A dish in the sink, a person lying in the street, people in pain all around us; we want to do something but we hesitate. The decision to cheerfully stop and help is described in Buddhist scripture as the step before ultimate love, or bodhichitta. And aren’t those who take responsibility even when its “not their problem” the most beautiful people you know?
Using a new translation of a text by the First Panchen Lama, Lobsang Chukyi Gyeltsen, called The Ship to Elysium, A Guide to the Practice of Chod, The Immolation of the Self, you’ll learn how to become that extraordinary being who embraces and enjoys taking responsibility, whether for the dishes or the planet. You’ll see that the result is a life full of sheer enchantment and unsurpassed joy.
And so all you little bumblebees,
Disciples of intelligence,
Hum yourself a thousand songs of joy;
Fly hither to this wondrous teaching
With single-pointed thoughts
Of drinking in the nectar
Which lies beyond all death.
-A Selection from The Ship to Elysium: A Guide to the Practice of Chod, The Immolation of the Self, by His Holiness the First Panchen Lama, Lobsang Chukyi Gyeltsen (1570-1662)
