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On Chögyam Trungpa

On Chögyam Trungpa

Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche is the quintessential spiritual guide. His teachingssteeped in ancient tradition and presented with relaxed fluency in western language and cultureare profound, accessible, and fresh. In addition to the buddhadharma, he offered the secular path of Shambhala, cultivating an appreciation of inherent bravery, dignity and goodness beyond cultural and religious bounds. Through his many books, Trungpa Rinpoche continues to be an incomparable source of wisdom and courage in the world. The Chronicles is an ongoing celebration of his profound teachings and life example.

Copyright Diana J. Mukpo. Used here by arrangement with Diana J. Mukpo and Shambhala Publications, Inc.
These teachings by Chögyam Trungpa are selected at random from Ocean of Dharma Quotes of the Week: the email service that brings Trungpa Rinpoche’s dharma to your inbox several times each week. For more information, or to add your name to the list, visit OceanofDharma.com.
Ocean of Dharma Quotes of the Week is edited and produced by Carolyn Rose Gimian. Thank you to Lady Diana Mukpo, Mrs. Gimian, and Shambhala Publications for making these teachings available on the Chronicles.

The Most Enlightening Choices

Relating with the present moment is quite difficult and painful in many cases. Although it is straightforward, a straight road, it is quite a painful one. It is like the bardo, or after death, experiences mentioned in The Tibetan Book of the Dead. You have a brilliant light coming at you with the image of a certain tathagata, or buddha, peering at you from within it. And on the side there is a less brilliant, less irritating light. The light from the side is much more beautiful because it is less glaring, only a reflection of the tathagata. So there are two choices. Should we go into the irritating one or should we just turn off on one of the sidetracks? This symbolism from The Tibetan Book of the Dead is very profound for our actual, everyday life situation. It does not have to refer only to the after-death experience. Perhaps the after-death experience just typifies the kind of situation in which choices are most enlightening or stimulating and most immediate. In our ordinary life situation, we have to open ourselves and investigate and then make a commitment. Without choice, there would be no leap and no moment of letting go at all. Because of choice, therefore, there is a moment of leap and letting go happens. So it seems that it is not particularly comforting and blissful and easy. On the other hand, it could be inspiring.

— From “Auspicious Coincidence,” in Glimpses of Abhidharma, pages 101 to 102.

The Path of Guru Devotion

  We may be a minority, but there are some of us who have the merit, as well as the guts, confidence and courage to...

The Nature of Mind

A single talk, given in Berkeley, Ca. on May 11, 1971

Chogyam Trungpa Poetry Readings

  September 1, 1972, Karme Choling, Vermont May 6, 1972, Boulder, Colorado June 10, 1975, Naropa Institute, Boulder, Colorado   We would like to thank the Shambhala Archives and Kalapa Recordings...

Visual Dharma Seminar

Audio recordings, Naropa 1979

Work Sex Money: Seminar One

Work, sex and money: these are the main things in our lives that we look to instinctively for satisfaction, and yet, they almost never supply it