The Hungry Ghosts Realm
Then we have another realm of mind, that of the pretas or hungry ghosts and news junkies. To begin with, we get into the luminosity by working up non aggression this time but intense greed. There is a sense of poverty, yet at the same time a sense of richness, contradictory and yet operating together simultaneously.
In the hungry ghost realm there is a tremendous feeling of richness, of gather a lot of possessions; whatever you want you do not have to look for, but you find yourself possessing it. And this makes us more hungry, more deprived, because we get satisfaction not from possessing alone from searching. But now, since we have everything already, we cannot go out and look for something and possess it. It is very frustrating, a fundamental insatiable hunger.
It is though you are completely full, so full that you cannot eat any more; but you love to eat, and so you begin to have hallucinations of the flavor of food and the pleasure of eating it, tasting it, chewing it, and digesting it. The whole process seems luxurious, and you feel extremely envious of other people who can really be hungry and eat.
This is symbolized by the image of a person with a gigantic belly and extremely thin neck and tiny mouth. There are different stages of this experience, depending on the intensity of the hunger. Some people can pick food up, but then it dissolves and they cannot eat it; some people can pick it up and put it in their mouth, but they cannot swallow it, and some people can swallow it but once it's in their stomach it begins to burn. There are all sorts of levels of that hunger, which constantly happen in everyday life.
The joy of possessing does not bring us pleasure any more once we posses something, and we are constantly trying to look for more possessions, but it turns out to be the same process all over again; so there is constant intense hunger which is based not on a sense of poverty but on the realization that we already have everything yet we cannot enjoy it. It is the energy there, the act of change, that seems to be more exciting; collecting it, holding it, putting it on, or eating it. That kind of energy is a stimulus, but the grasping quality makes it very awkward. Once you hold something you want to possess, you no longer have the enjoyment of holding it, but you do not want to let go. Again, it is the love-hate relationships with projections. it is like the analogy that the next door neighbor's garden is green; once it becomes ours we realize there is no longer the joy or appreciation of beauty as we saw it at the beginning; the romantic quality of a love affair that begins to fade away.
Fremantle & Trungpa, The Tibetan Book of the DeadThen we have another realm of mind, that of the pretas or hungry ghosts and news junkies. To begin with, we get into the luminosity by working up non aggression this time but intense greed. There is a sense of poverty, yet at the same time a sense of richness, contradictory and yet operating together simultaneously.
In the hungry ghost realm there is a tremendous feeling of richness, of gather a lot of possessions; whatever you want you do not have to look for, but you find yourself possessing it. And this makes us more hungry, more deprived, because we get satisfaction not from possessing alone from searching. But now, since we have everything already, we cannot go out and look for something and possess it. It is very frustrating, a fundamental insatiable hunger.
It is though you are completely full, so full that you cannot eat any more; but you love to eat, and so you begin to have hallucinations of the flavor of food and the pleasure of eating it, tasting it, chewing it, and digesting it. The whole process seems luxurious, and you feel extremely envious of other people who can really be hungry and eat.
This is symbolized by the image of a person with a gigantic belly and extremely thin neck and tiny mouth. There are different stages of this experience, depending on the intensity of the hunger. Some people can pick food up, but then it dissolves and they cannot eat it; some people can pick it up and put it in their mouth, but they cannot swallow it, and some people can swallow it but once it's in their stomach it begins to burn. There are all sorts of levels of that hunger, which constantly happen in everyday life.
The joy of possessing does not bring us pleasure any more once we posses something, and we are constantly trying to look for more possessions, but it turns out to be the same process all over again; so there is constant intense hunger which is based not on a sense of poverty but on the realization that we already have everything yet we cannot enjoy it. It is the energy there, the act of change, that seems to be more exciting; collecting it, holding it, putting it on, or eating it. That kind of energy is a stimulus, but the grasping quality makes it very awkward. Once you hold something you want to possess, you no longer have the enjoyment of holding it, but you do not want to let go. Again, it is the love-hate relationships with projections. it is like the analogy that the next door neighbor's garden is green; once it becomes ours we realize there is no longer the joy or appreciation of beauty as we saw it at the beginning; the romantic quality of a love affair that begins to fade away.
