Post #987

"It is true that from the standpoint of ultimate reality, the deity and our mind are one; but we also must understand that from this ultimate point of view, there is neither suffering nor fear. In reality, that which appears now as suffering, fear, and danger is nothing else but a manifestation of our mind. Just as our mind, during a dream, can create appearances that cause us to suffer, threaten us, or make us afraid. However, as long as we have not realized ultimate reality, we are exposed to suffering and fear that we conceive as real. It is in this relative context that the deity, who also appears to us momentarily as outside ourselves, brings us help when we pray to her. This prayer, in a relative sense, is necessary as long as we remain in the relative level. The ultimate prayer is to dwell in ultimate truth, the nature of mind, beyond any duality, where the mind, appearances, and deities are revealed to be of a single essence. Until we attain this level, while we perceive suffering and fear as real, we also call upon a ,deity that we perceive as existing outside of us. However, she really brings help and protection. It is necessary to differentiate between the realization of nonduality and the present state in which all our experience is lived in a constant subject/object duality." Bokar Rinpoche