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Continuing from "Buddhism 101", Surya speaks about the ways in which one can and become a Bodhisattva – a Buddha to be – by “…elevating our gaze, raising our aspirations to reach full, complete enlightenment for the benefit of all beings….” We need to be “fully here” while “getting there.” Surya discusses the Ten Principles of Enlightened Living: generosity, ethical self-discipline, patience, enthusiastic effort, mindfulness (meditation), wisdom, skillful means, spiritual powers, high aspiration and innate wakefulness. Explanations in detail are found in Buddha Is As Buddha...

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I read recently in the NY Times that people everywhere are making Life Lists, a contract with oneself to do meaningful things with this precious life before it is over; you can fill in the blanks on your own dreams and fantasies, wish-list, priorities and aspirations. One of the things you are supposed to do is to cross them off one by one as you achieve them. I’ve thought about it and found this a little hard, since I have already traveled almost everywhere and experienced almost everything, and my personal ideals and dreams tend now to aspire to large undertakings and abstract achievements,...

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President Bush is the first U.S. President to appear with the Dalai Lama in public. This was a quite a big step. I suppose the President did it both for personal and political reasons, being a person of faith himself, as well as needing some good pr.  He has met the Dalai Lama on at least three other occasions, including privately on Tuesday at his White House residence. The Dalai Lama calls the President and First Lady his friends. The Dalai Lama received the Congressional Gold Medal, America’s highest civilian honor, at the Capitol building rotunda Wednesday afternoon. He was introduced by Speaker...

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It's Columbus Day again, and the thought of discovering new worlds both delights and amuses me. Of course CC was not the first person on this continent, or even the first European–-Leif Erikson and other seafaring Caucasians almost certainly hold that distinction–-yet the quaint notion remains that our intrepid captain with his three little ships discovered America. Mistakenly, he took it for part of the spice-laden Asian Indies that he and his royal Portuguese patrons coveted and sought to connect with for trade purposes. Columbus did of course open a new era of history with his arrival in the Caribbean...

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Dwight D. Eisenhower commented that each and every gun, bullet, warplane, and battleship produced represented resources stolen from the poor and hungry people of this world. As a two term American president, and former commanding general who’d led the Allied Forces in 1945 on D-Day, he knew from experience what he was talking about. This week the totalitarian military junta which rules Myanmar--formerly known as Burma--has cracked down and shot upon unarmed citizens and Buddhist monks protesting poverty and lack of the freedom of self-determination in Southeast Asia’s second largest country,...

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It’s back to school week here, and the scent of autumn is in the air. This morning I am remembering that the sage & teacher known as The Buddha used to address all of ‘his students’ as worthy young’uns (being less mature in enlightened wisdom’s development and realization). Higher education is meant to educe the best in us; why settle for anything less? So, friends: What have we learned today? Answer:  If we don’t learn the lessons we might get left back, and even have to be reborn again and again until we do! It’s worth reflecting on the lessons now and then, I believe. Trying...

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Lama Surya Das introduces the basics of the Four Noble Truths and the Eight-fold Path of Buddhism and that “Buddhism is about awakening.” and …”can make us a better whatever we are.” One need not follow a particular belief system or dogma in order to pursue the path of enlightenment. A brief introduction useful to readers of Awakening the Buddha Within.

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I was out sailing with some friends yesterday, on the New England Coast above Newburyport, Massachusetts. Sky gazing and wave watching, letting everything go and just dissolve along with the waves and the clouds in the sky... I started reflecting how subjective everything is, that "Nothing is either good nor bad but thinking makes it so" (Shakespeare), and remembering that we can't control the winds of karma blowing from the past, but rather than just being blown away we can learn how to set our sails in order to navigate and sail better. I watched as the captain set the sails, found the right...

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I spoke to attorney Alan Dershowitz at dinner the other night, who is strongly for Hillary and thinks she is electable, which I still have my doubts about. She is certainly qualified, but will the rest of our country vote for her? Is this country ready for a woman, a person of color, or a gay president? Although to be pessimistic runs against my nature, I have to admit that I doubt it. I recently read that 70-75% of Kansans would vote for creationism to be taught in the public schools of their state instead of Darwinian evolution! I consider this pretty unevolved, as far as intelligent modern...

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No man is an island, as Milton sang. Isolationism is out, interconnectedness is in. We is the new I. Happy Interdependence Day! We all long for belonging. Who can go it entirely alone? It is incredibly difficult to accomplish anything much alone, either in the worldly or spiritual spheres. And if we don’t pull together, we pull apart. Especially today--in our rootless, socially mobile, fractured, violence-ridden and materialistic society-- who doesn’t need community of some kind in order to grow and flourish, and even to survive? Family, friends and colleagues, mates, neighborhood, local...

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