Their description of Buddhism is as follows:
“Buddhism is a tradition that focuses on personal spiritual development. Buddhists strive for a deep insight into the true nature of life and do not worship gods or deities.”

Similar to what I mentioned last week. It is not so much of a religion with a god and the whole fuss about it. It is more for you, your personal journey and your life – focusing on everything around you.

The Kadampa Buddhism tradition where Marcelo and I met, giving local access to Buddhist teaching, was founded in the 11th century in Tibet. Vulnerable Geshe Kelsang Gyatso founded the “New Kadampa Buddhist Tradition”, there is a blog about NKT I found, offers the following description:

“In his left hand he holds a heart, which symbolises great compassion and spontaneous great bliss… His round yellow hat represents the view of Nagarjuna, and the wisdom sword in his right hand teaches us to sever ignorance… Dorje Shudgen rides a snow lion …and has a jewel-splitting mongoose perched on his left arm, symbolising his power to bestow wealth on those who put their trust in him… His wrathful expression indicated that he destroys ignorance, the real enemy of all living beings, by blessing them with great wisdom.”

The NKT puts a high emphasis on “Buddhism in the modern world”. I remember when I used to attend the weekly teachings in London, that there is always a reference to daily life. Particularly in London. This really makes a difference to my view of any religion on spiritual thoughts as you have the direct connection to your environment.

You can download a comprehensive booklet about NKT on their website.

Also, browsing, I found a website about chanting.

I hope this gives you enough Sunday reading.

Have a peaceful week.
Love and Kindness
Volker

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I have been off work with flu/cold symptoms. And, whilst still working from home but coming to a close the end of the week, I was wondering about sickness and spirituality.

Why are so many people looking for spiritual help when being sick?

Are they looking for comfort? Relief? Or is it guilt because they have an illness that is self inflicted.

I remember about 15 years ago, I was about to go to sleep when I heard someone in the corridor saying “I would like to kill Volker…” – that person was drunk and out of their mind, but I was scared. Although I was not interested in any god at the time, I did what came natural to me, I prayed.

Now, I am not feeling close to dying at all but wonder, does this believe in something greater than us give us hope and relief? Are we trying to look for comfort when we are not well?

How does Buddhism treat that? We are looking into the inside of ourselves and try to find energy inside us to help us getting better. Is that not a wiser approach?

Marcelo, I am curious about your thoughts on that one!

Love and Kindness
Volker

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Congratulations for both of you! I am very happy of your conquerer. You have found the balance between your energies and opened the gates to let the mind of your positive seed Karma to enter in Jen’s body, passing through the inner channels and all chakras.

That’s a very important time for both of you, your collective Karma is flourishing and giving some fruits.

About your last post, I can say YES you are right we always, every single moment, we get involved and distracted by everyday things, duties and toughts. You are distracted in essence.

And sure, we use all excuses to not do what we want to do, sometimes we use excuses to not work, to not get up, to not exercise, to not read, to not relax, to not meditate and so forth.But can you imagine a Yogui or a Highest Buddha, they can do everything by their minds, they can do everything at the same time, they do not need to finish one task to start another, actualy for them, remember, there is no beggining and no ending. Is it not incredible?

You are so concentrate on the true nature of all phenomena that nothing can distracte us. Without understanding the true nature of all phenomena you will remain forever in the distracted world. Lossing our life, time, wishes, dreams, desires, aspirations by our self-grasping.

From Shantideva book “Guide to the Bodhisattva’s way of Life, we can have this instructions:

“…It is suffering and its causes that need to be abandoned,
And it is the ignorance of self-grasping that causes delusions and sufferings to increase.
“But there is no way to abandon self-grasping so that it will never recur.”
On the contrary, meditation on selflessness, or empitness, is the supreme method for accomplishing this.

Neither the feet nor the calves are the body,
Nor are the thighs or the loins.
Neither the front nor the back of the abdomen is the body,
Nor are the chest or the shouolders.

Neither the sides nor the hands are the body,
Nor are the arms or the armpits.
None of the inner organs is the body,
Nor is the head or the neck.
So where is the body to be found?

If you say that the body is distributed
Among all its different parts,
Although we can say that the parts exist in the parts,
Where does a separate possessor of these parts abide?

And if you say that the entire body exists
Within each part, such as the hand,
It follows that there are as many bodies
As there are different parts!”

Buddha says, there is no body neither its parts, we are not an unit nor a colection of them. The day we start to understand empitness and put its knowledge into practice, we will be permanent happy and there will not be any distraction, because there is no parts to get involved with and also there will be not unit to be stocked in.

You will never get me wrong. Do not worry, if I cannot understand whatever you are telling me it is because my selg-grasping ignorance and my karma, not because you are not being clear enough.

Love & Kindness

Marcelo

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I know you have been extremely busy, so have I. But, I don’t want to forget about you, Buddha or our blog. So, my weekly post and reminder.

Have I been practising? Patience I have been practising and I am also stressed. Should have taken advise to meditate to de-stress but did not. My apologies. So will keep it in mind for next week to meditate at least 3 times.

I had a conversation with my wife yesterday about the laughing Buddha. She asked, why is he laughing? I said because he is happy

This morning I did some reasearch and found some facts.

The laughing Buddha is a Chinese Buddha known as the friendly and loving one, part of the Shinto culture. He has become a deity of contentment and abundance. The sack he is carrying is full of rice plants (indicating wealth), candy for children, food, or the woes of the world. He is patron of the weak, poor and children. According to legend, if one rubs the Laughing Buddha’s great belly, it brings forth wealth, good luck, and prosperity.

What a nice story behind it, isn’t it?

And, here is a video to it too – have a blessed Sunday.

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Maybe off topic, but a friend of mine visited Nepal and flew with Buddha Air.

I wonder, are there any other airlines named after spiritual leaders?

Will it be a safer plane to fly with than a normal plane? What is the food like on board?

Volker

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