Self-Immolation

“The Void is fundamentally without spacial dimensions, passions, activities, delusions or right understanding. You must clearly understand that in it there are no things, no men and no Buddhas; for this Void contains not the smallest hairsbreadth of anything that can be viewed spacially; it depends on nothing and is attached to nothing. It is all-pervading, spotless beauty; it is the self-existent and uncreated Absolute.” Huángbò Xīyùn

“Were you now to practise keeping your minds motionless at all times, whether walking, standing, sitting or lying; concentrating entirely upon the goal of no thought-creation, no duality, no reliance on others and no attachments; just allowing all things to take their course the whole day long, as though you were too ill to bother; unknown to the world; innocent of any urge to be known or unknown to others; with your minds like blocks of stone that mend no holes — then all the Dharmas would penetrate your understanding through and through. In a little while you would find yourselves firmly unattached. Thus, for the first time in your lives, you would discover your reactions to phenomena decreasing and, ultimately, you would pass beyond the Triple World; and people would say that a Buddha had appeared in the world. Pure and passionless knowledge implies putting an end to the ceaseless flow of thoughts and images, for in that way you stop creating the karma that leads to rebirth — whether as gods or men or as sufferers in hell. Once every sort of mental process has ceased, not a particle of karma is formed. Then, even in this life, your minds and bodies become those of a being completely liberated. Supposing that this does not result in freeing you immediately from further rebirths, at the very least you will be assured of rebirth in accordance with your own wishes. The sutra declares: 'Bodhisattvas are re-embodied into whatsoever forms they desire'. But were they suddenly to lose the power of keeping their minds free from conceptual thought, attachment to form would drag them back into the phenomenal world, and each of those forms would create for them a demon's karma!” Huángbò Xīyùn

“Error has no substance; it is entirely the product of your own thinking. If you know that Mind is the Buddha and that Mind is fundamentally without error, whenever thoughts arise, you will be fully convinced that they are responsible for errors. If you could prevent all conceptual movements of thought and still your thinking-processes, naturally there would be no error left in you. Therefore is it said: 'When thoughts arise, then do all things arise. When thoughts vanish, then do all things vanish.'” Huángbò Xīyùn

“When all the Buddhas manifest themselves in the world, they proclaim nothing but the One Mind. Thus, Gautama Buddha silently transmitted to Mahakasyapa the doctrine that the One Mind, which is the substance of all things, is co-extensive with the Void and fills the entire world of phenomena. This is called the Law of All the Buddhas. Discuss it as you may, how can you even hope to approach the truth through words? Nor can it be perceived either subjectively or objectively. So full understanding can come to you only through an inexpressible mystery. The approach to it is called the Gateway of the Stillness beyond all Activity — If you wish to understand, know that a sudden comprehension comes when the mind has been purged of all the clutter of conceptual and discriminatory thought-activity. Those who seek the truth by means of intellect and learning only get further and further away from it. Not till your thoughts cease all their branching here and there, not till you abandon all thoughts of seeking for something, not till your mind is motionless as wood or stone, will you be on the right road to the Gate.” Huángbò Xīyùn

Acinta - The Avaricious Hermit "Mahamudra is imageless, objectless. Within it all phenomenon become Knowledge and pure awareness. Within it the ten thousand delusive thoughts Are empty. All reality Is Mahamudra." Long ago in Dhanirupa, there lived a man so poor that he was never certain of his next meal. But his fantasy life was very rich indeed. In fact, all his thoughts were centered on one unobtainable goal, - to be rich. So tormented was he by his obsession, that he couldn't bear to have others interfere with dreaming. To this end, he moved away from civilization and went to live alone with his fantasies in a little hut he built in the forest. One day, the Yogin Kambala chanced upon his hermits retreat. As they were sharing a frugal meal, Acinta poured his heart out to his visitor. "Well, I see you've managed to escape from men and their chattering said Kabala. But tell me this, has your thinking improved since you've been here?" "Unfortunately no," the hermit confessed with a sigh. "I'm still possessed by the desire for riches. But I do know this, if I could just get rid of this one thought my mind would be perfectly empty, for it's all I think about. Do you know of any way I could free myself from this foolishness?" "As a matter of fact, I do," replied the yogin. "If you will promise to practice what I teach you, I'll give you instruction." The hermit vowed to practice faithfully, and the guru gave him the Samvara initiation. Then he sang him this song of instruction: "Desire is like the child Of a barren woman, To free your mind of it, Visualize your body as the heavens, And each of your thoughts As the stars of the sky. In time, the God of wealth will himself appear, and all your desires will be fulfilled." In the solitude of the forest, the hermit meditated according to his guru's instruction. When the glittering radiance of the stars filled this mind, there was no room left for thoughts of gold. His obsession vanished, as did the stars themselves, into the boundless expanse of the heavens, and he became thought free. He sought out his guru to tell him that his mind had become empty, and Kambala sang him another song: "What is the nature of the sky? Can you make something of it? How can you desire it? How can you think about it at all?" When the hermit realized the deep meaning within this verse, he achieved, "Mahamudra-siddhi" and became known as the guru Acintapa, "The Thought-Free Guru". For three hundred years he selflessly taught his countless disciples how to realize the ultimate nature of being. And when the time came, they all accompanied him as rose bodily into the Paradise of the Dakinis. ~ From: "Buddhist Masters of Enchantment. The Lives and Legends of the Mahasiddhas." Translated by Keith Dowman Illustrated by Robert Beer Image: Acinta - painting by Robert Beer

“Since Mind knows no divisions into separate entities, phenomena must be equally undifferentiated. Since Mind is above all activities, so must it be with phenomena. Every phenomenon that exists is a creation of thought; therefore I need but empty my mind to discover that all of them are void. It is the same with all sense-objects, to whichever of the myriads of categories they belong. The entire void stretching out in all directions is of one substance with Mind; and, since Mind is fundamentally undifferentiated, so must it be with everything else. Different entities appear to you only because your perceptions differ — just as the colours of the precious delicacies eaten by the Devas are said to differ in accordance with the individual merits of the Devas eating them!” Huángbò Xīyùn

“Mind is the Buddha, while the cessation of conceptual thought is the Way. Once you stop arousing concepts and thinking in terms of existence and non-existence, long and short, other and self, active and passive, and suchlike, you will find that your Mind is intrinsically the Buddha, that the Buddha is intrinsically Mind, and that Mind resembles a void. Therefore is it written that 'the true Dharmakaya resembles a void'. Seek for naught besides this... Only come to know the nature of your own Mind, in which there is no self and no other, and you will in fact be a Buddha!” Huángbò Xīyùn

Happy Gurupurnima to all followers.

Aghora is to be in unity with the divine absolute truth, with loving kindness and compassion in the heart towards everything and anything that could be considered unpleasant or disgusting in this world.

“If an ordinary man, when he is about to die, could only see the five elements of consciousness as void; the four physical elements as not constituting an I; the real Mind as formless and neither coming nor going; his nature as something neither commencing at his birth nor perishing at his death, but as whole and motionless in its very depths; his Mind and environmental objects as one – if he could really accomplish this, he would receive Enlightenment in a flash. He would no longer be entangled by the Triple World; he would be a World-Transcendor. He would be without even the faintest tendency towards rebirth. If he should behold the glorious sight of all the Buddhas coming to welcome him, surrounded by every kind of gorgeous manifestation, he would feel no desire to approach them. If he should behold all sorts of horrific forms surrounding him, he would experience no terror. He would just be himself oblivious of conceptual thought and one with the Absolute. He would have attained the state of unconditioned being. This, then, is the fundamental principle.” Huángbò Xīyùn

An important aspect of our practice is our confidence in the law of karma: we are well aware that there is a cause-and-effect relationship between our actions and experiences. With this conviction, we have a basis for decision-making: we can distinguish which actions are beneficial and which are harmful. Kalu Rinpoche

“in the universal womb that is boundless space all forms of matter and energy occur as flux of the four elements, but all are empty forms, absent in reality: all phenomena, arising in pure mind, are like that. just as dream is a part of sleep, unreal in its arising, so all and everything is pure mind, never separated from it, and without substance or attribute. experience is neither mind nor anything but mind; it is a vivid display of emptiness, like magical illusion, in the very moment inconceivable and unutterable. all experience arising in the mind, at its inception, know it as emptiness!” ― Longchenpa