The Backyard Buddhist Podcast

Meditation is about sharpening your sense of awareness.  Over time our conscious awareness gets dulled down and we form attachments to the distractions in our lives instead of the ease of being in the flow of the present moment.  Join Ronn Pawo McLane in this skillfully guided meditation to help retrain your attention to your presence.  

Welcome to the "Embracing Community" guided meditation, designed specifically for gay men on their journey of building intentional and supportive communities. This meditation will help you cultivate mindfulness, compassion, and a deep sense of connection as you embark on this transformative journey. Find a comfortable position, close your eyes, and let us begin. Join Ronn Pawo McLane on this Gentl...

This meditation is designed to help you visualize and manifest your ideal friendships and relationships within the gay community. By cultivating a clear vision and connecting with the energy of what you desire, you can attract and nurture fulfilling connections. Join Ronn Pawo McLane on this gentle journey in the cultivation of great relationships. 

In this guided meditation, host Ngakpa Ronn Pawo McLane leads listeners through a journey of self-discovery and compassion. The meditation begins with a body scan and relaxation exercise to release tension and create a calm and peaceful state of mind. From there, Ngakpa Ronn Pawo McLane guides listeners through a process of cultivating compassion, starting with ourselves and extending to others. T...

In this episode of the Backyard Buddhist Podcast, host Ngakpa Ronn Pawo McLane explores the transformative power of compassion. In today's world of polarization and division, it can be easy to feel disconnected and hopeless. But, as Ngakpa Ronn Pawo McLane reminds us, even a small act of compassion can have a profound impact on the world around us. Throughout the episode, Ngakpa Ronn Pawo McLane s...

Attentive awareness is the first solid skill that you can learn and sharpen to help ease your mind when you are feeling restless, stressed, or upset.  Use this meditation again and again to help you to practice short periods of focused attention where ease is the outcome.  The more you do it the easier it becomes.  Breath, relax, center, and smile this is your time to be.  

Explore this Meditation to help ease your mind when you are experiencing difficulty.  Supporting your mental well-being through this mindful practice.  

Feelings of being overwhelmed, nervous, anxious, dread, resentment, and anger are all indicators that our Mental Well-Being is off the tracks.  Through meditation I have been able to find the common threads for supporting my own well-being.  Meditation may not be a cure-all but it is a damn good start.  

In this short meditation with Ronn Pawo McLane we focus on noticing the breath to help retrain our attention to be here in the present moment.  Practice this a often as needed grounding yourself in this present moment, no matter what is happening around you.  

I am back and excited to share with you a new season of The Backyard Buddhist Podcast.  In this episode let's talk about enlightenment.  What is it and how do we get there?  Make it simple and cut to the chase!  It is your innate right and ability.  Go For it!     If you'd like to be on the new season of the BYB to talk about your practice email me directly at urgyenpawo@gmail.com

In this episode of the Backyard Buddhist Podcast we are taking about the root of all suffering and most importantly how to spot it.  Once you spot it you can eliminate or at least reduce it's thrall.  We often miss the forest for the trees with reactive and repetitive conditioned responses.  Don't overlook the key to understanding and eliminating your suffering.  

What makes a great singer, songwriter, author, poet, actor or teacher?  Is there a gene that causes greatness?  Oprah says that luck is opportunity meeting preparation. So is greatness the preparation or is it the opportunity?  Join Ronn Pawo McLane for his 40th Podcast Episode and this enlightening conversation about the accessibility of greatness.

We all have experience situations that feel terrible and you wish them to be gone. We have also all had experiences when we felt that someone or something stood in our way of achieving something or getting somewhere. For me, obstacle removing was the first practice that I learned how to surrender. In this episode explore the secret of obstacle removal and path clearing.  Welcome our new contributo...

In the non-dual teachings of the Buddha we find ourselves faced with "The Two Witnesses", those being relative and absolute viewpoints.  In this episode of the Backyard Buddhist we seek to understand both relative and absolute while accessing the pervasive and ever-present unbiased consciousness that illuminates our truest nature.  

Cultivating awakened heart mind or Bodhichitta can be tricky and challenging.  It is more important than ever to find understanding in the challenges of our life experiences and how to navigate those rough waters.  When we endeavor to share the merits of our awakening with and for all begins what do we do about those who have treated us poorly and have wronged us?  It's kickoff time for the Super...

Everyone of us has been experiencing a divisive time of unrest and discourse.  But what is causing the conditions that seem to breed anger, rage and violence?  How are we unwittingly participating in the perpetuation of these conditions and how do we make a solid change for ourselves and each other?  This week's Backyard Buddhist Podcast has answers and antidotes.  Remember this moment that change...

We know that change comes from within but we tend to only go looking for the understanding that brings calm and peace when we are struggling the most.  Like a neglected garden we show up looking for a harvest when we are the hungriest.  My Dad taught me that to have a good garden you remove the obstacles on and in the ground and work the soil, providing moisture and nourishment and planting the se...

In this episode Pawo is talking specifically about your daily meditation practice.  It is the first month of the new year have you set any priorities or resolutions?  What are your goals for shaking off what has been holding your down?  What is getting in your way?  What is it going to take to relieve this daily condition?  Let's talk about it.   Check out Pawo's new 28-Day Meditation Transformati...

In this episode of the Backyard Buddhist Podcast Pawo talks about bringing ourselves to a constant state of awareness as we begin this new year.  Altars and offerings are a common practice but what about offering everything in our experience up to our awakened awareness?  There is Dharma when others show us exactly where we are stuck.  By doing or saying something that provokes us to get "hooked"...

Our gift to the world is a robust practice of altruistic generosity, ethical self-discipline, compassionate patience, joyous effort, concentrated awareness and the wise and loving actions that result.  Tis the season for giving and what better gift than one of kindness and inclusion for all beings.  Cultivating a practice of insight, awareness and compassion each and every day is shared with every...

Welcome back after a short break.  Look at all the things that have changed in the world around us in just a few weeks.  In today's podcast I am answering some great questions from listeners and talking about my own Game Changers.  It is important to take a look back from time to time to see the beauty of how our karma ripened to bring us into a new phase and understanding within our individual ex...

On this episode of The Backyard Buddhist my guest Christopher Bayne and I talk about being part of the LGBTQIA and Buddhist communities.  How does being gay fit into our practice and how do we use that practice to overcome stresses and fears?  You get to hear it first from two Big Gay Buddhists. 

I have often been asked why Buddhism seems to focus on suffering.  My answer to that is that none of us showed up here to find relief from our overwhelming and ever present, persistent joy.  So, we focus on finding the relief from our suffering, discomfort, and dissatisfaction not to replace suffering with joy but to find a state of ease and perpetual Okay-ness.  Truth number one is that suffering...

I am Ronn Pawo McLane and this is the Backyard Buddhist Podcast where we continually seek everyday enlightenment for the benefit of ourselves and all other beings.  I have invited my friend Brooke Beets to join us today in the backyard.  Welcome Brooke!   We often find ourselves in a state of dissatisfaction because our wants do not seem to add up to our haves.  I, like many of you, did my time at...

We all feel separate sometimes.  Sometimes we believe we have been forgotten in the middle of no-where.  In this episode of the Backyard Buddhist Ronn Pawo talks about the contemplation of self and other.   What is relative and what is ultimate?  Why does it feel like a vast ocean of separateness?   Are we separate?