Mahamudra Quotes

“Covered by the web of disturbing emotions,
One is a sentient being.
Freed from disturbing emotions,
One is called a buddha.
– Nagarjuna”
― Tsele Natsok Rangdrol, Lamp of Mahamudra

“Rest as the awareness that is aware without using thought.”
― Loch Kelly, Shift Into Freedom: The Science and Practice of Openhearted Awareness

“The big realization when we go beyond the ego is simply seeing that we've always been ok.”
― Loch Kelly, Shift Into Freedom: The Science and Practice of Openhearted Awareness

“You are already the awakeness that you seek!”
― Loch Kelly, Shift Into Freedom: The Science and Practice of Openhearted Awareness

“Well look, it seems as though you do have some experience now at least of threefold bliss, luminosity, and emptiness that is such an important feature of the first yoga. On top of that, you are in an excellent position, having had introduction from myself and having all the things on your side that you have going for you. But look out! Your mind is probably not strong enough yet that you can go wandering into town, as a lot of yogi-types would, drinking liquor and womanizing, and trying to incorporate that into your practice. Instead, and until you have advanced far enough that you can actually take these things onto the path, you should be practicising!

— Gampopa to Phagmo Drupa

(Duff T. Gampopa Teaches Essence Mahamudra: Interviews with His Heart Disciples, Dusum Khyenpa and Others. Padma Karpo Translation Committee, 2012. Pp. xxviii-xxix)”
― Tony Duff, Gampopa Teaches Essence Mahamudra: Interviews with His Heart Disciples, Dusum Khyenpa and Others

“The extraction of discrete parts of Chöd teachings from their broader philosophical contexts is symptomatic of how Chöd has been incorporated into and transmitted through other Tibetan Buddhist lineages. For example [...] Chöd practices gradually merged with pre-existing models of deity yoga, such the Vajrayoginī practices within Nyingma, Kagyü, and Geluk traditions. Fundamental Chöd practices such as those described in The Common Eightfold Supplementary Section do not tend to involve the kind of deity visualization common to *anuttaratantra practices, but many Mahāmudrā Chöd practices have been reconciled with other lineages through the employment of such visualizations. The incorporation of Chöd by the Geluk and Kagyü schools has thus had equivocal results: on the one hand, fragments of Chöd teachings are preserved, but on the other, the distinctiveness of Chöd is diminished in the service of different fundamental standpoints such as that of Mahāmudrā.”
― Michelle Sorensen, Making the Old New Again and Again: Legitimation and Innovation in the Tibetan Buddhist Chöd Tradition

“We can learn to return home to our open hearts at any moment.”
― Loch Kelly, Shift Into Freedom: The Science and Practice of Openhearted Awareness

“Whoever has a perfect vision of one thing,
Has the perfect vision of all things,
For the emptiness of one thing
Is the emptiness of all things.

– Aryadeva”
― Dakpo Tashi Namgyal, Mahamudra: The Moonlight -- Quintessence of Mind and Meditation

“Forever, we are arriving.
Forever, we are departing.
Always, night and day,
We are in a movement
That always takes us back
To our place of origin.
Here we have a mystery,
A truth to be grasped”
― Daniel Odier, Crazy Wisdom of the Yogini: Teachings of the Kashmiri Mahamudra Tradition