Bringing Home the Dharma: Awakening Right Where You Are

“Praise Allah, and tie your camel to the post.” Pray, but also make sure you do what is necessary in the world.

In the Christian mystical tradition one of the great texts is Dark Night of the Soul by Saint John of the Cross, in which he talks about the periods of loneliness, fear, and doubt that one goes through after the initial awakenings into the light. Evagrius,

bodhisattva vows based on the words of the beloved sixth-century sage Shantideva: May I be a guard for those who need protection A guide for those on the path A boat, a raft, a bridge for those who wish to cross the flood May I be a lamp in the darkness A resting place for the weary A healing medicine for all who are sick A vase of plenty, a tree o

form. As Zen master Dogen says, “Flowers fall with our attachment, and weeds spring up with our aversion.”

Martin Luther King, Jr., understood this when he said, “If a person sweeps streets for a living, he should sweep them as Michelangelo painted, as Beethoven composed music, as Shakespeare wrote his plays.”

To continue this journey requires reinforcing the necessary foundation of virtue. By establishing a practice of basic morality, of nonharming, virtue becomes a safeguard on the path, guiding and protecting us and all we touch from harm. In the simplest fashion these safeguards are spelled out in the five traditional Buddhist precepts: (1) not killi

Living Buddhist Masters.

I had many teachers, but the most central were two of the wisest Theravada teachers of the past century: one in Thailand, Ajahn Chah, and one in Burma, Mahasi Sayadaw.

If you want to live a life of balance, start now. Turn off the news, meditate, turn on Mozart, walk through the forest or the mountains, and begin to make yourself a zone of peace.

book Cutting through Spiritual Materialism by Chögyam Trungpa. We can become attached to noble views and ideals,