Pariyatti

Ch. 11 - The Path of Power from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner THE LIGHT OF GOD. Ishvara, the Lord. Divine Luminescence. Seen with the mind’s eye only through a mind that can see. I stared with eyelids drawn immobile at an empty black background. The shimmering disk of cool brilliance was not an object but an event, which eyes cannot see. My attention stayed with my breath as it had for days, the tiny touch of my life against thin skin. The awareness on that single point was almost unbroken. That stillness of mind created the light, the light that cannot be seen, only known, until I felt the light, breathed light as a tingly, glowing star. ... by Eric Lerner 2025 24 minutes 23 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (11.8MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti View the book, eBook and free PDF download. You can also find it at Amazon worldwide using this link: http://a-fwd.com/com=pariyatti-20&asin=B0CJL9SG5D. About Eric Lerner. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Ch. 10 - The Great Elder from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner AFTER TWO WEEKS OF isolation in the forest, I left the monastery for a short time, mostly to find out about the possibility of returning to Burma. It had been rumored that tourist visas to that country were going to be extended longer than seven days. If so, I could return there soon, and possibly stay for as long as a month. The rumors proved false, however, and I was left with a very open end to my trip. There was no particular rush to get back to Burma now, since that would probably be the last stop on my way home. And I certainly wasn’t ready to return home. ... by Eric Lerner 2025 24 minutes 24 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (11.8MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti View the book, eBook and free PDF download. You can also find it at Amazon worldwide using this link: http://a-fwd.com/com=pariyatti-20&asin=B0CJL9SG5D. About Eric Lerner. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Ch. 9 - A Taste of Stillness from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner ON THE MORNING OF the tenth day I interrupted my return to the hut following my breakfast to catch my breath on a high flat rock that afforded a view of the entire valley beneath the monastery. The dawn haze had burned off, revealing the neighboring valley, whose sharply edged checkerboard fields stood out in contrast to the surrounding jungle. Perhaps I romanticized by calling this place “jungle” when, in fact, farmland was everywhere. But there is so much unclaimed land in Ceylon that nowhere in the countryside are you so far from the uncultivated forests that you’d not have second thoughts about wandering off in broad daylight, much less in the dark. No cobras here, though, the monks told me. The mongooses made sure of that. One of them was staring at me from a rock higher up the path. His elongated, rodentlike body was covered with prickly fur that made him look as though he’d been dunked in motor oil. His snoutish face was kind of cute, though, and I’d often seen the monks feeding these animals in the courtyard, as a good turn, no doubt, for the animal’s appetite for poisonous snakes. ... by Eric Lerner 2025 20 minutes 53 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (10.1MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti View the book, eBook and free PDF download. You can also find it at Amazon worldwide using this link: http://a-fwd.com/com=pariyatti-20&asin=B0CJL9SG5D. About Eric Lerner. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Ch. 8 - Unmeasured Time from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner THE ENTIRE ISLAND OF Ceylon has only eight million inhabitants, and as I stood idly waiting for a bus or walked through the streets of Colombo, the capital city, I no longer felt the constant psychic assault that I had been aware of in India. The most obvious difference, however, was that Ceylon was a Buddhist country. Even the most casual conversation easily turned to a common appreciation of the Dharma. There are probably no more Ceylonese who actually practice the heart of Buddha’s teachings than there are real practitioners of any religion anywhere, but everyone I met at least understood the value of his teachings and was willing to support those who really did wish to pursue them. ... by Eric Lerner 2025 46 minutes 54 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (22.6MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti View the book, eBook and free PDF download. You can also find it at Amazon worldwide using this link: http://a-fwd.com/com=pariyatti-20&asin=B0CJL9SG5D. About Eric Lerner. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Realizing Change: Sébastian Bernier's Story This a Pariyatti Presents... event of the Realizing Change Series: Sébastian Bernier's Story. Sébastian Bernier December 2, 2022 1 hour 4 minutes Watch the video or download the audio. Download Audio (31MB) Video copyright, 2022 Pariyatti View the archive of all Pariyatti Presents... Events. View more books and audio resources available at the online Pariyatti bookstore.

Ch. 7 - No Way Off This Path from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner SIX OF US ARRIVED at the International Meditation Center in Rangoon late in the afternoon of the day the retreat in memory of U Ba Khin was to begin. A charming, middle-aged Burmese gentleman who produced movies for a living met us at the gate and immediately took us on a tour of the grounds. After all the build-up and expectation that had surrounded our trip, it was difficult to appreciate the fact that we were actually there. All we could do was gawk as we followed our host around. The most prominent feature of the Center was the arrangement of the meditation cells, the small individual rooms where one was expected to sit in darkness and silence for most of the day. They surrounded a large central pagoda that contained the shrine room where U Ba Khin himself had sat in meditation. Opening onto the shrine room were eight cells, which were also accessible by doors from the outside. ... by Eric Lerner 2025 29 minutes 48 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (13.7MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti View the book, eBook and free PDF download. You can also find it at Amazon worldwide using this link: http://a-fwd.com/com=pariyatti-20&asin=B0CJL9SG5D. About Eric Lerner. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Ch. 6 - Why the Buddha Sat Under a Tree from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner IMMEDIATELY AFTER HOVER’s departure I had begun another retreat, and on New Year’s Day Goenka’s chanting brought to an end forty continuous days of meditation behind walls for me. An hour after the meditation ended, my monastic woolen shawl and white cotton pajama suit were tucked away in my bag, and I marveled at the strange feel of denim against my skin once again. by Eric Lerner 2025 26 minutes 45 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (12.9MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti View the book, eBook and free PDF download. You can also find it at Amazon worldwide using this link: http://a-fwd.com/com=pariyatti-20&asin=B0CJL9SG5D. About Eric Lerner. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

An interview with Rivers Cuomo . This a Pariyatti Presents... event interview with Rivers Cuomo, lead singer, songwriter and guitarist for the band, Weezer. He is interviewed by Kory Goldberg, co-author of Along the Path. Rivers Cuomo February 18, 2024 54 minutes Watch the video or download the audio. Download Audio (52MB) Video copyright, 2024 Pariyatti View the video of the interview at Pariyatti. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Ch. 5 - Right Effort from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner TOWARD THE END OF the first week of the course, Hover introduced a new schedule for vipassana meditation which he had been shown on his recent trip to Burma. It consisted of six hour-long sittings each day in which the resolve was made not to move at all: two in the morning, three in the afternoon, and one at night after his discourse, plus some hours in the early morning and after tea. It didn’t take long for this regimen to produce some very deep pain. Shortly after we began it, a rock-hard knot about the size of a grapefruit surfaced in my neck. It grew in intensity during each hour-long sitting until I could no longer hold my attention on any other part of my body. When I focused right on the pain, my body would be gripped by enormous tension and the knot would suddenly disappear. This thrilled me the first time, but it soon became clear that it only meant that the knot would be back the next hour, stiffer, larger, and more difficult to deal with. by Eric Lerner 2025 24 minutes 40 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (11.4MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti View the book, eBook and free PDF download. You can also find it at Amazon worldwide using this link: http://a-fwd.com/com=pariyatti-20&asin=B0CJL9SG5D. About Eric Lerner. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Ch. 4 - Noble Silence from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner BENARES, THE SPIRITUAL CAPITAL of Hinduism, and the site of our next retreat, had been one of the most exciting places I’d visited in India or anywhere else in my travels around the world four years earlier. It’s a city of death and rebirth. Pilgrims gather there to bathe away their sins in the holy Ganges River waters and then patiently await the end of this life in order to be cremated beside the Mother of Waters. Saddhus and holy men mingle freely with the poor and the well-to-do. Everyone is a beggar at the end. The fires of cremation along the river banks produce eerie, smoky sunsets while the holy chanting of “Hare Krishna,” “Hare Krishna” goes on night and day. by Eric Lerner 2025 30 minutes 25 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (14MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti View the book, eBook and free PDF download. You can also find it at Amazon worldwide using this link: http://a-fwd.com/com=pariyatti-20&asin=B0CJL9SG5D. About Eric Lerner. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Ch. 3 - A Peacock is More Than a Bird from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner IN MID-NOVEMBER, after nearly three weeks of waiting, I finally took a train to a small city in Gujarat state in the far west of India. It was the nicest time of the year in that part of the country. The weather was warm and dry with an empty blue sky all day, and the area had a different feel to it than any place I had been. It was less intense, almost relaxed, and without the air of desperation that much of India had those days, as its economy teetered toward collapse. by Eric Lerner 2025 35 minutes 28 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (16.3MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti View the book, eBook and free PDF download. You can also find it at Amazon worldwide using this link: http://a-fwd.com/com=pariyatti-20&asin=B0CJL9SG5D. About Eric Lerner. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Ch. 2 - Siva’s Smile from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner IT TOOK A COUPLE of months to get used to the lack of drama that each hour of the ten-day retreat had contained. Hover had not given me much advice as to what to do next, except to keep sitting. Often I had no idea what I was doing, but I kept doing it at least one hour a day and although P, my wife, didn’t participate, she respected my effort. I hadn’t sat this evening, though, due to the rush of getting dinner before P and I went out. Now I wished I had. I wished I could be somewhere dark and quiet where I could close my eyes. by Eric Lerner 2025 29 minutes 34 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (13.6MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti View the book, eBook and free PDF download. You can also find it at Amazon worldwide using this link: http://a-fwd.com/com=pariyatti-20&asin=B0CJL9SG5D. About Eric Lerner. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Ch. 1 - The Dharma of an Aerospace Engineer from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner About a dozen of us sat cross-legged in a darkened living room in a Massachusetts country home, attentive to the speech of a man whom all present including myself would agree was a highly unlikely candidate for a meditation teacher. His name was Robert Hover, and he was an aerospace engineer from Los Angeles. He had the incongruity of a centaur. The bottom part of him looked right, seated comfortably on a cushion, wrapped in a Burmese style lungi, a cloth cylinder tied at the waist. Above that, though, was a 1950’s style short-sleeved sport shirt and a prominent, clean-shaven face and balding head with a fringe of gray hair cut as close as possible. He didn’t radiate beatitude, only practicality. He reminded me of my junior high school football coach. Something about his sparkling eyes, though, the slight hint of otherworldliness, reassured me. by Eric Lerner 2025 27 minutes 13 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (13.9MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti View the book, eBook and free PDF download. You can also find it at Amazon worldwide using this link: http://a-fwd.com/com=pariyatti-20&asin=B0CJL9SG5D. About Eric Lerner. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Introduction from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner AS THE WORLD ADVANCED into the early seventies I felt strangely dislocated. I really couldn’t accept that the sixties had so quickly become an “era” in the past tense. I tried to remind myself that, if only for a brief time, the mind of my generation had been wide open to experiences, perceptions of the universe and modes of life whose power and truth contradicted a lifetime of convention. For a while, through chemicals, a wholly other state of being seemed possible. In the initial hour’s rush of my first dose of mescaline, that surge in which my perceptions set out on their own, I was freed for the first time from my conceptions, and the world of accomplishment and prestige became someone else’s bad dream. But somehow, I was still the same. Despite the incredible visions of Truth I had experienced, I was no more peaceful or loving than ever, and as the visions became memories, I began to experience the most profound disorientation. Nothing made sense. Almost overnight I had given up most of the beliefs and operating principles of twenty years. I was ready to give up old explanations as long as I had a new one. ... by Eric Lerner 2025 7 minutes 38 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (4.5MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti View the book, eBook and free PDF download. You can also find it at Amazon worldwide using this link: http://a-fwd.com/com=pariyatti-20&asin=B0CJL9SG5D. About Eric Lerner. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Review of Buddhism without Beliefs by Bhikkhu Bodhi It has often been said that Western Buddhism is distinguished from its Asian prototype by three innovative shifts: the replacement of the monastery by the lay community as the principal arena of Buddhist practice; the enhanced position of women; and the emergence of a grass-roots engaged Buddhism aimed at social and political transformation. These three developments, however, have been encompassed by a fourth which is so much taken for granted that it is barely noticed. This last innovation might be briefly characterized as an attempt to transplant Buddhist practice from its native soil of faith and doctrine into a new setting governed by largely secular concerns. For Asian Buddhists, including Eastern masters teaching in the West, this shift is so incomprehensible as to be invisible, while Western Buddhists regard it as so obvious that they rarely comment on it. Stephen Batchelor, however, has clearly discerned the significance of this development and what it portends for the future. Having been trained in Asia in two monastic lineages (Tibetan Gelugpa and Korean Soen) and relinquished his monk’s vows to live as a lay Buddhist teacher in the West, he is acquainted with both traditional Buddhism and its Western offshoots. His book Buddhism without Beliefs is an intelligent and eloquent attempt to articulate the premises of the emerging secular Buddhism and define the parameters of a “dharma practice” appropriate to the new situation. ... narrated by Jonathan Nelson 2025 22 minutes 32 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (11MB) Audio copyright, 2025 Pariyatti Investigating the Dhamma as a book and eBook can be found at https://store.pariyatti.org/investigating-the-dhamma. More by Bhikkhu Bodhi. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore. "Review of Buddhism without Beliefs" at Amazon: https://amazon.com/dp/1573226564.

A Household Tradition by Patrick Given-Wilson This talk by Patrick Given-Wilson was given for the European Dhamma servers' meeting in Spain, June 2024. The talk is followed by a Q&A session. by Patrick Given-Wilson 2024 62 minutes 2 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (60MB) Audio copyright, 2024 Pariyatti View the video version of this talk at Pariyatti. All works by Patrick Given-Wilson. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

The Simpler Side of Buddhist Doctrine by Kassapa Thera In the Holy Books are many sermons, long and short, full of advice to the average layman. Notable amongst these is the Sigālovāda Suttanta, known as “the Layman’s Vinaya” which details correct behaviour for the good layman. Excellent though all such sermons are, none can surpass the brief simple appeal of the words to Nakula’s parents, which advise the cultivation of four things: Saddhā, Virtue, Generosity and Wisdom. A striking thing in the Buddha-dhamma is that here we find naught of “Thou shalt” or “Thou shalt not.” When once it is realized that selfishness and self-indulgence cause all our woe, then a wise one strives for self mastery. Sīla is the mastery of speech and action. Of his own free will, the Buddhist “pledges to observe” this precept of virtue, and that. The minimum number of such precepts of virtue that the good Buddhist should observe is five: (1) I undertake to observe the precept to abstain from destroying the life of beings; (2) from taking things not given; (3) from sexual misconduct; (4) from false speech, and (5) from liquor that causes intoxication and heedlessness. The Buddhist has no impossible postulates; he tries to see, as his teacher taught, “things as they really are.” He looks at the world around him and sees that all, all is transitory there. He sees that what is transitory is bound to be sad. All that we love is passing away, and such parting from the loved is suffering. And we, we too are part of the passing show—with greying hair, falling and decaying teeth, disease and death looming ahead—it is all sad. The Buddhist sees that, to what is transient and sad, one clings in vain, and in all this we can see naught of which he can say—with assurance as to the permanent value of such statement—“This is me, this is mine, this is a soul.” by Kassapa Thera 2024 63 minutes 6 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (30MB) Audio copyright, 2024 Pariyatti View this audiobook and more information at Pariyatti. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Parents and Children: Transmitting the Buddhist Heritage across Generations by Ven. Medagama Vajirañāṇa Nayaka Thera One essential requirement for a happy society is that the individuals constituting the society must have tranquillity of mind. This tranquillity of mind arises from purity of thought, word, and action, which means the observance of an ethical lifestyle based on the Five Precepts. As human beings we are unique in our ability to see the difference between good and bad. We have the capacity to make moral choices and thereby to influence the pattern of our own lives and that of others. This influence is exerted through our thoughts, speech, and actions. If we can develop inner purity and strength, then we have established the basis on which we can give what is needed by others in all our relationships. It is up to us to create a safe and harmonious society. by Ven. Medagama Vajirañāṇa Nayaka Thera Narrated by Ethan Christy 2024 29 minutes 121 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (16MB) Audio copyright, 2024 Pariyatti View this audiobook and more information at Pariyatti. More by Ven. Medagama Vajirañāṇa Nayaka Thera. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

Introduction to Vipassana This short introduction to Vipassana talk was given on June 29, 2024 at Bondi Beach, Sydney, Australia. by Patrick Given-Wilson 2024 32 minutes 48 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (16MB) Audio copyright, 2024 Pariyatti More by Patrick Given-Wilson. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.

The Jewel in Mumbai by Bikram Dandiya "The Global Vipassana Pagoda in Mumbai was built to mark the birth centenary year of Sayagyi U Ba Khin, the Burmese Dhamma teacher of Shri Satya Narayan Goenkaji. The monument is built in the Myanmar style of the Shwedagon pagoda, as a token of gratitude to that country where the essence of the Buddha’s teachings was maintained in its pristine purity, and from where it is now spreading throughout India, and via India to the rest of the world. Our Dhamma teacher Shri S.N. Goenkaji became the vehicle to make this happen. He was also our inspiring guide for every important aspect of this building project. Tremendous volition and effort went into the building of this staggering monument and it is interesting and educative to explore the journey. "Mr. Bikram Dandiya has beautifully chronicled some of these experiences in his booklet, “The Jewel in Mumbai”, the story of the making of the crystal bud atop the Global Vipassana Pagoda. Although his story concentrates on a specific part of this enormous structure, it typifies the challenges and solutions witnessed by those of us closely involved in its creation. For example, experts had opined that it was not possible to construct a 325 foot wide stone dome without supporting pillars; the dome went up thanks to indigenous technology, using thousands of huge interlocking stones weighing 700 to 800 kg each, and now seemingly floating in the air!" —M.M. Khandhar, 14th January 2020 narrated by Bikram Dandiya 2024 23 minutes 35 seconds Listen to Streaming Audio Your browser does not support the audio element. Download Audio (12MB) Audio copyright, 2024 Pariyatti Available at Pariyatti at https://store.pariyatti.org/jewel-in-mumbai as a papaerback, free PDF download, and free audiobook. In Hindi as a PDF download. View more books and audio resources available in the Pariyatti bookstore.