Dharma Seed - Rodney Smith's Dharma Talks

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Rodney Smith's Dharma Talks

Rodney Smith

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More and more, the teaching practice takes me into the community where I engage directly with students. My focus right now is on bringing the continuity of the Dharma into the market place. Although retreating is an important form for self-knowledge, I find myself less interested in the immediate results of a retreat and more interested in helping students investigate their relationship to the ups and downs of their everyday life.

Nature, death and spontaneous freedom continually interweave themselves into my teaching. From the forest of Thailand, where I spent several years, I bring a deep awareness of the healing quality of nature into my teachings. Relaxing into our true nature allows us to realize what it means to be a human being. It is here we find a resting point, a counterbalance to the speed and turbulence of our culture.

My work in hospice brings a sense of urgency into my teaching. Working with the theme of death and dying reveals the here and now of life to us, how important it is to open to each loss, change and transition that marks our path. Life is precious. We need to awaken without hesitation.

Many of us crave to be more calm and centered. We know that life has more to offer than this fleeting material world. For each of us, the Dharma offers an immediacy of freedom for which we do not have to strive or wait. In practice, we can learn to relax deeply into the moment and rediscover spontaneous freedom.

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2011-09-13 Satipatthana Sutta, Fourth Foundation: The Lions Roar 59:42	Download Listen
Accessing the Fourth Foundation is as easy as abiding in wonder. A question that is interesting to you but does not immediately resolve itself into an answer holds that wonder. When you hold a question without trying to immediately find the answer, you will feel the pull of form (needing to know the answer) in conflict with the formless (the wonder within the mystery of the question itself).
Seattle Insight Meditation Society
In collection: The Satipatthana Sutta

2011-08-30 Satipatthana Sutta: Questions and Answers 62:08	Download Listen
Seattle Insight Meditation Society
In collection: The Satipatthana Sutta

2011-08-16 Satipatthana Sutta, Fourth Foundation: An Overview (2) 65:28	Download Listen
A quality of awareness is discernment, which can be active or passive. Passive discernment is seeing, "just this" without doing anything about it, while active discernment is uncovering what is hidden and unconscious. It uses an energetic and curious probing to broaden the expanse of awareness and welcome it beyond its egoic boundaries.
Seattle Insight Meditation Society
In collection: The Satipatthana Sutta

2011-08-02 Satipatthana Sutta, Fourth Foundation: An Overview (1) 1:38	Download Listen
The Fourth Foundation of Mindfulness is the ability to discern what limits freedom and to see the value of open awareness when it is not limited. It encourages a complete examination and investigation of mind until there is existence without obstructions.
Seattle Insight Meditation Society
In collection: The Satipatthana Sutta

2011-07-12 Satipatthana Sutta, Third Foundation: The Personal and Impersonal 56:49	Download Listen
The personal evolves into the impersonal with time and exposure to awareness. The less "you" do about this process, the quicker it happens on its own. Simply say when a state of mind arises, "Is this about me?" In one way it is, in another way it is not. Be willing to see both tendencies and investigate each.
Seattle Insight Meditation Society
In collection: The Satipatthana Sutta

2011-06-28 Satipatthana Sutta, Third Foundation: Division Through Arrogance 1:26	Download Listen
Arrogance is a remnant from the pain of the self that wants to be seen and heard as special and privileged. It is our spiritual work to watch not only the subtle grasping and aversive formations of self but its gross manifestations like arrogance as well. What is the pain behind this mental display, and what are the assumptions that move arrogance forward?
Seattle Insight Meditation Society
In collection: The Satipatthana Sutta

2011-06-14 Satipatthana Sutta, Third Foundation: Division Through Boredom 1:12	Download Listen
Boredom tries to convince you that you must wait for life to be interesting enough to live and that now is not worth paying attention to. Boredom has you bypass the present for the excitement of a future possibility. Ask yourself when boredom arises, "When is life better than now?"
Seattle Insight Meditation Society
In collection: The Satipatthana Sutta

2011-05-24 Satipatthana Sutta, Third Foundation: Division Through Worry 59:12	Download Listen
Worry attempts to protect us from every contingency. It becomes a pattern and view of life where I am the guardian and protector of my security. Worry is actually a process of self-affirmation because we keep affirming our power over what life brings forth. If I let down my guard, life would be chaotic and out of control, and therefore I need to worry to have everything turn out as I wish. Worry and planning elevates us to the status of a god while we are actually being controlled by fear.
Seattle Insight Meditation Society
In collection: The Satipatthana Sutta

2011-05-10 Satipatthana Sutta, Third Foundation: Division Through Judgment 58:55	Download Listen
Judgment is seeing the world in quantifiable terms. There a holistic way of seeing that is not partial and comparative but becomes inaccessible when we believe in judgment. Let the presence of judgment remind you that your thinking and emoting is arising from an incomplete perception. Quiet yourself to the inward narrative and allow the whole mind, undivided by judgment, to arise.
Seattle Insight Meditation Society
In collection: The Satipatthana Sutta

2011-04-26 Satipatthana Sutta, Third Foundation: Division Through Shame 59:40	Download Listen
While we may have guilt over an incident or a series of mishaps, shame is the accompanying attitude about oneself and can therefore be far more disruptive. Life becomes an uphill battle against our destructive inward narrative. Its variations go from feeling lesser and smaller than to being an obstacle and ultimately better off not existing. Confronting our conclusion around shame is taking on our emotional posture to life itself.
Seattle Insight Meditation Society
In collection: The Satipatthana Sutta

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