American Buddha Bulletin Board

The Interview

Her phone rang, and she recognized the number. Samantha, the lawyer Adam Lobel had recommended she work with. She answered, “Hello, Samantha.”

“Hi Andrea, just to let you know, Jeff Martens is on the phone with me here. He’s an associate here at the firm, helping me on this matter ...

In response to an r/ShambhalaBuddhism thread on Reddit, where Samten Lahri was pushing Thrangu Rinpoche's teachings on guru devotion, I posted this:

Devotion to the teacher is not necessary to develop respect for the knowledge s/he transmits. Actual knowledge carries its own warrant of credibility ...

GOOD DAY, SUNSHINE

“I need to laugh, and when the sun is out,
I’ve got something I can laugh about.
I feel good, in a special way,
I’m in love and it’s a sunny day.
Good day, Sunshine!”

-- Lennon – McCartney

The mandala of her mind was ready. Cleansed by wisdom fire, wind and water, clean to ...

Three Flavors of Denial

Currently, the Shambhala scions are playing a game that status-seekers always play when a power structure crumbles. In " Homage to Catalonia ," George Orwell describes how swiftly Anarcho-Communists became fascists when Spain fell to Franco under a hail of German bombs. It ...

...do we really want to join forces with someone who is honest and capable, or do we secretly want to go with someone who we know is dishonest so they will obstruct our enlightened wishes? Maybe we really don't want to have the good thing happen to us that we say we do, but actually we want bad ...

Shambhala's Social Justice Deflection Gambit
by Charles Carreon
6/22/19

Please Do Not Disturb the Looters

There’s nothing more dangerous to a tyrant than frank accusations that stick. Baker Roshi got away with bedding a lot of women who came to Zen Center to do shikantaza, not hanky panky, but ...

Embattled Sakyong Steps Down: Imaginary Press Release Two Years in the Future
by Tara Carreon
February, 2005

-- Born in Tibet, Again: The Exile of the Twelfth Trungpa Tulku. How Sakyong Mipham Usurped the Trungpa Throne, by Charles Carreon

EMBATTLED SAKYONG STEPS DOWN.

Increasingly the focus ...

Voidsuck This!: Charles Carreon’s Review of Riding The Torch by Norman Spinrad
by Charles Carreon
February, 2005

In this novelette, published some years back, the august chronicler of imaginary odysseys was hammering away on his piece of malleable mindstuff, refining the themes that became more ...

Seven Minutes in Tibet: The Swift, Unfortunate Death of Douglas Seymour Mackiernan
by Charles Carreon
February, 2005

https://www.american-buddha.com/sevenminutetibet.1a.jpg
Douglas Mackiernan (standing in the middle) against a snowy landscape not unlike that across which he attempted to flee ...

RIGHTEOUS LIVELIHOOD -- BUILDING WEALTH IN OUR COMMUNITY
by Charles Carreon
June 1, 2006

Invisible Hand, 101

Adam Smith was one of the first economists, and those who feel that the government should stay out of labor relations, or at least refrain from supporting the goals of workers and ...