We’re fortunate that Kaira Jewel Lingo has generously offered to lead our daily meditation sessions for Europe and the UK this week. Links mentioned during these sessions can be found at the bottom of this page. To find out more about Kaira Jewel, and view her other recordings on the platform, click here.
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Kuan Yin’s Prayer for the Abuser (author unknown)
To those who withhold refuge,
I cradle you in safety at the core of my Being.
To those who cause a child to cry out,
I grant you the freedom to express your own choked agony.
To those who inflict terror,
I remind you that you shine with the purity of a thousand suns.
To those who would confine, suppress, or deny,
I offer the limitless expanse of the sky.
To those who need to cut, slash, or burn,
I remind you of the invincibility of Spring.
To those who cling and grasp,
I promise more abundance than you could ever hold onto.
To those who vent their rage on small children,
I return to you your deepest innocence.
To those who must frighten into submission,
I hold you in the bosom of your original mother.
To those who cause agony to others,
I give the gift of free flowing tears.
To those who deny another’s right to be,
I remind you that the angels sang in celebration of you on the day of your birth.
To those who see only division and separateness,
I remind you that a part is born only by bisecting a whole.
For those who have forgotten the tender mercy of a mother’s embrace,
I send a gentle breeze to caress your brow.
To those who still feel somehow incomplete,
I offer the perfect sanctity of this very moment.
–gratitude to Celia Landman for sharing this in an email
Quote from the Jack Kornfield meditation: “The Sufi say, “Overcome any bitterness because you were not up to the magnitude of the pain that was entrusted to you. Like the mother of the world who carries the pain of the world in her heart, we are each endowed with a certain measure of that cosmic pain, and are called upon to meet it in compassion instead of self-pity.”
Audio of Jack Kornfield’s meditation, Compassion in the Time of Coronavirus
Recorded :
The practice and realizaton of Right View is the first of the eightfold path. Holding to views and opinions is a sure way to suffering, says the Buddha. But can we live with no views at all? To realize Right View we have to look deeply into life, in order to free ourselves from wrong…
Recorded :
In our troubled world dharma practitioners sometimes become earnest. But beings learn and develop through play, and to play we have to be fluid in mind, heart and body. Play fertilizes the human spirit and makes us feel a sense of belonging. Welcome to a session exploring dharma practice as original play and creativity.
This week’s topic is (Be)Come As You Are. Our driven-ness, our ruminating thoughts, and our feelings of shame, guilt, and anxiety never allow us to simply ‘be’. They evolve around a sense of identity , a process the Buddha called selfing (bhava), a form of suffering (dukkha). We are endlessly trapped in a narrative of who we think we ought to be, were in the past and should be in the future.
We will dedicate our shared time together to build an awareness of these processes and find alternative ways to relate to the many experiences of life.
Recorded :
Our practice cultivates qualities of boundless love, whether through loving kindness practice, or opening to the love inherent in deep states of awareness. But can we really love everyone boundlessly? What about political leaders who may be causing tremendous suffering? Or when our boundaries get crossed in any way—personally, at work, in our families, or…
Recorded :
Transform your relationship with the body. When we move beyond perceiving the body as merely a possession or a dense, fixed object, our experience of reality shifts. Experience how dropping the attention from the conditioned mind into the true nature of the body is a gateway to the heart of awareness. Here we discover the…
We’re fortunate that Christopher Titmuss has generously offered to lead our daily meditation sessions for Europe and the UK this week. To find out more about Christopher, and view his other recordings on the platform, click here. Monday, June 22 The power of listening Wednesday, June 24 Love Friday, June 26 Choices and decisions Tuesday,…
Recorded :
I cannot be fully me if you are not fully who you are destined to be. I AM Because We Are.
This week’s theme is: Opportunities for Deepening Compassion and Wisdom. Dharma teachings and practices invite us to use our difficulties and problems to awaken our hearts. Rather than seeing the unwanted aspects of life as obstacles, we can relate to them as the raw material necessary for awakening genuine wisdom and compassion.
The cultivation of wisdom and compassion for ourselves leads naturally to compassion for others. True compassion does not come from wanting to help out those less fortunate than ourselves but from realizing our kinship with all beings.