I've found the following procedure to be useful in attaining the benefits of spiritual teachings:
(1) establish a good motivation; (2) stabilize your mind through meditation; (3) get the information; (4) establish an appropriate practice through analysis, synthesis, resolution and dedication.
Analysis (literally "taking apart") and synthesis ("putting together") are necessary because any good spiritual teaching such as the Lam Rim is rich in interrelated meanings, rather like Forrest Gump's "box o' chawklits" - all are sweet, but it is impossible to ingest them all at once without getting sick.
In a traditional Christian worship service you will hear four interrelated readings from the Bible: a Psalm, another reading from the Hebrew Bible, a reading from the Letters of the Apostles and a reading from one of the Gospels; then you will hear a sermon or homily that will provide advice on how to apply some of the points in these readings to your life as a follower of Jesus Christ.
The challenge after getting the information is to identify and then practice those points that are most suitable for your own particular stage of spiritual development. Here are some techniques that can help in this work during and after a Christian worship service:
- Stabilize your mind through meditation before, after, and during breaks in the service.
- Take notes whenever something in the service, even a hymn, strikes you as particularly significant. Don't try to write down everything, and don't get lost in speculation around a particular point - you may miss something! Just jot it down and let it pass, just as you do with wayward thoughts during meditation. Have paper and pencil at the ready!
- Reserve some time during the week to review the written materials from the service in the context of your notes. You may find points you have missed, or you may find passages that reinforce or correct the points in your notes (a good study Bible helps here). At Faith UCC, we try to facilitate this process by publishing links to the Bible readings and hymns on the Worship page during the week preceding the service, and to provide a written copy of the sermon along with the Bible links on the Sermons page early in the week after the service.
- You may find it useful to begin your review session with a short period of meditation and motivation.
- Identify one or points that "resonate" most strongly with you. This may be in the form of connections to things that you already know and practice (I find that the lam rim provides me with a framework within for making these connections), or sometimes in the form of an "aha" moment that rings like a bell, or sometimes in the form of a growing, joyful awareness.
- Synthesize the information by finding a word, phrase or passage that helps you link the new point(s) into your existing framework of knowledge and practice, and commit this mnemonic to memory.
- Resolve to follow the advice of Geshe Chekawa in the Seven-Point Mind Training: "Remember this by repeated recollection. Practice every activity by these words."
- Dedicate the practice of what you have learned with a mind calmed and stabilized by meditation. A simple dedication is: "Through this practice may I and every being be blessed."
