These are notes taken after receiving teachings from Khenpo Urgyen Tsering and are about how must one meditate in the Dzogchen tradition.
Disclaimer
I’m a beginner and my involvement in the Dzogchen is not as strong as many serious practitioners, so these notes I believe Khenpo Urgyen Tsering adapted for a smaller-capacity person, such me.
We are a composite of feelings, mind, and thought on one side and body and speech on the other. The feelings can drag the rest of aggregates around. To illustrate it, he showed the famous painting 9 Stages of Samatha (monkey = thought, elephant = mind, lama = mindfulness). The mind is the boss.
With Shiné or Calm Abiding we control the thought through the use of mindfulness, instead of approaching the speech or body directly. The Buddha gave many teachings because there are many different thoughts.
There is a correspondence between the number of senses and the number of realms: 6 senses → 6 realms.
The spine must be straight pointing up, so the lung (air) can flow freely.
The tongue tip touches the back of the teeth creating a slope for the saliva to slide back into the throat.
In the general Shiné the hands are placed on top of the other and thumbs touch, but in Dzogpa Chenpo they are placed on our knees and it a way to express “Oh, we have lived through all realms for many lifes, so I relax.”.
Another aspect of this type of Shiné is that we look straight instead of looking down (hinayana way). By looking forward we can visualize elements and also we can feel more awake. The meditations get clear and it’s more difficult to fall under dullness. Dzogchen’s Shiné is more energetic and active in that sense, and clear.
The hinayana way analyses attachment and where does it come from, boiling it down to particles (called Atta Kalapa). The mahayana way questions those particles further and sees that they are empty of existence too. And the vajrayana way is visualizing the gods and their influence in all those interactions on top of that.
Accumulation of merit helps control thoughts also.
When visualizing physical objects:
- The syllable should be at 2 meters.
- Do not look down, your eyes should be looking straight, not down (that would be hinayana), in Dzogchen the view is higher — physically and in terms of meaning too. If it’s a little higher than eye height it’s also OK.
You must be active and relaxed. Just as when Buddha used the metaphor of a guitar string: not to tight nor too loose if we want the correct sound.