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China at a Tipping Point: Ecological and Spiritual Awakening

Zilong Wang, a pilgrim

Posted: 11/23/2015 

There is the China we hear about in the news: largest economy 

in the world; lifting hundreds of millions out of poverty and into 

urban areas; largest CO2 emitter; entrenched corruption; toxic 

air; poisoned food and water; growing disparity; political uncertainties; global expansion and entanglement...

Yes, that's perhaps all true. But, on my recent 4-week trip across
the country, I saw a different China - different from my impression just a year ago, and different from what I thought I knew. Yet 
deep down, it felt strangely familiar.

I sensed an ecological and spiritual awakening in the country, at 
a tipping point. I saw countless people and groups doing their 
small and inspiring parts. Many of them do not know each other. 
But they are essentially doing the "same work": being the change they want to see in the world.

Below are some snapshots of the emerging landscape of change.

Mindful Nation UK.

I am deeply honoured to have been invited to contribute to this All-Party Parliamentary Report. I extend my personal thanks and that of the wider mindfulness community to the Parliamentarians and all those whose hard work has brought it to this stage in an ongoing process that carries so much vision and promise for the United Kingdom and for the world.

Mindfulness is a way of being in wise and purposeful relationship with one’s experience, both inwardly and outwardly. It is cultivated by systematically exercising one’s capacity for paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally, and by learning to inhabit and make use of the clarity, discernment, ethical understanding, and awareness that arise from tapping into one’s own deep and innate interior resources for learning, growing, healing, and transformation, available to us across the lifespan by virtue of being human. It usually involves cultivating familiarity and intimacy with aspects of everyday experience that we often are unaware of, take for granted, or discount in terms of importance. These would include our experience of the present moment, our own bodies, our thoughts and emotions, and above all, our tacit and constraining assumptions and our highly conditioned habits of mind and behaviour. Mindfulness practices in various forms can be found in all the meditative wisdom traditions of humanity. In essence, mindfulness - being about attention, awareness, relationality, and caring - is a universal human capacity, akin to our capacity for language acquisition. While the most systematic and comprehensive articulation of mindfulness and its related attributes stems from the Buddhist tradition, mindfulness is not a catechism, an ideology, a belief system, a technique or set of techniques, a religion, or a philosophy. It is best described as “a way of being”. There are many different ways to cultivate it wisely and effectively through practice.

Indonesia Tipitaka Chanting & Asalha Mahapuja 2559 / 2015

Indonesia Tipitaka Chanting & Asalha Mahapuja,

25-26 July 2015,Borobudur Temple, Indonesia

Background & Music copyright of:

Ratana Sutta (Pali) in Gamelan Instrumental by Tanah Putih Monastery, Semarang - Indonesia

Forbidden Friendship by John Powell

https://vimeo.com/144326185

Just seven minutes of meditation can cut racial prejudice

Deccan Herald Friday 20 November 2015

Not just making you calm and creating a feeling of kindness, a mere seven-minute of meditation daily can help reduce racial bias too, a new study shows.

The researchers found that just seven minutes of a meditation technique called Loving-kindness meditation (LKM) directed to a member of a specific racial group (in this case, a black person) was sufficient to reduce racial bias towards that group. 

The Loving-kindness meditation (LKM) is a Buddhist practise that promotes unconditional kindness towards oneself and others.

The correct way to bow ( in the Theravada tradition).

Daily motion

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/xtnhkb_five-points-prostration-%E0%B8%81%E0%B8%B2%E0%B8%A3%E0%B8%81%E0%B8%A3%E0%B8%B2%E0%B8%9A%E0%B9%81%E0%B8%9A%E0%B8%9A%E0%B9%80%E0%B8%9A%E0%B8%8D%E0%B8%88%E0%B8%B2%E0%B8%87%E0%B8%84%E0%B8%9B%E0%B8%A3%E0%B8%B0%E0%B8%94-%E0%B8%A9%E0%B8%90_webcam

A critical point is to keep your elbow close to your knee when you bow down.
Keep your butt down as much as possible. As a further refinement, men sit on their toes, women on the top of their feet.

Buddhist nuns set to become first generation of 'dons'

IANS, Nov 17, 2015

Dharamsala, India -- Nearly three years ago the globetrotting elderly Buddhist monk the Dalai Lama came out with a perfect prescription for the first time in history to empower the nuns. His decision encouraged them to take up doctorates in philosophy. The first batch of 20 Buddhist nuns is set to become the first generation of women professors in the Tibetan tradition.

Kelsang Wangmo, the first female Geshe, here pictured with her mother and His Holiness the Dalai Lama

Traditionally, the doctorate was awarded only to the monks after 12 or more years of rigorous study in Buddhist philosophy. Officials say in 2012 a historic decision was taken by the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) as advocated by the Dalai Lama that the doctorate programme for nuns be established.

Selflessness.

Pakistan’s Gandhara ruins to receive Korea’s Buddhists

by Joel Lee, The Korea Herald, Nov 15, 2015

Seoul, South Korea -- According to some historians, Korea’s Buddhism traces its roots to the Gandharan Civilization that thrived 2,000 years ago in the territories of today’s northern Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The Mahayana school of Korea’s Buddhism, one of two main branches alongside the Hinayana school, was introduced to the ancient Kingdom of Baekje (B.C. 18-A.D. 660) in 384 by monk Maranatha, native of Gandhara, the historical records say.

The triangular tract largely to the west of the Indus River and bounded to the north by the Hindukush Mountains includes the Peshawar Valley, Taxila, Swat, Dir, Buner and Bajaur. In ancient times, it was a religious melting pot of Buddhism, Sikhism, Jainism, Zoroastrianism and Hinduism, whose coexistence was encapsulated in coins, sculptures and paintings.

Pakistani Embassy secretary Anna Kim, Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation managing director Kabir Ahmad Khan and Pakistani Ambassador Zahid Nasrullah Khan speak at a press conference on Nov. 9 to promote the Gandhara Civilization. 

Buddhist beliefs can connect people across Taiwan Strait: Master Hsing Yun

CCTVNews October 26

In an exclusive interview with CCTVNEWS, Master Hsing Yun talked about how Buddhist beliefs can connect people from different system, and how the Precepts can help promote a harmonious world.

https://www.facebook.com/cctvnewschina/videos/1064850666889086/

The Kasava..

According to vinaya set up by the Buddha, a monk robe is patterned after rice field that the Buddha thought it was beautiful. Each robe must be at least five khandas (parts) sewn together. If there are more than five khandas, the number must be an odd number.

Why Are Myanmar Nuns Not Granted the Same Respect as Monks?

August 07, 2015 Ei Cherry Aung, Myanmar Now
Image: Hkun Lat/Myanmar Now

Due to patriarchy, nuns have to struggle to live with dignity.

A young Buddhist nun rides Yangon's circular train in June 2015.

Born of Buddhist parents and raised in a Buddhist environment, I grew up as a typical Myanmar Buddhist girl. Under the care of my grandmother, it was hammered into my brain that we should worship and pay the utmost respect to Buddhist monks in all circumstances. My grandmother instructed me, for example, to never sit on the same level as monks, but place myself at their feet. Yet in all the years of my childhood she never said a word about how to behave in front of Buddhist women who had become nuns.

It’s customary in Myanmar to make donations at monasteries during annual religious events and to donate to monks begging for alms on the street. I used to see my grandmother give rice and curries to monks every morning, before anyone had a chance to eat, and I learned that I should always offer food to the monks first. But when nuns came asking for alms she usually replied: “Sorry, please no offerings.” Only occasionally a nun would receive a spoonful of rice or a one-kyat note—this was at a time when the bus fare for a short trip cost around 50 kyats.

Ledi Sayadaw on Kamma

"Kamma is determined to be good or evil according to whether it leads to the cultivation and growth of one’s own mind and the benefit of others, or to the deterioration and defilement of one’s own mind and the harm of others. Thus by doing the following ten types of deeds one makes evil or unwholesome kamma which will bear the fruits of suffering, but by abstaining from these ten and cultivating their opposites one makes good kamma which will bear the fruits of happiness. These ten are as follows: