Spontaneous Becoming – The Nine Spaces of Being

‘Birth and death are the mothers of experience.’ This statement has great relevance, not only to those involved with the care of the dying, and to those giving birth; but also to anyone experiencing life-changes – whether joyous, painful or confusing. The Aro gTér teaching of the Nine Bardos explores discontinuous experiences such as birth and death, waking and sleep, meditation and action, remembering and experiencing. The Lamas introduce thamal-gyi shépa—instantaneous recognition—as the means by which we abandon the illusions of our own continuity and discontinuity through time. Thamal-gyi shépa explodes us into the dimension of who we are. Then we discover – that this is precisely where we have always been.

“Thamal-gyi shépa is the extraordinary dimension of the ordinary instant which is discovered through practising the bardo of the changing moment. The nature of time is transcended in the indivisibility of continuity and discontinuity. They are the creative play of existence, which move within the womb of Space. Death happens. It is not a terrible juncture. It simply happens. Birth simply happens. Birth and death take place magically within every moment. When one discovers birth and death within every moment, it is no longer possible to live a pallid half-hearted life, haunted by morbid fears of visceral recycling.”

Ngak’chang Rinpoche

Recommended reading: Crazy Wisdom; Transcending Madness