What does Kyerim and Dzogrim mean in Meditation?

In a previous page I detailed the difference between Shiné and Laktong, or shamata and Vipassana here I would like to highlight Kyerim and Dzogrim two closely related but very different terms so as to avoid any confusion as to how Vajrayana Tibetan meditations are often structured and how skillfully they have been put together to enable one to work with mind.

Kyerim the Building Up Phase

Kyerim (sounds like Cherim) is the building up or generation phase and is closely linked to the practice of Shiné. One could almost call it Shiné plus, as the student does not just calmly pacify mind or rest mind on an object of meditation — the object of meditation interacts and provides feedback. Through a process called self-initiation, the meditator receives a combination of lights, syllables, and sounds from the object of focus or the Buddha aspect. Sometimes even a feeling is transmitted to the meditator. This feedback is said to trigger subtle psychological changes or responses in mind; the cumulative effect of such feedback is not to be underestimated.

A typical example of Kyerim would be as follows: A white light from the Buddha form shines out towards us from an Om syllable on the Buddha’s forehead towards our forehead. At the same time we — and or the group we are meditating with — say the syllable Ommmmmmmmmm out loud for a few seconds. We feel or experience the vibration of the light and the sound together. This process is greatly magnified when we meditate in groups, especially when we are in very large groups.

Kyerim can be translated as the moment when the Buddha is born. Here the Buddha or Buddha nature is clearly born and activated in our mind. This conscious feedback is also the same feedback one receives in Tibetan empowerments or initiations, albeit with less ritual. This is why this phase is sometimes referred to as self-empowerment, as the lights, syllables, and sounds all correspond to the main chakras that are blessed by high Lamas and Rinpoches during an initiation. This self-empowerment provides the meditator with a strong blessing and enlightened contact regardless of where the lama is.

One can also use the analogy of tying one’s rapidly changing stream of consciousness to a pole. Within the meditation, one has a series of approved distractions or highly detailed archetypal forms to focus on. Often one can simply rotate one’s attention from one specific aspect to another at will within a much smaller field of attention than one is normally used to. These skillful means are very powerful mind training techniques.

Dzogrim the Completion Phase

Dzogrim or the completion phase can be compared to hugging or uniting ourselves with the Buddha form. The full mixing of powerful light energy and one’s own energy form imbues the meditator with the enlightened qualities of the Buddha aspect and one is filled with blessing. When the term dissolving phase is used it can be understood to be where we dissolve the barrier or distance between us and the enlightened qualities of the lama or Buddha aspect, here one simply feels inseparable from the teacher and all beings. One no longer is looking into the mirror of mind, we are the mirror, reflecting our own enlightened qualities. 

I often feel Dzogrim with my Lama, pure thankfulness, pure devotion, Suchness.

Perfection phase refers to the total understanding or the absolute realisation of Mahamudra, the highest teachings in Vajrayana Buddhism. This is a CLEAR experience of mind unadulterated by the veils of our disturbing emotions and basic ignorance. All three are Dzogrim. 

Dzogrim and Laktong often share the same place and time in most meditations but as Laktong is the insight, the “ah ha” moment or the connection to one’s deepest awareness, beyond the normal understanding. Dzogrim singularly points to a pristine, unadulterated experience of the LUMINANCE of mind.

The Result of Clear Light

This CLEAR LIGHT, when seen from an outside perspective but still within the meditative experience, is the mechanism with which mind shines on the form and sound realms in order so that we may perceive them. This responsive outward shining of consciousness is what we are mentally reproducing in the Khyrem part of the meditation.

In its very essence, we are the CLEAR LIGHT when there is no longer any distance or barrier between us and our experience and when we have total unity within our experience, sounds perfect, doesn’t it?

This is like living on the wavefront where particles condense out of mind and form our universe. Here we are the creators; we own the cinema; we no longer just watch what is on the screen. We are the screen, the projector, and the LIGHT shining for all to see. This is Mahamudra.

The Secret the Generation Phase Carries

Here is something worth sitting with — something that will become increasingly important as we develop these ideas further in the Quantum Mahamudra series.

When we practice Kyerim, we are generating a form. Building, constructing, elaborating. It can feel like we are working toward something — creating something that isn’t yet there, assembling the Buddha quality piece by piece from the ground up.

But this is the surface reading.

Deeper into Dzogrim

The deeper understanding — the one the Kagyu lineage points to again and again — is that the fruition is already fully present at the basis. The tathāgatagarbha, the buddha nature, the seed of complete awakening — is not something Kyerim creates. It is something Kyerim reveals.

We are not building a Buddha. We are using the skillful structure of the generation phase to remove what obscures the Buddha nature that was never absent.

The Third Karmapa, Rangjung Dorje, stated this with extraordinary precision in his Treatise Distinguishing Consciousness from Wisdom (Namshe Yeshe): ordinary consciousness (rnam shes) and wisdom (ye shes) are not two different substances — one to be discarded and one to be achieved. They are the same awareness, seen with and without recognition. Namshe is yeshe unrecognized. The generation phase is namshe pointed directly at yeshe until recognition becomes unavoidable.

This means Kyerim, understood deeply, is not the inferior half of the practice with Dzogrim as the real destination. Both phases are a single movement of recognition — the same light seen first as object and then as nature, first as other and then as inseparable.

The Physics Parallel — A Seed for What’s Coming

For those following the Quantum Mahamudra series on this site, a small seed to plant here:

Kyerim maps onto the preparation of a quantum state — the careful construction of a system, the choosing of a measurement basis, the deliberate arrangement of conditions. This is namshe at its most disciplined: ordinary consciousness wielded with complete precision, shaping the Hilbert space of experience toward a specific arising.

Dzogrim maps onto the dissolution of the measurement apparatus — the release of the constructed state back into open, undetermined awareness. The wave function no longer collapsed into a specific outcome but recognized as the open field it always was.

And the recognition that the tathāgatagarbha was fully present at the basis — that the fruition was always already there in the generation phase — this is the recognition that the quantum vacuum, the zero-point ground state, was never empty. The ground of all arising was always already full.

The physicist calls this the measurement problem — the great unsolved mystery of how the open quantum field becomes definite experience.

The Kyerim/Dzogrim practitioner calls it Tuesday morning meditation.

We will develop this parallel fully in an upcoming post. For now, let this seed sit.

In Practice

Kyerim and Dzogrim are not two separate meditations that happen to be paired. They are one continuous movement — like breathing in and breathing out, like a wave rising and releasing. The generation phase builds the conditions for recognition. The completion phase is the recognition itself.

And what is recognized in Dzogrim was present — always, without interruption — throughout every moment of Kyerim.

This is the teaching. This is the practice. This is what the Kagyu lineage has preserved and transmitted, teacher to student, for a thousand years.

QP

Related pages:

• What do Shiné and Laktong mean?
• What is Ngöndro?
• Cauchy Surfaces & the Power of Now
• Hilbert Space & the Mathematics of Emptiness
• Lhan Cig Skye Pa — Coemergence

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