Divine pride

When we become Maitreya we have to be really convinced that we’re the real thing rather than think that we’re just pretending. Pretence is no good; we need to really believe “I am the universal love and compassion that is Maitreya.” Remember, Maitreya isn’t just some person. “I am Maitreya” is actually the experience of enlightenment.

This method of bringing the experience of enlightenment into the present is unique to tantra. It’s a radical expression. When we think, “I am the experience of universal love and compassion,” which is the essential characteristic of Maitreya, we knock out all our self-pity thoughts and imagination, and the more we develop that thought the more we eradicate our self-pity.

In a way, it’s like thinking, “At the moment, I’m a profound, healthy, modern man, a profound, healthy, modern woman, functioning perfectly in modern society.” Carl Jung spoke a lot about modern man. I interpret that to mean enlightened man…or woman. Don’t think he didn’t include women when he said that. Men and women can do anything; we are equally capable of anything.

Why am I bringing this up? If we’re under the influence of our ego-created preconceptions and think, “I can’t do this; I can’t do that. Modern men and women have to be like this—that’s beyond me,” you’re lying to yourself. It’s not true; it’s the wrong attitude.

I have a lot of hippie students in Australia. They wear rags, don’t use make-up, go barefoot and live in isolated areas. I find it very beautiful. When I went back to Australia earlier this year I got a big shock: their hair was clean, they were wearing make-up and nice, modern clothes like everybody else. They looked like Hollywood movie stars. I said,

“Do you enjoy being like this?” They said, “Yes, very much.” I thought great; let them go.

Before, they were very confrontational; if somebody looked at them the wrong way they’d get upset. Now they’re completely different. I was very surprised. When I first met them they wouldn’t dream of working; now they all have jobs, make lots of money, go to fancy restaurants for lunch and dinner and love dancing. Of course, they’re not gods; they’re just like us.

I feel they’re being realistic. I like my Western students to be normal Westerners and take advantage of what society has to offer. Conventionally they’re imitating other people but what’s the big deal? We can imitate anything we like.

If we look at it from the Dharma point of view, imitating others can be likened to manifesting as Maitreya. Why manifest as Maitreya? Lord Buddha manifested in many different ways. At certain times it was appropriate for him to manifest in a certain aspect, so he did. We can be like that, too. If, in a certain environment, it’s appropriate for us to manifest in a certain way, we can do so, and in that way our energy can remain in harmony with our surroundings.

Lord Buddha’s sutra teachings assert that the root of samsara, the cause of all suffering, is ignorance, in particular the self-grasping ignorance that is the ego. From the tantric point of view, the root of samsara is the ordinary conception, or view, of seeing ourselves as poor quality; tantra considers the self-pity image to be the main obstacle to human progress. This assertion is unique to tantra.

Therefore we have to transform ourselves into, or emanate as, Maitreya, with a golden radiant-light body and the strong conviction, “I am Buddha Maitreya,” and it’s very important that we develop this kind of understanding wisdom.

Practicing in this way is very logical and very simple. For example, look at the way Western society has developed. Twenty-four hours a day, advertising is telling us, “Men should be like this; women should be like that. Put this here; don’t put that there. This is bad; that is good.” It’s all so incredibly aggressive; we’re constantly bombarded by dualistic images of “this is better, that is worse; this looks good, that looks bad” so that in our mind we come to really believe what they’re telling us and start acting in the way they want.

In a way, we have no choice. Western society is so proud of its great democratic and individual freedoms but they’re illusory. Actually, our ego is always put into a very narrow position. Is Western society mad or not? Well, it’s our own emanation—we abandon our natural body and kind of create an artificial one. We do this to ourselves; Tibetan Buddhism doesn’t do it to us.

It’s strange, isn’t it? When we look at ourselves and our situation through the lens of Lord Buddha’s teaching we can laugh at ourselves; we can be sitting here quietly and suddenly burst out laughing. That’s the power of the Dharma. It’s strange, yet for me it’s completely logical. Why do contemporary men and women change the shape of their body? It’s because of desire and grasping.

Clear appearance

As far as the technique of self-generation is concerned, we do need to generate a clean clear mental image of Maitreya’s golden radiant light body but at first it’s quite gross. That’s good enough. We don’t need to see the details of his eyes, nose and so forth. First we just try to get a total picture in our mind and contemplate that with mindfulness and clarity, without distraction or sluggishness.

One meditation technique that can help make concentration and mindfulness easier is to breathe in slowly and gently and hold it, which helps bring energy inside. But don’t force it; as soon as it becomes uncomfortable to keep holding your breath, exhale.

When you exhale it’s important to do so slowly and completely otherwise too much pressure builds up in your body. Holding your breath is good for developing concentration but failing to exhale properly can block the flow of energy and cause pain.

Build up your concentration on the emanation of yourself as Maitreya slowly and without expectation. It’s a gradual process. When you have a general impression of yourself as Maitreya, rest in mindful awareness of that without intellectualizing and just let go. Then, to develop continuous concentration, mindfulness and awareness, inhale and hold, which will make your visualization more clear.

Holding your breath can also help to control your emotional bodily reactions. Our bodily emotions are often unstable and give others a false impression, which can be a big problem in human relationships. We need to develop stability and control over them.

Breath movement is important. Sometimes we see mentally disturbed people breathing rapidly and noisily. From the Tibetan Buddhist point of view, when the mind is refined so too is the breath.

Having developed clear appearance of yourself as the deity you then need to generate divine pride, as above. Develop divine pride and clear appearance alternately. When mindfulness of yourself as Maitreya is strong, pour on the gasoline of divine pride: “I am the universal love energy of Maitreya.” When this is strong, let go. When you need to make your concentration stronger, generate more clarity of your visualization and when you have done so, again let go. Then, at a certain point, generate divine pride once more: “I am universal love and compassion.”

Alternating in this way, build up the two factors of clarity and divine pride. This is the way to train your mind. Generate the intensive awareness of concentration. When your mind stops moving, simultaneously generate divine pride. Make it stronger and again let go. Then make your concentration stronger—more light, more clarity, then let go. When there’s no distraction, leave it there and simultaneously add the gasoline of divine pride without moving or disturbing your concentration.

As I said before, it’s a bit like driving a car. You drive along with concentration and mindfulness and change gears without thinking, spontaneously. It’s no big deal; it’s automatic.

The object of the divine pride you generate should be the unity of the universal love energy of Maitreya’s clear light body and non-duality. The unity of these two is of the nature of enlightenment and “that is me.” When you say, “I am the enlightened state of Maitreya,” you have to understand that there’s a basis of reality to the divine pride you generate.

When you see yourself possessing the profound, transcendent qualities of Buddha Maitreya, divine pride is extremely effective in eliminating self-pity pride, the pride of being inferior. The qualities with which you identify should be profound—“Non-duality is me; I am non-duality”—and when, on the basis of these profound qualities, you develop concentration on the crystal-clear, rainbow body of Maitreya, it’s easy to discover shunyata because you’re aware of its non-dual nature.

The main thing in developing concentration is to continuously remember the object on which you’re focused without sluggishness or distraction. To help with this you need to develop the skill of recognizing negative thoughts that arise during meditation as the energy of universal love. If you can do this you leave no room for negative thoughts to proliferate. That’s also a technique for eliminating distraction; you can deal with other distractions in a similar way: recognize distracting sounds as mantra and distracting pleasures in the nature of blissful non-dual wisdom.

These things are very important when you practice the main body of the yoga method. If you practice in this way, real transformation will come. 

Mantra recitation

From the practical point of view, when practicing sadhanas, recitation of the mantra is not the main thing. First you have to develop clear appearance and divine pride of yourself as the deity. Mantra practice follows that. Once you have developed strong concentration and divine pride, without losing concentration, shift your focus and meditate on the syllable hum and moon disc at your heart. Unify your mind with the moon disc—your mind becomes the moon disc—and meditate for a short time on that.

Then, at the center of the moon disc, a golden light syllable hum appears, with the mantra OM AH MAITRI SARVA SIDDHI HUM standing clockwise around the periphery of the moon disc, and this is when you can recite the mantra.

As you do, much radiant light emanates from the syllable, mantra, moon and your body, pervading the ten directions of the universe, touching all living beings. They are all purified of whatever sufferings and dissatisfaction they have—physical, mental, emotional—and transformed into Maitreya—all living beings appear as Maitreya, all sound as mantra and all thoughts as universal love and wisdom. Then, all beings, in the aspect of Maitreya, sink into you. This improves your concentration.

You can also recite the mantra silently. First recite it with sound, then without; do mental recitation. When your concentration on this is good you can move to practice other techniques.

For example, you are Maitreya and on the moon disc at your heart is a small flame, or the feeling of fire. Your consciousness manifests within this fire feeling as the mantra; in aspect it’s the mantra but in essence it’s your consciousness. So, when you practice this technique, don’t recite the words of the mantra; just concentrate on the unity of the fire, the mantra and your non-dual wisdom. Hold this mindfully, without distraction or sluggishness, emphasizing the unity of vipashyana meditation.

Again, in order to enhance clear concentration when practicing these meditation techniques, breathe in and hold it without exhaling quickly.

The effect of practicing these particular meditation techniques is the experience of great bliss and non-superstitious wisdom, similar to tummo meditation, which also produces heat and blissful energy in your nervous system.²⁶

Once you have mastered that meditation with good concentration and the desired effects, again shift your emphasis. On the moon disc at your heart visualize another very subtle, very small Maitreya. His size can be according to what works best for you: like a sesame seed or a little bigger, like a rice grain or even an apple. It depends on your own experience but make him as small as you can. And then, again, at his heart concentrate on the fire feeling and mantra. This trains your mind to become very subtle and helps you reach the very depths of your unconscious mind.

There are other techniques you can employ but I think that’s enough for now. I hope you don’t feel deprived of meditations to practice. However, the techniques I have given you very briefly here are actually very powerful and are what you need to practice to develop special insight.

Transforming yourself into Maitreya is very important. It changes your entire mental attitude. For example, when you see a normal rainbow you don’t grasp at it strongly or get neurotic and emotionally disturbed. Since your attitude toward it is different from how you normally relate to sense objects, your relationship with it changes too; your feelings and emotions change. Similarly, by transforming yourself into the profound, universal love characteristic of Maitreya, you can easily change your attitudes, feelings and emotions and easily understand non-duality.

The posture in which you visualize yourself as Maitreya can be as seated on a chair, as mentioned in the sadhana, or in the vajra posture, whichever you feel more comfortable with. And your three places are marked by om, ah and hum.

Now let’s return to the sadhana where we left off.

Invocation of the wisdom beings

From the blue HUM at my heart
Much brilliant blue light radiates out to Tushita,
Invoking the wisdom beings in the form of Maitreya,
Who come back with the light and melt into me.

(Generate the strong divine pride that you have actually become Maitreya Buddha and visualize yourself vividly as having a brilliant form made of clear light, as transparent as crystal.)

What is the purpose of doing this? You are Maitreya but there’s also the Maitreya who we normally think of, the relatively existent Maitreya in Tushita pure land. He is a wisdom being. So the question arises, since we’ve already become Maitreya, why do we need to invoke an external one? It’s because we still have our dualistic mind and it’s always out of control. We always see things dualistically. Invoking the wisdom beings from Tushita or the ten directions in the aspect of Maitreya and having them enter and unify with us helps us overcome that dualistic view.

As the text says: “Generate the strong divine pride that you have actually become Maitreya Buddha and visualize yourself vividly as having a brilliant form made of clear light, as transparent as crystal.”

The emphasis of this yoga method is putting an end to all dualistic thinking, so we generate the shunyata experience and arise as Maitreya, but still within us, perhaps even unconsciously, there’s a feeling of separation: “I’m the self-pity one; Maitreya is fully enlightened universal love, wisdom and compassion.” The experience of invoking and absorbing the wisdom beings helps cut the dualistic thought that sees us as separate from the wisdom being Maitreya.

NOTES

²⁶  See Lama’s Bliss of Inner Fire.  [Return to text]