Training in shamatha provides an incremental experience of the mind as it is. This mind is distinct from the thoughts that arise or roll around in it or the emotions that come and go or the sensations that produce our sense of the physical and dimensional worlds. This mind is Awareness; it is continuous, bright, spacious, and pure.
It is this mind born of Awareness that continues after the body dies. That is worth knowing and worth contemplating. It is also valuable to call to mind throughout the day as Awareness-mind gets temporarily cluttered with the thoughts or tasks of the day, with something upsetting, or by fleeting joy and delight. Noticing the fluxuations of the content that passes through the mind, one also begins to notice the nature of mind as distinct from those contents. The nature is Awareness.
When in a meditation session practicing abiding in the spacious tranquility of luminous mind (shamatha), to call this thought to mind is very worthwhile. This recollection often re-collects the wandering mind to center. Then, as one abides, the truth of “this mind” continuing through the session, through the day, and through the afterlife states becomes obvious. The quality of the mind that is experienced in meditation is the mind-nature that will continue. As one’s practice deepens and the attributes of Awareness-mind become more refined and clear, transparent and expansive, one’s experience declares that “this mind” is what continues through life and death.
I have found this recollection powerful for its truth plus instrumental in stabilizing myself in the innate qualities of Awareness.
Reblogged this on Blue Dragon Journal and commented:
Our bodies are vehicles for our consciousness as we experience a “life”. Yes, consciousness continues beyond the death of the body.