Hi everyone,
Happy April.
We are starting a six week course on the 18th April based around the amazing book “Not about being good”. You can check it out at any good bookseller 🙂 As usual, the first half of each evening will be devoted to meditation (with full instruction). Then after the tea break we will have the course. Beginners are very welcome. No need to book. Just turn up.
Normally we have random unrelated people leading each week. But this time we are doing something different. The course will be led by a team of people from our GFR sangha. i.e. people in the ordination process (Amber, Bev, Helen, Katey, Keith, Nigel, Rob, and Simon). We have never attempted anything like this before. But it does make a lot of sense to work as a team like this.
It will be a fantastic course. I am really looking forward to it. The book is written by Subhadramati who used to be the female mitra convenor at the London Buddhist Centre. She does have a very special warm energy, and wisdom which is transmitted through the book. When I first started teaching meditation, I used to sneak into her beginners’ meditation sessions at the LBC on Wednesday evenings so I could learn from her:-)
As it says in the book’s blurb: “other people are essentially no different from ourselves. We can, if we choose, actively develop this awareness, through cultivating more and more love, clarity and contentment. Helping us to come into a greater harmony with all that lives, including ourselves, this is ultimately a guidebook to a more satisfactory life.”
04 Apr 2023 Our birthday bash – Celebration of the founding of the Hertford Buddhist Group 14 years ago
11 Apr 2023 Padmajata
18 Apr 2023 Course week 1 – GFR Sangha
25 Apr 2023 Course week 2 – GFR Sangha
02 May 2023 Course week 3 – GFR Sangha
09 May 2023 Course week 4 – GFR Sangha
16 May 2023 Course week 5 – GFR Sangha
23 May 2023 Course week 6 – GFR Sangha
I hope to see you at many of these
Keith
p.s. Excerpt from one of my favourite books: “Buddhism: Tools for Living Your Life” by Vajragupta © Windhorse Publications
Buddhists talk a lot about contentment and simplicity, but what do these ideals actually amount to when we are in the midst of a busy job? What does simplicity mean in a society that is complex, quick to change, technologically sophisticated, and far from simple?
Maybe simplicity is about doing what is really important in our lives and not getting caught up in that which is of lesser importance. There is a well-known exercise in which participants are asked to write down all their plans for the coming year. (If you want to do this exercise yourself, then don’t read any further before you’ve done that bit!)
Then they are given a second sheet of paper and asked to write their plans for the year once again, but this time knowing that it is the last year of their life. The contents of the two sheets are often very different – the hopes and aims of the first suddenly appear in a new perspective. This exercise might show us what is really important and worth focusing on.