Author: Luna Kadampa

The other day I was at a yard sale with my neighbor and friend, more like family actually, searching for stuff for his and his fiance’s new property. There is, ermmm, about 20 years difference between us in age this time around, and this is sometimes obvious. For example, he can solve any computer problem at the speed of light and gets paid handsomely for doing it; but when we drove past several streets with the names “Whitman”, “Chaucer” and “Blake”, his face went blank when I said brightly: “Well, this is a literary area!!” At the yard sale, he…

One of my dearest friends is a hoarder. He is gentle, kind, thoughtful, funny, and very unable to let go of his junk. For him, of course, that is because it is not junk. We tried to do a yard sale of all his stuff earlier this year and after weeks of work involving a small army of his loved ones, we raised all of $300. This to my mind proved that his big house-load of stuff was junk, but that reasoning does not work on him. This is because for him it could all come in useful one day,…

The two main practices of a Bodhisattva are compassion and rejoicing. If you think about it, that pretty much covers every variety of human experience — people are either experiencing suffering or misfortune, in which case they are worthy of compassion, or else they are experiencing happiness or good fortune, in which case they give us the perfect excuse for rejoicing. For example, in this New York Times article, there is a hero called John Prendergast, aged 47,  who has spent his entire adult life helping war-torn countries in Africa, drawing attention to them. He got interested in this at…

There is a little bear who lives opposite me. When i first saw him, at dusk, I didn’t see anyone with him and I couldn’t figure out what manner of being he was, even though he was clearly very cute. I exclaimed to my companion: “What is that!” “That” turned out to be Rusty, the little Pomeranian. Life was not always easy for him. Literally thrown around as a puppy (two boys were found playing catch with him on the beach), he was rescued by someone, only to spend the next five years in a cage, let out just to…

I know this is old news but it is a classic and classics can be repeated… See if you can watch it without smiling. It reminds me of our Buddha nature, how it remains immutable, this potential we always have for perfect happiness, goodness, wisdom, purity, kindness… It is currently wrapped in the rags of our delusions, doubts and negativity, but every now and then it shines through, and we feel blissful, free and completely connected. Even if it is only for a few moments, it gives us hope that there is more to come.

This blog was originally intended for a few friends, family and me. Mainly me. I thought it would beat writing down my musings in a scrappy old notebook, even one with this picture on the front … But I came to the conclusion, over the past couple of months, that we needed more Kadampa bloggers. I know they are out there, waiting. So this blog has become an invitation. Don’t leave me alone on this big world wide web! If you want to write just a little something but don’t want to start a blog, you can send me your…