Diana Clark, PhD, offers Dharma teachings grounded in many years of meditation practice, retreat experience, and study, as well as a deep trust in the Buddha’s path of peace and freedom. Her teaching invites people to discover greater ease, clarity, and freedom in the midst of ordinary life. Diana was trained as a retreat teacher by Gil Fronsdal and Andrea Fella. Her background also includes serving as a professor of Theravāda Buddhism at the Institute of Buddhist Studies and working as a cancer researcher. She has a PhD in biochemistry. These varied forms of practice, teaching, and inquiry inform an approach to the Dharma that is careful, experiential, and engaged with everyday life. More than a thousand of Diana’s talks and guided meditations are available at AudioDharma.org. Her website is DianaClarkDharma.org.
Sometimes it can be helpful to see the bigger picture and simplify practice to cultivation and letting go. In this talk we explore the power of cultivation in the context of balancing the five faculties. Specifically, cultivating wisdom as balanced by faith and supported by concentration is emphasized.
With metta practice we start where it's easy and expand the loving-kindness to more and more beings. In this session, we begin with the easy being, then expand to include oneself and then a good friend. Focusing on our intention for cultivating loving-kindness, rather than on having any particular experiences, supports the transformative power of this practice.
Diana talks about how to develop resilience in the face of difficulties. By practicing noticing one’s thoughts and emotions, starting with the easier and gradually moving toward the more difficult can be a compassionate and skillful way to develop strength. She talks about how this resilience creates the conditions that can allow one to help others as well as oneself.
Diana Clark gave the second talk in a seven-week series on lesser known Buddhist teachings titled "Thus Have I Heard." This talk emphasizes the importance of good spiritual friends in preparing our minds for liberation. Given this importance, there are four ways to sustain a good relationship: generosity, endearing speech, beneficial actions, and viewing others without bias or prejudice.
The Pali Canon includes over 5,000 discourses that document conversations and encounters that occurred during forty years of the Buddha's ministry. Over the centuries, certain teachings have risen to the surface with popularity and come to characterize our impression of what the Buddha taught. However, the vast collection of source material reaches beyond these well known teachings. For this speaker series, IMSB has invited teachers to focus on teachings that have been largely neglected by contemporary Buddhist groups. Each talk will share a lesser-known teaching, event, or instruction that will enrich our comprehension of what the Buddha taught. We will discover whether broadening our source material reinforces the dominant view of Buddhist practice or paints a different picture of meditation and the path of liberation.
