‘Furthermore, Subhuti, self-identical is that dharma, and nothing is therein at variance. Therefore is it called ‘utmost, right and perfect enlightenment’. Self-identical through the absence of a self, a being, a soul, or a person, the utmost, right and perfect enlightenment is fully known as the totality of all the wholesome dharmas. ‘Wholesome dharmas, wholesome […]
‘One thing I have learned about attention is that certain forms of it are contagious. When you spend enough time with someone who pays close attention to something (if you were hanging out with me, it would be birds), you inevitably start to pay attention to some of the same things. I’ve also learned that […]
The rain passed through the city over the weekend, as it did a couple of weekends ago, as the slowdown was starting. That, of course, seems a long time ago. Most days, I feel like I end up spending too much time sitting down. I am sure this was true of my life hitherto, but […]
‘We can learn to welcome everything, including our own failures. When we learn to welcome everything wholeheartedly, we become fearless, and that helps others to become fearless also.’ (Entering The Mind Of Buddha) This is the heart of bodhisattva activity. The transformation that allows us to welcome our own failures and to drop away some […]
This might have become part of a talk I had been planning to give in England, to the Hebden Bridge group, this evening – though I allow myself longer words and fuller sentences in this written version: Memories of London sometimes permeate my thinking, and in those memories, the depths of the city’s past make […]
‘In those moments when it feels like there’s no way to keep going, that whatever is happening is too much, how do we touch into that sense of space? If we can breathe in and out, putting our mind on our breathing, we create space. We slow things down and let our nervous systems recalibrate […]
‘Each of the six perfections is suffused with the perfection of understanding, which sees the truth of the empty nature of all things. Naturally our discussion of simple ethical conduct would end with mystery and emptiness. Just as there is in reality no giver, no gift, and no recipient, so also there is no hurting, […]
