I've been feeling more joy in my practices this week.
Not entirely sure why there's been a shift, but it seems to be easier to access and easier to sustain. What may make it a little easier is the shift I've made from seeing emotions, sensations, thoughts, and anything that arises as objects, to simply being in the awareness of whatever comes up. I am moving towards a more intuitive feeling of non-duality.
In doing this joy becomes less of an object to be grasped, and more of a type of awareness to be experienced. It is a particular colour and feeling that wisdom takes on.
I see my sensations these days as a kind of x,y grid. Calm and alert on the vertical y grid. Pleasant and unpleasant running along the x grid. Joy kind of runs along the pleasant side of x. But not too pleasant that I have to worry about getting addicted to it.
Buddhism believes that this joy is in everyone. But what if it isn't. What if it is just a construct like any other emotion.
Would it matter?
What matters I guess is whether there is a cost to spending too much time in joy. Real joy, not manic over excitement or overly heightened expectation. Is there a cost to resting in quiet the confidence that there is enough for myself and for everybody, that happiness is not only possible, but sustainable, and that joy can be the thread that binds us. Is there an advantage to living in the sustained fantasy of deprivation and alienation, self hatred that we believe is natural?
Put this way it's so obvious, and yet we are pulled towards the bad dream again and again.
Sunday, February 3, 2019
Wednesday, January 16, 2019
Is anger useful?
"Anger is one of the densest forms of communication. It conveys more information, more quickly than almost any other type of emotion." Charles Durhigg in this article in the Atlantic.
Tuesday, January 15, 2019
The one and the many
« This knowing does not have time. Neither does it belong to particles. This knowing quality does not belong to subject and object. It does not exist, nor does it not exist. It is not both, nor neither. It is everywhere and nowhere. There is no beginning, so this luminous mind is never going to die. »
Mingyur Rinpoche
Mingyur Rinpoche
Sunday, January 13, 2019
Sensations
Yesterday I did a one day Vipassana retreat.
How fortunate I am to have this strong sangha of meditators in this tradition that has had so much impact on the practice of meditation in North America. Almost 40 years ago S.N. Goenka visited Montreal, his first North American lecture. The community he seeded grew into this strong and resilient charity that runs a beautiful retreat center an hour outside of Montreal, and then these one day retreats in the East End of the city.
Despite the 10 day retreat I did back in September, the two hours a day that I've been doing, and the one hour group sitting that's a 10 minute walk from my apartment, yesterday I feel like I finally "got" it.
Goenka's technique attunes you to the sensations flowing through the body, and cultivates the ability to look at these constantly changing sensations with calm alertness. I also cultivates the ability to see where these sensations are rigid, giving the impression of solidity and permanence.
Developing this intuitive relationship with our sensations, in their true impermanent and continuously changing state, helps us to develop emotional and intellectual agility. We make emotions out of our sensations, and then our sensations respond to these emotions. It's how we get into these ruts. Goenka's technique effectively deconstructs our emotional patterns so that we can start again.
This morning a 2 hour meditation flew by, largely because I was focussed on just being present and directly aware of the the flow of sensations. I had some moments where my mind flew off and started working out some work problems. When I returned to my body, all I had were these weak solid little spots of sensations and it became so clear how much the overthinking of life damages our ability to just feel it.
When it become more habitual to sit quietly with sensations, face them with equanimity, and be willing to be with whatever arises--be it warm sparkly vibrations of warmth and ease, or rock solid terror--then we are truly free to live.
How fortunate I am to have this strong sangha of meditators in this tradition that has had so much impact on the practice of meditation in North America. Almost 40 years ago S.N. Goenka visited Montreal, his first North American lecture. The community he seeded grew into this strong and resilient charity that runs a beautiful retreat center an hour outside of Montreal, and then these one day retreats in the East End of the city.
Despite the 10 day retreat I did back in September, the two hours a day that I've been doing, and the one hour group sitting that's a 10 minute walk from my apartment, yesterday I feel like I finally "got" it.
Goenka's technique attunes you to the sensations flowing through the body, and cultivates the ability to look at these constantly changing sensations with calm alertness. I also cultivates the ability to see where these sensations are rigid, giving the impression of solidity and permanence.
Developing this intuitive relationship with our sensations, in their true impermanent and continuously changing state, helps us to develop emotional and intellectual agility. We make emotions out of our sensations, and then our sensations respond to these emotions. It's how we get into these ruts. Goenka's technique effectively deconstructs our emotional patterns so that we can start again.
This morning a 2 hour meditation flew by, largely because I was focussed on just being present and directly aware of the the flow of sensations. I had some moments where my mind flew off and started working out some work problems. When I returned to my body, all I had were these weak solid little spots of sensations and it became so clear how much the overthinking of life damages our ability to just feel it.
When it become more habitual to sit quietly with sensations, face them with equanimity, and be willing to be with whatever arises--be it warm sparkly vibrations of warmth and ease, or rock solid terror--then we are truly free to live.
Sunday, January 6, 2019
The Wave
So a few days ago I had an exceptional mind flipping meditation.
And then on cue, a wave of craving hit, Netflix binging on Billie Bob Thornton's washed up alcoholic redemption series. So, yesterday morning I'm struggling with a splintered chaotic mind.
The one thing I had going for me, apart from my years of meditation practice, was a tidy room. I sought refuge. Meditated when I felt the craving hit. Examined my options like reading a revolutionary book on How Emotions Are Made by Lisa Feldman Barrett, instead of defaulting to Netflix. And ended up in bed at 10 p.m.
I feel the fruits this morning, feeling a palpable shift from right brain to left brain awareness.
Making more room for healthy energy in my life, literally means making a room for it.
And then on cue, a wave of craving hit, Netflix binging on Billie Bob Thornton's washed up alcoholic redemption series. So, yesterday morning I'm struggling with a splintered chaotic mind.
The one thing I had going for me, apart from my years of meditation practice, was a tidy room. I sought refuge. Meditated when I felt the craving hit. Examined my options like reading a revolutionary book on How Emotions Are Made by Lisa Feldman Barrett, instead of defaulting to Netflix. And ended up in bed at 10 p.m.
I feel the fruits this morning, feeling a palpable shift from right brain to left brain awareness.
Making more room for healthy energy in my life, literally means making a room for it.
Thursday, January 3, 2019
The Force
Wonderful meditation this morning.
Yesterday I watched a video that reminded me of that six second time lag we have between when our brain makes a decision and we become conscious of the decision. It's hard to wrap our heads around the fact that we might not have free will. And especially the idea that if we don't, why would this decision making energy make some of the poor decisions that it does?
But another way of looking at it is that we make some of the bigger decisions, based on reflection on previous decisions, and our brain then makes the smaller ones. One big decision we can make is to turn out lives over to the management of the energy that makes better decisions. This force field that created this magnificent world.
Combining some of the golden ball tai chi I'm recovering and the body scanning I've been doing in Vipassana, I found myself this morning really being in a bigger, better energy. Really feeling what it would be like to let it manage me, and thus impact the lives of the people who depend on me.
For a good long while I felt this energy flip me around and take control.
May I continue today to be with this force.
Yesterday I watched a video that reminded me of that six second time lag we have between when our brain makes a decision and we become conscious of the decision. It's hard to wrap our heads around the fact that we might not have free will. And especially the idea that if we don't, why would this decision making energy make some of the poor decisions that it does?
But another way of looking at it is that we make some of the bigger decisions, based on reflection on previous decisions, and our brain then makes the smaller ones. One big decision we can make is to turn out lives over to the management of the energy that makes better decisions. This force field that created this magnificent world.
Combining some of the golden ball tai chi I'm recovering and the body scanning I've been doing in Vipassana, I found myself this morning really being in a bigger, better energy. Really feeling what it would be like to let it manage me, and thus impact the lives of the people who depend on me.
For a good long while I felt this energy flip me around and take control.
May I continue today to be with this force.
Wednesday, January 2, 2019
The plan
My plan for returning to Zhan Zhuang is to start the way I would start if I were arriving at this blog for the first time, and starting the way I started almost 25 years ago, with Lam Kam Chuen's Way of Energy.
The plan is to stand five minutes a day this week, ten next, until by the end of the month I'm doing the regular twenty minutes, and by three months I'm back to an hour.
But I'm going to add something new. A new Chuen book. His Qigong workbook for anxiety. While I don't tend to think of myself suffering from anxiety, I clearly do. I had a terrible dream last night, in which my insecurity and reactivity lost me my job. Of course this anxiety is at the root of all my cravings and bad habits. Bad habit are almost always a poor response to nervousness and fear.
Last night I noticed once again how hard it is for me to lie still in my bed and go to sleep. There is a kind of terror that still grips me when I lie in bed. You'd think after years of meditation it would have ebbed, but it's still hard.
Chuen's approach is not to eliminate anxiety, but to work with it. So here goes...
The plan is to stand five minutes a day this week, ten next, until by the end of the month I'm doing the regular twenty minutes, and by three months I'm back to an hour.
But I'm going to add something new. A new Chuen book. His Qigong workbook for anxiety. While I don't tend to think of myself suffering from anxiety, I clearly do. I had a terrible dream last night, in which my insecurity and reactivity lost me my job. Of course this anxiety is at the root of all my cravings and bad habits. Bad habit are almost always a poor response to nervousness and fear.
Last night I noticed once again how hard it is for me to lie still in my bed and go to sleep. There is a kind of terror that still grips me when I lie in bed. You'd think after years of meditation it would have ebbed, but it's still hard.
Chuen's approach is not to eliminate anxiety, but to work with it. So here goes...
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