Like I said and I want to repeat again. When I say “introduction to this next and current generation” it doesn’t mean you have to tell them how to do the Preliminaries, it doesn’t mean you have to teach how to maintain a posture,like a piece of wood, like not moving at all, it doesn’t mean that. It can be something more gentle, more loving, more eye opening experience, more with the wisdom, more with the clarity, more with the meditation, something more gentle, something combined with their lifestyle, something that they don’t feel embarrassed to share with their kids and their friends.
That’s why I teach the Niguma Yoga, that’s the whole purpose because the Yoga is seen as something that is not so religious anymore. The kids are doing it at school, the prisoners are doing it in prison, you know. People who are working in the office and when they come out, those who are unemployed, taking a break, they do the Yoga and meditation.
So I’m doing what I can, I’m sure I can do better. But that doesn’t mean that only a few have a responsibility. I do what I can but I also mean that “you” have a responsibility to do more or less the same.
Whether we have a title or not doesn’t matter. It is a collective responsibility that we have for this next generation. Because there are many kids in this current generation who are atheist, and this is an opportunity for us to talk about Buddhism. And I don’t see it as a decline but if you are not careful it will be the beginning of decline.
So therefore we have the responsibility to modernize how we introduce Buddhism, that we no longer stuck with a very conservative cultural barrier but be more out there. I think that is necessary.
Because people who are interested in Buddhism, you know, if you don’t have the right presentation they just need to be disappointed once, not twice, then they will look for something else as an alternative which is a loss for the Buddhist community and the Buddhist society at large.
Kalu Rinpoche
FB Livestream – February 8, 2024 (1h 14′ 01”)
To be continued …
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