[GoodLover]

[First I want to apologize for the heavy use of Tibetan Buddhist terminology in this post, not sure how familiar people are with these terms, I will try to make it simple, +I'm just rambling a bit here.]

~Hey so I want to post some stuff about Chöd,the shamanistic practice native to Tibet, that went on to influence
Bön -- the animist religion of Tibet, that also went on to give Tibetan Buddhism it's distinct flavor. the way one see's Chöd and Bön in Vajrayana/Tibetan Buddhism is through it's "skillful means" practices which are a kind of "transformative energy practices" through the boddhisattvas/Tulpa embedded in Thangkas viewed as literal energetic imprints of the Mind, and can be used to cultivate specific states of consciousness.

In the Nyingma lineage that I study, by cultivating emptiness (dzogchen: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dzogchen) via meditation, then one can consciously go on to decide specific states of consciousness for particular functions.

IE. Green Tara is a energetic imprint/thought-form/Tulpa[ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulpa ] for compassion as is depicted as such:
[img]http://www.tu****a.info/green_tara.jpg[/img]

~It's considered dangerous to work with Tulpa if you haven't mastered emptiness/control of your mind. This is pretty standard stuff too, most traditions of shamanism there is a trial period that must undergo before coming fully into one's domain.


But now to the stuff on: Chöd: An Advanced Type of Shamanism

***** From: http://www.dharmafellowship.org/library/essays/chod.htm


There is something attractively romantic about the mysterious, shamanic practice of ancient Chöd (Skt: ccheda-sadhana, Tib: gChod sgrub thabs). Chöd-practice, cutting through delusion's root, is haunting, strange and mysteriously beautiful all at the same time. This practice involves a whirling dance, accompanied by drum and bell. As the following essay will recount, Chöd is a special type of mysticism that unites shamanic practice with profound yogic meditation.

Chöd has long been a way of seeking direct and personal experiences of mind and divinity outside of conventional and institutional frameworks.

In Chöd-practice, the yogi or yogini journeys into the night world”the dangerous regions of ghosts, spirits and the damned, to bless all souls lost for a time on the wheel of existence. The selflessness of the practitioner's compassion, his or her contact with spirits of the other-world, and the making of himself into a vehicle of healing, all tends to become a path for the hero to win the noetic Mind-Jewel of true awakening.

Chöd is a practice that combines Buddhist meditation with ancient Tibeto-Siberian shamanic ritual. The "liturgy" of Chöd is sung to the accompaniment of drum, bell and a thigh-bone horn. The word "Chöd" means to cut through, to "chop," and what is chopped off is ultimately the Ego. Initially this begins with cutting all attachment to the body and to material things. When identification with the finite mind-body complex is let go of, then the pure awareness is set free to perceive reality as it really is. The whole world becomes potent as a place of blessing power and awareness." --more on the site.

/////
A lot of this is interesting to me. I said before, I am a student of the Nyingma [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyingma ]tradition and I (unofficially) practice Dream Yoga, of which is also a Tibeto-Buddhist practice. The reason I say unofficially is because of the way Tibetan traditions are structured are very hierarchically and it is generally through oral empowerments/permissions from an authorized Rinpoche that one is instructed to go on to do more advanced studies.(I'm not trying to brag at all or come off snobby or anything) The reason I began practicing dream yoga was because these experiences were already happening to me. I was already literally lucid dreaming 5x a week, and disconnected and experience an overwhelming transience of things and went to a meditation center to help unify the worlds I was being swirled around in. A problem I have with the politics in Tibetan Buddhism is the practice is a bit caught up in bureaucracy and looks like a religio-political institution at this stage of development.

Dream Yoga is sort of a shape-shifting practice, and all the time lucidity, and also a recognition of of transience. Once you reach a level of lucidity, you go into the dream-state to change the parameters of your environment, conquer your fears, and begin transmuting the environment you find yourself in, and then altering your body image and transforming into other entities. The goal behind the practice of Dream Yoga is so that consciousness doesn't lucidity when the body dies and is reincarnated into another form. I have to say I'm a materialist, but not necessarily a reductionist, but I have some issues with Buddhist ontology that I won't address here.

Here's some stuff on Dream Yoga from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dream_yoga

"Dream Yoga or Milam[1] (T:rmi-lam or nyilam; S:svapnadarśana)[2] — the Yoga of the Dream State are a suite of advanced tantric sadhana of the entwined Mantrayana lineages of Dzogchen (Nyingmapa, Ngagpa, Mahasiddha, Kagyu and Bönpo). Dream Yoga are tantric processes and techniques within the trance Bardos of Dream and Sleep (Tibetan: mi-lam bardo) and are advanced practices of Yoga Nidra. Aspects of Dream Yoga sadhana are subsumed within the practice suite of the Six Yogas of Naropa.

According to contemporary Dzogchen teachers Namkhai Norbu, Lopön Tenzin Namdak and Tenzin Wangyal, the perceived reality and the phenomenal world are considered to be ultimately "unreal" ” an "illusion" (refer Mahamaya): a dream, a phantasmagoria, a thoughtform. All appearances and phenomena are a dream or thoughtform, inter- and intra- reflecting and refracting jewels and mirrors of possibility and potentiality, "arising in relationships" or "dependent co-arising". It is held by these lineages and due to the realisations of the sadhana, that the dream of life and regular nightly dreams are not dissimilar, and that in their quintessential nature are non-dual. The non-essential difference between the general dreaming state and the general waking experience is that the latter is generally more concrete and linked with attachments, samskara and skanda; whereas, standard non-lucid dreaming is ephemeral and transient, and generally culturally reinforced as baseless and empty. In Dream Yoga, living may become the dream, and the dream may become the living. Progressing the sadhana may be metaphorically likened to living the scientific hypothesis of a resolved superposition. The resolved superposition being a mindstream conflation of Dharmakaya with Shunyata and Indra's Net. The entwined Mantrayana lineages of Nyingmapa, Bonpo, Ngagpa and Mahasiddha are saturated with trance and dream transmissions of teachings, doctrine, etcetera that transcend constructs of time, place and space, these are often called "whispered traditions" and terma. Refer Lucid living."

The primary aim and foundation of dream practice is to realize during a dream that one is dreaming. Once lucidity has been established the applications are limitless. One can then dream with lucidity and do all sorts of things, such as: practice sadhana; receive initiations, empowerments and transmissions; go to different places, planes and lokas, communicate with yidam; dialogue with sentient beings, creatures and people such as guru; fly; shapeshift, etc. It is also possible to do different yogic practices while dreaming (usually such yogic practices one does in waking state though the product and fruit of sadhana is greatly accelerated due to the learning, play and practice context). In this way the yogi can have a very strong experience and with this comes understanding of the dream-like nature of daily life. This is very relevant to diminishing attachments, because they are based on strong beliefs that life's perceptions and objects are real and, as a consequence, important. Dream yoga mastery not only assists in the complete realisation of shunyata, but also in the lila of Mahamaya. When one realises and embodies the Shunyata Doctrine of Buddha Shakyamuni and Nargajuna amongst others forded by Dream Yoga and other advanced sadhana, complete realisation is imminent and elementary.



I I have to say I found my spirit animal (salamander) via dream yoga. I used to catch salamanders as a little kid, and the first animal I ever transformed into was a salamander, and shortly after (while "awake") I opened the door to my apartment and found a spotted salamander of America:



at my door covered in cotton and dirt and dehydrated.. I quickly brought him inside and washed him off and then returned him to the outdoors. A great encounter to be sure. ^_^

Also, it might be interesting for people to find out too that the Tibetan Book of the Dead is a Dream Yoga text, a set of instructions on how to deal with passing through Bardos (transition states: emotions, wake, sleep, life, reincarnation, etc).

+++Here's a practical guide on Dream Yoga with a bit of info if you're interested: http://www.plotinus.com/zhine_tibetan_d ... a_copy.htm

[sleelverrex]

Wow!
Very informative and affirming.
Thank you.

Ashashane

[Bxbhtjnr]

This is very interesting, hyperobjects!

Thank you!

[Garry Hovard]

Thank you for providing the practical guide. Lucid dreaming is a valuable life tool and
a productive manner in which to spend one-third of our lives.

I just picked up the book, "Dreaming While Awake" by Arnold Mindell. Lucid dreaming
while awake reminds me of the Australian Aborigine's "Dreamtime".

[duawLauff]

Cor Blimey

In research for my last pots on Druids there's tons of stuff on shape shifting.

And now it's in Tibet too.

There's something going on here...or maybe I need more sleep

Caigwyn

[margoaroyo]

~If you are interested in learning a bit more about DreamWork/DreamYoga,
check out: Dream Yoga and the Practice of Natural Light by Namkhai Norbu

{This is a DL link from my public dropbox folder with the whole book availbe in a variety of formats --.doc, .htm, .rtf, in a .zip compression format: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/7107981/Dream%2 ... 0Norbu.zip }