Dear Friends, I was inspired to look at the five faculties this month because they can guide us in practice and in daily life. I like how Elizabeth Day described the applicability: This particular framework of the five faculties can be a framework for success in anything that we do. It is a succinct summary of a sophisticated… Read More »
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… Read More »
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… Read More »
Dear Friends, In a short story called “A Painful Case,” James Joyce wrote that the main character, Mr. Duffy, “lived at a little distance from his body.” As we sit with our devices at hand, reading these words, perhaps some may notice that we too live at a little distance from our bodies. I have certainly noticed that… Read More »
Dear Friends, For the next few days, I’m listening to the next talk from the Equanimity and Awareness Retreat, given by Kamala Masters, titled “Equanimity-Seeing the World with Quiet Eyes“. However, before diving right into the talk, I thought I’d share how, for me, Kamala exemplifies living with equanimity. I haven’t had the opportunity to sit with Kamala… Read More »
Dear Friends, Gil Fronsdal’s translation of the opening two stanzas of the first verse of the Dhammapada is: All experience is preceded by mind, Led by mind, Made by mind. Speak or act with a corrupted mind, And suffering follows As the wagon wheel follows the hoof of the ox. All experience is preceded by mind, Led by… Read More »
Dear Friends, Today is the last day of the 5 day retreat with Adrianne Ross, so I’ll be back to the land of technology later this afternoon. I thank you for your patience! Meanwhile, here’s a reflection for today! I look forward to catching up with your responses. It’s hard to believe we’re at the end of January!… Read More »
Dear Friends, I had the opportunity to attend a meeting yesterday evening, and the talk turned to boredom, and the tendency that many people have to fill time by doing “stuff”. In the context of that conversation, Doris mentioned a talk she listened to by Gil Fronsdal, in which he suggested a practice of doing one thing at… Read More »
Dear Friends, In the spirit of Andrea Fella’s seventh talk from the Daily Life Practice Retreat, I’m going to keep this simple. Her advice to the participants was to simplify things as part of their retreat week. The question she suggested they consider was: “is this necessary?” In our daily lives, we have to think. But sometimes we do stuff that’s… Read More »
Dear Friends, In the sixth talk of Andrea Fella’s Daily Life Practice Retreat, she encourages a practice of recognizing mindfulness, of knowing that we are aware. (Andrea F provided a handout to summarize the key points from this talk too.) In sitting meditation or in the daily activities, when we recognize that we’ve been lost in thought, Andrea F says that… Read More »
Dear Friends, I’m going to share a bit of advice from Sayadaw U Tejaniya, a Burmese monk. Before becoming a monk, he was a householder and merchant, so he can relate well to the challenges that people like us deal with. Here’s a paragraph from the first chapter of his recent book When Awareness Becomes Natural: A Guide to Cultivating… Read More »
Dear Friends, In Joy on Demand, Chade-Meng Tan describes four sources of joy, two of which he says are short-lived, and two which are “very important and highly durable.” The two that he describes as short-lived are the joy of novelty, and the joy of perceived agency. The joy of novelty is the excitement of experiencing something new,… Read More »
Dear Friends, We’ve covered a lot of ground these past few days, so let’s take a moment to recap. We started by talking about intention – setting an intention for the year, the day, a meditation practice, a chore – and we also looked at closing the day, practice, etc. with a dedication. We reviewed a few different… Read More »
Dear Friends, How’s it going with your mindfulness-bell activity? Remember, the goal is not to be perfect. If you’ve remembered that you’ve forgotten, just notice what’s obvious now, say “I’ll keep trying”, and then carry on. The recommendation for the activity yesterday was something that was relatively quick and occurred often. The second project Andrea Fella recommended in… Read More »
Dear Friends, In the fourth talk from the Daily Life Practice Retreat, Andrea Fella mentions that the tool of “what’s obvious” can work well in sitting meditation, but often what is obvious is not strong enough in our daily lives to help pull us out of our “habitually lost” mode. In our sitting, we have some reminders about becoming… Read More »
