NEW YEAR’S EVE. THE ENDING OF 1986. Soon it will be the beginning of another year. Today I glanced at an article in a journal I have, which sparked something off in my head. It was about the psychology of peace, and I suppose one of the things that is most desperately needed in the world these days is peace. There seems to be a growing feeling, a growing change in awareness of the need for peace.…

The Buddha’s instructions for dealing with the hindrances at the approach of death make most sense when viewed in the context of his teaching about how those currents of the mind influence death and rebirth. This teaching, in turn, is based on his explanation of kamma and rebirth: that skillful actions tend to lead to good results in this life and the next, while unskillful actions tend to lead to…

So it is: when we enter the field of meaning, image, fable and myth arise. They sustain the collective domain. And although the way the mythic Buddha – the figure who appears in the literature, art and temples of Asia – is shaped is in accord with a culture’s expression of veneration, all accounts are consistent in presenting a person of unwavering resolve, peerless depth and steady compassion. ‘F…

Time is our present breath. This reflection by Ajahn Chah is from the book, No Ajahn Chah, (pdf) p. 21.

Part of cultivating and sustaining awareness is recognizing what pulls the mind out into becoming and birth. What allows the mind to turn to non-becoming, to not being born into anything? As we explore that, the mind can become very still and very silent. Allow that sense of spaciousness and silence to open up and create a wedge in the habit of movement. Rather than allowing attention to be hijack…

I have been listening to a few of Bhikkhu Bodhi’s talks on mettā, loving-kindness. He explained that in many practice situations, mettā can often be used with an external, outgoing energy and making a genuine wish for other people to be happy. However, there is also an internal response that can occur for us when we express mettā in this way. I was surprised when Bhikkhu Bodhi mentioned that th…

I was reading something from a talk of Ajahn Sumedho that touched me very much. He was saying that when he’d just become a monk, he didn’t speak Thai at all and he met a Thai monk who had previously been in the Thai Navy; so, he’d met Americans and knew a bit of English. This Thai monk had been with Ajahn Chah for a while, so he was quite diligent in terms of discipline and meditation. Ajahn Sumed…

Greater in battle than the man who would conquer a thousand-thousand men, is he who would conquer just one– himself. Better to conquer yourself than others. When you’ve trained yourself, living in constant self-control, neither a deva nor gandhabba, nor a Mara banded with Brahmas, could turn that triumph back into defeat. This reflection from the Pāli Canon is from Thousands, Dhammapada Chapter 8…

It is important to recognize that the nature of becoming is generated through the force of desire, tanha, of craving—craving for sensuality, craving for being—for a sense of self, to be somebody, to be something, or craving for non- being—that sense of pushing away, of aversion, of negation. The becoming mind then seeks an object that is either internal or external. What does that seeking look lik…

How are we holding the practice? The Buddha taught many different aspects of technique and method, often from an organic, big picture, complete view. How do we encompass that for ourselves? How do we develop a context for using different methods, techniques and particulars of practice? One of the most clear and tangible examples showing the Buddha’s approach is the discourse in the Anguttara Nikay…