Taking and giving
Compassion and wisdom combined.
Taking in your pain;
transforming it into love -
sending it back now.
The practice of Tonglen 👇🏻💜
“Tonglen is a compassion practice. In Tibetan, tonglen means taking and giving. When practiced fully it combines compassion with wisdom. It is linked to the breath. When we breath in, we imagine taking all the suffering from all beings. When we breath out, we imagine filling all beings including ourselves with love and all that is necessary to bring lasting happiness. After we take this dark painful suffering from others in, we imagine it exploding in the center of our chest into light, in the nature of love and joy, that goes out filling everyone when we exhale. We can even practice tonglen when we see someone who is hurting. We imagine with the inbreath we take in all their pain and suffering. Explode it at our heart and send it out as light in the nature of love with the causes for love. This is a very powerful practice. It cultivates Bodhicitta. The full expression of Bodhicitta is unconditional love and compassion inseparable with wisdom. The wisdom to know all appearances as false, even the appearance of who we are. This deeper expression of tonglen goes on to enlightenment. Emaho!”
Barry Kerzin
