Words of My Perfect Teacher - Week 18 (Bodhicitta III) - includes DJKR Moscow teaching on Bodhicitta from 17 July

On 25 July, we continued Patrul Rinpoche's commentary on the Longchen Nyingtik ngöndro,The Words of My Perfect Teacher, continuing with Chapter Two, "Arousing Bodhicitta: The Root of the Great Vehicle" (continuing with section III.2, "Training in the bodhicitta of application: the six transcendent perfections", starting at "Transcendent concentration", p.248 in the First Edition).

We started by listening to and discussing Rinpoche's teaching on bodhicitta given in Moscow on 17 July, which was part of his ngöndro teaching on The Excellent Path to Enlightenment (Rinpoche's teaching is included as part of the recording of today's conversation).

The topics we talked about included:

• The importance of aspiration bodhicitta and not being too hard (or too loose) with oneself
• Reducing the distinctions among the Eight Worldly Dharmas during the journey towards realising ultimate bodhicitta
• The importance of giving up distractions and creating a protected space (or retreat boundary) in order to support one's practice (see section III.2.5.1 "Giving up distractions" in The Words of My Perfect Teacher)
• How any action includes all six paramitas, and how we can use this as a checklist to check our own practice of application bodhicitta (see section III.2.6.3 "Wisdom through meditation" in The Words of My Perfect Teacher)
• Atisha's teaching that "The best diligence is to give up activities"
• Jigme Lingpa's teaching that "Transcendent generosity is found in contentment; its essence is simply letting go"

A recording of our conversation is available here.