B. Alan Wallace, 13 May 2010
Today we had a very deep practice on Compassion.
The introduction contains great examples as always in order to turn our minds towards the cultivation of compassion, to make real the suffering of others and to unveil our innate compassion, with the boldness, courage, and vision to realize what is happening, attend to the world of possibility, and aspire “may there be freedom.” This will leave us poised for action and ready to come out of meditation and do some good in the world.
The outro talks about the peril of classifying ourselves as “not a loving person” or “not a compassionate person.” Being more reserved does not mean being less compassionate. Alan talks about the obscurations that these feelings bring, and how to peel off the crusts and reveal the compassion that we do not get from anyone, not even from the meditation, because it’s already there. The meditation just blows the dust of our eyes.
You may notice that this podcast is quite short. Unfortunately my poor laptop was expecting to be on retreat as well, little did it know what awaited it! Today it had an electrical affliction and the hard drive refused to continue recording. I have fixed it, but unfortunately this podcast was cut short. Not to worry, the themes covered will probably come up again very soon, and if you are still longing (I won’t say craving) for more then:
Alan is happy to announce that the videos are now available from the “Science and Buddhism” colloquium at the University of Oxford, sponsored by the Physiology Department and the Oriental Institute of the University of Oxford, the Santa Barbara Institute for Consciousness Studies, and the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies, March, 2010. The videos are accessible here:
http://www.voicesfromoxford.org/B-S-Introduction.html
The videos are on a menu to the right and they can be downloaded!
The picture used is that of Avalokiteśvara so that all sentient beings (and my laptop!) may be free of suffering!
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