Customer Reviews

Transcending Madness: The Experience of the Six Bardos (Dharma Ocean Series)

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This is quite a special book about the psychology of bardo experience in Tibetan Buddhism. If you are new to these bardo teachings, then this is probably not the best book to start. However, it is very useful for further reading, particularly on the human psychology of the bardo experiences.

In his book, Trungpa Rinpoche describes what is traditionally known in Tibetan Buddhism as the "six realms", or worlds that we create as the projections of such powerful energies as anger, greed, ignorance, lust, envy, and pride. Having disowned the power of our emotions and projected that power onto the world outside, we find ourselves trapped in a variety of ways and see no hope of escape.

But it is within these projected realms, that the bardo experience arises as the heightened experience of that realm.
Now this heightened experience may go either way: Either we become (further) stuck in complete confusion of entrapment, or we open up to the possibility of sudden transformation of solidity into freedom - thus utilizing the bardo as a turning-point to freedom.

Bardo is explained as a ambiguous peak experience of "being in-between", "being in no-man's-land", neither belonging "here" nor "there". It belongs to situations in which we have emerged from the past and have not yet formulated the future, but strangely enough, we happen to be "somewhere".
It is at once "as if" being completely confused (to the point of being on the verge of madness) "and yet" being on the verge of awakening by resolving the confusion. You are not quite certain whether you have completely gone mad or you are "just about" to receive something. It is at once sanity/insanity.
This happens because even within the most solidified and seemingly hopeless accomplishment of ego's domain, the possibility of awakening is ever-present.

Bardo experience could be a breakthrough, but at the same time it is not a "big deal" (as ego would like to have it). Bardo understanding brings us into the very earth-grounding quality that nothing is changed before bardo experience, and nothing is changed after bardo experience - the experience is simply gone through. Bardo experiences, whether highlights or ordinary situations, are not "transformations" of your life; they are continuity.

Nevertheless, bardo experiences do provide turning-points in our awareness, if we would only know how to handle the experience. The book provides lively presentations, in which the author tries to convey to the reader - in his characteristic style - the sense of how the various bardos are actually experienced, and resolved:

projected realm -- ambiguous (confused) bardo experience -- potential bardo solution:

god realm - immobile eternity of "fearful hope/hopeful fear" -- "clear-light"
jealous gods' realm - speedy paranoia of "going too far/getting somewhere" -- "giving birth"
human realm - tricky deception of "reality /hallucination" -- "illusory body"
animal realm - stupid dependency of "holding on/giving in" -- "dream"
hungry ghoast realm - craving despair of "wanting to get/keep on wanting -- "becoming"
hell realm - mad terror of "destructive creativity/creative destruction" -- "death"

I made the above table from my notes from the book, but it shows only a few aspects. The following descriptions are pieced together from the book, for the purpose of this review:

The bardo of birth in the jealous gods' realm is like a woman trying to give birth and keep the baby at the same time. You put out a certain amount of speed constantly, constantly comparing with others, yet you are not quite certain whether you are getting anything out of it or whether you are losing something. It is as if you are going too far. Trying to attain something higher and greater constantly, it may lead to a peak state of extreme paranoia that if you watch for every pitfall, then you will be saved. In the bardo experience of this realm, absolute speed seems to be stillness.

In the human realm everything is experienced very intimately, purely at the naked flesh level. These emotions are so sharp and penetrating that we can't bear to see them, so automatically we put on masks, skin, clothing. But the moment we do that, we have second thoughts - after all, we do like to experience these passions and emotions in their naked quality. In the human realm there is that kind of ambiguity.
The bardo experience of the human realm has a hallucinatory quality, or illusory body, which is precisely the transparent nature of experiences: that we see, yet we don't see. Is it real, or is it pure imagination? We typically "find ourselves" in this situation, yet we don't know what we are doing here. This ambiguity can only be resolved by not panicking, accepting and just going along.

The animal realm involves the utterly self-conscious self-righteousness of being proud of your confusion. You feel you have something to hold on to, and you do not want to give in or to yield. You would even fight for it, and you're constantly trying to overpower others. The basic twist of ego is that such basic uncertainty doesn't become humble, but instead becomes proud. And one is not quite certain whether this person is crying because of his or her humiliation, or laughing because of his or her sinister opportunities.
Dreaming is based on the confusion of not being quite certain whether you are sleeping or not. The dream bardo, which is connected to the animal realm, is a way of seeing yourself in that particular uncertainty. You are uncertain whether you are weak or powerful, aggressive or peaceful.
Confusion and uncertainty intimately belong to each step that you have to go through in the bardo experience of the dream world, which is a very valuable and personal experience.

Hunger and thirst and trying to find an alternative to them is the hungry ghost realm. There is a constant demand for something, constantly being busy at something, constantly wanting to learn, wanting to know, wanting to "get it".
There is however a difference between that kind of hunger and grasping, and actual relationship with the subject. It is like the difference between reading the menu and deciding to eat. You are not sure what you like better: actually consuming or all the time preparing to consume.
Several types of craziness or levels of hallucination are involved in this realm. You dream of food, and the whole world becomes that shape. You go toward it, but when you get near it, the chocolate ice cream begins to become just a pile of rocks. Suddenly the waiters and waitresses become the guardians of the food. Or you rush to the food, you pick it up and eat. But the minute you swallow it, it turns into flames in your stomach and begins to burn you. There is a constant frustration of not being able to be fulfilled completely.

The experience of the hell realm comes from deliberate, basic aggression, from wanting to destroy your projection. The perceiver is extremely painful, so there is the suicidal mentality of wanting to destroy the perceiver of the mirror as well as the mirror itself. There is constant destruction going on.
The bardo of death, connected to the hell realm, has to do with the claustrophobia of pain and pleasure, the sudden peak of anger in which you are uncertain whether you are actually trying to destroy something or whether you are trying to achieve something by destroying.

To conclude:

The author provides very good pictures of the various bardo experiences, and makes them felt. Nowhere else in Buddhadharma literature have I found such precise observations.

Nevertheless, I do have the following critical remarks:

1. I think the author should have explained the six paramitas, or transcendent virtues, that serve as effective, "soothing" antidotes to the afflictive emotions (kleshas) of each realm. Such as: patience for the hell realm, generosity for the hungry ghost realm, and so on.
2. I think the author should have explained the transcendent wisdoms that are inherent in each afflictive emotion. For instance: all-accomplishing wisdom of the jealous gods' realm, discriminating wisdom of the human realm, mirror-like wisdom of the hell realm, and so on.

These aspects can however be found in other books by Chogyam Trungpa. Nevertheless I would have liked them explained in this context as well.

The book also has the drawback that is edited from transcriptions of two seminars and therefore the information becomes a bit scattered.

No matter what, it will probably take a long time to digest the subject matter of this book, due to its profound nature and because of some drawbacks as mentioned above. But I do think it's a marvelous book, opening psychological perspectives that are nowhere else in dharma literature explained from such a point of view, in such detail.

On a final note: It may be that this book (or even this review) triggers profound frustration or pain in the reader. It may be that you feel you're close to something extremely valuable, but you just can't get it. I know from my own experience that in such a situation talking to someone may be very useful. You may want to visit a kind-hearted and skilful Buddhist monk or nun, or even a kind teacher, and confess your distress. I'm sure they will really listen to what you have to say. This might well provide the opening you're looking for.

Hope you enjoy this book, and take it easy...

Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche's theory of six states of being/mind is based on Tibetan Buddhist psychology. The cycle of Bardos or states of in-betweeness (similar to Heidegger's idea of throwness) is something through which we all go through. The in-betweeness or bardo described by Trungpa is that state in which we experience the peak of a certain state of mind about to change into another - for example peak of anger, peak of bliss, peak of jealousy, peak of anxiety etc. These situations make us feel trapped because we are on the verge of 'going over' and yet it seems we cannot cross the river.

These are at once states of madness and sanity. Trungpa does not operate through a Western separation of thes concepts but shows that by allowing the peak to pass you realize the insight of the peak. He does not say that you should try hard to move away from a Bardo. If you do, you move into another Bardo and in any case you can only move from one Bardo to another. It is fruitless if you get caught in the same Bardo permanently. So the solution to seeking sanity in everyday experiences of madness is allowing a Bardo to be realized and to pass - neither grasping nor freeing oneself from it. That is, not moving away, and not trying to hold on, but realizing it and allowing it to pass.

Trungpa's language is difficult both because of his Asiatic style of emphasis and because his method of argumentation is based on the Indo-Tibetan (Nyaya-Jain-Buddhist) tradition of syllogism rather than the Western one. Accordingly many of his statements are in the form 'neither this nor that'. This can be frustrating for readers schooled only in Western logic, but is perfectly logical for Oriental minds.

Based on orally delviered lectures and dialogues with students, and relying heavily on a neither this nor that logic (Buddhists attach a great importance to going beyond this and that), the work shows a path to sanity that must be grasped through direct awareness rather than scientific analysis of what is meant or not meant in the arguments of Trungpa. Even the hermeneutics is different.

Perhaps the biggest benefit of this book is that it smashes through many western notions of psychology and offers a powerful alternative to thinking abouut mind-body-being.