Click here to join our daily meditations to support establishing a regular sitting practice.

On Teachings and Teachers

With Martin Aylward recorded on March 17, 2018.

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

People often ask about the importance (or not) of working closely with a teacher. One can benefit greatly from general meditation instruction, but personalised guidance from someone who knows you and your practice well can be deeply helpful.

In this session, Martin speaks about approaching teachers for guidance and about the dynamics of the teacher-student relationship; the promise, the potency, and the possible perils and pitfalls.

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

Discussion

Subscribe
Notify of
guest
0 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

Discover more from the Dharma Library

  • The voiceless voice of awareness.

    How often does it seem that the master of your life is the conditioned mind? To what degree does this mind of limitation color your experience? When the conditioned mind reigns, it becomes difficult to hear the still, small, voice within. This voice could also be talked about as the voiceless voice of awareness itself….

    Read More

  • Kaira Jewel Lingo

    Staying Open Through Change, Loss and Disruption

    When we are faced with suffering and uncertainty or life becomes overwhelming we can tense up, resist or try to control. But when we open and let go in the midst of change and release expectations we get in touch with enormous possibility and a powerful freedom.

    Read More

  • Vimalasara Mason-John

    The Wheel of Life

    Understanding the mental states that we cycle through moment to moment. Links referred to during the session: The Wheel of Life Five Basic Needs of the Heart meditation

    Read More

  • Kim Allen

    Clear Presence, Sweet Absence

    Dharma practice encourages us to see the present moment clearly – to meet and respond to it well. What is here in this moment? Another dimension of practice is to learn to appreciate absence: What is this moment free from? Having skill in both these dimensions brings us closer to the joy and peace that…

    Read More

  • Gregory Kramer

    Illness, death, urgency and love.

    Yes, the Buddha repeatedly recommended that each of us contemplate our own aging, illness and death. But what gap do you feel between an abstract contemplation and the actuality of this fragile and limited life? With death rolling in like a mountain, quickly and from all sides, do you feel any samvega, or sense of…

    Read More

  • Jaya Rudgard

    Time and Timelessness: Finding Refuge, Finding Inspiration

    Certain moments, events and experiences open our awareness beyond the everyday to a sense of something more eternally present. Meditation points our attention to just this place, which the poet TS Eliot called ‘the point of intersection of the timeless with time’. Contemplating life from such a perspective we can often find fresh resources of…

    Read More