Courses / Fall 2015 Stage of Generation, Shamatha, Vipashyana and Mahamudra /

86 Signs of successful practice

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Fall 2015 Stage of Generation

B. Alan Wallace
30 Jul 2015 – 24 Sep 2015
Araluen Retreat Center, Queensland, Australia

This eight-week retreat will focus on stage of generation, shamatha, vipashyana and mahamudra.

Participants in this retreat should have a sound understanding of the Sutrayana teachings of Mahayana Buddhism, and have experience in the practices of shamatha, the four applications of mindfulness, and the four immeasurables.

Please read the text, A Spacious Path to Freedom: Practical Instructions on the Union of Mahamudra and Atiyoga, by the great 17th-century master Karma Chagmé (from the chapter “The Stage of Generation” up through “Mahamudra”). The book can be purchased from SBI here.

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B. Alan Wallace, 18 Sep 2015

We start immediately with meditation. The meditation is mindfulness of breathing while viewing the body as a field of energy and breathing as fluctuations in the field. It ends with a brief period of non-meditation.

After meditation, Alan returns to the text (pg. 144 or 1838 on the Kindle). The text offers many ways of saying, stop doing anything. There is a play between observing your own mind and returning to not doing anything. If anger or any mental affliction comes up, don’t go to the referent of the affliction but observe the mental event itself. The meditation is what is left over when you are not distracted. Once you have identified pristine awareness, the method doesn’t change from there to enlightenment.

Alan continues into the Mahamudra chapter. First one experiences understanding, then experience, then realisation and finally confidence. The text discusses signs that the preliminary practices have given rise to fruit. This discussion encompasses the four thoughts that turn the mind, guru yoga, Vajrasattva practice and the mandala offering.

The meditation starts at: 0:18

Course notes, other episodes and resources for this retreat are available here The text for this retreat can be purchased via the SBI Store. Finally, Please contribute to help us afford the audio equipment we rent to make these, and future podcasts freely available.

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Transcript

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