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A timeless wisdom, refined to guide us through confusion
Nalanda University, ancient seat of learning
INTRODUCTION
There Is A Timeless Universal Wisdom
Concerning Human Existence And The Existence Of The Universe.
This wisdom is so old that it might even have been connected with ancient western knowledge long before it flowered in the eastern hemisphere in India and later on in Tibet. This wisdom encompasses the knowledge that our seemingly solid world in its deepest nature is subject to continuous becoming and cessation and that at its root anything is interconnected with everything else, in unity; and that everything which exists has a causal and interdependent nature. This means that each and every phenomenon only exists because of the coming together of countless causes and components in every moment – in duality. In Tibetan this knowledge, of the interdependent origination of everything that exists, is called “Tendrel”. Unity in Duality springs from the Buddhist Inner Science tradition’s expression of this universal knowledge.
Transformation of being
Because of the relationship of ‘subject’ and ‘object’ we can change our experience of the world and of the situations, which arise in it. Buddhist psychology maintains in this respect that the ‘self-feeling’ is the core around which the psychological patterns and the reality of the individual develops, and this ‘self-feeling’ becomes the subject of change for personal development and therapeutic healing.
Dual transformation: The Buddhist personal development methods, and the therapeutic methods that Tarab Tulku XI has developed, deal essentially with healing and strengthening the ‘self-feeling’ and refining the ‘self-feeling’ as well as that of mastering the dynamic of ‘minds’ in their diversity, realising their interrelated nature. In this way, the experience changes, becoming less projected and more refined.
The non-dual transformation process of an inadequate or vulnerable ‘self-feeling’ into a healthier one, introduced by Tarab Rinpoche XI on the basis of the ancient practice methods, takes the practitioner through the following process of change:
(1) from a solid form level of the problematic experience,
(2) to an energy level, beyond the vulnerable self-feeling and connected experience, and
(3) back into a new creation of the form level, into a new and more genuine experience of oneself, and existence.
When applying the insight of this basic interrelatedness of ‘body’ & ‘mind’, ‘subject’ & ‘object’ and ‘energy (potential-field)’ & ‘matter’ the experience of ‘self-feeling’ and that of the ‘object’ changes, and the former problematic ‘subject’-‘object’ relationship is transcended.
Within these areas, Buddhist Psychology offers a well-grounded and highly developed frame of reference for understanding personal development. It gives the theoretical analysis for changing the experience of oneself and experience of the surroundings, and it offers adequate therapeutic as well as personal development methods for its attainment. All in all Buddhist psychology and therapy give a new and valuable perspective, foundation, and method supplementing and enriching contemporary psychology.
Subject-Object
Buddhist psychology cannot be understood isolated from its philosophical basis. The understanding or any other experience (object-pole) does not exist as such independently of the experiencing ‘minds’ (subject-pole); which at all levels is essential to Buddhist Psychology. In different ways, this diversity of minds is interrelated with their corresponding objects (experiences) in their meeting with that to which these refer. The minds perceive their objects conceptually, feeling, image and sense wise. And as individuals of modern cultures, we accordingly experience these appearances as an undifferentiated integral part of our reality, which, when not realising this ‘subject’-‘object’ interrelationship, we impose indiscriminately on what exist.
Body – Mind
Buddhist Psychology has as its basis an understanding of the nature and functioning of ‘mind’ in its many different states of experiencing. However, it does not see the ‘mind-experiences’ as isolated phenomena. It sees the ‘body’ and ‘mind’ as mutually interrelated on all levels, from both an ordinary level to the basic energy level. The former is characterised by an experience of great separation and the latter by the experience of the inseparability of ‘body’ and ‘mind’. This view further implies that ‘mind’ does not exist without a corresponding ‘body’, and vice versa.
Matter – Energy
Following Tibetan metaphysics ‘matter’ emerges gradually from the four basic ‘energy element origins’, such that, ‘energy (potential field)’ is seen as both the basis of matter and is continuously informing ‘matter’. From this ‘energy’ resource all forms arise and return in a continuous movement of birth, existence and death, taking place in every instant of time. Change and exchange is the basis of existence and is only possible due to this continuous informing of ‘energy (potential-field)’ throughout all forms of existence. We can understand the interrelationship between ‘body’ and ‘mind’ as well as ‘subject’ and ‘object’ through this interrelatedness of ‘matter’ and ‘energy (potential-field)’. Our solid bodies are inseparable from the basic energy of ourselves from which also ‘mind’ evolves, similarly, the universe is inseparable from its resonating ‘energy element origin’.