What do you think about the concept of freedom as an acceptance of a lack of control? Can you remember moments when relinquishing a sense of control felt freeing to you, particularly within the context of shaping or maintaining your personal identity? Rev Angel writes:
"One of the extraordinary things about liberation is that you do not feel the need to control things when you're free. And the freer you get, the less you feel the need to control. Because the illusory nature of control becomes clear to you. It's like, 'I'm just making this up! I'm not actually controlling anything.'"
Each of the authors write beautifully about how self-love, healing, and compassion are related to being intimately present with our personal woundedness and pain. Can you think of examples from your life where your self-love and love for others expanded through sitting with your pain? I loved this quote!
"The most profound practice I have ever been taught by my teachers is simply letting my shit fall apart, developing the courage to sit with all of my rough edges, the ugliness, the destructive and suffocating story lines I have perpetuated about myself, and letting go of the same suffocating storylines others maintain about me"
What is the relationship between meditation and the enactment of love in the world? Do you see meditation as something that can help us cope with disappointment or frustration so that we can pursue our goals? Is it something that helps us understand suffering, and its causes, more clearly so that we can better help? Do you believe Jasmine Syedullah's more expansive, utopian claim that the power of a meditation practice lies in empowering us to stand in community with people--not directed towards particular goals or aims--but simply together with faith in a loving world?
"Love is liberation, and liberation is love...You neve really know what might happen. This is how I want to learn to want to be free...singing each other's radical wisdom, waking up to ourselves, our dead, to their hearts and hunger, to their dreams of someday, I believe"
Did anything in this section unsettle you? For me it was the assertion that for white people, love is too private and interpersonal and not an "earthy, grounded power to be wielded for justice."
Hi all,This is a reminder that our next monthly book club to discuss Radical Dharma will take place November 14th at 5:30pm (meeting the second Saturday of the month to avoid crossover with Thanksgiving). Prior to the meeting we'll send out a list of discussion questions. This meeting will focus on Section II of the book: "Stakeholders-What We Bring Forward"Thanks,LukeOn Fri, Oct 9, 2020 at 4:58 PM Vince Lampone <vince.lampone@gmail.com> wrote:--Hi everyone,On the third Saturday of each month, a friendly collection of folks from the sangha meet on Zoom to discuss readings that relate to the dharma.For the next few months, we'll be focusing on the book Radical Dharma: Talking Race, Love and Liberation, by Rev. angel Kyodo williams, Lama Rod Owens, and Jasmine Syedullah.Our next group meeting is next Saturday, October 17, from 5 to 6:30pm. If you're keen to explore how Buddhism intersects with racial justice, or seek deeper connections with folks from our sangha, you're warmly invited to join us! We'll examine themes from the first few chapters then.Warmly,Vince
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