Chapter 14 of “A Trackless Path II”
Sky-Gazing Ken: Wednesday, August 11th, A Trackless Path II, evening session. I’m getting this down. There’s one question that was posed to me a couple days ago which I have not responded to but I should since the subject matter’s been mentioned many times without any other reference, and that is sky-gazing. In The Jewel […]
Chapter 13 of “A Trackless Path I”
Sitting in the mess Ken: Tuesday, September the 1st, A Trackless Path, morning session. Well, I’ll just speak from my own experience. It’s very important to learn how to sit in the mess. Student: To sit in what? Ken: It’s very important to learn how to sit in the mess. Now, because of what we […]
Chapter 15 of “Then and Now: A Commentary on The Jewel Ornament of Liberation”
Choice depends on perceiving an alternative Ken: This is the 15th class in the series of Then and Now, January 29th, 2008. A couple of things before we turn to the material: I am going to change the format of the class slightly. Instead of giving people via the Facebook group, meditations to do in […]
Chapter 13 of “Mind Training in Seven Points”
Make the practice your own Ken: So, we didn’t get to it this morning, but now we get to it. Proficiency: take two. All teachings [instructions] have one aim. The Great Path of Awakening, Jamgön Kongtrül, Ken McLeod (translator), p. 29 Again, Stephen Batchelor, in one of his books, I think it was Buddhism Without […]
Chapter 13 of “A Trackless Path II”
The Wisdom Experience of Ever-Present Good Ken: Wednesday, August 11th, A Trackless Path II, morning session. I want to go through the rest of The Wisdom Experience of Ever-Present Good this morning. There are some other things I want to turn attention to this evening. As Larry pointed out yesterday, in a certain sense we’re […]
Chapter 12 of “A Trackless Path I”
Five Whys Ken: August 31st, morning session, A Trackless Path. Last night I asked you to consider “Why am I here?” And I encouraged you not to answer this intellectually but to listen to all the different forms of knowing in our body, guts, heart, mind, spirit, so forth. There’s also another way to work […]
Chapter 14 of “Then and Now: A Commentary on The Jewel Ornament of Liberation”
Karma explains everything and nothing Ken: Fourteenth class in the Then and Now series. January the 22nd, 2008. Tonight we look at the chapter on karma. I’m not sure where I saw this or heard about this, or if I saw this as some video on the web, but my friend and colleague, Stephen Bachelor, […]
Chapter 12 of “Mind Training in Seven Points”
The five forces Ken: Today we’re going to look at the condensed form of five forces, and then the proficiency. And, as we’re doing, looking at this from the point of view of the world of complete experience. Now, if you’ll recall, what to do while living. We have these five forces: impetus, repudiation, virtue, […]
Chapter 12 of “A Trackless Path II”
Energy transformation techniques Ken: August 10th, A Trackless Path II, evening session. I got it right didn’t I? Okay. What was your question Roby? Microphone. [Whispering] He doesn’t know what dangerous waters he’s stepping into, but— Roby: I have a Tilopa question. Ken: Okay. Fire away. I don’t guarantee to understand it. There’s a lot […]
Chapter 12 of “37 Practices of a Bodhisattva”
Student questions on translation points Ken: All right. This is our last class. First glance, looks like we have an awful lot of verses. But the last three practices are very much summaries. And then the last four verses of the text are traditional elements that you’ll find in many, many texts. So, questions about […]
Chapter 11 of “A Trackless Path I”
Power exercise Ken: Saturday, August 29th, A Trackless Path. Tomorrow a number of you are going to be heading back to your homes. And as you’ve discovered you’ll be saying something about your experience here this evening. Early in the retreat I talked about the four ways of working: power, ecstasy, insight and compassion. What […]
Chapter 13 of “Then and Now: A Commentary on The Jewel Ornament of Liberation”
The six realms Ken: Okay! Is this twelve or thirteen? I think it’s the thirteenth class, January 15th, 2008. This evening we’re going to focus on the six realms. In case you’re wondering why the flip chart and everything; it’s a math class tonight but I have reasons for it. I know there are all […]
Chapter 11 of “Mind Training in Seven Points”
Increasing capacity of attention Ken: Work at resting in the field and doing that for a while. You’ll develop a capacity in attention in which you can start opening to what’s inside. And even at the stage of the field, you can still work, to a certain extent, with a sense of balance and noticing […]
Chapter 11 of “A Trackless Path II”
Emptiness is not a thing Ken: Tuesday, August 10th, okay, A Trackless Path II, morning session. There are two things I want to touch on this morning. A major one is a continuation of what we were discussing yesterday, mahamudra. In the classical presentations of mahamudra there’s a list of four what I call pitfalls, […]
Chapter 11 of “Karma: Awakening From Belief”
Being nice gets in the way Ken: Well, I suppose the short version of this morning’s talk is: You can’t wake up by being a nice person. [Laughter] Student: Does it help though? Ken: No, it doesn’t. It gets in the way. The origin of the word nice—I’m not 100 percent sure of this, but […]
