Living Meditation
Humans are fundamentally good, caring and wise. We may appear otherwise, but at the core, we are basically good, sound and fully deserving of goodness. So why do we experience such pain in our lives? If we were to find our way to the truth of our existence, we’d see that so much of our struggle is created by a false sense of identification born … Continue
Meeting Your Mind Head On: Mindfulness, Driving and a Weeklong Meditation Retreat
I’ve come to realize that the act of driving is where I crash into all my attempts to be compassionate and full of equanimity toward my fellow humans. It’s where I drive head on into society’s speediness and aggression, its indifference to others, as well as my own impatience and judgmental nature. It’s when I … Continue
Enlightenment in the Age of Disruption: An Interview
Recently Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche, the spiritual head of Shambhala International, sat down with journalist Jonathan Fields of The Good Life Project to discuss technology, fatherhood, bravery, and living life as a journey rather than an obstacle you have to overcome. http://youtu.be/AsQRRbW_W8E
Enlightened Society in the City: Cultivating Kindness to Ourselves
I am looking forward to coming back to New York in August to lead our third annual weeklong meditation retreat. We had a rich time last year, practicing with the intention of creating enlightened society for the week. Rather than being a group of individuals meditating together, we explored how it feels to be a … Continue
The Aging Dance
A conversation between Lanny Harrison and Andrea Sherman on meditation, performing and growing older. Andrea: Could you tell us about your background in terms of the dharma, the arts and how aging fits into all of this? Lanny: I’ll go back to when I first heard about Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, because it was an important turning point … Continue
Meditation For Actors: An Interview with Parlan McGaw
By Amanda Quaid I saw a sign at Michael Howard Studios in NYC advertising Meditation for Actors. I had tried meditation several times, sitting reluctantly on my rug like a naughty child in time-out, trying to think of nothing at all in an effort to, somehow, improve my connection to the present moment. My legs … Continue
The Myth of Self Improvement
The practice of meditation is an excellent tool for interrupting the momentum of the hamster wheel. It allows us to stabilize experience so our natural clarity can dawn. Then we can begin to see the life we are living. Along the way, we begin to recognize the places we undersell ourselves in order to follow … Continue
iMeditation
I live in New York City. I work at a meditation center. This one. By the way, this is a great conversation starter at parties. “And what do you do?” “I work at a meditation center.” “Really. Can you get me tickets?” People may not know exactly what we’re all about, but they know, deep … Continue
Buddhist Meditation Practice for the Boston Marathon Tragedy
This Monday I woke up and did what I’ve done every morning for the past 3 weeks: I practiced a compassion meditation in honor of my recently deceased father. He had been sick for many years before he passed and, as odd as it may sound, had a better death than I had imagined was … Continue
How Vulnerability Can Save the World
In the past, I’ve blogged about vulnerability as a path. In other words, it’s not simply a choiceless state of being (we are vulnerable), it is a point of view. A stance. A way. In fact, it may be the only way to solve the problems our world faces. We could at least consider that. … Continue
