OK a little warning: This post is a little more technical/boringly written in an effort to more clearly show the structure of my thinking. However, it does deal well with the key cause (wrong view) of fears and phobias –the crazy belief that what has happened to in the past/what we imagine is an indicator of what will happen in the future. Spoiler alert: it’s not, too much changes, all the time… So anyway, if you can stay awake, it…
For me, one of the most empowering aspects of the Dharma approach taught by Luang Por Thoon’s students is the use of methods, tools, to structure my practice. Though I incorporate many different tools into my contemplations (I will call-out a few special ones in some of these blogs), there has been one in particular that has supported almost all of my contemplations — this method, which I will outline here, was adopted from what I understood from a teaching…
I had a very dear friend, we’ll call her Sue, who was quite overweight (FYI I got Sue’s permission before writing this). Try as I might, nothing I did could convince her to drop the pounds. I invited her to exercise classes with me, insisted we eat only healthy foods together, I nagged and pestered, but to no avail. I worried constantly about Sue since she is a friend that I love and depend on in my life; I was…
So If you will bear with another prelude…when I first came to this practice I suffered from extreme, almost crippling anxiety. I was afraid of almost everything, though disease, death, injury and abandonment certainly topped my list. It quickly became clear that without addressing my fear and the views that underlay it, I just wasn’t going to get anywhere. After all..extreme anxiety is not exactly a clear headed place from which to contemplate. Looking back now however, I can see how much…
I was a few days into my first KPY retreat and I was still on the fence about whether or not this approach was for me. I had quietly listened as other folks shared stories from their lives and the realizations they had achieved when they examined their experiences from a correct viewpoint. I still don’t know what persuaded me to finally speak. But I did. I raised my hand and tearfully shared a story that had caused me a…
So, Neecha and Phra Anan actually asked me to start this blog years ago (2011). At first I said yes (because who wants to disappoint their teachers?) but then…on second thought…no. Neecha told me, “We just get so excited about your practice because it progresses naturally and your examples are so clear that we want others to see how it can be done”. But honestly, I just didn’t think I was someone worthy of writing a blog about Buddhism. I…
