Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Khyentse Rinpoche opens this 45-minute weekend retreat session by establishing the philosophical foundation for tantric practice. He begins with refuge-taking—showing how in highest yoga tantra, refuge becomes non-dual, where the practitioner recognizes the deity as oneself—then moves through the structure of visualization: how to mentally cultivate Avalokiteśvara (white, four-armed, holding jewel and rosary) on the crown. He addresses a core question troubling practitioners: if you visualize yourself as a Buddha while still deluded, isn’t that dishonest ego? Rinpoche explains that your true nature is Buddha-nature itself, not the false “I” you habitually project, making the practice not wrong but redemptive. He then explores the philosophical and functional role of letters and seed syllables in tantric tradition, explaining how refined energy channels are said to embody letter-forms, and why different deities have different seed syllables tied to Buddha families. The session concludes with a guided group meditation on Avalokiteśvara, beginning with the reflection on all beings as former mothers, generating bodhicitta, and moving into the visualization step-by-step.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 06 WR.mp3
UUID: 20019e84-7314-4715-bc6b-28accd3e4472
Teacher: Khyentse Rinpoche
Collection: Weekend Retreat (Khyentse Rinpoche)
Date: 1986 (exact day not recorded)
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 44.7 minutes
Words: ~3,624
Once to practice highest yoga tantra, then same. First, you have to take refuge. Even in the highest yoga tantra, you have to take refuge. You’re still a refugee. Even in the highest yoga tantra.
But then the difference is there’s a big difference. If it is highest yoga tantra, like mother tantra or like Chakrasamvara or kalachakra, then you say When you take refuge, even in some texts you will find that deity is myself and myself is deity. In this non duality of myself and deity, I take refuge. You see? So the refuge is much more profound and much more deep.
Anyway, first you have to take refuge. After taking the refuge, then generate bodhicitta. And then, and emptiness meditation. Then oneself visualize. Okay, now this, as just now Ani-la said, first you visualize Ārya Avalokiteśvara in front of you or on the top of you.
That depends on the different text. Visualize lotus, out of letter bam, lotus, and then moon disc, and then letter Hrīḥ. Is it letter Hrīḥ if it is Avalokiteśvara? Yes, sir. Then Avalokiteśvara, who is symbol of all the buddha and bodhisattvas compassion sitting in front of you.
Right after visualizing this, you see, these are all training of mind. You must have received teachings of lamrim so many times. Lamrim is lojong, training the mind. These are also training the mind. Both are training the mind, but lamrim trains your mind in a different way, and this also trains your mind in a different way.
For example, as I said yesterday, when you are looking at me, actually what happens is you are visualizing me. There’s this automatic visualization. But since your mind is not trained, since your mind is deluded by habit of thinking that this is not a vision, this is not a visualization, but this is something solid, this is something touchable, someone who can talk, that’s why you have a strong habit of me as some person, a reality really existent. In fact, the Avalokiteśvara which you visualize here is not different because they are both visualization. But your mind is not trained that way.
Your mind is not accustomed by this visualization of Avalokiteśvara. You have never seen white form with four arms, that kind of thing. Not only that, when I say I am someone someone, we always have this habit of calling oneself as I to the five aggregates, which is another visualization. Actually, what is the definition of visualization? Pardon?
An image that my yeah. This what I say. You see, when when you look at me, I’m an image which your mind created. But you won’t say, of course, because you haven’t had this. You think that I am something externally existent.
It is not you who has created me. But if you, perceiver, is not here, my perception is also not here. That’s why previous night we had a discussion. Maybe I don’t know whether you are there or not. Without the perceiver there is no perception.
I also bring this idea, you know, before Armstrong, or what, that American astronaut, before he went to moon, before anybody talk about moon like these days, moon rock in the moon, what was there in the moon? Tibetans think gods. Children think cheese. You see? But what was there?
Before we even saw or heard about moon rock, what was there? What was there? Before any perceiver perceives there was a moon rock, what was there? Light is something that you perceived already, but I’m saying inside the moon, on the moon. Our perception?
Yeah. But what kind of perception? Before you realized that there is a moon rock, what was there? Okay. I’ll change the example.
Before you met me, what was was I exist in this world? Before you even heard of me. That other people is your perception. You see? We could have heard from other people you are asking.
That you can always say. That other people is your perception. Right? Then you can say maybe under this place where you sit, there must be a big diamond. You can imagine some other people can see it.
You see? If you say there is a perception or there is a thing before a perceiver, then that is act exactly the same as you believing in in eternal God. Before everybody, God came and God created us. Right? Before everybody before there was any perceiver, before there was before there was someone who knows that there is God, God is there.
That’s what most of the religions they say, right? But that is something unacceptable here at this time because there must be a perceiver of God. You understand? What is God are better than human? If they if he exists before human, then he’s not God because there is he doesn’t have anyone whom he can call, I am God, not you.
You understand? This is exactly the same. Before the perceiver, before the mind, if there is something, then that is exactly the same as believing in an eternal God. What do you think? He’s an engineer.
Engineer? Oh yeah, of course, you can say, Our mind created him and then he created us. That’s very easy. I think that’s the best way, you know. Can still we can say God created us because we believe in God.
We believe in God. See? We created the God, our mind. Perception. That’s why if you don’t have mind, I am not here.
I’m talking strictly about you. You don’t have to be busy about others. I’m strictly talking about you people. That’s why for this reason, this imagination of me is completely your idea. It is completely your imagination.
It is nobody’s imagination. That’s why are very used to have imagination. We are very, very used to have perception. You see? Lot of perception.
Every time we have perceptions. There is no time when there is no perception. Every time we have is a perception. So then Buddha vajradhara, he thought, Okay, if sentient beings are really If sentient beings are very attached to the perception and visualizations, then okay, let them have it. Then he gave another visualization.
You see, that is his skillful means. He thinks that, Well, he was very skillful. He doesn’t want to say, No, this is not true. Visualization is not true. He wants to say, Okay, yeah, you can have visualization, but now how about this?
Do you understand what I’m talking here? We are very much used with imagination. We’re used to imagination. And he gives us another source of imagination, but this time better one. You understand?
Better in the sense of relative truth. But in the ultimate truth, nothing is better. Whether you have four arms or whether you have two arms, both are the same. Both are dualistic mind. That’s why when you get enlightenment, you don’t have to do the developing meditation.
You will automatically have to abandon visualization of four arms, two arms, or thousand arms. We have this habit of imagining oneself as an ignorant and sentient being, someone who is incapable of gaining the wisdom. That’s why even though we say, Oh, good enough. I can do it. You see?
I’m capable. Even though we think that outwardly, inwardly we always, always have this depending mind. We always have this anxiety to ask people, what can I do? You know? It’s like outwardly people talk about politicians.
Ah, these politicians, you know, these people, these leaders, these presidents, these ministers. But inwardly, we have this habit of always obeying their order. Naturally we obey somebody’s rule. We used to obey somebody’s rule and regulations. Like that.
Inwardly we have this thinking of incapable of gaining the wisdom or enlightenment by oneself. So now, for example, many people think, I have no compassion. Right? I don’t have compassion. I have lots of anger.
I’m a deluded being. I have no compassion. So what should I do? Then if there’s a clever teacher, he says, Okay, first do some meditation on patience. That works sometimes.
Sometimes it doesn’t work. This clever guru gave another method. Do the compassion meditation. If that doesn’t work, guru said, Then he asked, Why? Why you don’t have this compassion?
Then you can answer in a different way, but actually I’m not born as such compassion. I don’t have this feeling of compassion. I don’t have this energy of compassion. And then this clever teacher says, Okay, now you visualize as Avalokiteśvara. And then you have this concept.
Avalokiteśvara is someone who has compassion. You see, it is written in the book. Avalokiteśvara is presenting as a compassion, Buddha of compassion. So you have no doubt about him not having compassion. But you have doubt of not having compassion within yourself.
So now you visualize as This encourage you. Then at that time you will have this pride of feeling that, Oh, now I can have compassion because I’m Avalokiteśvara. Now there’s the question, you see. If you are Avalokiteśvara, if you are a deluded being, and if you visualize yourself as a Buddha, isn’t that an ego? Isn’t that something wrong?
How can if you are if you are a sentient being, then how can you think that you are Buddha? Isn’t there something wrong? No. That is not not wrong. Because nature of you is Avalokiteśvara.
Your nature is Tathāgatagarbha or Buddha-nature, who is the source of Avalokiteśvara. Your nature is not you whom you call yourself, whatever name, John or whatever. Your nature is not your name, your ego. Your nature is not something that you perceive. Your nature is our objectivity itself.
In fact you are doing the right thing. By this kind of visualization, it improves the compassion within oneself. That is the importance here. Do you have any question here? I don’t know.
I had a feeling that the explanation was a little bit confusing. If that helps you, I think you should do. There’s no objection, particularly from me. For example, this is related like For example, it is better to hang a rainbow picture than Mother Teresa. I mean, it is better to hang Mother Teresa than a rainbow.
You see? You understand? It gives you the feeling of compassion. You understand? That reminds you, sort of.
This is what they do in Thailand. Monks, they always hang lots of skeleton and picture of dead body. This is so good. This reminds you. This visualization is, Yeah, that’s right.
That’s very good. This visualization is a reminder, you know? A very good reminder. And then one will have self respect. When one have very good self respect, then one will respect others.
The things which we call self respect these days is not self respect. This is ego. One is the best and others are not good. That’s not good. That’s not self respect.
That is self disrespect. The real self respect is when one knows one’s own value of life, then taking this example of one’s life we will respect automatically to others. You know? I think that’s a good idea. But the thing is that there are a lot of reasons.
Relatively speaking, there are differences between you visualize as Mother Teresa and you visualize as Avalokiteśvara. Why? Because there haven’t been any method of visualizing Mother Teresa-ism. There has been lots of different methods of how to visualize oneself as Avalokiteśvara. And it has been practiced by lots of and lots of lineage gurus, and they have put their own experience there.
You see? So that makes difference. So that’s why lineage in Buddhism, in Tibetan Buddhism, is very, very important. One must have guru lineage if one wants to practice the Dharma. But if you just want to study Dharma, you can go to a bookshop and buy some books and read.
You will have some understanding. But if you want to practice the Dharma, you must have a guru, and that guru has to have unbroken lineage because the blessing is different. Any more question? Now okay. Now what kind of answer now this time?
Okay. Letter has got to do a lot with anuyoga. Letter things mostly comes with completion stage meditation. The highest yoga tantra, says that all our refined veins are form of letter. That’s why example, there is this permanently existent three letters, om ah hum, within our veins.
Now this we have to talk a little bit about channels and chakras. Chakras, do you know this? Chakras and sid syllable and om ahum, so ah, and that kind of letter. Actually, refined veins. If you go to theatre and operate, you won’t find these three veins.
You won’t find because these are invisible veins. Veins, we call these veins because they are In a dakini practice, say that, you know, air or breathing, not this breathing. This is very gross. But subtle air, subtle air, subtle air, okay. Anyway, air is like a blind horse, and mind or the thought or conceptions are like handicapped rider, and veins are like what do you call it?
Like a bush? Pardon? Yeah. All the roads like this, you see? I don’t know.
Maze. Maze something that what structure? Maze. Lots of lots of path, but but all the paths are mixed. You know?
Maze. Unrefined or untrained veins. Veins are like a maze. So when this horse, blind horse, go run, the mind, the rider has to go wherever this So that’s why this actually comes within completion stage. So in the completion stage meditation, we first have this sitting meditation, like Vairocana’s posture, seven points of Vairocana posture.
That trains your body who is container of your air, air which is the sort of horse of handicapped mind. Do and then more. Then you do exercise. You must have heard of this. Different exercise, like six doctrines of Naropa.
And that breaks some knots of the veins, and that makes all this maze as a good way, good road. No traffic jam, sort of. And then when you can control your body or veins, and then automatically the air will the air will go down, sort of come down. The air will come down. When the air come down, the rider will come down automatically, and then you can catch the mind.
To try to catch the mind, you see. It’s all about catching this handicapped rider, methods are. So these veins, anyway, these refined veins are in the form of a letter. Letter is very important in in vajrayana Buddhism. For example, in Mañjuśrī Namasamgiti.
You heard of this Mañjuśrī Namasamgiti, the names of Manjushiri, this tantra. It there’s one quotation. A. Letter a is letter ah is the supreme letter of all the letter. King of sort of like king or supreme of all the letter.
Letter ah. I don’t know. What is the definition of letter? I still want to ask this. I asked this many times, but nobody has given me some satisfactory answer.
It seems that you people are talking about when you talk about letter, you talk about something like this. Right? Yeah. Yeah. This this kind of thing.
But this is just a vision, you see. This is just a vision. This is not the real letter. The real letter is your habit of mind that makes ABCD. But, okay, for example, if I do this, no nobody says I’m w.
Right? You see? Like that. Nobody reads as w. Unless I say, okay, I’m w.
And then you say, Oh, you are W. Because I give you the habit. I sort of awaken your habit. You understand? I don’t know.
So what is the definition of letter now? We talk about letter in Buddhism, we depend on Vaibhāṣika school, abhidharma. In abhidharma, letter is ming gsum. Combination of habit of name, habit of word, habit of sound. And there’s one more thing I don’t remember.
Anyway, talk about letter now. Anyway, you see, ah is the supreme letter. Why? Can you say hello without a? Can you say hi without a?
So a is supposed to be the supreme letter. Ah represents emptiness also. Letter is very important in vajrayana Buddhism. Any definition you can give me later? So Mix like do you like words?
Mix words. Yeah. But I still find that this is not important. The symbol is not important. The one who used the symbol is important.
For example, if you go to some nomad place in Tibet and you show this, this is not letter for them. You see? Yeah. Right. So letter is got to do with agreement also this time.
See? So letter is this this letter is really not that important. This is just a form. This is just a It’s just a note, or this is just a remembrance, a notebook, something like that.
What was your question anyway? This is about your question, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s why refined veins Since refined veins are all letter, letter like This usually comes in the body. Now this letter, all the refined veins are this letter.
So that’s why we we pick seed letter now. Seed letter. Seed syllable. Yeah? And seed syllable there are lot of different types of seed syllable.
Om, hum, tam, shi, ah. You see? Why different? Because, again, different family. Five dhyani buddha, you see?
Five buddha family has their own different syllable. Most of the Amitābha’s Buddha family, they have seed letter Hrīḥ, like that, three. But that can be most, but I don’t mean all because Tārā belong to Amitābha family, but Tārā doesn’t have Hrīḥ. Not all the Tārā has Hrīḥ. Most of the Tārā’s seed syllable is TAM.
Okay. So as part of retreat, shall we do some meditation of Avalokiteśvara now? Because retreat in Tibetan concept is where you chant mantras and like that. Do you have can you do you have any maybe I just say some guide as yesterday, or do you have any Whatever. Yeah.
I I just we can yeah. Okay. No. What I mean is, do you have any chanting or anything like that for? Do you have any sort of melody?
Yeah. So I will I will do I will just tell the visualization. And when I when it is time for reciting my mantra, then you please I will turn. Okay. First, think that all these sentient beings for many times has been once friends, mother, or parents.
All these changing beings, for hundred and hundred thousand times, they have been your lover, someone who helped for you. If you collect their bones, it should be even higher than all the mountains. If you collect all their tear which they cried for you, it will be even deeper than all the oceans and vast. Every sentient beings wants happiness, but they don’t know how to collect the cause of happiness. Instead, they collect cause of suffering.
But we know how to collect the cause of happiness, and we have to tell them. We have to help them because they have helped us in many ways. They have fed us. They have clothed us. They’ve helped us.
But with this ignorance, now we don’t recognize each other. Instead, we misunderstand. We consider some of them as enemy. The enemy which you consider in this life has been your relatives and friends who cared for you in past life, not only for once but for many times. The friends or parents which you consider in this life, Your loved ones, which you consider this life, has been for many times your enemy.
All this nonrecognition comes from ignorance. Also, without all these sentient beings, oneself can’t get enlightenment. So it is these sentient beings that I can generate my bodhicitta. I can get enlightenment. So for this reason, today, we will do a short meditation on Ārya Avalokiteśvara.
Now think that I and all the sentient beings take refuge under guru Avalokiteśvara, Dharma, and Sangha. Now first, do a short emptiness meditation. Everything is from the beginning less time empty. Everything is all the phenomena is pure from the beginning, pure from one’s own conception from the beginning. Everything is not what they seem to be.
All these things reality of all these things are as you perceive or as you imagine or as you consider or as somebody consider. The reality of all these things are beyond conception of anybody. Reality of all these phenomena is emptiness from beginningless time. Now think that we are surrounded, I am surrounded by all the mother sentient beings, infinite as space. All the sentient beings, those who constantly seek for happiness but constantly collect the cause of suffering.
Now visualize on the crown of one’s own head and of all the sentient beings is a white lotus, and on the top is a moon disc. And in the center of this moon disc is a white letter Hrīḥ. Slowly, this letter Hrīḥ transform into Ārya Avalokiteśvara. He is pure in color and in the nature of light, radiating with five colors, white, red, blue, green and yellow. His face has a smiling expression and with eyes of great compassion.
He looks upon me and all sentient beings equally. He has one face and four arms. The first two hands are joined together at the heart, holding a precious jewel which fulfills the wishes of all sentient beings. His second right hand holds a clear crystal rosary. His second left hand, he holds a white lotus.