Todayand#8217;s FBA Dharmabyte and#8220;Aspiration Manifesting in Daily Lifeand#8221; is a lovely Dharma gem from the talk and#8220;Enlightenment as Heart, Life as Whole.and#8221; In the full talk Saddhanandi takes us through a set of very thought-provoking reflections as she explores the difficulties and joys of cultivating faith in the Dharma.
Given at Taraloka, May 2005.
[music] Dharma Bites is brought to you by Free Buddhist Audio, the Dharma for your life. Our work is funded entirely by donations from our generous listeners. If you would like to help us keep this free, make a contribution at freebuddhistaudio.com/donate. Thank you, and happy listening. [music] Okay, I'm moving on to the next bit of a talk, which isn't as long, life as whole. So why this aspiration needs to manifest in our daily lives? Our aspirations need to manifest in our lives because that's how we become complete. It makes us whole. It's what makes our hearts whole. We have to embody our higher values. It gives life to our heart and gives heart to our life. When our heart is strong, our life becomes whole. There's continuity. There's this Chinese teaching, which I've recently learned about, called Essence and Function. Essence is what we value in ourselves, our inner values, if you like. And function is just how we are, what we're doing, how we're functioning in the world. And the art of Essence and Function is to make sure those two things are balanced. That our functioning isn't so dominant that we lose contact with our Essence, or that our Essence isn't so dominant we can't function. Quite an interesting model, actually. So when our hearts and our life meet truly and well, we no longer compartmentalise between what's spiritual and what is not. So spiritual practice just becomes what we're doing now. Anything else is just fantasy, it's just what we think we should be doing. We're not looking for anything special. We've just got a sense of things that are spiritual, I've just been quite ordinary. I think sometimes the way we hold spiritual ideals can put us at odds with our life. It kind of separates us from our life, but really they're just this complete thing. We need to embody enlightenment. It doesn't mean that we have to make big grand gestures. We just have to keep stepping forward. Yes, keep progressing. Small acts are equally important. So just get on with your life, but gather your life around this aspiration and allow that heart of aspiration to make its own demands on your life. We hope you enjoyed today's Dharma Bite. Please help us keep this free. Make a contribution at freebuddhistaudio.com/donny and thank you! [ sub by sk cn2 ] [BLANK_AUDIO]
