Train your Mind: Tibetan Exercises in Wisdom and Compassion

Train your Mind: Tibetan Exercises in Wisdom and Compassion

Tibetan Buddhism's Mind Training uses 59 slogans to develop wisdom and compassion. Dhirananda and Viryabodi provide commentaries and exercises to bring these teachings to life. The book inspires and challenges us to overcome limitations, shift from self-centered views to a more compassionate, liberated perspective, prioritizing others' welfare. ‘This book is precious. Read it carefully to discover a brilliant map for training your mind and heart that is immediately applicable to all of life’s circumstances. If things are going well, be generous and share your good fortune. If things are difficult, use this as an opportunity for empathy for others suffering in similar ways. Dhirananda and Viryabodhi have done a brilliant job of translating the profound and compassionate slogans into immediately accessible and practical teachings for the modern world.’  Vidyamala Burch OBE , founder of the Breathworks Foundation and author of Living Well with Pain and Illness, Mindfulness for Health, and Mindfulness for Women ‘This is a great book for anyone who wants to know how to practise the Dharma in every moment of their life. The authors invite us to change our habitual attitudes to ones in which we treat whatever happens to us as gifts – opportunities to grow spiritually.’  Ratnaguna, author of The Art of Reflection and Great Faith, Great Wisdom ‘The pithy slogans of the Tibetan mind-training tradition challenge us to face up to our self-centredness and to recognize how it perpetuates our suffering. Drawing on several traditional commentaries, the authors show how this ancient wisdom remains pertinent to today’s existential challenges.’  Nagapriya, author of The Promise of a Sacred World: Shinran’s Teaching of Other Power Dhirananda is a retired doctor and Triratna Buddhist Order member in Stockholm. He co-founded the Triratna community in Sweden and has taught Buddhism, meditation, and mindfulness. As a former GP and medical advisor, he enjoys outdoor activities like rock climbing, kayaking, skiing, and ice skating. Viryabodhi born in 1959 in Helsingborg, Sweden, became interested in spirituality in his teens and began practicing meditation and yoga. He encountered Triratna Buddhism in 1982 and was ordained in 1989. Since returning to Stockholm in 1997, he has led the Stockholm Buddhist Center, translated numerous Buddhist texts into Swedish, and helped establish Dharmagiri Retreat Center. Slogan Thirty: Don’t Be So Predictable We all have a tendency to react to events in life through familiar and habitual patterns. Much of the time we are on ‘autopilot’, and what we do is largely predictable. This slogan is about being creative rather than reactive in our approach to the world.24 Sometimes it is as if we wake up and realize that things can be done differently. Or we meet another person who says or does something unexpected. Like when your debit card at the supermarket checkout isn’t working and you’re standing there with all the goods on the conveyor belt and can’t pay, and the customer behind you says: ‘It’s okay, I’ll pay for your groceries.’ It can be simple things like actually talking about how we really feel when a colleague asks this at morning coffee break, instead of saying: ‘Yes, it’s all fine’, when it’s not. These moments when we are not so predictable are moments when we are authentic and present. You could also say that they are moments when we are fully alive. Any time we act in a completely predictable way, it is as if we were already dead. Another meaning of this phrase is that we should avoid the tendency to always keep track of pluses and minuses in our relationships. We expect to receive as much as we give, of money and of our time and energy. If we don’t, we tend to become dissatisfied and may distance ourselves from that person. But the slogan asks us to give people a second chance, not to see people as unchangeable.