Amaravati Buddhist Monastery

Family Events



June weekend

Welcome puja

Saturday Morning puja

Saturday Evening Puja

Sunday Morning Puja

 

 

 

 

 


Welcome Puja

Heres some games we played on the first evening

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Pass Your Own Name Game

ICEBREAKER: YOU AND ME, BOTH!

meditation on arriving

5 precept game - the group was divide into five small groups and each group picked a precept and made a advertising poster for that precept.

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Saturday morning

Luang Por Tee-an meditation

Kamma means: action.. what we do/say and each action has a cause

So kamma is about Cause and effect.
So cause is simply the start of an action
and the effect of that is the result...

So please let me explain the game first...


So I would like you to get in two circles ... each group has a bean bag or something to throw.
So you start saying any word that comes in to your mind (does anybody remember the buddhist swear word? - read the book buddha in the jungle to find out more) and then you throw the ball to somebody in the circle and then they must respond with a word.

Then after game

You can see how we connect words together by association or by habit....

So you can see the cycle of cause and effect. So this is how go about creating Kamma – creating action – when we do not have refuge in Buddha, refuge in awareness, each cause creates and effect and each effect creates a cause and so on.

With awareness we can start to see this process and we can choose do something about it.

So the Buddha talks about two types of effects wholesome (good) and unwholesome (bad)


How do you think we know whether some action is good or bad?


What is the result of your action – wwtbd (What would the buddha do)

discussed about the preciousness of a human birth

So this goes back to the precepts about what we spoke about last night.


Another of looking at this is to ask yourself what actions would you
least like have done to yourself?

Just have a think about this today...

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Saturday Evening Puja

guided meditation on choice


So this morning we looked at how any action has a cause and effect –
And how any actions can produce a good effect and/or bad effect

The buddha defined it interms of light and dark

i) dark with a dark result, - GOOD
(ii) bright with a bright result, BAD
(iii) dark and bright with a dark and bright result, CHOPSEY KAMMA
(iv) neither dark nor bright with a neither dark nor bright result. - RESULT of Meditation

more information here

So how do we know what type of action, produces what type of result.
Here is an example – a person walks into a kitchen their is another person in the kitchen there is a knife on the table.

What do you think could happen know - lets here some examples?
And what do you think the result of that action could be?

In Buddhism we use the word “intention” – it’s a big word which means to choose to do something for some specific reason.

We can choose to use a knife to kill someone, or chop a piece of cheese for a monk or nun.

So in a very complicated world – how do we make this choice.
Any ideas?

We make choice on what we’ve be taught, learnt and when we get old enough we can investigate the very choice, by feeling and understanding the effect and then by giving it values or judgments from our own experience.

Lets do a mantra on some of the more positive choices you can make when decided on a looking at a situation.


Metta – mean lovingkindness and you can use choice do think in this way when you feel hate
Karuna – means compassion you can use choice do think in this way when you feel selfish
Mudita - symapthetic joy you can use choice do think in this way when you jealousy
Uppekha – means even minded/ balance you can use choice do think in this way when you feel unbalanced.

we chant the words metta, karuna, mudita, upekkha along with movements

Brahavihara (divine abodings) mantra with movements - read the Brahmavihara sutta
movement metta opens hand out like embracing
karuna (touch heart)
mudita (throw hands up)
uppekha – hands out in line with shoulders - to represent balance

So I would like to finish of by reading a book called good news/bad news

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Sunday


So here we are heading towards the end of the weekend and we have seen that every action has a cause and effect and that we can choose whether that action has a good/bad or no result.

Why do we react to certain situation?

Because we have a memory and then that memory helps us make a choice, we either like something, dislike something or a not bothered by it.

So how is it possible to escape from creating action the answer is with awareness.

I'd like to read a short section from Fox in Socks by Dr.Seuss

When we read a story like Fox in the socks we can get lost in the words, we try to understand the story rather than trust in the point that recognise that something is happening: – understanding awareness


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Family Event Dates 2008

The Theme is Good -Evil and The Way It Is

Rainbows 2nd-5th May

Family weekend 27-29th June

Family Camp 16th-25th August

General information here

Young Persons Retreat 21st-23rd November

Creative Weekend For Adults 19th-21st December

Booking information here


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