Tonglen Practice When Things Fall Apart

"When Things Fall Apart" is the title of a wonderful book by Pema Chödrön, a Western Buddhist nun and one of the most respected and loved teachers of Buddhism in the West today.
We all have difficult situations at one time or another, I think what she has to say is important and profound. It comes from the Lojong and Tonglen tradition of Buddhism.



If you don't have access to the book, there is an online excerpt "When Things Fall Apart, Heart Advice for Difficult Times, Widening the Circle of Compassion"

In difficult times, we must start with openness towards a space where we do not cling to self-righteousness, blame others, caught in our own version of reality.
"When it hurts so bad, it's because I am hanging on so tight. What it implies is that pain comes from holding so tightly to having it our own way and that one of the main exits we take when we find ourselves uncomfortable, when we find ourselves in an unwanted situation or an unwanted place, is to blame."

Instead accepting our hatred and aversion for others as our own, "..... what we reject out there is what we reject in ourselves, and what we reject in ourselves is what we are going to reject out there. But that, in a nutshell, is how it works. If we find ourselves unworkable and give up on ourselves, then we'll find others unworkable and give up on them. What we hate in ourselves, we'll hate in others. To the degree that we have compassion for ourselves, we will also have compassion for others. Having compassion starts and ends with having compassion for all those unwanted parts of ourselves, all those imperfections that we don't even want to look at."

This is the result of our Interbeing , our interconnectedness with others. If we hate or are angry with someone, it means hating or being angry with ourselves, and vice versa.

"We start with ourselves. We make ourselves right or we make ourselves wrong, every day, every week, every month and year of our lives. We feel that we have to be right so that we can feel good. We don't want to be wrong because then we'll feel bad. But we could be more compassionate toward all these parts of ourselves. When we feel right, we can look at that. Feeling right can feel good; we can be completely sure of how right we are and have a lot of people agreeing with us about how right we are. But suppose someone does not agree with us?

On the other hand, when we find ourselves feeling wrong, convinced that we're wrong, getting solid about being wrong, we could also look at that. The whole right and wrong business closes us down and makes our world smaller."

Tonglen is "the art of taking and giving by breathing". It is at first, not at all intuitive, usually practice recommends breathing in prana, qi and all the good things, and getting rid of our bad things.
Tonglen is the opposite. Breathing in all the sufferings of the world, including ours, and absorb them in our hearts. Does it not make us sick? Yes, if it stops there. All the suffering we absorb must be "processed" in our hearts to become joy and bliss, which is then radiated when breathing out. We breathe in dark, heavy and hot poison and breathe out white, light and cool compassion. It works wonders.

Some points of the practice of Tonglen:

As you breathe in, take in and accept all the sadness, pain, and negativity of the whole world, including yourself, and absorb it into your heart.
As you breathe out, pour out all your joy and bliss; bless the whole of existence.
Understand your attachments, your aversions, and your indifference, and love them all.
When practicing unconditional acceptance, start with yourself.

Details of the practice can be found in: The Seven Points of Mind Training, Exchanging Self for Others , where you can find commentaries by Osho, Chogyam Trungpa, Pema Chödrön, Jamgon Kongtrul, Alan Wallace, Geshes Rabten and Dhargyey, and Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

Further references:
Wiki entry on Pema Chödrön
Shambhala