Tag: death and dying

8 – Death & Dying: Helping a Loved One

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On 2023-03-02

In Blog, Guidance & Inspiration

A straight-forward series of posts on the delicate topic of Death and Dying

Over the last several posts, I’ve shared what I have understood of my recent exposure to the Tibetan Bardos teachings. Today, I present some of the ways we can support those we love who are in transition or who have already passed.

I hope that you understand that we do not need to be experts on these teachings to benefit from them ourselves or to help our loved ones benefit. We just have to have an open mind and of course, be able to recall what we’ve learned at the time it is needed. I came across an article before writing this and I share it here because it speaks more about the importance of our own state of mind in being with those in transition.

When with someone who is transitioning, be affectionate, keeping the person calm and warm. It is most important to control your own emotions around them as these can create strong attachments or fear. Also, it is best to limit distractions (television, lively conversation, all but gentle, lyric-free music) so that they can focus on the work at hand…dying.

We can be of most help to others by pleasing them: honoring their wishes, remaining positive in spirit, surrounding them with cherished memories, and offering our forgiveness and compassion. In so doing, we open them to receiving any guidance we have to share through what we ourselves have learned through the teachings, not as some dogma of which they must be convinced but as an interesting possibility, making it possible for them to be aware and watchful for the experience of it.

This is work that can be done while our loved ones are still with us or even after their passing. It’s never too late. In fact, certain prayers or rituals should only be said and done after physical death and not before.

There are many different kinds of rituals that can be done, at different timings (for example a ritual every seven days starting from day after the 3rd day of outer death), some that address specific Bardo issues and others that are more general. I won’t go into them in any detail here, but I list them as a means to enable one’s further research:

Bardo Rituals

Pacification of Wrathful Energies
Summoning Consciousness
Help for Wandering (Lost) Beings
Help to Move Up the Realms (from hell realm, to hungry ghost, to animal to human…)
Butterlamp or Candle Offerings
Mantras
Food Offerings (burned)

The last two, mantras and food offerings, I performed on behalf of my brother after his passing many years ago. It felt so loving to prepare some of his favorite foods and send them to his spirit. I will never forget chanting one day with my sisters when a framed photo of him literally shot itself off the mantle and onto the floor. There was no explanation for this…no earthquakes or strong winds. Nothing around it shook. It was clearly intentional. I wasn’t sure if he was asking us to shut up already, but at least I knew he was listening.

While I may continue to write about the subject of death, this is my last post in regard to my training with Choekhortshang Rinpoche, whose name I can now pronounce. He can be followed on Facebook where you can find more about opportunities to learn from him.

I would also like to offer the following resources for further study:

Tibetan Book of the Dead
Tibetan Buddhist Encyclopedia

May this series be of benefit to all sentient beings who find it, helping us all realize True Nature. And certainly, may it help you prepare for the inevitability of your own encounter with death.

Namaste!

 

About the Author:

Beth Ciesco is your Selfcare Specialist, a certified yoga teacher and meditation facilitator. Check out the rest of the website to learn more about Restorative Healing Yoga, Mirror Meditation, E-Motion Alchemy, and Voicework as capital S Selfcare tools. You can also follow her on these sites:

❤ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/divinemetime/
❤ Insight Timer: https://insighttimer.com/tranquilliving
❤ Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@DivineMeTime

7 – On Death: Two More Chances

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On 2023-02-23

In Blog, Guidance & Inspiration

A straight-forward series of posts on Death and Dying

Last time, I wrote about the most auspicious opportunity to awaken that comes to us in the Emptiness Bardo. The last two means by which one can awaken along the Bardo journey I now present to you here. Though my wish for all sentient beings is that we can take full advantage of Dharmakaya and remain forever free of cyclical existence, it is perhaps in our best interests to keep the following information tucked somewhere in our consciousness, just in case!

2nd Choice State: SAMBHOVAKAYA

In the Clarity (Rigpa) Bardo

In the Bardo of clarity, there is no familiarity. The first experience is the sound of emptiness followed by the light of clarity or rays of unity. If one recognizes even this is yet again just the mind, one can become realized. Any former physical form (or rather, the memory of it) dissolves into light. Those who fail to see the truth or who refuse to accept it might return as spirits to the world they knew. Others will establish a “life” in the Bardo.

3rd Choice State: NIRVANAKAYA

In the Sidpa Bardo (of Becoming)

If one remains heavily self-identified, there is still one last chance to be freed from the Bardo journey. If one can become aware that death has occurred, there is the realization that one must move on. One’s karma plays big part in whether or not this happens and what manifests. (This is, of course, true at every stage.) The forces of resonance and attraction will draw the being toward a new life…hopefully as another sentient being able to continue the path until full awakening can arise.

This state makes me think of the times when I have had to tell spirits that they are dead in order to be free of them in environments they were “haunting”. It always seemed to work. Perhaps they simply needed to be told this truth…they were dead and needed to move on. (Sometimes, even the living need this reminder!) At any rate, it is a simple enough thing to do and may be an act of compassion for those wandering the netherworlds rather than fearing them as hungry ghosts.

Next time, more practical tips on how to help our transitioning loved ones, perhaps the most relevant of the last 7 posts!

 

About the Author:

Beth Ciesco is your Selfcare Specialist, a certified yoga teacher and meditation facilitator. Check out the rest of the website to learn more about Restorative Healing Yoga, Mirror Meditation, E-Motion Alchemy, and Voicework as capital S Selfcare tools. You can also follow her on these sites:

❤ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/divinemetime/
❤ Insight Timer: https://insighttimer.com/tranquilliving
❤ Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@DivineMeTime

Inner Death and the Sands of Time

6 – On Death: Dharmakaya – Precious Seconds to Awaken

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On 2023-02-16

In Blog, Guidance & Inspiration

A straight-forward series of posts on Death and Dying

According to the Tibetan Bardo teachings, there are three opportunities for full enlightenment after one dies. Dharmakaya is the first and most precious of these, and is considered the ultimate or absolute body, beyond form, substance, concept and even the ideas of existence and nonexistence.

This is probably a topic which I am least qualified to write about and one which I intend to spend more time studying, but I’ll give it a go, as my intention here is two-fold, processing what I’ve learned through writing and writing in service to even one being who would benefit from an introduction to this wisdom.

Below is a brief summary describing Dharmakaya, comprised of three “seconds” (in quotes because the last second itself is comprised of three parts) and how one might recognize it during one’s own transition. I will just say, as much as this information is related in a linear fashion, my sense of it is that it doesn’t necessarily follow our understanding of time.

Dharmakaya - Seconds to AwakenTHE BARDO OF EMPTINESS

The First Precious Second:

This is considered the most fortuitous opportunity for self-realization, when all appearances fall away.

The eyes have rolled and the final breath has been taken. The senses have turned inward. The gross body has dissolved. The energetic body has dissolved as well revealing a subtlety that was always there between mind and body, now revealed. It is all that remains. The illusory world falls away and with it, all appearances.

At this point, one drop of father essence or male bodhisattva seed descends down from the crown into the heart. In that second will come a shining vision or perhaps a feeling akin to a column of smoke rising which pacifies all emotions of the angers, leaving a sense of pleasure in its wake. If one is aware, one can abide in that purity.

The Second Precious Second to Awaken:

Here, one drop of essence of mother or female bodhisattva seed ascends up from the root into the heart. In this moment, there is a flame of a butter lamp burning and a redness that colors everything like a red dream. All afflictions of desire and attachment are pacified, giving a blissful feeling and revealing naked mind. If one is aware of this, one can awaken.

The Third Precious Second (comprised of three) to Awaken:

This final second for enlightenment in this most blessed juncture for awakening is actually followed with two more opportunities at other stages of the Bardo journey, is comprised of three seconds marked as a black, radiant near-attainment of mind. Three drops come from the heart itself back into the heart. All goes dark. It is said to be an experience like a sky full of stars. All ignorance emotions are pacified. Pure mind abides. If you see it, your very own dharmakaya, and if you can stay there, you will be realized.

I should mention that if the being fails to self-realize, then there may follow total unconsciousness and all activity ceases. Decaying back in the physical world starts. Perhaps this explains why certain realized masters or even Christian saints have remained composed and fresh long after death; they realized Dharmakaya. It is so beautiful when wisdom transcends mere religious belief.

But, in case you haven’t already noticed, things tend to happen in threes. So, there are actually two more kayas, Sambhogakaya and Nirvanakaya, in which one can awaken. I’ll talk about those next time.

 

About the Author:

Beth Ciesco is your Selfcare Specialist, a certified yoga teacher and meditation facilitator. Check out the rest of the website to learn more about Restorative Healing Yoga, Mirror Meditation, E-Motion Alchemy, and Voicework as capital S Selfcare tools. You can also follow her on these sites:

❤ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/divinemetime/
❤ Insight Timer: https://insighttimer.com/tranquilliving
❤ Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@DivineMeTime

Inner Death and the Sands of Time

5 – On Death: Inner Death

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On 2023-02-09

In Blog, Guidance & Inspiration

A straight-forward series of posts on the delicate topic of Death and Dying

Last time, I posted about death as we tend to think of it — a gross physical process. Today, we’ll encounter two additional stages that appear in the Tibetan Bardo teachings.

These next two stages of death are perhaps a little harder for the typical Western mind to grasp. After all, for the majority, if you can’t see it or prove it scientifically, it doesn’t exist, right? (And these days, even if you can see it, that doesn’t mean it’s worthy of belief!) But the Tibetans understand that there is an internal death that must take place; in other words, the energy that is identified with being a person must dissolve. This is what happens at the subtle stage of Inner Death.

INNER DEATH

Practicing yogis, energy workers, healers and the like will have a much easier time understanding the Inner Death during which the 5 pranas or subtle winds (prana, apana, samana, udana, vyana) and 5 chakras or wheels of energy (as opposed to the 7 of other systems) and their elements collapse down. In other words, the energy channels of the body must also die, not just the gross physical manifestation.

The result of this is collapse is a highly concentrated mind…all that remains of the person we knew. There wouldn’t necessarily be any obvious signs of the Inner Death taking place but the one experiencing it can know it by its visions and lights, that is if that person knew to look out for them. (And now you do!) It’s a mind/body experience without the body…so very like dreaming. It bears similarities to the “light at the end of the tunnel”, which in itself is a pretty fascinating phenomena commonly reported in near-death experiences, giving the Western concepts something in common with Eastern ones.

Different elements are said to give off different lights as they dissolve:

Earth – may see yellow light
Water – may see blue
Fire – may see what appear to be fireflies
Air – lightening visions, red and green (marked by a feeling of tension and grasping)
Space – complete darkness

Unfortunately, at this stage, there is a danger of the mind becoming unconscious, making it impossible to continue one’s journey with awareness.

SECRET DEATH

Finally there is the Secret Death. Secret, to remind you, just means ‘hidden’ from anyone not ready/able to receive them. Here consciousness leaves the body, and though it was not specifically stated, I took this to mean that it returns to the greater mind, the Absolute. This is the real and final death and perhaps the most mysterious of the three because of its hidden nature.

But of course, as any Tibetan will tell you, that isn’t the end! Causes and conditions can lead to other lifetimes or even Buddhahood. In fact, it is said that the best opportunity to become enlightened upon death happens between the Inner and Secret Death stages. One’s lifelong spiritual practices, if they had any, would become most valuable here. I’ll write more about this opportunity in my next post.

PS:
A brief mention for the zombie fans out there. If a dead person refuses to leave their body, this can result in the arising of the zombie state. Pulling the hair at the crown, pulling the ears, or shouting in a body’s ear can help nudge the spirit out and guide it to liberation. The question remains, are zombies something we need to fear while we live or after we die and find ourselves traversing the Bardos? Hmm…

 

About the Author:

Beth Ciesco is your Selfcare Specialist, a certified yoga teacher and meditation facilitator. Check out the rest of the website to learn more about Restorative Healing Yoga, Mirror Meditation, E-Motion Alchemy, and Voicework as capital S Selfcare tools. You can also follow her on these sites:

❤ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/divinemetime/
❤ Insight Timer: https://insighttimer.com/tranquilliving
❤ Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@DivineMeTime

4 – On Death: Outer Death

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On 2023-02-02

In Blog, Guidance & Inspiration

A straight-forward series of posts on the delicate topic of Death and Dying

Over the next couple of posts, I’ll be going over what I understand to be the three types of death—outer, inner and secret— as reported in the Tibetan Bardo teachings, and more specifically today, the outer death.

Outer death is the death of the physical form and the way Westerners typically think about death. Our loved one stops breathing. The heart stops. That’s it. Dead, however much we wish they weren’t. However, according to Tibetan traditions, this signifies only one level of the total dying process. Furthermore, there a aspects to this outer death which are only acknowledged in the Tibetan system.

The outer death is a reversal of the creation process I wrote about HERE. So, starting with the element of earth, there is a dissolution of the physical form moving through each of the elements exemplified in the following ways:

Earth

  • senses and their cognition get weaker and as earth element decreases
  • the body shrinks
  • feelings of heaviness
  • loss of touch
  • spleen energy dissipates

Water

  • body dissolves back to semen and blood (back to water)
  • kidney/bladder energy dissipates
  • lips dry
  • thirst
  • elimination slows
  • hearing loss

Fire

  • liver/bile energy dissipates
  • person gets cold
  • loss of taste
  • mumbling
  • other organs as containers fail

Air

  • lung energy dissipates
  • sense of smell goes
  • breath weakens
  • intestinal control goes

Space

  • heart energy dissolves
  • the power of manifestation/creation leaves

Unless we are in the caring professions and work directly with the dying, we don’t often notice or think about these aspects of dying. Certainly looking at this transitional process through the lens of the elements offers us a deeper understanding (and hopfully allowing of and trusting in) the experience.

It is then that we move onto the more mysterious and subtle inner death, and I’ll describe that process in my next post.

I would like to again mention in thanks that I was the beneficiary of this knowledge as shared by Choekhortshang Rinpoche. If you are fascinated and would like to delve deeper into the Bardo teachings, there will be future opportunities to do so. The description above, indeed this series of posts, is not by any means complete and simply meant to provide a tantalizing introduction to this important wisdom.

May those who would most benefit from reading this, find it. And may the act of writing it be of merit to all beings.

 

About the Author:

Beth Ciesco is your Selfcare Specialist, a certified yoga teacher and meditation facilitator. Check out the rest of the website to learn more about Restorative Healing Yoga, Mirror Meditation, E-Motion Alchemy, and Voicework as capital S Selfcare tools. You can also follow her on these sites:

❤ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/divinemetime/
❤ Insight Timer: https://insighttimer.com/tranquilliving
❤ Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@DivineMeTime

2 – On Death: When You’re Dead, You’re Dead (or Are You?)

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On 2023-01-20

In Blog, Guidance & Inspiration

A straight-forward series of posts on the delicate topic of Death and Dying

Welcome to another installment on Death & Dying. In this post, we begin our dive into the Tibetan Bardo teachings.

Most would assume that once you die, you’re dead. The Tibetan, however, have a different perspective. They believe first of all that there are, if you will, levels or stages of death:

  1. outer death (that which we typically conceive of as death when the last breath is taken)
  2. inner death (the dissolution of the subtle, energetic body)
  3. secret death, secret simply implying hidden but in so much as someone who isn’t ready won’t be able to understand (when individual consciousness becomes unconscious or transcends).

They also believe that it takes at the very minimum three days for this to occur, or to occur to such an extent that the deceased will be spared from any residual discomfort. In other words, we ought not to bury or cremate our loved ones for at least three days, lest we put them through some kind of torture. Bear in mind this torture is not the physical kind, obviously, but born of the stubborn tethering of the mind to the body and not realizing that one has passed…or in rare cases, not having completely died. In fact, there are instances of those who have been assumed dead, buried even, only to be discovered still alive a short time later to the shock of those doing the discovering!

When I heard that the ‘apparent’ dead might still suffer as if in their bodies, I was a little concerned about my father’s death years ago. When he died, everything happened very fast. He was cremated, if not the next day, then the one following. I remember how sweet our family experience at the funeral home was, full of joyful laughter that probably looked like a total loss of sanity to the funeral director. But Dad (and his sense of humor) was truly present with us as we chose his urn, all five of us pointing at the exact same time to the exact same one among a wall full of different styles. Since it hurts to think of him suffering from a too-quick cremation, I choose to believe he was already very much aware he was not his body and all too happy to have it over quickly. I am also reassured because he was ill for some time and was aware of the gravity of his situation.

Actually, despite this minimum of three days, it is believed that it takes 49 days or seven weeks to move through the entire after-death bardo journey. Therefore, our loved ones remain near during that time (and many of us feel and know they are always around even afterwards in different ways), feeling separated by an unsurpassable boundary, as they process their past, resolve feelings from their most recent life, and consider possible futures. This journey is marked by present confusions and obstacles and the visions that enter the mind that continues to exist after bodily death. The dead must overcome temptations, Bardo beings and illusions, and the various traps that would render them “stuck” in the Bardos, unable to transition to another life or to self-realization altogether.

Therefore, it is of great benefit during this 49 days to offer up prayers, rituals, happy memories, and any offerings to assist the loved one’s transit. I will write more about this perhaps at a future time.

Next time, I’ll go into a little more detail about how we come into and go out of existence according to the teachings. Until then…

 

About the Author:

Beth Ciesco is your Selfcare Specialist, a certified yoga teacher and meditation facilitator. Check out the rest of the website to learn more about Restorative Healing Yoga, Mirror Meditation, E-Motion Alchemy, and Voicework as capital S Selfcare tools. You can also follow her on these sites:

❤ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/divinemetime/
❤ Insight Timer: https://insighttimer.com/tranquilliving
❤ Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@DivineMeTime

1 – On Death – Are You Ready to Die?

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On 2023-01-17

In Blog, Guidance & Inspiration

A straight-forward series of posts on the delicate topic of Death and Dying

I know. I know. It’s everybody’s favorite topic to avoid. Forget the fact that we’re all dying the minute we’re born. Forget the fact that everyone we know now will be dead in, at best, 100 years. Forget the fact that life has been pushing death in our faces for the last two years (to say nothing of countries that have been facing it on a daily basis for much longer). It’s a disturbing taboo subject. And so naturally, I am enthralled!

In my last post, I began a conversation about death sharing some insights from philosopher Alan Watts as well as a recent dream I had. Over my next few blog posts, I will be sharing what I learned in 2022 having received the transmission of Tibetan Bardo teachings with Choekhortshang Rinpoche. Bardo, if you are unfamiliar with the term, literally means ‘journey between two lives’. It also refers to those opportunities for realization that come during/between the death stages outlined in these teachings.

In the West, we are most familiar with the tantric approach to the dying process or journey between two lives. What I received, however, was the Dzogchen approach. I was humored by Rinpoche’s explanation of the difference which says everything it needs to about Western culture. The tantric approach is like an action adventure movie, full of drama and complexity. The Dzogchen approach is pure simplicity. (That one! I’ll take that one.)

Death was also a confronted aspect in my Toltec studies in which a friendship with the Angel of Death reminds us that everything is on loan to her. Furthermore, a ritual writing of one’s Book of Death helps one along the journey of personal transformation, to confront what must die in order to be free. In that regard, the focus was more of the death that happens before death, the death of the identity and conditioning in which we had no choice. But it, of course, prepares one for the ultimate death, too.

But I see how the Bardo teachings can also apply to the egoic death before physical death as well. In fact, life is not ended in a single death. Life is full of millions of little deaths…of moments, of relationships, of circumstances. And our aversions, attachments, and ignorance (the three poisons according to Buddhist teachings) are what make us suffer each of those little unavoidable deaths. Naturally, when Selfcare is our concern, we are working to minimize our suffering, so this wisdom becomes a very helpful tool.

This is my 3rd exposure to these teachings, the first being a part of Ngondro, the foundational practices of Tibetan Bon Buddhism, the second being Chod, practices for overcoming fear. Each exposure deepens my insight a little more, but I’m obviously far from being any kind of expert. I’m just a student, mostly interested in finding ways to apply ancient teachings to my own modern life. But I’m happy to process my understanding here and share it with you.

So stay tuned…

 

About the Author:

Beth Ciesco is your Selfcare Specialist, a certified yoga teacher and meditation facilitator. Check out the rest of the website to learn more about Restorative Healing Yoga, Mirror Meditation, E-Motion Alchemy, and Voicework as capital S Selfcare tools. You can also follow her on these sites:

❤ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/divinemetime/
❤ Insight Timer: https://insighttimer.com/tranquilliving
❤ Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@DivineMeTime

Death is a Constant

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On 2023-01-17

In Blog, Guidance & Inspiration

Introducing a straight-forward series of posts on the delicate topic of
Death and Dying.

I doubt anyone on this globe hasn’t been thinking of their own mortality. If fears of some disease taking hold and killing you and your loved ones didn’t get you, then the life-abolishing threat of nuclear war may very well have. But the subject of death is often deemed unsuitable for discussion and we are left alone with our anxieties.

Since Selfcare, at least the capital S kind, deals with all aspects of life and requires a commitment to facing challenging topics, I thought I would share some of my own explorations on the topic of death. Over a series of posts, I hope to get us all thinking in ways that might reduce or eliminate altogether the anxieties surrounding the 100% eventual loss of everything we ever thought we owned, knew or loved, ultimately including our own life.

Death is a Constant

I was listening to a fabulous satsang, or teaching, by Alan Watts in which he said, “Death is constant”. He’s not exaggerating. We die in every moment to the one that follows. And we are, for our entire lifespan, mysteriously reborn into the next moment. Sometimes, these moments pass with some fanfare and other times, we barely notice a difference. But this is the truth of our physical existence. Death isn’t some end-of-life event. It is happening now, and now. and now.

At least for me, this perspective seems to make the ultimate death somehow less important. It’s just one more little loss in a life that is actually full of such losses.

Look at it this way…

Can you imagine a tree that every Fall started to freak out the dropping of its leaves? This sad little neurotic tree would be giving itself so much anguish over something it had zero control over. It would dread the winter and the thought of all its branches exposed for the world to see. It is no less absurd that we fight against or even try to deny what is a very natural, unavoidable part of life.

A Recent Dream

A few weeks ago, I had a powerful dream. I was outside under a tree on a park bench with my sister. On the table was a plastic cup of some kind full of liquid starting to bubble and fizz. I told my sister we needed to move or back up or something. It kept heating up and went through the container but then it wouldn’t stop. It wasn’t flowing like liquid. It was burning like heat.

The dream scene changed to my old room but the bubble and fizz was still there boring through what surrounded slowly. I realized we needed to move everything out of the room. It was a process of deciding what mattered and what didn’t. We carried stuff out, but that light kept boring, like a white hole. Back and forth with notebooks, stamps, postcards, clothes…

I had a realization of the depth of the situation. That boring wasn’t going to stop. It would take the entire room, then eat away at the next and so on. I was credulous. I thought, “this can’t be happening.” I walked up to a mirror and could see my reflection in it. I said, “Wake up. You’re dreaming.” I lifted my hands to clap, but they were all foggy. I repeated the chant three times trying to clap.

I felt my body drop like a ghostly sack; I felt a second of fear and then felt myself faint from outside my body. In an instant, my consciousness came back to my sleeping body as I woke up.

Waking from the Dream

Maybe that’s all death really is…simply waking up somewhere else. Or, as Alan Watts put it, “Death might be how we wake up from the dream called life.”

Death is not only a constant; it is a certainty. The better we are at dying to moments, the easier it will be to face that final one. Our souls will simply slip out of these containers and that ineffable something that we are will suddenly be elsewhere, the dead self never-the-wiser and the new self ever wiser.

 

About the Author:

Beth Ciesco is your Selfcare Specialist, a certified yoga teacher and meditation facilitator. Check out the rest of the website to learn more about Restorative Healing Yoga, Mirror Meditation, E-Motion Alchemy, and Voicework as capital S Selfcare tools. You can also follow her on these sites:

❤ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/divinemetime/
❤ Insight Timer: https://insighttimer.com/tranquilliving
❤ Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@DivineMeTime

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