Lo-jong
Mind training, the Tibetan tradition of mental and emotional cultivation: Part I

Geshe Thupten Jinpa: “Buddhism is not about emptying your mind. It’s about being calm and still.”

Scholar and chief translator for His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Geshe Thupten Jinpa, discusses the Tibetan tradition of mind training (lo-jong), which forms the basis of his important bookMind Training: The Great Collection.

The book is, in fact, a translation of an anthology of Tibetan Buddhist texts called lojong, or mind training, which is at the heart of mental and emotional training practices, common to all the schools of Tibetan Buddhism.

But first, let me give a little background in the wider context of Buddhism. Nowadays terms like yoga, zen, and meditation are a part of the English language but, at least on the popular level, almost every individual seems to have a different take on what the word “meditation” means.

For many, meditation seems to be understood as a form of relaxation. This is not how it is understood in the traditional Buddhist context. Those who come from outside and encounter Buddhism for the first time will notice that some form of training of the mind, some form of spiritual exercise, is at its heart.

Buddha summed up the essence of his teaching when he said, “Avoid all forms of destructive actions, engage in actions which are positive and beneficial, and tame your mind, and this, in essence, is my way.” In other words, training, disciplining, and calming the mind is seen as the heart of the Buddhist path or Buddhist practice.

And so, right from the beginning, there is a sense that Buddhist teaching, or Buddhist religion or faith, is not really a form of worship – faith in some kind of transcendental being as the foundation – but rather, the journey of the individual. The metaphor that is used is “the path” – a journey from one state of ignorance, from an unenlightened, undisciplined state of mind, to a disciplined, calm, compassionate, and more enlightened state of mind.

In a sense, what Buddhists are supposed to be doing is trying to understand what constitutes the content of the enlightenment experience that the Buddha went through, and how we can replicate that experience. What are the mechanics, what are the processes that will lead us to basically follow in the footsteps of the Buddha – literally... 

In our next issue, Geshe Thupten Jinpa describes how lo-jong can radically re-orientate our personality, attitudes, and thoughts so that we can shift from our habitual self-centeredness to other-centeredness.

This article is an excerpt of the full article printed in Mandala

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