The Teaching Buddha

04/09/2026

September 4 How is it now and what did I learn today?

For more almost two months now we walk through this hall, back and forth to visit my husband. The LUMC in Leiden is a very good hospital, but the interior design and facilities for family are absolutely depressing and poor. I guess they did not build it for people who have to visit their beloved one for such a long time.

Because a long time it is. We all notice tiredness now as the first shocks and moments of crisis subside. It is a periode of seeking a balance between serving the other and taking care of yourself. A well-known principle in yoga but also Buddhism. I mentioned before the idea of becoming a “nobody”: rendering service without attachments to the ego. When there is loss of identity, there is loss of ego. The feeling of nothingness or lack of worthiness however do not make it easier to take care of other people. And yet, this is about where the challenge is- the entrance of the spiritual path. And this might even be an interesting challenge. Ram Dass again:

“And then finally, when you merge into that place, when you surrender, when you finally see that your own trip isn’t that interesting, when you finish tripping, then you become service. You just are that for other people, just because of the nature of the way of things. You are service. You no longer do service. You are service.

And some of you have had the graceful experience of feeling that you are an instrument of dharma, that you die into service. That there’s no you doing anything. It’s just service is happening.

I feel that we’re all, like, experimenting with this process. I think that if you aren’t experiencing from the way in which you do service, whether it’s professional or personal to another human being or volunteer or paid or family or to yourself, if you’re not doing service in such a way that at the end of the service you feel freer, higher, clearer, lighter, and more energized, you got work to do.

It’s an interesting challenge. We all have work to do. Because if you think you’re somebody doing something, it’s going to burn out. Simple as that.”

From somebody to nobody.

03/09/2026

I already wrote something about these new insights on my Instagram account of The Teaching Buddha . Now I share with you the blog of my beloved Dr. Arielle Schwartz. In the comments I will post her short video on this. Thank you, Arielle, for your contribution to this discourse! The neuroscience, academic discussions and somatic practices are so important because there is a belief (science:) that enduring chronic stress in many ways works the same as an experienced trauma. And don’t we know that só many people on this planet suffer from trauma and/or chronic stress? Yes. ❤️‍🩹

https://drarielleschwartz.com/if-the-body-doesnt-keep-the-score-what-does/?fbclid=IwRlRTSAUGDx5wZG9mBWZkaWQWUNvl7rGg55w3lez9jS_HHM-_TQOOq2V4dG4DYWVtAjExAHNydGMGYXBwX2lkCjY2Mjg1NjgzNzkAAR4YwNocsSqftLZdEOiHQNSaO00vhlZFsOFUNUoyHAwidTy_KzFlhn2LT2EOpA_aem_iVJtrIvEEg2pSl-4XC9fog

Dr. Arielle Schwartz responds to the recent article that challenges whether the body keeps the score.

28/08/2026

27/08/2026

August 27 ~ How is it now and What did I learn today?
Becoming Nobody.

Sometimes the loss kicks in. Just as the second series of chemo’s kick in the body of my husband, after a few days, there are the consequential side-effects. I also feel different kinds of loss and it never is just physical or mental.

One kind of loss definitely is the loss of identities, as we perform different roles in our lives. As I had quite some (and very different) roles, I really have to get used to becoming a “nobody”. As if time is standing still and my mind and body only serve myself and my inner circle to survive. Am I still serving the world around me?

There is the loss of being a teacher in social studies and law. The new schoolyear starts next Monday and of course this causes a lot of thoughts, emotions and even requires some actions, because I had to end the last schoolyear abruptly. After starting a new year for 22 years, it feels sort of empty to not join my colleagues on this very first day of a new beginning.

Then there is a loss of being a yogateacher and trainer in Mindfulness and Buddhism. I think I have given so much of myself in these lessons and invested so much time, energy and money into these spiritual paths, that the feeling of loss is finally weighing down on me, after staying at bedsides of beloveds for more than 2,5 months. So there is emptiness and heaviness.

A very special kind of loss is a totally new identification I developed last year, namely with being a tour guide, a leader of spiritual retreats. I think I have never been happier than during my teachers-trip to Nepal, where I could combine my teaching skills, my experience as a yoga and meditation teacher and my passion for travelling. Now parts of Nepal are in ruins and my attachment to this new role and thus identification seems to crumble with it.

Diving into the teachings of Ram Dass (and with the help of the wonderful online Inner Academy) I am studying the concept of “becoming nobody”. This concept is so interesting. I will elaborate upon this more spiritual theme more!

Ram Dass: “Discovering one’s personal purpose is essential to becoming nobody and aligning oneself with reality.” 🙄

18/08/2026

August 18 ~ How is it now and what did I learn today? Find stillness in a period of transition.

These are the Bardodays for my husband and our family. In between treatments, the days of resting, digesting and recovering. A period of transition: everything has changed, will change and we do not know the roadmap or direction.

There is some calmness in these days: no treatments, results and new medical steps. It means staying in a place where there is space for reflections, talks and memories or nostalgia.

Because there are so many ways to use these moments in between, I found a series of Ram Dass on the internet called: Many Paths, One Mountain. I have become a huge “fan”, student, or devotee of Ram Dass. At the farewellparty at school I used this popular quote “In the end we all walk each other home.” Not knowing that two weeks later my mother would die and my husband, who arrived that day from India, would get a diagnosis of a life-threatening disease.

The platform of the Ram Dass’ Inner Academy is a goldmine really for talks, meditation and inspiration. The sangha is a fully international community, all touched by the work of Ram Dass. I am grateful for this opportunity to rest and digest with the loving spirit of this guru, who was not afraid to not chose one path. But helps you “being the mountain”. From all directions we come, seeking for the same peak: no matter which method you use, the goal of inner peace and loving awareness is the same.

Ram Dass, Love Serve Remember


Picture: https://www.ramdass.org/decade/70s/

14/08/2026

🕊️ Public Talk: The Power of Gratitude with Geshe Thubten Sherab (FPMT)

What is gratitude, really? In Tibetan Buddhism, it's far more than polite thanks - it's a way of seeing, rooted in recognizing kindness and interdependence. Join the international renowned Geshe Thubten Sherab for an evening exploring gratitude as a path to genuine contentment and a kinder, more connected world.

All are welcome, regardless of background or experience with Buddhism.

🗓️ Wed 26 August, 19.00-21.00
📍 Onsite at our Maitreya Center Amsterdam & online via Zoom
🌐 In English | Recording provided
ℹ️ www.maitreya.nl

10/08/2026

August 10 ~ How is it now and what did I learn today? Trauma, stress and yoga in a flow state.

All your issues are in your tissues, one of my earlier and most important yogateachers ever said. Now recently there has been a new scientific discourse on how trauma and chronic stress exactly work in the body. After the upheaval and impact of the book “The Body Takes The Score” by Prof. Dr. Bessel van der Kolk, there are some new insights about the workings of the brain and the body. Where in the spiritual field we consider these as one…

A major criticism is that the phrase "the body keeps the score" has been taken too literally by the public. In scientific literature, a team of computational neuroscientists published a framework clarifying that the body does not literally store trauma memories like a hard drive. Instead, the brain's predictive models are disrupted. The brain mistakenly predicts constant danger, sending continuous stress signals to the body. It is a system-wide loop, not a localized physical "deposit" of trauma.

This I read in the article, published in April 2026 (link below). A trauma creates a rigid pattern of threat prediction within the brain, reducing cognitive flexibility. Pathology arises not from the permanence of what was stored but from the failure of that recalibration process.

I quote:
“The practical question becomes: how can flexibility be restored when it is lost? Evidence now points to a surprising candidate—flow states. Flow, the state of complete absorption in a meaningful, high-challenge activity, may produce the very network dynamics that PTSD disrupts. During flow, the prefrontal cortex undergoes localized transient hypofrontality—reduced self-referential processing—while frontoparietal and sensory-motor networks exhibit rapid, adaptive reconfiguration. Functional MRI and EEG studies have implicated attentional, executive, and reward systems in flow, though the literature remains methodologically heterogeneous, with some findings supporting the transient hypofrontality hypothesis and others reporting increased prefrontal activity during challenge-skill balance conditions”.

Now this is complex stuff. Maybe it is just enough that in many cases of trauma and chronic stress (Van der Kolk and others explained how these “work in similar ways”), the moving, the breathing, the attention, the stretching and feeling make you feel better, a kind of awake energy combined with grounded calmness. There are a millions of articles that explain the benefits of the physical yoga practice. There are developments in science. I trust my experience. And the experiences of a millions of people for centuries… You always feel better after an embodied meditation and a flow yoga practice.

https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/systems-neuroscience/articles/10.3389/fnsys.2026.1812957/full

07/08/2026

August 6 ~ How is it now and what did I learn today? Attachment as the root of suffering.

The doctors call it the dip-days: the days after the treatment with chemotherapies. Not immediately, but slowly but certainly unsettling the body and thus the mind. There already was a lot of loss: our dream of working and living in India for four years, the loss of health and moving abilities with my husband, the loss of an independent life, a happy life together. And now there are the side-effects of being bound by the bed and the strong therapies in the hospital.

Apart from the loss of a meaningful job, being able to walk, your appetite and your hair, the loss of self-identity is maybe the most difficult one. And of course they all interrelate. Who am I in this bed? What is left, is that defining me now? What is gone, is that still part of the self?
But also family can suffer from this feeling, seen as the root cause of unhappiness in Buddhism: attachment. We want this former happy life back again!

In Buddhism, attachment (Sanskrit/Pali: upadana) is identified as one of the main causes of suffering (dukkha) in our lives. Because everything must eventually change and die, all our attempts to cling to them are ultimately futile. This leads to great suffering as we inevitably lose that which we want to hold on to.

Upadana refers to the ways we grasp or cling to other people, objects, ideas, or experiences. So actually to everything that is subject to change anyhow…. And although we know this, the truth becomes only really clear when it manifests itself and we notice we do not want this. Thus the clinging or resisting or ignoring of all this- that’s causing the suffering. And again, the notion of a separate or permanent self, is considered especially problematic and to be abandoned. We are all interdependent. It is what Thich Nhat Hanh would call the principle of interbeing.

So when the identities as a journalist, a husband and a father as well as a teacher, a wife and a mother fade and the hair falls out, the exercise is to not cling, to accept the changing self and acknowledging that we all do this together: living, suffering, changing, enjoying, loving and dying.

At the end of a long day, I found out at the trainstation where I always park my electric bike, that my longtime used and beloved bike was stolen. Another lesson. It was only the day after that I could work with Upadana. Before there was a lot of anger and grief at another loss.
I counted my blessings that I could afford a new bike (with insurance, this time), although it meant I spent all the extra money I received from school double and at once. But I found some freedom again being able to bike. Maybe more important: however difficult, we finally find freedom in non-attachment. And that is a wonderful lesson at the end 🙏🏻

05/08/2026

August 4 ~ How is it now and what did I learn today? Being the owner of your actions.

I have always had a strong belief in taking your own responsibility, be it for your own happiness, health or fortune. Life is not perfect in the sense of “we can fully make it or break it”, there are too many causes and conditions, but we must always try to make good choices. Good choices in the sense of: wholesome and wise. And guided by the principle of ahimsa: not hurting or causing harm to yourself and all sentient beings. Finally: your own happiness and health are important to be wholesome and wise for others.

That’s why I visited a notary today, so legal stuff gets attention too. Not only because of the decease of my mother, but also because of the ilness of my husband. It seemed wise to work on all kind of legal provisions, on behalf of my husband, myself and our children. For now and in future.

This comes from the Upajjhatthana Sutta: Subjects for Contemplation, translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu:

“There are these five facts that one should reflect on often, whether one is a woman or a man, lay or ordained. Which five?

"'I am subject to aging, have not gone beyond aging.' This is the first fact that one should reflect on often, whether one is a woman or a man, lay or ordained.

"'I am subject to illness, have not gone beyond illness.' ...

"'I am subject to death, have not gone beyond death.' ...

"'I will grow different, separate from all that is dear and appealing to me.' ...

"'I am the owner of my actions heir to my actions, born of my actions, related through my actions, and have my actions as my arbitrator. Whatever I do, for good or for evil, to that will I fall heir.' ...

"These are the five facts that one should reflect on often, whether one is a woman or a man, lay or ordained.

Link:
https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an05/an05.057.than.html
Picture: Unsplash, Nikhil Singh.