Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. The king-and-leather parable — covering the soles of your own feet does the same work as covering every road in the kingdom — opens this 46-minute session from Khensur Rinpoche’s Art of Dying Workshop. The story grounds the session’s argument: since external circumstances cannot be controlled from the outside, training the mind is the only lasting remedy for suffering. Q&A comes first, covering whether cremating a body too soon harms a consciousness still residing in it, organ donation, euthanasia, and how bereaved parents can help a dead child through prayer and compassion rather than distress. Mindfulness of breathing with counting and noting techniques follows, then a guided visualization leads participants through the dissolution at death — earth, water, fire, and wind elements dissolving in sequence, each producing its characteristic vision (water mirage, smoke, sparks, flickering butter lamp) — through moonlit space, red space, and blackness to the clear light of death.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 07 A of D 1993 08 07.mp3
UUID: 6f475022-c7cb-49ea-a8b0-bc2479c3c9cd
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Art of Dying Workshop (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 1993-08-07
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 45.8 minutes
Words: ~3,526
So if there’s no If there’s no suffering involved in in in maintaining this person and that system, then it’s not it’s not going to harm the consciousness. But if the body is disposed of in four to three days, what happens to that consciousness? What kind of would you have in mind when you talk about disposing? So there’s no problem with burial because you aren’t harming the body in any way, but it would be harmful to the consciousness if it since it hasn’t left to burn the body. So, you know, though the external indications of life have ceased, such as respiration, etcetera, there’s still there while the the life force has not been severed, there still remains a a cellular consciousness within the body.
So to to burn the body, for example, previous to while the non while the consciousness is still residing in the body would be would have the the negative consequences for the for the person who’s doing the the burning of killing. On the on and on the other hand, the the consciousness still has a subtle sense of feeling consciousness, and it would experience great suffering. So if one had, gave donated these organs out of altruism, beneficial intention, then it would be a skillful action. It would be meritorious, and it would be useful in one’s in the taking of a positive rebirth in the future. To kill him.
Yeah. So who decides to kill him? The prisoner is dying. The vegetable. The vegetable.
Me? So would would it be wrong if they chose to kill themselves? So it’s it would be negative for them to kill themselves. There’s one one more question. Did you have a question?
So explain to them that what occurred was, happened under the influence of karma, and that it and that it would is of no use to the dead person now to be distressed. That it what could is of no benefit. On the contrary, what would be a benefit if they did cultivate love and compassion, and made prayers of aspiration to and towards the positive rebirth of the child, then this would be of this would be of great use. But their worry and distress is not going to help the dead child. But their prayers and the cultivation of love and compassion will.
That’s if the parents worry and distress is not going to benefit the dead child. It’s only going to make the parents sick and unhappy. And on the contrary, if they cultivate these skillful states of mind such as love and compassion, and make heartfelt prayers for the welfare of their dead child. This will benefit not only the child, but it will also be able to make them happy. We have a some prayers of dedication that are often recited.
They’re on pages they’re verses eight to nine. So if you’d like to recite along with us, you’re welcome. Breathing for the next, say, five minutes. So if you take a comfortable but firm posture, if it’s helpful using the techniques of counting and noting. Over the course of the day we’ve created a great deal of positive energy, creative potential, and we can dedicate that that positive energy.
So each of us in our own way, within our own hearts, dedicating whatever creative energy we may have accumulated for the deviation of suffering, bringing about of peace. For the happiness of all that lives. I’ll stop there. In our meditation, we’re going to be doing, continuing the mindfulness of breathing meditation. I I think it seems as if some kind of note needs to be made about that in terms of you know, as I as I mentioned yesterday that meditation is the way that we’re using to solve our problems.
It shouldn’t become incorporated in our in our as as simply another means to extend, support, maintain our problems. And then that’s and that what I mean by that in in our usual competitive, ambitious, acquisitive, manipulative mind frame that we usually bring to most of our activities. It’s it’s something that we that we do simply as a way to express our compassion for ourselves. And in fact, indirectly perhaps, a way that we can express our compassion for others by developing ourselves, our skills, abilities, we can be of that much more service to others. And one of the most direct methods to develop the mind, which is the basis of of our skills and the mind is the forerunner of all things, is through meditation.
It’s it’s a direct method. There are other various indirect methods, but perhaps the most the meditation is the most effective way to change our mind for the better, and therefore to be able to be of greater use to oneself and to others. So, you know, the talking about mind is I’m just gonna tackle a minute if I can, which is difficult. But, you know, the I think, you know, there is this reorientation that has to take place. You know, as I mentioned yesterday, it’s not so much why what we do, but why we do what we do.
Am I okay? Can you hear me okay? Okay. The the motivation is is of paramount importance to to determine the quality of the outcome. And that there is in talking we all have some suspicion or from time to time we’ve had some insight in the fact that very much it is our mind which is a large determinant of the quality of our life.
There’s a there’s a story which it’s a traditional antidote which portrays this idea. There once was a king, and this king was walking about his kingdom. And and he kept walking along the road, he kept to step on a thorn, and it hurt a great deal. And so he called together his ministers, and he put the royal foot up on the royal table and said, look at this, look at this, we can’t allow this to happen again. Look, something’s gotta be done.
So all the all the ministers they thought and they thought and thought and and one of the clever ones spoke up and said, we’ll cover all the roads in your kingdom with leather. That way, wherever the king walks, the king’s foot will be protected from all sorts of sharp objects, thorns, stones, whatever. And then you can walk freely without any worry about harming your foot. And king, ah, this is a brilliant idea, great idea. But as as usually is the case in such situations, the treasurer spoke up.
And he said, you know, we we can’t do it. There first off, there’s not enough leather. There aren’t enough cattle in the country to produce that much leather. And even if there were, it would bankrupt the treasure. It’s it’s simply not a workable plan.
And then as is usual the case, one of the old wise ministers after long pause, pregnant pause, pointed pause spoke up and and she said, I and she and she said, I suggest we cut a piece of leather. We take a piece, small piece of leather, and we trace out the the the shape of the king’s, the sole of the king’s foot on each piece and cut it out, and we bind it with thongs, leather thongs to the to the soles of the king’s feet. And then it will be as if the all the roads in your kingdom were covered by leather. They would serve that same purpose. It would it would provide the same function.
So the thing is, we cannot control the world about us, the people and the situations and what arises for us. But if we can control one factor, that is our mind, then it is as if we control the world. And controlling our mind is sufficient. It’s enough. It’s more than enough in a way.
So developing this sort of orientation away from seeing one’s problems and therefore one’s solutions outside of oneself, but more and more seeing that one’s problems and therefore the solutions to those problems lie within your own mind, in development of of your own mind. And so this becomes a motivating force for for taking what is said, is learned, and trying to see its relevance and adapting it and integrating it. Not It becomes something more than a matter of intellectual curiosity or something, another trophy we can put up on our mantle, another activity amongst our various all our various activities to become something which is relevant to our lives, then we can bring about change. And it’s necessary to change, you know, that hopefully we can begin to recognize that over the course of our lives. These repeating patterns, these same themes, the same problems which keep reoccurring.
And at some point in our life, we we quit changing the people about us, our partners, and our jobs, and our houses, our geographical locations, and we begin to change our mind, the source of our problems and the source of our happiness. So we’re going to and, and one of the most effective means of changing our minds is through meditation. It’s a direct means, I think. And I mentioned yesterday, using it in terms of mindfulness of breathing, of using these two techniques of counting and noting. And I’m going to give you a demonstration of what how a possible I’m not suggesting that you meditate in this way, but a possible sequence of meditation might sound like.
I’m going to speak these words, you would be thinking them if if you were that that’s what you were doing. You know, you’re breathing in, breathing out, counting one. Breathing in, knowing that you’re breathing in, noting that you’re breathing in, noting in, breathing out, noting noting that you’re breathing out, noting out. The mind becomes distracted, noting whatever the distraction was, bringing it bringing your mind back to the breath. So it’s possible sequence.
Now, I’m just suggesting that you model your meditation after this sequence. I hope you don’t, matter of fact. It could run something like, you know, you’re sitting there very straight, you know, like you know what you’re doing. And and you’re breathing in out one, in out thinking, in out one, in out thinking, boring, hearing, thinking, in out thinking, in out thinking, hearing pain, pain, sleepy, sleepiness. In out one, in out two.
If you never get to three, there’s no problem, you know. These aren’t the tryouts for the, what is the, the Atlanta, Meditation Olympics. And it’s a you know, somehow it’s it’s just enough to work with the the trying which is important. You know, it’s useful to develop, to be able to get the ten. There’s some but actually just the the, the journey is is just as important as the goal and how the quality of our attitude that we bring to the to the experience is just as important as our So this mindset of having to achieve is it can be a corrupting influence and, it can simply become a you know, we we won’t enjoy what we’re doing perhaps quite rightly because it mimics the rest of our life in in a way.
And and meditation is supposed to be something that perhaps in a in a way is altogether different than most of our life. It’s a it’s a it’s another order of being as I mentioned yesterday, perhaps what I call an aesthetic way of being as opposed to our usual habitual pragmatic way of being, which are they’re both necessary for quality life and perhaps we’ve got gotten out of balance. So we’re going to do mindfulness of breathing as a basis for our meditation. And then we’re going to do, we’re just going to run through. I think you’ll find it quite interesting, this sequence of inner appearances or visions that occur in the natural death process.
You know, as Khensur Rinpoche mentioned yesterday, there is maybe we can talk about it during discussion here. I don’t want to go into it, too extensively because I will run out of time as I usually do. But there are different levels of body. There’s a gross body of flesh and blood, bones, muscles, whatnot. There’s a subtle body which is composed of nervous channels throughout the body, psychic channels sometimes they’re called.
And then there is a very subtle body which is simply a very extremely subtle wind energy. And these three levels of body correspond to three levels of consciousnesses. There’s gross consciousnesses, sense physical sense consciousnesses, i.e. eye, ear, nose, tongue, body sense consciousnesses. There’s subtle consciousnesses, conceptual consciousness, thinking consciousnesses. And then there is subtle extremely subtle consciousness.
Sometimes as these are these subtle these three levels of consciousness are likened to our waking consciousness, our dream consciousness, and then our consciousness during deep sleep. And they are they are they act the the bodies, these three levels of body act as supports for these three levels of consciousness, like a horse and a rider. The the the principal characteristic of consciousness is its cognitive factor. It is able to know objects. The principal, characteristic of bodies or the system type of physical energy is its motility.
It’s able to move in space. So like just as in the case of a horse and rider, the, together they can move to an object and know the object. The one without the other, they will not arise knowing as we as we recognize it. So these two these two factors always work in conjunction. In fact, they’re one entity, consciousness and its physical basis.
And as the the death, proceeds, the physical basis, first on the gross level begins to lose its ability to act as a support for consciousness. The intimate connection between a gross consciousness and a gross body begins to weaken just as Rinpoche mentioned about the glue between the papers beginning to weaken and finally they dissolve and, the bond is broken and the two papers separate. Likewise, during the dissolution process, the gross body slowly in in a serial form begins to lose its capacity, beginning with the earth element, which is, the principle of solidity, hardness, extension in space. It begins to lose its ability to support a particular level of gross consciousness. And as it does, there’s a particular inner vision will appear to the dying person.
Then the water element begins to lose its ability. That is to say, by water element, the various fluids in the body, the saliva, the urine, the mucus, all the foreign substances in the body, which which up to at that point, we’re able to act as a support for consciousness. This is a computer can act as a support for software. And as the the computer begins to malfunction or things begin to go wrong, the computer is less and less able to express its full capacity, its function. And likewise with the mind and different appearances will be will will appear to the dying person’s consciousness.
Then the earth, water, fire, that’s the temperature or the the movement at a micro scale. The within the body, the the the vibration quality of of the matter, the principle of vibration or or on a micro scale. Another, vision. And then finally, earth, water, fire, air, the wind energy element. The gross wind energy element begins to lose its capacity to support or maintain that particular level of consciousness, a corresponding level of consciousness.
And, by wind energy, it’s mostly most principally characterized, as I mentioned, by motility, movement. And then so then the gross body is no longer able to support gross consciousness. So gross consciousness dissolves. Since there’s no support, it’s like taking away the necessary, hardware, which is necessary for a particular software program to express itself. Once that if the hardware is not there, there’s no way that the software can function.
And another level of consciousness begins to predominate. This is a subtle level, and this begins to break down in various visions until what is only left at the very end is what is called the mind of clear light. And this is the most subtle consciousness in combination with the most subtle level of energy. And it’s this combination which has our evolutionary history imprinted on it. And all the various actions, verbal actions, physical actions, mental actions that we’ve created over the course of our lives are imprinted, encoded, impressed upon this combination.
And this is what we will go on to the future lives. So the the process of death revolves around the changes in the physiology of the of the of the gross body, of the subtle body, and finally the the most subtle body. And various has various psychological consequences in terms of the of the experience of the dying person. And, one way we can note these is in the various visions which appear. So it’s quite interesting.
So we’re going to go through these visions and you can sort of just mimic, you know, that that you as if you were a dying person and just play with these images, try to become aware of the sequence of images and how that they may progress. So shall we try that? So if you take a comfortable but firm posture, begin with, mindfulness of breathing. And perhaps we first we can get in touch with the body, noticing any tightnesses, any tensions, especially around the neck and shoulders. And consciously relaxing, softening those areas.
Feeling any tension, physical tension moving down and out into into the floor. The body becoming comfortable. A sense of physical well-being. Then bringing the mind to the breath. Just a gentle, easy in and outflow of the natural breath, if it’s useful using techniques of counting and noting.
Now we’re going to begin the visualization of the dissolution process. As death death proceeds first, the earth element begins to lose its capacity. And there’s inner vision of a mirage, a water mirage, a shimmering layer of a like lake in the distance on a hot desert. This begins to disappear as the earth element begins to dissolve and the water element begins to predominate. A water mirage.
And slowly, the earth element, the water element begins to lose its ability to support consciousness. And there appears smoke, bluish dark smoke swirling, filling the air, filling the room. The fire element is beginning to predominate. And the fire element begins to dissolve, And we see a vision of sparks in a black sky, or fireflies flicking here and there. The wind energy element predominating.
Then finally, the wind energy element begins to reduce its capacity to support consciousness. And there’s an inner vision of the appearance of a a butter lamp in a darkened room. It’s just about to go out. The the wick is barely lit, and there’s a flickering. The flame just about to go out.
The butter lamp just about to go out. A very dark room. So the gross body is no longer able to support the consciousness, and gross consciousness has completely dissolved. Now there’s only subtle body and subtle consciousness. As the wind energy begins to dissolve, what appears to the mind is a great vast empty space pervaded by the whiteness of the moonlight.
A vast empty space pervaded by moonlight, white moonlight. Now the various layers of subtle energy are beginning to dissolve. Next, there arises a vast empty space pervaded with the red light of the sun. A vast empty space, depthless space pervaded by the redness of the sun. And then another level of subtle energy is losing its capacity to support consciousness.
And then now appears, again, the vast empty space pervaded by blackness. The white drop from the the crown has moved downward. The red drop from the navel has moved upward, enclosing the mind. And then they begin to move onward. And what next appears is the clear light of death, the moment of death.
And it’s a vast empty space, like just before sunrise. And the air is completely clear, colorless, vacuity. Crystal clear vacuity, depthless infinite space appears to the mind. This is the moment of death. Just try to rest your mind in a vast, luminous, empty space.
If thoughts arise, just note them thinking. And then the rebirth, the sequence. First, empty space pervaded by blackness as gross as subtle consciousness begins to manifest itself. Then empty space pervaded by redness. Empty space pervaded by whiteness.
Now, consciousness is beginning to manifest. There’s appearance of a a sputtering butter lamp in a dark room, in a black room. As the wind energy element begins to gain its capacity to support consciousness. And the appearance of sparks in the black sky, like the sparks from the bonfire rising up in the sky. The fire element is beginning to gain its capacity to support com