So much of our sense of struggle in life stems from the delusion that we live in a world of binaries: good and bad, happy and sad, clear and obscure. But what if we could view these oppositions, with all the tension they carry, as the keys to enlightenment? According to the mandala principle of tantric Buddhism, we can put dualities to use by seeing that they are not actually contradictions of each other. Instead, they are interrelated and reflect a single totality in which everything in the cosmos is included and nothing is left out. Through this all-encompassing quality of the mandala, we can discover how to transmute confusion into wisdom and struggle into liberation.

In this online course, esteemed Buddhist teacher and editor Judith Lief takes us on a journey through the mandala principle teachings of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche as presented in his Profound Treasury of the Ocean of Dharma. Using video recorded during a nine-day retreat, we’ll begin with a deep dive into shamatha-vipashyana meditation—the practice that builds our capacity for experiencing reality directly and completely. We’ll learn the basic tenets of the abhidharma teachings, which outline how our psychology keeps us trapped in dualistic mind. We’ll explore the five wisdom families: elemental qualities that describe everything from the seasons to our personalities. And we’ll discover the three interpenetrating layers of the mandala principle: the outer mandala and the nature of perception, the inner mandala and the experience of embodiment, and the secret mandala and the recognition of sacredness.