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So far Elena Weiss has created 12 blog entries.
9 08, 2024

BUD 502 Clear Thinking 清晰思辨

2024-09-02T20:54:23-07:00Categories: reg-semester, registration|

BUD 502 清晰思辨 教授: {!{types field='faculty' style='text'}!}{!{/types}!} 该课程有两个目的：A）从性相、同义词、分类的角度阐述“所知”，教导来源于阿毗达磨的入门文本《摄类学》。B）从辩经传统中的现象的四种关系的角度，学习清清晰晰的思辨。我们将在轻松的环境中，作辩经的基础训练。 资格要求: 无 所需教材： 《摄类学》，阿阇梨喇嘛滇巴嘉诚，了义学院出版  《清晰思辨练习本》，了义学院出版 日期和時間: {!{types field='dow'}!}{!{/types}!}, {!{types field='course-dates'}!}{!{/types}!}, {!{types field='meeting-times'}!}{!{/types}!} 學費: ${!{types field='course-cost' style='text'}!}{!{/types}!} 註冊即將開始 了義學院的財務援助計劃由學院的同學們捐款資助，旨在支持那些沒有這種援助就無法參加課程的同學。 如您覺得需要申請，請在您報名注册前提交 PPFA 學費援助申請表 。 WHAT YOU WILL BE INTRODUCED TO: (This is a small sampling of the topics covered in this course.) Explore the thought process of mind. Discover how to gently guide your ego into egolessness. Practice the basic techniques that are used in the subsequent debate courses. Learn the vocabulary that is used by all of Nitartha’s shedra studies, including explanations,

30 05, 2024

Buddha Nature: The Most Powerful Antidote

2024-05-31T14:40:03-07:00Categories: Blog, Mahamudra, Meditation|

Buddha Nature: The Most Powerful Antidote Written by Israel Lifshitz We, as 21st century Westerners, have a strong historical, religious and cultural background of low self-esteem and self-deprecation. Our ideas about sin and guilt are so deeply ingrained that even the non-religious, free thinking scientist Sigmund Freud said in Civilization and Its Discontents: "Due to our own psychic constitution we have a limited capacity for virtue and happiness, and therefore, we must feel satisfied with a moderate level of mental balance and wellbeing."* This is not a minor issue. It can even work as our biggest obstacle to progressing along the Buddhist path. If deep down in our

12 05, 2024

Key Qualities of Mahamudra Meditation

2024-05-12T14:21:54-07:00Categories: Blog, Mahamudra, Meditation|

Key Qualities of Mahamudra Meditation Written by Michael Miller Nitartha CFO Nalandabodhi Karunika and Practice Instructor As we embark on our journey through the Mahamudra practices, it is important to note the differences between Mahamudra meditation and simple shamatha. The differences are subtle but profound, and we can miss the point entirely if we do not know them. First, renunciation or revulsion is important. We need to develop some sense of giving in, some sense of renunciation. This does not mean going off to a cave and giving up all our worldly possessions. But it does mean that we must be willing to give up our fixed

30 04, 2024

Improve your meditation with thangka drawing

2024-05-03T11:03:08-07:00Categories: Blog, Meditation, Science of Creative Arts, Shamatha|

Drawing the Awakened Heart Improve your meditation with thangka drawing, one of the courses offered by Nitartha’s Department of Science of Creativity and the Arts. This is a powerful tool for developing our visualization and creation stage practices. After taking this course, many students have found it easier to generate their visualizations and with greater clarity. Studio classes are also a natural environment for practicing shamatha meditation. One's mind relaxes and simply focuses on drawing, which can be a very calming experience. Nitartha teaches thangka drawing based on the Karma Gadri Lineage. One of the four major schools of Tibetan thangka painting, we begin by learning the

16 08, 2023

Non-Thinking through Clear Thinking

2024-03-26T09:41:45-07:00Categories: Blog, Cittamatra, Karl Brunnholzl, Mahamudra, Mind Only, Shedra, Summer Institute, Yogacara|

Non-Thinking through Clear ThinkingIt sometimes feels like study proliferates our thoughts, when what we really want is for the mind to be still. But our thoughts are a tool. We can use them to undermine our belief in solidity. In fact, Nitartha’s Clear Thinking course offers a method to arrive at non-thought, which is one aspect of the experience of meditation.Dignaga and Dharmakirti analyzed language, words and clauses, and observed that among those the most elemental unit of expression is a word which is imbued with meaning. They noted that thoughts are language and concluded that language is the same as logical operations, and that the expression of

8 05, 2023

The Elegance of Union

2024-03-26T09:11:00-07:00Categories: Blog, Intermediate Curriculum, Lorik, Mind & Its World, Summer Institute, Tibetan, Valid Cognition|

The Elegance of Union:Joining Study and MahamudraAt Nitartha's Summer Institute study and Mahamudra meditation are joined. Why?Jirka Hladiš says, “It's very simple -- that’s the elegance of it. The whole point of studying the view is to clarify the object of meditation. When you get the object of meditation right, then you just rest one-pointedly on the object, without the need for more instruction.”Study is quite extensive at Nitartha because it is crucial for determining the object of meditation. We often determine our object of meditation in an incorrect or unclear way. This creates a problem. While we still benefit from shamatha because it settles our minds, we

17 04, 2023

The five sciences

2023-04-18T16:16:25-07:00Categories: Blog, Intermediate Curriculum, Lorik, Mind & Its World, Summer Institute, Tibetan, Valid Cognition|

The Five Sciences: Accomplishing the Aim of the Bodhisattva This year at the 2023 Summer Institute, thefive sciences will be taught on site at the University of Colorado, Boulder In order to benefit all sentient beings, one needs to be able to communicate according to the interests and abilities of a great diversity of minds. The best training for achieving that goal is the training in the five sciences because, together, they encompass all that can be known. Lama Mipham said, “All mundane and supramundane topics of knowledge can be contained . . . within a simple enumeration of just five fields of knowledge.”1 As aspiring bodhisattvas, we

11 04, 2023

Yogacara: the remedy for the poor diet of “Mind Only”

2023-04-11T16:55:53-07:00Categories: Blog, Cittamatra, Karl Brunnholzl, Mahamudra, Mind Only, Shedra, Summer Institute, Yogacara|

Yogacara: the remedy for the poor diet of "Mind Only" by Mitra Dr. Karl Brunnhölzl. Mitra Brunnhölzl will be teaching on Yogacara at July's Summer Institute. To remedy the poor diet of “Mind-Only” always being refuted by Madhyamaka as the highest Buddhist view and do justice to the great Indian Mahayana Yogacara tradition, recent teachings on Vasubandhu’s Thirty Verses by H.H. the 17th Karmapa, Ogyen Trinley Dorje, extensively discuss the need to review the way Tibetan doxographies present the so-called “Mind-Only School” in light of the classical Yogacara School in India and China. Yogacara is (mis)represented as “Mind-Only” for three main reasons: superficial and out-of-context judgments based on

22 02, 2023

Enhance Your Mahamudra Practice through Space Awareness

2023-03-09T11:07:26-08:00Categories: Blog, Buddhist Studies, Mahamudra, Summer Institute|

Enhance Your Mahamudra Practice through Space Awareness Space Awareness will be offered on site at this year's Summer Institute (for details, check out the Summer Institute Enhancement Activities page). I wonder, how would we be able to experience the "spaciously relaxed" quality of Mahamudra meditation without having a sense of space? How big is your sense of space? As you go about your day, do you feel the space behind your back? Are you aware of the space above and below you as you walk, talk or wash the dishes? Or do you go through most of your day only aware of what is in the visual field

7 12, 2022

Sautrantika Philosophical System: The Path of Vipashyana

2022-12-07T17:29:06-08:00Categories: Blog, Buddhist Studies, Shedra, Uncategorized|

Once we have developed calm-abiding to some degree, the mind becomes settled enough that we can take anything that arises in our present moment experience as the object of meditation. For example, in this course we will explore the key vipashyana practice of the Four Foundations of Mindfulness, which encompasses everything that we experience. We will have an opportunity to practice some of these four foundations through guided analytical meditations. Another vipashyana practice is meditation on the Four Noble Truths: what we are to know (the truth of suffering), what we relinquish (the origin of suffering), what we attain (the truth of cessation) and what we rely upon

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