Tibetan Buddhist Lamrim: The Initial Scope Meditations

A summary of the initial scope with links to detailed explanations of the five meditations.

The Initial Scope, Intermediate Scope, and Great Scope of Lamrim

When people are very young, they learn to crawl; later, they learn to walk; finally, they learn to run. Each skill builds on the previous one.

Similarly, the scopes of Tibetan Buddhist Lamrim, Initial, Intermediate, and Great, build upon each other.

Lamrim is the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment. There are no viable shortcuts, and the path itself has side roads to explore, depending on the practitioner’s past Karma and emotional issues they must resolve.

Someone could study a meditation handbook and attempt to master the advanced meditations of the Great Scope, but the likelihood of success is very low.

The Tibetan Buddhist Lamrim teachings on the initial scope focus on the foundational stages of spiritual practice and emphasize the desire to achieve a favorable rebirth and avoid the suffering of lower realms.

While the emphasis in the initial scope is on ethical conduct and virtuous actions, practitioners may also engage in basic meditation…