In the discussion following Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche’s What About Me video at Monday’s Open House, the topic of “idiot compassion” came up, as it often does in Shambhala Centre discussions on how to serve others.

Participants offered their understandings of the term―“enabling,” “self-referential compassion” and others slightly less succinct.

For an expanded exploration of the topic, check out the following recent post on the One City blog: The Buddha at Work - “Adventures in Idiot Compassion”

Presented here is the March 2010 dharma teaching from Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche’s website.

Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche

It is absolutely possible to create a good human society here on earth. To do so, we need strong mindfulness and intention. As human beings, we are influenced by our environment. If we create an environment of aggression and disharmony, stress will become the norm. Conversely, if we create an environment of kindness, love, discipline, and generosity, we will all begin to feel a sense of peace.

One characteristic of this dark age is that we doubt our innate goodness. We look outside ourselves for fulfillment, which creates individualism, where we believe only in our own interests. We solidify our mind and consciousness—which are naturally fluid and harmonious—into material entities. We become hard individuals who communicate through anger and arrogance. We imagine that all that will satisfy us is material. With this view we create a hard, angry, and materialistic world.

At present, the world seems to be running on self-centeredness, speed, and aggression. As this pattern exacerbates, the possibility of peace, both personally and socially, will diminish. Materialism will never make us happy because it is of a different nature than consciousness. Even though material things are important, they are not fundamentally at the core of the human being. The antidote for this materialistic outlook is peace, the opposite of stress.

In creating peace, our relationship with the environment is critical, particularly our relationship with the inner environment—our consciousness. If we don’t have a peaceful and harmonious relationship with our own being, it will be impossible for us to create peace anywhere else. Without a personal experience of peace, we won’t even believe in the possibility. Therefore we must become mindful of peace. Read the entire teaching on the Sakyong’s website.

In his Shambhala Day address this year, Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche delivered a potent teaching on manifesting love and kindness.

“At this particular time, it is love that is the message. We don’t need to give into hate, but rather we should have the power and maturity to express our love. I believe that this maturity to express love and kindness is what will save our mind and will save our planet. Love is believing in our basic goodness.”

To listen to an audio recording of the address, click here.

In mid-November, just before entering retreat, the Sakyong recorded an interview with President Reoch about the significance of Shambhala Households.

“Shambhala is historically connected with household,” he said. “I feel that the next phase is really this notion of the Shambhala Household. A person could choose to say ‘I would like to live as a Shambhala Household,’ and they would participate in this way.”

To view a video of the interview, click here.

In conjunction with the Sakyong’s message, the Shambhala Times is running a series of articles on the topic during the first week of January. See Shambhala Households.

12 Nov 2009 - Sakyong welcomes Charter of Compassion launched today; Shambhala members invited to give support

The Sakyong, Jamgon Mipham Rinpoche, welcomed the new global initiative, Charter for Compassion, that was launched today by an inter-faith coalition of leading religious teachers and scholars.

The Charter of Compassion, compiled over a two-year period as a result of broad internet consultation and a high-level drafting commission, was initiated by author Karen Armstrong who announced the results at the recent Peace Summit, held at the Dalai Lama Centre for Peace and Education in Vancouver.

Following the summit, the Sakyong responded positively to her appeal for international support and issued the following message, affirming the intention of the charter:

“Compassion is a core value of world culture,” he said. “It is at the heart of all spiritual traditions. It is a pith instruction of the Buddha. It binds us to our common humanity. In a deeply divided world, it is the vehicle that enables us to transcend our differences.

“Compassion is a path of practice. It can be pointed to in words, but never captured. Thus this charter and the campaign that will radiate out from it — like compassion itself — is a work in progress. It is part of a global realization that the time has come when compassion must rise to the forefront of our collective consciousness.”

To read the full text of the charter and learn about how it is being unveiled around the world, please click here. Read the rest of this entry »

Here is the October 2009 dharma teaching from Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche’s website. Other topical teachings are available in the website’s Archive.

Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche

The Tibetan word for refuge means “to be protected by.” Every day we wake up and tacitly take refuge in something that we think will offer us security and protection. Most of the time we put our poker chip on the little thing that says “desire.” We spend our time chasing worldly gains. We take refuge in comfort, in having things, in being busy.

While there’s nothing inherently wrong with external pleasures, when we believe that our happiness depends on them, we’re reinforcing a circular and endless process that results in pain, suffering, and disillusionment. This is called samsara. We work hard for what we think we want and when we get it, we don’t feel the happiness we expected.

In formally becoming Buddhists we take refuge in the three jewels: the Buddha, the dharma, and the sangha. Read the entire teaching on the Sakyong’s website

Presented here is the July 2009 dharma teaching from Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche’s website. Other topical teachings are available in the website’s Archive.

Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche

In the economic hardship the world is now suffering, it is possible for us to spin out and become very dualistic. When we are not sure what is going on, we react in fear and start labeling things black and white, good or bad, doomed to fail or destined to succeed. The process of labeling something because we are not sure what it is further increases the illusion of duality. Dualistic mind creates an aggressive scenario because we project a self and “other.” This process becomes a cycle: the heavier the dualism, the heavier the fear.

Egolessness, or practicing now, frees us from that cycle. But when fear has taken over and we can’t control the negative emotions that arise, the internal freedom that comes from egolessness is beyond our means. Instead we become fixated. We are living in the memory of the past or the fantasy of the future. We are stuck, unable to see the fluid truth of now.

At the heart of the dharma, we know that the world is fluid. When we practice now, we see the flow clearly. Now is now. There is not another now. If we realize that truth, we stop putting things off and engage in our life wholeheartedly. Read the entire teaching on the Sakyong’s website

Meditation can be viewed in many ways―as a tool for calming the mind, as a process of uncovering natural wisdom and compassion, as simply appreciating what it is to be fully human.

If you’d like to see for yourself what meditation is (and how it might affect your relationship with your life), the resources presented below will help you get started.

Come to our weekly Monday night Open House.

Sign up for our Meditation in Everyday Life weeknight course and/or Shambhala Training Level I weekend program.

Connect with a meditation instructor through our Meditation page.

Explore multimedia teachings on meditation in Shambhala’s About Meditation area.

Visit Shambhala Sun magazine’s How to Meditate section.

20 Apr 2009 - The Sakyong offers Protecting the Earth; a call to contemplation and action on climate change

The Sakyong offers these teachings in support of Earth Day, this Wednesday, 22 April, and the work of the Touching the Earth Working Group of the Sakyong’s Council.

Protecting the earth

A call to contemplation and action on climate change

Our precious planet and the innumerable beings who dwell here face an unprecedented crisis. The escalating threat to the world’s environment and climate stem from a profound predicament that affects all humanity. We are ever more rapidly losing our connection with the sacred nature of our world. This tragedy affects us in so many ways, but at its heart, it is a crisis of the spirit. We are harming our planet and fellow beings because we are losing touch with the basic goodness of our own sacred being.

This disconnect from our primordial basic goodness is amplified by unparalleled technological and industrial capacity, dramatic population growth, and the vast inequalities we witness everywhere in our world. Read the rest of this entry »

On Shambhala Day―this year, February 25th―we rang in the Year of the Earth Ox. A highlight of the day’s festivities was Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche’s annual Shambhala Day address to the international Shambhala community. Unfortunately, due to technical glitches, few people around the Shambhala world could hear it!

Well, now you can hear it, and the addresses of Khandro Tseyang and President Richard Reoch as well. Audio-recordings of all three addresses are available at: http://www.shambhala.org/community/video.php