A personal blog by a graying (mostly Anglo with light African-American roots) gay left leaning liberal progressive married college-educated Buddhist Baha'i BBC/NPR-listening Professor Emeritus now following the Dharma in Minas Gerais, Brasil.
Whatever a person frequently
thinks about and ponders, that will become the inclination of their
mind. If one frequently thinks about and ponders healthy states, one has
abandoned unhealthy states to cultivate the healthy states, and then
one’s mind inclines to healthy states. (MN 19)
Here a person rouses the will, makes an effort, stirs up energy, exerts
the mind, and strives to maintain arisen healthy mental states. One
maintains the arisen investigation of states awakening factor. (MN 141)
Reflection
Practice is not
just about abandoning the mental and emotional states that get in the
way of a peaceful mind; it has equally to do with encouraging and
supporting all the beneficial states. When kindness, generosity,
compassion, or wisdom arises, this is a good thing, partly because it
encourages further healthy states and partly because it blocks out
unhealthy states. Only one state at a time can occupy the mind.
Daily Practice
When you are
able to arouse the interest and curiosity that characterize the
awakening factor of the investigation of states, see what you can do to
maintain or sustain such interest. Mindfulness is a supporting
condition, as is energy or relaxed effort. It is a matter of taking
interest in the phenomenology of the inner life and inquiring deeply
into the texture, not the content, of experience. What does it feel like
to be aware of what is actually going on?
Tomorrow: Establishing Mindfulness of Mental Objects and the Fourth Jhāna One week from today: Restraining Unarisen Unhealthy States
Share your thoughts and join the conversation on social media #DhammaWheel
In
music, technical brilliance by itself may be impressive, but if the
tone isn’t true, the music does not resonate, and those who listen soon
become bored or restless. The same holds true for meditation. There is a
quality in attention, and when you hit it, your practice is alive and
awake.
On this date a sociologist at an Iranian university presented a study showing high levels of homosexual experiences among the country's population.
Iran has strict laws against sex outside marriage and other sexual acts
such as masturbation. Adultery and same-sex acts are punishable by
death. Startling new research from sociologist Parvaneh Abdul Maleki
found that 24% of Iranian women and 16% of Iranian men have had at least
one homosexual experience. 73% of men and 26% of women surveyed said
they had masturbated.
Ms. Maleki presented her findings at the Third Conference on
Well-being in the Family and the story was reported in the Iranian
press, albeit as a report on sexual deviance in need of treatment. The
report also revealed that more than 75% of those who grew up in a
conservative religious environment have watched pornography, 86% have
had a heterosexual relationship outside of marriage and just over 4%
have had Gay or Lesbian relationships. Since Iran's Islamic revolution
in 1979, human rights groups claim that between 3,000 and 4,000 people
have been executed under Sharia law for the crime of homosexuality. The
President of Iran admitted in an interview that there may be "a few" gay
people in his country, but attacked homosexuality as destructive to
society.
In an interview with U.S. current affairs TV program Democracy Now,
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also rejected criticism of the execution of
children in Iran. During a visit to the U.S. in 2007 he said in reply to
a question posed about homosexuality during his speech at New York's
Columbia University: "In Iran we don't have homosexuals like in your
country… In Iran we do not have this phenomenon, I don't know who has
told you that we have it." In his TV interview he condemned American
acceptance of gay people. "It should be of no pride to American society
to say they defend something like this," President Ahmadinejad said.
"Just because some people want to get votes, they are willing to
overlook every morality."
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