Ganges Mahamudra: Tilopa’s Pith Instructions to Naropa

In this class, Ken McLeod brings Tilopa’s Ganges Mahamudra to life by translating each verse into clear practice instructions and engaging participants in penetrating inquiry. He encourages students to rest in experience just as it is, using practices like “open your heart to everything you experience” and “what experiences this?” to reveal the mind’s natural clarity. “As long as you’re trying to do something with your experience, you can’t just experience what arises,” Ken says—a reminder that even subtle effort can block what is already present.

1. Mahamudra Cannot Be Taught

Ken opens this series on the Ganges Mahamudra with a vivid historical and philosophical context for Tilopa’s pith instructions. He explores the tantric roots of the text, the transformational lineage from Tilopa to Naropa to Marpa, and sets the stage for a meditative approach grounded in resting in experience. “Don’t control. Let go and rest naturally. Let what binds you let go.” Topics covered include devotion, hardship, clarity, space as metaphor, and practical guidance on developing attention.
2. Look in the Resting, Rest in the Looking

Ken continues exploring Ganges Mahamudra with six verses that reveal the view of mahamudra through metaphor, experiential insight, and practical meditation. Emphasizing presence over understanding, he challenges habitual patterns and offers students methods to shift from conceptual thinking into direct knowing. “Let go of control and rest right there.” Topics covered include the nature of thoughts, devotion as responsive awe, the essence of mind, and the practice of sheer clarity.
3. Mind Without Reference

Ken opens the third session of Ganges Mahamudra with clarifications on meditation practice and the distinction between sensory feeling tones and emotional reactions. He then turns to Tilopa’s teachings on resting in experience without reference—beyond striving, beyond ambition. “Do not accept these struggles.” Topics covered include mind as experience, the limits of scripture and scholarship, the importance of ethical action, and how meditative insight dissolves reactivity and opens the way to peace.
4. Open to Everything

Ken returns to the Ganges Mahamudra with teachings on embracing experience from both sides—being wrung and doing the wringing. He addresses the value of rest, the grief of letting go, and the challenge of ambition in spiritual practice. “When you come to nothing to come to, you come to mahamudra.” Topics covered include subject-object duality, the shift to personal motivation, the role of grief in transformation, and resting in awareness as a doorway to freedom.
5. Open Your Heart, Rest in Awareness

In this final session, Ken explores the experiential heart of mahamudra through personal inquiry and communal reflection. He guides students to open their hearts to every facet of experience, rest in awareness without expectation, and navigate the pitfalls of ambition, conceptual overlay, and spiritual striving. “What would your life be like if this is how you related to everything you experienced?” Topics covered include aspiration vs. ambition, the role of energy transformation, resting without agenda, and the poetic depth of Tilopa’s spontaneous instruction.

Ganges Mahamudra: Tilopa’s Pith Instructions to Naropa

1. Mahamudra Cannot Be Taught

2. Look in the Resting, Rest in the Looking

3. Mind Without Reference

4. Open to Everything

5. Open Your Heart, Rest in Awareness