Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Ven Thubten Dondrub explains why sūtra practice and tantra must work together, dispelling the misconception that tantric techniques alone lead to enlightenment. He traces how equanimity developed through sūtra study creates the foundation for tantric visualization to be genuine rather than pretence. Moving into the structure of highest yoga tantra, he details the generation stage—visualizing oneself as a deity with divine pride and clear appearance, and developing single-pointed concentration over extended periods—as essential preparation for the completion stage. The completion stage, he explains, involves manipulating subtle energy winds and the channels they flow through to artificially induce the death process in meditation and access the mind of clear light, which then meditates on emptiness. He stresses that without ethical discipline, control over desire, and genuine single-pointed concentration, no one deserves the title tantric yogi, whatever rituals they perform. Pitched at serious practitioners already familiar with tantric frameworks.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 14 Combining Sūtra and Tantra 1998 02 22.mp3
UUID: b540089c-02d7-423d-aca7-3feeec9eb9e6
Teacher: Ven Thubten Dondrub
Collection: Retreat (Ven Thubten Dondrub)
Date: 1998-02-22
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 26.4 minutes
Words: ~3,103
If one has practiced sūtra equanimity, where you don’t relate to friend, enemy, and stranger, good, bad, and indifferent, if you’ve got some mastery over that mind that is always saying, no, Oh, this is good. That’s terrible. Can’t stand that, ignoring all that. If one has some mastery over that, then that is a basis for being able to see everything as pure, that even the sound of a jackhammer is mantra, no different than the sound of a symphonic music. Yeah.
But if there’s no equanimity, how can you pretend everything is mantra? You’re just pretending. So one has to have done the sūtra practice, or the more one’s done it, the more tantra works. But by itself, tantra is just a technique that has no taste. Now it’s just dead mechanical stuff, and you’re just we’re just pretending.
We can say everything is mantra, but if we have no equanimity in our mind, then you can say this is mantra, this is mantra, but one is developing aversion and attachment. The two are fundamentally linked. The more sūtra basis we have, the more the tantra techniques work. But just technique without any kind of heart and meaning to it is just dead. Yeah.
And this deadening is not enlightening at all. So, in highest yoga tantra, there are two levels. There is what is called the generation stage and the completion stage. You first have to develop the generation stage, then you have the qualities to do the completion stage. So it’s in the generation stage that there is the main emphasis on trying to see oneself, visualize oneself as a deity, develop the divine pride and what is called the clear appearance.
The divine pride is thinking, I am a Buddha, and having the clear appearance, which is being able to concentrate on oneself as the deity. During the generation stage, one has to develop concentration, single pointed concentration. In fact, in the Tibetan system, I think in all schools of Tibetan Buddhism, the main way that you develop single pointed concentration is through the practice of highest yoga tantra, doing the generation stage of concentrating on visualising oneself as a deity. That where one practices developing single pointed concentration. You can do it at other stages, but most Tibetan teachers and masters do that.
But in order to develop single pointed concentration, if you study how to develop single pointed concentration, you have to give up, you have to have non attachment, this, that and the other, you have to observe pure morality, good morality, all these things. Right? So at that level of practicing generation stage highest yoga tantra, you have to observe the law of cause and effect. One has to give up. One has to have subdued one’s desire.
Yeah. You definitely have to have done it. If your desire is out of control saying, I am Tantric Yogi, I don’t have to control my desire, there is no way you can develop single pointed concentration. And therefore, there is no way you can complete you can how do you say, complete the generation stage practice. If you can’t complete the generation stage, you’re not able to get to the actual completion stage.
Right? Because, just to make the point, I hope this doesn’t upset you about quick enlightenment and everything, but the sign of completing the generation stage of highest yoga tantra is when you are able to single pointedly visualize yourself as the deity surrounded by the mandala. You know, as these deities have a mandala here in the celestial mansion. So these deities, if you know anything about them, have many arms, shapes, colors, so you have to be able to visualize it all in detail. And the whole mandala, which has an endless description, many colors, parts, You have to be able to visualize it all in clear detail as vividly as seeing it in front of your eyes.
You have to be able to do that for four hours nonstop When you can do thatthere are more details but I won’t go into itbut you have to be able to do that for four hours with real single pointed concentration, not the kind of sitting there in a state of confusion pretending you’re visualizing, you’re actually able to visualize it completely for four hours. When you’re able to do that, then you’re really qualified to do the completion stage tantra, which is the very special, tricky, delicate part. Because completion stage tantra, what completion stage tantra is about is about trying to work with this most subtle mind that I was talking about, to get in contact with that. So it’s explained in tantra and it’s not explained anywhere else, that the mind is dependent on this subtle energy. Right now we have a body and mind, they go together.
We have this gross body, this appealingly solid heavy body, and we’ve got a heavy mind that goes with it, a gross mind that goes with it. They’re inseparable while we’re alive. And in all our previous lives, there’s always been a body and a mind going together. Or to put it another way, there’s been some physical form and this formless consciousness going together always. So according to tantric view, the most subtle mind is also connected with the most subtle level of physical energy, and this is called in Sanskrit prana.
In Tibetan it’s called lung, and in English we translate that as wind, wind energy, which is the most subtle type of physical form. And these things are inseparable. They’ve always existed. They always will exist. This most subtle mind of clear light is always connected with this most subtle level of physical energy called wind, which is basically a kind of movement.
It’s a quality of movement. So where the wind goes, this most subtle wind goes, the mind goes, the most subtle mind goes. So they say it’s like a rider on a horse. Wherever the horse goes, the rider goes. Similarly, if the rider kind of directs the horse, the horse will go there.
The two things are interrelated. So from a tantric point of view, why we suffer, why there is suffering and confusion and limitation, why we aren’t experiencing our Buddha nature, is because the subtle energies, these winds that are moving in the bodyI’m just expressing it in a very rough form, are out of control. They’re moving in a disorderly way, in an uncontrolled way. But if they were to flow correctly and smoothly, then the mind itself would become smooth and clear. I mean, that’s a very gross way of putting it at some points anyway.
So according to the tantric view, there are many, many winds, these subtle winds in the body, various levels of them. And each movement of these different winds produces different kinds of minds and awarenesses. Also, the subtle energies, winds in the body, also regulate the functioning of the body. So there’s things like the there’s something called the downward voiding wind, which is connected with the mind but also relates to the digestion of food and the evacuation of food from the body and things like that. So the meditation posture, the Vairochana posture, just by putting the body in that posture, causes the winds in the body to move in particular ways.
Yeah. Automatically, just that does that. And because the winds start moving in a more correct way, then the mind itself that is dependent on those winds starts to calm down and be more clear. So the winds move in these channels. There’s these thousands of subtle energy channels in the body and the winds move throughout these, and the movement of the winds causes the mind to behave in certain ways.
For example, if you get very angry, then your body kind of shakes, and even after you’ve stopped, your mind has stopped being angry, you can kind of feel that energy. So that’s the movement of the winds in the body that have been moved by anger. The anger moves the winds. If the winds move in a certain way, anger arises. If the winds move in a certain way, desire can arise, and so on.
And you can feel that sometimes. You become more sensitive. You can feel this in your body more and more. So there are these countless little energy channels throughout the body. They’re not gross physical things you can’t, they’re there.
Something like acupuncture channels, energy channels, but they’re not those, I think. Maybe there’s some similarity and maybe some overlapping, but even more subtle than that, I think. So according to the tantric view, there is one central channel, which is called the that runs from the crown of the head down in front of the spine and down to about a point four finger widths below the navel. Then there are two side channels that run along that and kind of go up into the head, down through the nostrils. No, no, sorry, they come down the head and kind of come out here.
So in highest yoga tantra, what is trying to be done is to absorb all the secondary winds, the various levels of winds, to force them to absorb into each other like little rivers going into other rivers until they all subside and go into the main there is this what is called the it’s called the sorry, I’ve forgotten what the main wind is, the most subtle wind. There’s one principal one. I think it’s called the life supporting wind. I don’t sorry, my I’m not sure if it’s exact I think it’s this one. It’s the life supporting wind.
That’s the most subtle one on which the the most subtle mind of clear light arises. So one tries to get all these secondary winds to absorb into that and to get this most subtle wind into the central channel and to abide in the central channel and particularly to abide at the heart chakra, the heart center here. Because if you can do that, then by doing that, this mind of clear light arises. The reason why we have this gross mind is because these much grosser levels of energy are functioning in the body. These grosser levels of energy winds are dominating at the moment, so this gross mind is functioning.
If you can absorb those, then the gross mind will stop and the subtle mind will arise. If you can absorb these more subtle winds into the most subtle wind, then the subtle mind stops and the most subtle mind arises. So that’s what completion stage tantra is about. These chakras that everyone thinks are so wonderful and mystical that we have working with the chakras, these chakras chakra means wheel because there are these energy channels in the body and they say at these various points, these vital points in the body, at the crown chakra, the throat chakra, the heart chakra, the navel chakra and the sex chakra, At those points, all these energy channels which the energy winds flow in are all knotted. So chakras aren’t very mystical.
They’re the problem. Right? These heart these chakras are where all these energy channels are all completely knotted, and that’s why we’re all screwed up, right? They’re all knotted up and the energy isn’t flowing properly. It gets blocked in these particular places, so the winds and the mind doesn’t flow smoothly.
In highest yoga tantra, in completion stage tantra, one unblocks, unwinds these blocked channels so that the winds can flow smoothly and eventually there’s just the flowing of the most subtle wind and therefore the arising of the most subtle mind. So how do you do that? I I can’t explain. But, no, just one point, the main point, to generally explain how it’s done. It is done through the power of concentration.
Single pointed concentration, not flaky concentration, but one has to have single pointed concentration. Because the point is, the interesting discovery about tantra is that, like, normally many parts of like, right now while you’re listening to me, you’re unaware of many sensations in your body or unaware of parts of your body completely. But if you were to think now, like right now, to try and just place your focus, concentrate on your big toe right now, Just a little bit. Can you try and feel your big toe? Any one of you.
Any one of them. If you just kind of visualize your big toe where it is and concentrate on there, can you feel it? So you should be able to a bit. Yeah? Which normally we’re not aware of.
But the point is, wherever you place your mind, the wind goes there, and the mind is there. Yeah. If the wind goes there, the mind goes there. If you place your concentration there, the wind has to go there. It has to move because the two things go together always.
So sometimes it’s the wind that forces the mind to go somewhere. In other cases, it’s your mind that forces the wind to go there, because they’re always connected. So in tantra, we’re trying, through the power of our concentration, forcing the wind to move in correct ways. That’s basically what it’s about. In order to cause the mind of clear light to arise, because this mind is very pure and subtle, and it’s this mind that can penetrate the meaning of emptiness quickly and easily.
So the more you have studied sorry, to go back to the old theme. The more one has studied emptiness through the sutras, yeah, through the sūtra practice, the worrying old sūtra practice, the more one has done that. So the more you know that, if you use and you study that with the gross mind, but then if you’ve got that understanding in your gross mind and you’re a tantric yogi and you go into tantric meditation and are able to make the mind of clear light arise and use that to meditate on the information that you’ve got through your gross mind. Bingo. It is so easy, they say.
So nice. Yeah, that’s the point. So sūtra and tantra always goes together, and it all comes from single pointed concentration. You focus on You draw the energies into various parts of your body by the power of your Samādhi. And if one is leading a wild life, ignoring the law of cause and effect, there is no way you can develop Samādhi.
Therefore, there is no way you can control the the winds in your body, and therefore, there is absolutely no way you can call yourself a tantric yogi unless you’re just stupid and ignorant and have no idea what you’re doing. Excuse me. Sorry. Just to make the point. Oh, because a anyone can ring a bell.
Right? That’s not being tantric. It’s pretty irrelevant. Anybody can read a sadhana. Anybody can roll their eyes up and stuff.
That’s not being tantric. A a yogi, a tantric yogi, who is someone who is able to control the winds in their body at the very least. When we die, the gross mind just naturally stops, and the subtle mind stops, and then the very subtle mind arises. But unfortunately, because we’ve died, the definition of death is that the mind leaves the body, and the subtle mind, the very subtle mind leaves the body, and it leaves without any control, and we’re not aware of it. Right?
Also, when we go to sleep every night, the mind the subtle mind of clear light arises for a split second just as we go to sleep, just in the moment between our waking consciousness and our sleeping consciousness. Every time we wake up in the morning, in that split moment between sleep and awake, the mind of clear light arises. It is said every time you sneeze, the mind of clear light arises for a split second. Every time one has a sexual orgasm, the mind of clear light arises for a split second. But we have no awareness of that.
It happens so quickly we don’t notice it, and even if we were to notice it, we have no control. So what happens in highest yoga tantra is what is being done in this completion stage tantra is that one is, by the power of one’s samadhi, artificially creating the death process without dying so that the things that support the gross mind, the winds and energies that support the gross mind absorb by the power of one’s concentration, the subtle energies that maintain the subtle mind are absorbed by the power of one’s concentration so that what is left is just the most subtle energies which support the most subtle mind of clear light and it arises. So highest yoga tantric completion stage tantra is about the death process of artificially inducing it in meditation and generating the mind of clear light and staying in that and meditating on emptiness. That’s what one is doing, meditating on emptiness for the sake of all sentient beings, not to have a good time with all your girlfriends or boyfriends and all this kind of stuff, but for the benefit of all sentient beings. In generation stage practice, as preliminary to developing these qualities, has to by visualising oneself as a deity and visualising chakras and various things, it says that this is somehow creating the cause for the energies in the body to start moving more correctly, to loosen up the chakras and so on.
Also, in the generation stage practice there is also the visualization of the death process. This is one of the actual central causes of generation stage tantra, is visualizing the death process and going through it. So you’re not actually able to generate the mind of clear light in the generation stage, but you pretend you are. You visualize the whole process so this acts as a precondition that when one has developed single pointed concentration and so on, that when you actually do the completion stage practice you’re actually able to simulate, not just imagine the death process but bring it on but without dying. But, shall I go on?
Do you need a break? Tea break? Yeah. Maybe tea break. Tea break?
Yeah. What well, what’s the schedule for tea breaks? It’s two forty five. Yeah. It’s two it’s tea break time.
Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Thank you.