The encounter with sensory experiences can lead to insight and calm, or reactivity and suffering. How do you guard your mind in the midst of a daily barrage of sensory input? How do you protect your mind so that tranquility and wisdom will be well established? The Buddha encouraged restraint of the senses, but this restraint does not require avoidance of sensory contacts or control of the external environment. In this talk, Shaila Catherine will describe how mindfulness allows us to meet the experiences of sensory contact – of seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching, and thinking with a mind free of reactivity. Mindfulness protects the mind so that it does not come under the sway of defilements. Mindfulness is a special quality of attention that is balanced in the moment of observing experience. Before looking, before reaching, before speaking, before any activity, we can establish the intention of mindfully meeting the experience without giving rise to anger, irritation, lust, fear, or any defilement. The practice of sensory restraint leads to a life of happiness and joy, and lays the foundation for experiences of deep concentration and awakening.
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Natural awareness: practicing in daily life.
Recorded :
July 10, 2016 Meditation is often viewed as something restricted to a certain posture or time of day. For most of us, the majority of our life will not be on retreat or even spent in a formal sitting posture. If we want to make best use of our daily life, it’s important to know that being aware…
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Daily Meditation Recordings, with Nirmala Werner – Week of May 22 – 27, 2023
This week’s topic is “The Steam of a Cup of Tea: Teachings on Generosity, Gratitude and Renunciation”. Can we achieve happiness and wealth by giving? Can we experience abundance through simplicity? In this exploration, we’ll examine how such concepts are possible in today’s world by delving into certain aspects of the 10 Perfections (Paramis), all while embracing our perfectly imperfect nature.
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This is, because that is
Recorded :
October 29, 2017 “This is, because that is. This is not, because that is not. This comes to be, because that comes to be. This ceases to be, because that ceases to be.” – The Buddha When conditions are sufficient things manifest. But if there aren’t enough conditions, things cannot yet manifest. How can we skilfully live in…
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Blunt Suffering
Recorded :
April 29, 2018 Let’s not flinch when we look at the lived experiences of illness, confusion, and relational pain. Let’s allow the texture of hurt to be known. Awareness remains brilliant, for sure. Any of us can experience this. Maybe the more we allow the blunt pain of the body-mind, the more we can sit squarely in awareness….
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The Practice of the Beautiful: Moving Beyond Fragmentation and Stability
Recorded :
June 2, 2024 Allowing the beautiful to guide us in our practice opens up possibilities beyond our conditioned habits. Awakening to beauty involves being with the messiness and the challenges of our lives. Beauty does not belong to anyone. As we orient away from that which is pleasing to that which is beautiful in ourselves and in our communities, we align ourselves with a path that blossoms into liberation for all beings.
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Self-compassion.
Recorded :
June 7, 2015 Worldwide Insight talk from Tara Brach: “Self-Compassion”. Guided meditation, Dharma talk and Q&A.
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Daily Meditation Recordings, with Ulla Koenig – Week of June 17, 2024
This week’s theme is “Preparing the Heart and Mind”. In Buddhist practice we often hear we should let go. And often enough we would really like to let go of those thoughts, impulses, moods and contractions which keep us agitated and in unease. But letting go is rarely something we decide to do; and neither is holding on. In the upcoming week we will explore why the heart-mind holds on to something and how we can prepare, nourish and soothe it, so that letting go becomes a natural process, not a willful command.
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Daily Meditation Recordings, with Martin Aylward – Week of 31 August, 2026
This week’s theme is: A Path With Heart . A week of morning practice together, exploring dimensions of loving awareness, including the depths, the vulnerabilities and the liberating expansiveness of the undefended heart. Our Dharma Library thrives through collective generosity. Your donation helps sustain this offering for our entire community.
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