Points on Sadhana and Visualisation

Talk 3: (Revised July 01 on the basis of 2^nd talk from Vajraloka 1998)

I have always thought that Bhante’s lecture, ‘A System of Meditation,’ provides an excellent overview of what sadhana is about.  I’m sure you all know it.   He speaks of five stages of meditation: concentration, positive emotion, spiritual death, spiritual rebirth, and the just sitting practice.  Concentration and positive emotion, both together, represent the stages of sila and samadhi.  They represent the mundane process of spiritual development: that is, first, of becoming more harmonious and positive through the practice of ethics, and second, the state of samadhi that naturally arises when the mind is brought into harmony, especially through the practice of shamatha meditation.  Thus the stages of ‘concentration and positive emotion’ in Bhante’s system of meditation also refer to the two principal shamatha meditations that we do, the mindfulness of breathing and the metta-bhavana. 

Concentration and positive emotion are mundane, not transcendental, aspects of spiritual development.  The third stage, ‘Spiritual death,’ represents the possibility of the arising of the transcendental, which means there is a qualitative change.  It is not easy to describe what that means.  It is not a matter of greater and greater quantities of bliss, deeper and deeper concentrations and integrations.  There is a change of quality in the mind itself, and that change is brought about by a kind of ‘seeing through’ of our habitual self-identification, a kind of seeing into what is actually real.  The term spiritual death describes this quite well, but it is also a problematic term, I feel, because it tends to put some people off!  On the other hand, death itself is something so deeply mysterious and elusive, so beyond any kind of explanation, so that it’s actually a good metaphor for insight.  It gives us an intimation of a liberated, unbounded, yet very subtle quality of the mind.  That quality seems just outside our reach, yet the idea of death, or spiritual death, points in its direction, if we can see death as a positive term.  Unfortunately, we usually can’t do that.  So we need to work on this, and see this stage of practice as bringing about spiritual transformation, bringing about the subtle but complete transformation of our whole view of things.  I do think it is important that we see this positively.  As you know, this stage is represented by the vipashyana meditations, such as the six element practice and reflections on the three lakshanas of impermanence, insubstantiality, and unsatisfactoriness.  I have been thinking about this area quite a bit in the last year, and one thing I have noticed is how quick people are to assume that these things represent something negative.   For example if you mention impermanence, many people jump to the conclusion that this is something necessarily unpleasant.  A lot of people think that this is the meaning of the lakshana of dukkha – that because things are impermanent, they are inevitably unsatisfactory.   I don’t think that is why samsara is unsatisfactory.  Samsara is unsatisfactory because we cling to things that are naturally impermanent as though they were permanent, to things that are naturally painful as though they could be pleasant, and cling to things as things anyway, when they never were things in the first place.  Impermanence is the cause of as much our pleasure as our pain.  Things we like are always coming to an end, which is unpleasant; but again, things we don’t like are always coming to an end, thankfully, and that is pleasant.  New things are continually arising that are sources of pleasure; new things are continually arising that are sources of pain.  Impermanence itself is just the way things are.  It isn’t painful or pleasant.  It is as wonderful as it is tragic. 

Anyway, these reflections are all part of the stage of vipashyana meditation, which I’ll have more to say about later on.  Also it is called, in Bhante’s lecture, the stage of spiritual death. 

And it is the fourth stage, spiritual rebirth, which represents the stage of sadhana or visualisation.  I think we can clarify more the connection between the idea of our own spiritual rebirth and our visualisation of a Buddha or Bodhisattva.  I won’t say more about it now.  I’ll be exploring this in more detail in a later talk (‘Listening to the Buddha’). 

All this is by way of a preamble.  Today I want to give a few practical points for working in visualisation.   First I have six general points about approaching sadhana, and then there are eight sequential stages in the sadhana meditation itself. 

1.       The first point is that you should remember the context of what you are doing.   What are we doing when we do our sadhana?  We need to remember that sadhana is done in a context of Going for Refuge, in the context of our whole spiritual life – it’s a kind of recapitulation of everything we aspire to achieve spiritually.  There are other, more philosophical contexts too, for example the doctrinal context, in this instance the Yogacara world view.   So my first point is that to recall the context of sadhana is a way to work in your sadhana.   It is a way to bring about faith in the Dharma.   It’s quite often the case that if you simply call to mind what it is you are trying to do, – well, you find that you’ve started doing it.   In fact, quite often in any meditation, what stands in the way is simply the fact that we cannot bring ourselves to remind ourselves of the View, of what we are supposed to be doing.  So remember. Remind yourself. 

To say ‘this is an expression of your Going for refuge’ is another way of saying that our sadhana is an insight practice.  So deliberately call to mind that the whole point of doing this practice is radically to change yourself.  Actually not just that it’s an expression of your Going for Refuge, but that it’s a means of taking your Going for Refuge deeper.  You are trying to get yourself to really Go for Refuge.  So be very aware of this, remember that is what you want to do, this is why you came here, this is why you got ordained and were initiated in the first place.  So if you reflect in this way, the meditation will come more from your heart. 

Remembering all this is another way you can work in sadhana.  You can spend the whole sadhana, if you like, remembering this profound context, deepening your mindfulness of purpose. 

2.       The second point is to remember to prepare.  This should perhaps have been the first point, because the preparation should have been done before the meditation started.  In fact preparation includes the whole of the rest of your life; it’s your ethical life, essentially.  This is of course not special to sadhana meditation; it is very basic Buddhist teaching.   But let’s say you are sitting there, about to do your sadhana, and you realise you aren’t well prepared.   What can you do? Well, you can do some basic samatha practice in the spirit of your sadhana.  It’s a question of regular steps.  So recapitulate those first two of Bhante’s stages.  Do something which will build up your integration and positive emotion, and do it with your sadhana in mind.  Make the connection.  You don’t have to do anything special, but you could, say, simply recite the mantra.  Recite it while doing Metta Bhavana or Mindfulness of Breathing, on the in and out breaths, or just recite it on its own.  Or you could imagine the Buddha sitting there.  I’m going to repeat the point later that you don’t always have to do the full blown sadhana.  It’s good to build up an attitude whereby every shrine room practice you do is an aspect of your sadhana.  Then you never have that undermining feeling that you’ve been neglecting your practice.  

3.       The third point is to remember how to work in samatha.  Actually a lot of the sadhana practice is a samatha practice, so treat it as such.  Don’t allow yourself to indulge in distractions.   Work against the hindrances to shamatha.  Let them go, or counteract them somehow.  Maybe just noticing, and acknowledging, will do the trick, or maybe you have to stop and create some counteractive karma, even for a whole session or more of meditation, before you can carry on.  Remember all the teachings you’ve learnt about how to work in samatha: that mindfulness of body, feelings, emotions, moods, all help you place your mind solidly on the object of practice; that mindfulness of purpose clarifies your intentions in doing that; having awareness of your posture, so that energy flows through the right channels; establishing regular steps, so that you are supported in your purpose and in your placement of attention.  All the sagely advice that we dish out on our meditation courses – it all applies in sadhana, too. 

4.       The fourth point is remember to stay with the Buddha.  This is similar to point three, but it applies in particular to the visualisation.  Again it means, practically speaking, letting go attachment to distraction.  You need to maintain concentration and positive emotion to stay with the Buddha.  When you are sitting and looking at the Buddha, or just being aware of him in some way, you don’t need to do anything special.  But you do need to be there with the experience.  So it’s more like Just Sitting.  You just take darshan.  Just hang out, relax, with the Buddha.  As with any kalyanamitrata, getting deeper takes time, and often at first it’s a bit dull, or not going anywhere.  So this attitude of ‘being there’ is something you need to maintain.  The main shamatha method you need to employ is the sky like attitude.  Let go obstacles.  At the same time, be aware of them, and experience their nature of anitya, impermanence.  Watch them going all the time; don’t hang on to the fact that they arise; give no special attention to them.  Remember what’s important: staying with the Buddha.  Give him your primary attention, not these obstacles you’re in the habit of attaching to.  It doesn’t really matter what happens, if you are there with the Buddha.  And just be yourself with the Buddha.  There’s no need to put on a show for him; don’t pretend.  If you can be yourself when you spend time with the Buddha, you can allow his presence to purify your investment in relative unskilfulness. 

5.       The fifth point is that your visualisation doesn’t have to be visual.  If you don’t find visualisation comes naturally to you, just try to do what you usually do when you imagine another person.  When you think of another person, or even when you’re actually with them, some process of imagination goes on.  So what is that? How does it work?  Watch your mind, and see what happens when you do it, experience the manner in which you do it, and look for that same process in the meditation. 

For example, when I think of someone, I don’t quite have a mental picture, it’s a bit more complex than that.  Sometimes there is a clear image, but usually there is a whole mixture of things.  It’s partly a kind of atmosphere.  It’s partly a jumble of impressions and memories.  Some of these things probably have nothing to do with how that person really is.  But that is still how I see them; and my need to work through all the projections and misperceptions is the process of my actual relationship to them.  To me, that is how they are, it is who they are.  I surely need to adjust the way I see everyone I know.  So how much more is that the case with the Buddha.  So when you think of the Buddha, try to imagine them in the same manner in which you normally imagine others.  Or perhaps it’s a little bit more like imagining Bhante or your preceptor.

I’m not altogether happy with this word ‘visualisation,’ because it implies an exclusively visual experience.  I prefer to use the word sadhana, which is more about the incorporation of our Dharma practice as a whole.  Within our sadhana, when we are actually ‘visualising’, or imagining, the Buddha, remember what I said earlier on about tuning into sense experience.  Imagination is a activity which employs the senses.  We are using our subtle inner senses, we are using the mind sense, we are employing inner memories of sense experiences of all kinds – visual, aural, tactile – to construct the imaginal world.  Some of this may be visual, but actually it’s a lot more subtle than that. 

6.       The sixth point is you don’t have to do the whole practice.  You can also work on the different parts of the practice, doing a bit here, a bit there.  Then, when you do do the whole of it, all of it is alive, all of it is meaningful.  So sometimes go into a particular area more deeply, for example the visualisation, or the mantra, or fine details like the transition from one stage to another.  You can spend a lot more time on just that area, and less on the others – even leave the other areas or abbreviate them for the time being.  I think you should do the whole practice fairly frequently, but it really helps your own understanding and inspiration if you are also working on the details.  You should try to avoid the feeling of being ‘trapped’ by a perceived need to do the whole practice every time.  It doesn’t have to be like that.  You can spend the whole period chanting and reflecting on the mantra if you want, and it’s just as valid. 

The next eight points all concern the stages of sadhana.  These stages differ in different practices; they certainly aren’t all always explicitly there.   But they are implicit, and if you like, you can put them in.   You can embellish your sadhana.   Newer Order members should perhaps keep their preceptors aware of what they are doing; but in principle, it’s not much different from embellishing the Puja.   You don’t have to have all seven stages in the Puja, you can, say, just do the GFR, the Confession and Rejoicing in Merits, and the Entreaty and Supplication.  Or other stages can be put in, and embellished with mantras and reflections.  Sadhana is similar to puja in this way.  The stages of sadhana represent moods of the spiritual life which the drama of the sadhana recapitulate.  

7.       So start with samatha – ideally, you should be mindful and peaceful throughout the whole practice.   So work to concentrate the mind, to generate metta and the Brahmaviharas, as a preliminary to the visualisation.   The whole sadhana, like the whole spiritual life, needs to be done mindfully, and in a spirit of metta. 

8.       Then, recollect your purpose and generate inspiration.  Remember that your purpose in the spiritual life is the deepening Going for Refuge.   So this is the part of your sadhana in which you remember this intensely, and either reflect on, or actually do, practices which intensify your sense of purpose and generate real inspiration.   This is where the Mula Yogas come in.   So this is potentially quite an extensive stage of sadhana, with quite a number of different practices and reflections. 

For example, you could do some Prostrations now, or beforehand, to strengthen this stage.   Also, you can reflect on the Ordinary Foundations – remember how lucky you are to have been born a human being and to have come across the Dharma.  

Then you could generate the Bodhicitta through the Bodhicitta Mula Yoga; or at least recollect it, perhaps by doing some ‘sending and receiving’ breathing.  

Next, you could go deeper by doing a confession:  something Dhardo Rimpoche used always to do before he meditated.  You could confess and purify yourself by doing the Vajrasattva Mula Yoga.   And to generate merit, you could do the Mandala Offering Mula Yoga, or recollect it briefly in this stage of the sadhana.  

Finally, you could deepen your connection with your preceptors and the whole tradition by doing, or briefly recollecting, the Kalyanamitra Yoga.   This is the last stage here, because it is like the Entreaty and Supplication in the Puja, just before reciting the Heart Sutra.   You are about to go into the sadhana proper, so you pray to your teachers and kalyanamitras for inspiration and support.  

Very often all these recollections of purpose and inspiration are summarised by verses in a written sadhana. 

Just before we go on to the next stage, it is quite a common practice to do, or briefly recollect, the Six Element Practice as a preliminary or ‘starter’ to the vipassana element in the visualisation which follows. 

9.       Then, we start on the visualisation. Here the point to be aware of is, reflect on sunyata and rupa i.e., when visualising the blue sky and the form of the Buddha manifesting out of the sky. 

This is the main insight element in the sadhana.  The Mahakarunika Sadhana says,

As forms in a glass, deities in ourselves we image:

Image and void conjoined are maya’s dance;

Dancerlike, divers costumes make him fair:

Fair, comely, mirrored image of the mind.

Bhante has also analogised this relationship between rupa and sunyata as that between Beauty and Truth.  The truth of things, the real nature of things, is that they are impermanent and have no substantial existence.  The manner of their existence is deeply mysterious.  You just cannot get at the way things exist.  You just cannot understand it.  Not as you are now, anyway.  So all is mysterious, all is void.  This is sunyata, the open dimension of things.  Existence is ineffable, beyond description.  So we meditate on this.  ‘As forms in a glass, deities in ourselves we image’.  This refers to self-visualisation, but it’s the same if you image the Buddha out there.  Image and void are conjoined.  They are inseparable.  The visualised image is sunyata, just like everything else.  Everything is beyond words, and this is the dance of maya or illusoriness.  Just as dreams throw up images and create a world, our world is a dance of images that are ultimately devoid of inherent existence.  So we meditate on this, using the visualised Buddha as our object for reflection.  We are using something that we know we have created, so that makes it clearer that this object is entirely conditioned.  Our ability to visualise is imperfect, and we can perhaps hardly perceive anything at all, yet we are doing something.  Something is arising in dependence on our efforts.  That something is what we call the visualised image.  It is an imperfect image, but we are creating it.  We are creating it out of sunyata.  We, who are ourselves sunya, are creating something which is also sunya.  And this empty thing has a certain form.  Perhaps not the classic Tibetan form with all the trimmings, with extra long ear lobes and long hooded eyes and wisps of transparent cloth flowing in the breeze – but however crude it is, there is some form to our imagined Buddha.  This form, whatever it is, is also void, is also pratityasamutpada, is also sunyata.  So another point about working in sadhana is to reflect on the relationship between rupa and sunyata, and I’ll try to find ways to draw your attention to this aspect of sadhana over the rest of our retreat. 

Formally, one does this reflection at the beginning and at the end of the visualisation part of the sadhana.  At the point when we start to imagine the Buddha appearing out of the blue sky, and when the Buddha dissolves back into the blue sky.  The blue sky is a representation of the idea of sunyata, so when you imagine the blue sky, reflect on sunyata.  Often the sunyata mantra is recited at this point, to mark the transition.  Then, when you start to evoke the form of the Buddha, however you do that, reflect on the nature of rupa.  What is a form? There is visual form, aural form, tangible form, the form of an idea.  A feeling has a certain form, and idea has a certain form – it’s not a visual form, though the idea or the feeling might also spark off a visual image in our mind.  The form of an idea or a feeling is indescribable in visual terms, but it has a form.  A perfume has a form.  If I imagine the perfume of a rose, or the perfume of a frying sausage, I can imagine these quite clearly.  They have a form, but I can’t describe what kind of form they have.  So when imagining the form of the Buddha, it also includes form in this indescribable, non-visual sense.  What is the form of an atmosphere? A person has an atmosphere which is quite distinct and recognisable.  It has some kind of form, it has some kind of outline, it has certain definite characteristics which can be recognised.  But this rupa, this form, can’t be adequately described.  So don’t think of form just in terms of shapes in space, think also of shapes in the mind, impressions which don’t translate in visual terms. 

Then, when you have finished visualising the Buddha, and communicating with him, reciting his mantra, hanging out with him, taking darshan and all the rest of it, then you dissolve him back into the voidness.  And then again, at that point, reflect on what you are actually doing.  I think this can seem a rather abstract thing to do.  But it only seems abstract because we are so lacking in interest and awareness.  The sunyata is completely real, and the form is completely real.  All dharmas really are sunyata.  Form really is sunyata.  The fact that we often dismiss that fact and pass on makes no difference whatsoever to the reality of it.  So maybe as a start we can just remind ourselves: ‘I don’t know what the mind is, and I don’t know what things are, and I don’t know what I am either, so since the Buddha is near, maybe it would help if I relaxed some of my assumptions about reality.’ So we at least remind ourselves that we have just created this form, that we are now bringing to a conclusion the conditions which created it, and that all things are like this, dependent on conditions, sunya, void, empty, totally mysterious.

10.     Reflect on the symbolism of the visualised image.   There are countless ways of doing this.   For example, in seeing the image as pervaded with light, one may equate its transparency with sunyata.   One may reflect on the symbolic meaning of its different aspects, for example, the Buddha’s ornaments symbolise the six Perfections.   One may reflect on the symbolic meaning of the mudra, the colour, the bodily posture, the items held in the hands, and the figure’s special qualities, e.g.  Great Compassion.   One may reflect on any Dharma verses present in the sadhana. 

11.     Ask for the Buddha’s teaching.   This is again like the entreaty and supplication mentioned under 10., but here it is done at a time when one is potentially in direct contact with the Buddha.   It may be marked in the sadhana by specific verses, or may be implicit.  

12.     Be receptive to the Buddha’s blessing.   The actual transmission of teaching is usually marked by the passage of light rays to one’s heart.  Its reception may be indicated by the recitation of the mantra, or by a period of silent sitting.   This stage is very important and should not be hurried.   One should be very receptive and quiet, in a spirit of Just Sitting, letting go distraction and unskilful mental activity. 

13.     Dedicate the merit gained from the practice.   Recall all forms of life and pray that this practice will benefit them.   This final stage (usually after the dissolution of the image and blue sky) is the link with the rest of one’s life and so is extremely important.   It may be marked by verses which evoke the myth of the sadhana.   Some remembrance of that myth at this stage can help us express it more in our daily life.  

14.     Allow space after the practice.  This is often said in the context of samatha meditation and it is even more important in the context of sadhana.  It’s important to allow what has happened time to sink in and have an effect.  It is quite easy to underestimate what has happened, quite easy to jump to the conclusion that nothing much has happened at all. It is possible to have unrealistic expectations as to what should happen in sadhana practice, and when when that doesn’t happen, we dismiss the practice.  We think, what’s the point of allowing space for the practice to have an effect when the practice didn’t work anyway?  This is a mistake, because we can’t predict in what manner the practice is going to take affect.  So we should always give ourselves at the very least a quarter of an hour of quiet time after practising sadhana.  If we have to do some activity, we should be aware that this should really be our quiet time, and do that activity in a way that protects our sadhana and allows us to be receptive to it. 

Once we have taken it up as a regular practice, the sadhana never stops having an effect – it is there all the time.  Being mindful of our practice at all times is one of the three aspects of sampajanna.  Allowing space after the meditation helps us bear it in mind all the time. 

Just a word in conclusion.  Since sadhana meditation is so rich and complex, it is important that we don’t lose sight of the principles of working in meditation.   So we can reduce everything to three simple points:

1. generating samatha;

2. reflecting on vipassana, and

3. cultivating receptivity to the enlightened qualities of the Buddha.  

Again, when we want to recall the richness of sadhana, we can re-flesh these bare bones again with all these fifteen points.