In Between Paths Part I

I'm writing this to capture my thoughts about the NKT and my experiences at one of it's centres. I have been connected to the centre since University and it was my second practical connection with Buddha-dharma, the first being an Insight meditation retreat in Sarnath led by Christopher Titmuss. It is the only practice I have taken on board deeply, having practised it for 12 years. Prior to it, I was doing Breathing meditation and loving-kindness practices, inspired mainly by the retreat in India and A Path with Heart.

When I first went to a general programme (GP) class my impressions were not good because I was not interested in the deities and gods that I saw depicted all over the leaflets and books they had out on the tables. However, the teachings were extremely clear and logical in a way that deeply appealed to me. To this day listening to a good NKT teacher tends to set me on the edge of my seat.

Having engaged in retreat in India, I soon visited the centre for what I assumed was their sitting session (as it was the most regular occurrence in the schedule) but Wishfulfilling Jewel is actually the Chanted Sadhana practice of Je Tsongkhapa and Dorje Shugden. I was a little discombobulated by the second part of the Sadhana as I had just finished reading the Dalai Lama's Autobiography, at the end of which, he warns against the Dorje Shugden practice and attempts to give some explanation of his position against it. I was somewhat troubled, but I noticed that after attending the puja, my meditations were more powerful. This made me override my misgivings somewhat and I continued to attend classes and started regular attendance at puja. Pretty soon I was told about Foundation Programme (FP) and I started attending on a Sunday Morning and enjoyed it immensely. I started on the second chapter of Joyful Path which is the second part of the Lamrim cycle. I'm aware that if we'd started with reliance on the Spiritual Guide, I probably would have left at that time as I still very much had my guard up.

When I was due to leave University and move back home, I was offered a place to live at the centre as a resident. The day before this happened I had just finished reading the Alchemist and the main message I had taken away from that book was the slightly scary "follow the omens in your life or they will cease to appear and your life will become meaningless". So I immediately agreed on the spot, then spent a few weeks worrying about what I had agreed to!

My experience of the centre was mainly very good, I was a little taken aback by some of the ways the teacher treated some people and I was intimidated by his presence and struggled to connect with him, apart from one occasion when he gave me a real gift of listening and I was moved to tears by the way he listened to me and the love he communicated whilst doing so; this experience is one of the things that got me interested in learning to be a counsellor. It was not long before I was invited to teach a GP class of my own. I agreed with a lot of misgivings about my ability. However, it turned out that teaching as a path was very powerful for me, it took a while but once I figured out how to set my intention properly before I began, I would say it enabled me to help a lot of people and I continued to teach for a couple of years. Then I had a hiatus from teaching and living at the centre for three years when I moved out with a girlfriend; a painful misadventure.

My way out of the relationship was to move back into the centre. By this time I was on my third NKT teacher who encouraged me a lot and allowed me to take on a lot of responsibilities. Having been away for so long I was enthusiastic and for a while taught two GPs, held a directorship and worked as Education Programme Co-ordinator at the centre. I quit my job and took on part-time work so I could give more time to the centre. I gave up one of the GPs but kept my other roles. Being so close to the goings on, I became very aware of the difficulties the teacher faced internally and externally. She and I did not have the most healthy of relationships, but I know that she cared for me. However, I repeatedly found myself and others in situations that seemed to be a product of the teacher's delusions and mistakes. It irks me to this day that, in the five years I was EPC we were not once visited by anyone in a senior position who was interested in the way things were being run or what was happening on a day to day basis. I was also studying counselling and the disparity in the ways the BACP requires and supports ethical conduct of counsellors vs the lack of support and supervision of NKT teachers was quite distressing. Steve at NKT central is a really great guy, but the support is reactive, not proactive as I believe it needs to be, after all, the NKT is caring for people's spiritual lives.

Things continued to trouble me and I found that there was noone I could talk to about it. It was so hard, I saw people being mistreated and misused in strange and difficult situations, our karma seemed to be that we were dealing with a lot of (conventional) mental health issues. At one point, a depression-prone resident was asked to leave the centre by text message, I was, and am, horrified by that. There are a number of horrible and difficult things I could detail, but its not worth it. I became aware through contact with people at festivals and online that burnout and mismanagement were not uncommon at other small centres and even some of the big ones.

The central tension I experienced was between my immense appreciation and connection to the teachings and the dysfunctional and problematic life I experienced at the centre. My approach to solving this was to try to fix things at the centre. I was only a Director at this point, I was instrumental in changing the contracts for residents to be more inline with the NKT's standard contracts. It is indicative of the lack of oversight the NKT head office has of its child centres that we were operating without any formal rules or the proper residential agreements for probably ten or more years. I'm still proud that my partner and I were able to put helpful processes and agreements in place in collaboration with head office for new residents that had a major impact on the atmosphere and quality of life within the centre. By this stage, things were still not ideal. The community was healthier, but the residents were not integrated and working well together. I wanted to solve these problems I was aware of until the centre felt whole. By now we were on our fourth teacher and she and I have an uneasy relationship (I can be a little outspoken, and I think she is wary of my influence). At one point she asked me to enlist the rest of the directors to find a new Admin director after we'd lost the fourth AD in my time being there. Having seen the difficulties previous ADs had faced and the amount of skill required to do that job well, the directors struggled to identify anyone in our community that could carry the role. The resident teacher wanted a person who was very new to the NKT and was to my mind in the romantic first stage of practice. I couldn't bear to see this person thrown to the wolves in the way we were being asked to. We asked my partner, a very mature Vipassana practitioner to step in and handle some of the responsibilities, she thrived in the role having shadowed and supported the previous two ADs at the centre. However, her involvement worried the RT I think because my partner was not practising Kadam Dharma and therefore not allowed to take on the kind of role we were asking her to. I was excluded from the meetings due to the obvious conflict of interest (which I had blindly brought onto myself). My relationship with the teacher from this episode deteriorated further and I stepped down as Director. With no influence on the path taken, a new AD was brought on whom I felt we were setting up to fail. I was so uncomfortable with what was happening that I stepped down and moved out. I did everything I practically could to improve things.

I reconnected deeply with the Kadampa teachings this year, culminating in the summer festival highest yoga tantra empowerments, which were the most powerful and moving I've ever experienced. I was lit up with faith and an intense connection to the tradition and teachings. However, since then I have had an equal and opposite experience. I realised that most of the people who have been in the NKT for a while are operating at a distance. That in a sense they are all survivors, who learned to maintain their spiritual life by not being too involved in the tradition. Simultaneously, I became aware through STTP teachings that there has been a concern within Tibetan Buddhism and Kadam Buddhism in particular, that we avoid the "dangerous heresy" of Hashang Mahayana's concept-less meditation. My suspicion is that this concern is really at the heart of the Dorje Shugden controversy. That we are seeing the tension between Chinese and Indian Buddhism that manifested in Tibet before the great debate was won, now manifesting on the streets of Europe and the US. This is not to say that I think that the Dalai Lama is right to act in the way that he has, he's over-reacting massively but I think he's basically right in his assessment of Gelug's having a superior and exclusive mindset. His best argument is actually hard to find but paraphrasing it goes something like this "Are you saying that before Je Rinpoche there were no enlightened beings in Tibet? This is nonsense so lets have none of this talk". It seems there is a long-standing suspicion that the Nyingmapa teachings are Hashang Dharma in disguise. These two insights have left me wiser, but less grounded in practice. I need to find my way.

Alan Watts - Whats wrong with our culture

This video has stuck with me for a long time, "Our success is a failure"... I wonder about what it must be like for young people as this fact becomes more and more impossible to ignore. An underlying unease that is only growing as time passes.

In one respect this gives me hope as change becomes more obviously required. But I fear for the mental health of the generations to come.

Christian Slater's rant at the end of Mr Robot has a similar theme.

"Is any of it real, I mean look at this, a world built on fantasy. Synthetic emotions in the form of pills. Psychological warfare in the form of advertising. Mind altering chemicals in the form of food. Brainwashing seminars in the form of media. Cold isolated bubbles in the form of social networks..."

Each to their lineage?

One of the most important principles in Buddhism is for teachers to leave the meaning of Buddhist teachings unchanged for future generations. The presentation can be altered for students' karma as exemplified by Atisha's creation of the Lamrim, but you must keep it Buddhism. However, there is great disagreement over the meaning of the higher teachings on emptiness. The Buddha's approach to teaching is confusing, as he gave multiple and seemingly contradictory explanations of the nature of reality. These are widely understood to have been directed to the karma of his audience and to lead disciples on a graduated path of understanding which takes the student closer and closer to ultimate truth. I have posted previously about the disagreement between Je Tsongkhapa and Gorampa and there is general public rejection of Hashang Mahayana's concept-less meditation style amongst the four schools of Buddhism from Tibet. However, because the schools are different, there is inevitably some tension and criticism between them for example, the historic origin's of Dzogchen practice are elusive and its often criticised as being Hashang's Chan Dharma in disguise.

"Again, the emphasis is on non-conceptualization and the uselessness of any practice based on striving toward a goal."

Tension between these different approaches to attaining wisdom understanding reality appears to have been inherited from India and China.

"By the late 8th century tension developed between the different groups of foreign teachers and their Tibetan disciples, particularly between the Indians and the Chinese. While the Indian teachers taught a graduated path in which the tantric and sutric teachings were carefully laid out as steps to enlightenment, the Chinese taught a method they called Chan (their pronunciation of the Sanskrit dhyāna, meaning “contemplation”). Chan, the forerunner of Japanese Zen, emphasized the result rather than the path, and a straightforward concept-free meditation rather than the multitude of methods offered by the Indian teachers.

When the tension between the Indian and Chinese camps threatened to erupt into violence (in fact, some of the Chan disciples actually wounded themselves in protest and threatened suicide), the Tibetan emperor Trisong Detsen called for the situation to be resolved in a formal debate."

The war of ideas must rage on.

So we have a situation where students of Tibetan Buddhism are taught and practise different methods and inherit different views. Within the gradualist path sorting through these views and attaining the correct generic image of emptiness is of paramount importance. Inevitably as part of this investigation, one must be able to dismiss incorrect paths or views. Indeed, three or more views that Buddha himself presented must be rejected! Not to mention understandings presented in other traditions. For the gradualist, at some point it can be rightly said that they will reject, for themselves, teachings that many other people involved in Buddhism are fervently and sincerely practising. In the situation, how does one avoid tension and dischord? Furthermore, as Stephan Batchelor pointed out, Bodhisattvas are concerned with the liberation of all living beings. It is very simple to understand what it might mean to someone with this concern when they feel they have recognised a false path.

All of these concerns can seemingly be dismissed when one contemplates the differing karma of disciples, however, in Tibet this is not what happened. Upon the loss of the Great debate to Kamalashila, Hashang was kicked out of Tibet!

Kongtrul's Rimé movement has gone someway to establishing a good deal of cooperation and sharing of teachings between the various traditions of Tibet. Dorje Shugden practitioners have commitments to follow one tradition purely which can seem on the surface to be sectarian and cult-like. However, it is actually a sentiment echoed throughout all lineages and teachings including within the Rimé tradition itself. You can find similar instructions in Jack Kornfield's teachings in A Path with Heart.

"taking the one seat describes two related aspects of spiritual work. Outwardly, it means selecting one practice and teacher among all of the possibilities, and inwardly, it means having the determination to stick with that practice through whatever difficulties and doubts arise until you have come to true clarity and understanding...

If we do a little of one kind of practice and a little of another, the work we have done in one often doesn't continue to build as we change to the next. It is as if we were to dig many shallow wells instead of one deep one. In continually moving from one approach to another, we are never forced to face our own boredom, impatience, and fears. We are never brought face to face with ourselves. So we need to choose a way of practice that is deep and ancient and connected with our hearts, and then make a commitment to follow it as long as it takes to transform ourselves. This is the outward aspect of taking the one seat."

The NKT emphasises avoiding pick and mix Buddhism and a issues a challenge to "get out of Samsara" as quickly as possible, both of which seem to oppose the idea of studying the ideas of other traditions - as what is the intention behind doing this? If you want to help others get enlightened a quickly as you can, then you will be able to help all beings in accordance with their karma.

An excellent examination of the Dreams preceeding the "Restriction" on Shugden

NKT Master Genla Khyenrab offers an excellent dissection of some of the strange material the Dalai Lama has posted regarding Dorje Shugden. Refutation of Dalai Lama and Central Tibetan Administration one of the speeches he refers to is here.

Letting Daylight into Magic

Stephan Batchelor touchs on this tension between Dzogchen and Gelug practices when he discusses the Dorje Shugden issue.

One can understand why the Dalai Lamas would tolerate and even embrace Nyingma views in order to honor the historical heritage of Tibet, to affirm unity among the diverse communities of the Tibetan nation, even to be true to their own spiritual intuitions, But however justified such a position might be in personal or political terms, it should not obscure the real and potentially divisive philosophical and doctrinal differences that exist between the Nyingma and Gelugpa ideologies.

The Nyingma teaching of Dzogchen regards awareness (Tib., rig pa) as the innate self-cognizant foundation of both samsara and nirvana. Rig pa is the intrinsic, uncontrived nature of mind, which a Dzogchen master is capable of directly pointing out to his students. For the Nyingmapa, Dzogchen represents the very apogee of what the Buddha taught, whereas Tsongkhapa’s view of emptiness as just a negation of inherent existence, implying no transcendent reality, verges on nihilism.

For the Gelugpas, Dzogchen succumbs to the opposite extreme: that of delusively clinging to something permanent and self-existent as the basis of reality. They see Dzogchen as a return to the Hindu ideas that Buddhists resisted in India, and a residue of the Ch’an (Zen) doctrine of Hva-shang Mahayana, proscribed at the time of the early kings. Moreover, some Kagyu and Nyingma teachers of the Rime (“impartial”) revival movement in eastern Tibet in the nineteenth century even began to promote a synthesis between the forbidden Jonangpa philosophy and the practice of Dzogchen.

For the followers of Shugden this is not an obscure metaphysical disagreement, but a life-and-death struggle for truth in which the destiny of all sentient beings is at stake. The bodhisattva vow, taken by every Tibetan Buddhist, is a commitment to lead all beings to the end of anguish and the realization of buddhahood. Following Tsongkhapa, the Gelugpas maintain that the only way to achieve this is to understand non-conceptually that nothing whatsoever inherently exists. Any residue, however subtle, of an attachment to inherent existence works against the bodhisattva’s aim and perpetuates the very anguish he or she seeks to dispel.

I am left wondering what the Dalai Lama's position is regarding the disputes between the claims of Je Tsongkhapa and Gorampa...

Gorampa vs Tsongkhapa

Gorampa, a Sakya scholar, was a fierce critic of Tsongkhapa's philosophy and was a proponent of eliminating concepts to achieve an understanding of ultimate truth. As a result, his books were banned for sometime by the Gelugpa hierarchy in power in Tibet. With the ascendency of the Rime movement, his understanding of Nagarjuna has been assimilated into the other two schools (Nyimgma and Kagyu).

This is worth reading in it's entirety, although I believe it mischaracterises Tsongkahapa's view as being in disagreement with Chandrakirti that Buddha does not have concepts, there is also no mention of the fact that Tsongkhapa's method is intended to lead to a non-conceptual experience of ultimate truth:

Gorampa employs a fourfold negation known as the tetralemma (mtha’ bzhi) in order to refute all concepts in their entirety. Use of the tetralemma as a tool in Buddhist philosophy can be traced to Nāgārjuna's Mūlamadhyamakakārika, in which he famously remarks, “Neither from itself, nor from another, nor from both, nor without a cause, does anything, anywhere, ever, arise”.

Gorampa understands the tetralemma as a tool that one uses to analyze the ultimate truth. One uses logic and reasoning to arrive at a conceptual understanding of the nominal ultimate, and meditative practices allow one to reach a direct, nonconceptual realization of the actual ultimate truth. The logical reasoning involved in the fourfold negation is implemented by ordinary persons in order to understand what the ultimate truth is like, but logic alone is not sufficient to arrive at a direct realization of the actual ultimate.

Gorampa understands the tetralemma as a tool that one uses to analyze the ultimate truth. One uses logic and reasoning to arrive at a conceptual understanding of the nominal ultimate, and meditative practices allow one to reach a direct, nonconceptual realization of the actual ultimate truth. The logical reasoning involved in the fourfold negation is implemented by ordinary persons in order to understand what the ultimate truth is like, but logic alone is not sufficient to arrive at a direct realization of the actual ultimate.

This particular way of understanding the tetralemma is, again, at odds with the views of Tsongkhapa. Tsongkhapa contends that Gorampa's assertion that all concepts must be eliminated entirely amounts to nihilistic quietism. Tsongkhapa understands each of the four extremes of the tetralemma as being qualified according to the conventional or ultimate truths. According to him, existence is negated ultimately, while nonexistence is negated conventionally.

This debate between Gorampa and Tsongkhapa is based on each philosopher's understanding of the ways in which negation functions within the tetralemma. Tsongkhapa upholds the law of double negation elimination (dgag pa gnyis kyi rnal ma go ba), a logical law stating that the negation of a negation implies an affirmation. The negation of existence, therefore, implies the acceptance of nonexistence, while the negation of nonexistence implies the assertion of existence. Because of this, Tsongkhapa's understanding of the tetralemma involves a complex system of logical statements, each qualified according to one of the two truths. If one accepts double negation elimination, then it makes no sense for both existence and nonexistence to be negated, unless these negations are qualified in certain ways.

Gorampa, on the other hand, does not adhere to double negation in the context of the tetralemma. Instead, he understands the tetralemma as a succession of four negations that are applied to the four possible ways of conceiving of the status of the ultimate truth. Because the ultimate truth is nonconceptualizable, Gorampa contends that Tsongkhapa's understanding of the tetralemma is incomplete, because it doesn’t negate enough (literally, it underpervades [khyab chung ba]). While Tsongkhapa's model successfully refutes the extreme view of existence at the ultimate level, Gorampa argues that it does not eliminate all extreme views ultimately and in their entirety.

Tsongkhapa argues that a negation of all four extremes at the ultimate level contradicts logic, but Gorampa contends that an elimination of logic is specifically the tetralemma's purpose. By negating all possibilities for logical, conceptual thought, the only recourse is to abandon concepts completely. True freedom from conceptual constructs lies outside of the scope of conceptual thought, and is therefore inexpressible. Gorampa maintains, however, that because ordinary persons utilize conceptual thought, they necessarily construe the ultimate truth as an object of conceptual constructs (that is, they construe it as the nominal ultimate). As such, one must first use conceptual reasoning to refute each of the four extremes, but these concepts must eventually be abandoned.

In other words, because all four extremes are negated under the analysis of the tetralemma, Gorampa concludes that a correct realization of the ultimate truth must be something that is other than these conceptualizations of and dichotomizations into existence and nonexistence. As such, the ultimate truth cannot be described using these terms. And, since these are the only possible ways of speaking of or conceptualizing the status of the existence of things, once they are all negated, one is forced to conclude that the ultimate truth cannot be described linguistically or conceptually. The actual ultimate truth transcends the boundaries of language and conceptual thought. However, Gorampa still maintains that logic and analysis are essential in arriving at a state of nonconceptuality.

As I read this essay, I was struck by the following:

After one has successfully negated the first extreme, Gorampa concedes that a person's natural inclination is to assume that the negation of existence implies the assertion of nonexistence. If one were to stop his logical analysis at this point, Gorampa argues that one would adhere to a nihilist view; failure to correctly negate nonexistence can lead one to wrongly believe that nonexistence is ultimately real. In order to show that the acceptance of nonexistence is untenable, Gorampa argues that the concepts of existence and nonexistence depend upon each other; one makes no sense without the other. And, since the concept of existence has already been negated, it makes no sense to conceive of nonexistence independently.

Indeed this appears to be central to his disagreement with Tsongkhapa who maintains that the negation of an opposite is an affirming negative as explained later in the article thus the negation of existence affirms non-existence and vice-versa. Tsongkhapa doesn't leave his analysis there either arguing that the extreme of existence is eliminated by understanding emptiness and the extreme of non-existence is eliminated by understanding dependent relationship.

Generic Images

This post is my ramblings about approaches to meditation and the realisation of emptiness. Within the Tibetan Buddhist world there is a long standing debate (~500 years) about the use of conceptual minds to realise emptiness firstly with a conceptual mind realising emptiness through a generic image and then with a mental direct perceiver of emptiness through the "gradual wearing away" of said generic image. This use of generic images to realise emptiness is at the heart of Je Tsongkhapa's Gelugpa/Kadampa tradition. Sean Robsville explains in detail the use of generic images to understand objects and how they differ from Plato's ideal forms.

When Je Tsongkhapa broke away from the Sakya tradition this use of conceptual minds was at the core of the philosophical difference in the Gelug path; as illuminated in his debates with Gorampa.

For myself, the differences between Atiyoga practices and the gradualist path is something of a connundrum as I have an strong connection to Je Tsongkhapa's tradition but am also attracted to Atiyoga practices of technique-less meditation such as that taught by Adyashanti or to a lesser extent in Dzogchen.

One of the most thought provoking of the teachings I have been studying on STTP is the rejection of Atiyoga (or simultaneist or Hashang) meditation as a true path to realise the actual nature of reality as intended by the Buddha when he exhorted his followers to attain true cessations. The argument is that all one would be left with when one has abandoned conceptual thought is the conventional nature of the mind, empty of form and empty of conceptual thought, not empty of inherent existence which is the object we need to focus on to attain liberation and enlightenment according to Je Tsongkhapa.

I've discussed this with online sangha, and include the salient posts here:

[ME]: A question that has arisen from STTP study regarding meditation on the nature of the mind free from concepts. I'm struggling to see how this is an invalid approach to perceiving emptiness. Can anyone help? My understanding is that Self-Grasping is a conceptual mind, therefore, if it is stopped as part of this form of meditation, why wouldn't emptiness be perceived?

[SANGHA]: One thing that helped me was the short section in Universal Compassion on Close Placement of mindfulness of mind (p. 64). Then the difference between meditating on the emptiness of mind versus merely stopping the flow of conceptual thoughts became more clear.

[SANGHA]: Hi, I had some thoughts about this. In answer to your initial question: it is an invalid approach to perceiving emptiness, because such a mind does not perceive emptiness either conceptually or non-conceptually. It experiences only a lack of conceptual thought. Not a lack of inherent existence. Although during such a meditation self grasping and all conceptual thoughts temporarily cease, this is temporary, because this meditation does not directly oppose self grasping or its seeds,or the imprints of self grasping. Due to the imprints of self grasping, all phenomena will still continue to appear to be inherently existent (dual appearance) . Due to the seeds of self grasping remaining, the mind of self grasping will again arise. In his root text on the mahamudra the first Panchen Lama wrote: The mind that is free from conceptualisation, Is merely a level of conventional mind; It is not the mind's ultimate nature. Therefore seek instruction from qualified Masters. (CLofB p152) The mind that realises emptiness non-conceptually, is called a yogic direct perceiver. The way these non-conceptual minds are generated is quite unlike the way that other non-conceptual minds are generated: in short though, they do so in dependence upon a union of tranquil abiding and superior seeing, which in turn depend upon first meditating with an inferential cognizer and re-cognizers which are both conceptual minds. Finally just to add, I think that CLoB outline "Avoiding mistaking the introduction to the conventional nature of the mind for an introduction to the ultimate nature of the mind" (pg151 in my copy) directly deals with your point. x

[ME]: That's getting to the issue directly, and believe it or not I was reading that very section yesterday. I might have a block here, but this seems contradictory: "such a mind does not perceive emptiness either conceptually or non-conceptually. It experiences only a lack of conceptual thought. Not a lack of inherent existence. Although during such a meditation self grasping and all conceptual thoughts temporarily cease" - if self-grasping ceases and the mind is still aware surely emptiness is perceived...?

[SANGHA]: Self grasping conceives of inherent existence. When self grasping has a temporary cessation, inherently existent objects would not be conceived. However the issue here is what our mind ascertains and thereby realises. In the meditation you mention, when we perceive the mind directly what the mind ascertains is clarity and cognizing and it experiences a lack of conceptualisation (it does not 'look' at anything else). This mind can then, in fact should, ascertain firmly how the mind and its object lack or are empty of the previously misconceived inherent existence. But this would be done quite specifically, and in dependence upon initially understanding emptiness using reasons and an inferential cognizer (ie conceptually). x

[ME]: if what is perceived is the clarity and cognising of the mind and self grasping is not present one will be perceiving the ultimate nature of that clarity. But now I think I'm just repeating the same argument.

[ME]: Hang on, if the mere appearance of an object is perceived directly - the object lacking inherent existence, is meditating on that mere appearance not a true path? Or is it merely a conventional truth and therefore won't get you anywhere... So is what you are saying when you (and Geshela and Neil) say conventional nature of the mind in this context you mean these mediators are focused on the mere appearance of the mind as opposed to the lack of inherent existence of the mind. Is that right? I though we could conjoin our experience of things as mere appearance and our understanding of emptiness as a correct and effective path a'la tantra

[SANGHA]: Yes that is right, meditator is focused on the mere appearance of the mind as opposed to the lack of inherent existence of the mind. And yes again, we can then conjoin our experience of mere appearance and understanding of emptiness by understanding the 4 profundities. This is precisely the path of such a mahamudra meditator, but conjoing this meditation with meditation on emptiness is done quite deliberately and specifically as previously mentioned. The mahamudra meditator uses the conventional nature of the mind to attain tranquil abiding because it is an easier less subtle object with which to progress to tranquil abiding than the ultimate nature of the mind. However having done so it is then easier (in comparison to other objects of TA training) for such a meditator to proceed to realise emptiness, this is one of the main benefits of choosing this object as a object of tranquil abiding training. x

More to follow...