Buddhas in my pocket

Four months ago twenty little buddhas found their way to new homes on one night. I had the good fortune to live for a month with twenty people who were living their life with a total dedication to developing compassion and wisdom. Some of them I had met before and some I hadn’t. The month together was full of beauty, laughter, friendship, inspiration, uplift and new learnings.
In that time our wonderful 93 year old teacher died and I know we will all continue to share, across the world, the gifts he gave us.
Forever grateful.

Buddhas donated by Pasadadipa, UK

There’s been a pause in handing on the remaining 80 little donated Buddhas.  My energy needed to be directed to supporting family more intensively for a while, so the trips to the town square were put on hold. I have really missed those random, uplifting encounters.

So today I was delighted to receive this communication from a friend who chose some of the little Buddhas to take with her to the UK recently.

I never imagined one of these precious donations would make it all the way to Adhisthana into the hands of my main teacher Sangharakshita-the  man who in many ways gave me the gift of the dharma.

Here is my friend’s letter …..

“Hello dear Maitripala,
Today I went to see Bhante to say goodbye and I wanted to give him a gift. I didn’t have many things with me that I could have given  Bhante. Then I remembered the Buddhas  you gave me. First I felt a bit shy about it but my community members encouraged me to do it, so I put it in my pocket.

It was so wonderful seeing Bhante again. He was in a great mood. We talked about the birds at Vijayaloka and the trams of Melbourne. Then we talked about how to make decisions, the significance of commitment and of faith.

Bhante said ‘Faith is your connection to what is higher.’  He said “Faith is the seed of the spiritual life”.

I told him that sometimes when I think about rebirth I feel so overwhelmed about having to come back again and again to samsara and he leaned back and laughed. He said the Bodhisattva doesn’t tire of samsara. He said I should never give up and take advantage of every opportunity.

I felt the arising of faith so overwhelming that it brought me to tears. I had a sense that this wasn’t the first time we were having this conversation.

I gave him the little Buddha as a parting gift and told him about your project which he seemed to know about.

Here is a photo of the Buddha (donated by dear Dhiracharita) in the hands of Bhante.

How very wonderful. This was a moment I will reflect on again and again. “