The Heart of Meditation: Discovering Innermost Awareness

by The Dalai Lama, Jeffrey Hopkins

Overview

His Holiness the Dalai Lama provides intimate details on an advanced meditation practice called Dzogchen using a visionary poem by the 19th-century saint Patrul Rinpoche, author of the Buddhist classic Words of My Perfect Teacher.

The Dalai Lama deftly connects how training the mind in compassion for other beings is directly related to—and in fact a prerequisite for—the very pinnacle of Buddhist meditation. He presents his understanding, confirmed again and again over millennia, that the cultivation of both compassion and wisdom is absolutely critical to progress in meditation and goes into great depth on how this can be accomplished.

While accessible to a beginner, he leads the reader in very fine detail on how to identify innermost awareness—who we really are—how to maintain contact with this awareness, and how to release oneself from the endless stream of our thoughts to let this awareness, always present, become consistently apparent.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781559394536
Publisher:	Shambhala
Publication date:	04/05/2016
Pages:	168
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 7.60(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

HIS HOLINESS THE FOURTEENTH DALAI LAMA is considered the foremost Buddhist leader of our time. The exiled head of the Tibetan people, he is a Nobel Peace Laureate, a Congressional Gold Medal recipient, and a remarkable teacher and scholar who has authored over one hundred books. JEFFREY HOPKINS is Founder and President of the UMA Institute for Tibetan Studies. He is Professor Emeritus of Tibetan Buddhist Studies at the University of Virginia, where he taught Tibetan Buddhist Studies and Tibetan language for thirty-two years from 1973. He served as His Holiness the Dalai Lama's chief interpreter into English on lecture tours for ten years, 1979-1989, and has translated and edited fifteen books from oral teachings by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. He has also published numerous translations of important Buddhist texts that represent the diversity of views found in Tibetan Buddhism.

Table of Contents

Foreword ix

Part 1 The Buddhist Path

1 My Focus 3

2 Empathy: The Basic Practice 10

3 Meditation: Channeling the Force of Mind 16

Identifying the Mind 20

Technique 22

4 Knowledge: The Purpose of Concentration 24

Begin with Yourself 27

Progress to Enlightenment 28

Qualities of Buddhahood 34

Part 2 Introduction to the Great Completeness

5 The Fundamental Principle Common to All Orders of Tibetan Buddhism 41

Innermost Awareness Pervades Every Type of Consciousness 43

Practicing the Path Right Now 44

6 The Innate Mind of Clear Light 46

No Exertion 46

The Centrality of the Mind of Clear Light 47

Types of Books 48

Part 3 Commentary on Patrul Rinpoche's Three Keys Penetrating the Core

7 The First Key: Introducing Innermost Awareness 53

Relax 54

Stop Thinking for a While 55

Shock 56

8 The Supreme Way to Rest 61

Levels of Consciousness 61

The Clear Light within All Consciousnesses 74

9 The All-Good Diamond Mind 77

Aiming Your Attention at Space 78

Identifying Innermost Awareness 78

10 The Second Key: Maintaining Meditation 81

No Danger 82

Clouds and Sky 83

Meeting of Mother and Child 84

The Clear Light of Death 85

Mother and Child Clear Lights in the Poem 87

Remaining in the Experience 88

Dealing with Interference 88

Inside Meditation and Outside Meditation Are Similar 89

Three Types of Release from Conceptions 91

11 The Gradual Way 93

The Danger 94

Coming to a Decision 95

12 The Third Key: Self-Release 97

The Space of Noninvolvement 98

Crucial Difference 101

Confidence 102

13 The Uniqueness of the Three Keys 104

Altruism 105

Greatness of the Path 105

The of View, Meditation, and Behavior 109

Final Lines of the Poem 115

Part 4 The Old and New Translation Schools Compared

14 Basic Structures in the Old Translation School of the Great Completeness 119

The Two Truths 119

Basis, Paths, and Fruits 123

A Special Meaning of "Meditation" 128

15 Advice 133

Appendix: Three Keys Penetrating the Core Dza Patrul Jigme Chokyi Wangpo 137

Selected Readings 141

Index 143

Editorial Reviews

"One of the greatest living teachers of Dzogchen, His Holiness the Dalai Lama, explains one of the most profound texts of this tradition (Patrul Rinpoche’s Three Keys), and the teaching is translated by one of America’s leading scholars, Jeffrey Hopkins. Does it get any better than this?" —José I. Cabezón, author of The Buddha's Doctrine and the Nine Vehicles

"Despite the alleged sectarianism of Tibetan Buddhism, there has been a long history of mutual influence and inspiration across the traditions. Over the course of the past four hundred years, one of the most famous has been the study and practice of Dzogchen by the lineage of the Dalai Lamas. It continues to the present day, as this volume eloquently attests." —Donald S. Lopez Jr., author of From Stone to Flesh: A Short History of the Buddha

From the Publisher