By Altair Shyam

Day One with the Dalai Lama

Dear Enlightened Ones,

It is always such a blessing to be with His Holiness the Dalai Lama. This time I was in Yokohama, Japan for a three-day retreat.

The Dalai Lama began the day with a talk about us all being One Family of Love and Compassion.

Here is the core of His teachings from Day One for you.

We are all One Family of Love and Compassion no matter our religion, history, or scientific background.

Happiness comes from peace of mind, and we cultivate happiness through love, compassion, and practicing patience and kindness.

Obstacles such as anger, delusion, and attachment act as a veil to the mind. When we purify these, we become free and see reality as it is.

The Heart Sutra of Avalokiteshvara Guan Yin is like an Ancient Mother.

She teaches us the wisdom of emptiness, which means seeing that things have no external existence. (At this point in my meditation and contemplation on this a bright violet-blue orb appeared.) She also teaches the essence and importance of Bodhicitta, which means to have an altruistic intention to cherish others and then to liberate others.

In dreams, we can see an elephant and when we wake up we know it is not real. When we are awake, we can see a partner or friend as frustrating and be angry at them, but then the next day we can be fine and calm around them. This shows us that the impressions we have of people through the impurified mind or consciousness are unreliable. When you are aware of that in the present, in that moment, you are awake. Awareness is luminous. Past and future have no existence.

Liberation of your self comes down to cherishing others. When you have compassion, you see suffering in others and develop empathy because you can see how ignorant others are of how things are. So, there is a strong desire to help—to take on the suffering of others.

Maitreya taught the Buddha Nature is All One; there is no division between teachings on love and compassion.

Afflictive emotions, like anger, can be used to see into the nature of emptiness and luminosity. When you are angry, you believe your reasons for being angry are real. If you see directly into the nature of things and see that these feelings change, you can realize the nature of change. You can see that these feelings dissipate, so they are empty of any real existence. Realize the nature of emptiness then you can use this to liberate.

Quantum physics points to things having no objective existence.

Ask yourself, “Who is this body this voice this mind? Who am I?”

We appear to each other as if we are real, but where are you? Are you the body? Are you the voice? Are you the mind?

The nature of these forms is emptiness. They all change and eventually transform and dissolve.

Things exist by Name. The Dalai Lama had a “lightning bolt” of realization about the “I”—the Name we give to ourselves and the identities, feelings, and thoughts we attach to ourselves.

By cultivating the path of perfection of wisdom, we form the intention to help all beings and to bring love and compassion wherever we go. We see the truth of emptiness, that there is no “I,” and we seek to liberate ourselves by cherishing others. By letting go of self-cherishing and “I,” we open to a deeper luminous awareness of All That Is.

Stages of Meditation
Past and future lives can be discovered. They are based on dependent origination. The roots of compassion in us all can bring about a special resolve to bring all sentient beings to enlightenment.

There are different types of suffering from which we should try to be free. These are the suffering of suffering, the suffering of change, and the suffering of conditions or conditioning.

Then there are afflictive emotions and karma.

Cherishing others with an altruistic and emptiness is helped by meditation; meditation on equanimity, on love and kindness, on compassion, and on wisdom.

To begin with, meditation practice on emptiness involves perfecting single-pointed concentration. Training in mindfulness and introspection develops concentration.

Here are some steps:

1. Choose a quiet, serene place.
2. Physical posture: Vajra cross-legged, lotus position, or on a chair:

• Hands held together in Mudra. Left hand under right and two thumbs touching against the navel.
• Straighten spine.
• Tip of tongue to upper palate. Eyes on top of nose, straight ahead, or slightly uplifted.
• Eyes half open.
• Shoulders relaxed.

These steps are important for later Tantric practices, where you use the breath to breathe light. Energy in the spine and the flow of energy in the right and left channels need to be balanced.

3. To begin with, use an object of focus.
This could be a flame, flower, or piece of wood. This uses the sixth mind, not visual consciousness, for example. Focus on the image of the object, say a flower, in your mind. Stay singled pointed for a long time until you can hold the object in your mind with calm abiding.

The Dalai Lama joked that he had met Hindu Sadhus in the Himalayas with better focus than Buddhist monks!

4. Special insight.
You begin to see things as they are in extraordinary ways. You see into the formless realms and Higher Realms that have been spoken of by all saints and mystics, Buddhas, Christs, Mohammeds, Krishnas, and Avalokiteshvara Guan Yins.

The Dalai Lama said from his conversations with all Masters they all agree on these basic points. He is on the lookout to meet many more beings who have developed single-pointed focus and insight into the nature of things!

The Notion of an Independent self is the root of all delusion.

There is no self.

There is no “I.”

Nothing can be found.

The innate clear light mind is not the self.

Within consciousness, there are degrees of subtlety. Past and future lives are explained on the basis of self.

As the self becomes more transparent to the light, the memory of these past and future lives is realized. Some children have clear memories of their past lives. There is a child in New York who has a past life memory of dying in the tragedy of 9/11.

There are meditators the Dalai Lama has met who can keep a single focus in their mind for three to four hours and who can stay in the subtle, clear light of death at the point they transitioned, due to long and continuous practice.

To develop calm abiding, you have to calm the mind and place it again and again in that state through practice.

The main obstacles are mental laxity and mental excitation.

Alertness must be there.

If your mind is dull, lax, or cloudy like daydreaming and you have lost alertness, then you need to practice uplifting the mind. You could visualize the Buddha or Christ in illuminated bodies. Tantric Yoga is particularly useful when you meditate, visualizing yourself as a deity and doing it within emptiness. Some yogis can project their bodies out into other bodies.

If your mind is too excited, then meditate on emptiness.

Then contemplate what arises, and develop special insight or Vipassana.

Love and blessings,
Altair and Mother with the Dalai Lama

Day Two with the Dalai Lama
This was a completely different day to Day One. The focus was on the Avalokiteshvara Guan Yin Initiation.

To begin with, I met up with such a diverse group of people—Mongolian and Tibetan monks and devotees—who had traveled all the way to Japan to receive this initiation. Many did not speak English or Japanese, so we communicated with my smattering of Tibetan, lots of gestures, and by acting out scenarios.

It was a day of energies and—as the Dalai put it—channels, winds, and bliss drops.

The actual ritual is secret, so I cannot share the techniques, although you can find many similar techniques documented in my favorite book by the Dalai Lama, Kalachakra Tantra: Rite of Initiation.

The Avalokiteshvara Initiation is a secret Mantrayana ritual. Fundamentally, you visualize yourself as the deity Avalokiteshvara Guan Yin, although the experience is far more profound than my words can convey. Perhaps because of my karmic predisposition (although I have a very fresh beginner’s mind), I was able to devour the energies like a starving man. I went through some quite startling, even shocking transformations, as if a lightning bolt had struck me. Those blessings, in particular, I dedicate to all beings.

The Vows
The initiation begins with taking vows. These include vows for laypersons, monks and nuns, and Bodhisattva vows. To summarize these vows, the Dalai Lama says to be kind to everyone and to not wish anyone harm in thought, word, or action.

I will share the one I use daily here with you, should you wish to use it. It is derived from the one I took when I did the Kalachakra Tantra.

“From my Heart, I go for refuge to the three jewels, Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, Christ Krishna, Divine Mother. I will free all beings from pain and set all in final bliss. To do that, I will generate an altruistic intention to attain perfect enlightenment, and thereupon will train in the learnings of Bodhisattvas, Archangels, and Elders/Masters.”

Whatever Vow you take, a formal one or one that you create yourself, the Dalai Lama recommends saying this with a deep, pure intention at least six times a day.
I say it at the following times: When opening my eyes upon rising, in my morning meditation, in my midday meditation, at some point in the afternoon, in my evening meditation, and as I close my eyes to go to sleep.

The Initiation
The Avalokiteshvara Initiation is comprised of Secret Mantra and Secret Kriya. It comes from Tibet and the tradition of the 17 Nalanda Masters. It involves activating energies in the channels, winds, and bliss drops in the physical body and light body. The Buddha tailored these techniques for specific disciples. They arose in different bodies, sometimes in a celibate monk and sometimes in a deity.

The Profound Vision Tradition

This comes from the Hidden Terma (treasure) or Profound Vision tradition.

The initiation we took came from the Fifth Dalai Lama, who had many visions of deities and shared 25 cycles of visionary teachings. These are called the Father Teachings.

Each of the Dalai Lamas was famous for particular visions. The First had visions of white and green Tara. The Second had visions from childhood and composed music and chants about them. The current Dalai Lama has dreams, not visions. He joked about this by saying he was the only Dalai Lama who has not had visions of deities, but he takes consolation from the fact that he is the most famous Dalai Lama.

My Visions
Though I cannot share the specific techniques of the initiation (the Dalai Lama asked us not to share them), I can share the visions I received, as they are very personal and do not in any way reveal the secret process.

I hope that you may relate to some of them.

As many of you know, I have had a deep connection to the Fifth Dalai Lama over a long period of time. I had five visions over the course of this initiation.

The First Vision
A dark-haired woman with tanned skin appeared suddenly, her eyes blazing with light. It was quite shocking. This was a form of Palden Lhamo. She is the Protector of Tibet.

The Second Vision
I was transported bodily to a world I did not recognize, somewhat similar to the windswept snowy slopes of the Tibetan highlands. All my senses were fully on and engaged, yet I feel it was not there.

The Third Vision
I was witness to what I would describe as twin Vajras spinning horizontally with tremendous force.

The Fourth Vision
I was aware of an enormous pillar of light to which we all are connected. It ran the length of my spine above and below and connected space and spacelessness. It was immovable and yet highly volatile, like being connected to a God-cable through Heaven and Earth. My body shook as if unable to contain the voltage. This was a somewhat shocking part of the initiation, and I felt as if I might pass out at that moment.

The Fifth Vision
There was a point at which this body dissolved, and the physical body was “replaced” by another in full light body “form.” I recognized it as our ultimate truth. The energy and consciousness were overwhelming and entirely magnificent. It left me in tears.

The Stories
Today the Dalai Lama told many stories.

He shared about famous Thangka (sacred art) of Avalokiteshvara and the effect it had on devotees leading them into trance and ecstasy.

He told the story of Je Tsongkhapa’s vision of Manjushri sitting in a circle of Blue Light.

He spoke about how the Fifth Dalai Lama’s visions emerged from the Heart of Avalokiteshvara.

He told us about a statue in Potala and that when he prayed in front of it, its expression changed. He had seen the face change from serious to smiling.

He also had a dream of Avalokiteshvara where he got to ask about the depth of realization of emptiness and to have many of his own personal questions about enlightenment answered.

He sees Avalokiteshvara on his own shoulder. He said, “I act as Messenger for Avalokiteshvara.” And he said he was born to do this.

He told stories about Nagarjuna and his feats of moving beneath the ground and flying.

But he said the real miracle is in the transformation of the mind through the Master’s writing.

He spoke about how magnificent the true teachings and writings of all traditions are and that all religions are beneficial.

He spoke about the types of visions and that the profound visions were when deities appear to Masters when the Master’s eyes are open.

He said there is a Divine Plan in place.

He said the Divine Plan was about spreading a spirituality that was sovereign and unified, and that all religions were part of that.

The Dalai Lama ended the initiation with the aphorism, “NO BEGINNING, NO END” in true Tantra and alchemy tradition.

Love and blessings, Altair and Mother

Useful Resources
You may find the following articles helpful:
The Yoga Method of Avalokiteshvara, the Buddha of Compassion
Avalokitesvara Compassion Practice can “Enhance the Treatment of Anxiety, Depression, Trauma…”

Day Three with the Dalai Lama
The third day of the retreat with the Dalai Lama started with a debate between His Holiness and three well-known scientists, a psychologist, a neuroscientist, and a quantum physicist.

From the outset, the Dalai Lama made it very clear he was there to discuss and investigate the mind and consciousness, because, he explained, science seems to have very few answers about what consciousness is and how it operates. He said he was like an alchemist, who checks to see if the gold is pure. Anything we believe, he said, we should investigate thoroughly until it becomes clear and only then should we accept it.

I really took this to heart (as you will see later) when I got the opportunity to speak to the Dalai Lama directly, as I have each time that I have met him. I feel so blessed, as just like with Jesus/Yeshua, Yogananda, Babaji, and Guan Yin, I feel I have had “personal tuition” on the path with heart!

A Brief Summary of My Own Connections to the Dalai Lama
In case you haven’t followed my particular process with the Dalai Lama, I dreamed when I was two years old that I was one of his monks at Samye Monastery. I had the same dream every night for a year, a dream in which I fell into an abyss, heard the sacred OM sound and saw the clear light.

Then in my twenties, when I was running a company, I sponsored the Dalai Lama’s first trip to New Zealand in which I was granted a personal audience with him. When I met him, his simple advice to me was to follow the path of love and compassion.

Some years later when I met the Dalai Lama again, he guided me to follow the path of Avalokiteshvara Guan Yin with the love and affection of a mother for her child. Then, while doing the Kalachakra Tantra (a ritual I followed for over a year devotedly), he appeared to me in a profound vision. He appeared to me with my eyes open after I had breakfast one morning, and guided me into the techniques of subtler consciousness of the Kalachakra.

When I came to do the actual initiation, I did it with deep devotion over a 12-day period, online, as the Dalai Lama had specifically stated that Tibetans who lived abroad would be able to receive the initiation if they applied themselves with deep faith and devotion. (I consider myself a Tibetan because of my past life experience over a year, as a two-year-old until I was three.)

I experienced two profound moments.

One was while I was in a train meditating on the fire part of the ritual. Suddenly my hand caught on fire and my thumb burst into a flame. I was left with a burnt thumb which I had to nurse when I got back home.

The second was when doing the rebirth part of the initiation at home. I spontaneously changed the ritual to include the Archangel Metatron and Guan Yin in Union, and my mind burst into light. In the most shocking event of my life, there was no meditator and no meditation for three days, an event my wife witnessed.

That was my experience of the clear light. I realized we were made of light and the divine light was our birthright. As the Dalai Lama had suggested, I was able to test it and verify its authenticity. As Jesus said, “If your eye is single then your entire body is filled with light.”

A World In Crisis
The Dalai Lama said our world is in an emotional crisis. He said we are repeating our mistakes and that violence is outdated. It is not the right method. The key is inner peace. If we want to de-militarize the world, then we need to inner de-militarize ourselves. Constant anger and fear weaken our immune system.

The Dalai Lama does not spread Buddhism in the West anymore because the West has a Judeo-Christian tradition. He spoke to a Christian monk who was a well-known speaker who asked him how to develop emptiness.

“Don’t ask,” joked the Dalai Lama. “It is none of your business.” He told the monk that if he put doubt into people’s minds, he would feel uncomfortable, whereas he feels comfortable teaching in Japan as it is a Buddhist country.

Science and Wisdom
The Dalai Lama kept repeating this—that he felt very happy, there was no hesitation, and that he truly appreciated the opportunity. I could really feel it. Something was different. Something had changed.

He praised Indian psychology, the Vedas, and the yoga systems, saying how highly developed they were and that the Buddha himself used them. He said they were like the university, and that modern psychology was like being in kindergarten. He repeated often that with all our modern psychology, education, and technology we are failing our children and our people.

He gave a number of examples of where science is unable to explain phenomena. At death, the Dalai Lama’s senior tutor and Yogananda’s body stayed fresh for many days after passing, showing how deeply being a meditator can affect the brain and body.

He spoke about Dreamtime and how sensorial consciousness is not active, but other consciousness is active.

No Beginning, No End
He talked a lot about no beginning, no end.

He explained that when the brain stops there is subtle consciousness (this helped me explain why I could experience the clear light because of what happened to me as a two-year-old, when I repeatedly died).

He gave another example of a Tibetan monk in New Zealand whose body remained very fresh after death. On the fourth night, three fingers of his left hand moved to hold his right hand, showing these subtle levels of consciousness and the four levels of emptiness. Around the second level of emptiness, at death, the body consciousness dissolved into emptiness, but the bright kind or subtle consciousness continues.

He asked the scientists to explain when consciousness is formed and at what point?

He also asked the scientists to explain the cause of the Big Bang.

On both points, they were forced to admit they didn’t know.

Talking With the Dalai Lama
A small group of us were allowed to be part of the final discussion, and again I was blessed to be chosen. I was the first to speak to His Holiness and the scientists. I asked the following question:
“Your Holiness, from the age of two to three I had a recurring dream as a Tibetan monk, every night, in which I died and experienced the cosmic sound of OM and the clear light.

From my own observations of space and time, it would seem that space and time emerged from nothing at the moment of the Big Bang, from an emptiness as it were. In our universe the constant is light, and light is the only exception from the fact that it can propagate in a vacuum or emptiness.

Einstein intuited the Theory of Relativity from observing light. Christ and the Buddha tell us be the Light of the world and be a Light unto ourselves. What can be learned about the origins of consciousness by observing clear light in meditation and studying its connection to physical light like an Einstein-Buddha?”

The Dalai Lama answered me by first addressing my dream experience. He said that I should follow the practices of dream yoga (as outlined in the six yogas of Naropa) and practice realizing the clear light within the dream.

He explained that the subtle consciousness is awake generally only through dreaming and deep meditation. Dreaming, therefore, affords a remarkable opportunity to know the self by realizing you are dreaming within the dream. Then you are able to practice witnessing consciousness at play within the dream and awaken within the dream with clarity at the same time.

(In beautiful synchronicity, this is actually one of the practices I outlined in the first chapter of Portals of Presence at the end of my book Diary of a Yogi: A Book of Awakening.)

He then went on to talk about the clear Light. He said the Experience of the Light the Masters speak about is a direct experience of the Source. No beginning, no end. The Dalai Lama joked and said he had tried to realize clear light consciousness but failed. He explained that it was a very difficult subtle experience of consciousness and not his experience so far.

You Are Your Own Master
His Final Speech was as follows:

You are your own Master.
Be a Light for the World.
Take this amazing opportunity of a human life and use it well.
Become like Nagarjuna, who was both a scientist and a meditator.
If you are suffering, look for the “I” who is complaining. Where is it?

He told a story of a woman who was suffering. He told her, “If you think the “I” is in the heart, what shape is it? Imagine the Dalai Lama there in your heart with you. He will help take the burden of your suffering.”

Be like a mother in her affection for her child.

Educate the world with love, kindness, and compassion.

If you are involved in any spiritual education and technology, we need more education on human values to unite our world.

Finally, he said, “Meditate for 30 minutes to an hour every day for inner peace. That is the bare minimum.”

Love and blessings, Altair and Mother with the Dalai Lama

About Stephen-Altair
Stephen-Altair, also known as Altair in healing and lightworkers communities, is a teacher, healer, and mystic guiding the way of love, unity, and harmony for the Enlightened World that we are co-creating. He teaches that we are the way and that our freedom to be our true self is the key to transformation.
“The miracles of God lie within Us. We are the Light. We are the Temple of the One Chakra. Our Awakened Infinite Light Body brings all our dreams into reality.”

Altair’s background in spirituality has at its foundations the teaching of the Christ, Buddha, Krishna, the Archangels and Bodhisattvas, and Divine Mother. He comes to the fields of transformation, healing, and awakening with over 25 years of formal and intensive mindful and heartful training, a background in teaching and education, and degrees and certifications in counseling and alternative health, business, and mindful and heartful education.

Website: www.altairshyam.com

Website: www.diaryofayogi.com

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