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Mindfulness Matters

Watch His Holiness the Karmapa, one of the most important figures in Tibetan Buddhism, talk about his life and philosophy.   

Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, Democrat from Arizona, was shot in the head a point blank range this past Saturday injuring 14 other people, with six dead. The suspect is 22-year-old Jared Loughner who apparently planned out this killing ahead of time.  If you listened to Tom Ashbrook’s On Point this morning, the conversation turned towards the…

It’s Stress Reduction Sunday. Read my weekly post in the Connecticut Watchdog. Here is my CT Watchdog posts from last week: After the Novelty: Finding Peace in the Present Moment OK. Now it’s 2 January and it’s time to get to work (or play) with the ordinary, day-to-day, pedestrian aspects of life. I’m reminded of what…

The snow has been falling gently here in Northern Vermont for the past day or so and the beauty just sort of punches you between the eyes. The naked branches of stick season offer themselves to the gentle flakes of snow, and the snow creates colonies that reach to the sky. It’s easy to be…

We can find the dharma in unlikely places. This shouldn’t be surprising because everything is dharma — the sacred and the profane; in pigs and the most sublime thing you can imagine. As the commenter on my blog entry from Monday suggested, we apply limiting mindsets to everything. Consider the possibility that there is no…

I heard a joke on Old Jews Telling Jokes that is a funny testimony to the power of mindlessness.  It goes something like this: A man is stranded on an island with only a dog and a pig. After a long while he become lonely and the pig starts to look attractive. When he approaches…

I am pleased to announce the publication of my next book, The Everything Buddhism Book. You can look “inside” the book on Amazon and read the first couple of chapters. It is available in both a print version and is ready to read immediately on Kindle. It’s a great way to start the New Year.…

Happy New Year! One of the greatest cliches in the vernacular and an important one at that. One of my friends* shared the alternate term, “Happy New Instant” and I really dig that.  On the one hand, the transition to the new year is special and reflects a physical reality — the earth has completed…

I celebrated the New Year Zen style at a small Zen temple in a rural corner of Vermont. The evening consisted of meditation (zazen) starting at 5 PM. It’s always a good idea to start with meditation to settle into the form and intention of being awake (or at least aspiring in that direction).  Following…

Buddhism is a relatively new term, coined in the 19th century by Western “Orientalists” studying the cultures and traditions. Mu Soeng points out that, “Buddhism is not a unitary phenomenon.” It might be more accurate to say there are many Buddhist traditions that trace their origin back to the Buddha — Siddhartha Gotama — some…
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