Making the commitment to complete a 10-day meditation course is a major commitment. Making the jump from completing a 10-day course at a meditation center to integrating a daily practice with life is even harder. This dhamma lifestyle is very different from my pre-Vipassana life, and that transition can be overwhelming. The reality is, sitting two hours …
Update
Thank you Sanket and Guido for sharing their stories with Living Vipassana! They have both chosen to move on to other things, but maybe they will return in the future. Living Vipassana has reached two milestones of 30,000 hits and 300 Facebook followers which is amazing to me as this blog started as my personal journal just 18 …
Making myself available
I prefer to believe that I am quite efficient at cooking. For last seven years or so I have been preparing my meal. Washing the vegetables, chopping them finely, frying at right temperature, knowing things like exactly how many pinches of spices would make the dish taste perfect or how many minutes of boiling would be optimum usually …
Peace, Love, and Happiness
I've been trying to bring focus and understanding to my new dhamma life for quite some time. Whenever I try to explain why I meditate I seem to struggle over my words, searching for the language that will resonate for a non meditator, and I rarely succeed in conveying what Vipassana is all about. These …
Maintenance as Love (Part 1)
“People don’t visit me anymore,” my grandmother says over the phone. “I guess they’re all too busy.” Loneliness has made her voice more tender than usual. I start feeling the urge to leap over her pain by changing the subject to something lighter, brighter, more superficial. But when she stops to apologize for talking about …
Pilgrimage into the Heart of Burmese Dhamma
by Branden Macie From January 2012 to March 2012 a nickel of wisdom arose in me while serving long-term at Dhamma Patapa in Jesup, Georgia, U.S.A. I was there to strengthen my individual walk in Dhamma and to share my merits with others who came for meditation alongside other meditators who wanted to apply the …
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Vote With Your Time
People often talk about voting with your money. When you buy organic food, you support that industry, and when you buy fast food, you support that industry. This makes sense to me, but a bigger issue that I hear far less frequently is how we vote with our time. People seem to feel that they …
There’s no news at all
Days are paler. Nights are calmer. Dramas are becoming rarer. Strangers appear as benign as long forgotten friends. Instead of being in the central locus I step aside. Adrenalin rushes are making room for stillness as past and future are making room for the present. Present, a water droplet, captured in a quick shot, at …
Conversation 1
Dhamma Projects: with the aim to discuss, document, celebrate and where possible enable activities that integrate the practice and principles behind Vipassana out of the centre and into the world of the householder we invite you to read a conversation of sorts between two meditators: 1. What is your understanding of Dhamma? Dhamma is simply …
Young Meditators will Flock to Urban Centers
In my experience, establishing a daily practice is harder than sitting a 10-day course. A big part of this challenge comes from trying to follow a different path from everyone else. There is a tremendous amount of support that comes from having even one other meditator to sit with regularly. The idea of having an …
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