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 Buddhist teachings on family life
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    What's the Opposite of Jealousy? Paid Member

    By Jorge N. Ferrer
    BUDDHIST TRADITION SPEAKS of four "divine abodes," or qualities of an awakened mind to be cultivated and put into practice. Also called the “four immeasurables,” these states—lovingkindness (maitri), compassion (karuna), sympathetic joy (mudita), and equanimity (upeksha)—are to be aroused and radiated outward by the practitioner, without limit or exclusion. Of these, mudita is for many Westerners the least familiar, at least as a term. It refers to the capacity to participate in the joy of others, to take happiness in the happiness of others. Though practice aims ultimately to develop sympathetic joy for all beings, intimate relationships offer everyone—whether Buddhist or not—a precious opportunity to taste its experiential flavor. When we are in love, the joy of our beloved becomes extremely contagious. More »
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    Family Practice Paid Member

    By Lama John Makransky
    I’d been away on a silent retreat for several weeks. We’d engaged in a Dzogchen preliminary practice of self-inquiry in which one asks, “Who is meditating? Who, what is aware?” By retreat’s end, wondering how my family was doing, I called home. Jonathan, who was three at the time, answered the phone. “Daddy!” he said, excited. “Yes.” “WHO are you?” I was stunned; my mind stopped. Jonathan giggled. “Just teasing, Daddy!” More »
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    As If I Were Your Mother Paid Member

    By Sarah Aceto
    My son was less than twenty-four hours old, and I knew he was going to die. The yellow cotton hat snuggled on his precious head, the brown handknit blanket securing his winging arms, he lay silently in the neonatal-ICU clear plastic crib. Veins no longer pricked, oxygen hood gone, lungs finally clear, he was healthy. Skye was coming home, yet I knew he would die. Some day. More »
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    Family Dharma: The Joy of Generosity Paid Member

    By Beth Roth
    Many years ago I learned that the Buddha taught ethical conduct as the necessary prerequisite for meditation practice. It made perfect sense. As my teacher Jack Kornfield says, “Can you imagine settling down on your cushion for a peaceful meditation session after a full day of killing, stealing, and lying?” Much later I discovered that the Buddha taught the practice of generosity first, as a foundation for establishing an ethical lifestyle. I marveled at the possibility that generosity might be the most important thing of all, the platform on which our actions, our meditation practice, and our spiritual journey rest. More »
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    The Dharma of Motherhood Paid Member

    By Trish Deitch Rohrer
    There have been moments in my life when I’ve felt that I found Buddhism mostly so that my daughter, Maud, now fourteen, could grow up around a dharma practitioner. It’s never been a problem, trying to practice with Maud around the house: At five, she was as fascinated by the idea of my sitting as she was by everything else I did. For a five-year-old, how was my practicing shamatha different from my putting on makeup, doing yoga in the middle of the living room floor, driving a stickshift, struggling for hours at my computer over a single paragraph? It was all the same to her—the mystery of Mama, and of womanhood, and of humanness. More »