28 September 2011

Event: Potluck at Jikan's Place

Let's get together for sangha togetherness and sangha food: October 9, 2011, at 5pm, at Jikan's house.

For more information or to RSVP, check out our meetup page or contact Jikan at JikanAnderson@gmail.com.

26 September 2011

Contemplation: The Supreme Treasure of the Buddhas

After reviewing the guidelines for practice, take this as the object of your contemplation:

Ordinary people caught in bondage are unaware and do not know, like blind children of a rich family sitting in a storehouse of treasures without seeing any of them, just bumping into them when they move and thus being wounded by the treasures. Those of the two vehicles, in their fever, think the treasures are ghosts and tigers, dragons and snakes; they reject them and run away, wandering in misery for fifty-odd years. Although these two types differ in bondage and liberation, both lack the supreme treasure of the Buddhas, those who arrive at thusness. Producing a great compassionate vow to remove their pains and give them happiness is arousing the genuine aspiration for enlightenment, neither in bondage nor in liberation.


Chih-i, Stopping and Seeing

21 September 2011

Jikan's Office Hour

I am hosting an Office Hour on Sunday, 2 October, at 7:30am at Caffe Amouri in Vienna, Virginia. Find out more at our Meetup page.

I look forward to seeing you there!

19 September 2011

Contemplation: Guarding Ethics

After reviewing the guidelines for practice, take this as your object of contemplation:

If, lacking ethical conduct, one fails to achieve one's own purpose, the wish to accomplish others' purpose is laughable. Therefore, guarding ethics devoid of aspirations for worldly existence is the Bodhisattva's practice.


from The Thirty-Seven Bodhisattva Practices by Ngulchu Thogme Zangpo

12 September 2011

Contemplation: Salt Water

After reviewing the guidelines for practice, take this as your object of contemplation:

Indulging sense pleasures is like drinking salt water--however much one indulges, thirst and craving only increase. Immediately abandoning whatever things give rise to clinging and attachment is the Bodhisattva's practice.


from The Thirty-Seven Bodhisattva Practices by Ngulchu Thogme Zangpo

05 September 2011

Contemplation: All Things Must Pass

After reviewing the guidelines for practice, take this as your object of contemplation:

The reality of birth-and-death is such that the sorrow of parting is mutually felt by all generations. A father cries over the death of his children; children cry over the death of their father. Brothers, sisters, husbands and wives mourn each other's death. According to the basic law of impermanence, whether death will occur in order of seniority or in the reverse is unpredictable. All things must pass. Nothing stays forever. Few believe this, even if someone teaches and exhorts them. And so the stream of birth-and-death continues everlastingly.


Buddha Shakyamuni, in The Sutra on the Buddha of Infinite Life (the Larger Pure Land Sutra), published in Three Pure Land Sutras, p. 286.