The Collected Works of Chögyam Trungpa: Volume Eight (55 page)

In the 1970s and 1980s, he reached out to thousands who couldn’t relate to a traditional approach to religion, yet were starved for spirituality. His teachings still have that quality of being genuine and guileless. While editing this volume, I experienced such relief to hear a spiritual teacher talking about any and every topic without any pretense of religiosity.

About five years ago, the Shambhala Archives (of which I was then the director) was just beginning the transfer of some of the above-mentioned half-inch reel-to-reel videotapes recorded at the Naropa Institute in the early seventies. I sat in on the transfer of a panel discussion on death and dying, where Chögyam Trungpa joined two Western therapists talking about death. One of the therapists, now a leading Buddhist authority on death and dying, was very self-serious and solemn during the discussion. She seemed to be adopting the posture of a wise, caring person talking about a very important, serious subject like death. Then, at the very end of the reel, after the discussion was finished and the participants felt “off-camera,” this young woman was shown on camera asking Trungpa Rinpoche for a cigarette. Suddenly, as she smoked her cigarette, she became young, carefree, and sexy. Rinpoche didn’t change at all. It was interesting.

Trungpa Rinpoche had an incredible knack for saying things that people are always thinking but are afraid to talk about. He didn’t pull his punches. There are many examples of this in the present volume, some humorous, some shocking, some heartrending. I hope the editing has done him justice in this regard.

His command of the English language would have been impressive for a native speaker; it was quite extraordinary for a gentleman from Tibet. His choice of English terms to define key concepts in the Buddhist teachings and his rich and metaphoric use of the English language in his books have to a great extent defined the vocabulary of Buddhism in America and helped to provide its poetic voice. His understanding of the Western mind is uncanny. Now, more than ten years after his death, those qualities still make him unique among spiritual teachers in the West.

Chögyam Trungpa was a teacher for many times, not just for the generation to whom he delivered his teachings. As he says over and over in this book, what he truly cared about was benefiting others. I hope that his teachings will be recognized for the wisdom they contain.

G
REAT
E
ASTERN
S
UN:
T
HE
W
ISDOM OF
S
HAMBHALA

Source Materials and Structure

Except for two chapters that are based on public talks, this book is based entirely on weekend seminars given by Trungpa Rinpoche in Level Five of the Shambhala Training program. The programs that formed the basis for the book were given in New York City; Boston, Massachusetts; Boulder, Colorado; Berkeley, California; and Vancouver, British Columbia. The audience for each program was usually between 150 and 200 students who had completed four training seminars, also conducted as weekend programs. The Level Five would begin with a Friday night talk. During the day on Saturday and Sunday, periods of sitting and walking meditation would be interspersed with individual interviews and group discussions conducted by assistant directors who were senior students of the author. The concluding event each day would be a talk in the evening by the author. Following the final talk of the weekend on Sunday, students would receive a diploma and pin to signify their graduation from the program, and there was usually a reception with food and drink, often accompanied by poetry readings, singing, and toasts—and occasionally other events such as a calligraphy demonstration by the Dorje Dradül. The chapters in the book are generally grouped together in two, threes, or fours—mostly threes—corresponding to the three talks given by the author in each program. I have given every chapter and grouping a title, drawn from the content of the talks on which they are based.

At the time that the talks were given, the title of every Level Five seminar was “Open Sky/Primordial Stroke.” The talks in the program were based on a simple threefold logic, one logic for each talk: trust, renunciation, and letting go. Thus, from one point of view, almost all the talks in this book are about one of these three topics, although each talk is also unique. No attempt was made to mask repetitiveness in the content, but I hope that, nevertheless, readers find the material of interest. In the editor’s preface, I have offered some possible approaches to exploring the redundancy of the material.

Some of the material in
Great Eastern Sun
also appeared in
Shambhala
. In the first volume, it was generally used in quite a different context, so I have not been shy about allowing the occasional reedit and reuse of material in
Great Eastern Sun
. In preparing transcripts as source materials for this book, I found that the audiotapes of talks that were the most powerful and poignant were often the worst-quality recordings. I don’t know why that is the case; I merely report it. Most of the talks on which this book is based have been unavailable to people since the time they were given, some almost twenty years ago. Many of the tapes were never transcribed, and unlike most of the author’s other Shambhala presentations, this material was not widely studied. It is a pleasure to return it to the world. In one case, the last talk of a seminar was missing, and I sent out a call over the Internet to the members of the Shambhala community to locate this talk. Although given in Boston, the only known copy of the recording turned up in the local office of Shambhala Training in Boulder, Colorado. In another case, the audiotapes of an entire Level Five given in Chicago were missing and could not be located.

Readers may want to hear some of the recordings for themselves. I would recommend this, although the poor quality of some does not allow for their general release. Tapes of some of the original seminars can be purchased in their entirety from Kalapa Recordings. (For information about contacting the publisher, see the Resources section.)

For some, it may be of interest to know that the Dorje Dradül’s own study material for these talks was often the Tibetan text
Moonbeams of Mahamudra,
by Tagpo Tashi Namgyal. An English translation was published in 1986 by Shambhala Publications and is now out of print.

Editorial Decisions

I had three principles that guided me in the editing of the manuscript. They were not to change or omit anything simply because (1) I didn’t understand it, (2) I didn’t agree with it, or (3) it made me uncomfortable. There are many things in the book that I don’t understand, a few things that I don’t agree with, and certainly places in the book that make me uncomfortable. Thinking about it, I realized that this was a mark of Chögyam Trungpa, the Dorje Dradül, the man and his teachings: he often makes us very uncomfortable. It seems to be part of the genuineness.

There was some profanity in the original manuscript, which I eventually removed. The Dorje Dradül never used profanity in a habitual fashion. He used it deliberately and powerfully. However, if the author were alive today, I don’t think that he would want swear words in print in the context of a book clearly meant for a large and diverse reading public. During his lifetime, he certainly favored a formal approach to the written word. Fairly early on in the editing of the book, I had occasion to speak with Mrs. Diana Mukpo, the wife of the Dorje Dradül, and I mentioned the issue of profanity to her, especially the use of the f-word in several chapters. I remember that she said, “Oh dear!” in her most regal, English fashion, and then laughed.

Some of the talks on which this book is based were quite rigorous expositions of the Shambhala wisdom, and I have tried to respect their rigor. Others were more atmospheric, and I have tried to communicate the atmosphere. I have tried to retain as much of the humor as I could. In most cases, answers to questions have been either incorporated into the body of a chapter or omitted. In a few cases, a question or an interchange was left in dialogue format. Audio recordings of some events included the closing ceremonies, toasts, and other details mentioned above. Occasionally, those were incorporated into a chapter. This was not done primarily to communicate the atmosphere
then
. Rather, I have tried to let the nowness of events speak out. The reader will have to judge whether this attempt has been successful or not.

Sometimes, editing from the spoken word to a written text is mainly a matter of adding punctuation and correcting grammar. That approach can work well if the original language was being chanted or the recitation was a form of poetry. But for most of the material in this book, I took another approach to try to grapple with the nuances of meaning and expression. I didn’t want to ignore the intonation and emphasis put on different words or the rhythm and melody of the author’s speech, which make his language so alive and rich. I did a fair bit of pruning of the language in this book. Most people include a lot of extra words in their speech, many of which are de-emphasized when they talk, but which become large and glaring on the page. So although I tried to respect both the letter and the sense of the original, many words were cut back. I have worked very hard not to put many words into the author’s mouth in this book. Occasionally, I felt that I had no choice but to add a word or phrase, so that readers would not be unnecessarily confused. The end result, I hope, captures the lithic quality of the Dorje Dradül’s speech. He uses words in ways that are so concrete, as well as alive, that you feel you can almost hold them in your hand.

I have tried to respect the author’s voice in this book. For some, it will seem raw, although I hope that it will also seem immediate and alive.
Great Eastern Sun
is being presented more than twelve years after his death. Liberties I took with the first book I don’t feel are appropriate now. Some readers may find the voice and the approach to content in this book a contrast to
Shambhala: The Sacred Path of the Warrior
. In that volume, the author’s personality was downplayed, in keeping with his instructions to me about the kind of book that he wanted. For the present volume, I didn’t edit out the outrageous, humorous, and disturbing qualities that made the author the powerful, magnetic, and controversial teacher that he was. I haven’t taken anything out purely because it might be shocking, quirky, or controversial. I hope this will make it harder to expropriate these teachings as food for New Age dogma.

Editing, at its best, is like being a midwife—helping to bring the expression of an idea or an emotion into the world but not confusing it for one’s own achievement. In this case, the midwife felt that she was staring into the womb of space, witnessing the birth of the primordial dot.

This book was edited in Nova Scotia, the last place that the Dorje Dradül called home. Most of the work on the book was done in retreat in a little house grandly named Trident Mountain House on Tatamagouche Mountain in the autumn of 1997 and the spring of 1998. During one of his early visits to Nova Scotia, the Dorje Dradül passed through the town of Tatamagouche and stopped for a meal at the Balmoral Inn. After lunch, all of us in his party went for a walk in a field behind the restaurant that slopes down through alders to the harbor. We were less than ten miles from the current site of the rural practice center, Dorje Denma Ling, which the Shambhala community established in 1990. It was very close to this location that I worked on the book, a pure coincidence that pleases me.

Chögyam Trungpa in a field behind the Balmoral Inn in Tatamagouche, Nova Scotia,
1979.

PHOTO BY JAMES GIMIAN.

I do not think that this book would have taken its present form anywhere else. Nova Scotia provided the air, the atmosphere, of simplicity and open space in which this book took shape. And now, some twelve years after his death, this place still echoes with the mind of the Dorje Dradül, projecting his uncomfortable, uncompromising, and vast sanity. If that quality is not apparent in this manuscript, then the failure is mine. Certainly, it pervades his teachings.

Acknowledgments and Dedication

There are many people to thank. Fifteen years ago, Robert Walker and Rachel Anderson prepared some of the original transcripts of talks used in this book. Thanks to both of them. Tingdzin Ötro transcribed many others during the winter of 1997 and checked the earlier transcriptions. Thank you, Ting. The staff of the Shambhala Archives provided copies of tapes and transcripts that were the basis for the book, gave me the long-term loan of audio equipment, and were supportive in many other ways. Thanks to James Hoagland, Donna Holm, Gordon Kidd, Judith Smith, and Alexis Shotwell for this. The publisher at Shambhala Publications, Samuel Bercholz, and my editor there, Emily Hilburn Sell, both provided motivation and feedback. I thank them as well for their ongoing commitment to publishing the teachings of Chögyam Trungpa. Thanks also to Hazel Bercholz at Shambhala Publications for the design of the book and Jonathan Green, Amy Allin, Jenn Martin, and Jennifer Pursley for helping in other ways. Particular thanks to John Rockwell, Scott Wellenbach, and Larry Mermelstein of the Nālandā Translation Committee for the translation of the author’s note cards and for providing Tibetan script of the poems that open and close the book. As well, a thank-you to the photographers who contributed illustrative material to the book; to Peter Volz, Eric Schneider, Eve Rosenthal, and Robin Kornman for help with several entries in the glossary; to Susan Cohan for excellent copyediting; to Helen Berliner for an inspired index; and to the many members of “sangha-announce” who helped in the Internet search for audiotapes and calligraphies.