Columbus Karma Thegsum Choling Buddhist Meditation Center

[This paper was written for my Cultural Pluralism class at Capital University last semester.]

Jesse Harmon

UC 200

September 29, 2011

Columbus Karma Thegsum Choling Buddhist Meditation Center

            On September 18, 2011, two of my classmates and I went to the Columbus Karma Thegsum Choling Buddhist Meditation Center, or Columbus KTC for short, on Grubb Street in Columbus, Ohio. 

            One of the first things I noticed walking into the former Christian church was the shoe rack off to the side.  When one enters a Buddhist temple, one must remove his or her shoes out of respect.  This is completely the opposite of what I grew up in, (a Lutheran congregation), where shoes were required out of respect for the church.  I noticed the very bright colors associated with Buddhism.  My group and I were directed upstairs into the main temple area, and told to head to the back of the mediation area.  That was where the introduction to meditation class was held. 

            On our way through the temple, we had to walk past about thirty people meditating.  I was amazed at how still they all sat with their backs straight.  At that time, I didn’t know what they were suppose to be thinking or doing while meditating.  I soon found out though.

            We walked a little bit late into the class, but the leader didn’t mind.  We gathered some mats and cushions and sat down, obviously in the wrong position.  The first thing we did was we learned how to sit properly on the cushion.  Traditionally, the men were to sit with their right leg on the left thigh, and their left foot on their right thigh.  Being a bigger person, I found this difficult to achieve.  Thankfully, the leader told us that some flexibility was allowed, so I just sat “Indian style.”

            The next thing we did was to learn how to be properly positioned for meditation.  This was actually a fairly difficult thing to do.  I’m a person who naturally slouches over, and sitting up straight for five minutes, let alone thirty minutes, was difficult.  We had to sit and count our breaths, (one, two, three, four), all the way up to twenty-one, which we then had to start back at one.  Whenever another thought came to our minds, we were to think about suppressing that thought and then to start counting again.  This was extremely difficult for me, as I’m a person who usually has a lot of things going on in my mind.

            I would consider this event a positive event.  I initially did this for my religion class, but I felt it also fit well within this class, (Cultural Pluralism).  One thing I didn’t expect at all was the large amount of people who I wouldn’t imagine being Buddhist.  I expected more eastern Asian people, and found that many people were of other races, (actually, I didn’t even see any eastern Asian people.  Many were dressed as though they were businessmen and businesswomen).  Since I am seeking a minor in religion, this was truly an eye-opening experience, even if I didn’t participate in the actual meditation time scheduled.