The Tantric Path of Indestructible Wakefulness

by Chogyam Trungpa

  The expansiveness of the apparent phenomenal world means that the world is seen as full of details and characteristics, as complete and incomplete at the same time. Expansiveness means that there are lots of things happening. But that expansiveness has to be cut through. You cannot be constantly overwhelmed by the expansiveness, and you cannot make it a permanent home. The expansiveness has to be reviewed piece by piece. That is where the profundity or ultimate töndam principle comes in. So this yana is definitely more the output of töndam than kündzop. The existence of kündzop is provided by the other yanas in any case.

  Seeing the wide range of things experienced in ordinary life from the absolute or meditative point of view is said to be a profound view. This is the most auspicious way to look at the phenomenal world, more so than in the previous yanas. It is profound because you are seeing through those expansive visions and experiences of apparent phenomena by means of shunyata colored with mahasukha, or great joy. Ultimate truth is associated with joy because there is nothing other than joy, even no joy is no other than joy; therefore, it is so joyful.

  By seeing the workings of phenomena much more clearly, you also develop a greater sense of humor. In tantra, humor becomes less self-conscious, because you have a sense of power, control, and openness. You are free from doctrine and more interested in experience, so your humor becomes heightened.

  THE PRINCE OF MAHASUKHA: SELF-EXISTING BLISS

  Yogayana is referred to as the embodiment of a great prince. This embodiment does not refer to tathagatagarbha, but to self-existing bliss or joy. Joy exists on this path because the dichotomy between physical or external practice and internal practice has been solved. There is complete union, complete oneness. At the same time, there is both wideness and deepness, breadth and depth. In this particular practice, breadth is connected with kündzop, and depth with töndam—and kündzop and töndam are indivisible. There is an emphasis on physical activities, rituals, and external things, and at the same time, there is enormous looking inward. Both are equally respected.

  In yogayana, the great sun of mahasukha is unfolding, and there is a feeling of confidence and the potential of crazy wisdom. There is an appreciation of the prince of mahasukha, based on the clear seeing of the phenomenal world outside as potential mahamudra experience—or complete mahamudra experience, in certain cases. You have glimpses of openness and glimpses of lost awareness, which alternate naturally, since you are still a practitioner journeying through the path. Those kinds of alternations are not regarded as contradictory to the idea of oneness and unity. They are just casual experiences.

  The real unity is when you have a glimpse of joy, appreciation, and accomplishment. At that point, pride becomes important. With vajra pride, you know that there is no need for reassurance. At the same time, that needlessness of reassurance is a source of humility, because you do not have to confirm yourself anymore. It is all a state of being. So vajra pride is very close to the notion of confidence.

  BECOMING ONE WITH THE PHENOMENAL WORLD

  The instruction given in the texts on how to become one with the phenomenal world, as well as one with oneself, is through visualization practice. It is by realizing that the self-visualization, in which you visualize yourself as the deity, and the front visualization, in which you visualize the deity in front of you, are indivisible, but at the same time they are separate. You realize that oneness and separateness could coexist at the same time, which is enormous training. Basically, you will be overwhelmed by the phenomenal world until you begin to realize that the self-visualization and the front visualization are one; they are just mirror reflections.

  In sadhana practice, you send out offering goddesses from your heart, which means from the deity’s heart as well. So you are offering and offered to at the same time. You have a dual relationship going on, and because it is dualistic activity, oneness is always there. It is like reflecting sunlight back to the sun by way of a mirror so that the sun knows how brilliant it is.

  BUDDHA FAMILIES

  In yogayana, there are five main buddha-families, which are further divided into twenty-five lesser families.

  Main Families

  The five buddha-families in yogayana are: buddha, vajra, ratna, dharma, and karma. The dharma family is law-abiding and willing to keep samaya. It is similar to the padma family, but it is not quite the same as the padma family in regard to passion. Yogayana does not talk too much about passion, and it does not deal very much with the spicy aspects of the emotions. For that matter, yogayana has nothing to do with anger, either. It is just trying to set the ground. It is almost like first introducing yourself to society: once you have introduced yourself and made friends with people, you can combat them or make love to them. But yogayana is just the level of shaking hands with people. You may be having tea, but you have not had cocktails yet.

  Lesser Families

  Each main family is divided into five lesser families. For instance, buddha has five lesser families: lesser buddha, lesser vajra, lesser ratna, lesser dharma, and lesser karma. So each of the five families is divided into five parts, which makes twenty-five families altogether.

  The idea of lesser families is very close to the idea of the exit family, which is a kind of psychological shift.1 A person’s basic family is supposed to be fixed, unlike the exit family, which is temperamental. For instance, although your basic family may be the buddha family, you might have a slight inclination toward sharpness or seductiveness or enrichment or industriousness. According to the yogayana, those slight inclinations mean that you belong to a lesser family or subfamily, as well as to a basic family.

  Family Characteristics

  Each of those twenty-five families can also be looked at in four ways. You can look at them according to: essence; mudra, or manifestation; guhyamantra, or secret mantra; and vidyamantra, or magical power.

  The combination of basic family, lesser family, and these four categories makes one hundred families—five times five times four—and there are actually deities related with each family. But all these families are based on the five basic families.

  A family can be seen from the point of view of its essence. It can be seen in terms of its expression or manifestation, or mudra. It can be seen from the point of view of the realization of its inner nature or hard-core characteristics, or guhyamantra. And finally, a family can be seen in terms of its application, its power over others or magical aspects, or vidyamantra.

  You may belong to the buddha family, have a ratna inclination, and be mudra oriented, with a very expressive type of personality. You might belong to the buddha family, be ratna inclined, and be essence oriented, with a sense of seriousness, personal involvement, and exploration. With guhyamantra, you have intuitive knowledge; you are experiencing the texture of the phenomenal world very intuitively. So you could say that if you belong to the vajra basic family, and have a vajra subfamily, and belong to the guhyamantra division, a triple vajra is happening.

  The vidyamantra division is largely based on magic. You are able to change things miraculously into whichever level or element you like. If you belong to the ratna family, and you have a ratna subfamily, and you also belong to the vidyamantra family, you can expand your ratna-ness. You can negotiate with somebody, and convince them or hypnotize them into what you want to achieve. You can overpower them immensely, so you are a triple ratna. You might say this is like being a triple Taurus.

  In the early stages, before this further elaboration of the five buddha-families takes place, you have the potentiality of all of them. The five-buddha-family principle continues all the way to the atiyoga level, but this is the first time that these categories of minute families have been described.

  THE MANDALA OF VAJRADHATU

  In yogayana, the phenomenal world is seen in terms of simplicity and self-luminosity. The wisdom of that particular vision brings what is called the mandala of vajradhatu, or the mandala of the indestructible realm. With that, students have a quality of clari
ty that goes beyond purity, but with the help of purity. So purity is still part of the involvement of the student of yoga yana.

  Yogayana stresses both utpattikrama and sampannakrama, the creation and completion stages. In this yana, you are just about to relate with an internal atomic bomb. Your attitude toward practice has become simplicity. Töndam has been seen as your basic nature, and kündzop has been seen as vajradhatu. Therefore, individual uncertainty and individual commitment are taking place within you at the same time—and the internal space created by that combination is a potential atomic bomb.

  At this point, the definition of the vajradhatu mandala is that the phenomenal world is seen as very simple, direct, and ordinary, and at the same time, highly sacred. That sacredness comes from experiencing the phenomenal world in its precision and directness. If you turn on the tap, depending on which way you turn it, either hot water or cold water will come out. If you step on dog shit, that is going to have its own definite consequence. If you sneeze, that is going to have its own consequence. If you insult your vajra master, that will also have its own consequence.

  Vajradhatu is based on seeing the automatic reactions that take place in ordinary situations. And with vajradhatu, self-made explosiveness is taking place all the time. Because kündzop is seen very simply, it gives direct feedback. This brings a feeling of sacredness, much as the idea of purity does in kriyayoga. It is because of seeing that directness as sacred that you have an attitude toward the deities as being neither good nor bad. The deities are seen as having the same beauty that you might see in a Coca-Cola bottle, as opposed to reserving the feeling of beauty for sacred objects. Both deities and ordinary objects are seen as the same sort of phenomenal experience. That realization of the directness and simplicity of the world is very immediate and personal. You can’t miss the point—and when you are missing the point, the point is still there. Even though you think you are missing it intellectually, it is still there always.

  1. Trungpa Rinpoche introduced the idea of exit family in order to indicate the style in which one might exit or get out of tight situations. The exit family is shiftier and manifests on a more superficial level than the primary buddha-family, which is more deep-rooted. The exit family can serve as a way of disguising or covering over one’s more fundamental buddha-family style, or simply be an adornment to a more basic pattern.

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  Yogayana: Empowerments and Practice

  It is very important to understand that visualization practice is quite different from imagining an image. Simply picturing a deity sitting on your head or imagining deities in front of you as mental images is completely different from visualization practice. Visualization is the sensation of being positively haunted.

  YOGAYANA EMPOWERMENTS

  In yogayana, abhishekas are connected with the ideas of depth and breadth that we discussed. The breadth of relative truth brings confidence in relative truth as an object of pleasure, and the depth of absolute truth is that there is self-existing joy or bliss within you. So you have two forms of entertainment: you are entertained by your basic being, and you are also entertained by the devas and devis and by the phenomenal world. Such entertainment, as well as your approach to your guru and to abhisheka, is something that you expect. It is not that you are looking for help.

  Yogayana is very simple. You are beginning to get a sense of the energy or potentiality of anuttarayoga. You are developing generosity, spaciousness, and a greater sense of craziness—much more craziness than in the previous yana. There is a more daring quality in the way you relate with the deities and handle your experience of the phenomenal world. The phenomenal world is seen as the expression of various deities. Therefore, there is no difficulty experiencing its profundity and expansiveness. The whole process becomes very easy and natural, and the experience of union is no problem. You could almost say that it is taken for granted.

  Three Tests

  In a yogayana abhisheka, you go through three basic tests to determine your buddha-family. The first test uses a stick from a neem tree, the Indian tree that is used for cleaning one’s teeth. This stick is carved in a certain way so that it has a point and a base, and you attach flowers to the top. You throw that particular stick onto the mandala. The second test is again throwing that flower-stick onto the mandala, and the third test is throwing it once again. So there are three times when you throw flowers. The first time you throw the flower you are blindfolded, and the second and third times your blindfold has been removed.

  Those three tests should uncover your buddha-family from among the one hundred family possibilities. With the first flower you disclose your major family; with the second flower, you disclose your lesser family; and with the third flower you uncover your family characteristic. So the whole process has been worked out.

  Five Abhishekas: Relative Truth

  The first five abhishekas that are received in yogayana are very similar to those of the previous yana, upayoga. We could say that they are connected with the wideness of relative truth. That is to say, the water, crown, vajra scepter, bell, and name abhishekas are expressions of understanding relative truth completely. You are finally being enthroned as a prince or princess, and greater fearlessness begins to develop.

  Six Additional Abhishekas: Absolute Truth

  After the first five abhishekas, there are six more abhishekas, which are connected with the quality of depth, or absolute truth. These abhishekas are a further confirmation, and altogether they are called vajra master abhishekas.

  IRREVERSIBLE ABHISHEKA. The sixth abhisheka is called the irreversible abhisheka. In this abhisheka, the teacher promises you that from this time onward, your journey is completely irreversible. You do not have to depend on purity or the introverted practice of meditation—you don’t need those things. By revealing yourself to yourself, you begin to feel a tendency to be filled with joy, to be filled with bliss completely. A quality of conviction begins to develop. The guru encourages this by offering the irreversible abhisheka first. In doing so, the guru does not use any ritual objects; but this abhisheka is presented to you by words.

  SECRET ABHISHEKA. The seventh abhisheka is the secret abhisheka, which is connected with the practice of karmamudra. In karmamudra, the experience of sexual passion is transmuted into your basic being. So your basic being is a form of orgasm, rather than needing to have a physical orgasm as a way of manufacturing joy or bliss.

  AUTHORIZATION. The eighth abhisheka is called authorization. In this abhisheka, you are given power to impart to others the abhishekas that you have received. This is a very special characteristic of yogayana. From this time onward, you yourself become a guru. You have the power to impart to others the fundamental bliss within yourself.

  FINAL CONFIRMATION. The ninth abhisheka is called final confirmation or prophecy. Having removed all doubts, the final confirmation is that you do not have to hide any secret fears. You could communicate those fears to your guru. Although yogayana encourages unity, there may still be a faint fear of separateness due to ignorance and confusion. You may feel that you might be excluded in some way. So in order to confirm you, in order to tell you that you are a child of the tathagatas, a child of the herukas, you need to acknowledge your unity with the phenomenal world and your own buddha nature.

  ENCOURAGEMENT. The tenth abhisheka is encouragement. The idea is that confirmation is encouraging. It is a very polite way of cutting through, presented as hospitality, rather than cutting.

  PRAISE. The eleventh and final abhisheka is called praise. In this abhisheka, the guru appears in the form of the nirmanakaya buddha, as the bhikshu Gautama Buddha, and proclaims your future buddha name, saying that when you attain enlightenment and become a buddha, you will be known as “Buddha Such and Such,” and you will teach at a certain time and in a certain place. The praise abhisheka is based on the idea of going deeper and deeper into the absolute truth, and acknowledging the depth of the essence of joy or pleasure. The reference to power and pleasure
is one of the important points of this tantra.

  YOGAYANA PRACTICE

  Having received the yogayana abhishekas, the student continues with two types of practice: tsen-che, or visualization practice, and tsen-me, or formless practice.

  Visualization Practice

  FOUR STEPS OF VISUALIZATION PRACTICE. In yogayana, visualization practice has four steps: visualization yoga, complete yoga, all-inclusive yoga, and supreme yoga.

  Visualization yoga. The first step is called visualization yoga. In yogayana visualization, you visualize the deity as almost equal to you, as more of a friend. In fact, you look down on the deity slightly as being part of your extension in the relative world, rather than looking up to the deity as a highly divine being.

  Complete yoga. The second yoga is called complete yoga. In this step, the jnanasattva is embodied in your being. There are two different approaches to embodiment: embodiment as though you had been impregnated, or embodiment as snow falling on a lake. In this case, the embodiment is that of snow falling on a lake. You become completely one with the jnanasattva, rather than being impregnated or heightened by the embodiment of your jnanasattva, which is a form of vajra pride.

  All-inclusive yoga. The third step is called all-inclusive yoga. In this yoga, animate and inanimate objects are seen as the realm of the deity. It is a form of meditation in action, but you are still very much conscious of the deity, which is why this yoga is part of tsen-che, or visualization practice.