John Peacock's generous Buddhism

This man is the tip of an iceberg, in that he is a successful academic in the field of Buddhism and its ancient languages (Pali and so on, "so on" being a tacit acknowledgment that I am out of my depth here...) and a teacher of meditation for over 25 years. He's done the hard yards, went to India aged 17, lived it in India and Sri Lanka

When he talks to you and guides you, as he did yesterday in Bangor, he's the tip of an iceberg because he is friendly, informal, relaxed and engaging. His scholarly knowledge, his experience and his Buddhism he puts to our use on such a day, not to any self-aggrandisement, defensiveness, or display. He also uses references from our own (European, North American) cultures, which help with bridging any gaps between, er, Pali, and me.

He opened with an absolute favourite quote of mine on the destructive nature of not being in the present moment:

"We never keep to the present. We recall the past; we anticipate the future as if we found it too slow in coming and were trying to hurry it up, or we recall the past as if to stay its too rapid flight. 
We are so unwise that we wander about in times that do not belong to us, and do not think of the only one that does; so vain that we dream of time that are not and blindly flee the only one that is. 
The fact is that the present usually hurts. We thrust it out of sight because it distresses us, and if we find it enjoyable, we are sorry to see it slip away. 
We try to give it the support of the future, and think how we are going to arrange things over which we have no control for a time we can never be sure of reaching. 
Let each of us examine his thoughts; he will find them wholly concerned with the past or the future. We almost never think of the present, and if we do think of it, it is only to see what light it throws on our plans for the future. 
The present is never our end. The past and the present are our means, the future alone our end. Thus we never actually live, but hope to live, and since we always planning how to be happy, it is inevitable that we should never be so."

Wise if troubling words, by a shrewd old bird, Blaise Pascal:

Then towards the end of the day John Peacock quoted from a group of peoms I frequently rummage around in, TS Eliot's "Four Quartets," in this instance, "Little Gidding:"

 "We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time...."

Given this congruence between John's favourites and mine, I'm bound to see him as a genius...and will write more soon about the main and many benefits I took from his input. Here's TSE, looking slightly pained by my frivolity, to play us out:

Take it, Tom:

"....Through the unknown, unremembered gate
When the last of earth left to discover
Is that which was the beginning;
At the source of the longest river
The voice of the hidden waterfall
And the children in the apple-tree
Not known, because not looked for
But heard, half-heard, in the stillness
Between two waves of the sea.
Quick now, here, now, always—
A condition of complete simplicity
(Costing not less than everything)
And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well
When the tongues of flames are in-folded
Into the crowned knot of fire
And the fire and the rose are one."