Discovering Ourselves Through Fully Resting

An Excerpt from Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche's New Book A-tri Dzogchen

This excerpt from Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche's newest book, A-tri Dzogchen: Teachings from the Bon Tradition on Recognizing the Nature of Mind, is from a session called Concentration Without Attributes.

This session is very much about discovering ourselves through fully resting. This second part of concentration practice is abiding in awareness without relying on attributes, without the external support used in the earlier stages. Here, we just rest and abide. One needs to rest in order to self-realize, to realize the nature of mind. Resting doesn't necessarily mean not doing, saying, or thinking anything. When we are resting, doing, saying, or thinking something can give us more energy because it results from resting. Then our movements happen because of stillness, speech comes out of the silence, and thoughts come out of spaciousness. When we are resting they are manifestations of that state. . . .

We are aware of our body and our field of energy or breath. Remaining fully aware of our breath, we breathe deeply. Our mind abides in the present, in the here and now, connected to our breath, to our body.

This is equipoise, abiding. The mind does not hold on to anything. It rests. The breath is resting, the mind is resting, yet we are fully aware and connected. The mind does not grasp anything but perceives everything. It lets go of everything but is effortlessly connected with everything.

Doing nothing does not necessarily mean that we are resting. When we are really resting, we know how it feels. Fifteen or twenty minutes of good rest makes us immediately feel fresh and clear. It's about allowing ourselves to rest fully. Then maybe we can have a little bit more trust in this moment, in this situation, with a sense that whatever comes is meant to be, and I'm open to it.

We just rest without someone who is resting. It's like meditating without a meditator. Meditation is happening in itself, by itself. When someone is trying to rest, when energy in their body is trying to rest, then resting is not happening by itself. When someone is trying to control the breath while trying to rest, then it's not happening by itself. When someone is trying to control the mind to make it rest, then it's not happening by itself. When it is natural, no one is doing it, no one is trying to rest. We simply experience restfulness. That is the meditation.

We rest fully and we are comfortable, aware, alert, with a sense of freshness, without expectations, without effort, resting within. Whatever arises, we do not grasp it, we just allow ourselves to be with it. Whatever is pure, we don't pollute. Whatever freely arises, we don't grasp.

In dzogchen teachings, the value of resting is really important. But resting is not the end product or the result of the practice. We rest to experience our mind without grasping, without self-operating, without the mind running the system. The true ability to rest helps us override the grasping self and ultimately connect with our subtle self. We become a new, fresh person. There is no way to feel a genuine connection to oneself unless one fully rests. It's like being reborn. The purpose in the end is very clear: it's about self-realization.

In the practice there are two processes. The first is resting; the second is becoming more alive. If we find self-grasping interfering with resting, we continually let it go, getting closer to the subtle self, until we can really rest. Second, we become more alive when we exist without that grasping I. When we live with that sense of I, it's holding something somewhere, it's contracting in the form of pain or congestion. When we are aware of that, we watch it and say, "Be careful, notice, and just relax." Within minutes, sometimes only seconds, we feel a response. That actual moment occurs and is felt immediately, because awareness has a wind or energy that changes and influences whatever and wherever there is pain, congestion, or blockage.

But wind also is related to the karmic I. When it is related to the karmic I, it is called the conceptual wind horse. Whenever we're sick, for example, our conceptual wind is very active in that sickness, our conceptual I, or pain I, is present in that sickness. Our conceptual I is the blockage in that particular area of the body or the chakras. Until we let it come into conscious awareness, into our mind at rest, it will continue to block. What we need is a glimpse of awareness when that actual separation happens. Winds can be destructive, creative, blissful, or karmic; there are all kinds of winds. The creative wind comes from resting.

I always wonder why people fall asleep during meditation. One answer is that we become alive through our thoughts, emotions, and ego. When the ego dies, we die, because generally what exists in samsara is mostly only the existence of the ego and of pain identity. True bliss, with which we are usually unfamiliar, seems relatively boring, seeming almost dead, compared to the familiar excitement of pain that seems to keep one alive and moving. But that's not a good or healthy way to live. We disconnect from ourselves, we are not aware enough of ourselves, not aware of the gifts of life until we begin to let go of the familiar excitement of our pain.

When we are resting we have fewer thoughts, less ego. And when there's no ego, we feel we don't exist. When we identify with the grasping ego, we become less interested in our meditation, less motivated, less alive, less connected. There is less light and less clarity, and we lose our joyful motivation for practice. Then the only thing left to do is fall asleep. That is what happens.

Instead, we need to come to understand that the moment we are selfless, present, and not thinking, we can become clearer, more alive, more alert, more present and connected. It's like becoming a new person when we are being still and more still, silent and more silent, spacious and more spacious.

Sometimes if we practice incorrectly, it is possible that we become less clear, but if we practice properly and consciously, we become more and more clear and present. We have to be aware of that sense of connection, of clarity, vividness, and sharpness.

In a deep place, finding out if we are truly resting is simple. Are we trying to rest? Is there somebody working hard to rest? These are important spiritual questions. "Who?" is the best question a dzogchen practitioner can ask, not "What?". The very last obstacle to enlightenment is the sense of self.

Having a deeper connection means being aware beyond our sense of self and ego. That's probably the only genuine way of defining deeper. It's a secret connection, a secret bliss. Nobody needs to know about it; we can simply smile. That connection is so beautiful, so simple, yet so valuable. That is what the A-tri is teaching, enabling us to connect with ourselves beyond the sense of self and ego.

We find we know something precious. We become familiar with something that for a long time we have been longing for. That connection is what is happening during meditation. And that leads to many creative things happening without effort. In that place we find ourselves and the meaning of life. We simply need to be aware of being in that central, core place, that's all. What is the perfect place? Where we are right now.