Rev. Danny Fisher

Just a Buddhist Minister Trying to Benefit Beings

Month: September, 2009

September 23, 2009

Discovering Meditation by Godwin Samararatne

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Godwin Samararatne.

I just blogged about my friend Dr. Miles Neale and some of the work he’s doing.  When Miles got in touch with me, he also mentioned something about a teacher he and I share:  the late Godwin Samararatne.  A new book of his teachings, Discovering Meditation, has been published.  You can download it here.

Godwin was my first meditation teacher.  I studied vipassana meditation with him and Anagarika Shri Munindra when I was a student on Antioch Education Abroad’s Buddhist Studies in India Program in 1999.  I don’t know that I will ever be able to fully convey the extent of his effect on me.  He was my “heart teacher,” and the most “awake” person I have ever known.  Perhaps Bhikkhu Bodhi captured him best in his eulogy:

What was so impressive about Godwin…was not what he did but what he was. He was above all a truly selfless person, and it was this utter selflessness of the man that accounts for the impact he had on the lives of so many people.

I use the word “selflessness” to describe him in two interrelated senses. First, he was selfless in the sense that he seemed to have almost no inner gravitational force of an “I” around which his personal life revolved: no pride, no ambition, no personal projects aimed at self-aggrandizement. He was completely humble and non-assertive, not in an artificial self-demeaning way, but rather as if he had no awareness of a self to be effaced. Hence as a meditation teacher he could be utterly transparent, without any trips of his own to lay upon his students.

This inward “emptiness” enabled Godwin to be selfless in the second sense: as one who always gave first consideration to the welfare of others. He was ready to empathize with others and share their concerns as vividly as if they were his own. In this respect, Godwin embodied the twin Buddhist virtues of loving-kindness and compassion, maitri and karuna. Even without many words, his dignified presence conveyed a quietude and calm that spoke eloquently for the power of inner goodness, for its capacity to reach out to others and heal their anxiety and distress. It was this deep quietude and almost tangible kindness that drew thousands of people to Godwin and encouraged them to welcome him into their lives.

Again, you can download Discovering Meditation here.

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September 23, 2009

Dr. Miles Neale’s Sacred Pilgrimage to the Sacred Sites of Peru

milesOur friend Dr. Miles Neale writes to tell us about a spiritual pilgrimage to the sacred sites of Peru that he is leading this December.  It will involve daily guided meditation, yoga and Buddhist teachings as well as meetings with Shamans and a day of service with the local peoples.  For more information about joining the pilgrimage and to follow the adventures, visit http://milesnealeretreatandtour.blogspot.com.

Miles is a great guy, and very active on the American Buddhist scene.  Check him out http://www.milesneale.com.

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September 23, 2009

Tibetan Nannies – The New Parental Status Symbol?

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This is more than a little icky…

When $800 strollers hit the market a few years ago, it looked as if baby status symbols had reached a new odd, capitalist apex. Now, according to a growing number of parents and experts, the primo credentials trade in a different kind of capital: nannies.

In American cities that draw domestic workers from around the world, the nanny pool is incredibly diverse, with women from the Philippines, Jamaica and the West Indies, Nepal, Russia, Poland and more. In some families, the ethnic background of a nanny carries a certain cachet — and entrenched stereotypes.

“Generally speaking, what is the difference between someone from the Philippines, Tibet and the Caribbean in terms of child-raising mentality, patience, education …?,” wondered a recent poster on the popular parenting site UrbanBaby.com.

Such posts — and parents — are not alone in voicing their wishes to hire nannies with the “right” socio-ethnic background for their children. For the past several years, Tibetan nannies have been all the rage in New York City. On message boards and playgrounds, some parents claimed Tibetan nannies were “very balanced and Zen” and aided in children’s “spiritual development,” whereas in areas such as Dallas, for example, Latino nannies have been more in demand for their Spanish-speaking abilities.

At the Diki Daycare Center in Astoria, N.Y., demand for Tibetan nannies became so great that the preschool began offering a Tibetan nanny referral service.

“Tibetan women are well known for being caring and loving nannies,” reads the promotional literature. “They are recognized for becoming ‘one of the family’ and offer the same compassion and quality of care for their charges as they do their own children.” Furthermore, it says, “Cleanliness, organization & dedication to education are values of Tibetan culture.”

In fact, Tibetan nannies have become so popular that they may have become victims of their own success as they’ve been able to request and get escalating salaries — much to the annoyance of some employers.

Read the rest here.

September 23, 2009

Support the Bicycle Pilgrimage Benefitting the Konchok Foundation and Shambhala Mountain Center

This from MahaSangha News:

This Friday, September 25,  Joshua Weinstein and his fellow mountain bikers will leave Boulder to begin their gallant  and inspired pilgrimage to the Great Stupa  to raise money for Konchok Foundation and Shambhala Mountain Center.  There will be a brief send off ceremony for them in Joshua’s yard  (2815 7th St. in North Boulder)  at 8:30 AM with Meditation and a Lhasang performed by Surmang Khenpo Tsering.

The route being taken to the Stupa is on mountain paths.  Here is Joshua’s blog entry from yesterday:

Monday September 21st only four days before our departure it is snowing over much of the route. Rollins Pass, the high point at 11,671 ft., may see 6 inches of snow.  We are packing some wool socks and hoping for those classic Rocky Mountain fall days with snow on the peaks and yellow aspen leaves waving up at them.  There are 9 of us riding to Vagabond Ranch and 4 continuing on to the Stupa for an estimated 166.5 miles and 20,800 ft. of ascent and 18,662 ft. of descent.

Please sponsor Joshua and his fellow bikers, and help them to meet their goal of generous donations for Konchok Foundation and Shambhala Mountain center.  (The donations will be divided 50/50)  Go to
http://www.konchok.org/mountainbikepilgrimagedonations.htm to find out more and to sponsor any biker you wish to support.

For more  detailed and intimate information about how the Pilgrimage is progressing, please go to Joshua’s blog at http://www.vagabondranch.org/

You can also go to http://www.vagabondranch.org/pilgrimage-fall-09 for information regarding their route.

For more information about the Konchok Foundation and Shambhala Mountain Center, visit http://www.konchok.org and http://www.shambhalamountain.org, respectively.

September 22, 2009

“The Monk Behind the Myth”

web_picoThis week on Interfaith Voices, the lead story is “The Monk Behind the Myth”–an “intimate portrait” of His Holiness the Dalai Lama with Pico Iyer, longtime friend of His Holiness and author of The Open Road: The Global Journey of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama (now in paperback).  The segment is described this way:

The Dalai Lama is a complex figure- at once a Buddhist monk, the leader of the Tibetan community in exile and a spiritual celebrity.  He is also a man whose human side few people know. We talk with Pico Iyer, a friend of the Dalai Lama for over thirty years, about the man behind the image.

Listen to the show here.