Just as we have learned that there is the practice "in practice sessions" and the practice "outside of practice sessions" where we make the effort to carry our meditation into worldly activities, I learned something very important from the fabric of sharing at Ati Ling, something which became apparent from the activities outside of the regular teachings.
Driving through the vineyards to the Oakville Grade, I was mentally embroiled in my own efforts to integrate Dharma into my work-day life. But by the conclusion of our first evening puja, I was becoming aware of a fundamental obstacle I had created in my own mind. The whole notion of Dharma as something separate from work-day life, and of sangha as a kind of "production number" dissolved. With Rinpoche in our midst I felt the timeless and placeless nature of the relationship of all students to their lama. It is this eternal relationship that is the heart-reality of the practice and the sangha.
Retreat was the practice session, and leaving, I committed myself to applying its lesson to the practice we all do "in life." Just as Ati Ling was truly the Vulture Peak and Rinpoche the Buddha, so too is this very moment, wherever you seem to be. Everything else is extraneous. This brings to mind two verses Shantideva wrote in his Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life:
May there abound in all directions
Gardens of wishfulfilling trees
Filled with the sweetsound of Dharma
Proclaimed by the Buddhas and their Sons.
May all embodied creatures
Uninterruptedly hear
The Sound of Dharma issuing from
birds and trees,
Beams of light and even space itself.
By Hal Sundt
Just as we have learned that there is the practice "in practice sessions" and the practice "outside of practice sessions" where we make the effort to carry our meditation into worldly activities, I learned something very important from the fabric of sharing at Ati Ling, something which became apparent from the activities outside of the regular teachings.
Driving through the vineyards to the Oakville Grade, I was mentally embroiled in my own efforts to integrate Dharma into my work-day life. But by the conclusion of our first evening puja, I was becoming aware of a fundamental obstacle I had created in my own mind. The whole notion of Dharma as something separate from work-day life, and of sangha as a kind of "production number" dissolved. With Rinpoche in our midst I felt the timeless and placeless nature of the relationship of all students to their lama. It is this eternal relationship that is the heart-reality of the practice and the sangha.
Retreat was the practice session, and leaving, I committed myself to applying its lesson to the practice we all do "in life." Just as Ati Ling was truly the Vulture Peak and Rinpoche the Buddha, so too is this very moment, wherever you seem to be. Everything else is extraneous. This brings to mind two verses Shantideva wrote in his Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life:
May there abound in all directions
Gardens of wishfulfilling trees
Filled with the sweetsound of Dharma
Proclaimed by the Buddhas and their Sons.
May all embodied creatures
Uninterruptedly hear
The Sound of Dharma issuing from
birds and trees,
Beams of light and even space itself.
By Hal Sundt
Just as we have learned that there is the practice "in practice sessions" and the practice "outside of practice sessions" where we make the effort to carry our meditation into worldly activities, I learned something very important from the fabric of sharing at Ati Ling, something which became apparent from the activities outside of the regular teachings.
Driving through the vineyards to the Oakville Grade, I was mentally embroiled in my own efforts to integrate Dharma into my work-day life. But by the conclusion of our first evening puja, I was becoming aware of a fundamental obstacle I had created in my own mind. The whole notion of Dharma as something separate from work-day life, and of sangha as a kind of "production number" dissolved. With Rinpoche in our midst I felt the timeless and placeless nature of the relationship of all students to their lama. It is this eternal relationship that is the heart-reality of the practice and the sangha.
Retreat was the practice session, and leaving, I committed myself to applying its lesson to the practice we all do "in life." Just as Ati Ling was truly the Vulture Peak and Rinpoche the Buddha, so too is this very moment, wherever you seem to be. Everything else is extraneous. This brings to mind two verses Shantideva wrote in his Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life:
May there abound in all directions
Gardens of wishfulfilling trees
Filled with the sweetsound of Dharma
Proclaimed by the Buddhas and their Sons.
May all embodied creatures
Uninterruptedly hear
The Sound of Dharma issuing from
birds and trees,
Beams of light and even space itself.
By Hal Sundt
Just as we have learned that there is the practice "in practice sessions" and the practice "outside of practice sessions" where we make the effort to carry our meditation into worldly activities, I learned something very important from the fabric of sharing at Ati Ling, something which became apparent from the activities outside of the regular teachings.
Driving through the vineyards to the Oakville Grade, I was mentally embroiled in my own efforts to integrate Dharma into my work-day life. But by the conclusion of our first evening puja, I was becoming aware of a fundamental obstacle I had created in my own mind. The whole notion of Dharma as something separate from work-day life, and of sangha as a kind of "production number" dissolved. With Rinpoche in our midst I felt the timeless and placeless nature of the relationship of all students to their lama. It is this eternal relationship that is the heart-reality of the practice and the sangha.
Retreat was the practice session, and leaving, I committed myself to applying its lesson to the practice we all do "in life." Just as Ati Ling was truly the Vulture Peak and Rinpoche the Buddha, so too is this very moment, wherever you seem to be. Everything else is extraneous. This brings to mind two verses Shantideva wrote in his Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life:
May there abound in all directions
Gardens of wishfulfilling trees
Filled with the sweetsound of Dharma
Proclaimed by the Buddhas and their Sons.
May all embodied creatures
Uninterruptedly hear
The Sound of Dharma issuing from
birds and trees,
Beams of light and even space itself.
By Hal Sundt
Just as we have learned that there is the practice "in practice sessions" and the practice "outside of practice sessions" where we make the effort to carry our meditation into worldly activities, I learned something very important from the fabric of sharing at Ati Ling, something which became apparent from the activities outside of the regular teachings.
Driving through the vineyards to the Oakville Grade, I was mentally embroiled in my own efforts to integrate Dharma into my work-day life. But by the conclusion of our first evening puja, I was becoming aware of a fundamental obstacle I had created in my own mind. The whole notion of Dharma as something separate from work-day life, and of sangha as a kind of "production number" dissolved. With Rinpoche in our midst I felt the timeless and placeless nature of the relationship of all students to their lama. It is this eternal relationship that is the heart-reality of the practice and the sangha.
Retreat was the practice session, and leaving, I committed myself to applying its lesson to the practice we all do "in life." Just as Ati Ling was truly the Vulture Peak and Rinpoche the Buddha, so too is this very moment, wherever you seem to be. Everything else is extraneous. This brings to mind two verses Shantideva wrote in his Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life:
May there abound in all directions
Gardens of wishfulfilling trees
Filled with the sweetsound of Dharma
Proclaimed by the Buddhas and their Sons.
May all embodied creatures
Uninterruptedly hear
The Sound of Dharma issuing from
birds and trees,
Beams of light and even space itself.
By Hal Sundt
