by David Michie
But another, more negative undertow was troubling Serena. “I suppose as an advanced meditator”—she bowed to Yogi Tarchin—“such training is very useful. But for someone like me …” It was as though she couldn’t bring herself to express her reservations.
Smiling, Yogi Tarchin leaned forward and touched her hand. “Which is better,” he asked, “a doctor or a first-aid worker?”
She looked surprised by the question.
“A doctor,” she answered immediately, and then hesitated. “But if someone just needed minor attention …”
“Both are useful,” he confirmed.
She was nodding.
“To train in first aid takes how long—a few days? But a medical doctor?”
“Seven years. Longer if they specialize,” Serena said.
“Is that not a waste of time? Seven years when instead they could be out helping people within days?”
There was a pause while Serena absorbed the real meaning of what he was saying.
“All these meditators,” he said, with a gesture that encompassed the Himalaya region and beyond. “Why are they not working for charity? This is how some people think. Much better they help distribute food and build shelter for the homeless instead of sitting on their bottoms all day.”
Serena chuckled at this reminder of Yogi Tarchin’s direct manner.
“Very good to help humans and animals with charity. This is useful, like first aid. But a permanent solution to suffering requires something different: transformation of the mind. To help others achieve that we must first remove what is obscuring our own mind. Then, like the doctor, our capacity to help is very much greater.”
“There are some who would say that this is all just talk,” Serena said. She seemed glad for the opportunity to discuss her reservations frankly. “They would say that consciousness is just the brain at work, so the idea of transformation over many lifetimes …”
Yogi Tarchin nodded, eyes twinkling. “Yes, yes. The superstition of materialism. But how can something give rise to a quality that it doesn’t possess?”
Serena’s brow furrowed. “I don’t follow.”
“Can a stone create music? Can a computer feel sadness?”
“No,” she acknowledged.
He nodded once. “Can flesh and blood produce consciousness?”
She reflected on this for a while. “If the brain doesn’t create consciousness,” she said, “why is it that if the brain is damaged then the mind is also affected?”
Yogi Tarchin smiled broadly and rocked back on his cushion for a moment. “Very good! Very good that you are questioning! Tell me, if your television set is damaged and you can’t see anything except a black screen, does it mean that there is no more television?”
As her smile grew, he didn’t wait for an answer. “Of course not! Of course, if your brain is damaged it affects the experience of consciousness. Perhaps consciousness cannot be experienced at all. But the brain is only like a receiver, a television set. It’s … unfortunate to confuse the two.
“If anyone ever says to you, ‘Ah, mind is just brain,’ then ask them, ‘Please tell me where memories are stored.’ They will have to admit to you, ‘We do not know.’ Despite many years of research and much money, scientists have never discovered where in the brain memories are stored. They never will because they are not stored physically! Scientists have done experiments on animals, destroying parts of the brain that they thought contained memory. But the animals could still remember. Neuroscientists, psychologists, philosophers—they all have their ideas about mind. But an idea is just an idea, just a concept. It isn’t the thing itself. If we want to know what mind really is, we must experience it firsthand. Directly.”
“In meditation?”
“Of course. Some people are frightened to do this. They worry that if they experience a mind free of thought, somehow they will cease to exist. They will disappear in a puff of smoke!” He smiled. “But thoughts are just thoughts. They arise, abide, and pass. When we are able to settle in pristine awareness, free from the thought that has just gone and the one that will arise, we can see our own mind for ourselves. We experience its qualities. Just because it’s hard to describe those qualities doesn’t mean that the mind doesn’t have any.”
Serena looked puzzled. “What do you mean?”
“Can you really describe the qualities of chocolate? You can say it is sweet and melts in the mouth and comes in different flavors, but these are just ideas—just concepts pointing to something that is not conceptual in nature. In the same way, we can describe the mind as boundless, radiant, serene, all knowing, loving, and compassionate in nature. But again”—he shrugged—“these are mere words. Verbal fiction.”
“I suppose most of us think of body and mind as just this,” Serena said, gesturing toward her physical form.
Yogi Tarchin nodded. “Yes. It is a tragic misunderstanding to have such self-limiting beliefs, to think that you are nothing but a bag of bones, rather than boundless consciousness; to believe that death is an ending, not a transition. Worst of all is not to realize how every action of body, speech, and mind affects your future experience of reality, even beyond this time and this life. Beliefs like these make people waste the opportunities of our very precious human life. Our minds are so much greater than this!”
“All-knowing?” Serena asked.
“We have that potential.”
“Clairvoyant?”
He shrugged. “Some make a big fuss of this. But clairvoyance arises naturally in an unobstructed mind.”
“What about dreams?”
“In a mind that is agitated, untrained, a dream is just a dream—unless you have the good fortune to have a teacher who can reach through this agitation.”
For a moment he stopped stroking me. I turned my head and looked up at him until he resumed.
“If you are a trained person, sleep offers an amazing opportunity. Knowing that you are dreaming when you’re dreaming enables you to control the dream. We can project our consciousness into different realms of experience.”
Yogi Tarchin reflected on the common theme underlying Serena’s questions before asking, “Why such questions about clairvoyance and dream states?”
She looked down at her hands, which were folded in her lap.
“I think, perhaps, there is something else?” he added.
I saw her cheeks color as she glanced at him briefly. “I guess …”
Yogi Tarchin remained silent and perfectly still. The only movement in the room was a silver ribbon of smoke curling lazily upward from a stick of incense burning in the window.
“I got back from Europe just a couple of months ago,” Serena began.
“Yes, yes,” he confirmed, as though well aware of this and urging her to continue.
“My plan was to come home just for a short break. But being here I’ve begun to question my reasons for wanting to return to Europe. I think it would be better, and I could be happier, if I stayed here.” She met his eye.
“Very good,” he said, seeming to affirm the decision.
“But I’m not sure. You see, I’m single. I don’t know if Dharamsala is the place. You don’t meet the kind of people here …”
“I see,” he said gently, after her words trailed off. A sparkle of mischief suddenly played across his face. “You want me to be a fortune-teller?”
Serena’s smile was rueful. Bringing her palms together at her heart she said, “You have qualities …”
“Such prostrating”—he wagged his forefinger—“is not necessary. What arises for you depends on your actions, on the karma and conditions you create.”
“Oh.” Her mouth fell. “I thought it was possible for you to see the lives of others.”
Yogi Tarchin responded to her disappointment. “You have no reason to worry,” he told her.
She looked at him beseechingly. “Do you see children in my future? I’m beginning to think of a very different way of life …”
&n
bsp; Her words hung suspended in the warmth of the afternoon before Yogi Tarchin told her simply, “You have created the causes for much happiness.”
Wordlessly, he communicated a profound sense that all would be well.
Serena sat back, her shoulders relaxing.
For a while their talk turned to how things were going at the Himalaya Book Café and Yogi Tarchin’s plans to remain in McLeod Ganj for several months and give teachings. Then the conversation came to a close. As Serena thanked Yogi Tarchin for their time together, he took her hands and thanked her, in turn, for reestablishing the connection.
I hopped off the yogi’s lap as Serena got up and followed her across the carpet. The light in the room was even more subdued now—the three panels of gold had turned to silver—but the room was alive with energy. Serena left with the feeling that, at some profound level, all was well and always would be.
Yogi Tarchin followed Serena to the door, then watched as we made our way down the corridor with me padding along behind Serena, my bushy gray tail held high. Serena was just about to turn the corner at the end when he called after her, “Perhaps you have already met him.”
She paused, turning around. “You mean, here in Dharamsala?”
He nodded. “I am thinking.”
Later, over the end-of-the-day hot chocolate, Serena told Sam, “I so wish everyone could meet Yogi Tarchin. Or someone like him.”
Bronnie was taking a class, so it was just the three of us and the dogs.
Serena had been describing her visit with Yogi Tarchin and their conversation. Not the bit about her romantic prospects, of course, but more of what he had been saying about the mind.
“It’s not just the explanations, the words,” she said. “It’s the sensation you have in his presence. This vibe. I can’t really describe it, but when you’re with him you feel qualitatively different.”
Sam was nodding.
“He’s living, breathing proof of what happens when we realize the potential of our minds,” Serena said, her eyes sparkling. “Everything is possible. It goes way beyond even stuff like clairvoyance and telepathy, which occur naturally with an unobstructed mind, Yogi Tarchin says.”
“Even ordinary minds are more capable of those sorts of things than most people believe,” Sam said.
Serena raised her eyebrows.
“Most people experience telepathy or precognition at some point but just think of them as chance events,” he continued. “Coincidence. Most scientists won’t even look at evidence for ESP because they believe it’s rubbish. Ironically, that’s quite an unscientific attitude, because most of them are denouncing the subject without even looking at the evidence.” He chuckled. “Interesting how through the ages, when people have shown mystical powers they’ve been either revered or reviled. A much more sensible reaction, you’d have thought, would be to wonder, how can I, too, develop those powers?”
“Exactly.”
“We’re innately wired for them.” Sam made the assertion with such confidence that Serena raised an eyebrow. Putting down his mug, he stood up and walked to one of the shelves, then pulled out a book and returned with it.
“There are tons of research studies in here, proper clinical trials done by scientists who are prepared to investigate things objectively. They show that the so-called paranormal is actually normal. One experiment I like, which has been replicated a number of times, hooks up people to a lie detector as they look at a sequence of images on a computer, either emotionally calm ones like landscapes or shocking ones like corpses cut open for autopsies. A computer randomly selects the images, so that no one, not even the researchers, knows whether the next image will be a calm one or a shocking one. What do you think happens?”
“The needle goes wild every time people are shown a shocking image?”
He shook his head. “Three seconds before they’re shown a shocking image. Before the computer has even made the selection. It’s precognition. And these are just ordinary people being tested.”
Serena sat back in her chair with a smile. Having finished my milk, I took the available lap as an invitation.
“The mind isn’t just a computer made of meat,” said Sam.
“And we’re not just human beings capable of spiritual experiences,” added Serena, “but also spiritual beings capable of human experiences.”
Kneading her legs, I extended my claws through her clothes for just a moment.
She winced before adding, “Or feline experiences.”
“Naturally,” deadpanned Sam.
That night as I curled up on the bed I usually shared with the Dalai Lama, I contemplated the extraordinary insights into the mind revealed by Yogi Tarchin. And I realized that true happiness is only possible with a panoramic understanding of mind. A limited, bag-of-bones view, as he put it, could only ever yield limited happiness—passing sensory pleasures, temporary contentment, experiences that blaze for a few glorious moments before dying away. But the feeling of profound well-being in people like Yogi Tarchin and His Holiness was so strong you could actually feel it. And it had nothing to do with temporary pleasures: Yogi Tarchin hadn’t had any of those for 12 years! No, this feeling was oceanic, enduring, profound—happiness of a very different order.
There is an air of impending danger when His Holiness returns to the room. He is young, in his mid-20s. Accompanying him is an older Tibetan lady with a kind but fearless face. Her brocade shawl is gathered at the neck with a turquoise clasp. She carries herself like a queen.
Following the two are a number of attendant monks, moving urgently about the room. They gather up papers, pack personal items into cases, roll up the intricately woven rugs. I recognize one of them as a very young Geshe Wangpo. They are in a great hurry.
Lying on the sill, I have been looking out of the window of the Potala Palace, across Lhasa to where mountains rise on the other side of the valley. As the Dalai Lama enters the room I lift my head to watch.
Feeling a slight itchiness, I raise my right rear leg reflexively and scratch myself several times. Looking down I see that my leg is short and covered in course, shaggy fur. My tail is also short, with a plume of woolly hair. Instead of retractable claws, my nails are wide and blunt. His Holiness comes over and picks me up. “This is the day we have all feared,” he whispers softly in my ear. “The Red Army is invading Tibet. The decision has been made, and I must leave Lhasa as soon as possible. My advance party can’t carry you with us through the mountains. It wouldn’t be fair to anyone. But Khandro-la will take the very best care of you here in Tibet. She will look after you, as if you were me.”
Now I know why the lady with the turquoise clasp has come. There is a moment of intense heartache. Is it emanating from the Dalai Lama or from me?
Turning away, so that it’s just the two of us looking out the window and down the valley, His Holiness whispers, “I don’t know how long I will have to be away. But I promise I will find you again, my little one.” There is a pause before he continues, “Even if not in this lifetime, then definitely in a future one.”
As this is happening, I know my dream is a dream.
Only it isn’t. I am also being allowed a brief, unobstructed glimpse into my past.
As a dog …
CHAPTER SEVEN
ME?!?!
I won’t pretend, dear reader, to have been anything but astounded by the dream. However, after the meeting with Yogi Tarchin I had no doubt about the truth of what I had seen. For a few extraordinary moments, I had been able to tune in to a previous experience of consciousness.
Then it was gone.
Waking up early the next morning, I remembered Yogi Tarchin talking about “the good fortune to have a teacher who can reach through this agitation.” And I knew that wherever in the world the Dalai Lama happened to be, the dream had been a gift. An affirmation of the bond that drew me to him—a bond, I was startled to discover, that reached back to a previous lifetime.
Perhaps I should not be so amazed. Was i
t not conventional Buddhist teaching that the law of cause and effect, or karma, spans many lifetimes? The reason why good things happen to bad beings and bad things to good beings doesn’t necessarily arise from causes they have created in this particular lifetime. As I had just experienced, only the flimsiest of veils prevents us from reviewing, with perfect clarity, previous moments of consciousness. And what was the passage of a few decades in the context of beginningless time but a momentary leap from one place to another? Nevertheless, the dream opened the door to possibilities I had never considered, such as who I had been in previous lifetimes.
And what!
A Lhasa Apso in 1959, it seems, when the Dalai Lama was forced into exile.
The idea that I had been a dog was deeply disconcerting. It certainly put into perspective my woes about the fact that my impeccable Himalayan breeding was undocumented. Bloodlines, pedigree, and so forth suddenly paled in significance compared to the much more important matter of where my consciousness had been, what it had experienced, and what it had done, the effects of which I was experiencing in the here and now. As much as I, like other felines, see our species as altogether superior to canines, one thing I cannot deny is that dogs have consciousness. Like cats and humans they fall into the category of sem chens, Tibetan for mind-havers.
In the curious way that a number of seemingly unrelated events can sometimes occur around the same time in your life, pointing you toward a single, unmistakable truth, within days of the dream I was eavesdropping on the most intriguing conversation down at the Himalaya Book Café. The person leading the conversation wasn’t one of Sam’s book-club speakers, although he was as well-known as the best of them. A biologist from one of Britain’s top universities, he was a research fellow whose studies of memory and consciousness had been published in books that were bestsellers worldwide. Visiting McLeod Ganj he just happened to walk past the café. It was 10 A.M., and he decided he was in the mood for a cup of coffee. Stepping inside, he couldn’t avoid a large poster of himself above an even larger stack of his latest book. Wearing precisely the same tweed jacket, forest-green shirt, and corduroy trousers as in the photo, he paused to stare at it and then realized that behind the counter, Sam was looking from the poster to him and back again.