GINA SHARPE

March 10, 2014

Loving All Life

In awareness practice, we invite ourselves into more and more sensitivity to life–to the aliveness within us and our interrelatedness with all life around us.  We cultivate this sensitivity by becoming very simple, slowing down…

March 3, 2014

“Strive on with heedfulness”

Every Law student studies the case in which Oliver Wendell Holmes advised that when we come to a railroad crossing, we should “stop, look and listen” in order to be safe. Great advice, not only…

February 24, 2014

Refuge in the Rich Tapestry of Sangha

Sangha is the third jewel, the third refuge in the Buddha’s teachings. The traditional meaning of “Sangha,” is the community of practitioners who preserve and uphold the teachings of the Buddha: the enlightened Buddhas and…

February 17, 2014

Safety in Dhamma

Dhamma is the second jewel, the second of the three refuges in Buddhist practice. Taking refuge begins with asking the question, “where do I find safety?”  When we take refuge in Dhamma, it means we…

February 10, 2014

We Are Awake

In what do we take refuge when we take refuge in the Buddha? Like us, the Buddha was a human being, and our refuge in these qualities of Awakened Mind/Heart respects deeply our own potential—luminous,…

February 3, 2014

Finding Safety

All Buddhist traditions invite taking refuge in the Buddha, the Dhamma, and the Sangha.  These Three Jewels provide a focus for commitment and  reflection.  In daily life, we are constantly looking for safety, refuge,  in…

January 27, 2014

Worldly Winds

We each have our measure of joy and of suffering, which the Buddha referred to as the Eight Worldly Winds: gain and loss, pleasure and pain, praise and blame, fame and disrepute.  I suspect he…

January 20, 2014

The Beloved Community

Today we honor Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  Many of us see him only in oversimplified terms of race:  as an eloquent, segregation-era “voice of his people.” Yet, his words resound as moral philosophy, informed…

January 13, 2014

Who Are You Really?

What does it mean to say “not self?” I often hear the confusion of this penetrating teaching of the Buddha, ubiquitously described as the most transcendent and transformative aspect of his teaching. For me, it…

March 17, 2014

Contentment Fuels the Second Precept

The precepts can be understood in the context of illuminated heart-mind.  We are guided not by “do’s” and “don’t’s” but by the interconnected nature of being.  This is not so much to be understood by…

March 10, 2014

Loving All Life

In awareness practice, we invite ourselves into more and more sensitivity to life–to the aliveness within us and our interrelatedness with all life around us.  We cultivate this sensitivity by becoming very simple, slowing down…

March 3, 2014

“Strive on with heedfulness”

Every Law student studies the case in which Oliver Wendell Holmes advised that when we come to a railroad crossing, we should “stop, look and listen” in order to be safe. Great advice, not only…

February 24, 2014

Refuge in the Rich Tapestry of Sangha

Sangha is the third jewel, the third refuge in the Buddha’s teachings. The traditional meaning of “Sangha,” is the community of practitioners who preserve and uphold the teachings of the Buddha: the enlightened Buddhas and…

February 17, 2014

Safety in Dhamma

Dhamma is the second jewel, the second of the three refuges in Buddhist practice. Taking refuge begins with asking the question, “where do I find safety?”  When we take refuge in Dhamma, it means we…

February 10, 2014

We Are Awake

In what do we take refuge when we take refuge in the Buddha? Like us, the Buddha was a human being, and our refuge in these qualities of Awakened Mind/Heart respects deeply our own potential—luminous,…

February 3, 2014

Finding Safety

All Buddhist traditions invite taking refuge in the Buddha, the Dhamma, and the Sangha.  These Three Jewels provide a focus for commitment and  reflection.  In daily life, we are constantly looking for safety, refuge,  in…

January 27, 2014

Worldly Winds

We each have our measure of joy and of suffering, which the Buddha referred to as the Eight Worldly Winds: gain and loss, pleasure and pain, praise and blame, fame and disrepute.  I suspect he…

January 20, 2014

The Beloved Community

Today we honor Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  Many of us see him only in oversimplified terms of race:  as an eloquent, segregation-era “voice of his people.” Yet, his words resound as moral philosophy, informed…