Mangala Shri Bhuti - The Link Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, Dungse Jampal Norbu and students

Speaker: Susan Walp. Following Rinpoche's advice, Susan shares her personal journey in learning to practice the Dharma from a place of enjoyment, rather than discipline. Discipline is important for the practitioner, but there are two kinds of discipline: one that comes from a feeling of obligation, competitiveness and wanting to be a good student, and the other which has enjoyment as its basis. In examining what inspires her to practice, she is learning to approach her practice from a place of appreciation, warmth, creativity and inner joy.

Speaker: Dungse Jampal Norbu. Dungse-la explores the practice of self-reflection as the way of finding our true north as practitioners. We can use the interrelated methods of analysis (‘tokpa’, in Tibetan) to look at things in general and ‘chopa’ to examine details for clarifying our own thought process. With the internet and social media we meet with many contrasting perspectives and narratives that push agendas. Dungse-la encourages us to align ourselves with the perspectives of the Buddhas by being honest with ourselves, holding ourselves accountable to mind training and facing our mind with equanimity. We learn to trust ourselves as the primary witness. Then, we do not build new stories of ourselves or the nature of reality. We transform the negative emotions by seeing they are ultimately empty of intrinsic characteristics and remain natural- a child of illusion.

Speaker: Sasha Dorje Meyerowitz. Sasha describes how discipline is a natural feature of our longing to attain a state of awakening. The Latin word ‘disciplina’ refers to teaching, learning and knowledge. A disciple is someone who listens and learns. In the conventional world, our lives are not patterned towards practice; practice feels inconvenient and seems to contradict our belief in finding happiness in samsara. The diligent practitioner recognizes that discipline aligns our actions and intentions, fortifying us against neurotic habits. The discipline of directing our minds towards the Dharma and away from ego-clinging provides us with a greater experience of confidence and freedom.

Speaker: Jill Oppenheimer. Jill explores the practice of self-reflection and shares her experience of working with hindrances that can arise as part of this process. The point of all Buddhist teachings is to reduce self-importance and make room for the truth, and this begins with self-reflection. It involves turning the mind inward and looking without judgment at whatever arises in our experience. Jill explains the necessity to pause before engaging in self-reflection as it is only with the discipline of shamatha and vipashyana that the wisdom to self-reflect is available. She explores how confusion can arise if we hold hopes of certain outcomes and try to use the practice of self-reflection to fix things. We also need to appreciate that self-reflection is not just a single practice but involves many skillful means such as simmering practice, analytical meditation, mindfulness, observing thoughts without judgment and contemplating the eight worldly concerns and the four immeasurables.

Speaker: Chris Holland. Chris examines buddhanature as the foundation of enlightened qualities, including love. In this talk, he sets the stage to understand the genuine or absolute ground of buddhanature in order to see how the path functions. He describes absolute ground as a living presence, primordially existent with radiant qualities, the "enlightened essence" or absolute nature. Love is the radiance of absolute nature. Chris sees the Four Immeasurables practice as the "structure" of enlightened essence because the practice stirs up the qualities of enlightened essence (wisdom, love and power). Enlightened essence is the limitless source of all worlds, all positive qualities, all goodness. What separates us from allowing this essence to flow freely through us is grasping to a limited self; the path is simply to purify the obstacles that block us from recognizing the absolute nature. From there, we become a limitless source of love.

Speaker: Dungse Jampal Norbu. Dungse-la shares his experience of travel and the unique opportunity it brings to step out of our comfort zone and actively engage with our mind. He describes the difference between being a pilgrim or a tourist, the latter being one who seeks fun and comfort, the former being one who brings Dharma practice along for the ride, perhaps even seeking discomfort. Experiencing his own discomfort, Dungse-la closely examined his own mind and discovered that his experience was dependent on his attitude. Knowing there is no happiness to be found in outer circumstances, he allowed himself to relax into his discomfort and a positive mindset blossomed. That mindset allowed him to walk through the world and offer everything as if he owned it; his enjoyment and appreciation became a mandala of offering.