No abstract given. Here are the first relevant paragraphs:
The bodhisattva path, in the Mahāyāna tradition, has been elaborately described in a number of ways. Reference is usually made to the practice of the six (or ten) perfections (pāramitā) (see 4.4.3). Sometimes these are correlated to the schema of progression through ten bodhisattva stages (bhūmi), whereby one moves from the first, the "Joyous Stage," through to the last, the stage of Buddhahood known as the "Cloud of Dharma Stage." Before embarking on either of these courses, however, a bodhisattva must first develop the thought of enlightenment (bodhicitta) or, more precisely, the "mind fixed on enlightenment by means of a vow" (bodhipraṇidhicitta). This event marks the start of one's aspiration to Buddhahood, and it can be understood as the initial experience of embarking on the path, akin to the step taken by the Buddha Gautama, in his previous life long ago, under the past Buddha Dipaṃkara (see 1.7.1 ). What was legendary and biographical in the case of Gautama, however, became ritual and meditational in the Mahāyāna and extended to everyone. This is significant, for though the arousing of bodhicitta was theoretically something to be done once at the start of the bodhisattva path, in fact, ritually, it became something to be repeated often, the repetition serving to renew one's dedication.
There are several preliminary phases to the act of arousing the mind set on enlightenment. The following selection from the Bodhicaryāvatāra [Entering the Path of Enlightenment], by the eighth-century poet Śāntideva, describes them well. The ritual begins with praise and worship of the Buddhas (magnified by the visualization of tremendous offerings), followed by a number of steps: reaffirming refuge, confessing one's faults and sins, expressing thanks for the merits of others, supplicating the Buddhas for help, and making a declaration of altruism leading up to a more formal bodhisattva vow. (Strong, "Śāntideva on Developing the Thought of Awakening," 175-76)
