Dharma Library

Teacher: Howard Cohn
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Talks

September 2, 2023 | 1 hr.

Nothing Can Make You Happier than You Are

Howard Cohn

“Our search for happiness drives us, but this search leaves us in a state of “suspended happiness”—not quite happy yet, hoping someday I might be. This story of happiness is always about an imaginary future, dependent on conditions being met. That's a pretty tough task... to get everything to fall into place, someday. This plan reinforces the view that “I am not there yet.” We all want peace, but we think it lies at the end of the rainbow. We think that it takes time. We don't realize that there is no salvation in time. Peace is in you now as your natural state when you are not waiting for it, not postponing it.”

Talks

September 19, 2021 | 56 min.

Integrating Life into Practice

Howard Cohn

The nature of our heart, when in relatively safe circumstances, is kind and caring. But that natural sweetness often gets occluded, blocked by the systemic forces of greed, hatred, ignorance—all the ways that we create ill will and separation through misperception, seeing through the clouded lens of our likes and dislikes, views and opinions. This is why the teachings invite us to look deeply into our nature, to realize the sky-like nature of the mind, the boundless nature of the heart, the capacity of the heart to have lovingkindness for all beings—to have no one left out of your circle of affection. That’s the potential, and that’s what we practice to reawaken.

Talks

August 31, 2019 | 60 min.

What We Need Is Here

Howard Cohn

Even though a large piece of what we are asked to look at in our practice is not so easy to bear, the Dharma is actually such good news. The good news is that we have the capacity to be whole, to be embodied, to be here. When we make the slight shift from being simply carried along by what might be called the stream of distress—our mind stream, everything we’re thinking about, everything we’re worried about, everything we want, everything that is not working in our life—to noticing it, that is the beginning of freedom.

Talks

January 19, 2019 | 55 min.

Song of Freedom

Howard Cohn

"The more the dust of memory gets cleared of our confusion, and our confused notions of ourselves, the more intuitive awareness shows that it has a certain intelligence to it. The data points of what we’re experiencing moment to moment start lighting up in a way that our intuitive awareness operates on them. And all of a sudden we have this understanding of ourselves as not as separate as we thought, nor as describable as that version of ourselves that plays in our minds. We are really too amazing to describe. We are vast beyond our comprehension. We are wonderful beyond our comprehension—and the shadow side of that is terrible—but a sense of well-being is easier and closer than you think. It is partly this view that plays through our mind of being a problem to be solved that prevents us from recognizing the natural well-being and happiness of being awake."

Talks

May 27, 2018 | 63 min 2 sec

Empty of Self, Full of Love

Howard Cohn

Don’t postpone being at peace. Happiness is not something at the end of the rainbow, it’s our natural state. If you’ve touched this joy of being in any way, get used to it, nurture it. And as you rest in that experience of yourself, try to make peace with the version of yourself that plays in your mind. It’s completely interesting. It’s not the enemy. It’s inevitable. But a view of yourself is not self—it’s changing all the time. It’s not yourself because it cannot capture the beauty of your nature.

Articles

June 1, 2016

True Happiness Is...

Howard Cohn

The imagined happiness and security we feel when we think of fulfilling our hopes and desires is just that: imaginary. It’s a happiness that is dependent on specific circumstances.

Talks

March 11, 1999 | 57 min

Practical People Make a Peaceful World

Howard Cohn