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Retreat Dharma Talks
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Monday and Wednesday Talks
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| Regular weekly talks given at the lower Spirit Rock meditation hall |
Spirit Rock Meditation Center
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2021-07-07
Deepening Daily Life Practice 2: Practicing with Reactivity
69:27
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Donald Rothberg
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We begin with a review of last week's opening exploration of deepening daily life practice, naming some of the challenges of daily life practice, some initial ways of deepening such practice, and the centrality for such practice of mindfulness of the body. We then, for the rest of the session, explore how we can practice with reactivity when it arises, in its two forms--grasping after the pleasant and pushing away what is taken as unpleasant. We ground such practice in the Buddha's teaching in the model of Dependent Origination of the sequence from contact to feeling-tone to wanting (or not wanting) to grasping (or pushing away). We then point to a number of ways of practicing with reactivity and some of the complexities of such practice, particularly the ways in which reactivity can be enmeshed with discernment. A discussion follows!
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2021-07-28
Deepening Daily Life Practice 3: Practicing with the Eight Worldly Winds
68:43
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Donald Rothberg
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We begin with a review of the last two sessions related to deepening daily life practice, including identifying some of the challenges of contemporary daily life practice and some basic ways of deepening such practice, the importance for such practice of mindfulness of the body, and the centrality of practicing with reactivity (based on looking closely at the sequence from contact to grasping or pushing away). We then, for the rest of the session, explore the teaching of the Eight Worldly Winds (pleasure or pain, gain or loss, fame or disrepute, and praise or blame) as a way of looking out for eight specific experiences that are likely to lead to reactivity. In all of this, we focus on how we might learn from and respond skillfully to such challenging situations rather than simply react in a largely unconscious and habitual way. The talk is followed by a discussion.
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2021-08-04
Guided Meditation: Practicing with the Eight Worldly Winds 2
37:38
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Donald Rothberg
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After some general instructions for settling and seeing clearly and a period of practice, there is guidance for practicing with the Eight Worldly Winds (pleasure or pain, gain or loss, fame or disrepute, and praise or blame). We focus first on being attentive to moderate or greater levels of pleasant or unpleasant experiences (when the experiences are in the "workable" range). Then we bring in attention to the other Winds, when they arise.
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2021-08-04
Deepening Daily Life Practice 4: Practicing with the Eight Worldly Winds 2
69:42
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Donald Rothberg
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We begin by naming some of the important supports for daily life practice and by exploring further the importance of practicing with reactivity (compulsively and habitually grasping after or pushing away). It's helpful to focus on the center of practice: Transforming reactivity and learning better how to respond skillfully in all parts of our lives. It's also important to name some of the complexities of practicing with reactivity: (1) Seeing that the pleasant and unpleasant aren't the problem, that reactivity is the problem; (2) understanding that this isn't about passivity but rather about skillful response; and (3) clarifying that reactivity can often be enmeshed with important insight, clarity, and intelligence, such that the aim of practice is to separate out the reactivity from the insight. In this context, we then look further at the Eight Worldly Winds (pleasure or pain, gain or loss, fame or disrepute, and praise or blame) and point to a number of guidelines and suggestions for practicing when they arise.
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2021-08-23
Loving Witness
45:27
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Jack Kornfield
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In any moment you can become the loving witness—it’s why we sit in meditation. We learn to sit with both heartbreak and love—with whatever arises. We become the loving witness of it all. What channel do you turn to amidst the joy and sorrows? With mindful loving awareness we can see it all anew. When we see with amazement, with loving awareness, we also see with the heart.
As Mary Oliver writes:
“And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood….
and I think of each life as a flower, as common
as a field daisy, and as singular….
and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth.
When it’s over, I want to say all my life
I was a bride married to amazement….”
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2021-08-23
Loving Witness Meditation | Monday Night
27:51
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Jack Kornfield
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Notice as you feel the breath, that who you are is not this breath, or this body, but you are loving awareness, the loving witness. You are consciousness itself—open, spacious, letting the breath breathe itself. Experiences can rise and fall in a field of loving awareness. Notice how emotions, feelings and thoughts rise and fall like the waves of the ocean; you are the loving witness to them all.
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2021-09-01
Awakening
67:45
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Donald Rothberg
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After a number of sessions focused on practicing with reactivity and with challenges, we focus on awakening and awakened qualities. We survey the Buddha's main understanding of awakening as the ending of greed, aversion, and ignorance, as well as his pointing to a "signless, boundless, luminous" awareness at times. We also explore some of the understandings of a similar "awakened awareness" found in the Thai Forest tradition and the Tibetan Dzogchen and Mahamudra traditions (in part through slides, which can be found below, at this Dharma Seed site). Finally, the suggestion is made to set the intention especially this next week to cultivate one or two awakened qualities.
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Attached Files:
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Awakening Slides
by Donald Rothberg
(PDF)
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2021-09-08
Awakening and Paths of Awakening: Traditional and Contemporary
67:03
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Donald Rothberg
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We first review last week's theme of traditional understandings of awakening and the path to awakening, focused on the teachings of the Buddha, of the Thai Forest tradition, and of Tibetan Dzogchen and Mahamudra. Then we explore the question whether we have need as well of contemporary maps of paths to awakening, to get at dimensions of contemporary greed, aversion, and delusion that are not identified in traditional maps. We suggest the need for such maps, and for integrating traditional understandings with examination particularly of psychological and social conditioning. If not transformed, such conditioning can lead to many problems for all practitioners, including teachers and those with some significant taste of awakening. Discussion follows.
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2021-09-20
Forgiving Heart | Monday Night Talk
53:08
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Jack Kornfield
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There’s a truth and reality deeper than conflict. We are not the stories we tell ourselves. How do we touch our measure of suffering? With a forgiving heart. Step out of the tyranny of self-judgment. Forgive yourself for being a learner in this life.
Three principles of wise forgiveness of others:
1. Forgiveness is not weak, naïve. It’s not "forgive or forget." It takes real courage. Forgiveness does not condone what happened nor allow it to continue.
2. Forgiveness is not quick. It is often a long, difficult, tender process of the heart digesting the pain of what happened.
3. Forgiveness is not for them—it’s for you. It’s about our own heart not being chained to the past.
Sometimes it's your loving heart that opens your broken heart. We can let go. We can put down the burden of resentment. We can live with a gracious heart.
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2021-09-20
Forgiving Heart Meditation | Monday Night
25:26
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Jack Kornfield
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If it’s helpful, you can whisper in the back of your mind “ease” or “calm,” as suggested by Thich Nhat Hanh. Try to meet every breath with lovingkindness and loving awareness. Wish calm and peace for beings everywhere, far and near. Rest in stillness and love.
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2021-10-04
The Nature of Awakening: Traditional and Contemporary Maps
1:11:48
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Donald Rothberg
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While much of our interest in practice may be focused on finding some degree of peace and understanding, or on making workable challenging states of body, mind, and heart, it's helpful to keep the vision of how practice aims at awakening (bodhi). In this talk, we explore how the Buddha understood awakening and the path to awakening, as well as perspectives on the lived experience of awakening from later Buddhist traditions. We then ask the question about whether a contemporary path of awakening simply follows the traditional path of awakening. We explore how it's important also to include as parts of the path of awakening teachings and practices that help us work with both more psychological material (such as connected with difficult early experiences, trauma, limiting beliefs, etc.) and with our social conditioning (such as around race, gender, sexuality, class, age, etc.), areas that may not be adequately transformed only with the resources of traditional paths of awakening.
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2021-10-06
The Seven Factors of Awakening
68:45
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Donald Rothberg
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After a brief review of the last two sessions that Donald has offered on traditional teachings about awakening and contemporary maps of the path of awakening, we explore the core teaching of the Seven Factors of Awakening: mindfulness, investigation, resolve or energy, joy or rapture, tranquility, concentration, and equanimity. We look both individually at each of the seven, and also suggest a number of ways of practicing with this teaching, whether in a particular meditation session, in daily life, or over a sustained period of time. At the end, there is some discussion.
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2021-10-11
Mindful Loving Witness Meditation
24:31
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Jack Kornfield
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Gently acknowledge any strong waves of thought or emotion that pull you away from the breath. Let them rise and fall, then return to breath. Become the mindful loving witness of each breath.
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2021-10-11
On Death | Monday Night Talk
58:46
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Jack Kornfield
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We live in a culture of denial and youth. How can we find a freedom of heart in this world of birth and death? We can start by acknowledging that everything is subject to change. Death is an advisor that can give us clarity about what really matters.
We can be the loving witness of this life, yet not cling to it. We can cherish life, yet in the end we will have to let go.
As Mary Oliver writes:
To live in this world
you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it
against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.
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2021-11-17
Doorways to Awakening
66:22
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Donald Rothberg
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Remembering the teaching about there being 84,000 "Dharma Doors," we explore a number of such "doorways to awakening." The interest is especially in inviting us each to have a sense of what at the current time brings one's practice alive, identifying one's "edge of current learning." This may be to identify a current challenge or difficulty and approach it as part of one's practice, and/or to emphasize a dimension of formal and/or informal practice that brings interest, joy, and aliveness.
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2021-11-22
Gratitude and Generosity Meditation | Monday Night
27:23
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Jack Kornfield
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Like the waves of the ocean, the breath rises and falls. Bring loving awareness to the breath.
Shift your attention from the breath to all the sensations in your body. With mindful loving awareness, notice the whole field of sensations. If there are areas of pain or stiffness, bow to them and hold them with kindness. Hold them as you would a child who is going through a hard time. Notice how this kind loving awareness allows for the tension and knots to soften in their own way.
Now as an expression of gratitude, say thank you to your own body for caring so much, for holding so much as you move through the days and nights. Tell your body, “I’m ok just now—you can relax. You can rest.”
Now bring your attention to your heart that carries so much. Notice all that your heart has been holding: longings, fear, love, worry, frustration, excitement, sadness, appreciation, doubt, deep love. Say thank you to your heart for caring so much, for trying to help and protect you. Tell your heart, “I’m ok just now—you can relax. You can rest.” Let your heart be at ease.
Now bring your attention to your mind that produces a stream of thoughts, images, pictures, plans, memories, ideas. Feel the energy of the mind, creative, sometimes obsessed, analyzing, exploring, opening. Say thank you for working so hard to take care of you, to protect you. Tell your mind, “I’m ok just now—you can relax. You can rest.”
Notice that you’re not your body, feelings, thoughts. You are the loving witness, you are consciousness itself. You are the loving awareness that acknowledges the body, heart and mind. Relax into loving awareness. You are the silent, vast witness to it all.
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2021-11-22
Gratitude and Generosity Dharma Talk | Monday Night Talk
46:36
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Jack Kornfield
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Gratitude is a gracious acknowledgment of all that sustains us, a bow to our blessings, great and small. Gratitude is the confidence in life itself. In it, we feel how the same force that pushes grass through cracks in the sidewalk invigorates our own life. Gratitude does not envy or compare. Gratitude receives in wonder the myriad offerings of rain and sunlight, the care that supports every single life.
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2021-11-24
Cultivating Generosity and Gratitude at the Time of Thanksgiving
65:05
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Donald Rothberg
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After we set the context of the holiday of Thanksgiving, including Native perspectives, we explore the inter-related qualities of generosity and gratitude. Gratitude is especially in relationship to acknowledging the generosity of others, and of life. We clarify a number of ways to cultivate these two qualities. The talk integrates some discussion and is followed by a longer period of discussion.
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2021-12-01
The Seven Factors of Awakening 2: Cultivating Mindfulness and Equanimity in Formal Meditation and in Daily Life
69:14
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Donald Rothberg
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Our practice aims at awakening (and awakened beings help others awaken). We review briefly the nature of awakening for the Buddha and later Buddhist traditions, and the centrality of the teaching of the Seven Factors of Awakening. We then explore the two foundational factors--mindfulness and equanimity--identifying their core qualities, as well as how to practice to cultivate each of these factors, both in formal meditation and in the movement of daily life. There is a talk and then discussion.
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2021-12-20
Nourish And Connect Meditation | Monday Night
27:23
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Jack Kornfield
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Release whatever wants to be let go of in this moment. Let yourself become loving awareness itself. Feel yourself relax with each breath. You can nourish, connect, and come to rest. As you feel the breath come and go, there will likely be a stream of thoughts. Bow to your thoughts and say to yourself, “I love it when they come, and I love it when they go.” You can rest here and now in the reality of the present.
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2021-12-20
Setting An Intention Of The Heart Dharma Talk | Monday Night Talk
50:13
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Jack Kornfield
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When we sit quietly and face the stillness, we start the feel the grief that we carry—and the immense beauty of life. When we get quiet we can see in a new way.
Make of yourself a light. It’s never too late to start over and set an intention of the heart. It could be as simple as “I vow to be kind.” By aligning our dedication with our highest intention, we chart the course of our whole being. Then no matter how hard the voyage and how big the setbacks, we know where we are headed.
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2021-12-29
Guided Meditation Exploring Several Forms of Inquiry 1
35:25
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Donald Rothberg
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After some basic instructions in settling with an anchor, and on being with and seeing clearly what's predominant when somewhat settled, we can also explore several instructions for bringing inquiry (or investigation) into practice, through (1) asking what is present right now; (2) exploring with mindfulness an experience that has some duration, asking, "What's going on in the body? . . . What emotion is there and how does it change? . . . What's the narrative or storyline"; and (3) examining the memory of a challenging experience, and inquiring into what is present in re-living that experience.
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2021-12-29
Inquiry as a Factor of Awakening in Formal Meditation and Daily Life
66:41
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Donald Rothberg
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Inquiry is one of the Seven Factors of Awakening, and can be a crucial factor in our practice, leading to greater energy, interest, and learning. Yet we may believe that meditation should be about "not thinking." We explore how we need to be able to not be ruled by thinking; this can make it possible then to use thinking and question fruitfully in inquiry. In the talk, we outline five modes of inquiry, going into depth on two of them: (1) bringing inquiry into our mindfulness practice in several ways, and (2) listening deeply, particularly through the body and emotions (in the "dropping down practice") when there are repetitive thoughts and narratives. After the talk, there is discussion.
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2022-01-05
Guided Meditation Exploring Several Forms of Inquiry 2
35:53
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Donald Rothberg
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After a period of settling, we work with two main forms of inquiry or investigation (one of the Seven Factors of Awakening). The first is inquiry through mindfulness when an experience has some duration: Asking what's happening and exploring what's going in the body, the emotions, and the story-line or narrative. The second is inquiry through working with a teaching. Here we work with a simple teaching, coming from the Four Noble Truths: "If there's suffering (or struggle), where's the attachment (or fixed idea, etc.)?" We explore these in formal meditation; they can also be applied in the flow of daily life.
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2022-01-05
Inquiry as a Factor of Awakening in Formal Meditation and Daily Life 2
64:10
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Donald Rothberg
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In this second exploration of the nature of inquiry or investigation, we first review some of what was covered in the first talk. We situate inquiry or investigation within the teaching of the Seven Factors of Awakening, as one of the three "energizing" factors. After outlining five modes of inquiry and reviewing the first two--inquiring with mindfulness and deep listening--covered last time, we explore a third mode of inquiry--using a teaching to guide one's practice--pointing to using several possible teachings as examples. We then focus on a fourth mode--radical questioning--giving several examples. We end with a period of discussion and dialogue.
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2022-02-02
A Guided Meditation in the Manner of Thich Nhat Hanh
36:47
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Donald Rothberg
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A 35-minute or so guided meditation in the manner of Thich Nhat Hanh (connected with the talk honoring Thich Nhat Hanh). The guided meditation is mostly silent, with three short periods of guidance, using these words:
(1) Breathing in, I know I am breathing in.
Breathing out, I know I am breathing out.
Breathing in, I calm myself.
Breathing out, I feel at ease.
(2) Breathing in, I calm body and mind. Breathing out, I smile. Dwelling in the present moment I know this is the only moment.
Bring body and mind back to the present moment. So that you do not miss the appointment with life.
(3) Breathing in, I see myself as a flower. Breathing out, I feel fresh.
Breathing in, I see myself as a mountain. Breathing out, I feel solid.
Breathing in, I see myself as still water. Breathing out, I reflect all that is.
Breathing in, I see myself as space. Breathing out, I feel free.
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2022-02-02
Honoring the Great Teacher of Interbeing and Engaged Buddhism, Thich Nhat Hanh
65:16
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Donald Rothberg
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There is weaving together in the talk of several areas, including (1) Donald's stories of his encounters with and learning from Thich Nhat Hanh, starting in 1987; (2) the life story of Thich Nhat (1926-2022); and (3) exploring Thich Nhat Hanh's core teachings, including his teachings about "interbeing," engaged Buddhism, mindfulness, and "being peace." There is a slide show of Thich Nhat Hanh's life shown during the talk available as a pdf file.
The talk is followed by the first 3 minutes and 19 seconds of a video of Thich Nhah Hanh talking about "War and Peace Within" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pk1jpeo3w6U) and a period of discussion.
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2022-02-09
Donald Rothberg and Yassir Chadly in Dialogue on Buddhist and Sufi Perspectives and Practices: A Gathering of Wisdom, Love, and Respect
66:34
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Donald Rothberg
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Yassir Chadly, a long-time friend of Donald's who is a Sufi teacher, musician, and former Olympic swimmer, originally from Morocco, is in dialogue with Donald, and then, during the last part of the session, with the whole group. We explore Yassir's background, the three main levels of practice in Sufism, practicing in Sufism with what arises in the heart, parallels between Sufi and Buddhist practice, how to make sense of how and why some act negatively in the name of a religion (we discuss Islam and Buddhism), the unity of traditions in their deep mystical expressions, and the need to work together across traditions in our current world.
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Attached Files:
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Photo of Yassir Chadly
(jpg)
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2022-02-28
A Peaceful Heart In A Time Of War And The Legacy Of Thich Nhat Hanh | Monday Night Talk
54:40
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Jack Kornfield
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Tonight I had planned to talk about Thich Nhat Hanh, the great and wise Zen master and teacher who died recently at age 95. But it seems critical to also acknowledge the grief of the war in Ukraine. As it says in the Buddhist teachings (and in other wisdom teachings), in this world, hatred never ceases by hatred, but by love alone is healed.
There has to be a better game than war for human beings. We have to look at the war within ourselves as well.
Thich Nhat Hanh’s instruction was to stop—stop making enemies.
Make prayers. Make blessings. This is our moral task.
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