46. Practice the five strengths, the condensed heart instructions.

This slogan and the following one refer to the Five Strengths, a potent condensed teaching about how to live and die. In this slogan, they offer us encouragement in how live our precious human life:

  1. Strong Determination: Life is practice. Practice is life. I am ceaselessly motivated to awaken Basic Goodness in myself and others and to be of benefit to all beings.
  2. Familiarization: I am familiar with the Dharma, so everything becomes a reminder of the path. I learn to live with awareness and sanity.
  3. Seed of Virtue: I don’t take a break from letting even the most difficult of circumstances wake me up.
  4. Reproach: I do my best to let go of ego clinging and transform it into presence.
  5. Aspiration: I continually aspire to infuse my whole life with these practices. In the traditional practice of Lojong there are also three specific aspirations:
    • May I save all sentient beings;
    • May I remember two-fold bodhicitta; and
    • May I practice two-fold bodhicitta.

Original Presentation || Commentary References

Point III | Slogan 14 || CTR 52 | PC 64