Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Action: Reflecting upon Mental Action

 

RIGHT ACTION
Reflecting Upon Mental 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 mental action is to be done with repeated reflection. (MN 61) When you have done an action with the mind, reflect upon that same mental action thus: “Has this action I have done with the mind led to the affliction of another?” If, upon reflection, you know that it has, then tell someone you trust about it and undertake a commitment not to do it again. If you know it has not, then be content and feel happy about it. (MN 61)

Reflection

We are used to hearing that Buddhist teachings encourage us to stay in the present moment, and this is true of meditation generally. But it is also appropriate to learn from the past, and reflecting on your past actions is one way to do this. Notice that actions include mental actions, so even what you have thought in the past is to be investigated to see if any of it has caused harm to another person.

Daily Practice

Think back on the quality of your thoughts directed toward other people in the recent past. Have you felt jealousy, ill will, or repressed anger, for example? Have you plotted in some small way to undermine the success of someone, even if you did not put the plan into action? This is intrinsically unhealthy and potentially harmful behavior, and bringing such thoughts to light by confessing them to a friend can be helpful.

Tomorrow: Abstaining from Misbehaving Among Sensual Pleasures
One week from today: Reflecting upon Social Action

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Questions? Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.

Via Daily Dharma: Loss Is Just Loss

Loss itself is not a gift; loss is just loss. Pain is not okay just because we can grow from it. We never need to be blown apart just because we can learn from the act of piecing ourselves back together.

Teri Dillion, “Making Our Own Jewels”

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Tricycle // Podcast

 

Podcast: Getting Close to the Terror
With Ocean Vuong

In our latest episode of Life As It Is, Buddhist poet and novelist Ocean Vuong sits down with co-hosts Sharon Salzberg and James Shaheen to discuss his latest collection, Time Is a Mother, which explores grief, loss, and survival.

Via Queerty // George Takei issues stark warning following the SCOTUS leak

 

Via Facebook // Exposing homophobia and intolerance online

 

O Buda de Ibiraçu

 

O Buda de Ibiraçu é o maior do ocidente e segundo maior do mundo, perdendo apenas para uma estátua em Hong Kong, que tem 42 metros. Siga-nos no Instagram @belezascapixabas

Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Speech: Refraining from Harsh Speech

 

RIGHT SPEECH
Refraining from Harsh Speech

Harsh speech is unhealthy. Refraining from harsh speech is healthy. (MN 9) Abandoning harsh speech, one refrains from harsh speech. One speaks words that are gentle, pleasing to the ear, and affectionate, words that go to the heart, are courteous, and are agreeable to many. (DN 1) One practices thus: “Others may speak harshly, but I shall abstain from harsh speech.” (MN 8) When one speaks hurriedly, one’s body grows tired and one’s mind becomes excited, one’s voice is strained and one’s throat becomes hoarse, and the speech of one who speaks hurriedly is indistinct and hard to understand. (MN 139)

Reflection

This is a simple and straightforward suggestion for how to speak more effectively. Hurried speech is a form of harsh speech and is to be abandoned whenever possible. When you look, you can see how strained people can get when they rush their words, and you know what this feels like when you do it. Speedy action of body, speech, or mind supports restlessness, while taking your time is conducive to calming body and mind.

Daily Practice

Put this guideline for right speech into action today and see what effect it has on your mind and body and on the people with whom you speak. Slow down your speech. Take your time to say what you mean with care. See if you can craft words that “go to the heart” rather than speaking harshly. Notice also when the speech of others is indistinct or hard to understand, and learn from this the effect of your own speech.

Tomorrow: Reflecting upon Mental Action
One week from today: Refraining from Frivolous Speech

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#DhammaWheel

Questions? Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.

Via Daily Dharma: Actualize Your Realizations

 Realization needs to be actualized. And having realized the fact that there’s no separation, an imperative arises to reach out to take care of things. That’s compassion. We take care of things because everything is this very body and mind itself. What we take care of is another question.

Jeff Zaleski, “Straight Ahead: An Interview with John Daido Loori”

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - May 4, 2022 💌

 “Even though we find ourselves afraid, and not feeling peaceful, and less than fully loving and compassionate, we must act. There is no way you can be in an incarnation without acting. We cannot wait until we are enlightened to act. We all hear the way in which our silence is itself an act of acquiescence to a system. That is as much an action as walking. Since we must act, we do the best we can to act consciously and compassionately.

But in addition, we can make every action an exercise designed to help us become free. Because the truth that comes from freedom, and the power that comes from freedom, and the love and compassion that come from freedom are the jewels we can cultivate to offer to our fellow sentient beings for the relief of their suffering.”

- Ram Dass -

From a conversation with Daniel Ellsberg, 1983

Via Lion’s Roar // Reimagining School Through a Buddhist Lens

 

Reimagining School Through a Buddhist Lens

Susan Yao explores how Buddhist principles could help us reimagine the American school system.

Via FB

 

Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Intention: Cultivating Appreciative Joy

 

RIGHT INTENTION
Cultivating Appreciative Joy

Whatever you intend, whatever you plan, and whatever you have a tendency toward, that will become the basis upon which your mind is established. (SN 12.40) Develop meditation on appreciative joy, for when you develop meditation on appreciative joy, any discontent will be abandoned. (MN 62)  Appreciative joy succeeds when it makes discontent subside. (Vm 9.95)

Reflection

The third brahma-vihara, appreciative joy, is not mere joy. It is the gladness that arises when you witness or contemplate the good fortune and happiness of another being. It is a celebration of all that is good in the world, an appreciation of healthy enjoyment itself. If you allow yourself to experience this often, your mind will naturally incline toward this state. It is impossible to feel any discontent when you genuinely feel good about others.

Daily Practice

This is a practice the world needs greatly, and it is deeply healing to the wounded heart. Living beings abide together in such profound interdependence that when relationships are fused with appreciative joy rather than discontent, the entire system becomes healthier. Practice celebrating the good things you see around you every day and use appreciative joy as a powerful antidote whenever you feel discontent.

Tomorrow: Refraining from Harsh Speech
One week from today: Cultivating Equanimity

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Questions? Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.

Via Daily Dharma: Let Your Eyes Adjust

 Zen practice involves finding and dwelling in emptiness. It’s like a person who goes into a dark room from a lighted hallway. When you look around at first, it’s absolutely black, but if you stay in that room, you begin to be able to operate. You begin to be able to see.

Kurt Spellmeyer, “Seeing in the Dark”

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Via New York Times

 

Via Tumblr// Humus

 

Via Daily Dharma: Unmasking the Ego-Mind

 When you challenge ego-mind, be firm but gentle, penetrating but never aggressive. Just say to your ego-mind, “Show me your face!” When no mind shows up saying, “Here I am,” ego-mind will begin to lose its hold on you and your struggles will lighten up.

Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, “Searching for Self”

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Via Dhamma Wheel | Right View: Understanding the Noble Truth of the Cessation of Suffering

 

RIGHT VIEW
Understanding the Noble Truth of the Cessation of Suffering

What is the cessation of suffering? It is the remainderless fading away and ceasing, the giving up, relinquishing, letting go, and rejecting of craving. (MN 9) When one knows and sees thoughts as they actually are, then one is not attached to thoughts. When one abides unattached, one is not infatuated, and one’s craving is abandoned. One’s bodily and mental troubles are abandoned, and one experiences bodily and mental well-being. (MN 149)

Reflection

Since suffering is caused by craving, the cessation of craving brings about the end of suffering. We have seen how this works for each of the sense modalities, and now we turn to the mind as the sixth pathway of experience. We are attached to certain thoughts—usually the ones that feel good—and we struggle against others, which results in a lot of mental troubles. We gain well-being by letting go of both forms of craving.

Daily Practice

Right view can be a practice in itself, a practice of gaining insight into the nature of our experience. Seeing thoughts as they actually are, as arising and passing conditioned events, helps us get free of attachment to them. Thoughts are not wrong, but we suffer in direct proportion to our infatuation with them. Craving can be relinquished, if only for a moment. Abandon bodily and mental troubles and get free—if only for a moment.

Tomorrow: Cultivating Appreciative Joy
One week from today: Understanding the Noble Truth of the Way to the Cessation of Suffering

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Questions? Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.

Mosteiro Zen da Vargem

 

About GBF

 

Inclusivity

As practicing Buddhists, we cherish the unique potential of each individual, and each individual’s unique mission in the world that only they can accomplish. We believe that each person has the ability to contribute positive value to society in their own unique way.  

GBF welcomes people of all races, backgrounds, and gender and sexual identities: BIPOC, men, women, LGB, Trans People, differing educational and economic backgrounds, and differently abled.  

 

“Do the best you can until you know better. 

Then when you know better, do better.”

– Maya Angelou

 

Our Practice

As a Buddhist organization, GBF undertakes the study and practice of living with mindfulness, compassion, and wisdom toward all beings, including those with whom we don’t agree. We do not experience this as being weak or passive. On the contrary, Buddhism is a path of courage, discipline, and deep commitment to truth and right action. Living with mindful awareness requires we first examine our own hearts and minds to become aware of unconscious internal biases and assumptions; in order to avoid the very dynamics of division and objectification which we strive to end. 

Courage, compassion, and a commitment to truth are required to acknowledge our thoughts and feelings, and self-discipline is required to change, regardless of the guilt and shame we may feel in identifying our own prejudices against others, based on race, gender, social class, etc. This is a practice of turning toward greed, hatred, and ignorance, in order to end the unnecessary suffering that they cause to ourselves and others. It is a path based on the disciplined application of moral principles of non-harm, development of community, and liberation for all beings – not just those who are privileged.

 

Via LGBTQ Nation // Same-sex marriages have happened on every continent now after Antarctic ceremony

 

The two men were the first same-sex couple to marry in Antarctica.

Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Mindfulness and Concentration: Establishing Mindfulness of Feeling and the Second Jhāna

 

RIGHT MINDFULNESS
Establishing Mindfulness of Feeling

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 feeling a neither-pleasant-nor-painful feeling in the body, one is aware: “Feeling a bodily neither-pleasant-nor-painful feeling … one is just aware, just mindful: 'There is feeling.'” And one abides not clinging to anything in the world. (MN 10)

Reflection

Of the three kinds of feeling tone—pleasant, painful, and neither-pleasant-nor-painful—it is this third, neutral feeling that is the most challenging to the practice of mindfulness. Feeling tones arise in a steady stream, just like the stream of consciousness; the practice is to pay close enough attention to the textured sensation of each moment. The object is one thing (sight, sound, etc.), and the feeling tone that arises with it is another.

Daily Practice

Sit quietly for some stretch of time and attend carefully to all the neutral sensations in the body. You might even scan systematically from head to foot looking for all the feeling tones that are occurring. Some are obviously pleasant, some are clearly painful. What about the rest? These are the neutral sensations—you feel them, but they do not feel good or bad. They are just there. Feel what it's like to feel what is just there.

RIGHT CONCENTRATION Approaching and Abiding in the Second Phase of Absorption (2nd Jhāna)

With the stilling of applied and sustained thought, one enters upon and abides in the second phase of absorption, which has inner clarity and singleness of mind, without applied thought and sustained thought, with joy and the pleasure born of concentration. (MN 4)

Reflection

The mind is capable, through training, of becoming more concentrated than is usual in ordinary daily experience. The Buddha describes this as a natural process, unfolding as the body and mind become gradually happier and more tranquil while the mind is focusing upon a single object. In the second phase of this process, discursive thinking gradually fades away as the feeling of pleasure and well-being grows stronger and deepens.

Daily Practice

As you sit quietly and focus on your breathing, the thoughts and memories and plans that so habitually inhabit the mind begin to settle, and the mind becomes calmer. At a certain point thoughts may cease altogether. Awareness of sensory experience remains strong, but it is no longer mediated by words, images, or concepts. The need to re-engage the mind with an object and hold it there is no longer needed, so these functions drop away.

Tomorrow: Understanding the Noble Truth of the Cessation of Suffering
One week from today: Establishing Mindfulness of Mind and Abiding in the Third Jhāna

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

Questions? Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.

Via Daily Dharma: Let the Winds Blow

Desirable things do not have to beguile the mind, and undesirable ones do not have to bring endless resistance. We can let the winds blow through us instead of letting them buffet us about. 

Mark Epstein, “How Meditation Failed Me”

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - May 1, 2022 💌

 
 

You are listening as well as you can to the universe, and often you will see that when things start to happen a certain way, your mind will focus in on that because you’re looking for patterns, which we call ‘synchronicity’.

Often you will just get caught in your desire to find a pattern that will give you an external validation for what you’re doing. You just end up using the universe again to do it to yourself.

So stay with your truth from moment to moment, and get the clues wherever you can. I mean, I’ll open up the Chuang-tzu and read something when I have a question, and if it doesn’t feel good, I say, “Well, that was interesting,” and I close it. If it feels like what I wanted to do anyway, I say, “Ohhh, wow, synchronicity!” And I do it, so I’ve learned that I’m a complete phony anyway, so I might as well just honor it and get on with it.

- Ram Dass - 

Via IMS Book Club: A Queer Dharma

 

IMS Book Club A Queer Dharma: Yoga and Meditations for Liberation Thursday, June 16, 7 pm - 8:15 pm ET

Jacoby Ballard provides an empowering and affirming guide to embodied healing through yoga and the Dharma, grounded in the brilliance, resilience, and lived experiences of queer folks. Enhanced with stories from Ballard's personal practice and professional experience teaching yoga in schools, prisons, conferences, and his weekly Queer and Trans Yoga class, A Queer Dharma is a guidebook, reclamation, and unapologetically queer heart offering for true healing and transformation. Open to all.

Enroll Today

Via Be Here Now Network

Mindrolling – Raghu Markus – Ep. 437 – Emotions, Mindfulness, & Metta w/ Sharon Salzberg & Noah Markus
April 28, 2022 Sharon Salzberg & Noah join Raghu for a metta-steeped conversation around emotions, mindfulness, self-compassion, and real change. Explore the intersection of Buddhism & Bhakti at...

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Via Be Here Now Network

  Ethan Nichtern – The Road Home Podcast – Ep. 72 – Zen Practice and Collective Ceremonies w/ Osho Zenju Earthlyn Manuel
April 29, 2022 This week on The Road Home Podcast we hear from Ethan Nichtern and Osho Zenju Earthlyn Manuel. They discuss the overlap of science and...

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