Mangala Shri Bhuti - The Link

Speaker: Paddy McCarthy. Three approaches can help us to avoid self-aggression when working with habitual patterns of thought: an outer approach (seeking external support); an inner approach (self-reflecting), and a secret approach (recognizing the nature of interdependent origination). The outer approach, which relies on using external supports such as maintaining practice records or working with "practice buddies," is a useful though limited way to cultivate beneficial habits of thought and to challenge harmful ones. The inner approach, which relies on self-reflection, engages us in investigating the thoughts that present obstacles to progressing on the path; it has the added benefit of allowing us to develop our resolve and to understand how our thought process imputes our reality. Finally, the secret approach, which involves recognizing the nature of interdependent origination, provides a broader context for understanding how habitual patterns of thought arise and how we can free ourselves from them by coming to understand their true nature.

Speaker: Tina Toriello. Authentic engagement with the Dharma begins with directly acknowledging impermanence, renouncing attachment to it and seeking refuge from it. When we use distraction and denial to avoid confronting the reality of old age, sickness and death, we are shocked when it touches us directly. Resisting the truth of impermanence and clinging to our attachments and addictions only give rise to suffering; recognizing and accepting impermanence is the ground for renunciation and refuge.

Speaker: Mary Cobb. To cultivate, maintain and renew an intimate relationship with practice, it is helpful to return to the basic practice of shamatha to relax and settle the mind. Dry spells, arising from conditions both internal and external, are natural and inevitable aspects of being on the path. Learning to work with them is essential. One way to navigate such dry spells is to return to the basic practice of shamatha to cultivate calm abiding and to nurture an intimate relationship with the mind.

Speaker: Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche. This is a re-broadcast of a talk Rinpoche gave on March 18, 2001 at Phuntsok Choling in Ward, CO.

Speaker: Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche. This is a re-broadcast of a talk Rinpoche gave on August 29, 2004 at Osel Ling in Crestone, CO

Speaker: Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche. This is a re-broadcast of a talk Rinpoche gave on July 11, 1999 at Rangjung Yeshe Gomde in Leggett, California.

Speaker: Deborah Haynes. Amidst the heightened suffering in the world today, it is vital to develop a positive relation to impermanence, suffering and death. We are experiencing natural disasters, political and social upheaval, and the Covid19 pandemic, all of which have caused profound suffering and death for billions of beings. As practitioners we are called upon to respond to this suffering through practice, prayer and meditation. Deepening our understanding of suffering, death and the dying process can enable us to develop a positive relationship to our own life and death and to support others to do so as well.

Speaker: Bob Reid. When we take refuge in the Dharma, we renounce violence against beings. To adhere to this vow, we need to cultivate awareness of our body, speech and mind through practicing the three wisdoms. In taking the refuge vow we commit to nonviolence, one of the four virtuous disciplines. The practice of nonviolence requires us to adhere to four precepts: never to repay abuse with abuse, never to be angry in return for anger, never to strike back when struck, and never to expose the faults of others when they reveal our own. To understand, accept and practice these disciplines we need to recognize and overcome the obstacles presented by our habitual and conventional mindsets, and to remember that the Buddhist wisdom tradition seeks not to control behavior or adhere to dogma but to cultivate authentic wisdom and alleviate suffering, which arises from self-grasping ignorance. As the Venerable Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche recalls one of his teachers saying, with "genuine renunciation toward self-importance, half the Dharma is accomplished." The process of seeing, understanding and dissolving this ignorance takes place through engagement with the three wisdoms-hearing, contemplation and meditation.

Speaker: Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche. In a talk originally given on 12/06/2010 from Bir, India, Rinpoche reminds us how fast time passes, from a day to a month, a year and then our entire life. What will we have made of this precious opportunity? How do we determine what is important, and not? Will we talk in the footsteps of those who have made communicating the dharma to others their priority?

Speaker: Dungse Jampal Norbu. Dungse-la discusses change and impermanence as being the very nature of things, what enables everything to function. In our self-cherishing and fixations, we resist change and therefore suffer. However, we can choose to rest in change by engaging a bigger view that acknowledges the reality of impermanence and constant change. For example, we can place the changes we are experiencing in the larger perspective of history.

Speaker: Daisuke Inaba. To find time in our busy lives for practice and service, we can apply techniques to calm ourselves, to be kind to ourselves, and to be more aware of our state of mind. Taking deep breaths calms us and gives us the space to be kind to ourselves. Although we may be tempted to blame ourselves or others for not accomplishing our goals, it is important to remember that aggression is not productive. With a calm and accepting mind, we are better able to consider objectively how we use our time; observing our behavior in this way allows us to recognize how we distract ourselves and how---and why---we procrastinate. We can also try to emulate how Rinpoche moves through the world with such relaxation and lightness.

Speaker: Suzy Greanias. The events of 2020, which astrologers have predicted, increase our awareness of the instability of outer circumstances, and can inspire us to contemplate and investigate our inner circumstance and the impermanence and suffering of samsara, which are the first two of the four seals of Buddhism. The Vajrayana path also encourages us to go beyond these, engaging in practice to cultivate the third and fourth seals: the wisdom of emptiness and the promise of liberation.

Speaker: Tatjana Meyerowitz. Practicing sadhana liberates us from our samsaric mindset and introduces us to our own nature and to the sacred world. It is important to practice wholeheartedly and with devotion for an extended period of time, allowing the practice to take root in our mind. The sadhana practice, "a methodical discipline to attain desired knowledge," enables us to realize that we do not have to be at the mercy of karma or external forces. It liberates us from the ego' s habitual grasping and rejecting, allowing us to experience sacred world on and off the cushion.

Speaker: Gretchen Holland. The crises facing us in this moment--the COVID 19 pandemic, racial violence, natural disasters, and widespread fear and anger--call upon us to reflect on how to respond as individuals and Buddhist practitioners dedicated to benefiting all beings. Using Jamgon Kongtrul Lodro Thaye' s prayer as guidance and support, we can extend our care by accepting responsibility for the history of oppression in which we all share by listening and educating ourselves about this history, and by recognizing the power of generating tsewa and offering prayers to the world.

Speaker: Dungse Jampal Norbu. Dungse-la explores the topic of service from multiple angles, enumerating the kinds of service and how the noble attitude of service of benefitting others is best accomplished without grasping to a sense of self. In this way all dharma practice becomes an act of service as it serves that primary intention.