Gil Fronsdal invites us to see Buddhism not as a doctrine but as a lived experience where insight, trust, and letting go give rise to genuine freedom.
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This week on the BHNN Guest Podcast, Gil Fronsdal dives into:
- How the twelve steps of dependent origination fit into the schema of Buddhist practice
- The stark difference between an insight and a belief
- Buddhism as a path to walk rather than a doctrine to believe in
- Turning from suffering and clinging to peace
- Finding out how Buddhism is meaningful to us individually
- How we have all been liberated from something in our lives
- Appreciating the relief and clarity that comes from letting go of clinging
- The profound act of trust that it takes to be open and present
- The door of the wishless, when the mind stops desiring
- Looking at things exactly as they are rather than trying to conceptualize
“How deep and thorough can we let go? Can we liberate ourselves? The challenge that Buddhism offers us, more than a doctrine, it offers us a challenge that it is possible to get into the very deepest roots of the clinging in our hearts and uproot it, to become free from it.” –Gil Fronsdal
This episode was originally published on Dharmaseed
About Gil Fronsdal:
Gil Fronsdal is the co-teacher for the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California; he has been teaching since 1990. He has practiced Zen and Vipassana in the U.S. and Asia since 1975. He was a Theravada monk in Burma in 1985, and in 1989 began training with Jack Kornfield to be a Vipassana teacher. Gil teaches at Spirit Rock Meditation Center where he is part of its Teachers Council. Gil was ordained as a Soto Zen priest at the San Francisco Zen Center in 1982, and in 1995 received Dharma Transmission from Mel Weitsman, the abbot of the Berkeley Zen Center. He currently serves on the SF Zen Center Elders’ Council. In 2011 he founded IMC’s Insight Retreat Center. He is the author of The Issue at Hand, essays on mindfulness practice; A Monastery Within; a book on the five hindrances called Unhindered; and the translator of The Dhammapada, published by Shambhala Publications. You may listen to Gil’s talks on Audio Dharma.
“Instead of a doctrine to believe in, Buddhism offers a path to walk, a path to engage in, a path of practice that leads to seeing something in a particular way.” –Gil Fronsdal