Saturday, April 27, 2024

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)

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 all five arisen hindrances. (MN 141)
Reflection
Having worked through all five hindrances one at a time, we now focus on treating sense desire, ill will, restlessness, sluggishness, and doubt as a group. These are the five kinds of mental states that obstruct the ability of the mind to gather strength and become unified. Unhealthy states breed more unhealthy states, and it is helpful to abandon, not suppress or resist, them when you notice them arising in your experience.

Daily Practice
Become familiar with these unhealthy states and notice them at any point during your day when they come up—which is bound to be often. Just notice them one by one, recognize each as being not helpful, and let it go. That’s all. Gently guide your mind away from states that obstruct the mind toward states that are free of these obstacles. You will come to know your own mind better, and the practice will become easier to do.

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

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VIA Daily Dharma: We Are All Foolish

 



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We Are All Foolish

I was chatting with a couple of fellow students afterwards over tea and they told me about the word bombu. “It means foolish being,” they said. “We are all bombu. And we are all forgiven by Amida Buddha.” 

Satya Robyn, “Meeting Shame with Compassion: A Pure Land Antidote”


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A Great Human Revolution
By Kamilah Majied, PhD
In a personal reflection, Dr. Kamilah Majied celebrates the legacy of her spiritual mentor, Dr. Daisaku Ikeda, and his impact on her life and Buddhist practice.
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Friday, April 26, 2024

Via White Crane Institute // BEA ARTHUR

 

Died
Bea Arthur
2009 -

BEA ARTHUR, American actress, dies (b: 1922); A long time ally of the LGBT community, Bea Arthur, was famous for her title role in the sitcom Maude and later for The Golden Girls and many Broadway appearances and film.

She was an early opponent of Proposition 6 in California that would have forbidden Gay people and their allies from being teachers. It was called The Briggs Initiative after the state senator John Briggs who sponsored the ballot initiative. When this writer approached Arthur to request that she appear before the Morals and Ethics Committee of the Screen Actor’s Guild. I asked her if she would help and the first thing she said was "I will do anything you want me to do." As a result, the SAG union would be among the first to speak out against the broadly discriminatory proposition. 

In November of 2005, Bea flew to New York City from her home in Los Angeles to give a special benefit performance of her one-woman show. The performance raised over $40,000 for the Ali Forney Center. In an interview for Next Magazine Bea explained her decision to offer her support "I'm very, very involved in charities involving youth and the plight of foster children. But these kids at the Ali Forney Center are literally dumped by their families because of the fact that they are lesbian, gay, or transgender - this organization really is saving lives."

Bea continued to offer her support, both as a donor and as an advocate. In one of her very last interviews, published in the New York Blade in May 2008, Bea spoke with pride of having done the benefit for AFC, and indicated that she would do anything to help gay kids disowned by their parents.


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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 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)

One is to practice thus: “Here, regarding things cognized by you, in the cognized there will be just the cognized.“ When, firmly mindful, one cognizes a mental object, one is not inflamed by lust for mental objects; one experiences it with a dispassionate mind and does not remain holding it tightly. (SN 35.95)
Reflection
Five of our sense doors open onto the world, while the sixth, the mind door, opens inwardly to draw on sensory experience and mental objects such as memories, imagination, and thoughts. The mental objects are cognized, or known to us, one after another in a stream of consciousness. Here we are encouraged to encounter our thoughts without elaboration, as phenomena arising and passing away.

Daily Practice
See if you can regard your mental activity—the thoughts and images and words passing through the mind—with equanimity. That is, observe them closely but without becoming entangled in their content and without favoring some and opposing others. Thoughts are merely objects that, like sights and sounds and physical sensations, come and go based on various conditions. See if you can abide without “holding them tightly.”

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

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Questions?
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Via Daily Dharma: Equanimity Is an Anchor

 


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Please make a tax-deductible gift here »
Equanimity Is an Anchor

Equanimity is said to be an anchor. It protects you against the “worldly winds”—pleasure and pain, praise and blame, gain and loss, and fame and disrepute—by keeping you anchored so you’re not tossed about by those winds.

Daisy Hernández, “The Noble Abode of Equanimity”


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Lichen Days
By Seth M. Walker
What fungi and the practice of Miksang—a contemplative photographic tradition—can teach us about interdependence.
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