Coogee Buddhist Group

Sraddha and Imagination

On Thu, 28 April, 2016 - 07:47
Dhammalata's picture
Dhammalata

In my Buddhist community sraddha is the word we use to describe the confidence one develops around something. This faith or confidence must be won for oneself through following our own intuitive sense of rightness. Something seems or feels to be right and so one tests the water around it through a variety of investigations and principally through giving it an authentic trial. 


For example one may have read about meditation, seen the figure of a meditating Buddha or been around a person who one experiences positively and who meditates and so you give it a go. When you give it a go you begin to feel different; you calm down, you see things more clearly and you experience peace …….. and so you develop confidence in it. 


But we also need imagination; we need to imagine a way of being beyond our current one. And so the faculty of imagination is seen as critical if one is to really grow and develop. We need to honour and cultivate our capacity to imagine ways of being that are richer and more satisfying than our current ones even if our current ones are really good!


I hope you can meditate with us this week:


Thursday    7 - 8.30 pm


Sunday       8 - 8.50 am


Much metta


Padmadakini and Dharmalata
 

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