Students who have received over the course of years rather short and pithy introductions to the nature of mind, and introductions to how to look at the mind, will find in this extraordinary set of instructions systematic and comprehensive approaches to ascertaining the mind’s true nature, to checking one’s experience, and to refining and extending one’s insight.

In order to make use of these instructions – in order for these instructions to become something other than a passing academic curiosity – one must first develop the experience of Shamatha or tranquillity meditation.

If one can rest undistractedly in an awareness of the present moment, then the Vipashyana instructions contained here, when accompanied by the appropriate direct transmission, will not only be of great interest and great benefit but can become the one sufficient path that will lead the practitioner to the understanding, direct experience, and full realization of selflessness; the emptiness of phenomena, and the emptiness of consciousness. If one is still having difficulty resting undistractedly in an awareness of the present moment, one needs to practice Shamatha until one can. If one has difficulty practicing Shamatha in the rather formless way of not following after thoughts of the past or inviting thoughts about the future, then one should practice Shamatha with a support. The most common support, as Rinpoche mentions, is to follow the breath. Five additional supports for the practice of Shamatha are mentioned in this text.
If one is still having difficulty achieving the experience of Shamatha, then one needs to practice Ngondro to remove karmic obstacles to meditation; to create openness, surrender to the teachings, and proper motivation; to accumulate virtue and positive spiritual energy; and to induce the merging of one’s own mind with the enlightened aspect of the guru’s mind, thereby drawing into one’s mental continuum the blessings of the enlightened state transmitted by the root and lineage gurus.

If one is having difficulty in motivating oneself to practice, one needs to think long and hard about the fundamental truths of samsaric existence as embodied in the “four thoughts that turn the mind to dharma.” These are presented here but if one requires greater detail one can find them in all books that give a systematic presentation of the path, such as Gampopa’s Jewel Ornament of Liberation or Jamgon Kongtrul’s Torch of Certainty. In particular, one needs to evaluate and reevaluate one’s own personal samsaric agendas in light of their inevitable consequences as illuminated by these teachings. Just as bodhicitta is the heart of dharma, these four thoughts that turn the mind to dharma are the adrenaline.

If one finds oneself so emotionally conflicted that one dislikes meditation or dislikes what one sees when one meditates, one needs to adopt a policy of meditating at first only for very short periods of time – thirty seconds, forty-five seconds, two minutes, five minutes – and one needs to evaluate one’s conduct and one’s relationship with others in light of the seven points of mind training as presented, for example, in Jamgon Kongtrul’s Great Path to Awakening, and in light of the teachings of Shantideva’s Bodhisattvacharyavatara, sometimes rendered Bodhicharyavatara, in English, A Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life or The Way of the Bodhisattva.

The teachings of Mahamudra are the essence of all the Buddha’s teachings. Together with the teachings of Dzogchen they comprise what is known as the path of liberation. Traditionally these teachings are practiced in tandem with deity meditation and the various tantric yogas which comprise the stages of creation and completion of the path of means, the path of method. This was not overly difficult to do in the highly spacious and open conditions of Tibet and other Himalayan countries. But in the very busy, highly stimulated, and stressful conditions of Western life it is often difficult to find the time, the opportunity, the motivation and even the willingness to practice the path of method. Practiced without the proper foundation and preparation in Shamatha and Vipashyana, without proper motivation and training in the practice of bodhicitta, without a substantial accumulation of merit and wisdom, and outside of an appropriate environment, some of the advanced practices of the completion stage can actually lead to even greater stress and, as it states clearly in tantric literature, can endanger one’s health and sanity.

But the teachings of Mahamudra are much gentler, and their practice leads to further and further relaxation and openness, to the gradual resolution and elimination of all personal mental and emotional problems, to increasing mental clarity and intelligence, and to the general wellbeing and uplifting of sentient existence – and one can still get enlightened practicing them.

I would like to point out that, since Vajrayana regards the enlightened state as the path and not simply as the goal, for these teachings to be truly effective one must receive or have received some introduction to the nature of mind from the tantric tradition, whether that occurs or has occurred in a totally informal situation, in a teaching on Mahamudra, or in a tantric ritual such as an empowerment. And it is important that such an introduction be received in the very presence of the lama.

– Lama Tashi Namgyal