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

Search Sangha Live

The Individual-Relational Dharma Paradox and Why it Matters to Your Life

With Gregory Kramer recorded on February 16, 2025.

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

Biologically, psychologically, and in common sense there is no doubt that the human experience is both intrinsically individual and intrinsically relational. Our bodies are separate. You will never directly know my inner universe. Also, our bodies evolved to relate. The brain is a relational organ. Our sense of safety and joy, suffering and inquiry, has relational roots.

And since the Dharma is about the nature of the human experience, the Path must be both intrinsically individual and intrinsically relational. Morality, wisdom practices, and even meditation will be most fitting when they reflect this conjoined individual and relational nature.

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

Discussion

Leave a Reply

Discover more from the Dharma Library

  • Tuere Sala

    The Supramundane Nature of Emptiness

    Recorded : September 15, 2024

    Emptiness can be a loaded word for lay practitioners. It can bring up a sense of isolation and annihilation. The dharma of emptiness, however, is a fundamental part of practice. Even in the most mundane tasks of our ordinary lives, we can access emptiness and feel the freedom that comes with it. It’s not about…

    Read More

  • Kaira Jewel Lingo

    Honoring our ancestors, healing our ancestors.

    Recorded : October 30, 2016

    As we prepare for Halloween and All Souls Day, we explore how we can practice the wisdom of interbeing to help us nurture the wholesome seeds our ancestors transmitted to us and transform the unwholesome habit energies we have received from them.

    Read More

  • Nina la Rosa

    Freedom through focusing in.

    Recorded : September 25, 2016

    Before this live session, Nina wrote: “I want to share a mindfulness technique this Sunday that’s particularly alive in my life right now. As a new mother I’ve experienced an increase in planning, anticipating, worrying, and fear. Before the birth of my daughter a few months ago I read a book by Karen Maezen Miller,…

    Read More

  •

    Can love reveal ultimate reality?

    Recorded : December 19, 2021

    We know the cost to the reality of life through deprivation of love.

    Science has eliminated love from its analysis of reality.

    We cannot know ultimate reality though highlighting the mind and dismissing the heart or vice-versa.

    The Buddha made frequent reference to metta with its three-fold application of deep love, kindness or friendship.

    This talk will explore the relationship of love to ultimate reality.

    Read More

  •

    Daily Meditation Recordings, with Ulla Koenig – Week of March 29, 2021

    This week’s theme is: Re-Enchanting Our Practice. As much as anything else our practice of mindfulness and meditation can become a habit, and either turn dull, or come with a sense of obligation, work, or duty. In this week together, we will explore ways to bring imagination, embodiment, and intimacy to our practice. After all, meditation is as much a craft as an artform – a chance to discover inner landscapes, hidden mysteries and fascinating insights.

    As much as anything else our practice of mindfulness and meditation can become a habit and either turn dull or come with a sense of obligation, work or duty. In this week together, we will explore ways to bring imagination, embodiment, and intimacy to our practice. After all, meditation is as much a craft as an art form – a chance to discover inner landscapes, hidden mysteries and fascinating insights.

    Read More