Goenkaji says that craving and aversion are two sides of the same coin, as well as emotions and sensations being two sides of the same coin. My practice of choosing beyond the negative, which over time morphs into focusing on the positive, is teaching me that Positive and Negative can be looked at the same …
A Thousand Kisses Deep.
Hi everybody – I will be contributing my thoughts here every fortnight. I would like to start my introduction today with lyrics from the song of Leonard Cohen. The ponies run, the girls are young, The odds are there to beat. You win a while, and then it’s done – Your little winning streak. And summoned now …
The Secret of Continuity
We've all heard it. Continuity is the secret of success. It's Goenka's favorite, but it's not a secret. He straight up tells us, again and again. Continuity is success. We are successful through the continuity of practice. It's obvious when you practice. So why say it's a secret? I think I know the secret to …
Choosing Beyond the Negative
A series of choices makes life. One's mindset and perspective makes life. What one focuses on makes life. This week, life has been schooling me in the power of saying, "thanks, but no thanks" to the Negative. What power it has and how its power disempowers me. I've been reading and hearing from good sources that when we get …
Limiting Beliefs
Sometimes, while writing for this blog, I get imposter syndrome. I don’t know if I should be sharing my experience of practice, when I’m such a far cry from maintaining a solid one. I’ve gone through phases of consistently sitting in which I maintained a clarity that can’t be articulated, but have also gone through …
Interested in Writing?
My life is about to get pretty busy so I'm going to cut back to writing once a week for a little while. I would like the blog to continue having 3 posts a week for people to read, but that will require some new writers joining the team. If you are interested in writing …
Dhamma Parenting
I don't know many Dhamma Parents, but the ones that I know always speak of the struggle to continue meditating with the added responsibility of parenting on their plate. Some parents meditate less. Some say they will start meditating again when their children are older. Some parents make major changes to their career goals to …
Conversation 2, part 3
To assist Dhamma Projects’ focus in exploring how meditators integrate their practice of Vipassana out of the centre and into the world of the householder, we would like to share a recent conversation exploring this subject in the three parts. If you missed the first part of the conversation you can find it here, and the …
Learning to Love and Think
Graduation ceremonies always have speakers that talk about the friendships people made in school, and the hope of teaching the world how to love, but this is the first time I hear a commencement speaker discuss without it sounding a bit cliché. The difference was that I felt I've actually learned how to be a more loving person through …
A Mixed Crowd
I attended a small dinner party of people with mixed Vipassana representation. We had a pair of serious meditators, a pair of students who had sat 1 course, and a pair of people who had never sat. There was no Vipassana agenda with this meeting. We simply enjoyed hanging out and getting to know each other. The topic …
Living Vipassana 