Maryann directed our reflections on Joy today, using her own recollections of joyful times, along with excerpts from a recorded dharma talk given by Mark Coleman at Spirit Rock.
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1/6/2013 – Joy
Rebecca guided our reflections on Joy, using both a guided meditation and a portion of a dharma talk by Tara Brach, “Committing to Joy.” Both may be found at http://dharmaseed.org/teacher/175/talk/16433/
Margaret led our reflections, using part of a talk by Rodney Smith titled “Mirroring Meditation”
<http://dharmaseed.org/teacher/148/talk/17881/>
along with a reading by Guy Armstrong of the Lump of Foam Sutta
<http://suttareadings.net/audio/index-readers.html#garm>
Both stressed the possibilities of seeing, in meditation, the relative insubstantiality of our experience – and with that, the freedom to shape our experience in the direction of freedom.
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12/23/2013 – Motivation to Practice
Michael framed the question for the day’s discussion,and everyone present had something to contribute, as our reflections on our individual motivations for practice were shared and explored. Among the questions that came up was the matter of how our overall orientation in practice affects our individual sessions of meditating. . . and also whether our daily practice has evolved in pace with the shifting goals of our intention.
Payton led our reflections this morning, revisiting the topic of Energy as a Factor of Awakening. In addition to leading us in two guided meditations employing different styles of energy, Payton framed the discussion with excerpts from a talk by James Baraz on “Energy/Effort (Virya)”
http://dharmaseed.org/teacher/86/talk/12355/
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12/09/2012 – Energy
Wendy led our reflections today, on the topic of Energy, the third of the seven Factors of Enlightenment. Our session focused on the many perspectives raised in Joseph Goldstein’s recent talk: “Virya – Courageous Energy”
http://www.dharmaseed.org/teacher/96/talk/17252/
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12/02/2012 – Investigating Emotions
Doubt PDFJoey led our reflections on investigating emotions in a meditative context, as a factor of awakening. During our time together, she drew on many sources, including playing a recording of the middle portion of a talk on Investigation by Joseph Goldstein
http://dharmaseed.org/teacher/96/talk/1966/
and reading/sharing a guided meditation from Tara Brach, Radical Acceptance: Embracing your life with the heart of a Buddha. pp. 87-88
as well as reflections on investigating emotions by Pema Chodron and Achaan Cha (via Jack Kornfield):
Pema Chodron, Taking the Leap: Freeing ourselves from old habits and fears. pp. 31 – 36; 40 – 43
The Buddha is still teaching: Contemporary Buddhist wisdom, edited & selected by Jack Kornfield, pp. 76, 81, 109
Anne led our reflections on this seasonally appropriate topic, using a talk by Tara Brach.
http://dharmaseed.org/talks/audio_player/175/11461.html
Among the many sources alluded to in the talk was Naomi Shihab Nye’s poem “Wandering Around in an Albuquerque Airport Terminal”
After learning my flight was detained 4 hours,
I heard the announcement:
If anyone in the vicinity of gate 4-A understands any Arabic,
Please come to the gate immediately.
Well — one pauses these days. Gate 4-A was my own gate. I went there.
An older woman in full traditional Palestinian dress,
Just like my grandma wore, was crumpled to the floor, wailing loudly.
Help, said the flight service person. Talk to her. What is her
Problem? we told her the flight was going to be four hours late and she
Did this.
I put my arm around her and spoke to her haltingly.
Shu dow-a, shu- biduck habibti, stani stani schway, min fadlick,
Sho bit se-wee?
The minute she heard any words she knew — however poorly used –
She stopped crying.
She thought our flight had been cancelled entirely.
She needed to be in El Paso for some major medical treatment the
Following day. I said no, no, we’re fine, you’ll get there, just late,
Who is picking you up? Let’s call him and tell him.
We called her son and I spoke with him in English.
I told him I would stay with his mother till we got on the plane and
Would ride next to her — southwest.
She talked to him. Then we called her other sons just for the fun of it.
Then we called my dad and he and she spoke for a while in Arabic and
Found out of course they had ten shared friends.
Then I thought just for the heck of it why not call some Palestinian
Poets I know and let them chat with her. This all took up about 2 hours.
She was laughing a lot by then. Telling about her life. Answering
Questions.
She had pulled a sack of homemade mamool cookies — little powdered
Sugar crumbly mounds stuffed with dates and nuts — out of her bag —
And was offering them to all the women at the gate.
To my amazement, not a single woman declined one. It was like a
Sacrament. The traveler from Argentina, the traveler from California,
The lovely woman from Laredo — we were all covered with the same
Powdered sugar. And smiling. There [are] no better cookies.
And then the airline broke out the free beverages from huge coolers —
Non-alcoholic — and the two little girls for our flight, one African
American, one Mexican American — ran around serving us all apple juice
And lemonade and they were covered with powdered sugar too.
And I noticed my new best friend — by now we were holding hands —
Had a potted plant poking out of her bag, some medicinal thing,
With green furry leaves. Such an old country traveling tradition. Always
Carry a plant. Always stay rooted to somewhere.
And I looked around that gate of late and weary ones and thought,
This is the world I want to live in. The shared world.
Not a single person in this gate — once the crying of confusion stopped
— has seemed apprehensive about any other person.
They took the cookies. I wanted to hug all those other women too.
This can still happen anywhere.
Not everything is lost.
Michael guided our reflections today, first by setting Investigation (dhamma vicaya) in the context of the progressive chain of the 7 Factors of Awakening (mindfulness, investigation, energy, joy, calm, concentration and equanimity) and then by distinguishing the different versions of these factors which do or don’t aim at enlightenment. The two types of investigation, analytic and intuitive, were then explored. Ajahn Sumedho’s approach to holistic or intuitive investigation is articulated in the first 48 minutes of this talk
http://dharmaseed.org/teacher/10/talk/5382/
Donia framed our second inquiry into Mindfulness, the first Factor of Awakening, with short excerpts from two talks, both by Donald Rothberg
2010-10-13 Mindfulness-What it is and What Makes it Difficult
2007-10-26 Supporting And Deepening Daily Life Practice
and then invited us to enter on-the-spot experiments in mindfulness. For those interested in revisiting the music we listened to mindfully, the piece was the third movement from Beethoven’s String Quartet Opus 132 – a hymn of thanksgiving, after being delivered from a great illness. If you’d like to listen to it again, you may click this link or copy it and paste it into your browser:
