Sunday, April 19, 2020

Via Daily Dharma: Changing Your Mind’s Patterns

Purification is not about being pure. Purification is about changing our relationship with the reactive patterns that run our lives. 

—Ken McLeod,“Forgiveness Is Not Buddhist”

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Via Sounds True // [New Podcast] Meet Tara, the Beloved Female Buddha

According to Dr. Rachael Wooten, a Zurich-trained Jungian analyst and author of the new book Tara: The Liberating Power of the Female Buddha:

Tara: The Liberating Power of the Female Buddha
Tara appears in a beautiful, subtle body of green light, and she appears with her right foot forward. That right foot forward symbolizes that she's ready to come the minute you think of her. In the tradition, the idea is that Tara is already here, but if we're not thinking of her, we don't really know that. When we think of her … we might say her mantra, we might visualize her … then she's instantaneously ready to come to our assistance.


Dr. Rachel Wooten reports that some people, when they hear about Tara, about her origin story or her mantra, or when they see a picture of one of her emanations, feel an immediate draw to connect in a deeper way. If you are one of those people, I encourage you to follow your instinct and explore your own connection with this inner and outer presence that is always available and known in Tibetan as Dolma, "She Who Liberates, the One Who Brings Us Across." You can listen to the podcast here.

Saturday, April 18, 2020

Via Daily Dharma: How Mindfulness Can Benefit Your Life

When the Buddha taught mindfulness, he always taught it as part of a whole. He never said, “Pay attention to your breath and you will be free of suffering.” More like, “Pay attention to your breath as a way of steadying the mind, and then look at your life.”

—Craig Hase and Devon Hase, “In Brief”

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Friday, April 17, 2020

Via One Earth Sangha

May our fierce and tender longing
fuel the fire in our souls. When we
stand side by side, let us dare to focus
our desire on the truth.
 

— from Danna Faulds "Sangha"

Via Tricycle: What If Buddha and Jesus Were Roommates?





An award-winning manga about the Buddha and Jesus living in modern Tokyo, now available in English, offers a humorous yet profound commentary on the role of religion in contemporary life.

Via Daily Dharma: Let Go of What You Cannot Change




Why be unhappy about something
If it can be remedied?
And what is the use of being unhappy about something
If it cannot be remedied?


—Shantideva,“Shantideva Patience”

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Thursday, April 16, 2020

Via Daily Dharma: Realizing that Thoughts Are Not Facts

Once we recognize that thoughts are empty, the mind will no longer have the power to deceive us. 

—Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche, “Teachings on the Nature of Mind and Practice”

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Wednesday, April 15, 2020

Via FB:


Via FB;


Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation / Words of Wisdom - April 15, 2020 💌





"If we only work with our intellects and with the emptying of our minds, as in some yogas, and we fail to open our hearts, our journey becomes very dry and brittle. Ultimately, no matter what our methods, we have to find a very even balance between our energy, heart, and mind. "

- Ram Dass -

Via Daily Dharma: How to Turn Suffering into Connection

Compassion allows us to use our own pain and the pain of others as a vehicle for connection. 

—Sharon Salzberg, “A Quiver of the Heart”

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Monday, April 13, 2020

Via Daily Dharma: Embarking on an Optimistic Path

Buddhism is a path of supreme optimism, for one of its basic tenets is that no human life or experience is to be wasted or forgotten, but all should be transformed into a source of wisdom and compassionate living.

—Taitetsu Unno, “Number One Fool”

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Sunday, April 12, 2020

Via Daily Dharma: How to Develop Real Intimacy

There is no such thing as two people—whether baby and mother, two lovers, or teacher and student—being perfectly in sync with each other’s needs and wishes. Real intimacy arises from an ongoing process of connection that at some point is disrupted and then, ideally, repaired.

—Pilar Jennings, “Looking into the Eyes of a Master”

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Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation / Words of Wisdom - April 12, 2020 💌





"Over the years we develop strong habits of perceiving the universe, and we come to be very secure within these habits. We selectively perceive our environment in ways that reinforce them. This collection of habits is what we call ego. But meditation breaks the ego down. As we begin to see through it we can become confused as to what reality is. What once seemed absolute now begins to seem relative.
When this happens, some people get confused; others fear they may be going insane. The best strategy for dealing with this disorientation is to note it and let it be. The path to freedom is through detachment from your old habits of ego.

Slowly you will arrive at a new and more profound integration of your experience in a more evolved structure of the universe. That is, you will flow beyond the boundaries of your ego until ultimately you merge into the universe. Until then you must break through old structures, develop broader structures, breakthrough those, and develop still broader structures."

- Ram Dass -

Saturday, April 11, 2020

via Daily Dharma: Wise Mind, Not Blank Mind

The purpose of Zen is not to become people who don’t think, but to think only what we need to; not to be lost in unnecessary thoughts, but to see what is most necessary right now.

—Shodo Harada Roshi, “Finding Our Essence of Mind”

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Via Daily Dharma: The Power You Hold

Buddhism is a demanding moral practice; it turns over to each person the power to decide what is right to do in any given moment.

—Sallie Tisdale, “A Life in Her Hands”

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Thursday, April 9, 2020

Via Ram Dass / A Breath Exercise for Suffering and Joy

breath
Posted


In the 11th chapter of the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna shows Arjuna all the forms of the Universe, turning back into the pure form from which they were manifested.
The forms of the Universe: Breathe them in. Take in the baby’s crying, the sound of traffic, it’s all energy, it’s all shakti in form. As you draw it into your being, let the forms go, let your concepts about it all go, turn it back into pure shakti. Sit straight, draw it all into your chest.
All of your thoughts now, your memories, think of the political world, a breath for that.
See all the candidates, all of the international intrigue, all of the genuine seeking for peace, a breath for that.
See it all; the play, the dance, the forms, the mother, the mother at play, all aspects of the mother. Draw it back into its pure form within you, Mother shakti. Draw it into your heart.
Think of all the things that fill you with love and tenderness, a child’s smile, a flower, the smell of Spring, feeling love for another human being or from another human being, seeing peace exist between two people, moments of gratification.
As they come to mind, notice them, allow them, see them as forms, draw them in upon your breath. You are forming a relationship with the Mother, for these are all aspects, the beautiful aspects of the Mother. These are Durga, Lakshmi, Mary, Rachel, all the beautiful aspects.
Now bring to mind all the heavy aspects of the Universe: violence, suffering, physical pain, incredible loneliness, paranoia, people out of control on drugs, tensions between generations, races, religions, man’s ecological shortsightedness, our greed, lust, our anger.
Draw it all in on the breath. These are the other faces of the Mother. This is Kali Ma; the Mother whose tongue hangs out dripping with blood, who wears a circlet of skulls around her neck, who is ugly beyond belief.
If you’re going to have a love affair with the mother, you can’t just have the beautiful aspects, you’ve got to take it all.
Are you strong enough and quiet enough to give space to all the faces of the Mother, to all the forms? Hey Ma, you’re really ugly, oh Ma, I love you so much. Can you love the Universe that much?
Can you find a place in yourself where you don’t judge God? Where you look upon it all and see it’s perfection, including its horror?
– Ram Dass

Via Daily Dharma: Living a Life of Compassion

Compassion is one of the principal things that make our lives meaningful.

—H. H. the Dalai Lama, “Consider Yourself a Tourist”

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