何来烦恼？ 自寻烦恼! ‘Definition’ of Samsara: Self-sabotage

Samsara might be interesting at times, but it is also dissatisfactory most of the time, even if at subtle levels. So long as we are unmindful of this, we will be intrigued by it and mistaken its fleeting pleasures as true bliss, clutching at illusion instead of realising...

The cleaner at the food court came to retrieve an empty tray, but with absent-mindedness. She lifts a tray off the table, without even looking, and misses the one stacked just below. She’ll have to return for other tray later, though it needn’t be at all, if she had more presence...

Above is Ni Andong’s cover of Damien Rice’s ‘The Blower’s Daughter’, whose original version is below. Ni’s take sent some shivers down my spine (in a resonant, not creepy way), more so than Rice’s version, which is moving too. But what’s more...

A genie appeared to three in a boat and granted each of them a wish. A: I want to go to a place where I will always have enough to spend. The genie said okay and sent him to Moneyland. B: I want to go to a palace made of gold with all my needs attended to. The genie said okay and sent him to...

It’s okay, such nonsense, this (somewhat) nonsensical place with (some) nonsensical people with (some) nonsensical matters, because I’m leaving this behind. It’s okay, such nonsense, not that I’m condescending or heartless, as I’m going to Pure Land to better my...

From TheZena56: ‘I had a nightmare once. I was walking down a snowy road and the full moon was blood red. And I swear I heard something like this (Digital Daggers’ cover version of Tears for Fears’ Head Over Heels) playing in the background. And I had the biggest urge to...

I found this re-blogged on another blog: Be careful when you sing a song of broken love, a song of Samsara. Just when you think you are relieving yourself of Samsara, you might begin romancing it. When the song sticks, your broken love is replaced by a new love… and you’re it...

The ingenious film that is ‘Inception’ begins with the assumption that it is possible for multiple persons to enter someone’s dream, that can even be designed without that person knowing, thus digging out deep secrets from his sub-consciousness, or even implanting ideas...

Q: I have always thought that the Buddha’s Parinirvana was the end and that he would not be subjected to rebirth upon achieving it. I was surprising that you mentioned that the Buddha still exists. And that he and all other Buddhas are still working hard to guide beings to Nirvana A:...

One who braces for the hard knocks of life will find them less shocking and painful. Not bracing for reality is to be attached to fantasy. - Stonepeace During naval exercises, sometimes there is this announcement over the broadcast system to simulate incoming missile...

Form is emptiness; (色即是空) Emptiness is form. (空即是色) Form is not different from emptiness;（色不异空） Emptiness is not different from form.  (空不异色） So says the Heart Sutra, but what do these lines really say? They speak of that which cannot really be put ...

Am sure you have come across ‘peculiar’ haikus, which seem weird in the sense that they seem to be about nonsense, yet possibly having some wit and wisdom tucked within. Here is a peculiar haiku series in three parts for you. It doesn’t follow the traditional syllable structure though,...

The classic ‘Mad World’ by Tears for Fears seems to be a poignant string of world-weary haikus. In between its stanzas below are some one-liner comments. Above is the more meditative cover version by Gary Jules, in a video directed by the very creative Michel Gondry, who gave us...

S took a cursory glance at some alternative seats at the centre, where there is a full-house Dharma talk about to start. S: There are better seats there by the side of the building (which is out of the line of sight). G: What’s wrong with here? S: The seat here is on sloping ground and...

A Tit for a Tat (117) Tit: I don’t feel that I belong! Tat: Belong where? Tit: Here – in Samsara Tat: That’s good! Tit: How so? Tat: If you feel right at home, how are you going to break free from Samsara? Tit: But aren’t Bodhisattvas supposed to feel at ease in...

‘Summer Wars’ tells of how virtual reality as a ‘Second Life’ spills over to reality, till it becomes indispensable to real life when it gradually replaces aspects of it. In reality, like the illusory in Samsara, nothing is merely virtual once it is taken seriously...

From ‘Essex County’ by Jeff Lemire, Annie the nurse says, ‘I lost a patient today… Humph!… I know what you’d say if you could. You’d say, “It’s part of your job, Annie. Won’t be the first, won’t be the last.” But I… well...

Yah: I’m apolitical. Jat: More like apathetic. Yah: Apathetic to politics… yes! Jat: How so? Yah: Because politics has too many shades of grey. So I would rather spend time on something more real, like studying the Pureland sutras. Jat: And Pureland is more real than our...

A Tit for a Tat (66) Tit: I don’t have enough strength or patience! Tat: Why not train your strength and patience? Tit: I don’t have enough strength or patience! Notes: To break free of the circular loops of Samsara, we need to stop rationalising and behaving in pointless loops....