Teachings on the Seven Branch Offerings

In these teachings, Khenpo Sherab Sangpo, a professor of Tibetan Buddhism and Spiritual Director of Bodhicitta Sangha | Heart of Enlightenment Institute, instructs his students on the importance of the practice of “The Seven Branch Offerings”; teachings that include all five preliminaries from the Ngöndro (Preliminary Practices) and are part of Guru Yoga. Each of the seven offerings is an antidote to an attitude that obstructs the realization of the nature of one’s mind (buddha-nature). By practicing the seven branches, the practitioner purifies their mind of misconceptions and generates the causes necessary for enlightenment to be realized. In brief, the seven offerings are: prostrations (antidote to pride); mandala offering (antidote to miserliness); confession (purification); rejoicing (antidote to jealousy); requesting the teachers to teach (antidote to ignorance); offering prayers for the long life of your teachers (deepening one’s karmic connection to the Dharma and its teachers); and dedication of merit of all the seven offerings to benefit all sentient beings. After the teaching, Khenpo Sherab Sangpo guided his students in meditation by instructing them to be aware of the nature of mind and rest in that essence, a form of objectless meditation. When thoughts arise, he instructed them to look at the nature of thoughts and recognize that these thoughts are nothing but the manifestation of the nature of mind and to allow the thoughts to dissolve into that nature. He advised them to practice Guru Yoga if their minds are unable to recognize or rest in the nature of mind.