imprisoned; while others suggested exile. After the meeting, the king met
Padmasambhava secretly and asked him which of the three punishments he
preferred. Padmasambhava replied, “I have no attachment to the kingdom, so I do
not fear banishment. There is neither birth nor death, so I can endure
impalement. I have broken the law of the kingdom, and I prefer exile. Please don’t
worry, father. We have a karmic relation, and we will meet later.”
Padmasambhava had no fear of horrible places infested with snakes, wild
beasts, demons, and so forth, or any place of unbearable heat. Because he was
fearless, he could be exiled without danger. Since birth and death are just labels,
and they have no substantial existence, he was not afraid of dying.
I’ll do whatever my father and mother prefer,” he said. “But I would like to go to
the cremation ground of Sosaling to practice tantra. I prefer to be exiled to a far-
away kingdom.”
The king told the assembly of ministers and people that he was going to expel
Padmasambhava to the charnel ground of Sosaling. And so it came about. While
he was there, he was accompanied by thousands of dakinis and performed great
benefit to many men, half-men, and spirits.
Where did Padmasambhava’s fearlessness of death and banishment come from?
It arose from nonattachment to whatever arose and from the realization that all
experience is like a drawing on water, a continuity of simultaneous self-arising
and self-release.
Those great meditators and yogins unable to sustain the actions of body, speech,
and mind as reflexively liberating nonreferential conduct are referred to by Patrul
Rinpoche in his The Three Incisive Precepts,
Knowing meditation but not release,
Isn’t that the divine trance of the gods?When we engage in rigorous meditation with fixation of mind, we will be released
from suffering for a while. But when we arise from that meditation, suffering will
again follow us like a shadow. This is the fault of not knowing the manner of
release.
Patrul Rinpoche says in his Collected Fragments,
In short, resting completely in whatever arises, there is no need of any
antidotal practice. Totally relaxed, gaze into whatever arises, and clear and
pure presence will occur naturally. There is no need to ask for confirmation
from outside because confirmation will arise confidently from within. This
inseparable view of meditation and conduct is called “The River Flow Training
of the Great Perfection.”