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 14 – Transforming challenges to objects of meditation
Dear Friends, Yesterday’s post listed five common categories of challenges we may encounter in our meditation — and in life. Today, I’ll offer a few ideas of ways we can work with these challenges. The first thing is to recognize that these are habitual states of mind, so we don’t have to make this a problem. We do want to notice when a challenging state is present. We can recognize the attitude we have with this challenging state… are we meeting this difficult state with more resistance? And also to notice when the state is not there! Enjoy those moments too. I’ll list a few strategies my training colleagues and I brainstormed for each at our most recent training module in December. Desire for pleasurable experience Notice what is pleasant in this moment, that there is enough in this moment. Practice the opposite of gratitude or generosity. Reflect on the…
January 13 – Try to love everything that gets in your way
Dear Friends, With the prospect of strong winds and snow across much of Saskatchewan over the next day or two, there’s a good chance things here will look a bit like a snow globe that has been shaken up. We won’t be able to see the buildings or trees clearly as the snow is whipped up and swirled around. So too, we might be noticing weather patterns of our own that disturb the peace and clarity of our minds in meditation – and in life. Many teachers group some of the common challenges we encounter into five broad categories: Desire for pleasurable experience Resistance to disagreeable experiences, aversion Restlessness or worry Sleepiness or dullness Doubt Often this list is called the hindrances, because when any of these states are present, they hinder our ability to stay mindful and cultivate wisdom. One thing I appreciate about this list is that it…
January 23 – Unhindered attention is a treasure
Dear Friends, Gil Fronsdal wrote: Because we tend not to see clearly when the hindrances are present, the Buddhist teachings strongly encourage people not to make decisions while under their influence. If possible, wait to make a decision when the mind is more settled or clear. So if you have something big on your to do list today, see if you can check in first – what’s the state of the mind? Gil’s article included this metaphor for the hindrances (based on the Sangaravo Sutta): An ancient metaphor for how the hindrances obscure clarity of mind is a pond. When the pond is clean and the surface still, the water reflects our image. The effect of sensual desire is like looking into a pond that has been dyed; we are predisposed to see unrealistically—that is, “seeing with rose-colored glasses.” When the heat of ill will is present, it is as…
January 22 – Your meditation is always successful
Dear Friends, As we enter into the fourth week of our daily emails, our focus now moves to the fourth way of establishing mindfulness, mindfulness of dhammas, which can be translated as mindfulness of phenomena or “stuff”. As Mark Coleman explains in a lecture from Essential Buddhist Teachings, The other three [ways of establishing mindfulness] – we were cultivating mindfulness of the body, awareness of the body in the body; awareness of the feeling tone – the qualitative tone of our experience; and … cultivating awareness of mind, mind states, things that are coloring our mind. Mindfulness of dhammas is more of a wisdom element, and a reflective element in the practice. This doesn’t mean thinking about our experience. We’re in particular paying attention to the causal nature of our experience. How things arise and how things cease to be. … Understanding that, we understand a lot about our experience,…
January 30 – today is your day!
Dear Friends, In A Path With Heart, Jack Kornfield mentions a Tibetan practice called “Making Difficulties into the Path” and he shared a prayer that is recited before each step of practice: Grant that I may be given appropriate difficulties and sufferings on this journey so that my heart may be truly awakened and my practice of liberation and universal compassion may be truly fulfilled. This dharma talk by Bob Stahl reviews some of the obstacles in our practice, including the hindrances, and various antidotes. (~33 minutes) https://www.dharmaseed.org/teacher/268/talk/17338/ Hindrances can show up in any practice, so feel free to do your favorite meditation and notice the obstacles as part of your path. If you want a longer guided meditation looking at hindrances, here’s one ~42 minutes https://www.dharmaseed.org/teacher/12/talk/31018/ And per Dr Seuss: Today is your day! Your mountain is waiting. So… get on your way! With best wishes, Andrea G
January 29 – light RAIN
Dear Friends, From Shantideva, an eighth-century Buddhist master: There’s nothing that does not grow light Through habit and familiarity. Putting up with little cares I’ll train myself to bear with great adversity. In chapter 5 of True Refuge, Tara Brach suggests a way of dealing with these “little cares” through a process she calls “light RAIN” – a way you can practice this during the day, in just a minute or two. Briefly, the steps are: Recognize emotional reactivity Pause by taking three full breaths, and Allow your inner experience to be as it is Investigate with kindness whatever feelings are most predominant Resume activity, and notice if there is more Natural presence You can read a summary of the practice here: https://www.nicabm.com/finding-true-refuge-with-tara-brach/ The light RAIN practice gives us opportunities to work with the little cares in the day, and then, as Shantideva suggests, we’ll be better prepared to bear…
January 28 – desire
Dear Friends, In Seeking the Heart of Wisdom, Jack Kornfield explains the first hindrance of desire as follows: The first hindrance is desire for sense pleasure: pleasant sights, sounds, smells, tastes, bodily sensations, and mind states. What’s the problem with desire–what’s wrong with it? Nothing, really. There’s nothing wrong with enjoying pleasant experiences. … But they fool us. They trick us into adopting the “if only” mentality. … There is no problem with enjoying pleasant experiences, and to practice does not mean to dismiss them. But they don’t really satisfy the heart, do they? For a moment we experience a pleasant thought or taste or sensation, and then it’s gone, and with it the sense of happiness it brought. Then it’s on to the next thing. … Again, the problems is not the object of desire, but the energy in the mind. The energy of desire keeps us moving, looking…
January 27 – what’s your type?
Dear Friends, In her book, Happiness is an Inside Job, Sylvia Boorstein discusses a difficult scenario and different possible reactions one might have in that scenario. I’ve adapted her example below… Scenario: You walk out of your apartment and notice all the tires on your car have been stolen. You’re so upset you… a) walk to the nearest mall and buy those pajamas you’ve been coveting b) go to the building manager and give him a piece of your mind about the building security c) feel exhausted and go back to bed d) worry about what else might go wrong e) blame yourself … and after that, you call the police… Which one of those five might reflect your initial inclination (although not necessarily what you would actually do…)? In Sylvia’s story, each of the reactions corresponds to one of the five hindrances: a) desire b) aversion c) sloth and…