Chapter 12Transference of Consciousness

Important note: The practice of transference of consciousness (phowa) is a Vajrayana method that absolutely requires proper empowerment, oral transmission, and personal instruction from a qualified teacher. The descriptions that follow are offered for study and understanding only. One should never attempt this practice without having received the complete transmission from an authentic lineage holder. To do so would not only be ineffective but could be genuinely harmful.

There is a verse of homage that captures the spirit of this entire teaching: the teacher's compassion reaches out to even the most confused of beings, embraces those who have committed terrible wrongs as worthy disciples, and employs the most skilful means with those who are hardest to tame. It is at the feet of such a peerless guide that we begin.

Among all the extraordinary methods the Buddha taught for the moment of death, transference of consciousness -- known in Tibetan as phowa -- holds a uniquely cherished place. It is sometimes called "the teaching that brings Buddhahood without meditation," because when practised correctly, it offers a direct route to liberation at the very threshold between this life and whatever follows. Even those who have accumulated the heaviest burdens of harmful action can, through these instructions, close the door to the lower realms and arrive safely in a pure land. The great master Padmasambhava himself declared that while everyone knows about awakening through meditation, he knew a path that requires no meditation at all.

Yet this path is not casual or simple. It rests on faith, devotion, proper transmission, and diligent training. Let us explore it step by step.

The Five Kinds of Transference

The teachings describe five distinct levels of transference, ranging from the most sublime to those accessible to ordinary practitioners.

The first and highest is the transference of consciousness into the dharmakaya through the seal of the view. Practitioners who have spent their lives cultivating genuine familiarity with the natural, unfabricated state of awareness can, at the very moment of death, bring together the essential points of space and awareness on the secret path of primordial purity. Their consciousness merges directly into the vast expanse of the dharmakaya itself. This is awakening without passing through any intermediate state at all. For such rare beings, death is not an ending but a homecoming.

The second, or middling level, is the transference into the sambhogakaya through the inseparable union of the generation and perfection phases of practice. Those who have trained deeply in seeing the deity's form as nothing more than a magical display -- vivid yet empty -- can navigate the visionary experiences that arise at death with complete mastery. When the hallucinatory appearances of the intermediate state unfold, they transfer their consciousness into the union wisdom body, the luminous dimension of the sambhogakaya.

The third, or lower level, is the transference into the nirmanakaya through immeasurable compassion. Practitioners who hold faultless samaya, who have received the ripening empowerments of the Secret Mantra vehicle, and who have a natural affinity for the generation and perfection phases can, at the crucial moment, block any undesirable rebirth. Driven by boundless compassion and the aspiration to serve beings, they consciously direct their rebirth as a nirmanakaya emanation in one of the pure lands. This is a moment that demands fierce determination and utter purity of vision.

The fourth is what is called ordinary transference using three metaphors. Here the practitioner imagines the central channel as the route, the essence of mind-consciousness as the traveller, and a pure land of great bliss as the destination. This is the form of phowa most widely taught and practised, and the one that will be explored in detail below.

The fifth is the transference performed for the dead through the hook of compassion. This practice can be done either for someone on the verge of dying or for a being already in the intermediate state. It requires a practitioner of highly developed realization -- someone with genuine mastery over their own mind and the ability to locate and influence the consciousness of a being who has already left the body. As the great Jetsun Milarepa cautioned, one should not attempt transference for the dead until one has genuinely perceived the truth of the path of seeing.

A Warning About Practising for the Dead

Patrul Rinpoche speaks with characteristic frankness here. Many people in his day -- and no doubt in ours -- who carry the title of lama or tulku in name only perform transference rituals for the deceased. If they do so with the authentic love and compassion of bodhichitta, with absolutely no selfish motive, there is every possibility they can genuinely help. It is bodhichitta alone that makes such help possible.

But anyone who merely recites the words for personal profit, collecting a horse or some other valuable as payment, is, as Patrul Rinpoche says bluntly, truly despicable. It is like offering your hand to a drowning person while you yourself are being swept away by the flood.

He tells a striking story about the great master Tendzin Chapel. While on pilgrimage in Tsari, Tendzin Chapel had a vision of someone for whom he had once performed transference -- and for whom he had accepted a horse as payment. All he could see was the person's head, protruding from a lake of crimson blood, calling him by name and pleading for help. Shaken, Tendzin Chapel offered the merit of his pilgrimage to the apparition, and the vision dissolved.

There is another story about the incarnate abbot of Dzogchen Monastery, Gyurme Thekchok Tendzin. When this master passed away, a teacher named Trime Shingkyong Gonpo was invited for the funeral ceremonies. But instead of performing a brief, dignified ritual as everyone expected, he spent an entire day doing purification rites and repeating the transference over and over, as though for an ordinary person. The monks were baffled and asked why. He explained that long ago, Dzogchen Rinpoche had accepted a black horse on behalf of a deceased person -- a great wrongdoer -- without properly completing the necessary rites and dedications. Because of this, certain obscurations had subtly clouded Rinpoche's path. Now the two teachers had combined their efforts to resolve the matter.

The message is unmistakable: even for great masters, accepting offerings on behalf of the dead without fulfilling the corresponding spiritual responsibility creates real obstacles. How much more carefully, then, should ordinary practitioners tread.

Ordinary Transference Using Three Metaphors

For those of us who have not yet reached the heights of realization described above, the ordinary transference practice is an extraordinary gift. It is sometimes also called "the transference of consciousness into the teacher," and it corresponds to what certain tantras describe as transferring the ball of light using sound at the moment of death.

For those who have already captured the stronghold of the absolute truth during their lifetime, death holds no terror. As the tantras express it, what we call death is merely a concept -- for a realized yogi, it is simply a small enlightenment, no different from moving from one room to another.

But for practitioners who have not yet attained stability on the path -- and especially for those burdened by harmful actions -- this technique is essential. The tantric scriptures make an extraordinary promise: even one who has committed crimes of immediate retribution will not be reborn in the lower realms if they hold and practise these instructions. The great scholar Naropa taught that there are nine openings in the body that lead to continued wandering in samsara, but one opening -- at the crown of the head -- leads to liberation. Close the nine, open the one, and do not doubt that liberation will follow.

And Marpa the Translator, that fierce and tender master, said with the confidence born of long practice: he had trained and trained again, and even if he were to die an ordinary death, he had no cause for worry. Familiarity had given him perfect confidence.

Training for Transference

The instructions come in two parts: first the training, and then the actual practice at the time of death.

Using the instructions you have received from your teacher, you must train diligently and repeatedly until the signs of success appear. Patrul Rinpoche offers a beautiful analogy. Right now, while all your body's channels, energies, and essences are intact and vigorous, actually performing the transference is quite difficult. But when your final hour arrives -- or in the frailty of extreme old age -- it becomes much easier. It is like fruit on a tree: hard to pluck in summer while still growing, but once ripe and ready to fall in autumn, the slightest brush of your clothing against it will send it tumbling from the branch.

This is why we train now -- so that when the moment comes, the practice is as natural as breathing.

The Actual Practice at the Time of Death

The time to put transference into real effect is after the signs of approaching death have appeared, when you are certain there is no turning back and the process of dissolution has already begun. The tantras are very specific: perform the transference only when the right time comes. To do it prematurely would be to destroy the sacred mandala of the body -- in the language of the Vajrayana, to "kill the deities."

The process of dying unfolds through recognisable stages. As the five sense faculties dissolve, sounds become a confused murmur, forms blur, and the experiences of smell, taste, and touch fade away. Then the four elements dissolve in sequence. As the element of flesh dissolves into earth, there is a sensation of heaviness, as if being crushed beneath a mountain. As blood dissolves into the water element, the mouth and nose begin to run. As the body's heat dissolves into the fire element, warmth leaves the extremities. And as the breath dissolves into the air element, all the body's energies collapse into the life-supporting energy, breathing becomes laboured, and finally, with three long sighs, the outer breath stops.

What follows is even more subtle. A white luminosity descends from the crown of the head, and a red luminosity rises from below the navel. When the two meet at the heart, consciousness briefly swoons into utter darkness. Then, emerging from that swoon, there appears an experience like a perfectly clear sky -- the clear light of the ground nature. To recognise this luminosity as your own nature and rest within it is itself the supreme transference to the dharmakaya.

For those without adequate experience of the path, the best moment to apply the transference practice is at the very beginning of the dissolution process. At that time, Patrul Rinpoche urges, cut completely through all attachment to this life. Give yourself courage with the thought: "Now that I am dying, I will rely on the instructions of my teacher and fly to the pure lands like an arrow shot by a giant. What a joy this is!"

If you have a trusted companion who can remind you of the visualisation and the key points, ask them to do so. But in any case, the moment has come when you must draw on everything your training has given you.

The Steps of the Meditation

The practice begins by sitting comfortably with the spine straight, then completing all the preliminaries in full, beginning with Calling the Teacher from Afar and continuing through the dissolution in the Guru Yoga.

For the main visualisation, you arise instantly as Vajra Yogini -- red, with one face and two arms, standing with her right foot slightly raised. Her three eyes gaze upward toward the sky. She holds a small skull-drum in her right hand, which awakens beings from the sleep of confusion, and a curved knife in her left, which severs the three poisons at the root. She appears vividly yet has no solid substance, like a tent of red silk.

Within this form, running down the centre of the body, is the central channel -- like a pillar in an empty house. It is blue like indigo, fine as a lotus petal, bright as a sesame-oil lamp flame, and straight as a segment of bamboo. Its upper end opens through the aperture of Brahma at the crown of the head, like an open skylight -- the gateway to liberation. Its lower end is sealed four finger-widths below the navel, closing all access to lower rebirths.

At the heart level within the central channel, resting on a swelling like a knot in bamboo, is a vibrant light-green bindu of energy. Just above it sits the red syllable HRIH -- the very essence of your mind-awareness -- fluttering and vibrating like a flag in the wind.

Above the crown of your head, upon a jewelled throne held up by eight great peacocks, atop a lotus with sun and moon discs, sits your root teacher in the form of Buddha Amitabha. He is brilliantly red, like a mountain of rubies embraced by a thousand suns. His hands rest in the gesture of meditation, holding a begging bowl filled with the wisdom nectar of immortality. To his right stands the white Avalokiteshvara, embodiment of all the Buddhas' compassion, with one face and four arms. To his left stands the blue Vajrapani, embodiment of all the Buddhas' power. Around these three, the entire lineage of transference teachers is gathered like clouds in a clear sky, gazing upon you with love.

With total faith, tears streaming from your eyes, you recite the prayer to Amitabha. Then comes the crucial technique of ejection. As you recite the syllable HRIH, the red syllable of mind-awareness is lifted upward by the vibrant green bindu, rising higher and higher through the central channel. As it emerges from the crown aperture, you call out "HIK!" and visualise it shooting upward like an arrow and dissolving into Amitabha's heart. You repeat this process -- seven, twenty-one, or more times -- each time visualising the HRIH returning to the heart and being ejected again.

When the session is complete, you seal the practice by reciting "PHET!" five times, resting briefly in the natural state. The lineage teachers dissolve into the three main figures, who dissolve into Amitabha, who dissolves into light and then into you. You then arise as Buddha Amitayus -- red, holding the vase of immortal life -- and recite the long-life mantra and dharani. This prevents the practice from shortening your lifespan and clears any obstacles. This longevity portion is not needed when performing the transference for someone who is actually dying or already dead, nor at the moment of your own actual death.

Signs of Success

The signs that the training has taken effect are described with refreshing concreteness. Your head aches at the crown. A drop of serum appears there, glistening like dew. And a thin grass stalk can be gently inserted into the opening at the crown of the head. You should practise with dedication until these signs arise.

Patrul Rinpoche assures us that unlike other practices of the generation and perfection phases, which may require years of training, signs of success in transference will come within a single week of diligent effort. This is precisely why it is called the teaching that brings Buddhahood without meditation, and why every practitioner should take this extraordinary shortcut as their daily practice.

He closes with characteristic self-deprecating humour and honesty, acknowledging his own limitations -- muttering incoherently over the dead, spreading the canopy of interminable teachings without practising them himself -- and praying that he and all others like him may find the strength to practise with genuine perseverance.