Happiness, serenity, and equanimity                                         Equanimity: the key to happiness: A Zen perspective Let us start with a definition: Happiness:      The intermittent positive emotional feeling of joy and pleasure is triggered by an external source. Serenity:     State of mind combining calmness, contentment, composure..... only when everything is OK. Equanimity:     Permanent even-tempered […]

                                              If you doubt fully, you will awaken fully            Japanese Zen teacher Hakuin loved to repeat: "At the bottom of great doubt lies great awakening. If you doubt fully, you will awaken fully, if you never doubt you will stay asleep with a frozen mind"    This is one of these paradoxical, and obscure Zen statements […]

 Dharma: Nothing is permanent, except impermanence    When asked what was the most important message of his 50 years of oral teaching, the Buddha replied these words. “Everything is transient, live and work diligently to appreciate and experience your impermanence.” There were his last words a few minutes before dying from mushroom poisoning. The key teaching […]

When, and how the past is polluting our present; what to do Our past is a master in polluting, once in a while, our present moment if not too often. The past is the largest tenant of our 3 space-times, followed by the future, and finally by the present moment.  Remember, the mind loves to […]

     SOME INFORMATION ON MIND CONTROL FROM GREAT MASTERS There are two levels of activities in our actions: In our subconscious Mind or the unaware level and in the Aware level. Our actions in the world can be a) Thinking b) Talking c) and doing something Our Mind is like an iceberg where the bulk […]

                     The mind watcher (redrafted) I want to empty my mind says the student coming for a meditation class. Ok, replied the teacher, but you have to be dead before succeeding. The main source of our suffering is the ongoing, restless output of our ego-driven mind, especially made of our negative thoughts and feelings, unreachable […]

                                               Benefits of mindfulness-based meditation In this talk, I will not describe again what mindfulness meditation is all about but look at its beneficial effects. Also, no one should look at mindfulness meditation as the Holy Grail, which will fix all our problems. Over the last 30 years or so, science has been able to […]

                                                  MEDITATION: More on the basics. Learning meditation is like learning to play a musical instrument: It is learning how to “tune” the mind, to get better relationships with our thoughts, and eventually control them Dedicated, regular, patient, and non-judgmental practice is how to achieve this. Progress will not occur if one is casual about […]

                                         Stress,  Mind-body interconnection                                            and the effect of meditation Mindfulness-based Meditation is a well scientifically documented therapeutic tool offered to many patients suffering from acute or chronic stress since the work of Jon Kabat Zinn in 1991 What is stress? The term  “stress” was coined for the first time in 1926 by a Canadian Hans Selye […]

May 8 22 The greatest part of human pain is not only self-created but also unnecessary. It is self-created as long as the unobserved mind controls and runs your life. The pain we are created is very often some form of resistance or complaint against something or someone. Rather than resistance, Zen prefers the word […]