Wednesday, 22nd May 2013 10:00am. Home
| Ripened on the Vine by Sati Saraniya | ||||
| Saturday, June 17, 2006
Devoted to this work of emptying and opening the heart, the fruits we taste, like his joy in offering them, are greater than those of the earth. They are indeed heavenly - beyond pain, beyond death.
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| A Community of One by Sati Saraniya | ||||
| Sunday, April 30, 2006
I had long wished to be a hermit. Now, in these times of despondency, I visualised the faces of my spiritual companions far away and felt unequal to eremetic life.
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| Sole Food by Sati Saraniya | ||||
| Wednesday, April 12, 2006
I find this both humane and comforting especially when collecting alms alone in a Western city. On the sidewalks of the non-Buddhist world, mendicancy has vastly different overtones. There are no formalities or scripts to follow.
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| Not Equal and Not Less by Sati Saraniya | ||||
| Friday, April 07, 2006
Sayadaw U Pandita once said he could not make me a bhikkhuni but I could become a bhikkhu, one worthy of the robe, who had left the home life and -purified the stains. Moved and encouraged by this loftier footing, I would use it as my compass.
In every encounter, I can choose to respond well - with kindness, gentleness, and care towards all – unequivocally. That is the brief for my life.
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| Setting the Pagoda Alight by Sati Saraniya | ||||
| Friday, March 31, 2006
When I was 37, I undertook an intensive meditation retreat at the Mahasi Sasana Yeiktha in Rangoon. Within several months, inspired by the purity and profound benefits of the practice, I felt called to the holy life and, in honour of that intention, navigated through a maze of dusty roads to worship at the sacred Shwedagon Pagoda.
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| Not Straying from Ancient Virtue by Sati Saraniya | ||||
| Wednesday, March 29, 2006
Even when I can endure and be content with little, I sense a pernicious psychological need for approval, encouragement, and appreciation – to be remembered and cared for beyond the physical requisites of life. These yearnings of the heart undermine the practice of renunciation.
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| The Ninth Patch by Sati Saraniya | ||||
| Wednesday, March 08, 2006
Steeling myself, I recalled my lifetime vows. As the daughter of the Buddha, I would never forsake them. I would endure hunger, discomfort, danger – any obstacle – to continue walking in his footsteps.
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| Lenten Feast by Sati Saraniya | ||||
| Wednesday, March 08, 2006
Steeling myself, I recalled my lifetime vows. As the daughter of the Buddha, I would never forsake them. I would endure hunger, discomfort, danger – any obstacle – to continue walking in his footsteps.
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| Composting the Heart by Sati Saraniya | ||||
| Saturday, February 25, 2006
We must care for the state of our minds where all conflict and unhappiness take root. This then will enable us to address the source of our dis-ease and so overcome the moral inertia that brings harm to ourselves and others – our mental and emotional addiction, aggression, instability and excess. And we accomplish this by applying moral principles even to the smallest details of our daily lives and relationships.
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| Taming of the Shrewd by Sati Saraniya | ||||
| Sunday, February 19, 2006
My personal identity was dismantled on the day I donned the robes of a Buddhist nun in Rangoon. After months of intensive meditation, I prayed at the Thursday Shrine of the Shwedagon Pagoda, being born on that day, to ordain as a nun. Within three weeks, I was accepted, my robes were quickly sewn, and the nuns gathered to chant while one of their elders scraped away the remnants of my hair with a cutthroat razor.
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