Our first session of the international New Year, 2025 was dedicated to commemorating the parinirvāṇa anniversary of the First Karmapa, Düsum Khyenpa. His Holiness the 17th Gyalwang Karmapa, Ogyen Trinley Dorje, shared a beautiful verse on Facebook, on January 3rd. While it is difficult, if not impossible, to capture the profoundness and beauty of His Holiness’s writing in Tibetan, we wrote an English translation for our session, which we read together:
“Water cascading from the ocean of all that can be known in the three times
Flowing into a single vessel of omniscience –
The great sage who takes in the whole universe of appearance and existence at once,
Glorious Jetsün Lama, today I fondly remember you.”
— Karmapa, Ogyen Trinley Dorje
Resting our Minds, Opening our Hearts
Since Acharya Lhakpa Tshering will not resume his teachings on The Thirty-Seven Practices of a Bodhisattva until January 19, we began our session by contemplating the verses covered so far, along with additional quotes from the sūtras and commentaries by His Holiness the 17th Gyalwang Karmapa and His Eminence the 10th Sangye Nyenpa Rinpoche. Before discussing those, we started with the usual practice of śamatha (calm-abiding).
Reminding ourselves of the importance of our physical and mental posture, everyone present was encouraged to sit comfortably in an upright position—firmly grounded yet relaxed, not minding the past nor the future, resting in the present moment. Sitting with a sense of ease, everyone was invited to open their hearts and give rise to bodhicitta. Paying attention to the movement of our minds–what to do when there are a lot of thoughts and distraction or when we lose our mindfulness because of being sleepy–we practiced śamatha to let the mind settle. As Acharya Lhakpa usually says, simply be aware.
The Thirty-Seven Practices: A Lamrim Text
In his introduction to A Guide to the Thirty-Seven Practices of a Bodhisattva, Christopher Stagg writes about the format of Ngulchu Tokmé’s root text, which follows the lamrim, or stages of the path teachings. This means it stands within the long lineage of the Kadampa tradition, considered to be first taught by the great master Atīśa (c. 982–1054) who wrote the foundational text Bodhipathapradipa (In Tibetan: བྱང་ཆུབ་ལམ་གྱི་སྒྲོན་མ།), In English: Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment).
Ngulchu Tokmé is a later commentator in this lineage, which traces back to Atīśa via the great Kadampa teachers Chekawa, Sharawa, Langri Thangpa, Potow, and Dromtönpa, Atīśa’s main disciple. Like Atīśa, Tokmé’s text follows a key aspect of the lamrim teachings: He categorizes the various practices progressively based on three types of beings’ or (humans’) ability–lesser, middling, and great. In verses 8, 9, and 10, he points to these, which Acharya Lhakpa will likely comment on in his upcoming teachings.
It seems a somewhat auspicious coincidence to pause and contemplate verses 1 to 7. What we have covered so far can be taken as a collection of preliminary practices with one single wisdom intent: turning the mind away from saṁsāra and towards the Dharma. This ends with the verse about taking refuge–both outer and inner–as explained by Acharya Lhakpa during our previous session.
Lojong: A Pithy Set of Verses for Everyone to Cultivate Bodhicitta
Ngulchu Tokmé also stands in the tradition of lojong. Christopher Stagg explains that this genre “concentrates specifically on the cultivation of relative and absolute bodhicitta, and on working practically and directly with one’s personal situation in everyday life.”
To make the teachings workable for everyone, including those who have little time to study the many sūtras and commentaries, the text is composed in verse form and is only forty-three verses long. We can see this quality of the text already reflected in the first seven verses, which speak directly to our hearts. In his commentaries, Acharya Lhakpa further highlighted this by often relating the verses to our own lives and today’s world. Below is an overview of summaries of his teachings:
- Opening verses: The Heroic Path of Compassion: Meditation for All – 37 Practices of a Bodhisattva – session 1
- Verse 1: Seizing the opportunity: Embrace Life’s Meaning: 37 Practices – session 2
- Verse 2 and 3: Leaving Our Homeland and Samsaric Distractions Behind – 37 Practices – Session 3
- Verse 4: Embracing Impermanence – 37 Practices – Session 4
- Verse 5 and 6: A Poisonous Tree and a Waxing Moon – 37 Practices – Session 5
- Verse 7: Mirroring Ourselves: Finding Outer and Inner Refuge – 37 Practices – Session 6
The Meaning of the Instruction “Give Rise to Bodhicitta”
With verse 10 pointing to the Mahayana path, the remainder of Ngulchu Tokmé’s text presents the practices for those with the third and highest kind of (human) ability. Here, cultivating bodhicitta is put at the very heart of each instruction. While Acharya Lhakpa will surely elaborate further on this in upcoming sessions, we briefly looked at a definition of the widely used term bodhicitta.
In the great Kagyü master Gampopa’s Ornament of Precious Liberation, as translated by Ken Holmes and edited by Thupten Jinpa, bodhicitta is defined as follows:
“The ‘thought of awakening,’ an altruistic resolve to attain buddhahood for the benefit of all beings.”
Looking carefully at this definition, we can see that it is characterized by an object–the full awakening of buddhahood, and a purpose–the fulfillment of other’s welfare.
Furthermore, bodhicitta is typically divided into two parts, often translated as relative bodhicitta and ultimate bodhicitta. Whereas the first relates to the altruistic resolve, the second is about the direct realization of the emptiness of the fully awakened mind.
What is called relative bodhicitta is again divided into two, described by Gampopa as follows:
- Aspiration bodhichitta: the wish to attain the genuine thought of awakening.
- Engaged bodhicitta: the actual training in the thought of awakening.
At the beginning of our practice, we are typically invited “to give rise to bodhicitta.” Knowing the above may help us to understand what that actually means, realizing that it is probably already a great sign of accomplishment if we genuinely feel the wish to attain the thought of awakening (aspiration bodhicitta). Acharya Lhakpa’s usual instruction is, therefore, illuminating and greatly supportive: “Give rise to positive thoughts, thinking ‘may this practice be a cause for all beings to attain enlightenment.’”
Practice Brings Scriptures to Life
After delving a bit further into the background of the text and the thread of bodhicitta running through all verses, we had another look at the second opening verse: the purpose of the composition.
In a commentary by the contemporary Kagyü master Sangye Nyenpa, only available in Tibetan and translated especially for Meditation for All, the meaning of “sources of benefit and happiness” is highlighted in connection with “depends on understanding their practices.” What does this mean? First, he posed the question: “How are the perfect buddhas the sources of benefit and happenings?” This is about the fact that the Buddha not only came to the world but that he also taught the genuine dharma, “without it, there would be no genuine dharma for us to practice to begin with.”
So, we have the great fortune of a Buddha who came to our world and taught the dharma. However, that is not enough. Sangye Nyenpa somewhat playfully notes that we could stack many scriptures of the Buddha’s words together, yet, if we never study and contemplate them, forget about putting them into practice, that would be entirely pointless.
On the other hand, if we engage with one single scripture, it could remove our mental afflictions and deal with the root of our confusion. “If we somehow separate the dharma from ourselves, putting one thing here and another there, so to speak, there is no benefit whatsoever.” Therefore, Ngulchu Tokmé points out the practices of the perfect buddhas so we can engage with those.
I Have Given You the Lamp, but You Must Walk the Path
To further support the explanation given above, Sangye Nyenpa frequently quotes from the sūtras. During today’s session, we contemplated two phrases from the sūtras. Translated into English, the first reads as follows:
“I have shown you the methods of liberation. Yet, know that freedom depends upon yourself.”
Sangye Nyenpa comments that these two lines encompass all dharmas (in the sense of the teachings of the Buddha). It illustrates that the Buddha taught what to reject–misdeeds,and what to adopt–virtue. He also taught how to attain freedom and traverse the five paths and ten bhumis. Yet, Sangye Nyenpa humorously comments: “The Buddha can’t just throw a stone in the air and then suddenly everyone is liberated.” Liberation, he says, depends on us. For that, we need to practice.
The second line from the sūtras says:
“You are your own protector; you are also your own enemy.”
This is closely related to something Acharya Lhakpa also explained during one of our previous sessions. We may think of others as our protector or enemy. We may think that the hell realms, and so forth, are somewhere out there. We may think other forces lead us to fall into darkness and misery. However, as these words of the Buddha indicate, it is not like that. When we are very angry, our resident teacher noted, “hell is right there.” In this way, we are our own enemy.
This also means that if we engage in studying, contemplating, and meditating, as the very first practice of a bodhisattva, and work through the three higher trainings, then we can attain liberation and Buddhahood. In that sense, we are our own protector.
In concluding today’s session, we summarized Sangye Nyenpa’s commentary by saying that we must know the practice and put it into action ourselves, otherwise we will not be able to accomplish the genuine Dharma. Reflecting on direct words of the Buddha and connecting them with Atīśa’s teaching, we can say that, like Ngulchu Tokmé with our text, they have given us the lamp, but we need to walk the path.
Noting that we will do a contemplative meditation and look at commentary from His Holiness the 17th Karmapa, Ogyen Trinley Dorje, during our next session, we ended today’s Meditation for All with the dedication of merit: May we follow in the footsteps of the First Karmapa, and all attain the state of omniscient Buddhahood.