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TLK Life Skills & Arts Center Statement of Purpose

  • Quantum Life Activities and Skills

    The core of the Quantum Life philosophy practiced at the Threefold Lotus Kwoon is the integration of the three basic elements of human life, namely the body, the mind, and the essential and innate creative core of our being. This creative core is the fundament upon which we build our beliefs, our epistemology and the basis for all our relations with the phenomenal world about us. The ultimate teachings of the Buddha provide the perfect framework to create a happy and fulfilled life.

    We have adopted specific activities that excel at this integration to be the consistent and daily activities around which all other activities are structured. These activities of Tai Chi Chuan, Chi Gong, Massage, are thousands of years old and for good reason. They are all relatively easy for anybody to start, and offer an endless depth of skill and integration comensurate with the practitioners will.

  • TLK Resources

    Building our first sanctuary is very exciting. And the 15 acre parcel we have acquired has a mixture of trees, large pond and pasture. We are being diligent in developing this land slowly and with great respect for integration of our presence here so that we will maintain the peaceful beauty already here.

    This will limit the size of activities and residencies available at this location. However, we feel strongly that the experience provided here is of an intimate nature and that our activity plans are very well suited to this intimate setting.

  • TLK - Quantum Life Art Philosophy

    An excerpt from "Artist - Bodhisattva" by Reverend Sylvain Chamberland, Nyudo:

    Art is uniquely qualified to mediate between both material and spiritual by definition. The "work" of Art is nothing other than spiritual, and the manifestation of the "work" instantiates the very principles involved in the "creative" process. Further, the "language" of Art is unique in its interpretive manipulations of the samsaric condition to transcend and engage the mind to also transcend and thereby to perceive the mind and its constructs. This is the first step in a process of "cleansing" the samsaric delusions from the mind both in the contemplative sciences and Art. Art therefore belongs also to the contemplative sciences.

    Our planet is ever more pressed upon by the samsaric (attachment to physical "thing-ness" by the "ego" to serve as identity) desires of increasing populations demanding immediate gratification and rampant cravings for all manner of entertainment, ego boosts, and possession to support an ever more fragile matrix of egos. The ascetics have been steadily at work to raise the consciousness of the masses through their individual practice. Much has been done to spread the teachings. It remains however, to the small percentage of those who would seek such teachings, for the widespread practice of this most noble of practices to grow and include the greater of the world's peoples. Much advancement is occurring in the West. Yet the courage and stamina required of such practice has left widespread practice a distant even if realistic dream. We need more allies to awaken the masses. In this task the Artist is again uniquely positioned.

    I cannot stress enough the absolute necessity for a curriculum of Arts classes in history, technique, appreciation, and critique as well as philosophy, science of mind, and physical health, be developed and adopted for all levels of education not only as option, but mandatory.

    The ability to abstract knowledge and experience color, shape, forms, textures, and all the elements of discernment inherent in the Arts is critical for analytical thinking and the support of the conscious mind. This kind of thinking, when developed, is intrinsic to problem solving in math, English, literature, and all the "needs" of samsaric life. When education can facilitate the "success" of students in their daily activities while supporting and re-enforcing the "reality" that all samsaric phenomena are of no "intrinsic" value, that all phenomena is impermanent, the student has no other choice for "identity" than the consciousness of his own mind. From this point and only this point must all "education" be derived.

    In this curriculum, only the Arts can lend "concrete" and tangible "reality" to those very concepts. From the moment of embryonic development, sentient beings are surrounded by samsaric "realities". To "learn" from any teachings solely on the merit of language or verbal communications is only one third of the necessary elements to gain wisdom. And in fact, it is the capability of "listening and hearing" which is really responsible in this first element. The second element is contemplation and reflection, the actual use of the mind to discern and apply what was "heard", and thirdly, meditation, deep consideration, and contemplation on the nature of the self and resistance of the samsaric attachments creating agitation and unrest. All these elements are contained and expressed through the Art experience and should be exploited fully at all levels of education.

    Because of its unique blend of the manipulations of the illusory world of phenomena and the conscious "sparks" or exhortations to "understand" them by creator and viewer, the visual and aural arts are far beyond any other methodology to experience immediately the transcendent reality of the nature of the mind. Art is preeminent and inextricable from the development of sentient beings and the purification of the senses and the mind.

    It is in this regard that the establishment of the TLK Life Skills and Arts Center is dedicated and committed to the free flow of ideas without censorship.