Rest In The Nature Of Present Moment And Be A Child Of The Illusion

In the session, I elaborate on what the great Meditation Master Atisha means when he says: "Self-liberate even the antidote; Rest in the nature of the present moment; Be a child of the illusion." This is part of Atisha's 7-Point Mind Training.

Be Well,
Dhyanse

Transcript

Namaste and a warm welcome to all of you in this daily live meditation session with me,

Dhyansa.

30 minutes today and every day.

If you put in these sessions,

Walk along with me towards silence and awareness.

It will bring you much needed inner peace,

Happiness and take your life slightly more towards its highest potential,

Towards more sanity,

Putting it more back in order.

In this series,

We are going through 7 points of mind training by Atisha,

Which is a part of the Tibetan Buddhism practice called Lojong.

It has 7 points.

I have previously discussed point 1,

Which is to have 4 reminders that life is precious,

Life is impermanent,

Every action,

Every thought counts and don't be obsessed with anything in life.

So that's point number 1.

We are on point number 2,

The pillar number 2,

Which is a path towards Bodhichitta,

Pure consciousness.

Let me once again read out the sutras to you and we'll then dive into it.

Atisha says,

Regard all phenomena as dreams,

Although experiences may seem solid,

They are passing memories.

Examine the nature of unborn awareness.

Self-liberate even the antidote.

Rest in the nature of Alaya,

The essence,

The present moment.

In post meditation,

Be a child of illusion.

We had discussed the first 2 components of it already,

Which is regarding the phenomena,

All phenomena as dreams,

Because they are all memory,

They are all past,

And we had also yesterday discussed the nature of unborn awareness.

Today I would like to focus slightly in depth into what is,

When Atisha says,

Self-liberate even the antidote.

Meditation is a journey towards self-liberation.

It is not another addiction that you have.

I have heard people when they see a particular technique working for them,

Then they continue remaining in that technique for a very long period of time and never dare to come out of it.

In meditation,

What that means is,

No matter which technique you are using for your meditation,

No matter how effective that technique is,

No matter how beautiful,

Wonderful the experience of that technique is,

Be it concentrating on breath,

Be it chanting a mantra,

Be it visualizing an image,

Be it any other form of meditation that you have been practicing over the last months,

Years and lifetimes,

Whatever you are doing for meditation,

You have to remember that there has to be a point when the technique has to be dropped as well.

Self-liberate even the antidote.

That is what Atisha says,

Which means even the technique has to be dropped.

Your practice has to be so natural that you move away from the technique to naturally falling into silence,

Being in the present moment,

Being aware without having to do anything about it,

Something for it,

Without having to make an effort towards it.

How does that happen?

It doesn't happen on its own.

Of course,

You need a technique to take you from where you are to a place where you can effortlessly settle into awareness and silence.

That journey is along with the technique,

But all throughout this journey,

Please remember that that also has to be dropped one day.

So don't attach,

Identify yourself to any technique that you are following,

Which is a part of any tradition that you are following in the context of meditation.

There is a slight interpretation of this as well in our daily life,

Also when it comes to how we treat ourselves even with medicine.

I would like to comment here,

Every therapy that we go through,

Every medication process that we go through,

If this is going in the direction where you are throughout your life dependent upon it,

Question it.

Maybe there is a better way.

Because a perfect therapy is which allows you to come out of the therapy as well,

To self liberate out of the therapy,

Out of the antidote as well.

So in whichever situation you are in life,

If you are under any kind of therapy,

Any kind of medication,

See that there is a journey towards self liberation out of the therapy as well,

Out of the medication,

Out of the antidote as well.

Moving on further to what Atisha says,

Rest in the nature of the present moment,

The essence.

What is this present moment which Atisha is talking about and which we have heavily used as a jargon in today's times?

We have completely forgotten what is the present moment.

Present moment is not an idea.

Present moment is not another thought.

Present moment is the journey from all what you are thinking,

All the time,

All the thoughts,

All the emotions,

All the contents of your mind to first of all become mindful of what's happening right now.

The sounds that you hear,

The voice that you hear,

What you see,

What you perceive,

You slowly coming out of the grip of your mind,

Of your thoughts to more raw perception,

What you feel,

What you sense in this very moment.

That journey is still half done.

We famously call this mindfulness,

But that's half the journey to settle only in your senses.

Then you have to move even away from the senses.

Being in the present moment is being even dis-identified,

Being at a distance from all what you sense,

From all the sounds,

The visuals,

The thoughts,

Everything,

All the contents of the physical world,

Of your mental world,

Of any kind of contents of your mind that has to be at a distance.

Only then you are in the present moment.

In that present moment,

Be at rest.

Settle in that present moment.

Be at rest in that present moment.

That present moment comes also on several occasions in your daily life when you are just sitting on a bench in the park or just looking at the sky,

Looking at the ocean,

Or any other moment where you are free of all your activities.

That present moment comes as well to you,

But that lasts very,

Very small in terms of time.

So what you have to do is learn to rest in it.

Learn to settle in the present moment.

We in today's meditation are going to practice that as well.

You are going to draw all your attention and awareness inwards,

Disidentify yourself from everything that is external,

Even your internal perceptions,

And just sit in the awareness in the present moment in silence.

Before we do that,

Moving on to the last point what Atisha makes for today.

In post meditation,

Be a child of illusion.

This is very interesting.

What does Atisha mean by post meditation,

Be a child of illusion?

We have these sessions every day,

30 minutes,

And after these 30 minutes of silence,

Of awareness,

You move back into the world,

Which stance do you take when you move back into the world?

When more awareness is arising in your consciousness,

When you are more settled,

You will start to see everything that is happening around you as somewhat of an illusion,

Because you will be disidentified with what is happening.

In that state,

How do you act?

In that state,

You don't conflict with the illusion.

You don't start going and talking to people as if it's an illusion and they don't understand that it is an illusion.

You don't start building any sort of conflict with the illusion,

Rather be a child of the illusion.

You play with the illusion.

That's what Atisha suggests us.

If we look at other traditions,

Other masters who have taught similar thoughts,

Similar ideas of how to deal with the world,

How to deal with the illusion of the world,

Osho has said,

Be in the world,

But not of it.

That means,

Very similar to what Atisha is saying,

Be a child of the illusion.

Be in the world and not of it.

With that,

I invite you to take this moment to move within.

Close your eyes.

Sit in a posture that is comfortable for you,

With your back upright.

Your hands on your lap or on your thighs.

Take a nice deep breath.

As a first step,

Allow your awareness to come to your sense perceptions,

To become mindful,

To move away from thoughts,

From the contents of your mind,

To what you perceive in this moment,

What you hear outside,

What you sense,

You smell.

The gentle touch of air on your skin.

What you see behind your closed eyes in this moment.

With that,

I welcome you to begin to camera contact with your burst of communication.

Sit,

Relax.

As you're more mindful,

Shift your awareness to your breath.

Observe the flow of your breath.

As you're more mindful,

Shift your awareness to your breath.

Awareness settles on your breath,

Build a focus on the gap after the exhalation,

Before the inhalation.

After every exhalation,

There is a gap.

Focus your attention on this gap.

This gap is the door to the present moment.

With every breath,

With every attention on the gap after exhalation,

Come more and more in the present moment.

Disidentified with everything at a distance.

This gap is the door to the present moment.

With every breath,

With every attention on the gap,

Come more and more in the present moment.

With every breath,

Take a distance from even the sense perceptions.

Move towards pure awareness by bringing the attention on the gap after exhalation,

Before inhalation.

This gap is the door to the present moment.

With every breath,

Take a distance from even the sense perceptions.

Remember what Atisha says,

Self liberate even the antidote.

Let go of the technique and rest in the nature of this present moment.

Lose all effort and simply remain silent and aware.

No more focus on the breath.

No more focus on the breath or anywhere in particular,

Rather awareness,

Pure awareness in silence.

No more focus on the breath.

No more focus on the breath.

No more focus on the breath.

Slowly awareness back to your body.

Feel the stillness that arises in your body.

Awareness to your breath.

Feel the stillness of your breath.

Awareness to your mind.

The centeredness,

The calmness of your mind.

And very gently and slowly you may open your eyes.

As you move back into the world,

Into your daily life,

Into your work,

Into your family today,

Remember what Atisha said.

While maintaining this silence,

This awareness that you have gathered over the last minutes,

Atisha says,

Be a child of the illusion.

Play with the illusion,

Remain at a distance from the illusion.

Zen master was one asked,

What did you do before enlightenment?

He said,

I chopped wood,

I drew water.

Then he was asked,

Okay,

What changed?

What did you do after enlightenment?

He said,

I chopped wood,

I drew water.

The act remains the same,

But how you move into those acts changes.

With that,

I wish you a very lovely day and I'll see you tomorrow.

Namaste.

Reviews

I am doing these meditations on Atisha’s 7 points of mind training daily. Thank you so much for creating these!

Letting go of even the technique of mediation... that's a new concept to me. Thank you and Atisha for these mind training teachings.

Another good one!
Thanks for taking the time.
You are one of the best teachers on this platform. I hope that you are not discouraged by the relative low number of followers compared to the quality of your output. You are having an impact.
Namaste!

These teachings validate the path of my practice. Encouraging and reassuring. Thank you, Dhyanse. I appreciate all of your efforts. 🙏❤️🌎

amazing insight I am very new to this kind of mindfulness/ practices but I found this so very helpful thanks ! x