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Talk on Meditation

given by Kyabje Gehlek Rimpoche

August 12, 2004

Jewel Heart New York

Welcome here tonight. We’ve been talking about concentrated meditation as a structure, and in terms of obstacles and how to overcome them, the stages, the powers which establish each stage, and the awareness and mindfulness obtained at each stage. Everything has been covered in great detail, and has been completed, actually. At the same time, on Tuesday nights, I’m [presenting] the [eighth] chapter on meditation from the Bodhisattvacaryavatara. As you have noticed, it does not give you any structure of meditation at all. It does give you the subject [on which to meditate] very strongly, of compassion, love and bodhimind. You will find it particularly in last Tuesday’s talk, and that of the Tuesday before last. This past Tuesday is about exchange. With the combination of these two, the Tuesday and Thursday talks, we have one of the best complete [sets of] meditation instructions.

I am quite behind on the subject of meditation in the Bodhisattvacaryavatara. I think I just finished verse 113 or 114. [There is a total of] 190 or 200 verses. On the other hand, on Thursdays in New York, I’m [reaching] the end of the [road] way ahead of schedule. I am OK here, but not OK [in Ann Arbor]. [The eighth chapter presents] much more material to think about than how to think [about it].

The material to think about is endless, actually.

What I’d like to do today is to (almost) conclude the discussion on the structure of meditation. We have already reached the ninth stage. I know you don’t have that transcript yet, because this ‘elephant chart’ is somehow not working with our computer. Every individual has his/her own thought, and is doing something different. As a result, nothing has come of it yet. Some people have even said ‘it has to be a booklet’ because it’s too much, blah blah blah. Booklet or no booklet, those transcripts have to become available. Hopefully, it will happen soon.

Also, the people who do the transcripts here, they do very well, but over there in Ann Arbor, they’re doing a Cittamani retreat. Everybody is sitting on the second floor, not on the third floor. Normally we do retreats on the third floor, which is somehow not right. A lot of our responsible members have raised concern, so we came down to the second floor. There are twenty or thirty people sitting four times a day. Some of them sit at least once a day. So they are stuck in [occupied with] that.

Hopefully that [work with the transcripts] will be done soon. That doesn’t mean we should hold back the other transcripts. They are there [on the web], right? We are holding back the one about the nine stages because of that ‘elephant chart’. The elephant is too big to fit in the computer, that’s what the problem is.

I’d like to bring up two questions now. Tsong Kha Pa, in his Lam Rim Chen Mo, raises three questions, but I’d like to ask two. The first is, where do we consider we have established zhi ne or shamatha? The second is, how do we move from there?

The first question is, has one reached zhi ne with the development of shin jong, the perfection of body and mind concentrated training, or without it? [In other words, does one reach zhi ne only after achieving the perfection of body and mind, or shin jong; or can we say one has arrived at the level of zhi ne prior to that development?]

We have already explained that at the ninth stage, there is not the slightest problem with either laxity or excitation. Therefore you can continuously and effortlessly focus and meditate for a long time. Is that meditative level considered zhi ne or not?

That question was actually [addressed] by Maitreya Buddha, to Buddha himself. The way he put it was, ‘When the Bodhisattva is focusing internally, having developed perfect focus, but not yet the perfection of the physical and mental states, what kind of meditative state is that?’ Buddha replied, "Maitreya, that is not zhi ne. It is semi-zhi ne. It looks like zhi ne, but it is not yet zhi ne.’

I don’t know whether you use this language in America or not, but in India they use the phrase, ‘quasi-permanent’. When you have a professorship, you don’t get tenure, but you are on the tenure track. They call that ‘quasi-permanent’.

We can call this meditation level ‘quasi-zhi ne’. It’s not zhi ne yet. That was Buddha’s reply to Maitreya Buddha. After that, Maitreya wrote (Rimpoche recites Tibetan). In short, as Maitreya reinterpreted, once you have perfected meditating and focusing effortlessly, continuously, then you develop this perfection of body and mind. At that point, you have obtained zhi ne. Without it, you have not.

When you are learning, and have understood only theoretically the principle of how it functions, you can’t achieve that level. You have to get used to it. It is like my English reading. Somehow I recognize the letters, but I am not used to putting them together [into words and sentences], so I don’t get it perfectly. It’s also like riding a bicycle. You learn a little bit, get used to it [reach that level of perfection], and then you can effortlessly ride the bicycle.

Buddha is saying it, Maitreya Buddha is saying it, and Kamalashila is continually saying it too. (Rimpoche recites Tibetan). Kamalashila is the clearest on this point.

When you have physical and mental perfection, which means you can use your body and mind as you like, you have obtained zhi ne.

What does that mean? There is a perfection of meditation level, but that is not zhi ne. ‘Is that beyond samsara or within samsara’? these earlier teachers asked. When you are looking for the perfection of meditation level, these are the questions. Is my activity part of the desire realm, or am I beyond that, if I have not yet developed the perfection of body and mind? The teachers tell us, we are still in the desire realm. This is perfect meditation, and your mind is totally focused, but we have not gone completely beyond regrets, nor have we obtained joy. We are still within the desire realm.

Even though this meditation is so powerful, so focused and so complete that throughout every physical moment, our every activity, such as walking, sitting and sleeping are done almost at a meditative level; even then we are still in the desire realm. Why? Because we don’t have that physical and mental perfection yet. So what is this development called shin jong? Which of the two comes first? Now, Asanga is the one we go to for the answer.

If you keep on focusing (having reached the ninth level), not very long after that you will develop this perfection [of body and mind]. The pre-signal is the individual meditator will feel some kind of heaviness within his/her brain. Immediately, he says this heaviness is not unpleasant. Nor does it hurt him/her at all.

Then the meditator feels a warmness, along with a kind of moisture feeling. Pabongka gives the example of the Chinese hot towel. You shave your head completely, and have one very hot, wet towel put on your head. Perhaps until Pabongka’s time, they hadn’t seen this Chinese hot towel treatment. Pabongka had a lot of warlords from the Szechuan province as disciples and they might have given him this hot towel. Since he kept his head shaved all the time, so probably they put a hot, wet towel on his head, and he recognized that feeling and said, ‘Aaahh, the experience of the warmth and moisture feels like that’. Then, of course, you feel good too.

That is not the joy itself. It is a signal that the joy is going to come. The moment that pre-signal comes, your personal attitude will change. Laziness, tiredness, all desire and hatred; somehow, you are not willing to entertain them at all. You’ll be happy to be without them. Your mind is leaning towards being free of those disturbing emotions and physical feelings such as laziness, tiredness and heaviness. It is as though you have switched them off, and your whole attitude has completely changed.

As a result of that, you develop so much joy and happiness, not only for meditation, but just for living, just for being, just being there, being alive. You feel a lot of happiness and joy with no reason. The reasons are there [no doubt]; for example, all of the efforts you made and all the mind stages you [had to achieve]. It appears, however, that without any reason, tremendous joy and happiness have suddenly developed.

Then, because of that, this mental happiness, which means mental perfection, enables you to use your mind wherever and for whatever you want. Of course, by the nature of how perfection works, you will completely withdraw from the negative side, push, and put all your focus completely on the perfect side. So, that is called mental perfection.

If having developed that you misuse it, if you use it for any wrong thing you want to do, it may work for a while, by the nature of its activity. After a while, however, [the mental perfection] will stop. Through working perfectly toward the positive side, [this perfection] won’t stop thereafter. It will continue. It will [transform] the energy within your body. The perfect type of energy will be developed, and it will travel throughout your physical body, from head to toe. Your physical body will react [function] completely differently. It will be light, perfectly light.

You will be able to use the body any way, whatever way you want. That’s what happens. Tsong Kha Pa tries to prove this, and quotes Asanga. (Rimpoche recites Tibetan.)

Because of the energy produced at that perfect mind level, you will feel your body is full; full of air and completely light. You will gain complete control over every part of your physical body. This is what perfection of the body is all about.

Now, Tsong Kha Pa asks, ‘what is this? Is it a mental faculty? Is it [a property of] the body? What is it?’ Tsong Kha Pa says it is a feeling within the body. It is not a mental faculty. In other words, you will perfectly [fully] feel that way.

There is a funny story I can tell you, and I really saw it. It is about one of my students, a fully ordained monk, who had been studying with me for a long time. He worked for Drepung Loseling [Monastery]. He’s a German-oriented guy, right? Everything has to be done right. He had that sort of push [pushiness]. He went into Loseling, and continually did things his way. He did organize Loseling quite a different way. He set up the library, he set up a printing press, and did many things, but always the way he wanted.

A lot of the senior monks didn’t like him very much. They realized he was helping a lot, but this Gelong-la would argue [with everyone] every time. A number of junior monks got together and beat him up one day (Rimpoche cracks up), not so badly – well, actually quite badly. Still he wouldn’t stop! Then they couldn’t help it, one day the abbot had to make an announcement and request that he leave. Even then, he wouldn’t go (Rimpoche laughs more).

Finally, he went to Kyabje Ling Rimpoche, who was of course the seniormost lama in Loseling to ask him to intervene. I happened to be there, and Kyabje Rimpoche told me, ‘You take him with you.’ (Rimpoche cracks up more.) That’s how Gelong-la came with me. Our Gelong-la. Kyabje Song Rimpoche, another very, very senior monk, made many visits to the west in the ’70s. On one of his very last visits, he was with us. Song Rimpoche had a beard and always traveled in a wheelchair. Gelong-la, who spoke half-broken Tibetan, kept bugging Song Rimpoche all the time, ‘You have to do exercise.’ Song Rimpoche would never move.

We kept on hearing that Gelong-la was bugging him. Song Rimpoche called me and told me, ‘Take this guy away from me.’ But one more time he let him come and see him. He said, ‘Let me talk to him.’ Song Rimpoche was sitting on one of those folding beds. Normally, when Song Rimpoche got up, he had to be pulled forward by two people, with someone pushing from behind. Song Rimpoche said to Gelong-la, ‘What is it with this exercise? What are you talking about?’ So Gelong-la started doing exercises (Gehlek Rimpoche demonstrates, waving both arms.) Song Rimpoche said, excitedly, ‘Is it like that?’ He jumped out of bed just like that; boom, up and started making the same movements. Gelong-la got a little surprised and said, ‘What is this? You really don’t need a wheelchair.’ Song Rimpoche said, ‘Get out.’

Probably, when you have the lu shin jong, the perfect body, the body must be of a light nature. Probably, if you really want to jump, you can jump; maybe, just maybe. If you look into the Chinese tradition, you’ll find they have these physical phenomena a lot, in their martial arts. For instance, there are the great masters of the Shaoling tradition. While some of the new ones are learning and jumping round everywhere, these old people don’t even move. Sometimes, during the chanting, like ‘Form is emptiness, emptiness is form,’ there is all this gossiping going on. Sometimes when this is happening, some of the older monks just open their eyes alone and the younger ones fall over. Probably this is a result of the perfection of body and mind.

Even then, if you really look into it at the zhi ne level, with this perfection, you may obtain zhi ne. That zhi ne, however……I should read it here. I shouldn’t talk.

It says,

Until you use your body and mind perfectly toward the positive meditative level, as much as you want, in the way you want, you have not obtained this perfection of shin jong. The body and mind shin jong free you of wrong functioning of mind and wrong functioning of body.

This is an old text. Wrong functioning means negative functioning. This perfection takes you away completely from functioning negatively. (Rimpoche recites Tibetan).

Whenever you try to get rid of negativities, you feel tired or heavy. You have to push yourself, and even then are unable to do [what you are trying to do] properly. Body perfection will take you completely away from that and give you the opposite; lightness, and the ability to use your body as much as you want and as long as you want. Likewise, with the mind, while you are trying to get away from the negativities, [at first you encounter] a lot of obstacles, you find a zillion different reasons why you shouldn’t [try to get rid of negativities] and you just stop. Then the mind will automatically take you toward perfection. This is called ‘useful mind, useful body.’

There are a lot of quotations on this that I’m going to jump to now.

From the very beginning of our meditation, from stage one onward, in tiny, tiny subtle [increments] we begin to obtain [this perfection]. However, we will never notice. We will never know. By these [increments] this perfection will [increase more and more] until we reach [real] perfection. With that joy, with that lightness in body, that perfection is now called zhi ne.

That is where zhi ne is first obtained. The Buddha says so in the sutra itself. Buddha’s nice word(s) here are

If your mind is happy, your body will be perfect.

That’s it. If your mind is happy, your body will become perfect. What does that mean? ‘Mind happy’ means mental perfection develops, and that will bring the development of physical perfection.

By this time, both mind and body have a tremendous feeling of joy and lightness; however, that feeling will gradually [diminish]. When it seems to be [diminishing], it is not actually going down. [It has a great impact] when it first comes. As it remains with you, you will notice it less. It’s not that the joy is going down [diminishing], nor that the perfection of the body is [diminishing]. You will just notice it less. (Rimpoche recites Tibetan.) The mind has somehow adapted to it. This is called ‘unshakeable samadhi’.

Such joy in the mind and the body will be continuously focused. Then you will be freed from all that is wrongful, and it becomes perfect zhi ne.

[That is yet another] quote from Asanga.

When you have that perfection, that is really called zhi ne, what is zhi ne exactly and where do you get zhi ne? Actually, zhi ne is the first stage of meditation. It is very interesting. By meditating on zhi ne, body-mind perfection will [naturally occur]. You can focus completely and reduce all negativities. You can properly concentrate. Desire, sleep, etc. will gradually decrease. When you ‘wake up’ from the meditative level, you will feel completely rested and relaxed in your body, and happiness in your mind.

These are the signs of the development of the shin jongs. In other words, once you develop body and mind shin jongs, you can probably substitute meditation for sleep.

The more meditation you do, the more the perfections will grow. The more the perfections grow, the more zhi ne you will develop. It’s as though the mental and physical perfections and the perfect meditation are competing with each other.

Tsong Kha Pa confirms this.

What happens is that when the mind is perfect, it produces perfect energy. That energy brings perfection of the body, which brings another perfect meditative level, which produces perfect energy. [In this natural cycle] they will produce each other constantly and continuously within the individual.

That is shamatha or zhi ne, which we’ve been talking so much about. There is still a lot to talk about here.

Sometimes, our habits and our addictions will cause our mind to lose [its positive focus] and we will entertain negative thoughts and negative emotions. The moment that begins to happen, the strong habit we’ve developed (through the nine stages) of reminding ourselves and looking at all these negative emotions as a fault and a source of trouble; that habit will draw our attention [back] again [to the positive]. Occasionally [these problems] will pop up, but your mind will be able to correct itself.

The state of the mind appears to be: nothing remembering, nothing concentrating. The focusing mind and the mind on which you are focusing are almost in a state of oneness, of open space.

Ultimately, when you are focusing on anything; forms, sound, smell, touch, etc. there will be such a clarity; such extreme clarity. Yet there will be no mental provocation. The mind will play no tricks whatsoever. Any thoughts that pop up here and there will be like a bubble in the water. It will pop up and disappear by itself. Within that [total but effortless] focus you will experience openness and spaciousness, yet with clarity and knowledge. [One still experiences] joy. At that moment, you will feel nothing about yourself, even your own physical body. Your mind is space-like, as though you are part of space. When you ‘wake up’ from that meditative level, you will feel as though your physical body has suddenly developed. It is all there.

After that, hatred, etc. may occasionally develop [arise] but that will not be able to continue.

That is called perfect peace. It is almost like space, but it is not without clarity. It is still absolutely clear. If you look at a house, you can clearly see every particle of the walls, pillars, etc. You’ll be able to see each and every small atom. You can still focus very strongly. Sometimes you do not need to sleep. Meditation and sleep (almost) merge into oneness. You do have dreams, but they are pure visions.

That is really what zhi ne is all about. Why am I reading? Because I don’t have it. Someone who has it will tell you [about it].

Now the question arises: if you have such a meditative level, where is it, in relation to the five paths? Is it the path of accumulation, the path of action, the path of seeing, the path of meditation or the path of no more learning? Tsong Kha Pa replies,

If you have understanding of emptiness, it is considered the path of liberation for ordinary persons,

which means, the second path. It may be either the first or second path.

If there is no influence of emptiness, then it is just meditation. It is the samsaric meditative level.

This is nothing to be surprised about. It is a samsaric, not a non-samsaric level. It is however, free of attraction, free of attachment, free of hatred, so it is possible that you may be able to reach a higher level.

This is a common state that everybody, Buddhist and non-Buddhist can have. It is very, very common. It is the beginning.

If you have understanding of emptiness, or if you are seeking liberation from samsara, or if you have a desire to free yourself at the beginning level, then of course, it is the path to liberate yourself. If this is influenced by bodhimind, love and compassion, then of course this is part of Mahayana. It will give you total enlightenment. For example, if a Bodhisattva with a bodhi mind gives just a single piece of food to an animal, it will be considered perfect generosity. Just like that.

We are not talking about whether it will be a cause of enlightenment, we are talking about which level this state of concentrated meditation [occupies]. It is, just as I stated earlier, very common; it is a beginning. It is a fundamental basis of liberation. No matter what path you may be following, Buddhist or otherwise, [this basis] is required.

In the Hindu tradition, the higher, upper stages are considered to be at the subtle level, and the lower stages are at the gross level. You move from the gross level to the subtle level, as far as you can. There are four stages with form, four that are formless, making eight stages. Starting from the first form, second form, third form and fourth form stage, you may reach the formless space-like (Rimpoche recites Tibetan), mind-like, (chilnay??} nothingness and then the ultimate peak. These are the eight stages. You move from the gross to the subtle levels. Hindus and Buddhists differ [on this matter].

Based on the Buddha’s experience, Buddha recommends against looking for gross and subtle differences. According to Buddha’s teaching, it is important to gain the power to use your mind and body as much as you want to, when you have zhi ne. Do not go toward the subtle path. Move to wisdom.

That is how Buddha works. (Rimpoche recites Tibetan.) There was a Hindu pundit; an anti-Buddhist, great Maha Pundit (Lovobo?) I think Bo means ‘hero’. He was really a hero as an anti-Buddhist, great, great master. He debated, I think, at Nalanda with masters. Nalanda was considered one of the biggest Buddhist learning centers during that period. In India, at that time, debates were not like the debates here [nowadays]. At those debates, the king and all the people came together. Whoever lost the debate had to follow [the tradition of his opponent]. You had to give up your tradition completely. That is how the debates in the old, ancient Indian and Tibetan tradition were done.

This Lovobo(?) was a great one. In his debate, Nalanda almost lost completely. Finally something happened. (I don’t want to go into that long story.) He was defeated. So he flew in the air. Another great pundit flew [after him] and brought him down. They sort of arrested him and threw him into prison. There was no actual prison, so they put him in the old library where there were a lot of books that were not sorted out.

Books that talk about spiritual path are considered Dharma, so they are respected. They didn’t want to throw them in the street, so they made a little mudhouse and threw them in there. They couldn’t put him anywhere else, so they locked him in there. He was sitting there with these loose books, so he was reading through and reading through them. Finally he took a book out from under his butt, and he started reading.

He found that in this book, the Buddha was prophesying about (Lovobo) himself. This was four or five hundred years after Buddha. He prophesied that there will be such and such a person who is a great learned blah blah blah, who will join my order, and follow this and that. He was very surprised, and began to think, ‘Why did I lose? Where did I go wrong?’ He then reversed [went back over and reviewed] everything. Finally he realized, ‘This is where I went wrong’. He wrote a very famous praise to Buddha. In that praise, he said (Rimpoche recites Tibetan),

In the path that I followed, we had gone so subtle, subtle, subtle and we reached the ultimate peak level. Since, however, we could never get rid of negative emotions completely, we had a fallback. We went up to the peak, to the subtlest pinnacle; however, the power of this meditative level would reduce. Negative emotions and sufferings would somehow grow again.

Through your path, what you are showing, is even though you don’t reach even the first [subtle] level, you use Wisdom. You have thus removed the eyeballs of suffering completely [making us] free, and I praise you.

There is a huge balance there, but these two verses will really tell you the difference here [between the two systems].

We have been trying to develop this shamatha, zhi ne level. We have talked in very fine detail. This is not just part of Lam Rim. This [applies] to every [level of practice]. Even the perfect completion stage of great Maha anu yoga tantras needs this.

All Vajrayana practitioners have had at least a little bit of pre-Lam Rim training. If you haven’t developed shamatha before going into the perfect completion stage, however, then at the development stage you have to develop this zhi-ne. Although [the instructions] may not be as detailed [as what we’ve heard here], each sadhana provides the so-called purities. They are not contained in the short sadhana, but all the long sadhanas have them.

For example, in the Yamantaka sadhana it says that the nine faces are the nine doors of teaching. The two horns are the two truths. Thirty-four hands, plus body, mind and speech make the thirty-seven wings of the Buddha. When you[are trying to] reach that level, you have to develop shamatha. If you have developed it earlier, you don’t have a job to do. If you haven’t, however, you have to develop it there.

This is the meditation that is common to Hindu, Buddhist and all traditions. It is [shared by] Mahayana, Theravadin, Vajrayana. That is shamatha.

As you heard earlier, if you [are motivated by] a mind seeking liberation, desiring freedom, every meditation will be anti-Samsara. Every meditation influenced by bodhimind will be on the Mahayana path, the path that delivers Buddhahood. If you [are lacking those], it will be just meditation. These are the differences you will find [or, that’s how the motivation makes a difference]. If you are a Vajrayana practitioner, you will not [have completed] the development stage, but this will give you a tremendous boost in your development stage. That is shamatha. So, next will be wisdom.