Under this category we share Living the Lojong articles with you.
Simply put, don’t try to be the fastest. Don’t turn everything into a competition. Spiritual growth isn’t a race. If we want to compete against anything, it’s our former selves. The wisdom of this lojong slogan teaches us to keep our focus on ourselves and not…
Another lojong slogan situated in the life of ancient Tibet: Don’t transfer the ox’s load to the cow. In other words, don’t pass the buck. Cows provide milk, but they are not meant to be load-bearing animals. That’s what the ox is for. So, don’t put…
Lojong slogan 33 can be translated a number of different ways. Most commonly it’s rendered “Don’t bring things to a painful point.” Other versions say “Don’t go for the throat” or “Don’t make everything so painful.” And like the slogans preceding it, it deals with the…
The 32nd lojong slogan says, “Don’t wait in ambush.” In ancient Tibet, being ambushed by robbers was a very real problem. So the wisdom of this slogan carried a lot of impact. It’s sneaky to ambush someone. It means hiding or waiting until someone is in…
This may be the most straightforward of all the slogans yet: Don’t malign others. Don’t talk bad about people. Do not criticize them, talk behind their backs, ridicule them. Don’t think the worst about them when you want people to think the best of you. This…
The 30th lojong slogan says, “Don’t be so predictable.” And while it sounds straightforward, this one’s got some unpredictable depth to it. (See what I did there?!) First and most directly, let’s talk about our hot buttons, those things that are sure to get us riled…
Lojong slogan 28 is pretty straightforward: abandon poisonous food. Traditionally, the primary teaching on this lojong is about keeping our egos in check. Don’t get so full of yourself that your good deeds become a little too heavy-handed in the self-righteous department, in other words. As…
The 28th lojong slogan, “Abandon any hope of fruition,” is the first one I learned. My teacher had it posted in the room where we spent most of our day. I didn’t like it. It felt, at first, pessimistic and unreasonable. As you can imagine if…
Lojong slogan 27 says, “Work with the greatest defilements first.” Other teachers phrase it as working with your strongest emotions, or your biggest problems, first. Whatever way we phrase it, the wisdom here is not leaving the worst for last. Often, that’s what we want to…
The 26th lojong slogan says, “Don’t ponder others.” Much like the last saying, “Don’t talk about injured limbs,” the wisdom here is about tending to our own stuff and not projecting that stuff onto others. Have you noticed how we can so easily find reasons to…
