| List of Photographs | xv |
| Foreword | xvii |
| Acknowledgments | xix |
| Technical Note | xxii |
| Note to the Reader | xxiii |
| Introduction: The Tradition, the Teachings, and the Teacher | xxvii |
| 1 | A Priceless Jewel in a Garbage Heap | 3 |
| 2 | Reveling in the Wine of Bliss | 11 |
| 3 | First Things First and Last Things Last | 25 |
| 4 | Climbing a Steep Ladder without Hands | 31 |
| 5 | The Umbrella of Refuge | 45 |
| 6 | Holding Fast until Enlightenment Is Won | 53 |
| 7 | Suppose You Own a Fine Horse | 61 |
| 8 | The Needle Point of Worldly Existence | 69 |
| 9 | Sheer Pain | 75 |
| 10 | The Forest of Swords | 83 |
| 11 | Ignoble Stinginess | 93 |
| 12 | From Celestial Mansions to Murky Depths | 101 |
| 13 | No Rest from the Dance | 109 |
| 14 | A Fish Cast Up on Hot, Dry Sand | 119 |
| 15 | Careless Craving | 127 |
| 16 | Ceaseless Roaming | 135 |
| 17 | Imagine a Blind Tortoise | 143 |
| 18 | A Lump of Charcoal and a White Conch | 151 |
| 19 | Just Somebody Dressed in Red | 159 |
| 20 | The Great Fisher, Death | 169 |
| 21 | Discarded in Some Dark Hole | 175 |
| 22 | A Protector, an Island, a Great, Friendly Host | 185 |
| 23 | Deeds, Like a Shadow, Will Follow | 197 |
| 24 | A Great Vessel Filled by Drops of Water | 211 |
| 25 | Black Pebbles and White Pebbles | 223 |
| 26 | As Helpless as a Worm | 233 |
| 27 | Giving Our Parents a Piggyback Ride | 247 |
| 28 | A Mind Like an Overturned Pot | 257 |
| 29 | The Flavor of Compassion | 261 |
| 30 | Rudderless on the Sea of Life | 269 |
| 31 | A Coiled Rope in the Gloom of Night | 277 |
| 32 | "Beloved Daughter" Kicks His Mother | 285 |
| 33 | The Hand Must Help the Foot | 293 |
| 34 | A Cloud of White Light or a Sudden Dawn | 303 |
| 35 | Turning the Wheel of the Rat Race | 313 |
| 36 | Doing What Bodhisattvas Do | 321 |
| 37 | A Protector of the Protectorless | 327 |
| 38 | Seeing Things Exactly as They Are | 337 |
| 39 | Insight Yoked with Calm | 345 |
| 40 | Pouring Water into a Vase with a Hole in It | 351 |
| 41 | A Four-Petaled Blue Flower | 359 |
| 42 | The Monkeys Were Perplexed | 367 |
| 43 | The Flame of a Lamp in a Windless Place | 375 |
| 44 | A Storm of Thought Processes | 379 |
| 45 | Ten Million Blind Men | 389 |
| 46 | Rebirth as a Woodchuck | 397 |
| 47 | Samsara Falls Apart Like a Tattered Rag | 407 |
| 48 | If You Think of Yourself as a Tiger | 417 |
| 49 | It Is "Natural" Not to Be Natural | 423 |
| 50 | Paying the Tax of Compulsiveness | 429 |
| 51 | Awakening Certitude | 435 |
| 52 | Tasting Sugarcane for the First Time | 441 |
| 53 | A Chamberpot, an Offering Bowl, a Buddha | 453 |
| 54 | The Dreaming Mind Deludes Itself | 465 |
| 55 | Tuning the Violin of Meditation | 475 |
| 56 | The Sharpness of a Thorn, the Roundness of a Pea | 483 |
| Outline of the Text | 493 |
| Notes | 497 |
| Bibliography | 511 |
| Tibetan Names and Terms | 523 |
| Index | 529 |