What is delusion?
Delusion refers to ignorance, which can also be called unawareness. It can be understood on two levels: one is relative, referring to not understanding the truth and not wanting to understand it; the other is absolute, referring to reacting with greed and anger due to not understanding the true nature of things. Ordinary people do not know what ignorance is, hence they are ignorant; practitioners may know about ignorance, but because they do not understand the essence of ignorance itself, they have not completely transcended it.
All our troubles arise from delusion; it is the root of all our suffering in samsara. The fundamental aspects of the twelve links of dependent origination—actions, consciousness, mind and body, the six senses (eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind), contact, feelings, craving, clinging, existence, birth, aging and death—are fundamentally rooted in ignorance. Beings are born with inherent ignorance and cling to the duality of subject and object; they cannot liberate themselves from the cycle of birth and death. To escape from this cycle and free themselves from suffering, beings must break through their ignorance and recognize their inherent awareness.
Unlike greed and anger which arise in response to ignorance, delusion can arise independently. The generation of ignorance can be divided into two aspects. From a relative perspective, ignorance arises from our discriminative consciousness creating illusory concepts; for example, we perceive all things as fixed realities when in fact everything is impermanent and selfless. From an ultimate perspective, ignorance does not exist; the very concept of when ignorance arises is itself a form of ignorance. It’s like sitting on a rapidly spinning carousel at an amusement park thinking that everything around us—the scenery and sky—is spinning when in reality it is ourselves that are spinning. In that moment of realization there is no existence of ignorance. Enlightened beings are like those who have stepped off the carousel; they discover that it isn’t the world that spins but rather themselves who are spinning. In such moments of insight into reality there exists no ignorance. The Buddha’s eighty-four thousand teachings aim to help us realize that it is ourselves who are turning on this carousel and encourage us to step off.
To encounter the Great Perfection teachings in this life is indeed a great blessing; these teachings point directly to one’s own nature and represent one of the most direct methods for breaking through ignorance. However, practicing Great Perfection requires three essential conditions: first is purifying karmic obstacles; second is accumulating merit; third is receiving direct oral transmission from a qualified teacher. Therefore, the quality of preliminary practices (ngöndro) and subsequent practices (main practice) becomes crucial—much like how a rocket needs sufficient energy to break through the atmosphere: preliminary practices guide its correct trajectory while subsequent practices provide energy for its flight; the teacher’s instructions serve as the launch button for taking off.