meditating Burmese monk

The Yoga Place

532 Main St

Bennington, VT 05201

802.447-0393

www.benningtonyoga.com

MARCH 27 2011

IN MEMORIAM

DAWN RAPHAN GUILD

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Greetings!

 

      It is with deep sadness, respect and humility that I report the passing of a dear friend and dedicated yogini, Dawn Raphan Guild.  I have included her posted obituary here for those of you who may not have known her.  May you find inspiration and instruction from hearing how she lived her living and her dying. 

     And since Dawn, along with her husband Bill,  was a lifelong practicer of meditation, I include an article on meditation, recently published in the Harvard Womens Newletter.

     We often finish our classes and our meditations with Metta or a loving kindness meditation: 

 

May all beings throughout all space and all time, in all the directions, including ourselves, know happiness and the causes of happiness.  May all beings, including ourselves, be free from suffering.  May all beings, including ourselves, know peace.

 

     Our hearts and intentions for happiness and peace go out to all friends and all families everywhere and our particular well wishes reach out to Dawn, her family and friends in the Bardo of transition.

 

Namaste

jane


                            DAWN



DAWN
Mindfulness Meditation
Harvard Women's Health Watch
www.harvard.edu
Mindfulness Meditation practice
changes the brain
burma buddha  Mindfulness meditation alters regions of the brain associated with memory, awareness of self, and compassion.
Studies have found differences in the brains of experienced meditators compared with non-meditators, but this is the first investigation to document brain changes occurring over time in people learning how to meditate mindfully.  Results published in Psychiatry Research:  Neuroimaging (Jan. 30, 2011). 

     Mindfulness meditation is the practice of paying attention to what you're experiencing from moment to moment without drifting into thoughts about the past or concerns about the future and without analyzing (or making judgments about) what is going on around you.  Its not a new idea.  

  
  Please find the rest of this article, the study, and its results in Harvard Women's Health Watch or Psychiatry Research mentioned above.
andfinally
buddha

The great Tibetan rinpoches teach us that the Bardo of passing from this life to the next, the bardo of transition,  is like this:

 

"O being of noble family, Dawn, listen.  Now the pure luminosity of the dharmata is shining before you; recognize it.  O daughter of noble family, at this moment your state of mind is by nature pure emptiness, it does not possess any nature whatever, neither substance nor quality such as colour, but it is pure emptiness; this is the dharmata, the female buddha Samantabhadri.  But this state of mind is not just blank emptiness, it is unobstructed, sparkling, pure and vibrant; this mind is the male buddha Samantabhadra.  These two, your mind whose nature is emptiness without any substance whatever, and your mind which is vibrant and luminous, are inseparable; this is the teaching of the buddha.  This mind of yours is inseparable luminosity and emptiness in the form of a great mass of light, it has no birth or death, therefore it is the buddha of Immortal Light.  To recognise this is all that is necessary.  When you recognise this pure nature of your mind as the buddha, looking into your own mind is resting in the buddhamind..........

 

Or as Dawn put it:  "I'm not going anywhere.  Where could I go?  I'll always be here."

 

In love