Gompa

The Lamrim Chenmo is a foundational text in our Gelugpa lineage of Tibetan Buddhism, so it's beneficial to review it regularly.

We will gather Saturday afternoon for a lightning reading of Lama Tsongkhapa’s master work, monastery style, with each person taking a different section.

The more who come, the merrier — and quicker! — the practice, and the greater the joyful noise.

If you have copies of the books, please bring them to share. Be sure to write your name in your books.

This practice will be a wonderful offering for Geshe-la when he returns.

There's a garden planting event in the morning followed by lunch; if you wish you can come at noon and join in lunch with the gardeners before the reading begins.

Discovering Buddhism: How to Meditate will not meet tonight, November 28, 2016, because of the Thanksgiving weekend.

An introductory course on basic Buddhist meditation techniques for complete beginners. Includes Buddhist meditations that can be used by anyone to create more peace and happiness in daily life. Presented in five sessions and covers basic Buddhist meditation techniques. Students are encouraged to come for the whole class, but drop-ins are welcome. In keeping with our tradition, the class is offered on a donation basis and no pre-registration is needed.

The basic Buddhist meditation techniques covered include:

what is meditation?

breathing meditations

mindfulness meditations

visualization meditations

The course is led by Venerable Lhamo

When he was 41, Shakyamuni Buddha ascended to Tushita to repay his mother's kindness by giving teachings to liberate her from samsara. After three months, he returned to earth to continue his teachings at the request of his disciples. As a Buddha Holy Day, this is an auspicious day for practice, when the karmic effects of actions are multiplied exponentially, according to Lama Zopa Rinpoche.

At Kadampa Center, we will gather in the afternoon after Sunday Dharma for a group reciting of sutras and prayers. Students who wish to are encouraged to take the Eight Mahayana Precepts at home, and anyone is welcome to circumambulate the stupa.

This is a merit-multiplying day, when the karmic effects of all our actions (negative as well as positive) are multiplied a million times, according to Lama Zopa Rinpoche, so any virtuous practice on this day is especially auspicious!

Get an overview of the entire Tibetan Buddhist path to awakening. Study the life story of the Buddha and discover a unique system for putting Buddhist philosophy into practice – the lam-rim, or "graduated path to enlightenment."

Presenting the Path is part of a two-year series of classes called Discovering Buddhism. In this course we explore 13 essential topics in Buddhism, from Meditation to Karma to Death and Rebirth, with much, much more! This is an excellent course of study for those who have the very basics and wish to start going a little deeper into Buddhist philosophy.

DB was developed by our affiliate organization, the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition, and is taught at Kadampa Center by senior lay students with many years of study and practice. Students who take the course together tend to develop great friendships with their Dharma buddies!

In keeping with our long-standing tradition, Kadampa Center does not charge a fee for any Dharma course. These teachings are too precious to allow money to be an obstacle for anyone to hear them!  We do, of course, have expenses to offer the course, so we happily welcome any heart-felt donations.  No pre-registration is required.

This class is led by Don Brown.

New Member Orientation CANCELLED due to weather

New Member Orientation CANCELLED due to weather

Sunday morning Meditation CANCELLED DUE TO WEATHER.

It is a fundamental insight of the Buddha that the quality of our life depends primarily on the quality of our mind. As stated in the collection of Buddha’s sayings known as the Dharmapada:
All that we are is the result of what we have thought. It is founded on our thoughts; it is made up of our thoughts. If we speak or act with an impure mind, suffering follows us, as the wheel of a cart follows the foot of the ox that draws it….
If we speak or act with a pure mind, happiness follows us, like a shadow that never leaves.
    
Therefore all of Buddha’s teachings can be thought of as mind training: how to lessen and eventually eliminate the various harmful states of mind responsible for suffering and dissatisfaction, and how to cultivate and bring to perfection the beneficial states of mind that lead to temporary and ultimate happiness and fulfillment.

However, the term “mind training” (and its equivalent “thought transformation”) is most commonly used to translate the Tibetan term lo-jong, which refers specifically to those spiritual instructions concerned with cultivating the altruistic motivation of a bodhisattva, the supremely compassionate being aiming to achieve enlightenment for the sake of benefitting others. The selfless motivation of a bodhisattva is known as the precious bodhichitta and, as Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche always emphasizes, the greatest obstacle to developing this supremely altruistic motivation is what he calls "the demon of self-cherishing."

The work we will look at this weekend is called the Seven-point Mind Training, one of the fundamental texts of the lo-jong tradition, and it contains very profound and eminently practical advice for reducing the strength of our habitual selfishness and generating in its place the peerless jewel of bodhichitta.
The workshop will consist of lecture, meditation practice and Q&A.

As with all Dharma teachings at Kadampa Center, we offer Jon's classes without charging a fee, so that no one is prevented from hearing the precious Dharma because of money. Of course, there are costs involved in bringing the teachers to Kadampa Center, so we rely on the heartfelt generosity of our members, friends and visitors to cover those costs.

Click here to sponsor Jonathan Landaw.