Since the mind can endlessly produce thoughts, clearly it has the potential to endlessly produce new products. Like thoughts, they may not necessarily be helpful or beneficial. In the past, technological culture-changers like the telephone and electricity took a long time to produce and cultures had more time to absorb and contemplate their impact. Now, especially with electronic media, new cultural and ethical values are being developed and challenged, and things are changing so fast that we have little time to contemplate and absorb their impact.
Like many other things, technology can serve us well or not serve us well. If we approach it with vision, we can utilize it. If we lack vision, technology can prey on us, detecting our weakness or lack of resolve, such as discursiveness or desire for gossip. Or it distracts us from nowness.
In this way, it seduces us for a few minutes, which become hours, days, months and years.
We can tell if we have been served well by technology if we feel uplifted, informed or delighted by it. These are signs that the encounter was virtuous. However, if we feel dull or disconnected, then clearly that technology has numbed our senses. We are mentally less sharp and emotionally distant. We know we were used by the technology, as opposed to using it, because it has drained our energy. Technology can be a great expeditor of virtue, or it can create negativity. With the telephone or email, we can easily comfort, console or celebrate with others. At the same time, because we are not face-to-face, we might say or do things that we would not normally say or do. Thus, our negativity can become exponential due to the effect and power of technology. We may also tend to hide behind the electronic medium because we are less exposed.
Even though technology has advanced our ability to communicate, the five basic parameters of karma are still in place: raising the intention, deciding to do the action, preparing to do the action, doing the action and having no regret. We can decide to either apologize or to chastise an individual, and once the “send” button is pushed, the karma has been initiated. Afterward, if we sit there satisfied, it is a complete karmic act. That action does not go unnoticed.
In the modern era we need to be even more convinced of virtue, having resolve in terms of who we are and how we want to manifest. Generally, the best approach with technology is to consider our dignity and concern for others.
Thus, as we produce new programs for our laptops and applications for our smartphones, the principles of virtue must be clear in our minds. The point is to cherish the mind and not abuse it. If we remain mindful of our principles and priorities, just as we do in meditation, we can use technology to awaken our discipline and dignity, instead of letting it take over our lives.
The above is an excerpt from Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche’s new book, ‘The Shambhala Principle’ (Harmony, May 2013).
The Shambhala Principle – Book Trailer -Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche.
One of Tibet’s highest and most respected lamas elucidates for us the principles of Shambhala, or the path to happiness, set down by his legendary father, Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche.
We humans have come to a crossroads in our history: we can either destroy the world or create a good future. The Shambhala Principle offers the principle of basic goodness as a way of addressing the personal and social challenges that we face. Do we, as humans, have confidence in the basic goodness of humanity, as well as of society itself? As a Tibetan lama and spiritual leader, this strikes me as our most compelling global issue.
The book revolves around a dialogue with my father, the legendary Chögyam Trungpa. Whether his responses were direct or mystical, he continuously returned to the topics of basic goodness and enlightened society. Not only did he show me how I could become confident in their existence through awareness and meditation, he also taught me how basic goodness is a socially viable standard that could stabilize and transform our world.
However, this book is not a memoir, or even a message. It is an invitation to readers to reflect on their own basic goodness and the basic goodness of society, and then contemplate the question, Can we rouse our energy and confidence to create a good world that is founded on this principle?
I encourage you to join me in this contemplation.
— Sakyong Mipham
Click here to browse inside.
Khenpo Gawang Rinpoche is the founder and spiritual director of Pema Karpo Meditation Center in Memphis, Tennessee. Having completed twenty-seven years as a monk, twelve years of teaching experience, and nine years of study at the Buddhist University of Namdroling Monastery in South India, he holds a Khenpo degree, the Buddhist equivalent of a PhD. Gawang Rinpoche came to the United States in 2004 at the invitation of Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche and Shambhala International. He proudly became an American citizen in 2012. 
This introduction to Buddhist psychology supplies essential instructions for successful meditation practice. Rinpoche presents meditation practices that can powerfully influence and ultimately transform the mind into the purified mind of a Buddha. He clearly describes how consciousnesses operate in everyday perception and how at the time of Buddhahood, these same consciousnesses express the five primordial wisdoms of the five Buddha families. 
The Very Venerable Khenchen Thrangu Rinpoche was born in Kham in 1933 and was formally recognized at the age of five as the ninth incarnation of the great Thrangu tulku. One of the most highly regarded masters of Mahamudra meditation, Rinpoche has touched the lives of students from all parts of the world through his compassionate presence, his immense knowledge, and his way of making even complex teachings accessible. 
Through lively anecdotes and stories this highly revered Buddhist meditation master and scholar tells about his life of study, retreat, and teaching. The formative events of Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche’s life, and those insights and experiences that caused him to mature into the warm, brilliant, and highly realized meditation master and teacher he was, are deeply inspiring. The details of his early life and spiritual training reveal an authentic and human view of Tibetan culture, as well as the hardships endured by the Tibetans who fled their country and reestablished their tradition in exile.
The Wisdom of Compassion offers rare insights into the Dalai Lama’s life and his efforts to translate compassion into action through deeply engaging, behind-the-scene stories about his interactions with remarkable people from all walks of life.
The most basic, clear principles of Tibetan Buddhism are here lucidly presented by a renowned modern teacher and monk. Tai Situ illuminates Buddhist teachings in commonsense terms, using down-to-earth examples- making this is a perfect handbook for beginners as well as an excellent companion for long-time students.
