Lojong Practice Journal: Train Wholeheartedly
The 59 Slogans through a social justice lens
One of the most impactful teachings I’ve ever encountered was from a talk by Ani Pema where she said: “If death is certain, and the time until death is uncertain, what’s the most important thing?”
While this isn’t a central teaching in my practice these days, for over a year it was a question I asked myself every single day. Knowing I will die, knowing all things are impermanent, knowing that anyone I love could be gone in the next breath, what is the most important thing? Knowing that change is constant, that we are interconnected, and that our choices matter, what is the most important thing? Knowing that we are all subject to reality and reality is swiftly shifting and indifferent, what is the most important thing?
To train wholeheartedly is to orient ourselves to what is most important every day, every moment. The most important thing is collective liberation — trans liberation, queer liberation, Black and Indigenous liberation — and every day I am alive is a day I can contribute to that. Asking myself what the most important thing is, knowing that death is inevitable but not a fixed point on the calendar of my life, has been essential to discovering my North Star:
I want us to be free.
How we train is deeply personal — ultimately you know the context of your life the best — and also has a far-reaching impact. The choices we make and how we inform those choices will ripple out to family, friends and colleagues, and therefore the broader culture and society in which we are situated.
To train wholeheartedly is to see the future as unwritten and that every moment we have the opportunity to contribute to what is unfolding. To train wholeheartedly is to recognize that our choices matter and as long as we are alive, it is never too late to cultivate compassion, kindness, and the kind of abiding love that is borne of knowing we are interconnected. As long as we are alive, it is never too late to cultivate our awakening.
Originally published on Medium.
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While I have no urge or desire to die right now, I do feel the necessity to prepare for death. I could die any moment – because of an accident, an aneurism, a crime – life is so fragile. Life is fragile and precious. If we really contemplate this, our heart opens up to all beings and we become gentle and soft. We wouldn't want to hurt anyone or anything.
I guess it would be easy to understand "training wholeheartedly" to mean to train with great effort, the way we think of a work-out at the gym. Afterwards we're all sweaty and exhausted. But there is no effort involved. Contraction is work, opening up and letting go is release. To "train wholeheartedly" means to go to our heart and allow the compassion and tenderness that reside there to flow freely. That's what life is all about. That is the most important thing. Everything else follows from that, and that is the way I want to live.