Via LGBTq Nation

 

Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - January 30, 2022 💌

 
 

We’ve been talking about balance—that the game is not to push away the world, the game is not to get caught in it—the game is to, as Christ said, ‘Be in the world, but not of the world,’ to be simultaneously empty and full, to be somebody and nobody. It’s all these paradoxes you have to embrace. There’s nothing to do, so get on with it.” - Ram Dass

 
Excerpt from Episode 191 of the Ram Dass Here & Now podcast

Via Dhamma Wheel | Right View: The Noble Truth of the Origin of Suffering

 

RIGHT VIEW
Understanding the Noble Truth of the Origin of Suffering

What is the origin of suffering? It is craving, which brings renewal of being, is accompanied by delight and lust, and delights in this and that; that is, craving for sensual pleasures, craving for being, and craving for non-being. (MN 9) When one does not know and understand odors as they actually are, then one is attached to odors. When one is attached, one becomes infatuated, and one’s craving increases. One’s bodily and mental troubles increase, and one experiences bodily and mental suffering. (MN 149)

Reflection

The classical teaching of the noble truths is described in this text by cycling through all six sense spheres one by one, pointing to how suffering arises and ceases in countless individual experiences. Suffering is not a broad concept, but an intimate and fleeting experience. Every time you are experiencing something and craving it in some way, you are creating a micro-event of suffering. Today we are considering suffering in relation to the sense of smell.

Daily Practice

Smell is perhaps the least used of all the senses, but it is not to be overlooked as a field for practice. Are you capable of smelling odors without at the same time saying to yourself on some level: “This one is good"; "This one is bad"; "I want more of this one"; "I want this one to go away"? This is the invitation to practice. See if you can experience odors simply as what they are and not in relation to your desire for or against.

Tomorrow: Cultivating Compassion
One week from today: Understanding the Noble Truth of the Cessation of Suffering

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Via Daily Dharma: Uncovering Intrinsic Beauty

 When we’ve traced the senses back to the mind’s intrinsic radiance, every experience becomes the path—beautiful in the beginning, the middle, and the end, just as the Buddha said.

Kurt Spellmeyer, “Awakened by Beauty”

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Via Thich Nhat Hanh Foundation

 

 

 

Prayer for the New Year

Today, the 31st January 2022 marks the eve of the Lunar New Year, known in Vietnam as “Tet.” This was Thay’s favorite time of the year, as it always marks the coming together of our spiritual family in an intimate and relaxed way with poetry, gentle music, the hanging of simple poetic couplets, and “the fragrance of Zen.” When Thay first ordained and received the novice precepts, his teacher gave him the monastic Dharma name “Phùng Xuân” 逢春 which means "Meeting the Spring." In welcoming Tet this year, we will be honoring Thay’s memory and the spirit of “meeting the warmth of spring” in every moment.

Ashes of our teacher on the altar

As we welcome the new year tonight in our monasteries around the world, we will do as Thay always taught us to do, and present to the Ancestors’ Altar our formal aspiration or “New Year’s Prayer” for the year to come: … Dear Respected Thay, you are a beautiful continuation of spiritual and blood ancestors across the ages, like a lotus in a sea of humanity. In your whole life of practice you have made an infinite contribution towards peace in ourselves and peace in the world. You encourage us to come home to ourselves, to be present for one another, to be as one body, to breathe as one body, and to go together as a river. You bridge differences and fill chasms, and always find the most beautiful gems in each culture and in each faith in order to enrich our path of practice, and inspire in us a direction and a course of action to take so that we can contribute to humanity’s collective wisdom, so that Buddha Maitreya—the Buddha of Love—can manifest each day in the form of a sangha.   Dear Thay, as we end the year, and as your physical body may play hide and seek, we give ourselves permission to grieve, to cry and to remember you. At the same time we come home to the present moment, looking deeply to recognize you in each brother and each sister, each flower bud and new leaf, in each passing cloud and beautiful walking path—in the many wonders of life. Some of us have been your life-long students, some have been to retreats, some have read your books, and some may have never met you but have spent moments enjoying a cup of tea in silence or admiring nature’s beauty with clear eyes—in one way or another, we know you, Thay, and we can recognize you in our very own practice. Read the New Year's Prayer in Full

 

Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Intention: Cultivating Compassion

 

RIGHT INTENTION Cultivating Compassion

Whatever you intend, whatever you plan, and whatever you have a tendency toward, that will become the basis on which your mind is established. (SN 12.40) Develop meditation on compassion, for when you develop meditation on compassion, any cruelty will be abandoned. (MN 62)  The function of compassion is not bearing the suffering of others. (Vm 9.94)

Reflection

Compassion is an emotion to be felt, a "trembling of the heart in the presence of suffering." Its opposite emotion, cruelty, can come in strong or very subtle forms and involves the mind being unmoved in the face of suffering. Allowing yourself to be moved by compassion (as opposed to merely bearing or tolerating it) has a gradually transformative effect, softening the hardness of the mind and heart and allowing the habit of compassion to develop.

Daily Practice

Open yourself to the suffering of others. There is no shortage of opportunity for doing this in our world. But instead of noticing a tragic event or an injustice and then moving on to something else, allow your attention to linger on the suffering for a while. Open your mind and body to the unpleasantness of attending to suffering. It is okay to feel the pain of suffering without immediately trying to fix it. We learn and grow from this.

Tomorrow: Refraining from Malicious Speech
One week from today: Cultivating Appreciative Joy

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Questions? Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.

Via Daily Dharma: Finding Yourself in No-Self

 It’s not that there’s no self, because that’s ridiculous. You’re you, and I’m me. But the self doesn’t exist in the way we imagined it does. . . . Try to find it as it really exists, not as you think it should.

“The Zen of Therapy”, Interview with Mark Epstein by James Shaheen

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