The meaning of being reborn into human life
Conditions and connections meet, karmic bonds are brought to completion — practice, turn in the homework.
If a disciple's soul-light has not yet matured and I perform phowa for you, what comes out is a yin spirit.This is spoken of in the Xingming Guizhi; it is also spoken of in Taoist methods.In both the Master's tantric methods and in Taoist practice we know the situation very clearly.If this chicken (metaphor for the spirit-body) hasn't matured (metaphor for the yin spirit) and it hatches out, that is very dangerous.The spirit-body is not sound: first, it cannot protect itself; second, it cannot protect the body of flesh.This is very dangerous.This is called "sending out the yin spirit." The yin spirit does not emit light.It cannot transform, cannot form an emanation body.So when the yin spirit goes out, it is the same as what is called soul-leaving-the-body, and it easily gets its vessel seized by an outside spirit (the body gets taken over).So you cannot casually send out the yin spirit.Sending out the yin spirit easily makes you jittery and unstable.If you cultivate to the point of sending out the yang spirit, the body is covered in a halo of light and won't be seized.So cultivating to the yang spirit is called the Great Circulation; cultivating only to the yin spirit is roughly only the Small Circulation.The Small Circulation still has postnatal breath; the Great Circulation has only the primordial breath.
What is emptiness?Emptiness is the world before you were conceived — that is the first emptiness.So when you meditate, you have to slowly retreat from your current age back to 20… back to 10… back to 2… back to 1… back to when you were still a fetus inside Mama's belly… back to the embryo… and from the embryo retreat one more step — that is your past life.You will retreat to the emptiness before you were reborn, before you were materialized.Coming out of another flesh-body, in that soul-realm of the bardo — if you keep diligently practicing in the soul-realm, that is right.Because that is where the soul is still alive.So that kind of soul is not a dead soul, it can still be cultivated.If the soul is dead, it cannot be cultivated.When a person is alive, the navel still has a silver cord, going through the mother's body via the mother-light.But the moment a person dies, this silver cord is cut.So without this silver cord as the conveyor belt of light, the person is dead, and the person has to start all over.So while you are alive, this soul-light can still provide whatever light the flesh-body and the dharmakāya need.
A person needs the three treasures to be able to cultivate.Without the body of flesh it won't work.The three treasures are jing (essence), qi (vital breath), shen (spirit); and what they connect to are sun, moon, and stars.Buddhism speaks of Buddha, Dharma, Sangha — it is not speaking of Buddha, Dharma, and monks.It is saying that only humans possess these three functions — meaning the three souls.A person has the three souls and can cultivate.Without the three souls, you cannot cultivate.A human being is actually reborn in order to cultivate and go back — not to come here to goof off, to be a worldly person, to forget the purpose.For example, the company sends you on a business trip to America, originally to win business for the company.But the glitz of America is such fun, you keep playing, you forget the purpose of the trip.Time's up and you have to come back.The company asks: on this trip did you bring the business back?"I didn't bring any business — America was so much fun I forgot and rushed back." Cultivation is just like this: one day you die and go back, no matter whom you see, did you cultivate anything to bring back?No.So what have you been doing?Busy chasing boyfriends and girlfriends, playing with relationships all day, earning money just to feed yourself, every day thinking about this.Then the company sent you abroad for nothing — you're not a talent, next time someone else goes.What are you supposed to do?You were sent (into the world) to deliver other beings back, to find your companions and bring them back.You don't bring your companions back, and you don't elevate yourself either — then your coming to be reborn was meaningless.
So if you've already married, you have kids, you've got money, don't go on stupidly chasing the glitz of this world.Life has a time limit — every day you are walking toward death.You don't have that much time to keep chasing meaningless things.You need to concentrate on liberation.What is liberation?Cultivate until the yang spirit can leave the body.The moment you close your eyes (die), at least you've still got something (the yang spirit) running out — very free.Then you won't fear the future — the seven disasters and eight calamities, great earthquakes, great tsunamis, comet strikes, pandemics — none of it.In the end, you don't even have to enter nirvana.If this world is finished, close your eyes, and you're gone.
In mainland China there was a Venerable Hai Xian.All his life he practiced austerities, held the precepts, chanted the Buddha's name.He never studied in school.At 112 he still took care of himself, needed no help, chopped firewood, pulled weeds, worked the fields every day.At 112 he foreknew the time of his passing and freely crossed over to the Land of Ultimate Bliss.A fellow Pure Land practitioner praised him in verse: "One phrase of Amitābha, the king within the Dharma, / for seventy years hidden in the heart./ Not inquiring into Chan, not studying the teachings, / not understanding sūtras or mantras — what harm does it do?/ With deep faith and ardent vow he chanted straight on, / and naturally the flower opened in the Land of Bliss./ He left this vajra, indestructible body behind, / to witness and turn the Dharma wheel, delivering the lost./ Look closely at where the Buddha's head bowed low — / it is just like the Sixth Patriarch piloting the ferry of compassion./ Now reverently I pray before the lotus seat: / Master, lead me out of the dreamland."
The most important line is the last one — you need a true teacher to guide the disciple out of the dream and attain the dharmakāya.
Excerpted from a teaching by Master Urgyen Topden Rinpoche on 2017-09-30.