The Imperfect Buddha Podcast

The Imperfect Buddha Podcast is moving on to new terrain and a new home over at the New Books Network, a location for intelligent conversations. Here's the link:

https://newbooksnetwork.com/category/academic-partners/the-imperfect-buddha

Past episodes will remain here at Soundcloud for the next six months. You can also listen to all episodes at the host site fro now and forever and catch writings and think piece too, as well as check out my work on coaching. Scroll down for the player:

https://imperfectbuddha.com/

It will also continue to be available through Stitcher, itunes and even Spotify.

To all those who signed up here to catch regular episodes, a big thank you. I hope you will continue to follow the podcast at its new home. New episodes coming out there continue with the theme of Secular Buddhism with an interview with Stephen Batchelor, followed by another with secular maestro Winton Higgins, and a think piece on Doubt.

What you waiting for. Head on over!

From immanent Buddhism to cruel optimism, from secular subjectivity to the unconscious material running through your personal practice, today's episode features a returning guest in the figure of Richard K. Payne who is here to discuss his latest work and the contributions made by many great authors thinking deeply and critically about contemporary Buddhism.

Published by Shambhala Publications, Secularizing Buddhism was released on the 3rd August, so if you like what you hear, why not consider getting a copy. It features contributions from Ron Purser, David L. McMahan, Bikkhu Bodhi, Sara Shaw, Gil Fronsdal and many more.

Richard K. Payne's first interview with us on Critical Reflections on Buddhism https://soundcloud.com/imperfect-buddha-podcast/48-ibp-richard-k-payne-critical-reflections-on-western-buddhism

Links

The Imperfect Buddha site: https://imperfectbuddha.com

O'Connell Coaching: https://imperfectbuddha.com/authors-notes

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/imperfectbuddha

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Imperfectbuddha

Something like a provocation, something of an introduction; this audio-cast presents a recent piece of work over at the Imperfect Buddha site on non-practice for all those interested in how to apply the non- to the practising life.

Built on Complex world, Complex Practice and prior to a series on applied practice, this is the audio version of an elaboration of the opening shots of a revolutionary practice.

See what you think, do the warm up and get ready for the main meal.

Background music by Funki Porcini

https://funkiporcini.bandcamp.com/

Accompanying texts;

Complex World, Complex Practice

https://imperfectbuddha.com/2021/03/24/complex-world-complex-practice/

You Need Non-Practice!

https://imperfectbuddha.com/2021/06/07/you-need-non-practice/

Tina Rassmussen is one of our first meditation teachers on in a long while. Well, being a practice based series, this was inevitable. Tina was co-author of a book on jhana states and concentration that I have had on my shelf for a long time. Concentration is not the topic of our conversation, however. Here are some of the themes we explored;

• Compatibility issues between neo-Advaita and Buddhism

• Generational conceptions of practice; from Boomers to Millennials

• The need to evolve our understanding and ways of thinking about and describing awakening/enlightenment

• The phases and stages of a practising life

• Roadblocks, hurdles, maturation; limitations

• Critiquing the language we use to talk about self, ego, awakening

• The way belief shapes practice, perception, expectations and the contours of subjectivity

Enjoy the spring everyone and let’s all wish a swift end to this pandemic.

https://luminousmindsangha.com/

And so it goes on. This is our second episode in the new practice series. In the meantime, I had something of an allergic reaction to social media, and the internet more broadly. Despite a pretty disciplined relationship with digital life, I had something akin to an epiphany mid-January and realised that in my own way I had got caught up in maintaining what I am increasingly thinking of as the synthetic real. The digital life is seductive in ways that are not always easy to identify and like many insidious forces in this world, it can creep up on you in unexpected ways. What this means long-term is anyone’s guess. For now, I have reduced my internet time drastically, with time spent on social media cut by 90% and I am thrilled by the results. If such concerns orbit your life too, you may want to check out Jaron Lanier’s work on social media.

Our guest this time is Gregory Kramer, insight meditation teacher since the 1980s, he has developed a practice called Insight Dialogue; A sort of interpersonal meditation practice. Gregory teaches meditation, leads retreats and has written two books on Buddhist practice. The first on Insight Dialogue, and the second released in 2020 called A Whole Life Path.

Gregory was candid in his answers. There are powerful moments in this episode that arise as we venture down the path of the deeply personal nature of practice. Gregory’s work is rooted in early Buddhist traditions yet he lives a house-holder’s life. His commitment to the practising life is evident throughout.

In his own words;

“...my own life experience have led me to emphasize an integrated path of development, where individual and interpersonal meditation are joined with contemplation, ethical inquiry, and a commitment to kindness.”

Other point of interest, Gregory’s been married for over forty years and has three sons and five grandchildren. He was once a music composer, performer and taught composition at NYU while scoring films, video and dance works. He also developed devices for the music and recording field, and was even a founding figure in the science of auditory display and data sonification.

Links

The Imperfect Buddha site: https://imperfectbuddha.com

O'Connell Coaching: https://imperfectbuddha.com/authors-notes

Facebook: www.facebook.com/imperfectbuddha

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Imperfectbuddha

https://gregorykramer.org/

Asian and Buddhist and living in America: Does any of that matter? Those focussed in on practice and not much else regarding Buddhism might proclaim a resounding no. Others, all too aware of the tendency of western practitioners to ignore culture, and Buddhism beyond the meditation cushion might instead bellow forth with a resounding yes! Whatever your take, today’s guest Chenxing Han has written a book that fills a gap in our collective understanding, and appreciation of the role of Asians in making, shaping and living western Buddhism.

Be the Refuge is not merely another book obsessed with race and social justice, however. Those themes do appear but it is more than another product in the polarised times we live in. Yes, some of the buzz words and concepts are there, but this book is as much a work of poetry as it is a research project designed to illustrate the often sidelined role of Asians in making and shaping Buddhism in the West.

If more than two thirds of U.S. Buddhists are actually Asian American, perhaps it’s worth becoming more aware of them, right?

Be the Refuge is both critique and celebration, countering the erasure of Asian American Buddhists while uplifting their stories and experiences. The Oriental monk, the superstitious immigrant, the banana Buddhist: dissatisfied with these tired tropes, Han asks, Will the real Asian American Buddhists please stand up? Her journey to answer this question led to in-depth interviews with a pan-ethnic, pan-Buddhist group of eighty-nine young adults.

Weaving together the voices of these interviewees with scholarship and spiritual inquiry, this book reenvisions Buddhist Asian America as a community of trailblazers, bridge-builders, integrators, and refuge-makers. Encouraging frank conversations about race, representation, and inclusivity among Buddhists of all backgrounds, Be the Refuge embodies the spirit of interconnection that glows at the heart of American Buddhism.

https://www.chenxinghan.com/

Links

The Imperfect Buddha site: https://imperfectbuddha.com

O'Connell Coaching: https://imperfectbuddha.com/authors-notes

Facebook: www.facebook.com/imperfectbuddha

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Imperfectbuddha

Happy New Year to one and all and welcome to this new season (proper) of the Imperfect Buddha Podcast. Focussed on practice, this season engages Buddhist teachers, long-term practitioners, and creative innovators engaged in the practising life. Interspersed with regular interviews, this practice focussed season finally gets the podcast off of the couch and responding to the long stream of listeners calling for a practice focus.

Our first guest is meditation teacher, artist and author, George Haas. George moved to Los Angeles from New York in 1992. He started practising Vipassanā at Ordinary Dharma in Venice, and studying Buddhist texts extensively. In 1998 he began study with his current teacher, Shinzen Young, at Vipassanā Support International, where he is now a senior facilitator. He began teaching meditation in 2000, founded Mettagroup in 2003, and became an empowered teacher through Against the Stream Buddhist Meditation Society, where he taught from 2007 to 2016. Along with his daily Morning Meditation and full schedule of one-on-one students, he continues to teach weekly classes and intensives in Los Angeles, and offer day-long, weekend and extended retreats around the country. He's also an artist with works in the permanent collections of the Hammer Museum, the Library of Congress, MoMA and the American Irish Historical Society.

Mettagroup

Founded by George Haas in 2003 and named the Best Online Buddhist Meditation by Los Angeles Magazine in 2011, Mettagroup uses insight meditation to help students live a meaningful life. Drawing from Buddhist teachings and John Bowlby's Attachment Theory, the Mettagroup techniques serve as a model of how to connect with other people, and how to be completely yourself in relationships with others and with work.

https://www.mettagroup.org/

Links

The Imperfect Buddha site: https://imperfectbuddha.com

O'Connell Coaching: https://imperfectbuddha.com/authors-notes

Facebook: www.facebook.com/imperfectbuddha

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Imperfectbuddha

Santiago Zabala was once described as a most ignorant philosopher by the American philosopher Brian Leiter: An interesting take that one will need to interpret for themselves in listening to this conversation on fake news, the role of interpretation, freedom, and being at large. Santiago is not at all ignorant, of course, and might be better understood as a pluralistic thinker in the stream of European philosophy, thus accompanying living thinkers such as Slavoj Zizek, and Simon Critchley; philosophers who aren’t afraid to risk controversy by expressing ideas and opinions on all manner of topic, from film to Covid. Thinkers that Mr Leiter no doubt dislikes, in fact he considers poor old Zizek to be a charlatan and bigot! American Imperialism indeed!

Santiago is rooted in the hermeneutic tradition of philosophy and we discuss the role and unavoidability of interpretation in our relationship with the world, and the latest phenomena of fake news, online battles, and the wider sphere of social life, politics, and, that topic so fundamental to western Buddhists, freedom.

What is freedom today? What would it mean to use the concept of ’being at large’ to understand how we might or might not be free today? What does it mean to have a return to order?

We cover this and more in this conversation which stretches well beyond the world of Buddhism, but also philosophy, by looking at how society is evolving today. We discuss Santiago’s latest book, Being at Large: Freedom in the Age of Alternative Facts, but asides from his books you can also find his writing in The Guardian, The New York Times, and Aeon, to name a few.

This is the third in this trifecta of episodes signalling a return to podcasting for the Imperfect Buddha Podcast.

Links

The Imperfect Buddha site: https://imperfectbuddha.com

O'Connell Coaching: https://imperfectbuddha.com/authors-notes

Facebook: www.facebook.com/imperfectbuddha

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Imperfectbuddha

This episode involves a conversation with the Tibetologist Sam van Schaik. Sam wrote his original PHd thesis on Dzogchen and the work of Jigme Lingpa and has been involved in the International Dunhuang Project at the British Library, where he currently works, and also teaches at the SOAS University in London. He also happened to write one of my favourite books on Tibet, called appropriately, Tibet: A History. Well-written, entertaining and informative, Sam’s overview of the history of the country that has lived larger than life as a place holder for all manner of western fantasy is a book with academic chops but aimed at a general audience. If you like Donald S. Lopez’s work on Tibet and Buddhism, this is one for you for sure. We discuss it as well as his book Tibetan Zen but the lion’s share of the conversation concerns his latest work on Buddhist Magic. Something of a companion piece to Tibet: A History, it looks at the role magic has played throughout the history of Buddhism and in the wider world of Buddhism today beyond Mindfulness, Secularism, and the cute fantasy that westerners hold that Buddhism is not a religion, but a philosophy. Such folks might like to wonder if the other world religions have ever made similar claims too. I get a story in about my first encounter with the Shugden Oracle in case you are interested.

Links

The Imperfect Buddha site: https://imperfectbuddha.com

O'Connell Coaching: https://imperfectbuddha.com/authors-notes

Facebook: www.facebook.com/imperfectbuddha

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Imperfectbuddha

In an attempt to make more sense of non-Philosophy, and therefore non-Buddhism, I interview Irish philosopher and academic John O Maoilearca, the author of All Thoughts Are Equal, an exceptionally accessible introduction to the work of that pesky French philosopher Francois Laruelle, who we’ve been name dropping on the podcast for quite some time.

Laruelle's work navigates an interesting paradox. On the one hand it can be incredibly straightforward, perhaps more so for those who have not been indoctrinated into philosophical thought. On the other, it presents a wide range of challenges to established philosophy and systematic modes of thought, including those found in Buddhism.

We talk about non-philosophy as a heuristic in this regard, therefore as a kind of practice that people can engage in, and experience certain kinds of liberation through. A practice, I would argue, that compliments Buddhist ideals and fits perfectly well into the practicing life for those intrigued by post-traditional explorations of Buddhist materials, notions and practice techniques.

In part, this episode acts as a preparation for grappling with non-Philosophy and so we unpack three of its most important concepts.

Topics include;

• What makes Laruelle’s non-Philosophy so radical and so intriguing for the world we live in today?

• The Democracy of Thought.

• What are we to make of the democratization in an age of alternative facts, and the difficulty of distinguishing narrative and reality in polarized times?

• Decision, sufficiency, and The Real.

• The most important contribution John’s book makes to Laurellian thought.

• Where non-philosophy is heading.

• Henri Bergson & Mysticism.

Links

The Imperfect Buddha site: https://imperfectbuddha.com

O'Connell Coaching: https://imperfectbuddha.com/authors-notes

Facebook: www.facebook.com/imperfectbuddha

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Imperfectbuddha