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

Search Sangha Live

The practice of pleasure and delight (or the spiritual art of having fun).

With Martin Aylward recorded on April 22, 2018.

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

Dharma teachings importantly emphasise suffering, compassion, renunciation, desire, non-reactivity, peacefulness. All these are potent themes, yet ones which can make our practice feel overly heavy, unnecessarily serious, maybe even uptight!

Dharma practice equally points us towards a playful nature, light-heartedness and ease, delight and the capacity to really enjoy life. Especially when we can get bogged down in the circumstantial reality of both our personal struggles and of world affairs, we need uplift for the heart. Joy as resilience. A buoyant heart, that though it may get pushed under, cannot be sunk.

In this class, our founding teacher Martin reflects on ways to cultivate that buoyancy, to explore our capacity for pleasure, to enjoy the gift of life.

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

Discussion

Leave a Reply

Discover more from the Dharma Library

  • Ralph Steele

    Discovering Diamonds in Darkness: Racism & Cultural Diversity

    Recorded : March 19, 2023

    Racism and cultural identity have indiscriminately been seeded into human consciousness since the beginning of humanity. The health of any community begins with the Sense of Self. This Dharma assembly will focus on our sense of self as we investigate consciousness using the Noble Truths for Awakening. Millions have followed this path of practice for millennia.

    Read More

  •

    Embodied Intentionality

    Recorded : July 15, 2018

    This session is an exploration of the ‘truths’ that might lead to conviction, to directed karma, to mindfulness as remembering-to-remember, and to the path to joy & beyond.

    Read More

  •

    A Relational Dhamma

    Recorded : October 17, 2021

    If humans are intrinsically relational creatures, how do we integrate this understanding with the Buddha’s teachings on suffering and its cessation? Relational suffering and craving? Dependent origination? In this session, we explore the power and necessity of a relational understanding of the Buddha’s teachings. We discuss and practice relational aspects of the path, including the…

    Read More

  • Stephen Fulder

    Welcoming the Beyond

    Recorded : October 15, 2023

    What is beyond the ordinary mind? Can thought be background music, not a distraction? How can we access a consciousness that is open, free and limitless? How can we dive into the ocean instead of being tossed by the waves? The Buddha was an unparalleled non-dual teacher who taught the formless as well as form….

    Read More

  • Daigan Gaither

    Exploring Practice: What it is, and Why we do it

    Recorded : September 17, 2023

    What does it mean to practice? The term carries many interpretations and meanings. In this session, we won’t offer what practice should or shouldn’t mean for you; instead, we’ll embark on a journey of exploration. We’ll discover how each of us can find our practice in every moment.

    Read More