Phenomenological Experience within Transcendental Knowing and within the Knowing of the Field of Immanence
Rudolph Bauer, Ph.D. Diplomate in Clinical Psychology ,A.B.P.P.
The Washington Center for Consciousness Studies and The Washington Center for Phenomenological and Existential Psychotherapy Studies
Formulated Experience and its Limitations
In a profound way only in the formulated experience of Transcendental knowing does Transcendental Reality exist. This Transcendental experiential view is a function of a human being entering into a dissociative Transcendental state that invalidates ordinary experience of the Being of the world, invalidates the Being of the natural experience of phenomena, and even invalidates the natural being of our mind and can even invalidate the multidimensionality of Being itself.
‘You and I’ have the power of withdrawing the field of Being from phenomena and we have the power of manifesting and transmitting the field of Being into phenomena. ‘You and I’ are the cosmological universe in its expression and non-expression of self- liberation. This power is owned by everyone and does not belong to any tradition, any culture or any religion. This power is owned by everyone and does not belong to any one tradition, any one culture nor any one culture. Of course, each religion loves to think that “Outside the Church there is No Salvation”.
Purposeful Dissociation
This transcendental view reflects the experiences of purposeful dissociation as reflected in psychological and phenomenological studies of dissociation. In contemporary psychoanalysis, the practice of withdrawal, dissociation and foreclosure of vital experience has been well studied in our contemporary philosophical and psychological culture. In ancient cultures, this explicit psychological knowledge of dissociation was not present. Dissociation does have a liberating dissolving-ness into transcendental knowingness.
Social Cultural Experience and Transcendental Experience
The transcendental practice results in a person knowing pure Transcendental Being. The person who is the knower of pure transcendental Being experiences a social cultural difference from the knowers who only know and live within the duality of phenomena. This transcendental person is also different then the person who knows and who experiences the duality of beings within the Non- Duality of Being. Or to say in another way the transcendental knower of Transcendental Being is different than the person who knows and lives within the Non-Duality of Being within the duality of beings. This is the knower of immanence within the field of immanence.
Moreover, the person who only knows Pure Being as Transcendental Being becomes the person who experiences the continuous unreality of world and continuous unreality of phenomenological appearance and experience. The person who only knows Pure Being as Transcendental Being experiences the Nirmanakaya dimension of ordinary life world as lacking reality. The person who only knows Purity of Being as Transcendental Being experiences the Sambogakaya Rupa (form) Archetypal dimension as lacking actuality. The person who only knows the Purity of Being as Transcendental Being may experience the Dharmakaya as actual because they experience the Dharmakaya as form of Transcendental Being.
The Transcendental traditions considers that the Dharmakaya is transcendental Being and is the creative source . This is a Transcendent View and this prejudice does not reflect the experiential actuality that the transcendental state does not self-manifest Being or beings. The Transcendental state is not the creative source or the creative manifestation of Being or beings from the view of Dzogchen.
The great primary source text of Dzogchen which is The All Creating King supports the ontological understanding that the ground of Being is the primordial creative source and is within the realm of immanence. It is not a transcendental phenomenon. The Dharmakaya is immanence as source. This is why the great Dzogchen prayer is ‘May I experience all appearance and all phenomena as the Dharmakaya.” James Valby has a wonderful and complete translation of this great source text and a great commentary on the text by an Dzogchen Master. To understand this essay as I am presenting the drama of Dzogchen and the context of Transcendence and Immanence the translated source text by James Valby is of great value and is beyond my opinions.
The ground of Being, the source of Being , the Dharmakaya is Immanence. And that is why All phenomena are the Dharmakaya! This knowing is a non- conceptual experience that is articulated through language. The experience is the power of knowing without doubt. Belief, as intellectual assent to what you have been told by authority is always accompanied by doubt as John Henry Neuman brings forth with such explicitness.
The Archetypal Dimension of Being and The Sense of Unreality
The Archetypal Ream as experienced through the Dzogchen Tradition of Immanence is different experience of the Archetypal forms of the field of Being from the view of the Transcendental Tradition. The Sambogakaya realm or the Archetypal dimension of Being appears and is experienced as lacking realness of being, within the Transcendental View. From the view of Transcendental Reality the Archetypal realm lacks reality and is absent of Being. The Transcendentalist practitioner cannot experience the archetypal dimension or archetypal forms (rupakaya) as immanent within their own Transcendental Being. The Transcendental practitioner cannot experience the Archetypal dimension and Luminous archetypal energies as being within their own Being or within their own Sambogakaya dimension of Being.
Transcendental Being does not experience otherness. Yet neither does the Transcendental view the archetypal forms of light as forms of their own Being. Rupa does not exist in Transcendental Reality. The transcendentalist may use the meaningless obscuring insipid phrases such as “display.” This word display means “as if” but not in reality and not actual.
Through the Dzogchen experience within the tradition of Immanence, the archetypal dimension is our own dimension of our multidimensional existence. We are the Nirmanakaya dimension of the ordinary life world, and we are the Sambogakaya archetypal dimension of archetypal energies and luminous forms of light, and we are the Dharmakaya dimension of pure potentiality, the pure ground of Being.
And through the Dzogchen practice of invocation, the archetypal dimension can be invoked and brought forth and made present within our own Nirmanakaya dimension of Being and within the ordinary existential context of our life world.
The transcendental understanding of the actually or reality of Archetypal forms is different than the immanent understanding of the archetypal dimension and the archetypal forms. The transcendental understanding about the transcendental nature and experience of the Kayas is different than the understanding that which takes place within the realm of immanence.
Many Transcendental practitioners consider that theArchetypal Practice is a prayer like activity to a transcendental Being who is similar to the Platonic Archetypal Greek Deities who exist in a distant transcendental realm and who can give them blessings from afar. They exist just as the Buddha Fields exist. This is a theistic transcendental frame of belief. There are also Transcendental practices that use the imaginary archetypal imagery as a psychological practice for the practitioner to become more self- empowered and self- illuminated.
Transcendental Being being the wonderful jewel box that it is, has no room for other beings and no room for other dimensions. In the Transcendental state there is no experiential space for otherness, even the otherness of archetypal light and energy. Transcendental experience paradoxically considers the archetypal dimension as mysteriously beyond the Transcendental Reality or in another form of Transcendental reality. Some Transcendental traditions considers the archetypal realm as a form of tantric imagery that is used to invoke forms of experience that are useful in sustaining and maintaining Transcendental Knowingness.
Once a person dissociates from the ontological reality of the Being of the ordinary reality, other dimensions of Being can easily seem as imaginary and lacking reality but working with the display can be useful.
The roots of Shamanism are not roots of Transcendentalism. The roots of Shamanism are deeply within the realms of immanence as innate reality. The power of Shamanistic invocation is the power to bring forth what is already deeply within us. The Dzogchen tradition of immanent understanding of the archetypal dimension is shamanistic in origin and the archetypal realm of luminous energies of the Deities and Dakinis are realities reflecting manifestation and support of our ordinary world of Being. Archetypal Elemental-ness brings forth our multidimensional existence. The Dakini is an actuality of our very own existence and simultaneous beyond our own existence. We participate in the Realm of the Dakini.
The Dakini is the Nature of Awareness as Our Own Gnosis.
Dark Emptiness: In this social cultural framing of Transcendental experience, the transcendental knower as the ‘One who Knows,’ pure transcendental Being can fall into a dramatic melancholic sense of the dark emptiness of the phenomena of the world. This dissociative transcendental view manifests as a limiting sense of reality because there is an active dissociative splitting off of the actuality of the luminous Being of the phenomenological world. The knower of the transcendental path through their successful use of dissociation and detachment, their successful withdrawal of their personal awareness, and their successful withdrawal of their field of Being from phenomenological experience, have created and entered into the narrowing experience of Transcendental Reality. Outside of their experience of transcendental reality is there is only the darkness of Thanatos. Thanatos is the absence of the luminous radiance of Being becoming presence. This radiance of Being is withdrawn into the transcendental state of Transcendental Being. The darkness is the absence of the Divinity of Pure Being in the phenomena of the world. This is a function of the dissociative method.
This natural experience reflects their splitting and locating the Bliss of Being in Transcendental Reality alone. They spiritualize Transcendental Being and de-spiritualize the ordinary phenomena of living circumstance. Divinity has become Transcendental and only exist in the Transcendental Realm. This is a form of Spiritual Dualistic dissociation and brings forth Death of Eros. Many monastic practitioners of both east and west experience this fate.
This is a natural event given the splitting of Being from ordinary reality of life. Being and the divinity of Being is located only in the containment of the precious Jewel Box of Transcendental Reality. Being and the Bliss of Being is split off from the ordinary experience of Nirmanakaya. What is left is darkness and lifelessness and existential ontological absence of the luminous light of Being.
The experience of Pure Transcendental Being and the corresponding experience of the darkness of the phenomenological world and the darkness of the ordinary phenomenological experience is a distortion of the wholeness of Reality. From this experiential dissociative contemplative process, the philosophical opinion of the unreality of existential phenomena and the unreality of the world arises and becomes a philosophical assumption and a philosophical belief that becomes an fact. This split view is a self- imposed distortion of the world born out of dissociation and splitting of reality.
This melancholic sense of the phenomena of life is often sanctified as being the best motivation for self- liberation. In others words if you really cannot stand being here, then you will liberate yourself by remaining in the Transcendental Realm. Some even say without this experience liberation cannot take place.
This view is a regression back to the early Buddhist view of cessation being the goal. A kind of let me out of here motivation. The deeper the depression, the deeper the hopelessness, the better the motivation. Actually, this not Dzogchen or Shavism or Sufism. As natural liberation of the heart essence declares the Bliss of Samadhi is the Bliss of the world. Or as Chakarasmavara Tantra declares Bliss is the nature of Being and Bliss overcome suffering.
To say this another way, the Transcendental Path could expand its perception of the field Being into and as the world. This is the unfolding of Dzoghcen.
As we know believing is not seeing, and seeing is not believing. Cardinal John Henry Neuman in his magnificent text The Grammar of Assent describes belief as an intellectual assent to an understanding that has been given to us often based on religious and patriarchal authority. He himself was a Catholic Cardinal. He also wrote the great text on Comparative Thinking which is called The Nature of the University. The University is a place where learning to think takes place.
This self-inflicted dissociative view becomes the philosophical view (Descartes) of spiritual idealism. Descartes, just as Gautama, centuries earlier, entered the isolation of transcendental reality through intense dissociative praxis. The experiential result is the emptiness of reality, the emptiness of phenomena, and the emptiness of the sense of embodied self. The emptiness of embodied Being is the emptiness of our sense of self. The emptiness of sense of self becomes unhappily the lack of self-agency.
Obedience and the Lack of Self Agency
Obedience to the Patriarchal Authority is essential to path of self- liberation according to Patriarchal Traditions. Patriarchal Tribal Tibetan Buddhism emphasizes this obedience to the Singular Vajrayana Guru. Patriarchal education tends to be learning as memorization, rather than learning as thinking. Thinking in essence, is a comparative process and not simply memorization of dogmatic beliefs. Beliefs are opinions, unless the opinions are of the ‘One Who Knows’ omnisciently, then they become Dogma! You and I have opinions. The One who knows speaks Dogma. This is kind of like the infallibility of the Roman Catholic Pope. Infallibility is the gift of omniscience and omnipotence!
Dependency on Patriarchal Person Precludes the Inner Guru
There arises a naturalistic dependency on patriarchal person and patriarchal structure in order to experience support in the transcendental experience and transcendental view. The patriarchal structure is essentially organized around the patriarchal person who is the ‘One Who Knows’ with omniscience and lives within Transcendental reality. Monastic life from the 5th century CE was created to support the ongoing transcendental life of the person who wishes to live in Transcendental reality. The early social cultural life of Buddhism was focused on monastic culture and monastic support for living within Transcendental Reality. This social process continues to this very day.
Splitting, Dissociation and Fragmentation
Through our existential phenomenological exploration, we discover a dissociative split between ordinary knowing of the reality of the experiential world and the transcendental knowing of transcendental reality by the ‘one who Transcendentally knows.’ We discover a splitting between the experience of the oneness of transcendental reality and experience of the unreality of phenomenological experience of the world. Phenomenological difference and phenomenological otherness is experientially split off and foreclosed in the Transcendental Path.
Only Non- Dualistic Transcendental Knowing
The Transcendental state of reality only encompasses Non-dualistic Transcendental knowing. We experience a split between the oneness of non- duality of transcendental Being with the dualistic experience of dualistic beings. We have a dramatic split between our experience as the transcendental knower of transcendental Being and our experience of the Being of the phenomena of the dualistic relational world of beings and Beingness. As we spiritualize transcendental reality we de- spiritualize the world of beings and Being. We spiritualize transcendental reality and de-spiritualize Being in the World. This dramatic action lacks ethical vision. The transcendental path is Ma Rigpa. Ma Rigpa means absence of Being. The transcendental path is the path of the archetypal Trickster. What seems to be is not, and what is not seems to be?
We have a split within the knower of transcendental Pure Being and their experience of the Being-less-ness of phenomena. We have a social cultural difference from the transcendental knower of pure transcendental Being and the seemingly deluded knowers of ordinary knowing of phenomenological beings. There is a split within the oneness of transcendental Being and the experienced lack of Being within the dualistic phenomena of dualistic beings. This spiritualization of transcendental Being results in the de- spiritualization of dualistic phenomena. This Transcendental view is a distorted and distorting view of the wholeness of reality. This transcendental path is a path of Ma Rigpa which is the path of absence of Being and ignorance of the Pure Being-ness of beings.
The dissociative transcendental practice cuts into the fullness and whole sense of the vast reality of human experience. This dissociative cut seems to be the choice between the experience of Non Dual Transcendental Being and the experience of dualistic phenomenological beings. This cut is a distortion of Naturalistic Actuality.
Tragically, this dissociative spirituality distorts the nature of Equality Consciousness. This dissociative spirituality distorts the nature of our human Being-ness and distorts our existential nature of Being in the world. This dissociative transcendental path is not the generative path of compassion. Compassion is the self-manifestation of the field of Being that we are into the world and the inhabitants of the world. Compassion is the power of transmission of the awareness field into the being of others and the being of the world. Transcendental Reality is precluded from this relational intimate drama.
The Distortion of the Reality of Indivisibleness
This Transcendental view is a fundamental distortion of the reality of the Duality of beings within the Non-duality of Being. This transcendental view becomes the philosophical prejudice of Transcendental Buddhism as well as other transcendental traditions that dwell within Hinduism, within Christianity within many other religions.
The Transcendental Path and the Implicit Requirement of Patriarchal Structure
This transcendental philosophical praxis makes participation and dependence on the cultural socialization of Patriarchal authority and Patriarchal organizational structure absolutely necessary. Patriarchal Authority and Patriarchal Institutionalization validates and sustains and mirrors the dissociative transcendental contemplative life. Patriarchal authority validates and culturally mirrors this dissociative approach to the reality and actuality of human experience. This dissociative approach to the reality of the world reflects the dissociative assumptions of transcendental spirituality.
The Nature of the Guru in light of Immanence and the Nature of the Guru in light of Transcendental Path
In Dzogchen which is the path of immanence, the Guru is within everyone. The Guru is the inner most self of everyone. The Guru is not a person. The Guru is within myself, as my most inner self of awareness. The Guru is my most inner luminous awareness. The Guru is the self- revealing light of Being. The Guru is the self-revealing light of awareness. The Guru is not a singular person or the ‘One who knows’, knows absolutely. The Guru is wisdom gnosis. The Guru is within everyone and the Guru is within all events and all circumstances. The Guru is the Field of Being. This Existential understanding of the Guru is not the understanding of Guru in transcendental traditions.
Guru in Transcendental Traditions
In the transcendental traditions the Guru is a singular person who absolutely knows Transcendental Being and Transcendental Reality. The Guru is the person who has accomplished being established in the transcendental dimension of Being. The Guru is supposed to be established in the Transcendental knowingness. The Guru is more or less considered to be always in the transcendental state and views the transcendental dimension as the only actual reality. Being established in the transcendental dimension is considered liberation. Moreover, the Guru is the person who is established in the transcendental state or transcendental dimension is considered the ‘One who Knows’ and is in certain ways is considered omniscient and even omnipotent. The Guru in transcendental traditions embodies the theocratic drama of living within the union of Royalty and Spirituality. The theocratic drama of living as the union of Royalty and Spirituality does not easily reflect or support equality consciousness. The love of Hierarchy is intrinsic to Patriarchal Existence and Patriarchal Geometry.
In contemporary Social Psychology a major area of study has been the authoritarian personality. There are two sides to the authoritarian personality system. There is the authoritarian personality who is the one who knows and has omnipotent self-agency and the other side of the complementary system is the ones who does not know and gives up or gives over self-agency and the sense of knowing to the authoritarian personality. Both sides reflect the authoritarian drama, and these two complementary sides are often deeply involved in systemic patriarchal social systems.
The Knowing of Transcendental Reality
There is in transcendental traditions, the patriarchal narrative of the person as Guru who is liberated through having knowledge of the Transcendental Reality and who lives in Transcendental Reality and is self- liberated by being in Transcendental Reality. Transcendental Reality is considered to be Absolute Reality. This is not Dzogchen understanding of self-liberation. Dzogchen does not equate liberation with being located in transcendental reality.
Dzogchen deconstructs the patriarchal narrative of having knowledge of Transcendental Being as Having Absolute Knowledge. Dzogchen deconstructs the understanding that absolute knowledge as the knowledge of transcendental reality. Dzogchen deconstructs the patriarchal narrative of self-liberation as a function of the absolute knowing of transcendental reality. Dzogchen considers this view of absolute knowledge as illusionary and grandiose. Yes, Being the ‘One who knows’ is illusionary grandiosity. This is the eastern version of Papal infallibility. There is no spiritual hierarchy in Dzogchen. Being no body is better than being somebody. The Guru is our the luminous light of our own awareness. And authentic self- agency arises out of this timeless awareness into time.
As Hegel and later Lacan describe within their study of patriarchal reality as being realm of the ‘One who Knows’ absolutely and out of this context of the ‘One knowing absolutely’ arises the Master- Slave Relationship.
A Narrowing of the Experience of Being
Transcendental reality is actually a narrowing view of Being and a dissipation of range and expression of Being. This Transcendental view bypasses the Nirmanakaya dimension of ordinary reality. This Transcendental view by passes the Sambogakaya or archetypal dimension. This patriarchal view primarily rests in the Dharmakaya or pure potentiality as source of Being.
The transcendentalists consider the Dharmakaya as transcendental reality. Dzogchen does not consider the Dharmakaya as transcendental phenomena. Dzogchen understands and experiences the Dharmakaya or ground awareness as completely immanent, completely within us and us within Dharmakaya. The world of Dzogchen is Pantheistic, and ‘Divinity dwells within us as us.’ And we can experience divinity in each other. As the Dzogchen prayer says “May I experience all Appearance as the Dharmakaya.” This is a cutting through illusion prayer. This is the cutting through of Trekchco practice. The Dzogchen text the “All Creating King “is a major Dzogchen text focused on the reality as immanence.
Great Perfection As Great Completeness
The actuality of transcendental Being is experienced through detachment and dissociation. This is not the knowing of multidimensional Being of Equal Vision. This is not multidimensional knowing of embodied Being simultaneously in all its dimensions and its self-manifestations. This transcendental drama is not the view of natural liberation through ordinary knowing which is the union of mind within awareness knowing Being and the forms of Being and the Being of forms. Transcendental knowing is incompleteness. Transcendental knowing is not the great completeness. Transcendental knowing is a distortion of Equality Consciousness and Philosophical completeness just as we are.
Two Ways of Knowing as the Natural Path of Self Liberation
Dzogchen understands and makes the important distinction that we have two ways of knowing. We know form through our mind. We know Being through our direct knowing of awareness. Most importantly, we can integrate the knowing of our mind knowing forms within our awareness knowing Being. In the union of our mind within our awareness field, we can naturally know the Being of forms and the forms of Being. We can experience Being within our own being and we can experience Being through the being of others. We can experience the indivisibleness of Being within our own being, and within the being of others. We can experience the unfolding of the field of Being within us and around us. We live in the sea of Being. We live in the sea of Ontological manifestation.
Through the power of natural knowing, within our two ways of knowing, we can experience the duality of beings within the non-duality of Being. And we can experience non-duality of Being within the duality of beings. As the tantras declare the “Bliss of Being overcomes suffering.” We can live in the field of Being through beings including our own being. We can live in the Bliss of Being whatever the events. Bliss is not an emotional event. Bliss is the essential nature of Being. Bliss is the experience of Being and the events of Being. Bliss is the experience of the Purity of Being.
Our minds knows forms and our mind knows dualistically. The truth of our mind is the truth of judgment. The truth of judgment is the truth of the character of this or that. Through our awareness we experience the truth of Being. Our awareness experiences the ontological truth of Being which is the truth of Alethea. The truth of Alethea is the truth of the continuous self- revelation of Being through our ordinary experience of living. Through the truth of mind we can discriminate the truth of character of situations and character of persons.
Through the truth of Being we can experience the ongoing continuity of the unfolding of Being within all events and all situations. We can live continuously within the ordinary field of Being. As the one knower, we know the two truths simultaneously. We know the truth of phenomena and the truth of the Being of the phenomena. We can know and live within the truth of the phenomena of Being and the Being of phenomena. This is self-liberation ‘just as we are.’
Cultural Limitations of Transcendental Knowing
Our human awareness knows Being and the Being-ness of beings. In light of our two ways of knowing, Dzogchen understands the serious cultural limitations of transcendental knowing. Transcendental knowing is limited and contained in its knowing of Pure being. Pure Being is located and contained only within the Transcendental Reality. Transcendental reality is a box, a beautiful jewel box, but a box nonetheless. Transcendental Reality is incomplete and its containment can be bewildering.
The Purity of Being of the infinite phenomena of the world is foreclosed. The Purity of Being of ordinary life is foreclosed. The Transcendental assumption is that the only way to experience the Purity of Being is to experience the Purity of Being in the Transcendental Box. The presence of Being experienced in a dissociative container and process. There is statement by Dudjom Lingpa: ‘Dzogchen is the training to experience the Purity of Being of all Phenomena.’ This is the natural view of self- liberation as experiencing the Purity of All Phenomena just as it is.
Our knowing of mind which knows forms and our knowing of our awareness which directly knows Being, can enter into union. In this integrated union, we can as the one knower, know the Being of forms and the forms of Beings. Through form we can know the fullness of Being and we can know the Purity of Being within all the forms of Being. The purity of Being is not limited to the transcendental Being in the jewel box but the Purity of Being is all beings. Through the infinity of forms of Being we can directly know the Purity of Being within all the forms of Being. This is self-liberation through circumstance. This is the Bliss of the ordinary. Or as the Shavites declare the “Bliss of the world is the Bliss of Samadhi and the Bliss of the Samadhi is the Bliss of World.” Or to say this in another way the “Bliss of Being is the Bliss of Samadhi and the Bliss of Samadhi is the Bliss of Being.”
Self- Liberation and The Purity of beings
The mastery of Dzogchen is the mastery of knowing experientially the Purity of Being within all beings and all forms of beings. Knowing the Purity of Being in and of itself; and the purity of Being in and through form, is self-liberation.
Our awareness knowing Being and experiencing the self-manifestation of Being is ordinary knowledge. Our knowing directly the Being-ness of our being and the Being-ness of other beings and the Being-ness of Being in and of itself is ordinary knowledge and not exceptional esoteric knowledge. There is no absolute knowledge.
This is co-natural knowing. This is the nature of awareness knowing the nature of Being, and mind knowing the nature of forms. This is the nature of our awareness knowing the Being of beings including our own Being. To experientially know our own Being is to Know Being in and of itself. This knowing is self-liberation. This is the nature of awareness knowing Being in and of itself. This direct knowing of Being is completely natural and completely within everyone ‘just as they are’. Self- liberation is naturally given and open.
Our knowing is a multidimensional knowing of Being. We can know the being of the ordinary life world ‘just as we are.’ This is dimension of the Nirmanakaya. ‘Just as we are. We can know the apparitional manifestations of the archetypal Being of the archetypal dimension of existence which is called Sambogakaya. ‘Just as we are’. We can know the Being of the Dharmakaya dimension which is openness of Being as pure source, pure potentiality, and pure indeterminacy. Being has three dimensions. All three dimension of Being and are dimensions of our own Being. The three dimensions are the same in essential nature. I am Nirmanakaya dimension, I am Sambogakaya dimension and I am Dharmakaya.
In Dzogchen there is great prayer. And this is the prayer that “May I experience all appearance as the Dharmakaya”. The Dharmakaya is the openness of Being as source. And so the Dzogchen prayer declares: “May I know that all appearance are the Dharmakaya.” And all this is the bliss of the ordinary person.
The Nature of the Human Being as Ontic Ontological Being
Dzogchen and Contemporary Existential phenomenology are intimately related as both traditions understand human beings as Ontic Ontological Being. Both Traditions are phenomenologically based. Ontic is the psychological dimension and Ontological is the dimension of Being.
The Nature of human beings is luminous spaciousness and luminous radiance. The nature of human Being is luminous open knowingness. The openness of Being is the knowingness of Being. The openness of a being is the openness of Being itself. The openness of a being is the knowingness of Being itself.
This knowingness is not the grandiose fantasy of the absolute Knower of the Absolute. Human beings are the intertwining of psychology and ontology, the intertwining of self and Being, the intertwining of mind and Being. When this intertwining is not understood then bewilderment takes place or as Dzogchen says Ma Rigpa happens. At this cultural moment, Dzogchen has particular contributions to make to western mystical life and western healing and psychotherapy traditions.
Phenomena as Self -Manifestation of Being
All phenomena are the self-manifestation of Being. All phenomena are the essence of Ground Awareness. The essence of Being is Purity. The Purity of Being is pervasive. The Purity of Being is complete in its Givenness. The Purity of Being is the Nature of Being. The Purity of Being is Buddha Nature. Buddha Nature is Wisdom Knowingness and Wisdom’s self- manifestation as phenomena. The Ground of Being is the Source. The Ground of Being is Buddha Nature as Source. The Ground of Being is Wisdom Gnosis. Wisdom Gnosis is direct perception of Being. Between the Ground of Being and the self-manifestation of Being as beings there is no difference in essence. The different dimensions of Being are the same in essence.
Self- Liberation as Phenomenological Path
To experience that all beings are the manifestation of Buddha Nature is self- liberation. To experience that all Beings are the manifestation of Pure Being is self- liberation. Self-liberation is a phenomenological path. Self- liberation is the process of experiencing what has already been completely given. Our self is the embodiment the luminous presence of the radiant light of Being. Our self-experience is of the Purity of Being. The Purity of Being is the Nature of Being. All beings are the Purity of Being. To experience the Purity of Being in one self and in others is self-liberation. Being is intrinsically pure and does not need to be purified. The purity of your Being is not a function of what you think or if you think, or if you do not think. The Purity of Being is not a function of what you eat or do not eat.
Being is Given-ness. Buddha Nature is not merited nor earned as patriarchal traditions love to insist. Buddha Nature is given as the Being-ness of our Being. Buddha Nature is not earned. The experience of Buddha Nature is not the drama of spiritual economics. The appearance of Buddha nature is not obscured since even the obscurations are Buddha Nature. All appearances are Buddha Nature. All experience is Buddha Nature. All events are manifestations of Buddha Nature. Buddha nature and Buddha Mind is not the mind of the one who knows absolutely. Buddha Nature and Buddha Mind is not the absolute knowledge of omniscience. Buddha Nature is not omnipotence. Omniscience and omnipotence are deluded grandiosity of the patriarchal cultural mind and the patriarchal Personal mind.
All persons are Buddha Nature. All animals are Buddha nature. All vegetation is Buddha Nature. All earth is Buddha Nature. All elements are Buddha Nature. Being is Buddha nature and Buddha nature is Being. Buddha nature is a metaphor for Being.
The Nature of Being as Awareness
Being is awareness and awareness is Being. Awareness knows Being. Awareness is the knowing of Being as Being. Awareness is Buddha Nature. Buddha Nature is the nature of awareness. Being knows Being as awareness. Awareness is the Knowingness of Being. Awareness is the Openness of Being. Through awareness Being knows Being. By becoming aware of awareness, our awareness knows Being. Our awareness is the knowingness of Being. Awareness knowing Being is Jnana and Gnosis. The nature of awareness is direct perception. The nature of awareness is direct knowingness. The nature of awareness is the direct knowing-ness of Being. The knowing of awareness is not knowing of mind. Awareness is the knowing of Being. All human beings have Gnosis and are Jnana which is direct knowingness. Direct knowingness is not the knowingness of our mind.
Sometimes the word awareness in English is used only within the context of mind alone. Such a use for example would be the statement I am aware of the feeling of my toe or I am hungry. This awareness as state of mind is not the awareness of Dzogchen. In Dzogchen there is the distinction between mind and awareness. Sems is our mind that thinks through thought, feels through affective states, senses through sensation, imagines through imagination, perceives through the senses, remembers through memory and is able to think reflectively. And there is semde which is awareness or direct knowing. Sems is the awareness of mind and semde is the awareness of awareness. Semde is awareness as the innate field of direct knowing. Semde is the direct knowing of Being. Even babies have Semde. Babies directly know the field of Being through their mothers’ bodies. That is why the mother is the first Guru.
The nature of awareness is unbound spaciousness, and unbound openness and unbound luminosity and unbound vital energy. To become aware of our awareness is to experience Being. Awareness is a quality of Being and Being is the quality of awareness. Awareness is an aspect of the field of Being. Our awareness is the manifestation of primordial awareness. Our awareness is the manifestation of primordial Being or the ground of Being. Our very own awareness is the manifestation of primordial timeless awareness in time. This awareness of Being is a given-ness.
There is no one way to enter into awareness or any one way to become aware of our awareness field. One way to enter into awareness is through our suspension of our mind, and in the suspension of our mind, we free awareness to become aware of awareness itself. In phenomenology this suspension of mind is called the ‘epoche.’ And then as we focus our awareness on awareness itself and we enter into the openness of awareness and into the openness of the field of Being. In phenomenology Heidegger called this openness of our awareness of the field of Being “ Da Sein.” In becoming aware of awareness we become directly aware of the field of Being manifesting with ‘us as us.’ In phenomenology this experience of awareness becoming aware of awareness as the field of Being is the phenomenological reduction.
Another way entering the field of awareness is through the gaze of the Togel practice. Gazing into the sky, gazing into nature, gazing into events, gazing into people, gazing into the darkness, and gazing through our whole embodiment in every situation is a direct way of entering into the embodied gaze of awareness. Through the gaze, the light of our own awareness becomes present, and the light within phenomena becomes manifest. The same luminosity that is manifested in and through our gaze, is manifested in and through phenomena.
As we embody this field of Being, and we establish our self in awareness, we can then take the next step of integrating our mind into this awareness field. At this moment our mind that knows form, and our awareness that knows Being are in union. This union allows us as the one knower, to know the Being of the forms and the form of Being of beings. The field of Being is now open to our openness of awareness. This is natural self- liberation.
Nature of Transmission
The nature of transmission is the Nature of Being. The nature of transmission is the nature of the self-manifestation of Being. Being self-manifests through human beings as their Being. Being self-manifests through human beings to other human beings. There is no difference between human beings in the Beingness of their Being. Human beings are forms of Being. The nature of human beings is the nature of Being.
This Secret Essence Tantra or The Guhyagarbha Tantra is a profound shift from the view of Buddha Nature as Tathagarbha which is the universal potential for awakening to the exalted view of the complete actuality of Buddha Nature. In the Secret Essence Tantra, the Buddha Nature is every person ‘just as they are.’ In the Secret Essence Tantra the Buddha Nature is every event ‘just as it is’.
The Buddha Nature is not only a single person but the very nature of Being itself. Buddha Nature is the nature of every single person. The Buddha nature is the nature of sentient Beings. The Buddha Nature is the nature of every person and every singular sentient being. Buddha Nature is the innermost self of our person. Our Buddha nature is the authentic self of our personhood. Our Buddha nature is within our mind and is within our embodiment and primordially within our innermost awareness. Buddha Nature is Shunyata. Shunyata is the openness of Pure Being. The Openness of Pure Being is Buddha Nature. Pure Being is the spaciousness of all phenomena. Being is the openness of all phenomena. Buddha Nature is the Nature of Every Situation, and Every Occurrence. Buddha nature is a metaphor of Being.
Immanence of Divinity
Within the unfolding of Dzogchen there is a deeply radical movement and transition towards the immanence of Divinity that goes beyond the esoteric preoccupation with transcendence of Divinity. There is the profound understanding of Divinity manifesting as the Appearance of Everything and Everyone. Divinity is the manifestation of Phenomena. Phenomena is the Light of awareness, phenomena is radiant light of Buddha Nature. Phenomena does not have to be voided or avoided. Phenomena is not a delusion or an illusion. Phenomena is path of liberation. Phenomena is openness of Being in its self- manifestation. Phenomena is the Radiance of Being. Appearance is the openness of Being in self manifestation of Being. Appearance is the luminosity of Being in its self-manifestation as radiance, the radiance of form.
Dzogchen is neither idealism and neither is Dzogchen materialism. Dzogchen is the middle path of oneness within difference and difference within oneness. Dzogchen is the existential path of duality of beings Being within the non-duality of Being and the non-duality of Being present within the duality of beings.
The Path of Appearance
Our experience of our self and our experience of the appearance of the self of others is the manifestation of Being. The appearance of the world is the manifestation of Being. This Being of the world is spaciousness, vital energy, primordial knowingness, and the translucent radiance of light . All this phenomena is the experience of the Buddha Nature and Buddha Nature is great compassion. The great compassion is the self-manifestation of compassion manifesting within the immediacy of a person and within the context of a person.
Absolute Compassion as Direct Transmission of Light of Awareness
The great compassion manifests everything and everyone for the experience of self- liberation. Bodichitta, or compassion is the self-manifestation of the transmission of human awareness from one person to another. This self-manifestation of the transmission of our innate awareness into the present moment of another person, into the past time of the person and into the future time of the person is the essential drama of compassion.
The absolute compassion in the Nyingma traditions as the great Dzogchen Master Yang Thang Rinpoche teaches is the direct transmission of the light of awareness from one person to another person. Compassion is the self- manifestation of awareness from one person to another person. There is a transmission to a person in the present moment, there is a transmission to the past of the person and a transmission to future time of the person. The transmission arises within us out of timeless awareness into time. There are four times in Dzogchen, the Past, the Present and the Future and the Fourth time is Timeless Awareness. The essence of Dzogchen is being in timeless awareness in time simultaneously. Everyone has this capacity in their own hands and this capacity is little used. Just as people pass self- agency to the patriarchal personage, so too people pass their capacity of transmission to the patriarchal personage.
Compassion is the Cosmological manifestation of the Beingness of Being into the beings and the Being of the world. Compassion is a collective experience. Compassion is not a sentimental moment.
Our Being is Our Sense of Self, Our Sense of Self is Our Sense of Being
The experience of our direct knowingness of Being as Divinity and our experience of the Divinity of our own being and the bliss of our own Being is the bliss of Beings. Bliss is the nature of Being. Our Being is our sense of self. Our own Being is the Being of Being. Our self is a multidimensional experience of multidimensional Being. Shunyata is a multidimensional experience of the openness of Being. Our sense of self is our openness of our own Being.
Now the sense of our self is the sense of our own Being which is Being itself. Our own self is our knowing of Being and the knowing of our Being as our very form. Our knowing knows our being as Being itself. And through our Being we can know the Being of others which is Being itself. Being manifests as forms. All forms are the trans-lucidity of Being.
In our becoming aware of awareness we experience the self- liberation of awareness. Our living within the field of Being is the natural path of self-liberation.
Continuity Life after Life and Death after Death
Our existential circumstance and events are our path of self- liberation. Our path is our ongoing continuity of Being life after life, and our path is continuous through death after death. Death is a circumstance. Our path is our profound experience of our awareness being unborn and undying life after life and death after death. Our path is infinite in its horizon, vast and multidimensional. Human awareness is immortal in essence and in nature. This is essential knowledge of Dzogchen. This is the essential knowledge and experience of the indestructibleness of innate awareness. Our awareness is unborn and undying and is the ongoing continuity of Being as timeless awareness in time.
Purification of Mind Alone is Not The Path of Self Liberation
Purification of mind alone is not the path of self-liberation. To experience the Purity of Being of all phenomena and to experience the Purity of our own Being just as we are is self -liberation. The Purity of Being is not a function of the purity of a mind! Again, the Purity of Being is not a function of the purity of our mind. The purity of Being is known directly through the purity of our awareness. Our mind does not know Being. Our mind knows the form and forms of Being. Our awareness knows Being and our awareness is Being. To become aware of our awareness is to become aware of our Being as our own awareness.
A pure mind will support you in having clarity of thought and clarity of reason and clarity of mental understanding. The purity of mind will not unveil the pure nature of your awareness, the pure nature of your Being just as you are. If you become aware of your awareness, you will experience the Purity of your Being and the Being of others. Awareness and awareness alone knows Being and the Purity of Being. Awareness is intrinsically Pure just as Our Being is intrinsically Pure.
Integration of Transcendental Reality within the Context of the Phenomenology of Immanent
This is a process of integrating the the transcendent dimension into the world of phenomenal reality. This integration of transcendental awareness into the natural awareness of Dzogchen is wonderful and can be accomplished with consciousness and determination.
Rudolph Bauer, Ph.D. Diplomate in Clinical Psychology, A.B.P.P.
The Washington Center for Consciousness Studies and The Washington Center for Phenomenological and Existential Psychotherapy Studies
Jim Valby, Translator ,Tantra of the King of the Infinite Space, “The All Creating King”. Jim Valby Publications, PO Box 235 ,Shelburns Falls,Ma 01370