Glimpses of Abhidharma by Chogyam Trungpa

Author:Chogyam Trungpa
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Tags: Religion, Buddhism, General
ISBN: 9781590300268
Publisher: Shambhala
Published: 2004-02-10T00:00:00+00:00

Meditation

PERHAPS AT THIS POINT there is a sense of being bombarded with the classifications of the abhidharma—the process of the development of the skandhas and the various aspects of form, feeling, perception, and samskara. At this point I think it would be good to talk about the practice of meditation very practically and how it fits in with the psychological development we have been talking about. Meditation is a way of scientifically looking at our basic situation and seeing what is important in dealing with it. But maybe we think we do not have to deal with anything at all. Maybe we should just let everything happen and abandon the idea of meditating. That is another possibility, of course, a very tempting one. But the reason for getting into meditation is a very tempting one as well. If we get into meditation, we begin to see our psychological situation very precisely and directly.

I think a fundamental problem that we all have is that we are very critical of ourselves to the point where we are even our own enemies. Meditation is a way of making up that quarrel, of accepting ourselves, making friends with ourselves. We may find we are not as bad as we have been told we are. We will also find that meditation practice is not something exotic and high and out of reach so that we cannot grasp it. Meditation practice is something that takes place on a personal level. It involves an intimate relationship with ourselves. Great intimacy is involved. It has nothing to do with achieving perfection, achieving some absolute state or other. It is purely getting into what we are, really examining our actual psychological process without being ashamed of it. It is getting into what we are properly and thoroughly. It is just friendship with ourselves.

Unless we are able to make friends with ourselves there is no hope at all. If we abandon ourselves as hopeless, as villains, then there is no stepping-stone. If we take that attitude then we must constantly be looking for something much better than ourselves. And that attempt to outrace ourselves on the spot can continue perpetually, on and on and on. And in fact that is just what we do.

So meditation is coming into contact with the actual situation of ourselves, the raw and rugged, painful, irritating, disgusting things going on within our state of being. But even if our state of being is disgusting we should look into it. It is beautiful to see it. To discover that such things exist in the natural situation is very beautiful. It is another dimension of natural beauty. People talk about appreciating natural beauty—climbing mountains, seeing giraffes and tigers in Africa, and all sorts of things; but nobody seems to appreciate this kind of natural beauty of ourselves. This is actually far more beautiful than flora and fauna, far more fantastic, far more painful and colorful and delightful and all the rest.

Meditation is getting into this kind of natural situation, the organic natural situation of what we are, directly, thoroughly, properly.

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