Prime Junta
RPGCodex' Little BRO
- Joined
- October 19, 2006
- Messages
- 8,540
I attended a whole-day Buddhist lecture/meditation session yesterday. New Kadampa Tradition to be precise; it's a Tibetan (Mahayana) Gelugpa tradition that's doing well in the West. (Apparently it's embroiled in some kind of doctrinal dispute with the Dalai Lama about someone/something called Dorje Shugden, who, apparently, one bunch believes is a Protector of the Dharma and another bunch figures is some kind of demon. But we didn't enter into that yesterday.)
There were three hour-and-a-half sessions, where we sat quietly listening to an Englishman named John explain stuff about Affectionate Love, Wishing Love, and Cherishing Love, with some tangents here and there, mixed in with meditation on the same topics, with John quietly going over the main points. It started and finished with a prayer to Shakyamuni Buddha set to a sort of New Age-y music; there was also an altar set up with a little brass Buddha, a photo of Kelsang Gyatso, the founder of this particular tradition, seven bowls of water, a candle, and a bunch of sweets left as offerings.
There were sixteen people attending, including one bhikkuni (nun). Most of them were women; there were only two men apart from me, and both were regulars.
It was an interesting and somewhat unusual experience. I felt a bit embarrassed about the New Age-y stuff; the altar and offerings struck me as corny/terribly out of place, and the prayers were just... weird. I also didn't much care for the veneration given to Kelsang Gyatso -- his photo with the lighted candle, John singing his praises and citing his books in-between teaching; that struck me as cultlike in not a good way.
On the other hand, I liked listening to the teaching, and I enjoyed the meditation. (I have meditated before; I did a few years of ki no kenkyukai aikido in my late teens and early twenties, and there were a quite a lot of meditation exercises involved there.) I have read a quite a bit about Buddhism, so there wasn't all that much in the lecture that I hadn't encountered before; however, the way it was presented was new to me, and quite interesting.
On the face of it, John was just talking, stream-of-consciousness style, but I'm pretty sure there was a great deal more to it. He repeated, revisited, and reiterated core ideas many times through the day; his cadence and tone were rhythmic and soothing, and he repeated the main points during the meditation; his gestures and expressions also appeared "trained" -- I've seen film clips of the Dalai Lama making very similar gestures when talking. That can't be accidental, and the effect was different than just reading about the ideas, or talking informally about them. I do feel a good deal more relaxed and calmer than before the session; it gave my mood and feeling of general well-being a lift.
The bottom line for me? This tradition at least isn't for me. My overall impression was of something that's solid at the core -- the main gist of what John was saying, how he was saying it, and the meditation itself --, but has a lot of fluff around, some of which has just a bit of a nasty taste.
However, it did get me even more interested about Buddhist practice than I've been before. There's a small Zen community in Helsinki; they have a basic course in zazen meditation in August. I might be going to check them out next.
There were three hour-and-a-half sessions, where we sat quietly listening to an Englishman named John explain stuff about Affectionate Love, Wishing Love, and Cherishing Love, with some tangents here and there, mixed in with meditation on the same topics, with John quietly going over the main points. It started and finished with a prayer to Shakyamuni Buddha set to a sort of New Age-y music; there was also an altar set up with a little brass Buddha, a photo of Kelsang Gyatso, the founder of this particular tradition, seven bowls of water, a candle, and a bunch of sweets left as offerings.
There were sixteen people attending, including one bhikkuni (nun). Most of them were women; there were only two men apart from me, and both were regulars.
It was an interesting and somewhat unusual experience. I felt a bit embarrassed about the New Age-y stuff; the altar and offerings struck me as corny/terribly out of place, and the prayers were just... weird. I also didn't much care for the veneration given to Kelsang Gyatso -- his photo with the lighted candle, John singing his praises and citing his books in-between teaching; that struck me as cultlike in not a good way.
On the other hand, I liked listening to the teaching, and I enjoyed the meditation. (I have meditated before; I did a few years of ki no kenkyukai aikido in my late teens and early twenties, and there were a quite a lot of meditation exercises involved there.) I have read a quite a bit about Buddhism, so there wasn't all that much in the lecture that I hadn't encountered before; however, the way it was presented was new to me, and quite interesting.
On the face of it, John was just talking, stream-of-consciousness style, but I'm pretty sure there was a great deal more to it. He repeated, revisited, and reiterated core ideas many times through the day; his cadence and tone were rhythmic and soothing, and he repeated the main points during the meditation; his gestures and expressions also appeared "trained" -- I've seen film clips of the Dalai Lama making very similar gestures when talking. That can't be accidental, and the effect was different than just reading about the ideas, or talking informally about them. I do feel a good deal more relaxed and calmer than before the session; it gave my mood and feeling of general well-being a lift.
The bottom line for me? This tradition at least isn't for me. My overall impression was of something that's solid at the core -- the main gist of what John was saying, how he was saying it, and the meditation itself --, but has a lot of fluff around, some of which has just a bit of a nasty taste.
However, it did get me even more interested about Buddhist practice than I've been before. There's a small Zen community in Helsinki; they have a basic course in zazen meditation in August. I might be going to check them out next.
- Joined
- Oct 19, 2006
- Messages
- 8,540