Dakini's Whisper Monthly Journal December 2020 Crucial Advice for Times of Turmoil Taking Joy and Sorrow as the Path |
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“Once you master your own mind, neither friend nor foe can benefit or harm you. But if you don’t tame your mind, then attachment and anger well up constantly. You must understand that your mind is the root of all joy and sorrow, good and evil, attachment and anger.” - Khenpo Gangshar |
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INTRODUCTION Facing Turmoil with Mahamudra Pith Instructions was the theme of Dakini’s Whisper’s recent Online Fall Retreat. Teachings and practices from Khenpo Gangshar, Naturally Liberating Whatever You Meet - Instructions to Guide You on the Profound Path were offered by Khandro-la. This “jewel of illuminating instructions of an awakened sage shines like a diamond on the peak of jewel mountains” as teachings for facing the challenges in our world at this time. As the story goes, in the mid-1950s, Khenpo Gangshar anticipated a time of great change and turmoil for his beloved Tibet. He wanted to prepare his fellow Tibetans for the coming Chinese occupation by giving them vital instructions that would help them to meet these difficulties. To meet change and face challenges, Khenpo Gangshar realized it was essential to understand one’s mind. These precious teachings, Naturally Liberating Whatever You Meet, provide profound yet simple instructions for understanding the mind, its thoughts and emotions, and uncovering the innate wisdom that resides in our deepest dimension. The teachings are quite relevant to our times as well. We are facing a historic pandemic, climate disasters, heightened divisions and polarities around race, religion, economic and social justice, and heart-breaking humanitarian crises around the world. Khenpo Gangshar tells us there is something we can do. We can meet whatever arises. We can bring it onto the path with each breath, in each moment. Taking joy and sorrow, sickness, and disturbing emotions as the path shines a light into our heart/mind, revealing who we truly are. Recognizing and settling into this space of clarity and knowing increases our confidence and our capacity to not be shaken by life’s tumultuous alterations, and to remain open, receptive, fearless, and fiercely compassionate in all activities. So, just as great Tibetan masters practiced when facing the horrors of the Chinese invasion which caused imprisonment, death, and grueling escapes to India, we can use these special teachings to face our own collective and individual disasters. As Dharma practitioners, we are keenly aware that times of disruption and uncertainty are fertile ground for heart-opening practices on behalf of all beings. With this as our motivation, Dakini’s Whisper explores these life-changing teachings in this December Monthly Journal. Students and friends of Dakini’s Whisper will soon be invited to deepen our understanding and bring these teachings directly into our lives by participating in the Mahamudra Journey in January 2021 - a one-year Journey into the Art of Looking, Resting, and Living Presence. Ellen DW Team and Student |
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KHANDRO-LA'S CORNER Rest Awareness like a cloudless sky without even a speck of hope or fear Resting Meditation of a Kusulu “We set the motivation based on this revulsion, cultivate, or come to terms with this samsara, samsaric administration. Then we choose freedom, the path to freedom. Revulsion is the foot of meditation and devotion is the head of meditation. Just have a sense of faith, devotion, confidence, confidence in your true nature, ability to realize, recognize ordinary mind, that is who you are already. Machik’s instructions are, “Let the four limbs relax. Let everything be. Don’t pursue the past, and don’t invite the future. Simply rest naturally in the naked, ordinary mind of the immediate present without trying to correct it or replace it.”If you rest like that, what happens? “If you rest like that, your mind-essence is clear and expansive, vivid and naked, without any concerns about thought or recollection, joy or pain. That is awareness,” Rigpa, rest in that. Look at the mind, nature of the mind directly. It is right there. We are really seeing it. There is no doubt whether or not this is it. We are not thinking about it with logic or seeing it from far away. It is right here. This is where we rest in this nature of mind, rest directly in emptiness, clear, luminous, nature of mind. Indescribable, inexpressible, beyond mental fabrication, the nature of mind, like the sky, self-awareness. That is who you are. Rest in that. Get used to it, accustomed to it. Be one with it. Then everything, whatever you do, everything arises from there, unfolds from there. Then no failing, that’s the most effective way to help all sentient beings of suffering.” - Excerpt from Khandro-la’s teaching during the Annual Fall Retreat |
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"When the bonds of negative thoughts are released, you will be free, there is no doubt. When mind is looking at mind, all discursive thoughts cease and enlightenment is attained. In the Dharma tradition of this old lady there is nothing to do other than this.." - Excerpt rom Machik’s Last Instructions |
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STUDENT'S REFLECTION on the Dakini’s Whisper November retreat and Khenpo Gangshar Wangpo’s powerful wisdom Reading just the title of Gangshar Wangpo’s nature of mind instructions -- Naturally Liberating Whatever You Meet – pierces through my conceptual mind and pulls me into direct knowingness, the space of timeless awareness in time. I feel myself entering into Gangshar Wangpo’s words and mindstream and suddenly feel the sharp directness of his clarity touching me. It’s a powerful and forceful transmission, and the urgency of Gangshar Wangpo’s words in his historical moment jump up and out through the pages of the text and into me. A few years after these Nature of Mind instructions were written in 1957, the Chinese would invade Tibet, raid and destroy hundreds of monasteries, and many, many Tibetan Buddhist monks and lamas would be exiled and on the run. Gangshar Wangpo offered these teachings to many of them – perhaps his greatest and most concise terton gift of all. And many of the monks and lamas who escaped and survived would later share their gratitude. Whether they were imprisoned or re-located, many would express how these teachings had a profound effect on their practice and had supported them through great difficulty. I, too, am deeply grateful to Khandro-la for her wisdom in choosing Gangshar Wangpo’s text for the urgency of our present moment. Here we stand in the midst of a global pandemic of epic and profound suffering, and we, too, are in need of skillful instructions to guide us: to truly meet the moment as awakened compassionate beings, to be the benevolent presence we wish to be in the world – heart-to-heart, inside-to-inside – awakening within us the vast Bodhicitta for all beings. So how do I begin to work skillfully with my own mind at this time? How to navigate the intensity and steady stream of energies both internally and externally, many of which are manifesting in the form of thoughts and emotions so potent in this moment? I’ve been with the instructions on Kusulu or resting meditation, most deeply since the retreat, and feel this is what I’m carrying with me. Gangshar Wangpo’s teachings on “resolving” and “distinguishing” emphasize the “mind essence that is the nature of all sentient beings…” “All these renowned expressions point a finger at the mind essence itself and nothing else…”(p. 226), no matter the path. For me, again and again, I practice trusting and returning to a simple “distinguishing” question: Am I in my mind or am I in awareness? In mind alone or discursive thinking, I’m lost. In awareness, I feel confidence and trust like an invincible and indestructible Vajra. I am learning (on a good day!) not to turn away from appearances out of fear, but to recognize and approach – to begin to naturally liberate whatever I meet, to open and rest in spacious awareness and recognize all as appearances and manifestations. Following Gangshar Wangpo’s dedication at the end of his profound instructions: “May we be among the infinite number of beings who are victorious in the battle with the demigods of platitude, May we be among those who shine with the majestic brilliance of the essence of profound meaning, And may there be a celebration of a new golden age.” Deep, deep gratitude to Gangshar Wangpo, Khandro-la, and to all the dakinis and protectors! EMAHO! Kate DW Student |
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Ancient Sage, Ancient Wisdom Khenpo Gangshar |
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This is a picture of Khenpo Gangshar with Trungpa. They are young and holding their hands up in the air. According to this post, very interesting and meaningful, I think. Some thought they were expressing some sort of spiritual mudra but this photo was a sort of public service announcement. They were showing their fellow Tibetans what to do when the Chinese Liberation Army approached their village. In other words, hold your hands up to surrender! By the fall of 1957, in the face of the impending Chinese invasion, Khenpo Gangshar instituted a new radical approach to teaching. He opened up the full range of meditation instruction to monks and laypeople alike (including women), and asked the hermits with lifelong vows of seclusion to come down from their retreats and help teach. He wanted to prepare his fellow Tibetans for the coming Chinese occupation by giving them special teaching, ”Naturally Liberating Whatever You Meet”. Many fellow prisoners received his teachings while in prison, and later gave accounts of how he helped them survive the tortures and privation. Khenchen Thrangu Rinpoche credits this particular instruction with saving his life during the exodus from Tibet. From a FB post (Tonpa Jon) |
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To share upcoming online teaching and practice opportunities, we have attached the Dakini's Whisper Google calendar which gives you a complete view of the various events, at-a-glance, so to speak. Please note, however, that all times listed here are PST. More detailed information can be found on the webpage or DW members can check their personal version of the DW Google calendar. You can access the DW calendar from the webpage. |
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