A Short Lama Dawa Siddhi Story

“First, skillfully examine a guru.

In the middle skillfully rely upon a guru.

Last, skillfully emulate his realization and action.”

-Paltrul Rinpoche

Lama Dawa told this story to Rinchen during his last long visit when he stayed with us for three months in 2016. 

In it he shared that at some time at a later stage in his life it must have been in the 1990s, he fell gravely ill.  Afterwards he decided to do Troma practice outside in the wilderness and Khandro Kalsang accompanied him in order to serve him during the day, while he was practicing in solitary retreat in the night.  I don’t remember exactly where, and he may not have mentioned the location at all.  The location isn’t the main focus of the story anyways, the events that took place, are.

“I practiced usually throughout the night and had chosen a spot near a river.  There were many huge boulders between the river and the cliff in the back.  Most were unsuitable as practice support.  However, towards the back at the base of the cliff there was one almost perfectly flat large rock, which I chose as my seat.  I went there regularly.” 

“One night, it must have been the one before the new moon, as I was sitting fully absorbed in one pointed concentration.  It was pitch black.  I could not see a thing, not even my hands in front of my eyes.  But some time in the middle of the night, I had the sense that something had shifted.  The air felt different, there was more of a breeze, and I felt as if the twig of a dried out bush was slightly touching the back of my neck.  But I knew that where I sat there was no bush behind me.  I found this curious and was wondering what might have happened.  When I looked up in the morning, I saw some bush protruding nested just under the edge of the cliff, fairly high up, probably about 18 to twenty feet above ground.  But then, on the other hand, Troma practice has been known to play tricks on practitioners’ minds.”

“I returned the following night and resumed my practice, with the same one pointed focus.  Toward the middle of the night, the same thing happened.  I again felt the breeze and some twig slightly touching the back of my neck.  I decided to establish without room for doubt what was happening and untied one of the strings attached to my damaru.  This I attached to the twig that I my hands could reach.  Then I concentrated on practicing again, until daybreak.”

“When I looked up in the morning, I could clearly see the string from my damaru tied to a twig from the same bush that I had noticed the day before, meaning:  the rock on which I had been sitting all these nights had floated up about twenty feet, with me on top.  It was a good sign.”

Everyone who knew him remembers how humble Lama Dawa acted and behaved almost all of the time. He hardly ever flaunted his yogic achievements.  But Lama’s humility was never false or fake, a mask merely put on in order to appear the perfectly humble ‘guru’, always smiling and accommodating.  At times he could be and also act not so humble at all.  And when he did it was in order to illustrate the results of successful practice. When appropriate, he never shied away from displaying the vajra pride befitting his status of a fully accomplished tsalung and dzogchen master.

My guess is that he told the story to Rinchen in order to imprint in her mind the importance of gaining siddhi, that is worldly siddhi for people to see, or touch, or experience.  He himself had mastered each and every one of the 21 worldly siddhis mentioned in the Yeshe Tsogyal dakini practice cycle.  He always stressed how much he wanted all of his dharma friends (he didn’t much like and hardly used the word ‘student’) to accomplish at least one of these siddhis. 

This is our real work.  In the guru’s eyes that are still seeing us even though the lama’s body has dissolved, this is more important than many of the things we might deem important, ourselves.  The siddhis of the present generation of practitioners can instill confidence in practicing in the next generation of practitioners.  Intellectualizing and philosophizing and meditating nicely and peacefully, these overvalued qualities may not be enough.  They will not suffice to keep the teachings alive.