Post-Meditation

How to properly sustain the practice of post-meditation based upon the view of Dzogchen

In equipoise, one leaves the rigpa (pure awareness) in its natural state, resting within the condition of the ground. In post-meditation, when encountering appearing objects, ensuring that one does not become separated from the view is a crucial point of Dzogchen practice.

Specifically, in the post-meditation period, when the sense faculties encounter various external objects of appearance such as forms and sounds, rather than grasping at those objects as truly existent or independently real, one should recognize them as the expression of one's own rigpa or as magical displays of the mind. Understand that all appearances are the play of the mind, and view all arising phenomena as dissolving right within the expanse of rigpa.

The way to understand this is, for example, just as when reflections appear within a mirror, they are vividly clear yet there is nothing to grasp onto, and just as moonlit reflections in water cannot be held onto; similarly, the moment the sense faculties merely perceive objects, without being tainted by conceptual grasping and without dividing into subject and object, one rests within the clear and non-conceptual state. Knowing all appearances to be like a dream, one lets grasping self-liberate.

In this way, whatever thoughts of good and bad or attachment and aversion arise, one abandons the grasping that takes them as true, sustaining a post-meditation free of grasping like an illusion or a dream. Moreover, when the sense faculties look upon objects, rather than falling under the sway of afflictive emotions, one must seize them with the hook of mindful and alert unforgetfulness (dran pa & shes bzhin). The very moment that attachment or aversion arises upon encountering an object, one looks directly at the nature of one's own mind, resting in the manner of self-liberation observing where the thought came from, where it currently abides, and where it ultimately goes, leaving no trace.

In short, the wisdom of equipoise should not remain confined to equipoise alone, but should be integrated with the conduct of post-meditation. At all times whether walking, sitting, lying down, or standing—no matter how vast the sensory appearances may be, one carries all activities on the path while remaining unfailing from the primordial expanse of rigpa. Without splitting into subject and object, whatever appears is taken as the display of rigpa, sustaining an ungrasping continuum unmixed with judgments of good and bad. This is the ultimate key point of how sense faculties engage with objects without any grasping entering in the supreme instruction of remaining inseparable from the view during post-meditation.

Whenever an individual examines their own consciousness or mind, it is devoid of any tangible characteristics, being emptiness itself, while simultaneously possessing the aspect of knowing and clarity thus abiding as the nature of “clarity and awareness”. Whether it is a discursive mind in which various deluded thoughts flutter, or a non-discursive mind resting naturally in equanimity, the foundational state of all these is a single reality wherein emptiness (freedom from conceptual elaboration) and clarity (the capacity for everything to arise and be known) are inseparably united. This is the ultimate ground-status according to Dzogchen.

Accordingly, this luminous, clear aspect of the mind is not something newly brought from the outside or originating elsewhere; rather, it never transcends the spontaneous radiance (or dynamic display) of the primordial, self-liberated great rigpa of the ground. Therefore, whenever either the sensory consciousness (such as the eye, nose, or tongue consciousness) or the mental consciousness of our continuum engages with its respective object whether the sensory consciousness is seeing sights and hearing sounds, or the mental consciousness is conceptualizing phenomena at that very moment, without dividing them into an external object and an internal mind, one must recognize all these as arising solely from the self-radiance of one's own primordial wisdom and sustain the continuity of that recognition.

However, if when encountering objects one fails to recognize them as not transcending this radiance of pristine wisdom, one falls into “gross grasping” at the objects meaning one grasps at objects as truly existent and falls into the dualistic net of self and other, subject and object. Conversely, by recognizing whatever appears as the dynamic display of rigpa, one severs the binding chains of dualistic grasping between the perceived object and the grasping subject. This is the supreme and vital point of Dzogchen practice; one must apply this instruction precisely and undistractedly, striking the crucial nail of the practice.

All fleeting forms are magical and grand, 

Dissolving softly in pure rigpa’s hand. 

Void clarity like ocean waves untamed, 

In post-meditation, rest ungrasped, unaimed.

All sensory shows like phantom pageants play, 

In Rigpa’s vast expanse, grasp melts away. 

Void clarity like ocean waves unfurled, 

Rest undistracted, embracing all the world.