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Via Daily Dharma: Keep a Fluid Mind

 If the mind congeals in one place and remains with one thing, it is like frozen water and is unable to be used freely: ice that can wash neither hands nor feet. When the mind is melted and is used like water, extending throughout the body, it can be sent wherever one wants to send it.

—Takuan Soho, “The Right Mind and the Confused Mind”

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Via White Crane Institute // ALFRED EDWARD HOUSMAN

 

A.E. Housman

1936 -

ALFRED EDWARD HOUSMAN, English poet died (b. 1859); A. E. Housman's poetry is inextricably rooted in homosexual experience and consciousness and is also a significant reflector of gay history. In 1942 A.E. Houseman’s brother, Laurence Housman, deposited an essay entitled "A. E. Housman's 'De Amicitia'" in the British Library, with the proviso that it was not to be published for 25 years. The essay discussed A. E. Housman's homosexuality and his love for Moses Jackson. Given the conservative nature of the times it is not surprising that there was no unambiguous autobiographical statement about Housman's sexuality during his life.

It is certainly present in A Shropshire Lad, for instance #30 Others, I am not the first / have willed more mischief than they durst', in which 'Fear contended with desire', and in #44, in which he commends the suicide, where 'Yours was not an ill for mending'... for 'Men may come to worse than dust', their 'Souls undone, undoing others': he has died 'Undishonoured, clear of danger, / Clean of guilt..'.

More Poems was more explicit, as in no. 31 about Jackson 'Because I liked you better / Than suits a man to say', in which his feelings of love break his friendship, and must be carried silently to the grave. His poem 'Oh who is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his wrists?', written after the trial of Oscar Wilde, addressed more general societal injustice towards homosexuality. In the poem the prisoner is suffering 'for the colour of his hair', a natural, given attribute which - in a clearly coded reference to homosexuality - is reviled as 'nameless and abominable' (recalling the legal phrase 'peccatum horribile, inter christianos non nominandum', 'the horrible sin, not to be named amongst Christians').

Via Daily Dharma: Adjust the Description

 If the world is difficult and life is difficult, it may not be that there is something wrong with life or the world—it may be that there is something wrong with our descriptions.

—Norman Fischer, “Beyond Language”

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Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - April 28, 2021 💌

 

How does one become loving awareness?

If I change my identification from the ego to the soul, then as I look at people, they all appear like souls to me. I change from my head, the thought of who I am, to my spiritual heart, which is a different sort of awareness – feeling directly, intuiting, loving awareness.⁣⁣ ⁣

It’s changing from a worldly outer identification to a spiritual inner identification.

Concentrate on your spiritual heart, right in the middle of your chest. Keep repeating the phrase, “I am loving awareness. I am loving awareness. I am loving awareness.”⁣⁣ ⁣⁣

The object of our love is love itself. It is the inner light in everyone and everything. Love is a state of being.⁣⁣

You begin to love people because they just are. You see the mystery of the Divine in form. When you live in love, you see love everywhere you look. You are literally in love with everyone you look at.⁣⁣ ⁣⁣

When you and I rest together in loving awareness, we swim together in the ocean of love. Remember, it’s always right here. Enter into the flow of love with a quiet mind and see all things with love as part of yourself.⁣⁣ ⁣

- Ram Dass -

The LGBTQ National Help Center

 

The LGBTQ National Help Center is connecting members of the LGBTQ community with local, national, and international resources. You can also connect to hotlines, chatrooms, and peer support groups through them.

Via Daily Dharma: Dwell in the Present

Dwelling in a time other than the present starts to churn the ego: anxieties arise, desires become distractions, and to do things well is nearly impossible. But when there is no idea of time, there are no expectations, and desires do not become a problem.

—Les Kaye, “The Time Is Now”

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Via Daily Dharma: Knowing Happiness

 When we’re able to move beyond the fear of death, we’re greatly served in our efforts to know happiness in life.

—Peter Doobinin, “Sutta Study: Fearless”

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Via Lion's Roar // How to Read Buddhist Teachings

 

How to Read Buddhist Teachings

No matter where you begin, says Judy Lief, or whether you are an independent practitioner or affiliated with a particular tradition, all you have to do is to dive in.

Some people love to practice and hate to study, and other people love to study and hate to practice. Which type of person are you? If studying comes easy for you, it is possible to confuse intellectual understanding with real understanding. If studying is more difficult for you and practice is easier, it is possible to hide out in a vague understanding of meditative experience and fail to challenge yourself intellectually or to develop a sophisticated understanding of the dharma. So before you launch into further study, study yourself.

Via Daily Dharma: Act with Enlightenment

 For me the enlightened state is the realization of the oneness of life. And the proof is in the pudding: Are you functioning that way? Are you helping others?

—Interview with Bernie Glassman by James Shaheen, “Working in the Cracks”

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Sua...

'Sua generosidade chamará a bondade alheia em seu socorro.
Sua simplicidade solucionará problemas para muita gente.
Sua complexidade provocará muita dissimulação no próximo.
Sua indiferença fará manifesta frieza nos outros.
Seu desejo sincero de paz garantirá tranquilidade no caminho.
Seu propósito de guerrear dará frutos de inquietação.
Sua distinção edificará maneiras corretas naqueles que o seguem.
Sua espiritualidade superior incentivará sublimes construções espirituais.
Diariamente, semeamos e colhemos. A vida é também um solo que recebe e produz eternamente.''
 

André Luiz.

Drone images of mass cremations as India battles Covid-19

Via lgbtq Nation // Biden administration reverses Trump’s ban on rainbow flags at embassies

 

Secretary of State Antony Blinken told American embassies and diplomatic missions that they can fly the Pride flag again as well as “other symbols connoting support for LGBTQ rights based on what is ‘appropriate in light of local conditions.'”

It’s a reversal of the Trump administration’s ban on embassies flying the rainbow flag that even resulted in former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to force the U.S. embassy in Seoul, South Korea to take down its Pride flag.

To read the full article and more make the jump here

Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - April 25, 2021 💌

 
 

The romantic quality of love, which is between separate entities, is a doorway into deeper love. A lot of people experience a quality they call love but they’re doing it with their mind, they’re not really opening their hearts fully, they are loving, meaning I am attracted to… or I am attached to.

When we talk about love versus fear for example, we are talking about ‘being’ versus ‘fear’, or ‘unity’ versus ‘separateness’.

So I would say that when the fear dissipates you are feeling at home in the universe. Meaning your identity with your separateness isn’t overriding your feeling of connection with everything to the point that you’re feeling cut off and vulnerable - which is where the root of the fear is.

So as you cultivate that unitive quality the fear dissipates, so the relation is one between love and fear, but it’s not the love in the sense of ‘I love you’, it's the sense that we are together in the space of love.

- Ram Dass -

Via Daily Dharma: Seeing Our Lives as They Are

 We think we know our own life, but what we know is only an edited version, colored by our emotions and narrow vision. How close can we come to the original draft?

—Gregg Krech, “Naikan Therapy”

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Via Ordem Budista Sarvastivada // Buda pronuncia o Sutra do Grande Cundī Dhāraṇī

 

Ordem Budista Sarvastivada

Buda pronuncia o Sutra do Grande Cundī Dhāraṇī

O Coração da Mãe dos Sete Koṭi Budas

Traduzido do sânscrito para o chinês na Dinastia Tang pelo Mestre Tripiṭaka Divākara da Índia

" Certa vez, o Buda estava morando no Jardim Anāthapiṇḍika do Parque Jetavana, no reino da cidade de Śrāvastī. O Honrado Pelo Mundo meditou, observando os seres sencientes do futuro. Sentindo simpatia por eles, Ele expôs o Dharma do Cundī Dhāraṇī, o coração da mãe de sete Koṭi Budas.

O Buda então pronunciou o mantra dhāraṇī:

“Namaḥ Saptānāṁ Samyak-Saṁbuddha Koṭināṁ, Tadyathā: Oṁ Cale Cule Cundi Svāhā”

1. “Se, entre bhikṣus, bhikṣuṇīs, upāsakas e upāsikās, houver aqueles que defendem este dhāraṇī e o recitam 800.000 vezes, seus pecados, como os cinco pecados rebeldes acumulados em inúmeros kalpas, serão todos eliminados. Eles renascerão em lugares onde encontrarão Budas e Bodhisattvas. Eles terão todos os bens materiais que desejarem. Eles podem escolher renunciar à vida familiar em vidas futuras sucessivas e serão capazes de observar os preceitos puros do Bodhisattva completamente. Eles renascerão no mundo humano ou no céu, tendo terminado para sempre as jornadas da vida maligna. Os deuses sempre os protegerão. Se houver bons leigos e leigas que continuam recitando este dhāraṇī, suas casas não serão devastadas por catástrofes ou doenças. Seu trabalho será suave e harmonioso, e os outros acreditarão e aceitarão o que eles dizem.

2. “Se alguém recitou este mantra dhāraṇī 100.000 vezes, verá em seus sonhos Budas, Bodhisattvas, ouvintes ou Pratyekabuddhas e se verá vomitando coisas pretas. Para pecados mais graves, deve-se recitar o mantra 200.000 vezes. Então, a pessoa também verá em seus sonhos Budas e Bodhisattvas, bem como a si mesma, vomitando coisas pretas. Se alguém é incapaz de ter sonhos bons por ter cometido qualquer um dos cinco pecados rebeldes, deve-se recitar o mantra 700.000 vezes. Então, deve-se ter esses sonhos bons e até mesmo se ver vomitando coisas brancas, como arroz cremoso. Esses são sinais de purificação, indicando que os pecados dessa pessoa foram eliminados.

3. “Em seguida, irei agora explicar o procedimento para usar este grande dhāraṇī. Na frente de uma imagem de Buda ou de um pagode, unte o chão de uma área limpa com esterco de vaca, formando uma maṇḍala quadrada grande ou pequena. De acordo com sua habilidade, decore-o com oferendas de flores, incenso, estandartes, dosséis, comida, bebida, lâmpadas e velas. Para marcar o limite, recite o mantra para água perfumada em um recipiente e borrife nas quatro direções, também para cima e para baixo. Em seguida, coloque um recipiente com água perfumada no centro e em cada um dos quatro cantos da maṇḍala. Você, o recitador de mantra, permanecendo dentro da maṇḍala, deve ficar de frente para o leste, ajoelhar-se sobre o joelho direito e recitar o mantra 1.080 vezes. Depois, os vasos de água perfumada devem girar sozinhos. Em seguida, segure um ramo de flores com as duas mãos, recite o mantra 1.080 vezes, e espalhe-os todos na face de um espelho. Olhando diretamente no espelho à sua frente, recite o mantra 1.080 vezes. Então você deve ver imagens de Budas e Bodhisattvas no espelho. Novamente, recite o mantra 108 vezes para outro ramo de flores e espalhe-as como oferendas aos Budas e Bodhisattvas. Então você deve receber respostas para todas as perguntas que fizer.

4. “Para tratar doenças causadas por fantasmas, pincele o paciente com grama kuśa para a qual você recitou o mantra. Então ele deve ser curado. Para uma criança possuída por um fantasma, peça a uma jovem donzela que torça cinco fios de cores diferentes em um cordão. Recite o mantra uma vez cada vez que você dá um nó na corda como você dá vinte e um nós. Amarre o barbante com nós em volta do pescoço da criança. Recite o mantra sete vezes para algumas sementes de mostarda e espalhe-as em seu rosto. Então, a condição deve ser removida.

5. “Outro dharma é fazer um desenho do paciente em um pedaço de papel. Bata na frente do paciente com um galho de salgueiro para o qual você recitou o mantra. Isso também deve remover a condição.
6. “Outro dharma é para um paciente possesso que vive longe. Recite o mantra sete vezes para um galho de salgueiro. Envie o galho de salgueiro a alguém para golpear a foto do paciente em sua presença. Isso também deve remover a condição.

7. “Outro dharma é recitar o mantra enquanto você viaja. Então você deve estar livre do medo de bandidos e animais ferozes.

8. “Outro dharma é continuar recitando este mantra para vencer quaisquer disputas ou ações judiciais. Ao cruzar um rio ou oceano, a recitação contínua do mantra o manterá protegido dos animais aquáticos.
9. “Outro dharma é para uma pessoa que está algemada ou na prisão. Se ele continuar recitando o mantra, ele será libertado.

10. “Outro dharma é para um país atormentado por enchentes, secas ou epidemias em curso. Você deve misturar um pouco de manteiga, sementes de gergelim e arroz branco. Pegue uma pitada da mistura com três dedos, recite o mantra uma vez e jogue-o no fogo. Repita este procedimento continuamente dia e noite nos seis períodos por sete dias e sete noites. Todas as catástrofes ou epidemias devem ser eliminadas.

11. “Outro dharma é imprimir com um selo nas margens dos rios ou praias arenosas a imagem de um pagode. Recite o mantra 600.000 vezes, imprimindo um pagode a cada vez. Você então verá Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva, Tara Bodhisattva ou Vajrapāṇi Bodhisattva. Qualquer um deles pode cumprir seus desejos, dar-lhe o remédio divino ou conceder-lhe a profecia da iluminação futura.

12. “Outro dharma é circular a imagem da árvore bodhi no sentido horário enquanto você recita o mantra 10.000.000 vezes. Você deve então ter a visão de um Bodhisattva [sagrado] ensinando-lhe o Dharma, e você pode escolher segui-lo.

13. “Outro dharma é recitar o mantra enquanto você implora por comida. Então você não será prejudicado ou assediado por vilões, cães ferozes ou semelhantes.

14. “Outro dharma é recitar o mantra 300.000 vezes na frente de um pagode, uma imagem de Buda ou um pagode contendo relíquias sagradas. Além disso, no décimo quinto dia da lua crescente, faça uma grande oferenda e recite o mantra atentamente, sem comer comida por um dia e uma noite. Você poderá até ver o Bodhisattva Vajrapāṇi, e ele pode levá-lo ao seu palácio.

15. “Outro dharma é ir ao pagode onde o Buda girou a roda do Dharma pela primeira vez, o pagode no local de nascimento do Buda ou o pagode onde o Buda desceu os degraus de joias do Céu de Trayastriṁśa, ou um pagode contendo relíquias sagradas. Se você recitar o mantra enquanto circula o pagode no sentido horário, então você deve ver Aparājitā Bodhisattva e Hāritī Bodhisattva. Eles podem conceder seus desejos, dar-lhe remédios divinos se você precisar e mostrar-lhe o Caminho do Bodhisattva, ensinando-lhe o Dharma. Quem quer que recite este dhāraṇī, embora ainda não esteja em um bodhimaṇḍa, terá todos os Bodhisattvas como seus amigos benéficos.

“Além disso, este Grande Cundī Dhāraṇī, o grande mantra de iluminação, foi pronunciado por todos os Budas do passado, será pronunciado por todos os Budas do futuro e será pronunciado por todos os Budas do presente.

O Buda Śākyamuni disse: "Eu também falo dessa maneira para beneficiar todos os seres sencientes, fazendo com que eles alcancem Anuttarā Samyaksaṃbodhi (bodhi Insuperável). Se houver seres sencientes com pouco mérito, que carecem das raízes da bondade, habilidade natural (sem o direito capacidade), e os [Sete] Fatores de Bodhi (sem os [Sete] fatores de Bodhi), se eles ouvirem este método Dhāraṇī (Se eles tiverem a sorte de ouvir o Dharma deste Cundī Dhāraṇī), eles perceberão rapidamente a obtenção de Anuttarā Samyaksaṃbodhi. Se houver pessoas que sempre são capazes de lembrar, recitar e manter este dhāraṇī, todas obterão raízes incomensuráveis ​​de bondade. "

Enquanto o Buda estava expondo este Dharma do Grande Cundī Dhāraṇī, inúmeros seres sencientes evitaram a poeira e a sujeira [suas aflições] e ganharam a virtude do Grande Cundī Dhāraṇī, o mantra da grande iluminação. Eles foram capazes de ver Budas, Bodhisattvas e outros seres sagrados [em mundos] nas dez direções. [Os ouvintes] prestaram homenagem ao Buda e partiram. " ( Ven. Ananda Avalokita OBS / SBO )

 

Via Daily Dharma: Set an Intention

 It is vital to cultivate a good motivation, for this will profoundly influence the nature of your practice.

—B. Alan Wallace, “Tibetan Buddhist Meditation”

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Via Daily Dharma: What Karma Teaches Us

Karma teaches us that every action that we take has a very pow­erful impact. It also reminds us that the state of consciousness in which we live has a long-term impact on our own life as well as on the lives of the people around us.

—Anam Thubten, “Karma: Not Just Action”

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Via Daily Dharma: Develop Qualities of Admirable People

 Admirable people have four qualities: They’re virtuous, generous, wise, and believe in the principle that skillful qualities should be developed and unskillful qualities abandoned.

—Thanissaro Bhikkhu, “Skillful Shelter”

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Via Lion’s Roar

 

Learn about May 4’s National Buddhist Memorial Ceremony livestream

Buddhist communities and teachers from around the US are gathering together on May 4th for a livestreamed ceremony to remember Asian American ancestors.

Via Daily Dharma: Our Unmarred Nature

Our true nature is like the infinite sky, unmarked by whatever drama temporarily appears in its vast space. 

—Kittisaro, “Tangled in Thought”

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Via white Crane Institute // GEORGE TAKEI

 

George Takei

1937 -

GEORGE TAKEI, American actor, born; a Japanese-American actor best known for his role in the TV series Star Trek, in which he played the helmsman Hikaru Sulu on the USS Enterprise. Most recently, he played Hiro Nakamura’s father Kaito Nakamura on the NBC television show, Heroes.

Takei is also known for his baritone voice and deep-throated catch phrase, "Oh my!"  In October 2005, Takei revealed in an issue of Frontiers magazine that he is Gay, and has been in a committed relationship with his partner, Brad Altman, for the last eighteen years. He said, "It's not really coming out, which suggests opening a door and stepping through. It's more like a long, long walk through what began as a narrow corridor that starts to widen." Nevertheless, Takei's sexuality had long been an open secret among Trek fans since the 1970s, and Takei did not conceal his active membership in Gay organizations including Frontrunners, where Takei met Altman, along with fellow runners Kevin and Don Norte, with whom he became friends.

"We are masculine, we are feminine, we are caring, we are abusive. We are just like straight people, in terms of our outward appearance and our behavior. The only difference is that we are oriented to people of our own gender." This is said to have been taken from a December 2005 telephone interview with Howard Stern, in which Takei described Altman as "a saint" for helping to take care of Takei's terminally ill mother.

Alex Cho, former editor of Frontiers, has stated that the Takei article was initiated by someone in the Takei camp when a close personal friend called the papers to ask them if they would be interested in the story. The friend remains unidentified but according to Cho, Takei offered his story voluntarily and not under any pressure from the media. Kevin Norte and Don Norte, when asked if they were involved in initiating the article, declined to comment.

When asked whether his character Sulu was Gay, Takei's response was that he would like to believe that sexual orientation would not even be an issue in the twenty-third century. Of all the show's principal characters, Sulu was the only male never depicted with a romantic interest; having said that, in the alternate universe depicted in "Mirror Mirror", alternate-Sulu tried many times to seduce Uhura, and "normal" Sulu is revealed to have fathered a daughter, Demora, during the opening sequence of the film Star Trek Generations (Demora's origins were further explored in Peter David's novel Captain's Daughter).

Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - April 21, 2021 💌

 

It’s a very delicate task to interpret things like ego and fear because we tend to interpret from where we’re sitting, and we’ve developed these structures around it.

The root of fear is the feeling of separateness that can exist within oneself. The root of fear is within the model one has of oneself. That’s where fear starts. Once that feeling of separation exists, then you process everything from either inside or outside in terms of that model. Then it keeps reinforcing the feeling of vulnerability, because there are incredibly powerful forces moving both inside and outside of you.

The transformative process of spiritual work is reawakening to the innocence of going behind that model of separation that one has, that cuts you off, that made you a tiny little fragile somebody. A lot of the power comes from a freeing of our own fragility.

- Ram Dass -

Via Daily Dharma: Think of Everyone’s Needs (Including Yours)

 Crucial to the process of Nonviolent Communication is learning to listen empathically and to strategize ways to meet others’ needs as well as our own.

—Katy Butler, “Say It Right”

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Via SBMG / Edward Brown

 

Via Daily Dharma: Your Unlimited Mind

 Appearances occur in the mind, and mind has no limits. You cannot say that the mind has a center or periphery that is either large or small. The nature of the mind is that it permeates everything.

—Khenchen Thrangu, “On What Is More Important”

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POSTCARDS FROM LONDON - Harris Dickinson - Trailer - Peccadillo

Via Daily Dharma: Noticing with Kindness

In meditation, we are invited to not judge what’s going on for us, but rather to be in relationship with whatever is happening with a sense of kindness and commitment. 

—Sebene Selassie, “Meditation Q&A with Sebene Selassie”

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Via 💌 Inbox Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - April 18, 2021

 

Meditation provides a deeper appreciation of the interrelatedness of all things and the part each person plays. The simple rules of this game are honesty with yourself about where you are in your life and learning to listen to hear how it is. Meditation is a way of listening more deeply, so you hear from a deeper space, exactly how it is. Meditation will help you quiet your mind, enhance your ability to be insightful and understanding and give you a sense of inner peace.

If you meditate regularly, even when you don’t feel like it, you will make great gains, for it will allow you to see how your thoughts impose limits on you. Your resistances to meditation are your mental prisons in miniature.

When I asked Maharajji how to meditate, he said, “Meditate like Christ.” I said, “Maharajji, how did Christ meditate?” He became very quiet and closed his eyes. After a few minutes, he had a blissful expression on his face and a tear trickled down his cheek. He opened his eyes and said, “He lost himself in Love.” Try the meditation of losing yourself in love…. 

- Ram Dass -

 

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Via Lion's Roar // Detox Your Mind: 5 Practices to Purify the 3 Poisons

 

Detox Your Mind: 5 Practices to Purify the 3 Poisons

Five Buddhist teachers share practices to clear away the poisons that cause suffering and obscure your natural enlightenment. Introduction by Lion’s Roar’s editor-in-chief Melvin Mcleod.

I think what makes Buddhism unique — what makes it Buddhism — is its diagnosis of what causes suffering, which is called the second noble truth. Looking at the other noble truths, most religions acknowledge the pervasive reality of suffering, that it can end (if not in this life, then after), and that wisdom, compassion, and ethical living are a path to less suffering. But why do we suffer at all? This is where Buddhism stands alone, offering a real-world explanation that is simple, testable, and, to my mind, irrefutable.

Via Daily Dharma: Choose Your Response

 Our emotions aren’t up to us. What we do with them, however, is absolutely up to us.

—Ralph De La Rosa, “What Is Up to Us”

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Via White Crane Institute // CHAVELA VARGAS

 

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Chavela Vargas

1919 -

ISABEL VARGAS LIZANO (d: 2012), better known as CHAVELA VARGAS, was a Costa Rican-born Mexican singer. She was especially known for her rendition of Mexican rancheras, but she is also recognized for her contribution to other genres of popular Latin American music. She has been an influential interpreter in the Americas and Europe, muse to figures such as Pedro Almodovar, hailed for her haunting performances, and called "la voz áspera de la ternura", the rough voice of tenderness.

She is featured in many Almodóvar's films, including La Flor de mi Secreto in both song and video. She has said, however, that acting is not her ambition, although she had previously participated in films such as 1967's La Soldadera. Vargas recently appeared in the 2002 Julie Taymor film Frida, singing "La Llorona" (The Weeping Woman). Her classic "Paloma Negra" (Black Dove) was also included in the soundtrack of the film.

Vargas herself, as a young woman, was alleged to have had an affair with Frida Kahlo, during Kahlo's marriage to muralist Diego Rivera. She also appeared in Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu's Babel, singing "Tú me acostumbraste" (You Got Me Used To), a bolero of Frank Dominguez. Joaquin Sabina’s song "Por el Boulevar de los Sueños Rotos" ("Down the Boulevard of Broken Dreams") is dedicated to Vargas.

Her heavy drinking and raucous life took their toll, and she vanished from public life in the 1970s. Submerged in an alcoholic haze, she said, she was taken in by an Indian family who nursed her back to health without knowing who she was. In 2003, she told The New York Times that she had not had a drink in twenty-five years.

In the early 1990s she began singing again at El Habito, the bohemian Mexico City nightclub. From there her career took off again, with performances in Latin America, Europe and the United States. At 81, she announced that she was a lesbian.

“Nobody taught me to be like this,” she told the Spanish newspaper El País in 2000. “I was born this way. Since I opened my eyes to the world, I have never slept with a man. Never. Just imagine what purity. I have nothing to be ashamed of.”

On the eve of her Carnegie Hall debut in 2003, she looked back on how her singing had changed over her career. “The years take you to a different feeling than when you were 30,” she said in an interview with The Times. “I feel differently, I interpret differently, more toward the mystical.”

On the evening of her death in 2012, instead of holding a traditional Mexican wake, friends, fans and musicians gathered in the evening for a musical tribute at Plaza Garibaldi in Mexico City, where Ms. Vargas had spent many a night drinking with Mr. Jiménez. She would have loved it.

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Via Daily Dharma: Learn to Listen Fully

 In your daily life, notice the positive and negative habits you might have in your approach to listening. What helps you to listen fully and spaciously?

—Martine Batchelor, “Instructions for Listening Meditation”

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Via Daily Dharma: Developing Wisdom

 Wisdom has to do with seeing clearly, seeing things as they are, that is, coming to terms with the way things are.

—Larry Rosenberg, “Death Awareness”

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