Author: Payton Swick

While it’s nice to take time each day or perhaps each week to give our minds space to rest in silence, the reality is that for most of us, much of our days are spent immersed in the digital world. Clicking on notifications, scrolling for updates, reading articles, and chatting with friends or coworkers online has become, for many, our default state. It would be easy to say, “this is unskillful behavior” and stop, but would we? Could we? And would that really fix everything? Just because the lake has dangers doesn’t mean we need to forego swimming. Maybe there’s a way to treat our digital world as another aspect of our lives and learn how to attend to it wisely. We talked about it this Sunday when Payton played a series of short talks by Dr. Nikki Mirghafori.

You can find the series and its set of guided meditations here: https://www.audiodharma.org/series/26399

Among the teachings that the Buddha considered most important to learn, to internalize, and to detect in all situations is Annica – Change as a characteristic of all experience. 

Usually this is articulated somewhat negatively – whatever we have and love will be taken from us. But that is only one dimension of Annica. Life flourishes around us and in us – even as the season moves toward the ‘death’ of the year, there is the beauty of autumn. Can we find beauty and peace here and now, even as we realize there is nothing to hold onto?

This week, Steve guided our reflections in this exploration of the beauty of Annica.

Papanca is the Pali word for the way that thoughts seem to arise on their own, often uncontrollably, and free associate more or less endlessly.  How shall we meet this tendency, this force?

To really get hold of this elusive topic, Sam recommends a bit of reading, a brief and telling article titled “What is Papanca” by Andrew Olendski at https://www.lionsroar.com/what-is-papanca/

Sam played excerpts of these three talks:

https://dharmaseed.org/talks/player/13466.html

Christina Feldman 2011-07-15 53:19

53:19 Mana Papanca

Insight Meditation Society – Retreat Center: Mindfulness, Insight, Liberation: Insight Meditation Retreat

https://dharmaseed.org/talks/player/68004.html

Joseph Goldstein 2021-07-16 1:16:07

1:16:07 “Papanca 1: Craving, Conceit, and Wrong View”

Spirit Rock Meditation Center: “July Insight Meditation Retreat” with Kamala Masters, Joseph Goldstein, bruni dávila, Shelly Graf and Walt Opie

https://dharmaseed.org/talks/player/66476.html

Joseph Goldstein 2021-04-05 1:28:19

1:28:19 08 Papanca, Part 2

Insight Meditation Society – Retreat Center: Insight Meditation and the Forces at Play in Our Lives – 21JG0

I read “The All”,  SN 35.23:

At Savatthi. “Bhikkhus, I will teach you the all. Listen to that….

“And what, bhikkhus, is the all? The eye and forms, the ear and sounds, the nose and odours, the tongue and tastes, the body and tactile objects, the mind and mental phenomena. This is called the all.

“If anyone, bhikkhus, should speak thus: ‘Having rejected this all, I shall make known another all’—that would be a mere empty boast on his part. If he were questioned he would not be able to reply and, further, he would meet with vexation. For what reason? Because, bhikkhus, that would not be within his domain.”

and part of the Bahiya Sutta (Udana 1.10):

“Then, Bãhiya, you should train yourself thus: In reference to the seen, there will be only the seen. In reference to the heard, only the heard. In reference to the sensed, only the sensed. In reference to the cognized, only the cognized. That is how you should train yourself. When for you there will be only the seen in reference to the seen, only the heard in reference to the heard, only the sensed in reference to the sensed, only the cognized in reference to the cognized, then, Bahiya, there is no you in connection with that. When there is no you in connection with that, there is no you there. When there is no you there, you are neither here nor yonder nor between the two. This, just this, is the end of stress.”

Leigh Brasington expressed his interpretation of this passage: I take this to mean, “if you don’t go creating an object, you won’t be creating yourself as the subject”. This is my interpretation, not what it literally says. Subject-Object duality was not an idea at the time of the Buddha, so he had to come up with some way of expressing it. Given the limitations of language/ideas, this is what he came up with.

I tend to translate this as “You will not be in that (the object), you will not be in this (the subject), you will not be in-between.”

When a situation calls us to action, we often feel uncertain about what to do. Even after acting, we may wonder if we did the right thing or did enough, leading to endless self-questioning.

In fact, the test of appropriate action is much simpler:

  – Am I being sincere in what I do?
  – Am I doing the best I can in the situation?

Jackie, who is moving, starting a new job, and digging out from under piles of associated paperwork has had plenty of recent opportunities to face these questions. She guided our discussion this Sunday, sharing a talk by Chas DiCapua that points to ways we can free ourselves of self-judgemental thoughts.

You can listen to Chas’s talk here: https://dharmaseed.org/talks/99297/

Vedana – the ever shifting feeling tone by which we relate to the texture and meaning of our lives, is what we explored this Sunday.  Guided by Darryl, with a recording by Akincino mapping out the philosophical landscape, we investigated how our own experience gives a lived sense of what we’re engaging, how it shapes us, and how we shape it.

You can listen to Akincino’s talk here: https://dharmaseed.org/talks/87927/

In the period after the Buddha’s death, as in America today, many styles of Buddhist wisdom and practice evolved.  The Theravadin practice is the only one of these that survived, and it forms the basis of Early Buddhism that many of us have engaged with teachers from IMS, BCBS, Spirit Rock

But other styles of Buddhism have great influence on these teachers of Early Buddhism and their followers.  

•Suzuki Roshi’s “Zen Mind Beginners Mind” showed many of us the rich results of practicing Soto Zen style.  

•Pema Chodron’s reflections of and practice invitations have secured a clear place of Tibetan Buddhism in the spiritual lives of many here today.  

•Reciting the Heart Sutra, which directly contradicts the Theravadin Abidharma, is a part of practice at of many Early Buddhist  centers.  

Michael guided our reflections and practice this past Sunday, as we explored and sample some of these developments in practice and understanding.

Ram Das said:  “If you think you’re enlightened, go spend a week with your family.”   

Family of origin or close household family members have an outsized ability to touch our deepest triggers.  In a flash, our deepest insights and understandings can seem to vanish, to be replaced by reactivity that can heap suffering onto pain.  What can we expect of our practice of Buddhist principles in the face of intense relational triggers?  What insights from Buddhism can help us work with strong reactivity in close relationships?  How should we approach, and cultivate practices that can help us remain grounded at perhaps the toughest times?  

Lorilee shared reflections this week on her experience with applying various spiritual teachings to family-generated triggers, and share a talk by Jake Dartington and some of Pema Chodron’s reflections which offer some practical wisdom on the topic: https://tricycle.org/dharmatalks/wise-effort-and-the-window-of-tolerance/

Life can feel so demanding. At times, we may feel we don’t have enough energy, time, resources, or clarity to meet life’s demands. 

Our heart can feel under a “constant squeeze”- the pressure to make things better or fix them, driven by a sense of lack that seems to touch everything. 

How can we discover or cultivate a sense of “enoughness”—the felt sense that nothing more is needed? 

How might this moment already be enough? 

Sonia framed our conversation as we explored these questions with our Sangha.

Sonia played a talk by Gil Fronsdal which you can listen to here: https://sati.audiodharma.org/talks/4064

How do we keep our practice alive and applicable to life just as it is?  Sometimes, practice can feel effortless.  But at other times, being mindful or sending metta can be the last thing we want to do in a situation.  When this happens, and practice takes the back seat, what are some ways we can re-center it in our lives?  This can be especially difficult for lay practitioners, as we live in the midst of circumstances that seemingly pull us away from practice and towards destructive habits.

This Sunday Max guided our exploration of ways to recognize that our practice is always right here, right underneath us, even when it feels far away.

Amongst the wisdom of his talk, Max read a quote from a Q&A with Thich Nhat Hanh,

Q: Why do people have to suffer?

To grow lotus flowers, you need mud. Suffering is the mud and the lotus is happiness. The mud does not smell good, but the lotus flower smells very good. If you know how to make good use of the mud, you can grow a beautiful lotus. If you know how to make good use of suffering, you can create happiness. We need some suffering in order to create happiness, but we already have enough suffering. We don’t need to create more.

If we know the art of suffering, we will suffer much less; we will suffer only a little, and we will use our mud to grow our lotus flowers

You can read the rest here: which you can read here: https://www.parallax.org/mindfulnessbell/article/dharma-talk-the-art-of-suffering/

He also referred to part of a story told by Joseph Goldstein,

Once when I was on retreat in Nepal with my Burmese teacher, Sayadaw U Pandita, I had an experience of the difference between more-or-less mindful and fully mindful. The conditions on this retreat were really bad: poor food and just a cement floor and whatever kind of pad we had brought with us to sleep on. My room was right next to the latrine. A lot of smells. I found myself grumbling a lot inwardly—the inner grumble, the inner complaining. 

One day I went for a meditation interview with my teacher, and I told him what I was experiencing, expecting a little sympathy, or at least empathy, about what I was going through. But all he said was, “Be more mindful.”

My first thought was, “Thanks a lot! I’m suffering with all these bad conditions, and you’re just telling me, ‘Be more mindful’?” But I left the exchange, went outside, and started walking meditation. I thought, “Well, he’s a great meditation master. He said to be more mindful. Let me try it.”

In that period of walking meditation, I intentionally brought my attention in closer. My habit of attention had been halfway there, halfway not. But when he said to be more mindful, I realized: “Oh, I can change this habit of attention.”

You can read the whole thing here: https://www.lionsroar.com/the-doorway-to-wisdom/

Our mind loves to feel safe, and in order to feel safe it wants to have control. If I think about my problems enough, will they go away? If I am careful enough, can I prevent pain? If I practice hard enough, will I stop feeling afraid? Most people would say no, of course not. But a real part of each of us truly believes that we might have that level of control, if we just try a little harder. Our meditation practice can be a tool to pick apart our struggles and examine the views that lie beneath them. Can we meet them with care? Along with the Sangha this Sunday morning, Payton tried to find out.

Payton played a talk by Diana Clark, which you can listen to here: https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/25617