Personal reflection

I landed in the emergency room a couple of weeks ago. Reflecting on that experience, I realized how useful my practice had been. I'll discuss six aspects of practice that were most important.

How did I get into Buddhism? I'll discuss my first experiences with material from the dharma and how it developed in my life.

It's been almost a year now since our house fire, but the saga is coming to a close. I'm back in my office now making new videos! In this video I'll discuss a bit about what's happened, as well as making some recommendations in case you…

Do all systems of spiritual practice lead to the same place? Are they all essentially identical? This is a view that's come to be known as "perennial philosophy" or "universalism". I'll consider what the Buddha had to say about such…

Here's an update on the state of our house after the interior demo that followed our recent house fire. I'll discuss our plans!

The elements play a key role in early Buddhist meditation practice, but the idea of them didn't originate with the Buddha. I'll look at the history of the elements with a focus on their role in ancient Greek philosophy as well as other…

I'll outline three lessons learned from the fire, worldly wise things that helped out in a time of need, as well as two practices that I've found useful. I'll also consider a couple of key early Buddhist suttas.

We had a house fire a few weeks ago. I'll begin by looking at the Buddha's famous Fire Sermon, traditionally understood to be his third public discourse, and then turn to what happened to us during that long night. I'll also have a nice…

In this video we'll take a look at the idea of finding a "Buddha Before Buddhism," an idea suggested by a recent translation of the Chapter of the Eights (Aṭṭhakavagga) by Gil Fronsdal. I'll talk a bit about his book, then we'll turn to…

How do people practice Buddhism? I'll look at some of the more popular contemporary Buddhist practices from around the world. Recorded before our house fire.

What was Buddhism like early on? We'll consider that question when looking at an early text called the Chapter of the Eights or Aṭṭhakavagga. In particular we'll look at its early concept of dependent origination and how it relates to…

How do you become a Buddha? You work at perfecting several different virtues or "pāramīs". I'll give a brief history of the practice and then go through a list of ten of them from the Theravāda tradition. Then we'll look at some…

The Buddha had a nuanced view on magic and the supernatural. We'll look at one crucial aspect of that view, corresponding to what we might term "conversion magic" or magical means used to convince and convert. Recorded before our house…

There seem to have been differences between Theravāda belief and practice and that found in early Buddhism, however figuring this all out is a matter of some debate and controversy. Translator and scholar Bhikkhu Sujato has written an…

The Buddha often referred to himself as "the Tathāgata". But what does that epithet mean, and where does it come from? I'll look at some scholarly opinions, and then turn to the interesting history of the term. Recorded before our house…

When the Dalai Lama first heard of self-hatred, he was confounded by it. I'll look at his encounter with Sharon Salzberg and other eminent scholars and scientists, and consider their thoughts about where low self esteem arises from. I'll…

What if there were something permanent and unchanging we could possess? Are there conceptions of a self, or beliefs that we should look to as permanent sources of happiness? We'll look at an early discourse of the Buddha that answers…

I'm in a new office/studio space, and have some updates after the fire. Plus I'll discuss how practice helps me get through it all. Stick around!

This is a quick update on the fire that recently broke out in my studio/office. It’ll be awhile until we’re back home!

I’ll be out of commission for awhile. There was a thing.

It's the fourth anniversary of this channel Doug's Dharma on YouTube! To celebrate, I'll look back on several videos I found particularly interesting to make over the past year, and then we'll turn to the top five videos in terms of…

I recently ran a poll on the Community tab of my channel asking how long you all preferred these videos to be. Here I'll discuss the results of that poll and some thoughts I have about the videos for 2021 and beyond!

Well my power was out for a week recently, so I decided to make a video on what it was like, and how the power being out is its own kind of teaching.

How can I help you? In this video I'll discuss the ways I'm trying to provide aid for you in your understanding of early Buddhism, but I'm interested also in hearing other ideas from you!

Today's video is all about a fun announcement I have of a new project to teach the dharma. You all need longer-form material in addition to these YouTube videos. That means courses! I'm starting up the Online Dharma Institute to provide…

Let's talk about four books that drew me to Buddhism, and why. Please put any books that drew you to Buddhism in the comment section below!

It's hard to believe it's been two years already! I'll go over some of the developments we've been through over the past twelve months, and look ahead to some new ones. I'll also discuss the aims of this channel going forward. Thanks to…

We'll take a step back and look at the reason why I started making videos for this YouTube channel, why I feel that the teachings of early Buddhism are so interesting for today. We'll look at how their teachings compare with contemporary…

The news nowadays can be pretty stressful and depressing for many of us. Are there any strategies we can use to lessen its psychological impact on us? I'll outline three basic mindsets we can use, suggested by early Buddhist teachings,…

Today I'll discuss some experiences with a teacher of mine who was in a couple of cults, plus an example of weird Buddhism that provides a bit of a lesson.

Oy, OK this is another experiment. Mixing things up a bit, this is a bit of a "behind the scenes" vlog, talking about some history I've had finding my way with Buddhism and creative writing. OK don't hate on me too much if vlogging isn't…