From Ven Robina - One scientist a few years ago said that neuroplasticity “is the greatest finding of the twentieth century.” I’m glad we’re catching up with the Buddha who’s been telling us this for quite a while!

If we could have confidence in this, it’d radically change our lives. Right now, instinctively we assume that the anger, the fears, the depression are at the core of our being.

The skill we need to learn is to hear those thoughts and then to change them. But the trouble is we don’t notice what the mind is doing until our body feels it, and that’s too late.

For Buddha, what’s in my mind at this moment is mine, regardless of what triggered it; it’s mine, it’s my jealousy, my love, my compassion. This consciousness is one’s own. Awareness of this gets deeper and deeper and deeper as we go along in our practice. We really learn to own what we think and feel. And therefore we learn to change it. As Lama Zopa Rinpoche says, “We can mould our mind into any shape we like”.

When: 10 am, Second Saturday of each Month
March 12, April 9, May 14,June 11,July 9, August 13, September 10, October 8, November 12, December 10.

Where: via Zoom

Meet the Teacher: Ven. Robina Courtin

Ordained since the late 1970s, Ven. Robina has worked full-time since then for Lama Thubten Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche's FPMT. Over the years she has served as editorial director of Wisdom Publications, editor of Mandala Magazine, executive director of Liberation Prison Project, and as a touring teacher of Buddhism.

Her life and work with prisoners have been featured in the documentary films Chasing Buddha and Key to Freedom. Venerable Robina has traveled extensively and taught the Dharma all over the world. Venerable is an extraordinary person with boundless energy and charisma and her style when teaching the Dharma is sparklingly clear, direct, and compassionate.