Dharma Wheel

Does anyone know why the traditional (Tibetan) metal bowls have the little bump at the bottom?

I had to just visualize the water bowls offering for many years, having no place to safely place actual bowls if water. Although I have small, plain metal (I think it’s nickel over copper) Tibetan style bowls now, originally I used small stainless steel sauce dipping bowls from a restaurant supply s...

One of my favorites!

You should contact Professor Huntington.
He knows a lot about this academic historical stuff,
being one of the world’s leading authorities on Buddhist art.

https://www.huntingtonarchive.org

According to the teachings, what we experience is the result of ...you might say, a reflection of our past actions in this life and in a previous life or previous lives. But, it’s a moot point, really. Don’t get into a blame game or a self-blame game. Some people do that, like there’s some kind of p...

Two steps that helped me a lot: 1. Before you begin, reassure yourself that this time period will be just for meditation. In other words, sometimes you have to give yourself permission to turn everything else, all the distractions, off for a while. 2. Before you begin, freeze like a statue and hold ...

I think this is an example of a commonly made mistake in interpretation. Tathagatagharba isn’t a thing like some kind of existing essence. It’s the true nature of mind. It’s like talking about the loudness of the sound from a stereo speaker. The sound itself has no permanent qualities, no shape or c...

If you really understand the meaning and implications of anatman (“no self”) then you will immediately see that rebirth is occurring every moment, supported by, but not dependent on physical conditions. Whether it’s just a fingernail trimmed off, or the compete decomposition of a corpse, makes no di...

What you are referring to doesn’t have to do with karma. If a person dies in an agitated or terrified state of mind, this creates conditions for a negative rebirth. But keep in mind that strictly speaking, all states of rebirth are ultimately nothing but projections of one’s own mind. However, just ...

The hurdle people often run into when discussing rebirth (and why the concept at first doesn’t seem plausible) is that really, they start with the pretext of a "me" a “self” that is supposedly reborn, and then wrestle with how that can actually happen. But there’s no place an actual “self” can be f...

It’s helpful to understand the difference between rebirth , as understood in the Buddhist context, which is that our confused experience (of a constant ‘self’) perpetually arises both moment to moment, and from one lifetime to another, and reincarnation which is that an ultimate “self” exists, that ...

Hmmm may I know where Mahayana question fits in to this? Why Mahayana needs to be taught hundreds of years later and not during the time of Buddha? Why teach the Hinayana path at all? The Mahayana teachings were taught during the time of the Buddha (at least according to the Mahayanists) even thoug...

During the time the Buddha was teaching, many of his followers attained realization, because the causes and conditions for that to occur existed. 2600 years later, even when the teachings are only a few clicks away on a computer or smart phone, it is very hard for people to attain realization. Why? ...

If you can focus on your breath without distraction for five minutes, without your mind wandering,
That’s pretty damn profound.

Usually stream entry is code for Western--- usually men--- who work outside of Buddhist tradition and self-diagnose how enlightened they are. That's exactly what it is. It's a subreddit built around Daniel Ingram and the "Pragmatic Dharma" movement. It is right up there with r/zen as one of the wor...

There is an overwhelming emphasis in this society to form opinions simply for the purpose of having an opinion. You see this in both broadcast and social media. One gets great satisfaction in forming opinions. It creates the sensation of actually doing something, but without actually helping to chan...

I’m looking for information / teachings / lineage / practice etc. regarding 11 head, 8 arm Chenrezig.
Thanks

I think (or rather, in my own experience) when you cannot change the things “outside of you”, the world around you, things that make you unhappy, then use this as an opportunity to focus on “Inside you”, meaning to examine the nature of your own need for things to be other than what they are, and at...

Is it correct to continue to give the rich person love and support, to spend according to his wishes leisure time with him- even if the Bodhisattva knows that to poor person suffers all the time. Of course being so stingy and having no empathy for others is a mental illness. How to act to people wh...

Memories are simply what they are. Some you want to hold onto, others you want to let go of. But the memories themselves, even if they in themselves are memories of joyful events, don’t trigger either happiness or sadness outside of the context of the present moment. A clear example of this is grief...