The practice of Lojong has the literal translation of “mind training.” The great Buddhist master Atisha taught mind training over 1,000 years ago in the form of slogans. These 59 slogans are designed to be practiced in the hustle and bustle of daily life to retrain our minds in the ways of peace, compassion, wisdom, and bodhicitta (the wish to attain enlightenment for the sake of all living beings.) In this episode, JoAnn Fox focuses on the 13th slogan, “Be grateful to everyone.”

 

Be grateful to everyone. Who does everyone include? 

• Grateful to those who lift us up
• Grateful to All living brings
• Grateful to people we find difficult

 

A grateful mind is a happy mind. With such a mind, we see the wonders in the world and many possibilities. 

 

Being grateful to those who are kind or help us is easier, but sometimes we forget. 

 

One way to develop gratitude to all living beings is just to consider what we had at our last meal. We didn’t pick the vegetables. We didn’t build the truck that delivered the vegetables. We didn’t build the road the truck drove on or the roads that carry us home each day. We are connected to all living beings and benefit tremendously from them. 

 

With difficult people, we can be grateful for the things we learn from them. Only from those who challenge us can we learn great patience and resilience. They can also show us what we still need to heal. Our mind is like an open wound; others help us to understand that the wound hasn’t healed yet. Gratitude for lessons learned can be a great healer of resentment.

 

The sluggish and gluttonous simpleton 

Who sleeps and rolls about

Like a fat, grain-fed hog

Is reborn again and again. (325)*

 

In the past, this mind went wandering 

Where it wished, as it liked, and as it pleased. 

Now I will retrain it wisely, As

an elephant keeper does an elephant in rut.

—Buddha, The Dhammapada 

 

References

 

Buddha.The Dhammapada. Translated by Gil Fronsdale. (Kindie).Shambala, Boston and London, 2011.

 

Buddha (1986).The Dhammapada: Verses and Stories. Translated by Daw Mya Tin, M.A. (Website). Edited by Editorial Committee, Burma Tipitaka Association Rangoon. Courtesy of Nibbana.com. For free distribution only, as a gift of dhamma.

https://www.tipitaka.net/tipitaka/dhp/verseload.php?verse=325

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