Letting It Do Its Thing

Very much enjoyed spending the evening last night with Ayya Anandabodhi, at IMC. 

As usual, the nun had much wisdom to share. I especially resonated with this:

The body and karma have their own pace, that cannot always keep up with the mind. We need to just be with what is and give it time to do its thing. This (pointing to body) right there as it is, is our opportunity [to enter the path of awakening]. 

As much as I understand about clinging, how ludicrous the whole habit is, I am not completely in control of what the mind, and the heart, and the body do. Walking earlier, here it was, the anger, the tightness, the pain from clinging to what cannot be had. Walking, I meditated on Ayya Anandabodhi's words, and I held the hotness with much love, and patience. Giving it some space, and the time it needs. 

I also remembered this quote from Ram Dass: "If you think you're enlightened, go spend a week with your family." Being grateful for the crucible of family life to keep me honest with where I really am . . . 

Owning the Clinging, Finding Inner Freedom

There has been a big (good) change in my practice lately. Away from feeling at the mercy of the pain from clinging, to owning my part in the process. This is akin to a tectonic shift in self-awareness, a new way of seeing, and feeling that opens the way to true inner freedom.

Before, paired with the suffering, was much powerlessness, and resentment almost for being stuck with such unpleasantness. I realize lots of that had to to with some misinformed thinking. Maybe if I could unlock the cause of the clinging? It felt so old . . . Surely, something in my past needed to be dealt with. How much longer would I have to sit and feel the pain?

Now, I have stepped away from being a victim of the clinging, to fully owning my role. Realizing that clinging is an action that I can control. The letting go may be slower than I would like, but nevertheless, 'I' am the one doing the clinging, right now, in the present moment. The cause of clinging is almost irrelevant, although it does help to see one's rough spots.

Now, there is something I can do. Sitting is indeed a very active process. One of seeing, and taking necessary corrective action. Sitting, I notice tension, tightening in the throat, in the stomach, in the mind. And I use acquired wisdom to decide on what to do with the closing in. Sitting, I know to relax each tension point, using the breath as anchor, over and over again.

And I remember, the whole idea is of putting aside greed and distress with reference to the world. Putting aside, letting go, relaxing . . . all active words. 

Motherhood, Love, and Mindfulness

Mother's Day . . . has arrived, and with it the usual onslaught of happy stories glorifying mothers everywhere. 

Mother's Day . . . for me is a day to reflect on Ayya Khema's commentary on  the Buddha's fourth remembrance:

"Everything that is mine and is dear to me must change" relates particularly aptly to our relationship with our children and our partners. Children begin changing from the day they are born. But they disappear or they can disappear [. . .]

None of us really believe that our children or partner belong to us. Nevertheless we feel that way about them and want to hold on to them. The various relationship problems in families arise out of this. 

[. . .] We think we have to determine the way our children develop. We think we can decide what they should and should not do. We not only want to keep our children and partners for ourselves, but we think they should live in accordance with our wishes and our conception of them. And none of this is true. 

We have to let go if we want to live and love in freedom. Not even one's own body is "mine", the Buddha said, so how can another person be "mine"? Everyone creates his or her own karma. 

[. . .] Pure love is love that has not wish to hold and to keep but is simply given freely. 

~ Ayya Khema, I Give You My Life ~ 

Mother's day . . . is a time to thank both of my daughters for helping me awaken to the nature of true motherly love, as so beautifully expressed by Ayya Khema. 

3 Tiny Habits to Enhance My Mindfulness Practice, Two Months Later . . .

Back in March, in the Huffington Post, I reported on 3 tiny habits I had successfully taken on to enhance my mindfulness practice. The post, inspired by an experiment from BJ Fogg's at Stanford University, got some attention. The 3 tiny habits were:

1. Right after I open my eyes, and before getting out of bed in the morning, I state my intention to be mindful for the day. I appreciate my intention.
2. Right after I finish getting dressed in the morning, I sit on my meditation chair, and I practice mindfulness for a few seconds. I appreciate myself for making it to the chair.
3. Right after I turn off the light at night, I do 30 seconds of loving kindness practice, wishing myself and other beings well. I appreciate myself for remembering to practice.

That was five days worth of tiny habits, then. 

Well, I am happy to report that two months later, my 3 tiny habits of mindfulness are going strong. Every morning, as I awake, the word 'mindful' pops up in my mind, automatically just like that. From there, attention goes straight to the breath, taking its rightful place away from 'being lost in thoughts' to 'dwelling in awareness'. Same thing with sitting first thing in the morning. Finishing getting dressed, body knows where to go next, without any need for the mind to make any effort to remember. A new imprint has been created, in the brain. Last, turning off the light at the end of the day, it is time for 'kindness', a smile in the darkness that seals the day with sweetness and makes it easy to drop into sleeping.

Tiny habits, powerful changes in daily mindfulness practice.

Ways to Concentration in Meditation

Gil's talk last night was the second one in a series of three on concentration. Amongst many other things, Gil talked about counting breaths as a way to develop single pointed concentration, counting until ten, one number for each breath, and then starting over. If the mind gets lost on the way, simply start over from one. I have tried this method and found that it does not work so well for me. I become too preoccupied with keeping track of the number, and gather some unwanted tension in the process. No, better for me instead is one of these two methods:

First is not counting, but instead focusing on the rising and falling of the abdomen, sometimes saying silently and softly to myself 'rising', 'falling', 'rising', 'falling', etc . . . This, I got from U Pandita. When the pause is long between the out and in breaths, I may even insert a 'pausing' in there. This way, the mind's got no opportunity to branch out and fabricate.

The other way is simply to say one on the in breath and two on the out breath, with each breath. 

How about you? What do you do to still the mind?

Undoing the Clinging Habit, One Breath at a Time

Meditating this morning, I sat with the intention of:

Remaining focused on the body in and of itself - ardent, alert, and mindful - putting aside greed and distress with reference to the world.

Remaining focused on the feelings in and of themselves - ardent, alert, and mindful - putting aside greed and distress with reference to the world.

Remaining focused on the mind in and of itself - ardent, alert, and mindful - putting aside greed and distress with reference to the world.

Remaining focused on mental qualities in and of themselves - ardent, alert, and mindful - putting aside greed and distress with reference to the world.

~ from The Four Frames of Reference in The Seven Sets, in A Table of the Wings of Awakenings, in Thanissaro Bhikkhu's The Wings to Awakening ~

and noticed once more, the mind's difficulties in putting aside greed and distress with reference to the world.

Mind kept on disrupting the calm flow of breath with its fabrications. 

First in the craving family: 'I really want to go to Target and check out the new Webster collection.' 'I want to finish up writing the grant.' 'It would be nice to have some cereals right now. Oh! how much I love the taste of dried cherries!' 

Then some random thoughts about people who have done me wrong some while ago. Why think of them now? Go figure . . . The aversion habit needed a fix.

Awareness catching up and noticing the physical and mental stress from such hunger pains, about not wanting the present moment or some representations of the past. Tightness in the stomach and in the jaws, tension in the mind . . . could only be eased a bit. Years of clinging habit could not be undone that quickly. Warm determination was in order, with the going back to the breath, over and over again, each time giving the mind a chance to put aside its usual preoccupations.

And oh! so close, the possibility of freedom, only one breath away. 

Memory and Mindfulness

Lately, I have become acutely aware of the power of memory to inform the practice of mindfulness.

Sitting, there is the experience of the present moment, for sure. And also embedded in this moment, lies the memory of all the other times before when the same kind of thought, the same kind of feeling, the same kind of bodily sensation came and got noticed, and the connection was made between certain conditions and the arising of suffering. After enough of these repetitions, the mind becomes more clever at recognizing those antecedents to suffering, and not indulging them. It feels as if there needs to be enough of those earlier impressions in order for the mind to finally get it, and be swift in its response.

Mindfulness is not just attention to the present moment, but also remembrance of prior moments, with the two colliding with acquired wisdom to produce insight, disenchantment, and dispassion. Letting go of suffering becomes then a natural consequence. 

Getting in touch with the root meaning of 'mindfulness': 

"And what is the faculty of sati (mindfulness)? There is the case where a monk, a disciple of the noble ones, is mindful, highly meticulous, remembering and able to call to mind even things that were done and  said long ago" - SN 48.10