“One day in 1974 I was sitting with my teacher Dezhung Rinpoche in the living room of his home in Seattle. I had been enthralled by Rinpoche’s eloquent, profound, and hilarious stories about the renowned Tibetan master Tangtong Gyalpo for the last year or so. He often told these tales in private conversation, or while explaining Tangtong’s practice for meditation on Avalokiteśvara, or when bestowing the great adept’s ritual blessing for longevity. Tangtong’s biography had been one of Rinpoche’s favorite books in Tibet, although he had not seen the work since fleeing his homeland in 1959. I had recently come across the biography among the uncatalogued microfilm collection of Tibetan works at the University of Washington. When I mentioned this to Rinpoche, he began to quote from memory a long series of verses from the text. Then he wrote for a moment in a small notepad, tore off the sheet, and handed it to me, saying, ‘Look for this!’

On the mountain of the illusory body
of four elements
is the monastery of uncontrived mind.
It’s the sublime place where
bliss and lucidity arise.
Be single-minded in that place of practice!

Tangtong Gyalpo is said to have lived 125 years as a result of his perfection of meditative techniques for achieving longevity. These methods have been passed down as the most efficacious and popular such practices in Tibetan Buddhism. His other systems of meditation, in particular those of Avalokiteśvara and Vajravarahi, are still practiced after more than five hundred years. He is known as a mental emanation of Guru Padmasambhava and is believed to have recovered numerous caches of hidden treasure teachings (gter ma) concealed by the Indian master. His nonsectarian activities and teachings have earned him a special position in all the Buddhist traditions of Tibet.”

—Cyrus Stearns, from the Preface and Introduction to King of the Empty Plain: The Tibetan Iron-Bridge Builder Tangtong Gyalpo