Coming up – the Aotearoa New Zealand launch of After Buddhism – a workbook
January 2019
Tēnā koutou katoa, greetings everyone.
Welcome to the fourth newsletter from The Tuwhiri Project.
AOTEAROA NEW ZEALAND LAUNCH OF
After Buddhism: a workbook and The Tuwhiri Project
Wednesday 13th February 2019 • 7–9pm
Friends’ Centre, 7 Moncrieff St, Mt Victoria, Wellington
Come and celebrate the Aotearoa New Zealand launch of After Buddhism: a workbook & The Tuwhiri Project.
In lieu of the regular Wednesday evening meeting of One Mindful Breath, Wellington’s secular dharma practice community, Winton Higgins will speak on secular Buddhism and the western search for meaning. He will be tracking the ‘know thyself’ dictum from the ancient Egyptians, through the ancient Greeks and early Christianity, to modern iterations, including secular philosophy and psychoanalysis. All of these point to the supreme importance of the inner life, the reflective life.
Introducing the metaphor of a hiker’s map to capture the length, breadth and purpose of the Satipatṭhāna sutta, he will show how it answers the same challenge, this time in more practicable detail. To use it now, though, we need to liberate it from both traditional associations with redemption and rebirth, and from the limited horizon of today’s mindfulness-based psychotherapy.
After the talk Winton will take questions, and we will then launch his latest book, After Buddhism: a workbook.
onemindfulbreath.org.nz/events/2019/2/13/secular-buddhism-and-the-western-search-for-meaning
WHILE HE’S IN WELLINGTON
You are invited to take part in a one day secular Buddhist workshop with Winton Higgins on Saturday 16 February, Entering the tiger’s cave, insight meditation and the inner life.
In the Japanese Zen tradition there is a saying: ‘to catch a tiger’s cub, you must first enter the tiger’s cave.’ During this daylong workshop, Winton will locate meditation practice within the wider transcultural project to ‘know thyself’, of cultivating the inner life, however scary it might seem.
There’s more on this workshop here:
https://www.onemindfulbreath.org.nz/events/winton-workshop
During his brief stay in Wellington, Winton will be available for one-on-one conversations around secular Buddhism and meditation practice. To set up an appointment send an email.
ON METRICS
What did we learn from the Kickstarter process? Most importantly, that how success is measured changed radically during the month the crowdfunding process was taking place.
That the goal was reached is vital as it meant we actually received the pledged amounts, but not as important as the fact that 98 people in 15 different countries supported the project. Further, 63 pledges came directly to Kickstarter offering 79 percent of the total amount, and this was most likely a result of us letting people know about the project showing the importance of word of mouth recommendations and systematically building an audience for secular Buddhist ideas and practices over a long period.
As for social media, the ten people who found the project via FaceBook and one via Twitter offered less than four percent of what was pledged. Eight pledgers came directly from a newsletter we’d sent out, while six came from websites on which the project had been mentioned.
Our initial goal was reached in just 20 hours, and after that pledges trickled in, plateauing at around 250 percent of the original goal after ten days, one third the way through the process.
Yes, in the end, we were offered a magnificent 292 percent of our goal by 98 backers, of which more than 20 would receive 10 books, enabling them to run a course.
Crowdfunding is a way of preselling books before they’re printed, we learnt. This means there’s no need to have boxes full of unsold books sitting around as they are now printed on demand in Australia, Europe and the USA as sales come in from around the world.
EDITORIAL BOARD NEWS
We recently welcomed Tom Ilbery in Sydney as a member of our editorial board, and farewelled Margaret Tung who will be putting her energy into other activities.
DO YOU HAVE THESE SKILLS?
To ensure the success of The Tuwhiri Project, we do need more people. Right now, two volunteers are needed to join the Tuwhiri team who can:
+ take charge of fundraising for books and online courses, and
+ someone with experience of the publishing industry, or marketing in general.
Like to have a chat about this? Please click Reply to this email or phone/text Ramsey on +64 21 97 35 31.
ON THE HORIZON
Three books are currently in the Tuwhiri pipeline, and the manuscript of the first is close to being ready for page design. Published jointly with Gaia House in Devon, What is This? Intimations from a Sŏn retreat by Martine and Stephen Batchelor brings together instructions and talks given during a retreat.
A fundraiser for the Gaia House Building Fund, The Tuwhiri Project is keen to be giving this book worldwide circulation.
This will be the 2nd edition of What is This?. The 1st edition with Stephen’s talks, put out by Gaia House in April 2018, had limited distribution. Including Martine’s talks in the book will increase it from 94 to around 160 pages and provide readers with a better understanding of what it was like to have taken part in the retreat.
PLEASE SUPPORT THE TIBET VISION PROJECT
A San Francisco-based not-for-profit, The Tibet Vision Project trained eye doctors in Tibet from 1995 when Buddhist practitioner and ophthalmologist Dr Marc Lieberman first started travelling there to run mobile eye camps.
You can watch the documentary Visioning Tibet on the Tuwhiri website here.
Although western NGOs such as Handicapped International, the School for the Blind, Médecins sans frontières, and Tibet Vision Project were stopped from working in China by the Beijing Government in 2015, Marc tells us that:
All Tibet Vision Project funds are now being directed to provide the same eye care to active programs run by colleagues in Nepal, whom I trust fully. Insofar as whose blindness is being reversed, I have no preferences. Any restoration of sight to those who can benefit is a mitzvah [a blessing]. I'll be going to Nepal again in February 2019.
The Tuwhiri Project is pleased to be able to support ways in which western dharma practitioners provide practical support to Buddhists in Asia. While you’re on YouTube, please like this video and subscribe to the Tuwhiri YouTube channel, which is at:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB-URIzQFMmLJjepCAw07fg
ONLINE COURSE
We soon realised that setting up an online course using the material in After Buddhism: a workbook, one of our Kickstarter stretch goals, was not going to happen quickly. Rest assured – we’re seeing excellent progress.
We have an excellent working group, consisting of Sylvie Vanasse, who had a career in training and development for over 25 years, Mike Slott, who teaches an online course for Rutgers University; and Tom Ilbery who brings user experience from a variety of online courses. Tom and Ramsey Margolis represent the Tuwhiri editorial board on this working group.
We realised that if the course is no different from the book, people might as well just read the book. The course is therefore being developed in seven modules:
1 – Introduction to secular Buddhism
2 – The heart of secular Buddhism: the fourfold task
3 – The eightfold path
4 – Letting go of truth claims and metaphysical beliefs
5 – Where does meditation practice take us?
6 – Towards a culture of awakening
7 – Conclusion
We’re looking for a small number of people to test the course once it’s been put together. Would you like to be a course tester? If so click Reply to this email.
TRANSLATING THE WORKBOOK
The Tuwhiri editorial board has yet to decide on the language into which After Buddhism: a workbook will be translated. Stephen Batchelor’s After Buddhism: rethinking the dharma for a secular age has been published in German (Jenseits des Buddhismus: Eine säkulare Vision des Dharma), Russian (После буддизма) and Spanish (Después del budismo: Repensar el dharma para un mundo secular) and is being prepared for publication in Dutch and Italian. We’ll keep you posted.
FINALLY
If you like what Tuwhiri is doing, please let your sangha know about us through your community’s newsletter. You may also wish to share this newsletter with a friend or three. Any question? Click Reply to this email.
Kati ake nei, ka kite ano,
Ramsey Margolis • Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand
for The Tuwhiri Project