Tuesday, December 22, 2020

The Precepts of Tilopa



Tilopa was a Buddhist meditation master living in the earliest 11th Century.

He left behind pointers:

No Thought
No Analysis
No Reflection
No Cultivation
No Intention
Let it Settle Itself

This may look like an excuse for inaction. Especially in times which appear to cry out for action. 

If you are inclined to act, by all means, do what you're going to do. 

Looking into those precepts over the years I am beginning to so how they in fact represent real action. Powerful and effective.

Just to give you a heads up that, at the end of all that doing and going and getting, Tilopa will be standing there with his Precepts for going on.

But, maybe not without some purifying time in Purgatory. That is, if all that doing and going and getting does get you a ticket straight to hell. 

[My translation is copied from a note tacked on the restroom wall at a store in Boulder, Colorado in my travels 1n 1994.]