Mastering Meditation

Book excerpt: A legendary contemporary meditation master illuminates practices that are essential to Tibetan Buddhists everywhere. Tibetan Buddhism is estimated to have 18 million followers worldwide. Mastering Meditation gives you the experience of studying with one of the greatest meditation masters of the modern age. His Eminence Chöden Rinpoché was not only a celebrated scholar, honored by selection as a debate partner to His Holiness the Dalai Lama, but he was also an accomplished yogi who spent nineteen years in solitary meditation retreat. In this thorough and thoroughly clear book, Rinpoché offers meticulous explanations and profound practical instructions on two essential practices in Tibetan Buddhism: calm abiding and mahamudra. The first part of this book contains instructions for developing calm abiding, an unshakable single-pointedness of mind. The second part, Rinpoché’s direct commentary on the Fourth Panchen Lama’s foundational text, offers advanced instructions on using calm abiding as a platform to develop mahamudra. Rinpoché elucidates both sutra-system mahamudra—meditation on the emptiness of the mind—as well as mantra-system mahamudra, a specialized meditation that uncovers subtle, hidden levels of mind to pierce into the ultimate nature of self and reality, leading finally to complete enlightenment. Drawing from his vast learning and personal experience, Rinpoché provides readers with an open gateway to remarkable states of lucidity and peace.