Links for Monday

• This video of Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche answering the question of karma, free will and pre-destination is short but sweet. Reflects a lot of what I wrote in my recent post on the topic. I notice that he runs through all the perspectives from a soteriological (i.e. a pragmatic, “what will liberate us”) perspective — he doesn’t definitively answer the question from a metaphysical perspective but rather tries to provide a variety of helpful views that support practice. He ends up at the “mindfulness gives you free will to stop the chain of karmic action-determination” View.

• I finally got around to watching Werner Herzog’s beautiful documentary on the Kalachakra (wheel of time) initiation. A wonderful depiction of the intricacies of ritual practice. Seeing the devotion of the monks in their multi-year prostrating walks to the pilgrimage sites was awe-inspiring. The creation and then destruction of a beautiful sand mandala as a reminder of impermanence was also very moving. The Dalai Lama in a brief interview also expounds on the sacredness to be found everywhere at all times, not just at holy sites. And of course Herzog’s commentary is always good for a few laughs. Related: this NPR article about the chanting of Gyuto monks. Worth a listen!

• Great Twitter thread listing out psychologists who have attempted to bridge “the transpersonal” (i.e. spiritual) and Western psychotherapeutic. I had been familiar with only a small subset of these folks. Of them, I’d only heard of Judith Blackstone based on this podcast and someone I met at a party who was doing Realization Process and said great things about it. Related: long article by one of the psychotherapists (Ron Manley) on non-duality and attachment repair, highlighting the need for somatic therapies and suggesting that people with damaged attachment systems are prone to engage in spiritual seeking for relief.