TONGLEN - TIBETAN BUDDHIST PRACTICE

Get to know this tonglen Tibetan Buddhist practice, what I do almost every day...

https://www.wired.com/2002/07/what-buddhists-know-about-science/

What Buddhists Know About Science

Tibetan Buddhists described advanced neurological concepts 2,000 years before science had the technology to discover them. By Daithí Ó hAnluain.

I WAS AMAZED a couple of years ago when I discovered Thong Len. I had a burnt hand, and (when I used) that technique, it was like an anesthetic had been injected into my arm," said Jack Pettigrew, a renowned Australian physiologist, at a Science and the Mind conference that was attended by the Dalai Lama.

Thong Len is a meditative technique developed by Tibetan Buddhists almost 800 years before the discovery of anesthesia. It's explained in that classic of Tibetan Buddhist thought, the Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. It works by imagining someone else's pain, like a burn, and drawing it into oneself. As you take the pain from others, your own hurt disappears.

Adepts of the technique are constantly practicing Thong Len, every minute of the day, drawing pain from those around them and enhancing their own sense of well-being. They've been described as "shit filters," taking negative energy out of the world and replacing it with positive.

"You can explain what might be happening when you anesthetize your own arm," Pettigrew said. "But people in a room with a Thong Len practitioner have also said they feel better. How do you explain that?" Scientists don't know, but they know it works, powerfully.

Pettigrew believes Western science could use Eastern introspection, or meditative techniques, to deepen its understanding of how the brain works and to provide practical help to people in distress.

In a host of fields, Tibetan practices have subsequently proven valid when science finally developed technology sophisticated enough to test them.

This established that humans perceive only what they are looking for, not what's there. Oh, and Buddhists figured this out 2,000 years ago, while modern science caught up in the last two decades.

The issue is not that modern science is dumb and Tibetans are smart. Rather, Tibetans have discovered many scientific truths through empirical observation. They also have many other techniques that still mystify scientists, but seem to work, like Thong Len.

Science is unable to explain them and is loath to embrace Tibetan techniques in the absence of proof.

"It's a phenomenon. But in one sense, it does indicate that there are a lot of things that we know nothing about in Western science."

Pettigrew, unsurprisingly, believes the Tibetans provide a clue to the solution. "If you go to Dharamsala (in India, home of the Tibetan government in exile), you go up through the fog in midwinter and you come out in the bright sunshine, it's like going to heaven. What strikes you immediately is the happy, smiling faces of the Tibetans, who don't have much, have been terribly deprived, and yet they are happy. Well, why are they happy?

"They work at it! They don't take their Prozac in the left hand and pop the pill. Monks have been studied by Richard Davidson, they are very positive, they've got no material possessions, it's a grind, it's cold, they don't have much food. But they are happy. They work at it."

That work is focused on introspective meditative practices that have been developed over thousands of years.

While Tibetan Buddhism and other ancient practices like Taoism have developed scientifically accurate explanations of some phenomena, the Dalai Lama has also said Buddhists can abandon scripture that has been reliably disproved by science. No creationist controversies here, then.

The Dalai Lama has an intense non-specialist interest in science, and he believes there are points of contact (with Buddhism) in cosmology, neuroscience, physics, quantum physics, and modern psychology. He has even opened a school of science at his monastery in India.

"I feel it is basically the Buddhist tradition to try to see reality. Science has a different method of investigation. One relies on mathematics; Buddhists work mainly through meditation. So different approaches and different methods, but both science and Buddhism are trying to see reality," he said.

"When I meet with scientists, it has nothing to do with religious faith. It's just theory or the experience of experiment. So, today's meeting is using reason only, not faith. I'm not trying to convert scientists to Buddhism, and they are not trying to convert me into a radical materialist!" (Someone who believes all phenomena are physical only.)

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https://www.lamayeshe.com/article/preliminary-practice-tong-len

Tong-len is the practice of “taking and giving.” It is a most brave practice to generate bodhicitta. “Tong-wa” is giving your merits and happiness to others; “len-pa” is taking others’ suffering and negative karma on yourself, right onto the self-cherishing thought and destroying it.

Taking on the suffering of others and giving your happiness to others is the quickest way to generate bodhicitta, the quickest way to abandon the oceans of samsaric suffering and the quickest way to achieve full enlightenment—having finished all the mistakes, the gross and subtle defilements, and generated all the realizations—and this is the quickest way to be able to free the numberless hell beings, hungry ghosts, animals, human beings, suras, asuras and intermediate state beings from the oceans of suffering and bring them to full enlightenment. For example, even though Maitreya Buddha generated bodhicitta first, Guru Shakyamuni Buddha achieved enlightenment earlier because his compassion was stronger.

When you do this meditation, it is the most excellent thought transformation and the best psychology for the West to make the mind happy no matter what problem there is mental or physical. It is the best treatment for the mind and, through that, for the body. Also, if you are sick this is the best healing and it is also helps heal other sentient beings.

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"On the in-breath, you breathe in whatever particular area, group of people, country, or even one particular person... maybe it’s not this more global situation, maybe it’s breathing in the physical discomfort and mental anguish of chemotherapy; of all the people who are undergoing chemotherapy. And if you’ve undergone chemotherapy and come out the other side, it’s very real to you. Or maybe it’s the pain of those who have lost loved ones; suddenly, or recently, unexpectedly or over a long period of time, some dying. But the in-breath is... you find some place on the planet in your personal life or something you know about, and you breathe in with the wish that those human beings or those mistreated animals or whoever it is, that they could be free of that suffering, and you breathe in with the longing to remove their suffering.

And then you send out – just relax out... send enough space so that peoples’ hearts and minds feel big enough to live with their discomfort, their fear, their anger or their despair, or their physical or mental anguish. But you can also breathe out for those who have no food and drink, you can breathe out food and drink. For those who are homeless, you can breathe out/send them shelter. For those who are suffering in any way, you can send out safety, comfort.

So in the in-breath you breathe in with the wish to take away the suffering, and breathe out with the wish to send comfort and happiness to the same people, animals, nations, or whatever it is you decide.

Do this for an individual, or do this for large areas, and if you do this with more than one subject in mind, that’s fine… breathing in as fully as you can, radiating out as widely as you can.

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https://www.skepticspath.org/blog/tonglen-meditation/

What is tonglen?

Tonglen is one of the “mind training” techniques from Tibetan Buddhism that reverse our ordinary state of mind of selfishly seeking happiness and pleasure for ourselves and those close to us. Instead, we willingly open ourselves to the suffering of others. In translation, tonglen practice can be called “taking and giving” one of the practices of exchanging self with other.

How do you practice tonglen meditation?

The practice of tonglen can be accomplished in a series of steps that grow in power and intensity, gradually expanding the scope of your compassion from one person to your close family and friends, to all sentient beings. 

To begin, first, settle yourself into a meditation posture, either cross-legged on the floor with your seat elevated, or seated in a chair with your legs uncrossed, feet flat on the floor. And then follow these steps:

Think of someone you love who’s going through physical or emotional pain right now. Imagine them sitting in front of you. Contemplate how that pain feels to them, what is going on in their mind.

Visualize that their pain becomes a sphere of dense, dark smoke that forms at the center of their chest.

Think how wonderful it would be if I could take away their pain.

What if the only way I could take away their pain would be to take it on myself? Decide that you would be willing to do this, in your imagination.

As you breathe in, the dark spot travels as a cloud of black smoke, gradually, with each breath, coming closer to you until it is a sphere of dark smoke right in front of your nose.

Be brave, let go of your own fear and imagine a bright point of light at your heart, emanating love & compassion, which are your true nature.

All at once, with an in-breath, breathe in the small black cloud and the smoke travels into your body and down towards that point of light.

The instant the smoke touches the brilliant point of light there is a great explosion of light, completely eliminating the problem as you breathe out.

Imagine light as love energy streaming out from your heart to theirs, giving them everything positive you have: a healthy body, a good environment, food, shelter, friends, family, peace of mind, good teachers, a path to inner happiness and a meaningful life, and even give giving itself. Rest in this.

Now we expand these feeling. Imagine a huge crowd of everyone on earth with this same problem. Imagine the problem seeping out of their bodies, through all their pores, like a dark cloud of smoke. These clouds all pool together like great, low storm clouds hovering over their bodies.

Generate a strong wish to take away their suffering.

Remember the light at your heart.

Breathe in the huge cloud over the course of several breaths. The cloud condenses and comes into your nose then down towards your heart.

The moment it touches the light/love/energy at your heart, there is a fantastic explosion of light rays from your heart in all directions.

As you breathe out, you give all that is positive to all these people. Focus just on the out breaths and rest in giving.

Now try alternating, taking on the pain of others on the in-breaths; giving everything good on the out-breaths.

Dissolve the visualization, come out of the meditation, and open your eyes.

How to practice Tonglen in everyday life

One of the most powerful aspects of the practice of tonglen is that it can be done in daily life. When you find yourself with some extra time, waiting, on the train, driving, or walking, you can become aware of your breath. As you breathe in, practice taking on the imagined pain of others. And as you breathe out, imagine practicing loving-kindness by offering those around you whatever they need.

Practicing tonglen meditation like this in everyday life can soften your heart and gradually reduce conflicts, calming your mind to help stay connected to others around you. And as a side effect, you become happier and more peaceful yourself.