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Posts tagged with "meditation"
What Are Buddhist Meditative Practices Truly For?
Sep. 17 | Question: What are Buddhist meditative practices for? Can they be for relaxation and the sharpening of mindfulness for work and play? Answer: They are for training, to attain enlightenment, which leads to liberation from the cycle of birth and death....
‘Tidying Up With Marie Kondo’ & The Dharma?
Jun. 3 | The KonMari Method is a technique to organise material stuff at home. Its first step is to heap especially clothes in one giant pile – to realise how much ‘more than enough’ one has. This creates motivation to declutter and to sort what...
Not ‘Possessed’ Of Enough Compassion & Wisdom
May. 16 | Featured in the middle of season 1 of ‘Possessed’, are some dialogues that a fictitious ‘monk’ has. Try to spot the Dharma mistakes… The senior monk asks a few young child monks who returned to the Korean monastery if they...
Be More Mindful Of The Ocean Not Its Waves
Jan. 1 | What to be dissolved is not the self, but the sense of self, by realising it is not there in the first place. – Shilashanti Suzuki Roshi… had a very helpful way of describing the relief that comes from getting over yourself. He used the expression...
The Buddha’s Leading Lay Disciple’s Dialogue With Mahavira
Jul. 11 | In the case of words that the Tathagata knows to be unfactual, untrue, unbeneficial, unendearing and disagreeable to others, he does not say them. – Sakyamuni Buddha (Abhaya Sutta) [Citta was the model Buddhist layman whose learning and behaviour the...
Why A Monk Shattered His One Precious Bowl
Feb. 24 | 若人欲拿金碧峰， 除非铁鍊锁虛空， 虛空若能锁得住， 再來拿我金碧峰。 – 金碧峰禅师 If one desires to seize Jin Bifeng, unless able to use metal chains to lock empty space, [and] if empty space is able to be locked...
How To Be Free From Demonic Obstacles
Jun. 26 | 虽则身心，无杀盗淫… 若大妄语，即三摩地， 不得清净，成爱见魔， 失如来种。 Although thus with bodies and minds without killing, stealing [and] sexual (mis)conduct… if [beings are with] great false speech, immediately,...
Why Do I ‘Naturally’ Hold My Breath During Meditation?
Aug. 14 | Question: I realised that I tend to hold my breath when I practise meditation on mindfulness of breathing (Anapanasati meditation, as a kind a Samatha or calm-abiding meditation). But when I breathe, I would be controlling my breathing, while holding...
The Importance Of Teaching Appropriately
Aug. 4 | Although there are many Dharma doors, each more appropriate for some, there are also some Dharma doors, the most appropriate for most. – Stonepeace | Get Books When Buddha Sakyamuni was alive, during his many travels, a group of devotees sought...
Awaken To The Light Of Understanding
Dec. 28 | When your mind is not clear… you may well take a thief to be your own child. – The Buddha (Surangama Sutra) When you practice meditation in stillness and enter samadhi, the essence of your mind merges with the Bodhisattvas of the ten directions...
At The Beginning, Middle And End Of Meditation
Aug. 16 | Life doesn’t stay in place, even for just a moment. – Gampopa Gampopa said, “When you first begin to practice, you must be like a deer locked in a pen, or a prisoner in jail, urgently seeking a way out of samsara. In the intermediate...
How To Enjoy Life More Fully
Aug. 10 | Your life’s happiness is directly proportional to mindfulness of life itself. While unmindfulness prolongs suffering, Right Mindfulness lessens suffering, and approaches True Happiness. – Stonepeace When we speak of the cultivation of Right...
The Buddha’s Eight Remedies For Drowsiness
May. 31 | If one does not even resolve to stay awake, how can one resolve to fully awaken? – Stonepeace Drowsiness is a common recurring problem for many meditators (and chanting practitioners, as chanting is a meditative practice too). If we fail to counter...
Two Proven Pain-Free Solutions For Meditators
May. 2 | The only good about suffering is that it reminds us that it is good to rise above it. – Stonepeace A recurring problem for many beginner meditators (and those who practise chanting, which is essentially a meditative practice too) is that of physical...
