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7C. A-Tri Session Two: Intention (Bodhicitta), Taking Refuge, Confession
November 22, 2024
Week 3 – Nov. 19, 2024 This covers Session Two in the A-Tri text and includes sections 1.4.1.2.2 – 1.4.1.2.2.3.3 The session starts with this statement: Generating bodhicitta and taking refuge has three subdivisions: generating bodhicitta; taking refuge; and confession of negative deeds. Virtually all…
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7B. A-Tri Session One: Impermanence and Turning Away from Attachment
November 15, 2024
Week 2 – Nov. 5, 2024 This covers Session One in the A-Tri text and includes sections 1.4 – 1.4.1.2.1.3. This lesson on impermanence is intended to develop the skillful means to turn away from attachment. This is text from the meditation: “All appearances arise…
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7A. Initial Class on A-Tri Text: The Importance of the Lama
November 12, 2024
Week 1 – Oct. 29, 2024 The emphasis for this first week was on Section 1.3 of the text, which entails advice concerning finding and establishing a relationship with the teacher or lama. Translated in today’s terms and Western culture, this is often seen as…
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7. Mustang Bon Foundation A-Tri Dzogchen Course
November 11, 2024
This winter (2024/25) while participating in a dozen on-line sessions covering a newly translated Bon (Tibet/Nepal) text on awakening/enlightenment, I plan to comment on each lesson using Western ideas and terms appearing in McGilchrist’s work. My basic idea is this: McGilchrist urges his readers to…
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6. Self and Identity
March 17, 2024
McGilchrist says that while the self is needed for our development and individuation, we must eventually transcend the self. He points to a value that will lift us to a higher Gestalt. It is a remembrance – or is it a knowing? – of a higher identity.
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5. Opposing — But Not Equal — Forces
February 28, 2024
The hemispheres must work together, as opposites fulfilling each other, but they must not be considered equals. The right hemisphere is the only one that can produce wide and deeply resonating truths.
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4. Starting with the Biggest Questions
February 27, 2024
McGilchrist’s work takes on big questions, in fact, the biggest questions. This is especially helpful when trying to bridge the divide between mind and matter. Chapter 25 of The Matter with Things is an 83-page exploration of matter and consciousness, seen from the opposing views of the two hemispheres.
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3. Jill Bolte Taylor and the Right Hemisphere
February 26, 2024
She points to a trinity — a life force power, the right hemisphere consciousness and the left hemisphere consciousness. I have been surprised at how well this correlates with other trinities in Eastern spiritual traditions.
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2. A Little Background Info
February 26, 2024
The corpus collosum embodies the hemisphere hypothesis. Surprisingly, the majority of the neural fibers in the corpus collosum are involved in the inhibition of the other hemisphere. This is needed for each hemisphere to specialize, work separately and more quickly. The corpus collosum holds them together and keeps them apart. Its existence is testimony to the importance of union and division together, a main theme in McGilchrist’s work.
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1. Reframing the Bridge
February 26, 2024
By embracing consciousness as fundamental, I believe McGilchrist has laid a foundation for building a bridge between the West and Eastern spiritual traditions. The Matter with Things makes extensive use of Western neurology, physics and nearly forgotten Western philosophy that support this deeper understanding of reality and mind.
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