Compassion

Introduction His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama emphasizes that religious harmony must be based on education, knowing about each other’s traditions. With thorough knowledge, we can acknowledge the common goals we share, while respecting the differences. In fact, from...

Definitions of Love, Compassion and Bodhichitta Today I’ve been asked to speak to you about the practice and methods for equalizing and exchanging your attitudes concerning self and others. The subjects of love and compassion, and developing a dedicated heart of bodhichitta,...

General Assertions Buddhism does not assert creation or a creator. The mental continuums of all sentient beings have no beginning. “Sentient beings” are living beings that act with intention and experience happiness or unhappiness as a result. Like souls in Islam, however, the...

Let’s look at the six far-reaching attitudes themselves. The first of these is generosity. The Definition of Generosity Generosity is defined as the willingness to give. It’s an attitude, a state of mind. Shantideva wrote: (V.9) (After all,) if the perfection of giving were...

Review We were speaking about the initial and intermediate level motivations in the lam-rim process for self-development on the spiritual path. And we saw that on the initial scope, or with the initial scope, we are aiming for better rebirths. We want to avoid worst rebirths...

The Need for an Equal Attitude toward Everyone In order to develop compassion it’s necessary to purify and train the mind and the heart. The definition of compassion is the attitude with which you wish everybody to be free from their problems and unhappiness. The attitude with...

Review I’d like to continue our discussion, but before I begin, there is a piece of advice that a very wise woman once gave me, which I think is relevant here. If you have a group and you want to lead it into a destructive action, like into battle, then you instruct them at...

Review In our last session we presented the first stages in the process for working ourselves up to developing bodhichitta. We saw that the first type of equanimity that we cultivate is the equanimity that tries to rid ourselves, at least provisionally, of gross disturbing...

Verses 4 through 6 Verse 4: Lessening Flightiness of Mind by Having Few Desires Let me rid myself of (desire for) material gain and honor and always rid myself of (desire for) profit and fame. So, let me have few desires, be content, and show appreciation for the kind acts...

Review This morning is the fourth session of our discussion of the seven-part cause and effect meditation method for developing the bodhichitta aim. We have discussed the ground floor level, or step number zero, of this process, which is to develop equanimity. This...