The Sound of One hand clapping The paradoxical mystery of koans and their teaching purpose Translated from Chinese, koan literally means “ public statement”. Koans were created in the XI century by a Zen Master called Dahui to assess student progress toward Awakening. A Koan is a short question, statement, story, riddle, image, […]
DHARMA: Illusion and Delusion: main sources of suffering The optimal goal of Zen-Buddhism practice is to control, if not eliminate suffering. The word “suffering” is better translated as “negativities in its broader sense” that is any situations and feelings affecting us negatively i.e. Struggling, anger, sadness, resentment, anxiety, unhappiness, jealousy, etc. Sources of negativity […]
The art and power of resting In this talk, resting is a relaxation exercise, different from meditation despite some similitudes. We are always running around and struggling with time. Fighting time has become a kind of addiction. We cannot resist being active, running around like a hamster on its wheel, giving us the feeling of […]
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 […]
