The essential meaning of transmission lies in continually experiencing oneself in relation to the Lama.

The function of the Lamas – with regard to their disciples – is to provide what their own Tsawa’i Lamas provided for them: themselves. The Lama is the sum total of their devotion for their own Tsawa’i Lama, and that is what the Lama offers.

The main rôle of the Lama is not to ‘give teachings’ or even to ‘give empowerments’ – but simply to be with disciples in the living context of Vajrayana.

If teachings or empowerments are being given, then this is naturally entirely excellent – but the genuine wine and meat / blood and guts / emptiness and form / of transmission occurs in every moment.

This style of continual ordinariness-transmission is subtle. Most people miss it altogether. It is not a question of being ‘blissed out’ by trivia either. If people are so much in awe of the Lama that they are reduced to simpering spectators of his or her presence, that is also non-functional. It is a matter of being open and natural – relaxed yet disciplined. Being with the Lama is a practice in itself, if one is willing to find oneself on that precarious perch which is the brink of knowing and not knowing; of sanity and the collapse of conventional rationale; of anxiety and utter trust. . . an indefinable frisson must arise.