Sunday, June 18, 2023

Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Mindfulness and Concentration: Establishing Mindfulness of Body and the First Jhāna

 

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RIGHT MINDFULNESS
Establishing Mindfulness of Body
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 lying down, one is aware: “I am lying down.”. . . One is just aware, just mindful: “There is body.” And one abides not clinging to anything in the world. (MN 10)
Reflection
Practicing in a prone position is not essentially different from practicing in the other three primary bodily postures: sitting, standing, and walking. The instruction is simply to be fully aware of all the bodily sensations that arise and pass away in your experience. The most common form of doing this is the body scan, wherein you systematically focus on all bodily sensations from head to toe or from toe to head.
Daily Practice
In addition to practicing while sitting, standing, and walking, become familiar with meditating while lying down. The particular challenge there is to avoid falling asleep. In the other three positions muscle tension helps prevent this, but when you are prone it is very easy to doze off. You will find the ability to practice lying down especially valuable if you are sick and stuck in bed.     
RIGHT CONCENTRATION
Approaching and Abiding in the First Phase of Absorption (1st Jhāna)
Having abandoned the five hindrances, imperfections of the mind that weaken wisdom, quite secluded from sensual pleasures, secluded from unwholesome states, one enters and abides in the first phase of absorption, which is accompanied by applied thought and sustained thought, with joy and the pleasure born of seclusion. (MN 4)

One practices: “I shall breathe in experiencing rapture";  one practices: “I shall breathe out experiencing rapture.” 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 the Origin of Suffering
One week from today: Establishing Mindfulness of Feeling and Abiding in the Second Jhāna

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Via Daily Dharma: Shifting Old Perceptions

The cause of our suffering is not what we do but the way we perceive, and until this obstacle is addressed, all actions of body, speech, and mind will predictably reinforce our old perceptions of self and other, problem and solution, and limitation and freedom.

Rodney Smith, “Undivided Mind”


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Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - June 18, 2023 💌

 
 

"Being conscious is cutting through your own melodrama and being right here. Exist in no mind, be empty, here now, and trust that as a situation arises, out of you will come what is necessary to deal with that situation including the use of your intellect when appropriate. Your intellect need not be constantly held on to keep reassuring you that you know where you’re at, out of fear of loss of control.

Ultimately, when you stop identifying so much with your physical body and with your psychological entity, that anxiety starts to disintegrate. And you start to define yourself as in flow with the universe; and whatever comes along—death, life joy, sadness—is grist for the mill of awakening."

- Ram Dass -

 

 

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Friday, June 16, 2023

Via White Crane Institute // An Excerpt from Jaime Manrique’s Eminent Maricones

 

Today's Gay Wisdom
2018 -

TODAY’S GAY WISDOM

An Excerpt from Jaime Manrique’s Eminent Maricones

“A Sadness As Deep As the Sea”

The last days of the Cuban-born Reinaldo Arenas ("Before Night Falls") Reinaldo lived on 44th Street between 8th and 9th Avenues. He had visited my apartment many times yet had never invited me into his home. So when Thomas Colchie phoned in December 1990 and asked me to check on Reinaldo, I thought I'd better get in touch with him right away. Too many friends had died before we had a chance to say things we wanted to say. I called him, and we made plans for me to stop by late that afternoon. I climbed the steps of Reinaldo's building and rang his buzzer. The building was a walk-up, and Reinaldo's apartment was on the top floor, the sixth.

At the top of the steep stairs I knocked on his door. I heard what sounded like a long fumbling with locks and chains, which even in Times Square seemed excessive. The door opened, and I almost gasped. Reinaldo's attractive features were hideously deformed: half his face looked swollen, purple, almost charred, as if it were about to fall off. He was in pajamas and slippers. I can't remember whether we shook hands or not or what we said at that moment. All I remember is that, once I was inside the apartment, he started putting on the chains and locks, as if he were afraid someone was going to break down the door.

We went through the kitchen into a small living room. Besides an old-fashioned sound system and a television set, I remember a primitive painting of the Cuban countryside. A table, two chairs, and a worn-out sofa completed the decor. Reinaldo sat on the sofa and I took a chair. I felt that if I sat too close to him, I would not be able to look him in the eye. Stacks of manuscripts lay on the table--thousands and thousands of sheets, and Reinaldo seemed like a shipwreck disappearing in a sea of paper.

When I asked if they were copies of a manuscript he had just finished, he informed me that the three manuscripts on the table were a novel, a book of poems, and his autobiography, Before Night Falls. Reinaldo spoke with enormous difficulty, his voice a frail rasp. "The novel, El color del verano, concludes my Pentagony. It's an irreverent book that makes fun of everything," he mused.

"Leprosorio is a volume of poems. And Antes que anochezca," he pointed to the third pile, "is my autobiography. I dictated it into a tape recorder and an amanuensis transcribed it. It's going to make a lot of people mad.

It seemed to me absolutely protean the amount of writing he had managed to do, considering what a debilitating disease AIDS is. I said so. "Writing those books kept me alive," he whispered. "Especially the autobiography. I didn't want to die until I had put the final touches. It's my revenge." He explained, "I have a sarcoma in my throat. It makes it hard for me to swallow solid foods or to speak. It's very painful." "Then maybe you shouldn't talk. I'll do the talking," I offered, moving to the sofa.

"But I want to talk," he said curtly. "I need to talk." I said, "Reinaldo, if there is anything you need, please don't hesitate to let me know. Whatever it is...cooking your meals, getting your medicines, going with you to the doctor, anything." I mentioned the the PEN American Center had a fund for writers and editors with AIDS and offered to contact them. "Thanks so much, cariño," he said in the plaintive singsong in which he spoke. It was a sweet, caressing tone: melodious like a lazy samba but also mournful, weary, accepting of the hardships of life. This was a typically peasant trait. "There is a woman who comes to help three days a week. She does all my errands. Besides, Lazaro [Lazaro Carriles, his ex-lover who had remained his closest friend] comes by every day."

Just in case he wasn't aware, I mentioned other sources where he could go for help. He snapped, "I don't like those men who serve as volunteer. I can't stand all that humility." From where I sat I could see a bleached wintry sunset over the Hudson. "But if you contact the PEN Club that would be good," he conceded. "I would like to get away from here before winter comes. My dream is to go to Puerto Rico and get a place at the beach so I can die by the sea." To encourage him, I said, "Perhaps your health will improve. People sometimes..."

"Jaime," he cut me off, "I want to die. I don't want my health to improve...and then deteriorate again. I've been through too many hospitalizations already. After I was diagnosed with PCP [AIDS pneumonia], I asked Saint Virgilio Piñera," he said, referring to the deceased homosexual Cuban writer, " to give me three years to live so that I could complete my body of work." Reinaldo smiled, and his monstrous face showed some of his former handsomeness.

"Saint Virilio granted me my request. I'm happy. I do wish, though, that I had lived to see Fidel kicked out of Cuba, but I guess it won't happen during my lifetime. Soon, I hope, his tyranny will end. I feel certain of that." I knew better than to disagree with him when it came to discussing Fidel Castro. Once, in the mid-eighties, I had tried to tell him to put behind him his years of imprisonment and persecution, to forget Cuba, to accept this county as his new home and to live in the present.

"You just don't understand, do you?" he had shouted, shaking with anger. "I feel like one of those Jews who were branded with a number by the Nazis; like a concentration camp survivor. There is no way on earth I can forget what I went through. It's my duty to remember. This," he roared, hitting his chest, "will not be over until Castro is dead. Or I am dead." We talked for a while about the collapse of the communist states.

The last thing I wanted was to upset him in any way, yet I had to defend my belief in socialism as the most humanistic form of government. So I spoke to that effect. "On paper socialism is the ideal form of government," he said, not altogether surprising me. "It's just that it's never worked anywhere. Perhaps some day." Becoming thoughtful, almost as if talking to himself, he added, "Jaime, what a life I've had. Even before the revolution, it was bad enough the agony of being an intellectual queen in Cuba. What a sad an hypocritical world that was," he paused.

"Finally, I leave that hell, and come here full of hopes. And this turns out to be another hell; the worship of money is as bad as the worst in Cuba. All these years, I've felt Manhattan was just another island-jail. A bigger jail with more distractions but a jail nonetheless. It just goes to show that there are more than two hells. I left one kind of hell behind and fell into another kind. I never thought I would live to see us plunge again into the dark ages. This plague -- AIDS -- is but a symptom of the sickness of our age."

As night fell, the neon of the billboards of midtown Manhattan and the lights of the skyscrapers provided the only illumination. We chatted in hushed tones, more intimately than we ever had before. I was aware of how precious the moment was to me, how I wanted to engrave it forever in my memory. When I got up to leave, Reinaldo had difficulty finding his slippers in the darkness, so I knelt on the floor and put them on his calloused, swollen, plum-colored feet. We went again through the kitchen, where he mentioned he would have broiled fish for dinner. Then he unchained the numerous locks, slowly, one by one.

We didn't hug or shake hands as we parted -- as if neither of those gestures was appropriate. "Call me any time, if you need anything," I said. "You're such a dear," he said. As I was about to take the first step down, I turned around. The door to the apartment was still open. In the rectangular darkness Reinaldo's shadowy shape was like a ghost who couldn't make up its mind whether to materialize or to vanish.

The following day Reinaldo called to ask me if I could get him some grass. He said he had heard it helped to control nausea after meals. I told him that I would try to get some. I called a couple of friends and mentioned Reinaldo's request. Bill Sullivan suggested that I contact the Gay Men's Health Crisis because he thought Reinaldo sounded suicidal. I dismissed this possibility. Because his wish was to die by the sea, I thought he would try to make it to Puerto Rico if he received the grant from PEN.

The next day, around noon, Tom Colchie called to say the Reinaldo had taken his life the night before; that he had used pills and had washed them down with shots of Chivas Regal; that he had left letters -- one of them for the police, clarifying the circumstances of his death -- and another one for the Cuban exiles, urging them to continue their fight against Castro's rule. Reinaldo had died in the early hours of December 7, and his body had been found by the woman who came by to help with his chores. He was forty-seven.


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Gay Wisdom for Daily Living from White Crane Institute

"With the increasing commodification of gay news, views, and culture by powerful corporate interests, having a strong independent voice in our community is all the more important. White Crane is one of the last brave standouts in this bland new world... a triumph over the looming mediocrity of the mainstream Gay world." - Mark Thompson

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Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Living: Abstaining from Harming Living Beings

 


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RIGHT LIVING
Undertaking the Commitment to Abstain from Harming Living Beings      
Harming living beings is unhealthy. Refraining from harming living beings is healthy. (MN 9) Abandoning the harming of living beings, one abstains from harming living beings; with rod and weapon laid aside, gentle and kindly, one abides compassionate to all living beings. (M 41) One practices thus: “Others may harm living beings, but I will abstain from the harming of living beings." (MN 8)

This is something that leads to the welfare and happiness of a person in this present life: accomplishment in initiative. Here, whatever may be the means by which a layperson earns their living—whether by farming, trade, government service, or some other craft—one is skillful and diligent. One possesses sound judgment about it in order to carry out and arrange it properly. (AN 8.54)  
Reflection
Many of the Buddha’s followers were members of the merchant class, and much of what he teaches is suitable for those who are earning a living in society at the same time as trying to follow his guidance. The practical advice here is that it is good to be "skillful and diligent," whatever your trade or mode of livelihood. Sound judgment is a valuable quality to have and leads you naturally to a respect for life that abandons all harming.

Daily Practice
Mindfulness is a form of skillfulness. When you do what you do—whatever it is—with full attention, this contributes to its skillful accomplishment. Try approaching your means of earning a living as a craftsman might approach their craft, with focus, sound judgment, and full awareness. Notice in the text that this applies to managerial work as much as to farming, and there is no modern pursuit that will not benefit from a mindful approach. 

Tomorrow: Restraining Unarisen Unhealthy States
One week from today: Abstaining from Taking What is Not Given

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Via Daily Dharma: The Meaning of Intensity

 Intense times call for intense practice. But intensity does not mean straining or pushing; rather, it is a willingness to begin fresh.

Bonnie Myotai Treace, “Rising to the Challenge: Filling the Well with Snow”


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Via SFGate

 


Disneyland’s first-ever Pride Nite was one of the best nights I’ve ever had in the park

Column: SFGATE’s Olivia Harden visits Disneyland on its inaugural Pride Nite and takes in how Disney is appealing to the evolving American family