Dhamma Talks
Letting Go Of Things
This talk follows up on the talk last week involving the Parami of Generosity. Each person attending was given a worksheet, (the .doc file posted below) to review, creating a hierarchy of valuing possessions, from relatively unimportant to the most important. This...
The Benefits Of Generosity
This is the second of a series of talks exploring the Paramis, translated as the qualities of mind to be perfected during the awakening process. The topic for this talk is dana, generosity. Some references to how the Buddha's teachings were reported, followed by...
Perfecting Wholesome Mental Qualities
This talk begins a series of explorations of the paramis, qualities of the mind to be perfected during the process of awakening. The word parami is translated from Pali as perfection; in Sanskrit, the word is paramita. These qualities emerge as the frequency and...
Mike’s Retreat Report
One of the Sangha members, Mike Maldonado, recently completed a one week retreat at the Insight Meditation Society Retreat Center in Massachusetts. It is customary for a person who has completed a significant retreat to describe his experience in order for him to...
Four Clear Comprehensions
This talk focused on a commentarial addition to the Mindful Comprehension stanzas of the Satipatthana Sutta, (sati sampajanna), which emphasize integrating mindfulness into all activities, walking, eating, dressing, and other behavioral routines of daily life. The...
Peter’s 2017 Forest Refuge Retreat Report
It is customary for an evening's discussion to be dedicated to a review of a significant recent retreat experience. Peter spent the month of March at the Forest Refuge, part of the Insight Meditation Society in Massachusetts. The retreat's theme involved what is...
2017 Deerhaven Practicing At Home
During this final talk about how to integrate the benefits of the retreat, Peter offered suggestions regarding various ways to transfer what was gained from rigorous meditation practice to daily life routines. This was followed by discussion of various ways more...
Self State Integration And Liberation
During this talk, Peter talked of the process of personality integration that occurs as the hindrances are less and less impactful in life, leading to deep insights into the fundamental conditions that create a misperception of reality as an enduring self that can or...
7 Awakening Factors And 5 Powers
During This talk, Peter described the advances for insight fostered by the 7 awakening factors: mindfulness, investigation of mental phenomena, energy/effort, joy/enthusiastic interest, tranquility, concentration/unification of mental functions and equanimity/balance...
How To Change Your Mind
This evening's talk focused on the core teaching of Buddhism called "paticca samuppada" (pah-tee-chah sah-moo-pah-dah), traditionally interpreted as "dependent origination". Peter offered an alternative translation, "contingent provisional emergence" with...
