For those of you who weren’t able to attend, I wanted to give you a
quick review of our Harvest of Peace celebration on Sunday, Sept. 19, 2010
as well as offer an opportunity to contribute to our Center.

In brief: we meditated, we ate together, we listened to messages from
the Sakyong and President Reoch, and we raised money to benefit our
Center. A great time altogether! Here are some details:

One thing I have been able to always count on is the absolutely
wonderful food that magically arrives at any of our celebratory events
at White River. Last Sunday was no exception. In fact, the table was
so scrumptious looking that Beth took the pictures you see here.

This year, for the first time, instead of viewing the online talk on a
tiny computer screen or even our newer big flatscreen TV, we watched
it projected on one of the Center’s walls. (Someone kindly borrowed a
projector for this event. It was GREAT). A letter from the Sakyong
(who is still in retreat) to the world-wide Shambhala community was
read, and then we heard from President Richard Reoch, broadcasting
live from Poland.

As you probably know, Harvest of Peace is the only time we fundraise
for our Center. All gifts stay at the Center. This year, our
Shambhala Council thought it would be wonderful if we could raise
enough funds to recover our cushions (in Shambhala blue) and add to
our scholarship fund. I’m delighted to say that we are nearing our
goal of 35 new cushion cover sets. Plus we did raise a nice amount
for the scholarship fund.

Hopefully, you will be inspired to give as generously as you can
towards the cushion sets or the scholarship fund. Or both. A
cushion set costs $43 (we can get a generous 25% discount from Samadhi
Cushions).

Should your generosity be such that we exceed what we need to make our
cushion target, then any extra will go towards purchasing our own
projector. This projector can be used for world-wide Shambhala
events, messages from the Sakyong, and of course the growing number of
classes that are being offered by Shambhala-Online.

Thank you very much. Our new blue cushions will really look spiffy!!

This is a photo of the participants who completed the Shambhala Sacred Path level entitled “Outrageous and Inscrutable” on May 17, 2009. This level was directed elegantly by Ms. Donna Williams, and assisted by Mr. Hill Anderson. Many of those in attendance began together with Level I (The Art of Being Human), and have continued as a core group ever since, referring to themselves as “litter-mates”. A cheerful congratulations to these inscrutably outrageous warriors.

Posted by Hill Anderson:

Friday and Saturday my wife and I went to a packed and inspiring conference in Boston on “Meditation and Psychotherapy” featuring His Holiness the Dalai Lama himself!

I sat about a third of the way back in a crowd of 500 in the “Imperial Ballroom” of the Boston Park Plaza Hotel, about 50 feet away from the stage on which sat His Holiness and a changing group of panelists who were psychologists, psychiatrists, psychotherapists, and brain scientists asking him questions. What I recount below is my memory of two days ago, and my imprecise paraphrasing of what I understood His Holiness to be saying. It is probable that some of my descriptions are my limited transposition of bigger meanings that I was unable to fathom. We were told that a DVD of the event might be available in a few weeks, which would be well worth the purchase.

As is often said of him, His Holiness was present, relaxed, genuine, and at times very funny. He was able easily to admit “I don’t know” when he didn’t, and to express an acceptance of the human condition in the face of so many who were looking for techniques to improve it. In introducing him, the speaker quoted him as saying, “If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.”

One person asked if we corrupt Westerners couldn’t learn a lot from the Eastern cultures. He said he thought there was no difference between those who live in the East and West, and that human nature had not changed in the 2600 years since the Buddha walked the earth. It was a million years ago that the brain had its last structural change, so we might have to wait another million years for the next model. He went on to say that the West had greater material wealth and that the higher the socioeconomic level the worse off one was, the harder it was to be happy and insightful. The wealthy tended to isolate, the poor were often more easily interrelated and compassionate.

A question asked in many ways was how one could have compassion for perpetrators and torturers. He spoke of “biased” and “unbiased” compassion. We begin by having compassion for lovers or family members, which is good, but that can be “biased compassion” which can rapidly turn into hatred toward someone who might betray it or for those outside its circle. Unbiased compassion includes everyone.

Perpetrators should be stopped, to keep them from hurting more people, and even to compassionately save them from the terrible karma they are generating for themselves. When something is wrong it is OK to say it is wrong.

He spoke of interviews he had had with monks who were imprisoned and tortured by the Chinese. One said that his experience in the Chinese gulag had been a great aid to his practice. Another said that he was most afraid that he was in danger of losing his compassion for the Chinese. A third was red-faced and trembling with anger.

His Holiness told a story about his escape from Tibet. They were hiding by a river and could hear the hoof beats of the horses of the Chinese who would shoot them if they were discovered. He said that was not a time particularly for compassion to ascend, but that what was more called for was wisdom, prajna. It was on the next day that he felt anxiety and anger, a “post-traumatic” response.

He was asked about self-hatred that is so common a symptom in the West. His Holiness said that self-hatred was based on failing our own expectations, and that there was something good in those aspirations in the beginning. The desire to be connected and happy is universal.

One psychologist asked if there were a simple practice we could all use with clients to put them in touch with wisdom and compassion. His Holiness said that no one practice was enough. Experience is too complex and practice takes many forms in different situations.

He spoke on the nature of self. The grasping self was a problem. (He made grasping motions with his hands.) While we could seem to locate our brain and our body, no one has ever been able to find the location of a self. It was a matter of appearance versus reality. There was the appearance of a self, but in reality there was none, and that emptiness left us with the truth of the interrelationship (as opposed to the independence) of all things.

The grasping self was a bad self, but he proposed that a “good self” was needed to muster the required confidence and willpower to dedicate oneself to reducing the suffering of sentient beings.

He said that within the major religions, having faith in God could be an exercise in selflessness leading to the loosening of the self and commitment to helping others. He said Buddhism, however, was non-theistic, believing in the chain of cause and effect (karma) rather than God. But in either case, and also with those who have no religion, compassion was innate. The nurturing bond between mother and child, that “sweet milk”, was the love and compassion and interdependence that characterized everyone’s nature from the very beginning.

Another psychologist asked him how we could know what was “wise behavior,” and he said there were two aspects: the intention and the result. An apparently virtuous act performed with a corrupt intention was not virtue, and sometimes an act with good intention behind it had an unexpectedly bad result. He said that one who can see but has no legs doesn’t get around much, and one who has legs but is blind doesn’t see much. Both eyes and legs were needed.

A psychiatrist asked him about her patients who heard voices and suffered other psychotic symptoms who never seemed to get better, and who had little hope of recovery. His Holiness said that, like a diamond, experience has many facets, and that every life has many perspectives that can be applied to it, not all of them unhappy. He went on to say that when we treat the mentally ill (and prisoners too) as inferior to us we are causing them great suffering and isolation.

Those are some of the highlights of what I can remember of what His Holiness had to say. It was inspiring to be in his presence, and everything he communicated was infused with the depth (and lightness) of a being it is hard to describe in words. He recalled a teacher of his who said that “When you become an object of reverence, that is when you must be the most lowly,” implying the importance of humility and the danger involved in separating yourself from others when placed on a pedestal.

To me, His Holiness seemed to be a master of what CTR called “ordinary magic.” Throughout the conference the dralas were landing everywhere…

Welcome to the newly established White River Shambhala Center blog. To those unfamiliar with “web logging,” or blogging, it is the most fashionable way to keep people up to date on what you are doing and thinking. In our Center, blogging presents an opportunity to keep people updated on our community events, social activities, volunteer opportunities, member updates (such as marriages, births, deaths, etc.), and any other information that relates to our Sangha.

Those that are members or otherwise have a relationship with the White River Shambhala Center are warmly encouraged to contribute articles, which will be posted on our blog, according to our guidelines. Please feel free to email me (click here for contact information) for more details. Help us get this blog off to a good start.