The following article by Bodhipaksa shows that we offer a great service to others and to humanity in general by cultivating the art of happiness:
“ Saddhamala wrote the other dayabout how we “catch” emotions from others. As she points out, this happens when you’re hanging around someone who is negative, and it brings you down, and that it even happens when
In the following article, Bodhipaksa offers an impressive array of skillful ways to increase our levels of joy and happiness:
“Joy (sukha in Pali) should be our natural state of being. Unfortunately, though, we’ve been brought up in a society that emphasizes wanting things and having things. Wanting things actually destroys joy, while having things brings only a short-term burst of pleasure that fades quickly.”
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Jon Kabat-Zinn, an MIT-trained molecular biologist, began meditating in 1966, when the practice was primarily the province of hippies and gurus, not scientists. Now, thanks in large part to his efforts, it has become mainstream medicine. Dozens of studies have since shown the benefits of what he termed Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) in treating cardiovascular disease, depression, addictions, chronic pain and many other conditions.
Kabat-Zinn
This is an invitation to my new Facebook page. Its title is “We’re All One” and its main aim is to promote full awakening from the pervasive illusion of separateness, which I regard as the single most important cause of suffering on Planet Earth.
Please check it out and “Like” it at:
http://www.facebook.com/WereAllOne?sk=app_351957104934
The list of potential benefits of mindfulness meditation is getting progressively longer as people with various physical, mental, or emotional afflictions experiment with it. Here’s a recent report of its effectiveness in helping people who are subject to chronic tinnitus:
“Silence is a beautiful thing. But Robert DeMong has accepted that he’ll likely never experience it again.
“He’s got a condition called tinnitus, which means a
I just received the following message from Craig Hamilton. I resonate with it strongly and thus decided to share it here:
“It’s Independence Day here in the U.S., and I’ve been reflecting
all day on both the beauty and the limitations of the fierce
independence so deeply rooted in our culture.
The call to independence is, in its
Much of the essence of Mahayana Buddhism is summed up in the noble “Bodhisattva Ideal” of achieving enlightenment for the welfare of all sentient beings. Those who have followed this noble path down through the centuries have been centrally motivated by bodhicitta–i.e., the wish to become a Buddha for the benefit of all beings.
The following short essay, which I received as an email message from Craig
I would like to share here an amazing personal story that I think you will agree is stranger than fiction. In my lifetime repertoire of memorable experiences with the world of Nature, it holds undisputed first place.
When I retired on May 28, 1999 from my 34-year career as a psychologist and psychotherapist
In less than four decades from its introduction into the U.S. and other Western countries, mindfulness meditation has been embraced enthusiastically by millions of people as it becomes increasingly mainstream. Originally introduced by the Buddha over 2500 years ago, it has been referred to during most of its history as Vipassana (in Pali) or Vipashyana (Sanskrit) Meditation, which is usually translated literally
There is now abundant evidence that the practice of mindfulness
meditation has many significant benefits. Some of these highly diverse
positive effects have been highlighted earlier on this blog. They
include: stress reduction; overcoming addictions; enhancing creativity;
increasing happiness; reducing suffering; rehabilitating hard-core
criminals; and
Since this blog is dedicated to promoting wise ways to happiness, I would like to raise a crucially important question here: To what degree (if any) does the way of Wall Street contribute to true happiness?
I’m afraid that the prevailing answer that is most deeply engraved in our
In 1973, Bo Lozoff and Ram Dass hit upon the highly innovative realization that people in prison were ideally positioned to utilize their prison time as an opportunity to transform themselves spiritually through intensive meditation. This novel idea gave rise to the highly successful Prison Ashram Project that Bo has subsequently coordinated.
In his well known book
During my long career as a psychotherapist, I became somewhat notorious for repeatedly saying “of course” to my clients. I came to regard these two magic healing words, in fact, as by far the most powerful form of therapy I had to offer. Let me spell out specifically why I say this.
As I strongly believe is true of
Along with her compatriots, Joseph Goldstein and Jack Kornfield, Sharon Salzberg was instrumental in planting the fertile seed of Vipassana Meditation into the U.S. starting in the mid-1970′s and in fostering the deep roots that it has subsequently developed through the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, MA.
Perhaps more than any other Western teacher of Insight Meditation,
she
For over three decades, Duane Elgin has been a highly successful author, speaker, educator, consultant, and media activist. Through his work, he has also become respected as a leading futurist.
He holds an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, and an MA in economic history from the University of Pennsylvania. He has also received an
In order to wake up from our “life-dreams” and the illusory sense of separateness they entail into what Tim Freke calls “Lucid Living,” we must take the necessary first step of “entering The Mystery.”
Very simply, this consists in becoming consciously aware of the mind-boggling awesomeness of the universe with which we are seamlessly one.
To fully know and embrace this basic, incontrovertible fact is a huge first step
My first exposure to Vipassana (Mindfulness) meditation was in 1975. It came through listening to a series of audio recordings of Dharma talks presented by Jack Kornfield and Joseph Goldstein at Naropa Institute in the previous year. They, along with a number of other wonderful teachers at the Insight Meditation Center in Barre, Massachusetts and at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Marin County, California have continued to guide and inspire me up to the present.
Jack
In the following two videos, I invite you to join me in taking a first essential step into Lucid Living, as defined by Tim Freke. More specifically, I invite you to “enter the mystery,” as Tim refers to it, by joining me in a brisk walk in a beautiful winter wonderland.
If you would like to get a quick, in-depth overview of Lucid Living
For the past 35 years, Peter Russell has been a highly respected spiritual leader and a revolutionary futurist. In 1965, he began a course of study in mathematics and theoretical physics under Stephen Hawking at Cambridge University (UK).
Then, due to his increasing fascination by the mysteries of the human mind
In a previous post, I’ve enthusiastically introduced Tim Freke, a highly successful and prolific author, as well as a very engaging and entertaining “stand-up philosopher.” Although he is adamant in saying that he does not want to be regarded as a “spiritual teacher,” I don’t know of anyone who more effectively imparts the perennial wisdom that
Introduction:
In my view, an absolutely necessary condition for experiencing extraordinary happiness entails awakening from the pervasive, illusory sense of separateness that humans experience almost universally.
Most commonly, the miniscule minority of humankind who successfully attain liberation from this prison of limited ego-hood do so only through highly dedicated and intense spiritual practice for many years or
Paul Hawken, described by Fortune magazine in 2002 as “the original hippie entrepreneur,” has carved out a unique and highly successful position in American business. He has achieved impressive credibility not only among environmentalists and social critics, but with mainstream corporate audiences as well.
On the one hand, he has written, “there is no polite way to say that
His Holiness the XIV Dalai Lama returned to Emory University on October 17-19, 2010 in his capacity as Presidential Distinguished Professor, the first university appointment accepted by the 1989 Nobel Peace Laureate and leader of the Tibetan people. During this short period, he participated in several public presentations, all of which were videotaped.
Each of them embodies a treasure
I’ve long regarded Dr. Roger Walsh as one of the most dedicated and highly developed spiritual leaders in the Western world today. Originally trained as a psychiatrist, his wide-ranging interests and areas of expertise include anthropology, psychoactive drugs, religious/spiritual experiences, altered states of consciousness, and meditation. In recent years, he has also become recognized
In his ground-breaking book, “The Empathic Civilization: The Race to Global Consciousness in a World in Crisis,” Jeremy Rifkin offers some strong, scientifically-based hope for a much brighter future for humanity. More specifically, it’s based on the recent discovery of “mirror neurons” in the brains of humans and apes.
These neurons are powerful
Introduction:
This blog is dedicated to promoting ordinary and extraordinary happiness. In my view, by far the most effective means to the former end is to develop the skill set of Basic Mindfulness–that is to learn how to live as fully as possible in the Eternal Now and to utilize the power of awareness in
I have created another personal video that provides a brief introduction and overview of Michael Dowd’s magnificent book, “Thank God for Evolution.” It features at the end a lovely song, “Holy Now,” written and performed by Peter Mayer. This song artistically captures a key part of the essence of Evolutionary Spirituality.
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IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT
By clicking on the
In his revolutionary book, “Thank God for Evolution,” Michael Dowd elegantly elucidates what I regard as “the mother of all paradigm shifts.” Building on the previous work of other evolutionary philosophers, especially Teilhard de Chardin, Thomas Berry, and Brian Swimme, he eloquently presents the overwhelming scientific evidence that we humans–along with all the rest of the
After devoting several decades in intensive spiritual development work, Craig Hamilton has become a prominent pioneering leader in Evolutionary Spirituality and Integral Enlightenment. In a video introduction on his main website, he delineates the important distinction between this and traditional enlightenment. Most importantly, whereas the main motivation for the latter has generally been personal liberation or transformation, the main motivational impetus for Integral Enlightenment is societal transformation.
I
A central defining characteristic of the human ego is its deeply conditioned sense of separateness from the rest of the world. Under the control of this pervasive illusion, we tend to fall into self-cherishing and become strongly attached to whatever we define as “I, me or mine.” We also develop a wide array of defenses aimed at protecting ourselves from everything we perceive as not-I–namely, the rest of the universe.
Each of the following three bulleted links below will take you to an excerpt from (or related to) Bodhipaksa’s wonderful new book, “Living Like a River.” Together, they elucidate beautifully the truth of “no self” (“anatta”), which was taught by the Buddha as one of the three basic “marks of existence.” The other two of these three basic truths are: Impermanence (“anicca”) and suffering or unsatisfactoriness (“dukkha”).
According to the Buddha and many other non-dualistic spiritual teachers, the vast majority of humans are imprisoned in the deeply conditioned illusion of separateness from others and from the universe.
This pervasive illusion is seen to be a primary root cause of the suffering of humans and, indirectly, of that inflicted upon other beings as well. It is also a major indirect source of the massive pollution and destruction that humans have caused to
In a wonderfully wise and compassionate video presentation, originally presented on www.ted.com, Edmund O. Wilson, one of the world’s most distinguished and respected biologists, makes a heartfelt plea on behalf of all life forms in our biosphere that we continue to learn about them as fully as possible and to build an exhaustive encyclopedia about them on the internet.
Drawing upon his deep knowledge
Barbara Marx Hubbard is an outstanding visionary in the tradition of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Father Thomas Berry, and Brian Swimme. For many years, she has dedicated herself one-pointedly in promoting Conscious Evolution for humankind.
Dr. Charles T. Tart, an American Psychologist and Parapsychologist is well known for his psychological work on the nature of consciousness (particularly altered states of consciousness), as well as for his extensive research in scientific parapsychology. He is also one of the founders of the relatively new field of Transpersonal Psychology.
He has authored a number of important books, including: Living the Mindful Life;
If you’re not yet familiar with the revolutionary work of Reverend Michael Dowd and his wife, Connie Barlow, I think you’re missing out on what may well turn out to be one of the most important transition points in the history of Christianity.
In his groundbreaking book, Thank God for Evolution, Michael masterfully reframes the science of evolution as “The Great Story” and eloquently shows how it
Brother David Steindl-Rast is an eminent and highly respected Austrian-American Roman Catholic theologian of the Benedictine order. He has shown tireless dedication and commitment in helping to heal the huge gap between spirituality and science on the one hand and the equally great division among the major world religions on the other.
In this latter endeavor, his most recent literary contribution is of monumental importance.
In his
A major root cause of most of the massive global problems confronting us today is the human ego. It is deeply invested in its illusory separateness from all supposed “others,” including the entire planetary web of life, into which, all humans are seamlessly interwoven and upon which they are crucially dependent for their very survival.
Driven relentlessly by the instinctive forces of greed, hatred, and delusion, this collective human ego
Many years ago, John Seed and Joanna Macy, created some highly effective “re-Earthing” rituals to help humans see the world through the eyes of many other parts of Great Nature. This involved groups of people taking the roles of diverse other beings and meeting together in a “Council of All Beings.”
Not surprisingly, this proved to be a highly effective way for the humans involved to gain
The Buddha said, “I teach one thing and one thing only, suffering and the end of suffering.” The word, “suffering” here is the most commonly accepted translation of the word, “Dukkha,” in the ancient Pali language, which the Buddha spoke.
According to one common rendering of his Fourth Noble Truth, “The cessation of suffering can be attained through the Noble Eightfold Path,” the cornerstone of which is “Sati,” or Mindfulness.
In the modern world of multi-tasking, it has become increasingly rare for most of us to be fully and mindfully present to a particular activity that we’re doing; instead, very typically, our attention is scattered as we try to do several things at once in order to “save time.” Another common pattern is to be “lost in thought” as we engage in activities–especially if they’re routine, such as walking, driving
Mindfulness, very importantly, entails shifting out of our prevailing mental mode of constant thinking into moment-to-moment awareness or “just being.” In the following video, I focus on how the thinking “little mind,” as important as it is in our everyday life is also intrinsically limiting. I posit, moreover, that true wisdom develops only through shifting into the “big mind” of pure awareness.
His Holiness, The Dalai Lama, has been quoted as follows:
“From the viewpoint of absolute truth, what we feel and experience in our ordinary daily life is all delusion. Of all the various delusions, the sense of discrimination between oneself and others is the worst form, as it creates nothing but unpleasant” (sic).
I’m sure that the adjective, “unpleasant,” here is intended to modify a noun, such as “results” or
Along with her compatriots, Joseph Goldstein and Jack Kornfield, Sharon Salzberg was instrumental in planting the fertile seed of Vipassana Meditation into the U.S. starting in the mid-1970′s and in fostering the deep roots that it has subsequently developed through the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, MA.
This blog has been created as a resource to all people who are dedicated to increasing happiness and to decreasing suffering in their lives--and in the world--by learning how to live more wisely and skillfully.It aims to include a distillation of what I have personally learned in theses regards, along with the collective wisdom of many others.