Sunday, September 17, 2023

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


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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 common painful feeling, one is aware: “Feeling a common painful feeling.” When feeling an uncommon painful feeling, one is aware: “Feeling an uncommon painful feeling”. . . One is just aware, just mindful: “There is feeling.” And one abides not clinging to anything in the world. (MN 10)
Reflection
Common feelings are those that come with ordinary experience, while uncommon feelings are connected with more subtle psychological and meditative experience. Remember, feelings in this context are not what we commonly think of as emotions; rather feelings refer to physical and mental sensations of pleasure and pain. Here we are directed to take note of the painful sensations with the equanimity of mindfulness.

Daily Practice
Pay close attention to what it feels like when something is painful, both physically and mentally, as a way of practicing the second foundation of mindfulness. This means you are not resenting or resisting the pain but merely taking an interest in it and investigating its nuances with a balanced mind. Pain need not be seen as “bad,” but rather can be explored as a different texture on the continuum of lived experience. 


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 but with joy and the pleasure born of concentration. (MN 4)

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

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Via Mushim Patricia Ikeda // FB: October 7-8, 2023, a hybrid conference, "Mindfulness: What's Next?"

 

 October 7-8, 2023, a hybrid conference, "Mindfulness: What's Next?" from the Mangalam Research Center in Berkeley. For info and registration see https://www.mangalamresearch.org/special-events/

Via GBF: From the Archive: Weaving a Path Home - Alzak Amlani


[GBF] From the Archive: Weaving a Path Home - Alzak Amlani

We hope you will enjoy this new dharma talk that has surfaced from the archive, featuring our very own sangha member Alzak Amlani:


Alzak Amlani has been practicing Buddhism for 20 years and in the last ten years has been a student of the Diamond Approach. He is a practicing psychologist and teaches in the Integral Counseling Program at the California Institute of Integral Studies, where his work focuses on integrating spiritual approaches and multiculturalism into psychotherapy.
He is of Indian origin and grew up in Uganda, East Africa.
 

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Enjoy 800+ free recorded dharma talks at www.gaybuddhist.org/podcast/




Via White Crane Institute

 


Perry Brass Photo credit: Jack Slomowitz
1947 -

American author, poet and activist, PERRY BRASS was born today Brass grew up in Savannah, Georgia grew up in the 1950s and 60s in equal parts Southern, Jewish, economically impoverished, and very much gay. To escape the South’s violent homophobia, he hitchhiked at age 17 from Savannah to San Francisco — an adventure, he recalls, that was “like Mark Twain with drag queens.” He has published fourteen books and been a finalist six times in three categories (poetry; gay science fiction and fantasy; spirituality and religion) for national Lambda Literary Awards.

One of the main themes in his writing has been the integration of sexuality and the religious or spiritual impulse, as exemplified in his novels Albert: or, The Book of ManAngel Lust, and Substance of God. His writings have attempted to answer questions such as: Why are so many gay men religious and political conservatives? Why is the need for God so important to us? What is our own place in nature and the world?

Among the early anthologies that included Brass's work were The Male Muse, the first anthology of openly gay poetry ever published, edited by Ian Young; The Gay Liberation Book from Rolling Stone Press, including work by John Lennon; The Penguin Book of Homosexual Verse; and Gay Roots from Gay Sunshine Press. His work can be found in over 20 anthologies of poetry, short stories, essays, memoirs, and other writings. A poetry cycle called "Five Gay Jewish Prayers" was used as part of the high holiday service at New York's Beth Simchat Torah congregation. The text of this poem was accepted (in 1985) as one of the first gay Jewish documents in the YIVO Archives of Jewish history. This poem was set to choral music by Chris De Blasio, as "Five Prayers," which has been sung by several gay choruses.

In 1984, his play Night Chills, an early play dealing with the AIDS crisis, won a Jane Chambers International Gay Playwriting Award. Brass’s collaborations with composers include the words for "All the Way Through Evening," a five-song cycle set by DeBlasio, which was featured on the AIDS Quilt Songbook CD from Harmonia Mundi, France, and Heartbeats from Minnesota Public Radio; "The Angel Voices of Men" set by Ricky Ian Gordon and commissioned by the Dick Cable Musical Trust for the New York City Gay Men’s Chorus, which has featured it on its CD Gay Century Songbook; "Three Brass Songs" with Grammy-nominated composer Fred Hersch; and "Waltzes for Men" also commissioned by the DCMT for the NYC Gay Men’s Chorus and set by Craig Carnahan.

Brass's non-fiction book, How to Survive Your Own Gay Life (Belhue Press, 1999) deals with the psychic and physical survival of gay men, with their spiritual and psychological growth, and with achieving happiness and maturity. It was a finalist for a Lambda Literary Award in religion and spirituality, and has been the basis for many LGBT discussion and support groups, classes, and workshops.

Noteworthy
The European Parliament
1996 -

The EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT calls for an end to "all discrimination against homosexuals."


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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

Exploring Gay Wisdom & Culture since 1989!
www.whitecraneinstitute.org

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Via Daily Dharma: Real Recognizes Real

Real Recognizes Real

Just as it is only the real Self that can see the real world behind appearances, so it may be that it is only the real seeker who can recognize a genuine man or woman of wisdom.

Jason Needleman, “Bread and Stone”


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Saturday, September 16, 2023

Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Effort: Abandoning Arisen Unhealthy States

 


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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 to unhealthy states. (MN 19)

Abandoning doubt, one abides having gone beyond doubt; unperplexed about healthy states, one purifies the mind of doubt. (MN 51) Just as a person, laden with goods and wealth, who undertakes a long journey across a dangerous wilderness, would make it safely through with their goods to safety, so would one rejoice and be glad about the abandoning of doubt. (DN 2)
Reflection
Our text likens doubt to the insecurities felt while undertaking a dangerous journey, something that would have been commonplace to the merchants of ancient India. It is a sense of uneasiness around vague but real threats, and the image describes very well what today we might call anxiety. Might anxieties be regarded as unhealthy states, and might it be possible to simply abandon them, as described here?

Daily Practice
Notice when you feel anxious about or wary of little things in your daily experience, and see if you can just abandon them. I'm not referring to a diagnosed anxiety disorder here but to the many small worries we have that might respond to this sort of approach. Ask yourself if these doubts are helpful, and when you realize they are not, see if you can let go of them simply by deciding "not to go there” just now. 

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

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

Questions?
Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.



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© 2023 Tricycle Foundation
89 5th Ave, New York, NY 10003

Friday, September 15, 2023

Via Daily Dharma: Reconciliation Is a First Step

Reconciliation Is a First Step

Reconciliation is not an end point of practice. It is a beginning place for continuing to free your heart. 

Phillip Moffitt, “May All Things be Reconciled”


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Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Living: Abstaining from Taking What is Not Given

 


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RIGHT LIVING
Undertaking the Commitment to Abstain from Taking What is Not Given
Taking what is not given is unhealthy. Refraining from taking what is not given is healthy. (MN 9) Abandoning the taking of what is not given, one abstains from taking what is not given; one does not take by way of theft the wealth and property of others. (MN 41) One practices thus: “Others may take what is not given, but I will abstain from taking what is not given.” (MN 8)

On touching a bodily sensation with the body, one does not grasp at its signs and features. Since if one left the body faculty unguarded, unwholesome states of covetousness and grief might intrude, one practices the way of its restraint, guards the body faculty, and undertakes the restraint of the body faculty. (MN 51)
Reflection
The sense of touch is so basic, so intimate, and so alluring a feature of embodied existence that we generally cannot help reaching for what feels good and recoiling from what feels bad. Yet by doing this we are in a way taking more than is given, as we try to leverage the raw sensations and manipulate the next moment into something more favorable for us. This is, in fact, the source of most of our problems.

Daily Practice
Practice regarding the physical sensations that constantly flow from your body to your mind with detached curiosity. Some feel good, some feel bad—interesting! Resist trying to shape the next moment into something other than what it will naturally become by grasping for more gratification or pushing away any discomfort. This ability to be with what is, rather than yearning for something else, eliminates most suffering.

Tomorrow: Abandoning Arisen Unhealthy States
One week from today: Abstaining from Misbehaving Among Sensual Pleasures

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

Questions?
Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.



Tricycle is a nonprofit and relies on your support to keep its wheels turning.

© 2023 Tricycle Foundation
89 5th Ave, New York, NY 10003