Chitta Chat with Lama John Podcast

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lamajohnbuchanan.substack.com

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit lamajohnbuchanan.substack.comIn this episode, Lama John continues discussing the first topic, “The Five Aggregates,” from the classic text “A Manual of Key Buddhist Terms: Categorization of Buddhist Terminologies With Commentary” by Kawa Paltsek. (Click here for an overview of the text.)Continuing with the Non-associated compositional factors started in the previous episode, Lama J…

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit lamajohnbuchanan.substack.comIn this episode, Lama John continues discussing the first topic, “The Five Aggregates,” from the classic text “A Manual of Key Buddhist Terms: Categorization of Buddhist Terminologies With Commentary” by Kawa Paltsek. (Click here for an overview of the text.)Lama John begins by talking about how when we first begin meditating it’s hard to see results, t…

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit lamajohnbuchanan.substack.comIn this episode, Lama John continues discussing the first topic, “The Five Aggregates,” from the classic text “A Manual of Key Buddhist Terms: Categorization of Buddhist Terminologies With Commentary” by Kawa Paltsek. (Click here for an overview of the text.)Lama John spends the first few minutes describing the essence of the effortless path of Mahamudr…

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit lamajohnbuchanan.substack.comIn this episode, Lama John continues discussing the first topic, “The Five Aggregates,” from the classic text “A Manual of Key Buddhist Terms: Categorization of Buddhist Terminologies With Commentary” by Kawa Paltsek. (Click here for an overview of the text.)Lama John first talks about his recent revelation and decision to begin labeling himself as a Ma…

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit lamajohnbuchanan.substack.comIn this episode, Lama John continues discussing the first topic, “The Five Aggregates,” from the classic text “A Manual of Key Buddhist Terms: Categorization of Buddhist Terminologies With Commentary” by Kawa Paltsek. (Click here for an overview of the text.)He continues talking about the fourth aggregate, that of Compositional Factors, also known as me…

In this episode, Lama John continues discussing the first topic, “The Five Aggregates,” from the classic text “A Manual of Key Buddhist Terms: Categorization of Buddhist Terminologies With Commentary” by Kawa Paltsek. (Click here for an overview of the text.)First he talks about his recent two-week retreat, where he discovered the new approach that he will take moving forward with his teaching. He then talks about the fourth aggregate, that of Compositional Factors, also known as mental formations (sankharas), that are considered willful mental actions, triggered by some object, that produce karma. There are 51 psychic factors, which are further delineated into omnipresent factors, determining factors, virtuous factors, six root afflictions, secondary afflictions, and changeable factors (the first two are discussed in this episode). We all experience these factors differently, based on our karma, and the nature of our belief system makes it so that we see only what we believe. He then describes how mindfulness can be for good or bad and similarly our knowledge can be correct or incorrect. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lamajohnbuchanan.substack.com

In this episode, Lama John continues discussing the first topic, “The Five Aggregates,” from the classic text “A Manual of Key Buddhist Terms: Categorization of Buddhist Terminologies With Commentary” by Kawa Paltsek. (Click here for an overview of the text.) He dives into the second and third aggregates, feeling and recognition, and describes the role they play in our happiness and the perception of our reality. As always, karma plays a big role in everything. He describes the three feelings (happiness, suffering, neutral) and how we experience each of the three realms of recognition (desire, form, and formless). He further explains how stability of awareness leads to greater serenity and how, in the formless realm, we can disappear entirely from our concept of self. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lamajohnbuchanan.substack.com

In this inaugural episode of Season 03, Lama John discusses the first topic, “The Five Aggregates,” from the classic text “A Manual of Key Buddhist Terms: Categorization of Buddhist Terminologies With Commentary” by Kawa Paltsek. (Click here for an overview of the text.) The first of the five aggregates (a.k.a., the five skandhas, the five conditions, the five heaps, or the five collections) is the 15 form aggregates, which consists of the four elements and the eleven physical manifestations stemming from those elements. (Buddhism loves its lists and taxonomies, to be sure.) Lama John explains how the four elements can, to a varying degree, be found in everything, and that the interaction between the elements and the physical manifestations creates our reality and our sense of self. The result is our own personal magical display of the elements in space, which is wholly based on our karma. A deep understanding of these interactions will eventually lead us to break down the conceptual barrier of “outside me” and “inside me,” to see that this ignorance of our true nature is, at the end of the day, just an idea in our mind. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lamajohnbuchanan.substack.com

In this episode, Lama John concludes reading from the “Unifying Method and Wisdom” chapter from Kamalaśīla’s “Stages of Meditation,” the final chapter in the text. He begins by talking about how you can gauge progress in your meditation by noticing the cessation of mental afflictions in your mind that had been there before. He then goes on to describe how difficult it is to let go of our samsaric tendencies due to our propensity to get ensnared, virtually non-stop, in the net of our conceptual elaborations. As the text comes to a close, he tells us to never give up, to keep going forward on this path toward the ocean of omniscience, toward Bodhisattvahood, toward Buddhahood. We can do this! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lamajohnbuchanan.substack.com