The Cult of Tara

MAGIC AND RITUAL IN TIBET
or bad; at this stage an event increases as the Clear Light; it is
called the "deep contemplation of More Emptiness."
Because he is free of taking it to be good or bad, he does not,
through desire or aversion, try to get it or avoid it; at this stage
an event becomes the Clear Light; it is called the "deep contemplation
of Great Emptiness."
By attempting neither to get it nor to avoid it, he cuts off the
happy or miserable feelings which are the result of his getting it
or not getting it, avoiding it or not avoiding it, and which are the
constructs of the five poisons. He thus cuts off suffering and
dwells in the all-absorbing; at this stage an event culminates as
the Clear Light; it is called the "deep contemplation of Complete
Emptiness."
This is the basic experience of the Clear Light of understanding
as it is to be performed "in the daytime" [that is, through the
waking awareness, the waking bardo; the text later gives instructions
for its experience "in the night" (the dream bardo) and "at
the moment of death" (the "bardo of dissolution into Emptiness")].
In this method, just described, of entering into contemplative
communion with the Clear Light, the practitioner should sit in
the posture "precious body of the deity" like Vairocana, his body
unmoving, his voice unspeaking, his mind constructing no "reality,"
entering into uninterrupted contemplative communion like
a river falling downward or the flame of a lamp burning upward.
But in fact even if the experience were explained a thousand times,
there is nothing else for it but the unremitting mindfulness on
what is to be experienced.
But having thus experienced, a yogin whose faculties are of the
very best forms even his mental constructs themselves as mindfulness.
Thus he forms the mindfulness of "recognition": he
gains the freedom that occurs simultaneously with appearance.
He who becomes firm therein is said to be "in contemplative
union even afterward, even when he is doing something else";
he is called "a Buddha in a single lifetime." Thus by his mindfulness
of recognition he recognizes each appearance to be neutral
Empty form; as soon as it occurs he is freed of it simultaneously,
and the four stages of appearance do not occur.
Thus, as it is said, "Understanding the object to be appearance and
Emptiness, without truth, the mind becomes Light and Emptiness,
without grasping." 204
It is, of course, only the practitioner "whose
faculties are of the very best" who could hope to achieve Buddhahood
in his lifetime; the main point in the "contemplative communion
with the Clear Light," I was informed, is to gain the ability to
recognize and embrace the Clear Light of the moment of death, when
the hindering presence of the physical body has been removed.