Buddhist Women on a Path of Spiritual Awakening
Be Like Bamboo
The jhana factors serve as antidotes to the five hindrances as well as supports in developing the Noble Eightfold Path. But they are not enough in and of themselves to establish wisdom. Studying the body and mind through samatha and vipassana, we come to…
Who’s Sitting Under the Bodhi Tree?
The mind is so easily duped by its own delusion. By holding perceptions, views and opinions – our own, as well as others – as “uncertain”, and being circumspect, we can bear witness to experience as the Knowing Mind, unburdened by its conditioning. When…
Body-Wise Guided Meditation
As we establish awareness on the breath, notice where the mind is, polishing it until it shines like a bright moon. Use the sublime abidings to spread calming energy throughout the breath and the body. The hindrances fall away. Relieved of our attachments, we…
The Poison Arrow
Stokes Valley Monastery Retreat, New Zealand The poison arrow of ignorance spreads its toxins through passion, desire and ill will. By sitting still, applying mindfulness and surrendering to what is, the right view will illuminate our minds and will help us extract the arrow…
How Do I Know I’m Deluded?
A breakthrough step on the spiritual path is realizing just how deluded we really are – otherwise we would not have to seek happiness outside ourselves. To see our true state of mind, we have to properly investigate and honestly peel away the layers…
Sacred Heart: First Inside the Temple
Within us we have a sacred space that we need to reclaim – the very space inside the heart. Here the Four Noble Truths come to life. Know our suffering, not blaming anyone or any conditions for it, see its origin within us, and…
First Aid
To free us from our relentless conceptualising and the suffering that comes of it, the Buddha has thrown us a lifeline. We can grab hold of it by continually using the perspective that “this is impermanent”, and thereby we can pull ourselves to safety….
Nothing There: Beyond the Prison of ‘Self’
The Fourth Insight known as udayabbaya ñāņa arises bestowing six qualities of upekkha as well as intimate knowledge of anicca through seeing the arising and disappearance of all conditioned things – most importantly, the emptiness of ‘self’. A talk given at Sati Saraniya Hermitage…
Crossing Boundaries: Ayyā Medhānandī & St. Thérèse de Lisieux
An interview in 2005 with Ayya Medhanandi about how, though more than a century apart and of different religious orders, St.Thérèse de Lisieux blesses the life of a Buddhist nun:
~ Dhammapada Verse 54