We began by viewing each other as enemies and ended up holding hands—a young college student and a broken soldier holding hands together in the brightness of early winter. I give his story to you now because it’s all I can do to relieve the heavy tenderness I still feel for him to this day.
Selections from Remembering Eternity, by author Rick Maddox:
He felt that he had been dissolved as a discrete entity but had, in an incomparably advantageous exchange, been reconstituted as the vital center of everything. Ego had nothing to do with this conception; on the contrary, the change allowed Skylar to see, in a profound way, that not only were all people and things in the universe interconnected, but that they all depended on one another.
The journey to enlightenment proceeds along a very slippery path. According to many unimpeachable sources, if you think too much about how to approach the destination then you’re sure to end up wide of the mark. Indirection may be all-important and yet too much stratagem may likewise lead you astray.
The human world is cracking up. A century of warfare, genocide, destruction and want has severed men and women from their roots.
They have no forbears, no folkways or culture, no past. Money has shredded all other values. The young wander in a phantasmagoria of luxurious diversions, violence, intoxication, constant novelty and hopelessness.
The enchanted story of two sisters who became enlightened yoginis, filled with deep levels of meaning, retold by a contemporary American poet and writer. Excerpted from The Brilliance of a Naked Mind.
There are several lineages of transmitting realization alive today. The Indian master Tilopa is the forefather of many of them, especially those that combine inner yoga with a totally naked and open mind. Enjoy a eloquent and poetic story centered around this outstanding master.
Once a fine sheep, a goat and an ox who were with other animals feeding in the courtyard happened to hear about The Great Vegetarian Debate, and their faith in the Dharma was greatly renewed. “We take refuge in the Triple Gem,” they thought, “in the wise and compassionate Buddha, his meaningful message, and in those living ones who follow his ways.
YOU ARE DREAMING ME is about the inward concerns and conflicts of young contemporary Buddhist lamas as they travel in opposite directions across cultures, and reflecting those of Khyentse Norbu himself. In search of dreams, desires and enlightenment, their contrasting journeys reveal more unanswered questions than solutions.
A historical fiction about the great female meditation master Sera Khandro, from the point of view of Pema Ozer, a sixteen-year-old attendant, involving being empowered and guided in an intimate atmosphere.
This play for children is designed to be easily performed with a minimum of rehearsal. There are readers who perform in various configurations, movers who enact the plot and musicians who improvise. It requires no set, just a dark room.
A personal account centered around the remarkable Buddhist master Fish Guru, as he is known around Kolkata, who bought millions of live fish to release into the sacred Indian river Ganges.
A dialog between student and teacher on the philosophical basis for being in the present in the classical dialog style.
One day, as a man was walking along the beach, he noticed that there was a rock sticking out of the sand. It was an unusual looking rock. There was something about the way the light reflected off it. He could almost see things in it.
I found myself among endless lines of crystal urinals and polished sinks, utterly alone. Or at least something close to it, if you remove the senior citizen janitor’s presence. I unwrapped a small, bleach-white sliver of soap, compliments of last night’s lodging.
The LEVEKUNST Inner Theater presents a Performance Inside Your Mind. You are invited to read and imagine Stravinsky’s music, performers, dance, sets, lighting, stage, theater, its city and world. Here is your free ticket.
In a void, free from space and time, a subtle whisper appeared, or actually a rustle. It rustled so for a while, until it felt uneasy.
– It’s so strange, rustling coming out of nothing – it thought. And to justify its presence it created leaves for itself.
Scheherazade knew a great truth: the telling and the hearing of stories, the exchange of tales and sagas is the deep breath of human life. Listening and telling are the inhalation and exhalation of human experience. We move, each day, on an ocean of stories, tales, jokes, reports elegies, confessions. We are sustained in our lives by unending narratives. It is the air we breathe.
At first she was horrified, doing her best to keep them out by stuffing an old blanket into the crevice beneath the door so that they couldn’t get into her bedroom. But they easily chewed and clawed their way through whatever barrier she put there, until finally she gave up fighting them.
Trungpa Rinpoche gave particular emphasis to four rulers as exemplars of the spontaneous appearance of the Shambhala path: Ashoka Maharaja, Gesar, King of Ling, the third Ming Emperor, Yong Le and Prince Shotoku Taishi who was Regent of Japan. Trungpa Rinpoche referred to these four as the ancestral sovereigns of Shambhala.
They had obviously done this many times before. He fought as hard as he could, hitting and kicking, and screaming curses the whole time. But there were four of them, and his body though tall and imposing no longer had enough strength. In the end, they wore him down, lying on top of him on the dusty floor.
The vision of Shambhala is not a vision of something seen, but rather a way of seeing and perceiving and acting in the context of the phenomenal world. The Kingdom of Shambhala is an innate and spontaneous longing to realize the freedom of the awakened state within the context of our existing social life.