Sacramento Homeless blog

Shantideva, an 8th-century Indian Buddhist scholar at Nalanda University and an adherent of the Madhyamaka philosophy of Nagarjuna. From somewhere in Shantideva 's Entering the Path of the Bodhisattva (aka, The Bodhisattvacharyāvatāra ): May I be a guard for those who are protectorless A guide for those who journey on the road; For those who wish to go across the water, May I be a boat, a raft, a bridge. May I be an isle for those who yearn for landfall, And a lamp for those who long for light; For those who need a resting place, a bed; For all those who need a servant, may I be a slave. May I be the wishing jewel, the vase of plenty, A word of power; and the supreme remedy. May I be the tree of miracles, And for every being, the abundant cow. Like the great earth and the other elements, Enduring as the sky itself endures, For the boundless multitude of living beings, May I be the ground and vessel of their life, Thus, for every single thing that lives In...

A new edition of Gabor Maté's book In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction is getting attention in the buddhoblogosphere because of its insightfulness on matters of addiction, using Buddhist constructs. Here, words by the author as presented at the amazon.com webspace: I've written In The Realm of Hungry Ghosts because I see addiction as one of the most misunderstood phenomena in our society. People ― including many people who should know better, such as doctors and policy makers ― believe it to be a matter of individual choice or, at best, a medical disease. It is both simpler and more complex than that. Addiction, or the capacity to become addicted, is very close to the core of the human experience. That is why almost anything can become addictive, from seemingly healthy activities such as eating or exercising to abusing drugs intended for healing. The issue is not the external target but our internal relationship to it. Addictions, for the most pa...