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Photo from our course last week

Author keithPosted on February 12, 2018February 12, 2018

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We will send you an email once a month to let you know what is going on at the Hertford Buddhist Group.


Recommended nearby Buddhist groups:

LBC (London Buddhist Centre)

Cambridge Buddhist Centre

Useful Links

A very beautiful site with great photos and content unifying both Triratna Buddhist groups in Hertford

Herts Buddhist Meditation
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Lots of mp3s of talks on Buddhism:

Free Buddhist Audio
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Lots of information about Buddhism and Triratna:

The Buddhist Centre

The Buddhist Centre Online

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A site that lists Triratna upcoming retreats all over the UK

Going on Retreat
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Many amazing Triratna videos

Video Sangha
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Also you can subscribe to the following podcasts (search for them in your podcast app):

The Buddhist Centre Online
Free Buddhist Audio
Manchester Buddhist Centre
Buddhist Voices
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and to the following youtube channels:

The London Buddhist Centre

The Buddhist Centre

Sheffield Buddhist Centre

Manchester Buddhist Centre

Clear Vision Trust

Devamitra

1 month ago

Hi there,

This is what is coming up at our drop in Tuesday night class at Hertford Buddhist Group:

Each evening includes:

1) a guided meditation taught from first principles.
2) a tea break
3) a talk and/or discussion

5th March: Perfect Emotion led by Keith
12th March: Perfect Speech led by Khemananda
19th March: Perfect Action and Livelihood led by Mangala
26th March: Perfect Effort, Awareness and Meditation led by Padmajata

So why not come along and join us. Newcomers and beginners are always very welcome. You do not have to have meditated before, "be a Buddhist", or know anything about either subject. We normally get at least one or two newcomers every Tuesday.

Hope to see you at one or more of the above

Keith

p.s. In the meantime, here is a short excerpt from one of my favourite books: "Buddhism - Tools for Living your Life" by Vajragupta.

_____________________________

The Four Reminders

We've seen that the Buddhist life involves having an ongoing sense of the story of our lives and being aware of what is really important and vital to us. It means being more alive to the opportunities for realizing that significance and possibility. But it is very easy to lose touch with all this. Through the busyness, distractions, and comforts of modern life we can slip back into our 'default setting'. Our old habits reassert themselves, and we trundle through life without really addressing our deeper questions. Because of this, it can help to have some practical tools to ensure we don't forget our true potential and purpose.

The rest of this chapter concerns a set of reflections from the Tibetan Buddhist tradition that are designed to help us cultivate and keep alive this awareness.

Traditionally known as the 'four thoughts that turn the mind towards the Buddhist teaching', they have also been called the four reminders, because of this need to keep reminding ourselves to make the most of our lives.3
exercise - the four reminders

What follows is an explanation of the main idea behind each of the four reminders. Then there is a more reflective evocation of each one. Try reflecting on these over the next few weeks.

There are more practical suggestions about how to carry out reflection in Chapter 9. For now, you could reflect on one reminder for five minutes each day. This could be at the start of your meditation - if you already have a daily meditation practice - or it could be at another time, while sitting quietly or going for a walk. You first need a space free of distraction, some time being quiet and getting settled, and then you can start the reflection.

You could focus on one reminder for a week or so, and then move on to another. Or you could rotate them on a daily basis, doing a different one each day.

The basic idea is to mull over what it is we are being reminded of, and to notice what, if any, effect that has on us. You could slowly read the relevant reflection to yourself a few times. Or you might know another piece of writing, a poem, or a song, a piece of music, a painting, or a photograph that addresses the same theme.

Just let the main message sink in to your heart. There is no need to try to force any response - keep it simple and trust your intuition.

The idea is that, through sitting quietly and contemplating the four themes, they gradually drop down more and more deeply into your being. At first, your reflections may seem a bit abstract and artificial, but, with practice, they gradually become more emotionally real, and become part of you.

You could even keep a journal, briefly recording what impression each reminder makes upon you.

1. Life is a precious opportunity
2. Impermanence. Everything in this world will pass.
3. Actions have consequences
4. There is suffering in life

© Windhorse Publications ... See more

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1 month ago
London Buddhist Centre

This page has an online version of all the London Buddhist Centre programmes. Most of these have interesting articles in the first half, and a programme of events in the second half.

https://issuu.com/londonbuddhistcentre ... See more

The London Buddhist Centre teaches meditation and Buddhism in a way that is relevant to modern London life. We are a public centre, open to all, with no expectation of Buddhist involvement. We also teach Mindfulness for health and well-being. The Centre opened in 1978 in what was a disused fire stat... ... See more

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2 months ago

Hi there,

Just to let you know what is coming up at Hertford Buddhist Group on Tuesday evenings.

By the way, the photo was taken a few weeks ago at our first class of 2019.

Just drop in any Tuesday evening between 7pm and 7.15pm. Everyone including total beginners and people knowing nothing about Buddhism or meditation are very welcome.

12/2 Mangala will be leading the class and talking about wisdom
19/2 Keith leading Four Noble Truths, Noble Eightfold Path, and Perfect Vision
26/2 Padmajata leading on Perfect Emotion part 1
5/3 Keith leading on Perfect Emotion part 2

I hope to see you at some of these

Keith

p.s. If you want to be informed of what is going on (eg festivals, retreats, special events etc) at the two centres we are most connected with in East London and Cambridge I would recommend that you sign up to their email lists at:-

https://www.lbc.org.uk/
https://www.cambridgebuddhistcentre.com/email-bulletin

___________________________________

Here is an excerpt from "Buddhism: Tools for Living Your Life" by Vajragupta

exercise - your sacred questions

Returning to the reflections on your life-story from the exercise above, can you formulate something that is a sacred question for you?

Again, start by sitting quietly and allowing time for your thoughts and feelings to emerge. It would also be good to use pen and paper, but what you write doesn't have to be polished or complete. Sometimes such questions evolve gradually. To start with, you may get just a faint sense or intuition of what it is that matters most to you. Or perhaps you already have a very clear idea.

Just express your question (or questions) as clearly as you are able.

--------

I had a strange experience the first time I went on retreat, which has never happened again since then. I was a student at the time and had very little money, but I wanted to go on a Buddhist retreat. The group retreats at established retreat centres cost more than I could afford, but I'd heard some Buddhists talking about 'going on solitary'. A solitary retreat is when you stay on your own somewhere in the countryside and spend your time meditating, reflecting, going for walks, and reading. I knew of a caravan in Wales, in an ideal location, and very cheap to rent, so I booked myself two weeks there. It was in a beautiful spot halfway up a steep hillside. Just a few yards from the caravan were stunning views to the sea. Every evening I would walk a short distance and watch the sun setting into the Irish Sea. I would probably have been better off doing my first retreat at a centre where someone more experienced could provide some guidance, but nevertheless I gained a lot from being on my own.

At the beginning of the two weeks, without my consciously deciding to, I started thinking through my life. I found myself spontaneously recalling a certain period of time, memories would come flooding back to me in meditation, and even in my dreams I would be remembering people and incidents from the past. By the end of the fortnight I realized I had reviewed my whole life and that it had happened roughly in chronological order. Through this process I came to know and accept myself more fully. I felt tangibly more confident and sure of my direction when I returned. It was a pivotal time in my life, a life-changing two weeks.

I realized that all my life I had been looking for something. I had not found it yet, but I knew that, through the Buddhist practice I'd learned, and through my contact with other Buddhists, the search had truly begun. After many years of wondering what my life was about, I was on a path at long last. On one of the final evenings of the retreat, the sunset was particularly lovely, the sea calm and silvery, and the light from the sun made a red pathway across the water. It was as if I was setting out on that pathway, setting out across the ocean towards that beautiful sun. ... See more

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4 months ago
New Drop in Meditation and Buddhism Course starting Tuesday 8th Jan 2019 - Hertford Buddhist Meditation Group

No classes over Christmas and New Year, a new course starting on Tuesday 8th Jan and our Thursday class is closing

Hi everybody

We are having another 6 week (ie 6 Tuesday evenings) meditation and Buddhism course starting 8th Jan (turn up between 7.00pm and 7.15pm). This one is called "Radical Dharma", and is suitable for complete beginners who have never meditated, or who know nothing about Buddhism, as well as seasoned meditators, and everyone else in between.

And when it finishes you have the opportunity to go on to a 6 week intermediate level course that is designed to follow on from it.

As usual, we are offering this course free of charge, and we would be really grateful if you could give us a donation towards our costs.

More info is at https://hertfordbuddhistgroup.co.uk/new-drop-in-meditation-and-buddhism-course-starting-tuesday-8th-jan-2019/

There are still a couple of weeks to go though, so don't wait till then. Drop in before that!

Tuesdays
11th Dec - Keith is leading
18th Dec - Padmajata is leading a special celebratory evening. On this evening we will celebrate our sangha (=spiritual community) in lots of lovely ways. If you want you are invited to bring something green and red for a festive shrine and seasonal goodies for the tea break. We will meditate as usual in the first half and for the second half you are invited to bring something to share like a poem, song, music or dance etc. But all of this is optional. You can also just turn up and enjoy the evening.

No class on Christmas Day or New Year's Day.

Classes resume on 8th Jan with the course mentioned above.

Thursdays
13th Dec - Rob is leading
20th Dec - Rob is leading. This will be the last public Thursday class, as we are having a more advanced invitation only training program on that night for mitras, or people thinking about becoming mitras.

It is with a lot of regret that we are closing down the Thursday class, as a lot of people have benefitted from it. However the room is needed for other purposes, and we do not have anyone available to teach it.

A big shout out to Rob who has been leading classes at Hertford for pretty much every week for the last 9 and a half years, as well as co-founding the group with Helen.

Have a great Christmas and New Year. I know it is a bit early for New Year Resolutions, but when it comes around, why not make one about meditating, and/or connecting with like minded friends (eg at our Tuesday classes!). Just an idea 🙂

That is all for now.

Keith

_____________________________________

I thought it would be a good idea in these monthly emails (at least now and again) to give you a bite sized chunk from one of my favourite books: "Buddhism: Tools for Living Your Life" by Vajragupta
We actually have studied this book week in and week out for over a year, and we found it very accessible and thought provoking for all different types of readers.

1
Four reminders:
everyone has a story
To write down all I contain at this moment
I would pour the desert through an hour-glass,
The sea through a water-clock,
Grain by grain and drop by drop.1

Everyone has a story to tell. Everyone's life is a unique combination of events, full of dark and light, hope and disappointment, meetings and partings, the unusual and the mundane. Living a Buddhist life is about understanding our story, knowing for what our heart most truly wishes, and feeling we have the tools to change direction if we wish. Life will have dealt us a certain hand of cards, but we can learn to play them more and more skilfully.

In the Buddhist communities I've been part of, we would often tell each other our life-stories. Each person will take an evening, maybe longer, and tell the story of his life thus far. Over the years I've heard many stories, and each has been intriguing, even inspiring. There is no such thing as a boring life-story.

As a result of hearing their history, you usually feel you know that person much better. This greater understanding allows you to feel more empathy with them. Maybe you can see that they arrived in the world with a particular physical and psychological make-up already in place. They were also born into certain family, social, and cultural conditioning. They tell how they juggled with this complex, interacting set of conditions, and how they struggled to find happiness and fulfilment in the midst of it all. You hear of the long course of chances, circumstances, and choices that brought them to where they are today. What they describe helps make sense of the person you now know. You can see where they have come from. You can recognize them in the story they tell.

I once saw an exhibition of photographs that consisted of shots of the same objects close-up and from a distance. A photograph of a tree would show a tangle of twigs and branches twisting and pointing indifferent directions. The next image would be a long avenue of trees - each one beautifully proportioned and in line with all the others. Another photograph would show a heap of stones of various shapes and sizes, the weathering and the lichen giving each a different colour and texture. The next picture would be the same stones from afar - a wall of regular width and height that ran alongside a road, perfectly following every curve of the road and contour of the hill.

Our lives, too, can be like this. Close-up, day-to-day, there is just a busy jumble of incidents, conversations, and experiences. Only from a distance can we discern an overall order or pattern. This is partly why going on a retreat can be so valuable - we can look back at our lives from a distance. We can take stock and consider whether we are heading in the right direction. Are we going where we really want to be going? Are we becoming the kind of person we really want to be?

The Buddhist life involves asking those kinds of questions. Buddhist practices, such as meditation, are about becoming more aware, or conscious, of the patterns of our lives. Through the Buddhist life, we try to become more consciously the authors of our own life-story. We are trying to ensure that life is not something that just happens to us, but increasingly an act of creativity. This means not only creativity of the artistic kind (though it might include that), but that we engage in all aspects of our lives with fullness of attention and purpose. We are aware that each little incident will become part of the larger narrative of our lives.

One great danger of the today's busy world is that life can slide past us without our really noticing it. How often have you eaten a meal, made a journey, or even had a conversation with someone, and afterwards realized that you weren't really there, and that your mind was caught up with anticipation or worry about the next thing? Although, in the western world, life is often enjoyable and comfortable, there is a danger of superficiality, of living too often in a twilight zone of distraction.

I have a friend who, at the age of twenty-one, witnessed her younger sister dying of cancer. Her sister was only sixteen, on the cusp of an adulthood she would never live. As the months wore on, the family looked after her as best they could - managing trips to the hospital, washing and feeding her increasingly sick and frail body. Their lives revolved around being there for her in those last weeks of her life.

It is a tragic story, yet my friend says there is something about those days that she has been trying to recapture ever since.

In some respects the aim of her Buddhist life is to live the way she lived then. The family lived in the presence of death. They knew the sister would not be around much longer, but this enabled them to be much more alive former and for each other. Every moment of every day was precious. Of course, they did not always manage this perfectly, and there were occasions of anger or irritation, but they gave themselves to the situation, they had a tremendous sense of being fully present.

Eventually the young girl died, the funeral came and went, and life for this family gradually returned to normal. My friend says that part of the pain of this subsequent period was the loss of the depth and presence they had all lived with. She couldn't sustain that intensity of awareness of life under ordinary conditions, but she had been left ever since with a sense of its potential.

Maybe we, too, desire to live more fully, more from the depths of ourselves. When we manage to do this, life seems somehow more real, more authentic, and therefore more satisfying - even if we are in the midst of pain and suffering. We realize that we have often been living as shadows of ourselves, existing as a fraction of our potential. We are capable of much more feeling and awareness than we dare to imagine. ... See more

You are warmly invited to come to a six-week (ie 6 Tuesday evenings) course for anyone wanting to learn how to meditate or find out about Buddhism or who wants to deepen their knowledge or practice. All are welcome including total beginners, and people who know nothing about meditation or Buddhism..... ... See more

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5 months ago
's cover photo

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5 months ago
What is going on in November

Hi everyone,

Twenty one of us have just returned from our annual retreat at Burwell House near Newmarket (see live photo). It was a truly magical time which really helped us get a glimpse of a deeper experience than is possible at our evening classes. It was especially powerful for the people who were attending a retreat for the first time. It also helped friendships deepen as we all got to know each other much better.

This is what is coming up in the next few weeks:

Tuesday evenings
Drop in class with lead meditation
6th Nov Taradasa (meditation workshop)
13th Nov Leah
20th Nov Taradasa (meditation workshop)
27th Nov Leah and Keith
4th Dec Khemananda
11th Dec Not sure yet
18th Dec Padmajata
25th Dec no class
1st Jan no class
8th Jan Week 1 of Radical Dharma 6 week course

Thursday evenings
Drop in class with unlead meditation
8th Nov - the 3rd Precept - stillness simplicity and contentment
15th Nov - life of the Buddha video
22nd Nov - four noble truths
29th Nov - eight fold path (might go on to December)

That is all for now.

Have a great November

Keith ... See more

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6 months ago
London Buddhist Centre

The chair of the London Buddhist Centre was on Radio 4 recently talking about kindness. Definitely worth a listen.

Catch Suryagupta, chair of the LBC, talking on the theme of Kindness on BBC 4's Something Understood...

Listen on iPlayer > https://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/play/b0blgj7k

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7 months ago

Note that The Wash in Hertford will be closed completely from 21/9 to 5/10/18.

This will make parking and using the Millbridge Rooms a little harder, so if possible, please leave a bit earlier than you normally do. ... See more

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7 months ago

This is the photo that Padmajata took at the end of the class last night.

We had a really lovely evening, and it was wonderful to see so many people coming along to find out a bit about meditation and Buddhism.

Why not come and join us next Tuesday?

It does not matter if you missed last night and have not been before. The course is designed so that people can join at any point.

Keith ... See more

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7 months ago

Hi everybody,

There is a lot going on in Hertford in September. Here goes!

Tuesday nights 7.30pm to 9.45pm

We are going to have another free 6 week course starting 11th Sep teaching both meditation and Buddhism. It will start from very first principles, and assume no previous knowledge or experience of either subject.

Many people have found these courses extremely useful and have made massive shifts in their life from them (especially if they carry on practising and attending after the course).

People report these shifts in areas such as more happiness, less anxiety and less negative emotions. The general goal is to be more content, more aware, have more loving kindness, joy, and ultimately more freedom from our reactive mind.

Repitition is important in Buddhism because there are different levels of depth, experience and understanding. So if you have been before, then why not come again and you will build on what you have learned and be able to go a bit deeper this time. So it is also suitable for anyone, no matter what their experience.

Details are at https://hertfordbuddhistgroup.co.uk/free-6-week-meditation-and-buddhism-course/ and repeated at https://www.facebook.com/events/2189363678013951/ .

On the Tuesday before that (i.e 4th Sep), Leah and Keith will lead the class.

Thursday nights from 7.30 to 9.30

Anyone is welcome to attend as long as they are able to sit and meditate for half an hour without any instruction.

Unled meditation and talk/discussion/reflection on the Worldly Winds and how they affect our lives.

30th August Helen
6th Sep Keith
13th Sep Helen
20th Sep Helen

The 8 Worldly Winds are things that sometimes control our lives, but if we become more aware of them, we will have more freedom and can make better choices.

ie: gain, loss, status, disgrace, censure, praise, pleasure, & pain

I hope to see you at some of these events, but in any case, have a great September 🙂

Keith

p.s. Don't forget to book on our annual retreat at October 26 - 28th 2018. Time is running out. Suitable for all levels of experience including complete beginners. More info at https://www.facebook.com/events/2189363678013951/ and https://hertfordbuddhistgroup.co.uk/our-weekend-retreat-in-october/ .

p.p.s. Another event not to be missed is the Open Day at the LBC (London Buddhist Centre) on Sunday 16th Sep. https://www.lbc.org.uk/event-details/open-day-915 . ... See more

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This meetup should be easily reachable from Cheshunt, Broxbourne, Hoddesdon, Waltham Cross, Waltham Abbey, Harlow, Enfield, Barnet, Waltham Forest and beyond!
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