Dharma Roadside Dialogue. Some of the Positive Mental Events

Dear friends,

Let us meet once more for our monthly dialogue.

Saturday february 22nd, 2025  at 1:30 pm East coast time (EST),  7:30 pm European time (CET).

Join us for a 90mn session of questions and answers by clicking this link:

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/88203132402

This month topic will be:

Some of the Positive Mental Events

Pliancy  

The Tibetan word for ‘pliancy’ or ‘flexibility’, shin jang, means that you have some sense of how to ride your own mind. At first, you learn how to tame your mind. Having tamed your mind, you learn how to make friends with it. And having made friends with it, you learn how to make use of it.

Shin jang is a very important term. It is often referred to as the fruition, or the complete accomplishment of shamatha, your mind is soothed, your body is completely relaxed.

But here, shin jang as an antidote is what you could call ‘early’ shin jang. Here, you are simply learning to make friends with yourself.

You have some sense of relaxation and some sense of trust in yourself. You have become less paranoid about your own mind. You realize that your mind is workable and that there is an end to suffering from your mind, of your mind, with your mind, and by your mind.

Dignity, Self-respect, Sense of shame or personal integrity

Tib. ངོ་ཚ་ཤེས་པ་ནི་བདག་གམ་ཆོས་རྒྱུ་མཚན་དུ་བྱས་ཏེ་ཁ་ན་མ་ཐོ་བ་ལ་འཛེམ་པ་ཉེས་སྤྱོད་སྡོམ་པའི་རྟེན་བྱེད་པའི་ལས་ཅན་ནོ།

Dignity is the attitude of refraining from unwholesome actions (or misdeeds) on account of one’s own [conscience] and [trust in] the Dharma. Its function is to support one in refraining from negative actions.

Propriety, Sense of decency  

Tib. ཁྲེལ་ཡོད་པ་ནི་གཞན་ནམ་འཇིག་རྟེན་རྒྱུ་མཚན་དུ་བྱས་ཏེ་ཁ་ན་མ་ཐོ་བ་ལ་འཛེམ་པའི་ལས་ཅན་ནོ།

Propriety has the function of causing one to refrain from misdeeds, either because of being reproached by other [noble] people or by the world.

It is the attitude of refraining from unwholesome actions out of concern for others.