Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for November, 2009

Illness: Fear and Fearlessness

Posted in Illness, tagged , , , , on November 28, 2009 | 12 Comments »

The second of the five great fears in Buddhism is fear of illness.  In the time of the Buddha, and for most of human history until quite recently, this was a formidable fear indeed.  Disease was everywhere.  Infants and small children, as well as adults, were regularly taken away by cholera, diphtheria, influenza, smallpox, and [...]

Read Full Post »

Fear of Life, Fear of Death

Posted in Fear, tagged , , , on November 22, 2009 | 13 Comments »

In Zen we say, “Life and Death is the great matter.”  This is a kind of exhortation to take spiritual practice seriously, but as my teacher used to say, “Don’t be too serious.”  There is a little ego in being too serious.  Anyway, life and death are two sides of the same coin.  They arise [...]

Read Full Post »

Practicing with the Fear of Dying

Posted in Death and Dying, tagged , , on November 14, 2009 | 10 Comments »

It is not easy to “call up” our actual fear of dying.  Like Buddhist or Christian monks of old, we can remind ourselves each morning when we wake up, “Death could come at any time.  Don’t waste time.”  This is useful, though somewhat abstract exercise, though with repetition it sinks in.  As one psychiatrist said [...]

Read Full Post »

Five Great Fears 1

Posted in Uncategorized on November 6, 2009 | 26 Comments »

I have written before about Buddhism’s Five Great Fears; they are fear of death, fear of illness, fear of losing your mind, fear of loss of livelihood, and fear of public speaking.  I think that reason Buddhism calls these “great” fears is because each of them mobilizes the full force of our nervous systems’ threat [...]

Read Full Post »