Once again, I arrive at a sticking point with the ngondro. I feel as if I should have done it twenty years ago, rather than now, when the form of my practices is dissolving. And this dissolving feels right. For many, many years I’ve been loyal to forms, to the letter of the law of my practices. Now I’m letting everything fall apart a bit. I’m letting all the rules unravel round the edges. I’m allowing things to breathe, expand, sigh, settle. I’m dispersing, feeling my way, letting the stones fall out differently. The ngondro feels like a starting practice. It feels like the boat that launches you. It feels like the daily dozen which, in one form or another, I’ve done for dozens and dozens of days. It feels like the means of establishing a self-discipline, whereas I’m letting my hand fall open and the string run loosely across my palm.

And what keeps me prostrating and chanting is mostly just this damn idiot determination to finish because I’ve started. It doesn’t feel skillful; it feels like a machine that is out of control, like a piston that is driving me, and I don’t seem to be quite able to find the ‘off’ switch. Inside me is a jumped-up tyrant with a big stick always driving me on. And although I’ve often challenged the tyrant, and laughed at his stick, I’ve never quite pushed him off his throne. Why?