Dear Friends, Sharon Salzberg offers a wonderful perspective on the balance between relaxation and energy in meditation in a short talk. She highlights how meditation is about finding a middle ground—cultivating calm, peace, and relaxation while also strengthening energy, alertness, connection, and interest.The balance of relaxation and energy in meditation (4:24) Sharon explains that too much relaxation can… Read More »
Dear Friends, Thank you for being part of this month-long exploration of the five faculties. I really enjoyed having the opportunity to dive deep into the topic, and I hope you found it interesting as well. Special thanks to the teachers and poets who generously post recordings (and sometimes transcripts) of their teachings online for us to follow… Read More »
Dear Friends, In the second short talk on the faculty of sati, mindfulness, Gil brings in an element to help with the establishment of mindfulness – “the mind’s capacity to comprehend what is happening, to know what is happening. … This is the ability to clearly recognize what something is.”https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/11117 The simple recognition that Gil discusses is not… Read More »
Dear Friends, In Pali, the first faculty is “saddha” – and that word can be translated many ways. One of the common translations is “faith.” For some folks, the word “faith” is a tricky word. Sharon Salzberg talked about how people responded when she first gave talks on faith: Painful associations with the word faith came pouring out… Read More »
Dear Friends, In insight meditation, we often practice cultivating four specific qualities of the heart: kindness (a.k.a. metta, loving kindness, goodwill, friendliness), compassion, joy (particularly joy in the joy of others, a.k.a. mudita), and equanimity (having a balanced perspective). In some circles, my fellow practitioners and I have discussed that this list could include a fifth quality: gratitude.… 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, 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… Read More »
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… Read More »
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… Read More »
Dear Friends, You may have seen this meme before: a stick person is walking with a dog (or sometimes a child or other person). There is a thought-bubble from each. The person’s bubble is full of people, cars, music, food, clothes, mail, gadgets, etc. The dog’s thought bubble reflects just the scene ahead – trees, sun, earth. The… Read More »
Dear Friends, One last message for this series of emails, to express my deep appreciation and gratitude for being part of this month with me. As the Buddha said to Ananda, “Good friends, companions, and associates are the whole of the spiritual life. ” (SN 45.2) It is inspiring for me to know that there were people from… Read More »
Dear Friends, Continuing with Kamala’s talk, “The Five Spiritual Faculties’ relationship to Equanimity“ Kamala gives a brief overview of the five faculties, and then delves into each in more detail. Today, we’ll look at the overview and touch into the first – in Pali, it’s called saddha, which is often translated as faith. Kamala’s talk describes how the… Read More »
Dear Friends, The closing paragraph of Christina Feldman’s Boundless Heart gives us the big picture of where/why/how these practices from this month matter: The noble abidings of kindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity becomes immeasurable and unshakeable when rooted in profound understanding. Step by step and moment by moment, a home is established in the qualities that ennoble our lives… Read More »
Dear Friends, I’m on retreat this weekend, but I’ve queued up this message to keep you company until I’m back on line on Monday. The “worldly winds”, the vicissitudes – these terms describe what most of us have experienced. There’s a standard list of eight, listed in opposing pairs:Pleasure and PainGain and LossPraise and BlameFame and Disrepute I… Read More »
Dear Friends, Generosity is a favorite topic of mine. In studying and practicing generosity, I’ve learned much about qualities of the heart. Generosity is so much more than just a monetary exchange or giving a gift. There are many ways to give that we may already be doing – through our presence, and the way we are in… Read More »
