Lama Dudjom Dorjee - Stillness, Insight, and Emptiness: Buddhist Meditation from the Ground Up

A profound teaching in a concise and simple style. As a guide to students of meditation at all levels, this book will benefit those seeking to understand and practice the Buddhas holy Dharma.

His Eminence the Twelfth Kenting Tai Situpa

Remarkable in its clear explanation of the profound wisdom of the East for inquiring Western minds. His teachings on meditation are fresh and vital, reminding us of its power to transform our lives.

Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche, author of Rebel Buddha

A heartfelt and comprehensive presentation that brings clarity to this profound and delightful topic. A wonderfully potent and engaging resource for practitioners at all stages of meditation experience.

Rose Taylor Goldfield, author of Training the Wisdom Body: Buddhist Yogic Exercise

ABOUT THE BOOK

Developing an effective meditation practice is the first step toward discerning the true nature of mind and reality as taught by Buddha Shakyamuni. In Stillness, Insight, and Emptiness, Lama Dudjom Dorjee offers instructions that will help beginning meditators establish a firm foundation in the practices that lead to direct realization. Topics such as finding the best meditation posture, learning to direct and focus the attention, expanding the minds scope, and realizing the luminous and spacious qualities of the mind are explained in terms that are both encouraging and easy to understand.

Born to a nomadic family in eastern Tibet, LAMA DUDJOM DORJEE grew up in India and received a distinguished Acharya degree from Sanskrit University in Varanasi. In 1981, at the request of the Sixteenth Gyalwang Karmapa, he came to the United States as a representative of the Karma Kagyu lineage. He is presently Resident Lama of Karma Thegsum Choling in Dallas, Texas.

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Stillness, Insight, and Emptiness

Buddhist Meditation from the Ground Up

Lama Dudjom Dorjee

SNOW LION

BOSTON & LONDON

2013

Snow Lion

An imprint of Shambhala Publications, Inc.

Horticultural Hall

300 Massachusetts Avenue

Boston, Massachusetts 02115

www.shambhala.com

2013 by Lama Dudjom Dorjee

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Dudjom Dorjee, Lama.

Stillness, insight, and emptiness: Buddhist meditation from the ground up / Lama Dudjom Dorjee.First Edition.

pages cm

eISBN 978-0-8348-2915-2

ISBN 978-1-55939-420-8 (pbk.)

1. MeditationBuddhism. I. Title.

BQ5612.D83 2013

294.34435dc23

2013002684

CONTENTS

:

As requested, I am imparting a few words on behalf of Lama D. Dorjees latest publication, Stillness, Insight, and Emptiness: Buddhist Meditation from the Ground Up.

This is the third Dharma book written by Lama D. Dorjee, conveying a profound teaching in a concise and simple style. As a guide to students of meditation at all levels, this book will benefit those seeking to understand and practice the Buddhas holy Dharma.

May excellent virtue increase,

The Twelfth Kenting Tai Situpa

September 1, 2011

Please feel free to recite this prayer, either silently or aloud, just as if you were reciting it along with me. You can do this any time you like, but especially each time you begin reading this book.

To the three jewelsthe Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha

To the three rootsthe Lamas, Yidams, and Dharma Protectors

To all you sources of refuge: consider your vows to help all sentient beings forever end their suffering, break the chains of samsara, and find true freedom in the path of liberation.

Buddhas and bodhisattvas, please grant your blessings that our aspirations and prayers may be fulfilled.

Through the negative thoughts and unvirtuous actions of beings in these degenerate times, and the turmoil of the outer and inner imbalance of the four elements, we are beset by a horde of human and animal diseases, both old and new.

Buddhas and bodhisattvas, please grant your blessings that our aspirations and prayers may be fulfilled.

Everywhere on the earth, nagas, gyalpos, and maras bring suffering. We see these manifest as blight, drought, and famine. They reveal themselves as terrible storms such as hurricanes, floods, and tornadoes. We even see their presence in the form of weapons of mass destruction, nuclear, chemical, and biological. Even the four elements are angry. We see their distress at their state of imbalance as earthquakes, volcanoes, and wildfires.

Buddhas and bodhisattvas, please grant your blessings that our aspirations and prayers may be fulfilled.

We hang at the very edge of the precipice of environmental catastrophe. Human activity has brought this planet to the brink of destruction. The air we breathe and the water we drink have become toxic to our systems. The atmosphere no longer provides us the necessary protection from the suns powerful rays. Every year, more and more species disappear from the planet, never to be seen again.

Buddhas and bodhisattvas, please grant your blessings that our aspirations and prayers may be fulfilled.

In particular, we are constantly threatened by the accumulation of negative thoughts and energies brought into the world by each and every individual mind. What starts as individual negativity is compounded when added to that of the rest of the world, allowing it to grow to planetary proportions. What starts as individual negativity that may result in suffering on a smaller, more personal scale as one person does physical harm to or murders another, eventually grows and spreads like a cancer. One persons negativity is added to the next persons until the world is a place of terrible invasions, wars, and genocides.

Buddhas and bodhisattvas, please grant your blessings that our aspirations and prayers be fulfilled:

That thoughts and feelings of loving-kindness and compassion increase, person-to-person and family-to-family, so that they may become nation-to-nation. Fighting and wars must be quickly pacified and eradicated; all destructive activity swiftly brought to an end.

Buddhas and bodhisattvas, please grant your blessings that our aspirations and prayers may be fulfilled:

That all beings, humans and nonhumans, naturally generate precious bodhichitta, like a mothers love for her child, but toward all sentient beings without exception. May they be free from pain and suffering of malevolent thoughts and actions.