January 2012
24 posts
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WHY STUDY RELIGION →
If I had it to do over, I would make the same decision I made 17 years ago as a college freshman.
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Atma Shatakam by Adi Shankara
(perhaps you’d also enjoy listening in song, in Sanskrit)
1) I am not mind, nor intellect, nor ego, nor the reflections of inner self (chitta). [more] I am not the five senses. [more] I am beyond that. I am not the ether, nor the earth, nor the fire, nor the wind (the five elements). I am indeed, That eternal knowing and bliss, Shiva, love and pure consciousness.
2)...
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Brahman is beyond personality and impersonality,...
The teacher said: If you think: “I know Brahman well,” then surely you know but little of Its form; you know only Its form as conditioned by man or by the Gods. Therefore Brahman, even now, is worthy of your inquiry.
The disciple said: I think I know Brahman. The disciple said: I do not think I know It well, nor do I think I do not know It. He among us who knows the meaning of “Neither do I not...
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Seeing and Hearing
The following is excerpted from Awareness Alone Is Not Enough (PDF) by Sayadaw U (Ashin) Tejaniya
YOGI: The other day you were talking about the importance of seeing and hearing versus sight and sound. I still don’t understand. Can you explain this to me?
SUT: Don’t pay attention to a particular sound. Just be aware that you are hearing. Hearing means that you know that the mind...
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A personal note
If you’ve noticed more reblogs than “original” posts of late, it’s partly because I haven’t been reading all that much on or offline. I’ve been listening though, should you be interested. I’ve also not been writing here or there because I’ve been concerned with significant autobiographical and expository undertakings, part of my applications for a...
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“I have realized that which is unborn
It is what language cannot communicate
It...”
– Mahavairocana Sutra
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“A hand moves, and the fire’s whirling takes different shapes:
All things change...”
– Kûkai (710–784CE), trans. by Jane Hirshfield
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“I am not in the mosque of the believer,
Nor in false rites.
I am not in the...”
– Bulleh Shah (1680 - 1758)
Please also consider this alternative translation.
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Hammarskjöld on Forgiveness
“Forgiveness is the answer to a child’s dream of a miracle by which what is broken is made whole again, what is soiled is made clean. The dream explains why we need to be forgiven, and why we must forgive. In the presence of God, nothing stands between Him and us - we are forgiven. But we cannot feel His presence if anything is allowed to stand between ourselves and others.”
- Dag Hammarskjöld,...
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“In the point of rest at the center of our being, we encounter a world where all...”
– Dag Hammarskjöld, Markings
Thanks to whiskey river … see also from crashinglybeautiful and here from dhammanovice
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“Birds afloat in air’s current,
sacred breath? No, not breath of God,
it...”
– Denise Levertov, “‘In Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being’”
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Where English falls short
God.
Elaha. Allah. Yaweh. Ruach. Adonai. Yeshua. Jehovah. Ahura Mazda. Ishvara. Brahma. Krishna. Rama. Shiva. Kali Ma. Buddha. Dhamma. Sangha. Amida. Avalokiteshvara. Vairocana. Samanthabadra. Maitreya. Padmasambavha.
Ahhhhhhh.
Where is the breath?
.
.
.
(It’s that hard ‘d’.)
For your reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_(word)
...
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“Ningún camino lleva a ninguna parte, pero uno tiene corazón y el otro no. Uno...”
– Carlos Castaneda
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“reflected in glass
a bird grapples with herself…
how true”
– silenceandink
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“All men to me are god-like Gods!
My eyes no longer see
vice or fault. Life on...”
– Sant Tukaram (1608-1649)
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“In Zen, there are only three things. First, cleaning. Second, chanting. And...”
– Even Dewdrops Fall an interview with Taitetsu Unno, a Pure Land priest and the father of one of my teachers, by Tracy Cochran
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Dr. Thynn Thynn on khanika samadhi
In daily-life meditation, is the mind actively watching itself through a state of no thought?
Yes. When your mindfulness is at its peak, you can experience states where thoughts fall away. But the no-thought state lasts for only a split second. You experience a heightened awareness that is one-pointed as well as absolutely quiet. This momentary one-pointedness of the mind is called khanika...
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“Vipassana concentration is called khanika samadhi. It is translated as momentary...”
– Sayadaw U Jotika, A Map of the Journey
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“I come from a tradition that places great importance on samadhi, on getting into...”
– Sayadaw U Tejaniya in Awareness Alone Is Not Enough (PDF)
See also, A strong, stable and continuous samadhi
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The unstruck gong
Living in the world and practicing meditation, you seem to others like a gong that has not been struck and is not producing any sound. They will consider you useless, mad, defeated; but, actually, just the opposite is true. Truth is hidden in untruth, permanence is hidden in impermanence.
—Venerable Ajahn Chah
A gift this morning in my inbox from a dear friend, sent to me and another...
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December 2011
25 posts
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Vimala Thakar on observation without the observer
This morning I would like to take up two points for serious consideration of earnest inquirers. An inquirer is a person in whom the questioning is sustained. The person questions the validity of everything that one sees around, hears about, reads in the scriptures, notices in traditions and customs. An inquirer has the humility not to accept anything on belief or tradition. He has the humility to...
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How can one be happy while others still suffer?
lisawhitehare asked you:
hi sharanam, would value your thoughts on a quote from osho which was just posted by illuminatedbeing. he talks about a complete cessation of sadness through meditation practice. what do you feel about how personal suffering can end alongside the suffering of other beings? many people are in dreadful pain and distress; animals suffering; ecosystems being destroyed by...
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Association with the Wise by Bhikkhu Bodhi
Progress along the path of the Dhamma hinges on making the right choices in our friendships.
The Maha-mangala Sutta, the Great Discourse on Blessings, is one of the most popular Buddhist suttas, included in all the standard repertories of Pali devotional chants. The sutta begins when a deity of stunning beauty, having descended to earth in the stillness of the night, approaches the Blessed One...
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“A Master once described the journey to enlightenment as ‘like filling a sieve...”
– Total Immersion
(Unknown, from the book 1001 Pearls of Buddhist Wisdom)
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Dhamma Nature, A Dhamma Talk by Ajahn Chah
Sometimes, when a fruit tree is in bloom, a breeze stirs and scatters blossoms to the ground. Some buds remain and grow into a small green fruit. A wind blows and some of them, too, fall! Still others may become fruit or nearly ripe, or some even fully ripe, before they fall.
And so it is with people. Like flowers and fruit in the wind they, too, fall in different stages of life. Some people die...
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“Even if one should carry about one’s mother on one’s shoulder and...”
– Anguttara Nikaya, Twos: 32 (referenced in a beautiful talk on gratitude, Pali: kataññu, by Ajahn Sumedho)
See also Thanissaro Bhikkhu translation.
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The aim of Buddhist meditation then, is to let go...
…Then we learn: when we emphasise our personality we create problems, because the personal qualities are different for each one of us. We have our common human problems: old age, sickness and death; but there are attitudes, cultural expectations and assumptions wherein we differ, and these are conditioned into the mind after we are born. Because of this, I often say to people, ‘Whatever...
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"That in 2011, devotional chants on YouTube are... →
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The Non-Traditional Approach to Religion
So in the very beginning when I go home and I would like to be a pilgrim, launching upon the pilgrimage to Truth and Reality, let me find out, exactly where I stand. This is necessary in the initial stage so that the fear of the unknown, the fear of infinity, the unknowableness of the immeasurableness of life does not block our path, obstruct our exploration or frustrate us in any way.
So the...
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Reflections of Universal Well-Being
Chanted by the...
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Arahant Bhikkhuni Chant (MP3)
[This chant...
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“Among the Brahma-Viharas, the word used for compassion is ‘karuna’....”
– A Rich Mandala on Anukampa.
Thank you dear one.
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November 2011
23 posts
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What is meaningful sharing for you?
I’m feeling myself running out of social media steam. Certainly, frictionless sharing is to blame, as is the death of Google (shared) Reader. I feel disillusioned by the big guns. I learn so much about human behavior, including of course my own motivations, fears, and desires by being engaged in social media and so I keep at it. And yet, there’s a danger in over-sharing. I’ve...