In this slightly deeper series of drop in meditation classes we will draw inspiration each week from the book Modern Buddhism which teaches the Kadampa Buddhist path of compassion and wisdom.

In Modern Buddhism, it says, Kadam Dharma cannot be separated from daily life. Everyone needs it to make their lives happy and meaningful, to temporarily solve their human problems, and to enable them ultimately to find pure and everlasting happiness through controlling their anger, attachment, jealousy and especially ignorance.

Kadampa practitioners emphasise training in meditation and choose objects of meditation that are deeply meaningful.

Come along for a weekly dose of inspiration and guided meditation. Everyone Welcome

The individual topics of each week are below:

Recommended Reading – Modern Buddhism

18 August – Do you believe in karma?

From non-virtuous actions comes suffering and from virtuous actions comes happiness: if we believe this, we believe in karma. Buddha gave extensive teachings that prove the truth of this statement and showed how we can use our understanding of karma to avoid future suffering and enjoy pure happiness.

25 August – The truth about suffering

In general, everyone who has physical or mental pain, even animals, understands their own suffering; but when Buddha said in his first teaching, ‘You should know sufferings,’ he meant that we should know the sufferings of our future lives and develop a strong wish to liberate ourself from them now while we have the opportunity.

1 September – What causes suffering?
The main cause of our suffering is our deluded minds, especially our self-grasping. If we abandon our self-grasping permanently, all our suffering and problems of this life and of countless future lives will cease permanently. How can we do this?

8 September – What is a true spiritual path?
A spiritual path is an inner path, or spiritual realization, that leads us to the pure happiness of liberation and enlightenment. How do we train in such paths?

15 September – Permanent freedom from suffering is possible
Buddha said we should not be satisfied with merely temporary freedom from particular sufferings but apply great effort to attaining permanent freedom from all suffering. Only by following a correct spiritual path can we accomplish this freedom

22 September – Developing affectionate love for all living beings
Buddha taught how to develop and maintain a warm heart and a feeling of being close to all living beings without exception. This affectionate love makes our mind pure and balanced, and prepares the foundation for generating cherishing love for all living beings.

29 September – Equalizing self and others
When we train in equalizing self and others we are learning to believe that the happiness and freedom of ourself and all other living beings are equally important. Learning to cherish others is the best solution to our daily problems, and is the source of all our future happiness and good fortune.

13 October – Exchanging self with others
This profound practice enables us to change our perspective at a very deep level so that eventually we spontaneously believe that the happiness and freedom of each and every other living being are far more important than our own.

20 October – Wishing the very best for everyone
By training in wishing love we will genuinely wish for all living beings to attain the pure and everlasting happiness of enlightenment and make a strong determination to work for this aim.

27 October – Being truly compassionate
Universal compassion is a mind that sincerely wishes to liberate all living beings from suffering permanently. We can develop this mind spontaneously by training in special meditations taught by Buddha.