Waking at 3 this morning, from an unsettling dream, I was unable to go back to sleep. I turned and twisted for an hour in bed, calculating in my head what it would cost to rent out Dharmagiri (for some reason), and chanting the Tara mantra, and … But to no avail. At 4 I got up, went downstairs made a cup of tea, and then sat down in the sofa, crosslegged and started listening to a talk on Padmasambhava by Padmavajra. And then it made sense, or began to make sense, why this unrest, why this worry. As my friend Sven said last night in the mitra group: ”When I wake up in the morning, I have this sense the problem is ’I’,” he said and contimued: ”I don’t often remember the details of my dreams but I have a clear feeling tone of what has happened.”
Unlike Sven I often remember my dreams, and sometimes wake from them, and sometimes only gradually does the feeling tone come through. So when later meditating this morning, I realised the problem is the ’I’ – not Sven’s, as we joked about last night, knowing we were all – each one of us – uniquely the problem. In other words, we were aware that it was our clinging to self, or defence of self or whatever, that truly is the problem.
So, what do you do? Well, there is no immediate answer, I assume. We need to sit with it, be with it, get to know it and then do all that we do in our Dharma practise. It is the cremation ground, the place where we meet our fear and our ’self’, all of us. So listening to the accomplished master speaker, Padmavajra, talk about the life and myth of Padmasambhava (Guru Rinpoche), is something to do as well.
And here I must express my gratitude to you, Padmavajra, for your ever engaging, clear and inspiring talks. I know you do enjoy giving talks – that is not your cremation ground, as you say – but you share so much and open the door to the Dharma for us, again and again. So, thank you, and thank you to your and my own precious Teacher, Urgyen Sangharakshita, who ignited you, me and so many of us.
If you wish to listen to these talks here is a list of the talks in chronological order (it’s a little difficult to get the order from www.freebuddhistaudio.com where you find them). You can click on the titles below, and off you go into a rich Dharma world and your inner experience.
”Life, myths and legends of Padmasambhava”
talks by Padmavajra, from the Winter retreat at Padmaloka 2009-10
1. The Waste Land and the Found Child
2. Exile In the Creamation Grounds
3. In the Castle of the Skull
4. Transforming the Gods
5. Mastering the Mother Eater
6. The Land of the Flesh Eaters
(The image is a print of Padmasambhava that Paul Riches made in the 1990’s.)
Thank-you so much for the rich reminder of the need to detach from the "I." It is at once a recognition of the "I" and also letting go of it at the same time. My sleep will be better tonight because your shared this post. Thank-you again.
I particularly enjoyed imagining you and your friend Sven laughing over a little philosophical interchange. So refreshing, as is your blog.