Buddhist Voices
Buddhist Voices

50 Years, 50 Voices: Amitamati and Ratnadeva (Highlights)

By Candradasa on Wed, 29 Aug, 2018 - 16:21

It’s like the laboratory of our minds.
Ratnadeva

It excites me too, the science… very strong links, science and Dharma.
Amitamati

NB. Amitamati has been in touch to say that in track 3 when she refers to having studied “Social Sciences” for 25 years she actually meant “Life Sciences”.

Amitamati’s Annals

In 1968: I wasn’t born! May be My consciousness was waiting for the right womb!

I was born in 1970 into a Buddhist family – my grandparents on both sides had converted with Dr...

Buddhist Voices
Buddhist Voices

Fifty Years, Fifty Voices Website now live!

By Satyalila on Sun, 26 Aug, 2018 - 19:18

Fifty Years, Fifty Voices Website now live!

By Satyalila on Sun, 26 Aug, 2018 - 19:18

Just a quick note to announce that the Fifty Years, Fifty Voices website is now live!  It was always our intention to present the voices through a website, not just this, more ’linear’, blog.  Rijupatha has made a great start with the website, presenting all the voices currently available (20/50 so far) in an ‘at a glance’ way, side by side, but also sort-able by the topic areas each person touches on.  It’s a beginning of the vision for the website and...

Buddhist Voices
Buddhist Voices

50 Years, 50 Voices: Purna (Highlights)

By Satyalila on Tue, 14 Aug, 2018 - 16:02

I couldn’t have done it any other way, as hard as it was…

Purna’s Annals 

In 1968 I turned 20 and was in the second year of a Maths and Physics degree. Joined my brother for a yacht trip around the South Pacific for two months, sailing to Samoa, Tonga and Fiji. Hove to for three days surviving a tropical cyclone. Finished my degree and started travelling in South-East Asia and India to find a Buddhist meditation teacher.

In 1978, having been ordained by Bhante on...

Buddhist Voices
Buddhist Voices

Fifty Years, Fifty Voices Exhibition Goes up at Adhisthana

By Satyalila on Tue, 14 Aug, 2018 - 10:29

Fifty Years, Fifty Voices Exhibition Goes up at Adhisthana

By Satyalila on Tue, 14 Aug, 2018 - 10:29

It was great - and fitting! - to have Ananda’s help in putting up the Fifty Years, Fifty Voices exhibition in the Adhisthana library just after the Blake retreat last month.  Here he is hanging a photo we’ve used of the first ordinations in 1968 - tho’ unfortunately he’s not actually in that image himself.  Huge thanks to Dhammarati for fitting in the design work on this - and doing such a fab job, as ever - amidst his myriad other tasks

The exhibition is...

Buddhist Voices
Buddhist Voices

50 Years, 50 Voices: Aryadhi (Highlights)

By Satyalila on Tue, 7 Aug, 2018 - 15:30

 I think it was the missing piece of the jigsaw, as it were.

Aryadhi’s Annals

In 1968 I was 6 years old, final year at infant school and struggling with the outside world as I experienced it through school.

In 1978 I was 16 and studying for ‘A’ levels, on the brink of adulthood but feeling an outsider, never really fitting in and very afraid.

In 1988 I was working in a classical music publishers in London and leading a life immersed in the arts – in and...

Buddhist Voices
Buddhist Voices

Fifty Years, Fifty Voices: Introduction, Invitation & Kit

By Satyalila on Mon, 23 Jul, 2018 - 11:35

Although we now have the first ‘Fifty Voices’ in the can and they’ll be appearing here in due course, they’re just a start in terms of the bigger vision of the project.  The editorial board (Lokeshvara, Nagabodhi and Vidyamala), Candradasa and I are all keen that as many voices of Order Members as possible are recorded while we still can.  One original suggestion for the project included recording the ‘first 50’ OMs - but on balance we decided to go...

Buddhist Voices
Buddhist Voices

Celebrating Dhivati - whose legacy part-funded Fifty Years, Fifty Voices

By Satyalila on Mon, 18 Jun, 2018 - 14:56

Here, Sucimani talks with me about Dhivati, whose legacy part-funded The Fifty Years, Fifty Voices Project..  Although we don’t have any recordings of Dhivati herself (a reminder to us to record while we can!), we do have a celebration of her life written by Vijayasri and her family have helped us to put together her ‘Annals’. 

Dhivati’s Annals

In 1968 Dhivati was Joyce Mumford, living in Chessington, married to Ian and mother of Bill, Liz and Julia, taking them to Quaker Meeting each...

Buddhist Voices
Buddhist Voices

50 Years, 50 Voices: Vessantara (Highlights)

By Satyalila on Thu, 31 May, 2018 - 15:00

…there was something which came through Bhante which really was full of Dharma qualities, and that’s what started Triratna…

 Vessantara’s Annals
In 1968 I’m 18, and spend eight months working in clerical jobs, earning money before going to Cambridge University to study English. I’ve adopted a hippie view of the world and spend hours in my friend Les Doyle’s attic bedroom, which is painted black and decorated with silver foil, listening to early Pink Floyd and Jimi Hendrix. I’m reading about eastern religions,...

Buddhist Voices
Buddhist Voices

50 Years, 50 Voices: Karunadevi (Highlights)

By Candradasa on Thu, 24 May, 2018 - 15:00

…these issues that were very controversial, they didn’t make me want to run away. But they did make me wonder whether I could be a part of the Order.

Karunadevi’s Annals
In 1968 I had recently moved to the San Francisco Bay Area from Iowa with my husband. I was 24 years old, had graduated from Iowa State University in ’66 and was teaching 4th grade. California was a very different culture, especially around San Francisco, and I felt both overwhelmed and enthralled...

Buddhist Voices
Buddhist Voices

Some Glimpses Into The Vision And Sometimes Messy Unfolding Of The Triratna Buddhist Order on its 50th anniversary

By Satyalila on Fri, 18 May, 2018 - 13:04

This is a talk I gave on our Sangha Night in Bristol to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Order in April.  It puts the ‘Fifty Years, Fifty Voices’ project in context alongside the Sangharakshita Complete Works and includes a sneak preview of a number of ‘voices’ from the project, including Vessantara on Bhante in the early days, Buddhadasa on the Order & Arya Sangha, Vajratara on what she loves about the Order, , Manjusvara...

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