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RobertaParticipantHi Omyk
I hope that you are having a sitting Lent. Indeed you are right about being our own teacher, only we ourselves can do the work of teaching our hearts & minds to be at peace once we have been give the tools. Like most homes will have a bible etc lying around somewhere, but how many chose to pick it up read, learn & put its wisdom into action in their daily life?
Best wishes
RobertaRobertaParticipantHi Confused
Yes it is hard to focus on anything for extended periods especially if it is something we think we might not enjoy or find boring.
One of the more modern takes on meditation is that in general most people can only concentrate in short bursts so to do 3 mins of mindfullness/meditation is a lot easier & more likely to accomplish a long term sitting practice than forcing yourself to sit straight away for 30+ mins in an unusual position every day.
When I was about to do a prostrations 100,000 in all I received some good advice from someone who had already accomplished it (you must not miss a day if you do you go back to the beginning). It was do 3 prostrations for 3 days running, then do 6 prostrations for 6 days then 12 prostrations for 12 days etc, by the time I went into my three month retreat I was fit & could concentrate for longer periods & was eventually able to do 1,000 a day.
One of the tools I use when teaching beginners is a clear glass jam jar, a little bit of ground/dirt, water & a stick.
Our jar is like the body, the wisdom mind is the water & the dirt ( or you could use glitter) for instance could be seen as thoughts, sensations & emotions. When a thought etc arises stir the water with the mud in it, then sit back & watch it settle, each time a thought etc arises give it a stir. This way you can see how if we ruminate on something there is little chance for the wisdom & clarity to show itself.
A further additional part of this experimentation into self exploration, is to hold the jar out at arms length & it doesn’t take long for your arm to ache & what a sensation of relief when you put it down. With painful/ non helpful thoughts imagine that the jar is wrapped in barbed wire, why would you pick it up in the first place, yet alone grasp it tightly & refuse to put it down.At one retreat I went on our teacher said “right we are going to meditate for half an hour on the breath & I will give you a million pounds at the end of the session, but every time you loose concentration you loose £1,000.” Needless to say none of us managed to hold our awareness solely on the breath for very long.
RobertaParticipantDear Confused
The practice I described takes less than a minute of your time, needs no special equipment or location, so in any one day you have at least 600 chances to look after your wellbeing.
In life there are roughly three options in the sense when we are ill we can choose go to the doctor or not. Then we get given a prescription & again we choose whether we collect the medicine & then thirdly you choose whether to take the medicine.
You do not wait till you are better & then start taking the medicine.May you be well, safe & happy
RobertaRobertaParticipantDear Confused
When we consciously stop for those few breathes, we are training our mind to go where we want it to, in this case awareness of the breath in & out of our nostrils. What it offers is peace in that moment, past & future drop away.
RobertaRobertaParticipantDear Confused
There are loads of techniques. the quickest & easiest one to get started is to concentrate on the sensations of the air going in & out of your nostrils for say 3-5 breaths to start with this is like putting other thoughts & multitasking on hold for a minute. You can fit these pauses in through out your day ie before you get out of bed, before you take a sip of drink, before you switch your car engine on, whilst cuing in the supermarket, before you eat, before you use your computer or phone.
RobertaRobertaParticipantHi Alessa
is a song about the monks walk across America. Short but inspirational. EnjoyRobertaParticipantDear Confused
That is right mindfulness is that process of awareness. In Buddhism we have the three foundations – teachings/contemplation, meditation & ethical conduct. Each of these support the other to help us along the journey. Many people do not like to think or look really deeply about their ethical conduct & what it entails and what they need to do to stop hurting themselves or others.
Maybe you could change your how you think about that empty space you have. It is an open space/clean slate where you have the opportunity to reflect & choose which seeds you want to plant & tend there……love, compassion, wisdom, empathy, community to name but a few or worry, anxiety, grasping & rejecting anger, impatience etc. About a decade or so ago I did a meditation using an apple, then I put the core in a pot with some compost & tended it, it sprouted & eventually I planted it out in the garden & kept it free from other weeds that could smother it, it kept growing & after a few years it started bearing fruit, which now many people can enjoy.
I have to start kinda forcing my thoughts to go another way i guess.. is what you said to Anita….. It is not about forcing thoughts away, more about seeing the thought, not grasping it, but gently letting it go. Then congratulating yourself for the process of spotting & letting go & then choosing where you want to put your attention. So initially you may realize that you have spent 5 minutes on a certain train of thoughts before you realize that they were un helpful. if you can you could try writing the thoughts down in reverse order. So that you can start to see a pattern or links. Then the time lapse between getting pulled into a certain kind of stream of thoughts & the noticing will get quicker, eventually you may even notice that initial spark, thought, movement, feeling or sensation and choose whether or not you want to nurture it.
Have you seen anything about the Walk for Peace – some Buddhist monks have been walking for the last 3 months from Fort Worth in Texas to Washington DC – it fills me with hope & inspiration
I hope that this has been helpful to you.
RobertaRobertaParticipantDear Confused
Thoughts we all have them millions over a lifetime. in general they can be split into 3 types helpful, neutral, unhelpful. The bits of our thoughts are so quick that they can flow into one another ( & almost appear as one thought) as I described in my post to you the other day. We we slow down as in meditation we can start to see these thoughts as individual moments. Then we can see that with every single bit (using computer speak) we can change the whole direction)of how the byte is going. Like now a visitor has arrived for coffee so I am signing out to turn my attention to them.
no disrespect to you but real life comes first.
regards RobertaRobertaParticipantDear Confused
I am sorry that my style & content does not appear to help you to understand samsaric life in general & or your life in particular.I have just wrote a line & then deleted it .. the ego level of my mind was starting to take control, but then i heard the wisdom mind thought that said” this is not about me” hence the deletion.
So I will leave it here & wish you happiness & the causes of happiness
RobertaRobertaParticipantHi
I really enjoyed this video, especially since Jet Li & I are the same age & his outlook is similar even though I have not been rich or famous, I do not concern myself with physical looks or keeping my money for just me & I accept the reality of aging, sickness & death so I too do not suffer.
Thank you for sharing the videoRobertaParticipantDear Confused
Similarity…But its been 5 days and radio silence – she has not been in touch and then your later posts states .. i think i feel no motivation at all to communicate with her. ie neither of you feel like communicating with each other. So why do you impatiently expect her to communicate with you in a timescale that suits you when she explicitly said she was overwhealmed & had no energy to talk?
I had to ask someone to give me a communication break back in October & I am still not ready to converse with them.As to our thoughts in general you could see it as like AI everything we have seen, heard, read & experienced in our life is the input to our system. for instance I am sitting meditating & my tummy rumbles this is an input sensation, then I think “I am hungry” next thought “what shall I eat? followed by ” Shall I have a cheese sandwich?” then “No I had that for lunch yesterday” then “Hmm I fancy peanut butter” again yet another movement of thought “oh I forgot to get any when I went to the shop last week” followed by ” I better go and get some” then I move my body & stop the meditation session. Or I am meditating tummy rumbles I note the sensation “tummy rumbling” & I consciously return my attention to the object of my meditation …awareness of the breath & continue to meditate for another 20 mins or so.
I read somewhere that each of us has 64,000 thoughts a day, but how many do we recognize, believe & decide whether or not to act upon on?
Regards
Robertaregards
RobertaParticipantHi
The Forum is a public space & I feel no ownership to this thread.
Anyway back to farting in meditation. One summer i was asked to give a guided meditation to about 2dozen scouts plus their leaders in the scout hut . So they are all lying down eyes closed and as I said take a deep breath in some one farted really loudly so I quickly said ” Take a deep breath in unless you are in the fartzone! this brought about a few giggles and lightened the atmosphere. When I do my initial introduction to newby meditators at our centre I tell them that it is alright to laugh, cry, snore, fart, gently move position or even die. this helps them relax.RobertaParticipantDear Confused
Your quote “We stopped contacting each other because she told me she was overwhelmed with family stuff and she had no energy to talk, so i told her to hit me up anytime she feels better or needs something if i can help and she said “yes honey we will talk”
But its been 5 days and radio silence..My mind tells me she is trying to leave slowly but that’s what it always does, catastrophizing.”and then a few days later “We didn’t end it tonight, but i think i feel no motivation at all to communicate with her”
Can you see the similarity? two side of the same coin, .Depression takes so much energy to sustain its self once it gets hold. For instance I have noted in myself if I believe the initial depressive thought I feel X today and do not recognize that it is in fact just a momentary feeling, I am is writing off the whole day mentally, these “micro depressions’ if not counteracted at source & then checked to make sure that they are not true through out the day will turn into the heavy fog of full blown depression. Connecting with nature & other beings helps to water the seeds of happiness one drop at a time. We may not notice any positive changes for quite a while, but the gaping hole or heaviness can heal. Having the aspiration to have the attitude of say gratitude you smile at a stranger, help some one in need in other words fake it to you make it. It is better to do something useful with your time whilst you have the energy even if it is only for 10 minutes, there is still 24hrs in a day all of us have options. Even if one is bed ridden you can spend time in prayer for others.
I do not mean to sound harsh, more trying to help you see that there are alternative ways of being.
Kind regards
RobertaRobertaParticipantDear Dave
Congratulations to you & your soon to be ex wife, so many people could learn so much from the pair of you on how to review, try again & amicable admit that a parting of the ways is the right thing for both of you. I am glad that both of you have found love in another direction & that you actively co parent which teaches your children the together apart way of being a family.
Best wishes
RobertaRobertaParticipantDear Thomas
Would THE answer make you happier, kinder? If there was no heaven, hell, rebirth or reincarnation, no karma how would you live your life?
I have just perused a little book of poetry called The book of questions – some lines stirred my heart other the brain went huh, still I am glad that I picked it up. in places it has a gentle whiff of a koan ” Where does a rainbow end, in your soul or on the horizon?”
Roberta -
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