What Am I Feeling?

(Back from two and a half week retreat with Ruth Denison, at Dhamma Dena Desert Vipassana Center, I am devoting the next few weeks to sharing Ruth's wonderful teachings.)

Ruth's Teachings About Feeling Consciousness

Ruth devoted a whole talk to the importance of vedana, or consciousness of three main types of feelings: pleasant, unpleasant, or neither pleasant not unpleasant. 

You need to notice and acknowledge vedana. Asking yourself, what am I feeling now? and noticing the origin either in the body (sensations) or in the mind (thoughts). Vedana is with us at all times. We are always valuing our experience, whether we are conscious of it or not. And we can wake up more for it, we can guard for it, we can be more in relation with it. Or we can let it run our life, always searching for pleasantness.

If you are not aware of the unpleasantness it will snowball and leave the door open for more unpleasantness. If you are aware of the pleasantness, it will also snowball, but in the direction of more pleasantness.  Two big reasons to be aware of vedana at all times . . .

What are YOU feeling right now?

It is interesting to compare with U Tejaniya's approach on the same topic. Also Mingyur Rinpoche's related notion of 'booster of emotions'.