Category: Teachings
Develop a Mind Like Sky
Meditation comes alive through a growing capacity to release our habitual conflicts and worries that make up our sense of self, and to rest in awareness.
Why We Take Refuge
There are two kinds of refuge. The reason we take refuge in the outer forms of enlightenment is so that we may find the buddha within.
How Mindfulness Can Help Ease Anxiety
Buddhist teacher Judy Lief explains the Buddha’s deep analysis of the roots of anxiety and shows how mindfulness can help us ease the suffering of an anxious mind.
How Mindfulness Leads to Enlightenment
Melvin McLeod on how Buddhism uses mindfulness to develop the wisdom that frees us from suffering.
Who Was the Buddha?
The Buddha who lived 2,600 years ago was not a god. He was an ordinary person, named Siddhartha Gautama, whose teachings on enlightenment and the end of suffering became the basis of the world religion of Buddhism.
What Are the Three Types of Suffering?
Suffering is the central problem that Buddhism addresses, and recognizing our suffering is the first step to its solution.
What Are the Three Minds?
Zen master Dogen wrote that someone working to benefit others should maintain three minds: magnanimous mind, parental mind, and joyful mind.
Celebrating Vesak (“Buddha Day”) 2024
Vesak, also known as “Buddha Day," marks the birth, enlightenment, and death of the historical Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama. This year, it falls on May 23.
The Eightfold Path of Joy and Liberation
The Buddha’s four noble truths include the truth that the eightfold path is a way out of suffering. It’s not just the path to happiness, says Sister True Dedication. It’s happiness itself.
No Self, No Suffering
Melvin McLeod breaks down the Buddha’s four noble truths and argues it’s not only the ultimate self-help formula, but the best guide to helping others and benefiting the world.
How to Practice Mindful Eating
Jan Chozen Bays teaches us how to make every meal a celebration of gratitude, enjoyment, and true nourishment.
Buddha’s Birds
From the swan that Siddhartha nursed as a boy to the fantastical Garuda—Andrea Miller explores the intriguing role that birds play in Buddhist mythology.
I Vow to Save Everyone?
Noel Alumit reflects on the daunting commitment of the bodhisattva vows, and how his ordination bolstered his relationship with his mother and culture.
What Are the Four Foundations of Mindfulness?
The four foundations of mindfulness is the Buddha’s fundamental teaching on meditation common to all Buddhist traditions.
What “No Self” Really Means
The journey of awakening, says Buddhist teacher Gaylon Ferguson, begins by examining our usual beliefs about who we are. Because maybe we’ve got it wrong.
Turn Your Thinking Upside Down
We base our lives on seeking happiness and avoiding suffering, but the best thing we can do for ourselves is to turn this whole way of thinking upside down.
Should I Try to Stop Thinking?
Good luck with that. What you can do, says Jules Shuzen Harris, is change your relationship with your thoughts.
10 Ways to Find True Happiness
Introduced by Kaira Jewel Lingo, ten Black dharma teachers dive deep into the paramis, the ten qualities of enlightened beings.
Practice for a World at Risk
It’s the concept of “other” that drives the evils the world suffers from, says Roshi Joan Halifax. The contemplation we need now is that in reality there is no separation.