Tuesday, January 27, 2009 at 7:13 am (buddhism)
Tags: impermanence, mandala, Tibetan
Each school of Buddhism has its own traditions, but they all point back to the same source, the same teachings.
This short narrated slideshow helped me understand the aspect of public ritual that is associated with the creation and destruction of a sand mandala:
Dissolution of the Chenrezig Mandala
As part of an exhibit at the Museum of Natural History at the University of Florida in 2007, Drupon Thinley Ningpo Rinpoche and Lama Konchok Gyaltsen Rinpoche worked on the creation of this mandala for two weeks.
Breathe.
4 Comments
Monday, January 26, 2009 at 9:31 am (buddhism, quotations)
Tags: Buddha, dharma, teachings
The flood — the river of suffering. How should we cross over to the other shore beyond?
I have heard that on one occasion the Blessed One was staying near Savatthi in Jeta’s Grove, Anathapindika’s monastery. Then a certain devata, in the far extreme of the night, her extreme radiance lighting up the entirety of Jeta’s Grove, went to the Blessed One. On arrival, having bowed down to him, she stood to one side. As she was standing there, she said to him, “Tell me, dear sir, how you crossed over the flood.”
“I crossed over the flood without pushing forward, without staying in place.”
“But how, dear sir, did you cross over the flood without pushing forward, without staying in place?”
“When I pushed forward, I was whirled about. When I stayed in place, I sank. And so I crossed over the flood without pushing forward, without staying in place.”
It sounds like Zen, but in fact this Ogha-tarana Sutta comes from the Pali canon.
Breathe.
4 Comments
Saturday, January 24, 2009 at 7:10 am (buddhism, practice)
Tags: india, prosperity, religion
In the country we associate with the earliest history of Buddhism, where today 80 percent of the population is Hindu,* there is a growing interest in Buddhism:
The faith that was started 2,500 years ago by a worldly, disaffected Indian prince, Siddhartha Gautama, is finding new adherents among the modern princes and princesses of the country’s prosperous élite. They’re facing some of the same tensions that have made Buddhist practice so popular in the U.S. and Europe. “As in America, there are all kinds of new pressures that are at work on people, all kinds of mental stress,” says K.T.S. Sarao, a professor of Buddhist studies at the University of Delhi. The wealth created by India’s technology boom has brought with it the realization that material comfort isn’t the same thing as happiness. Caught in that tender trap, Sarao says, “People turn to meditation.” (Time magazine, July 15, 2008 )
Everything is always changing.
And of course, there’s no need to give up your previous religious practices if you begin to practice Buddhism. So as the article points out, Indian Buddhists do not need to dissociate themselves from the myriad Hindu holidays and rituals that permeate the country’s culture.
Breathe.
*CIA World Factbook: India.
2 Comments
Wednesday, January 21, 2009 at 7:18 am (buddhism)
Tags: Buddha, dharma, Gregory Schopen, teachings, translation
I recently discovered another interesting Buddhist blog: “Dharma Folk.” A particularly good post there summarizes a lecture said to come from Gregory Schopen, a professor at UCLA:
As any translator is well aware, when you translate a text from another language, you are staking a claim on what was meant by these words. Every time there is an ambiguity, then you are the one the readers rely on to resolve this ambiguity. When you gloss over subtle meanings in the original text, you are implicitly saying that this nuance has no value.
We also should appreciate that for a few hundred years, the teachings of the Buddha were wholly and completely oral. That is, they were not written down. (The same is true of the Old Testament, of course, and famously true of the Iliad and the Odyssey). This is not to say that the teachings are unreliable, but only to remind us that it’s not as if we have a videotape of the actual words the Buddha spoke.
And even if we did — the meaning of words changes over time, even in their native language and original geographic location. An argument over the exact meaning of a term might be a fun intellectual activity, but we really can’t hope to time-travel back to 400 BCE, or thereabouts, and obtain the actual words spoken.
Breathe.
3 Comments
Tuesday, January 20, 2009 at 7:50 am (buddhism, practice, self, zen)
Tags: emptiness, no-self, thinking
I’m at a funny (funny = strange, not funny = amusing) place in my practice. I’m working to investigate the self, the “I” we all perceive. I expect that eventually this will lead me to an attainment of emptiness. The difficulty is to sit without wanting to reach a goal. I am struggling to investigate this “I” without having any focus on getting to the bottom of it.
This is “funny” because I believe that I know how to do this — that my training over the past year has prepared me for this stage — but at the same time, I have no idea what to do. Our instructions in the Kwan Um school are to ask “What am I?” and reply “Don’t know.” I asked a Zen master about this recently: If I’m asking and answering a question, I’m using words, and therefore, I am thinking. Is this correct?
He said sometimes thinking is necessary. And I experienced one of those “Aaahhh” moments.
Skillful means, yes? There are no shortcuts in Zen practice. You can’t jump-start to the thinking part before you have learned how not to think, to sit without thinking, and not to attach to thinking.
Still, this is damned difficult! Also, I have found that I am really distracted when I have a head cold, and I’ve just gone through my second head cold of the new year. I’m not usually one to get sick, so I’m frustrated by that, and doubly frustrated by my poor concentration. But everything changes, and the cold symptoms will be gone soon, and presumably my ability to focus will improve.
Breathe.
(For a post related to illness, see Meditating on Sudafed at the blog Dharma Folk.)
4 Comments
Monday, January 19, 2009 at 7:44 am (buddhism, practice, self)
Tags: no-self, relationships
Sometimes you’ve just GOT to link to a post: Holy Crap is one of those posts. John Herberger wrote about how having a wide-open relationship with the self is as hard as (harder than) any two-person relationship you’ve ever worked on.
Because just as with any relationship we have that grows deeper, the relationship with the self as it opens, brings to the surface all the dark stuff, all the shit, all the obstacles — anxieties, triggers, the raw-ness, the mistrust that comes from being in love and getting closer.
Yes, peeling that onion is not all sweetness and light. I find it a bit scary, because I don’t know what’s under the next layer!
It’s good that we only need to go one layer at a time.
Breathe.
6 Comments
Sunday, January 18, 2009 at 10:06 am (buddhism)
Tags: history, lecture, video
If you’re interested in the history and spread of Buddhism, this video is quite good. It’s a one-hour lecture by Lewis Lancaster, Professor Emeritus, Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, University of California, Berkeley.
Also, if you haven’t been watching The Story of India on PBS, you’re missing a great series. It’s not focused on Buddhism (except for the second episode), but of course the history of Buddhism is woven throughout the history of India.
Breathe.
3 Comments
Saturday, January 17, 2009 at 7:12 am (meditation, practice, zen)
Tags: mindfulness, sitting
Are you new to meditation practice — or are you just thinking about starting a regular practice?
Wildmind has all kinds of free resources to help you! I suggest you start on either the Meditation Posture page or the Mindfulness of Breathing page.
Breathe.
1 Comment
Friday, January 16, 2009 at 7:35 am (buddhism, practice, zen)
Tags: koan, path
Sometimes I feel as if the Zen master is blasting roadblocks into my neural pathways and requiring me to cut a new track through the jungle.
I stand there like an idiot, my parang (machete) dangling from my hand. I have the proper tool. My parang is sharp from continual honing! But seeing the roadblock, I hesitate. I — I hesitate. My hand and the parang know exactly what to do. Start hacking that underbrush!
But the mind wants to analyze. The mind assesses all the 10 directions and tries to evaluate the best one. Thence comes confusion and indecision. Second-guessing. Doubt. Clouds obscure the clear, clear sky.
Only go straight!
Breathe.
3 Comments
Thursday, January 15, 2009 at 7:37 am (buddhism, meditation, zen)
Tags: growing, learning, path, results, sitting
We sit only to sit. There is no goal. If you have a goal, you’re doing it wrong.
It’s a path, but without a destination. Without an end. It’s the path you’re already on.
Did you ever look forward to something ending? Well, was that something enjoyable, meaningful, beneficial? No? Hm. When we look forward to the ending, we are not experiencing what’s happening right now.
I would say sitting meditation has done me a lot of good — but not because I tried to get results. Sitting trains the mind to be different. And when the mind is different, many other things in your world become different too.
Breathe.
See also Sitting, and learning to sit.
2 Comments
« Older entries
