Review: Equanimity & recognizing others as our mother
57 Middle-Length Lamrim
Part of a series of weekly teachings on Lama Tsongkhapa's Middle-Length Treatise on the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment.
- Bodhicitta is a main mind with two aspirations
- Great compassion is the root of the Mahayana
- Overview of the sevenfold cause-and-effect method to develop bodhicitta
- Equanimity lays the foundation for bodhicitta to arise
- Eliminating anger and attachment toward others
- All sentient beings want happiness and not suffering
- All sentent being have been a companion in previous lives
- Friend, enemy and stranger are not fixed, but change
- Guided meditation on developing equanimity
- Developing conviction in rebirth and seeing all beings as having been our mother
- Questions and comments
Venerable Tenzin Tsepal
Venerable Tenzin Tsepal was first introduced to meditation in high school in the 1970s. While working as a dental hygienist in Seattle and hospital administration in Yakima, she practiced and attended retreats in the Vipassana tradition. In 1995, she found Dharma Friendship Foundation and teachings with Venerable Thubten Chodron. She attended the Life As A Western Buddhist Nun conference in India as a lay volunteer in 1996. Following a life-changing 3-month Vajrasattva retreat in 1998, Ven. Tsepal lived in Dharmsala, India for two years where she further explored the idea of monastic life. She received novice ordination as a Buddhist nun with His Holiness the Dalai Lama in March of 2001. After ordination, she was immersed in the full-time residential Buddhist Studies Program at Chenrezig Institute in Queensland, Australia, principally with Khensur Rinpoche and Geshe Tashi Tsering. As a qualified FPMT teacher, Ven. Tsepal was appointed the Western Teacher at Chenrezig Institute from 2004 to 2014, teaching the Discovering Buddhism series, tutoring for the general program and leading retreats. In 2015, she tutored three subjects for the FPMT Basic Program. Venerable Tsepal arrived at Sravasti Abbey in mid-January for the 2016 Winter Retreat. She joined the community in September 2016, and received Shiksamana training that October.