[GBF] new GBF talks

 

New talks have been added to the audio archive at the GBF website:

2022.01.09 Laura Burges (The Four Brahmaviharas).mp3

2021.11.13 GBF Retreat - Steven Tierney (Elderhood).mp3

 

 

https://gaybuddhist.org/

 

Via Dhamma Wheel // Cultivating Appreciative Joy

 

RIGHT INTENTION Cultivating Appreciative Joy

Whatever you intend, whatever you plan, and whatever you have a tendency toward will become the basis on 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)  The characteristic of appreciative joy is gladdening produced by the success of others. (Vm 9.93)

Reflection

Appreciative joy is the neglected brahma-vihara, or sublime state of mind, less well known than its siblings lovingkindness, compassion, and equanimity. As we see from this definition, it serves as an antidote to discontent. When feeling good about someone else, you cannot at the same time feel bad about yourself. While feeling joy in appreciation of the good fortune of others might feel forced at first, it can gradually become a habit of mind.

Daily Practice

Look for opportunities to notice when good things are happening to other people and extend good wishes to those people rather than jealousy or resentment. Celebrate the good fortune of even strangers and be happy for them. Joy and gladness are both rare and precious, and celebrating others' good fortune is an easy way to access those feelings on a regular basis. Even if things are not going well for you, you can share in the happiness of others. Try it and see for yourself.

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

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Via Daily Dharma: Look Beneath the Surface

 If an emotion or a disturbing state of mind is too painful to look at directly, seek the underlying condition that holds it in place. You may be surprised at what you discover.

Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, “The Aim of Attention”

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Via Tricycle // Overcoming the Inner Critic

 

Overcoming the Inner Critic By Dawn Scott

There is gold to be found in our longings and aspirations. But we must meet them with kindness—and protect them from the inner critic—so they don’t become a source of tension.

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Via Daily Dharma: The Right Attachments

 There’s no need to banish our longings or our aspirations, because we can recognize the gold and the beauty at the center of them. When we relate to them wisely, they can fuel our practice.

Dawn Scott, “Overcoming the Inner Critic”

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Via Dhamma Wheel // 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 sounds as they actually are, then one is not attached to sounds. 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

Craving is the cause of suffering, and if we crave a hundred things we will experience a hundred episodes of suffering. We are used to this constant thirst to possess things we like and to avoid what we don’t like. But we do not have to follow the dictates of our desires. It is possible to notice the yearning for something and then simply let go of it. This capacity points the way to freedom from compulsion.

Daily Practice

Using sound as the focus of practice, see if you can begin to notice the minor ways you favor or oppose the sounds you meet in your experience. Step back from being annoyed by a particular sound; step back from the allure another may induce; step back from constantly welcoming what sounds good and resisting what sounds bad. This stepping back is replacing desire with equanimity and can be practiced in small ways.

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.

Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - January 9, 2022 💌

 

If you cannot find that place in you that is free of fear, even though you acknowledge that there might also be a part of you that is frightened, you are not going to be able to contribute to a universe that is free of fear. So, as far as I am concerned, social action must have at its very foundation a spiritual focus.

But 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 -

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Via Daily Dharma: Know Your Scars

 

By looking at our own old wounds, by identifying them, by being with them with compassion, we can all find healing and contribute to our world in a meaningful way.

Radhule Weininger, “A Practice for Breathing Through Pain”

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Via Dhamma Wheel // Abandoning Arisen Unhealthy States

 

RIGHT EFFORT
Abandoning Arisen
Unhealthy States

Whatever a person frequently thinks about and ponders, that will become the inclination of their mind. If one frequently thinks about and ponders unhealthy states, one has abandoned healthy states to cultivate unhealthy states, and then one’s mind inclines toward unhealthy states. (MN 19) Here a person rouses the will, makes an effort, stirs up energy, exerts the mind, and strives to abandon arisen unhealthy mental states. One abandons the arisen hindrance of ill will. (MN 141)

Reflection

Unhealthy mental states arise all the time. The causes and conditions for their arising have been forged in previous mind moments, and we have no direct conscious control over whether or not they arise. The practice of right effort has to do entirely with how we handle them once they have come up. In other words, we have no control over what hand we are dealt in each moment, but we have the power to play that hand more or less skillfully.

Daily Practice

The conscious mind cannot control what emerges from the unconscious, but it can exercise some influence over how we respond. Take, for example, ill will, which can manifest as annoyance, resentment, or hatred; practice the art of acknowledging it but choosing not to feed it. To abandon ill will is not to suppress it or block it but rather to see it, know it to be harmful, and abandon it—to let it pass through and wave farewell.

Tomorrow: Establishing Mindfulness of Feeling and Abiding in the Second Jhāna
One week from today: Developing Unarisen Healthy States

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Via Daily Dharma: Life Doesn’t Wait

 

The breath waits for no one. It just keeps coming and going, coming and going. It will not stop for you. Just like the river will not stop—it flows and flows, it doesn’t wait—so it is with our lives. They just keep going.

Guo Jun, “Zen’s Seven Wonders”

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Via Tricycle // Buddhist Shorts Film Festival 2022

 

Buddhist Shorts Film Festival 2022 Streaming January 1 through February 4

Grab your popcorn! This month we’re screening five short films documenting Buddhist diversity around the world.

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Tibetan Healing Sounds: Removes all negative energy & Cleans the Aura a...