Donald explores some of the main themes of his March retreat, connecting these themes to general aspects of our practice. He shares some images of the Spirit Rock land, a group of turkeys, his place of practice and altar in his room, and the bench where he twice a day carried out a kind of ritual "talking to" his parents, who are deceased. He focuses on themes of listening for what calls one in one's practice and his main practices during the retreat: concentration practice, metta practice, the Tibetan practice of tummo (the inner fire) and the life of Milarepa, and awakened awareness. He concludes by speaking of some ways of keeping the retreat going in daily life, and, in preparation for the appearance of the Garbanzo Bean, Donald's clown personality, some on humor and spiritual practice. There is then discussion, including an appearance by Guru Garbanzo Bean responding to some questions, and closing in which we remember and honor Cyndy Gagne, a sangha member who recently passed.

After getting a sense of those present and a self-introduction, there is a guided meditation. We start with a few words on posture and invite a short period to connect with what is alive in one's practice. Then there are instructions for developing samadhi (concentration), followed by several short periods of guidance to cultivate awareness of the energy of the body, to tap into a sense of happiness and perhaps joy, and then a sense of peace. There is then a short period of mindfulness followed by a few minutes of reflection on (1) what is "calling" now in one's life and practice, and (2) how best one can connect formal meditation and daily life.

We first hear from a member of the community about how he is experiencing and responding to what's happening in the larger society and world in our times. We then fairly briefly review last week's session, first identifying the three traditional areas of training--in wisdom, meditation, and ethics--and how each can be important resources for responding to what's happening in our own experience and in our society and world. We focus especially on reviewing our exploration of "ethical practice," responding in our everyday lives and in the larger society and world in caring and compassionate ways. We then explore the traditional figure of the bodhisattva as one who brings together deep commitments both to awakening and to helping others--helping others both in awakening and in terms of their life needs. We look at examples of bodhisattva vows from Theravada, Japanese Zen, and Vietnamese traditions, as well as from passages from Shantideva's "Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life." We show images of archetypal bodhisattvas such as Avalokiteshvara, Tara, Kwan Yin, and Manjushri and discuss the ten ways of training of the Mahayana bodhisattva. We suggest a number of contemporary exemplars of the bodhisattva vocation, and invite participants to develop their own personalized bodhisattva vows. The talk is followed by discussion.

We begin by hearing from two members of the community about how they are experiencing and responding to what's happening in the larger society and world in our times. Donald then discusses how we might respond on the basis of our practice, identifying the three areas of training--in wisdom, meditation, and ethics. Guided by wisdom teachings, we can see the society and world as both manifesting greed, hatred, and delusion, and also awakened qualities. In our meditation, we can practice on many levels, including working with challenging emotions, seeing through social conditioning, and bringing mindfulness to our thoughts, emotions, and bodies. We focus especially on "ethical practice," re-framed as developing caring and compassionate responses. We briefly outline the five ethical precepts, and then focus especially on the guideline of non-harming, clarifying how this is understood both more individually and socially, identifying teachings from the Buddha, King Ashoka, and Thich Nhat Hanh. We ask what our practice of developing "caring and compassionate" responses might look like, bringing in also material from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., including his nonviolence and understanding of interdependence, and Elie Wiesel, including his commitment always to speak up whenever there is suffering.

Diana and Donald each speak for about 20 minutes. Diana focuses especially on relational metta practice in daily life, including with parenting. Donald speaks of the aspiration, as the great Tibetan teacher Shabkar, emphasizes, on having one’s life and practice be one. He then focuses on the different dimensions of individual metta practice in daily life. The two talks are followed by a period of discussion.

Practicing to develop lovingkindness (metta), warmth, kindness, and love is an ancient vocation. The Buddha’s teachings on metta echo in many ways what we find in Jewish, Christian, Islamic, and other traditions. In this talk, we explore the aims of metta practice, how it works, and some of the different approaches to such practice. With the retreat overlapping with Dr. Martin Luther King’s birthday on January 15, we point to some of the parallels between metta practice and the life and work of Dr. King. We also identify the main challenges of metta practice, including distractions, uneven energy (including sleepiness), inability to access the heart, and difficult emotions, thoughts, and body-states emerging in what we call the “purification” process. As we deepen in metta individually, we also may bring metta into our community, social, and political lives.

We explore the centrality of being skillful with intentions in our practice and a number of different ways of practicing to cultivate skillful intentions, in part related to the New Year. We look at the Buddha's account of karma (kamma in Pali) as intention, and his teaching on the importance of reflection in living with skillful intentions. Remembering the Chinese Chan (Zen) teacher Yunmen's speaking of the centrality of "appropriate response," we develop a simple model for developing skillful intentions leading to skillful or appropriate responses. We also explore the variety of types of intentions, and recent Stanford research about how we might skillfully (and successfully) follow intentions to develop new routines. We then look at the importance for identifying our deeper intentions of develop an intuitive listening to life and to what calls us, in part exploring the theme of listening through poems. The talk is followed by a short guided meditation on intentions and then by discussion.

We start by tuning into our intentions, both our "larger" or "deeper" intentions for why we practice and a more specific intention for this practice session based on how we are in the moment (maybe really settled or maybe distracted by what happened yesterday). We then work to develop concentration (samadhi) in one of several ways, particularly setting an intention either to be more relaxed (if we tend to be "tight" and over-efforting) or to be more effortful (if we tend to be overly relaxed). We later tune in to how the practice is going and see if we want to respond with an intention. After a period focusing on developing concentration, we practice mindfulness, again after a while seeing how things are and whether we want to set a skillful intention related to mindfulness. We close with a series of reflections on what we want to let go of in the next period of time, and what calls us.

We continue with the exploration opened up last week in our examination of "skillful desire," starting again with the common misunderstanding of the Buddha's teachings as suggesting giving up all wanting of the pleasant and all not wanting of the unpleasant. There are, to be sure, some passages in the teachings which seem to suggest this approach; here is one example, from the Sallatha Sutta about the results of practice: “Desirable things don't charm the mind, undesirable ones bring no resistance." In the talk, we first review the nature of skillful desire and the distinction between skillful and unskillful desire. A starting reference point is the understanding of the sequence from contact to grasping in the teaching on Dependent Origination and. We look again at the Buddha's teachings on chanda or "skillful desire" and the importance of experiences of pleasure, joy, and happiness in different practice contexts. We then look in a similar way at skillful aversion, asking about the distinction between skillful and unskillful aversion, and pointing especially to the importance of inquiry into the experience of aversion; we look with some detail into the experience of anger. Finally, we connect our explorations with the experience of darkness and light at the time of the Winter Solstice, four days from now.

We start with settling for about 8 minutes followed by about the same time with basic mindfulness practice. Then we explore "moderate" experiences of pleasant or unpleasant when they occur, whether a bodily experience, an emotion, or a thought (or a mix), experiencing pleasant or unpleasant and seeing whether there follows wanting (or not wanting) and reactivity (habitual grasping or pushing away). We close with some reflection on what we explored, with an emphasis on skillful aversion: Was some of the not wanting skillful? Unskillful? What do we find in some daily life examples of aversion? This exploration is related to the talk given a short time later.

Sometimes people interpret the Buddha's teachings as suggesting giving up all wanting of the pleasant and all not wanting the unpleasant, and that equanimity has no wanting or not wanting; there are some passages in the teachings which seem to suggest this approach. However, the Buddha in a number of ways pointed to what we might call "skillful desire." We explore this in several ways. First, we go back to the teaching on Dependent Origination and the sequence from contact to grasping. We can identify that sequence as illustrating unskillful desire (or wanting) followed by grasping (as well as unskillful aversion). Secondly, we explore the Buddha's teachings on chanda, which could be translated as "skillful desire." Thirdly, we look at the role of experiences of pleasure, joy, and happiness in different practice contexts, and ask more generally about the nature of skillful desire (and some on "skillful aversion") in everyday life. What characterizes desire being unskillful or skillful? The talk is followed by discussion.

We start with settling for about 7-8 minutes followed by about the same time with basic mindfulness practice. Then we explore "moderate" experiences of pleasant or unpleasant when they occur, whether a bodily experience, an emotion, or a thought (or a mix), experiencing pleasant or unpleasant and seeing whether there follows wanting (or not wanting) and grasping (or pushing away). We close with some reflection on what we explored: Was some of the wanting or not wanting skillful? Unskillful. This exploration is related to the talk given a short time later.

After a brief general account of the three ways of liberating insight, we look at each of the three--insights into impermanence, dukkha, and not-self--with a longer treatment of insight into not-self. There is an emphasis especially on how we practice in order to come to these insights. We close with a passage from Ajahn Chah pointing to the unity of developing samadhi and cultivating insight. The talk is followed by discussion.

We review the nature of samadhi, how it is a natural quality that surfaces in many human experiences, and its importance in meditation (and the teachings of the Buddha). We briefly examine the five jhanic factors that point to how samadhi deepens. We also look at several of the main challenges that arise as we practice to develop samadhi.

We continue the exploration from last week, beginning with Donald sharing a few of his experiences of being able to learn and practice when there have been differences of views and even conflicts. Then there is a review of some what we explored last week, including the importance in a functioning democracy of navigating differences of views, some of the factors making that harder in current times, and some of the practice supports for conversations when there are different views—both inner and outer (especially related to wise speech practice). We go further into exploring inner practices helpful when there are differences, including working with reactivity and difficult emotions, exploring views and options, and then the integrated inner and outer practice of cultivating empathy as a practice. The talk is followed by discussion, including several people sharing their own explorations with challenging conversations in the last week.

We begin with settling and developing more concentration for about 10-12 minutes. Then we shift to mindfulness practice. In the last third of the session, there are instructions for exploring one's own views and opinions, including in relationship to others (connected with the talk).

How do we bring our practice to challenging conversations and discussions, including there are major differences in views and positions, whether on spiritual or social-politlcal or daily life matters? This is both a perennial practice question and a particularly important one in the current times. We begin our first of two explorations inviting the participants to explore both their most successful and their most difficult or painful discussions across differences, asking about the qualities present with both. We outline first some current social conditions that make discussions with differences more challenging, while acknowledging that such discussions are at the heart of a healthy democracy. Then we explore several supports for skillful conversations when there are differences, including shared agreements (among individuals or in a group or organization), wise speech practice, the vision of the "beloved community" or universal metta, and a commitment to align means and ends. The talk is followed by discussion.

We begin with a review of how the Buddha saw "ignorance" of the basic nature of things (not so much of facts or information) as the basic problem of human life; we are as if asleep, caught in dream-like living, and need to "wake up." For the Buddha, we are especially ignorant about impermanence, dukkha (or reactivity--grabbing at the pleasant and pushing away the unpleasant or painful and believing that this is the way to happiness), the nature of the self, and nirvana or awakening. We bring in a brief report of the experience of attending the previous week's EcoDharma retreat at Spirit Rock, emphasizing especially the pervasiveness of a sense of separation--from the earth, other living beings, and each other--and the connection of such sense of separation with our systemic problems. Indigenous teachers at the retreat particularly emphasized living without such separation. The second part of the talk, we focus on the teaching of not-self (anatta), and ways of practicing that deepens our understanding of not-self, as well as how we hold this understanding of pervasive human ignorance with compassion and kindness, including in our responses to the manifestations of ignorance. The talk is followed by discussion.

We begin with about 7-8 minutes of developing stability of attention and less distraction, through concentration practice or some other practice. We then explore several aspects of how we "construct" experience. We look at impermanence in several ways, noticing the arising, staying and changing, and passing away with (1) the breath, (2) body sensations, (3) sounds, and (4) the open flow of experience (about 3 minutes). Then there is a period of mindfulness practice with the additional instruction of looking out for a moderate or strong sense of self. We close with a short period of a heart practice such as lovingkindness or compassion.

The Buddha saw the core problem in human life as "ignorance"(avijjā), not an ignorance of facts or information, but rather a not-knowing about the basic nature of reality and our experience. The Dalai Lama tells us: "There is a fundamental disparity between the way we perceive the world, including our own experience in it, and the way things actually are." We explore how similar understandings of a core human ignorance are found in Plato, Christian and Islamic traditions, and in later Buddhist traditions. The Buddha said, in particular, that we are ignorant about impermanence, dukkha (or reactivity), and the nature of the self. We look into some of the main habitual constructions of experience, including a sense of permanent, stable, separate external objects, and a sense of a separate, independent self, pointing to ways of exploring such constructions meditatively. We also point to experiences in which we go beyond such constructions, in meditation and also in "flow" experiences. The talk is followed by discussion.

We begin with about 7-8 minutes of developing concentration, becoming more settled and less distracted. We then explore the impermanence in several ways, noticing the arising, staying and changing, and passing away with (1) sounds, (2) body sensations, and (3) the open flow of experience (about 2 minutes). Then there is a period of mindfulness practice with the additional instruction of looking out for a moderate or strong sense of self. We close with a short period of a heart practice such as lovingkindness or compassion; brief instructions are given for self-compassion practice (as developed by Kristen Neff).

Sometimes it is thought that Buddhist practice is exclusively about "inner" transformation. However, the Buddha himself spoke of going out for the benefit of others and understood basic ethical guidelines socially. Later approaches and tradition, such as embodied in the rule of King Ashoka and the Mahayana vision of the bodhisattva, also manifest the connection of inner and outer transformation. In this talk, a contemporary "Eightfold Path" is offered to support connecting inner and outer transformation--bringing our practice into engagement with our contemporary society and world in great need. There are three wisdom guidelines, two meditation guidelines, and three ethical guidelines. The talk is followed by discussion.

We begin by remembering the three core methods of training given by the Buddha (wisdom, meditation, and "ethics"), and their interrelationship. We reflect on how ethics has often been marginalized in Western Buddhism (and at times in Asian Buddhism). We then look in depth at the first lay ethical precept, non-harming, first in terms of the core teachings of the Buddha, and its centrality in the earlier Indian traditions of the Vedas. We examine some of the more "outer" dimensions of practicing non-harming, seeing how, with mindfulness and strong intentions, we can bring non-harming into our daily lives, including in our speech and communication. We then look at the more "inner" dimensions of practicing non-harming, looking in particular at how harming ourselves or others typically comes out of our own pain, so that practicing with pain (and the teaching of the Two Arrows) is central. The talk is followed by discussion.

In this guided meditation, connected to the later talk on "Non-Harming," we begin with about 8 minutes of settling and becoming more present, developing more samadhi (concentration). Then there is a period of lovingkindness (metta) practice, including starting where the lovingkindness flows the easiest and then extending the lovingkindness to many other beings. This is followed by mindfulness practice, with guidance on exploring when there are negative or blaming views of self or another. Finally, we close with several reflection questions related to how there is harming of self and/or others at times in our lives.

This talk occurs five days after Joanna's death at age 96, and two days after Donald attended a wake for Joanna at her home, saying good-bye to her. Donald first met Joanna Macy in 1977, while still a student. When he moved to Berkeley, California in 1988, he helped start a neighborhood daily meditation group of ten households, including that of Joanna and her husband Fran. So he got to know Joanna and Fran as friends and neighbors. In 1991, he first trained in her approach, later called "The Work That Reconnects" and offered this work in different venues. Over the years, they have stayed friends and colleagues, and sometimes taught together. In this talk, Donald gives a sense of the trajectory of Joanna's life and work, showing photos of Joanna spanning her life-time and interspersing stories of training with Joanna and using her practices and perspectives in his own teaching. He focuses in the second part of the talk on the four aspects of the "spiral" of her teaching: (1) starting with gratitude, (2) honoring our pain for the world, (3) seeing with new eyes, and (4) going forth into the world. We close with a brief account of Joanna's wake from two days before the talk, and a video recording from the wake of group singing about the "Great Turning." The talk is followed by discussion and closing intentions. For the slides shown during the talk, see document 318, below.

We begin with a period of settling, developing greater samadhi or concentration, and then move to mindfulness practice, including giving some attention to noticing moderate or a little greater levels of pleasant or unpleasant feeling-tone. When we notice pleasant or unpleasant feeling-tones, is there any tendency toward grasping or pushing away, in habitual or automatic ways? We then explore gratitude as a practice, simply reflecting on ways that we are grateful, first for aspects of our own lives, and then for aspects of the wider world. This is followed by opening with mindfulness to some difficult or painful aspects of our world, whether close to home or farther away, inspired to see and be with what is painful through wisdom and care. We end with a return to mindfulness practice for a short time. (This guided meditation is related to the talk that follows, honoring the life and work of Joanna Macy.)

For the Buddha, practice was understood as involving three trainings, in wisdom, meditation, and ethics (sila). Ethics, typically under-emphasized in much of Western Buddhism, with sometimes clear negative consequences, had as its horizon helping others. The Buddha said: “Wander forth . . . for the welfare of the multitude, for the happiness of the multitude, out of compassion for the world.” The later emphasis on the bodhisattva develops this emphasis further. In this talk, we suggest a contemporary “Eightfold Path” for understanding and responding to the current difficult times in the society and world. It’s outlined in terms of three wisdom guidelines, two meditation guidelines, and three ethics guidelines. The talk is followed by discussion.

We begin with brief instructions for developing samadhi (“placing together” or “concentration”), followed by basic mindfulness instructions and then guidance for working with the feeling-tone of pleasant or unpleasant, when it appears in the moderate range. We are mindful of pleasant or unpleasant and look for grasping or pushing away in some form, guided by core wisdom teachings.

After a brief review of the first two talks in this series, we explore the nature of ethical practice, one of the three core inter-related areas of training for the Buddha, along with training in meditation and in wisdom. We see how ethical practice has often been understood historically as having a social dimension, both in the teachings of the Buddha and later, as in the edicts of King Ashoka. We also explore some of the ways that ethical practice has been marginalized in Western Buddhist practice, with significant consequences. Then we look at the commonality of ethical guidelines in cross-religious context, with Donald telling some personal stories. Finally, we outline several ways to carry out ethical practice and then open up to discussion.

We continue our series of meditations and talks exploring the foundations of contemporary Buddhist practice. We begin by reviewing last week's talk on the basic model of Buddhist meditation, identifying three aspects of practice. These three are (1) developing samadhi or concentration; (2) cultivating three modes of liberating insight--into impermanence, dukkha or reactivity, and not-self; and (3) opening to awakened awareness. Then we focus on a crucial, central, and not always developed dimension of contemporary practice, especially for the vast majority of Western Buddhist practitioners who do not live in monastic contexts--bringing practice to everyday life. We identify nine ways of deepening daily life practice (see the attached document, #314). The talk is followed by discussion.

The talk begins to give the "big picture" about the nature of our practice, and how we come, in a way suitable to our times and places, to manifest wisdom, love and compassion, and skillful responses in our lives, increasingly more of the time. We reflect first on some of the challenges of our times, and how Buddhism, as it has moved to different cultures, has always taken new forms. A main part of the big picture, which is our main focus today, is a model of how meditation develops. We articulate a model involving three main forms of practice (that we can find in multiple Buddhist traditions): Developing samadhi (concentration), opening to liberating insight, and opening to awakened awareness. We explore each of the three and their relationship to each other. The talk is followed by discussion.

We begin with guidance to develop samadhi (concentration). About mid-way through, we move to mindfulness practice, cultivating insight, and then to two important areas of liberating insight--insight into impermanence and insight into reactivity (the most fundamental meaning of dukkha).

We first review of some of the themes explored last week. We look at the appropriateness of understanding and responding to social and political concerns, in the context of non-profit organizations and then in the context of the Buddha's teachings (which involved commentary on the caste system, on the origins of wars and poverty) and later Buddhist traditions (for example, King Ashoka, a practitioner in what is now India in 250 B.C.E. eliminated the death penalty, renounced war, and set up medical facilities for non-human animals). We then identify four foundations for bringing our attention to social and political concerns, including staying connected to the vision and practice of awakening and grounding ethically. This is followed by identifying, through the lens of teachings, six contemporary systems and ideologies (strengthened in the current U.S.) that manifest greed, aversion, and delusion and violate core ethical teachings. Then we look briefly at ways of practicing and responding individually, in connection with community. The talk is followed by discussion.

We begin with some guidance on developing samadhi (concentration) and stability, followed by practicing developing samadhi. After about 10 minutes developing samadhi, we move to mindfulness practice. After about another 10 minutes of practice, we then inquire into some of the emotions and thoughts that have been present recently, whether difficult or joyful, related to the current state of the society and world. We first relive a recent experience and then bring mindfulness to the somatic, emotional, and mental dimensions of experience. While staying silent, we also have a sense of being in community and sharing our experience. We then work with Kristen Neff's three-step self-compassion practice (shifting to a three-step joy or mudita practice if the experiences have been more positive).

We first explore in general the relationship of core teachings and practices to the social and political dimensions of our lives. We see that Buddhist practice in the West has commonly emphasized meditation and inner practices, often neglecting or marginalizing the ethical training that traditionally is one of the three dimensions of training, even though the Buddha did often give social commentary (e.g., on the caste system) and at times social interpretations of the ethical precepts ("Let one not destroy life nor cause others to destroy life and, also, not approve of others’ killing. . . . Let one not cause to steal, nor approve of others’ stealing.'). We explore a vision of individual and collective awakening, inspired in part by more contemporary traditions of socially engaged Buddhism initially developed by pioneers like Thich Nhat Hanh, Sulak Sivaraksa, A.T. Ariyaratne, Dr. Ambedkar, Joanna Macy, and Robert Aitken. Then we give some attention to how to connect inner and outer practices, particularly focusing, as we did in the guided meditation, on practicing with challenging emotions and thoughts, and clarifying ways to act in the world. The talk is followed by discussion and ends with the setting of intentions.

After about 25 minutes of lightly guided practice, to settle with concentration and/or mindfulness practice, we explore in several ways some of the emotions and thoughts that have been present related to the current state of the society and world. We first relive a recent experience and then bring mindfulness to the somatic, emotional, and mental dimensions of experience. We then work with Kristen Neff's three-step self-compassion practice, leading to developing intentions for how to practice with such experiences in the future.

This talks focuses on one of the three areas of practice discussed a week before, on developing samadhi (or concentration), the theme of Donald's four weeks of practice in March. We begin by more generally discussing the nature of samadhi, including short account of the etymology in Pali, and the Tibetan sense of samadhi as "staying," as developing in the nine stages of the "Elephant Path." We look at the place and importance of developing samadhi in our practice and its relationship to insight practice; developing samadhi is one of the eight factors of the Noble Eightfold Path and appears in many of the Buddha's core teachings. We discuss some ways to practice developing samadhi, and then focus especially on several challenges of such practice and how to work with such challenges. The talk is followed by discussion, including further exploration of the relationship of cultivating samadhi and insight practice, the nature of skillful effort, and the joy that can arise in the development of samadhi.

This guided meditation gives more detail on developing samadhi than the guided meditation from a week ago. First, after a brief overview of the nature of samadhi (usually translated as "concentration"), instructions are given for a practice session developing samadhi, including on posture, gaze, possible objects of focus, and skillful effort. Midway through the session, some further guidance is given on "intensifying," which helps both to deepen samadhi and to cut through background thinking as well as foreground thinking.

In the talk, Donald reflects on having just completed, four days before the talk, four weeks of practice at Spirit Rock. He particularly focuses on three themes from the retreat, exploring each theme in terms of both its retreat context and its daily life context. The first is the theme of listening deeply to one's own "intuition" and what "calls." The second is the theme of developing samadhi (usually translated as "concentration"--the unified mind and heart and body) and in particular practicing the eight jhanas as taught by the Buddha. The third is the theme of bringing the retreat learning and explorations into daily life, and how in particular to cultivate the first two themes in the daily life context. The talk is followed by discussion.

We begin with a brief account of the nature of samadhi (usually translated as "concentration"), and then give instructions for developing samadhi in formal meditation. (We'll come back to discuss samadhi in more depth in the talk.) There are several reminders during the meditation to return to the focus on cultivating samadhi. In the last part of the meditation, we connect the greater stability that's developed in the practice of cultivating samadhi with cultivating mindfulness.

Wise speech is an integral part of the traditional Buddhist path of awakening and a powerful way to energize our daily life practice, but is often underdeveloped in Western Buddhist practice. We’ll look in a very practical way at three aspects of wise speech: (1) developing presence in the midst of communication; (2) working with the four guidelines for skillful speech developed by the Buddha; and (3) becoming more mindful of and skillful with thoughts and emotions occurring during communication. For each of the foundations, a number of ways of practicing are offered. The talk is followed by discussion.

How do we see the world, especially and social world, from the perspective of awakening--with, we might say, "dharma eyes"? We explore this question in a time of great turmoil and concern in the world, particularly in the U.S. We start with several passages coming from an awakened mind and heart, including a passage from the Metta Sutta--how would one then look at the larger world? We explore how the Buddha himself looked at the world and social structures, particularly in terms of caste and gender. From our practice seeing greed, hatred, and delusion in ourselves, we learn how to see these qualities in others, and in the world. From our ethical training, we learn how to see when we are not following the ethical guidelines and when others are not, including on a larger social level. We also see how we can understand some of the larger social issues, particularly related to the climate crisis, racism, and gender, in terms of greed (especially), hatred, and delusion. We close, in this context, first with a pointing to ways of responding, using Joanna Macy's model of three ways that the "Great Turning" occurs, and then with a poem.

After guidance in developing concentration and mindfulness, we practice in silence. Then there is guidance related to mindfulness of the feeling-tone (the Second Foundation of Mindfulness), particularly the pleasant or the unpleasant (and whether there is reactivity, grasping after the pleasant and pushing away in some way the unpleasant), related to the theme of the talk given after the meditation.

We continue to explore the nature of awakening. In the first 2/3 of the talk, we examine the traditional notion of awakening, as going beyond the habitual constructions of experience in all the parts of our lives. These constructions are rooted in reactivity (grasping and pushing away aspects of our experience), and a sense of self along with a world of objects known conceptually (through "signs"). We look also at the more positive sense of awakening to the "signless, boundless, and all luminous," to what the Thai Forest teacher Ajahn Mun calls the "primal mind." Then we ask about whether there are other dimensions to awakening needed for contemporary awakening, and examine in particular what awakening means in a time of turmoil. We take Thich Nhat Hanh as an exemplar--a practitioner dedicated to awakening practicing and teaching amidst the turmoil of war and exile. We outline a number of suggestions and guidelines for those practicing and awakening amidst the current turmoil.

We start with basic instructions in developing (1) concentration and stability, and (2) mindfulness, and then practice developing these two qualities. With mindfulness practice, we notice the main patterns of thoughts, emotions, and bodily experience. In the second half of the session, we work with being aware of the feeling-tone (linked with the Second Foundation of Mindfulness), noticing moderate (or somewhat greater) pleasant or unpleasant feeling-tones, and what occurs after we notice them. We also attend for a short period of two minutes to the moment-to-moment feeling tones of pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral, and then go back to basic mindfulness practice for the last part of the session.

In this session, Donald gives about a 25-minute talk, followed by 15 minutes of discussion. How do we move from a week of metta practice into a time of turmoil and uncertainty in the U.S. and in the world? A number of guidelines and suggestions are given, including keeping the vision of practicing in all parts of one’s life, and keeping close the visions of awakening and of what Dr. King called the “beloved community.” In this time, staying connected with community is also crucial, as are, among many skillful intentions, practicing skillfully with difficult emotions, grounding in the body, cultivating cycles of engagement and withdrawal, and being careful about the amount of information one takes in. The talk ends by pointing to Joanna Macy’s model of three areas of transformation, and the invitation to respond to the call that each of us may hear. Discussion follows.

On the birthday of Dr. King, we explore some of the remarkable and powerful parallels between Metta practice and Buddhist teachings, on the one hand, and the life, teachings, and work of Dr. King, on the other. We explore in particular three areas: (1) the connection between Metta and the Christian tradition of acting from love that is central for King; (2) the wisdom perspective of seeing greed, hatred, and delusion, and developing understanding and manifesting non-reactivity through ethical grounding and nonviolence; and (3) the other qualities of the awakened heart--the Brahmavihara for the Buddha, and Dr. King’s way of manifesting qualities in addition to love, such as compassion, empathy, joy, and equanimity.

We start with naming two general contexts for metta practice: (1) metta is practiced along with the other three brahmavihara—compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity—and when mature integrates the other three; and (2) there are different ways of practicing metta. We then look at another main way of practicing, likely the way that the Buddha practiced—radiating metta. After a brief overview, we practice radiating metta first through a guided spatial expansion of radiating metta, from one’s own heart to the infinite expanse. Then we practice briefly a simple way of just letting metta radiate. After practice, there is discussion.

We begin with a short overview of the nature of forgiveness and forgiveness practice. Then there is a guided practice of forgiveness, followed by discussion.

We start with a story and poem related to developing metta. Then there is an overview of the nature of metta and metta practice, and how the intention to manifest metta—good will, care, and a powerful friendliness—has many resonances with the core intentions of other spiritual traditions, often expressed in terms of manifesting love. We explore how we train in developing the intention to manifest metta and how we see what gets in the way. We look at several of the challenges of metta practice and how to work with them.

As we begin a new year, it's helpful to remember the deep motivation of our practice--to awaken--and to ask how our intention to awaken manifests in our practice. In this talk, we explore the Buddha's metaphor of "awakening" (from sleep, from dreams) as a metaphor for spiritual practices, and how he also speaks of realizing Nirvana. We unpack how the Buddha understood Nirvana and awakening--both negatively, as the end of ignorance, and dukkha and reactivity--and more positively as going fully beyond the ordinary constructions of experience. We also look at how the Buddha understood the practical path of training to realize awakening and Nirvana, and how this was explicated through different teachings and practices. At the end, we briefly bring up the question of what a contemporary path of awakening looks like. The talk is followed by discussion.

After some basic instructions in developing concentration and stability, as well as mindfulness, we practice in silence. After about another ten minutes, there are several periodic brief periods of guided practice, in which we are guided to notice our main patterns of thought and perception of objects. In the latter part of the period, we are guided to drop constructions of experience in two ways.

The time of the Winter Solstice, leading up to the New Year, can be an important time for practice, as we, like the plants, stop, as we open to not doing as much, to stillness, and to listening. We look at some of the background, across different cultures, for the celebration of the Winter Solstice. We then explore five themes, five metaphors of darkness, that can support our practice at this time: (1) the darkness as related to a stopping and becoming still, like the earth; (2) being able to be with difficulties, the darkness as a metaphor for difficulty or challenge; (3) going into the darkness of not knowing—the unknown, the mystery; (4) the darkness as generative and creative; and (5) the darkness as luminous, generating light, opening us to the light. The talk is followed by discussion.

At the time of the Winter Solstice, our practice (for the Wednesday morning gathering) connects our usual grounding in concentration, mindfulness, and lovingkindness with themes related to the later talk on the Winter Solstice, particularly opening to the unknown and mysterious, and to what is difficult, through mindfulness and compassion.

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).

We begin with basic instructions on settling, developing concentration, and mindfulness, with a few reminders to be present. Around 2/3 into the 40-minute meditation is a guided exploration of an experience of anger (the theme of the talk that follows is on understanding and practicing with anger).

It's important for our teachings and practices to help orient us in relationship to all parts of our lives, including the larger social and political dimensions of our lives. In this session, we explore one core teaching and one central practice that together help us to respond skillfully to differences in political views. The teaching is that of dependent origination, particularly the sequence from contact to grasping. We see how the two forms of reactivity, grasping and pushing away (each potentially manifesting in many ways) result from pleasant and unpleasant feeling-tones, when there is a lack of mindfulness and background habitual tendencies. We can see how the underlying pain, for example, of many working-class people (economic pain; and the pain of feeling disregarded, left behind, and/or not respected), or the pain related to anxiety about changing gender roles, can, especially when manipulated by those in power who provide scapegoats, lead to reactivity. After presenting a model of empathy practice as crucial for bringing our practice to interacting with those with different views, we can also, through such practice, tune in with compassion to the underlying pain, and have a sense of the deep genuine needs, in our examples, for economic well-being, respect, and clarity around gender. We explore all of this in an exercise with the "empathy map," which is followed by discussion. (There were several files shared via screen sharing during the talk. These files can be accessed below and potentially downloaded, by clicking on the "Q" under "Documents," and looking for documents 229, 273, 274, and 275.)

After setting the posture and tuning into intentions, we have a short period of settling, typically through the breath or some other anchor. Then there is guidance to tune into the feeling-tone, especially when there is a "moderate" level pleasant or unpleasant feeling-tone, noticing tendencies to move to wanting/not-wanting or grasping/pushing away--the two forms of reactivity. We can also, when there is reactivity, tune into the pleasant or unpleasant "beneath" the reactivity, finding, for example, some compassion when there is underlying pain. Near the end, we also explore being with all feeling-tones for a very short period of a few minutes.

We gather for two hours together the morning after Election Day, 2024, in large part to ground what we are experiencing in our practice and in community. We begin with short reflections from Sylvia and Donald, followed by short periods of meditation and then sharing from many of those present at the gathering, with intermittent reflections from Sylvia and Donald. We finish with short talks from Sylvia and Donald and then a reading of the intentions of community members going forward in the next period of time.

We begin with a review of last week's talk and exploration, on being a bodhisattva in our times. The theme was inspired by Donald's experience teaching two retreats north of Asheville, NC during Hurricane Helene and being inspired by the response of the retreat center, Southern Dharma, both locally near the center and in Asheville, combining community, inner practices, and helping others. In this session, we look first more at the traditional understanding of the bodhisattva, both in the context of the Buddha's teachings and later Theravada, and then Mahayana. We bring in images of the archetypcal bodhisattvas, Avalokiteshvara, Tara, Kwan Yin, and Manjushri, as well as examples of the vows of bodhisattvas, and an outline of the training of a bodhisattva in the ten paramitas (or "perfections"). We then ask about the nature of a contemporary bodhisattva, pointing to how connecting inner work and helping others can be a corrective to exclusively outer-oriented forms of activism and exclusively inner-oriented forms of Buddhist practice, in the context of a number of systemic crises that are facing us. After then looking at some of the capacities of a contemporary bodhisattva, we invite bodhisattva vows from those attending and hear from many. Discussion follows.

We start with Donald's experience of being at Southern Dharma Retreat Center in North Carolina, north of Asheville, teaching two retreats during Hurricane Helene, some four weeks ago, and how staff and community members have responded during and in the weeks since the hurricane, grounded in community and their inner practices. Such a response, linking inner practice and the outer support and help of others, resonates with the aspiration of the Bodhisattva, one dedicated to awakening and to meeting the needs of others. We explore some of the qualities and capacities of the bodhisattva, including being in touch with freedom and awakening, navigating difficulties and painful experiences skillfully, and following the challenging teaching of acting fully without attachment to the outcome or fruits of one's actions. The talk is followed by discussion.

In the first part of the talk, we explore the Buddha's core teaching, "I teach dukkha and the end of dukkha." This teaching can be confusing as the Buddha gave at least four different meanings of "dukkha." We examine each of the four and find that only the last sense of dukkha as reactivity, developed in the teachings of the Two Arrows and Dependent Origination, makes sense of "the end of dukkha." We then look at ten ways of practicing with and transforming reactivity (see the attached file), discussing briefly each of the ten. The talk is followed by sharing, questions, and discussion.

After guidance on the basics of our practice--developing stability and concentration, and cultivating mindfulness--and a period of silent practice, there is additional guidance, related to the later dharma talk, on noticing any experiences of reactivity and on exploring moderate or greater experiences of pleasant or unpleasant.

The Buddha suggested the core of his teaching in one short sentence: "I teach dukkha [suffering or reactivity or a sense of unsatisfactoriness] and the cessation of dukkha.” We explore this teaching in several ways. We see how the Buddha had multiple ways of talking about dukkha, with only, I suggest, the understanding of dukkha as reactivity, making sense of what the end of dukkha means. Dukkha as reactivity is explicated especially in two teachings, the Two Arrows and Dependent Origination. We look at the meaning of reactivity and how it manifests in our experience. We also see how reactivity can often be enmeshed with insight, such it makes sense to speak of transforming reactivity rather than simply suppressing it. We then explore five ways of practicing with reactivity. The talk is followed by discussion.

After settling our attention through concentration and/or mindfulness, there are further instructions in noticing any reactivity (involving grasping or pushing away in a more automatic way at the levels of mind, body, or emotions), then in attending to the feeling-tone (especially a moderate or a little greater sense of pleasant or unpleasant), and lastly in recalling an experience of reactivity in the last few days and exploring it with mindfulness.

In this second talk on practicing with mystery, we begin by talking more generally about the nature of mystery. We then review seven ways of practicing with mystery explored last week, while bringing in further examples of these ways of practicing, and add an additional two further ways of practicing. Reading of poems and excerpts from poems support this sense of multiple ways of practicing with mystery. The talk is followed by discussion.

This is a fairly lightly guided meditation on ways to practice with a sense of mystery, linked with the talk on this theme. After grounding in posture and intentions, basic instructions in developing stability and concentration, and then in mindfulness, are given, with later periodic suggestions on ways to practice with a sense of mystery.

Inviting a sense of mystery as we practice can bring further aliveness, presence, and openness, and help us go beyond our habitual patterns of thinking and practicing. In the talk, we explore seven ways of practicing with mystery, with the aid of a number of poems. The talk is followed by discussion.

In the final session of this series, teachers Ronya Banks and Donald Rothberg offer a number of resources that can help one navigate these times and the conflict between Israel and Palestinians. After a brief period of meditation, we offer four teachings and practices, each first explored through teachings and then briefly guided experientially: (1) the teaching of the Two Arrows and Dependent Origination pointing to the nature of reactivity--habitual and often unconscious grasping after the pleasant and pushing away the unpleasant or painful; (2) the teachings about attachment to views; (3) the cultivation of wise speech and empathy, increasingly pointing toward universal empathy and what Dr. King called the "beloved community"; and (4) practicing with difficult emotions, body states (including traumatic reactions), and thoughts. These teachings and practices are followed by a period of discussion, closing intentions, and the dedication of merit.

The Dalai Lama has said, “My religion is kindness," suggesting that the core of spirituality is both beyond any particular religion and does not require religion. We explore, in a similar way, how the basics of Buddhist teachings and practices-- related to ethics, kindness and compassion, wisdom, and touching nibbana--can be understood and expressed in ordinary, everyday language and at its heart is both shared by other spiritual traditions and potentially beyond any particular tradition. The talk is followed by discussion.

Related to the talk given after the guided meditation on the foundational practices and how we can talk very simply about them, we begin remembering our grounding in ethics, and then develop concentration, then mindfulness and wisdom, and later the kind and compassionate heart.

In session 2 of this series, Donald Rothberg and Ronya Banks will engage in dialogue around their Jewish and Palestinian identities, their family histories, and their own experiences of being Buddhist teachers navigating the complexities of the conflict in Palestine/Israel. During the course of the conversation, they will offer reflections on what has been most helpful to each of them in dealing with painful truths, strong emotions, and difficult conversations. In the last part of the session, participants will have the opportunity to ask questions and offer reflections.

We continue with our exploration of how we contact what is "deep" in our lives and in life, and how we stay connected with our depths in our practice. We initially give a review of some of what we explored last week, recalling some of the many metaphors used for deepening in our lives in spiritual traditions, including awakening, being on a journey, liberation, seeing clearly whereas previously we didn't see clearly, coming to wholeness, among others. We recall the Buddhist emphasis on wisdom (especially the three ways of seeing that liberate--seeing into impermanence, dukkha or reactivity, and not-self; as well as touching nibbana); compassion; and skillful action. We hear also from several people sharing their experiences of their depths. We then explore a number of ways to stay connected in daily life with our depths, including several not mentioned last week. The talk is followed by discussion, including sharing of some ways that people in the group find helpful in terms of staying connected with their depths, including using phrases like "Begin again" and "Keep coming back."

How do we live from the depths of our being? We explore this question in a number of different ways. We begin by looking at some of the metaphors for "spiritual practice" (itself involving metaphors), including the sense of touching and living from our depths, becoming a "big person" (a Mahaatta in the Buddha's phrasing), awakening, being on a journey, and seeing through our conditioning, delusions, and the 70,000 veils (as is said in Islamic tradition). In Buddhist tradition, we especially connect, as in the image of the bird with two wings, with wisdom and compassion, and with ways to bring these qualities into our actions and interactions. After inviting several people to share experiences of their depths, we then explore a number of different ways to stay connected in daily life with our depths. The talk is followed by discussion.

A guided meditation connected with the talk on "Living from Our Depths," touching on exploring two of the three areas of liberating insight (impermanence and reactivity--or Dukkha) connected with developing wisdom, and practicing lovingkindness (or another heart practice), connected with developing the "awakened heart."

A central way to describe our practice is to say that we aim to touch and deepen in wisdom and in the awakened heart (particularly through cultivating the “divine abodes”: lovingkindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity), and to live and act increasingly from wisdom and the awakened heart. This is like the well-known image of the teachings and practices being like the bird with two wings—wisdom and compassion (the latter signifying the different qualities of the awakened heart). In the talk, we cover five areas exploring particularly how we connect wisdom and the awakened heart: (1) the aspiration to grow in wisdom and the awakened heart and the nature of wisdom and the awakened heart; (2) our social conditioning (including gender conditioning) about wisdom and the heart and how they can be separate in our lives or one or both may be relatively undeveloped; (3) some ways that they seem separate even in Buddhist teachings and practices, particularly in how metta has sometimes been understood; (4) how to have from different teachings of the Buddha a deeper sense of wisdom and the awakened heart as connected and integrated; and (5) how we might integrate the two in our practices, particularly focusing on the practices we explored in the guided meditation. The talk is followed by discussion.

A day before the Fourth of July and two days after Canada Day, commemorating establishing Canada, we explore the possibility of connecting the vision of individual awakening and freedom and the vision of social freedom and justice. We look at the "shadows" of these visions, of how greed, hatred, and delusion, whether individual or collective, as well as other factors, stand in the way of realizing these visions. We point to the importance of staying connected to these two visions in difficult and challenging times, and of how they can be brought together. After the talk, we have a group discussion.

We start with a brief reflection on today's holiday, Juneteenth. Then we review last week's initial exploration of practicing with views, including (1) identifying the main teachings on views given by the Buddha, and (2) three basic ways to practice with views, including developing mindfulness of views, inquiring when there is a charge related to another's view, and developing careful listening. This review is followed by bringing in several further ways to understand and practice with views, including working with a specific teaching and letting the "view [coming from the teaching] be the meditation," exploring how sometimes to rest in a kind of unknowing, and then how awakening lies beyond views and concepts. The talk is followed by discussion.

After initial instructions in developing stability and concentration, and then mindfulness, there are further instructions, given after 10 and after 20 minutes, on developing more mindfulness of views, stories, and narratives (related to the talk given after the meditation). At the end, there is an invitation to reflect on views or stories that have been prominent in the last few days.

We review some of the main themes from last week's talk on developing concentration (samadhi), including the importance of such practice for the Buddha and his teachings; without samadhi, the Buddha says, there is no freedom. We examine ways of practicing (including outside of formal meditation) and look at some of the factors that indicate a deepening of samadhi (the jhanic factors). We then review the main challenges of developing samadhi, particularly over-active minds, sleepiness and low energy, and over-efforting. We also explore further challenges to the development of samadhi, including working with background thoughts, the ways that more unconscious material can surface in cultivating samadhi, and attachment to concentrated states. The talk is followed by discussion.

After a short overview about the nature of concentration (samadhi), there is basic guidance on cultivating samadhi along with some more advanced instruction in the last third of the guided meditation.

There are two main forms of meditation as taught by the Buddha: Developing concentration and developing insight. We explore how they go together, the nature of concentration (samadhi), and the different ways of developing samadhi. We also look at some of the typical challenges of developing samadhi, particularly over-active minds, sleepiness and low energy, and over-efforting. Throughout there is an emphasis on finding ways to integrate active effort with ease and relaxation. The talk is followed by discussion.

At the beginning, there is a short discussion of the nature and importance of cultivating concentration or samadhi, followed by practical meditative guidance at the beginning and during the session.

We continue with the main ways of deepening practice identified in the talk from the week before, based on ways of deepening experienced in Donald's March four weeks of retreat. We go into more depth on each of the ten, inviting listeners to choose one or two ways of deepening for the next period of time. The talk is followed by discussion, and there's a downloadable pdf listing the ten ways of deepening practice (see below).

Following four weeks of Donald's personal retreat, he identifies a number of ways of deepening practice that he experienced and that we might bring into our lives. The invitation is to see what one or two or three ways of deepening resonate and seem to call us to our "next steps." Among the ways of deepening are going on retreats (understood as periods of intensive training), staying in touch with and periodically remembering one's deeper intentions, pausing and stopping regularly, clarifying priorities, the importance of working with the subtle energy body, opening to non-doing in meditation and daily life, integrating awareness and metta, and finding ways of regularly coming back if stuck, caught in reactivity, or lost in thought. The talk is followed by discussion.

We begin by reviewing some and expanding last week's introduction to practicing to transform the judgmental mind, including clarifying our language and the way that in English "judgment" can ambiguously mean either an expression of the judgmental mind or a non-judgmental discernment. We identify examples of the judgmental mind, and point to how it can be understood in terms of the sequence of contact to grasping (and pushing away) in the Buddha's teaching on Dependent Origination, how negative judgments (in the sense of the judgmental mind) typically come out of unacknowledged or unprocessed pain. We also point to how our practice with the judgmental mind, as it goes deeper, begins to identify "limiting beliefs," often from childhood, that generate our most chronic judgments. We end the talk with naming a number of ways to practice with the judgmental mind. The talk is followed with discussion.

After a period of settling and general mindfulness practice, we invite noticing and being with any expressions of the judgmental mind (here called "judgments") if they occur. In the second part of the guided meditation, there is also a more direct investigation of a selected judgment, exploring it at the levels of body, emotions, and thought, and seeing whether any underlying painful or difficult experience can be noticed. We close with a brief three-part self-compassion practice (from Kristin Neff).

We frame the session in terms of there being three main inter-related aims of our practice: (1) developing wisdom and insight, (2) cultivating the kind heart and compassion, and (3) acting skillfully and ethically in all the parts of our life. In this context, it's interesting that having insight can still be connected with reactivity; it's possible to be both "right" and see something clearly, and be obnoxious. We look at one major way in which insight can be enmeshed with reactivity--what I call "the judgmental mind." We first clarify how "judgment" in English is ambiguous, sometimes meaning judgmental, sometimes meaning discerning without reactivity. The judgmental mind combines typically some kind of noticing, insight, observation, etc. with reactivity, and the key to transforming the judgmental mind is to work through the reactivity, using multiple tools. The last part of the talk outlines our major tools for transforming the judgmental mind, and invites next week's practice. We then have a discussion.

We continue to explore how we might practice metta (and other heart practices) in a way integrated with mindfulness, wisdom, and insight, building on last week's session. We begin looking at some of the ways historically and culturally that the "mind" and "reason" have been separated from emotion, dating from Plato and the Greeks, and continued in the modern world with the understanding of reason and science as separate from emotion (and the body). This has been a major part of our social and cultural conditioning, evident in how mainstream education occurs, and also linked with gender conditioning. We also examine how, dating from Buddhaghosa's text, the Visuddhimagga (The Path of Purification), from the 5th century, metta and compassion has been labeled as practices leading to concentration, and not as linked directly with wisdom and awakening. This has been the basis for the 20th century Burmese approaches to metta and mindfulness, which have been the main influences in the West. However, when we look to the Buddha's actual teachings, as well as later Mahayana and Vajrayana teachings, we find much more of a connection between metta, compassion, and wisdom. We can see this in a number of texts which we explore, including ones in which the heart practices are seen as leading directly to wisdom, and development in awakening. In the last part of the talk, we explore ways that we can, in our formal and informal practices, integrate metta and wisdom. The talk is followed by discussion.

We begin with about 10 minutes of settling with our mindfulness (or another) practice. This is followed by about 5 minutes of practicing metta where it flows as easily as possible, and then by a guided practice in radiating metta, extended to radiating in a boundless way. We then return to a brief way of practicing radiating metta without visualization, followed by returning to mindfulness, infused with metta.

We often hear that the heart of the teachings and practice is to connect wisdom and compassion, clear seeing and the kind heart, developing what Jack Kornfield calls the "wise heart." Yet such a connection or integration can be challenging in several ways. First of all, we have major conditioning in modern Western culture to separate the "mind" and the "heart" (or emotions), as well as the body. Also we find tendencies in the Theravada tradition to see Metta practice as separate from Insight practice, as in the way that Buddhaghosa in the influential text, the Visuddhimagga, lists Metta practice as a form of Concentration practice, and in some of the ways that Metta is taught as a complement to insight practice in the West. In this talk, we begin to explore what it might look like to integrate more fully Metta and wisdom, mindfulness, and insight, both in formal practice and daily life. The talk is followed by discussion.

We begin with the basic instruction in metta (lovingkindness) practice, using the silent repetition of phrases. Then we move to a period of mindfulness practice, followed by metta practice, where the metta is most accessible, followed by an invitation to return to mindfulness practice, integrated with the energy and intentions of metta practice.

We begin by exploring the nature of some of the challenges of metta practice, including with difficult emotions, body-states, and thoughts, and how to practice when these challenges arise. The spirit is that of understanding challenges as part of the path of learning. We then focus on one way of deliberating bring metta practice to a challenging situation, through metta with the difficult person, followed by an account of one particular challenge, the “judgmental mind,” its nature and how to practice with it; this includes a short selection from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.s’ sermon, “On Judging.” Lastly, there is an introduction to forgiveness practice.