straight. And you're having trouble chewing gum and... What's the other one?

Walking at the same time. Walking at the same time, and then... I know.

But, yeah, you can pause and do the visualization. And Pabongka Rinpoche specifically says that. Yeah?

[Speaker 2]
Is it unkind when you have the negativities turn into certain different animals and dropping them into...

[Speaker 1]
Oh, no, it's just a metaphor. It's just a metaphor. Yeah, don't think like that.

They're not living beings. They're just pictures. Another visualization.

It's actually six and then you do the seventh at the end, right? The dedication goes at the end. So it's a six-limb puja with a meditation and then the last limb.

So you can keep him there and then bring him down and dedicate it, and then he's there when you walk around. So when you start breathing again... It's considered inauspicious to leave him out there.

Somebody asked me a good question about Maitreya and the other two disciples. They go into Je Tsongkhapa after he arrives. So they melt in.

The first time. Yeah, Maitreya melts in and then the two disciples melt in. So when you start the main practice you only have one.

I think at the time you come... After you finish asking them to stay, right? At that point he's still sitting in front of you.

Also sitting on the second breath. The purpose of the second breath is to bring you back to the image. Then you build it up from the silhouette.

And make it... I don't want to say... Don't visualize a thangka, okay?

Alright? Visualize a person. It's a very big difference.

I'm afraid that a lot of Westerners visualize thangkas. We're talking about, you know, somebody who is Jesus and Moses and your high school girlfriend all mixed in one. Enlightened.

You know what I mean? Like, get that human thing there, you know? Like a perfect being who's been following you around for a while.

Okay, like that, yeah.

[Speaker 2]
Of course.

[Speaker 1]
You know? I mean, we just got through saying, I mean, if Tsongkhapa can be Padmasambhava and Atisha and Pabongka Rinpoche and Khen Rinpoche and Dalai Lama. He's been following you around for a long time.

It's not out of the... It's not exaggerating, it's not new-agey to say that there's absolutely no... I'd say the odds are that they were your close friends in high school or something.

You know what I mean? Or some percentage of them, okay? There's no problem with that.

Every person you've ever met could have been an emanation of Tsongkhapa. So, but you have to get the right... You can't think of them as people.

You can't think of them as humans during the visualization, okay? Yeah, but you make sure that you realize who they really were, you know? Yeah, after a day or two, you won't notice, you see?

You just won't be looking at it anymore, and you'll say, oh, I did it, you know? Okay. Vajragini mantra is like this long, and you have to do a hundred thousand, and after the first hundred or three hundred, you don't notice that you're not looking at the paper anymore.

So it's not a big thing. Yeah, a hundred thousand would be very typical. I've never done a miksama retreat.

I mean, I went straight to my Vajragini retreats, but it'd be interesting to see how many... Let me know how many you do each day at the end, okay? Because I'm curious how long it would take.

I think it'd be fast... Probably about the same time as a Vajragini, I think, I don't know. Achieving achievements or something like that, okay?

And that last one has seven divisions. And we'll see how far we get. I want to stick with this one for a while, and then we'll see in the middle, if we go to number two.

We'll see how it feels.

[Speaker 2]
Should this be the main mantra, the same all the time?

[Speaker 1]
You mean after you finish this retreat? Yeah, during the retreat. Oh, yeah.

I mean, fulfill your other commitments at a minimum. Yeah, and then... But this should be the main thing.

Yeah, there's no rule that you can't say it while you're walking around, when you lay down to rest, like that. Keep doing it even outside in the session. It should be like rolling around in your head after a day or two.

[Speaker 2]
What's a more or less powerful state in Sanskrit, Tibetan, or English?

[Speaker 1]
They would say it has a great blessing. There is no Sanskrit that I'm aware of. You know, it was written in Tibetan.

So, there's rules for creating mantras. Of all people, Dharmakirti wrote about it, the logician. And, you know, I'm sure there will be English mantras.

But let's do this one. Let's do it in Tibetan from the blessing of the lineage, okay?

[Speaker 2]
If we're visualizing somebody that we know, do they have to be dressed like Je Tsongkhapa?

[Speaker 1]
No, they don't have to. He said, do they have to be dressed like Je Tsongkhapa? Like if you had a high school teacher that you've decided was probably Je Tsongkhapa, logically, then do you have to dress them with this hat and everything?

And no, you don't. I mean, it's a good question. But the identity, what we call, the equivalent of ngagyal in the sadhana, the identification of them must be there.

You can't think... You can use somebody like that, but absolutely don't ever think of them as a normal person during the visualization. That would be blowing it, okay?

Don't slide back into thinking them as as not having been an emanation of Je Tsongkhapa. Yeah, that's very strict. You can't do that.

Then you really blow it, okay? So it's a little danger to use somebody like that, but there's a big benefit. But you can't...

Just absolutely don't think of them in the other way that you used to think of them, okay?

[Speaker 2]
When doing one of these retreats, many people in the morning, people in the night, whatever, sleep longer, shorter, is it absolutely necessary to stick to this type of schedule?

[Speaker 1]
Or can you invent your own, which one's better for your body chemistry or type or whatever? I think in general, when you do your own retreats, you'll be forced to follow your body's clock. But tradition...

You know, it's all to do with the moon, the sun, how the dakinis are moving around the world at certain times. Generally, tun shing nyal drub chu le mi yo war means, do not vary from the pattern of the four sessions. And some scriptures say, tun shing nyal drub cho le mi yo war, which means, don't vary from that supreme four sessions.

I mean, I think if you try it, normally ending one session before daybreak, ending one session before noon, ending one before sunset, and then ending one after night. And then sleeping in the middle watch of the night, which you divide the day into six parts, the middle watch is like twelve to four. I mean, that's tradition.

You go crazy after a week of that. So, we kind of kept it light here, but I think traditionally, that would be the schedule. I think for Westerners, I think about 3.30 or 4 o'clock to 10 is good, with naps. But you shouldn't do that for about a week or eight days into a retreat. We just don't have time to get down there, so the schedule would be like that. It's good if you can keep the schedule in between.

[Speaker 2]
How do you do the visualization of like we were doing the first perfection with the mantra, which is not necessarily about that per se? How do you keep both of those things?

[Speaker 1]
I think you wouldn't be thinking about the meaning of the mantra necessarily at that moment. But you're saying it. Yeah, you have to keep saying it.

Somebody asked if you could pause. Pabongka Rinpoche in his commentary says, if you feel like it would be more useful to pause, then pause the mantra. But if you can keep it going, it's good.

So, it's good if you can keep it going. If it doesn't disturb your visualization. If it disturbs your visualization.

I'd say even if it disturbs it, try it for a couple of days. You might find that it works. And this is coming from a person who didn't do a mantra retreat for ten years because I didn't think it would work.

And I regret it that I didn't do it. It works. So I'd say kind of force it.

Is there anything written about how quickly, like with the visualization you taught us, you're picturing the deeds of not giving and you're picturing them as black and then you're picturing the nectar.

[Speaker 2]
Is there any gauge that you have used to how long you hold each image? Because I think I'm going through them much too quickly.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, how long do you hold each image? I'd say, this is a Dharma Bhadra answer, you know. Not so long that you get bored.

And not so quick that you can't concentrate on it. You know what I mean? And you know, frankly, it was very...

what do you call it? Comforting to me to find that quotation, you know, that Dharma Bhadra said. Look, you've got to keep the thing moving or if you're a normal person, you're going to get bored.

You know, something has to be happening. And don't just stop and space out. I'm afraid that a lot of Westerners, when they do a visualization during a retreat, you know, Maitreya is there, kind of fuzzy.

And then they think about their mom for a while and they think about their dad for a while. And you know, I don't really believe that anyone can sit there for an hour and just look at Maitreya, you know. So it was very comforting for me when I found that.

Somebody asked Moojibaba Bhadra that question in 1780-something. I don't know. And that was his answer.

Yeah, keep it going.

[Speaker 2]
Can we do how to bless the rosary?

[Speaker 1]
We're going to do blessing the rosary tomorrow morning. Because you're not doing mantras yet, really. It doesn't count yet.

We'll start the count tomorrow morning. So we'll bless your rosary and bless the meditation seat. Yeah, I would only count when you're in session, okay?

Like, it's hard to... I wouldn't count it when you're, like, in your room and just... If you're sitting seriously in your room, okay.

But otherwise not, okay? All right. Okay, take a short break.

Meditation with Moojibaba It's very simple, not too long. That was called Madak Tru. So the visualization you've done so far is called Cleaning Your Impurities.

And we did it for each one of the six perfections. The next part is called Mishe Sel. And Mishe Sel...

Mishe means things you don't know or don't understand yet. Sel means to make them clear or remove what you don't understand or light, make it light. And for each of the six perfections, you go through the same step again.

You have to start over. You have to do a Madak Tru for each perfection. So you do the...

Let's take the perfection of giving. You do the Marnde, which means the nectar comes down and pushes out negativities. And you think about two or three specific failures of the perfection of giving that you're doing or that you've done.

And then by the time they reach the bottom of your body, they become black like spiders or scorpions or something ugly. And then they go out of your rear end. The ground opens up.

Lord of Death is there. It goes into his mouth. And then he's satisfied with that.

He doesn't want you anymore. And then he lays down and then the ground covers up. And a double Dorje appears there and seals it.

Then the nectar keeps coming and flows up. And the last impurities or last weaknesses of the perfection of giving are floating on top of it as it comes up. And then it comes up out of your head and comes out.

And then you're clean. You imagine that you're clean. And then you rejoice in some of the successes you've had about the perfection of giving.

And you think it's very important to do the second part and to imagine in the last day or week or year of the good things you've done, the things you've given to other people. And you can rotate through the different kinds of giving. Giving things.

Giving love. Giving protection. And giving Dharma.

And then you, instead of going on to the next perfection, now you do Mishesel. Mishesel means more nectar starts coming down. And it fills your body.

This time it's a golden color. So the first time it was five colors. And this time it's a golden color.

And it starts seeping through your body. And the text says that try to imagine every single drop of the nectar, a separate drop, try to visualize them as a little globe of gold. And inside the globe is a wisdom light like a butter lamp, if you know that Asian classics butter lamp.

That's what that is. It's from the Manjushri Samgita Nama which is the first tantric scripture in the whole Kangyur. Chanting the names of Manjushri.

And it says your wisdom should be a light for the world. Something like that. So you visualize a globe and each drop is a globe and inside each drop is a lamp, a golden lamp, and it's burning with a gold flame.

And you imagine that Je Tsongkhapa is giving you more knowledge of how to practice giving and more strength and more power to practice giving, the perfection of giving. And specifically that you understand giving more. So at that point you go through while the light is filling your body you try to review what you know about giving, how you understand giving, what giving means, what are the different kinds of giving.

For example, what would it be like to give without the perfection of wisdom and what would it be like to give with the perfection of wisdom, that difference. So while it's circulating through your body, these little lamps, and you think your whole body is filling with light. And then you're gaining more knowledge from Je Tsongkhapa.

We call it TUSAM GOMESHERA PADUSU for those of you who know the extra verses. TUSAM GOMESHERA PADUSU means let me study more about perfection of giving, let me think more about the perfection of giving, and let me meditate or internalize more about the perfection of giving. So you imagine that while you imagine that Je Tsongkhapa is teaching you more.

So you review what you know about giving and then you... It's very important during this meditation that you are in the mode of asking for help. The whole point of this meditation we've been doing is asking for Je Tsongkhapa's blessing and help.

So it's very important to actually visualize a person and actually ask them for help. And they keep helping you and this nectar is coming down and your knowledge of how to give gets stronger and more and more bright, more and more light. And you ask them to help you understand more about giving and you ask them for the strength to give the things that you're not ready to give yet and to know the right ways to do it.

So we'll be doing this cycle through the six perfections like that. This is called the Miche Cel. And we'll do that for the next two days.

Today and tomorrow. Then the third step which is Ngo Drup. We'll go on to that on...

We'll finish on Saturday. That's all.

[Speaker 2]
RINPOCHE SINGS IN TIBETAN RINPOCHE SINGS IN TIBETAN