The Great Secret of Mind

Domang Yangtang Rinpoche remained in his monastery even though he knew his
life was at risk, and he had the chance to escape to India. During the Cultural
Revolution, though free of the slightest fault, he took upon himself all the
hardships of the fighting and conflict. For twenty-three years, he was incarcerated
in Dardo Ranga prison. During that time, the government imprisoned the great
gurus, tulkus, khenpos, and most of the high-standing people under appalling
conditions, deceiving them with lies, such as telling them that they would educate
them in the Cultural Revolution, give them certain rights and different positions,
and quickly release them. Some timid and jealous Tibetan people criticized the
dharma and the gurus and pretended that they believed in the Cultural
Revolution, and some humiliated the lamas, saying how shameful they were,
while those with faith in the dharma, standing by, became extremely
disheartened. During that time, Yangtang Rinpoche remained unmoving, like a
great mountain in the face of snowstorms. He was victorious over all obstacles, and
no matter how much they tortured and abused him, he remembered his guru’s
command and took Dzogchen as his heart practice.
At that time, secretly, he relied on Sera Yangtrul Rinpoche as a teacher and
shared his experience and realization with him. Many signs of the qualities of
experience and realization appeared increasingly, and those signs became
legendary in that area.
Although Rinpoche has many mind treasures, from among the different texts he
composed in this lifetime, the text entitled Instructions on the Great Perfection: A
Brief Summary of View, Meditation, and Conduct has the power of inconceivable
blessings. It is commensurate with Patrul Rinpoche’s The Three Incisive Precepts,
the sole practice of one hundred scholars and a thousand siddhas.
Although I was born in this period when the five degenerations are rampant,
due to the blessings of having met with gurus such as Domang Yangtang Rinpoche,
those who are fully endowed with the wisdom of Dzogchen, I can count myself as
a being of great good fortune. I obtained the blessings of empowerment, oral
transmission, and instruction from this Rinpoche, and in addition he gave me
some profound advice and encouragement with regard to both dharma and
mundane affairs. In particular, it was he who said to me, “If you can write a book,
it will be highly beneficial to the young people of this age,” and it was mainly
because of that that I took on the work of composing this book.