Practice: Irrelevance and Impermanence

The universe is very big. We are very small. The universe exists for an immeasurably long time. Our lives are very short. These are simple facts that we often forget. An omission which easily leads us to overestimate the importance of our life, actions and feelings in the greater context of existence. Western culture is …

Practice: Love

One of the most precious gift we have been given is our ability to love. Our love may encompass the big and small, our love may encompass the beautiful and ugly, our love may encompass ourselves and everything around us. Think about the many layers of your love; the romantic love for someone special, the …

Practice: Equanimity

A key insight of Buddhist philosophy is that the highest goal to strive for should not be boundless happiness - since that is bound to disappoint - but instead a sound evenness of mind, equanimity. Equanimity requires us to overcome attachment, to brace us against the loss of even what is most dear to us. …

Practice: Interbeing

We live in the illusion that we posses a self which is well delineated from the world around us. Whereas in fact, we are interwoven with everything around us in innumerable ways. No particle in the universe exists independently. Everything is affected by everything else. Modern science has shown the inter-relatedness of many social and …

Practices for Enlightenment

I believe we all have moments in which we become the best versions of ourselves; moments in which we are ever so slightly closer to true and deep enlightenment. Unfortunately, these moments are rare and we digress from whatever insights we have gained easily. For instance, we might realise that binge watching television brings little …

Practice: Joy

Joy is what makes the little moments in our life worthwhile. We may play a game, we may laugh with friends, we may dance, or draw or swim; any of the things nature has allowed us to find pleasure in. We need this joy and it is a great source of strength for us. In …

Practice: Thought Mindfulness

Although our thoughts are arguably very important for who we are, we are often unaware of what is occupying our mind at any given moment. In this post, I describe a simple practice which helps in increasing awareness of our mind and thoughts. These are the two simple steps to follow: Become aware of your …

Practice: Body Mindfulness

With all the distractions in our life, we often forget what is most fundamental to our existence: our own bodies. We should take time to be mindful of how our body feels. Do we have pain somewhere? Do we feel relaxed or tense? This is the first post of a series in which I will …

The Four Immeasurable Minds

I have long had an interest to learn more about Buddhism. Actually I bought myself a book on Buddhism many years ago while I was visiting Thailand. This book did not really grasp my attention and I always wanted to explore this topic further. So I recently obtained a collection of books on Buddhism. Unfortunately many …