Go!

I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed Michael Carroll’s book “Fearless at Work”. While I had hoped I would enjoy it since Carroll is a teacher in the Shambhala lineage I study, I was overwhelmed by ideas and inspiration after reading his book. I love it when someone takes the next step in how to apply old teachings to modern situations. This is NOT a “been there, done that” book – this really is fresh!

Yes, I am intentionally not telling more because I want you to get this book. Put it on your Christmas list. Beg someone to buy it for you. Or leave a comment here and win a copy!

In my review I tell the story of how I finished it on a Sunday  nite and by Monday morning I got a chance to use what I had learned.

I won’t give the entire review away – but here’s a line that I felt was powerful for me:

Carroll celebrates our own inner wisdom which can be accessed at any time. He doesn’t give formulas for more productivity or how to run a better project team. Instead, he says that we all actually want to feel confident, more than anything else, at work.

Go here to read more about how to become confident and defenseless at the office!

Here’s a little snippet of how Marc got started:

Many years ago, he and friend, Shakti Gawain, sat at a kitchen table and scratched out a vision for a publishing company focused on human transformation. Today, Marc is the head of this company, New World Library. NWL is a major player in the publishing world of self-help books.  To this day, Marc remains passionate about providing people with the tools they need to live lives of extraordinary brilliance and well-being.

Please go visit and listen!

Just go here!

This month’s edition is special because it features a book review (by yours truly) on Marshal Rosenberg’s newest book Living Nonviolent Communication. Jan is also giving away a FREE copy of this book to one lucky winner!  If  you leave a comment of the review, you’ll be entered to win – it’s that simple!

I encourage you to not only check out the book and Jan’s compassionate writings but to sign up with her for coaching and spiritual direction. I have never felt so heard as when I’m on the phone with her!

Go enter the giveaway now – click here!

If you’d rather not wait, order the book right now from SoundsTrue.com*

I will post more on how deeply affected I have been by Nonviolent Communication training, but for now I wanted you to know of a resource that is an easy read and will give you a great idea of how this kind of communicating works in real life.

*the FTC would like me to remind you that this is an affiliate link, which means if you buy something from them, I might get $.0003 from it. I’m not going to get rich, but I do want you to know of resources that I find helpful myself, and every $.0003 helps…

We were told as children “No, don’t do that! That’s bad!” or ” I can’t believe you did that!?? What is WRONG with you??” as if to say only people who had something wrong with them did such things. This type of speech is  so entrenched in our culture we no longer see through what message is being sent. We are no longer discriminating between the act and the doer of the act. I’m not saying  a child who is caught punching his friend on the playground shouldn’t have consequences, but the lannguage we use with children today is carried with them to adulthood. That child becomes an adult- us. We carry with us, of our own free will, the stories of what people said about us as children. As children, we felt small and helpless when adults disciplined us. Many times, we never saw that our ways of reacting to fear and anger as a child should be let go of to become a healthy adult,  never mind the fact that we all have this choice in the first place. Instead, that mistake we made at work and our boss frowns at us over makes us feel bad about ourselves. We tell ourselves “Damn! What was I thinking? What is WRONG with me?”

Do you hear the echo of childhood in that small question?

While the spirital path can be a blessing, western psychology goes hand in hand with spiritual practice. Many people have called it two sides of the same coin. Some people merely need to become aware of the stories they are telling themselves which are left over from childhood and no longer serve a useful purpose. But many  more of us need to be able to process the hurt and have someone listen and acknowledge our pain so we can fully release it.  That’s where mental health comes in, whether it’s a therapist or a trusted friend. Sometimes it’s not only about sitting on the cushion. Sometimes you need to lie on the couch and tell your story. A counselor will guide you to stop repeating your story to yourself over and over and how to feel the pain and release it.

Let me make this point clear – if you are on a spiritual path in order to get your psychological needs met, your spiritual experience may not be what you had hoped. While the paths look similar, different medicines heal different wounds. When all we know is that we feel pain it’s very hard to distinguish one from the other. The two intertwine nicely. If you find yourself re-experiencing trauma, abuse, constant negative self talk or even feel your spiritual practice is making you aware of things which feel overwhelming, looking into a psychological based path might be what’s actually needed.  If your Zen Master is not a licensed therapist, expecting him or her to know how to know why you won’t leave your abusive spouse is not in their purview.

Self worth is a celebration of having recognized that which reflects back at you. Coming to embody self worth takes courage and determination but it is also what we are driven to do.You are a walking reminder of what is good in this world. Many people are so on guard to all that is pain that they can no longer perceive the good. You reflect such a bright and steady light that no one can forget their own brilliance in your presence. Our daily practice is to do whatever it takes to embody this in our daily lives.

Here’s a list of books/ sites/ authors who really embrace this intertwining of western psychology and buddhist thought that I hope you find helpful:

• Tara Brach Ph.D.  www.TaraBrach.com
• Mark Epstein M.D. books
• Dr. Daniel Siegal Author of Mindsight and many others
• Jon Kabat-Zinn Founder of the Minfulness Based Stress Reduction course
• Dr Rick Hanson Author of Buddha’s Brain and more
• Psychoanalysis and Buddhism: An Unfolding Dialogue
• The Mindful Path to Self-Compassion: Freeing Yourself from Destructive Thoughts and Emotions
• Self-Compassion: Stop Beating Yourself Up and Leave Insecurity Behind
• Mindfulness and Psychotherapy 
• The Mindful Way through Depression: Freeing Yourself from Chronic Unhappiness
• The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You’re Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are

The our minds or ego has its own experience of each moment and attend to only a small portion of what can be truly experienced in any moment. The ego is going to continually act within the confines of its limited conceptions and continue the sense of separateness. This is why things seem separate to us. It is not an accurate reflection of reality.

We are not what we tell ourselves to be.

What are you telling yourself about your experiences throughout the day?

I’m adding a new section called “Jewels of Light” and here’s why. I have always been in love with the idea of Indra’s Net. It’s how I’ve always experienced the world and thought everyone else did too, until I discovered that they didn’t. Indra’s Net is an analogy for interconectedness. It’s the concept of dependent origination explained with beautiful imagery.

Here’s one version: “Far away in the heavenly abode of the great god Indra, there is a wonderful net which has been hung by some cunning artificer in such a manner that it stretches out indefinitely in all directions. In accordance with the extravagant tastes of the deities, the artificer has hung a single glittering jewel at the Net’s every node, and since the net is infinite in dimension, the jewels are infinite in number. There hang the jewels, glittering like stars of the first magnitude, a wonderful sight to behold. If we know arbitrarily select one of these jewels for inspection and look closely at it, we will discover that in it’s polished surface there are reflected all the other jewels in the net, infinite in number. Not only that, but each of the jewels reflected in this one jewel is also reflecting all the other jewels, so that the process of reflection is infinite.” 
“The Avatamasaka Sutra” Francis H. Cook: Hua-Yen Buddhism : The Jewel Net of Indra 1977

This line is what I have always seen and felt.  “….there are reflected all the other jewels in the net, infinite in number. Not only that but each of the jewels reflected in this one jewel is also reflecting all the other jewels, so that the process if reflection is infinite”. This line is what I have always seen and felt. It’s not some fluffy concept for me. It’s why I wanted to write this blog; to remind other of their jeweled light and reflect it back to them. It’s the convergence of individual forms with our shared functions.

So, to acknowledge my current reality, I’m going to bring in some different reflections. Posts tagged with “Jewels of Light” may not be my original words ( at least not every time) but words from others that I want to share with you which reflect what I’m thinking.

Here’s a few more links if you’d like to explore the concept of interconnectedness:

• My favorite video explaining Indra’s net
• A musician talks about how Indra’s Net influences her work – Part 1 and Part 2
•  And in case you forgot, there are  numberless being to be saved, and there is no one to save. The delusion that causes this pain and suffering is this sense of separation.
• I found these very inspirational 
• Unique images- youtube video
• This is a thought provoking video series exploring Buddhist/ Eastern though and how Science is explaining the same concepts but in Western terminology. Humanists and Atheists take note!  You can utilize the depth of buddhist philosophy and use completely Western terms and not have to worry about deities or superstitious beliefs. Part 1 and Part 2 

We all have difficult times. When the structure in our world seems to be crumbling, self care is usually the first thing to go in a crisis or stressful situation. Our minds are churning so much, trying to escape the pain that we spin around longing for the one thing that can make us feel better- someone to soothe us. While it would be great to have soothing family or friends (or even a counselor!) around 24/7, that usually isn’t possible. Well, how do we soothe ourselves then?

We can soothe ourselves until we’re strong enough to get back on our feet and walk our path. Comfort isn’t about chicken soup; it’s about feeling heard and loved.

There is a way to cope, a way to find some room to breathe. 

There are four things that all human beings need to bring a sense of safety, unconditional love, creativity and inspiration back into our lives. Without these four points, we can feel like something is “missing”.

I call them the four points of self soothing for stability.

If we hit all four points, especially when life is difficult, we will be nourishing our souls. We will learn to stay open in our pain and not contract and run away. Just as it’s very hard for a table with only two legs to be able to bear any weight, the same goes for the amount of stress we can handles in our lives.  It gives us the tools to build a structure of safety for self improvement, meditation practice, deep inner work or to just have more joy and mental clarity during the day.

If we hit all four points when life is just humming along, it allows you the stability to go within and explore deeper levels of spirit. If  we are constantly working to keep our table upright and centered, we won’t have the stability of mind to trust ourselves to explore beyond our normal perceptions.

I think about these four points as the four things needed in order for stability and strength and for me to find the balance in order to either bear my load or be centered enough to go within and explore my depths.

Think of these four points surrounding you wherever you go. One above, one below, one held in your left hand, one held in your right. Wherever you go during the day, you can always access them to help you find peace.

The first point I start with is the most grounding one. It is the one Below and is connected with the Earth.

The second point is the one that brings light and uncondiational love. It is the one Above and is connected with the Sun.

The third point is on your left side and brings joy and inspiration. It is the one to your left and is connected with the East.

The fourth point is on your right hand side and brings creativity and motivating energy. It is the one to your right and is connected with the West.

I’m going to be going into each point in more depth. Keep in mind,  it’s not a matter of trying to be perfectly balanced. What I’m trying to get you to consider is if you identify with one point, look at the other 3 and think about when the last time was that you did something for those points.  All are needed for a balanced human being but they all don’t necessarily have to be a perfect 25/25/25/25. I’ll be giving more detail as to how to do each point and help you regain your balance.

So I was talking to a friend the other day who was exploring meditation for the first time. He mentioned his explorations to his mother who then launched into him about why does he want to be a Buddhist and give up all his worldly possessions. He was hurt by her assumption and tried to explain that he didn’t want to become Buddhist. He just wanted to be happier and find some peace. She told him to go pray on it. He was quite upset about this and asked me what I thought.

I, of course, had a response. Practicing mediation makes you a Buddhist about as much as swimming in a lake makes you a fish.

While I really commend Buddhism for bringing awareness of meditation to the West, I’m looking for my Christian brothers and sisters to speak up about Christian contemplative practices. Christians meditate too!!  Meditation is not just a “Buddhist thing”; it’s just more widely advertised.

Meditation is to allow you to listen and become aware of the stories we tell ourselves. Meditation that has the majority of Buddhist terms stripped out  is referred to as “mindfulness”. It’s still the practice of stopping our hectic lives and really *listening* to the present moment instead of making it into something else we have to go *do*. It’s about clearing away the clutter in our heads to bring about clarity and peace of mind.

Recently, I’ve been exploring Christian Contemplation practices and I’ve found a book which I really like. Now, Thomas Merton is really the Father of Christian Contemplation practices, but this book is by one of his students, Cynthia Bourgeault. The book is called “Centering Prayer and Inner Awakening” and the forward is written by Thomas Merton himself. I love the title and I love Cynthia’s voice throughout the book. She is familiar with Eastern meditative practices does a tender job of explaining the two. While Thomas knew D.T. Suzuki, he personally felt more at home in Christianity. However, he said he felt Christianity had undervalued the mystical traditions and gone more towards “the reification of concepts, idolization of the reflexive consciousness, flight from being into verbalism, mathematics, and rationalization”.  Eastern traditions have retained more of the “beyond words” aspects of mysticism, explaining why they’re still so popular today.

Cynthia writes: Dying to self means being willing to let go of what I want (or think I want) in order to create space for God to direct, lead and guide me into a truer way of being.

I feel that Eastern traditions and Judeo – Christian beliefs are brothers and sisters in the family of spiritual nurturance.  You may feel more in common with one than the other, but neither one should be disowned and abolished. One emphasizes dealing with your own thoughts and how you hide your inner radiance with stories that feed only egos and beliefs which have never been examined. The other emphasizes listening to the still, small voice of the Divine and how you can radiate that outward to others.  You can’t hear the voice of the Divine to share with others if you’re consumed with listening to the stories you’re still telling yourself and not existing in the present moment.. You can work hard and unearth all the wisdom inside of you but unless you take the next step and express that Divine Compassion, your wisdom as well still be covered up. Cynthia talks about both as allowing for us to be “continuously dying to self”.

While she points to Jesus’ struggle in the garden of Gethsemane, I find this to be something that I could find in any Buddhist book. (Without the reference to an external creator, of course). But the sentiment is exactly the same.

I really feel Cynthia’s book does a great job of bridging the gaps in understanding of these philosophies. There isn’t much instruction that I’ve ever heard about contemplation practices in Christianity in common church – goers. She explains why Christian contemplation is isn’t some “New Age” thing but a real, heartfelt tradition that more Christians could learn about in the hopes that it enriches their spiritual lives.

Feel free to talk to your local spiritual minister if you’re intrigued by the concept of Christian contemplation, but don’t feel like if you don’t that you’re not still one of God’s children if you also chose to include some traditionally Buddhist type meditations in your practice.
The mere fact that meditation and mindfulness practices have become so well-known is because people don’t currently have a practice which settles their minds. If you’re in pain, you seek a remedy for that pain. I wouldn’t avoid taking a medicine that is the remedy for my pain simply because I’d have to switch brands; if it works, it just works!

Do what feels true for you. You are the only one who can judge if you are being true to your own inner wisdom.  I’m hoping this prompts you to explore and ask “Does this work for me?”

In my cube at work I have a picture that my seven year old niece made for me at Easter.   She loves to draw, as most little girls do. She will draw a picture with anything on anything. So at Easter, when she felt the urge she pulled out a school notebook and started drawing. I think she’s the slightly shorter one in the picture. She has the speech balloon pointing to her mouth, and it’s filled with love. I wonder how aware she is that her speech contains that much love.   Judging by the picture, I think she’s quite aware. The representation of me has a big smile on my face so I must be enjoying it.

Anyway, I remember watching her just run off with paper and very shortly thereafter, come rushing back with this picture. She was so calm when she showed me. She didn’t say I hope you like it! She just said This is for you, Aunt Leann!

After I accepted it and told her it was going up in my cube at work; she nodded her head and ran off with her brother. I got to thinking, I don’t come rushing up to people with what I’ve creatively brought forth and just say Here you go! At work (significantly less creative) I am checking and re-checking and it still takes me 30 minutes to press the send button when I have to send my document out for review (last-minute, of course). With the blogs I write here; I’m not standing on a street corner handing out the URL. Why is that? What happens to us past the age of 7?

My niece is reflecting back to me her perception of the time we had just spent together. She feels it, she expresses it. She didn’t worry about good enough or will I like it. It’s hers – why isn’t that good enough? I love that about her. If I had her sized pinky’s worth of her self-confidence to sell I could retire.

She also didn’t seem especially excited that I would hang this up at work. At first, I thought it was because she probably had no idea what a cube was. I thought about showing her this post with cubes. When I got home that nite, I realized the misunderstanding wasn’t with her; it was mine. She didn’t need her work displayed for others. She didn’t withhold her art until I could promise a place of worth to display it. She just expressed.

How many times do we put off creative endeavors that our heart ached to do?

How many times have we heard a tune and thought we could write words to it?

How many times have we seen nature and wanted to paint it, but didn’t?

I had to ask myself, how many words have I not written in this life because “I have better things to do”.

“Better”? What could be deemed better than following that thing that gives us life? What is more meaningful than noticing a nudge towards creativity – whether on canvas, in music or on paper – and given it form? Do we really need to beat it out of its original shape in order to be declared “worthy of my time”?

There’s one big thing I’ve noticed since I started writing this blog and it’s something to ponder when you’re exhausted from a long day. On the days I write, I have more passion for the rest of my life. I can now tell when I don’t write. I’m crabby(ier) than usual. If I don’t meditate AND I don’t write, don’t bother talking to me. Writing plugs me into energy that lifts me up and inspires me all day. I think of more original ways to solve problems at work. I’m clearer in my thoughts. I have more patience, and I could use every ounce I can get. Writing – or any sort of unearthing the creativity that’s so alive in a seven year old  – gives your life meaning. It gives you something to love, not to build. It allows you to be, not to do. Ava lives this. She is not of the age to ask What’s the use?.

I’m glad I wrote that day so I could enjoy the energy of a seven year old teacher….

 “Spiritual bypassing—the use of spiritual beliefs to avoid dealing with painful feelings, unresolved wounds, and developmental needs—is so pervasive that it goes largely unnoticed. The spiritual ideals of any tradition, whether Christian commandments or Buddhist precepts, can provide easy justification for practitioners to duck uncomfortable feelings in favor of more seemingly enlightened activity. When split off from fundamental psychological needs, such actions often do much more harm than good.”

There’s a great Tricycle article on the downfall of majoring in Self Help techniques. We start to do exactly what all these things are advising us not to do;  tally the books we’ve read, the insights we’ve had, or the years we’ve spent meditating. Somehow, we think, this should protect us. Somehow, all this work for all these years should be our shield against ever having to feel pain or grief again. We forget that we still live one moment at a time. If your practices so far have made you think about the oneness of the universe, or have great memories of listening to a talk on how to be compassionate, yet you still find that you don’t know how to apply these things, this may point to a trap called spiritual bypassing.

We want to feel better, but instead of doing things which will lessen the amount of stories we tell ourselves, we start telling ourselves stories about the things we do to lessen the stories.  So if your practice involved visualizing a compassionate person but there’s no experience of compassion, you may want to wonder what it’s place is in your practice. Yes, sometimes we need to do things in order to feel better in the moment, but if you have the desire to cut to the root of your pain, then you will want to be mindful of when you telling yourself you are compassionate, or when you instinctively act out of compassion and notice it afterwards.

If I  need to feel better in the moment, I do the Four Points Practices. Once I’m steady again, I turn to wanting to dig up the root of what knocked me off my center in the first place.

In order to determine which is which, I ask myself a simple question, “Am I adding to my thoughts, or getting to the root of my thoughts?”

While this peace goes deep,  eventually we can find it limiting.  We may notice one day that you keep having the same thoughts over and over and over. This means we’re starting to see clearly that managing our thoughts is not the same as getting to the core of who is thinking these thoughts. Many things like body work, yoga,  and deep meditative states start to give us a feeling that there’s more down there.

It’s like going down layer upon layer through the earth. We can easily find grass, soil, dirt, pebbles, or rocks. But eventually we hit bedrock or granite and we’re stopped. We think this is the end of what there is. However, it is just that we become limited by the method we use for digging.  We need a different kind of tool to penetrate this hardened layer. While our minds  use words, we can also become limited by them. We are limited to the concepts that words can convey. This is the hard layer we hit when digging. Eventually, we want to feel what’s beneath that. So when that time comes, we need a tool that goes beyond words. Beyond whatever religious or spiritual practices we have.  We want to use the deepest and wisest parts of our practice to transport ourselves back into the present moment.

Some people may question “why mess with a good thing”. Meditation feels soooooo good at this level! We’re deeper than in our normal, daily lives. Maybe we’ve found a meditation that really works to calm our mind down after a bad day. Maybe we’ve found such a peace and stillness that we can’t imagine that there’s anything deeper.

I tell you, there’s a great vastness of light and warmth that is right there in front of you that is unlike anything anyone has ever described. It is the origination and orginator of not only your thoughts, but the entire world.

We can get trapped by staying at the surface, by believing that what we’ve worked so hard to attain is all the peace and joy that there is. We are transported away from the scary and unpredictable world – isn’t that enough?  We can’t even fathom what else there could be discovered.  But what if we could drive an anchor through our soil, through the bedrock, through the granite layer we call think is the bottom.  What if we could realize we are actually living topsy turvey? What if we saw that in order to keep up our daily lives predictable and safe, that we make this illusion real. By doing so, we suppress the sacred meaning underneath it. People talk about wanting to “become more spiritual”. But what if you could experience that we ARE Spirit? We have these physical lives in order to express that spirit, but somehow along the way our longing for certainty became the view we live from instead of the joy and possibilities that we actually are. We can learn to allow this light and warmth to seep upward, through all the layers of our rocky resistance, through the layers of fertile soil of our day to day lives and expand out in our every waking moment of sunlight.

If you keep digging through these hardened layers of bedrock and granite, we find a core. An unpredictable, warm core which is what gives us life. Without our heated core, there would be no life on earth. Without the inner warmth of our being, we lose the sprit of life. When we touch this core, when we anchor our lives in it, we bridge  the gap between the depths of the warm earth and a bright, life giving sun. We no longer need to be soothed, we are soothing incarnate.

We are that anchor, bridging heaven and earth to the here and now.

If you’ve never worked in an office before,  here’s a picture of a cube farm. Yours may vary slightly.

See the color of those cubes? What color is that? I’ve wondered for 15 years now. They’re always the same color. If any of you manufacture these things, can you please tell me what the CMYK color code is? Beige? Gray? Brown? Tan?

Maybe you are lucky enough to work in your own office.  Ah, an office! With a window! And a potted plant! And your own coffee pot!

Maybe you work out of your home. Then I pray you don’t have a cube. Unless you design cubes for a living, then I could see you having one. But if you design cubes and you have one, you would very quickly realize that this is not a very good design if you want someone to be sane.

Maybe you’re a hair stylist, and you have a station. I’ll bet you have a mirror and a very big one. And scissors. I bet you’re never having to hunt down a pair of scissors.

Maybe you’re a sales person. Maybe you visit other people’s cubes.  Or offices. I hope you only have to visit offices so you can keep your sanity. I’ll bet you spend a lot of time in your car.

Maybe you’re a mom. So you have small humans. They have needs. Wherever you go, you’re a mom. Mom momomomom I want a cookie!!!!

Regardless of your job title, most people have at least something they do day after day. They repeat it. Over and over again. Some people go to the same place even. Some people get to vary their location slightly by visiting clients and driving to different locations. Some people work different job sites where they swing a hammer or hang or paint things.

Where does your mind go to work? What does your mind do while you’re doing your job? If you say, well I think about what I’m doing and I have very complicated things to think about, well, that’s one place. But eventually, you get a break. In between customers. In between projects. In between phone calls. At some point during the day, there is a moment when you are not talking to someone, writing about something important, being nagged to get a cookie for someone.

See, when you’re in your cube or doing whatever it is you do, you just “keep pushing”.  We sit or stand or run in our normal, repetitive environments, and keep pushing our minds down the same tracks.  We make well-worn groves in our minds that “when I am in this physical space my mind must work”. So the only thing hard about “finding time to meditate at my job” isn’t so much about finding the time. You have time – at least eight hours! The hard part is jumping out of that grove and stopping. Seeing that there is nothing that will explode immediately if you just stop and feel where you are in the present moment.

At some point during your day, there’s a pause. Maybe when you go to the restroom. Notice, it’s called a restroom, not a “I have to hurry up and do my bodily functions so I can run off to my next meeting and oh my dog I have no idea what I’m going to say” room. It specifically says “Rest”.  Sometimes that’s the best place to meet up with your mind again. To say “Hey! I recognize you! I’ve seen you around!” It’s been my favorite place to meditate for years.

Your mind will try to tell you that you have to *finish*, you have to *go*, you have to *do*.  But in the Resting Room, you don’t have to. This is Sacred Space – in a stall.

Go find your Sacred Stall

If you have no idea what you are thinking and your thoughts are still fast and furious, just notice that. Keep checking in with how you’re breathing. Don’t try and change it- just notice it.  Sit for a few minutes and notice what’s going on inside of your head. Notice how your body feels during the thoughts. Notice you do not have the exact same word in your head for more than a brief moment. You might have different words about the same subject, but no one word stays in your mind. Thoughts pass, that’s what thoughts do. Our minds think, that’s what they’re designed for.  If you have emotions come up while you watch the thoughts, notice them. If you feel something someplace in your body, notice that too.

This sitting is not about NOT having thoughts, this sitting is becoming aware of what is already there. The myth that mediation is all about getting rid of thoughts is just that – a myth. Our minds are designed to have thoughts. The problem is, we have becomes so identified with the mind – “I think, therefore, I am”- that we have forgotten that this is one big, gray squishy tool. Our minds have come to rule us. Instead of us using it as a skillful surgeon uses a blade – to cut thru and see what’s beneath. We find ourselves feeling anxious, or angry, or scared and believe that’s who we are. We believe it and there is nothing outside of us forcing us to! Why? What if there was a different way? What if you could see that these thoughts come and go and change and morph but… they do not define who we truly are? Could you imagine who you’d be without your thoughts? Do you have a sense of who or what that is? The “You” behind your thoughts?

That is the point of meditation. To watch what’s happening; to become aware that thoughts occur, but they are not the captains of this boat. That yes, Virginia, there really is something else behind the thoughts. That thoughts are here to help us, not rule us. We can use our thoughts to cut away at the illusion that we ARE the thought – to see that there is space between the thought and what is behind it.

For right now, just watch your thoughts. Watch them prance in your own head. Remember that even if your thoughts take you to 1879 or 2112 or last week, they are just thoughts, they will pass. Can you come back to the present and start watching your thoughts all over again?

When you try it, feel free to post your experience in the comments section below.

You may have heard our minds are like training a wild elephant or wild horse. I think in the modern world our minds could be likened to rush hour traffic. You think you’re going for a nice drive, but instead you become aware of the mass chaos that is actually your mind. You feel like you can’t control all these other drivers and they do stupid things you don’t understand. So, look up – into the sky. Is the sky clouded by the traffic? We have storms and smog and pollution, but is the sky polluted? If you keep going up,  where are you? Is the universe polluted? No, the universe has the space to hold this pollution.  Your mind is just like space. There is room to work with the atmosphere and the weather and the smog and the cars  and all the people in the cars.

You have been training in wild mind as Pema Chodron calls it. You have been trained in the skilled navigation of getting thru this traffic. Meditation is about training your mind in stepping back and not becoming another obnoxious driver on the road. If you’ve never trained in how to move in outer space, you can’t conceive of the possibility.

So what we do in meditation is to just look over this city and observe. There are lives and loses and gains here, but we are simply observing. This does not mean we’re detached- we have a curious sense of compassion for what goes on in this world. Many people have never visited this city of mind and would be heartened to feel the joy within it! But we never get caught up in the story. We always return to watching what’s happening in the present moment. We balance curious compassion with observation skills from the sky over the city mind.

Many people say “Well, I can’t meditate, my mind jumps all over the place”. What would you expect; thus far, that’s all you’ve trained in! That’s like saying “I can’t learn to play the guitar – every time I try it sounds horrible”. That’s why you’re learning. You’re training. You practice.

So meditation practice really is about learning what is really going on with your mind, moment by moment. It’s not about having nothing going on upstairs, it’s not about silence. It’s about observation and keeping a heart of curious compassion for all that occurs. It’s about not following the stories in your head to their emotional conclusion, it’s about noticing them and coming back to the present moment. Over and over again.

If not, I want you to pray. Surrender. I don’t care if you believe in a God/ Goddess/ Almighty Spaghetti Monster. I want you to leave your desk, your car, your kitchen table and go outside and visit your  nearest place of worship. Yes, even if it’s 10 am on a Tuesday, I want to go and pray for at least an hour. Tell your boss you’re sick (you’re not even lying – you just don’t know how sick you really are) and go pray/ surrender.

If after you pray, you still don’t know what you are doing here – what fuels the life that you live – I want you to grab a Priest/ Rabbi/ Minister/ Holy Person. Ask him or her your questions, and see what s/he has to say. Ask more questions. If you don’t understand the answers (and you’ll know if you understand them because you’ll be able to answer the first questions) then find another Holy Person. If you run out of people there, go to another house of worship.  Or another city. If you run out of churches/ temples in your denomination, open up your phone book and find another one. Repeat the cycle until you’ve hit everything in your phone book. If that doesn’t work, go talk to people on the local street corner. Ask them your questions.

Keep going until you find one that has your answer. Keep branching out. If it sounds wacky, try it anyway. How has the non-wacky sounding plan worked for you so far?

If you have no building or institution near you, go do what you believe in. We’re trying to save your heart.  Your mind will tag along in this process.

If you have no faith, try one, or make one up.

You are human – it will come. It is a manifestation of what we all are, how we are built.

Phrases like this get tossed out like clichés now. They make is sound like if you take 2 aspirin and some mediation then everything will be fine in the morning. Even Huffington Post has an entire section devoted to meditation. The Doctor in you can feel reassured by the scientific validity of what mediation can do to improve your immune system, brain function and pain sensitivity. You can participate in their “Healthy Living” meditation.  There’s even an article on sleep meditation.

As you can see, meditation is not even associated with some “exotic” religion – anymore your local YMCA might even offer meditation or “stress reduction” classes.

Is it really true? Can we take aspirin – uh, meditation – and all will be well and our sanity restored?

Well, like most things in life, it depends upon your motivation.

After watching some of the above videos, take a look at the videos here.

Here’s a quote off that page, from the Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche. Don’t worry about who he is right now (unless you already suspected he is head of the Shambhala Buddhist lineage – this guy is getting to be well-known by many non-buddhists).

“Many of us are slaves to our minds.

Our own mind is our worst enemy. We try to focus, and our mind wanders off. We try to keep stress at bay, but anxiety keeps us awake at night. We try to be good to the people we love, but then we forget them and put ourselves first.

And when we want to change our life, we dive into spiritual practice and expect quick results, only to lose focus after the honeymoon has worn off. We return to our state of bewilderment. We’re left feeling helpless and discouraged.

It seems we all agree that training the body through exercise, diet, and relaxation is a good idea, but why don’t we think about training our minds?“

This is my little intro to meditation and the different types. What I want you to think about is why do you want to meditate? When the Sakyong talked about intention, what was the first thing that came to mind?

Let’s talk about it!

It got me to thinking about words and other people’s words.

As soon as I type out these words in my head, they are no longer living in me. They are dead words. Don’t get me wrong: dead words contain the potential for lots of information. But they are printed on dead trees with dead ink with dead pictures (or dead electrons.)

By dead I mean they are no longer living fresh in the mind of the thinker who thought them. I think we can feel that way about most self-help or improvement books we read. Over and over and over, we buy more and more books. Sooner or later, we get the feeling we’re reading the same thing the same way for the same millionth time. We wonder what we spent all that money and time on!

But that’s only if you hang on to dead words. Our job as readers is to pick up on what these words are pointing to. What is the author trying to convey? Not with his mind but with his heart. What is her experience with this great matter?

I think if we can  try to feel what the author is pointing to, words become more than just talk talk being flung at us. They become our crowbar to unlocking real change. They become our link across the separation between us. I can know you thru your words, and you me.

These words aren’t to be talked to you, they are to be lived by you. “Believed” by you, if you take them up and make them your own impetus to take the next step…

Take care with your words and they will take care of you.

My new favorite saying is, “When I grow up, I want to be honest”. I renounce this life spent longing for certainty! Renunciation doesn’t mean depravity, poverty- consciousness, or asceticism; it means renouncing all the ways we dive into the muck at the bottom of the pond to escape ourselves. It means giving up the weight of the secret whispers that are only heard in our own heads.
“I’m flawed.”
“I can’t trust myself.”
“I am not enough.”
I mourn for all of us who dirty up our tender, beating hearts because we think it will give us a sense of protection and control in our lives. Renunciation is about having the faith to live in an open-hearted and courageous way. If I don’t feel safe, I ask myself, What story am I clinging to? I realize that no story can save me. I ask, am I ready to see that the only thing that can grant me safety is renouncing the illusion of control? With true safety, I am courageous.
Realizing that true safety is never granted by control and constriction, I can be the space to hold my fears. If I’m no longer talking myself into constriction and fear,  I bear the openness of this space. Fears about the future, thoughts about losses, worries, concerns- they still exist, but they no longer tie to me where they are. They entertain me as they continue their march in my head, but I am more than what’s in my head.

I can no longer bear to hide in the dark: I have no choice but to let my own light rise! I’ve watched my thoughts and what I tell myself, and I can no longer believe them. I use the bottom of the pond to push myself up and burst through the water’s edge into the sunlight. There isn’t something worth covering in me, there’s nothing left to search for to hide under. I lay down this leaden suit of old beliefs and let it fall away and I stand here, in *home-space*. For that’s all there ever truly is. I always come back right here. When I leave, I suffer.

I no longer need to leave.