Dear Friends,
Now back in Mucuge and yesterday had our first meeting in the temple after 6 weeks away. It was good to see so many people there both old and new friends. I invited both Gelek whose from Germany and his friend from France to give a talk on following a spiritual path. They both were previously monks in the Tibetan tradition of Buddhism This was translated from French to Portuguese by a German quite international don't you think? I myself couldn't understand so much as my French and Portuguese are both not so good these days but what I could understand is that most of us have not even considered the meaning of the word "spiritual" . How can we talk about a spiritual path when we don't even understand the meaning of spiritual . What makes something spiritual and why should it be different from our daily lives now? what's the key factor of something being spiritual or not? I think we need to investigate some of our ideas, our concepts so that the answers we get actually give us the support we need to wake up a bit more as to how we can really make our lives not only of benefit to ourselves but others too.It seems we don't know where we're going or why we're going there. If we follow a path where it will take us or if we even want to go there? We run after certain concepts without examining what it might mean in relationship to our own lives. Do you honestly think this way of doing things is very productive? If we do not know what kind of causes and conditions can produce what kind of results and blindly follow what people tell us is right or wrong for us. Seems pretty futile believing that a seed of rice can give you tomato plant-we would check before we planted something wouldn't we to make sure that what we've planted would bring the result of what we wanted to happen. But psychologically we don't examine anything to see how we can find what we might be looking for-Or even what it is we're really looking for, if it could be a state of well-being and genuine happiness. Maybe that is not what we want? Then we need to ask ourselves what it might be that we really want to make us feel good about ourselves and if we get it Is that really the answer to what we're looking for? Ask ourselves what we think is missing from our lives now and how we're going to find whatever it is. You might think i'm a little crazy asking myself all these questions but I know I don't have time to waste-if I invest my time and energy to do something I would like to know it might work as far as bringing about the intended results-So I ask you all the question what does "spiritual" mean to you? What does it mean to follow a spiritual path?love Az
