Practice Library

Generosity and dana

18 teachings in the library are about this.

• D2S3 - Questions, and Whether Our Habits Really Change David Oromith · 59 minutes · recorded August 8, 2026

  The evening opens with a few minutes of settling in the body and the breath, then David works through questions from the room and from online. He talks about whether effort really does change our habits day by day, and about phrases like "so what, who cares, no big deal" and "it happens" for small irritations. Later ones cover sounds that pull the attention away, grief after a family death, feeling unworthy of receiving generosity, and where giving to our own detriment starts.

• D2S1 - Generosity, Contentment and Gratitude David Oromith · 86 minutes · recorded August 8, 2026

  The session opens with twenty minutes of mindfulness of breathing in which we release distractions with every out breath. David then begins the six perfections with the first, dana, generosity, which he describes as an attitude rather than always handing things over, and why expecting something back spoils it. He covers the three kinds of giving, material things, fearlessness and the teachings, then contentment and gratitude as antidotes to attachment. It closes with a practice called harvesting joy.

• Ryokan and the Moon David Oromith · 30 minutes · recorded February 1, 2026

  The meditation is an inquiry into awareness itself, in which we release thoughts, feelings and sensations to rest in what remains when everything else is set aside. David tells the Zen story of Ryokan and the thief who found nothing worth stealing, and talks about how giving away his only robe reveals that real wealth, unlike possessions, cannot be stolen or given away.

• Session Two - Enthusiasm, People Pleasing and Contemplation David Oromith · 82 minutes · recorded October 15, 2025

  The session opens with a guided meditation in which we drop from body sensation into resting in bare awareness itself, then continues through generosity, joyful effort and concentration among the six perfections. David explains the three kinds of giving, why generosity is spoiled by wanting something back, and pictures contentment and gratitude as floating in a reservoir, before setting out the three levels of wisdom: study, contemplation and meditation. Questions cover where generosity shades into people pleasing.

• Random Acts of Kindness David Oromith · 35 minutes · recorded May 4, 2025

  In the loving kindness meditation we extend the wish for genuine wellbeing from ourselves outward to a loved one, a stranger and finally someone we find difficult. David talks about noticing the small kindnesses that rarely make the news, from a stranger helping push a stuck car free of mud to holding a door open, and about practising one small act of generosity a day while letting go of any need for thanks.

• Session 3 - Cultivating Bodhicitta & Generosity David Oromith · 83 minutes · recorded February 5, 2025

  In the guided meditation we work through the sevenfold cause-and-effect method for cultivating bodhicitta, recognising all beings as having once been a mother, then building gratitude, loving-kindness and great resolve. David contrasts this with the equalising and exchanging method, then turns to the first paramita, generosity, described as a state of mind rather than an act, using the story of a poor woman's simple offering to the Buddha. Questions cover how expectation can quietly poison giving.

• D5S3 - Non-Attachment, Generosity and the Roots of Ethics David Oromith · 90 minutes · recorded December 2, 2024

  Desire and aversion are treated as appearances without solid existence, like a rainbow that can be admired but never grasped, or the death of a child in a dream. David works through the three kinds of generosity, giving materially, offering protection, and offering the Dharma, then turns to ethical discipline as the foundation the whole path rests on, using a leaking boat as the image for a mind not yet guarded by good conduct.

• Session 2 - Mindfulness of Feelings David Oromith · 84 minutes · recorded November 13, 2024

  In the guided meditation on mindfulness of feelings, eyes partly open, we note the pleasant, unpleasant or neutral tone in sounds, bodily sensations and thoughts, without moving to ease discomfort. David draws on the Buddha's teaching on vedana and the image of a songbird held too tightly, and explains why we tend to ignore neutral feelings until boredom turns them unpleasant. Questions cover whether attending closely to pain eases it or makes it worse, and adjusting to unfamiliar calm.

• Befriending the Mind Natalia Bojanic · 178 minutes · recorded November 9, 2024

  Natalia Bojanic on the attitudes that make mindfulness possible: curiosity, non-striving, letting be and letting go, and generosity, offered as antidotes to boredom, agitation, aversion and doubt. Two thirds experiential, with guided meditations, mindful walking and stretching, journalling and discussion.

• The Antidotes to Attachment and Navigating Loss David Oromith · 88 minutes · recorded April 17, 2024

  The session opens with a short guided meditation in which we settle body, speech and mind, with refuge and bodhicitta. David completes his look at antidotes to attachment: non-attachment, contentment, gratitude and generosity, using the image of a bird resting on an open palm. He turns to loss, telling the story of Kisa Gotami and the mustard seed, and separates the cognitive work of understanding impermanence from the compassion grief itself needs. Questions bring up chronic illness, bipolar and the loss of a parent.

• Guided Meditation - Cultivating Generosity David Oromith · 21 minutes · recorded January 15, 2023

  You sharpen the mind with twenty one rounds of breath, three lots of seven, and then its creativity is put to work. David asks for a picture of a typical day, where you go, the shops or errands, the people you meet, and for generosity imagined into it: something material, your time, your expertise, a kind word. Their response is imagined too, and the warmth of giving with nothing wanted back. It closes on an intention to carry that into ordinary days.

• The Six Paramitas - Generosity David Oromith · 32 minutes · recorded January 15, 2023

  In this visualisation we walk through an ordinary day and imagine bringing generosity into it: giving materially, giving time or expertise, offering a kind word. David opens a six week series on the paramitas with the first, generosity, describing three kinds, material giving, sharing the dharma, and offering fearlessness to those who are afraid, and why true generosity means being willing to give up what we are actually attached to, not just what we no longer want.

• The True Meaning of Non-Attachment and How It Sets You Free David Oromith · 53 minutes · recorded September 26, 2021

  David starts by saying what non-attachment is not: coldness, indifference, giving up relationships or pleasure, pointing to the Dalai Lama's own tears and laughter as evidence. He shows how attachment adds projection and expectation onto people and things, illustrated by a monitor smashed in the wind, causing disappointment the world did not create. The talk closes with a guided mindfulness of breathing in which we contemplate where attachment shows up in life. Questions cover forgiveness and boundaries.

• Guided Meditation - Mindfulness of Feelings David Oromith · 15 minutes · recorded December 4, 2020

  This is a guided meditation on the second close application of mindfulness - mindfulness of feelings (Skt. vedana). The four close applications of mindfulness (Skt. smrityupasthana; Pali. satipatthana) are the bedrock of the Buddha's teachings on vipashyana, and as the Buddha described them: the direct path to nirvana. In this guided practice we attend closely to the different types of feelings (pleasure, displeasure, and indifference) arising in relation to sensations from our five physical senses and we carefully pose questions and inspect the very nature of these feelings.

• Part Four - What a Thought Is, and Choosing a Teacher Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo · 133 minutes · recorded January 1, 2016

  Two ways of working with the mind, the controlling one and the letting go one, and why a wild horse has to be tamed before it can be trained. Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo explains that meditation is not blanking out but asking what a thought is and who is aware, sets out the eight consciousnesses of the mind-only school, and shows how generosity without wisdom stays bound by subject, action and object. A long section follows on choosing a teacher, and on not postponing practice while waiting for one.

• Part Two - The Perfections Turned Around, and Questions on Anger Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo · 80 minutes · recorded January 1, 2016

  The verses continue through the perfections, each definition undercutting the usual way of looking at it. The supreme generosity is non-attachment, the supreme ethical conduct is to pacify one's mind, the supreme patience is to take the lowest place, and the supreme effort is letting go of activity. Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo tells of Atisha keeping a rude attendant as his teacher of patience. Questions follow on teachers charging for Dharma and on whether anger ever serves a good cause.

• Guided Meditation - Loving Kindness for Oneself, Envisioning Flourishing, Receiving and Offering Lama Alan · 26 minutes

  Loving kindness begins with yourself. Lama Alan asks you to envision your own wellbeing, then to picture all you would love to receive from other people and the natural world, flowing in as effortlessly as the breath. You consider which habits you would love to be free of and which qualities you would love to be endowed with, then what you would love to offer the world. The session closes with a moment of simple presence.

• Omniscience and the Buddha’s Mind Vesna A. Wallace · 120 minutes

  Vesna A. Wallace reads the Buddha's omniscience through the Kalachakra tradition, working from Indian commentaries on the Litany of the Names of Manjushri, a text of 162 verses carrying some 800 names. The verses are read as outcomes of the six phase yoga, answering to the purification of 162 channels in the six chakras, and omniscience is self-awareness, all pervasive rather than localised. Questions cover how gnosis differs from wisdom, what emptiness means, and which language to recite in.

More by subject

• Anger and aversion 143
• Attachment and craving 123
• The nature of mind 93
• Emptiness 84
• The bodhisattva path 81
• Anxiety and fear 79
• Death and dying 77
• Distraction and attention 73
• Sleep and rest 66
• Buddhist psychology 59
• Illness and pain 57
• Karma 57
• Teacher and student 56
• Habits and change 53
• Genuine happiness and wellbeing 52
• Patience, forbearance and acceptance 50
• Impermanence 46
• Relaxation 43
• Gratitude and appreciation 42
• Relationships and family 38
• Motivation and intention 37
• Tantra and Vajrayana 37
• Depression and low mood 32
• Dream yoga 32
• Comparison and self-cherishing 31
• Dreams and sleep 31
• Guilt and regret 28
• Self-criticism and shame 28
• Work and daily life 28
• Rebirth and continuity 26
• Lineage and tradition 23
• Buddha nature 22
• The four noble truths 22
• Ethics and precepts 21
• Stress and burnout 21
• Emotional balance 19
• Forgiveness 17
• Consciousness and science 15
• The six perfections (paramitas) 15
• Enthusiastic effort (virya) 14
• Sangha and community 14
• The eight worldly concerns 14
• The four thoughts that turn the mind 14
• Grief and loss 13
• Perception and projection 13
• Dependent origination 12
• Refuge 11
• Not-self (anatta) 10
• Attentional balance 9
• Ecology and the climate 7
• Cognitive balance 6
• Nature and the outdoors 6
• The eightfold path 5
• Peace and conflict 4
• The sixfold matrix of mental balance 4
• Introspection and self-monitoring 3
• Secular mindfulness 3
• Self-compassion 3
• Symbolism and iconography 3
• Spiritual materialism and bypassing 1
• The three marks of existence 1