Lama Sonam

The Tibetan Practice of Chod, literally translated as "cutting", is a meditative practice, but not one done sitting quietly and comfortably on a cushion inside a shrine room. Instead, this meditation is purposely performed in frightening places, such as cemeteries and charnel grounds. Singing, dancing, and playing special bone instruments, the chod practitioner, or chopa, visualizes the dismemberment, cooking, and finally offering of one's own body as a banquet to an assembly of demons, spirits, and sentient beings. Phowa, transference of consciousness, is the simplest and most direct method to attain enlightenment. Through a combination of breath, mantra and visualization techniques applied at the time of death, the consciousness is ejected from the crest aperture, circumventing the Bardos and avoiding rebirth in the six realms of cyclic existence. From this gate one's consciousness can be transferred directly to the domain of Amitabha Buddha. Recorded in Cantonese.