What do we rely on in a world like this? When everything feels marred by conflict and division, violence and chaos, the mind easily fixates on fear, confusion, loss of faith. But if we keep fixating, our lives begin to organize around those energies. Taking refuge is a way of interrupting that pattern. Refuge not as a belief statement, but more like a commitment or a resolve to keep moving to align with a particular orientation to life. That we choose, again and again. And this view shifts dependency from external conditions to awakening, to the truth, to the field of practice.

Talk - Love and Fear

When strong experiences such as fear, grief, shame or desire become predominate in our awareness, we can meet them with mindfulness and interest. Asking “what is happening?” rather than “why is it happening?”. With mindfulness we can feel emotions as ripples of sensations within the body that arise, peak and fade when we dont feed the story in the mind. At times we need to fortify mindfulness by turning to other parts of the body such as feet or hands to allow for more space around intense sensations. This helps us not get caught in aversive tightening in response to the emotion.

00:07 Q1 There is body contemplation and contemplation of death. Can I contemplate things such as my work, my relationships with a fear of failing? How do I do it? 20:28 Q2 You mentioned during Qigong making a circle with the arms and concentrating within the ring. I found this very helpful to calm the mind. Is there something similar to help calm the mind during sitting or standing meditation? 29:40 Q3 You said the world begins and ends in the body. I'm rather used to hearing that the mind is the source of everything. Can you clarify this please?

We live in times when fear, greed and anxiety provoke our hearts & minds daily. Often, we relate to these triggers in ways that only amplify agitation and conflict in and around us. The Buddha’s teachings and practices help us uncover the stabilizing, tenderizing, and liberating force of wisdom and awareness. Wisdom and awareness is the necessary antidote for troubled hearts in troubled times.

As the old myths of our civilization crumble, in their place, fear, division, and the architecture of fascism are rapidly rising. As the Jungian analyst Edward Edinger warned, when a central myth breaks down, meaning drains away, and primal, unprocessed forces rush in. How then do we understand this immense historic moment? We can take courage from the Buddha, who also lived in a world burning with greed, hatred, and delusion. He didn’t always succeed. Yet he still stood before armies, spoke truth, and acted with compassion. Even when outcomes are uncertain, we too are called, at this time, to step forward with clarity, compassion, and steadfastness.

As the old myths of our civilization crumble, in their place, fear, division, and the architecture of fascism are rapidly rising. As the Jungian analyst Edward Edinger warned, when a central myth breaks down, meaning drains away, and primal, unprocessed forces rush in. How then do we understand this immense historic moment? We can take courage from the Buddha, who also lived in a world burning with greed, hatred, and delusion. He didn’t always succeed. Yet he still stood before armies, spoke truth, and acted with compassion. Even when outcomes are uncertain, we too are called, at this time, to step forward with clarity, compassion, and steadfastness.

As the old myths of our civilization crumble, in their place, fear, division, and the architecture of fascism are rapidly rising. As the Jungian analyst Edward Edinger warned, when a central myth breaks down, meaning drains away, and primal, unprocessed forces rush in. How then do we understand this immense historic moment? We can take courage from the Buddha, who responded to a world burning from greed, hatred, and delusion with profound wisdom. Even when outcomes are uncertain, we too are called, at this time, to step forward with clarity, compassion, and steadfastness.

We are living through a profound pivot point. The old myths of our civilization–endless growth, rugged individualism, and “us first” hierarchies are crumbling. In their place, fear, division, and the architecture of fascism are rapidly rising. As the Jungian analyst Edward Edinger warned, when a central myth breaks down, meaning drains away, and primitive forces rush in. The Buddha also lived in a world burning with greed, hatred, and delusion. He challenged the systems of his time, endured attempts on his life, negotiated peace between warring factions, and even stood before armies bent on destruction. In the Sakka-pañha Sutta, when asked why beings who wish for peace end up in rivalry and violence, he pointed to the root: the mind entangled in papañca, the web of proliferating stories that harden separation. How then do we understand this immense historic moment? We can take courage from the Buddha. He didn’t always succeed. Even with his wisdom and compassion, he could not prevent the destruction of his own people. Yet he still stood before armies, still spoke truth, and still acted with courage. Even when outcomes are uncertain, we too are called, at this time, to step forward with clarity, compassion, and steadfastness. Together we will explore how to bring the medicine of the Dharma into this moment of profound challenge, not as escape, but as a path of right action, refuge, and renewal.

Guided meditation.

When you experience your fear you become fearless. All other fears merge with that fear. If you fear that fear, then you will become fearful. Be fearless, and all your fears will flee. ~Kabir

Anger and fear are perilous, flammable states of mind – like barnacles attached to a ship's hull that undermine its power to sail. So we call on wise discernment and forgiveness to rescue us. We take stock: is there any anger within me? Or fear? The Dhamma purifies and frees us from these stains of the heart. So seek refuge. Guard the mind from the fires of anger or unwholesome states by directing full attention to present moment awareness. This is the blessing of our work, and the promise of awakening.

How do we extinguish the fires of greed, hatred and delusion that burn within the mind? The Buddha has thrown us a lifeline. We grab hold of it right here and now – one moment at a time. Free yourself from relentless conceptualizing and the suffering that comes of it. Stop and be aware –  again and again. What is happening within you? The Buddha's first aid is just this – see each moment of turmoil or fear that is assaulting us as impermanent. Witness these feelings of despair or darkness arise and pass away – not what you are. Breathe free. Breath by breath, we let the heart heal – at peace.

How kindness and the breath can be used when feeling fear.

A talk given at the Insight Meditation Center of Western Mass with QnA. Questions are précised: Q1 33:26 You were talking about the inner and outer skin. It seems this inner skin creates suffering. How do we start to be able to deal with this?Q2 37:34 Those words: Open, allow, let go are such a release. But something can happen that scares me, fear of annihilation. How do you practice with the insecurity of monastic life without being scared? Q3 42:03 In moving from control, do you go through indifference? Q4 43:50 Would you mind speaking about qualities of willfulness, striving, urgency, rigidity around meditation and holding attention in the body and that urgency. Q5 52:10 I feel very uplifted being so close to a monastic. Could you say something about the challenges and the fruits of being in robes for so long?

We are caught up in the world – as if we're in jail. But we are also on the threshold of silence wherein lies the key to pure, infinite, wordless presence. Isn't that love – timeless, universal, here and now? Sustain that purity of heart and abide in pure presence, aware of awareness itself. There is no 'one' there, no solid being, and no experience is refused. Why is that? Because we cease to live in fear. The Buddha guides us to witness this process – not as a person identified with self or ego but just letting the world go. For we are not what we know, and that consciousness is the Deathless.

Our practice is a unique opportunity to develop our deepest potential for happiness as human beings. We use the skills of interior investigation with patience and courage to study the intimate workings of the mind. Well-guided by the Buddha’s teachings, we gradually learn intuitively how to direct ourselves on this path of wholesomeness and devotion. By trusting our spiritual practice, we are strengthened, growing inwardly as we directly experience freedom from fear and the heart's true compassion.

This dhamma talk and Q&A was offered on April 5, 2025 for “How do I apply the Dhamma to THIS!?!”

The willingness to sit with fear is an act of courage. The old Buddhist texts refer to "the great and courageous bodhisattvas." These are beings who, have the fortitude to stand with suffering that might bring the rest of us to our knees. It's not that such people have no fear. Rather, they are able to maintain a courageous presence while they are afraid.

Dharma reflection: the story of Chiyono’s enlightenment poem; poetry, fearlessness, and flexibility of perception.

It's hard to keep up with all the disorienting changes we are processing each day. We can easily get lost in confusion trying to make sense of it all. As a result, we can draw conclusions based in despair and fear, thinking that we know where this is heading. We can find strength from Korean Zen Master Seung Sahn teaching: "Keep Don't Know Mind." In this "Don't Know Mind" we let go of knowing how things will turn out. This frees us from the tyranny of our mind-created stories and allows us to see many possibilities.

There is a transcendent Reality – inaccessible to the thought world – but to be known with right mindfulness and its accompanying powers of mind, patiently developed and polished day by day. These skills we learn provide tremendous traction to cultivate the mind, like gardeners watering the seeds of awakening. At the root of this uplifting spiritual training is the fundamental premise of our mortality. But are you ready to sit at the altar of the sublime and to have your illusions shattered? Like the hollow reed that becomes a flute, empty yourself of fear and be the pure love you seek.

It seems like many are feeling either a low-level anxiety or fear these days. Fear about their safety, about disasters like fire or floods, about what the future holds. While this is natural and understandable, when our minds get hijacked by fearful thoughts, it is almost impossible to have a wise or appropriate response. In this talk we explore practicing and skillfully working with fear so that it can transform into courage, compassion and wisdom.

Do we know the truth of what we are? If not, how can we love unconditionally? When the heart abides in loving-kindness, the misery of fear, anger and despair is vanquished. If we look for unconditional love outside of us, we will never find it. Nor can we know it by thinking. The mind must grow in silence and stillness, in unsullied conscious awareness. Then we can see what we truly are – intuitively, beyond thought, in the quality of this very breath, this moment. We pierce through the dust of lifetimes to know the core of our being, to wake up – here and now. Just to live in that kindness is the truest life of all.

This dhamma talk and Q&A was offered on January 4, 2025 for “How do I apply the Dhamma to THIS!?!” 00:00 - DHAMMA TALK 15:23 - INSTRUCTIONS FROM THE BUDDHA AND Q&A

We continue to explore the intersection of our more inner practice and our practice with the larger world, including the U.S. post-election world. Our starting point is seeing how widespread and predominant the emotions of anger and fear are in our society. We look particularly at the nature of anger and how to practice with it, especially in terms of our own anger but also in terms of the anger of others. Anger, it has been said, is the most confusing emotion in Western civilization, seen often over the last 2500 years sometimes as both entirely as negative and sometimes as a quality that manifests, for example, in the Jewish prophets, Jesus, and God. There's a confusion also among Western Buddhists, who may have conditioning related to aversion to anger combined with following problematic translations of terms like dosa (entirely negative in the Buddhist context) as "anger" (not entirely negative in the contemporary Western context). Based on these explorations of the nature of anger, we look at how to practice with anger individually, especially through mindful investigation of anger and how anger can lead either to reactivity and the formation of reactive views of self and/or other, or to skillful action. We also explore practicing with the anger of others through empathy practice. The talk is followed by discussion and sharing, including of the experiences of practicing with anger from several people. The meditation before the talk includes a guided exploration of an experience of anger in the last third of the meditation period (the meditation is also on Dharma Seed).

"In this particular flavor of global divisiveness, We need options of how to hold all that feels too big for us. And with these practices of the heart, we are given the opportunity to not succumb to hatred and ill - will. And so what I know to offer in difficult times, is love, in the midst of fear, in the midst of dominance "

Going beyond the constructs of the mind, trusting the heart, and upholding the Humane in Times of Destruction.

At this time, US citizens are going through a major adjustment to a new reality after the election. A large part of the population is happy at the outcome. And another large part is confused by that fact. A whole host of feelings are likely to arise--disorientation, confusion, fear, numbing out to name a few. In order to respond wisely to the moment, we first need to be present for and honor our experience. A key question to ask oneself is "What do I need right now?" We will explore this in the context of our Dharma practice.

Pure present moment awareness reveals what we are not; and thereby, what we truly are. Investigate and question all thoughts you see circling in the mind – fearful or fanciful, liked or not. Know their clever disguises: impermanence everywhere! Not what we are, but empty, ephemeral in nature, they orbit like space debris – crowding the heart mandala of consciousness. Let go and rejoice when states of wanting, judgement, restlessness, fear, unhappiness and all the many faces of 'self' dissolve in the silence of pure awareness. This is true refuge – here and now. All else withers in the furnace of eternity.

This week has been a test for anyone who values kindness, compassion, and equanimity. It's understandable to get lost in fear, confusion and despair. This is when spiritual practice is needed most. How can we use our practice to develop a balance of mind in unpredictable circumstances, and relate to those who have very different perspectives from ours without getting caught in "othering"?

During times of great collective stress, it’s common to get gripped by waves of anxiety and fear. This guided meditation, an adaptation of the Tibetan tonglen practice, helps us reconnect with our spiritual heart, the sea of love and light that can hold even the most painful waves in our lives.

What haunts you, and what helps you face fear?

This Thursday is Halloween night. It's definitely scary times so I thought we could explore working with fear. Join us online.

In the face of violence, hatred and loss, how do we handle the reactivity we feel? Our own anger, hatred and fear? These two talks offer guidance and practice in letting our own vulnerability be a portal to responding—to ourselves, each other and our world– with courageous, wise hearts.

Mindfulness of Death practice supports us facing fear of death, living with intention and aligned with our values, avoiding common regrets at the end of life.

In the face of violence, hatred and loss, how do we handle the reactivity we feel? Our own anger, hatred and fear? These two talks offer guidance and practice in letting our own vulnerability be a portal to responding – to ourselves, each other and our world – with courageous, wise hearts.

How can we remain calm and inwardly strong when we feel anger or fear, greed or grief? Meditate with new eyes – keen, open, attentive, and dare to forgive even difficult feelings or troubling conditions. Stay present, stop and witness fear's end, because stopping to see is just like turning on a light. There is more clarity to know fear as impermanent, and to observe the nuance of the fear of fear itself. It's not my fear or my anger but unpleasant sensation. So we depersonalize and pour gratitude into the new moment with the quintessential balm of peace – forgiveness.

What frees us from fear, anger, sorrow, chaos and all the many other sufferings of the mind? Beneath the rubble and ruin we may feel, in the silent depths of our own heart, there is a treasure. It may be hidden but it is there. And we can know it. Sitting in the still, pure presence of conscious awareness, turn away from thinking, worry, all those mental habits and the heartaches of life. Moment by moment, dive deeply into each breath – not to change anything but to know, to understand what is there. Bow to the silence and let go fleeting worldly pleasures. Just see the heart's intuitive dimension revealed. Listen, know Reality and rejoice.

True refuge is not a place or destination. It is a radical shift in attitude and orientation-from me to we, from reactivity to response-ability and from fear to love.

This talk explores various paradoxes, and covers the inner territory of fear and control, inflationary and deflationary self-importance, the illusion of decision-making, and responsibility vs responsiveness in how we interact with the complexities of the world.

This meditation guides us through a relaxing body scan and then explores how we can allow the breath to calm our body and bring peace to our heart.