January 30 – The path ahead
Dear Friends, I think many of us come to contemplative practices like meditation and mindfulness from a place of suffering, discontent, pain, grief, disconnection. We are looking for some relief. At least that was true for me. And through practicing, I have found certain deeply ingrained patterns that contribute to painful states, and the body/heart/mind is learning different ways to respond with more wisdom. (Still a work in progress, of course.) But as I have continued to practice, it has become more apparent to me the deep interconnection between all of us, and that what we do matters. Mark Coleman closes his book this way: In conclusion, through the journey of mindfulness, as we become more aware, we begin to wake up, personally and collectively, to our common humanity and our shared responsibility. With this awareness, we see our interconnectedness and understand that our role, in part, is to be…
January 29 – The path we’ve travelled
Dear Friends, So now that we’ve zipped through four weeks of material, and we’re nearing the end of January, I thought we could take a step back and have a big picture of what we’ve been cultivating this month. 1 – What’s your why – setting an intention can help us stay oriented in our practice and life 2 – Mindfulness is… – I presented my definition of mindfulness – in the course of this month, how have you refined your understanding of mindfulness? 3 – How did the rose ever open its heart? – kindness is an essential part of our mindfulness practice, allowing us to open to our inner goodness, and to meet experience with less resistance 4 – Taking your seat – some posture pointers for meditation 5 – Exhale and inhale – mindfulness of breathing 6 – Embodied awareness – bringing mindfulness to the body in…
January 28 – Short moments, many times
Dear Friends, As we near the end of January (already!), I thought I would share a few ideas how I keep my practice alive day to day… and invite some of your ideas too! One thing many of us may relate to is feeling like there isn’t enough time to sit and practice. That’s where I love this phrase, “short moment, many times.” Sharon Salzberg has mentioned it in a few places, including in one of her books: Q Can we benefit from meditation practices if we limit them to small pockets of time during the day, such as the commute to and from work? A Yes, we do benefit from small pockets of practice. One of my Tibetan meditation teachers counseled, “Short moments many times,” as a way to make progress in meditation. What I find personally though, is that if I have a period of time dedicated specifically…
January 27 – Cultivating kindness
Dear Friends, with great kindness inspired by Gnossienne 2, by Erik Satie the way morning suntouches the sunflower leaf–you may say that’s not kindness,it’s just how it is. exactly.let me love like that Rosemerry Wahtola Trommerhttps://ahundredfallingveils.com/2019/08/26/with-great-kindness/ Somedays, it might feel far away, but kindness is a natural state we can access, and it’s something that we can cultivate and grow. Emma Seppälä researches, writes, and teaches on the “science of health, happiness and success” – the tagline on her website. In one post, she writes: During my dissertation research at Stanford, I learned that many people don’t feel connected to others and that this low sense of connection impacts their health and well-being tremendously…. Studies also show that compassion is a key ingredient to our health and well-being but that, sadly, we’re not always as kind to others as we would like to be. Worse yet, we’re not always kind…
January 26 – Being present
Dear Friends, As we move from a single-pointed focus (e.g. on the breathing) to a more open awareness of whatever is arising, the present moment becomes the primary object of attention. Being Present Breathe, relax and feel;take time to slow downthe pace of life. Watch therise and fall of moods, thebirth and death of dreams.Feelings and sensation seemso real, yet they shift likechanging clouds, and flowwith the high tide out to seaagain. Allow it all to be, noneed to grasp or push away.Present with each moment,the whole of you, body, mindand soul, opens to receive. Danna Faulds, Go In and In: Poems from the Heart of Yoga.As shared here:https://ournewexperience.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Being-Present-Faulds.pdf When we practice in this way, we can become more attuned to the dynamic, ever-changing nature of experience. We may also start to notice how experiences are interrelated too. Habits and tendencies may be illuminated, and we can learn what patterns…
January 25 – Spectrum of awareness
Dear Friends, There are many ways to practice meditation. Over the course of this month, we have started very with a narrow focus (breath) and have widened the scope of possibilities to invite the inclusion of body sensations, hearing, the flavor (pleasant thru unpleasant), thoughts and emotions. We have also invited some more heartful practices of kindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity. If you work with different teachers and in different traditions, you will find other practices too. I have taken several online programs taught or organized by Diana Winston, the Director of Mindfulness Education at the Mindful Awareness Research Center (MARC) at UCLA. For the past few years, she has been teaching what she calls the “Spectrum of Awareness,” which widens the focus of attention in different ways. For example, when we started with focusing on the breath, we were doing what Diana would call a Focused Awareness Practice. Our…
January 24 – Responding from a broader perspective
Dear Friends, A friend of mine welcomed a new granddaughter into the world on Saturday. And at the same time, her 95 year-old mother-in-law is in palliative care. This reminds me of a verse in Sarah Slean’s song “Cosmic Ballet“ Sick woman in a sick bed waitingLight fast fading in her eyesSomewhere else, another light is fallingTurning into newborn cries Sarah Slean. “Cosmic Ballet.” Land & Sea, Pheromone Recordings, 2011. Sarah describes this as the “Ebb and flowing of an ancient ocean / Oh, the cosmic ballet.” And she tells us “A dancer you must be.” We’re all subject to the full range of joys and sorrows in the world. I once thought that if I could “get rid” of the pain, loss, failure, and blame, then life would be good… but of course if we don’t open ourselves to the pain and sorrow, we’re also not open for the…
January 23 – Here comes the judge
Dear Friends, I have noticed a particularly sticky thought pattern. It’s the one that says to me, “You’re not good enough. You should be doing more. You always lose your keys – how can you be that disorganized. You’ll never be able to do that thing, so why even try.” And on and on. Mark Coleman wrote a whole book about the inner critic. (See Make Peace With Your Mind: : How Mindfulness and Compassion Can Free You from Your Inner Critic) This is a very painful pattern, and it seemed like I became even more aware of this pattern when I started meditating. (Which, of course, cued even more criticism, “You can’t even meditate well! Geesh!”) This voice is a constant buzz – comparing everything “me” to some invented ideal – the one who is skinnier, fitter, smarter, always organized, and effortlessly perfect. And the “me” never can measure…
January 22 – Working with worry
Dear Friends, Based on some of the comments and emails, I’m pretty sure a number of us have noticed a planning, worrying mind is a deeply rooted pattern. …Worry thought in writing this post: “Wait… Is worry a thought or an emotion? I want to continue with the exploration of thoughts… so can I write about worry today?” Wikipedia to the rescue… Worry refers to the thoughts, images, emotions, and actions of a negative nature in a repetitive, uncontrollable manner that results from a proactive cognitive risk analysis made to avoid or solve anticipated potential threats and their potential consequences. Wikipedia contributors. (2021, January 14). Worry. In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 07:51, January 22, 2021, fromhttps://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Worry&oldid=1000321057 Sounds like both/and. Great! I can write about it! 🙂… Sebene Selassie wrote a post about worry a while ago. I can relate well to her opening few sentences: Much of my energy…
January 21 – Thinking about thoughts
Dear Friends, Thinking Don’t you wish they would stop, all the thoughtsswirling around in your head, bees in a hive, dancerstapping their way across the stage? I should rake the leavesin the carport, buy Christmas lights. Was there really life on Mars?What will I cook for dinner? I walk up the driveway,put out the garbage bins. I should stop using plastic bags,visit my friend whose husband just left her for the Swedish nanny.I wish I hadn’t said Patrick’s painting looked “ominous.”Maybe that’s why he hasn’t called. Does the car need oil again?There’s a hole in the ozone the size of Texas and everythingseems to be speeding up. Come, let’s stand by the windowand look out at the light on the field. Let’s watch how the cloudsover the sun and almost nothing stirs in the grass. Danusha Lamérishttps://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/152787/thinking-5e501c75668a4 When Danusha Laméris talks about wishing all the thoughts would stop, I think…
January 20 – What do you think?
Dear Friends, “The eyes see; the ears hear; the mind thinks.” I have heard many meditation teachers give a statement similar to the above. In the same way we don’t expect hearing to stop just because we are meditating, we also should not expect thinking to stop. That said, we can learn to relate to the thoughts in a different way, and meditation is one way to build these skills. Mindfulness practice isn’t meant to eliminate thinking but rather to help us know what we’re thinking when we’re thinking it, just as we want to know what we’re feeling when we’re feeling it. Mindfulness allows us to watch our thoughts, see how one thought leads to the next, decide if we’re heading down an unhealthy path, and, if so, let go and change directions. It allows us to see that who we are is much more than a fearful or…
January 18 – Reflecting on emotions
Dear Friends, As we sit in meditation and start to observe emotions as they arise and pass, we may start to notice tendencies and trends in what comes up most often and how we relate to them. Pema Chodron describes our usual tendencies when it comes to uncomfortable emotions, and how we can learn from them: Generally speaking, we regard discomfort in any form as bad news. But for practitioners or spiritual warriors–people who have a certain hunger to know what is true–feelings like disappointment, embarrassment, irritation, resentment, anger, jealousy, and fear, instead of being bad news, are actually very clear moments that teach us where it is that we’re holding back. They teach us to perk up and lean in when we feel we’d rather collapse and back away. They’re like messengers that show us, with terrifying clarity, exactly where we’re stuck. This very moment is the perfect teacher,…
January 17 – Give back your heart to itself
Dear Friends, We’re over halfway through this month of reflection and practice! And maybe you notice times you are discouraged that your practice isn’t going “better,” or you are sure you’re just not getting it, or other stories of self-judgment or shame. The RAIN practice discussed yesterday is one way to work with these kind of thoughts. Jeanne has another acronym that we can use, based on the self-compassion work pioneered by Kristin Neff and Christopher Germer. The simple form of Jeanne’s acronym is MUK. When we notice we are experiencing self-judgment, self-criticism, or difficult emotions we can try these three steps: Mindfulness: We recognize this is a moment of suffering. Kristin Neff also uses phrases like, “Ouch” or “This hurts”. Universal: This is universal human condition, experienced by people everywhere. We can remind ourselves that I’m not alone in feeling this way. Kindness: We can offer ourselves a kind…