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Homework Part 1 Where My Mind Vists Most Often: Alana’s Special Time

April 21, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

So, a little reminder, this entry is the first part of my homework assignment to use snippets of my life/experiences (a biopsy) to start evaluating what happiness is and if it’s worth it. Specifically I was told to: Figure out where my mind visits often, my memories/fantasies. See the suffering. How long is the suffering versus happiness? How do I repeat the cycle? Alana’s Special Vacation Time After months of prep and planning, the day of Eric and my first…

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But Whyyyyyyyyy-ey-ey-ey!!! Do I Create this Self Thing Anyway?

April 14, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

I had only a brief moment of feeling triumphant — having conquered Mae Yo’s seemingly impossible homework assignment about how the aggregates work — when I realized, I now had an even bigger question…Why? I mean seriously, why do I create a sense of self and then bolster it using some crazy ass mental acrobatics ( i.e. aggregates of memory (3) and imagination (4))? Why bother with this self-stuff? Why bother getting born? Try as I might I was stumped…

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Alana’s (Seemingly) Impossible Homework Assignment– Go and Figure Out How Memory (3) and Imagination (4) Work. What is Their Process?

April 7, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

Another technical entry warning, do your best and feel free to scan and skip ahead to next week if this is all a bit much… Gurrr, ughhrr, ugggh … those were basically my first thoughts when I sat down to do my homework. Fortunately, as I’m sure all you Dear Readers have noted already, the methods taught by LP Thoon are chalk-full of tools, the most important being to start from experiences in our everyday lives to understand the dharma….

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Alana’s 3s and 4s or, More Technically, the 5 Aggregates and the Buddhist Concept of Self

March 31, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

So, I am going to warn in advance that this is sure to be a mighty technical entry. This is about to get REALZ so, if you are having trouble, assume you’re in good company (even with this blogger) and do your best to follow along. Also note, the stuff in this post is not a starting place for practice, this is not meant to fuel anyone else’s contemplations, though none of this is a great secret (there are no…

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Buckle-up and Prepare for a Buddhisty Ride

March 24, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

I began this blog with the idea of Buddhism, of Bhuddistiness — what I said from the get-go remains entirely true: This blog, all my contemplations, my path, is firmly rooted in the path the Buddha himself laid-out, beginning with correcting our wrong views, to guide us to freedom from suffering. Simple as it sounds, this is the heart of my dharma practice — seeing the reality that everything is impermanent, subject to change, to cease, to die and that…

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Candy, Sounds so Sweet But Boy Can She Be Trouble

March 17, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

A dear friend from college, we’ll call her Candy, came for a few days to visit. Candy and I are extremely close, I love her like a sister, but sometimes we can fight like sisters too…when I look back at the visit I realize, I had prepared myself for a knockout prize fight from the moment she stepped out of the Uber and onto my front curb. You see Candy, despite having many redeeming qualities as a friend, can be…

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The Green-Not-So-Green Purse

March 10, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

Eric and I were in Hawaii and, me being a sucker for all things touristy and kitschy, got sold on tickets to a submarine ride. We took our seats on board and the boat began to descend. Down and down we went into a world that looks so different than what I’m used to. I peeled my eyes away from the window for just a sec and I noticed that my very bright neon green bag was changing colors. This…

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It’s Thai Time (A Year and a Half Late)

February 24, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

It was at the end of the 2012 (I think) retreat and the teachers were taking suggestions/ feedback on the retreat from the participants. I raised my hand, “I think it would be good if LP Nut (one of the teachers) led some of the English discussion groups/activities. I always get so much out of his teachings” LP Nut takes the microphone, thanks me, and then calls me out, “just remember Alana you can learn Thai too.” OK, I hear…

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I’m Better Than This Bus

February 17, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

The buses in SF suck! They are dirty, overcrowded, slow and filled with all kinds of ‘colorful’ and delicious smelling characters. So when, I could finally afford to drive to work everyday (and pay for parking) instead of having to take the bus, I felt like I had ‘made-it’. Sweet! Then one day, my husband needed the car and it was back to the bus for me. I got on and it was worse than I remembered — all pushing…

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That Thing Ringing in Your Hand, Its a Phone — PICK IT UP!!

February 11, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

My brother Seth called, again, I finally pick-up the phone and I get an earful, “(something like) Why can’t you just pick-up the phone. Or if you can’t pick-up the phone why can’t you just call me back. It’s been days I have been trying to get a hold of you. I always return my calls, is it so so much to ask for that you do the same?…”. In my head I’m thinking, “ he is blowing this out…

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Maybe Cinderella’s Evil Stepmother Wasn’t All Evil After All

February 3, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

Once upon a time, long long ago… LP Anan gave some homework: “Tell an old story again. Tell a story in which you usually speak as the victim , as the person in the right, again. This time, tell the story as the villain, as the person who was wrong.” Here is that home work: Back when I was in undergrad I had a pretty serious boyfriend, we’ll call him Chris. Chris was super-smart, academically ambitious and always up for…

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My Fortune is Your Disaster

January 27, 2017 alana Comments 2 comments

There was a little market down the block from my house that had struggled for years. It was such an eyesore, attracted unsavory characters, the whole neighborhood was waiting, hoping, it would shut down. That something fun and chic would open in its place and increase all of our property values. I walked by the market, looked-in and saw the owner arranging his empty shelves, trying his best to make the store look fuller, nicer, stocked. That’s when I realized…

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And Now for A Moment to Reflect

January 20, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

The Prelude: In general, my practice is to sorta put one foot in front of the other and trudge along my path. But, I have found that sometimes it helps to look-up and look around. To reflect on the distance I have come and to make sure I’m still headed along the right path. The look back — the wohhh something has actually changed in my heart (and much later in my practice I started noticing change in my relationships,…

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Judge this You Crazy Witch

January 13, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

New Technique Alert: Internalization (Opanayiko) We humans are super used to seeing everything from one side, our own, and that makes us blind (well at least it makes us half blind, which may be more dangerous than fully blind where at least we know we can’t see…). This semi blindness reinforces the idea that our beliefs, our actions, the great ‘I’ is exceptional…it traps us. Fortunately, the Buddha did us all a solid and gave us the crazy ninja tool…

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Sandy is Back on The Scene, Only Not Really…

January 6, 2017 alana Comments 0 Comment

One day I drive by my friend Sandy’s favorite shop and I get to thinking about her. Specifically how much she annoys me. Often. Alot. Then I realize I’m in the car alone, Sandy is no where near by, we haven’t even talked in a few weeks…In other words, there is only one place all this venom can be coming from and it’s not from Sandy, it’s from me. So why, why , why is it that Sandy gets on…

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More Kale, More Peeing, More Desire and More Suffering

December 30, 2016 alana Comments 0 Comment

I was walking around the farmer’s market and saw a bundle of kale that looked delicious; crispy and green, my mouth was watering as I imagined a crunchy salad for dinner. The problem, I had no cash. I went back inside and got in the painfully long line for the ATM. 5 minutes goes by and I have barely moved an inch, 10 minutes, 15 minutes and now, I have to pee so bad, but I can’t lose my…

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A Final Installment of the Break From Our Regularly Scheduled Program

December 23, 2016 alana Comments 0 Comment

Well Dear Reader, the boxes have begun to dwindle, my stuff has mostly found a home (even if I don’t feel I have), so soon we will be getting back to the regular schedule of blog posts. But, I didn’t want to end this interlude without some final thoughts: For those of you who are just tuning-in, my new home, New York, is not all I had hoped it would be. Its not what I had imagined. See before the move,…

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And Now an Interruption in Our Regularly Scheduled Programming Part IV — My House Thats Not Quite Mine

December 16, 2016 alana Comments 0 Comment

As part of our move to New York, Eric and I bought a new home in Lower Manhattan. We had seen it once, while he was here interviewing with his new company, and we fell in love at first sight. As soon as we stepped into the sunny loft space we began to imagine our life there — Eric cooking in the chef’s kitchen, me lounging by the fireplace, all the rooms open to each other so we could feel together…

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And Now an Interruption in Our Regularly Scheduled Programming Part III — Boxes of Rupa

December 9, 2016 alana Comments 0 Comment

In my time of transition I continue to ‘broadcast live’ some of my thoughts on my recent move to NY. Sitting shadowed by a tower of boxes, stuffed with the things I ‘own’, its a bit hard not to have some thoughts on that favorite old topic: Rupa I am surrounded by, swimming in, a sea of my stuff. I can look at each item and remember how badly I wanted it back when I bought it. My heart believed that…

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