From Path to Peace With Todd Perelmuter NewsletterHello my friend,The other day, I was goofing around with my friend and I started laughing so hard my sides hurt, water shot out my nose, and I was crying two waterfalls down my face. And it was awesome. Every single muscle fiber in my body relaxed, there was no thought — it was just pure joy.That’s when it occurred to me: dying from…
In meditation, we can become aware of awareness itself. The first step is simple. Close your eyes and begin by noticing your thoughts. Don’t try to change them. Just observe what the thoughts are, the nature of the thoughts, how one thought jumps to another, how they arise and how they fade away. Really look at what a thought is. As you observe your thoughts, notice something deeper: you are…
We often look back 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, or 100 years and ask, How did humans ever do that? What were they thinking? What was wrong with those people? We call them barbaric or monstrous, whether it was lobotomies on mental patients, denying women their rights, or denying minorities basic human dignity. I always ask: why do we have to wait to look back on other societies? Why can’t…
There was a famous lama I once spoke with in a Buddhist monastery in northern India. He was one of those lamas with the last name “Rinpoche.” I’ll butcher the first name, so I’ll just call him Mr. Rinpoche.He said:A bird needs two wings to fly, and humans need two wings to fly. One is wisdom, and one is experience.Wisdom is the intellectual understanding we develop about ourselves and spirituality…
It’s like watching a movie. It is a wonderful experience, unless we forget that it’s just a movie. But when we realize it is an illusion brought forth by the projector and the screen, then we can truly enjoy it, knowing we’re safe and knowing that nothing can hurt our true selves, that light of consciousness within us. If we look deeply into the nature of the universe, what we…
We all have these most advanced, incredible bodies of infinite potential. When we lose our gratefulness, we lose sight of our infinite nature. Instead of seeing infinite possibilities, we see only obstacles. But when we are grateful for ourselves, we know we can overcome anything, that there is nothing that somebody else has that we do not possess in terms of our inner ability. Every single one of us wins.…
We think we see the world as it is. But we see the world as we interpret it to be, and that interpretation is everything. If we see a picture in the newspaper, and it is a woman crying in front of a burned house, and the caption says, “Woman saved by neighbor,” and we read that and realize this is a happy moment, this isn't a tragic loss. But…
Minimalism is a practice that can really help us appreciate what we have and be very mindful about what we need, what we want, and what isn't contributing to our well-being. So often we're surrounded by stuff that we don't want, that we'll never use, and that is just creating clutter in our house, in our lives, and in our minds. So if we start to really notice what we…
Our minds are not much more than universe simulators. It is truly a remarkable feat that our minds can create such a perfect, solid internal recreation of the outer world. The fact that our minds can project all of the details of our universe, all of the intricate architecture around us, all the complicated details of a flower, in such high resolution, with such clear sound, is truly astonishing. But the…
When someone we love dies, where do they go? What is death?These are stories. They may be universal. We may all suffer immensely, but we are suffering a story. If your friend is moving away forever but going to live at Disney World, their favorite place on earth, you’re not really that sad. So it is our stories that we believe about death that make us suffer.In regard to something we…
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