May 3: Ayya Brahmavara gave a Dhamma talk that centered around Right Speech.
May 6: Ayya Brahmavara gave a fantastic talk on the Three Characteristics: impermanence, unsatisfactoriness and not self. I forgot to push the record button! Ayya laughed and said it was a perfect example of her talk.
May 10: Ayya Brahmavara gave a Dhamma talk on the Ten Paramis: generosity, morality, wisdom, energy, letting go (renunciation), patience, determination, loving friendliness, truthfulness and equanimity.
May 13: Ayya gave reflections on the life of the Buddha and how we can apply the birth, awakening and passing of the Buddha to every moment, with awareness.
May 17: Ayya starts this Dhamma talk by reviewing the last three months of the Buddha's life. Sariputta, in his last encounter with the Buddha, mentions that all the Buddhas have taught three things: the five hindrances, the four satipatthanas and the seven factors of Awakening. Ayya then gave an extensive teaching on the five hindrances: desire, aversion, restlessness, sleepiness and doubt.
May 20: Ayya started with a story of when and why the Buddha to be developed his aspiration to become Awakened. She then went on to tell the story of his meeting with Dipankara, the previous Buddha. In that lifetime our Buddha to be's name was Sumedha. Dipankara announced to an assembly that Sumedho would be the next Buddha and also said his chief disciples would be Sariputta and Mogallana and that his attendant would be Ananda. Tha Ap 491: Dhammaruciyattheraapadāna—Jonathan S. Walters (suttacentral.net) After this introduction and a review of the previous Path factors, she discussed the sixth Path factor, Right Effort.
May 24: Ayya gives reflections on Right Mindfulness, the seventh factor of the Noble Eightfold Path. She discusses the four pastures or focuses of mindfulness.
May 27: Ayya gave a Dhamma talk on Right Samadhi, stillness.
May 31: Ayya talked about the Factors of Enlightenment.
Comments