Universality
Though a conceptual mystery, mindstream may be conceived as nonlinear and holistic. The medium and conduit of mindstream is æther or space and is unbounded by temporality or locality. Welwood (2000) describes it in this way:
If the contents of mind are like pails and buckets floating in a stream, and the mindstream is like the dynamic flowing of the water, pure awareness is like the water itself in its essential wetness. Sometimes the water is still, sometimes it is turbulent; yet it always remains as it is – wet, fluid, watery. In the same way, pure awareness is never confined or disrupted by any mind-state. Therefore, it is the source of liberation and true equanimity.
Welwood (2000) introduces "pure awareness", the essence-quality of the mindstream, synonymous with natural mind (Tibetan: rig-pa). This is the primordial and principal constitutional consciousness of being. It is accessible by, and the point of origin of, all sentient beings. "Sentient beings" is a technical term in Vajrayāna denoting the mindstreams of all those consciousnesses not yet aware of the emptiness and fullness of perfection. Welwood (2000) links the mindstream with the three bodies (trikāya):
In terms of the Buddhist teaching of the three kayas, we could say that the contents of consciousness belong to the nirmanakaya, the realm of manifest form. The pulsation of the mindstream, with its alternation between movement and stillness, belongs to the sambhogakaya, the realm of energy flow. And the larger, open ground of awareness, first discovered in moments of stillness, is the dharmakaya, the realm of pure being (the thing-in-itself), eternally present, spontaneous, and free of entrapment in any form whatsoever.
The Buddhist and Bön teachings of mindstream and heartmind inform one another, as does bodymind. As Chodron (1991) states:
Just as the body is a 'continuity' even though it has parts, the mindstream or consciousness is also a 'continuity', although it has parts.
Hawter (1995) succinctly relates:
All of our actions lay down imprints on our mindstream which have the potential to ripen at some time in the future.
This should not imply that the mindstream is linear and only flows one way, but the mindstream is understood in the Himalayan tradition to flow all ways, always. For Morrell (1999):
The Mahayanists also contend that the mind forms a continuous, unending and unbroken mindstream or flow of consciousness, from beginningless time and indestructible. Thoughts and feelings in the mindstream are regarded as of supreme importance to Buddhist practice.
Kelzang Gyatso (1708-1757 CE), the 7th Dalai Lama is translated as stating:
ll things in the world and beyond re simply projections of names and thoughts. Not even the tiniest atom exists by itself, ndependently in its own right.
Therefore, the Universe is the thoughtform of the collective mindstream of all sentient beings (and there is nothing which is non-sentient; pansentience). This pansentient totality is the great continuum, the "great perfection" or "total completion" (Tibetan: rdzog-pa chen-po) of Dzogchen and Ati Yoga (Tibetan: shin-tu rnal-'byor where "shin-tu" holds the semantic field of "total", "complete", "absolute" and "rnal-'byor" holds the semantic field of "yoga"; Sanskrit: "Ati" holds the semantic field "primordial", "original", "first"; "yoga" holds the semantic field "communion", "union").
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