jankp's Full Review: Chogyam Trungpa - Meditation in Action
Have you ever wanted meditation specifically, spirituality in general, to make sense and be practical for where you are in life now? You don't have time or money to take a year off to go to Big Sur, California and hang out with Buddhist monks, right? Then you may be interested in this little, straight-talking book from 1969 by Chogyam Trungpa, a Tibetan-born Buddhist monk, writer, artist and teacher, as well as founder of more than a hundred meditation centers in the US, Canada and Europe, a liberal arts college and Shambhala Training (form of meditation). Who better to learn from, huh? That's what I thought.
Just Read This!
One wishes it were possible, by saying only a few words, to enlighten someone, but even great Teachers like Christ or Buddha were unable to perform such a miracle. They had always to find the right opportunity and create the right situation. If one examines the character of the person and studies the blockage, the difficulties, then one simply goes further and further...So one has to approach from another angle and start off by just accepting the character of the person, who may be completely worldly-minded, and then choose one particular aspect of his activity or mentality and use it as a ladder, an anchor, a vehicle, so that even the man on the street could give birth to Bodhi (Buddha-nature). (pp 20)
Contents
The Life and Example of Buddha How Buddha came to realze the Awakened State after meditating for years in the ascetic (disciplined) life.
The Manure of Experience and the Field of Bodhi See above text.
Everybody has Bodhi if they will only study the concepts, then scatter them like so much manure...
Transmission There are many difficulties and stages for a student of meditation to go through--no shortcuts! The Teacher creates the right environment for it, then stops, silent.
Generosity This happens only when we are not aware that we have compassion, but we simply arecompassion.
Patience The freedom to know the situation as it is at this very moment is found through the strength of one's patient awareness.
Meditation He discusses the two different forms of it, one based on devotion to something greater than yourself, the other one has no such separation, no limiting concepts, but an awareness of the whole. He explains the reasoning behind Buddhism, how to develop a questioning mind.
Wisdom "Prajna" happens when there is knowingness without Ego, no self-conscious attitude of superiority.
My Thoughts on It
This book is one I think you can only appreciate if you read it slowly and little by little. There is so much wisdom in these seventy-four pages that it takes time to think about the truth of the words. This is a good thing, not confusing but only thought-provoking. I thought it amusing that Trungpa blasts getting caught up in concepts, which he also calls opinions, so speaking for all of us "caught up" in Epinions, I shall garner a guess that he would find us very troubled with Egos well-intact!
You certainly have my blessings if you choose this highly-enlightening, challenging book. I love it and know I'll return again and again to be reminded of how I can be filled with Bodhi so others around me can be also. But maybe this isn't for you. This is no exciting bestseller that you can just skim through and forget about. You won't forget about it, trust me! I've only scratched the surface of the manure with this review. Now it's up to you to plunge into its depth and experience the now of life.
P U! Hahaha. No, actually this is the only way to get rid of it and its godforsaken smell. If you dare...
Chogyam Trungpa also wrote The Myth of Freedom and The Sacred Path of the Warrior.</i
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