lynda.com

What do two Ani's do on a Friday night after their fire puja to remove obstacles to getting the teachings out in the world? They hunker down and watch training tutorials on lynda.com.

Both of us have a comfort level with technology, and some experience with software such as photoshop and video editing tools, but designing an entire website requires skills we are only just beginning to cultivate.

Ani Yeshi has had the good fortune to attend classes through her work, for myself it is all self study. Thus, resources are key.

For those of you that might be interested in learning how to do some of the things you'll see emerge here over time, I highly recommend lynda.com. They have an extensive library of up to date and useful video tutorials on many software titles. I've used other online training resources, ranging from vtc.com (also good, but not quite as good) to adobe and macromedia sponsored "online universities". Lynda has a variety of titles at a great price.

It does work well as a sleep aid in the evenings though...

We're up for another webcast this Sunday of the video teaching! Hope you are able to share the experience!

The Beginning of the Long Haul

Well,

A blog about building a website as a beginner isn't as photo friendly as a blog about renovating Stupas! (see http://astupasuccess.blogspot.com to understand where I am coming from).

But, what can happen is folks who are interested can share resources! So here's a link to a site that Asbhy turned us onto:

http://www.webdesignfromscratch.com/reduce-reuse-recycle.cfm

This is just one page from an extensive site on designing for usability. If there is anything we hope to accomplish with this website it is achieving a site where the user is so comfortable with the interface that they can totally focus on the content.

We webcast a class for more seasoned students last night (hence it was password protected)and utilized the chat feature on ustream. It worked well, allowing distant students to feel they could truly participate. One thing that resulted was that a couple of our monks in Arizona had a conversation with a woman who works for a video production company. They sent her contact info on to us and we're going to see if she'll open a dialog with us. The webcasting seems to really help not only deliver our message (the teachings) but also helps those receiving them feel more like they are part of a larger community, rather than just browsing isolated movies on the web.

I'll post all kinds of links here as we go on, from learning resources to equipment resources.

For now, though it sounds like a bunch of tech speak to most of my associates, I know I'm just a baby geek. And all this effort is worth it only if I am able to translate it into something that can help others connect with the precious Dharma!

Keeping Heart Samaya

Well, we don't have our website built yet, and odds are good it will take a while to get through that. So, as folks have been asking how to access the recorded teachings, I've decided to go ahead and post them here.

Below is the teaching shown yesterday from Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo. She is our spiritual director here at KPC, and our Root Lama. For more about her and who we are please visit www.tara.org.

In fact, while we're at it, if you'd like to post a comment about the teaching it would be great to hear from you!

The teaching is titled "Keeping Heart Samaya" and is 10 years old (just so you understand why Jetsunma looks so young), but profoundly timeless. In it Jetsunma describes the path of vajrayana from the Four Noble Truths all the way through the Three Root Practices, all in the context of Guru Yoga, and all in a language we western students can hear. There is a wealth of wisdom in this teaching, please enjoy for the benefit of all:



It is auspicious to make offerings at the time of receiving a teaching, in gratitude for the teacher sharing her wisdom. As we are trying to reduce the barriers to distant students being able to participate in studying and practicing the Dharma, we have provided you a way to make an offering easily. There is a donate button on the right of this page. Any amount is worthwhile, please consider supporting this Dharma activity in the world, both the Lama and the temple, and our budding efforts at building a cyber sangha.

May we never forget those with hopes of us!

Added Elements

Well, won't be lengthy post today. We successfully webcast another Sunday video teaching from the temple. This allows folks around the world to see the teaching simultaneously (well, almost---there's about a 10 second delay between the live event and the video on a computer screen).

I've embedded the feed right over there on this blog! It'll stay at the top of the page so you can check in and see the teachings when they happen! We have a proper webcast page of course, but in case you stumble across us when we're streaming you can catch a glimpse and decide if you want to head over and watch it on a larger scale!

In case anyone is waiting in suspense, we did fit test the "bookcase" element of the throne (yes, I did forget my camera) and much to our relief it did indeed fit!

All the efforts recounted here are done with the hope they will bring benefit to beings, both in the immediate circumstance and in an ongoing way by helping establish the Dharma in the west.

If you're interested in our projects drop us a line, we'd love to hear from you. Even if you just have feedback or suggestions, we're all ears.

May we never forget those with hopes of us!

Webcasting and Planning

We spent the day in practice then getting a treatment from Wun Hee, an acupuncturist. Ani Yeshi and I both see her, though I was adopted in. Ani had to go as a result of her syncopy.

Once that was done we made some progress on a project we've been tending for some months now. Though we know nothing about carpentry (not unlike our upcoming endeavors in the web development world) we are in the final phases of building a new throne for our temple. I'll hopefully remember the camera and get some photos of that tomorrow.

We are still in the early stages of developing the website we've taken on, planning is barely begun.

We have, however, already begun to work with technology that we plan to use for the site. Ustream (mentioned earlier) has opened up a whole new venue for the teachings we receive. Hard to believe it's been just a little more than a week since we had our first broadcast! It has already brought up policy and procedure issues though, as we're already getting inquiries about embedding our content on other websites. You think you're just going to build a media driven website (a chunky enough task by itself) and suddenly you're confronted with questions about proprietary content, how to fundraise when the goal is a free site where folks can experience the Dharma anywhere in the world.

While we chew on those questions here's a video of Khenpo Tenzin Norgye teaching on the Buddhist path from a Vajrayana perspective. It's an overview, open to all:



Feedback on the technical aspects of this is welcome!

We'll be webcasting the Sunday teaching we view at the temple (a video teaching) tomorrow at 2pm eastern time if you want to tune in! Just go to our

webcast page

May every being connect with their true nature!

Fuel for Progress

Back in late September my buddy Ani Yeshi had an episode of vasovagal syncopy. For those who've never heard of it, her heart stops every now and then sometimes causing a faint. This first time it happened in her car (not convenient, but fortunately no damage was done) and then a few more times in the hospital. MDs say all is well as it is not a life threatening condition (unless you are in a dangerous place when it happens!). She has given me permission to post all this, but the whole ordeal was an "in your face" example of impermanence. She's recovered from it, though once in a while she feels unwell (so far no further faints though!). Today was one of those days....so we deployed our training as Buddhists....





Since Ani wasn't feeling great we employed one of the antidotes we know of...saving lives. Fortunately for us we live near the Potomac river, where fishing is popular. So we stopped at the local convenience store (BWB) and pick up a bucket of minnows. Our goal is to save them from ending up on the end of a hook...



There they are...




We take them to the river to release them after giving them a few "om mani pedme hung!"




Sorry the images aren't great. The only camera I had with me today was the one in my cellphone. But the little guys are now swimming in the Potomac river. Yeah, they may likely end up fish food anyway, but at least they had a shot at freedom for a while, and they did receive prayers from a couple of nuns!




We do fire pujas (smoke offerings) daily. We've found that working on Dharma activities can be challenging. Obstacles arise. The fire puja or smoke offering is a way to pacify obstacles through generosity.

We have no view, but fortunately we do try to utilize the technology of the Dharma as well as the worldly technology of computers and equipment.

A New Adventure

Well, you may remember some of us from the Stupa Renovation. We've undertaken a new task! We're working on creating a media website for our organization. I would say for our temple, but we now have two centers and some study groups around the world...hence the desire to make the Precious Treasury of Dharma teachings we have and continue to receive available to anyone who can connect to the internet.

Here's the video we cast this morning (yes, it will have 45 minutes of sitting still and meditating, but the beginning 30 minutes do provide instruction on a fundamental mediation technique practiced by our tradition).


Now, if you've ever seen our previous blog you'd know we're used to plunging into major projects we know nothing about.

So here we are, at it again. Ani Yeshi and I have begun working with other members of our temple to develop a website, Palyul Media International. Grand vision, but for those of us who found blogging attractive because it requires no programming knowledge, well, it's another steep learning curve!

It's a long term project, and as usual we'll share with you things that have worked well for us, and what hasn't. We will also, as always, invite suggestions or comments!

We are newbies to web development, but devoted to sharing the Dharma with the world!

More when I've caught up on some sleep, or maybe I can persuade my associate to contribute with news!