Use code SUMMERPRACTICE for a 25% discount on all On Demand Courses through August 31.

Search Sangha Live

Beyond the Self-Improvement Project

With Oren Jay Sofer recorded on April 25, 2021.

Found our teachings useful? Help us continue our work and support your teachers with a donation. Here’s how.

It’s common to come to the spiritual path seeking relief from psychological suffering or emotional pain. The modern wellness industry presents mindfulness and meditation as the ultimate antidote to stress and personal foibles. Yet the Buddhist path is about something far deeper than stress reduction or having an agreeable personality. In this session, we’ll explore the value of seeking relief from personal stress, the pitfalls of approaching meditation as a self-improvement project, and the true promise of the Buddha’s freedom.

(Poem read by Oren during the session: Free and Easy: A Spontaneous Vajra Song, by Venerable Lama Gendun Rinpoche)

Listen to the audio version below, or click here to download the mp3.

Tags: awareness and presence impermanence self and non-self wisdom

Discover more from the Dharma Library

  • Daily Meditation Recordings, with Leela Sarti – Week of March 7, 2022

    This week’s theme is “Nurturing a Long View and Living Now”. It takes a lot of heart and presence to live a satisfying and meaningful life. Our inner patterns of resistance and reactivity often make us short sighted and contracted, and yet we have the potential to live from a timeless presence and embody beautiful human qualities such as wisdom, care, passion and originality. How can you make your time on earth something beautiful to behold? How can you live now with zest, courage, and love? How can you be a good ancestor for the ones that will live 100,000 years from now?

    Read More

  • Sophie Boyer

    Daily Meditation Recordings, with Sophie Boyer – Week of 01 December, 2025

    This week’s theme is: Before Reactivity

    Desire and ill-will very often drive our experience without being noticed. Learning to stay in the space before it arises, no matter how uncomfortable it can be is the entry point that leads to resilience. This week Sophie Boyer invites us to explore some ways to become more familiar with that space and experience the freedom that emerge from it. Resilience as a space of non-reactivity.

    Our Dharma Library thrives through collective generosity. Your donation helps sustain this offering for our entire community.

    Read More

  • Leigh Brasington

    The Fruits of the Spiritual Life

    Recorded : April 17, 2022

    2 Kings. Palace Intrigue. A Murder. 500 Elephants. A nighttime visit to see the Buddha. And that’s just the backstory to one of the Buddha’s deepest teachings: his curriculum for spiritual advancement. Join us as we explore the lessons from the 2nd of the Long Discourses and gain a deeper understanding of how morality, concentration,…

    Read More

  •

    Daily Meditation Recordings, with Shireen Jilla – Week of 10 March, 2025

    We’re delighted to have Shireen Jilla guiding our Daily Meditation sessions this week. May her teachings support and enrich your practice.

    This week’s theme is: The Ease And Simplicity Of Letting Go

    The invitation this week is to explore Wise Intention. When we lean into letting go, we experience the simple clarity it brings. Every moment we drop fussing, fretting and freaking out over our experience deepens our practice in our daily lives. The intention of opening our hearts and harmlessness leads us beautifully towards the bliss of blamelessness.

    Our Dharma Library thrives through collective generosity. Your donation helps sustain this offering for our entire community.

    Read More

  •

    How to Find Equanimity Amidst Upheaval

    Recorded : May 3, 2020

    We are deeply habituated to seek equanimity as if it’s a state to be found. In times of crisis, stakes are high. We try harder. The more desperate we feel, the more effort we put in. In this striving, we forget to ask: “Who is it that’s striving?” This question isn’t about finding the right…

    Read More

  • photo of Martin Aylward smiling

    Transforming the poisons.

    Recorded : October 4, 2015

    Buddha points out the three main ways we get pulled into activity and self-contraction – Greed, Hatred and Delusion – which Martin often translates as Desire, Defense and Distraction. This class explores creative ways of meeting these forces in everyday life, and explores powerful reflections for each of the three.

    Read More