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The Buddhist Centre

The Buddhist Centre

Written by: Dharmachakra
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 News, event coverage, mantras and rituals, Dharma conversations among diverse voices from the Triratna Buddhist Community around the world, keeping you up-to-date with the latest in our sangha.

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Episodes
  • 456: Portraits of Samadhi

    456: Portraits of Samadhi
    Nov 8 2025
    Samādhi is the Sanskrit word for a state of peaceful, integrated absorption the mind can reach through meditation.

    And people’s faces in meditation have been a source of fascination (and distraction) for documentary filmmaker Hartley Woolf since he began his own Buddhist practice. “I can’t help but enjoy taking in all the different expressions around me in the shrine room,” he says, “and wondering what’s going on inside the mind behind.”

    Join us for a delightful conversation between an artist and some of his subjects (Bhadra, Eugene Furniss and Maitrijyoti) as we explore the beautiful intimacy of this unique art project. In the most mindful way, Hartley sets out to capture something of the mystery of meditation, expressed in the faces of a diverse set of humans trying to be present with their experience. The result is an extraordinary book of portrait photography and we are privileged to hear reflections after the fact from some of those sitting and from the artist himself.

    Self-consciousness and self-perception, what we look for in people’s faces and expressions, the vulnerability of meditating with others and of being witnessed – this conversation flows, you might say, like the breath, opening into a space of genuine shared gratitude for a memorable shared experience of sitting in stillness, and being in relationship.

    Produced and presented by Candradasa, edited by Zac Pomphrey and Candradasa

    ***

    "When I began this project, it was simply about capturing the subtlety of human facial expression. It quickly became about much more than that, however: my emotional connection to the sitter in that moment; the impact the lights, camera and my presence had on their meditation; the very act of watching for those subtle changes and deciding when to press the shutter. All these things became just as interesting—if not more so.

    I saw all kinds of emotions play out on my sitters’ faces. They may not have all reached such advanced states as samādhi, but I did see a lot of vulnerability, pleasure, discomfort, and courage. I’m very grateful to them all for allowing me (and you) into their intimate worlds of practice for a brief moment."

    Hartley Woolf

    Show Notes

    Order ‘Portraits of Samadhi’ by Hartley Woolf (Hardback)

    Revisting the Romantics by Vishvapani (free with sign-up)

    Alfoxton Park Retreat Centre

    A Renovating Virtue: Hartley’s film about the Alfoxton project

    Listen to The Intimacy of Art and the Dharma on painting as practice

    Eisenstein on co-creating films as art | A Dialectic Approach to Film Form by Sergei Eisenstein

    Hartley Woolf’s website | Follow Hartley on Instagram

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    Visit The Buddhist Centre Live (events year-round on Buddhism, mindfulness, meditation, and culture)

    Come meditate with us online six days a week!

    Theme music by Ackport! Used with kind permission.
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    48 mins
  • 455: The Intimacy of Art and the Dharma

    455: The Intimacy of Art and the Dharma
    Sep 13 2025
    Today we meet three Buddhists with a full time professional painting practice, exhibiting at The Art Pavilion in Mile End Eco Park. And we’re treated to a generous and intimate conversation about the tensions and creative dynamics between an explicitly artistic life and an implicitly spiritual, even religious one. All in context of shared joy at exhibiting openly as Buddhists in a beautiful space surrounded by and inflected with nature. We explore the relationship between the values of Buddhism and the values of contemporary art – and between what we call ‘mindfulness’ and the actual work of painting, making marks, building things that somehow capture a spirit or an attitude to life. Intuitive, sometimes faltering discovery is part of it; so is awareness of impermanence, grief and death; so is something in its own way ‘multi-dimensional’. We tap into the “more than human” that again takes us back towards multiplicity in nature rather than away from it. Heck, we even work in A.I. (of course we do!).This is all reflected and refracted through discussions around perspective, scale, layering, abstraction, breadth and depth, mixing, the materials painting is born from—linen, canvas, oil paint—and the mysterious resonance found at the softening, porous, reflective boundary between colour and form. It’s clear our three friends live out a practice where beauty and letting go is an adequate, even sometimes freeing response to suffering, at least some of the time. And there are the aches of aging and the accepting of limitations even as a sense of vital discovery and unfolding is still so strong. What comes through is how much their intention matters – to pay attention to, tune into, reality itself. Talking about painting may not be as much fun or as strong as standing in front of work and trying to see it, but it is possibly better than viewing reproductions! It was a privilege to be in this conversation with three deeply committed beings, artists and Dharma practitioners. And the world is that little bit brighter and more realised through their work.Produced and presented by Candradasa, edited by Zac Pomphrey and CandradasaShow Notes 'Painting Now' - a group show featuring Clare Barton-Harvey (Amitajyoti), Abhayavajra and Hugh Mendes (Paramabodhi) held in London 2-12th October 2025 at the Art Pavilion, Clinton Road, London, E3 4QY. More information about ‘Painting Now’ 🎨 The Art Pavilion in Mile End Eco Park 🎨 Parambodhi / Hugh Mendes' talk from 'Painting Now' 🖥️ Artists interview: Clare Barton-Harvey (Amitajyoti) in conversation with Bob Matthews🖥️ Explore the work of Paramabodhi (Hugh Mendes) and watch the accompanying film about the Buddhist aspects of his work 🖥️ Clare Barton-Harvey (Amitajyoti) online🖥️ Abhayavajra online🎧 The Heart of Imagination in Buddhism (with Amitajyoti and Vishvapani)🎧 The Impermanence of Everyone: The Art of Hugh Mendes (Paramabodhi)🎧 Painting Into Reality (with Abhayavajra)⚜️ The Alchemical Heart (Home Retreat & series of talks by Paramananda)🧘 Alfoxton Park Retreat Centre (Buddhism + Arts)📷 The work of Francesca Woodman 🪴 Derek Jarman's garden at Dungeness 🏛️ The Met Museum Archives, New York ***Visit The Buddhist Centre Live (events year-round on Buddhism, mindfulness, meditation, and culture)Come meditate with us online six days a week!Theme music by Ackport! Used with kind permission.
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    1 hr and 22 mins
  • 454: A Mythic Retreat Centre for Ireland: Shubha Vihara, The Place of Beauty

    454: A Mythic Retreat Centre for Ireland: Shubha Vihara, The Place of Beauty
    Mar 29 2025
    In Triratna, learning to understand what is truly beautiful is seen as a path to Enlightenment itself. In this episode we find ourselves exploring this in an unexpected and extraordinary way at the seat of all Buddhist paths and myths, Bodh Gaya in India. Not far from the bodhi tree, where the Buddha’s great achievement is said to have taken place, you’ll find us deep in conversation with visitiing leaders from the Dublin Buddhist Centre about their vision of building a Buddhist retreat centre in Eire: a realm of beauty and a fitting home for distinctively Irish Dharma practice in the heart of County Clare.

    We hear about the retreat centre’s name Shubha Vihara—The Place of Beauty—and how it sits alongside the legendary mythic names, spaces and stories of Ireland, before and after St. Patrick. We meet Brigid, Cuchulain (Setanta), and Fionn mac Cumhail as he catches the Salmon of Knowledge; and visit in our imagination Lough Derg, the ancient passage tomb of Newgrange, and the Hill of Tara—crowning place for the High Kings of Ireland. All while exploring aspects of Christianity’s impact on the country’s pagan spiritual history, and the role of positive warrior culture as it manifests and is transformed in both Buddhist and Irish contexts.

    It’s hard work building magic spaces and the team give us a glimpse into what’s involved on the ground trying to transmute spreadsheets and fundraising calls into the magic of genuine community, alive with deep possibilities, where practice is—somehow—palpably rooted in the native earth and energies of a specific land and a society ready for change.

    Join us for an inspiring episode for the ages about a distinctively Buddhist contirbution to Irish culture.

    As a bonus, we close this conversation with a recitation of the traditional Buddhist ethical precepts rendered into Gaelic. Beautiful indeed!

    Show Notes

    Support the creation of Shubha Vihara, the Irish Triratna Retreat Centre

    Explore key stories from Irish mythology

    Dublin Buddhist Centre

    The Windhorse Trust

    FutureDharma Fund

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    Visit The Buddhist Centre Live (events year-round on Buddhism, mindfulness, meditation, and culture)

    Come meditate with us online six days a week!

    Theme music by Ackport! Used with kind permission.
    Show More Show Less
    56 mins
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