Hi Albert,
I would not pretend to know about Tibetan Buddhism, I have only read a few books about it (Namkhai Norbu and Sogyal Rinpoche) so I would not attempt to compare the two systems. What I can say is that there is a fundamental difference between Shaktipat Diksha and any teaching method, be it Tibetan Buddhism, any other form of Buddhism, Hinduism in all its many different forms, Christianity, Islam etc etc.
The fundamental difference is that all the above are teachings, the student of any of those paths needs to learn the basic principles of his chosen teaching, the fundamental rationale of why the teaching exists in the first place, the means of attainment, the steps required in order to attain the given goal of the particular teaching and the recognition of the goal when it is attained.
Shaktipat Diksha in it's purest form is solely initiation based, it has no need of any teaching and there is no need to learn any steps of attainment, nor is there even a requirement to learn exactly what goal is to be attained (though, of course most candidates believe they understand the 'goal'). The candidate receives initiation, the kundalini shakti is awakened by the shaktipat diksha, the initiate then undergoes a multitude of manifestations though s/he has no idea what the significance of those manifestations are meant to be. As the normally outflowing currents of prana are diverted up through shushumna the initiate then attains the spontaneous peace of samadhi and so on.
It is a pity however that Shaktipat is not initiated in it's purest form, it is usually 'packaged' with a belief system that makes it appear as if dependent upon that system - Shaktipat Diksha is never dependent on any system, on the contrary belief systems arise in order to attempt to explain it's workings. I do not offer a set of beliefs along with initiation. I feel that the candidate / initiate is already overburdened with a network of beliefs that burden, rather than assist.
All the best
k
