Author name: Christopher

Christopher Titmuss, a former Buddhist monk in Thailand and India, teaches Awakening and Insight Meditation around the world. He is the founder and director of the Dharma Facilitators Programme and the Living Dharma programme, an online mentor programme for Dharma practitioners. He gives retreats, participates in pilgrimages (yatras) and leads Dharma gatherings. Christopher has been teaching annual retreats in Bodh Gaya, India since 1975 and leads an annual Dharma Gathering in Sarnath since 1999. A senior Dharma teacher in the West, he is the author of numerous books including Light on Enlightenment, An Awakened Life and Transforming Our Terror. A campaigner for peace and other global issues, Christopher is a member of the international advisory council of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship. . Poet and writer, he is the co-founder of Gaia House, an international retreat centre in Devon, England. He lives in Totnes, Devon, England.

Dear Facebook Friends, Can you recommend a book?

Dear Facebook Friends

Can you help? I would appreciate it if you kindly recommend to me a certain type of book to read, either fiction or non-fiction. Let me give you the background so that you get the picture. …

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While our Guitar Gently Weeps

 

I was born a year after George Harrison, the Beatle.  In the 1960’s, fans of the Beatles often asked each other “Who is your favourite Beatle?” My favourite Beatle was George – years before he went to India. George died from cancer just 10 years ago on November 29, 2001.  Here is a poem to George. Facebook friends will recognise the inspiration for the lines.

While our Guitar Gently Weeps

Life flows on without you,

we know the space between us

we didn’t want you to leave us

now our guitar gently weeps.

 

You had to leave us now,

it was not our wish somehow,

in this long, cold, lonely winter,

it seems like years since you’ve been here.

 

Something in the way life moves

touches us like no other wonder

something in the way life grooves

we don’t want to leave it now,

you know we believe somehow.

 

Here comes  your son,

and we say he’s alright,

we didn’t want you  to leave him now,

it was not our wish somehow.

 

We glimpse the truth; you’re not so far away,

we talk about the love we all could share

while our peace of mind is waiting there

as life flows on without you.

 

Try to realise it’s all without yourself,

no one else can make us change,

we see we are all so very small,

and life flows on within and without you.

 

Oh sweet George

we really loved to see you,

we really loved to hear you,

it take so long, dear George, for you

to write but we will sing your song.

Here comes your son

and he’s alright.

while our guitar gently weeps

as life flows on within you

and without you.

(George Harrison. 25 February 1943 – 29 November 2001)

 

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GO HOME! Analysis of the USA’s Military Empire

I arrived in Australia on the same day in November, 2011, as President Barack Obomber of the USA arrived to speak to a compliant Australian Parliament in Canberra, the capital city. So I watched on television as he explained his motives behind his visit. …

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OCCUPY! A Season for Changes. Autumn 2011

We’ll occupy your banks as you write your cheques
we’ll occupy your bonuses and your stock exchange,
we’ll occupy your seats in the wine bars of the city
and occupy the board room of every committee.
Yes we can. …

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A Government Health Warning to Meditators

The Government has determined that meditation is harmful to your health.

The Government’s health warning states that early physical symptoms in the process of meditation include pain in the knees, sore ankles, tension in the shoulders, and various degrees of back pain.

Early mental symptoms arise in meditation include lust, negativity, boredom, restlessness, fear and doubts. Meditators are liable at any time to multiple hindrance attacks.

Meditators believe they can resolve these issues without recourse to  the National Health Service, medication and years of weekly analysis in the private sector.

As early symptoms abate, meditators will sit motionless for hours every day or will find themselves, at fixed times, walking up and down, repetitively, unable to offer reasons for their behaviour. Some meditators stand still for an hour or more unable to move. They appear catatonic. Other lies on their back for lengthy periods perfectly still with eyes open, half open or closed. They appear dead.

They show no interest in blind pursuits of pleasure, endless hours in shopping malls or building up debts on their credit cards.

Surveys from the government show that some meditators remain vulnerable to reaction.

It is advisable to avoid talking to meditators who are in meditation. Such an approach can provoke strong irritability from the meditator. Under no circumstances touch a meditator as it can release a sudden outburst of hostile reaction such as ‘Can’t you see that I’m meditating?’

Government inspectors said that such meditators will probably apologise for their reaction and spend days, morning, noon and night, developing more loving kindness meditation.

The ability of meditators to spend most of their lives in an office or studying for years for degrees is greatly reduced. Hard core meditators stop obsessing about sense objects – sights, sounds, smells, taste or touch – nor want to chat constantly about sex, money, sport, work, cars  or computers. They tend to explore a different way of life.

In advanced stages, meditators will intentionally cut off all memories and any associations with the past. Such meditators will show a complete unwillingness to plan for the future and a refusal to cling onto anything that is happening in the present.

The government firmly rejects a timeless way of living in accordance with the rhythmn of nature and in harmony with the necessities of daily life as well as the needs of others.

Some are willing to work up to one hour per day in a retreat centre but they are known to work very slowly; they barely accomplish anything. Some advanced meditators take an hour to slice a single carrot.  Meditation teachers will ask their meditation students why did they cut the carrot so quickly.

In the most advanced cases, meditators spend long periods in solitude and silence ranging from a few weeks to many months or even years. These meditators require total care and support from retreat centres.

More and more advanced meditators claim they have no self while others claim they are the self of all. In either case, these meditators develop loving kindness, compassion and appreciative joy and cease to be competitive and ruthless in the private and public sector.

After they leave these centres, they might teach meditation and engage in a way of life free from any drive for personal sucess. They believe in co-operation, sustainability and the happiness of simple living.

The Government has defined meditation as a serious mental health hazard and advises the public to take all precautions necessary to avoid exposure to this dangerous activity.

If meditation is not stopped immediately, it can cause an end to craving for consumerism, desire for wealth and a total loss of interest in the constant pursuit of recognition.

Meditation has become associated with street protests, Occupy! and action for revolutionary change.

If meditation continues, it will bring about an end of  to the rebirth of “I” ‘me” and “mine”  upon which capitalism, economic growth and  State/Corporate control over the lives of citizens depends.

The Government report makes it clear that meditation is putting an end to people’s freedom to suffer.

In its conclusion, the Government has determined meditation as a threat to our society and our way of life.

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