Basic Meaning
The aspirational mind that aspires to attain enlightenment for the welfare of all beings
Has the sense of
One of the subdivisions of relative bodhicitta, this is the mind that aspires to attain enlightenment for the sake of all other sentient beings. Specifically, here, it is at the level of aspiration, so it is the mere wish that we attain enlightenment in order to most effectively be able to help all other beings.
In verse 16 of the first chapter of The Way of the Bodhisattva (Bodhicaryāvatāra), Śāntideva introduces a crucial division of the relative bodhicitta into two types: aspiring bodhicitta and engaged bodhicitta. Śāntideva uses a simple analogy to distinguish this difference:
As corresponding to the wish to go
And then to setting out,
The wise should understand respectively
The difference that divides these two.
In this analogy of a journey, aspiring bodhicitta is the mind that wishes to set out on the path but has not yet begun to actually walk it.
