Simply Being

Simply being is the state of the primordial buddha Samantabhadra / Kuntu Zangpo, the unchanging innate purity, the heart of everything.

Simply being is the ground, path and fruition of all existence. The teaching of this is known as dzogchen or the natural perfection of all experience.

This is not an abstract idea but is the vital presence which we embody and engage with as the world around us. Dzogchen teaching recalls us to the open nature of all things, the natural state we have never left, yet have somehow forgotten.

Meditation reveals the deconstruction of the disintegration (ignorance) which manifests as the separation of subject and object. As disintegration disintegrates, the given-ness of integration shines forth and the accumulations of tension, anxiety and assumptions which bind, knot and restrict us are released without effort.

The teachings of dzogchen have been present in our world for many thousands of years. They have been passed on in unbroken lineages which have survived in Tibet and have now spread out into the world following the Chinese invasion.

The purpose of this website is to offer the key points of dzogchen illustrated with many examples from everyday life. These presentations are mainly in the form of lightly edited transcripts of teachings given at retreats.

The teachings given here are by James Low, according to the transmissions he received from his root teacher C R Lama and from other Nyingmapa lamas.

It is hoped that the costs of setting up and maintaining the website will be met by contributions (dana) in the spirit that the greatest of gifts is the gift of the dharma.

If there is some merit in this work, may it help all beings awaken.
If there is no merit, may its emptiness protect all beings from disturbance.


Anyone who is interested is welcome to read these transcripts but in order to bathe in the living stream of the dzogchen lineages, it is important to make steps to gain transmission from a living teacher.

According to the tradition it is unhelpful to use the teachings for selfish purposes.

Much ado about nothing

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Latest news...


  • Thanks to Jo Féat for transcribing two new retreats.
    Eifel Autumn retreat 2005, a commentary on Garab Dorje's Three Points. Interesting & intriguing metaphors plus a final section on Anxiety. 105 pages! Bilbao Dzogchen retreat includes various 3 Aa practices and a unique Movement exercise.
    Date added: 20/08/2010
  • Buddhismus und Psychotherapie
    Stephan Schneider has translated into German this old favourite from a 1993 seminar in Berlin. Why, having been tortured in one situation, do we go back to the same place to be hurt again, in exactly the same way? I see this repetition a lot in the clinic
    Date added: 07/07/2010
  • Tajemna Bigrafia Maczik Labdron
    Joanna Janiszewska-Rain has translated another text into Polish for James. This time it is a chapter of a book, already on the website as The Secret Biography of Machig Labdron.
    Date added: 16/06/2010
  • Alternative Polish translation of Being Guru Rinpoche
    Magdalena and Witek Kaniewska-Matulewicz have also translated Being Guru Rinpoche into Polish and this version they make freely available here for people to download in PDF format.
    Date added: 24/05/2010

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