When discipline begins to be natural, a part of you, it is very important to learn to let go. For the warrior, letting go is connected with relaxing within discipline, in order to experience freedom. Freedom here does not mean being wild or sloppy; rather it is letting yourself go so that you fully experience your existence as a human being. Letting go is completely conquering the idea that discipline is a punishment for a mistake or a bad deed that you have committed, or might like to commit. You have to completely conquer the feeling that there is something fundamentally wrong with your human nature and that therefore you need discipline to correct your behavior. As long as you feel that discipline comes from outside, there is still a lingering feeling that something is lacking in you. So letting go is connected with letting go of any vestiges of doubt or hesitation or embarrassment about being you as you are. You have to relax with yourself in order to fully realize that discipline is simply the expression of your basic goodness. You have to appreciate yourself, respect yourself, and let go of your doubt and embarrassment so that you can proclaim your goodness and basic sanity for the benefit of others.


Normally, we limit the meaning of perceptions. In other words, we fit what we see into a comfortable or familiar scheme. We shut vastness or possibilities of deeper perception out of our hearts by fixating on our own interpretation of phenomena. But it is possible to go beyond personal interpretation, to let vastness into our hearts through the medium of perception. We always have a choice: we can limit our perception so that we close off vastness, or we can allow vastness to touch us.


When we draw down the power and depth of vastness into a single perception, then we are discovering and invoking magic. By magic we do not mean unnatural power over the phenomenal world, but rather the discovery of innate or primordial wisdom in the world as it is. The wisdom we are discovering is wisdom without beginning, something naturally wise, the wisdom of the cosmic mirror. In Tibetan, this magical quality of existence, or natural wisdom, is called drala. Dra means "enemy" or "opponent" and la means "above." So drala literally means "above the enemy," "beyond the enemy." Drala is the unconditional wisdom and power of the world that are beyond any dualism; therefore drala is above any enemy or conflict. It is wisdom beyond aggression. It is the self-existing wisdom and power of the cosmic mirror that are reflected both in us and in our world of perception....There is no fundamental separation or duality between you and your world. When you can experience those two things together, as one, so to speak, then you have access to tremendous vision and power in the world -- you find that they are inherently connected to your own vision, your own being. That is discovering magic. We are not talking here about an intellectual revelation; we are speaking of actual experience.