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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

30 04, 2024

Mind and Its World II: How Mind Engages with its World

2024-04-30T10:13:08-07:00Categories: Blog, Foundation Curriculum, Mind & Its World, Shedra|

Mind and Its World II: How Mind Engages with its World After exploring how mind cognizes in a valid or non-valid way in the first course in the Mind and Its World series, we are ready to look at how the mind works from the perspective of the way in which it engages with its objects, also known as “modes of engagement.” We spend a lot of our time engaged with our concepts, though we are rarely aware of this. Of course the conceptual mind is very useful, we need it to navigate our experiences of the world. But it is not a direct perception, it does not

25 04, 2024

Dharma without Compromise: How to take our practice off the cushion

2024-04-25T15:11:02-07:00Categories: Blog, Buddhist Studies, Jirka Hladis, Meditation, Shedra|

Dharma without Compromise: How to take our practice off the cushion Advice for those familiar with insight meditation and the study of the view, based on an oral presentation by Jirka Hladis. You might ask, “How can I use my formal dharma studies and meditation in practical ways, in everyday life?” This is an excellent question, because practicing the dharma is not meant to be limited to sitting on the cushion, but rather, it is intended to be applied and developed in all areas of our lives: home, work, school and community. Insight into egolessness or emptiness cannot be created in post-meditation without having had an experience or

12 04, 2024

Mind and Its World I: Valid Cognition

2024-04-12T11:41:04-07:00Categories: Blog, Buddhist Studies, Mind & Its World, Semester Course, Shedra, Valid Cognition|

This is the first course in Nitartha’s curriculum, and one of many that will be offered at this year’s Summer Institute in July.  This course explores the question: How do you obtain accurate and valid knowledge about the world? That’s the subject of pramana, or Buddhist epistemology. We typically assume that what we know about the world is valid. But is it? Our mind processes information so quickly, it responds so fast to what’s happening around us that we usually don’t realize when we are having a conceptual experience that is not actually in agreement with the object that we are experiencing. In this course, we become able

23 12, 2023

Presummer Mahamudra Vipashyana I

2024-03-01T18:02:21-08:00Categories: reg-semester, registration|

Pre-summer Course Mahamudra Vipashyana-I Starting February 2, 2024 Application Deadline: January 26, 2024 We invite you to take this recorded course of 2022 teachings by Acharya Lama Tenpa Gyaltsen if: You are going to attend the 2024 Summer Institute You have previously taken Mahamudra shamatha at a Nitartha Summer Institute You would like to qualify for Mahamudra Vipashyana-II at the Summer Institute A non-refundable deposit of US$500 (one session of the 2024 Summer Institute) is required at the time of registration for this pre-summer course to guarantee attendance at the Summer Institute. (Note: Either this Mahamudra pre-summer course or one Mahamudra review course can

21 12, 2023

Mahamudra Review Courses

2024-04-02T14:26:44-07:00Categories: reg-semester, registration|

Mahamudra Review Courses Mahamudra Shamatha, Vipashyana-I, and Vipashyana-II Have you taken Mahamudra Shamatha, Mahamudra Vipashyana-I, and/or Mahamudra Vipashyana-II at a Nitartha Summer Institute? If so, we invite you to review any one of those Mahamudra levels that you have previously attended. The courses are recorded teachings of: Mahamudra shamatha by Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche in 2014 (Chinese in audio only) Dates: February 2 - June 13, 2024 19 classes Cost: $200 Mahamudra Vipashyana-I by Acharya Lama Tenpa Gyaltsen in 2022 Dates: February 2 - March 29, 2024 (19 classes) Cost: $100 Mahamudra Vipashyana-II by Acharya Lama Tenpa Gyaltsen in 2023 Dates: February 2 - May 30, 2024

1 11, 2023

How To Practice In This Time Of Strife – Part 1

2023-11-10T07:05:52-08:00Categories: Blog, Dependent Origination, Featured, Jirka Hladis, Meditation, Shamatha|Tags: , , , , , , |

How To Practice In This Time Of Strife Part I: In this time of strife and war there is desire in the practitioner to send positive thoughts of compassion, some prayers. But there might also be a strong tendency to show anger, and blame one of the sides. And, what would be a guidance here, utilizing what we have studied here at Nitartha in the real world situation like this we could benefit from? How do we make this practice? The dharma of our teacher, Gautama the Buddha, the Tathāgata, the fully enlightened Buddha Śākyamuni, is the dharma of dependent origination, pratītyasamudpāda. The original formulation of the

1 11, 2023

How To Practice In This Time Of Strife – Part II

2023-11-10T17:48:16-08:00Categories: Blog, Dependent Origination, Jirka Hladis, Meditation, Shamatha|

How To Practice In This Time Of Strife - Part II Read Part I... Part II : The view of the dependent origination of the mutual dependence of the perceiver and the perceived, which is brought into life through the practice of mindfulness of breathing in such an immediate and compelling way, is furthermore expressed in the conduct of non-harming (ahimsā). The conduct of non-harming is the main topic of this presentation here - How To Practice In This Time Of Strife. Another name for the conduct of non-harming is the practice of compassion. The mind of the conduct of non-harming is the mind imbued with compassion. Thus,

7 09, 2023

BUD 692 Treasury of Valid Cognition and Reasoning – Chapter 1 (SPOC)

2023-12-13T14:34:07-08:00Categories: Blog, reg-spoc, registration|

BUD 692 Treasury of Valid Cognition and Reasoning - Chapter 1 (SPOC) Faculty: {!{types field='faculty' style='text'}!}{!{/types}!} This is the first of a series of teachings by Acharya Lama Kelzang Wangdi on Sakya Paṇḍita’s entire Treasury of Valid Cognition and Reasoning. Acharya Lama Kelzang will begin to teach chapter 1, “Investigation of the Object.” This chapter sets forth the major terminology of the tradition of valid cognition: valid cognition and mistaken cognition, their related objects that are things, non-things, and clearly appearing non-existents, and the modes of engagement of objects as appearing objects, referent objects, and objects of engagement. The theories of perception of the Vaibhāṣikas

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

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