Seven-Point Mind Training — 1984-11-26

Seven-Point Mind Training (Geshe Doga)

Seven-Point Mind Training — 1984-11-26

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Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.

About this talk. Geshe Doga teaches the Seven-Point Mind Training in this 42-minute session, focusing on the core technique of giving and taking (tonglen). He begins by explaining how to visualize absorbing one’s own present and future suffering, then extends the practice to one’s mother, emphasizing why starting with the person who has shown the greatest kindness makes the meditation genuine and powerful. He then walks through the step-by-step expansion: from mother to father, children, relatives, friends, neighbors, enemies, all humans, and finally all sentient beings. He addresses common obstacles, such as remembering a benefactor’s earlier kindness even when they later cause harm, and offers variations in visualization—taking different mental afflictions (anger, desire, ignorance) and giving back one’s body, possessions, or virtues. Finally, he connects tonglen to the development of bodhicitta, explaining that aspiration to help others must be paired with determination to achieve Buddhahood in order to benefit them completely. The session concludes with a preview of the ultimate aspect of awakening mind, to be discussed next.

What do we mean by that taking and giving? So while meditating on taking, first, one must visualize that one is taking one’s own suffering. Suppose if one has some physical and mental unhappiness or such pain at the present, one should think that by this present experience of this suffering, all suffering that comes in future, that comes in tomorrow, day after tomorrow, or in the future, may stop by my experience of this present suffering. So just to summarize, one was first visualized that by these present sufferings, may all those sufferings which come up in future be stopped.

Then after you could do that taking meditation on yourself, taking your own future suffering, as I mentioned before, then visualize your own present mother in front of you and think the kindness and the gratitude that she has shown to you. Think that by her gratitude and kindness, I could do this practice, do this meditation. And also think that present mother has shown you such same type of such kindness and gratitude in limitless previous lives too. And then after that, motivate to do the giving meditation. So and then we shall, that you are taking all the suffering and pain of your present mother yourself. And think that all her sufferings, the cause of suffering and sufferings, absorbing into your mind. And visualize that she has become pure, free from all affliction. And visualize that your mother has attained the Buddhahood. Now I forgot one point. While taking the sufferings of your mother, you should visualize this as if the black soot comes down when you cut the hair. It comes down. Like this, you are taking the such suffering of your mother. You know? So in the same way, after that, I mean, the same way after that, once you do the giving practice, that you are giving all your values and virtuous actions, such good karma to your mother, as though something in that realm has passed to your mother. So this is just the first stage to approach to that kind of meditation, giving and taking.

We did this giving and taking to just to one’s own present mother. You know? So after you could do well to your present mother, then you can extend the same giving and taking to your father, then to your children, and then to your relatives, then to your friends, then to your neighborhood, then to even then to your enemy, and all people of world, and after them to all sentient beings. So beginning from that stage, one should exchange until one could do the same to all sentient beings. So the process is same, but sometime while taking, while dreaming and while taking, one can wish, one can take sometime the desire of other people, sometimes the anger of other people, then sometimes the misconceptions. Yeah? So in the same process, one could do in bit different way of different visualization. And at the same time, while giving, sometimes one can visualize that one is giving one’s own this fully endowed body to other sentient beings and think that now all other sentient beings have got the perfect physical body to do the Dharma practice. Then sometimes one can do this giving by giving the things. And at that time, visualize that every sentient being is receiving the things that he or she needs.

And sometimes one can do like giving one’s own hand and such legs. So this can be visualized in different way. So as I mentioned before, at the first stage, one should do this practice to one’s own present mother, I mean, one’s mother. That doesn’t mean that one is discriminating the other beings. So, doing that first stage towards one’s mother has a great importance in respect to the, I mean, in terms of practice.

So to start that meditation, first, choosing one’s own present, I mean, parents is a great meaning, has a great point of significance, you know. Because once one, that present mother is, I mean, one’s the dearest, the most dearest in this life. And also one is fully aware of her kindness and gratitude. So, so if one doesn’t have such feeling at least to share one’s own happiness to her, then it’s very difficult to do this practice to to any other being. If one says that, that is just a lip service, you know. Because to one’s own mother is the most grateful to oneself in this lifetime. So, if one can’t, if one doesn’t, if one can’t, I mean, generate love and compassion to her, then it is very hard to generate loving compassion to any other being. Because one regards, I mean, her as the most gratitude, most kind to you.

So so without generating that love and compassion, I mean, to one’s own mother, then there is no any other way to generate, I mean, such love and compassion to other beings. So so one’s own parents are really the most gratitude, you know. So so it is needless to say about their kindness. It is also possible that sometimes they may give you some little, I mean, problem and show you some little disagreement. But at that time, one must not become completely dislike one’s own parents. Because their kindness is very great. So if one always remembers, keeps in one’s mind their kindness and gratitude, one won’t, I mean, retaliate even if they give you some such problem. So in the same way, one could do the same practice in many other ways.

Like, if you have a, I mean, good friend who showed you so kind to you before. And if he or she happen to disagree with you in a certain point, in a certain occasion, and at that moment, due to that slight disagreement from him or her, one should not show such anger. What to do is to remember his kindness and his gratitude that he showed you before. Always know the balance, the level of his kindness to you, then his harm to you. So that is very important. Because, I mean, many people forget what their friend, what, I mean, their relative or himself, I mean, have done good to them before and react when they do some slight problem to you. I mean, so the meditation of this giving and taking is equivalent to the meditation on love and compassion. So by doing that, one could develop the other-cherishing mind. So to generate the bodhicitta, it is not sufficient to develop only that aspiration to help other beings.

In addition to that, one must have a wish to attain the highest enlightenment. One must develop that wish to attain the highest enlightenment or the Buddhahood. Because without accomplishing the Buddhahood, one can benefit the other sentient beings in only an incomplete way. To benefit others intensively, one needs many powers and such qualities and such things. So only the Buddha had got all those such necessary qualities to help others. So realizing this importance of the true Buddhahood, and then when one generates an aspiration to achieve the Buddhahood for the sake of all sentient beings, then that is what you call the bodhicitta.

So now we have finished how the bodhicitta is generated through its seven causes and effects, and how it’s generated through the practice of exchanging self with others. So in fact, we are finished about the bodhicitta, or the, I mean, mind generation of mind awakening. So tomorrow, we will discuss about the ultimate mind generation or the ultimate awakening mind. As you know, the awakening mind has two aspects: the conventional aspects of awakening mind and the ultimate aspects of awakening mind. So the conventional aspect of awakening mind is the bodhicitta that we have finished. And the ultimate aspect of awakening mind is the mind which realizes the ultimate nature of phenomena, the emptiness. So we will discuss on that tomorrow.

Translation / བསྒྱུར།

This translation was generated using Gemini Pro 2.5 with a curated Buddhist terminology glossary and verified for register, glossary use, and absence of English leakage. The English transcript above remains the authoritative source.