Amy Schmidt and Sara Jenkins tell the inspiring story of Dipa Ma, known as "the patron saint of householders." Gotama Buddha's familiar story follows the archetypal hero’s journey: he left behind wife and child and renounced the ordinary world to seek the holy life. Dipa Ma followed a similar path, but with an unexpected turn. Ultimately she took her practice home again, [...]
You Can’t Fail at Meditation
Dan Harris gets the inside story on mindfulness and compassion from Buddhist teachers Joseph Goldstein, Sharon Salzberg, and Mark Epstein. It was a pretty sweet opportunity, really. The poobahs from Lion's Roar came to me and said: pick your favorite Buddhist teachers, and we’ll set up a public speaking event for you in New York City. Also, they promised to promote my new [...]
What Makes Us Free?
Insight. Loving-kindness. Cultivating what’s wholesome. And making them real in our lives every day. These are what make us free, say Insight Meditation teachers Jack Kornfield and Joseph Goldstein, in a conversation at California’s Spirit Rock Meditation Center, moderated by Michelle Latvala. Michelle Latvala: One of the big differences between Buddhism in the [...]
Spirit Rock at Twenty-five
In 1975, three young Americans who had recently returned from years of meditation and study in Asia embarked on an experiment. Starting with the strict Vipassana meditation in which they were trained, Jack Kornfield, Joseph Goldstein, and Sharon Salzberg would teach dharma in the West as a collaboration among Buddhism’s different meditative traditions. It was a radical [...]
The Four Foundations of Mindfulness
Insight Meditation teacher Joseph Goldstein examines a key teaching from the Satipatthana Sutta, the Buddha’s discourse on the four foundations of mindfulness, which he called the direct path to liberation. The simple, although not always easy, practices of vipassana are all rooted in one important discourse of the Buddha: the Satipatthana Sutta. Satipatthana is often [...]
Here, Now, Aware: The Power of Mindfulness
It’s the essence of the contemplative path and the key to transforming our lives. In this teaching from his book, A Heart Full of Peace, Insight Meditation teacher Joseph Goldstein describes this simple yet profound expression of our mind’s natural awareness. Mindfulness is the key to the present moment. Without it we cannot see the world clearly, and we simply stay lost in [...]
Mindfulness, Compassion, & Wisdom, Three Means To Peace
Joseph Goldstein on how three principles of meditation can be applied to the world's conflicts. The method is mindfulness, the expression is compassion, and the essence is wisdom. A central question confronting spiritual life today is how we can best respond to the tremendous conflicts and uncertainties of these times. The war on terror, the seemingly intractable violence of [...]
Panel: Full-Time Practice
Joseph Goldstein, Judy Lief, and Robert Thurman discuss the role of full-time practice in the West Buddhadharma: What role have long-term, full-time practitioners—whether monastics, priests, mountain yogis or forest yogis—played in the development of Buddhism? Are their activities essential to the continuation of an authentic Buddhist tradition? Robert Thurman: It is [...]