An explanation given by Steven Landsberg on Saturday, February 27, 2021, before the Worldwide Guruyoga practice that took place the following morning.
On three occasions during the year Chögyal Namkhai Norbu would do a special collective practice connected with direct transmission and introduction. On two of those days the practices were connected with Padmasambhava and on one of them with the anniversary of Guru Garab Dorje. On all three occasions Rinpoche would give the transmission or direct introduction to the nature of mind.
It is very likely that Rinpoche’s students still feel his presence while being in the state of contemplation especially when they are doing practice alone or together.
Although Rinpoche is not here physically with us, we still have the possibility to experience his presence as well as the presence of all the masters while engaging in this Guruyoga of Garab Dorje and relaxing in the state of contemplation.
This practice is always associated with direct introduction. But what do we mean by “introduction”? Generally, when we use that term we are referring to introducing ourselves with our names, our identities, our profession, or our position. For example, I am so and so, I am a teacher, I am an artist, I am a musician, I am a writer or farmer or whatever. But what is being introduced here has nothing to do with any kind of identity; who we are in terms of our history, and where we come from is not relevant because all of those classifications and all of our attachment to those associations are the source of our suffering, our grasping, our acceptance and rejection. Even the Buddhist sutra indicates that we are neither the body, nor sensation, nor mind and all its labeling, nor any aspect of consciousness.
Introduction to our real nature refers to who we really are and not to who we seem to be based on historical or psychological conditioning. Who we really are has nothing to do with our religious or spiritual affiliation, with our meditation practices, our visualizations, or any kind of focused fabrication. It is related to our primordial condition, which means a condition that is neither born nor dies, a condition that we cannot lose and that always remains pure regardless of temporary changes occurring in time. Therefore it is not a result such as the result of doing meditation or following a path.
It is quite normal that we may ask how we can know this condition as it is beyond investigation, logical analysis, or observation. It has never been and never will be an object of consciousness. And although we cannot know it in this way, we can never be without it. It is not something that, for example, appears when we are in a calm state and disappears when we are agitated.
In any case, since we cannot know it as an object, it must be introduced to us or pointed out to us, and the one who introduces us to that condition we call the “root teacher”. He or she must have knowledge of the base or primordial potentiality of the individual. Furthermore, he must know the path, the view which recognizes the ultimate condition, the path which leads to that total recognition, and the behavior which integrates all vision and circumstances into that state. It is not enough just to have some intellectual knowledge of the view, some meditational experiences, and some experience of one’s instant presence. That knowledge and experience has to shine through all circumstances in all of our relative vision. If we just have some experience but we don’t know well how to bridge that to our relative condition, then we don’t have the qualification to give this introduction.
A qualified master points it out to us through a particular experience, and somehow reflexively, rather than actively, we intuitively recognize that condition through a non-conceptual presence that neither looks forward nor backward, but arises instantly in the immediacy of every moment. This presence is not limited by any partiality, focus, or boundary. It is totally open on all sides and does not seek to establish anything. At the same time it is totally bright and luminous. There is a natural radiant glow to this unborn condition. And furthermore, it accommodates all our relative experience without exception as integrated enlightened possibilities. Our relative experience manifests as the energy of this instant presence. All objects of the senses as well as their consciousnesses, all of our experience is integrated and comes back or returns to its original source.
This introduction was communicated to us when our Rinpoche was with us. Now although he is no longer physically manifesting himself, somehow we still feel his presence especially when we are practicing together. Now that we are doing the practice perhaps because we have had that experience of being in that state with Rinpoche, we can refresh ourselves through this practice together. For those new people perhaps through your interest and devotion and the secondary cause of practicing all together you can also have some kind of experience.
