Show Notes
Speaker: Sharon Lukert. Sharon explores how the Buddha's teachings on birth, old age, sickness, and death can be brought directly into the lived experience of illness. Sickness brings us into intimate contact with our deepest attachment, which is the body itself. Drawing on her lived experience with Alzheimer's disease, Sharon shares how she has adapted her Dharma practice in response to this diagnosis. As outer cognitive capacities diminish, illness offers a deeper recognition of impermanence, and a tender cultivation of compassion for herself and others. She offers a line from the great Dzogchen master Jigme Lingpa for our contemplation: "Do not place the sickness on your mind, but place your naked intrinsic awareness upon your sickness."
More from Mangala Shri Bhuti - The Link
Speaker: Marjorieke Glaudemans. Marjorieke shares her experience of navigating life and Dharma practice by means of a personal koan, "Discern when you become ordinary", which Rinpoche requested of his students in a 2016 Shedra talk. Over the years, this koan has offered her clear instruction in how to stay connected to the emptiness view and how to understand the many ways she imprisons herself in ordinary, self-absorbed mind.
Speaker: Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche. This LINK was originally given by Rinpoche on September 7, 2014 at Phuntsok Choling, in Ward, Colorado. Rinpoche describes the wisdom and skillful means of aging gracefully, and gives students specific advice for right conduct leading up to old age and death.
Speaker: Dungse Jampal Norbu. Dungse-la begins with the importance of calling to mind the precious human life we have with all of its freedoms and advantages. He then reminds us how this may not be the case in the future unless we actively work to accumulate merit. On the path, we need to accumulate merit to gain wisdom. Our habitual tendencies and afflictive emotions are difficult to renounce without something to facilitate a change in attitude. Ultimately, taking responsibility for one's mind is a privilege. We can make the most of this opportunity by practicing the six paramitas and letting wisdom to guide the way.
Speaker: Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche. This is the fifth and final talk given during a weekend program to students of Naropa University in November 2002. The program focus was the practice of meditation. The entire series re-aired over the summer of 2026.
Speaker: Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche. This is the fourth of five talks given during a weekend program to students of Naropa University in November 2002. The program focus was the practice of meditation. In this fourth talk, Rinpoche revisits the pith instructions on in-meditation and post-meditation practice, including the fruition, which is to "wake up".