65 The Ideological Turn (of the Pedagogical Platter)

This Turn takes us deep, deep down into the deep dark world of ideology to show why it's such a fundamental concept for understanding ourselves and the world, and the entanglement between the two, in an articulation of the concept of interdependence that rarely gets explored by Buddhists or spiritual folks alike. Three Europeans will help us on our way and after regular requests, I provide some practice tips, a new Bodhisattva vow and more. Though practise tips are actually present throughout and the more discerning listener will see just how much gold dust and nuggets can be sifted from this enduring topic: too often dismissed or merely articulated in its grossest form. If it’s all too much, you might want to listen in more than one sitting and ponder the goods served up by these great thinkers and my own humble attempt to make their ideas as relevant and contemporary as possible to practitioners like you, and why not, if needed, wash it all down with a nice cup of Ted Meissner tea. Menu of the Day: Great Feast Specials 01. Overview of the themes that ideology forces us to confront. 02. Antonio Gramsci; ideas that capture populations and Buddhist groups, cultural hegemony...interdependence of the underappreciated kind. 03. Antoine Destutt de Tracy: coining ideology, the science of ideas, the sensual nature of ideas, ideaophobes...feelings are wrapped in ideology (who would’ve thought it). 04. Louis Althusser: identification, capture, the naturalness of it all...how ideology is in your subjective experience and on your meditation cushion. 05. Practise tips: entering the Great Feast, the bodhisattva vow...committing to the world beyond our dreams and fantasies. Background music is provided by some wonderful local musicians from Trieste; Riccardo Morpurgo Trio, a jazz ensemble, and Amorth, a music producer and electronic music artist. Along with these two dynamos, we have a fantastic Trip Hop artist still going strong from the UK, Funki Porcini.

Matthew O'Connell is a life coach and the host of the The Imperfect Buddha podcast. You can find The Imperfect Buddha on Facebook and Twitter (@imperfectbuddha).

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