Below are some pointers Garchen Rinpoche gave on the mahamudra
texts. He was teaching to a mainly Tibetan Buddhist monastic
audience based on Chetsang Rinpoche’s commentary on Tilopa’s Ganges
Mahamudra, Saraha’s Mahamudra Song for the People, and Jigten
Sumgon’s teaching on Coemergent Mahamudra.
With the mahamudra teachings, Rinpoche began by emphasizing the
most important point is to focus on the meaning of the teachings,
not any rules associated with it. The mahamudra seems like a
gentle remainder to not become too attached to the conceptual,
philosophical, or habitual elements of one’s practice.
Jigden Sumgon said that you miss the point if you become
attached to the teachings. The key point is enlightenment and it
doesn’t change from one vehicle or path to another. To think one
can attain it through a philosophical system is wrong.
Like Buddha taught, the mind is a union of emptiness and
luminosity. You can’t ascribe conceptual qualities to it or
actively seek to attain certain ends. Rinpoche clarified how in a
clear mind state you are not trying to abide in a particular state,
conceptualizing, or fabricating. We are taught in meditation the
mind is like luminosity. But we can try to focus on this and miss
the point.
We are all also distracted by many things during meditation. The
idea that discursive thoughts should be stopped is an illusion and
ignorant.
You also can’t be liberated when you are attached to the
physical body. You are liberating the mind not the body.
When there is no hope, expectation or fear, then fruition
manifests. Chetsang Rinpoche’s commentary on the mahamudra says how
when you are abiding without recollection of the past or without
following after thoughts of the present, or evoking thoughts of the
future, then you are liberated. Normally we have a strong fixation
on this life. The degree that you fixate is the degree to which you
miss the nature of true reality.
The point is that whatever arises is not real. Ultimately its
nothing more than like being in a dream. It is a dream. When you
are in a mindful state you realize wisdom and don’t have to
contrive anything. Thoughts are like waves. A yogi knows they will
arise and settle back down. A great meditator knows no antidote is
necessary.
When you are free from thought, like a drop of mercury falling
in the dust, the mind cannot become contaminated by others’ clouded
minds. However, if one faces others with his own mind corrupted by
afflictive emotions and discoursive thoughts, like a drop of water,
the dust sticks. With afflictive emotions, he explained, when you
blame others, we give our power to them, and we can even go to a
hell-like state through a simple afflictive emotion like anger.
Yogis know anger is caused without blaming another person or
object: anger is part of the nature of the mind. You are
liberated when you see it this way.
Even if you abide in a clear mind state, you must couple it with
compassion and the 37 practices of the boddhisattvas. The point is
to take insights learned from practice and to apply them in your
daily life. If you have seemingly wonderful mediation
practices but don’t apply them in your real life when afflictive
emotions arise, or lack compassion when others’ afflictive emotions
arise, it is cause for reflection on your practice.