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The greatest gift is the
gift of the teachings
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Dharma Talks
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2013-08-27
Dependent Origination: Grasping and Clinging
57:24
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Rodney Smith
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When the energy of self-formation moves through desire to clinging, there is a dramatic change in intensity. The grasping feels like a compelling need of the organism. We may feel that we must have this experience in order for life to be worthwhile, and we are usually willing to do whatever is needed to obtain it. The energy is very tightly bound to the sense of survival. The Buddha grouped the areas of clinging in four broad categories: (1) pleasurable experiences, (2) views and opinions, (3) rites and rituals, and (4) belief in self. When we see the ferocity of our need to procure and defend our right for pleasure, our personal and political opinions, the indoctrinated beliefs in our religious views and practices, and the obstinate way we defend our self-image, we begin to understand the entrenched positions our egoic state stands upon.
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Seattle Insight Meditation Society
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In
collection:
Dependent Origination
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2013-08-23
Pilgrimages to India and Tibet with Q&A
1:10:28
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Ajahn Sucitto
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Ajahn describes two pilgrimages, one a six month to India's holy places (audio book here: https://whereareyougoing.podbean.com/), and one to Mount Kailash. 01:04:10 Q1 Did you cry ever? 01:04:33 Q2 Did you feel you achieved your objectives? 01:05:17 Q3 Would you recommend this to others? 01:06:26 Q4 Would you do it again? Q5 01:06:56 In Poland where I come from, a big religious [experience] is national sport, with thousands of people walking to the shrine [/ stadium]. It’s not a pilgrimage but a great sense of community, a mass movement. 01:07:46 Q6 What was the purpose of your talk this evening? 01:08:44 Q7 One of the things I got from reading the book, somehow we get the idea we should be getting somewhere in meditation, and this got smashed to pieces several times in the book.
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London Insight Meditation
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2013-08-22
Follow Your Heartbreak
51:12
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James Baraz
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Inspired by Andrew Harvey's book A Guide to Sacred Activism. The journey of transformation, both personal and global, includes our hearts opening to all the suffering we encounter and letting our heart be shattered and break open to new possibilities. This is a natural and essential component of true awakening. This process is explored on different levels: our own dharma practice, the classical Progress of Insight and what Harvey calls "The Dark Night of the Species."
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Insight Meditation Community of Berkeley
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IMCB Regular Talks
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In
collection:
One Earth Sangha
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2013-08-20
Five Preconditions for Insight: Engage in Talk of the Dhamma (the third precondition)
21:35
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Shaila Catherine
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The Buddha taught that there are five preconditions necessary for the development of meditation practice in seclusion—good friends, virtue and restraint,
engaging in talk on the Dhamma, wise effort, wisdom. These preconditions, presented in the Meghiya Sutta, are developed progressively and support one another. This talk explores the importance of engaging in dhamma talk, reflecting on the teachings, and wise speech as ways of nurturing the path of awakening. How do you know when to speak and when to remain silent? What kind of speech is most true and useful? What types of conversation will distract you from your goals, or support the realization of nibbana? Does your engagement in conversation encourage attachments, identification, self-grasping, or does it nurture letting go, release, and peace?
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Insight Meditation South Bay - Silicon Valley
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Tuesday Talks
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2013-08-13
Five Preconditions for Insight: Virtue and Restraint (the second precondition)
22:34
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Shaila Catherine
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The Buddha taught that there are five preconditions necessary for the development of meditation practice in seclusion—good friends, virtue and restraint,
engaging in talk on the Dhamma, wise effort, wisdom. These preconditions, presented in the Meghiya Sutta, are developed progressively and support one another. This talk explores the importance of restraint in a successful practice, and considers virtuous action to be an expression of wisdom. Ethical behavior and the inner respect that comes with the knowledge that we can refrain from unwholesome impulses is a foundation for practice. Precept training encourages wise reflection regarding the many choices that we make in our lives. We can reflect on the intention that initiates an action, the experience while engaged in the action, and the result that develops from an action so that we bring wisdom into every action and interaction. The five precepts, and the ten unwholesome and ten wholesome actions are presented. We have the power to choose what we develop with diligence and wisdom.
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Insight Meditation South Bay - Silicon Valley
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Tuesday Talks
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2013-08-13
Dependent Origination: Desire
61:24
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Rodney Smith
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We think of desire as a spiritually undesirable state of mind. Because it holds such power over our actions and thoughts, we are reluctant to thoroughly take it on and explore what it is. Desire is not just one simple state of mind. It is the composition of all the links that preceded it in Dependent Origination, the confluence of ignorance, mental formations, consciousness, name and form, six sense base, contact, and feelings. It holds all of that and the idea of "me" as well. As an analogy, think of snow as being the composite of temperature, humidity, atmospheric pressure, etc. Snow seems like something separate and different from the conditions that form it, but it is those conditions. We can enter and examine the energy of desire through any of these composite conditions. Encouraged by our thoughts, desire also has a strong sense of becoming something, something essential to us. But when we look at desire, it is a future thought holding the wish of a different life. Sad, is it not? When properly seen, we can you feel the grief of the unfulfilled desire?
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Seattle Insight Meditation Society
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In
collection:
Dependent Origination
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