Comments on “Nothing special”

I’m not precisely sure if you are including the practice of yidams in this context, but, if you are, I would add to this that I have been taught that what you are describing as spacious passion is the result of accomplishing the yidam, of discerning that you and your yidam are not two separate things and that when seeing yourself as inseparable from the yidam you experience your ordinary emotions as the “five enlightened wisdoms”. Just as you have been one with the yidam long before you realized it, your emotions have always been these five wisdoms, you have merely been unaware of it because of your confusion.

Before you realize this, however, the yidam serves the profound purpose of undermining our habitual grasping and fixation on exterior objects as independent of our perception of them and of being “real” without that perception being involved. While we could argue about the metaphysics of this, they are beside the point. What is really important is that, for most of us, Tantra requires hard work. For a few fortunate individuals their confusion is so translucent that clearing it away requires far less work than the ordinary individual, but work there still is.

I have always interpreted Trungpa’s initial teachings as necessary and intended to dispell Western illusions that you could get Tantra as something for nothing, without work, through means of LSD or other psychotropics. I certainly found this to be the case while I was living through it. It was also the case that Shambala (then Vajradhatu) treated “Tantra” as a big deal and a big mystery for the fortunate few who obtained sufficient “work credentials” in sitting meditation and in many involved “levels” of hearing teachings and doing practice before you were actually given any “tantric” teachings at all. In fact, it always seemed far too credential oriented to suit me as a style of practice.

What was taught in Vajradhatu as Tantra to the fortunate few was the very traditional practice of Vajrayogini as passed down through the Trungpa lineage, with the very traditional beginning of the Four ordinary foundations and the four extraordinary foundation (large numbers of prostrations and so on) in the form described in Jamgon Komgtrul’s Torch Of Certainty. This all may have been a reinvention of Tantra, but, frankly, at the time, it seemed no different at the level of yidam practice to the traditional teaching of my Karma Kagyu teachers, merely a different approach to the Karma Kagyu initial training with a “safe” yidam practice such as Four Armed White Chenrezig, that introduced the terminology of traditional Tantra from the very beginning, even if the lamas’ explanations of it were very abbreviated and sketchy.

I would stress that this was exactly parallel in time to the Vajradhatu approach, and not in the least a “return” to anything on the part of my teachers. And if they did anything to suppress the Vajradhatu approach, I never saw it. Trungpa’s students, whether beginners, four foundations practitioners, or tantrikas were always treated with the greatest courtesy at my monastery.

As to the “hype” of “yogic applications” or “siddhi” I can’t claim any experience with these one way or another with one exception. There have been several instances over the past 35 years where lamas have displayed what appeared to be true clairvoyance or “suprasensible cognition”. Try as I might, I have never been able to come up with any explanation better than the traditional one, that these things are side effects of truly accomplishing a yidam.

David, I really love your writings, but I have to disagree with you here. You begin:

“The tantric scriptures are filled with extraordinary, ludicrous advertising claims. This plays poorly with intelligent Westerners, who disbelieve—and are repelled by—excessive self-promotion. I suggest that the traditional advertising claims of tantra are unrealistic and should be dropped.”

Should be “dropped”? From what tradition? For ALL traditions? For ALL practitioners?

I would say that if you don’t yet understand that the “ludicrous advertising claims” are METAPHORS and not to be taken ‘literally’, then what are you doing practicing tantra?! If you haven’t yet learned that ALL language is metaphor, in the sense of pointing at something beyond itself, then really, what kind of Buddhist are you? (Not YOU, which I think is a pretty great one generally speaking…)

Personally I LOVE the colorful, outrageous claims (from a conventional perspective) of flying lamas, walking through walls, reading minds and all the rest. I have found that they’re an ocean of creative, skillfully crafted symbolism that works well with my mind. Yeah, I remember in the early days being a tad confused by all that, but I kept digging and practicing and that quickly dissipated.

So, maybe for some folks we need new traditions devoid of the fantastic language and specific practices dropped, but for many (many, many, many…) such an approach is beautiful, functional and speaks to the heart, taking us immediately beyond clinging to things are real. A danger of not including such an approach is that you take the dry, “down-to-Earth” language as real… because it’s “logical” and “rational” and not ludicrous, not crazy.

No thanks, man. I’ll stick with the crazy shit. ;-)

David, I didn’t even think of the irony of your “fictional” work! Ha, ha! ;-)

But really, can I make one more point? Aren’t you insulting the intelligence of Westerners a little bit assuming that they can’t grasp the difference between metaphor and “objective truth”… But on that, I would also say that it has occurred to me that there is absolutely no such thing as objective truth either! ALL there is are meanings and identities that we fabricate. That we fabricate in a way that is consistent and agreeable because we happen to share similar karmic conditions doesn’t therefore make our less colorful language anymore True than the more “out there” ideas that enjoy less of a consensus.

Also, in regards to siddhis, the common and supreme siddhis… some of them do “work as advertised”, even in a “literal sense”. Take clairvoyance (a bad translation), or “knowing the mind of others”. Well, if you really know your mind - TRULY know it - your sense of what is going on in other’s minds is heightened to an almost “supernatural” level. You could argue that this is merely seeing subtle behavioral and verbal cues and knowing what they indicate, but that doesn’t negate the fact that via such channels you “know” the mind of another being in a much deeper way than your average person.

Also, the ability to manifest as multiple beings simultaneously (given a reasonable time frame, not literally all at once)… I just got done with a 10 days retreat with my guru and had lunch at a table with him and three fellow students. To me, he was clearly manifesting as four different beings, speaking to each of us in a different style and focusing on different “issues”, switching gears effortlessly. My mind-boggled watching him. He was carrying on 4-5 different conversations as well, leaving one for a moment then returning a few minutes later right where it left off without missing a beat… I’m not sure what siddhi that would be considered but it was amazing.

Finally, as regards to siddhis, the beautiful (?) thing about them is they cannot be cultivated or even discovered as an end-in-themselves. You must fully realize emptiness, but not become attached to it, and fully realize clarity-luminosity (likewise, not becoming attached) for siddhis to manifest… no special or extra effort is required, I believe.

Love your work, David. Apparent contradictions and all. You’re intellectually honest and a very clear, precise writer. Your work will no doubt benefit countless beings. Thank you.

I think we have to make a clear distinction here between lineage histories and namthar and the actual tantras, sadhanas, and practice instruction themselves. The histories and biographies are filled with all sorts of miraculous events. Did these happen? I have no idea one way or the other, but I have observed that the students who cannot seriously accept the possibility that they might have happened, and who start from an a priori position that such things are impossible, really never develop the oomph to practice Tantra at all, even though the practical parts have relatively little to contend with in the way of miracles. Water seeks its own level and, in my sangha, they naturally gravitate to the cultivation of Bodhicitta through the practice of Lojong, and remain highly satisfied with this, which offers little disturbance to their a priori conclusions about “objective truth”.

The point of Tantra is self-transformation from the speedy, but difficult, dispersal of most of our major samsaric confusion that results from any fixed ideas about what is possible or not. Because of this, I’m skeptical of any transformed Tantra that does not undermine the “rational, scientific viewpoint” (which is actually a covert Postivist philosophy in disguise) in the same way that it undermines all other explicit philosophical stances, of both physics and metaphysics.

The skeptical undercover positivist simply is not skeptical enough to release the stranglehold of an already made up mind. This is why, at least in my view, that Nagarjuna is of such overwhelming importance. His dialectic teaches you how to be skeptical of your already made up mind, and exposes the covert and unexamined assumptions of the commonplace Positivist philosophy which exists behind an a priori judgment of what is or is not “impossible”.

I think to practice Tantra with any practical results, you have to regard the miracle stories as something more than mere metaphor, even if you don’t expect to fly or meet anyone else who can fly either. This is not the same thing as the much, stronger, more explicit and fixed expectation that you will never fly nor ever meet anyone else who can. This simple, and very clear, error in logic is what is behind overly self assured and fixated “scientific rationalism”. It is that error in logic that is the toughest obstacle to overcome (at least for us in the West) for the tantric transformation to take place at all.

Karmakshanti, I agree with you almost entirely. Yes, siddhis are more than “mere metaphor”… they manifest as real phenomena, as real as anything else we experience. I have encountered such beings, as I said… but of course, what is possible is a line we draw in our imaginations. There’s no such line in actuality… To believe there is… well, just another security blanket, I suppose.

As I am personally becoming more convinced every day that man doesn’t need religion anymore, buddhism included, as we have arts and science to satisfyingly compensate for the loss of it, I wanted to comment on the “siddhis”.

Modern science have made most practices to gain siddhis obsolete, as we can wear a down jacket instead of spending years in practising gTummo, we can buy airplane tickets to all over the world instead of practising levitation, we can use a particle collider to get a glimpse inside the particles that atoms are composed of instead ofmeditating on becoming smaller than small, we can use telescopes to understand the universe instead of meditating on becoming bigger than galaxies, use X-ray to see through thick walls instead of developing third eye etc. etc. ad nauseaum.

I guess we still can benefit from teachings on the nature of mind/Mind and learn the ultimate siddhi. But we can get pretty close, if not all the way, just by arts and science.

Sorry for babbling.

@ Mouchoir - Mundane Siddhis were not primarily used as a means of living without a global transport network, or micro/tele-scopes. The only Siddhi that really matters is the ultimate Siddhi of Realization. The others are interesting side effects of practice, that can inspire some people to practice Buddhism. You could argue that perhaps the Science Museum in London or (smaller scale) Techniquest in Cardiff are displays of interesting scientific effects, intended to inspire some people to practice Science. Sci-Siddhis.

If practicing Science or the Arts makes those practicing it Decent Human Beings, then those people probably don’t need Religion. I have had the pleasure of playing in a number of bands, ensembles and orchestras, and meeting more than my fair share of scientists and engineers. In my statistically insignificant personal experience and entirely limited lifespan I haven’t noticed a great trend in decency increasing amongst those groups of, but I could be wrong.

Another consideration here is the practical use of such powers to sustain a life of isolated meditation. Even though the basic instructions for the Heat Yoga are in the Indian texts, it is the Tibetans who elaborated them as a means of managing meditation in a cold climate. I strongly suspect that, as time goes on, we in the West will elaborate the formless meditations of Mahamudra or Dzogchen to manage the major problem of our own day–chronic overstimulation.

As far as “needing” religion is concerned, there are two places where “the rubber meets the road”. The first is the undeniable fact that all the ordinary pleasures and joys of our lives are transient and impermanent and none of us is exempt from some form of mental or physical pain which we would rather not experience. The second is our own inevitable death. If something besides religion actually gives us tools to deal with these things, then we probably don’t “need” religion; but dealing with them means more than merely pretending that they aren’t there.

I observe that most of the people who have no religion but have “something else” instead do no more than pretend that transience, pain, and death simply aren’t there. I have not been impressed by efficacy of the “something elses” when you can no longer keep pretending. Consider your diagnosis of liver cancer. You won’t know it until you are overtly sick, by then it will be terminal in about six to eight weeks, and the final days of it will be a nightmare of horrible physical pain which may or may not be pallitated by the common, medical, opium derivatives. This assumes, of course, that you will be allowed to take enough of them to make a difference–our lingering Puritanism causes doctors to habitually under medicate pain. If your “something else” of arts and sciences will allow to deal with this, that’s great, but I don’t think this is very likely.

I’m not exactly sure what the Aro folks mean by a Decent Human Being with the capitalized letters. If it is some kind of norm or default setting for our species that most of us either lose track of or was never programmed into us when it might have been, I’m not sure what reestablishing the default setting will do for us when our liver cancer diagnosis shows up, either. If it is something more than just the desirable norm for human life, what the capital letters refer to is pretty opaque to me.

Can anyone speak to this?

@ Karmakshanti - Decent Human Being is not an Aro gTér term - it’s a personal term from yours truly. If it is nonsensical or incomprehensible please don’t think that is due to the Aro gTér - that’s just due to my own whimsy and particular linguistic peculiarities.

So, to explain what I meant - anyone who can generally go through life without kvetching all the time, and making other people’s lives a misery, who sticks to their word, has a sense of honor and whose manner and mode of being normally has an uplifting effect on the people around them would qualify. A Tantrika would therefore qualify; someone who followed the Shambhala teachings would qualify - anyone who is endeavouring to practice, and live the view. It is entirely possible to be a Decent Human Being without religious practice, and even if one does practice there is no great need for Realization. Decency is linked to attitude (and thus to David’s piece here).

I was endeavouring (and perhaps failing) to make the point to our French friend that I do not regard it as inherrent within science,the arts or religion that if you dabble in their respective paths you will automatically become a Decent Human Being. If you are one, naturally, you probably don’t need anything else in your life (I know one who sells steel, plays video games, and writes comedy scripts for TV programmes and needs nothing more in his life beyond the occasional espresso). I’m not convinced that science can be said to have successfully ‘replaced’ religion as a great source of increase in general decency amongst people in the world. Knowing how to split an atom doesn’t make me a nicer person to be with. Indeed I think the upside of religion is that being a generally decent person is the goal (that is not the goal of science or the arts). If you know someone’s goal is to be a generally decent person, you’ve got some gauge against which to measure your experience of them as a person. If your goal is to be a really good clarinet player, you can still be a real shitbag, whilst being entirely successful in your goal of being a really good clarinet player. No one can complain about your playing just because you are objectionable and an entirely unpleasant person to be with.