In an effort to counter tendencies towards striving and over-achieving, many Western approaches to meditation and spirituality emphasize relaxation. While relaxation and ease are essential ingredients on the meditative path, they must be integrated with whole-hearted effort. How do we find inner strength and make a clear resolve that is informed by wisdom and balanced with love? We will explore the power of determination in meditation and daily life.
With Oren Jay Sofer recorded on June 26, 2022.
Found our teachings useful? Help us continue our work and support your teachers with a donation. Here’s how.
Discover more from the Dharma Library
-
Cabbages & Condoms
Recorded :
October 24, 2021 During this session we be explore life’s basic necessities and drives, and the critical difference between ‘getting along’ and ‘getting ahead.’ Our meditation practice will be based on the Wise-Heartedness Bhavana to help us cultivate skilful response to distractions in daily life. A transcript of this session is available here.
-
Vesak 2568: The Radical Message of Siddhattha Gotama
Recorded :
May 18, 2025 On the Theravāda holiday of Vesak, 2568 years after the Buddha’s death, we honor the ancient ascetic named Siddhattha Gotama, whose insights into the nature of suffering and freedom have inspired fierce disciplines, soaring poetry, subtle psychological and philosophical investigations, and social movements for nonviolence, and social justice. We’ll meditate, learn traditional verses celebrating the…
-
Daily Meditation Recordings, with Kaira Jewel Lingo – Week of October 5, 2020
We’re fortunate that Martin Aylward has generously offered to lead our daily meditation sessions for Europe and the UK this week. To find out more about Martin, and view his other recordings on the platform, click here.
-
Letting go of fear; finding courage in the face of uncertainty.
Recorded :
March 5, 2017 Even though we know fear does not serve us, we often allow it to stop or limit us. We might not even be aware of the ways it drives us and makes us smaller than we are. Though we might think we can control life, there is little we can actually control. If we are…
-
Daily Meditation Recordings, with Martin Aylward – Week of 15 April, 2024
This week’s topic is “The Dharma and the Drama: Illuminating Heart and World”. Each day this week, Martin will offer some brief reflections as an introduction to meditating together, with the dual focus of supporting a deepening meditation practice, and integrating its themes into your daily life and activities.
-
Protecting the Mind
Recorded :
April 20, 2025 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…
-
The Power of Change
Recorded :
June 21, 2020 We wish for change. The time of the old is up. Its structures, habits and perspectives have lost their appeal. We sense the potential for something fresh to start. We can witness change. Feel victimized or beaten by it. Or find ways of empowerment and respond with wisdom. Meditation, mindfulness and reflection provide the tools…
-
Daily Meditation Recordings, with Christopher Titmuss – Week of 13 July, 2026
This week’s theme is: Resting in Being. A Major Step towards full Awakening. . What distracts us from resting in being? Is your daily life so preoccupied that you have no time for 20 minutes of silence? It means that the self, in the form of the thinker, the talker and the doer, dominates your mind. Twenty minutes of silence means resting in being. These sessions offer practical skills revealing signposts to a depth of experience and insight. Our Dharma Library thrives through collective generosity. Your donation helps sustain this offering for our entire community.