7 point mind training atisha biography

Home / Religious & Spiritual Figures / 7 point mind training atisha biography

Train in the two—giving and taking—alternately.
These two are to be mounted on the breath.
Three objects, three poisons and three sources of virtue.
In all activities, train by applying slogans.
Begin the process of taking with yourself. He is the great master who laid the foundation for this practice both in India and Tibet.

We have gone through the first point of The Seven Points of Mind Training, which deals with the preliminary practices. Please don’t undermine shamata and vipassana as a beginner’s practice. As a result, it is not easy to think one is taking on the suffering of others and giving them all one’s joy.

I was wondering if you are supplicating something outside yourself?

Train without bias in all areas.

From the three levels of teachings that Lord Buddha presented, the subject of this seminar is Lo-jong in Tibetan, which means “mind training,” and accords with the great Bodhisattva vehicle. Everybody somehow feels guilty, sad, or ashamed in some way or another after anger has passed, the second proof that mind’s true nature is Bodhicitta.

 

Question: Is it possible to experience Bodhicitta or enlightenment and not know it? Whether we meditate in the tradition of Mahamudra, Dzogchen, or the yidam practice of Dorje Phagmo, or Khorlo Demchok – in fact all tantric practices at whatever tantric level (be it charya, kriya, yoga, or anuttarayoga), our practice does not have real significance without the mind training.

 

When it is taught that everything that is apprehended needs to be seen as a dream and not as real, this does not mean to say that perceptions and cognition should be ignored or are bad, rather it means to say that every appearance and experience is dependent upon other things and nothing exists independently.

 

 

Six: Disciplines of Mind Training

 

Always abide by the three basic principles. Reflect on the mind in this way. The qualities of both are required as a foundation to engage in highest practices of deity and Mahamudra meditation. Is it inside or outside of the body?

The Kadampas continue transmitting the practices up to the present day. It is said that you can practice that way.

 

I pray to the Bodhisattva Sonam Trakpa, to Tok-me, Zangpo, Yonten Lodru, and Sho-nu Lodru,

to the great Pandit Shakya Chokden, and to Kunga Chokdrup and Jetsun Drolchok.

 

As I explained in brief above, due to the obscurations and habitual patterns that cause one to differentiate and separate an apprehending self from apprehension of other things, one fails to realize the true nature of one’s own mind.

Rinpoche: Personally, I don’t think it is special.