A guide to the Tibetan Buddhist practice of lojong meditation—or mind training—as a way to pause, reflect, and discover the true meaning and value of life In this society, with its hurly-burly pace demanding of our time, it is ever so easy to let life slip by. Looking back after ten, twenty, thirty, years—we wonder what we have really accomplished. The process of simply existing is not necessarily meaningful. And yet there is an unlimited potential for meaning and value in this human existence. The Seven-Point Mind Training is one eminently practical way of tapping into that meaning. At the heart of the Seven-Point Mind Training lies the transformation of the circumstances that life brings us, however hard as the raw material from which we create our own spiritual path. The central theme of the Seven-Point Mind Training is to make the liberating passage from the constricting solitude of self-centeredness to the warm kinship with others which occurs with the cultivation of cherishing others. This Mind Training is especially well-suited for an active life. It helps us to reexamine our relationships—to family, friends, enemies, and strangers—and gradually transform our responses to whatever life throws our way

Kyabje Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche, Whose Remarkable Life Came To An End In September, 1991, Was One Of The Foremost Poets, Scholars, Philosophers And Meditation Masters Of The Mahayana, Mahamudra And Great Perfection Traditions Of Vajrayana Buddhism. He Was Highly Respected By Thousands Of Students In Tibet And Throughout The World. The Text He Presents Here Is The Seven Point Mind Training, Broughout To Tibet By The Indian Master Atisha. This Teaching Is The Very Core Of The Entire Practice Of Tibetan Buddhism. It Condenses The Compassionate Path To Buddhahood Into Practical Instructions Which Make Use Of All The Circumstances Of Everyday Life. Khyentse Rinpoche Gave This Commentary In The Dordogone, France, During His Last Visit To The West. He Speaks Frankly From His Heart, Drawing On His Own Life Long Experience. The Fact That Rinpoche Has Departed From This World Adds Much Poignancy To His Words, Which Many Of His Students Regard As His Parting Gift.

Essential Mind Training is the first volume in the Tibetan Classics series, which aims to make available accessible paperback editions of key Tibetan Buddhist works drawn from Wisdom Publications' Library of Tibetan Classics. The key to happiness is not the eradication of all problems but rather the development of a mind capable of transforming any problem into a cause of happiness. Essential Mind Training is full of guidance for cultivating new mental habits for mastering our thoughts and emotions. This volume contains eighteen individual works selected from Mind Training: The Great Collection, the earliest compilation of mind-training (lojong) literature. The first volume of the historic Tibetan Classics series, Essential Mind Training includes both lesser-known and renowned classics such as Eight Verses on Mind Training and The Seven-Point Mind Training. These texts offer methods for practicing the golden rule of learning to love your neighbor as yourself and are full of practical and down-to-earth advice. The techniques explained here, by enhancing our capacity for compassion, love, and perseverance, can give us the freedom to embrace the world.

A comprehensive guide to lojong, a Buddhist practice used for centuries to develop loving-kindness and compassion, made popular by Pema Chödrön and Chögyam Trungpa For many centuries Indian and Tibetan Buddhists have employed this collection of pithy, penetrating Dharma slogans to develop compassion, equanimity, lovingkindness, and joy for others. Known as the lojong—or mind-training—teachings, these slogans have been the subject of deep study, contemplation, and commentary by many great masters. In this volume, Traleg Kyabgon offers a fresh translation of the slogans as well as in-depth new commentary of each. After living among and teaching Westerners for over twenty years, his approach is uniquely insightful into the ways that the slogans could be misunderstood or misinterpreted within our culture. Here, he presents a refreshing and clarifying view, which seeks to correct points of confusion.

Compiled in the fifteenth century, Mind Training: The Great Collection is the earliest anthology of a special genre of Tibetan literature known as "mind training," or lojong in Tibetan. The principal focus of these texts is the systematic cultivation of such altruistic thoughts and emotions as compassion, love, forbearance, and perseverance. The mind-training teachings are highly revered by the Tibetan people for their pragmatism and down-to-earth advice on coping with the various challenges and hardships that unavoidably characterize everyday human existence. The volume contains forty-four individual texts, including the most important works of the mind training cycle, such as Serlingpa's well-known Leveling Out All Preconceptions, Atisha's Bodhisattva's Jewel Garland, Langri Thangpa's Eight Verses on Training the Mind, and Chekawa's Seven-Point Mind Training together with the earliest commentaries on these seminal texts. An accurate and lyrical translation of these texts, many of which are in metered verse, marks an important contribution to the world's literary heritage, enriching its spiritual resources.

Expressed in a colloquial, intimate style, this teaching contains the essence of the Seven-Point Mind Training, condensing the compassionate path to Buddhahood into practical guidance.

"Shantideva pointed out that everything good--every form of happiness, all positive qualities and so forth--comes through the kindness of others. Therefore, the mind devoted to their welfare is like a wish-fulfilling jewel, the source of all happiness and everything good and useful in the world. Just as a farmer who possesses an extremely fertile field, where everything he plants always grows, is very happy to have it and cherishes and takes great care of it, we should feel the same way about other sentient beings--that they are extremely valuable, and cherish and take care of them. "It is interesting that, whether we are Buddhist or not, if we think about the great kindness of all beings it will be evident that all our happiness does indeed depend upon them." In this book, Khensur Rinpoche Geshe Jampa Tegchok explains how we can train our mind away from self-cherishing, the cause of all suffering, and develop compassion, the cause of everything that is good. He bases his explanation on Kadampa Geshe Chekawa’s classic text, The Seven Point Mind Training, which, amongst other things, teaches us how to transform problems into happiness. This book is made possible by kind supporters of the Archive who, like you, appreciate how we make these teachings freely available in so many ways, including in our website for instant reading, listening or downloading, and as printed and electronic books. Our website offers immediate access to thousands of pages of teachings and hundreds of audio recordings by some of the greatest lamas of our time. Our photo gallery and our ever-popular books are also freely accessible there. Please help us increase our efforts to spread the Dharma for the happiness and benefit of all beings. You can find out more about becoming a supporter of the Archive and see all we have to offer by visiting our website. Thank you so much, and please enjoy this book.

Learn the ropes of a cultivating a resilient and warm heart, even in the face of great difficulty, from one of the most beloved of the last generation of lamas trained in pre-invasion Tibet. The aphorisms of the Seven-Point Mind Training present a powerful and counter-intuitive call to Buddhist practice—view reality as dreamlike, contemplate the kindness of your enemies, give up expectations of reward, change yourself but remain as you are! When he fled Tibet, Gomo Tulku carried in his heart this widely studied Tibetan text, which he turned to time and again when faced with difficulties in life. Having relied on this practice to transform his own hardships, he shares here an inspired commentary to help us get through ours. Mirroring the simplicity of the original, Seven Steps to Train Your Mind succinctly provides a practical description of how to train the mind and develop the mental qualities of peace, joy, and wisdom that will carry one through any circumstance.

A prominent Zen teacher offers a “direct, penetrating, and powerful” perspective on a popular mind training practice of Tibetan Buddhism (Rick Hanson, author of Buddha’s Brain) Lojong is the Tibetan Buddhist practice of working with short phrases (called "slogans") to generate bodhichitta, the heart and mind of enlightened compassion. With roots tracing back to the 900 A.D., the practice has gained more Western adherents over the past two decades, partly due to the influence of American Buddhist teachers like Pema Chödrön. Its effectiveness and accessibility have moved the practice out of its Buddhist context and into the lives of non-Buddhists across the world. It's in this spirit that Norman Fischer offers his unique, Zen-based commentary on the Lojong. Though traditionally a practice of Tibetan Buddhism, the power of the Lojong extends to other Buddhist traditions—and even to other spiritual traditions as well. As Fischer explores the 59 slogans through a Zen lens, he shows how people from a range of faiths and backgrounds can use Lojong to generate the insight, resilience, and compassion they seek.

In this society with its hurly-burly pace demanding of our time, it is ever so easy to let life slip by. The process of simply existing is not necessarily meaningful. And yet, there is an unlimited potential for meaning and value in this human existence. The Seven-Point Mind Training is one eminently practical way of tapping into that meaning. The central theme of the Seven-Point Mind Training is to make the liberating passage from the constricting solitude of self-centeredness to the warm kinship with others which occurs with the cultivation of cherishing others even more than oneself. This mind training technique is especially well-suited for an active life. It does not require that we withdraw into seclusion, but that we re-examine all of our relationships-to family, friends, enemies, and strangers-and gradually transform our responses to whatever life throws our way. Book jacket.