Dzong-ka-ba and H.H. Dalai Lama.(2005). Yoga Tantra: Paths to Magical Feats.Jeffrey Hopkins (Trans. and Ed.). www.snowlionpub.com

Calm Abiding:

"Calm abiding is predominantly stabilizing meditation, in which the mind is kept on a single object, rather than analytical meditation, in which a topic such as impermanence or emptiness is analyzed with reasoning.

The purpose of developing calm abiding is that, since a mind that is scattered to external objects is relatively powerless, the mind needs to be concentrated in order to become powerful.

If you do not have concentration in which the mind is unfluctuatingly stable and clear, the faculty of wisdom cannot know its object, just as it is, in all its subtleties. Therefore, it is necessary to have a highly focused mind.

...In order to set the mind steadily on an object of observation, it is necessary initially to use an object of observation suited to counteracting your own predominant afflictive emotion, since its force remains with your mind now and can easily interrupt any attempt to concentrate the mind.

Therefore, Buddha described many types of objects for purifying behavior:

• For someone whose predominant afflictive emotion is desire,ugliness is a helpful object of meditation. Here, "ugliness" does not necessarily refer to distorted forms; the very nature of our body--composed of blood, flesh, bone, and so forth--might seem superficially to be very beautiful with a good color, solid and yet soft to touch, but when it is investigated, you see that its essence is quite different--substances like bone, blood, urine, feces, and so forth.
• For someone who has predominantly engaged in hatred,the object of meditation is love.
• For someone who was predominantly sunk in obscuration, the meditation is on the twelve links of the dependent-arising of cyclic existence because contemplating its complexity promotes intelligence.
• For someone whose predominant afflictive emotion is pride, the meditation could be on the divisions of the constituents because, when meditating on the many divisions, you get to the point where you realize that there are many things you do not know, thereby lessening an inflated sense of yourself.
• Those dominated by conceptualitycan observe the exhalation and inhalation of the breath because, by tying the mind to the breath, discursiveness diminishes.

  A particularly helpful object for all personality types is a Buddha body,since concentration on a Buddha's body causes your mind to mix with virtuous qualities. No matter what the object is, this is not a case of meditating within, looking at an external object with your eyes, but of causing an image of it to appear to the mental consciousness."

Generally speaking, there are Two forms of meditation on emptiness.

• One is the space-like meditation on emptiness, which is characterized by the total absence or negation of inherent existence.
• The other is called the illusion-like meditation on emptiness.

The space-like meditation must come first, because without the realization of the total absence of inherent existence, the illusion-like perception or understanding will not occur.

For the illusion-like understanding of all phenomena to occur, there needs to be a composite of both the perception or appearance and the negation, so that when we perceive the world and engage with it we can view all things and events as resembling illusions.

We will recognize that although things appear to us, they are devoid of objective, independent, intrinsic existence. This is how the illusion-like understanding arises.

The author of the "Eight Verses for Training the Mind" indicates the experiential result when he writes: "May I, recognizing all things as illusion, devoid of clinging, be released from bondage."

When we speak of cultivating the illusion-like understanding of the nature of reality, we need to bear in mind the different interpretations of the term 'illusion-like'....

For example, the Buddhist realist schools explain the nature of reality to be illusion-like in the sense that, although we tend to perceive things as having permanence, in reality they are changing moment by moment and it is this that gives them an illusion-like character.

~~ HH Dalai Lama. (2005). Lighting the Way. Geshe Thupten Jinpa (Trans.)

H.H. Tenzin Gyatso. (2006, rev. and updated, 25th anniv. ed.).Kindness, Clarity, and Insight 25th Anniversary Edition.Jeffrey Hopkins (Trans. and Ed.), Elizabeth Napper (Ed.). www.snowlionpub.com:

"...particularly in Buddhism while we practice we must use the brain as well as the heart. On the ethical side, we must practice the quality of a good and warm heart; also, since Buddhism is very much involved in reasoning and logic--the wisdom side--intelligence is important.

Thus, a combination of mind and heart is needed. Without knowledge, without fully utilized intelligence, you cannot reach the depths of the Buddhist doctrine; it is difficult to achieve concrete or fully qualified wisdom. There may be exceptions, but this is the general rule.

It is necessary to have a combination of hearing, thinking, and meditating. The Kadampa teacher Dromton ('brom ston pa, 1004-1064) said,

"When I engage in hearing, I also make effort at thinking and meditating. When I engage in thinking, I also search out more hearing and engage in meditation. And when I meditate, I don't give up hearing and don't give up thinking."

He said, "I am a balanced Kadampa," meaning that he maintained a balance of hearing, thinking, and meditating."

"Meditation on [or cultivation of] the six deities is like faith or love meditation in that The mind is being generated into the entity of the object meditated.

• When faith or loveare meditated, those two are not the object observed but the entity into which the consciousness is being generated.
• Meditation onimpermanence or emptiness, on the other hand, means to take these as the object and meditate on them.

Thus, there are two types of meditation--of a subjective aspect and on an objective aspect.

Meditation on the six deities is the former, for first one generates a wisdom consciousness knowing the sameness in suchness of oneself and the deity--the ultimate--and then causes it to appear as the sounds, letters, and finally the form of the deity."

~~ Tsong-ka-pa and H.H. Dalai Lama. (1987). Deity Yoga in Action and Performance Tantra.. Jeffrey Hopkins (Ed.). www.snowlionpub.com

"For those of you who are not able to devote all your time to meditation, there is nevertheless the possibility of engaging in practice in a serious way.

For example, the students at the monastic universities in South India can, with some effort, do meditations during the prayers.

When you recite the prayers, you can mentally do the contemplation. The lifestyle and daily routine at these monasteries have been structured by the great masters of the past in a way that is most conducive to individual practice as well as to the flourishing of the dharma.

If you find that your mind is in a very fluctuating emotional state--displaying anger, hatred, attachment and so forth--then you should first try to calm downthat state of strong emotion.

This should be done by first transforming it into a neutral state of mind, because there is no way that one can switch directly from a negative state of mind to a positive one.

Therefore , you should first reduce the force of these emotions and fluctuations and try to bring about some sort of calmness, using any means--such as taking a strollor concentrating on the inhalation and exhalation of the breath--that will enable you to forget what you are immediately feeling.

This will help you to reduce the forceof strong emotion, thereby giving you the calmness necessary for the practice of dharma. Like a white piece of cloth which could be dyed any color that you desire, such aneutral state of mindcould then be transformed into a virtuous state of mind.

You could also engage in the preliminary practices of performing 100,000 prostrations, recitations of the Vajrasattva mantra, and so forth.

When you undertake these practices, you should do them properly, not being only concerned about the number.

Many great masters of the past of all traditions have emphasized the importance of these preliminary practices--they will enable you to have a very firm start.

If through them you can acquire a fertile mind, then when the seed of meditation is planted, it will readily bear the fruits of realizations.

Having successfully neutralized the emotional fluctuationswithin your mind and having restored a reasonable degree of calmness, engage in the practice of taking refuge and generating the altruistic aspiration to attain full enlightenment.

Taking refuge in the Three Jewels is the factor that distinguishes one's practice from that of an erroneous path, and the generation of the altruistic mind makes it superior to the paths aiming at individual liberation.