Obstacles

Questions about the Clear Light Mind If the clear light mind is not influenced by causes and circumstances and it's not independently existing, then by what is it influenced? When we speak of clear light mind as being an unaffected or unconditioned phenomenon, we need to...

Introduction We have covered how to transform adverse conditions into a path to enlightenment with our thoughts, and now we’ll discuss it in terms of our actions, which is explained in the last line of this section: The supreme method possesses four actions of use, (so)...

Brief Review of the History of Mind Training Texts We have been discussing the Wheel of Sharp Weapons, by Dharmarakshita, which is included in the collection of mind training texts and seems to be the forerunner of them. Dharmarakshita was one of Atisha’s teachers and Atisha...

What Are Impure and Pure Appearances? Now let’s discuss the variable of impure and pure appearances. The variable of pure and impure is applied in terms of whether or not an appearance is adulterated and stained with faults. “Faults” here refers to items that arise from our...

Viewing Others as Respected Teachers Verse six of our eight-verse text expresses a similar sentiment to what Togme Zangpo communicates in the verse we previously cited in our discussion of verse five, in which he refers to someone we’ve raised and cherished like our own child...

(11) Teaching Voidness to Those Whose Minds Are Untrained We’ve been going through the bodhisattva vows. We have covered ten of the 18 vows and we’re up to number 11. What we want to avoid with this vow is teaching voidness to those whose minds are untrained. This is talking...

Brief Review The Eight Verses of Mind Training comes from a long tradition, beginning with Shantideva’s text Engaging in Bodhisattva Behavior, then with Atisha, who heard of these teachings from Dharmarakshita, who wrote Wheel of Sharp Weapons, and then...

Review We have been analyzing the various causal connections between clear-light mind, the winds of karma, the creative energy-drops and everything that’s involved in our experience of these mental holograms. We proposed that the winds of karma are the mounts of the mental...

The Tibetan word “damtsig,” “samaya” in Sanskrit, means “close bond.” It refers to practices that create a close bond between us and a Buddha-figure or our spiritual teacher.

The Gelug assertions of the various ways in which tendencies and habits differ.