Perform Wholesome action Don't perform sinful action Keep on purifying your mind That is all. Dhamma – nothing to take away, nothing to add. Acting without craving and aversion. What's wholesome? Abstain from sinful, and what remains is wholesome. Universal. Every religion would say this. The difference in the explanations. In sectarianism, Dhamma is no …
Commit
The word seems violent. Short and sharp, like so many crimes. It harkens suicide and mental hospitals. Electroshock therapy. Urgent test answers rammed into shallow grooves of my cortex. I've been consciously thinking of the word in softer terms, lately: Beneath the whole gamut of negative cultural connotations, it means to entrust or pledge fully …
S. N. Goenka: Notes – Day 1 Discourse
S. N. Goenka: Notes - Day 1 Discourse You will get the best results of your stay here, the better you work. You must work. The art of living is missing. This will teach you the art of living. Someone goes to the other bank of the river and comes back and says, it's so …
Moral Unity
A moral foundation allows people to coexist within communities. The Golden Rule, which exists in some form within all the major religions, reminds individuals of how it feels to be mistreated, and encourages them to act nobly. When we feel or witness the suffering we cause in others, we are much less likely to act in negative ways, but when …
Space
The stars soften this world. Seeing them illuminates the darker parts of my life that feel so hard, so permanent. It loosens the tightness in my chest and allows me to inhale with conscious awareness. I see from a further perspective just how essential breath is, how pure it is, and how nothing else is …
As I Go
Every sensation 'holds' energy. It stores it, and depending on our equanimity to it, it affects us this or that much. You may have heard of Chakras. They are considered to be stronger points of energy holds in the body. I say that all sensations are energy holds in the body, and what they contain is creative …
In Meditation. Being meditative.
I was contemplating on writing my blog this week while in travel mode and I was also observing how planning for travel can be meditative. I also had a little chat with my dear friend who hosted me in Barcelona about continuing our meditation practice. Indeed, travel can be so meditative. I'm sure we all …
Living With Reality
How much time do I spend distracting myself from reality? The obvious distractors are television, movies, and internet, but I want to look a little bit deeper. When I see a model seductively posed in an advertisement, how many seconds does this distract me from the people and circumstances around me? After watching a nice car drive …
Our Work is Love
Our work is love. The classic statement is that to love your job is to mean you will never work a day in your life. This is not work, but play. To find love, on the one side, may sometimes feel like work, but if we love our work, it will be play. If our …
The Answer Came
This was a story that ended where it began: with a death wishhh... listen, hear the ocean? A matrix of keys draped the space in between like a big fishing net someone checked periodically thinking she would capture life. When nothing was caught, she tried patching all the narrow passages through that story by retyping …
Living Vipassana 