Gurus, Guides, Teachers
Hindus make a distinction between what are called upagurus and what are called satgurus. A satguru is what we’ve been talking about here as the guru; it’s the one who is the doorway. … Along…
Category: Wisdom Traditions
Cheer Up: Reminders
Furnace. The first evening, about 5 o’clock, the pain from the extreme heat, exhaustion, and headaches make me completely lose control of my movements. I can’t lower the furnace damper. A coppersmith jumps up and…
Self-Reliance, Self-Sabotage
Study the capacities you have, and after studying them, say: Zeus, bring whatever circumstances you like; for I have the equipment and resources, given to me by you, to make a cosmos of myself by…
Present Moment, Only Moment: Reminders
Do not pursue the past. Do not lose yourself in the future.The past no longer is.The future has not yet come.Looking deeply at life as it isIn the very here and nowThe practitioner dwellsIn stability and…
For Whom Are We Living?
If we live only for ourselves, as most of us are conditioned to do, we will plunge ourselves and all those around us into misery. There is no human being who, once he develops this…
Up to Me
Buddhist nontheism teaches us that no one else is going to liberate us. We are each responsible for our own liberation. Thus, self-self-liberation first is most important because without self-self-liberation true compassion, the fuel to…
A Classic Is a Book That Has Never Finished Saying What It Has to Say
The moral compass of Les Misérables thus spreads far beyond the history, geography, politics and economics of the world in which its story is set. The novel achieves the extraordinary feat of being at the…
Dear Anya
Thank you for your cool list of queries which I saw after I got back from vacation at Blue-Eye, Missouri! I will start with an easy one: “Favorite Book”— The Brothers Karamazovby Fyodor Dostoevskyas translated by…
Get to Work
Work on reducing your likes and dislikes, not only in personal relationships but in everything….Try this with jobs and responsibilities: the nagging little things you have to do but just don’t want to. It’s…
Mirrors
CLEANSE THE MIRROR OF YOUR HEART AND YOU WILL SEE GOD. –Neem Karoli Baba, in Ram Dass, Miracle of Love, 249 The heart-mind of the ordinary person is like a dirty and stained mirror. One…