There’s a great story in the New York Times today about a new book of academic articles from various disciplines about the Coen Brother’s 1998 comedy classic The Big Lebowski, and the burgeoning field of “Lebowski Studies.” I’ve posted a couple of times in the past about the film and its Buddhist connections. It’s also just a terrific, very funny film–highly recommended if you haven’t seen it.
Today’s quote is another from the “Ladies’ Man,” Mr. Leonard Cohen, whom I previously quoted and wrote a little bio for here. This is it–a snippet from his song “Night Comes On”:
We were locked in this kitchen
I took to religion
And I wondered how long she would stay
I needed so much
To have nothing to touch
I’ve always been greedy that way
But my son and my daughter
Climbed out of the water
Crying, Papa, you promised to play
And they lead me away
To the great surprise
It’s Papa, don’t peek, Papa, cover your eyes
And they hide, they hide in the World
Today’s quote comes to us from psychotherapist, teacher, and author John Welwood.
The former director of the East/West Psychology program at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco, he currently trains counselors in “psychotherapy in a spiritual framework” and “the healing power of unconditional presence” and leads workshops on psycho-spiritual work and conscious relationship around the world.
Associate editor of the Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, he is also the author of Journey of the Heart: The Path of Conscious Love; Love and Awakening: Discovering the Sacred Path of Intimate Relationship; Awakening the Heart: East/West Approaches to Psychotherapy and the Healing Relationship; Challenge of the Heart: Love, Sex, and Intimacy in Changing Times; Ordinary Magic: Everyday Life as Spiritual Path; Perfect Love, Imperfect Relationships: Healing the Wound of the Heart; and Toward a Psychology of Awakening: Buddhism, Psychotherapy, and the Path of Personal and Spiritual Transformation.
Here’s the quote, from Perfect Love, Imperfect Relationships: Healing the Wound of the Heart, pg. 54:
You are flawed, you are stuck in old patterns, you become carried away with yourself. Indeed you are quite impossible in many ways. And still, you are beautiful beyond measure. For the core of what you are is fashioned out of love, that potent blend of openness, warmth, and clear, transparent presence.
Today’s quote is from the late Buddhist nun Ayya Khema (1923-1997).
Born in Berlin, she escaped from the country of her birth to Scotland with over two-hundred other Jewish children in 1938. She was later reunited her parents in Shanghai, China, only to be interned with them at a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp, where her father ultimately died.
Following the liberation of the camp by American forces, she moved to the United States and married. While traveling with her husband and son through several Asian countries, she first learned meditation. Then, in 1979, she ordained as a Buddhist nun in Sri Lanka. Her ordination name, Khema, means “safety and security.”
Her expansive work as a dharma teacher included serving as the spiritual director of Buddha-Haus and inaugurating Metta Vihara in Germany (the latter being the country’s first monastery in the forest tradition); establishing the International Buddhist Women’s Centre and the former Parappuduwa Nun’s Island in Sri Lanka; and helping to establish Wat Buddha Dhamma near Sydney, Australia.
Her biography page at Wikipedia adds: ”In 1987 she co-ordinated the first International Conference of Buddhist Nuns in the history of Buddhism, which resulted in the setting-up of Sakyadhita, a worldwide Buddhist women’s organization. His Holiness the Dalai Lama was the keynote speaker at the conference. In May 1987, as an invited lecturer, she was the first ever Buddhist nun to address the United Nations in New York on the topic of Buddhism and World Peace.”
Ayya Khema’s many books include Being Nobody, Going Nowhere: Meditations on the Buddhist Path (winner of the Christmas Humphreys Memorial Award); Be an Island: The Buddhist Practice of Inner Peace; When the Iron Eagle Flies: Buddhism for the West; and Who is My Self?: A Guide to Buddhist Meditation.
Here’s the quote:
The inward direction is an important aspect of our contemplative life. Whatever happens inwardly has direct repercussions on what takes place outwardly. The inner light and purity cannot be hidden, nor can the defilements.
We sometimes think we can portray something we are not. That is not possible. The Buddha said that one only knows a person after having heard him speak many times and having lived with him for a long time. People generally try to show themselves off as something better than they really are. Then, of course, they become disappointed in themselves when they fail, and equally disappointed in others. To realistically know oneself makes it possible to truly love. That kind of feeling gives the light-heartedness to this job in which we’re engaged, which is needed. By accepting ourselves and others as we truly are, our job of purification, chipping away at the defilements, is made much easier.
Image via Khoryug.
This from Khoryug:
Following the conclusion of teachings on Nagarjuna’s Letter to a Friend, His Holiness the 17th Karmapa, Ogyen Trinley Dorje, presented Khoryug; a newly formed association of Kagyu Buddhist monasteries carrying out environmental projects under his leadership and our new website www.khoryug.com.
Khoryug, Tibetan for Environment, and short form for Rangjung Khoryug Sungkyob Tsokpa, is an association of Tibetan Buddhist monasteries that have taken His Holiness’s vision to heart and are committed to developing environmental protection projects in our own locales. Khoryug currently consists of thirty six monasteries across India, Nepal and Bhutan that are working together to help create an environmental awakening in the Himalayas on the importance of forest protection, water conservation, wildlife preservation, climate change adaptation and waste management.
In the past two years, His Holiness has called for environmental commitments from Kagyu monasteries, nunneries and centers, which has resulted in many forestation activities by monasteries. In the last year, he has chaired two conferences on environmental protection for Kagyu monasteries and nunneries, with a goal of building environmental management capacity within the Kagyu Sangha. He said that ultimately, he would like Tibetan Buddhist monasteries and nunneries to become leaders on environmental issues, working within their community to address threats such as deforestation, water scarcity, wildlife extinction, pollution and climate change. Monasteries will update their progress on the website and will manage much of the information available there.
The launch was held at Tergar Monastery on December 22nd and had an audience of over 1500 monks, nuns and followers. Also present were H.E Jamgon Kongtrul Rinpoche, Drupon Rinpoche, Ringu Tulku and Drupon Dechen Rinpoche. Presentations included a general overview of environmental issues in the Himalayas and Tibetan Plateau by Dekila Chungyalpa, WWF; a compiled report of this year’s activities by all the Khoryug monasteries by Khenpo Kesang Nyima, Rumtek Shedra, and a talk by His Holiness himself.
In a powerful address, His Holiness urged the audience to ask themselves whether the beautiful aspirations and prayers they make in the morning are carried out in their actions throughout the day. Often when opportunities arise to work to benefit others, we do not seize them, and if we ask ourselves why this is so, it is usually because we are simply working for our own egocentric concerns. Too often we behave as if others existed for us, and as if the earth was ours alone to use as we wish, His Holiness said, and our actions based on such attitudes have had cumulative effects that are devastating for the earth itself.
Making the point that we humans are but one of the immense number of species of life on this planet, His Holiness added that nevertheless we dominate the planet as if it were ours alone, and are responsible for virtually all the damage done to it. His Holiness emphasized that this attitude is inappropriate as well as damaging, given our total dependence on others and especially on the earth itself, for our well-being and for our very survival. He noted that without the plants that yield oxygen, we would not even be able to draw a single breath.
Using a Powerpoint presentation to underscore his points with images, His Holiness took the audience on a dazzling tour of the galaxy, pointing out along the way that we humans have nowhere else to go if we destroy the earth’s natural environment.
Yet unlike humans, the earth is endlessly forgiving, His Holiness noted. When someone commits heinous crimes, such as murder, he is shunned and expelled from human society. Yet however much harm we do to her, the earth never banishes us. Despite all the damage we have done thus far, she has never given up on us, but continues to yield her resources to us with great generosity. We therefore all have a responsibility to consider what practical steps we can do to respond in kind to this great kindness that we receive from the earth.
The event concluded with a moving rendition of the song Aspiration for the World, composed by His Holiness himself and sung by a chorus of students from the Tibetan Children’s Village school.
