The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying by Sogyal Rinpoche: A Complete Guide

Sogyal Rinpoche and His Teachers

Sogyal Rinpoche (1947-2019) was born in Kham, eastern Tibet, and recognised as a tulku (reincarnate lama) in the Nyingma tradition at an early age. His root teacher was Jamyang Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö (1893-1959), considered one of the most accomplished Tibetan Buddhist masters of the 20th century and a revered figure in the Rime (non-sectarian) movement that sought to preserve the full richness of all Tibetan Buddhist lineages as the Chinese occupation of Tibet threatened their continuity.

After the flight from Tibet following the Chinese takeover in 1959, Sogyal Rinpoche continued his education in India and then moved to England, where he studied at Cambridge University. In London he came under the influence of Dudjom Rinpoche (1904-1987), one of the most important figures in 20th-century Tibetan Buddhism and the supreme head of the Nyingma lineage, and Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche (1910-1991), a towering figure in Tibetan Buddhist scholarship and practice who was revered by teachers across all the major Tibetan Buddhist schools.

These lineages, combined with Sogyal Rinpoche's Cambridge education and his exposure to Western culture, psychology, and death-and-dying research, shaped the distinctive character of "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying." The book is not an academic translation or a scholarly commentary but a living transmission in written form: it carries the warmth, directness, and practical wisdom of the oral teaching tradition while being fully accessible to readers without prior Buddhist training.

The book was over ten years in the making. Sogyal Rinpoche worked with editors Patrick Gaffney and Andrew Harvey to shape his teachings, lectures, and personal experience into the comprehensive and lyrical text published in 1992 by HarperSanFrancisco. The result was immediately recognised as exceptional: it became a bestseller, was translated into over 30 languages, and has sold over 3 million copies. Scholars of comparative religion, hospice workers, psychologists, and practitioners across many spiritual traditions have found it valuable.

The Bardo Thodol: Source and Tradition

The Bardo Thodol, which translates as "Liberation in the Bardo Through Hearing," is the primary source text that Sogyal Rinpoche's book draws on and interprets for contemporary readers. The text was discovered as a terma (treasure text) by Karma Lingpa in the 14th century and is attributed in the Nyingma tradition to Padmasambhava (Guru Rinpoche), the 8th-century Indian master who brought Buddhism to Tibet. Terma are texts said to have been hidden by Padmasambhava for discovery by future practitioners when the time was right for their teachings.

The Bardo Thodol reached Western audiences through the translation by Walter Evans-Wentz, published in 1927 as "The Tibetan Book of the Dead" with an introduction by Lama Kazi Dawa-Samdup. This translation, later criticised by scholars for inaccuracies, nonetheless introduced the text to Western readers for the first time. Carl Jung wrote a famous psychological commentary on Evans-Wentz's translation in 1935, interpreting the bardo experiences as representations of the unconscious mind's contents manifesting after the death of the ego. A more accurate scholarly translation by Chogyam Trungpa and Francesca Fremantle was published in 1975, followed by the comprehensive translation and commentary by Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche.

The text is traditionally read aloud to the dying person and the newly dead over the 49 days following death, guiding the consciousness through the bardo states. It describes the sequence of experiences that consciousness encounters after death: first the ground luminosity (the clear light of death), then the peaceful and wrathful deities of the bardo of dharmata, and finally the onset of the bardo of becoming in which the consciousness prepares for rebirth. At each stage, instructions are given for recognising the experience as the display of one's own awareness rather than an external phenomenon, and for thus achieving liberation rather than proceeding involuntarily toward rebirth.

Sogyal Rinpoche is clear that the Bardo Thodol is not merely a death manual but a complete teaching on the nature of mind and reality. The bardo experiences are not unique to death; they are versions of processes that happen continuously in ordinary experience, particularly in the transitions between waking, dreaming, and deep sleep. Understanding the bardo teachings as maps of consciousness in general, not merely at death, is one of his most valuable contributions.

The Six Bardos: States of Consciousness

Sogyal Rinpoche organises the book around the Tibetan concept of the six bardos, the six major intermediate states of consciousness that a human being navigates between birth and the next birth.

The first bardo is the bardo of this life, the waking state of ordinary human experience. This entire bardo, which for most people lasts 70 or 80 years, is itself an intermediate state between the previous life and the next. The bardo of this life is the primary opportunity for spiritual development, which is why "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying" is as much a guide to living as to dying. Sogyal Rinpoche quotes his teacher: "There is only one time when it is essential to wake up, and that time is now."

The second bardo is the bardo of dream. In the Tibetan system, the dream state closely parallels the bardo of becoming between death and rebirth. Dream yoga, the practice of maintaining conscious awareness during dreams and recognising the dreaming state as illusory, is considered excellent preparation for maintaining awareness in the after-death bardos. Sogyal Rinpoche devotes considerable attention to sleep as "a mini-death" and dream as a rehearsal for the bardo.

The third bardo is the bardo of meditation, the state of consciousness produced by deep meditative practice. In meditation, particularly in the Dzogchen and Mahamudra traditions practiced in the Nyingma and Kagyu lineages, the practitioner learns to recognise and stabilise in rigpa, the natural awareness that is the same luminous clarity encountered at the moment of death. Consistent meditation practice, from this perspective, is literally dying practice: training the recognition that liberation depends upon.

The fourth bardo is the bardo of dying, the actual process of death. Sogyal Rinpoche describes the Tibetan understanding of the dissolution sequence as the gross elements of the body dissolve one by one, with specific experiences accompanying each dissolution: earth dissolving into water (loss of physical solidity and heaviness), water into fire (drying sensation, loss of fluidity), fire into air (loss of warmth), and air into consciousness (loss of the final breath). At the end of this sequence, the ground luminosity appears.

The fifth bardo is the bardo of dharmata, the nature of reality. This is the period in which the consciousness of the newly dead person encounters the displays of the peaceful and wrathful deities, which are understood not as external beings but as the projections of the dying person's own mind. The instruction throughout this bardo is the same: recognise these appearances as your own awareness, rest in that recognition, and liberation will follow.

The sixth bardo is the bardo of becoming, the intermediate state between death and the next rebirth. Here the consciousness, if it has not achieved liberation, prepares for a new birth driven by its habitual karmic patterns. The consciousness in the bardo of becoming is described as particularly malleable and responsive to spiritual practice performed by the living on its behalf, which is why Sogyal Rinpoche devotes considerable attention to practices that practitioners can perform for the dead over the 49-day bardo period.

Rigpa: The Nature of Mind

The concept of rigpa is the philosophical and experiential heart of "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying." Rigpa is the Tibetan term for the natural state of awareness, the luminous, clear, knowing quality of mind that underlies and permeates all experience. It is distinguished from the ordinary thinking mind (called "sem" in Tibetan), which is the restless, reactive, concept-producing function that dominates everyday consciousness.

Sogyal Rinpoche defines rigpa most directly early in the book: "The nature of mind is the very root itself of understanding. In Tibetan we call it rigpa, a primordial, pure, pristine awareness that is at once intelligent, cognizant, radiant, and always awake. It could be said to be the knowledge of knowledge itself." This definition, precise in its simplicity, gestures toward an experience that language can approach but not fully convey.

He uses several extended analogies to point toward the nature of rigpa. The most memorable is the sky-and-clouds analogy: the ordinary mind is like clouds, appearing and disappearing, sometimes covering the sky completely and making it seem as though the sky is absent. Rigpa is the sky: always present, never actually obscured by the clouds, not disturbed by their passing. "Clouds do not bother the sky" is a phrase from the Tibetan tradition that Sogyal Rinpoche returns to several times.

The relationship between rigpa and the ground luminosity of death is direct: the ground luminosity is simply rigpa encountered without the mediating filter of the physical body and ordinary sensory mind. A practitioner who has learned to recognise and rest in rigpa during meditation recognises the ground luminosity at death and, in that recognition, achieves liberation. An unpracticed consciousness encounters the same luminosity but, not recognising it, passes through it into the subsequent bardo states and eventually toward rebirth.

Sogyal Rinpoche emphasises that rigpa is not a special or altered state achieved by some practitioners but the fundamental nature of every human consciousness. What meditation does is not create rigpa but clear the habitual overlay of the ordinary mind that prevents its recognition. In this sense, all humans are always already in rigpa; the challenge is simply to recognise this.

Helping the Dying: Practical Guidance

A significant portion of "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying" is devoted to practical guidance for those supporting the dying, reflecting Sogyal Rinpoche's extensive experience working with dying patients in hospice settings in Europe and North America from the 1970s onward. He founded the Rigpa Spiritual Care Programme specifically to bring Tibetan Buddhist wisdom on dying to hospice workers and caregivers across cultural and religious boundaries.

His practical guidance begins with the foundational principle that dying is a sacred process requiring a quality of presence from caregivers that ordinary social interaction rarely provides. He writes: "What the dying need is love, and an atmosphere of peace." Creating this atmosphere involves practical steps: removing harsh overhead lighting, introducing natural elements if possible, playing spiritual music or reading from sacred texts (from the dying person's own tradition if possible), and ensuring that the atmosphere in the room is calm, unhurried, and free from emotional turbulence.

He addresses the tendency of caregivers, even loving ones, to project their own fear of death onto the dying person through anxious interventions, forced cheerfulness, or refusal to acknowledge directly that the person is dying. Honest, gentle acknowledgement of the dying process, he argues, is more supportive than pretence. The dying person typically knows they are dying and benefits from being allowed to talk about it, express their feelings, and prepare consciously rather than having the reality avoided.

His guidance for what to say to a dying person distils years of experience: "You have lived a good life. There is no need to worry. All shall be well. I love you. I will miss you." The simplicity and directness of these words, he observes, are more valuable than elaborate spiritual instruction for most dying people. The quality of presence and genuine love from which these words are spoken matters more than the words themselves.

After death, Sogyal Rinpoche recommends maintaining a peaceful atmosphere and, if possible, not moving or disturbing the body for an extended period. The Tibetan tradition suggests that consciousness remains near the body for some time after breathing has stopped, and that practices performed during this period directly benefit the deceased. These practices include the recitation of phowa, prayers from any tradition the deceased would have recognised, and the maintenance of a loving, peaceful atmosphere.

Phowa and the Moment of Death

Phowa, the Tibetan practice of the transference of consciousness at the moment of death, is one of the most practically oriented teachings in Sogyal Rinpoche's book. The word phowa (pronounced "PO-wah") literally means "transference" or "ejection," referring to the directed movement of consciousness from the body at the moment of death.

The basic phowa practice involves visualising a central channel running through the body from the base of the spine to the crown of the head, with the consciousness as a sphere of light at the heart chakra. At the moment of death (or in the practice during life), the consciousness-sphere is visualised shooting upward through the central channel and out through the crown of the head (brahmarandhra, the Brahma opening) toward the realm of an enlightened teacher or deity, typically Amitabha Buddha in the Nyingma tradition.

Sogyal Rinpoche describes the signs of successful phowa practice: in training, practitioners sometimes experience warmth and tingling at the crown of the head. In traditional accounts, signs of successful phowa at the moment of death include the body remaining warm and fresh for longer than normal after breathing stops, and the presence of fluids at the crown of the head. He is careful to note that phowa should be learned from a qualified teacher in a genuine transmission rather than from a book alone.

He describes an experience from his own training in which he witnessed his teacher perform phowa for a dying person: "In a few moments, a small drop of blood or clear fluid was seen to emerge from the crown of the dead person's head, a sign that the consciousness had successfully departed through the correct channel." Such accounts, reported consistently across the Tibetan tradition, invite consideration of what precisely happens at the moment of death in ways that mainstream Western medicine has not yet fully investigated.

Modern Relevance: Hospice, Psychology, and Near-Death Research

Sogyal Rinpoche was careful to place the Tibetan teachings in dialogue with contemporary Western research and practice. His book includes extensive references to hospice pioneers including Dame Cicely Saunders and Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, whose work on dying as a developmental process parallels many aspects of the Tibetan teaching.

Kübler-Ross's "On Death and Dying" (1969) had already established in Western medical culture the idea that dying is a process with distinct psychological stages (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance) and that the dying person's psychological and spiritual needs are as important as physical pain management. Sogyal Rinpoche draws explicit connections between Kübler-Ross's model and the Tibetan understanding of the dissolution sequence, noting that Western observation and ancient Tibetan teaching had independently arrived at a similar map of the dying process.

Near-death experience (NDE) research, begun systematically by Raymond Moody in "Life After Life" (1975) and continued by researchers including Kenneth Ring, Melvin Morse, and Pim van Lommel, provides empirical data points that Sogyal Rinpoche finds significant. The consistent elements of NDE reports, including the experience of a tunnel, a bright light, a review of the life, encounters with deceased relatives, and a return to the body, align closely with the Tibetan description of the early bardo of dharmata. He writes: "The Tibetan Buddhist tradition is not surprised by the near-death experience. It confirms, in striking detail, what the Bardo Thodol has been saying for over a thousand years."

The book's relevance to contemporary hospice and palliative care has been widely recognised. Several hospice training programmes in Europe and North America include portions of "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying" in their curricula. The Rigpa Spiritual Care Programme has provided training to hospice workers internationally. The book's practical, compassionate, and non-sectarian approach to dying has made it one of the most widely recommended resources for professionals working with the dying across cultural and religious contexts.