One familiar grouping of emotional obscurations in Buddhism is the five poisons – greed, hatred, pride, jealousy and ignorance. I was reflecting this morning that my predominant poison has changed from what it was 6 months ago … so …. Let’s ‘name and shame’ !!!! My predominant poison at present is anger / hatred. (It’s […]
What’s your Poison? Read Post »
The most amazing thing about my life …. is that after going to sleep at night …. each morning …. I wake up again! When I really think about this …. no …. really think about this …. how extraordinary that life continues throughout my dullness during sleep, during my unconsciousness …. and somehow I
When it really gets down to it, how much of our activity is quite simply ‘useless’? I don’t mean that it has no use at all on a mundane level, but that it is so conditioned, so led by instinct or habit, so unconscious or below awareness or choice, or simply so trivial, superficial and
Understanding the teachings on the illusory nature of the Subject Object distinction used to be rather theoretical for me. Yes, I heard the words, I understood the theory, and it made sense. But, when the chips were down, when suffering arrived, this understanding was nowhere to be seen. In recent years with the blessing of
Subject Object Projections Read Post »
This last few days I’ve been reading blogs from soldiers fighting in Iraq. I’ve also been reading the comments on those blogs, and some related materials from people around the world. The recurring theme throughout those comments has been how polarised people seem to be in their views. They are either ‘for’ or ‘against’ the
Always Taking Sides Read Post »
How difficult indeed it seems to be to differentiate between fearlessly expressing one’s point of view, and indulging in pride, ill-will and ignorance. How easy it seems to be in retrospect (often a retrospect of many years) to see how thoroughly imbued with ‘concerns of the self’, (actions designed to support my illusory sense of
Difficult To Differentiate … Read Post »
Having been asked on a List to give my views on Islam, Muslims, and the actions and suffering which are associated in some way with them, I attempt to give it here. As it’s a huge and complex subject, I can only cover some aspects. And this is all just that, just my own views,
Islam, Emptiness and Realisation Read Post »
Last night I was watching the 1996 documentary on Tibet – ‘Time-Life’s Lost Civilizations – Tibet’. The documentary was well made, with some very powerful imagery and strong narrative relating to the distinctive contribution that Tibet has made to both spiritual practice and social and cultural development. The end of the documentary focussed on the
Confused Dharma from Tibet Read Post »
How wonderful that my wife ‘woke me up’ this morning with the bell of rememberance! Having got little sleep this last few night with my sick toddler, I slipped into an old pattern of ‘wrong speech’ when overtired. How often it seems to be that when I’ve not slept, I revert to more automatic patterns
Isn’t Light a metaphor for Wisdom, rather than Devotion? I thought it was interesting to reflect on why devotion was likened to the light in this metaphor. Common metaphors for devotion are in terms of energy to empower something, in terms of receptivity, or openness to the teachings. So why is devotion likened to light
A Beautiful Guru Student Relationship Metaphor – Devotion and Openness Read Post »
