Dear Friends, Energy, or viriya, can be directed toward many different goals. To align our energy with our intentions, we focus it on the four endeavors of wise effort. Over the next few weeks, we will explore each of these in depth. The first endeavor is to prevent unwholesome states from arising. Joseph Goldstein reflects: When we’re leading… Read More »
Dear Friends, Setting a New Year intention can be a powerful practice to align your actions with deeper values and aspirations. An intention is not a rigid resolution but a guiding principle to cultivate mindfulness and growth throughout the year. Christina Feldman discussed a way we can work with this by noticing intentions: Intention and viriya (energy or… Read More »
Dear Friends, Thank you for choosing to be part of this January email offering. This marks the tenth year of this tradition, and I am continually inspired by the teachings and by the knowledge that you are here with me on this shared journey. This month, we will be exploring the factor of energy, or effort, as one… Read More »
Dear friends, I will be offering daily meditation emails again for January 2025. Are you interested in participating? As in previous years, I will send an email each day throughout the month of January. This year’s theme, Strength for the Journey: Energizing Mind and Heart, focuses on the energy (viriya) factor of the seven factors of awakening. Together,… Read More »
Dear Friends, Gil’s fifth talk on viriya looks at “effortless effort.”https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/11105 He describes the progression of effort as “deeper layers of letting go.” Effortless effort is a continuation of this flow of effort in a profound way. There is equanimity, non-reactivity, non-attachment. An analogy Gil shares is that of something tethered outside with a rope. Over time, the… Read More »
Dear Friends, Gil is building the progression of effort in practice. The initiating effort gets us going, perhaps again and again. Then we can make choices where we will put the effort – to something helpful or not helpful. Then we develop some level of relaxed persistence, some continuity of practice. Gil describes these as “what we offer”… Read More »
Dear Friends, So far we have explored the energy to get started (initiating effort), the way we can decide where to put our effort (right endeavor), and today, we will review what Gil calls Continuous Effort.https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/11099 As he surmises, the phrase “continuous effort” brings up for me a tightness, a striving, a gotta-get-this-right feeling. And that is quite… Read More »
Dear Friends, The next aspect of viriya that Gil discusses is right endeavor.https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/11093(Gil talks about the word “right” elsewhere: “it’s useful to think of it as meaning ‘appropriate,’ as when we speak of having the ‘right’ tool for a particular task.”) He uses the word “endeavor” as it is “what we are trying to do, what we are… Read More »
Dear Friends, Today, we’ll shift to the next of the faculties – viriya – the effort, energy, spark that gets a person started and continuing on the practice. We all know that doing things can sometimes be hard – it’s hard to get started, it’s hard to keep going. That might be why viriya shows up in so… Read More »
