Integral Faith Practice?
Posted on Nov 21st, 2006
by 
ebuddha
ebuddha
One thing about the Integral Life Practice - it includes:
Mind
Body
Spirit
Shadow
But - there isn't SOUL there - any good community practice must have some SOULfood, IMHO.
At least a heart practice, right?
I've practiced a few different heart practices, but I wonder - is there a specific INTEGRAL heart practice that people know about? That takes as little as 5 minutes, up to 30?
I guess the "official" heart practice is Tonglen.
But this truthfully, isn't as effective as it should be.
I was speaking about this in our ILP Support Group, and one person said that, when he was working with a Buddhist master, the master said it was important to "pray to the Gods" before doing Tonglen, that your Tonglen would be EFFECTIVE. And that this was very necessary. (Being Western, he found it weird to pray to say, Amitabha. But he did notice that his tonglen was more effective.)
At some point, there is going to need to be an "integral ritual", that involves the heart, prayer, (song perhaps?), as I believe humans basic physiology is built to commune in faith, in that way. This also has a double effect to bind communites together.
But - damn - what ritual is going to WORK for us integral types? If any??
Mind
Body
Spirit
Shadow
But - there isn't SOUL there - any good community practice must have some SOULfood, IMHO.
At least a heart practice, right?
I've practiced a few different heart practices, but I wonder - is there a specific INTEGRAL heart practice that people know about? That takes as little as 5 minutes, up to 30?
I guess the "official" heart practice is Tonglen.
But this truthfully, isn't as effective as it should be.
I was speaking about this in our ILP Support Group, and one person said that, when he was working with a Buddhist master, the master said it was important to "pray to the Gods" before doing Tonglen, that your Tonglen would be EFFECTIVE. And that this was very necessary. (Being Western, he found it weird to pray to say, Amitabha. But he did notice that his tonglen was more effective.)
At some point, there is going to need to be an "integral ritual", that involves the heart, prayer, (song perhaps?), as I believe humans basic physiology is built to commune in faith, in that way. This also has a double effect to bind communites together.
But - damn - what ritual is going to WORK for us integral types? If any??
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May 2008
I totally agree with you. We need a devotionnal aspect to balance our practice. I do it that way: sometimes I meditate on the “I”, sometimes I meditate seeing my chosen Avatar. sometimes his “I” and my “I” feel like merging, sometimes I need to visualize him in front of me.