The quality of equanimity is a significant factor in coming to terms with impermanence and its manifestations: agin, illness and death. Learning to find balance with regard to the reality of change is explored
The importance of accepting and learning to love ourselves is important at any age. But it is particularly crucial as as we learn to adjust to a body and mind going through the aging process as well as a new self-identity about who we are.
We long for love and habitually armor our hearts. This talk explores the aggression and clinging that protect our wound of feeling unlovable, and the ways that mindfulness can dissolve our defenses and reveal our inner refuge of pure loving presence.
After a brief review of dependent origination. We also review ways of intervening in the cycle of suffering, and then begin to explore the teaching of "liberative" or "transcendental" dependent origination-focused on the causes and conditions leading to freedom and liberation.
The skillfulness of not-knowing is part of practice and the contemplative experience. We are released from the limitations of the known with the inclusion of not-knowing. The skill and art of not-knowing becomes one of the doorways to awakening, realization and the continued maturation of our understanding. As the Zen monk/poet Ryokan said, "I do not know others. Others do not know me. Not knowing each other we naturally follow the way."
