aci -la march test

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ACI-LA
A Message From Brian
(Venerable Marut)
Upcoming ACI-LA
Classes
Yoga Sutras - A Message From Erica
ACI Community Service
Day
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Dharma Flicks
A look at films that are
implicitly and explicitly
dharma!!
Dharma Website Of The
Month
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In last month’s newsletter, Venerable Brian spoke
about the practice called “guru yoga” (in Tibetan,
“lama chopa”). Recognizing that this practice is
very difficult, he reminded us that the more you
understand about karma and emptiness, the more
you glimpse just how fundamental the practice is.
own attainments if you train in faith by focusing on
the good qualities while not looking for the faults.
Venerable Brian said that one of the important
pieces of this practice is to focus only on the positive
things about your teachers. Je Tsongkapa quotes a
text called the Tantra Bestowing the Initiation of
Vajrapani which urges us to do this out of our own
“enlightened self-interest”:
This months newsletter highlights a number of opportunities to sit in front of your teachers and practice. Almost all of the ACI-LA teachers are teaching
right now and Venerable Brian will be in town for
most of the month teaching as well. Don’t miss this
chance to create the causes to live in your most perfect world where you can serve all sentient beings.
Keep the masters’ good qualities in mind
Never seize upon their faults,
Keeping their good qualities in mind, you will
reach attainments.
Seizing upon their faults, you will not.
Je Tsongkapa goes on to explain what exactly is
meant here:
Your guru might have good qualities for the most
part, and have only slight faults. If you examine
your guru for those faults, this will block your own
attainments. Whereas, even in the case of a guru
who mostly has faults, you will give rise to your
ACI-LA March 2006
JE TSONGKAPA
Venerable Brian urged us to just try it and explained
that this practice when done well gradually ripens
into you being able to see nothing but perfection,
love, kindness, and enlightenment itself in your
teachers.
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A Message From Brian
(Venerable Marut)
It was wonderful to see so many people from the ACI-LA
sangha in New York for the various teachings Geshe
Michael and Christie gave in late February and early
March. Lauren Benjamin, Lindsay Crouse, Ersellia
Ferron and Eric Smith, Vanessa Hopkins, and Zorie
Barber all attended some or all of the two weeks of
amazing teachings on the Hatha Yoga Pradipika (HYP).
Some also stayed on for three nights of teachings on the
life of Je Tsongkhapa.
We will meet again back in L.A. beginning March 13
for a series of various courses and events. I hope to
see the rest of you at one or another (or all!) of them.
There’s lots being offered. Please sign up now for
courses that begin soon.
For those of us trying to practice the Mahayana
path, it is really important to regularly check to see
if we are doing everything we possibly can to try to
fulfill our pledge to achieve enlightenment quickly
so that other beings won’t have to suffer any longer.
Every moment we delay, every opportunity to serve
others we don’t take advantage of, every teaching
we don’t attend because we’re “too busy” or think
there is something “more important,” every type of
higher practice that we are offered but refuse because we think we’re “not ready” or “not comfortable” with it – all this just means, in effect, that we
don’t care enough about the suffering of others to
do what we need to do to finish the job we’ve
started.
As many of you know, Geshe Michael and Christie
have for the past several years been teaching more
and more about the ways yoga should be integrated
into our daily practice to speed the process to enlightenment. The physical postures of yoga – which
in Tibetan Buddhism are nothing less than the highest practices of tantra – were designed as “outer”
methods to work with the “inner” methods of meditation, developing a compassionate heart, and cultivating wisdom and realizations about the nature of
reality.
Practiced together, the inner and outer methods of
yoga will move us quickly to the state where we can
truly help others. Those of us with bodhisattva
vows are obligated to utilize whatever means necessary to achieve enlightenment in the quickest possi-
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ble way. It is not accidental that we here in the West
now have the opportunity to practice these profound (and formally quite secret) methods for
speeding up the process. We have created the karma
for having this incredibly powerful technique available to us. Now we need to take advantage of it.
Venerable Brian’s
Teaching Schedule
Using physical yoga to feel a little better, lose
weight, get better muscle tone, or otherwise become
slightly more attractive for a short time even as we
inexorably grow older and nearer to death is a perversion of what yoga is really meant for. It is also a
bit like using a nuclear bomb to crack open a walnut. Yoga was designed ultimately to do one thing
and one thing only: help us achieve the state of a
fully enlightened mind -- totally free from suffering
and limitations -- and a perfect (i.e., deathless) body.
In Depth Course: Teachings of the Future Buddha
In the first chapter of the HYP, the author (Master
Svatmarama) begins his text with a traditional obeisance to his own guru and to the lineage of masters
who preserved and transmitted this holy wisdom.
He then states that by practicing the “yoga of the
sun and moon” (hatha yoga) these masters achieved
the real goal of yoga. They have “murdered death”
(kala dandam) and so to this day “roam the universe” and remain among us:
THESE AND OTHER MIGHTY,
ACCOMPLISHED BEINGS
BORN INTO POWER BY THE
YOGA OF THE SUN AND MOON,
ROAM THE UNIVERSE,
THIS EGG OF THE PURE ONE,
MINGLING AMONG
THE CROWDS OF MEN,
FOR THEY HAVE MURDERED DEATH ITSELF.
(HYP I.9)
This text, like many other yoga texts and Buddhist
scriptures like the Heart Sutra, claim that the state of
deathlessness is possible. Indeed, immortality and
the escape from involuntary rebirth is exactly what
enlightenment entails. But it takes focus, commitment and hard work. It takes daily dedication to
your goal. It takes caring about others enough to do
what is necessary to help them.
If you are not already doing a yoga practice, please
start. And it’s crucial to learn how to do your physical yoga linked with the proper inner methods and
motivation. Learning how to do yoga properly and
for what it was really meant to accomplish is the
main purpose of the Tibetan Heart Yoga classes that
Shannon Clements now regularly teaches in L.A.,
and that Erica Giovinazzo and I will teach in Santa
Barbara March 17-19.
Please make time to learn how to do yoga, and how
to do it right. Do it for others. They’re waiting for
you. They need you. Don’t delay. There’s nothing
more important.
ACI-LA Classes
Mondays and Wednesdays
March 13th through April 5th
7:30pm to 10:00pm
Westside location
Free and open to the public
Contact ACI.LAinfo@gmail.com to register.
Dharma Essentials XIV: Lo Jong- Developing a
Good Heart
Thursdays
March 16th through April 6th
7:30pm to 9:30pm
Hill Street Center
237 Hill Street
Santa Monica
Free and open to the public
Contact ACI.LAinfo@gmail.com to register
Review Class 16: The Great Ideas of Buddhism
Mondays and Thursdays
March 14th through April 4th
3-5pm
Westside location
Free and open to the public
Contact ACI.LAinfo@gmail.com to register.
Non ACI-LA Classes
Buddhism and the Yoga Sutras
Hosted by Loyola Marymount University Extension
Tuesdays, March 14th through April 4th
7:15pm to 9:45 pm
Loyola Marymount University
$165.00 to register - to LMU
Sign up on-line at http://extension.lmu.edu or
contact 310-338-1971
Yoga Essentials
Hosted by the Yoga Studies Institute
March 17 through 19
Santa Barbara location
$175 for all 6 classes
$120 for 4 philosophy classes or $35 per drop-in
(philosophy or asana)
Sign up on-line at www.yogastudiesinstitute.org
Click here to see current ACI-LA Classes
With all good wishes,
Marut
ACI-LA March 2006
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nairantarya: WITHOUT GAPS
Without gaps means every day do something. If all
our mind can commit to is fifteen minutes a day
then do fifteen minutes - but do it with the intention
to add more time in the future. Develop a plan to
increase that time but whatever amount we can do
at the present – whether it is ten minutes or two
hours, we must do it every day so that the habit can
be firmed in our minds. Then eventually we won’t
be able to take a day off because we’ll be so accustomed to it. Even when we’re on vacation, sick or
working many hours – we will want to work our
schedule around our meditation time.
Yoga Sutras
A Message from Erica
Giovinazzo
Sa tu dirgha kala nairantarya satkara-asevito dirdha
bhumih.
1.14 You must cultivate your practice
over an extended period of time;
it must be steady, without gaps,
satkara: CORRECTLY
Now that we’ve made the commitment of meditating every day for years and years… how should we
go about our meditation? Satkara means exactly as
our qualified Teacher has taught us. Suppose
we’ve found our teacher, we’ve checked them out,
they have the qualities that a teacher should have
and they’ve taught us how we should be meditating. This is exactly how we should we doing our
meditation - like our qualified teacher has taught us
to do it.
If we do all these things then, dirdha bhumih, a
FIRM FOUNDATION is laid. No problems! Good
luck and keep going!
and it must be done correctly –
for then a firm foundation is laid.
In order to get anywhere in any activity we need to
practice, that is obvious enough. However, we still
all have problems: impatience that we’re not getting
the results quickly, confusion about how to practice,
changing methods, etc. In this line of the Yoga Sutra, Master Patanjali tells us exactly how we should
conduct our abhyasa, practice, in order to reach the
goal of enlightenment. Please note that I have a
great deal of correct practice myself to do. This is
written based on advice from our Teachers in the
hopes that we all may practice properly.
dirgha kala: LONG TIME
For many of us, our meaningful, spiritual goals that
we’ve made are for life. Whether we are just starting or are continuing on our meditation journey we
must keep this in mind: it’s probably going to take
a long time. We might experience moments in this
journey that make us believe we’ve gotten much
further, that our minds are more advanced. However, we must keep going in order to really break
through the haze of ignorance. Therefore, be prepared to work so that we won’t burn out and will
still be on the path (either already enlightened or
still working on it) 10, 20, 30+ years from now. It
could take awhile.
ACI-LA March 2006
ACI Community
Service Day
On Saturday, February 25th a group of ACI-LA students and teachers joined together for a community
service day at the Hill Street Center in Santa Monica. Recognizing that the karmic cause for having a
nice place for dharma classes is to take care of the
places where dharma is taught, we installed some
new fixtures, and cleaned and organized the
kitchen, teaching room and storage room. We also
took on the task of updating the front steps. We
scraped, sanded and caulked the front porch to
ensure it is a welcoming place for all who come to
practice there.
Dana, or giving, is one of the six perfections and a
critical element of our practice. Choosing to give our
time and energy to maintaining the Hill Street Center was a great opportunity to build our local community, and create the causes to have teachings in a
safe and welcoming place in the future.
Dharma Flicks
Implicit Dharma: My Dinner with Andre
Wallace Shawn and Andre Gregory, apparently
playing themselves, share their lives over the course
of an evening meal at a restaurant. Gregory, a theater director from New York, is the more talkative of
the pair. He relates to Shawn his tales of dropping
out, traveling around the world, and experiencing
the variety of ways people live, such as a monk who
could balance his entire weight on his fingertips.
Shawn listens avidly, but questions the value of
Gregory’s seeming abandonment of the pragmatic
aspects of life. A slight disclaimer should perhaps
accompany this review if only to say that if the idea
of sitting in on a two-hour conversation between
two middle aged men, sounds like a trip to the gulag, this probably is not the movie for you. On the
other hand, if you think you can muster the attention required, you are in for a thought provoking
and (all disclaimers aside) entertaining film that
muses on the eternal conflict between reason and
passion.
Explicit Dharma: The Yogis of Tibet
Before 1959, there were 6,000 monasteries in Tibet,
and one in every six males was a monk. Many of
these monks not only studied science, philosophy,
the arts, and medicine but also often perfected spiritual disciplines in remote retreats. It is these rarely
discussed and often hidden practices that this film
describes. Realizing that their tradition and impact
on the future is now threatened, H.E. Choje Togden
Rinpoche, H.E. Garchen Rinpoche, Ven Drubwang
Konchok Norbu Rinpoche, H.E. Chetsang Rinpoche,
and H.H. the Dalai Lama discuss teachings passed
down through the generations about meditation,
controlling the mind, and eliminating suffering for
all beings.
The last section of the film focuses on the spiritual
practice of compassion. The Dalai Lama tells about a
Tibetan monk imprisoned by the Chinese who felt
that the only danger he experienced was when he
stopped loving his enemies. American Buddhist
teacher Robert Thurman has called Tibetan monks
and yogis “supreme artists of life.” No wonder they
are spreading the dharma all over the world. Yogis
are now teaching in the United States, and their
mind control techniques and example of inner freedom and peace continue to earn the respect of their
students. This inspiring and edifying film allows an
even wider audience to appreciate the special spiritual gifts of the yogis of Tibet.
We are planning to make community service a regular part of our schedule. Please consider joining us
in serving others in this way. A special thank you to
all the helping hands whose joyful effort made the
day so special.
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Dharma Website of the Month
We thought it might be useful to bring to your attention a valuable dharma-oriented website each month. There are so many great dharma sites on the web…
http://www.diamondmtn.org/
Almost everyone should have http://www.diamondmtn.org bookmarked because it is an incredible resource for the larger ACI community. The site will keep
you updated on the teaching schedules of many wonderful ACI teachers, including Geshe Michael and Christie, as well as the daily offerings at Diamond Mountain University. The mission of Diamond Mountain is to provide all of the conditions, inside and outside of us, that we need to actually reach enlightenment, ourselves, before the day we die. Given this joyous mission, you can imagine that the site is overflowing with useful information.
The site includes beautiful images, messages from students and teachers, and a handy events calendar among other things. Currently, the site has a link to Diamond Mountain’s very first Newsletter. So, check out the site and make sure to visit the newsletter.
The mission at Diamond Mountain is to provide you with everything you need to lead a wise and good life, and to become nothing less than a being who can go
to all worlds and serve all living creatures, all at once. This website provides some great resources to inspire you and guide you to get there.
If you come across a site that you’d like others to know about, please notify Shannon and contribute to this part of the newsletter.
Thank You
Thank you to Venerable Marut for his kindness in coming to teach the Dharma here in Los
Angeles. Thank you to Rick Blue, Lindsay Crouse, Brandice Valentino, Lauren Benjamin, Cliff
Spencer, Summer Moore and Erica Giovinazzo for their kindness in continuing to teach here
in Los Angeles.
Thank you to Stephane Dreyfus for maintaining the ACI-LA website. All suggestions and
updates for the website can be sent to Rick Blue. Shannon Parry will be producing the newsletters and would appreciate submissions. Please email your contributions to Shannon by the
25th of the month.
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ACI-LA March 2006