"Have you turned a straight guy?" | You Can't Ask That

Via ARISE Sangha

 

ARISE Sangha

Transforming the World's Divisions Through Love and Understanding

One branch of the International Plum Village Community tree that has sprung from Thay’s vision of inclusion is the ARISE (Awakening through Race, Intersectionality, and Social Equity) Sangha. ARISE works to address and heal wounds of racial injustice and social inequity, bridging mindfulness and social action in practice communities and in the larger world. ARISE offers special online gatherings, webinars, a newsletter, Dharma teachings, articles (like this one on Juneteenth), and opportunities for Engaged Buddhism, in-depth conversations, and mindfulness practices that uphold and honor historically underrepresented groups within the global Sangha. ARISE also speaks out on current events, including the recent gun violence that’s disproportionately affected people of color: “When one of us dies in the name of hatred, we do not condone, we transform through love,” part of a recent ARISE statement says.  For more information, visit the ARISE website or follow the Sangha on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. And look to our next issue of The Raft for Dharma talks and further content recognizing Pride Month and supporting our LGBTQIA+ friends.

Learn More About ARISE

Via The Raft // Honoring Juneteenth

 “I am a drop in the ocean, but I'm also the ocean. I'm a drop in America, but I'm also America. And as I transform myself and heal and take care of myself, I'm very conscious that I'm healing and transforming and taking care of America.”  

Larry Ward, author of America's Racial Karma: An Invitation to Heal

Honoring Juneteenth A Spiritual Practice for Racial Healing  On June 19, the United States marks Juneteenth, which commemorates the freedom of enslaved people at the end of the Civil War. While 156 years have passed since the first Juneteenth celebration, black people and other people of color continue to experience ongoing, systemic, and disproportionate levels of racism, discrimination, poverty, and violence.  In a Dharma talk from Blue Cliff Monastery’s online Order of Interbeing retreat in 2020, Sister Peace says we must continue advocating for legal and social reforms that protect, honor, and celebrate members of BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) communities. But she says people of all races and cultural backgrounds must also learn how to sit with our awareness of this vast sea of suffering to investigate its roots and discern its implications for our lives, first individually and then collectively.  “What's being requested is not with an intent of separation,” she adds, “because we all live and work and move and have our being within the beautiful arms of the Sangha. We need to do the work so that we can individually and collectively heal.”

Watch the Dharma Talk

 

Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Mindfulness and Concentration: Establishing Mindfulness of Mental Objects and the Fourth Jhāna

 

RIGHT MINDFULNESS
Establishing Mindfulness of Mental Objects

A person goes to the forest or to the root of a tree or to an empty place and sits down. Having crossed the legs, one sets the body erect. One establishes the presence of mindfulness. (MN 10) One is aware: “Ardent, fully aware, mindful, I am content.” (SN 47.10)   When the investigation-of-states awakening factor is internally present, one is aware: “Investigation of states is present for me.” When investigation of states is not present, one is aware: “Investigation of states is not present for me.” When the arising of unarisen investigation of states occurs, one is aware of that. And when the development and fulfillment of the arisen investigation-of-states awakening factor occurs, one is aware of that.  . . . One is just aware, just mindful: “There is a mental object.” And one abides not clinging to anything in the world. (MN 10)

Reflection

The second of the seven factors of awakening is investigation of states. This is a kind of natural curiosity and interest that emerges when you become mindful of something. The heightened awareness leads to an increased inclination to investigate the nature of what is seen. It is like looking at something under a microscope or through a telescope—once it has been illuminated, you can begin the process of examining it carefully.

Daily Practice

Taking a keen interest in your own experience is not something that happens all the time but arises and falls away under various conditions, just like every other mental factor. It is something you can practice doing. It is a matter of amplifying your attention when it comes to bear on an object and then taking the awareness a step further, looking more closely or listening more carefully with open curiosity: What is this?

RIGHT CONCENTRATION Approaching and Abiding in the Fourth Phase of Absorption (4th Jhāna)

With the abandoning of pleasure and pain, and with the previous disappearance of joy and grief, one enters upon and abides in the fourth phase of absorption, which has neither-pain-nor-pleasure and purity of mindfulness due to equanimity. The concentrated mind is thus purified, bright, unblemished, rid of imperfection, malleable, wieldy, steady, and attained to imperturbability. (MN 4) One practices: "I shall breathe in, tranquilizing the bodily formation"; one practices: "I shall breathe out, tranquilizing the bodily formation." This is how concentration by mindfulness of breathing is developed and cultivated so that it is of great fruit and great benefit. (SN 54.8)

Tomorrow: Understanding the Noble Truth of Suffering
One week from today: Establishing Mindfulness of Body and Abiding in the First Jhāna

Share your thoughts and join the conversation on social media
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Questions? Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.

Via Daily Dharma: Practice Again and Again

Practice is an act of vision, of faith, and of desire. It means performing something over and over again, in the face of obstacles and disappointments, to accomplish the goal. 

Diane Musho Hamilton, “Practice Is the Way”

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - June 12, 2022 💌

 

So if you keep your heart open with love towards all people, even though you might say to somebody, ‘That’s wrong, and I’m going to stop you from doing it,’ do it without closing your heart. At least you are offering to all human beings at all times a heart-to-heart resuscitation; you’re offering something of your own being. You’re being with other people in love. And that to me is a gift that you bring, that is the best you can do to heal the situation. 

- Ram Dass -

 

Quoted from the Here & Now Podcast Episode 200

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GBF retreat with Rene Rivera, July 30th 10 am to 3 pm

 

Cultivating The Heart of Peace

 Please join us July 30th at GBF’s Bartlett Street Sangha, 10am to 3 pm. for a half day retreat with Rene Rivera.

The theme is Cultivating The Heart of Peace Mediation.

A mediation, dharma talk and group interaction will all be part of the day. We will provide drinks but please bring your own lunch.

As usual we will be hosting you in person or on Zoom.

More information will follow but save the date.

René Rivera (he, him) is a leader and bridge-builder, working and learning in all the spaces in between race, gender, and other perceived binaries as a queer, mixed-race, trans man. He teaches heart-centered, trauma-informed meditation and mindfulness practices at East Bay Meditation Center (EBMC) and elsewhere. His path to spiritual leadership has included the Commit to Dharma and Practice in Action programs at EBMC and the Community Dharma Leaders program at Spirit Rock Meditation Center. His experience as an organizational leader guides his practice as a coach and mentor, supporting you to find your strengths, inner guidance, and self-accountability. René is committed to ending suffering due to violence, whether reducing our violence to ourselves through daily practice, transforming conflict and tensions as a facilitator, or working to dismantle racial capitalism, heteropatriarchy, and other systems of dominance. He works with the Ahimsa Collective as a restorative justice facilitator.

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Enjoy 700+ free recorded dharma talks at www.gaybuddhist.org

SFLGBT Sangha is celebrating our 20th anniversary with a daylong hybrid event at the SF Buddhist Center!

On the agenda: Sitting and walking meditation, lunch, dharma talks and visits from former teachers. Lunch will be provided. Evidence of vaccinations will be required for in-person attendees. 

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Steven Tierney and Syra Smith will be the core teachers. We will also have virtual appearances from Larry Yang and Arinna 

Weisman.

Please register @

https://www.sflgbtsangha.org

 
No one will be turned away for lack of funds.

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Enjoy 700+ free recorded dharma talks at www.gaybuddhist.org

Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Effort: Maintaining Arisen Healthy States

 

RIGHT EFFORT
Maintaining Arisen Healthy States

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 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 mindfulness awakening factor. (MN 141)

Reflection

One form that effort takes in Buddhist practice is the rousing of latent tendencies and dormant traits, encouraging them to rise into conscious awareness as active mental and emotional states. The more frequently you do this, the more likely these states are to become the natural inclination of your mind. And once aroused, healthy states such as mindfulness need to be reinforced and maintained by deliberate choice.

Daily Practice

Throughout the day, remind yourself often to be mindful, to be consciously aware of what you are doing or feeling or thinking. And once you establish the presence of mindfulness, make a further effort to sustain it over time. Mindfulness, once established, needs to be reestablished moment after moment. Each moment is a new beginning and a new opportunity to bring clear awareness to all you experience.

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

Questions? Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.

Via Daily Dharma: Staying Balanced

 Equanimity acts like the ballast of a ship. Although the ship is blown one way or the other by the winds of life, it neither sinks nor goes too far off-course.

Christopher Willard, “How Parents and Children Can Learn Balance and Equanimity from the Eight Worldly Winds”

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Living: Abstaining from Intoxication

 

RIGHT LIVING
Undertaking the Commitment to Abstain from Intoxication      

Intoxication is unhealthy. Refraining from intoxication is healthy. (MN 9) What are the imperfections that defile the mind? Negligence is an imperfection that defiles the mind. Knowing that negligence is an imperfection that defiles the mind, a person abandons it. (MN 7) One practices thus: “Others may become negligent by intoxication, but I will abstain from the negligence of intoxication." (MN 8) Gain and loss are two of the eight worldly conditions. These are conditions that people meet—impermanent, transient, and subject to change. A mindful, wise person knows them and sees that they are subject to change. Desirable conditions do not excite one’s mind nor is one resentful of undesirable conditions. (AN 8.6)

Reflection

The conditions of gain and loss are the first pair of the eight “worldly winds” described in the texts, and they constitute the Buddhist equivalent of the phrase “You win some and you lose some.” The idea is that some things are inevitable in life, and the appropriate strategy in such cases is not to hope for them not to happen but rather to adjust yourself to them in a way that is skillful and conducive to overall well-being.

Daily Practice

Notice how natural it is to feel good when you gain something you value and to feel bad when you experience loss. Notice also how, in such circumstances, you allow yourself to be buffeted by the worldly winds of gain and loss. See if instead you can remain firm, grounded in equanimity rather than in favoring or opposing what happens. This is one way to remain clearheaded when facing intoxicating conditions.

Tomorrow: Maintaining Arisen Healthy States
One week from today: Abstaining from Harming Living Beings

Share your thoughts and join the conversation on social media
#DhammaWheel

Questions? Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.

Via Daily Dharma: Send Lovingkindness to Oneself

 Metta, or lovingkindness, is first practiced toward oneself, since we often have difficulty loving others without first loving ourselves. Sitting quietly, mentally repeat, slowly and steadily, the following or similar phrases: May I be happy. May I be well. May I be safe. May I be peaceful and at ease.

Barry Magid, “Five Practices to Change Your Mind”

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Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Action: Reflecting upon Social Action

 

RIGHT ACTION
Reflecting Upon Social Action

However the seed is planted, in that way the fruit is gathered. Good things come from doing good deeds, bad things come from doing bad deeds. (SN 11.10) What is the purpose of a mirror? For the purpose of reflection. So too social action is to be done with repeated reflection. (MN 61) One reflects thus: “I shall initiate and sustain bodily acts of kindness towards my companions, both publicly and privately.” One lives with companions in concord, with mutual appreciation, without disputing, blending like milk and water, viewing each other with kindly eyes. One practices thus: “I set aside what I wish to do and do what my companions wish to do.” (MN 31)

Reflection

In classical Buddhist tradition there are three kinds of action—bodily, verbal, and mental—but we are adding a fourth one here, social action. This is to acknowledge that a big part of how we act in the world has to do with our role in larger social and cultural systems. Our society is made up of individuals, and ultimately the quality of the whole group is going to be shaped at the individual level. Acting with conscious awareness is healthy.

Daily Practice

Cultivate the practice of being demonstrably kind to people as carefully as you would practice meditation. Kindness is a practice in itself, and just as with the breath, when your awareness wanders off the focus point of being kind, remind yourself to gently bring it back to the practice. Let’s practice “blending like milk and water” and “viewing each other with kindly eyes” over and over until we are really good at it.

Tomorrow: Abstaining from Intoxication
One week from today: Reflecting upon Bodily Action

Share your thoughts and join the conversation on social media
#DhammaWheel

Questions? Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.

Via Daily Dharma: Seeing into Compassion

The practice of seeing clearly is what finally moves us toward kindness. Seeing, again and again, the infinite variety of traps we create for seducing the mind into struggle, seeing the endless rounds of meaningless suffering over lusts and aversions (which, although seemingly urgent, are essentially empty), we feel compassion for ourselves.

Sylvia Boorstein, “The Wisdom of Discomfort”

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