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DECEMBER, 2011
Greetings!
Mandala (dkyil 'khor). Simply, 'that which encircles a center.'
From hand mandalas to sand mandalas, this issue begins to explore the various expressions and uses of mandalas. Painted on fabric, built three-dimensionally with wood or metal or created with colored sands, every color and dot conveys meaning. From American Indians, Aztecs, Christians and Taoists to Carl Jung, individuals and cultures have been using mandalas for everything from assisting personal growth to representing the universe. The topic is as complex as it is beautiful.
As we begin to scratch the surface of mandalas, we encourage you to expand your own ideas of what they mean to you. What if you were the center and your life was a living mandala? During this holiday season, take a moment to notice, and maybe appreciate, the coalescence of color, sight, sound, smell and touch of your own personal mandala.
Happy holidays. May you find deep peace and joy.
With love,
Anne Meyer
Stacey Fisher
Roy Toulan
Barbara Simundza
Stephanie Hobart
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SPIRITUAL MATTERS  | |
Lama Cindy Lee
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THE MANDALA OFFERING by Cindy Lee The steps on the path to enlightenment (Lam Rim) are typically expressed and learned through words: by studying the written scriptures of the Dharma, or listening to the speech of our Lama. Another way that the path to awakening is expressed is through the physical symbols of a painted mandala. The elegance of this kind of mandala is that, while it can be used to learn the steps on the path to enlightenment, it also represents complete enlightenment itself. In other words the mandala shows us the path and the goal simultaneously. A mandala is like an architectural blueprint of enlightenment. Every shape, line, angle and image points to an aspect of the Dharma. It can relate to both our inner world and our outer world - the perfect world we would experience if we ourselves were perfected, and the perfect self that would perceive a perfect world. But the mandala is not just there for us to have yet another way to obsess about ourselves! The greatest use of a mandala is for the purpose of offering. And what better offering to make to the teacher who instructs you how to experience a perfect world than to offer them your practice of seeing your world perfected? We have the opportunity to make this outer offering of a mandala to our teachers to request every class or ceremony they kindly bring to us. Because we do it so often, the short mandala offering can become stale and casual. But if we remain mindful, it can be a deep and beautiful practice. Our whole being is used to perform this ritual- chanting the opening prayers with the sweetest vibrations of our voice, gathering the energies of the body to perform a gorgeous hand mudra, and generating a bright and focused mind and heart while we meditate on the offering all significantly allow us to offer with our three doors of expression: body, speech and mind. As the mandala itself represents both the path and the goal, we too offer the Lama our practice of the gradual path and our best understanding of the goal simultaneously. In order to realize the goal, we must collect merit. One of the highest merit making activities is making offerings to our Lama. If we see our Lamas in the highest way - as the very embodiment of the Buddha - and we offer them our highest view of our world, we are speeding up our path to reach the goal. And as the only place perfection can be found is here and now, rather than some imaginary time in the future, we begin our mandala offering by invoking the present with the word "Here." "HERE is the great earth..." Our hand mudra, or gesture gives us something for our mind to hold on to as we make our offering. The base of the mandala must be clean and pure so we begin our offering by covering the earth, with the purifying smell of incense and a blanket of lovely flowers. "...Filled with the smell of incense, Covered with a blanket of flowers..."
Here's where the fun begins. Be creative! Do some secret sleuthing work and find out your Lama's favorite incense, is it Sandalwood? Nag Champa? See puffy patterns of blue smoke fill the sky. Smell the incense and see your Lama take a big breath in and happily experience the offering. A blanket of flowers is not just a few random wilting petals scattered around. Imagine a vast ocean of colors. Again, think of flowers you wish to give your Lama - a sea of red and white roses or a rainbow of peonies. Look on the internet for images of fields of lavender or tulips and bring those swaying seas of color to mind. "...The great mountain, the four continents..."  | | Lama Marut |
Your two ring fingers raised in the center of the hand mudra represent Mount Meru, or as our Lamas have suggested, we can think of it as Mount Everest. The Four Continents are represented by the four fingers being pressed down by our thumbs and forefingers. You've got the whole world in your hands! So now you can start to get cosmic. Connect to Mount Everest and feel the strength of that rock rising from the earth and offer them the solidity of your own body. Upon the four continents that surround the great mountain we pile the most precious and valuable objects we can think of. Traditionally the continents hold jewels, a wish-fulfilling tree, an abundance of crops and so on. But we can again think of precious objects we would like to offer our teacher and pile them as high as we can. This ritual allows us to gather all the wealth in the world and offer it to our Lama, reminding ourselves that there is nothing in the galaxy more valuable than our Lama's teaching. "...Wearing the jewel of the sun and the moon.." We then light up the world with the sun and the moon and all that these great planets represent to us in our outer world and inner world. "...In my mind I make it a paradise of a Buddha and offer it all to you..." Finally we stamp the world with our best view-the paradise of a Buddha. One way to do this is to try to see the world you offered your Lama in the way that your Lama would experience it. Match your mind with your Lama's mind and receive his or her blessings. "Because my Lama understands reality perfectly, he or she sees this world as paradise; so I will try to hold this view myself." Sealing the offering as truly perfect is to bring up our highest understanding of how we could experience a perfect world, by making sure we never intentionally make other people's worlds imperfect. Therefore we end the prayer with: "...And by this deed may every living being experience a pure world." When we get good at offering this one world, we can start to multiply it to galaxies of planets. We try to generate our "galactic" bodhisattva feeling in the form of a wish that all beings could experience the world as pure and we remember that it is our job to ensure that they do. When we finish the offering with "Idam guru ratna mandalakam niryatayami" we can fold our hands away from ourselves and see the Lama accept our offering. If we would like to receive the blessings of the Lama then we fold our hands toward ourselves. Ultimately, when we make this offering we are requesting the Lama to teach us how to create a perfect world. So ironically it is the Lamas themselves who are offering us the world - through their teachings. | Back to Contents
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The stars, the suns, and the moons are never impatient. Silently, they float along the streams of pure existence, as the true Guru does.
~ Baul song (quoted by Lizelle Reymond) |
DHARMA ARTS
This World By Mary Oliver
I would like to write a poem about the world that has in it nothing fancy. But it seems impossible. Whatever the subject, the morning sun glimmers it. The tulip feels the heat and flaps its petals open and becomes a star. The ants bore into the peony bud and there is a dark pinprick well of sweetness. As for the stones on the beach, forget it. Each one could be set in gold. So I tried with my eyes shut, but of course the birds were singing. And the aspen trees were shaking the sweetest music out of their leaves. And that was followed by, guess what, a momentous and beautiful silence as comes to all of us, in little earfuls, if we're not too hurried to hear it. As for spiders, how the dew hangs in their webs even if they say nothing, or seem to say nothing. So fancy is the world, who knows, maybe they sing. So fancy is the world, who knows, maybe the stars sing too, and the ants, and the peonies, and the warm stones, so happy to be where they are, on the beach, instead of being locked up in gold.
- Submitted by
 Mandala inspired by poem by First Panchen LamaThe Lady who Came to Me* The meadow was green, lapis stealing my heart, gleaming jewels, spilled from the moon. ... It lay atop the majesty, shining in the nectar, a thousand rays from each of a hundred thousand jewels in the sky... ,,, Peaks piled from softest bubbles dressed in strings of pearls....  Lotus MandalaThe multicolored lotus has eight different petals; the petals of the four cardinal directions are all red; fire and wind are yellow; the unreal is green; the one of power is black; the hub is green, and the filaments are of gold. -Submitted by Anne Meyer * Poetry by Lobsang Chukyi Gyeltson, His Holiness the First Panchen Lama pp13-19, selected lines  Mandala Images * Oil on Canvas  | | La Fleur de la Vie |
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- Submitted by Anna Vojtech Back to Contents |
I offer every fruit and flower, Every kind of healing draft, And all the precious gems the world contains, With all pure waters of refreshment. - Master Shantideva
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CONVERGENCES
Those Lying Eyes: How Neuroscience can help you Grasp Reality (Part 2) "Boundaries are basically battle lines because they create pairs of warring opposites (self versus not-self, the conscious versus the unconscious... Hence problems... inevitably arise. Problems are transcended by tearing down the boundaries...As boundaries are basically illusory anyway, this just involves seeing through them." * In the first article of this series we explained that the biology of vision aligns with Buddhist insights on how we perceive the world. To help us function in everyday (or deceptive) reality, our visual system misrepresents reality in several specific ways. Instead of processing all of the data available to it, the visual system constructs its reality by a process of sampling and abstraction, in which it extracts patterns from collections of snapshots. These patterns become categories that impose themselves on future perception. The patterns are actually neural pathways in the brain that are created and reinforced by habitual repetition. Through meditation practice, we can learn to create new neural pathways, and "see" these illusions for what they truly are. Knowing what our visual system is up to can help us understand how this change can be realized. In our November article, we described the two overlapping but distinct visual systems: the center and the periphery. Here we move on to another process by which our vision distorts reality: Artificial Enhancement of Edges and Contrast Another way that the brain makes visual processing more efficient is by artificially sharpening contrast and exaggerating the edges between objects. This process, which is intended to make it easier to distinguish a book from the table it rests on (or a predator from the bushes where it is hiding), also has the unintended consequence of reinforcing the idea that there are rigid boundaries between objects-a view that is at odds with physical realityA body of research in the field of psychophysics has shown that our brains are misinterpreting the signals they get from "reality," all to make perception as energy efficient as possible. In the service of efficiency, our brains act to sharpen subtle distinctions and enhance differences. Click on the links to see two demonstrations of this edge enhancement effect: Simultaneous Contrast Effect In this animated demonstration you will see two squares that are the same shade of gray. When they are placed against contrasting backgrounds (i.e., the background on the left is darker than the original square, whereas the background on the right is lighter), your brain changes how you perceive the brightness of the original squares. There are competing views in science to explain why this is the case, but one thing is clear -- your brain is making an artificial distinction where one does not, in fact, exist. This is very helpful in the context of survival, but it is nonetheless a perceptual distortion. Craik-O'Brien-Cornsweet effect In this demonstration, you are originally shown one long gray strip that changes in intensity very gradually (linearly) from left to right. Then you see two identical sample squares removed from the strip and placed side-by-side. Once the squares are placed together, and the darkest part of the left square is connected to lightest part of the right square, your brain interprets this as a sign that the two squares are different shades of gray entirely. When this happens, your brain "fills in" the rest of the image, getting rid of the natural gradient in each square and forcing you to perceive the squares as different. Neuroscientists have learned that our eyes deceive us by falsifying divisions between objects in our world. This mechanism developed for purposes of survival, but when we experience it in our spiritual life it is nothing but a hindrance. The edges between things do not exist as we perceive them. But we behave as if they do. One of the most destructive consequences of this boundary illusion is our conviction that we as individuals exist separately and distinctly apart from everyone else. We are most firmly convinced that the boundaries of our bodies as we see them define the "me" whom we have to defend and support, as distinct from others. This mistake, based on a lie that is enhanced by our visual system, could be seen as the root of many evils: greed, divisiveness, and war. Jill Bolte Taylor, a renowned neuroscientist, actually experienced the dissolution of this boundary during a massive stroke to her left hemisphere. Fortunately, she survived the stroke and lived to tell the tale. At several points during the stroke she directly experienced the absence of boundaries between her body and the rest of the physical world, leading her to be aware that her being is intimately connected to a greater whole. We recommend viewing her entire talk on this subject, but to view a segment that is particularly relevant, please click here.
Buddhist practices to develop compassion are specifically designed to overcome the false idea of boundaries; boundaries between us that we so believe in that we harm others to gain what we want and avoid what we don't want. Compassion meditations offer us paths to overcome this false idea of separation. For an example click here!
-Submitted by Todd Rose and Anne Meyer
* The Buddhist Handbook: A complete Guide to the Buddhist Schools, Teaching, Practice, and History, John Snelling. Rochester VT: Inner Traditions Intenational, 1998 Back to Contents |
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TOO WONDERFUL
No one could ever paint
A too wonderful
Picture
Of my heart
Or
God - Hafiz
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TAKING IT TO THE STREET
Offering the Mandala
Here is the great earth,
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offering the universe
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Filled with the smell of incense,
Covered with a blanket of flowers,
The great mountain,
The four continents,
Wearing a jewel
Of the sun, and moon.
In my mind I make them
The paradise of a Buddha,
And offer it all to You.
By this deed
May every living being
Experience
The pure world.
Idam guru ratna mandalakam Niryatayami
RECOGNIZING AND DEVELOPING MANDALAS IN OUR LIVES
I do my best to practice what I know of the Dharma - to varying levels of success. Faced with societal rip tides and personal shortcomings, I often turn to like-minded individuals and communities for help-for refuge of sorts-to surround myself with people who choose to view the world as I try to. One such community is my son's school, the Cape Ann Waldorf School. The school's philosophy of educating the whole child is neither Buddhist nor new-ed cliché; it is time-tested and student-proven. Waldorf education was developed by Rudolf Steiner in 1919.
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a Waldorf celebration
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Recently, in a piece on physicist Arthur Zajonc in Krista Tippet's online newsletter, On Being, I read a reference to Rudolf Steiner. "STEINER recognized the mandala of living life, incorporating/transforming the miracle and majesty of everyday activities into sacred movement designed to develop the brain and feed the soul/nurture the individual. Sights, smells, sounds, movement - every one important in shaping the child, preparing him to see the world with open eyes and a gentle heart."
Exactly. Even though I still don't know the difference between Anthroposophy and Eurythmy, the mindset of the school gives me joy and confidence in sending my son there to learn, knowing he'll be well taken care of, inside and out. Belonging to an educational community that teaches its children to live life with a consciousness, an awareness of the sacred, a living mandala of kindness, love, patience and respect, reflects the priorities of our family and supports my practice. Being involved with a spiritual community like ACI-Cape Ann does exactly the same thing-it provides a refuge mandala...beautiful, supportive and complex.
- Stacey Fisher
 Wild Mandalas
For over 25 years I have made natural wreaths for holiday fairs in November and December. The process varies with my ideas, the year's adventures, and the vagaries of Mother Nature-all reminders of change, no matter what. The fun and serendipity of collecting beautiful and unusual material goes on year round. A kayak once granted me access to a swampy backwater on an Adirondack lake where a hemlock with very unusual long cones draped itself over me. I found bleached sea urchins dotting the rocks of an outer island in Boston Harbor. And Casco Bay's Eagle Island annually yields pale purple and pink mussel shells. In the Green Mountains I harvested a treasure trove of turkey tails: fans of fungus that occasionally complete themselves in sweet gray flowers. Sweet Annie, with its distinctive soapy fragrance, offered itself in great abundance on the banks of the C & O Canal where Newt and I picked bunches and brought them home tied to the panniers on our bikes.
 I learned early on in my history of wreath making not to depend on anything. A well-timed drought can destroy the color and quantity of essential multiflora rose hips-disaster!! Birch bark, so plentiful for many years, is now often mysteriously absent in my local woods. Then there was the year I discovered that princess pine-the backbone of many designs-is protected and therefore cannot be harvested. Flying squirrels, beavers, mice, chipmunks, deer and birds, the opportunists in my hood, regularly take advantage of my efforts and change my plans. Finished wreaths full of berries laid on the table in the garage are harvested over night by resident critters. Right now, this month, someone is gradually eating my variegated euonymus, lilacs, roses, and my shrubby willow.
You might think that after all these experiences, AND my Buddhist practice, that I would know better than to count on anything. But no...this year, bright red winterberry is particularly beautiful. Just last week I spent a number of sweet moments planning what I could do with the flaming bush on the edge of my pond. But when I returned from a weekend away, it was just a flicker of its former self-probably eaten by deer or crows. Who else could reach that high?
Collecting increases and intensifies in November and I spend delightful hours unaware of past or future wandering through the woods with my eye on the ground. Sheet moss, clump moss, silver-green lichen, bark covered with a combination of fungus and moss, wintergreen, teaberry, bayberry and blueberry twigs, Virginia creeper and wisteria vines are all treasures with potential that changes with my mood (and projections). Home in my garage, the meditation continues. Building a wreath has its own present and I often find that I am somehow rested after standing for hours over my worktable.
A little meditation, a little mindfulness, and a lot of renunciation go into my wild mandalas.
- Submitted by Bonnie Stafford
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Humankind has not woven the web of life, we are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect.
~ Chief Seattle
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DID YOU KNOW?
Mandala means "circle" in Sanskrit. The circle is one of humanity's most widely-occurring symbols. Cultures, science, religions, arts and crafts in every time and place make use of the  circle. For example, the ancient symbol of the ouroboros, or snake eating its own tail, occurs on every continent. At Christmas, we hang wreaths on our doors to celebrate the season. Buddhists make mandalas, elaborate multi-colored sand circles depicting complex Buddhist symbols.
Mandalas are a kind of roadmap for the Buddhist journey. They show you where you are and where you need to go, by virtue of the particular symbols used. Some portray the dangers of samsara-neighborhoods you don't want to visit. Some point the way to Nirvana and beyond, urging you onward toward your destination.
Traveling from classical Greece and Italy to the tribes wandering pre-medieval Europe, what became the Christmas wreath took on new symbolism within European Christianity-red-berried, twisted evergreen boughs came to mark Advent, the four weeks before Christmas. Colored candles set in the center of the wreath symbolized the sorrow of dark times (purple) and the joy of Christ's imminent birth (rose).
For Christians, Advent commemorates the time of waiting for their savior's birth thousands of years ago. There is also a haunting sense of waiting for Christ's future rebirth, when He will return to Earth to judge the living and the resurrected dead.
Wreath comes from the Middle English writhe, with its connotation of serpents writhing, or writhing in pain, evoking the universal symbol of the ouroboros. A wreath's flat, circular shape recalls the Buddhist Wheel of Suffering that circles endlessly, keeping living beings trapped in cyclical pain. And just as mandalas depict detailed road maps to escape suffering, the Advent wreath with its candles symbolizes hope for the future through the person of Christ.
-submitted by Christina Kasica
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I was seeing in a sacred manner the shape of all things in the Spirit, and the Shape of all Shapes as they must live together like one being and I saw that the sacred hoop of my people was one of many hoops that made one circle, wide as daylight and as starlight, and in the center grew one mighty flowering tree to shelter all the children of one mother and one father. And I saw that it was holy ~Black Elk |
IN THE LOOP
Changing of the Guard An open letter from our outgoing President of the Board - Elizabeth Toulan  | | Elizabeth Toulan |
I am happy to announce that on November 18, 2011, the board of ACI-Cape Ann elected three new officers to serve our sangha. Larry Wolf is now serving as our interim President, Karen Aase as our interim Vice-President, and Barbara Koen as our interim Clerk. These wonderful folks have agreed to serve until May, 2012. The board accepted my resignation as president and as a member of the board, and requested that I serve on the advisory board, along with Lama Phil and Lama Mary Kay, which I am honored to do. Steve Kelley will be serving as a board member through the end of this year. His service to our sangha has been characterized throughout by great wisdom and compassion. Steve and all of the other board members past and present have taught me many things, and all with great patience, love and kindness. I have loved serving our community as an officer and board member, and look forward to working together in new ways in the months and years ahead. Earlier this year Lori MacDonald resigned as treasurer and board member after two years of dedicated and faithful service. Lori served as well as a member of our Finance and Development Committee. During Lori's tenure, the duties of the treasurer grew exponentially. Lori met each new challenge with grace and equanimity. We are blessed by her service. The joy with which our sangha brother Larry and our sangha sisters Karen and Barbara stepped forward to serve as officers was the most blessed gift we could receive at this time. The sangha is equally blessed by the continued service of Pattie O'Brien, as a board member, our yoga program chairperson, and yoga teacher; and by Kari Freytag, who will continue to serve as a board member and our treasurer. As our officers, Larry, Karen, Kari and Barbara will serve as members of the Executive Committee. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to serve as a board member and officer of ACI-Cape Ann. It has been an honor and privilege. With much love, Elizabeth Toulan With Gratitude and Thanks From Lama Phil Salzman ACI-Cape Ann has so much celebrate and so many people to recognize who serve daily in differen t and meaningful roles. As a past president of ACI-CA, I had the opportunity to serve on the Board with two wonderful people - Elizabeth Toulan (President) and Steve Kelley (Clerk). Elizabeth has retired from the Board as President and Steve will be retiring at the end of December as Clerk. They each brought with them their heart, wisdom and skill to help build ACI-CA from the ground up. They spent countless hours in these roles working to meet the the internal and external needs of our growing community. They did this with great patience and commitment and on many occasions taught me what I needed to know. Please join me in a moment of gratitude and thanks to Elizabeth and Steve for this and all they have done for ACI-CA. Reflections from Steve Kelley departing Clerk of the Board  Thank you to all of the angels in our sangha for giving me the opportunity to serve on the ACI Cape Ann board for these past several years. And thank you to the other dear ones serving on the board who have provided such wonderful teachings and shared experiences.
We all strive to develop the perfection of giving, giving with a pure motivation, without thought of reward or attachment to the gift or the recipient. Often, that giving is of money or other material things. These gifts are important. However, giving time and providing service offers a more sustained experiential opportunity to investigate deeply the concept of giving within our own consciousness. Being privileged to serve as a board member provides just such an opportunity. I would recommend to all sangha siblings that they consider serving on the board or one of the many committees that do so much to support our ability to learn and teach the dharma. It is a wonderful experience!
ACI Cape Ann is moving into a new chapter of its existence. With new grants, capital campaigns, considerations of the physical location, new board leadership, it will be an exciting time. It will be fun to see what manifests as everything changes, as it always does!
Steve Kelley
The Library at the Vajramudra Center Coming to the Vajramudra Center is like finding an oasis in the middle of a dry and hot desert. From the moment I walk in the door I am filled with warmth and an overall feeling of calmness. How glad I am to be here, how happy that I found my way back to this place of stillness and remembering. We are so fortunate to have our beautiful Vajramudra Center in Pigeon Cove - a place to attend amazing teachings, meditation sessions, yoga classes, dharma flicks, the weekly Happiness Hour and more. But, are you aware we have a lending library at the VMC? At our library you can learn more about a certain aspect of a teaching, read from an adjunct text your teacher has quoted, or review one of the 18 ACI courses. Our library was created to enhance the study of Tibetan Buddhism so the collection consists primarily of Buddhist dharma books that have been donated by teachers and students of the center.Thesebooks may be borrowed on the honor system for a period of 14 days. Borrowers are asked to sign out their books or journals on the clipboard located on the library bookshelf providing their contact information, date borrowed and date to be returned. It is asked of all who borrow from the library to treat the precious dharma materials with respect. That is - don't leave books on the floor, or mixed in with commercial periodicals, handle them with care, and if possible cover the books with a special cloth or keep them in a clean bag showing wise respect for their value to facilitate awakening. Books should be returned in a timely manner, (no more than 2 weeks at a time) so others may benefit from the power of the written text to illuminate our minds and remove ignorance that causes our suffering. Recent donations include books from the Mahayana Sutra Tantra Press and Snow Lion Publications. There is now a special edition recently released of Geshe Michael's Quiet Retreat Teachings in four volumes. Some of our other new titles include: Commentary on Guru Yoga, Achieving Bodhichitta, Essence of Mahayana Lojong Practice, as well as several by Geshe Sonam Rinchen - The Six Perfections, Yogic Deeds of Bodhisattvas, and The Thirty-Seven Practices of Bodhisattvas. If you have borrowed materials from the center's library, PLEASE RETURN them so others may benefit. We would continually like to offer you a full collection of the 18 ACI courses. If you would like to donate any books, ACI texts or journals, please contact: Anita Pandolfe Ruchman, apr822@verizon.net May All Beings Benefit from our Study and Teaching of the Precious Dharma!!! Love and Blessings, Anita Pandolfe Ruchman
ACI-Cape Ann Serving at the Open Door Food Pantry Gloucester, MA VOLUNTEERS NEEDED Thursday, December 15th, 3-6pm Each month we need: - Money to buy food $200-$300 (donations appreciated) - 4-8 meal servers - Head Cook: meal planner/organizer Optional: Dessert Cook, Salad Bar Preparer, Grocery Shopper and Bread Baker/Buyer Children are welcome to serve the meal and are appreciated as long as they have parental supervision. To volunteer, please contact Sharon Muddiman at sangha@aci-capeann.org Back to Contents |
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The "squaring of the circle" is one of the many archetypal motifs which form the basic patterns of our dreams and fantasies. But it is distinguished by the fact that it is one of the most important of them from the functional point of view. Indeed, it could even be called the archetype of wholeness.
~Carl Jung
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EVENTS
Meditation Boot Camp with Larry Wolf, Tuesdays, Nov 15-Dec 20, 7:30-9:30pm. The Art of Reasoning: Asian Classics Formal Course 13 with Jesse Fallon, Saturdays, Oct 29; Nov 5 & 19; Dec 10 & 17, 1-5:45pm. How Karma Works: Asian Classics Formal Course 5 with Mary Kay Dyer, Mondays, Nov 7-Dec 26, 7-9pm. Light On Meditation - A Stillness & Insight Retreat with Special Guest Teacher Upasaka Culadasa (John Yates, Ph.D.) Feb 29-Mar 8, 2012. Rolling Ridge Retreat and Conference Center, N. Andover. Registration required. Email light.on.meditation@aci-capeann.org Weekly Meditation, Yoga, Discussion, Debate and Family Offerings with a variety of wonderful teachers. Visit aci-capeann.org for more information.
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For the shape of the world exists everlastingly in the knowledge of the true Love which is God: constantly circling, wonderful for human nature, and such that it is not consumed by age and cannot be increased by anything new . . . in its workings the Godhead is like a wheel, a whole. In no way is it to be divided because the Godhead has neither beginning nor end. ~ Hildegard of Bingen |
REBOOT...RETREAT
IT'S TIME TO PLAN FOR THE 2012 SUMMER RETREAT!
Shoot the Moon: Diamonds, Hearts, and Wild Cards August 6 - PM Public Talk by Lama Marut
August 7-12 Retreat
Once again we will be at the beautiful Governor's Academy
Stay tuned for more details.
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The mandala is an archetypal image whose occurrence is attested throughout the ages. It signifies the wholeness of the Self. This circular image represents the wholeness of the psychic ground or, to put it in mythic terms, the divinity incarnate in man. ~ Carl Jung |
SEND IT IN!
This newsletter is by and for our community. We welcome submissions - art work, movie or book reviews, dharma quotes, experiences on the cushion and on the street, dharma in the media, insights and ideas. We encounter teachers and opportunities to practice in the most unlikely places! So share it!
Upcoming Exploring the Path Themes! To encourage all of you to create content for our upcoming newsletters, we are letting you in on the secret! Here is next month's theme: January: Why Have a Spiritual Practice?
Please send your submissions for the January issue to: explorethepath@aci-capeann.org
by December 15, 2011.
Please provide full citations if submitting any copyrighted material (including the URL for graphics licensed under Creative Commons) and obtain permissions if using anything requiring permissions.
By submitting your work and your ideas you are giving EXPLORING THE PATH permission to publish them in this newsletter.
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THANK YOU FOR VIEWING OUR NEWSLETTER!
Questions or comments on our newsletter? Send them to explorethepath@aci-capeann.org
For more information about activities at the Vajramudra Center, please visit aci-capeann.orgIf you have questions of a spiritual nature or want to request a meeting with our Spiritual Advisor, Jesse Fallon, please email him at spiritualquestions@aci-capeann.org |
n o s t o p p i n g u n t i l e v e r y o n e i s h a p p y !
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