“Now I will banish all the blames onto one source;
And to all beings I will contemplate their great kindness
I will take into myself the undesirable qualities of others
And dedicate my virtuous roots for the benefit of all beings.”

— attributed to Dharmarakṣita, “The Wheel of Sharp Weapons,” verse 94, in Thupten Jinpa, Mind Training: The Great Collection.

Lojong
བློ་སྦྱོང་
blo sbyong

Lojong. Mind Training. The Mahayana meditation system of the early Kadampa School as brought to Tibet by Atisha Dipamkara (Rangjung Yeshe)

A spiritual training in which one cleanses disturbing attitudes from one’s mind and trains to replace them with constructive attitudes. Also called: cleansing of attitudes, mind-training, Lojong. (Berzin Definitions)

  • “Lojong.” Encyclopedia of Buddhism. encyclopediaofbuddhism.org
  • “Mind Training.” Study Buddhism by Berzin Archives. studybuddhism.com
  • Sweet, Michael. 1996. “Mental Purification (Blo sbyong): A Native Tibetan Genre of Religious Literature.” In Cabezón and Jackson, Tibetan Literature: Studies in Genre. Snow Lion. JABL

Subject Guide Sections

  • Lojong Texts 
  • Lojong Literature
  • Instructions for Tonglen
  • Other Resources

JABL Subject Headings

Lojong Texts for Download

Bodhisattva Garland of Gems
byang sems nor bu’i ‘phreng pa
བྱང་སེམས་ནོར་བུའི་འཕྲེང་བ།
Atiśa Dīpaṃkara
Tibetan  English (Lotsawa House)

Eight Verses of Training the Mind
blo sbyong tshig brgyad ma 
བློ་སྦྱོང་ཚིག་བརྒྱད་མ།
Geshe Langri Thangpa
Tibetan  English (Lotsawa House)

 

Seven Points of Mind Training
theg pa chen po blo sbyong don bdun ma
ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོ་བློ་སྦྱོང་དོན་བདུན་མ།
Geshe Chekawa Yeshe Dorje
Tibetan  English (Lotsawa House)

Thirty-Seven Practices of All Bodhisattvas
rgyal sras lag len so bdun ma
རྒྱལ་སྲས་ལག་ལེན་སོ་བདུན་མ།
Gyalse Tokme Zangpo
Tibetan  English (Lotsawa House)

Wheel of Sharp Weapons
theg-pa-chen-pohi-blo-sbyong mtson-cha-hkhor-lo’
ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོཧི་བློ་སྦྱོང་མཙོན་ཆ་ཧཁོར་ལོ།
Dharmarakṣita
lamayeshe.com – gandenforthewest.org –  studybuddhism.com

Lojong Literature

Thupten Jinpa. 2006. Mind Training: The Great Collection. Wisdom Publications w/ Institute of Tibetan Classics. JABL

Thupten Jinpa. 2011. Essential Mind Training: Tibetan Wisdom for Daily Life. Wisdom Publications. JABL

Eight Verses of Mind Training

Bstan-‘dzin-rgya-mtsho, Dalai Lama XIV and Matthew Pistano. 1999. Lojong: Training the Mind. Wisdom Publications. JABL

Bstan-‘dzin-rgya-mtsho, Dalai Lama XIV, and Thupten Jinpa, trans. 2000. Transforming the Mind: Eight Verses on Generating Compassion and Transforming Your Life. Thorsons/Harper Collins. JABL

Gyeltsen, Geshe Tsultim. 1989. Keys to Great Enlightenment: Commentaries on Kadam Geshe Langri Tangpa’s Eight Verses of Thought Training & Bodhisattva Togmey Zangpo’s The Thirty-seven Bodhisattva Practices. Thubten Dhargye Ling Publications. JABL

Thubten Zopa, Rinpoche. 2013. Transforming Problems into Happiness. Simon and Schuster. JABL

Seven-point Mind Training

Nam-mkha-dpal, Hor-ston (Nam-kha Pel) and Brian Beresford, trans. 2019. Mind Training Like the Rays of the Sun = blo-byong nyi-ma’i ‘od-zer. Library of Tibetan Works & Archives. JABL

Jampa Tegchok, Geshe and Stephen Carlier, trans. 2006. The Kindness of Others: A Commentary on the Seven-point Mind Training. Lama Yeshe Archive. JABL

Wheel of Sharp Weapons 

Lhundup Sopa, Geshe, Michael J. (Michael Jay) Sweet, and Leonard. Zwilling. 2001. Peacock in the Poison Grove: Two Buddhist Texts on Training the Mind; the Wheel Weapon (mtshon chaʼkhor lo) and the Poison-Destroying Peacock (rma bya dug ʼjoms) Attributed to Dharmarakṣita. Wisdom Publications. JABL

Thupten Jinpa. 2005. “The Wheel of Sharp Weapons.” In Jinpa, ed., Mind Training: The Great Collection. Wisdom Publications. JABL

“Wheel Blade of Mind Transformation.” Encyclopedia of Buddhism. encyclopediaofbuddhism.org

Instructions for Tonglen

Pema Chödrön:

Other Resources

“Dharmarakshita.” Study Buddhism by Berzin Archives. studybuddhism.com

Gardner, Alexander. 2009. “Atiśa Dīpaṃkara.” Treasury of Lives.  treasuryoflives.org

Ngawang Dhargyey, Alexander Berzin, and Sharpa Tulku. 1982. “The Life of Atisha.” From Anthology of Well-Spoken Advice. Library of Tibetan Works & Archives. JABL (studybuddhism.com)