37 Practices

Every experience has infinite dimensions. Can you experience all of them without struggling against any of them? If you can, then suffering comes to an end - so obvious, so simple, so deep, and so wonderful.
-Ken Mcleod 

Introduction 37 Practices

Rely on silence! You become aware of a silence - a silence that is always there, even in your darkest moments, a silence that includes everything and cannot be fathomed, a silence that allows you to listen to your heart, your body and your mind in a way you did not know was possible. Rely on Silence! - Ken Mcleod

37 Practices - Verse 1-3

Compassion isn't some kind of self-improvement project or ideal that we're trying to live up to. Having compassion starts and ends with having compassion for all those unwanted parts of ourselves, all those imperfections that we don't even want to look at.

37 Practices - Homage To Compassion

Give up your life. Give it all up. Do not base your life on what can be taken away from you - wealth, possessions, health, family, friends, fame, respect, even your own life. If you have those, savor them, knowing that they all must come to an end. But do not base your life on holding on to them. - Ken Mcleod

37 Practices - Verse 4-7

Forget about being good or bad. Bring attention to your life. Experience what is actually happening in you. Know what you are doing and how it affects others. - Ken Mcleod

37 Practices, Verse 8-9

Beings are numberless: may I free them all.
Reactions are endless: may I release them all.
Doors to experience are infinite: my I enter them all.
Ways of awakening are limitless: may I know them all.

37 Practices, Verse 10-11

In these six verses Tokme Zongpo describes how to practice in the face of injury, insult or the incomprehensible - situations that commonly provoke anger and rage. In all these situations you use anger as a basis for the taking and sending practice (tonglen).

37 Practices - Verse 12-17

What you experience is your mind. Your mind is not a thing. It is not located anywhere. Your mind is what you experience. What you experience is your mind. It is a bit like a dream. - Ken Mcleod

37 Practices, Verse 22-24

What is that stillness, that space, in which reactions arise and disappear? When you look at it, you see nothing at all. It is a bit frightening. It is like looking into the void of outer space. Something in you shrinks back. This is the other level of patience, letting your reactions to infinite nothingness come and go. - Ken Mcloed

37 Practices - Verse 27

Look again and again at what cannot be seen. At some point you see nothing - you really see nothing. You know, through your own experience, that there is no you in you, no fixed point, nothing. That experience makes all the difference. - Ken Mcleod

37 Practices - Verse 28-30

Stephan Wormland, MA in clinical psychology and trained in Gestalt therapy. He has studied and practiced meditation in multiple Buddhist traditions for over 30 years and spent altogether 5 years in meditation retreats. Stephan was a monk in the Tibetan tradition for 11 years and teaches meditation in Buddhist centers in Europe.

37 Practices

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