Mahayana Mind Training is not the same as study because Mind Training means to transform your attitude, transform your whole way of thinking and your outlook - entirely. Mere study, while beneficial, cannot change how you act, think, and feel. The Seven Points of Mind Training, by Chekawa Yesha Dorje provides practices to help us transform our minds. The main practice is “sending and taking.” The reason we engage in this practice is to cultivate loving kindness and compassion, which brings benefit to ourselves and others and is indispensable for attaining Buddhahood. The text also provides the foundations for engaging in this practice and guidelines and advice for bringing the benefits of this practice into our post-meditation world.

Khenpo Karthar Rinpoche’s teaching explains each of the seven points, drawing on commentary as necessary. Rinpoche first teaches the preliminary practices (Point 1) of guru yoga and contemplating the four reminders. Rinpoche’s teaching on absolute bodhicitta (Point 2) provides clear and profound practice instructions on resting in the nature of mind as well as on carrying the certainty from this formal practice into post meditation. With respect to the main practice (Tonglen, or Sending and Taking), Rinpoche begins with a contemplation to help us cultivate love and compassion, preparing us to engage in the main practice. This is followed by a beautiful and detailed teaching on the main practice of Sending and Taking (Point 2). Rinpoche then helps us take the results of Tonglen into our daily world by presenting detailed and easily-applied practice instructions. These instructions explain how we can use relative and absolute bodhicitta to work with adverse circumstances that arise in our samsaric world.

In the third and fourth talks, Rinpoche provides profound and concise commentaries on the remaining points and slogans. The Fourth Point offers condensed practices for life and death based on the essence of the Buddha’s teachings. Points Five and Six include slogans on measuring our mind training progress and slogans on understanding mind training commitments. The concluding Seventh Point presents slogans of Advice for Mind Training. In the final session, Rinpoche took questions from the participants, skillfully clarifying confusions. Translated by Lama Yeshe Gyamtso. Four talks and one Q&A Session on five DVDs.