Author Archives: John Barter
The Ending of Time!
The whole of I,
we, you and me;
is but a ‘cognitive creation’.
We think our self into being!
Behind and beyond the thought,
of I, we, you and me;
is simply energy manifesting as
the body and mind-ful awareness.
Meditation frees the mind,
from thought, from the activity of identification;
from ‘identity-ing’ and allows simply a
Body-Mind ‘Presence-ing’.
Here – Now, no one;
No – not now, no not here!
No story; no story teller;
no stress, no suffering; no drama and no SAMSARA.
For the I, we, you and me – self, is...
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Is It Peace?
Is it Peace?
Is it Peace that we seek?
Fundamentally and Ultimately, at the end of the day, at the end of our life, and everywhere and when in between; is it Peace that we seek?
Maybe!
So, what then is Peace?
Peace is a calm contentment, a quite joy, an ease and fulfillment.
Peace may be experienced in the external environment, but fundamentally is a quality and state of mind – heart (Citta).
Peace could be said to occur on three levels.
1. Peace is the...
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Spring Newsletter
Dear Friends
‘Ten thousand flowers in Spring,
The moon in Autumn.
A cool breeze in Summer,
Snow in Winter.
If your mind is not clouded
By unnecessary things,
This is the best season of your life.’
Wu-Men (1183 – 1260)
Welcome to Spring.
Certainly the best season or time in our life is when our mind is calm and clear. However Spring is a wonderful season to be alive in!
Spring calls us to our senses; to see, sense and feel the change in...
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Now – This – Here
NOW - THIS - HERE
Before ‘then’ – NOW
Before ‘that’ – THIS
Before ‘there’ – HERE
Our life is in Reality
Always – NOW – THIS - HERE!
Mindfulness through Meditation
Brings us back to Real Life
NOW – THIS – HERE.
Much of where we go wrong,
Is due to living where we don’t belong!
We get caught into the ‘Not Now, Not This, Not Here’.
So easily we React, Resist, Deny and Distract from
The wonderful Reality of NOW – THIS – HERE.
Our ‘Practice’ is to ‘Re-Mind’ our self,
To...
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Mindfulness is not enough!
Mindfulness is not enough!
The Great Forest Meditation Masters, including my own teacher Venerable Ajahn Chah; would often speak about the importance of ‘Sati – Paññā’.
In fact, the essence practice of the Buddha’s Teachings for those that are serious about serious results in practice is ‘Sati – Paññā ‘.
‘Sati – Paññā’ is ‘Mindfulness and Wisdom’.
Here the appreciation is that mindfulness alone is not enough! Whilst we hear and read a lot about ‘mindfulness’ the real experts have been saying and...
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Buddhist Psychology – ‘The Four Noble Truths’
Buddhist Psychology - The Four Noble Truths
Buddhist Psychology is much more that a psychology of psycho-pathology of the human condition.
Buddhist Psychology in its depth and breadth also offers the Practice - Principles, Perspectives and Path to complete psychological freedom - Awakening - Enlightenment!
The Buddha's Teachings, the Buddha - Dhamma, is wonderfully summarised in the Four Noble Truths (about Dukkha - dissatisfaction, distress and suffering).
These Truths are:
The Acknowledgement -of the reality of dissatisfaction, distress and suffering in our lives.
...
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Mindfulness moves us …….
Mindfulness moves us!
Mindfulness.
Mindfulness moves.
Mindfulness moves us!
Mindfulness moves us from havoc to harmony.
Mindfulness moves us from havoc to hope, from hope to healing, from healing to harmony and from harmony to happiness.
Mindfulness moves us from havoc to hope to healing to harmony to Happiness!
Without Mindfulness in our life, as our life; life can not only become messy but be a mess!
Mindfulness helps to create balance and harmony out of havoc. When we are mindful, all sorts of things begin to...
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Psycho Spiritual Well-Being through Winter
Psycho Spiritual Well-Being through Winter.
We all seek to have health and happiness.
We probably do appreciate that the most important Health and Happiness to have is beyond the physical and material, being more a matter of the mind – Psychological Health and Happiness!
The underlying cause of the distressing and destroying of Real Psychological Health and Happiness is the psychological states or Greed, Anger and Ignorance (LOBHA, DOSA, MOHA).
The wisdom of the Buddha points out that Greed, Anger and Ignorance as...
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Let’s get serious …..
Let’s Get Serious
What are we serious about?
How serious are we about Life, how serious are we about our life?
My sense is that most people do not and are not taking life and their life serious enough.
We do not even take the things in our life serious enough. Things like our health, both physical and mental; our relationships – intimate and otherwise; our work – be it self employed or employed by others; our potentials and life possibilities.
It appears that...
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Make Meditation about Meditation ……
We need to make our meditation about meditation!
Our meditation may include awareness of the body and certainly may help relax and heal the body, but it is not about the body but about the mind.
And as the mind, our meditation is not about the thoughts, memories, stories and ideas about our self.
Our meditation is not about the self’s wishes and wants, worries and woes.
Our meditation is not about being caught in the mental content of our mind, but about...
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