Musings

Only one popular Buddhist teacher has written a book about prayer, and that's Thich Nhat Hanh. Many Western Buddhists and mindfulness practitioners today seem unaware of the numerous prayerful traditions and practices of Buddhism in the old world. I myself savor the mystic poems, songs, chants, prayers and sacred music practices of Vajrayana Buddhism. Perhaps because Mahayana-Vajrayana Buddhism is very inclusive and open to eclecticism, I too feel that way. I wanted to share with you a prayerful poem gifted to me this month, from some Catholic friends. "As we turn our lives to the crosswalk of...

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Everything is Dharma, in a sense, for the true practitioner and avid seeker. Everything can be seen and taken as teachings, blessings and inspiration-- grist for the spiritual practice mill. There are no unequivocally good or bad, positive or negative things, experiences or people; it is only thinking that makes them seem so. Everything is so subjective. It’s not what happens but what we make of it that makes all the difference in determining our character and karma, our experience, fate, destiny. I just returned from ten days with my dear old friend and guru-brother Ram Dass, at his home...

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As a young child playing hide and seek outside, with my cousins and siblings, in both Brooklyn and suburban Long Island, I learned an early meditation lesson: the more I stopped, and simply tuned in and sensed, directly, in the immediacy of the moment--the more focused and still I got, in body and mind-- the more I saw and could see. And when I was clearer, everything became clearer. This was my youthful introduction to the harmony and oneness available via a heightened, wakeful, present awareness. I can almost see now how mind-reading works, when you utterly still your own body & mind, breath...

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Last month I was in Nepal at my dear lama friend’s mountaintop monastery, Druk Amitabha Gompa, overlooking the Kathmandu Valley. His Holiness the Gyalwang Drukpa was giving a series of teachings interspersed with special prayers and pujas, chants and rituals, dedicated for various purposes. I was seated near HH onstage in a small row of red-robed lamas, when suddenly – amidst it all, the pomp and circumstance, the deep beats of the giant drum, the Tibetan long horns, the rattle of hand rums and the cacophony of 800 people chanting together-- I realized that if I only released my resistance--...

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It’s freezing (and snowy) here in New England! But it’s good to be home from my fruitful pilgrimage to India & Nepal last month. I happily sat beneath the Bodhi Tree every day, and watched it grow while the leaves occasionally fell—and hordes of pilgrims and tourists passed around and through it all—the head monks of Buddhist countries and the homeless and beggars of Bihar, the poorest state in India… on The Champs Elysees of Buddhist pilgrimage places. I was so impressed by the HH the 17th Karmapa in person, in his room at the Tergar Monastery, which Mingyur Tulku built for him in Bodhgaya....

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I was recently asked by The Huffington Post to contribute my perspective on their TED Weekend Series "Identifying the Extremist Brain" , featuring Diane Benscoter's remarkable story "I Used to Be in a Cult and Here's What It Did to My Brain".     Cults Come in All Kinds: The Head Is Not a great neighborhood to Live In                                               by Lama Surya Das Not unlike people, all cults may be created equal, but some are more equal -- or should I say, dangerous? -- than others. This is a simple fact agreed...

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This is the high holy day season where I came from. At-one-ment is an excellent way to turn the ship around and start afresh, every annum, every day and every moment. I invite you to acknowledge your transgressions, make amends where possible, and at-one as well. This is the antidote to guilt and denial. I have wronged people, and I am sorry. I have finally felt a drop of heartfelt compassion, now that I've crossed the sixty yard line of life. I myself aspire to be the Bodhisattva of Children, of all the weak and little ones, the  under-dog and the marginalized, the sick, the weak, the halt,...

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What is wisdom?  This is one of the world’s timeless Big Questions. Wisdom is an endangered natural resource today, in our agitated and benighted world. We overlook and ignore it at our peril. Wisdom is as wisdom does. One would be foolish if enlightened only from the eyebrows up. Wisdom is the panacean pearl of great price, and priceless too. Wisdom can be developed, and it can also be awakened within us. Working from both ends or sides—from outside in, or from top down as well as from bottom up, swooping while climbing—we can gradually explore, develop and attain discerning wisdom...

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The secret to happiness is wanting what you got rather than getting what you (think you) want. This may not be as easy as it sounds, but it's simple enough once you find the balance point between effort and acceptance, what could be and what is. I try to apply the natural great perfection's Dzogchen pithy instruction "At ease." In that spirit of welcome and appreciation, openness and interest, everything is possible and nothing seems too difficult. The happiness movement today has many aspects, and I'm all for it, although sometimes it does seem a bit overly simplistic. I believe it's time...

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“Remember to remember to catch yourself before things catch and entangle you. It’s not outer objects that entangle you but inner attachment and fixation that entangles you. Why take the bait and get hooked, swallowing it all hook-line & sinker, and being pulled out of your element--when things and perceptions arise through the sensory gates? Better to enjoy seeing and smelling the enticing bait, and letting it hang out there; this is the practice of freedom and autonomy, nonattachment,  equanimity, and the essential practical point of cultivating present Awareness itself. Awareness...

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