Osho: Let Even the Remedy Itself go Free on its own Chogyam Trungpa: Self-liberate Even the Antidote Pema Chodron: Self-liberate Even the Antidote Jamgon Kongtrul: Even the Remedy is Freed to Subside Naturally Alan Wallace: Even the Antidote Itself is Liberated in its own Place Rabten & Dhargyey: The Remedy Itself is Released in its own Place Dilgo Khyentse: The Antidote Will Vanish of Itself INVESTIGATE THE NATURE OF UNBORN AWARENESS ESTABLISH THE NATURE OF THE PATH IN THE SPHERE OF THE FOUNDATION OF ALL  Formal Practice   Alan Wallace

Even the Antidote Itself is Liberated in its own Place

 

 
My Book on Tai Chi Imagery
The next verse of the root text continues on the subject of ultimate bodhicitta, or realizing the nature of reality, as a practice during meditation sessions. The direct realization of ultimate truth is the fundamental antidote and ultimate healer of the distortions that afflict the mind. The author is saying that even this realization itself is "liberated in its own place." And here "liberated" means lacking intrinsic existence. Even the notion of ultimate truth is itself devoid of inherent existence.

Sechibuwa has shifted here to a third aspect of reality. After denying first the intrinsic existence of objective reality, and then that of subjective awareness, he now moves on to transcendent awareness. Even this transcendent experience of ultimate reality, in which there is no sense of subject/object, no duality of this as opposed to that, self as opposed to other, no sense of time, no conceptual discrimination - even this fundamental antidote to the fundamental distortion of ignorance has no inherent existence. On what grounds can one make such a statement? The Madhyamaka view proposes the thesis that any dependently related event is devoid of intrinsic existence. Conversely, any entity that is devoid of intrinsic existence is by that very fact a dependently related event. This sums up the ultimate and conventional natures of all phenomena.

Excerpted from: The Seven-Point Mind Training(first published as A Passage from Solitude : Training the Mind in a Life Embracing the World), by B. Alan Wallace. Copyright 1992 by Snow Lion Publications, Ithaca, New York 14851.

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This site provides an on-line database of commentaries on the Tibetan Buddhist meditation practices of lojong (Mind Training) and tonglen.
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Written during a retreat in the high California desert by one of the foremost Buddhist intellectuals of our time. This commentary probably goes further than any other in making the Mind Training practice understandable and justifiable to a Western way of thinking. It also contains some very valuable 'lecture notes' taken by Sechibuwa, one of Chekawa's disciples who heard the teachings directly from the master.
All of us have attitudes. Some of them accord with reality and serve us well throughout the course of our lives. Others are out of alignment with reality, and cause us problems. Tibetan Buddhist practice isn't just sitting in silent meditation, it's developing fresh attitudes that align our minds with reality. Attitudes need adjusting, just like a spinal column that has been knocked out of alignment. B. Alan Wallace explains a fundamental type of Buddhist mental training called lojong, which can literally be translated as attitudinal training. It is designed to shift our attitudes so that our minds become pure well-springs of joy instead of murky pools of problems, anxieties, fleeting pleasures, hopes and frustrations.
Eighth-century text on the Mahayana path of love, compassion, and complete personal responsibility by the Indian master Shantideva. Translated by Alan and Vesna Wallace.