Sunday, June 22, 2025

Via LGBTQ Nation


 

Annie Jacobsen on Nuclear War - a Second by Second Timeline

Praised be my Lord, the Most High

Via Alison Elizabeth Marshall blog

 


Via GBF Dharma Talk \\ Accepting Impermanence Through Grief – Dave Richo

Our latest dharma talk is now available on the GBF website, podcast and YouTube channel:

Accepting Impermanence Through Grief – Dave Richo

What role does grief play in our understanding of impermanence? 

Dave Richo opens with the foundational Buddhist concept of impermanence, reminding us that everything—relationships, beliefs, identities—changes and ends. Drawing on teachings from Zen master Dogen, Dave shares how impermanence is not a flaw but actually embodies our Buddha nature. In this light, change becomes not just acceptable but sacred. Dogen's view that “the very impermanence of all things is Buddha nature” grounds Dave’s message that resisting change only leads to suffering, while embracing it opens us to enlightenment. This sets the stage for grief—not as something to avoid—but as a crucial practice that helps us process endings.

Dave outlines grief as a healthy psychological response to impermanence, made up of three core emotions:

  1. Sadness – letting ourselves feel the weight of the loss;
  2. Anger – facing the unfairness or hurt of what changed;
  3. Fear – acknowledging anxiety about what’s next.

He gently encourages us to face these with vulnerability rather than ego. Grief, when shared and expressed authentically, becomes a path to depth and personal growth. Using stories, metaphors like the “freeze frame” and “landing strip,” and even mystical quotes from Meister Eckhart, Dave weaves a poignant picture: everything is meant to be lost—not as punishment, but as a clearing for our true, unburdened self to emerge.

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David Richo, Ph.D., is a psychotherapist, writer, and workshop leader. He shares his time between Santa Barbara and San Francisco, California. Dave combines psychological and spiritual perspectives in his work. His latest book is Ready: How to Know When to Go and When to Stay (Shambhala, 2022). The website for books, talks, and events is http://www.davericho.com.

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Enjoy 850+ free recorded dharma talks at https://gaybuddhist.org/podcast/

Via Daily Dharma: Suffering Is Sickness and Medicine

 


Browse our online courses »
 Suffering Is Sickness and Medicine

Rather than medicine opposing sickness, emptiness sees in medicine and in sickness a mutual yielding and healing. That we suffer and share this great fact of impermanence together is profound medicine in itself, a medicine that releases compassion, love, connectedness, and forgiveness as the healing source. 

Susan Murphy, “Why Love What You Will Lose?”


CLICK HERE TO READ THE ARTICLE

Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Mindfulness and Concentration: Establishing Mindfulness of Feeling and the Second Jhāna

 

TRICYCLE      COURSE CATALOG      SUPPORT      DONATE
RIGHT MINDFULNESS
Establishing Mindfulness of Feeling
A person goes to the forest or to the root of a tree or to an empty place and sits down. Having crossed the legs, one sets the body erect. One establishes the presence of mindfulness. (MN 10) One is aware: “Ardent, fully aware, mindful, I am content.” (SN 47.10)
 
When feeling a mental painful feeling, one is aware: “Feeling a mental painful feeling”. . . One is just aware, just mindful: “There is feeling.” And one abides not clinging to anything in the world. (MN 10)
Reflection
Just as physical pleasure and pain are inevitable, so too are mental pleasure and pain. There is no use in trying to avoid mental pain, since it is an integral part of our experience, but it need not inevitably lead to suffering. Just as you might be aware of the pain of a stubbed toe and yet retain your mental and emotional balance, you can also turn toward and experience mental pain and hold it with healthy equanimity.
Daily Practice
Mental pain includes such things as sorrow and unhappiness. When we think about the loss of someone we care about, it hurts. When we open to the suffering of others, it hurts. Such pain is an intrinsic part of the human condition and is not to be avoided. Allow yourself to feel sorrow or even unhappiness and notice that it need not evoke unhealthy emotions such as despair or anguish. This too can just be held in awareness.  
RIGHT CONCENTRATION
Approaching and Abiding in the Second Phase of Absorption (2nd Jhāna)
With the stilling of applied and sustained thought, one enters upon and abides in the second phase of absorption, which has inner clarity and singleness of mind, without applied thought and sustained thought, with joy and the pleasure born of concentration. (MN 4)

One practices: “I shall breathe in experiencing pleasure"; one practices: “I shall breathe out experiencing pleasure.” This is how concentration by mindfulness of breathing is developed and cultivated so that it is of great fruit and great benefit. (SN 54.8)
Tomorrow: Understanding the Noble Truth of the Cessation of Suffering
One week from today: Establishing Mindfulness of Mind and Abiding in the Third Jhāna

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Via White Crane Institute \\ HUG

 

White Crane InstituteExploring Gay Wisdom & Culture since 1989
 
This Day in Gay History

June 22

Noteworthy
1985 -

Heterosexuals Unafraid of Gays (HUG) formed in Wellington, New Zealand.


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Gay Wisdom for Daily Living from White Crane Institute

"With the increasing commodification of gay news, views, and culture by powerful corporate interests, having a strong independent voice in our community is all the more important. White Crane is one of the last brave standouts in this bland new world... a triumph over the looming mediocrity of the mainstream Gay world." - Mark Thompson

Exploring Gay Wisdom & Culture since 1989!
www.whitecraneinstitute.org

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Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation \\ Words of Wisdom - June 22, 2025 💠

 


The truth is that behind the drama, here we are, no matter how poignant, captivating, dramatic, bittersweet it may be. Our work is not to get snared in anybody else's or our own drama, be it police, or the person who's suffering.

Can you accept total suffering, take on the karma of another human being, and yet not be attached to the melodrama of suffering? If a person is suffering, the only thing you can do for them is to find the place in them which is behind suffering. It's all you can do. It's all that's available.
 
- Ram Dass

Via Be Here Now Network \\ Ram Dass on Community and Satsang

 Ram Dass – Here and Now – Ep. 279 – Across the Decades: Ram Dass on Community and Satsang

June 16, 2025
Speaking through the decades, from the 1960s to the 2010s, Ram Dass shares his thoughts on Satsang, the community of seekers who come together...
Listen Now