A Thief in an Empty House

In the Dzogchen tradition, rangdrol (རང་གྲོལ་) means self-liberation or natural liberation: liberated just as it is, in its own place. One image used to illustrate this is a thief entering an empty house. The thief has nothing to gain. The house has nothing to lose.

We often approach practice as though we have something valuable to protect. We find some peace or insight and want to preserve it. When a difficult mental state or emotion arises, we feel that something has been lost.

Gradually, our life fills with thieves. Work, relationships, uncertainty, even our own thoughts begin to threaten the peace we believe practice should provide.

The empty house invites us to look more closely at what we are protecting, and whether the freedom we seek can actually be possessed.

Once we make freedom depend on a particular experience, we begin to imagine liberation somewhere beyond the life we are living. We imagine it as beautiful, peaceful, and finally free of everything that troubles us. Against that image, our present circumstances always seem inadequate.

Then the very experiences we need to meet on the path become reasons to postpone practice. We will begin again when work settles down, when the conflict passes, when our life becomes a more suitable place for awakening.

But where else could liberation occur? This thought, this uncertainty, this painful encounter are the circumstances of our practice. If we reject them as unfit, we turn away from the experience in which our natural freedom could be recognized.

The metaphor of a thief entering an empty house brings us back to precisely this moment. Something has arisen that we wish had not. Can we recognize its nature here, before requiring it to become something else?

The thief has nothing to gain

In your experience right now, thoughts are coming up. Pain or uncomfortable sensations arise. An emotion may persist that you have no idea what brought it on. Each can be vivid, compelling, and difficult to meet.

The Dzogchen perspective asks us to recognize the nature of that experience directly. A thought will arise, but we don't need to be drawn into its story. We can let it be free in its own place. We are not our thoughts.

The house is empty of anything the thief can carry away. The thought itself is an expression of the nature of mind, free in its own place. The image of the thief in an empty house points toward recognizing that nature within the thought as it arises.

There is nothing to gain. Nothing to lose.

That does not mean we always recognize this. We can become caught in anger, act carelessly, and hurt others. Our conduct still has consequences, and we still need to mindful of them. Recognizing the nature of anger and taking responsibility for our anger belong together.

In the metaphor of the empty house, liberation is simultaneous with what is arising. Recognizing the nature of the thought, there is nothing we need to remove before freedom is possible. We are not talking ourselves into accepting it, or waiting for it to disappear so we can be free again.

As we become less occupied with identifying with what is arising, there is more room to listen and see what the situation asks of us.

When we become the thief

There is another side to the metaphor.

Sometimes we enter practice looking for something to gain. We want an experience that confirms we are progressing, a sign that we have understood, some kind of proof or evidence of our accomplishment.

We may have a moment of insight and immediately begin to jot it down. We remember how a particular session felt, then compare later sessions with it and try to find our way back. What began as an opening becomes a possession we are afraid to lose.

Now we are the thief, searching the house for treasure.

Practice deepens our familiarity with what we have recognized, and our capacity to recognize it amidst the circumstances of life. The nature of mind offers nothing we can acquire to make it more complete. Looking for something to add can keep us from recognizing what is already present.

This also changes how we meet difficult circumstances. Restlessness does not have to become a verdict on our capacity. Doubt does not have to become proof that we have failed. We can attend to what is happening without making every experience proof of how much work we have yet to do.

Meeting what's coming up

Understanding the metaphor of the thief in an empty house cannot substitute for direct recognition of the nature of the mind. But it can help us notice how we approach the our practice: the restlessness we want to remove, the clarity we want to hold onto, the expectation that freedom depends on either one.

When the next difficult moment arises in your practice, notice what you are trying to protect and what you are hoping to gain. Look into that. Try to see it clearly for what it is. Then rest in the natural state.