He’d loosely but effectively articulated a secular Buddhism and now seemed to be just repeating himself. I was wrong.
In a series of six talks given on a retreat at Gaia House in England in July 2012, I find Stephen articulating a refreshing change of perspective.
Instead of still formulating a broad base for a modern Buddhism he’s now emphasizing the role of a modern dhamma in and on the lives of individuals. He says that meditation – a term he’s not very keen on – is generally articulated as a set of techniques used to attain goals, such as certain states of mind, or of calming the mind.
What is really being pointed to, he says, is a certain sensibility brought to every aspect of our lives; an ongoing engagement with existence. He sees four interconnected tasks that we might undertake:
- to engage fully with existence [just as we experience it];
- to experience that our wanting arises as an attempt to hold onto something, in a radically unreliable world;
- to experience freedom from the wanting through clearly seeing the uselessness of the wanting in bringing a lasting satisfaction; and
- to walk a life path that is intelligent, values-based and cultivates the practice of the first three tasks.
Stephen says that the above is his quite individual take on a modern dhamma and that a modern sangha will necessarily be composed of individuals working out their own view, rather than an adherence to a set of shared external beliefs; we can through our efforts attain an effective way of living, motivated and sustained by our particular individual way.
Your views?
One Comment
Nice comment. Sounds like an excellent review of Batchlor and in tune with my experience listening to him.