[22] Exploring the Tibetan Buddhist Teachings on Death, Consciousness, and the Bardo

3:59PM Jun 25, 2024

Speakers:

Andrew Holecek

Keywords:

bardo

mind

arises

form

body

deities

point

death

indestructible

consciousness

unconscious mind

projection

experience

dharma

manifest

recognize

talking

mother

subtle

instructions

Hey, everybody. Thanks for being flexible. I have been amazing. I've been out of town. The last three sessions for the Book Group, which has never happened before. First time was the draw Mountain Center parallels program. Last time it was the bay, your advanced Dream Yoga program. And this week, I'm going to be in Santa Monica at a conference. So best I can do. Thanks for your understanding. In terms of little announcements, the only thing that's really on the docket is kind of exciting gig next next Wednesday. Night, man, what is that the 26th at 6pm Mountain Time. Mia Lux who I met in Costa Rica blue spirit, a really wonderful gifted dreamer. Very, very well trained, very smart gal is going to come on she's going to do a free talk for us on lucid dreaming induction and whatever and then probably we're going to bring her on board is a more regular contributor and teacher and nightclub because this you'll see she has a lot to offer. I feel very fortunate to be able to invite her along. So that's next Wednesday. 26th Six o'clock, I'll introduce you I'm going to be there for this event. Tell all your friends. Hope you can make it. Okay book group. So we're on page 82 going through this book preparing to die. We left off this thing called took. Yeah, this is interesting. I just gave a presentation two weeks ago at a film festival from talking about the movie took down between worlds that came out. Just last year is when I first heard of it in May was with a director in University of Virginia. This is something that I have actually been involved with, in terms of studying yet from the outset with Richie Davidson, the neuroscientist out of the University of Wisconsin Madison. Many of you may know him arguably the world's most say knowledgeable, certainly famous, most famous scientists studying the interface between meditation and the Buddhist arts. The Dalai Lama asked him to start studying took them some 15 years ago. I know Richie is a friend he invited me out to present. I spent a weekend presenting to these amazing groups of scientists and scholars are truly the most unusual meeting I've ever been at. And so it's kind of cool to see that this is finally getting some real traction and publicity the film is definitely worth saying. And this is my little riff on it took down post death meditative absorption page 82. because of our lack of familiarity with the subtle aspects of the mind, the Dharmakaya and the simple GokaiOh most people go unconscious at the end of the inner dissolution. They missed the Bardo of data and regained consciousness in the Bardo becoming, well, here's the deal, they they experience it everybody experiences. That's called phenomenal consciousness. But only those who are prepared will recognize it. That's called Access Consciousness. So without some familiarity, there's no access to this experience. Just like there's no access to deep dreamless sleep. When we fall into that state. They miss the Bardo. damata and regain consciousness and the Bardo, becoming, we will return to these last two Bardot's later. A practitioner with some familiarity, the very definition of meditation, remember gone to become familiar with with a Dharmakaya. Whoever can enter meditative absorption. This is called Duck Dom, an honorific term for meditative practice indicates some level of enlightenment. Yeah, the reasons why somebody does this, they get pretty subtle they get they get a little bit complicated. is basically for those of you who do what I call completion stage practices. This is a way to complete your completion stage practice. So they're super similar reasons why people do this. Sometimes they'll do it as a sign of accomplishment for their students and that kind of thing. But people often wonder like, Well, why why are they doing this? Why are they hanging out in their body after they're clinically dead? Imagine that revolution of mind sciences here. This is the Dalai Lama is precious, when this is substantiated, and last is a really difficult study. Imagine what this is going to do to the science of mind and philosophy. Why? It's a game changer. Somebody's clinically dead, but they're showing no clinical signs of decomposition. Cooktown signals the union of the mother and child luminosity that we discussed earlier. If we recognize our primordial Mother, we will dissolve into her embrace and attain enlightenment and remember the Primordial Mother personal paramita that's just the mother of your mind. There's nobody there waiting for you it's just the mother of your mind. This is primordial mother. If we don't have recognition or the recognition this partial we will unwittingly leap out of her lap and begin that paradoxical search for her outside we we have discussed this earlier this extraordinarily painful point in moment where we all return to the lap of the mother this is the reunion of the mother Jai luminosity with those who have Access Consciousness to without recognize it what are they doing remember in logistically they returned to the lab but they're facing yen they're recognizing face to face. Those who returned to the same lab of the mother one small the colossal differences there in the lab, but they're looking out so they're looking away. Amazing. And then they jump out of the lab in the paradigm paradoxical search for the mother. When we all even you have to do a stop shamatha turn around and look the passionate. There she is. There. She's been all along and there There she is right now. You don't have to wait till you die to experience this. Just stop looking at your mind. In this is what actually cultivates child luminosity. It's amazing to me. This constitutes a leap from the Bardo marmota into the Bardo, becoming and in our next life. This metaphor becomes a literal description of our entry into samsara as we physically leap out of our mother's lap during birth due to what do these contractions? I mean, the whole thing has such strange, wonderful elegance. And right here is this switch like it says in the book, the Tibet Book of the Dead and a moment to complete enlightenment, right? You're not be distracted in a moment, complete enlightenment. This is what separates the Buddha's from the sentient beings, just this right here, just this gesture that we return to this primordial mother a death and leave her at birth is expressed by one of my favorite poets, the Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore, I am deaf your mother. For me, you will get new birth. Wow. as caretakers it's important to be aware of the signs of took down, they actually happened more than we know. So when I did this presentation, I did it with a professor out of a University of Colorado. And he was sharing stories about recent people, recent practitioners one issue I know Chris Monson, but I realized she had passed transition, but I didn't realize she had actually entered took down. And so he shared with me that she's showed all the signs of this kind of entry. So it's actually for practitioners, it's actually easier than you think. With some level of familiarity, right? This is why everything is amplified at the moment of death, even a small level of recognition in life, can bring about this type of maturation and death. If they manifest, we need to know what to do. The mind of someone that took time is resting and meditation in their heart, the mind is still in the body. And this presence is noticeable. The person doesn't look dead, but appears to be asleep. There's warmth around the heart. The body doesn't start to smell and rigor mortis doesn't say it in. If you pinch the skin, it returns to normal. If you pinch the skin of someone whose life force has left the body, it tends to stay where you pinch it and not move back. I'm not sure sure how often we get the opportunity and the scan of a corpse. So when I was doing gross anatomy, yeah, or when when I was teaching this class Bartow class here in Boulder. I would take these classes into this anatomy lab, where we would hang out with his really wonderful, workI guy who ran this anatomy lab, we'd hang out with all these different plays, and all these different levels of dissection and decomposition. Pretty interesting stuff actually. To avoid disrupting the Samadhi the post death meditative absorption of someone into time. To avoid disrupting your best chance for attaining enlightenment the classical instruction is not to disturb the body for at least three days. Depending on the instructions left by that person, we need to be sensitive to the signs of TOCOM happens more than we think. We'll we'll return to this topic when we discuss organ donation and whether or not that disrupts it. That's a coming up. PAGE 261 We should get there in three years. The amount of time someone spends and took down and therefore in the Bardo. Dermatol is measured in meditation days. Because this is the these are the meditation days that take place in the Bardo Dermatol there's no sun, there's no solar metric. There's no moon, so there's no time per se what actually transpires is meditate should do.

The Bardo, becoming. In the 49 days taught in the Tibetan Book of the Dead are normal solar days, the meditation day is five times the length of time you can rest your mind now without distraction. You can rest for five minutes and meditation day lasts 25 minutes. At a certain point, intentionally or through the activation of the winds of karma consciousness does have to leave the body right out of one of nine portals. We talked I think we talked about those earlier right? Top of the head is the best. That's where you want to go. That's what took a poll was all about. That's the Highway to Heaven. Yet, this is all I have no experience of this. This is all from the just the literature so top of the head, ears, eyes, nose, tongue, navel, urethra and anus. Lots of potential Stephen Colbert like jokes but I'll keep the gallows and toilet humor away. The red bird the red Bindu because remember, everything is at the heart remember the red binder has come up the weights come down. What happens here is the red Bindu continues its ascent and can sometimes be seen as blood coming out of the nose or mouth. The white Bindu remember that continues now its descent and can sometimes be seen as white discharge from the urethra. The separation of the red and white Hindus releases the indestructible at the heart where consciousness is held this is the literally member instructable Bindu it's easy to think of Hindi was like some soul or C but best translation about Thurman has this i like it is indestructible continuum, there isn't a thing that continues no thing continues the momentum of emptiness is continuous. There's no particular thing just like even now there's no thing that continues we think there's a thing called a body that's continuing but look in the mirror notice how this is pretty rapidly dramatically changing. So some thing continues but it's not a thing. It's the indestructible continuum the separation of the red and white been news releases the indestructible beginning with a hardware consciousness is held the winds of karma reignite and we are blown off into the Bardo becoming stiffening of the body odor coolness around the heart and flexibility of the skin and the fact that the person just looks dead or other signs that the death is complete and the consciousness has left the body so if you haven't seen this movie check it out. There's also I don't have a link to it actually I do in my resource page but not here. There's a choose to part Australian don't up documentary about an Australian Lama. I can't remember his name who who entered TOCOM and so if you just look if you Google this and look it up there actually a couple other films on it. It's it's a pretty wild phenomena right? Game Changer wants it substantiated. Okay, here we go. The peaceful raffle visions Yeah. So now we're back into the bard of Dharma talks. So this is what's happening when somebody's resting. Now in phase two of the Bardo Dermatol phase one is the emptiness phase, the no thingness Phase. Phase two is the luminosity phase, the sambhogakaya phase that so called everything phase, this is where all heaven breaks loose. The borrower Dhamma talk can be placed in the section for what to do during death or what to do after death. It's the point of death and fits into either category. The Tibetan Book of the Dead is the seminal instruction texts for what to do during this Bardo. Yeah, I mean, what? To 1/3 At least 1/3 of that text is devoted to this Bardo. And Francesco Fremantle is absolutely marvelous magisterial tome luminous emptiness. Understanding The Tibetan Book of the Dead has over 100 pages on what these deities represent the archetypal nature of the waking mind it's extraordinarily sophisticated elaborate. The instructions are thorough and will be summarized in chapter five to central instructions as mentioned earlier, condense the main points, rushed your mind went on whatever arises that's the shamoto part and recognize whatever arises to be the radius of your own mind but passionate just like in a dream. So this is this is where Dream Yoga This is where lucidity in the dream 100% translates into the dream at the end of time Bardot's. So y'all remember Jay says the Dzogchen Tantras. The ancient teachings from which the Bardo instructions come? Speak of a mythological bird that Garuda, which is born, fully grown. This image symbolizes our primordial nature which is already completely perfect. The Garuda check has all this weather wing feathers fully developed inside the egg, but it cannot fly before it hatches. Only at the moment when the shell cracks open, can it burst out and soar up into the sky. Similarly, the Masters tell us the qualities of Buddhahood are veiled by the body. And as soon as the body is discarded, they will radiantly be displayed. Cool. The Barnabe nama top is where the 100 peaceful and wrathful deities arise. They are part of this radiant display so don't be afraid of them. The visions or your wisdom mind archetypally right this is this is a this happens on dark retreat. By the way, if you're in there for a long enough when you're dropping down the sedimentation levels of the unconscious mind going from the refuse heap of the unconscious repressed unconscious, submerging repressed the emergent all the way down all the different strata of sedimentation, all the way down below the the collective unconscious, all the way down into the kind of the super unconscious mind. This is what awaits you at the deepest dimensions as the mind falls into itself. That's what's happening here. Mine is falling into itself wrong Bob. The deities are the purified aspects hence Purified means it's called language for what an empty empty form. The deities are the purified aspects of your mind the first forms I archetypes of the some Bulga kya. If you can recognize them as such, you are liberated at the level of the sunblock? If so training that recognition now how do you do that? Well do main practices dark retreat, the practice of toggle or toggle, literally crossing over into spontaneous presence, leap over practice. And then also generate the stage practice. Those of you who do deity yoga that applies here as well. That's the these are among the most refined sophisticated practices right? They're so subtle.

You if you can recognize them as such as purified aspects of your mind, you will be liberated. Recognition and liberation are simultaneous. So train in that recognition. Now. As mentioned earlier, people often wonder who will perceive these deities. Only practitioners who are familiar with a Tibetan pantheon of deities will recognize them as described in the Book of the Dead. I mean, really think about this, why why would like I mentioned I think at the outset the introduction, why would a Muslim or a Christian or Hindu or a Jew experienced these deities I mean, they'll experience their own version if they experienced anything at all. Most people like uninterrupted J says they either black completely out, just think what happens when you fall into the dreamless sleep. That's the analogy here. Or they'll see little flashes and just like beams of light takes a little bit of stability. Go those with no familiarity, you may only see glimmerings of light. This again is not physical light, but the light of the mind. The appearances are unique to your own state of mind. Any manifestation of form or color is not important. By the way, if you want to get a better sense of this one, there's some interesting literature. Here, there's not a lot but but Tenzin Wangyal is very first book, I believe it's his very first book, he's published like 25. Now, wonders of the natural mind. He writes a fair amount. It's the first exposition I've ever come across about his experience in dark retreat as a teenager, and then he talks about the lights and the rays and the sounds. So those of you who want a deeper dive, that's a good one, that's a that's quite a fine one. What's important is to recognize those expressions is the play of your own mind and to allow them to self liberate in that recognition. It's more important to understand how these appearances arise. And the opportunity they present for liberation than to get get hung up on the forms that they take. The Dalai Lama says the whole presentation of deities within mandola is comes from India. And it does and it does draws upon Indian culture. It's very unlikely that a person from another culture would have I'm sorry, it's very likely that a person from another culture would have different experiences. Yeah, like for sure. If you want to say what the actual nature of the sambhogakaya is, you have to say it is a form endowed with the greatest possible adornments, beauty, and perfections. As soon as that statement is made within a specific culture, then of course, people look around them and try to imagine what this perfect body might look like. And they might think of the adornments of a king and so forth. His Holiness continues and connects the deities to the sunbug loci, which is the main point Moreover, the Soboba kya is a Rupa Kaya, form kya. So this is boy, I mean this section, this is heavy duty Tibetan Buddhism is heavy duty luxury on a Tantra. But again, I wrote this, it just would feel so disingenuous not to pay homage to what literature says here, instead of trying to culturally translate this and water down and edit it, that I don't think you can. In fact, you can't do that at least I can't do that. So just a little bit of a qualifiers like yeah, this is this is serious Tibetan tantric stuff. But that doesn't mean that there isn't truth here, right. That doesn't mean this is all completely acculturated. Not at all. It just means that the the culturing it's like the coloring aspect of this, the fundamental principles least arguably, in this tradition, are universal. At least that's what they say. Makes sense to me actually. The Soboba carriers have Rupa Kaya form body and the very purpose of the Buddha. manifesting a foreign body is for the sake of others. This being the case the appearance assumed would be something appropriate for others. That's the skillful means, since intended for their service. It's not the case that there is some kind of intrinsic autonomous form of this and Bolga kya. totally independent from those from Lhasa. booga Kai is designed to help with very detailed descriptions of the visions of restful and peaceful deities that the person in the intermediate state experiences are very specific descriptions for practitioners following a particular Nigma practice. Therefore, it is not the case that all Tibetans even will necessarily experienced the same pattern divisions in the intermediate state. So here we go. This shows you how idiosyncratic gives this is. So it's not merely just within Tibetan Buddhism proper, but within this one particular school than Yang Ma, which is it's the tradition that has these toggle practices and practical teachings. So let's just to contextualize this somewhat subtle esoteric stuff. Okay, the hourglass Yeah, so this is one thing I came up with about 15 years ago, to try to kind of graph this whole thing. A diagram and the shape of an hourglass summarizes our journey through the Barbados. So those DVD have the look of course, it's kind of helpful page to see I figure three. The top half represents the Bardo of dying. The Centerpoint represents death and the Bardo Dharma TA in the bottom half represents the Bardo of becoming the two lines that follow into the point and then spread out beneath that represent the decrease and increase of duality respectively. Above the point is the eighth stage dissolution. So these are the eight stages of also relating the eight consciousnesses. Excuse me going from the most realistic at the at the top into non duality at the point below the point the eight stages manifest in an inverse fashion, going from non duality at the point to complete duality at the bottom. So the whole thing is just flipped, reversed. In other words, out of the Dharmakaya, slash, emptiness of the point arises the stage of black attainment, and the seven basic instincts of ignorance. From that arises right increase on the 45 states of passion from that arise way to parents. And the 33 thoughts data vigorous, I'm sorry, of aggression. So those of you who are just a little sidebar here, those of you who are PDP prepared, did I participants, the first in the first cohort, I gave two entire presentations on this whole issue of proof and the problem of proof. And how do we know that any of this stuff is true? So if you don't see it, there's some way I can get access to that for the rest of you if you're interested in exploring this, because this is obviously of some importance for those who may be interested like how do I know any of this stuff is true? I get into it and like a lot of four hour riff and from that arises the remaining five stages to the outer disillusion. Now appearing in reverse inverse inverse form from subtle to gross. This also by the way, this is a this dissent. So the dropping into is basically an excavation and archaeology of the unconscious mind. Everything's being revealed, revealed, revealed, revealed, revealed, discovered revealed discovered is revealed process of no nesis recollection until you reach the point, the moment of doubt, or no Dharma talk. And then this bottom part I was going to do my second edition of this book, this is now constitutes the sedimentation of the unconscious mind. So all of these archetypes these are the first forms they're buried at the highest levels of the evolutionary process, so these are these are the, the first aspects of form Rupa Kaya coming in the form of sound and light. And then this massive cover up begins really this cover up of the truth. All the sedimentation levels of the unconscious mind then plop plop, plop obscuration obscuration view escapes and on top of obfuscation creating the massive iceberg or the Freudian model of the unconscious mind. And so it kind of in psycho spiritual terms psychological spiritual terms, this is really a gin of journey into and through, dropping below conscious mind all the way into and through the unconscious mind to the very bottom was bottom that's the Dharma talk. And then if you can't recognize identify that contract away from it, these contractions then are basically create the levels of recoil sedimentation, the create the unconscious mind that then creates the body. When did to me this just makes so much sense so compelling to me. In other words, the subtle form of the elements. So the elements here that now we're talking about these lights, again, there's so much here. When you get to the kind to the C to the Nin tag to the essence, there's just so much here these are these are also these are our primordial ancestors is my friends V. Shalom writes about the 10 lights of the Safar rod. These These lights are these are our this is the genealogy of awareness, consciousness. These are our ancestors from the deepest genealogical point of view. So much going on here. The solar farm of the elements arise now in a reverse order from space arises the energy of wind, wind is just space and motion. From that fire from that water in from that Earth. Think of these as archetypes think of these as principles. But instead of manifesting a physical body composed of the five gross elements, which doesn't happen until conception and the beginning of the next life, a mental body is generated. This is what travels through the Bardo, becoming. In your guitar language, this

would be the Alia Viggiano, right? The Storehouse consciousness in terms of the a consciousness is it stages one to eight going into the point and stages eight to one coming out in mirror image? Yeah, there's one reason there's like footnotes off after almost every line here and again, maybe we'll go through those when we finish this book in two years. But if I also plop into these footnotes now probably TMI too much but they're there for the deeper diver. So much is happening here. The two lines which also represents self and other are widest apart the most dualistic when we start to die at the rim of the Bardo dying, they come together at the point, final moment of death, oneself another emergent and non dual bliss. As we descend into the point, we're also running out of time and space. I like that image, right? When you die, you run out of time. gallows humor, you run out of time you run out of space, you run out of causality, you run out of all these are these are platonic archetypes. These are the archetypes. They create a whole universe. Those that's also what's being constructed here. Amazing, amazing.

Yeah, as we descend into the point, we're also running out of time, space and causality, right because up because causality is contingent upon time. Since these are all dualistic constructs, everything material is falling apart, but everything spiritual is coming together. Duality disintegrates while non duality integrates. Death is bad news for matter, but great news for spirit. If you're spiritually minded, you really do have something to look forward to. Why because the excavation project is complete. All the adventitious defilements have been removed. Truth is being revealed all the fake news is gone. Truth is that like TS Eliot said, do human beings can't hand can't handle very much truth. What a great line. When the body of truth the Dharmakaya is revealed. Because we're so familiar with fake news, the ego and its narratives. When truth Dharmakaya is pointed out. We go No way. You know, we're not familiar with the truth. How much truth can you handle? How much space how much reality can you handle? That's what dictates whether you'll attain awakening at this stage or not. This shows us whether Allah Allah Oh here we go. If we extend the two lines past the rim to the barn of dying, the space they enclose represents the party when this life This shows us that whether we are acknowledging it or not, we're always running out of time. Have you noticed? As you read these words, the grains of time are slipping through this cosmic hourglass. Love it. The two lines also represent the extended arms of Yama, the Lord of Death, who holds the wheel of life the bhava chakra. You will find this wheel of life at the entrance to most monasteries, and the outside, not on the inside, because there's still outside the gate of samsara. Police there to remind us that life is always held by the embrace of death. Because we're alive Yamas grip is temporarily relaxed, we don't feel his squeeze. But as we age get sick and die, his vise like grip grip increases into a suffocating crunch Yamahas muscular arms contract into the point of death squeezing any remaining life out of us. That's kind of descriptive slash graphic. Yeah, this is I mean boiboi. Again, what we want to do a by understanding what's actually happening here and this is I discovered this in one of my doc retreats. This was a cataclysmic insight for me and actually more than insight, it was my experience. You know, the dark had previously been so so heavy and crushing. This is why this practice came about this is the toggle, Nima practice from the Zen tradition, dark practices. And it came about principally as a way to prepare for death because all this stuff happens in the dark. And so this is one of the terrific experiences for me where, you know, the dark had felt so heavy and crushing and it's just like I had so difficult. It was only years later than I realized it was so heavy and crashing because I loaded it up with all my projections. The Darkness itself is neutral I just projected the crap out of it actually projected my crap into it. And that's why the darkness so heavy in this way darker shaded first can be so challenging. But what happened is it was not amazing thing. At a certain point. It started to line up the crushing the crushing the you know, the tomb was actually replaced with a womb I shared this with my dear friend Bob Thurman. He just loved it along with a view along with the right view. And then what happened was Yama is no longer behind me Yama was I never, you know, field his crush anymore. Now what's behind me is what's really behind me Yama is transformed into Persian upon me. Whoa, now we're talking. Now it's not just the emptiness of death that's behind me. That's what Yama represents. Well, when Yama is recognized, Yama transforms into a permanent part of your being actually embraced not by the lord of death, but the my mother of all the Buddhas. I mean, how awesome is that? So there she is holding us always not this crushing thing up, dad. That's just egos point of view. Just as loving embrace what I just love these images, I definitely definitely have to write a new updated version of his book after you introduce all this stuff. This is pretty awesome. This image also helps us understand what we can experience. What we experienced with our mind during Catholic is exactly what we have put here to it. Garbage in, garbage out. Dharma and dharma out right. So you want to get rid of the garbage replace it with Dharma, to fill your mind with dharma. So that the net gets squeezed out right? Doesn't have to be all garbage. You can be dharna the mind is like a sponge. Sponge Bob, the ultimate Sponge Bob. It absorbs the contents of its environment. As we die, the contents of this sponge are squeezed out and become our entire experience. That's pretty good, actually. Excuse me. This is why we want to soak our minds with bodhichitta and create as much merit as possible. Our karma once again will take good care of us as it is expressed out of us. Same process occurs in life. If you really want to know the character of someone, their inner contents, see what comes out of them when they're in a squeeze. Boy, isn't that true? This is the best thing you can do. This should be required before anybody ever gets married. You know, is traveling with them. Go to a third world country for three months. You will learn more about a person excuse me when you're traveling. In really tough, challenging situations go on a pilgrimage with them. You'll find out what a person is really made of what what fabric are they because this kind of travel right you've done you know this will puts the squeeze out you know, wherever you really are is manifest traveling will do this to mix metaphors and introduce some gallows humor the upper aspect of the hourglass is more graphically depicted as a chipper I got this sick gallows humor thing from of course Fargo right the great Collins Brothers movie amazing. One of those roadside machines that grinds up branches and into saw does the Bardo dying is a chipper for anything, made a form anything material, ego. Exclusive identification with form doesn't fit. Nothing no thing can go through. Anything constituted a form cannot pass through this infinitely narrow confines. That is the Bardo Norma tough. The noun door point of reality. It's just like a black hole, not even space or time can fit through the singularity. This is why the Bardo, dramatize beyond space and time actually before space and time. Nothing in this manifest world goes through to the other side. In the upper reaches of the chipper, the gross outer body is ground up the outer disillusion in the inner reaches the subtle body turns to spiritual dust in the inner disillusion. Any form physical of the body Bentall or consciousness is chewed up and left behind. It's only the extremely subtle and indestructible body. Really the body of truth Dharmakaya where body at this level is made of prana that fits through the noun to a point. This indestructible body is formless awareness itself universe nature. Because it is formless, it can go through it doesn't die. Why? Because it was never born, such as the Buddha's gold, who discovered that which cannot die because it was never born. This does go through. Right Francesco writes, the indestructible Bindu or body the magick, particularly indestructible continuum is eternal, and unchanging. This is literally called In Mahayana, language, the changeless nature, but in nature, it continues from a life to life without beginning and without end. It is the basic nature of mind and the essence of life, a continuity of luminous awareness, it is bodhichitta the awakened heart mind and it is the Takata garba I love that word, the intrinsic but in nature, which we all possess, but in which we are unaware. This is the realisation of the Dharmakaya the ultimate source of life and of all appearances, from that state, or you can then take on the body of form, arising with a body of a deity in this and mocha kya or with a physical body and then nirmanakaya Well, there's more they can arise. They, this formless

awareness can be formed into any form, literally so called inanimate inanimate matter, so called like my glass here, right? So called inanimate matter, you can manifest this is that you can matter. It's called a technical technical term, it's called a diversified, or variegated nirmanakaya. This means that this, this type of mind can literally take on the form of a breeze medicine bridge. So if I hit if I pull it out in a second, I think it's the second chapter of the Bodhisattva Guide to the Bodhisattvas Way of Life by Shantideva. This really evocative set of images may be a bridge for those who need it may be a breeze for those who seek to be cool. I always used to think that was just completely nice poetry and metaphorical. But I've been corrected numerous times, but it's actually quite literal. I mean, do with it what you want, but there's something quite beautiful about it for me. It suggests that this you know, this so called inanimate world is in fact, the form the Rupa chi of the body of the awakened ones. This is the fundamental proclamation of sacred outlook darkness in Tibetan. pure perception in the virtual world is realizing the sacred quality of this that it's all really all of it is the body of the Buddha in that regard. Take it or leave it I take it makes so much sense to me. It's so elegant, everything that arises manifestation of this. In other words, naked, naked, formless awareness. The Dharmakaya is closed in this cosmic dressing room with fresh underwear, some vulgar Kaya and fashionable contemporary outerwear that nirmanakaya AR is it takes birth into a new form. It may seem fresh and fashionable, but it's simply a new form of old habits. The same old story right? For fame and glory, of birth, old age, sickness and death, our quote unquote Dharmakaya, the child luminosity fits through the point, because it is the point like water poured into water, luminous emptiness, or empty and pregnant essence is the only thing quote unquote, that slips through to the other side. Yeah, footnote after footnote after footnote, because like when we talked about several weeks ago, actually, at this point, several months ago, when you're talking about Dharma top business, you're talking about the cradle and the grave, the womb and the tomb of all manifest reality. Everything that we see here is just a dilution of the concentrated aspect of what's actually taking place here. That's why there's so much going on here. Everything's going on here all the Dharma. We will discuss the bottom half of the hourglass later on time, space causality and all of movement manifest reality returns in the Bardo have become a key ha. Okay, conclusion. Here are the main verses and summary instructions from the Tibetan Book, I'm sorry from the Bardo of dying and the Bardo Dharma TA, taken from the Tibetan Book of the Dead. These let these verses are so great. Now in the Bardo, the moment before death dawns upon me, I will abandon all grasping, yearning and attachment, enter undistracted into clear awareness of the teaching and eject my consciousness into the space of the unborn mind. As I leave this compound body of flesh and blood, I will know it to be a transitory illusion. Now with the Bardo Dharma ta dawns upon me, I will abandon all thoughts of fear and terror. I will recognize whatever appears is my projection and know it to be a vision of the Bardo. Now that I have reached this critical point, I will not fear the peaceful raffle ones my own projections. Yeah, and I think I think this the football may or may be about how Francesca amended the word projection. Projection doesn't really take place until the party will be coming. Bardot Dharma Tato radiance, the mind is just radiating self display. What happens in the Bardo, becoming is the radiance is flipped, perverted and twisted into projection. So this expressive force is still there. But now it's stained, like stainless window, it's staying in flipped into projections. And so the power of projection here is is colossal. And this is what gives birth to all of manifest reality. Matches psychological projection in the Union sense, but now deep psychospiritual ontological projection projection, projecting an entire body and an entire universe in cooperation with other sentient beings. The final pith instruction for what to do during death, release everything that will hold you back, let's pull up. That's the essence of POA how it called power just means movement transference of rejection of consciousness just means movement, the best go forward, to move forward, release everything that holds you back. That's all you have to do. Look forward, let go open and relax. That's it. Cool. Oh, boy, another session of semi heavy lifting. So now we start to switch. So now I believe. Yes, now we start to get into some things where we can start to talk a little bit more easily about some kind of practical related things. We're definitely going to come back to some heavier stuff again. But this we're done with the real heavy lifting, at least for now famous last words. And so because of the concentrated, concentrated nature of this, let's pick it up. I'll be back in two weeks. I don't have any other travels that I know of. I mean SLM, but I don't think that's a Thursday, we'll have to see I do the best I can. But thanks for your understanding. And remember, what we're doing here is not just for ourselves, we're doing it for the benefit of others. For those of you who are in the PDP community, for dear sister, Kimber, who's going through a transition, we send our merit to her and to all those who need it. So to whatever extent it speaks to you send what we're doing here for the benefit of all sentient beings. And otherwise, I'll be back in two weeks, we can then engage a little bit lengthier session for q&a Because I've been gone for three weeks, three sessions, which actually has never happened since the start of the book group thing. So thanks, everybody. Thanks for Be understanding you and a couple