Ramblings of a Monk

I was recently talking to a friend and she indicated that she is keen in volunteering to help out in Marine Life protection.  So I was wondering if anyone would know where she can volunteer in.  Kindly leave a note.

On a side note, for those of us who may not be ready to volunteer our time to save marine life, we can avoid harming them.  For a start, you may want to give up the rod and stop fishing or netting fishes, crabs etc.  I do agree that going out to the beach or sea is rather relaxing and calming, and I know of friends who join in such fishing trips, not really to fish, but for the company or just to enjoy the sea breeze.  However, one could still enjoy the sea breezes without leaving the hook out in the sea.  And if one really wants to feed the fishes, just bring along the appropriate feed and scatter them into the sea without the hook!  Trust me you, the fishes would appreciate it a lot better!

Daily Exercise II
From the earlier Daily Exercises (Vesak Exercises), one should have determined certain traits about oneself. One should become aware of certain patterns in one’s life that may be beneficial or harmful. With that in mind, it is then time to move to the next stage: Practice!

1.Practice Day
2.Practice Week
Read the rest

The one place you would not expect to find demand of “Human Rights” would be in a college, a Buddhist College I mean. One would think that 1) a Buddhist College would be extolling values above and beyond mere human rights and 2) students (monks in this case) would not really care much about human rights (HR). Afterall, Buddhism as a whole seem to point towards an attitude of non-attachment and non-self (no-self or not-self if you will!), it seem strange that they while working towards these ideals, would be so concerned with human rights. After all, without a self, who is to enjoy the rights or suffer their absence?

But this article is not about that. This article is about what I think Human Rights is and its place in an Asian society vs the role of Human Responsibilities. Read the rest

You know what they say, in some therapy, in some movies, or some TV shows, where the patient is advised to just let out their anger? Or in some cases, yourself or a friend who actually sees a “shrink” and you are told to acknowledge your anger (or whatever emotions you are dealing with! … rarely is it happiness!). Some of these scenes (not sure in real life) would further include the patient shouting out “I’m angry! I’m flabbergasted! I’m so f**king pissed!” … and in some cases even throwing things, and the good doctor would then say “Good good! Acknowledge your emotions. … ” etc etc …

I’m just wondering if anyone who tried this realise that the mere acknowledging or more rightly, the identifying with emotions in such manner, serves also to strengthen them. The mere “I am angry”, reinforces that well, I am angry. But where’s the I, as they would say? There’s probably a letting go part that some of these movies or real life accounts are missing, or maybe I didn’t watch the right ones or the persons I hear it from didn’t go to the right shrink. But is it just me or isn’t it harder to let it go later on after we have identified with it saying “I am angry” like a gazillion times?? Read the rest

Hi all,I’m going off on a retreat, and if anyone can help host the BuddhaVacana facebook app, please contact me. Appreciate it.

Hosting server needed:
* LAMP server
* PHP 5.* (facebook requirement, not my apps)
* 10mb space for the app (should be lesser)

Human beings are not light bulbs … … they cannot simply be switched on and off.

What do you think?