Restaurant Reality

I was far from sick of the world, even though it had its lows as well as its highs.  I was currently riding pretty high – and although I was aware that I needed to find the one taste of pleasure and pain, I had no objection at all to pleasure.  Maybe I’d just have to accept that you had to choose both from the menu at Restaurant Reality.  Would I ever be able to do that?  I both wanted it and feared it.

p179, Goodbye Forever: miscellaneous memoirs of an English Lama, Volume One Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books Worldwide, 2020, ISBN 978-1-898185-51-2  

Some kind of miracle

I was always amazed with the way that phenomena could be brought into being.  Even when I was part of the act of creation – the creation was still some kind of miracle.  There was no God – but every creative human being—every artist—was some kind of god.  Creativity was a natural phenomenon that pulsed in us all – and our rôle as beings was to allow that to surface from the primal ocean of existence. 

p173, Goodbye Forever: miscellaneous memoirs of an English Lama, Volume One Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books Worldwide, 2020, ISBN 978-1-898185-51-2 

Buddhism and Blues

There was something about being seated on a motorcycle that fitted both Buddhism and Blues – especially a chopped easy-rider motorcycle.  I had to concentrate in a relaxed manner – alert, yet not anxiously alert.  Being aware of the manœuvres of other motorists—which were not always precise—was a form of open-ended vigilance.  It was delightful that anything could be meditation if one was open to that dimension of experience.

p168-169, Goodbye Forever: miscellaneous memoirs of an English Lama, Volume One Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books Worldwide, 2020, ISBN 978-1-898185-51-2  

What matters

It does not matter how many teachings we may have attended.  It does not matter how many empowerments we have received.  What matters is how kind and open we are becoming.  

p92, Rays of the Sun, Ngakpa Chögyam, Aro Books worldwide, 2010, 978-1-898185-06-2