Awareness

Anxious times.

2012-01-30T10:43:00.000Z

Why We Worry (and what we can do about it by Dr. Stephen A. Diamond, Ph.D.

We all worry at times. Occasionally for good reason. But worrying can get way out of hand. Worrying and anxiety are intimately related. Anxiety can manifest in many ways, including persistent, excessive worrying. For example, in Generalized Anxiety Disorder, excessive anxiety and worry (apprehensive expectation) about events such as school or work performance has been present more days than not for a period of at least six months. By definition, this continual worrying is difficult to control and causes clinically significant distress and/or impairment in social, occupational or other daily activities. Ironically, worrying--which is typically an attempt to anticipate and prevent bad things happening-- tends to make one even more anxious, creating a never-ending and constantly escalating vicious cycle of anxiety-worry-more anxiety-more worry, etc. Why do we worry as much as we do? What exactly is it we worry about? And how can we worry a little less?
First and foremost, we fear the future. The unknown. We worry about what will happen to us, our family, our partner, our business, our money, our home, our possessions, our country, the world, etc. We live in a universe which is inherently unpredictable, dangerous and deadly. Indeed, anxiety (and the worry it generates which generates more anxiety) can be understood as an acute or subliminal awareness of life's insecurity. And the ever-present possibility and absolute inevitability of death. So much of what we worry about has to do with losing what we have: health, happiness, love, wealth, power, status, wisdom, freedom, independence, support, vitality and, ultimately, life itself. Either through making some mistaken choice or via the vagaries of fate. Existential anxiety is a recognition, either conscious or unconscious, that life is finite, existence tenuous, and that all or what little we have can be taken from us at any time. This is why existential psychotherapy places such emphasis on the experience of anxiety, seeing it as an inescapable and even necessary aspect of the human condition. And it is why we worry so much about making important decisions: We don't want to deal with the consequences of making a mistake. So we procrastinate, avoiding the existential anxiety of choosing without knowing for certain whether we are right or wrong.

In his classic work The Meaning of Anxiety (1950, 1977 ) existential psychoanalyst Rollo May differentiated between normal and pathological anxiety, suggesting that neurotic or even psychotic anxiety typically stems from the chronic avoidance of normal or existential anxiety. In other words, when we refuse to accept and tolerate anxiety as an inescapable part of existence (and the "dizziness" of our freedom, as Kierkegaard pointed out), we paradoxically set ourselves up for the appearance of pathological anxiety and pathological worrying. Some worrying and concern for the future may be unavoidable, and, in certain situations, necessary and potentially helpful. We need the capacity for anxiety to anticipate danger, detect and deal with fundamental threats to our basic survival, to motivate and energize us, to warn us when we have been inauthentic or betrayed our basic values, to grow more fully conscious and become more creative. But when we try to avoid or repress this healthy anxiety by denying reality and our true feelings, it turns toxic, taking the neurotic form of persistent worrying, chronic tension and fatigue, disturbed sleep, headaches, hypervigilance, irritability, restlessness, impaired concentration, digestive and other physical problems, panic attacks, paranoia and myriad other debilitating psychiatric symptoms. Our non-stop worrying has made us sick. And then we worry about having these symptoms, causing even greater anxiety.

Worrying can also pertain to wanting to be perceived by the world as we wish. And desiring to see ourselves as we want to be seen. When we are heavily invested in projecting and maintaining a certain image or persona to others, we must be ever-watchful and guarded about that particular persona being penetrated and seen through. We worry about being exposed. Being known. Found out, as, for example, in the so-called "imposter syndrome." Being judged. Criticized. And we worry about knowing ourselves. About being confronted with who and what we truly are. We humans innately harbor a primal fear of the unconscious, the unknown, and of what C.G. Jung termed the shadow. For the persona, as Jung pointed out, is specifically designed to hide our shadow, to keep us from fully knowing ourselves as well as for fooling others. For many, the facade or persona of a competent, confident adult disguises a worried, anxious little girl or boy trying to get by in a scary grown up world. Any circumstance that potentiates such embarrassing exposure, revealing the real person behind the mask, is deeply threatening and, therefore, extremely worrisome. Anticipatory anxiety kicks in: What if I can't hide my feelings? My insecurity? My love? My sadness? My rage? My neediness? My vulnerability? My true self? What many try so hard to hide and worry so much about others seeing is the fact that they feel anxious in the first place. We worry about what people will think of us if they know we have anxieties or insecurities. So we work hard and worry about how to conceal our shameful anxiety, which only makes it stronger and doubly difficult to disguise. Ad nauseum.

So what is the solution to this perennial dilemma? How can we stop our excessive worrying? Cognitive-behavioral therapy attempts to help patients see that their worrying is irrational and counterproductive. That it serves no purpose, heightens anxiety, and does nothing to prevent that which we worry about from taking place. "Catastrophizing," for example, is a very common kind of worrying in which we imagine the worst case scenario possible even for relatively minor events. Yet, in reality, such cataclysmic outcomes fortunately rarely occur. So why continue to do it to ourselves? True enough. Reasonable. Logical. But neurotic worrying and anxiety are, by definition, not rational. And as with other irrational symptoms like delusions in psychotic patients, they are not very amenable to rational disputation. Nor--despite the fact that psychiatric drugs like Lexapro or Klonopin can help reduce anxiety and thereby lessen excessive worrying--are they all that amenable to pharmacological intervention over long periods of time, since this treatment can become yet another potentially habituating type of avoidance. Existential psychiatrist Viktor Frankl employed a technique he called paradoxical intention: rather than worrying about controlling and concealing your anxiety, willing instead to be as anxious as possible in certain nerve-wracking contexts can paradoxically decrease your situational anxiety and worry. This is sometimes a helpful trick. But we need to dig deeper. We must also address what underlies and drives the obsessional worrying, the underlying anxiety itself. And discern the significance of that anxiety rather than trying merely to medicate it out of existence.

Existential philosopher Soren Kierkegaard felt that anxiety can be our best teacher. So the crucial question is whether we are willing to stop worrying long enough to listen to what our anxiety has to tell us. To sink more fully into our anxiety rather than run from it. To be more present to it. Is it a warning of some kind? An alarm or wake up call? An overactive thyroid or perhaps a sign of some other latent physiological illness? A byproduct of some psychoactive stimulant, like caffeine, nicotine, cocaine or amphetamine? Or a "signal," as Freud suggested, that we are resisting becoming more conscious of something unconscious and conflictual? Or could it be a psychological call to arms? An urgent inner necessity for action? Might it herald the pressing need to change our life, our persona, our relationships, our world-view? To live in closer alignment with our true temperament? Establish better balance in our personality or life-style? To seek some new sense of spiritual purpose and meaning? Find a more fulfilling work, social or love life? Or could anxiety sometimes be a clarion call and a spur to greater creative expression? (I discuss the close connections between anger, anxiety and creativity in my book Anger, Madness, and the Daimonic.)

Existential psychotherapy suggests that we must learn to accept and tolerate our anxiety, and that some anxiety is the inescapable price of being free, conscious, mortal and responsible for ourselves. But is this necessarily so? Philosopher and theologian Alan Watts, in his brilliant book Psychotherapy East and West (1961), doesn't buy it. What, Watts wonders, if we were to just stop caring so much about what we have to lose? In Buddhism, for instance, suffering (which certainly includes worrying and anxiety) is seen as the consequence of having too much desire, grasping or attachment. Attachment to material things. Desire to have certain feelings or experiences, and not others. Grasping for what we don't or cannot have. Expectations about how life, relationships, and people should be, and what the fruits of our efforts will bring. What if it were to turn out that we actually have nothing to lose? Because, in reality, we have nothing but our existence itself. All else is accoutrements or accessories. And what if even our existence is nothing more than a dream? A very convincing hallucination? (See my previous posts about reality and the movie Inception.) Or, in Hindu and Buddhist terminology, mere maya or illusion. What then is there to worry about? How can one lose what one doesn't really have? Or what one doesn't truly need? This would not be to say that we no longer care about others or the world. Only that we choose to be less attached to and more accepting of the world and what happens in it. Living in the world but not being of it. Ultimately, less anxiously attached to our own continued existence. And, therefore, less fearful of our own demise. We would be virtually liberated from worry. But such liberation is much easier said than done. For one thing, the survival instinct is primitive and supremely powerful. Traditional Western religions take a similar tack and serve a similar purpose: Spiritual faith in an all-powerful God and belief in life-after-death for some makes life more meaningful, mitigates anxiety, and diminishes excessive worrying. Unswerving faith and trust in a benevolent and omniscient God and relinquishing control eliminates any need to worry about what will happen. It's all in God's hands. The philosophical concept of predestination--that all is predetermined and planned for us in life, that free will is just an illusion, and that therefore it makes no difference what our decisions and choices are since the outcome is set--is yet another method of precluding the need to worry.

Still, there is no denying that death anxiety--or really, it's avoidance--is the surreptitious source of so many of our daily worries. When our worries are carefully examined and carried out to their logical conclusions, death is often what we find lurking there. Fear of death. Fear of Hell. Fear of reincarnation. Fear of nothingness or oblivion. Fear of suffering. As Woody Allen once put it, "I'm not afraid of death. I just don't want to be there when it happens." But what happens when we no longer dread death, but rather accept it as merely the necessary counterpart to life, as darkness is the counterpart to light? When we embrace suffering as the necessary counterpart to joy, pleasure and happiness? Opposite poles of the same existence. And when we see that there really is no such thing as security in life. Except for that sense of security that comes from within. A spiritual rather than physical security. We arrive at what Watts called in another superb book the "wisdom of insecurity." We realize that our constant worrying was always a way of denying these existential facts. Of escaping the present. Of avoiding our existential anxiety. Of trying to convince ourselves that we have more control over life than we actually do.

Relinquishing our illusions of control, accepting our relative powerlessness over life and death, and accepting ourselves as we are--including our anxiety--can be extremely liberating. It can allow us to stop worrying so much, and get on with living. The mysterious future will unfold soon enough. Make necessary plans and decisions. But don't dwell on them or their desired outcomes. Focus instead on what's happening right now, this very moment, however anxiety-provoking, painful, difficult or infuriating, rather than anxiously anticipating what may or may not happen next. And when you catch yourself worrying way too much about something, remind yourself that sooner or later you, just like all who have come before us, will be dead. We are destined to die someday. Given that sobering realization, how many matters are really worth worrying about? Try that existential perspective on for size. You might find it refreshing.

Dr. Diamond is co-founder and director of the Existential Psychotherapy Center of Southern California, a clinical training program for mental health professionals and graduate students located in Los Angeles.

Source URL: http://www.psychologytoday.com/node/50038

Empowering your thoughts triggers peace of mind.

2012-01-12T11:38:00.001Z

Peace of mind is a way of living in the present moment. In the immediacy of life, we are always a few actions away from chaos. Life is an organic process, in constant motion. Ergo, letting go of the Ego's need for control is how best to live this life and maintain a sense of effortless equilibrium. Not for the gratification seekers, is this methodology. However, for people who operate life with a hurry-up life-script and are highly stressed, and want to actually manage their lives differently, deepening their awareness of how to do this begins with the first step: being present. Not later. Not tomorrow or next week. Now.

Changing an approach/action/reaction to a situation is a powerful action. Doing things the same way and expecting a different outcome is what Einstein stated as a marker of insanity! Actually thinking for a few moments before responding/reacting is already an improvement. Our brains hardwiring does the firing. Bringing into awareness is the profound discipline of self mastery; pause then respond.

Technology has massive benefits, however it is artificial intelligence. The brain is not artificial. It is an organ. In our vastly accelerated lifestyle we operate in a faster modes of connecting. Instant gratification or not at all. Fail fast.

Awareness is an antidote.Mindfulness as a way of life creates a state of equipoise. The ideal of a balanced life means taking responsibility for ALL of your actions. Less people/life skills malfunction moments, less to mend.

In Transactional Analysis Therapy; the therapeutic framework is defined by the Three Ego States, Parent/Adult/Child. Then there are the Ego drivers: Be Perfect. Hurry up. Try Hard. Please others. Be Strong. The Ego drives will fire off according to your life script/narrative's needs. Expanding your role in life is learning how to meet your needs. We are here in this life to excel, thrive and flourish. We are born princes and princess's who often become frogs.

Reclaiming authenticity begins with trusting in the process of life. Authenticity, lifting the veil of illusion, revealing what is behind the fear generated mask. Being bullet-proof, barricaded avoidant, whatever label your want to tag onto your persona as a mechanism for keeping people at a "safe" controlled distance, keeps you isolated. Breaking free from the binds of flawed perceptions is an opportunity to challenge your inner critic's stinking thinking. It is illusory thinking that your can do this later/when.... "when" has a habit of NEVER happening.

Cultivating peace, developing a place within the recess of our psyche that we can retreat to, is a powerful discipline, an antidote to the propensity of over-thinking. In contemprary and ancient spiritual/mythological and philosophical readings much is written and recommended about the importance of Ego deflation, detachment, mindfullnes, compassion and empathy in order to transcending patterns/themes of an individuals lifetime.

Breaking the treaty is becoming who you were meant to be, means letting go of who you are not.
A journey of lifetime. Slowly peeling the layers of illusory thinking away. There is strength in being vulnerable, taking risks and actualising instrinsic courage.

Fear triggers stress which stimulates increased brain activity/impulsivity. Discipline is training the mind to explore the space between an action and a reaction. It may only be for a nanosecond but it is will make all the difference in the outcome if thinking about doing it differently is applied. Patterns and theme dominant habitual behaviours, default settings, our brain is hardwired to connect and react in a nano-second.

Fight or flight or respond with Ego strengths intact? Every action is energy in motion, E-motion. Therefore, autonomous being is available in the present moment. To retrain rogue, reactive, neural pathways, it is recommended that simply pausing, breathing and thinking about a response or even requesting time to do this with generate new/positive patterns in the art of Self-Mastery.

Your ability to breathe deeply, a few chest opening/expanding breathes, for a few moments will make a massive difference in harnessing fear by bringing in you back to the present moment.
Then you can give your self what you need. Often when we are afraid, we fail to self nurture, or protect. For example, creative visualisation is a powerful tool for handling stress. When I feel threatened I can breath, pause my thoughts, still my mind, and imagine in that moment that I have everything I need to take care of myself, that I am capable, that I am enough and that everything is exactly as it is supposed to be.

Acceptance of whatever is occurring is key to Self-Mastery. Every challenging situation presents an opportunity to apply a self empowering technique. Projecting into the future a worse case scenario script maybe your first choice, creating a positive intention means a re-write, often going against what you wish to happen. Timeline therapy aids the process of retrieving unresolved issues. Revisiting the past allows us to process the art of self-forgiveness, to forgive ourselves when we failed to be our best, do our best or follow through positive intentions.

A sense of inner peace is realised when we process fully all our emotions. Blocking this blocks the ability to have empathy. When there is an absence of empathy in how we engage with others, selfishness is unbridled.

Seva, doing service is consciously taking responsibility for how our actions can be of benefit to others. The antidote to selflessness is thinking about ways to make someone happy, feel nurtured, regarded and valued as a vital, essential human being. Peace of mind is a happy state of being.

Peace is perfected activity; that is perfect which is complete in all its aspects, balanced in each direction and under complete control of the will.

The following Commentary is by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan:
It is useless to discuss the peace of the world. What is necessary just now is to create peace in ourselves that we, ourselves, become examples of love, harmony and peace. That is the only way of saving the world and ourselves.

Peace is independently felt within oneself. It is not dependent upon the outer sensation. It is something that belongs to one, something that is one's own self. ... Peace is not a knowledge, peace is not a power, peace is not a happiness, but peace is all these. And besides, peace is productive of happiness. Peace inspires one with knowledge of the seen and unseen, and in peace is to be found the divine Presence. It is not the excited one who conquers in this continual battle of life. It is the peaceful one who tolerates all, who forgives all, who understands all, who assimilates all things. The one who lacks peace, with all his possessions, the property of this earth or quality of mind, is poor even with both. He has not got that wealth which may be called divine and without which man's life is useless. For true life is in peace, a life which will not be robbed by death.

The secret of mysticism, the mystery of philosophy, all is to be attained after the attainment of peace. You cannot refuse to recognize the divine in a person who is a person of peace. It is not the talkative, it is not the argumentative one, who proves to be wise. He may have intellect, worldly wisdom, and yet may not have pure intelligence, which is real wisdom. True wisdom is to be found in the peaceful, for peacefulness is the sign of wisdom. It is the peaceful one who is observant. It is peace that gives him the power to observe keenly. It is the peaceful one, therefore, who can conceive, for peace helps him to conceive. It is the peaceful who can contemplate; one who has no peace cannot contemplate properly. Therefore, all things pertaining to spiritual progress in life depend upon peace.

And now the question is what makes one lack peace? The answer is, love of sensation. A person who is always seeking to experience life in movement, in activity, in whatever form, wants more and more of that experience. In the end he becomes dependent upon the life which is outside, and so he loses in the end his peace, the peace which is his real self. ... the first thing is to seek the kingdom of God within ourselves, in which there is our peace. As soon as we have found that, we have found our support, we have found our self. And in spite of all the activity and movement on the surface, we shall be able to keep that peace undisturbed if only we hold it fast by becoming conscious of it.

May you find lasting happiness and peace. May all of us who share this planet go forward together into the new year in harmony.

2012-01-01T19:29:00.001Z

Peace of mind is about embodying a compassionate world-view. Open your heart to experience compassion for yourself and others. This state of play, is augmented by thinking of someone you love with every cell in your body. It can be your partner, spouse or a close friend. Your child. Parent or sibling. Someone who makes you smile with your heart.

Because it is all about love; if in doubt, ask yourself "What would love do?" Love overcomes feelings of discontent, isolation, alienation and unhappiness. Love has the power to process loss and or forgiveness. A mantra helps us to love ourselves, our thoughts, our lives, our essential being. Re-energising the flow of love is about overcoming selfishness. Ergo, doing something for someone else and not needing acknowledgement.

We learn about love from our parents. If you were fortunate to receive unconditional love from your family then you are blessed with the ability to self-nurture and engage with others without the need to edit your feelings.

I believe that we create out reality. Every day has an abundant amount of opportunities to amplify your awareness. People who operate on a higher frequency of awareness are vital, healthy human beings.

We all experience times in which we are challenged, want to run. avoid taking the next step towards changing a negative into a positive. It is good to know what your strengths are. And how you can renew your life-force.

The body is a sophisticated machine. Take good care of it and your body will respond in kind with abundant energy. How to increase your bodies natural fire ( Agni) is by nourishing your body with healthy food, sufficient rest/sleep.

Make time each day to quieten your mind in meditation. Exercise. Easy does it, but do it. Sign up for a course in Qi Gong and boost your immune system. Create peace of mind. Maintain a healthy equilibrium.

Learn to cook if you don't know how. If you do already, explore more ways to enjoy the aroma and taste of your cooking. I love layering in spices. Even our porridge! In winter it is good to increase the potency of food by adding spices. I add spices to do two things; color and taste. They never disappoint.

I can over-think my way into an avoidant dilemma; procrastination is my downfall. Therefore, mastering time is key to achieving what one must do in order to stay on top in the game of life.
Even though there are things I would rather not do,now or ever, doing these things has a knock-on effect of making me feel good...

For many of us, relationships can either empower us - win-win/love-love or make us feel resentful- victim/blame-game/triangulating dynamics that disempower us and others. The ensuing power struggle eventually destroys relationships.

I recommend doing a Metta Meditation as we ease into 2012. Try it every day for a month as part of your Meditation practice. Best done at the end of the day so that any slow-burn resentments can be reality-checked - self mastery means taking ownership of ALL aspects of your behavior.

Below is a Metta Meditation that I find life changing. Try it. I wish you all an "examined life" in 2012. It was Socrates who stated that "An unexamined life is not worth living" Self - reflection is the antidote for self-denial.

Altering perceptions, create positive and challenge fear and doubt.
A daily discipline I practice:
Metta- Loving Kindness.
The original name of this practice is "metta bhavana" which comes from the Pali language. Metta means ‘love’ (in a non-romantic sense), friendliness, or kindness: hence ‘loving-kindness’ for short. It is an emotion, something you feel in your heart. Bhavana means development or cultivation. The commonest form of the practice is in five stages, each of which should last about five minutes for a beginner.

1. In the first stage, you feel metta for yourself. You start by becoming aware of yourself, and focusing on feelings of peace, calm, and tranquillity. Then you let these grow in to feelings of strength and confidence, and then develop into love within your heart. You can use an image, like golden light flooding your body, or a phrase such as ‘may I be well and happy’, which you can repeat to yourself. These are ways of stimulating the feeling of metta for yourself.
2. In the second stage think of a good friend. Bring them to mind as vividly as you can, and think of their good qualities. Feel your connection with your friend, and your liking for them, and encourage these to grow by repeating ‘may they be well; may they be happy’ quietly to yourself. You can also use an image, such as shining light from your heart into theirs. You can use these techniques — a phrase or an image — in the next two stages as well.

3. Then think of someone you do not particularly like or dislike. Your feelings are ‘neutral’. This may be someone you do not know well but see around. You reflect on their humanity, and include them in your feelings of metta.
4. Then think of someone you actually dislike — an enemy. Trying not to get caught up in any feelings of hatred, you think of them positively and send your metta to them as well.
5. In the final stage, first of all you think of all four people together — yourself, the friend, the neutral person, and the enemy. Then extend your feelings further — to everyone around you, to everyone in your neighbourhood; in your town, your country, and so on throughout the world. Have a sense of waves of loving-kindness spreading from your heart to everyone, to all beings everywhere. Then gradually relax out of meditation, and bring the practice to an end.
I recommend beginning to develop a Metta practice this way then you can extend this to an audio format. For now learning how to develop new neural pathways begin this way. Think you way into feeling positive.
Metta.

All illness come from a state of non-acceptance.

2011-12-15T09:27:00.002Z

“My message is the practice of compassion, love and kindness. These things are very useful in our daily life, and also for the whole of human society these practices can be very important.” - Dalai Lama

Instead of recognizing the differences between yourself and others, try to recognize what you have in common. At the root of it all, we are all human beings. We need food, and shelter, and love. We crave attention, and recognition, and affection, and above all, happiness. Reflect on these commonalities you have with every other human being, and ignore the differences.

In order to sustain motivation it is vital for the purpose of holistic balance in all aspects of our daily life, that we get out need recognised. If we can't do this for ourselves then we will additionally struggle in the exchange that occurs when we engage with others.
This is the definitive and original Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.
The Psychological/Spiritual Contract:
Self-actualisation is living an autonomous/authentic life.Practicing awareness, honesty, freedom and trust.
Erikson's Psychosocial Theory of Human Development is a positive framework to aspire to.
While Maslow referred to various additional aspects of motivation, he expressed the Hierarchy of Needs in these five clear stages.
1. Biological and Physiological needs - air, food, drink, shelter, warmth, sex, sleep, etc.

2. Safety needs - protection from elements, security, order, law, limits, stability, etc.

3. Belongingness and Love needs - work group, family, affection, relationships, etc.

4. Esteem needs - self-esteem, achievement, mastery, independence, status, dominance, prestige, managerial responsibility, etc.

5. Cognitive needs - knowledge, meaning, etc.

6. Aesthetic needs - appreciation and search for beauty, balance, form, etc.

7. Self-Actualization needs - realising personal potential, self-fulfillment, seeking personal growth and peak experiences.

8. Self-transcendence - recognising the needs and wants of the human condition in a way the embodies compassion as the primary purpose to engender the self-actualisation of others.

Conversely, if the things that satisfy our lower order needs are swept away, we are no longer concerned about the maintenance of our higher order needs.

Maslow's original Hierarchy of Needs model was developed between 1943-1954, and first widely published in Motivation and Personality in 1954. At this time the Hierarchy of Needs model comprised five needs. This original version remains for most people the definitive Hierarchy of Needs.

Like any simple model, Maslow's theory not a fully responsive system - it's a guide which requires some interpretation and thought, given which, it remains extremely useful and applicable for understanding, explaining and handling many human behaviour situations.

Normally, we would consider that selflessly helping others, as a form of personal growth motivation, would be found as part of self-actualisation, or perhaps even 'transcendence' (if you subscribe to the extended hierarchy).

So how can we explain the examples of people who seem to be far short of self-actualising, and yet are still able to help others in a meaningful and unselfish sense?
This where practicing the guidelines found in the way of life that aspires to a non-violent approach to the human condition.
Projecting onto others our "movie" and expectations our "script" is about the need to control and or be in control. In the West we are taught that knowledge is power. We are aspire to reach the "holy grail" of existence - "living the dream"...

The veil of illusion binds us in a form of physic bondage to all things external as the antidote for fixing the hole in our soul. In an age of stimulation overload it is to be expected that heightened stress levels are the root cause many mental and physical illnesses.

It has taken me many attempts at understanding the hierarchy of existence to understand the importance of compassion. Spiritual fatigue robs us of the opportunity to be present. In the moment. Enriching our lives requires the discipline of being able to retreat within on a daily basis.

Not navel gazing. But actually going deeper into the recesses of ones psyche. Meditation is a wonderful way of "stopping the madness" unhooking from the intensity of existence.
Be still. Come back to your essential essence. Love and fear do blend together. Fear is projecting into the future. Situational depression is obsessing about the past - anxiety, the future. Nothing real can threatened. Nothing unreal exists.
At the heart of learning to work at love and love your work is the importance of developing compassion. Caring for your self leads to caring for others in an empowering way. Nurturing the brilliance of the human spirit is vital for humanity to flourish.

The word compassion comes from Latin and means "to bear with" or "to suffer with." Compassion and empathy are essential human qualities that allow one to feel, understand, and respond to the suffering of others. They enable individuals to enter into and maintain relationships of caring. The ability to care has been identified by Martin Heidegger as a fundamental aspect of the human condition. In every society the sick and the dying have been treated with compassionate care. This is a universal human response. Many of the world's major religions hold compassion as one of the highest spiritual virtues.

Dynamic compassion, or Ahimsa in Hinduism, is known as the God quality within a person. It is an open-hearted active response of respect, service, and care for those in need. It was a prime aspect of Gandhi's nonviolent liberation movement. Compassion is also a central tenet of Buddhism. The Buddha manifested absolute compassion for all creation. Buddhist compassion, or karuna, is seen as the appropriate human response to understanding the interdependence and mutual welfare of all beings. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, compassion is a manifestation of God's love and mercy. It is the way God interacts with creation and is, therefore, the way people should interact with one another. In all of these spiritual traditions, directly addressing the suffering of others through compassionate care is a religious obligation. In such responses we can see the hallmark of our shared humanity.

To have compassion or to "suffer with" another implies a quality of imagination and an identifying with the other's pain as something we can vicariously feel along with them, however tangentially. Compassion is an active choice to want with others and to want for others the alleviation of their suffering. In acting compassionately we acknowledge that we all share the same conditions of mortality; we all suffer and we all die.

Empathy derives from a Greek root word meaning, "in feeling" or "feeling into." A component of compassion, empathy is the recognition and understanding of the other's suffering. It is a deep appreciation for what it is truly like to be in the other's situation from his or her perspective. Empathy requires an openness to receiving and holding the other's experience without reservation or judgment. Empathy is passive but absolutely attentive. It involves entering into and staying present in the painful experience of the other without moving away from that experience by trying to change it. Empathy establishes a deep connection of mutual vulnerability and intimacy.

The dying are often subject to feelings of isolation, loneliness, and helplessness. Some of their suffering can be ameliorated by the strong sense of connection to the other that empathy brings. For the caregiver as well, an empathetic connection to another person nearing the end of life can offer the gratification of a uniquely intimate relationship.

Compassion encompasses empathy. Empathy is that aspect of compassion that opens one to a deep understanding of the other's suffering. Compassion also involves an active concern for and effort to alleviate that suffering. That is why compassion is sometimes called "love in action" by Mother Teresa. Compassionate action is a willingness to go beyond self-interest and give of oneself for the good of the other. In this regard it is similar to altruism, letting go of one's own needs to attend to the needs of another so that one can meet one's own deepest need: to feel a part of a larger shared humanity.

Compassion is a key aspect of care of the dying. K. R. Eissler, in his seminal work on caring for the dying, The Psychiatrist and the Dying Patient (1955), sets the tone when he advises caregivers to give themselves selflessly to the dying as a free gift of love. Other researchers and those writing from their personal experience of being with the dying have echoed Eissler's advice.

A terminal illness deepens one's need for empathy and compassion in physicians and caregivers. Unfortunately, it has often been found that it is just at this stage that physicians, family, friends, and caregivers can emotionally distance themselves from the dying. Those attending and caring for the dying, in such cases, have the opportunity to receive from them. By being open, empathetically present, and compassionate, they can themselves be healed in their humanity and experience the gift of an extraordinary intimacy.

Compassionately attending to the dying is often deeply rewarding. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross felt that a loving and caring commitment to the dying would help heal the isolation and division that is so destructive in modern life. She saw such commitment as helping to build broader forms of commitment within society that would benefit all of humanity. In being open and compassionately present to the dying, caregivers share the burden of suffering and of anticipatory grief with them. They also share with the dying the solidarity of their committed relationship together and the joy that intimacy can bring. This is what Stephen Levine (1979) calls the experiences of "cosmic humor" in their last journey together.

Someone mourning the death of an acquaintance, friend, or loved one also needs the support of compassionate care and the empathetic presence of others. Cultural and religious rituals of dying, death, and mourning can help one find meaning and comfort in loss. Compassion and empathy are gifts that people can share throughout their lives.

One Planet, many worlds.

2011-11-24T09:34:00.000Z

Our individual worldviews define and inform our daily patterns and themes of co-existence. Two people, even though they are very close, like-minded souls, will often differ in their world views. And so it is. What to do? A healing life lesson is to learn how to observe one another without the need to evaluate one another.

When we evaluate each other we are sharing our formed and often not asked asked for,opinions. Knowledge is power. And there is even greater power in knowing when to evaluate and when to suspend judgement. Most people hear an evaluation as criticism, and will automatically react. Moreover they will block and disengage. If all relationships, in their beginnings, represent a beautiful swimming pool, then blocking one another will result in the formulation of "no-go" areas. Eventually there is little space in this once beautiful pool to move. Feeling this people "swim" away.

When we sense this happening and feel powerless to overcome this impasse, learning how to be available for your own needs and then others requires a shift in relating dynamics.

Relationship ruptures/conflicts occur and if neither party "has their voice" they will adapt a victim/resistance stance. Lingering resentments stockpile and this habit eventually needs to come out. What is a resentment? A premeditated expectation.

Habitually, people tend to apply a defensive stance usually through a pattern of over-talking a conflict, defending their territory with an absence of acceptance and forgiveness. All incomplete transactions fester away.

When I began to apply willingness to be honest, open, validating, trusting, empathic and compassionate I am operating on a higher level of awareness. I am creating in the moment the opportunity to be listen to learn and learn to listen. Most people just want to be heard, then understood, then actions can occur that meet their needs. Then, relationships will improve, deepen in the realm of emotional/spiritual and intellectually closeness.

"How do we cultivate the conditions for joy to expand? We train in staying present. In sitting meditation, we train in mindfulness and maitri: in being steadfast with our bodies, our emotions, our thoughts. We stay with our own little plot of earth and trust that it can be cultivated, that cultivation will bring it to its full potential. Even though it’s full of rocks and the soil is dry, we begin to plow this plot with patience. We let the process evolve naturally" states Pema Chodron

I suggest that you become aware of your Ego drivers according to the frame-work of Transactional Analysis which are: Please others. Be right. Be strong. Try hard. Hurry up.

Ego drives manifest in a nano-second. The antidote to your hard wiring doing the firing is further compounded by a lack of compassion and empathy with yourself and with others. The following dynamics for creating new neural pathways will engender infinite possibilities to run your relationships in a new direction.

To learn new ways of being is possible - practice, practice, practice!
Being present - hit the pause button. Deepen your emotional connections by taking risks and speaking your truth - not what you think they want to hear - but what they need to hear from you about you. Transcend a pattern of lifetime; "knee-jerk" responses will create a self-fulfilling prophecy: you disempowering you! Pause to listen with your all your senses tuning in to the moment. It is not necessary to fill the void with a "solution." Ask for what you want is an assertive non-aggressive way without using demands, guilt or shame to "get what you want." Tune into your intuition to experience the needs beneath what you or others are expressing.
The golden relationship rule: Every interaction is a transaction.

Conversation on wellness.

2011-11-10T08:35:00.002Z

Simplicity, patience, compassion. These three are your greatest treasures. Simple in actions and thoughts, you return to the source of being. Patient with both friends and enemies, you accord with the way thing are. Compassionate toward yourself, you reconcile all beings in the world.

-Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching

Our biology becomes our biography.

2011-11-07T17:42:00.003Z

Who am I? This question urges me to search, seek, become teachable, learn and takes risks. Why? So that I will emotionally/spiritually and intellectually mature and come to understand the meaning of this existence. This need to know continues to motivate me in my pursuit of living an examined life.

When I feel challenged - which is often - an intrinsic awareness that I need to stop and reconnect to what is important to me, my family and friends is a reminder to reconnect to what inspires me.

Joseph Campbell inspires my heroic aspirations. Campbell showed that the story always began with an Everyman just living his hum-drum life. Suddenly and unexpectedly, either by chance or by choice, Everyman is either pulled out of his ordinary life or chooses to leave his ordinary life to launch into a great adventure, whose ending he cannot know at the beginning.

The adventure, according to Campbell, then goes through several specified stages. The hero will journey into a dark world where he meets various forces or entities which he has to deal with. Along the way he encounters a teacher who gives him the instruction in new skills he will need to learn to successfully achieve his goal. No later than this part of the journey the hero becomes consciously aware of what that very specific goal is.

Striving for his goal, the hero is challenged to his limit, reaching a peak culminating experience, that Campbell calls a "supreme ordeal." The result is that the hero "gains his reward" and is forever changed by the experience. He often gains some new powers and sets off with them. Eventually the hero re-emerges to his society with these new abilities bringing a boon to his society which somehow restores that society.

If you are at a crossroads in your relationships perhaps its time to go deeper into your understanding of how to deepen empathy and trust.

Authenticity is anchored in honoring your reality. Creating positive intentions. Becoming the change you wish to see in others. Pain is not Love. Pain is a marker that some aspect of your life is out of sync with reality, your reality.

Before I understood the essence of Dharma, I did drama. Its that simple. Changing is possible. Along the spiritual path I have met people that I have felt a connection with and we continue to work out difficulties that arise. Its not easy but one of the lessons I have learned the hard way: Love the hurt until it becomes LOVE. Because it is a challenge to stay present and create no more pain in the present, I must remain integrity when my feelings are hurt.

The shadow aspect of my personality is recovering, continuing to heal from being flawed.I don't do personal development work to be perfect. I have needed to address my defects of character. Anger. Alienation. Intolerance. Jealousy and Fear.

Every time there is an upset in my relationships, it is an opportunity for spiritual growth. Detaching with compassionate respect is the easier, softer way. It is my responsibility to self nurture. No one is going to give me what I already have.

When people project anger onto me its triggering. My ability to not react, but to respond appropriately is being tested. I can mirror empathy and compassion. Or I too can play the drama game and act out a toxic tango . Which is old brain thinking and behaviour. Hard questions occur. Do I want to stay in a relationship with this person?. Detaching with Love, not anger is a conscious choice.

People are in our life for a reason, a season or a lifetime. When the pupil is ready the teacher appears. If I operate with an agenda,it’s an invitation for a karmic purification process to occur.

Joseph Campbell talked about the need for an interior life- a place within. He was asked by a journalist, “How do you do get this” ….he said “You either do or you don’t”…

From The Power of Myth with Bill Moyers and Joseph Campbell. This was a successful series of television programmes. The is available in book form and DVD. .

CAMPBELL: That which is beyond even the concept of reality, that which transcends all thought. The myth puts you there all the time, gives you a line to connect with that mystery which you are.

Shakespeare said that art is a mirror held up to nature. And that’s what it is. The nature is your nature, and all of these wonderful poetic images of mythology are referring to something in you. When your mind is simply trapped by the image out there so that you never make the reference to yourself, you have misread the image.

The inner world is the world of your requirements and your energies and your structure and your possibilities that meets the outer world. And the outer world is the field of your incarnation. That’s where you are. You’ve got to keep both going. As Novalis said, "The seat of the soul is there where the inner and outer worlds meet."

MOYERS: In classic Christian doctrine the material world is to be despised, and life is to be redeemed in the hereafter, in heaven, where our rewards come. But you say that if you affirm that which you deplore, you are affirming the very world which is our eternity at the moment.

CAMPBELL: Yes, that is what I’m saying, Eternity isn’t some later time. Eternity isn’t even a long time. Eternity has nothing to do with time. Eternity is that dimension of here and now that all thinking in temporal terms cuts off. And if you don’t get it here, you won’t get it anywhere. The problem with heaven is that you will be having such a good time there, you won’t even think of eternity. You’ll just have this unending delight in the beatific vision of God. But the experience of eternity right here and now, in all things, whether thought of as good or as evil, is the function of life.

CAMPBELL: This is an absolute necessity for anybody today. You must have a room, or a certain hour or so a day, where you don’t know what was in the newspapers that morning, you don’t know who your friends are, you don’t know what you owe anybody, you don’t know what anybody owes to you. This is a place where you can simply experience and bring forth what you are and what you might be, This is the place of creative incubation. At first you may find that nothing happens there. But if you have a sacred place and use it, something eventually will happen.

MOYERS: So the experience of God is beyond description, but we feel compelled to try to describe it?

CAMPBELL: That’s right. Schopenhauer, in his splendid essay called "On an Apparent Intention in the Fate of the Individual," points out that when you reach an advanced age and look back over your lifetime, it can seem to have had a consistent order and plan, as though composed by some novelist. Events that when they occurred had seemed accidental and of little moment turn out to have been indispensable factors in the composition of a consistent plot. So who composed that plot? Schopenhauer suggests that just as your dreams are composed by an aspect of yourself of which your consciousness is unaware, so, too, your whole life is composed by the will within you. And just as people whom you will have met apparently by mere chance became leading agents in the structuring of your life, so, too, will you have served unknowingly as an agent, giving meaning to the lives of others, The whole thing gears together like one big symphony, with everything unconsciously structuring everything else. And Schopenhauer concludes that it is as though our lives were the features of the one great dream of a single dreamer in which all the dream characters dream, too; so that everything links to everything else, moved by the one will to life which is the universal will in nature.

It’s a magnificent idea – an idea that appears in India in the mythic image of the Net of Indra, which is a net of gems, where at every crossing of one thread over another there is a gem reflecting all the other reflective gems. Everything arises in mutual relation to everything else, so you can’t blame anybody for anything. It is even as though there were a single intention behind it all, which always makes some kind of sense, though none of us knows what the sense might be, or has lived the life that he quite intended.

Tribalism, Nationalism, Globalism
By Joseph Campbell

"We need myths that will identify the individual not with his local group but with the planet. A model for this is the United States. Here were thirteen different little colony nations that decided to act in the mutual interest, without disregarding the individual interests of any one of them."

"We can't have a mythology for a long, long time to come. Things are changing too fast to become mythologized. The individual has to find an aspect of myth that relates to his own life. We have today to learn to get back into accord with the wisdom of nature and realize again our brotherhood with the animals and with the water and with the sea."

"If you will think of ourselves as coming out of the earth, rather than having been thrown in here from somewhere else, you see that we are the earth, we are the consciousness of the earth. These are the eyes of the earth. And this is the voice of the earth."

"You can't predict what a myth is going to be any more than you can predict what you're going to dream tonight. Myths and dreams come from the same place. They come from realizations of some kind that have then to find expression in symbolic form. And the only myth that is going to be worth thinking about in the immediate future is one that is talking about the entire planet, not the city, not these people, but the planet, and everybody on it."

"This is the ground of what the myth is to be. It's already here: the eye of reason, not of my nationality; the eye of reason, not of my religious community; the eye of reason, not of my linguistic community. Do you see? And this would be the philosophy for the entire planet, not for this group, that group, or the other group."

"When you see the earth from the moon, you don't see any divisions there of nations or states. This might be the symbol, really, for the new mythology to come. That is the country that we are going to be celebrating. And those are the people that we are one with."

The Hero's Journey

Campbell tells the common story of the hero As Campbell outlines in The Hero with a Thousand Faces, the hero's journey consists of three parts - the departure, the initiation, and the return. Each of the three stages can also be divided further (see Table 1). Figure 1 shows graphically the hero's journey. Each of the stages are explained in the following section.

The hero's journey: summary of the steps
This page summrarizes the brief explanations from every step of the Hero's Journey.
1. Departure
1. The Call to Adventure
The call to adventure is the point in a person's life when they are first given notice that everything is going to change, whether they know it or not.
2. Refusal of the Call
Often when the call is given, the future hero refuses to heed it. This may be from a sense of duty or obligation, fear, insecurity, a sense of inadequacy, or any of a range of reasons that work to hold the person in his or her current circumstances.
3. Supernatural Aid
Once the hero has committed to the quest, consciously or unconsciously, his or her guide and magical helper appears, or becomes known.
4. The Crossing of the First Threshold
This is the point where the person actually crosses into the field of adventure, leaving the known limits of his or her world and venturing into an unknown and dangerous realm where the rules and limits are not known.
5. The Belly of the Whale
The belly of the whale represents the final separation from the hero's known world and self. It is sometimes described as the person's lowest point, but it is actually the point when the person is between or transitioning between worlds and selves. The separation has been made, or is being made, or being fully recognized between the old world and old self and the potential for a new world/self. The experiences that will shape the new world and self will begin shortly, or may be beginning with this experience which is often symbolized by something dark, unknown and frightening. By entering this stage, the person shows their willingness to undergo a metamorphosis, to die to him or herself.

2. Inititation
1. The Road of Trials
The road of trials is a series of tests, tasks, or ordeals that the person must undergo to begin the transformation. Often the person fails one or more of these tests, which often occur in threes.
2. The Meeting with the Goddess
The meeting with the goddess represents the point in the adventure when the person experiences a love that has the power and significance of the all-powerful, all encompassing, unconditional love that a fortunate infant may experience with his or her mother. It is also known as the "hieros gamos", or sacred marriage, the union of opposites, and may take place entirely within the person. In other words, the person begins to see him or herself in a non-dualistic way. This is a very important step in the process and is often represented by the person finding the other person that he or she loves most completely. Although Campbell symbolizes this step as a meeting with a goddess, unconditional love and /or self unification does not have to be represented by a woman.
3. Woman as the Temptress
At one level, this step is about those temptations that may lead the hero to abandon or stray from his or her quest, which as with the Meeting with the Goddess does not necessarily have to be represented by a woman. For Campbell, however, this step is about the revulsion that the usually male hero may feel about his own fleshy/earthy nature, and the subsequent attachment or projection of that revulsion to women. Woman is a metaphor for the physical or material temptations of life, since the hero-knight was often tempted by lust from his spiritual journey.
4. Atonement with the Father
In this step the person must confront and be initiated by whatever holds the ultimate power in his or her life. In many myths and stories this is the father, or a father figure who has life and death power. This is the center point of the journey. All the previous steps have been moving in to this place, all that follow will move out from it. Although this step is most frequently symbolized by an encounter with a male entity, it does not have to be a male; just someone or thing with incredible power. For the transformation to take place, the person as he or she has been must be "killed" so that the new self can come into being. Sometime this killing is literal, and the earthly journey for that character is either over or moves into a different realm.
5. Apotheosis
To apotheosize is to deify. When someone dies a physical death, or dies to the self to live in spirit, he or she moves beyond the pairs of opposites to a state of divine knowledge, love, compassion and bliss. This is a god-like state; the person is in heaven and beyond all strife. A more mundane way of looking at this step is that it is a period of rest, peace and fulfillment before the hero begins the return.
6. The Ultimate Boon
The ultimate boon is the achievement of the goal of the quest. It is what the person went on the journey to get. All the previous steps serve to prepare and purify the person for this step, since in many myths the boon is something transcendent like the elixir of life itself, or a plant that supplies immortality, or the holy grail.

3. Return
1. Refusal of the Return
So why, when all has been achieved, the ambrosia has been drunk, and we have conversed with the gods, why come back to normal life with all its cares and woes?
2. The Magic Flight
Sometimes the hero must escape with the boon, if it is something that the gods have been jealously guarding. It can be just as adventurous and dangerous returning from the journey as it was to go on it.
3. Rescue from Without
Just as the hero may need guides and assistants to set out on the quest, often times he or she must have powerful guides and rescuers to bring them back to everyday life, especially if the person has been wounded or weakened by the experience. Or perhaps the person doesn't realize that it is time to return, that they can return, or that others need their boon.
4. The Crossing of the Return Threshold
The trick in returning is to retain the wisdom gained on the quest, to integrate that wisdom into a human life, and then maybe figure out how to share the wisdom with the rest of the world. This is usually extremely difficult.
5. Master of the Two Worlds
In myth, this step is usually represented by a transcendental hero like Jesus or Buddha. For a human hero, it may mean achieving a balance between the material and spiritual. The person has become comfortable and competent in both the inner and outer worlds.
6. Freedom to Live
Mastery leads to freedom from the fear of death, which in turn is the freedom to live. This is sometimes referred to as living in the moment, neither anticipating the future nor regretting the past.
Be here now or plateau in all aspects of your life.

Depression - medication or meditation.

2011-10-13T22:47:00.000+01:00

What Depression Isn’t

Before considering how to handle depression, let’s ask the most basic question: Are you depressed? The bad side of the medical model arises when people rush to be medicated because they don’t like how they feel. Doctors barely bother to get a correct diagnosis, because the easiest thing to do –and the thing that patients demand – is to write a prescription.

Let’s see if we can get beyond this knee-jerk reaction.

Becoming sad or blue isn’t a sure sign of depression. Life brings difficulties that we respond to with a wide range of normal emotions: sadness, anxiety, resignation, grief, defeated acceptance, helplessness. Moods are cyclical, and if these feelings are your response to a tough event, they will subside on their own in time. If they linger, however, and there seems to be no definite cause or trigger, such as losing your job or the death of a loved one, depression is accepted as the conventional diagnosis.

Diagnosing Depression
Depression isn’t one disorder, and even though an array of antidepressants have been thrown at the problem, the basic cause for depression remains unknown. For a diagnosis of major depression, which is more serious than mild to moderate depression, at least five of the following symptoms must be present during the same 2-week period:

Depressed mood (feeling sad or empty; being tearful)
Markedly diminished interest or pleasure in all, or almost all, activities
Significant weight loss when not dieting, or weight gain, or decrease or increase in appetite
Insomnia or hypersomnia (sleeping too little or too much)
Slowing of thoughts and physical movements
Fatigue or loss of energy
Feelings of worthlessness or excessive or inappropriate guilt
Diminished ability to think or concentrate, or indecisiveness
Recurrent thoughts of death (not just fear of dying), recurrent suicidal ideation without a specific plan, or a suicide attempt or specific plan for committing suicide
If you can count five or more of these as being present, know that your list must contain “depressed mood” or “diminished interest or pleasure” before you’d be considered medically depressed. We’ve come to recognize different kinds of depression that fit certain circumstances:

Dysthymia is mild, chronic depression. It must present for at least 2 years for a diagnosis of dysthymia.
Seasonal affective disorder (SAD) is a form of depression that generally arises as the days grow shorter in the autumn and winter.
Postpartum depression begins after a woman has given birth and may get worse as time goes on.
Even though no one knows exactly what causes depression, it is clearly a state of internal imbalance. Balance is essential for the healthy functioning of both your body and your mind. The upsetting factors that make it more likely you will get depression form a long list: genetic predisposition, being female, death or loss of loved one, major life events (even happy ones, like a graduation), other mental illnesses, substance abuse, childhood trauma, certain medications, serious illness, and personal problems such as financial troubles. What these things have in common is that they disrupt the normal balancing mechanisms of mind and body. A treatment that aims at restoring balance therefore makes the most sense, and you can participate in these.

Rebalancing yourself forms its own long list of things you can do:

Be aware that you are depressed and seek help.
Treat your body well, including exercise.
Reduce stress.
Get enough sleep meaning a minimum of 8 hours a night.
Address situations that would make anyone sad, such as the wrong job, a bad relationship, normal grief, and serious loss. Don’t passively wait for time to heal your wounds.
Regain a sense of control.
Claim your sense of self – depressed women in particular may show a pattern of giving away too much of themselves in a relationship, leading to a sense of weakness and low self-esteem.
Examine your reactions to difficult situations. You will often find that reacting with helplessness, passivity, retreating inside, and turning passive lie at the root of your depressed state.
Spend time with people who give you a reason to feel alive and vibrant. Avoid people who share your negative responses and attitudes. Depression in some sense is contagious.
Rely to a minimum on antidepressants and apply your main efforts to other therapies. Pills should be as short-term as possible. They work best in removing the top layer of sadness so that you have a clear space to address the real underlying issues.
Talk about your problems and share your feelings with those who can listen with empathy and offer positive steps.
Make friends with someone who has recovered from depression or is handling the condition well.
Find a wise person who can help you to undo your most negative beliefs by showing you that life has other, better possibilities.
Because everything on this list requires a choice, bringing yourself back into balance means that you are aware enough to make decisions and have the ability to put them into practice. Quite often depressed people feel too helpless and hopeless to face the right choices, in which case outside help is needed, meaning a therapist or counselor who specializes in depression.
Beginning the Healing Journey

Here’s a general picture of how to make a plan for your own healing.

Psychotherapy, or talk therapy, works as well as medication for many people. It may be used alone or in combination with other forms of treatment. Studies have shown that psychotherapy can cause changes in brain function similar to those produced by medications. Focused, goal-oriented forms of therapy such as cognitive-behavior therapy appear to be the most effective in treating depression.

Diet may play a part in protecting against depression. Mediterranean countries have low rates of depression compared to countries farther to the north—and it isn’t just because they get more sunlight or have a more relaxed way of life. One large-scale study tracked almost 3,500 people living in London for 5 years and found that those who ate a Mediterranean diet were 30% less likely to develop depression. Researchers speculate that the foods in the Mediterranean diet may act synergistically together. Olive oil, nuts, and fatty fish are rich in omega-3 and other unsaturated fatty acids, and fresh fruits and vegetables contain flavonoids and phytochemicals that are full of antioxidants and folates (B vitamins).

Aerobic exercise is a very effective for depression. It’s been shown that moderate aerobic exercise done just 30 minutes a day, three times a week, can reduce or eliminate symptoms of mild-to-moderate depression and can help with severe depression.

It’s well known that exercise stimulates the release of endorphins, the “feel-good” chemicals (which function as neurotransmitters). Less well known is the startling effect of exercise on the structure of your brain. Exercise stimulates the creation of new nerve cells in the hippocampus, your brain’s center of learning and memory, so that it actually increases in size. This is especially relevant because depression, unless countered with effective therapy, causes the hippocampus to shrink in size. Exercise has also been shown to raise levels of serotonin and norepinephrine and to multiply the number of dendrite connections in neurons.

Yoga has been shown to lessen stress and anxiety and promote feelings of well-being. Communication between your body and your mind is a two-way street. Certain yogic practices can signal the brain that it’s all right to relax and prompt the parasympathetic nervous system to initiate the relaxation response. For instance, slow, deep, conscious breathing is also a vital element of yogic practice. This form of breathing is very effective in prompting the relaxation response to counter elevated levels of stress hormones. Someone with depression might be advised to practice “heart-opening” postures that elongate their thoracic spine. They may be told to stand with their shoulder blades drawn together so that their lungs are lifted and they are able to breathe more freely. An important component of yoga is paying close attention to what’s going on in the body at all times and locating and releasing any areas of tension. Yoga should ideally be practiced with the guidance of an experienced teacher.

Meditation can be a useful treatment for both stress and mild-to-moderate depression. Numerous studies have examined the effects of mindfulness meditation, designed to focus the meditator’s attention on the present moment. One study measured electrical activity in the brain and found increased activity in the left frontal lobe during mindfulness meditation. Activity in this area of the brain is associated with lower anxiety and a more positive emotional state. Subsequently, the researchers tested both a group that hadn’t meditated as well as the meditators for immune function. They did this by measuring the level of antibodies they produced in response to a flu vaccine. The meditators had a significantly greater reaction, which indicates they had better immune function.

I know that the easiest solution is to pop a pill, and in this country powerful forces back up the promise that drugs are the answer. Keep in mind that antidepressants only alleviate symptoms, and that in the long run couch therapy has proven just as effective in changing the brain responses associated with depression. The real goal should be to rebalance your life, gain control over the disorder, understand who you are, and elevate your vision of possibilities for yourself. All of that is harder than opening a pill bottle, but every positive choice leads to real healing and a much better life in the future.

Note: The information in this article is intended for your educational use only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition and before undertaking any diet, fitness, or other health program.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Be you. You are the only one you can change.

2011-10-11T23:02:00.000+01:00

"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma -- which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary."
~ Steve Jobs

Acceptance of self and others is living in the flow of natures natural intelligence.

2011-10-04T09:00:00.002+01:00

One of the surest paths toward feelings of inadequacy and an inability to move forward in life is to set unrealistic goals for myself. That is, to have standards that represent “getting there” that are so high that I always fall short. More likely, the effect of these overly high standards will be to keep me from ever beginning because the point of arrival looks too far away, and I cannot imagine how to find and take all of the intermediate steps. Today I will be realistic. I know that
there is no such thing as perfect, so why should I worry about getting there? There is the here and now, and when I get there, it will be that day’s here and now. I recognize that perfection is only an illusion, and I will learn to take daily pleasure and fulfillment from the process.
I live in today.
We have trained them (men) to think of the Future as a promised land which favored heroes attain – not as something which everyone reaches at the rate of sixty minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is.
C. S. Lewis

We are hardwired to connect.

2011-10-02T16:17:00.000+01:00

THE DYNAMICS OF SELF-REALIZATION--INDIVIDUATION:

To Jung individuation means becoming an in-dividual, it implies becoming one's own self. We could thus translate it as "self-realization." The aim of individuation is nothingness than to divest the self of the false wrappings of the persona and the suggestive power of the archetypes.
Individuation must not be confused with individualism, which over-looks collective factors and seeks some peculiarity valued by the ego. Although Jung calls individuation an "ineluctable (not to be avoided) psychological necessity" he also says that its nature is aristocratic, and that it is available only to individuals who are predisposed to attain a higher degree of consciousness and who are called to it from the beginning (elitism). To Jung the average person is content with limited horizons that do not include knowledge of the collective unconscious. (What does this mean? Is reading Jung enough? Must one go through a crisis?) Still he presumes that wider consciousness may be a universal capacity.

PSYCHOLOGICAL TYPES:

For Jung the process of individuation takes place in two stages: youth and middle age. The time of youth requires and extroverted attitude when one's libido (cf., Freud's) which is directed to outward and material things--marriage, career, education, etc.
The transition from this first stage to the next occur, says Jung, between 35-40. Along with it is supposed to come an urgent need to re-examine accepted values and to appreciate the opposites of earlier ideals. This stage is marked by Introversion where a person's concerns progressively become centred in the internal world and the fuller development of the psyche. This is a time of culture and wisdom and is governed by its own principles which are directed toward the end of self-realization through the union of opposites.

A further pair of basic types that Jung outlines are those of sensation and intuition. These are two differing modes of apprehension. Sensation refers to the process of perceiving physical stimuli from both outward events and inwards organic changes. Its opposite is intuition: which is said to mediate perceptions in an unconscious way. Intuition yields a content that is said to be whole and complete, a knowledge that possesses immediate certainty and conviction (Kant's a priori). Both sensation and intuition are called irrational as they deliver perceptions which are not based upon reason.

The next pairs of types that Jung points out is concerned with the conceptual relationships of psychic contents. He divides the means of doing this into thinking and feeling. Active thinking is directed and undertaken intentionally toward the end of some judgment. Passive thinking is called intuitive and is a case in which conceptual connections seem to establish themselves of their own accord and may lead to judgments that are contrary to one's intention. Both of these forms of thinking are to be distinguished from associative thinking, which produces ideas that form no connections and yield no judgments. Jung, it must be noted, considers only directed thinking to be rational, as the undirected thinking lies in unconscious processes and the idea of associative thinking is not really thinking at all.

Thinking is viewed as an opposite to feeling. It is a process that responds to psychic content with a subjective judgment of values. It is considered rational insofar as it is influenced by reflection and is in accord with the laws of reason.

The ideal situation to Jung is one in which the individual develops equally each of the two attitudes of extroversion and introversion, as well as the four functions of sensation and intuition, thinking and feeling, and also the two modes of apprehension, perceiving and judging. Every one, however, is considered to prefer one or the other opposites that from these pairs. One of the three sets of pairs ailing themselves to the person's aspect of extroversion or introversion. When one function is singled out it becomes superior and remains in conscious behavioral patterns, while the other, less favoured opposites, falls into unconsciousness--called the inferior function--here it remains inaccessible, undifferentiated and autonomous (but not dormant). The remaining two functions become secondary and operate in the service of the superior function.

DIFFERENTIATION AND INTEGRATION:

each of these represents pairs of opposites and the conflict between them provide the psyche with its energy. They are also necessary for renewal and self-regulation. This theme of opposites is the most persuasive and problematic in Jung's writings. That is, conscious/unconscious, rational/irrational, feminine/ masculine, matter/spirit, etc. To Jung's understanding of the unconscious, however, the unification of these pairs of opposites is always possible. Thus Jung sees individuation a never-ending process of differentiation and integration which repeats itself on higher and higher planes. One's analytical abilities function to distinguish, develop, and contrast the individual components of the individual psyche. The creative forces of the unconscious, on the other hand, provide symbols that bring the divided and one-sided elements into unity on a higher level. This is a process which Jung calls the transcendent function, i.e., it is a complex which brings conscious and unconscious together and allows for an organic transition from a 'lower' attitude to a 'higher' one.

I enclosed a link to a site that is beneficial for people to the theory behind individuation and differentiation.
How we attach and detach in our relationships will make all the difference in sustaining self-esteem, reciprocity, validation and empowerment. The following talk is by Author/therapist
David Schnarch: Emotional Commitment and Great Sex?
Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Tami Simon speaks with Dr. David Schnarch, a licensed clinical psychologist, certified sex therapist, and clinical member of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy. David is the author of the books Intimacy and Desire, Passionate Marriage, and Resurrecting Sex, and with Sounds True he has published a two-session audio program called Secrets of a Passionate Marriage: How to Increase Sexual Pleasure and Emotional Fulfillment in Committed Relationships. In this episode, Tami speaks with David about the four drives of sexual desires, his understanding of integrity and its importance in a healthy partnership, and what it might mean to “hold onto yourself” in relationship.

Tami Simon: You're listening to Insights at the Edge. Today my guest is Dr. David Schnarch. David is a licensed clinical psychologist, a certified sex therapist, and a clinical member of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy. David Schnarch is the author of a new book, Intimacy and Desire, as well as the book, Passionate Marriage: Resurrecting Sex and Constructing the Sexual Crucible. With Sounds True, David has released a two-session audio program called, Secrets of the Passionate Marriage: How to Increase Sexual Pleasure and Emotional Fulfillment in Committed Relationships, a program which shares a revolutionary approach thousands have used to take their relationships to new and lasting heights of sexual ecstasy and intimacy.

In this episode of Insights at the Edge, David and I spoke about the relationship between differentiation and sexual satisfaction in committed relationships. We also talked about the four drives of sexual desire; what David means by the word integrity and its importance in a healthy relationship; and what it might mean to hold onto yourself in a relationship. Here's my very helpful and provocative conversation with Dr. David Schnarch.

David, in your work on passionate marriage, you talk about the cornerstone of a passionate marriage as something you call, "differentiation." And so I want to start right there, right in the heart of your work. What do you mean by differentiation?

David Schnarch: Well, differentiation is the phenomenon that applies to all living things, but in human beings, differentiation is basically the ability to balance humankind's two most fundamental drives. One is our urge to be connected with other people, and the other is the urge to be free and autonomous and direct the course of our life. So both wanting to be in a relationship and wanting to be our own person are the two most fundamental drives and the two fundamental problems that couples have in emotionally committed relationships.
So differentiation is the ability to have both: to be very much involved in a relationship and also be able to be your own person within that relationship. When you can do that, you basically have the best of both worlds, including the kind of relationship everybody wants to have.

TS: OK, OK. Is it actually possible to have both?

DS: If it's not, you're going to be a hurtin' kitten. That is absolutely possible. But it's possible at a level of development. So just like you can have pedestrian spirituality or you could have a much more mature robust spirituality, the same thing is true about personal relationships. People have relationships at the level of their own development the same way that everybody has sex at their own level of sexual development. It's not about learning an idea or learning a new technique, like communication skills. But if you use the natural processes of emotionally committed relationships that grow yourself up, then absolutely, you are quite capable of having both an intense, satisfying relationship and also being your own person within that relationship.

TS: OK so a couple comes to you… Do you have certain litmus tests where you can see what level of differentiation they have in their relationship? How can you tell?

DS: Well, it's not that hard. For instance, differentiation is an abstract concept and I know that when you start talking about that, people scratch their head and when I do interviews with reporters and I talk about differentiation, you can watch their eyes glaze over. And they're saying, "explain to me in thirty words how I can tell my public how your approach is different?" So what we have done is operationalize differentiation into four basic human, uniquely human abilities. We call these the Four Points of Balance, the Crucible Four Points of Balance. They are written for the first time, actually, in my latest book, Intimacy and Desire.

The Four Points of Balance, which is our way of looking at differentiation, are, what we call solid flexible self which is the first one, the ability to have solid values that you can both hang onto and change over time. The second one is called quiet mind and quiet calm heart, which is the ability to contain your anxiety and not let your feelings overwhelm you and take care of your own self emotionally. Third point of balance is called grounded responding, which is not overreacting to other people's overreactions. And the fourth point of balance is called meaningful endurance, the willingness to tolerate discomfort for growth.

And so when the couple comes in, I will assess them across these four basic points and get some idea of where they are in their level of development. Also, one of the interesting things about differentiation is that if people are together for any length of time, they are at the same level of differentiation. You don't find couples that are together for some time that are remarkably mismatched. So by pegging one person, you very often can get a very good assessment about the differentiation level of the partner and that's the differentiation level of the relationship. So it's done in a fairly pragmatic, straightforward way.

TS: OK, just [for some] clarification about the very first point you mentioned: Having a solid and flexible self, what do you mean by that? Solid and flexible?

DS: Yes, that catches a lot of people, because most of us don't understand what "solid" is. Solid is, on the one hand, that ability to hang onto a set of core values and not be swayed simply by circumstance. But the other part is that people who really have a solid sense of self can change over time. They can change those values when it's appropriate, but they don't do it with pressure from the outside—they do it from the inside. It's a very determined decision.

So the hallmark of a well-developed person is not [just] a person who can stand on their own against pressure to conform and at the same time flex and bend when circumstances [require]. Anybody who knows anything about Buddhism—you know, it talks about flexibility being the strength. And so a human being, a real human being, a well-developed human being, has both the ability to transcend circumstances and maintain that core, and at the same time [has] the ability to change.

So somebody who is screaming, "Don't tell me what! I know what's right and wrong!" and who never changes their values, that's rigidity. The hallmark of a well-differentiated person is not like a knight in armor clanking around where they're in this kind of carcass and they can't move or change like a lobster. Basically, it is the ability to be flexible over time.

TS: Now here is the really critical question, I think, for this work on passionate marriage: What is the connection between a couple's level of differentiation and the level of hot sex they're having or not having?

DS: Well, that's a really, really good question, and that's the one that really attracts so many people to the approach. That it's not just [a] theory, that it gets to be very pragmatic. To really understand the connection, you have to understand the natural ecology of sexual relationships. Sex is not simply a collection of techniques or values. It turns out that when two people come together and have a sexual relationship on an ongoing basis, there are ecological rules that are as built in as the rules of world ecology. It's not just that we can come together and do whatever we want in relationships.

When humans form relationships, there are rules. So, for instance, one rule in emotionally committed relationships is that sexual relationships always consist of leftovers. You get to decide what you don't want to do. I get to decide what I don't want to do, and we do whatever's leftover. That's why sexual relationships always consist of leftovers. This is absolutely normal, and what happens is that people don't realize that sexual boredom is built into ongoing relationships for just that reason. Because regardless of how sexually developed you and I are, if we do the same thing over and over again for five years, we are going to be bored out of our minds.

Human beings like monogamy, but they also like sexual variety. The way you get that without having affairs or breaking up your relationships is you have to expand your sexual repertoire. But the elegance of the grand design, the sort of great Oneness showing up inside our relationships, [exists] because we've always gone through this. Sex always consists of leftovers routine.

The only way that you can now have a vibrant sexual relationship is a couple of things. You have got do something new, and that means, regardless of what it's going to be, it's going to be outside of both of your comfort zones, because we went through that initial process. The other part is when one of us suggests something new your partner is not going to say, "That's a wonderful idea, thanks for sharing. Let's go rip off our clothes and do it!" Your partner is more likely to say, "That's a disgusting thing to do," because you're taking them outside of their comfort zone.

And so all of a sudden, the Four Points of Balance come into play right there in simply curing sexual boredom, which we all have to do. You have to have a set of values. You can't overreact to your partner. You have got to take care of your heart because people say difficult things when they're uncomfortable. And you have to have meaningful endurance.

So now if we're going to keep hot sex alive in our relationship, presuming we had it to begin with, we're going to have to apply the Four Points of Balance. And if you and I are poorly differentiated—meaning we have weak Four Points of Balance—we're going to bog down like many, many couples do. We're going to start taking the fact that we don't have good sex personally, we're going to begin to tell ourselves common but wrong ideas like, "The chemistry is gone," or "We've fallen out of love," or "We're sexually incompatible."

If that's the case, then we're poorly differentiated, and we're not only going to get our feelings hurt, we're going to withdrawal from each other and we're going to have a lousy relationship—presuming we stay together. Or by doing things that you're not used to—that seem to be not "you" yet because they aren't a part of your sexual identity—it you're going to challenge the first Point of Balance, that flexibility. You're going to challenge the second Point of Balance about keeping your anxiety under control. You've also got the third Point of Balance; we can't be overreacting to each other. And we need the fourth Point of Balance because we have to hang in there and we have to go through some uncomfortable times to get to where we want to go.

It's not only the case that better-differentiated people handle this process better, but the elegance of the great design is that this is how poorly differentiated people become well-differentiated people. You don't do it by going to a monastery or by taking a course in sex. You do it by getting into a relationship and going through this incredible developmental process that is built into all emotionally committed relationships. And so the process of taking our relationship from boring sex to the one where we're so happy we stayed together because we're having better sex than ever before is the natural way that nature helps us all to become more differentiated.

When you begin to think that sex and differentiation and development of the self and the human brain are all entwined, I thought that this was an incredible idea. This is what made me take the next step beyond Passionate Marriage and write the latest book, Intimacy and Desire. But it's perfectly consistent with Passionate Marriage and it's still amazing to me that everything that we wrote about and talked about in Passionate Marriage and in The Secrets of a Passionate Marriage, they still hold true to today. We just built on it, but that is really the core of that approach.

TS: There are so many questions that I have here, but I'm going to try to hit it very succinctly. You said, "Human beings like monogamy" and I had a moment where I thought, well, is that true? I mean, I like monogamy, but I certainly know a lot people who wouldn't say that.

DS: Well, when we're talking about human beings, we're not talking about your opinion or my opinion. We're talking about a million years of human evolution. We're talking about 2,000 years of civilization. And if you look over it from an anthropological and sociological view, it is very clear that the basic human mating is serial monogamy plus affairs. That's it. That's not really disputable.

Now, whether or not people are going to say that they like monogamy, that's a different issue. But there are enough of us that like it enough that pair bonding is one of the basic characteristics of human relationships.

TS: Why is it in your work that you have decided to focus on increasing sexual pleasure and fulfillment in committed relationships versus looking at it in just sexual interactions in an open way?

DS: Well, because sex always occurs in the context of a relationship. There is no such thing as non-relational sex to a human being. That doesn't make a difference whether we are talking about a one-night-stand or we're talking about you masturbating. When people masturbate they're having a relationship with somebody in their head, maybe a brief encounter. But it's still inherently relational because the human self is basically relational, and the human self, which emerged about 1.7 million years ago, emerged at the same time that the human desire was developing. Selfhood relationships with other people and sexual desire are [so intrinsically intertwined, they are] basically almost one in the same. So that is why I started working with sex and relationships.

Another reason I started working [with the idea of] sex in committed relationships is because the more I did work with couples, the more I saw that really emotionally committed relationships, particularly when it comes to sex, are people-growing machines. I started seeing more than just people having whoop-de-do sex or just sex to the point to where it was transcendent. What I saw was couples going through the problems they were having—which was sort of their worst nightmare—and that was how they became more evolved. And as they became more evolved, both their sexuality and their spirituality became more evolved. It was something that just knocked me out. I wanted to be a part of it. So we developed an approach that lines up with the natural way that [being] emotionally committed works. That's why the approach is not only so powerful but also so successful.

So now Passionate Marriage is an international bestseller, and basically, it transcends culture. It transcends sexual orientation. It transcends race and religion. When you find something that works that [is] broadly distributed, you're going down into the very core of how humans relate to each other and how we fall in love. I wanted to line up with that. And that's why I work with couples in committed relationships. We don't take a stand and say that one-night stands are bad by any stretch of the imagination. We're not in the morality business. But we have found that by helping people grow themselves up with sex, they do develop more as moral people.

TS: Now, I know you've worked with hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands—I don 't know how many couples who have come to you and have said, "We have this challenge or this issue in our sexual relationship. We want to go deeper. We're not having as much as sex as we want." Or one partner wants more sex than the other. And I'm curious, do you ever find couples and just think, "Wow, you know, these people really are really just sexually incompatible? It just doesn't work?" Or is there always a chance if people are willing to engage in this type of growth that you spoke of that their sex life can become fulfilling?

DS: Well, let's do that in two steps. Number one, let's broaden out the kind of people that I get to see so that the listening audience will then understand the real meaning of the answer that I'm going to give you. We not only see couples who are dissatisfied with their sex—meaning that they [wish they] had more sex, it's not frequent enough, it's not erotic enough. We see lots of people that have not had sex in 20 years.

I worked with a couple last week where the man had rapid orgasm for 26 years. And when you have things like that going on for that long, it's no longer simply in your bedroom; it is now permeating all aspects of your relationship. People take bad sex very, very personally, and get their feelings hurt. So a lot of the people I see are on the verge of divorce. Some of them have already signed their divorce decree. You really need to understand the severity of the people that we work with here. We do a fly-in, four-day therapy program—people fly in from around the world to get this approach. So most of the people we see have failed in therapy three or four times, because Evergreen, Colorado, is not generally on your way home.

Having said that, no, I don't see couples that I say to myself, "These people are sexually incompatible, or these people really ought to bag it and get divorced," because sexual compatibility is not what people think, number one. And number two, very often the relationships are going bad not because they are bad relationships, but because of operator error, because people are normal, because they have these normal but wrong beliefs that may people had, and when you believe these things, it destroys your relationship, and you think it has to do with your childhood or you picked the wrong person.

But going back to what sexual compatibility is: Sexual compatibility is not finding someone who wants to do what you want to do and doesn't want to do what you don't want to do. That's what you find at the beginning of the sex-is-going-to-become-leftovers process. That's what you're doing there. You're finding somebody that wants to do what you want to do and doesn't want to do what you don't want to do. And when you find that, you guys think, you guys were made in heaven. But that is the recipe for the most boring sex down the road.

We teach people that real sexual compatibility is the ability to make room for each others' differences and preferences. The ability to accommodate differences is what makes people really compatible. And [it's] is also what makes them have lots of interesting sex. It keeps the sexual relationship really broad. Both people are bringing new things in. But since most of us get our reflected sense of self from our sexuality, how we look, how people respond to us, and what we do or don't do sexually, it's very, very rigid for most people. So changing your sexual behavior is not like picking up a copy of the Kama Sutra. It is rooted in your guts. It belongs to your sense of identity.

People who are really sexually compatible often want different things, but they can accommodate those differences. So if you look at that—we're talking about sex now—and we go back to what we were talking about earlier, and go back to the Four Points of Balance and solid flexible self and the ability to calm your heart and calm your mind, those—you now see that those Four Points of Balance are really the individual underpinnings of what true sexual compatibility really is.

TS: So my partner says to me, "I want try this new thing and I'm a little nervous bringing it up. I'm not quite sure how you're going to respond, but it's important to me and it's exciting to me." So the response of someone who is well-differentiated would be: I might feel the anxiety and excitement that I feel about that, but I wouldn't shut down or freak out. I would go with it and be experimental?

DS: Yes. That's exactly what you would do. It doesn't mean that you're not uncomfortable and it doesn't mean that you're not anxious. That's one of the beauties of a differentiation-based approach. When you're doing the safety and security attachment-type stuff, it sort of pitches marriages as safe wombs where you're never disturbed, you're always comfortable, and your partner never asks you to do anything that makes you uncomfortable. The reality is that there are a lot of things in life that make us nervous, but the hallmark of an adult—and an also good marital partner—is that you don't let your anxiety control you. That's the difference.

And so yes, if you and I are fairly well-differentiated people and you say to me, "I'd like to try this," I might say, "You know what? That makes me nervous, it really does. But why don't I hold onto myself as you hold onto me and we'll give it a go and see where it goes? The first time around, I'm not promising sexual Olympics or that my techniques are going to be wonderful, but basically, I'll take care of myself and we'll take care of each other, and we know that we already have a really good relationship. We've gone through difficult times before, the least of which is going to be in our bedroom. Let's give this thing a go!"

This is what welds people together for life, because what's also happening as we're doing this, by the way, [is] we're going through a time of heightened activation followed by a period of calm, and that is one of the seven conditions that promotes positive brain wiring. So when you and I go through this, we're not only starting to have some interesting sex, but part of the grand design is that people expand their sexual relationship. They are going to produce, without realizing it, the seven conditions that promote positive neuro-rewiring in the human brain. And that is how we get attached much deeper than simple oxytocin can do.

TS: You mentioned previously this idea that there is something in the development of the human brain over time that relates to our current desire… Actually, I didn't really follow what you were saying, so maybe you can help me understand it.

DS: This is why I had to write Intimacy and Desire, because Intimacy and Desire is all about how the human brain and the sense of the human self evolved, and that [evolution] now shows up in the battles that couples have in their relationships today. It's the first explanation of why normal, healthy couples have sexual desire problems.

Basically, 1.7 million years ago, the human brain was evolving. The cranial capacity of the brain doubled in a very short period of time. That's about the time that socio-anthropologists think that the human self emerged. Before that, there was no self. So for instance, before 1.7 million years ago, nobody felt sexually inadequate, because they didn't have enough of a self to feel sexually inadequate. And they didn't have enough of a a reflected sense of self to start comparing their bodies to other people's bodies, which is one of the problems we now have because of this magnificent brain we've developed.

So, basically, that's how the human raced evolved, and now this is the way each of us, in our own relationships, goes through that developmental process. And it shows up in sexual desire problems. For instance, when couples are getting together, they never think they'll have sexual desire problems. They can't keep their hands off each other. They can't wait to talk to each other. They just delight in each other's presence. The thought that they are going to end up like their parents is just implausible to them. And it turns out that [everybody has] the problem that nobody thinks they're going to have.

Everybody, every couple, will eventually go through sexual desire problems, because it's not about the chemistry being used up—which is a negative view—it's about how sexual relationships are people-growing machines. What happens is that shortly after you get into a relationship—and "shortly" can be anywhere from between a couple of months to five years—what happens is we start getting into the battle of selfhood. It starts getting into, "Why do [we] have to have sex the way I want?" Or I start complaining, "How come I have to make all the initiation?" And you start talking about how I'm taking you for granted, and I'm not letting you be your own person because I expect sex when you don't really want it. And we also start fighting over space in the closet, and who's potted plant is going to go where, because our sense of self gets attached to all these different things in our house as well. It gets attached to our sex, too. So eventually we get into emotional gridlock because our integrity goes on the line, which couples never anticipate. We feel like our sense of self is starting to diminish or disappear. We begin to feel subservient to our partner or controlled by our partner, which are all issues about selfhood. And when that happens, you can kiss sex goodbye.

Traditionally, therapists have talked about three drives of sexual desire: One is lust, driven by testosterone. Another is romantic love, driven by norepinephrine and serotonin and dopamine. And the third is attachment, driven by oxytocin and vasopressin. But more recently, I propose that there is actually a fourth drive of sexual desire, and that fourth drive is more powerful that the other three combined: the human drive to develop and maintain the self. The urge to maintain the self is all these other things.

For instance, as a woman, you can be at the peak of your hormonal frenzy. Meaning, at some point in your ovulatory cycle, you experience some biological increment in sexual drive. But when you are at that peak, driven by hormones, and I've treated you badly for the last three weeks, when you're in this heightened state of arousal, we don't have sex because of how you think I'm treating you, and how you think I'm seeing you outweighs any kind of sex drive you have. And if you're still horny, you'll take care of it by yourself.

The human self, and the issues of selfhood in couples—which nobody anticipates because it has never been looked at like this before—is what invariably causes normally healthy sexual couples to have sexual desire problems. And handled well, going through the gridlock and holding onto the four points of balance are what help you develop a self out of your sexual difficulties. The Crucible Four Points of Balance are the pillars of the human self.

So if you don't have much of a sense of a principal self, you ain't got much of a self, because you don't have any core values. And if you can't quiet the mind and calm the heart, you aren't going to have much of a self, because you're going to be simply so controlled by your emotions that there isn't going to be any stability to what you're doing that lines up with your sense of integrity. If you are overreacting all the time to everything that's going on, you aren't going to have much of a self.

If you're not willing to have meaningful endurance and tolerate discomfort for growth, you're not going to be able to accomplish any of your goals. And the self has goals. So this is the incredible way that differentiation and selfhood are built into emotionally committed relationships, but the ride is a lot tougher and lot less ideal than many of us would like to picture it.

TS: One thing that I think might be helpful and interesting would be to hear from your own life, and how this process of relationship differentiation has manifested. Maybe a challenge you had related to, having this solid but flexible self, and how you went through it?

DS: Well, I must tell you, Tami, the reason I joke that I need a book that says, "How to struggle on $10 million." Because everything I write about I end up having to live. And if that's the case, I may as well write about something like…

TS: Make it $100 million while you're at it!

DS: We'll split it between us! [Laughs]

TS: OK.

DS: One of the things that made Passionate Marriage popular, and we know this now from reader feedback, was the fact that Ruth and I were willing to disclose that differentiation doesn't make you perfect and doesn't sanitize you. You have the same problems that everybody else has, you just handle them a lot better.

So with my relationship with Ruth—one of the things I wrote about in Passionate Marriage was the time where Ruth wanted to have a baby much more than I did. And when we first got together we had an agreement, which was I didn't want to have a baby that I would end up regretting, and if I was going to have regrets, I'd rather not have the baby and regret that. I explained that to Ruth and she agreed. Time went on, and Ruth was saying more and more that she wanted to have a baby. And I was saying, "No. We had an agreement." Ruth was taking birth control pills at the time, and she looked at me and said, "OK. I'm going to stick to our agreement but I'm not taking birth control anymore because this is crazy. I want to have a baby. You don't want to have a baby so why don't you use birth control?"

Well, this just really ticked me off! [Laughs] My initial reaction wasn't, "Oh, how wonderful! How differentiated of you! You're standing up for yourself." It was, "What the hell do you mean? You're shaking up the boat! I don't appreciate this. And I don't like using condoms. Why don't you just keep taking the pills? It's easier for both of us if you just take the pills. It doesn't kill our sexual satisfaction that much." Ruth said, "No." That really pissed me off. And it also made me respect her.

I had this paradoxical reaction of, on the one hand, being angry at her, and on the other hand, having more and more demonstration that Ruth was the kind of person I wanted to have a baby with if I was going to have it with anybody. So I started thinking, "OK, well, let's have a baby." And then I had to do another thing that comes with differentiation: I had to confront myself about, was I selling out? Was I going to have a baby because I simply didn't want the pain of using condoms and I also didn't want the pain of having a vasectomy? I went through that and struggled with that for some time, and decided that, indeed, I did want this child. I have to say that our daughter is probably one of the most deliberately conceived children in the human race. And I think that's also why she is so absolutely wonderful. If I had had a child when I was younger, I don't think Sarah would be the person that she is today. So that is how Ruth and I have lived it out today. And there are many different ways in which that comes up with us as well.

TS: One of the points that you make in Passionate Marriage that I think is so interesting is that we don't go through a process of differentiation once; that it's a continual process in our relationship. And as we become closer and closer to our partner and more at risk of losing them—more of a sense of the level of loss that we would have if they died or if something happened to our relationship—that that actually requires greater differentiation the more in love or attached we might be. And I'm wondering if you might be able to talk some about that.

DS: Well, now you've made me settle down. I hear a lot of people talk about the idea that it's not just a once-through process. Actually, it's more like a helix, where you return to the same point but at a higher level as your level of differentiation is increasing. You've touched on something that a lot of people don't really talk about: that it does require going through repeatedly. As you become more involved, more invested, as both of you become better differentiated, and as you both become much more unique people and irreplaceable to each other, that that alone drives the process of differentiation. It isn't just our pain and the fact that our relationship is lousy that will do it. It also works on the top end as well.

As couples get older and more mature as they spend time together, they do have to learn to counterbalance the incredible investment that they have each other with being able to hold onto themselves, with being able to soothe themselves, because eventually one of you is going to bury the other. And if you can't take that hit, then you will do what many of us do, which is withdrawal from your partner as you get older so that by the time that they're dead, the loss isn't that great.

But if you really have respect for what it means to love somebody, and you really want to see what human beings have been able to do to have relationships that really do border on something spiritual, then you have to pay your dues and you better have a strong Four Points of Balance. And you do go through this. You go through this when your wife develops breast cancer. You go through this when you lose a family business or you're out of work and the funds aren't there. Or your child gets ill.

I'm watching this happen now sort of awestruck as my parents go through this. My parents just celebrated their 89th birthdays and they have been married for over 65 years. I'm fortunate to have two parents who are alive. But I must say I am completely intimidated when I contemplate both of them looking at each other, knowing that at some point, one of them will not be there. It's not just some idle or abstract idea. For them to continue to love each other on life terms is an absolutely awesome thing to me. So if I'm lucky, I'm watching now what Ruth and I will go through. I think that's also why [sometimes] people don't have these kinds of amazing relationships, because the price of success is so high.

TS: The price being facing that loss? Actually having to go through that loss? So we defend ourselves against it by not really opening to it and not really being there?

DS: Yes, if you're going to really love somebody and have that much time invested. I mean, 65 years together. All their friends are dead now and they are the only two [left]. They are the people who now store the memories and keep them alive, including of each other. To love like my parents love—I think I'm very, very lucky to have those kinds of parents—is a real act of integrity. And you better be able to take care of your own heart. You better be able to have a real core sense of values and not bail out like a lot of people do.

TS: Now, it's interesting that you use the word "integrity." "It's a real act of integrity." That's an interesting use of that word. What do you mean by that?

DS: A lot of people say that integrity [means] you don't steal. But integrity is the internal consistency of the self. You know, before there was a human self, nobody had integrity, because there wasn't any integrity to lose. When we do our work, we often talk about "integrity" in the Crucible Approach. People are often stunned to hear it used this way because they never think of themselves of possibly lacking in integrity, meaning that they are not internally consistent. Their values don't line up with their other values or what they do. And one of the things that emotionally committed relationships always do is they challenge your integrity.

One of the things that people don't realize, particularly early in relationships, [is] one partner can always force the other to choose between either staying married or keeping their integrity. Your partner can put it to you—and often does—where you really do feel like your integrity is on the line. Because people have always thought about marriage as [being] run by attachment and safe-havens, the idea that you could go through this soul-twisting, gut-wrenching crucible where it really does test what kind of integrity you have, people just don't anticipate it, but it's built into the heart of emotionally committed relationships.

Your children will challenge your integrity. Your children will push you to basically try to cut corners or give them slack or violate your values or things like that. And so there are integrity challenges built all throughout married and family life. When you have an approach like we do that mainstreams this—this isn't just if you have an issue of integrity or morality, you run and see a clergy person. This is well within what emotionally committed relationships do. That's why I like working with them. And this is also what apparently people like about the Passionate Marriage tape and book, that it talks to them in a way that they aren't used to, and when they hear something like this, it opens up tremendous opportunities for them to live a much better marriage and a much better life.

TS: So, going back to the idea of your parents married 65 years, when you say that it takes tremendous integrity to stay supremely open-hearted, when there is this risk of loss, can you still help me understand what you mean by that? What's the integrity there?

DS: Well, let's see. My mother has had several major surgeries and my father has had both hips replaced. The divorce rate among marriages where there is a serious illness is astronomical. The divorce rate among cancer patients—there are a lot of people who drop like flies. There are just poorly differentiated. They don't have enough inside them to hold onto their values. They can't soothe their heart. They are worried about "being abandoned." They're thinking that maybe there is somebody better out there. Those marriages, particularly when they are under stress, they break up.

But other marriages get better because it stretches people's integrity. It stretches what you believe in. And as I said, you can have all the values in the world, but if you can't keep your emotions under control, you still won't have integrity. If you're not willing to do hard things, you won't have any integrity. If you are overreacting to everything, you can't stay consistent with what your real goals are.

Integrity is something that's terribly important to human beings. Not to all of us, when we're not well-developed, but the better developed you get, the more integrity becomes important to you. And then [you develop] more integrity, and then keeping that integrity intact is about keeping your sense of self intact. That's what human beings are driven to do because it's wired into the evolution of the species, of our brain. When you realize this, what it finally comes down to, it gets tested on your capacity to love on life's terms.

A lot of people I see, they have a child who is mongoloid. They have a child who is deaf. They have a child with cerebral palsy and they often go through the feelings of, "I wish I had a different kid. Why did this have to happen to me?" There is a lot of research and the families who actually do better and survive these kinds of things are the kinds of families that are willing to have the feelings that I'm describing, which are less than ideal. The ones who try to keep a stiff upper lip, they are too rigid and they fracture. And so being able to hold onto yourself and acknowledge these difficult feelings for people, including the people that you love, and love them in spite of them, stick around in spite of them, go through the hard things, these are acts of integrity.

And so even loving kids… [Laughs] Maybe we don't always love our spouse, but we always love our kids—the families of children who are seriously ill also break up at a very, very high rate. So my parents had to do that too; they were challenged and they stayed together when their peers broke up. We certainly see this in our age group. It happens in every generation. People walk away from families.

One of the things that I have learned through my years of therapy that has really made me hold strongly to a differentiation-based approach, as opposed to an attachment-based approach, is the realization that basic decency is not something that we can take for granted. It is sublime. We need to encourage it. We need to respect it. We need to reward and encourage it every way we can.

But there are many, many people who do not come from decent parents. They do not come from decent families. So basic decency is not something I take for granted, but basic decency is the kind of thing that my parents demonstrate. And this is why a childlike approach or an approach that reduces adults to children (which is very, very common is pop psychology) is an enactment, as far as I am concerned, because we're not children. We may act like children but we're not perpetual children.

And the hallmark of truly being an adult and also truly being a spiritual person is the ability to hold on through difficult times. And ironically you don't have to be a saint. You don't have to see a burning bush and God doesn't have to give you the Ten Commandments. All you have to do is form an emotionally committed relationship and the great Oneness will visit you with all the normal, healthy, difficult problems that bedevil couples who simply want to stay together, love each other, and have decent sex and raise a family. Like my family did.

TS: Now, you use this phrase a couple times, "holding onto yourself." What do you mean by that?

DS: "Holding onto yourself" and the "Four Points of Balance" are one in the same. Solid, flexible self. The ability to regulate your own emotional life. Quiet mind, calm heart—which is also emotional autonomy. That's holding onto yourself. The ability to regulate your own emotions, and the interesting thing there is, if you want a stable relationship, the hallmark of stability in a relationship is not holding onto your partner. That makes the relationship rigid. It turns out that stability in an emotionally committed relationship resides in the individual's ability to hold onto themselves.

The irony is, when you often let go of your partner and stop trying to get your validation, your identity, your reflected sense of self, and your soothing from your partner, and you learn to hold onto yourself—including not overreacting and meaningful endurance, those are the last two points of balance—that is the "holding onto yourself," and that is what allows you to have a better and stable time holding onto your partner.

So if you listen to the things that you and I are talking about, they actually all fit together. They are one in the same. They are just different aspects of looking at the prism of the reflected light of relationships where you just see it parceled out into all of its pieces. But holding onto yourself is one of the unique things about human beings. We are self-soothing animals. Infants have the ability to self-soothe, albeit in rudimentary form, almost from the start of life, if not in utero. And so we are self-soothing animals, and we are able to control our own emotionality. We are able to control our own minds. That's certainly what meditation is all about. That ability to hold onto ourselves is what gives you the basis for having a close, stable, intimate, rewarding, and also growing, living relationship with another human being.

TS: You know, I think related to this point is a very interesting comment that you made in Passionate Marriage, that "in a well-differentiated couple, blame and criticism stop." And I was like, "Wow! Blame and criticism stop?" Not slowly go away but you actually use the word, "stop."

DS: Yes. You know, I'm sure that there must be a moment where the Dali Lama loses his magnificent control on himself and he has a thought where he is blaming somebody else. [Laughs] Maybe the Chinese.

The best differentiated person—you know, we're not perfect, and so when I say "stop," I'm talking about couples that [are] at each other's throats. They're gridlocked. They're contentious, they're belligerent with each other. That stops because the conflict shifts from between people to inside people. I think it was Teilhard de Chardin who said, "True spirituality is taking the max amount of angst into oneself and digesting it and making the world a better place." And that's what happens when people become more differentiated. Instead of keeping the anxiety between the people—forcing your partner to adapt and accommodate and keeping the conflict between the two of you—you bring it into yourself. You shift from confronting your partner to confronting yourself. And the first move in a collaborative alliance is always confronting yourself first. And by confronting yourself and having the tension within you, the conflict between you and your partner stops. The blaming stops.

It's not ethereal. It's a very, very pragmatic process, and it really, really works. It's one of the reasons that people are willing to tolerate a very direct, adult approach. There are a lot of people who say, "Look, Dave, people want to hear that it can be easy. They're going to want to go to a therapist who tells them, 'Yeah, it is a childhood wound and your partner should be there for you all the time.' Why do they stick around when you're talking to them about self-confrontation and soothing yourself and learning to take care of yourself as part of loving somebody else?"

The answer is: because people like the results. And it doesn't take a lifetime to change this. You don't have to be Buddhist to have a good marriage, where you hope there's reincarnation because it's going to take you two or three lives to get this thing worked out. You can do it in one life. It really comes from The Four Points of Balance and becoming more differentiated, and that's why the conflict stops.

Also, as you stop seeing your partner as an extension of you—that "acting badly" or "that needs to be controlled" or "that's wayward"—you really begin to realize something that couples in emotionally committed relationships forget, even they're going to the ashram each week, which is that their partner is a sentient being. It's a lot easier to think that the rest of the world is a sentient being, but when you've got a partner that you think is defying you, who doesn't like you sometimes, who finds fault with you and is angry with you for not picking up your socks and [making] a mess and [being] difficult to live with. Realizing that this other person is a sentient being and getting your anger and animosity under control, is really a big, big deal.

As you confront yourself, you are acutely aware of your own—not only your mortalities, but of being mortal in the sense that you have your own short-comings (God knows you have a lot of them), and as you see that more and more, I think you become more forgiving of other people's foibles, particularly people that you're living with. And so that's why the conflict simply stops.

Another reason it simply stops is that you realize that not only you're wasting time, but if you have children, you realize that your children are watching you. You cannot go into the bedroom and have a private fight. This idea that you don't fight in front of the kids, you can forget it. Your kids map you out and they know you're fighting. And when you realize that you're educating your children about how marriage is supposed to be, you're really shaping the kind of person they are going to pick. When people realize that, it gives them a kick in the behind and it really says, "If you have any integrity, you can't have a war of attrition for 25 years. You need to get your act together." And that's another reason why the conflict stops.

TS: Now, David, I just have a couple more questions for you. This first one is just sort of circling back around and completing this discussion, I think, in a very grounded way, which is: let's say somebody is listening and when we started talking about being sexually dissatisfied, they thought to themselves, "You know, I would like to be having more of x, y, and z. You know, the challenge here really is my partner. My partner is this way or that way." Or some type of criticism or blame came up in them about their partner and their current level of sexual activity and novelty. But they are listening to you and thinking, "OK, David is recommending a different approach, one that involved self-confrontation and self-soothing." How does that person work with that information? What do they do?

DS: OK. There are a lot of different ways to do that. Some of them are going to be specifically in the sexual arena, if they want to have good sex. And some of them are going to be more general. I think particularly since we started off talking about sex, we ought to hit that one first.

Very often what you need to do is that you have to be able to sit down with your partner and have the conversation that nobody has. I've worked with a lot of couples. They've been copulating or trying to copulate for 25 years and they haven't talked about it one time. So just talking about sex means that you're going to have to apply the Four Points of Balance. You're going to have to calm yourself down, not over react and not over anticipate your partner's rejection and things like that. You need to talk from your heart as opposed to having your armor on.

Being able to raise the topic straight and say, "Look, I'm not blaming. Actually, I want to raise this topic and as I'm doing this with you, I'm also thinking about how I'm complicit." Or, "What am I not doing in the instated quid pro quo that you and I have developed that allows the sex to stay bad? I'm thinking about that and I'm also in the process of confronting myself about that. I'll even tell you what it is." And then you lay it out. You will have your partner's undivided attention because they will want to know how the alien stole their partner and you showed up instead because they know. They have your mind map. And they know that you're not thinking like you usually do. It's not the words but the thoughts that get their attention. So going and opening your mind and showing a different mind to your partner is one of the things that really gets that sex conversation going. (By the way, mind-mapping is all described in Intimacy and Desire.)

So that's how the sex part starts. The other things more generally are going to your partner, and this can be in the sex conversation that says, "Look, I no longer believe in communal genitalia. I no longer believe that your genitals belong to me, that you're supposed to keep them ready and to go and give them to me whenever I want. I have learned the hard way that you belong to you, including your body. Your body belongs to you, too. I just hope that when that's clear, you'll be more willing to share." Because people don't share when ownership is being contested.

Letting your partner know that you really do see them as a separate entity from you is one of the best aphrodisiacs there is. Treating your partner with respect and confronting yourself in a way that is respect-worthy is also one of the best aphrodisiacs there is. Showing your partner that you recognize that sex is not just a bedroom behavior, but that you understand that the issues that are surfacing in the sex are not just about, "Are we going to do a new position?" but, "Are we going to grow as people? Are we going to always agree to live within each other's limitations? Or are we going to have a relationship [where] basically both of us agree that we don't want to live within our partner's limitations anymore and we expect each other to stretch. Not just in the sex."

You demonstrate that you're willing to go first and open an artery by confronting yourself about something that you know is true. Your partner has told you for years that it's true and you finally acknowledge it. And your partner's mind and mouth drop open because they can't believe you're doing this. Those are the kinds of things that if somebody has been listening to this whole conversation between you and I and they want to apply it, that's what you do.

Another thing that you can do that really helps is you offer to do "hugging to relax," which is a long-duration, ten-minute hug that is described in Passionate Marriage. It really, really helps people settle down because so many people are so anxious during sex and they've always been so anxious that they had no idea that they are anxious because they've acclimated to it. The only time they realize how much anxiety they are carrying in bed is when they finally slow down and settle down.

When I help couples have better sex, most people think at first that [they have to go] to a gym or [get] a trapeze and [do] athletic maneuvers, but the best sex that people ever have really is about finally having peace. Peace in the arms of somebody you love is really, for most people, the best sex you're ever going to have. So by offering "hugging to relax" with your partner, it does so many things at once. It gives the two of you a chance to quiet down and settle down because one-third of men have rapid ejaculation, which means that if they hug for ten minutes, it's longer than most of them have ever had sex. You can't relax in two and a half minutes.

When you say to you partner, "I want to hold you." It challenges your partner's self-worth because they might know why you want to have sex with them, but why on earth would you just want to hold them, unless it's a come-on for sex? When it isn't, and it's just the two of you, for a lot of people, it touches their hearts, it blows their minds, and it really allows them to connect with a partner that they've never been able to do while their underwear is off.

So this is also differentiation because while you're standing there, you've got to calm yourself down. Initially it's a little awkward. You're not used to that. You have to have meaningful endurance to get to the other side, to get to sense of peace. So when you put all of these pieces together, somebody who is listening to this and is saying, "Hmm. You know, I'd like to have a much better sex life. That sounds good to me. I'll take two helpings of that!" It really is something you can do in a very straightforward, pragmatic way and it doesn't take forever.

TS: Wonderful. That's very helpful. So just one final question, David. Our program is called Insights at the Edge, and I'm always curious in people's personal life—not so much your theoretical work, but really, in your life—what an edge might be for you currently in your own growth and development that you might be willing to share with us?

DS: [Laughs]

TS: I know! I can't help myself!

DS: [Laughs a long laugh]

TS: I think that might be the best laugh I've ever gotten yet on the program!

DS: Tami, I gotta tell you, that was seductive! [Laughs]

TS: Have as much integrity as you want and only share what you want.

DS: Oh, oh. I'm being hoisted on my own card. Now that's difficult. That's difficult.

I think the cutting edge for me is really acknowledging the way that I see the impact of my own therapy work on me. I find myself becoming less rigid. I find myself becoming more self-disclosing, softer, and gentler. And that, much to my chagrin, pushes me to acknowledge what I have not been up to now. So I think that the growth edge for me is really making peace with the harder parts of myself that, up to now, I might have wanted to acknowledge. And also really celebrating what I see as basic decency and the goodness in people around me. Because the more I look into the darkness in people's hearts, ironically, I guess, I see the light and the more I want to be a part of it.

So is that self-disclosing enough?

TS: It's perfect. Thank you so much. Thank you for the laugh. And thank you for the wisdom and clarity and your pioneering work.

I've been speaking with Dr. David Schnarch. He's the creator of a two-session, very quick-paced, provocative, helpful, and practical program with Sounds True called, Secrets of a Passionate Marriage: How to Increase Sexual Pleasure and Emotional Fulfillment in Committed Relationships. David, thank you so much for being with us. Thank you.

DS: My pleasure, Tami. Thank you for having me.

TS: SoundsTrue.com: Many voices, one journey. Thanks for listening.

Addiction is addiction.

2011-08-21T11:55:00.000+01:00

Freud stated that according to the psychoanalytic theory of personality, the pleasure principle is the driving force of the id that seeks immediate gratification of all needs, wants, and urges. In other words, the pleasure principle strives to fulfill our most basic and primitive urges, including hunger, thirst, anger, and sex. When these needs are not met, the result is a state of anxiety or tension.

A Radical New Definition of Addiction. A sweeping new definition of addiction stakes out controversial positions that many, including the powerful psychiatric lobby, are likely to argue with.

If you think addiction is all about booze, drugs, sex, gambling, food and other irresistible vices, think again. And if you believe that a person has a choice whether or not to indulge in an addictive behavior, get over it. The American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) blew the whistle on these deeply held notions with its official release of a new document defining addiction as a chronic neurological disorder involving many brain functions, most notably a devastating imbalance in the so-called reward circuitry. This fundamental impairment in the experience of pleasure literally compels the addict to chase the chemical highs produced by substances like drugs and alcohol and obsessive behaviors like sex, food and gambling.

The definition, a result of a four-year process involving more than 80 leading experts in addiction and neurology, emphasizes that addiction is a primary illness—in other words, it’s not caused by mental health issues such as mood or personality disorders, putting to rest the popular notion that addictive behaviors are a form of "self-medication" to, say, ease the pain of depression or anxiety.

Indeed, the new neurologically focused definition debunks, in whole or in part, a host of common conceptions about addiction. Addiction, the statement declares, is a “bio-psycho-socio-spiritual” illness characterized by (a) damaged decision-making (affecting learning, perception, and judgment) and by (b) persistent risk and/or recurrence of relapse; the unambiguous implications are that (a) addicts have no control over their addictive behaviors and (b) total abstinence is, for some addicts, an unrealistic goal of effective treatment.

The bad behaviors themselves are all symptoms of addiction, not the disease itself. "The state of addiction is not the same as the state of intoxication," the ASAM takes pains to point out. Far from being evidence of a failure of will or morality, the behaviors are the addict's attempt to resolve the general "dysfunctional emotional state" that develops in tandem with the disease. In other words, conscious choice plays little or no role in the actual state of addiction; as a result, a person cannot choose not to be addicted. The most an addict can do is choose not to use the substance or engage in the behavior that reinforces the entire self-destructive reward-circuitry loop.

Yet ASAM pulls no punches when it comes to the negative consequences of addiction, declaring it an illness that “can cause disability or premature death, especially when left untreated or treated inadequately.”

The new definition leaves no doubt that all addictions—whether to alcohol, heroin or sex, say—are fundamentally the same. Dr. Raju Haleja, former president of the Canadian Society for Addiction Medicine and the chair of the ASAM committee that crafted the new definition, told The Fix, “We are looking at addiction as one disease, as opposed to those who see them as separate diseases. Addiction is addiction. It doesn’t matter what cranks your brain in that direction, once it has changed direction, you’re vulnerable to all addiction." That the society has stamped a diagnosis of sex or gambling or food addiction as every bit as medically valid as addiction to alcohol or heroin or crystal meth may spark more controversy than its subtler but equally far-reaching assertions.

The new definition comes as the American Psychiatric Association (APA) is undertaking a highly publicized, decade-in-the-making revision of its own definition of addiction in its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders—the bible of the mental health profession. The APA’s DSM will have a larger effect on public health policies that guide addiction treatment, largely because insurance companies are mandated by law to use the DSM diagnostic categories and criteria to decide which treatments they will pay for.

Dr. Haleja told The Fix that the ASAM definition arose partly out of a disagreement with the DSM committee; although the DSM will define addiction as a disease, its symptoms (and therefore diagnostic criteria) will still be viewed mostly as discrete behaviors. Also, the DSM will define each type of addiction as a separate disease, instead of the singular and unified notion of disease that the ASAM proposes. “In terms of treatment, it becomes very important that people don’t focus on one aspect of the disease, but the disease as a whole,” says Haleja. Far from being a failure of will or morality, addictive behaviors are the addict's attempt to resolve the general "dysfunctional emotional state" that develops in tandem with the disease. In other words, conscious choice plays little or no role in the actual state of addiction; as a result, a person cannot choose not to be addicted.

Though addicts can’t choose not to be addicts, they can choose to get treatment. Recovery, ASAM says, is best realized not just by self-management and mutual support groups such as 12-step fellowships, but also with trained professional help.

Some addiction-medicine specialists see the sweeping new definition as a validation of what has, since the publication of Alcoholics Anonymous in 1939, come to be known as “the disease concept” of addiction. “Many people in the population at large see addiction as a moral problem—‘Why don’t they just stop?’” says Dr. Neil Capretto, medical director of Gateway Rehabilitation Center in Pittsburgh and an active ASAM member. “For experienced people working in addiction medicine for years, we know it’s a brain disease.”

Does this statement push the 12 steps, the mainstay of many treatment centers, programs and clinicians, toward obsolescence? After all, when a problem is declared to be a “medical” issue, doesn’t that imply that the solution should also be “medical”—as in doctors and drugs? “Both approaches have applicability,” says Dr. Marc Galanter, professor of psychiatry at New York University, founding director of its Division of Alcohol and Substance Abuse as well as director of its Fellowship Training Program in Addiction Psychiatry. “The fact that addiction is a disease doesn’t mean it’s only susceptible to drugs.” Says Capretto: “This new definition does not say that psychological or spiritual approaches are not important. My concern is that some people who really don’t understand the broader scope of addiction will see it only as a disease of brain cells. We’re not treating computers—it’s in the total human being who is, as the definition says, a 'bio-psycho-socio-spiritual' creature, and who will still need help in those areas.”

With its no-stone-unturned statement (it runs to eight pages, single-spaced, including footnotes), ASAM has come down—mostly—on one side of the chicken-and-egg question that has long befuddled people interested in addiction, physicians and recovering addicts alike: which came first, the neurological disorder or the compulsive behaviors and substance use? The definition states that abnormalities in the neurological system’s reward wiring—communication between areas of the brain, particularly those that process memory, emotional response and pleasure—come first, and drive the addict into a doomed pursuit to compensate for the reward-system imbalance through the addictive behavior. But later, the document notes that these behaviors themselves can damage the reward circuitry and lead to impaired impulse control and addiction.

The statement conforms, in its general outlines, with the prevailing premise in cutting-edge addiction science that the natural reward system designed to support human survival becomes overtaken or highjacked by the chemical payoff provided by substance use or addictive behaviors. “The reward circuitry bookmarks things that are important: eating food, nurturing children, having sex, sustaining intimate friendships,” says Dr. Mark Publicker, medical director of Mercy Recovery Center in Portland—Maine’s largest rehab—and former Regional Chief of Addiction Medicine for Kaiser Permanente Mid-Atlantic Region.

When we use alcohol or drugs, Publicker says, the chemical reward—the "high"—is many times more powerful than the natural circuitry’s reward, and the neurological system adapts to the flood of neurotransmitters. “But because we didn’t evolve as a species with OxyContin or crack cocaine, that adaptive mechanism overshoots. So it becomes impossible to experience a normal sense of pleasure,” he continues. “Use of the substance then happens at the expense of what otherwise would promote survival. If you think about it from that standpoint, it begins to account for illness and premature death.” An active addict has a very high risk of early death via sickness or suicide.

The statement raises repeated alarms about the danger posed by the development by teens and young adults of habits of consumption of substances because their brains are still in the process of maturation, and the chemical "hijacking" of the reward system may result in earlier and more serious addiction behaviors. While firmly grounded in the neurological disease model of addiction, the definition by no means discounts genes (it attributes about half of the cause to your DNA inheritance). It’s careful to say that environmental factors affect whether and how much the genetics will tip the scales. The statement notes that “resiliencies” acquired through parenting and life experience can inhibit genetic expression of addiction. “Genetics is tendency, not destiny,” Capretto says.

Psychological and environmental factors, such as exposure to trauma or overwhelming stress, distorted ideas about life’s meaning, a damaged sense of self, and breakdown in connections with others and with “the transcendent (referred to as God by many, the Higher Power by 12-steps groups, or higher consciousness by others)" are also acknowledged as having an influence.

In addition, ASAM further says that understanding reward systems is just a part of understanding addiction’s neurobiology. Scientists are still trying to comprehend how some addicts become preoccupied with certain drugs or behaviors and other addicts with others; how some addicts become triggered to use by some events that don’t affect others; and how cravings can persist for decades after a complete recovery.

The statement attempts to put forth diagnostic hallmarks, all of which are behavioral: inability to abstain; impaired impulse control; cravings; diminished grasp of one’s problems; and problematic emotional responses.

Is it a problem that the definition is incapable of pointing to a quantifiable diagnostic marker of this illness? “I may be stating the obvious, here,” Publicker says, sighing, “but you don’t need to do brain imaging to identify an active alcoholic.”

In fact it emphasizes that "the quantity and frequency" of addictive symptoms—like how many drinks you down in a day or how many hours you spend masturbating—is no more or less of a marker than the "qualitative [and] pathological way" the addict responds to stressors and cues by continued pursuit in the face of growing adverse consequences.

Publicker, an active ASAM member for 30 years and a proponent of medication-assisted therapy for addiction, notes that addiction recovery depends on treatment of psychological, social and spiritual aspects of the illness—not just its biological aspects. “It’s called medication-assisted therapy, not therapy-assisted medication,” he says. “Medication alone fails. I’ve seen this over a very long career. But it can really make a difference in people struggling to relapse.”

He draws the analogy with depression: “If you ask most people what depression is, they’ll answer it’s a serotonin deficiency disorder and that the solution is to put somebody on an SSRI [antidepressant medication]. But that’s a simplistic and inefficient way of managing depression. Medication can be helpful, but it needs to be combined with talk. We live in an era now where talk is not reimbursed.”It remains to be seen whether ASAM’s new branding of addiction as a full-bore biological illness will help addicts obtain reimbursement for treatment. In terms of insurers, clarifying that the illness has “biological roots”—stipulating that it’s not the patient’s fault he or she has the illness—may break down reimbursement roadblocks.

Capretto agrees: “Things like this definition help bring addiction more into the scope of other diseases, so for the future it will mean fewer barriers for people wanting to get help.”

One of ASAM's unstated goals was obviously to fight against the stubborn social stigma against addiction experienced by many addicts. “There’s no question they set out to de-stigmatize addiction,” Publicker says. “Nobody chooses to be an addict. The concern that I have is placing blame on the patient. It takes a very long time for the brain to normalize. While it’s waiting to happen, you’re feeling bad, your thinking is impaired, and it’s a setup for relapse. Patients are likely to be blamed for relapse, and families see them as unmotivated and weak. But that’s the disease of addiction.”

Love. The gift of being in community.

2011-08-14T19:04:00.001+01:00

How long does it take you to switch off when you are with someone who is behaving in an in-authentic way? Probably a few seconds! It is a fact that when people present with an agenda - people-pleasing for example - the exchange between them and others triggers disconnection - promptly.

I work at re-training the pleasure-principle part of my brain in order to HALT acting/re-acting on a stimulus driven impulse that may be flawed by a negative perception - not the most positive of actions. Damage control after the fact - step 10 works if you work it. Mindfulness is a state of being - equipoise - spiritual elegance personified is a constant aspiration.

Too often I have mentally drifted. My awareness has gone traveling into the future - the "what-if" zone or into the past - the " I wish -I hadn't' zone.

Nothing can be gained by projecting into the future. Buddhist's wisdom state that if I want to know what will happen tomorrow - then I need to be mindful of today - visa-vis - 12step recovery states that a 10th Step is in order if I am ruminating on the past.

Aspiring to live a mindful lifestyle is do-able. However, to live in the present moment requires discipline and a willingness to re-direct compulsive, instant gratification.

Respecting my needs - processing what is - and determining what it is that is occurring in the here is how I aspire to live my life. Too often it easy to drift into a malaise/feeling like a victim - vampires all that is good in life.

Motivating my self to take better care of myself, my family, friends and community calls for being available: emotionally,spiritually,intellectually and spiritually. People pick-up on our cues. If I am not really interested in their exchange with me, this is disrespectful behaviour.

A lesson I learned from Lama Yeshe when I visited him at the Samye Ling monastery in Scotland, he said: All problems come from non-acceptance. Ergo, my Ego.

If and when I am in the moment, I can be present to everything in my orbit, speak my truth, be boundaried and be happy! Be fully engaged and empowered.

Recently, a survey was undertaken in Britain to determine what it is that makes us happy. I am intrigued by the outcomes.

People from 40,000 households across the country, concluded that eating a family meal at least three times a week is the key to happiness because it helps build a strong bond between parents and their children.
Sound good. I cook and eat with my family most of the time! Win - Win here.

Married couples are most likely to be happy with their relationships, according to the study, which also found that the happiest relationships are those less than five years old between two university graduates who have no children.

Research has also suggested that happiness begins at 50. A study from Stony Brook University, New York, found that stress, anger and worry fade after your 50th. Women were also reported to suffer greater stress, worry and sadness at all ages.

SOunds true! I turn 58 on Wednesday the 17th August. Each year I feel healthier that I did the previous one. I sleep better. Exercise is easier. Being calm most of the time means that I am fun to be with. For someone who was Alpha type - AAA: Arrogant/Addicted/Auto-pilot I have worked hard at re-training professionally and personally.

Money makes the world go round, but it is not the key to happiness, according to other studies. In 2008, a survey from the Office for National Statistics found that British families were healthier and twice as well off as they were 20 years ago, but are no happier. However, other studies have found money can buy you happiness after all, but only if you spend it wisely. Indeed, that might be why a good holiday can boost your happiness levels "for up to two months" after - although the break has to be "very relaxing" to have such an effect.

We usually take 6 weeks of in Jan/Feb and travel to India for downtime in a retreat setting. But our routine has been sorely disrupted by external demands for the past 2 years that has meant we have had to do lots of min-break stay-cations. It is true to say that I have had to work harder at my "happiness" by finding new ways to do so:
Happiness regime:
1. Maintain contact with newer friends so that they will become old friends.
2. Wear clothes that feel good - I love the feel of cashmere, velvet, lightly & often laundered linen and cotton.
3. I tell people I love that I love then, often.
5. Continuing to learn stimulates the brain to stay robust. My kindle has aided the process of re-igniting a lifetime love-affair with reading.
4. Spread the joy. When I am feeling good - I up the ante by engaging with people who cross my path. It can be a simple nod of recognition. A smile. A compliment.We all want to feel seen and heard by others - a small step - a light touch goes a long way!
6. I love meditating upon peace of mind. Breathing in love and exhaling fear.
7. Buying presents for my beloved partner. He is so worth it. He has helped heal the hole in my soul.
It doesn't take much to change a negative thought into a positive action. Willingness works wonders.

Every moment presents an opportunity to engage in boundless awareness .

2011-08-03T11:25:00.000+01:00

A good morning to all. I ease into each new day by a series of rituals - one is to read a daily "serving" from the site: "Bowl of Saki, Hazarat Inayat Khan.

With an enduring longing for a conscious connection with humanity, myself included, I draw from the devotional disciplines of prayer and meditation a clarity and peace of mind, a bridging of the conscious with the unconscious.

When I drift from mind/heart disciplines I allow my fertile conscious mind to make up all sorts of things about others. I become a vessel of irrational -based - fear.

Love can overcome fear. Love is the antidote for fear. I though of sharing today's reading because it spoke to me using the language of the heart. Emotional balance is achievable when I challenge a propensity towards negative thinking - the absence of love - in my approach to others so that I can restore effortless equanimity.

Think, before envying the position of your fellow man, with what difficulty he has arrived at it.
Bowl of Saki, August 3, by Hazrat Inayat Khan
Commentary by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan:
There are experiences such as failure in business, or misfortune, or illness, or a certain blow in one's life, whether an affair of the heart or of money or a social affair, whatever it may be -- there are blows which fall upon a person and a shell breaks, a new consciousness is produced. Very few will see it is an unfoldment, very few will interpret it as such, but it is so. Have you not seen among your acquaintances how a person with a disagreeable nature, a most uninteresting man to whom you were never attracted, perhaps after a blow, a deep sorrow, after some experience, awakened to a new consciousness and suddenly attracted you, because he had gone through this process? As we unfold at every step in our life, so we do with every experience. The deeper the experience touches us, the greater the unfoldment.

from http://wahiduddin.net/mv2/XIV/XIV_2_19.htm

There is a story of a slave called Ayaz, who was brought before a king with nine others, and the king had to select one to be his personal attendant, The wise king gave into the hands of each of the ten a wineglass and commanded him to throw it down. Each one obeyed the command. Then the king asked each one of them, 'Why did you do such a thing?' The first nine answered 'Because your Majesty gave me the order'; the plain truth cut and dried. And then came the tenth slave, Ayaz. He said, 'Pardon, sire, I am sorry,' for he realized that the king already knew it was his command; by replying, 'Because you told me,' nothing new was said to the king. This beauty of expression enchanted the king so much that he selected him to be his attendant.

It was not long before Ayaz won the trust and confidence of the king, who gave him the charge of his treasury, the treasury in which precious jewels were kept. This made many jealous, this sudden rise from a slave to a treasurer of the king, a position which many envied. No sooner did people know that Ayaz had become a favorite of the king than they began to tell numerous stories about him in order to bring him into disfavor with the king. One of the stories was that Ayaz went every day into the room where the jewels were locked in the safe, and that he was stealing them every day, little by little. The king answered, 'No, I cannot believe such a thing; you have to show me.'

So they brought the king as Ayaz entered this room, and made him stand in a place where there was a hole, looking into the room. And the king saw what was going on there. Ayaz entered the room and opened the door of the safe. And what did he take out from it? His old ragged clothes which he had worn as a slave. He kissed them and pressed them to his eyes, and put them the table. There, incense was burning, and this that he was doing was something sacred to him. He then put on these clothes and looked at himself in the mirror, and said, as one might be saying a prayer, 'Listen, O Ayaz, see what you used to be before. It is the king who has made you, who has given you the charge of this treasure. So regard this duty as your most sacred trust, and this honor as your privilege and as a token of the love and kindness of the king. Know that it is not your worthiness that has brought you to this position. Know that it is his greatness, his goodness, his generosity which has overlooked your faults, and which has bestowed that rank and position upon you by which you are now being honored. Never forget, therefore, your first day, the day when you came to this town; for it is the remembering of that day which will keep you in your proper place.'

He then took off the clothes and put them in the same place of safety, and came out. As he stepped out, what did he see? He saw that the king before whom he bowed was waiting eagerly to embrace him; and the king said to him, 'What a lesson you have given me Ayaz! It is this lesson which we must all learn, whatever be our position. Because before that King in whose presence we all are but slaves, nothing should make us forget that helplessness through which we were reared and raised, and brought to life, to understand and to live a life of joy. People told me that you had stolen jewels from our treasure-house, but on coming here I have found that you have stolen my heart.'

Every moment presents an opportunity to be present.

2011-07-17T20:17:00.000+01:00

Without applying the tools of meditation and Self hypnosis my mind goes to mush really quickly when I allow stress to impact my sense of holistic balance. I lose focus. Forget to self-regulate.

And drift into that state of auto-pilot in which I am randomly projecting into the future or ruminating on the past.

Pinging back into the present is easy when you know how and that muscle is ready for spot of rejuvenation!

"When we meditate, we have the opportunity to attune to the freshness of the moment. Each breath is precious like a flash of lightening in a summer cloud, a bubble in a stream. Each breath is our life happening. Allow yourself to appreciate living. Your life is happening right now."

Surrender is the solution to inner power struggles.

2011-06-23T18:46:00.000+01:00

Each individual composes the music of his own life; if he injures another he breaks the harmony and there is discord in the melody of his life.
Bowl of Saki, June 23, by Hazrat Inayat Khan
Commentary by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan:
All the trouble in the world, and all the disastrous results arising out of it, all come from lack of harmony. And this shows that the world needs harmony today more than ever before. ... The true use of music is to become musical in one's thoughts, words, and actions. We must be able to give the harmony for which the soul yearns and longs every moment. All the tragedy in the world, in the individual and in the multitude, comes from lack of harmony. And harmony is best given by producing harmony in one's own life.

~~~ "Supplementary Papers, Art and Music II", by Hazrat Inayat Khan (unpublished)

The whole of life is as music and in order to study life we must study it as music. It is not only study, it is also practice which makes man perfect. If someone tells me that a certain person is miserable or wretched or distressed, my answer will be that he is out of tune.

The Sufi harmonizes with everybody whether good or bad, wise or foolish, by becoming like the key-note. All races, nations, classes and people are like a strain of music based upon one chord, where the key-note, the common interest, holds so many personalities in a single bond of harmony. By a study of life the Sufi learns and practices the nature of its harmony. He establishes harmony with the self, with others, with the universe and with the infinite. He identifies himself with another, he sees himself, so to speak, in every other being. He cares for neither blame nor praise, considering both as coming from himself. ... He overlooks the faults of others, considering that they know no better. He hides the faults of others, and suppresses any facts that would cause disharmony.

His constant fight is with the Nafs (self-interest), the root of all disharmony and the only enemy of man. By crushing this enemy man gains mastery over himself; this wins for him mastery over the whole universe, because the wall standing between the self and the Almighty has been broken down. Gentleness, mildness, respect, humility, modesty, self-denial, conscientiousness, tolerance and forgiveness are considered by the Sufi as the attributes which produce harmony within one's own soul as well as within that of another.

2011-06-05T17:04:00.002+01:00

by Grazyna Fosar and Franz Bludorf
Russian DNA Discoveries: Original version

THE HUMAN DNA IS A BIOLOGICAL INTERNET and superior in many aspects to the artificial one. The latest Russian scientific research directly or indirectly explains phenomena such as clairvoyance, intuition, spontaneous and remote acts of healing, self healing, affirmation techniques, unusual light/auras around people (namely spiritual masters), mind’s influence on weather patterns and much more. In addition, there is evidence for a whole new type of medicine in which DNA can be influenced and reprogrammed by words and frequencies WITHOUT cutting out and replacing single genes.

Only 10% of our DNA is being used for building proteins. It is this subset of DNA that is of interest to western researchers and is being examined and categorized. The other 90% are considered “junk DNA.” The Russian researchers, however, convinced that nature was not dumb, joined linguists and geneticists in a venture to explore those 90% of “junk DNA.” Their results, findings and conclusions are simply revolutionary! According to them, our DNA is not only responsible for the construction of our body but also serves as data storage and in communication. The Russian linguists found that the genetic code, especially in the apparently useless 90%, follows the same rules as all our human languages. To this end they compared the rules of syntax (the way in which words are put together to form phrases and sentences), semantics (the study of meaning in language forms) and the basic rules of grammar.

They found that the alkalines of our DNA follow a regular grammar and do have set rules just like our languages. So human languages did not appear coincidentally but are a reflection of our inherent DNA.

The Russian biophysicist and molecular biologist Pjotr Garjajev and his colleagues also explored the vibrational behavior of the DNA. [For the sake of brevity I will give only a summary here. For further exploration please refer to the appendix at the end of this article.] The bottom line was: “Living chromosomes function just like solitonic/holographic computers using the endogenous DNA laser radiation.” This means that they managed for example to modulate certain frequency patterns onto a laser ray and with it influenced the DNA frequency and thus the genetic information itself. Since the basic structure of DNA-alkaline pairs and of language (as explained earlier) are of the same structure, no DNA decoding is necessary.

One can simply use words and sentences of the human language! This, too, was experimentally proven! Living DNA substance (in living tissue, not in vitro) will always react to language-modulated laser rays and even to radio waves, if the proper frequencies are being used.

This finally and scientifically explains why affirmations, autogenous training, hypnosis and the like can have such strong effects on humans and their bodies. It is entirely normal and natural for our DNA to react to language. While western researchers cut single genes from the DNA strands and insert them elsewhere, the Russians enthusiastically worked on devices that can influence the cellular metabolism through suitable modulated radio and light frequencies and thus repair genetic defects.

Garjajev’s research group succeeded in proving that with this method chromosomes damaged by x-rays for example can be repaired. They even captured information patterns of a particular DNA and transmitted it onto another, thus reprogramming cells to another genome.  So they successfully transformed, for example, frog embryos to salamander embryos simply by transmitting the DNA information patterns! This way the entire information was transmitted without any of the side effects or disharmonies encountered when cutting out and re-introducing single genes from the DNA. This represents an unbelievable, world-transforming revolution and sensation! All this by simply applying vibration and language instead of the archaic cutting-out procedure! This experiment points to the immense power of wave genetics, which obviously has a greater influence on the formation of organisms than the biochemical processes of alkaline sequences.

Esoteric and spiritual teachers have known for ages that our body is programmable by language, words and thought. This has now been scientifically proven and explained. Of course the frequency has to be correct. And this is why not everybody is equally successful or can do it with always the same strength. The individual person must work on the inner processes and maturity in order to establish a conscious communication with the DNA. The Russian researchers work on a method that is not dependent on these factors but will ALWAYS work, provided one uses the correct frequency.

But the higher developed an individual’s consciousness is, the less need is there for any type of device! One can achieve these results by oneself, and science will finally stop to laugh at such ideas and will confirm and explain the results. And it doesn’t end there. The Russian scientists also found out that our DNA can cause disturbing patterns in the vacuum, thus producing magnetized wormholes! Wormholes are the microscopic equivalents of the so-called Einstein-Rosen bridges in the vicinity of black holes (left by burned-out stars). These are tunnel connections between entirely different areas in the universe through which information can be transmitted outside of space and time. The DNA attracts these bits of information and passes them on to our consciousness. This process of hypercommunication is most effective in a state of relaxation. Stress, worries or a hyperactive intellect prevent successful hypercommunication or the information will be totally distorted and useless.

In nature, hypercommunication has been successfully applied for millions of years. The organized flow of life in insect states proves this dramatically. Modern man knows it only on a much more subtle level as “intuition.” But we, too, can regain full use of it. An example from Nature: When a queen ant is spatially separated from her colony, building still continues fervently and according to plan. If the queen is killed, however, all work in the colony stops. No ant knows what to do. Apparently the queen sends the “building plans” also from far away via the group consciousness of her subjects. She can be as far away as she wants, as long as she is alive. In man hypercommunication is most often encountered when one suddenly gains access to information that is outside one’s knowledge base. Such hypercommunication is then experienced as inspiration or intuition. The Italian composer Giuseppe Tartini for instance dreamt one night that a devil sat at his bedside playing the violin. The next morning Tartini was able to note down the piece exactly from memory, he called it the Devil’s Trill Sonata.

For years, a 42-year old male nurse dreamt of a situation in which he was hooked up to a kind of knowledge CD-ROM. Verifiable knowledge from all imaginable fields was then transmitted to him that he was able to recall in the morning. There was such a flood of information that it seemed a whole encyclopedia was transmitted at night. The majority of facts were outside his personal knowledge base and reached technical details about which he knew absolutely nothing.

When hypercommunication occurs, one can observe in the DNA as well as in the human being special phenomena. The Russian scientists irradiated DNA samples with laser light. On screen a typical wave pattern was formed. When they removed the DNA sample, the wave pattern did not disappear, it remained. Many control experiments showed that the pattern still came from the removed sample, whose energy field apparently remained by itself. This effect is now called phantom DNA effect. It is surmised that energy from outside of space and time still flows through the activated wormholes after the DNA was removed. The side effect encountered most often in hypercommunication also in human beings are inexplicable electromagnetic fields in the vicinity of the persons concerned. Electronic devices like CD players and the like can be irritated and cease to function for hours. When the electromagnetic field slowly dissipates, the devices function normally again. Many healers and psychics know this effect from their work. The better the atmosphere and the energy, the more frustrating it is that the recording device stops functioning and recording exactly at that moment. And repeated switching on and off after the session does not restore function yet, but next morning all is back to normal. Perhaps this is reassuring to read for many, as it has nothing to do with them being technically inept, it means they are good at hypercommunication.

In their book “Vernetzte Intelligenz” (Networked Intelligence), Grazyna Gosar and Franz Bludorf explain these connections precisely and clearly.  The authors also quote sources presuming that in earlier times humanity had been, just like the animals, very strongly connected to the group consciousness and acted as a group. To develop and experience individuality we humans however had to forget hypercommunication almost completely. Now that we are fairly stable in our individual consciousness, we can create a new form of group consciousness, namely one, in which we attain access to all information via our DNA without being forced or remotely controlled about what to do with that information. We now know that just as on the internet our DNA can feed its proper data into the network, can call up data from the network and can establish contact with other participants in the network. Remote healing, telepathy or “remote sensing” about the state of relatives etc. can thus be explained. Some animals know also from afar when their owners plan to return home. That can be freshly interpreted and explained via the concepts of group consciousness and hypercommunication. Any collective consciousness cannot be sensibly used over any period of time without a distinctive individuality. Otherwise we would revert to a primitive herd instinct that is easily manipulated.

Hypercommunication in the new millennium means something quite different: Researchers think that if humans with full individuality would regain group consciousness, they would have a god-like power to create, alter and shape things on Earth! AND humanity is collectively moving toward such a group consciousness of the new kind. Fifty percent of today’s children will be problem children as soon as the go to school. The system lumps everyone together and demands adjustment. But the individuality of today’s children is so strong that that they refuse this adjustment and giving up their idiosyncrasies in the most diverse ways.

At the same time more and more clairvoyant children are born [see the book “China’s Indigo Children” by Paul Dong or the chapter about Indigos in my book “Nutze die taeglichen Wunder” (Make Use of the Daily Wonders)]. Something in those children is striving more and more towards the group consciousness of the new kind, and it will no longer be suppressed. As a rule, weather for example is rather difficult to influence by a single individual. But it may be influenced by a group consciousness (nothing new to some tribes doing it in their rain dances). Weather is strongly influenced by Earth resonance frequencies, the so-called Schumann frequencies. But those same frequencies are also produced in our brains, and when many people synchronize their thinking or individuals (spiritual masters, for instance) focus their thoughts in a laser-like fashion, then it is scientifically speaking not at all surprising if they can thus influence weather.

Researchers in group consciousness have formulated the theory of Type I civilizations. A humanity that developed a group consciousness of the new kind would have neither environmental problems nor scarcity of energy. For if it were to use its mental power as a unified civilization, it would have control of the energies of its home planet as a natural consequence. And that includes all natural catastrophes!!! A theoretical Type II civilization would even be able to control all energies of their home galaxy. In my book “Nutze die taeglichen Wunder,” I have described an example of this: Whenever a great many people focus their attention or consciousness on something similar like Christmas time, football world championship or the funeral of Lady Diana in England then certain random number generators in computers start to deliver ordered numbers instead of the random ones. An ordered group consciousness creates order in its whole surroundings! [http://noosphere.princeton.edu/fristwall2.html] [1] When a great number of people get together very closely, potentials of violence also dissolve. It looks as if here, too, a kind of humanitarian consciousness of all humanity is created.

At the Love Parade, for example, where every year about one million of young people congregate, there has never been any brutal riots as they occur for instance at sports events. The name of the event alone is not seen as the cause here. The result of an analysis indicated rather that the number of people was TOO GREAT to allow a tipping over to violence.

To come back to the DNA: It apparently is also an organic superconductor that can work at normal body temperature. Artificial superconductors require extremely low temperatures of between 200 and 140°C to function. As one recently learned, all superconductors are able to store light and thus information. This is a further explanation of how the DNA can store information. There is another phenomenon linked to DNA and wormholes. Normally, these supersmall wormholes are highly unstable and are maintained only for the tiniest fractions of a second. Under certain conditions (read about it in the Fosar/Bludorf book above) stable wormholes can organize themselves which then form distinctive vacuum domains in which for example gravity can transform into electricity.

Vacuum domains are self-radiant balls of ionized gas that contain considerable amounts of energy. There are regions in Russia where such radiant balls appear very often. Following the ensuing confusion the Russians started massive research programs leading finally to some of the discoveries mentions above. Many people know vacuum domains as shiny balls in the sky. The attentive look at them in wonder and ask themselves, what they could be. I thought once: “Hello up there. If you happen to be a UFO, fly in a triangle.” And suddenly, the light balls moved in a triangle. Or they shot across the sky like ice hockey pucks. They accelerated from zero to crazy speeds while sliding gently across the sky. One is left gawking and I have, as many others, too, thought them to be UFOs. Friendly ones, apparently, as they flew in triangles just to please me. Now the Russians found in the regions, where vacuum domains appear often that sometimes fly as balls of light from the ground upwards into the sky, that these balls can be guided by thought. One has found out since that vacuum domains emit waves of low frequency as they are also produced in our brains.

And because of this similarity of waves they are able to react to our thoughts. To run excitedly into one that is on ground level might not be such a great idea, because those balls of light can contain immense energies and are able to mutate our genes. They can, they don’t necessarily have to, one has to say. For many spiritual teachers also produce such visible balls or columns of light in deep meditation or during energy work which trigger decidedly pleasant feelings and do not cause any harm. Apparently this is also dependent on some inner order and on the quality and provenance of the vacuum domain. There are some spiritual teachers (the young Englishman Ananda, for example) with whom nothing is seen at first, but when one tries to take a photograph while they sit and speak or meditate in hypercommunication, one gets only a picture of a white cloud on a chair. In some Earth healing projects such light effects also appear on photographs. Simply put, these phenomena have to do with gravity and anti-gravity forces that are also exactly described in the book and with ever more stable wormholes and hypercommunication and thus with energies from outside our time and space structure.

Earlier generations that got in contact with such hypercommunication experiences and visible vacuum domains were convinced that an angel had appeared before them. And we cannot be too sure to what forms of consciousness we can get access when using hypercommunication. Not having scientific proof for their actual existence (people having had such experiences do NOT all suffer from hallucinations) does not mean that there is no metaphysical background to it. We have simply made another giant step towards understanding our reality.

Official science also knows of gravity anomalies on Earth (that contribute to the formation of vacuum domains), but only of ones of below one percent. But recently gravity anomalies have been found of between three and four percent. One of these places is Rocca di Papa, south of Rome (exact location in the book “Vernetzte Intelligenz” plus several others). Round objects of all kinds, from balls to full buses, roll uphill. But the stretch in Rocca di Papa is rather short, and defying logic sceptics still flee to the theory of optical illusion (which it cannot be due to several features of the location).

All information is taken from the book “Vernetzte Intelligenz” von Grazyna Fosar und Franz Bludorf, ISBN 3930243237, summarized and commented by Baerbel. The book is unfortunately only available in German so far. You can reach the authors here: www.fosar-bludorf.com

[2]; Transmitted by Vitae Bergman [ www.ryze.com/view.php?who=vitaeb ] [3] References: 1. http://noosphere.princeton.edu/fristwall2.html 2. http://www.fosar-bludorf.com 3. http://www.ryze.com/view.php?who=vitaeb

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Asking for help is the antidote for victimhood.

2011-06-04T10:17:00.000+01:00

Our relationship with ourselves ripples into the way in which we engage with others. Did you know that if your habitual mind-state projects fear and judgement into a person, place or thing, then this diminishes the natural flow of mind-fullness.

The balance of mind/heart is important for effortless equilibrium/inherent wisdom. Blocks to this state of consciousness is caused by the brains hard-wiring/learned helplessness. Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Illusory thinking has the power to rob you of what is real. Isolation from others is enduring the perpetual state of will-fullness.

By developing a daily practice of prayer and meditation you can learn how to let go of fear, rebalance, challenge impulsive and addictive behaviours that derail the path to self-actualisation.

The secret of a friend should be kept as one's own secret; the fault of a friend one should hide as one's own fault.
Bowl of Saki, June 4, by Hazrat Inayat Khan
Commentary by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan:
A very important thing in character-building is to become conscious of one's relationship, obligation, and duty to each person in he world, and not to mix that link and connection which is established between oneself and another with a third person. One must consider that everything that is entrusted to one by any person in life is one's trust, and one must know that to prove true to the confidence of any person in the world is one's sacred obligation. In this manner a harmonious connection is established with everyone; and it is this harmony which attunes the soul to the infinite. ...

Dharma in the language of the Hindus means religion, but the literal meaning of this word is duty. It suggests that one's relation to every person in the world is one's religion; and the more conscientiously one follows it, the more keen one proves in following one's religion. To keep the secret of our friend, our acquaintance, even of someone with whom for a time one has been vexed, is the most sacred obligation. The one who thus realizes his religion would never consider it right to tell another of any harm or hurt he has received from his friend. It is in this way that self-denial is learned; not always by fasting and retiring into the wilderness. ... The one who knows what the relation of friendship is between one soul and another, the tenderness of that connection, its delicacy, its beauty, and its sacredness, that one can enjoy life in its fullness, for he is living; and in this manner he must some day communicate with God. For it is the same bridge that connects two souls in the world, which, once built, becomes the path to God.

2011-05-23T14:17:00.000+01:00

The Pain-Body of Nations by Eckhart Tolle.

The recent unrest in the Middle East called the “Arab Spring” gives our planet an opportunity to compare and contrast the national pain- bodies of countries and regions here on earth and pave the way for relief from all that suffering.

In general, older countries have stronger pain-bodies, while younger ones like Canada or Australia are not as dense. Switzerland feels lighter because as a neutral country it has managed to segregate itself from the surrounding madness of Western Europe. In the Middle East the collective pain-body is so extreme that whole parts of those populations feel compelled to actually perform a continuous and psychotic cycle of perpetration and retribution. This explains why there is so much violence and unrest there since their pain-body is thriving right on the surface of people’s ordinary lives.

Certainly China’s oppressive regime would imply a very heavy pain-body that is acted out by human rights abuses, suppression of civil liberties, and lax labor and environmental laws. Yet, the wide spread practice of t’ai chi, where millions practice openly in parks in cities all across China has actually produced a marked decrease of China’s national pain-body by reducing thinking and generating Presence. In fact, all spiritual practices that involve the physical body contribute to diminishing the global pain-body.

As much as Arab nations are at the effect of national pain-bodies so are their rivals the Jews. Because of persecution suffered over hundreds of years, the Jewish people along with Native Americans and Black Americans have a collective pain-body that is quite specific and pronounced.

In the end it doesn’t matter how much of your pain-body is imported from the suffering of your nation or race and what part of it is strictly personal. You can only transcend it by taking full responsibility for what your inner state is right now. There may be many centuries of abuse by others to your people to blame, but as long as you blame others you are making your personality stronger. It not the Devil or Satan who is the perpetrating evil-doer of this planet, it is blind human unconsciousness. Find the Present Moment and inside that moment comes forgiveness and from the compassion of forgiveness arises your true power, the power of light and Presence over the darkness of blame.

Where ever you go - there you are.

2011-05-23T12:44:00.000+01:00

"Virtually everything that happens has nothing to do with your conscious intent. Your food is digested, metabolized, and distributed throughout your body without your volition. Your heart beats, your breath swells, even your thoughts occur spontaneously, like dreams throughout the day, and then disappear without your interference. Your life is an assemblage of arising processes, and your awareness is more or less along for the ride."

Mudita. The practice of being joyful for another's joy/happiness.

2011-05-10T17:41:00.000+01:00

Sympathetic joy gives to equanimity the mild serenity that softens its stern appearance. It is the divine smile on the face of the Enlightened One.

Mudita

by C.F. Knight
(From Metta, Vol. 12, No. 2.)

A feature of the Buddha-Dhamma is cognizance of the pairs of opposites in the training to get beyond them. The Buddha's method of mental training and development was to teach by first defining unwholesome or unskillful thoughts, words, and deeds, or practices which characterize many of man's proclivities, and then to propound their opposites of a wholesome or skillful nature as an achievement to be sought after for the abolition of them both, eventually, when even the good must be left behind as well as the evil; when even the Raft of Dhamma is to be abandoned — after crossing the flood of samsara. The trouble with so many of the unwise is their desire to abandon the Raft of Dhamma before reaching the further shore. The Buddha's method of expounding the negative and the positive, the passive, and the dynamic aspects of behavior, in both abstract and concrete terms, is obviously to create awareness of what is to be sought after and nurtured.

The basic ignorance featured in Buddhism is not so much a rejection of the truth as it is a failure to perceive it. It is, as it were, a "blind spot" in our perception akin to the physical damage of a section of the brain or the nervous system which results in impaired vision or locomotion. In other words, the depth of our ignorance may be measured by our lack of consciousness of it.

This is why it is so necessary that we should see and recognize our failings and shortcomings if we are to eradicate them. It is also important that we should be mindful of "the good that has arisen," and to foster and develop it to the point of perfection. To realize our imperfections is the beginning of wisdom — the first light to shine on the darkness of our ignorance. While we are blissfully unaware of unwholesome states of mind within ourselves, such states will continue to flourish, and their roots will dig deeper into our very being. Just so too, in our relationships with our fellow men, the unperceived evils will be repeated unconsciously and unrecognized, building up a cumulative unhappy future for us under the retributive causal law of karma.

In dealing with mudita or altruistic joy, we are once more to some extent frustrated with the inadequacy of translations for "brahma-vihara" or "appamañña" [appama~n~na] — the former as "sublime or divine abode," and the latter as "boundless state." To reduce either of these terms to modern idiom is difficult. The four characteristics grouped under these terms are: loving-kindness, compassion, altruistic joy, and equanimity, extended to universal application. In their perfection they are "sublime" and "boundless," and to be "dwelt in" as one speaks of "dwelling in Peace," so we will leave it at that.

As with all perfections, these four desirable characteristics are the antidotes to the poisons of their opposite imperfections, and here is where the recognition of their opposites is apposite. Less has been said or written of mudita than of the other three of these four characteristics, perhaps, again, because of its somewhat clumsy translation. While loving-kindness and compassion are objective, reaching out to all sentient beings, mudita and equanimity are subjective, or personal in their application.

It may seem strange at first, until we critically examine the source, to speak of either selfish or unselfish joy. Joy is an emotional ecstasy arising from pleasure. It is something intensely personal. While we can and do share our pleasures to some extent with others, the resultant impact of them on various personalities will vary as widely as the personalities. At times what may give rise to rapturous joy in us, when shared, may give rise to positive aversion in another.

A pertinent example of this would be the reactionary effect of certain music on people of differing tastes. While it is not uncommon for some of the modern generation to literally swoon in ecstasy under the influence of the combination of discordant and dissonant notes and chords, others find them anything but entertaining or pleasurable. Here we have what might be termed "selfish joy" on the part of the participants, by those who have to suffer most unwilling participation. For all that, within the group enjoying it, there is a reciprocity of delight, happiness, and rapture between the entertainers and the entertained. Superficially, then, we could say it is not the phenomenon of joy itself, that is either selfish or altruistic by nature, but that time, place, and circumstance must all be considered in relation one to the others.

However, to bring mudita within the ambit of the Buddha-Dhamma we need to go deeper into the necessity for cultivating this perfection. What are the opposites to be eliminated by its cultivation?

We never tire of asserting the interdependence of every aspect of the Buddha-Dhamma, no matter which particular facet is being discussed. We have already stated that ignorance is failure of perception, and it is true that greed and hatred do arise through the non-perception of their source and subsequent results; that basically craving born of ignorance is the culprit, and that the purpose of the Buddha-Dhamma is to eliminate craving. It is craving that gives rise to jealousy, envy, covetousness, avarice, and greed in all of its manifestations. Here it is that mudita when practiced and developed becomes a "sublime" and "boundless" state of mind to be "dwelt in" as a corrective characteristic for their removal.

One of the most frequently used similes by the Buddha was that of fire. At times it was the destructive quality of fire that was likened to the destructive nature of the passions. At other times it was the ardent nature of fire that was to be emulated in the pursuance of the path to holiness. In its uncontrolled existence fire is a destructive danger. Under control it is one of man's greatest boons and blessings. In either case it was a motivating force to be reckoned with, at all times active, potent, and energetic.

The three roots of evil — greed, hatred, and delusion — are also known as "the three fires." On one occasion the Buddha and his band of monks were for the time staying on Gaya Head, a mountain near the city of Gaya. From their elevated position they watched one of the great fires that from time to time ravaged the countryside. This inspired what is known as "The Fire Sermon," which is the third recorded discourse delivered by the Buddha subsequent to his Enlightenment, and at the beginning of his long ministry. To the Buddha, the world of Samsara was like the flaming plains below, "Everything is burning," said the Buddha, "burning with the fire of passion, with the fired of hatred, with the fire of stupidity." (Vin. 21)

It is these three fires that give rise to jealousy, envy, covetousness, avarice, and greed. The craving for possessions, the craving for sensual pleasures, the begrudged success of others, the hatred that is begotten by the gains of others, the odious comparison of greater status compared with our humble circumstances, these are the "fires" that burn within us to our undoing.

It is now evident why mudita is such an important characteristic to be cultivated. When we can view the success of others with the same equanimity, and to the same extent, as we would extend metta and karuna — loving-kindness and compassion — to those who suffer grief and distress, sadness and tribulation, sorrow and mourning, then we are beginning to exercise mudita, and are in the process of eradicating greed and craving. Developed still further, we can reach the stage of sharing with others their joy of possession, their financial or social successes, their elevation to positions of civic or national importance, or their receipt of titles and honorifics. In such a manner mudita is counteractive to conceits of all kinds, and its growth and development checks craving's grip.

Until we have developed this subjective characteristic within ourselves how can we develop the objective characteristics of metta and karuna? The accumulated possessions, results of our greed, may give us the pleasure and the happiness of the miser gloating over his hoard of gold. The happiness born of shared pleasures, shared love, shared possessions, shared delights in another's success, will surpass the meager selfish happiness of the miser.

Unselfish joy multiplies in ratio to the extension of its application, quite apart from its purifying effect on our own lives.

In Ñanamoli's translation of Buddhaghosa's Visuddhimagga he uses "gladness" for mudita, with the footnote: "Mudita — gladness — as one of the divine abidings is always used in the sense of gladness at others' success." Buddhaghosa illustrates this by saying: "On seeing or hearing about a dear person being happy cheerful and glad, gladness can be aroused thus: 'This being is indeed glad. How good! How excellent!' Just as he would be glad on seeing a dear and beloved person, so he pervades all being with gladness."

In "The Analysis of the Sixfold Sense-Field" (MN 137) the Buddha speaks of the six joys connected with renunciation. While such joys are subjective by nature, they are devoid of any taint of egoistic craving that could give rise to the cankers of jealousy, envy, covetousness, or greed. These joys arise on the realization of the impermanence of material shapes, sounds, smells, flavors, touches, and mental states, and the renunciation of attachment to them.

The Nature and Implications of Mudita

by L.R. Oates
(From Metta, Vol. 12, No. 2.)

Altruistic joy is one of the four "sublime states" of mind — friendliness, compassion, altruistic joy, and equanimity — which together form one related group among the various spiritual or physical exercises generally described as meditation or contemplation. These all have as their common aim the attainment of mental calm or equanimity, which is intended in turn to foster the development of liberating insight. "A still mind, like still water, yields a clear reflection of what is before it." This is why this particular series ends with equanimity, but the route by which it is attained in this case is different from that traversed for the most of the other themes used as a focus for concentration.

The others, such as meditation on the breath, on death, on visual objects (kasina [kasi.na]), or on the Buddha, the Doctrine, and the Order of the Enlightened One, are entirely concerned with the self-cultivation of the meditator. Most of these themes are abstract or inanimate, while the Buddha and the Order (in the strict sense applicable here) have transcended any power of ours to help or hinder them. So the only person concerned or affected in these forms of training is the meditator. It was doubtless to encourage those wrestling by these means with their own inner weakness or conflicts that the following verse of the Dhammapada was uttered:

Let no one neglect his own task for the sake of another's however great; let him, after he has discerned his own task, devote himself to his task.

— Dhp 166

But if this were the whole story it would be difficult for such self-cultivation to serve in turn as a basis for the freedom from bondage to the self-concept, which is the main characteristic of the development of insight. Indeed, it was the recognition of the dangers of self-preoccupation, or self-righteousness, liable to arise in these often acute struggles for self-discipline, that impelled the more extreme exponents of the Pure Land school of Buddhism to abandon self-cultivation in favor of the less exacting path of reliance on the Buddha's transforming grace. But the cultivation of the "sublime states" represents a less radical form of compensation which, while compatible with other practices, can help to broaden the meditator's perspective in order to achieve a mode of equanimity which does not imply withdrawal into oneself or indifference to others.

The starting point here, of course, is on the ethical plane in the practice of generosity in practical ways (dana; daana) which, in order to become interiorized and thereby go beyond mere outward form, must be grounded in an attitude of friendliness (metta) for all beings without distinction. Since this outlook implies the recognition that all beings are subject to joys and sorrows just as we are, it finds a natural development in sympathy — that is to say, compassion — for their sorrows and joy in their blessings.

The former of these seems much the easier to achieve, since it is possible to feel compassion for suffering even in the absence of any positive friendliness for the sufferer, whereas it is only possible to share genuinely in another's joy if there is some element of true affection or friendliness present. This is perhaps why, on a much lower level of sensitivity, the reporting of news seems so heavily concentrated on the side of crimes and disasters, which are perhaps felt more likely to arouse interest than happier events and deeds. If the latter arouse any interest at all, it is likely to be spiced with envy or cynicism.

Not only does genuine joy in the prosperity of others require some element of affection; it requires this to be of a quite high order. A great deal of what passes for love is really aimed at mere emotional gratification on the part of the lover, for whom the "beloved" is little more than a prop for acting out some drama satisfying a purely subjective need — the beloved's own needs being treated less seriously. Indeed, even apart from outright commercialization, a certain habit of bargaining with affections seems remarkably widespread, when one begins to take notice of it.

In the light of this, the ability to feel a genuine joy in another's happiness, equal to one's satisfaction with one's own, represents a truly "sublime state." So it is not surprising that in the history of Buddhism, which cultivated this attitude systematically, there arose an aspiration to share with others not only one's material resources, but the spiritual resources described as merit. This aspiration follows naturally enough from the basic theory as to what merit is. Merit is the accumulation of tendencies resulting from enlightened deeds which, according to the law of moral causation (the law of karma), conduce to the future happiness of the doer.

Here he is joyful, hereafter he is joyful, in both worlds the well-doer is joyful. "I have done good" is the thought that make him happy. Still greater is his joy when he goes to states of bliss.

If the doer is still in a state where only purely personal forms of satisfaction are possible, the fruits of merit can only take this form. But suppose he loves even one being so much that, if that being is in some state of deprivation, he can only be made happy by the improvement of that being's lot, then the merit which is due to him can only take effect by benefiting him through that other's welfare. The wider his altruism expands, so that purely personal gratifications no longer adequately satisfy him, the wider must be the range of the benefit which his own merit would need to bring to others if it is to fulfill its defined function of bringing happiness to him. At the same time, his altruistic tendencies will ensure that he will have vastly more merit due to him, so his resources will tend to become commensurate with the aspirations, for example, of Santideva, when he says:

May I be an alleviator of the sorrows of all beings and a divine medicine to those afflicted by disease. May I be the benefactor and bringer of peace to them until all their bodily ailments and mental tribulations are at the end.

The principle of the sharing or transference of merit, so much stressed in Mahayana Buddhism (though not unknown in Theravadan practices) is sometimes objected to by Western Buddhists because of a superficial resemblance to the Christian doctrine of atonement, which they have rejected. But the principles entailed are not really identical, since the Christian doctrine is based on an essential distinction between the roles of the Creator and the created, while the Buddhist sharing of merit arises from a combination of the definition of merit and of the nature of altruistic joy.

It has a further importance too, in that it anticipates the emancipation to be derived from insight into the emptiness of the self-concept, that is to say, awakening to the emptiness of the concepts "I" and "mine" in terms of ultimate truth. On this level, the description "mine" as applied to merit will finally be seen to be as inapplicable as in the case of any other assumed possession. This was already explicitly set out in one of the Buddha's earliest discourses, "The Marks of the Not-self," in which he taught his first five disciples to contemplate each of the five components of personality in the terms: "This is not mine; this I am not; this is not my self." The fourth of these components is the aggregate of mental tendencies or activities, which include merit and demerit. Even on a lower plane than that of perfect insight, it can be seen that our deeds are not exclusively ours, because no one acts in absolute isolation, so that every act involves some stimulus or opportunity arising from activity of others. On the other hand, a too persistent insistence on the individual nature of merit can only impede the ultimate awakening to the Not-self.

This has some bearing, too, on the reason why friendliness, compassion, and altruistic joy are regarded as leading to an equanimity which does not imply an indifference to the joys and sorrows of others. In the absence of such a conclusion, the alternate sharing of joys and sorrows, like these emotions arising on one's own account, would be as endless as the world-cycles which it is the Buddhist aspiration to transcend. The goal of the "divine states" is that the aspirant, who in process achieves the role of a Bodhisattva in a two-way empathy with others by his perfect sharing of their joys and sorrows, is in a position to radiate to them stability, which in turn will help them to be less subject to their own emotional vicissitudes. In this way, he and they are liberated together, each sustaining the other.

The Meditative Development of Unselfish Joy

by Ven. Buddhaghosa (fifth-century)
Excerpted from The Path of Purification (Visuddhimagga).

One who begins the development of unselfish joy should not start with dearly beloved person, a neutral person or hostile person. For it is not the mere fact that a person is dearly beloved, which makes him an immediate cause of developing unselfish joy, and still less so neutral or hostile person. Persons of the opposite sex and those who are dead are not suitable subjects for this meditation.

A very close friend, however, can be a suitable subject. One who is called in the commentaries an affectionate companion; for he is always in a joyous mood: he laughs first and speaks afterwards. He should be the first to be pervaded with unselfish joy. Or on seeing or hearing about a dear person being happy, cheerful, and joyous, unselfish joy can be aroused thus: "This being, verily, is happy! How good, how excellent!" For this is what is referred to in the Vibhanga: "And how does a bhikkhu dwell pervading one direction with his heart imbued with unselfish joy? Just as he would be joyful on seeing a dear and beloved person, so he pervades all being with unselfish joy" (Vibhanga 274).

But if his affectionate friend or the dear person was happy in the past but is now unlucky and unfortunate, then unselfish joy can still be aroused by remembering his past happiness; or by anticipating that he will be happy and successful again in the future.

Having thus aroused unselfish joy with respect to a dear person, the meditator can then direct it towards a neutral one, and after that towards a hostile one.

But if resentment towards the hostile one arises in him, he should make it subside in the same way as described under the exposition of loving-kindness.

He should then break down the barriers by means of impartiality towards the four, that is, towards these three and himself. And by cultivating the sign (or after-image, obtained in concentration), developing and repeatedly practicing it, he should increase the absorption to triple or (according to the Abhidhamma division) quadruple jhana.

Next, the versatility (in this meditation) should be understood in the same way as stated under loving-kindness. It consists in:

(a) Unspecified pervasion in these five ways:
"May all beings... all breathing things... all creatures... all persons... all those who have a personality be free from enmity, affliction, and anxiety, and live happily!"
(b) Specified pervasion in these seven ways:
"May all women... all men... all Noble Ones... all not Noble Ones... all deities... all human beings... all in states of misery (in lower worlds) be free from enmity, etc."
(c) Directional pervasion in these ten ways:
"May all beings (all breathing things, etc.; all women, etc.) in the eastern direction... in the western direction... northern... southern direction... in the intermediate eastern, western, northern, and southern direction... in the downward direction... in the upward direction be free from enmity, etc."
This versatility is successful only in one whose mind has reached absorption (jhana).

When this meditator develops the mind-deliverance of unselfish joy through any of these kinds of absorption he obtains these eleven advantages: he sleeps in comfort, wakes in comfort, and dreams no evil dreams, he is dear to human beings, dear to non-human beings, deities guard him, fire and poison and weapons do not affect him, his mind is easily concentrated, the expression of his face is serene, he dies unconfused, if he penetrates no higher he will be reborn in the Brahma World (A v 342).

Publisher's note
The Buddhist Publication Society is an approved charity dedicated to making known the Teaching of the Buddha, which has a vital message for people of all creeds.

Freud - A requiem.

2011-04-10T22:18:00.000+01:00

On Transience

By Sigmund Freud

Translation by James Strachey

Not long ago I went on a summer walk through a smiling countryside in the company of a taciturn friend and of a young but already famous poet. The poet admired the beauty of the scene around us but felt no joy in it. He was disturbed by the thought that all this beauty was fated to extinction, that it would vanish when winter came, like all human beauty and all the beauty and splendour that men have created or may create. All that he would otherwise have loved and admired seemed to him to be shorn of its worth by the transience which was its doom.

The proneness to decay of all that is beautiful and perfect can, as we know, give rise to two different impulses in the mind. The one leads to the aching despondency felt by the young poet, while the other leads to rebellion against the fact asserted. No! it is impossible that all this loveliness of Nature and Art, of the world of our sensations and of the world outside, will really fade away into nothing. It would be too senseless and too presumptuous to believe it. Somehow or other this loveliness must be able to persist and to escape all the powers of destruction.

But this demand for immortality is a product of our wishes too unmistakable to lay claim to reality: what is painful may none the less be true. I could not see my way to dispute the transience of all things, nor could I insist upon an exception in favour of what is beautiful and perfect. But I did dispute the pessimistic poet’s view that the transience of what is beautiful involves any loss in its worth.

On the contrary, an increase! Transience value is scarcity value in time. Limitation in the possibility of an enjoyment raises the value of the enjoyment. It was incomprehensible, I declared, that the thought of the transience of beauty should interfere with our joy in it. As regards the beauty of Nature, each time it is destroyed by winter it comes again next year, so that in relation to the length of our lives it can in fact be regarded as eternal. The beauty of the human form and face vanish for ever in the course of our own lives, but their evanescence only lends them a fresh charm. A flower that blossoms only for a single night does not seem to us on that account less lovely. Nor can I understand any better why the beauty and perfection of a work of art or of an intellectual achievement should lose its worth because of its temporal limitation. A time may indeed come when the pictures and statues which we admire to-day will crumble to dust, or a race of men may follow us who no longer understand the works of our poets and thinkers, or a geological epoch may even arrive when all animate life upon the earth ceases; but since the value of all this beauty and perfection is determined only by its significance for our own emotional lives, it has no need to survive us and is therefore independent of absolute duration.

These considerations appeared to me incontestable; but I noticed that I had made no impression either upon the poet or upon my friend. My failure led me to infer that some powerful emotional factor was at work which was disturbing their judgement, and I believed later that I had discovered what it was. What spoilt their enjoyment of beauty must have been a revolt in their minds against mourning. The idea that all this beauty was transient was giving these two sensitive minds a foretaste of mourning over its decease; and, since the mind instinctively recoils from anything that is painful, they felt their enjoyment of beauty interfered with by thoughts of its transience.

Mourning over the loss of something that we have loved or admired seems so natural to the layman that he regards it as self-evident. But to psychologists mourning is a great riddle, one of those phenomena which cannot themselves be explained but to which other obscurities can be traced back. We possess, as it seems, a certain amount of capacity for love—what we call libido—which in the earliest stages of development is directed towards our own ego. Later, though still at a very early time, this libido is diverted from the ego on to objects, which are thus in a sense taken into our ego. If the objects are destroyed or if they are lost to us, our capacity for love (our libido) is once more liberated; and it can then either take other objects instead or can temporarily return to the ego. But why it is that this detachment of libido from its objects should be such a painful process is a mystery to us and we have not hitherto been able to frame any hypothesis to account for it. We only see that libido clings to its objects and will not renounce those that are lost even when a substitute lies ready to hand. Such then is mourning.

My conversation with the poet took place in the summer before the war. A year later the war broke out and robbed the world of its beauties. It destroyed not only the beauty of the countrysides through which it passed and the works of art which it met with on its path but it also shattered our pride in the achievements of our civilization, our admiration for many philosophers and artists and our hopes of a final triumph over the differences between nations and races. It tarnished the lofty impartiality of our science, it revealed our instincts in all their nakedness and let loose the evil spirits within us which we thought had been tamed for ever by centuries of continuous education by the noblest minds. It made our country small again and made the rest of the world far remote. It robbed us of very much that we had loved, and showed us how ephemeral were many things that we had regarded as changeless.

We cannot be surprised that our libido, thus bereft of so many of its objects, has clung with all the greater intensity to what is left to us, that our love of our country, our affection for those nearest us and our pride in what is common to us have suddenly grown stronger. But have those other possessions, which we have now lost, really ceased to have any worth for us because they have proved so perishable and so unresistant? To many of us this seems to be so, but once more wrongly, in my view. I believe that those who think thus, and seem ready to make a permanent renunciation because what was precious has proved not to be lasting, are simply in a state of mourning for what is Lost. Mourning, as we know, however painful it may be comes to a spontaneous end. When it has renounced everything that has been lost, then it has consumed itself, and our libido is once more free (in so far as we are still young and active) to replace the lost objects by fresh ones equally or still more precious. It is to be hoped that the same will be true of the losses caused by this war. When once the mourning is over, it will be found that our high opinion of the riches of civilization has lost nothing from our discovery of their fragility. We shall build up again all that war has destroyed, and perhaps on firmer ground and more lastingly than before.

Breathe in hope, love and abundance. Exhale fear and doubt.

2011-04-03T10:33:00.000+01:00

Even though you may think you have changed your negative ways of being, there is always room for improvement. Especially when you feeling needy, develop mindfulness so that you are always in tune with you. Be there for you. Doing your best is creating positive, loving intention in everything that you do.

Say yes to love and life. Welcome challenges. Take a risk. Reframe and retrain your body, thinking, feeling patterns and themes. Life will expand when your thinking does. Fear constricts thinking. Listen to learn. And learn to listen.

When you feel trapped by life, embrace fully in your heart's 'Yes' whatever you are refusing. Feel your shape of tension, relax as it, and feel open, ten feet at a time, eventually feeling from your heart to all, and beyond.

Breathe as the shape you may still be holding, and breathe open as the all-living light, alive as the entire moment's display. As everything comes and goes, live all things open as love, gifting without choice from your depth. Freedom is openness is love.

Running is my new found magic bullet!

2011-03-27T18:34:00.001+01:00

The relationship I have with myself is the relationship template I bring into all my encounters. Therefore, being authentic; whole and complete may drive the quest for emotional/spiritual/intellectual and physical intelligence to manifest, albeit fleetingly in the beginning, then for longer periods until life becomes manageable, balanced and enjoyable for huge chunks of time.....until that gorgeous state of being - which is to be comfortable to be in one's own skin - arrives to stay.

If life is one long continuum of challenges then I think I am doing really well in my search for ways in which to increase awareness and be happy. Life in the metropolis means being challenged by people with an agenda or a need to attack either verbally or physically – such unfortunates cross my path on a daily basis.

Often I am shocked at how challenging it is to travel from point A –B across London without being run over, whacked by a handbag, tripped by a suitcase, stabbed by an umbrella or visually triggered by fashion-failures.

I usually commute preferably in the day time as I find the evening revelers, the tribally dis-affected packs of drug addicts/ binge drinkers to be invasive, rude and prone to violent outbursts in their attention –seeking endeavors.

Overcoming the need to act out emotional pain is a challenge. Eckhart Tolle wisely espouses "Create no more pain in the present" but for some people that is their reason for living!

It is too simplistic to say let go...letting go is a proactive process which considering how easy it is to act out discontent and approaching life with a modicum of healthy Ego boundaries may bypass huge swathes of civilization.
Doing things differently is a choice - a positive/proactive step towards changing maladaptive patterns & themes.

Like this....
Yesterday was the first morning meet up to run with my new running club. In January, spurred by my bodies inherent wisdom appearing as a wish to run, I listened and then responded to this odd, by my experience, request.
Odd, because I have never wanted to run in my life. On the contrary. I have avoided running because of childhood memories of coming last in every race I ever ran. If I did run a race it was because ALL my excuses had failed to have me excluded. Up to my early 50's I was always thin and toned naturally -people always assumed I worked out like mad or even ran.

Since childhood, in my adopted Australia, I grew up swimming in all seasons, in the ocean, surfing/ hang-gliding, sailing which continued when I lived in New York and Sag Harbor and up until my mid thirties when I moved back to the Mother Country- the U.K.

I ceased to expose myself to the sun 25 years ago - I have residual but minimal sun damage according to what my skin specialist said when he removed a benign mole from my neck a few weeks ago. I eat and cook organic food, juice-fast whenever and do need to knock on the head a hike in sugar that has continued for too long.

Mindfulness of the aging process is central to good health. Changing routines is also called for when injuries happen. For example, I used to love doing Iyengar yoga. This stopped when a shoulder injury meant that for over a year I could not lift my arm up, move it behind my back or lift anything. X-rays revealed no visible tissue/bone damage. Despite the pain-factor, the sheer discomfort of not being able to exercise at all took its toll.

It may have been linked to past injuries related to when I rode a bike around London. I did this for ever, until I decided that it is too dangerous – I have been run over and knocked off my bike a few times. Back then I would pick myself up and get back on the bike, now it is just too dangerous - in urban London so many people text/talk and drive that being a pedestrian is challenging enough.
I remember living in New York which is a gorgeous city to walk about in when you are not wearing stilettos that is…and the couriers used to own the sidewalk until New Yorkers reclaimed it, but that’s New York and not London.

Now, walking anywhere is a challenge. Yummy mummies, with their baby carriages. act as though they are in a coma, lacking in consciousness regarding other people using the pavement.

Hey ho. Shifting from yoga to Tai Chi and Qi Gong has been great and another challenge to work with different muscles and energies. I do subscribe to the idea that you can heal your life.

As of yesterday I am now becoming a runner. There are APPS for absolutely everything - and Nike's apps are fabulous but I needed a pre-app to kick start running. I do Qi Gong regularly and am in very good health but lack strong muscle tone and overall body strength. Factoring all this in I found a running club that runs in the park near my house. I waited patiently for the Clubs next start-date (Spring) three months later, to start doing something that began as an organic urge to run!
We have endured times where we were house bound because of snow resulting in a cold/long winter of great beauty blended with the usual discontent that the last vestiges of winter’s perma grey skies can induce.

I learned how to bring the influences of Ayurveda’s warming spices- with- everything cooking in our winter diet but still caught the mother of colds with only my daily meditation practice to keep me from going completely mad as a side-effect of antibiotics and flu-stress.

Now it is spring and everything is budding nicely in the garden.All week I have thinking about Saturday morning and my first run with the club. On Friday it was 16c and spring-like. I wore layers of linen and a gorgeous pair of velvet mules to work only to suffer later with blisters!!! What to do? Could I run on Saturday? Images of me sitting on the ground whilst everyone else was running played out in my fertile imagination.

What did happen in reality is that I took care of feet when I got home and again the next morning. My beloved darling soothed the blisters with neem cream and plasters. His an aside humor despite my protestations that I was doomed to fail-fast.

He needed to redeem himself after his fashion failure remark about my fab-designer-kit running jacket – this reminded him of a lollipop lady!!!!! Jacket return - rethought over night. Now I love it and now he does too!

Later for the designer-running kit – socks….. I ran without them in my newish trainers. As for sports bra! A question. Are sports bras designed by men or women without shoulders? Do these people not know that a cross-over back needs a front opening support to fit it all together and or a dresser to get you in and out of this contraption? Hey ho I refused to compromise my breasts – being bound in bands of elastic is my idea of fashion/bondage hell.

Instead, I wore one of my Rigby & Pellar bras and forgot all about the boring sports-bra consumer concept of “banishing bounciness”. Today I found a website that does front opening sports bras – Yes!

Fashion does not have to halt at the sports zone. Running with a nod to fashion-in-sports cred is an aspect of my emerging runners persona. As the time to get a move on into the park drew near and nearer, I switched to a free-floating obsession about age/body-image etc...this over-rode residual blister pain. When I met 30+ runners; 20 or so new to running like me and the others all experienced runners, to run with us I felt at home - pronto!

After the meet/greet etc...We did warm-ups and then I ran a mile! I ran my first ever mile without stopping to walk or pass out. It was the most wonderful feeling of complete at-oneness with life that I have encountered in ages!

My running club homework is this week I have to recreate the run twice, for 8 minutes, in the park before next Saturday's scheduled second lesson in running! How do I feel? Amazing! You know 8 minutes is nothing to a season runner but for this girl it's awesome.

Post one mile run, my breathing is fabulous. Ditto posture, skin and energy. No pain. No Gain. Despite feeling head-to-toe discomfort it is exquisite pain. I am a convert to running - I listened to what my body wanted and now it is humming.

2011-03-14T14:33:00.002Z

Meditation Newsletter

from vipassana.com

March 2011

"There is only one place where enlightenment is possible, namely, in the mind. All of us have the seed of enlightenment within. If that were not so, there would be no point in leading a spiritual life. But since the potential is in all of us, it is wise to cultivate that seed."

- Ayya Khema ('Within Our Own Hearts')

April Meditation Course

"This course was just the thing I was looking for: a balanced set of methods with your gentle but firm guidance and very practical point of view; no gimmicks or cure-it-alls but warm commitment. Great!" - a recent participant

The next session of our online meditation course begins on Saturday, April 30th, 2011. It provides a great opportunity to start learning to meditate or to develop your existing practice in the company of others from around the world.

Vipassana Fellowship's courses have been offered since 1997 and they have proven helpful to meditators in many countries. The 90 day course serves as a practical introduction to samatha (tranquillity or serenity) and vipassana (insight) techniques from the Theravada tradition of Buddhism. Intended primarily for beginners, of any faith or none, the course is also suitable for experienced meditators who wish to explore different aspects of the tradition. The emphasis is on building a sustainable and balanced meditation practice that is compatible with lay life.

The course takes place on our special website that offers daily material for each of the 90 days, interaction between participants and support from the tutor. Participants also have access to an audio supplement containing guided meditations and chants to support the online material. The course will be led by Andrew Quernmore, an experienced meditation teacher based in England.

Application details and further information is available here:

http://www.vipassana.com/course/

Our Parisa support and encouragement programme is for former course participants; if you have taken one or more of our online courses you are eligible to subscribe. We provide themed teachings each month, year round, and access to our latest course. Andrew is also available to respond to support requests.

http://www.vipassana.com/parisa/

What Does It Mean To Be Enlightened?

by Bhikkhu Bodhi

The word "buddha" was already known and in circulation before the Buddha appeared on the Indian scene. The word means "enlightened," and spiritual seekers would commonly discuss the question "Who is a Buddha? Who is enlightened?" Once an aged brahmin named Brahmayu heard that the ascetic Gotama, the man rumored to be a Buddha, had arrived in his town and he decided to pay him a visit. When the old brahmin arrived, the Buddha was in the midst of a discussion with many people. Since the old brahmin was highly distinguished, when he came into the midst of the crowd, everyone gave way to him. The Buddha too realized that this was a highly respected brahmin, the teacher of several generations of pupils, so he asked Brahmayu to come right up to the front of the assembly and to take a seat beside him.

Brahmayu then said to him, "Honorable Gotama, I would like to ask you some questions." The Buddha invited him to ask what was op his mind, and the brahmin phrased his questions in a four-line verse, the basic point of which was, "How can one be called a Buddha, an Enlightened One?" The Buddha responded in verse:

"What has to be known, that I have known;

What has to be abandoned, that I have abandoned;

What has to be developed, that I have developed;

Therefore, O brahmin, I am a Buddha."

This answer tells us, very concisely, three characteristics of an Enlightened One. These are not only three characteristics of a Buddha; they are also three objectives at which we aim in following the Buddha's teaching. If someone were to ask, "What is your fundamental purpose in taking refuge in the Triple Gem? What is your purpose in following the precepts? What is your purpose in practicing meditation?" your answer should come down to the same three points: to fully know what should be known; to abandon what should be abandoned; and to develop what should be developed. These are the goals of the Buddhist path and the three accomplishments that mark the attainment of enlightenment.

If you are familiar with the Buddha's First Sermon, you would immediately recognize that these three tasks are aligned with three of the Four Noble Truths. The first noble truth is the noble truth of dukkha, usually translated suffering, unsatisfactoriness, or stress. What is the task to be performed in relation to this noble truth of suffering? The noble truth of suffering is to be. correctly "known," fully known, fully understood. The noble truth of the origin, or cause, of suffering is craving, and the task to be performed in relation to this truth is abandonment: craving is to be "abandoned." The fourth noble truth, the Noble Eightfold Path, is the truth that has to be "developed." The one noble truth that isn't mentioned in the Buddha's verse is the third truth, the noble truth of the cessation of suffering. This has its own task as well: the cessation of suffering is to be "realized." But when the other three tasks are accomplished, realization of the noble truth of the cessation of suffering will naturally follow.

What does it mean to say that our task is "to know that which should be known"? What we have to know, what we have to understand, is that which is closest to ourselves, what we usually refer to as our self. What we usually refer to as our self is this complex of body and mind. For most of us, from the time we are born right up to the time of our death, our minds face outwardly, engaged in a tireless quest for pleasure and sensual gratification, for the enhancement of our self, for the confirmation of our sense of ego-identity. Very few people stop and turn around to consider the question, "What is it that I call my self? What is the 'I' behind the reference I make to myself?" And yet, if you reflect for just a moment, you will see that this is the most important question we can ask. If, from the day of your birth until the day you draw your final breath, the best you can do when you are asked, "Who are you? What is your identity?" is to pull out your driver's license or show your birth certificate, without really knowing who you are or what you are, then you've made a pretty bad job of your journey from birth to death.

Our task in following the Buddha's teaching is to investigate what it is we refer to as "I," as "my self;" as "what I am." We usually take these terms to refer to some kind of persisting entity, an ego, a substantial self possessing a real identity. But the Buddha teaches that all such ideas are deceptions. When we look, when we investigate the referents of the terms, 111,11 "me; " and "my self;" what we find are just components of bodily and mental experience. To aid investigation, the Buddha has neatly classified these components of bodily and mental experience into five groups. These are called the "five aggregates of clinging" because they are the things that we ordinarily cling to with the ideas, "This is mine, this is what I am, this is my true self."

So we find, underlying these notions of "I" and "self," just these five aggregates: the aggregate of bodily form, the material substance that constitutes our bodies; the aggregate of feeling: pleasant, painful, and neutral feelings; the aggregate of perception: the mental function of identifying the characteristics of things, acts of identifying, recognizing, and remembering; the aggregate of volitional formations, the various functions connected with volition; and the aggregate of consciousness: the light of awareness arising on the basis of the six sense bases.

For each of us, this is the totality of what we call our self. Our task in following the Buddha's teaching is to come to know, to come to understand, the true nature of these five aggregates. We thereby come to know what constitutes our real identity. From birth, through adulthood, to old age and death, this whole process of life is just a succession of the five aggregates bound together as conditions and conditionally arisen phenomena. The bodily aggregate or form is the basis, and on this basis, the mental aggregates arise and pass away. Through meditation practice, we examine very deeply, with a fine focus, the nature of these five aggregates as they occur from moment to moment. We see them arising, standing, and dissolving, which gives us the insight into impermanence. From the understanding of impermanence comes the insight into suffering, the unsatisfactory nature of the five aggregates. We then realize that these changeable five aggregates are undependable, insecure, unreliable, and therefore cannot be taken as our self: they are empty or selfless.

The second project the Buddha's teaching sets for us is "to abandon that which should be abandoned." What should be abandoned are the defilements. The Buddha uses the word kilesas as an umbrella term that includes all the mental states that cause suffering and unhappiness in our lives. The Buddha's teaching offers a detailed investigation of the mind which enables us to understand how the mind works. But this investigation is not undertaken in the value-free way in which contemporary psychology might describe the workings of the mind. Buddhist psychology defines its values clearly and sharply. It draws definite ethical distinctions, draws them without hesitation or ambiguity, because these ethical distinctions have vital implications for our desire to achieve happiness and avoid suffering.

According to the Buddha's teaching, unethical actions and impure mental states can never give rise to true and lasting happiness. Rather, unethical actions and defiled mental states inevitably germinate in unhappiness, in suffering. It is true that defiled states of mind, especially greed and craving, are accompanied by pleasure and enjoyment. If that weren't the case, the world would be filled with enlightened people. And yet the pleasure that accompanies present craving and greed is just a superficial coat that covers a bad seed. When that seed germinates and bears its fruits, it will bring pain and suffering either in this life, or if not in this life, then in future lives. In contrast, wholesome states of mind may sometimes be accompanied by present pain, because to develop them we have to go against the current, against the natural grain of the mind. But when those wholesome states bear their fruits, inevitably they will lead to happiness, to peace, and to inner well-being. Again, this is part of the same law, the law of moral causation.

The unwholesome mental states are called kilesas. The word can be translated afflictions because they bring suffering. It can also be translated defilements because they defile and corrupt the mind. The Buddha has analyzed the nature of the defilements and has beautifully explained how they can all be traced to the three "root defilements" of greed, hatred, and delusion. Our task in following the Buddha's teaching, in practicing the Dhamma, is to overcome, to eliminate, to abandon the defilements of greed and hatred that give rise to many other branch defilements. But greed and hatred spring ultimately from delusion or ignorance. And thus to eliminate all the defilements, we have to eliminate ignorance.

Ignorance is what covers up the five aggregates, what we refer to as I, mine, and myself. Thus the way to overcome ignorance or delusion is through the first task "knowing that which should be known." When we know that which should be known, ignorance falls away - greed, hatred, and all the other defilements fall away. It isn't possible, however, to accomplish this merely by having the desire to do so. We can't expect simply to think, "I want to know that which should be known;" and immediately it is known. That's why the whole practice of Buddhism is a process of walking a path. The great gift that the Buddha offers the world is not simply a profound philosophy, not simply a penetrating psychology, but a practical, systematic, step-by-step path that we can cultivate in every aspect of our lives.

To cultivate the path means to "develop that which should be developed." This is the third project the Buddha speaks of in his four-line verse: "That which should be developed, that I have developed." So what the Buddha has developed is what we have to develop. One cultivates the path in order "to abandon that which should be abandoned," namely, the defilements. And again, one cultivates the path in order "to know that which should be known," the five aggregates.

How does developing the path do this? Again, the path is structured in such a way that it proceeds not suddenly, not abruptly, but in a gradual step-by-step manner to help us climb the ladder to the ultimate freedom of enlightenment. One has to begin by keeping the coarser expression of the defilements under control. One does this by observing the precepts. One observes the Five Precepts or the Eight Precepts. These control the coarser expressions of the defilements, the defilements that erupt in the form of unwholesome actions.

Observing the precepts is not merely a matter of abstaining from negative actions. One also has to cultivate their counterparts: virtuous, wholesome actions. These suffuse the mind with pure and purifying qualities. One has to be compassionate and kindly towards others, to be honest in one's dealings with others, to be constantly truthful in one's communications, to be responsible to one's family and society, to observe right livelihood, to be diligent, to be respectful of others, to be patient under difficult conditions, to be humble and upright. All these virtues gradually help to purify the mind and make the mind bright, clean, and radiant.

To develop what must be developed, it isn't sufficient merely to cultivate morality. One must go further and cultivate concentration. When we try to collect and concentrate the mind, we begin to understand how our minds work. We gain insight into the workings of our own minds. By understanding the workings of our own minds, we're gradually changing the shape of the mind. First, we are beginning to weaken and undermine those unwholesome qualities that defile the mind. We are scraping away the soil in which the unwholesome roots have been lodged. We have to remember that the unwholesome roots have been lodged in our minds throughout beginningless time. The process isn't a quick or easy one, but requires gradual, persistent, and dedicated effort.

As one practices consistently, the mind will eventually settle into firm concentration. It acquires the skills needed to remain settled upon an object consistently, without wavering, and this provides the opportunity for wisdom to arise. Wisdom is the third quality that needs to be developed. Wisdom comes through examination, through investigation.

To be sure, wisdom does not arise only from meditative concentration. Even in your day-to-day life, when you study the Buddha's teachings, especially the important discourses on the development of wisdom, such as the teachings on the five aggregates, dependent origination, and the Four Noble Truths, you are investigating the Dhamma and thereby creating the conditions for wisdom. You are generating a conceptual wisdom that is already starting to dig away at the root of ignorance. So just by studying the teaching and reflecting on the teaching, you are already shaking the deep root of ignorance.

But the ultimate wisdom is experiential. When one has developed a strongly concentrated mind, one uses that mind to investigate the five aggregates. As one observes one's own experience, one directly sees into their real nature, into "the true characteristics of phenomena." Generally, one first sees the arising and falling away of the five aggregates. That is, one sees their impermanence. One sees that because they're impermanent, they're unsatisfactory. There's nothing worth clinging to in them. And because they're impermanent and unsatisfactory, one cannot identify with any of them as a truly existing self. This is the empty or self-less nature of the five aggregates. This marks the arising of true insight wisdom.

With insight-wisdom, one cuts deeper and deeper into the root of ignorance until one comes to fully understand the nature of the five aggregates. When one does so, one can then say that one has "known that which should be known." And by fully knowing that which should be known, the defilements "that should be abandoned have been abandoned;" and the path "that should be developed has been developed." One then realizes that which should be realized, the extinction of suffering right here and now. And, in the Buddha's own words, that is what makes an Enlightened One.

From BPS Newsletter No.55, 2006

Mindfulness: An All-Time Necessity

by C.F. Knight

Amongst the various attempts to define Buddhism is one that describes it as a system of mental discipline, or mind-training. Probably this is more accurate than most others, for whether we describe it as a philosophy, a religion, or a way of life, having regard to its goal — Nirvana — assuredly we find that “taming the mind” is the key to final liberation.

The importance of mindfulness, or mental discipline, cannot be over-stressed. “All that we are is the result of what we have thought,” says the Dhammapada. To give those words their full significance is to realise that in that pithy phrase is contained a full statement of the doctrine of karma. From our thoughts flow words and deeds of a karmic nature, the result of which (kamma-vipaka) is that all we are “is founded on our thoughts, is made up of our thoughts.” As our past thoughts laid the foundation for our present condition, so our present thoughts are further accentuating or modifying that condition.

In the Maha Satipatthana Suttanta of the Digha-Nikaya, the Buddha emphasises the importance of mindfulness. In opening the lengthy discourse he says:

"The one and only path leading to the purification of beings, to the passing far beyond grief and lamentation, to the dying out of ill and misery, to the attainment of right method, to the realisation of Nirvana is that of the Fourfold Setting up of Mindfulness."

In closing his discourse he further stresses its importance by saying:

"Whoso shall practise these Four Applications of Mindfulness for seven years, nay, for six, five, four, three, two or one year only, or even for six, five, four, three, two or one month, or for a fortnight, or even seven days in him one of two kinds of fruition may be looked for: either in this life Arahantship, or if there be yet residuum for rebirth, the state of him who returns no more. It was on account of this that was said which was said (at the beginning)."

The long variable range of time from seven years to seven days is a clear indication that while the setting up of mindfulness is the “one and only path,” it is still but a “path,” and not the goal. For some it may be longer than for others, according to their pertinacity and the insight acquired, and the hindrances and fetters to be overcome. It is mindfulness that enables us to become conscious of our shortcomings, but it does not eliminate them. That requires possession of the Seven Factors of Enlightenment of which mindfulness is but one in addition to a search for the truth, energy, joy, serenity, rapture and equanimity. Furthermore, the capacity for all factors will quite naturally vary from person to person. Still, the setting up of mindfulness is an all important prerequisite—“the one and only path.”

Such then is the necessity for the application of mindfulness insofar as our own spiritual progress is concerned in its most narrow and personal aspect. But it has a much wider application also. Mindfulness at a minimum is consciousness of actuality, awareness, or the grasp of facts independent of insight or intuition. Mindfulness in its broader sense invests every activity, through association of ideas, with a recollection, or calling to mind, of other facts or reactions. For example, mindfulness of a simple nature may be practised as we go about our daily tasks, observing in a specific way our actions, our immediate environment, the people we meet or pass, and so on. On a higher level, the offerings at the shrine and the repetition of the sacred formulas as we participate in our religious observances partake of a sacramental nature as mindfulness associates them with the object of our devotions. Again, in an even more simple form, it is mindfulness and the association of ideas that keep us from injury, from burning in the presence of fire, and on a higher level, it should make us conscious of the suffering created by the use of fire on other unfortunate beings as in warfare as waged today. As mindfulness protects us from pain and injury, it should also make us unwilling to inflict pain and injury on others. Mindfulness as applied to our personal lives is a necessity if we truly strive for perfection, and it should have a wider application in the appreciation of our relationship to our fellow beings. If we can “put ourselves in the other fellow’s shoes,” we can develop understanding and compassion in our dealings with him, and this is greatly to be desired today.

Before making mindfulness applicable to our wider contacts, our public life and its relationships, let us consider and understand them as they apply to us intimately in our own private lives. To engender love of our neighbour, compassion for him, and extend our help towards him, we must first be possessed of a loving nature ourselves; we must have before we can give. There are those who are more or less willing to assist in many ways others who are on a somewhat similar material, social, or spiritual level. Their sympathy and compassion, their generosity, is confined as it were to a horizontal plane, like a pebble dropped into a pool creating expanding ripples on its surface. They give where they can expect to receive in return. They seek for consolation from those whom they consider “will understand them.” Other strata of society are either beneath their notice, or regarded with envy as being “better off” and not in need of help or compassion. True metta and karuna — love in its widest sense, and compassion — should be like a gong struck in a silent room, from which the sound-waves are global in nature and penetrate to all six directions. To accomplish this, we must first discipline ourselves, and in order to do this we must understand our own make-up of foibles, eccentricities, short-comings, aspirations and ambitions, so mindfulness becomes a necessity and “the only path.”

Let us return to the discourse under consideration for guidance. The early portion of this discourse is introspective—know thyself—and is concerned with (1) the body, in physical structure and activities, (2) feelings, in their sensory meaning, and with regard to their instability, and (3) thoughts, with their ethical and karmic content. The latter portion of the-discourse leads on to (4) mindfulness of ideas, culminating in the perception of the Four Noble Truths, and living within the framework of the Fourth Truth—the Eightfold Way that leads to the “purification of beings, to passing far beyond grief and lamentation, to the dying out of ill and misery, to the attainment of right method, to the realisation of Nirvana.”

In considering the body mindfully we find it to be in a continual state of arising and passing away. We become aware of its movements and postures; aware of its need of clothing and sustenance, and how we supply these needs; aware of its component parts and their functions; and aware of its final disintegration—then we can say: “There is body.”

So too with feelings, as to whether they are pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral; whether they are of a physical nature or of a spiritual nature. We are fully conscious of our reactions to the stimuli affecting our feelings, recognising and classifying the cause and our reaction to it, until we can say: “There are feelings.”

Then we mindfully consider our thoughts fathered by our feelings. These cover our conscious life, our intelligent perception of action and reaction. We, at times, speak of our feelings being “hurt,” but do we ever mindfully reason as to why they are “hurt?” Probably we expected praise, or a gift that did not eventuate or thanks for services given. Or, maybe, we were censured or blamed unexpectedly. If we are mindful we will realise that the indifference, ingratitude, ill will or lack of generosity that ”hurt” our feelings belongs to another, and that vanity, covetousness, self-righteousness, etc, has been an error on our part.

That mindfulness of our thoughts is important we have already mentioned. It is in this realm that karmic volitions arise with their inevitable results to be experienced at some time in the future, in this life or another.

It is mindfulness that will enable us to recognise the three roots of evil arising from basic ignorance. Greed, hatred, and delusion are born of our thoughts due to an ignorance of their potentiality to reflect on our own lives the very results we are projecting towards others.

It is delusion which in turn gives rise to fear, superstition and intolerance on one hand, and on the other attachment, lust for sensual pleasures, craving and clinging.

It is from hatred that anger, malice and strife arise together with pride, resentment and revenge.

Greed is the source from which arises selfishness, avarice, covetousness, and the lack of generosity.

These evils — greed, hatred, and delusion — first arise to consciousness as the thoughts of our own mind, and later find expression as words and deeds. If we are mindful, it becomes most obvious that in the end we ourselves are the ones who suffer most from their arising.

This mindful self-analysis of our thoughts will enable us to subdue the unwholesome inclinations arising in the mind before they find irrevocable expression in words and deeds. In a like manner we should be just as conscious of wholesome thoughts and inclinations, and foster them. Also we should be conscious of the absence of wholesome thoughts and encourage their arising. Remember: “All that we are is founded on our thoughts, made up of our thoughts.” But, do not fall into the famous error of Descartes who declared: “I am thinking, so I exist” (cogito, ergo sum). What he should have said on that evidence was: “I am thinking, so there are thoughts.”

If the setting up of mindfulness has been successful so far, we know our body for what it is; we know feelings for what they are; we know thoughts with their fateful implications. Now we start to be mindful of the ideas that arise, the mental or psychological phenomena that are outside of the realm of sensory perception and reaction. If progress is to be made, first we must recognise and be mindful of any deterrents. Undue attachment to sensuous desire may gain admittance through any of the sense-doors, and mindfulness is the guardian of the gates. So too in respect to laziness and indifference, undue anxiety, worry and doubt. These should be promptly recognised and overcome or eliminated, while mindfulness itself should be a conscious factor in our determined search for truth, pursued with energy and joyous serenity and equanimity.

This brings us to the mindful recognition of the Four Noble Truths, the first of which is the all-pervasiveness of what is known in Buddhist circles as dukkha, a Pali word incapable of direct translation owing to the wide application of its meaning. The usual translations into “ill,” or ”suffering,” are inadequate, unsatisfactory, and misleading, giving rise to the popular criticism of Buddhism as being pessimistic. Dukkha does include ”suffering” ”pain” ”sorrow” and ”misery,” it is true, but it embraces a much wider scope of unease. It is defined as the ever-arising of new forms of existence; as growing old, with old age’s complements of decrepitude, hoary-ness, the wrinkled state, the shrinkage of life’s span, and the collapse of the sense faculties; as the laying down of the body in death; as the states of woe, heartache, and grief; as the visitation of calamity or illness; as the act and state of mourning, lamenting and deploring; as bodily and mental ill and pain; as the states of dejection and despondency and despair; as not getting what has been wished for.

Elsewhere in the scriptures it is further mentioned that dukkha is being separated from those we love and the things we are attached to; it is also being forced into contact with those we dislike, and having to bear with things which revolt us. Summed up, dukkha may be said to be all that amounts to disease in life. All the sorrows, the disappointments, the frustrations, and failures of our most cherished schemes are dukkha, but one cannot go into all these facets and details each time we wish to speak of the First Noble Truth, so we either use the imperfect and unsatisfactory translations or, better still, the untranslated Pali word — dukkha — rather than give an inadequate and wrong idea of it.

This is but one aspect of life as we know it. The Buddha did not eliminate happiness for either the layman or the monk. But happiness itself is based on an understanding of dukkha, its arising and its cessation. It is based on our individuality—our physical form, our feelings, our perceptions, our dispositions, and our mental activities as opposed to emotional volition.

The mindful absorption of the First Noble Truth may lend itself to the idea of pessimism if we fail to proceed to the subsequent Truths of its arising, its cessation and the Way leading to its cessation. These, while rebutting the idea of pessimism, are not on the other hand optimistic: they do not do away with the universality of dukkha, but they do lead to an understanding of why dukkha prevails and permeates our lives. By knowing it, realising its cause, and treading the Way to its final abolition, we are enabled to transcend the effect of dukkha, even to attaining the final goal of never returning to suffer again.

Now applying mindfulness to the arising of dukkha we can trace its rise to craving in one form or another, for this or that satisfaction that is so unstable and fleeting. It may be craving for the material things of this world, indulgence of the senses in sensual satisfaction, craving for fame and recognition, craving for the continued relationships of family life, craving for permanence in a world of constant change. Whatever form craving takes, it arises through the senses, through the imagination, or through the memory of past experiences, and only mindfulness will recognise the insidious growth of craving.

The cessation of dukkha is to the mindful person the elimination of that craving which gives rise to dukkha. At times we are faced with those who tell us any pleasure is an attachment and a source of craving, that it is wrong to like music, to admire a sunset, to enjoy one’s food, to appreciate odours, or to become attached to other beings. If this were so, then quite rightly Buddhism could be labelled as being pessimistic. But the Buddha and his disciples could admire the beauty of a tropic moonlight night. The Buddha could look back on Vesali and its beauty with nostalgia as he saw it for the last time. He praised those who cared for their children, and taught that the support of parents, the cherishing of wife and children, and the helping of relatives was of the highest merit. This applied to his monks as well as to laymen. He taught that brotherly love—association with the wise—was one of the highest blessings. The enjoyment of the good things of life was not condemned by the Buddha, although the acquisition of wealth added responsibilities in regard to its use. It is when craving for things not attained, or for the permanency of those which are attained, creeps in that dukkha becomes apparent.

Who has not suffered the loss of a loved one? Perhaps this is the most easy demonstration of attachment, craving, and subsequent dukkha. The reciprocal love that exists in a family is natural and virtuous in itself. From that untainted source grows the craving for an unbroken continuance of it. When death intervenes, as eventually it must, dukkha finds expression in the sense of loss and the grief that inevitably follows. If we realise that the most pleasant of relationships, the most desirable of experiences, the most fortunate of circumstances, are impermanent and unstable, then we can enjoy them while they last, and part from them with happy memories of the past, rather than with grief and sorrow as to the future.

And so we come to the Way that leads to the cessation of dukkha. It is also the Way that will enable us to give to others, to be mindful of their needs and, moreover, mindful of our obligations concerning them.

This Fourth Noble Truth has its eight sections, or steps, as they are often called. They cover a two-fold set of obligations for one who has set out on the holy life. The first is the further development of his own characteristics on the spiritual plane, and the other is his duty to his fellow men. There is another division usually used in dividing the eight steps, based on the development of ethics, concentration and wisdom. However, as we set out to show our obligation to others, for our purpose we will deal with them on the basis of us and others.

In regard to ourselves the first step is the acquisition of knowledge. By this is inferred a knowledge of the three Truths we have just examined—the mindful realisation of the universality of dukkha, its arising and its cessation. If we are going to be helpful and carry our beliefs into practice for the welfare of others it is obviously necessary that we must have an understanding of the cause and nature of the distress that is so evident in the world of today. This is called Right View.

Then we must be possessed of an aim or aspiration beneficial to others. We need and must have the aspiration toward renunciation in so far as ourselves are concerned—a detachment from selfish desires and ambitions and a willingness to make sacrifices for the good and welfare of others. There must also be the aspiration towards kindness and benevolence in our attitude to others. This is called Right Aspiration.

Our speech needs careful watching for this is so often the source of engendering anger and hatred in others. Lying, slandering, abusive terms, and derogatory statements in regard to others can but have the reaction of repulsion on their part, and lead on to active dislike or aggressive action as a result. To refrain from such speech is called Right Speech.

Speech leads to action as we have just mentioned. If our speech is right speech, our actions will be so influenced that the aspiration towards kindliness and benevolence becomes almost automatic. The incitement to acts of violence, the taking of life, stealing, or committing carnal offences against our fellow men cannot arise unless preceded by wrong aspiration and wrong thoughts. To refrain from such behaviour is called Right Action.

The next step is one that is, I think, unique among the injunctions laid upon the devotees of any religion — Right Livelihood. Certainly, the Christian is advised not only to avoid evil, but also the appearance of evil, or what might be assumed to be evil by the critics. Right Livelihood is not only to refrain from actions which in themselves involve direct and immediate harm to others, but also to refrain from depending for means of a livelihood on such a trade or following as will indirectly harm others. The occupations of hunters, butchers, fishers, and the makers of arms, are some of the proscribed occupations. This raises a most difficult point for one who would fulfil all the requirements of the Eightfold Way in the world of today. In a day and time when the world population was so much less, and the opportunities for choosing a trade or following were greater, it may have been possible to avoid occupations which directly or indirectly involved a threat of harm to others. But today, under modern conditions, it is virtually impossible for any individual to avoid being in some way indirectly involved in the harm of others.

This injunction has been rationalised in some cases by, for instance, employing other religionists as butchers, by driving cattle over a national boundary and then importing the products of the slaughterhouse. Again, during a period of war, a sincere conscientious objector may refuse to be inducted into the army, but he cannot earn a living in any trade or profession without paying taxes to sustain the war effort of his country. Under these circumstances there is no choice, but if there be a choice, for instance, if one can work as a carpenter, and though a slaughter man can earn more than the carpenter, it would be wrong to change to this means of livelihood just for the sake of the extra money to be earned. Difficult indeed is it to avoid harm to others for the layman, and it is obvious that a mass invasion of the Sangha is out of the question!

So we come to what is really a key to all the Steps of the Way — the cultivation of effort. In this essay we are primarily concerned with mindfulness, rather than a general exposition of Buddhist doctrines, and, most of all, the application of mindfulness in relation to our fellow men. But it is not possible to separate any one aspect of the Buddha’s teachings and isolate it from all others. In dealing with the Eightfold Way at some length, we are only as it were setting out the personal prerequisites that will enable us to give of our best. It will require great effort on our part to fulfil the perfecting of right thought, speech, action, and livelihood, even though we have right knowledge and aspiration.

It also does require effort to take an interest in the welfare of others. The general tendency of today is to let others do our thinking for us and then drift along with the crowd, indifferent as to where we are heading, or on whose toes we are treading. It takes mindful effort to concern ourselves with people we scarcely know or whom we have never met. We read of a flood in the East, of an earthquake in the West, of the genocide of a nation in the North, or suffering of civilian population caught between the cross-fire of armies in the South, but they are only items of news—they do not affect us. We are not mindful of the tragedies involved for those who suffer. One of the epithets assigned to the Buddha was “The Awakened One,” and because of his Awakening the floodgates of his compassion were opened to embrace all living creatures. For the most part we could be described as “The Asleep” in regard to our relationships with our fellow-men, and compassion is indeed a rare and seldom met characteristic today. We need to be mindful of our lack in this regard, and overcome the deficiency.

The seventh component factor of the Way is this very mindfulness with which we have been dealing. If subjectively mindfulness is present we should be aware of it, cultivate it, and develop it. If our mental training has been even partially efficient there is a more or less conscious control of our mind. The subjective existence or absence of mindfulness should be noted and mental action taken to develop existing mindfulness, or to bring mindfulness into existence. The whole purpose of Buddhist mind-training is for the adept to be the master of his mind, and by that discipline and mastery perfect his life to his own liberation and the benefit of others.

Much interest today surrounds the hallucinatory drug LSD. Repeatedly we are asked for our opinion as to its effectiveness in gaining “enlightenment,” or as an aid to meditation. The key to the answer is already inherent in its scientific classification. It is technically described as a “hallucinatory drug,” and its use can only produce hallucinations. This is just the opposite of the purpose of Buddhist mind-training, or the objectives of meditation, and can only bring evil effects to the addict. It is a gateway to delusion, which is one of the three roots of evil the true Buddhist seeks to overcome. It is also one of the forbidden things of the fifth precept, which proscribes the taking of intoxicants and harmful drugs.

The eighth step is the development of mental concentration up to the degree of the meditative absorption, which is not pertinent to our present consideration of mindfulness in regard to our relationship and obligations to others.

Now, if we have developed any such mindfulness, not only have we to some extent become masters of our own mind, but there has been an awakening of our understanding of the problems that we as individuals and the world of today are facing. It is such mental training that enables one to set aside the propaganda of nationalism or expediency, and penetrate to the root cause of the unrest and distress that is so prevalent. Many today are acutely conscious of the immediate circumstances that are causing their distress, and of these some are rebelling against them, whether they be famine, armed conflict, racial discrimination, the uncertainty of the future, poverty, or just sheer boredom from a surfeit of ease and luxury, but few there are who can penetrate to the basic causes for the existing conditions.

Earlier we referred to the function of mindfulness in recognising the three roots of evil — greed, hatred, and delusion— and on a world basis these apply just as equally as on a personal basis, so also does craving as a source of widespread dukkha, for world politics and national interests are but the sum total of the characteristics of the individuals holding the powers of government, and moulding the destinies of nations. In view of this it becomes obvious that we must first develop and train our minds, and then use them, if we are going to be of any real service to our fellow men. We must eradicate greed, with its selfishness, copiousness, and lack of generosity; we must eliminate hatred, with its anger, malice, strife, racial prejudices, resentment and revenge; we must wipe away the clouds of delusion that give rise to fear and intolerance, craving for sensual pleasures, and a continuance of the status quo. In their place we must develop unselfishness and generosity, loving kindness, tolerance and understanding, patience, and equanimity, and so fit us for the task of changing national and international conditions to a sum total of these beneficent characteristics.

Such is our aim and aspiration as Buddhists. The culmination will depend on the effort put forth as mindfulness reveals the cause and cure of dukkha.

From 'Metta', November 1967

Sati Haus, Germany

Our friends at Sati Haus, in the countryside near Hamburg, are offering retreats in Insight Meditation (with Vimalo Bhikkhu), Meditation and Calligraphy (with Byong Oh Sunim), Traditional Thai Massage (with Sakhorn Boudewijn), and Meditation for Young People (with Revato Axel Wasmann). Full details of all courses and retreats can be found at:

http://www.sati-haus.com

Vipassana Courses in the Czech Republic

Adjan Chaiwood will be leading 10 day vipassana courses and one 26 day course between April and July 2011 at Zeliv Monastery. Adjan Chaiwood is the fifty-five-year old abbot of the Wat Nong Bua monastery in Thailand. This is a rare opportunity to hear him teach in the Czech Republic. Further details are available at:

http://www.meditujeme.cz

The Vipassana Fellowship Newsletter is published about 10 times each year and is sent only on request and to previous participants of our courses. Vipassana Fellowship is an organisation dedicated to the dissemination of accurate and useful information on meditation practices as found in the Theravada tradition. Our next mailing will be in April. Our site can be accessed via the vipassana.com and vipassana.org domains.

Newsletter © Copyright 2011, Vipassana Fellowship Ltd. (Registered in England No. 4730782).

Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life by Karen Armstrong

2011-03-03T10:06:00.005Z

Book Description
After the bestselling The Case for God, Karen Armstrong makes the case for compassion – an urgent appeal to establish empathy and altruism at the centre of our private and public lives.
Product Description
* Drawing on a wide range of material - ranging from the spiritual character of the world religions to the findings of contemporary neuroscience - Karen Armstrong argues that compassion is hardwired into our brains, yet is constantly pushed back by our more primitive instincts for selfishness and survival. Since time immemorial religion has enhanced our altruistic tendencies: all faiths insist that the Golden Rule is the test of true spirituality – ‘Always treat others as you wish to be treated yourself’.

Taking as her starting point the teachings of the great world religions, Karen Armstrong demonstrates in twelve practical steps how we can bring compassion to the forefront of our lives. These steps both reveal the inadequacies of our knowledge of ourselves and others and enable us to unlock our potential for understanding, empathy and altruism that can be translated into acts of kindness and charity.They culminate in the most radical and challenging of all religious maxims – love your enemy. Yet in today’s world, compassion in no longer a luxury but, in the words of Martin Luther King, ‘an absolute necessity for our survival’.

Practising these steps will not change our lives overnight and turn us into saints or sages: the attempt to become a more compassionate human being is a lifelong project. Yet Karen Armstrong argues that compassion is inseparable from humanity, and by transcending the limitations of selfishness on a daily basis we will not only make a difference in the world but also lead happier, more fulfilled, lives.
These steps both reveal the inadequacies of our knowledge of ourselves and others and enable us to unlock our potential for understanding, empathy and altruism that can be translated into acts of kindness and charity.They culminate in the most radical and challenging of all religious maxims – love your enemy. Yet in today’s world, compassion in no longer a luxury but, in the words of Martin Luther King, ‘an absolute necessity for our survival’.
Practising these steps will not change our lives overnight and turn us into saints or sages: the attempt to become a more compassionate human being is a lifelong project. Yet Karen Armstrong argues that compassion is inseparable from humanity, and by transcending the limitations of selfishness on a daily basis we will not only make a difference in the world but also lead more fulfilled, happier lives.
From the Back Cover
Praise for The Case for God:
'A journey through religion that helps us to rescue what remains wise from that which to many in Britain today no longer seems true…. Armstrong is one of the the handful of wise and supremely intelligent commentators on religion' Alain de Botton, Observer
'A tour de force of learning...it knocks Dawkins and Hitchens into an intellectual cocked hat...Armstrong rejoices in the unknowableness of life and searches, logically enough, for meaning therein' Sunday Herald
'This is a stunned appreciation of an ‘otherness’ beyond the reach of language, and which, for Armstrong, constitutes the heart of every religion' New Statesmen

About the Author
Karen Armstrong is one of the world’s leading commentators on religious affairs. She spent seven years as a Roman Catholic nun, but left her teaching order in 1969 to read English at St Anne's College, Oxford. In 1982, she became a full time writer and broadcaster. She is a best-selling author of over 16 books. An accomplished writer and passionate campaigner for religious liberty, Armstrong has addressed members of the United States Congress and the Senate and has participated in the World Economic Forum.

Awareness.

2011-03-02T19:02:00.002Z

Truth is coherent, beauty attractive, goodness stabilizing. And when these values of that which is real are coordinated in personality experience, the result is a high order of love conditioned by wisdom and qualified by loyalty. The real purpose of all universe education is to effect the better co-ordination of the isolated child of the worlds with the larger realities of his expanding experience. Reality is finite on the human level, infinite and eternal on the higher and divine levels.
By Victor Frankl - "Mans Ultimate Search for Meaning"

This is a beautiful method of mastering negativity if you are feeling discontented, contemplate on contentment: What is contentment?

Bring a balance. If your mind is angry, bring compassion in. Think about compassion and, immediately, the energy changes because they are the same; the opposite is the same energy. Once you bring it in, it absorbs. Anger is there: contemplate on compassion.

Do one thing: keep a statue of Buddha because that statue is the gesture of compassion. Whenever you are angry, go into the room, look at Buddha, sit Buddha-like, and feel compassion. Suddenly you will see a transformation happening within you: the anger is changing, excitement gone...compassion arising. And it is not different energy; it is the same energy — the same energy of anger — changing its quality, going higher. Try it.

Because when I am angry, if I think about compassion, will it not be a suppression?” No. It is sublimation: it is not suppression. If you are angry and you suppress anger without thinking of compassion then it is suppression. You go on pushing it down and you smile and you act as if you are not angry — and anger is bubbling there and boiling there and ready to explode. Then it is suppression. No, we are not suppressing anything, and we are not creating a smile or anything; we are just changing the inner polarity.

The opposite is the pole. When you feel hateful, think of love. When you feel desire, think of desirelessness and the silence that comes in it. Whatsoever the case, bring the opposite in and watch what happens within you. Once you know the knack of it, you have become a master. Now you have the key: any moment anger can be changed into compassion, any moment hate can be turned into love, any moment sadness can become ecstasy. Suffering can become bliss because suffering has the same energy as the bliss; the energy is not different. You just have to know how to channel it.

There is no suppression because the whole energy of anger becomes compassion — nothing is left to suppress. In fact, you have expressed it in compassion.

There are two ways of expression. In the West. now, catharsis has become very important. Encounter groups and Primal Therapy believe in catharsis. My own Dynamic Meditation is a method of catharsis because people have lost the key to sublimate. Patanjali does not talk about catharsis at all. Why doesn’t he talk about it? People had the key. the knack. They knew how to sublimate. You have forgotten, so I have to teach you catharsis.

Anger is there; it can be transformed into compassion, but you have no idea how to do it. And it is not an art which can be taught; it is a knack. You have to do it and learn it through doing it; there is no other way. It is just like swimming: you have to swim, and err, and sometimes get into danger. Sometimes you will feel lost; that your life is lost, you are drowning. You have to pass all those, and then the knack comes, then you know what it is. It is such a simple thing, swimming.

Have you observed? There are a few things you can learn but you cannot forget: swimming is one of those things. Or cycling: you can learn but you cannot forget. Everything else you can learn and you can forget. A thousand and one things you learned in your school; now you have almost forgotten all. The whole school system seems such a wastage. People learn, and then nobody remembers. Just to take the examination...then finished. Then nothing is remembered, But swimming you cannot forget. If you have not been to the river for fifty years and suddenly you are thrown in, you will swim again as fresh as ever — you will not have a single moment of hesitation about what to do. Why it happens so? Because it is a knack. It cannot be forgotten. It is not a learning; it is not an art. And learning, art, can be forgotten, but a knack? A knack is something that goes so deep into your being it becomes part of you. Sublimation is a knack.

Patanjali never talks about catharsis; I have to talk about it because of you. But once you understand, and if you can sublimate, then there is no need for catharsis because catharsis is, in a way, a wastage of energy. But, unfortunately, nothing can be done right now. And you have been suppressed for so many centuries that sublimation looks like suppression, so only catharsis seems to be the way. First you have to be relieved — you become a little weightless, unburdened — and then you can be taught the art of sublimation.

Sublimation is using the energy in a higher way, the same energy being used with a different quality to it. But you can try. Many of you have gone through Dynamic Meditation for a long time. You can try: next time when anger is there, sadness is there, just sit silently and allow the sadness to move towards happiness — just help — push it a little. Don’t do too much and don’t be in a hurry, because the sadness will be reluctant at first to go towards happiness. Because for centuries, for many lives, you have not allowed it to move that way, it will be reluctant.

It is like a horse whom you are forcing towards a new path on which he has never been, he will be reluctant. He will try to go to the old pattern. to the old path, to the old rut. But by and by persuade it, seduce it. Tell sadness then, “Don’t be afraid. It is really groovy! Come this way. You can become happiness, and there is nothing wrong in it and nothing impossible.”

Just persuade, talk to your sadness, and one day you will suddenly find the sadness has moved into a new channel: it has become happiness.

Obstacles to peace of Mind.

2011-02-22T12:58:00.002Z

There are many ditractions during the day that take me out of the moment into the past and or future. Driven by fear and a flawed sense of injustice I can react when I know better thann that. Addtionally, I understand that it is my responsibility to take of myself.

The following article is taken from the Vipassana Meditation site and is valuable information regarding how such hindrances obstruct peace of mind and create upsets.
The Hindrances to Meditation
When we begin to meditate a whole range of things can very easily
deter us. Sometimes everything can appear to conspire against us
actually getting down to practise. It is important, particularly in the
early stages, that we have a strong resolve to keep meditating and
that our immediate expectations of results do not get in the way of
the actual experience of meditation.

The period we have set aside is a special time that we can use to refine our attentiveness to the object of meditation. Very often the mind will wander and each time we must remember to simply bring it back to the breath. The nature
of these disturbances will vary depending on a number of conditions.
If our lives are currently relatively calm and stress-free we may easily
be able to settle into a session. If we are hassled and have
difficulties in daily life then it may be more difficult. Some of us will come to meditation in the spirit of trust. Others will have many doubts about its validity. Wherever we are coming from, all of us will find that our initial sessions are not as we expected.
Stick with the practice as outlined and simply return to the breathing each time distractions arise.
There are common difficulties in practising meditation of which we will all become aware (even at an early stage). These are generally referred to as the Five Hindrances and they are those characteristics that make it difficult to sustain a regular practice. They are hindrances because they are apt to divert us from pursuing what is most beneficial. They sap our strength and ability to work in an optimal way. The Buddha likened this to a powerful river whose flow is gradually weakened by too many tributaries or streams draining off the water that gave it its strength. If we were to stop the water escaping to these secondary streams then the river would once more flow swiftly.

Another analogy used in the discourses is to impure gold. Until gold is purified to remove base metal and other impurities it is too brittle and cannot be fashioned effectively by the goldsmith. Once such impurities are removed the goldsmith is left with pure gold that is pliant, luminous and malleable. Our minds can have the strength and speed of a great river and the radiance, purity and flexibility of the purest gold if we work steadfastly to vanquish the hindrances.
As always, the Buddha does not spend time identifying problems without giving
recommendations on how we may overcome them. If we can identify these hindrances as
they occur then we can apply effective remedies to ensure that our meditation sessions remain valuable.

The Five Mental Hindrances (or nãvaraõa) are desire for sense experience (kàmacchanda),
Ill will (vyàpàda), sloth and torpor (thãna-middha), restlessness and worry (uddhacca-
kukkucca), and sceptical doubt (vicikicchà). We will look at each of the hindrances in turn and at some of the antidotes to them. Please incorporate any of the solutions that may be useful into your daily sessions. When we know how to work with the hindrances they lose their power, and even at this stage it is very useful to identify them as they occur.

Later, we will be working with other meditation practices that can also act as useful
antidotes.
DESIRE FOR SENSE EXPERIENCE
The desire for sensuous experience is said to be like trying to clearly see your reflection in a bowl of water into which various rich-hued pigments have been tipped. The colour and richness draw our attention and obscure the very thing we are trying to see.
The Buddha said that not even if it rained gold coins would we have our fill of sensuous pleasure. When we begin to meditate we find it very difficult to concentrate on such a simple object as the breath. Almost anything else seems more interesting. We actively listen for sounds that will entertain us during our sessions. We may drift off into fantasies about pleasant experiences we have had or which we crave. We anticipate the activities of the day and hold on to past experiences. If we allow these thoughts to hijack our meditation session then we cease to meditate and, instead, we escape into dreams and fantasy.
Rather than indulging this desire as it arises, it is simpler to acknowledge it and gently come back to the object of our meditation. These thoughts will arise for all of us. How we choose to respond to them is the key to whether our meditation periods will be of value.Sensuous desire is seen as preventing the attainment of one-pointedness. The classical antidote is consideration of the repulsive aspects of sense objects. We will look at an
aspect of how this may be incorporated into meditation practice later.
For now, the best strategy is one of acknowledgement, reflection and suppression. The
first tactic when sense desire arises is to acknowledge it. It is a hindrance to the meditation process because it makes concentration difficult. Although the thoughts are not wrong in themselves they are not meditation. Gently resolve to return to your object of meditation with determination to try to stay with it. If this is not effective, and the thought or distraction continues, then contemplate the nature of this desire that has arisen. Why do I desire this?
Is reality constructed only of those things we find attractive? Would I find lasting
satisfaction by giving in to this craving? Can it wait until this short period of meditation has finished? If the other antidotes have not facilitated a return to the object of your meditation, then determine that this period has been set-aside for a particular purpose and that the sense desire is preventing you from observing your commitment to the practice. The thoughts that have arisen are inappropriate at this time and cannot be indulged. Determine to return to the object of meditation. Outside of this meditation period you may like to consider simplifying your relationship to sense objects. Traditionally this is called guarding
the sense doors. A good place to begin is to reduce our reliance on trivia and indulgence.
Do these things actually bring us lasting happiness? If we simplify can we appreciate
things more and crave less?

You can heal your life.

2011-01-20T19:38:00.003Z

On Saturday I begin a 90 day Vipassana Meditation Training/Course. I work at love and love my work- this is how I do it - I meditate and am teachable. Living in the present moment is a gift. A marker of good mental health.

The following article has been condensed from a discourse given by S. N. Goenka.

At the surface, the mind plays so many games thinking, imagining, dreaming, giving suggestions. But deep inside, the mind remains a prisoner of its own habit pattern, and the habit pattern of the deepest level of the mind is to feel sensations and react. If the sensations are pleasant, the mind reacts with craving; if they are unpleasant, it reacts with aversion.

The enlightenment of the Buddha was to go to the root of the problem. Unless we work at the root level, we will be dealing only with the intellect and only this part of the mind will be purified. As long as the roots of a tree are healthy they will provide healthy sap for the entire tree. So start working with the roots. This was the enlightenment of the Buddha.

When he gave Dhamma, the Noble Eightfold Path the path of sīla (morality), samādhi (mastery over the mind) and paññā (experiential wisdom) it was not to establish a cult, a dogma or a belief. Dhamma is a practical path. Those who walk on it can go to the deepest level and eradicate all their miseries.

Those who have really liberated themselves will understand that going to the depth of the mind making a surgical operation of the mind has to be done by oneself, by each individual. Someone can guide you with love and compassion; someone can help you in your journey on the path, but nobody can carry you on their shoulders and say: "I will take you to the final goal, just surrender to me; I will do everything."

You are responsible for your own bondage. You are responsible for making your mind impure, no one else. You are responsible for purifying your mind by breaking all the bondages. No one else can do that for you.

Continuity of practice is the secret of success. When it is said that you should be continuously aware, this means that you must be aware with wisdom of the sensations on the body, where you really experience things arising and passing away. The awareness of anicca is what purifies your mind, the awareness of the arising and passing away of these sensations.

Intellectualising this truth will not help. You may understand: "Everything that arises sooner or later passes away. Anyone who takes birth sooner or later dies. This is anicca." You may understand this correctly but you are not experiencing it. Only your own personal experience will help you to purify your mind and liberate you from your miseries. The word for "experience" used in India at the time of Buddha was vedanā, feeling by experiencing, not just intellectualisation. And this is possible only when a sensation is felt on the body.

Anicca must be experienced. If you are not experiencing it, it is merely a theory. And the Buddha was not interested in theories. Even before the Buddha, and at the time of the Buddha, there were teachers who taught that the entire universe is anicca; this was not new. What was new from the Buddha was the experience of anicca; and when you experience it within the framework of your own body, you have started working at the deepest level of your mind.

Two things are very important for those who walk on the path. The first is breaking the barrier that divides the conscious and the unconscious mind. But even if your conscious mind can now feel those sensations that were previously felt only by the deep unconscious part of your mind, that alone will not help you. The Buddha wanted you to take a second step: change the mind’s habit of reacting at the deepest level.

Coming to the stage where you have started feeling sensations is a good first step, yet the habit pattern of reaction remains. When you feel an unpleasant sensation, if you keep reacting, "Oh, I must get rid of this," that will not help. If you start feeling a pleasant flow of very subtle vibrations throughout the body, and you react, "Ah, wonderful! This is what I was looking for. Now I’ve got it!" you have not understood Vipassana at all.

Vipassana is not a game of pleasure and pain. You have been reacting this way for your entire life, for countless lifetimes. Now in the name of Vipassana you have started making this habit pattern stronger. Every time you feel an unpleasant sensation you react with aversion; every time you feel a pleasant sensation you react with craving, in the same way as before. Vipassana has not helped you, because you have not practised Vipassana in the right way.

Whenever you again make the mistake of reacting because of the old habit, see how quickly you can become aware of it: "Look, an unpleasant sensation and I am reacting with aversion; look, a pleasant sensation and I am reacting with craving. This is not Vipassana. This will not help me."

Understand that this is what you have to do. If you are not one hundred per cent successful, it does not matter. This will not harm you as long as you keep understanding and keep trying to change the old habit pattern. If you have started coming out of your prison for even a few moments, you are progressing.

This is what the Buddha wanted you to do: practise the Noble Eightfold Path. Practise sīla so that you can have the right type of samādhi. For those who keep breaking sīla there is little hope that they will go to the deepest levels of reality. Sīla develops after you have some control over your mind, after you start understanding with paññā that breaking sīla is very harmful. Your paññā at the experiential level will help your samādhi. Your samādhi at the experiential level will help your sīla. Strong sīla will help your samādhi become strong. Strong samādhi will help your paññā become strong. Each of the three will start helping the other two and you will keep progressing, progressing on the path.

There were many techniques in India in those days, and also later on, practising which meditators started feeling subtle vibrations throughout the body, when the solidity of the body had dissolved. The truth is that even the subtlest vibration one can experience is still a phenomenon in the field of mind and matter. It is arising, passing, arising, passing; still in the field of anicca, a field of constant change.

Some meditators of old tried to impose a philosophy on this subtle experience. Having reached the stage where they experienced nothing but vibrations, they postulated: "Throughout the universe, there is this subtle energy. This is God Almighty. I am experiencing this; I am with God Almighty. The entire universe is one. Every being is God. Why should I have any kind of preference or prejudice?" It is a very positive mental suggestion but it only helps at a superficial level.

The reality is that even this very subtle experience is still in the field of mind and matter; it is not the ultimate truth that is beyond mind and matter. All these suggestions, however positive they may be, cannot liberate anyone. You must be with reality: all vibrations are nothing but a flux, a flow. This realisation removes the deep-rooted habit pattern of reacting to the sensations.

Whatever sensations you experience pleasant, unpleasant or neutral you should use them as tools. These sensations can become tools to liberate you from your misery, provided you understand the truth as it is. But these same sensations can also become tools that multiply your misery. Likes and dislikes should not cloud the issue. The reality is: sensations are arising and passing away; they are anicca. Pleasant, unpleasant or neutral it makes no difference. When you start realising the fact that even the most pleasant sensations you experience are dukkha (suffering), then you are coming nearer to liberation.

Understand why pleasant sensations are dukkha. Every time a pleasant sensation arises, you start relishing it. This habit of clinging to pleasant sensations has persisted for countless lifetimes, and it is because of this that you have aversion. Craving and aversion are two sides of the same coin. The stronger the craving, the stronger aversion is bound to be. Sooner or later every pleasant sensation turns into an unpleasant one, and every unpleasant sensation will turn into a pleasant one; this is the law of nature. If you start craving pleasant sensations, you are inviting misery.

The Buddha’s teaching helps us to disintegrate the solidified intensity that keeps us from seeing the real truth. At the actual level, there are mere vibrations, nothing else. At the same time, there is solidity. For example, this wall is solid. This is a truth, an apparent truth. The ultimate truth is that what you call a wall is nothing but a mass of vibrating subatomic particles. We have to integrate both these truths through proper understanding.

Dhamma develops our understanding, so that we free ourselves from the habit of reacting and understand that craving is harming us, aversion is harming us. And then we become more realistic: "See, there is ultimate truth, but there is also apparent truth, which is also a truth."

The process of going to the depth of the mind to liberate yourself is done by you alone; but you must also be prepared to work with your family, with society as a whole. The yardstick to measure whether love, compassion and goodwill are truly developing within you is whether these qualities are being exhibited toward the people around you.

The Buddha wanted us to be liberated at the deepest level of our minds. And that is possible only when three characteristics are realised: anicca (impermanence), dukkha (suffering) and anattā (egolessness). When the mind starts to become deconditioned, layer after layer becomes purified until the mind is totally unconditioned. Then purity becomes a way of life. You will not have to practise mettā (compassionate love) as you do now at the end of your one-hour sitting. Later, mettā just becomes a part of your life. All the time you will remain suffused with love, compassion and good will. This is the aim, the goal.

The path of liberation is the path of working at the deepest level of the mind. There is nothing wrong with giving good mental suggestions, but unless you change the blind habit of reacting at the deepest level, you are not liberated. Nobody is liberated unless the deepest level of the mind is changed. And the deepest level of the mind is constantly in contact with bodily sensations.

We have to divide, dissect and disintegrate the entire structure to understand how mind and matter are interrelated. If you work only with the mind and forget the body, you are not practising the Buddha’s teaching. If you work only with the body and forget the mind, again you are not understanding the Buddha properly.

Anything that arises in the mind turns into matter, into a sensation in the material field. This was the Buddha’s discovery. People forgot this truth, which can only be understood through proper practice. The Buddha said, "Sabbe dhammā vedanā samosaraṇā:, anything that arises in the mind starts flowing as a sensation on the body.

The Buddha used the word asava, which means flow or intoxication. Suppose you have generated anger. A biochemical flow starts, which generates very unpleasant sensations. Because of these unpleasant sensations, you start reacting with anger. As you generate anger, the flow becomes stronger. There are unpleasant sensations and, with them, a biochemical secretion. As you generate more anger, the flow becomes stronger.

In the same way, when passion or fear arises, a particular type of biochemical substance starts flowing in the blood. A vicious circle starts, which keeps repeating itself. There is a flow, an intoxication, at the depth of the mind. Out of ignorance, we become intoxicated by this particular biochemical flow. Although it makes us miserable, yet we become intoxicated: we want it again and again. So we keep on generating more and more anger, more and more passion, more and more fear. We become intoxicated by whatever impurity we generate in the mind. When we say that someone is addicted to alcohol or drugs, this is untrue. No one is addicted to alcohol or drugs. The actual truth is that one is addicted to the sensations that are produced by the alcohol or drugs.

Buddha teaches us to observe reality. Every addiction will be undone if we observe the truth of the sensations on the body with this understanding: "Anicca, anicca. This is impermanent." Gradually we will learn to stop reacting.

Dhamma is so simple, so scientific, so true a law of nature applicable to everyone. Whether one is Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, Christian; whether one is American, Indian, Burmese, Russian or Italian it makes no difference; a human being is a human being. Dhamma is a pure science of mind, matter, and the interaction between the two. Do not allow it to become a sectarian or philosophical belief. This will be of no help.

The greatest scientist produced by the world worked to find the truth about the relationship between mind and matter. And discovering this truth, he found a way to go beyond mind and matter. He explored reality not just for the sake of satisfying his curiosity but to find a way to be free of suffering. So much misery in every family, in every society, in every nation, in the entire world. The Enlightened One found a way to come out of this misery.

There is no other solution: each one must come out of misery oneself. When every member of a family comes out of misery, the family will become happy, peaceful and harmonious. When every member of society comes out of misery, when every member of a nation comes out of misery, when every citizen of the world comes out of misery only then will there be world peace.

There cannot be world peace just because we want world peace: "There should be peace in the world because I am agitating for it." This does not happen. We cannot agitate for peace. When we become agitated, we lose our peacefulness. Let there be no agitation. Purify your mind. Then every action you take will add peace to the universe.

Purify your mind: this is how you can stop harming others and start helping them. When you work for your own liberation, you will find that you have also started helping others come out of their misery. One individual becomes several individuals there is a slow widening of the circle. But there is no magic, no miracle. Work for your own peace, and you will find that you have started helping the atmosphere around you to become more peaceful, but only when you work properly.

The biggest miracle is changing the habit pattern of the mind from rolling in misery to freedom from misery. There is no bigger miracle than this. Every step that is taken toward this kind of miracle is a healthy step, a helpful step. Every other apparent miracle is only bondage.

May you all come out of your misery, come out of your bondage. May you all enjoy real peace, real harmony, real happiness.

Enlightenment.

2011-01-02T09:46:00.001Z

One of his students asked Buddha,
"Are you the messiah?"
"No", answered Buddha.
"Then are you a healer?"
"No", Buddha replied.
"Then are you a teacher?" the student persisted.
"No, I am not a teacher."
"Then what are you?" asked the student, exasperated.
"I am awake," Buddha replied

The Buddha:

Forgiveness is an act of self love.

2010-12-02T10:47:00.000Z

Facets of Metta
by Sharon Salzberg

A pearl goes up for auction
No one has enough,
so the pearl buys itself
-- Rumi

Love exists in itself, not relying on owning or being owned. Like the pearl, love can only buy itself, because love is not a matter of currency or exchange. No one has enough to buy it but everyone has enough to cultivate it. Metta reunites us with what it means to be alive and unbound.

Researchers once gave a plant to every resident of a nursing home. They told half of these elderly people that the plants were theirs to care for -- they had to pay close attention to their plants' needs for water and sunlight, and they had to respond carefully to those needs. The researchers told the other half of the residents that their plants were theirs to enjoy but that they did not have to take any responsibility for them; the nursing staff would care for the plants.

At the end of a year, the researchers compared the two groups of elders. The residents who had been asked to care for their plants were living considerably longer than the norm, were much healthier, and were more oriented towards and connected to their world. The other residents, those who had plants but did not have to stay responsive to them, simply reflected the norms for people their age in longevity, health, alertness, and engagement with the world.

This study shows, among other things, the enlivening power of connection, of love, of intimacy. This is the effect that metta can have on our lives. But when I heard about the study, I also reflected on how often we regard intimacy as a force between ourselves and something outside ourselves -- another person, or even a plant -- and how rarely we consider the force of being intimate with ourselves, with our own inner experience. How rarely do we lay claim to our own lives and feel connected to ourselves!

A way to discover intimacy with ourselves and all of life is to live with integrity, basing our lives on a vision of compassionate nonharming. When we dedicate ourselves to actions that do not hurt ourselves or others, our lives become all of one piece, a "seamless garment" with nothing separate or disconnected in the spiritual reality we discover.

In order to live with integrity, we must stop fragmenting and compartmentalizing our lives. Telling lies at work and expecting great truths in meditation is nonsensical. Using our sexual energy in a way that harms ourselves or others, and then expecting to know transcendent love in another arena, is mindless. Every aspect of our lives is connected to every other aspect of our lives. This truth is the basis for an awakened life. When we live with integrity, we further enhance intimacy with ourselves by being able to rejoice, taking active delight in our actions. Rejoicing opens us tremendously, dissolving our barriers, thereby enabling intimacy to extend to all of life. Joy has so much capacity to eliminate separation that the Buddha said, "Rapture is the gateway to nirvana."

The enlivening force itself is rapture. It brightens our vitality, our gratitude, and our love. We begin to develop rapture by rejoicing in our own goodness. We reflect on the good things we have done, recollecting times when we have been generous, or times when we have been caring. Perhaps we can think of a time when it would have been easy to hurt somebody, or to tell a lie, or to be dismissive, yet we made the effort not to do that. Perhaps we can think of a time when we gave something up in a way that freed our mind and helped someone else. Or perhaps we can think of a time when we have overcome some fear and reached out to someone. These reflections open us to a wellspring of happiness that may have been hidden from us before.

Contemplating the goodness within ourselves is a classical meditation, done to bring light, joy, and rapture to the mind. In contemporary times this practice might be considered rather embarrassing, because so often the emphasis is on all the unfortunate things we have done, all the disturbing mistakes we have made. Yet this classical reflection is not a way of increasing conceit. It is rather a commitment to our own happiness, seeing our happiness as the basis for intimacy with all of life. It fills us with joy and love for ourselves and a great deal of self-respect.

Significantly, when we do metta practice, we begin by directing metta toward ourselves. This is the essential foundation for being able to offer genuine love to others. When we truly love ourselves, we want to take care of others, because that is what is most enriching, or nourishing, for us. When we have a genuine inner life, we are intimate with ourselves and intimate with others. The insight into our inner world allows us to connect to everything around us, so that we can see quite clearly the oneness of all that lives. We see that all beings want to be happy, and that this impulse unites us. We can recognize the rightness and beauty of our common urge towards happiness, and realize intimacy in this shared urge.

If we are practicing metta and we cannot see the goodness in ourselves or in someone else, then we reflect on that fundamental wish to be happy that underlies all action. "Just as I want to be happy, all beings want to be happy." This reflection gives rise to openness, awareness, and love. As we commit to these values, we become embodiments of a lineage that stretches back through beginningless time. All good people of all time have wanted to express openness, awareness, and love. With every phrase of metta, we are declaring our alignment with these values.

From this beginning, metta practice proceeds in a very structured way and specific way. After we have spent some time directing metta to ourselves, we then move on to someone who has been very good to us, for whom we feel gratitude and respect. In the traditional terminology, this person is known as a "benefactor." Later we move to someone who is a beloved friend. It is relatively easy to direct lovingkindness to these categories of beings (we say beings rather than people to include the possibility of animals in these categories.) After we have established this state of connection, we move on to those that it may be harder to direct lovingkindness toward. In this way we open up our limits and extend our capacity for benevolence.

Thus, next we direct lovingkindness to someone whom we feel neutral toward, someone for whom we feel neither great liking nor disliking. This is often an interesting time in the practice, because it may be difficult to find somebody for whom we have no instantaneous judgment. If we can find such a neutral person, we direct metta toward them.

After this, we are ready for the next step -- directing metta toward someone with whom we have experienced conflict, someone toward whom we feel lack of forgiveness, or anger, or fear. In the Buddhist scriptures this person is somewhat dramatically known as "the enemy." This is a very powerful stage in the practice, because the enemy, or the person with whom we have difficulty stands right at the division between the finite and the infinite radiance of love. At this point, conditional love unfolds into unconditional love. Here dependent love can turn to the flowering of an independent love that is not based upon getting what we want or having our expectations met. Here we learn that the inherent happiness of love is not compromised by likes and dislikes, and thus, like the sun, it can shine on everything. This love is truly boundless. It is born out of freedom, and it is offered freely.

Through the power of this practice, we cultivate an equality of loving feeling toward ourselves and all beings. There was a time in Burma when I was practicing metta intensively. I had taken about six weeks to go through all the different categories: myself, benefactor, friend, neutral person, and enemy. After I had spent these six weeks doing the metta meditation all day long, my teacher, U Pandita, called me into his room and said, "Say you were walking in the forest with your benefactor, your friend, your neutral person, and your enemy. Bandits come up and demand that you choose one person in your group to be sacrificed. Which one would you choose to die?"

I was shocked at U Pandita's question. I sat there and looked deep into my heart, trying to find a basis from which I could choose. I saw that I could not feel any distinction between any of those people, including myself. Finally I looked at U Pandita and replied, "I couldn't choose; everyone seems the same to me."

U Pandita then asked, "You wouldn't choose your enemy?" I thought a minute and then answered, "No, I couldn't."

Finally U Pandita asked me, "Don't you think you should be able to sacrifice yourself to save the others?" He asked the question as if more than anything else in the world he wanted me to say, "Yes, I'd sacrifice myself." A lot of conditioning rose up in me -- an urge to please him, to be "right" and to win approval. But there was no way I could honestly say "yes," so I said, "No, I can't see any difference between myself and any of the others." He simply nodded in response, and I left.

Later I was reading the Visuddhi Magga, one of the great commentarial works of Buddhist literature which describes different meditation techniques and the experiences of practicing these techniques. In the section on metta meditation, I came to that very question about the bandits. The answer I had given was indeed considered the correct one for the intensive practice of metta.

Of course, in different life situations many different courses of action might be appropriate. But the point here is that metta does not mean that we denigrate ourselves in any situation in order to uphold other people's happiness. Authentic intimacy is not brought about by denying our own desire to be happy in unhappy deference to others, nor by denying others in narcissistic deference to ourselves. Metta means equality, oneness, wholeness. To truly walk the Middle Way of the Buddha, to avoid the extremes of addiction and self-hatred, we must walk in friendship with ourselves as well as with all beings.

When we have insight into our inner world and what brings us happiness, then wordlessly, intuitively, we understand others. As though there were no longer a barrier defining the boundaries of our caring, we can feel close to others' experience of life. We see that when we are angry, there is an element of pain in the anger that is not different from the pain that others feel when they are angry. When we feel love there is a distinct and special joy in that feeling. We come to know that this is the nature of love itself, and that other beings filled with love experience of this same joy.

In practicing metta we do not have to make a certain feeling happen. In fact, during the practice we see that we feel differently at different times. Any momentary emotional tone is far less relevant than considerable power of intention we harness as we say these phrases. As we repeat, "May I be happy; may all beings be happy," we are planting seeds by forming this powerful intention in the mind. The seed will bear fruit in its own time.

When I was practicing metta intensively in Burma, at times when I repeated the metta phrases, I would picture myself in a wide open field planting seeds. Doing metta we plant the seeds of love, knowing that nature will take its course and in time those seeds will bear fruit. Some seeds will come to fruition quickly, some slowly, but our work is simply to plant the seeds. Every time we form the intention in the mind for our own happiness or for the happiness of others, we are doing our work; we are channeling the powerful energies of our own minds. Beyond that, we can trust the laws of nature to continually support the flowering of our love. As Pablo Neruda says:

Perhaps the earth can teach us, as when everything seems dead in winter and later proves to be alive.

When we started our retreat center, Insight Meditation Society, in 1975, many of us there decided to do a self-retreat for a month to inaugurate the center. I planned to do metta for the entire month. This was before I'd been to Burma, and it would be my first opportunity to do intensive and systematic metta meditation. I had heard how it was done in extended practice, and I planned to follow that schedule. So the first week I spent directing lovingkindness towards myself. I felt absolutely nothing. It was the dreariest, most boring week I had known in some time. I sat there saying, "May I be happy, may I be peaceful," over and over again with no obvious result.

Then, as it happened, someone we knew in the community had a problem, and a few of us had to leave the retreat suddenly. I felt even worse, thinking, "Not only did I spend this week doing metta and getting nothing from it, but I also never even got beyond directing metta towards myself. So on top of everything else, I was really selfish."

I was in a frenzy getting ready to leave. As I was hurriedly getting everything together in my bathroom, I dropped a jar. It shattered all over the floor. I still remember my immediate response: "You are really a klutz, but I love you." And then I thought, "Wow! Look at that. Something did happen in this week of practice."

So the intention is enough. We form the intention in our mind for our happiness and the happiness of all. This is different from struggling to fabricate a certain feeling, to create it out of our will, to make it happen. We just settle back and plant the seeds without worrying about the immediate result. That is our work. If we do our work, then manifold benefits will surely come.

Fortunately, the Buddha was characteristically precise about what those benefits include. He said that the intimacy and caring that fill our hearts as the force of lovingkindness develops will bring eleven particular advantages:

1) You will sleep easily. 2) You will wake easily. 3) You will have pleasant dreams. 4) People will love you. 5) Devas [celestial beings] and animals will love you. 6) Devas will protect you. 7) External dangers [poisons, weapons, and fire] will not harm you. 8) Your face will be radiant. 9) Your mind will be serene. 10) You will die unconfused. 11) You will be reborn in happy realms.

People doing formal metta practice often memorize these eleven benefits and recite them to themselves regularly. Reminding ourselves of the fruit of our intention and effort can bring a lot of faith and rapture, sustaining us through those inevitable times when it seems as if the practice is not "getting anywhere." When we consider each of these benefits, we can see more fully how metta revolutionizes our lives.

When we steep our hearts in lovingkindness, we are able to sleep easily, to awaken easily, and to have pleasant dreams. To have self-respect in life, to walk through this life with grace and confidence, means having a commitment to nonharming and to loving care. If we do not have these things, we can neither rest nor be at peace; we are always fighting against ourselves. The feelings we create by harming are painful both for ourselves and for others. Thus harming leads to guilt, tension, and complexity. Sleeping easily, waking easily, But living a clear and simple life, free from resentment, fear, and guilt, extends into our sleeping, dreaming and waking.

The next benefit the Buddha pointed out is that if we practice metta we will receive in return the love of others. This is not a heartless calculating motivation, but rather a recognition that the energy we extend in this world draws to it that same kind of energy. If we extend the force of love, love returns to us. The American psychologist William James once said, "My experience is what I agree to attend to. Only those items I notice shape my mind." Perhaps this is partially how this law works -- opening to the energy of love within us, we can notice it more specifically around us.

It happens on other levels as well. If we are committed in our lives to the force of lovingkindness, then people know that they can trust us. They know we will not deceive them; we will not harm them. By being a beacon of trustworthiness in this world, we become a safe haven for others and a good friend.

The next set of benefits the Buddha points out promises that if we practice metta we will be protected. Devas, and other invisible beings, are classically taught as part of the Buddhist cosmology, but we don't have to believe in the intervention of invisible forces in order to comprehend how the practice of metta protects us. This assertion does not mean being protected in the sense that nothing bad will ever happen to us, because clearly the vicissitudes of life are completely outside our control. Pleasure and pain, gain and loss, praise and blame, and fame and ill repute will revolve throughout our lives. But nevertheless we can be protected by the nature of how we receive, how we hold that which our karma brings us.

Albert Einstein said, "The splitting of the atom has changed everything except for how we think." How we think, how we look at our lives, is all-important, and the degree of love we manifest determines the degree of spaciousness and freedom we can bring to life's events.

Imagine taking a very small glass of water and putting into it a teaspoon of salt. Because of the small size of the container, the teaspoon of salt is going to have a big impact upon the water. However, if you approach a much larger body of water, such as a lake, and put into it that same teaspoonful of salt, it will not have the same intensity of impact, because of the vastness and openness of the vessel receiving it. Even when the salt remains the same, the spaciousness of the vessel receiving it changes everything.

We spend a lot of our lives looking for a feeling of safety or protection; we try to alter the amount of salt that comes our way. Ironically, the salt is the very thing that we cannot do anything about, as life changes and offers us repeated ups and downs. Our true work is to create a container so immense that any amount of salt, even a truckload, can come into it without affecting our capacity to receive it. No situation, even an extreme one, then can mandate a particular reaction.

Once I had a meditation student who had been a child in Nazi-occupied Europe. She recounted an instance when she was around ten years old when a German soldier held a gun to her chest -- a situation that would readily arouse terror. Yet she related feeling no fear at all, thinking, "You may be able to kill my body, but you can't kill me." What a spacious reaction! It is in this way that lovingkindness opens the vastness of mind in us, which is ultimately our greatest protection.

Another benefit of cultivating of metta is that one's face becomes very clear and shining. This means that an unfeigned inner beauty shines forth. We know in life situations how mind affects matter, how if we are enraged about something, it shows in our face. If somebody is full of hatred, it shows in the way they stand, the way they move, the way their jaw is set. It is not very attractive. No amount of make-up, jewelry, or embellishments bring beauty to a sullen, disgruntled, angry face. In just the same way, when someones mind is filled with the rapture of lovingkindness or compassion, it is beautiful to see the expression of light, of radiance, on their face and bearing.

With the practice of metta one also has a serene mind. The feeling of lovingkindness generates great peace. This is the mind that can say, "You are really a klutz, but I love you." It is a feeling endowed with acceptance, patience, and spaciousness. This great peace allows union with all of life, because we are not relying on changing circumstances for our happiness.

The peace of metta offers the kind of happiness that gives us the ability to concentrate. Serenity is the most important ingredient in being able to be present or being able to concentrate the mind. Concentration is an act of cherishing a chosen object. If we have no serenity, the mind will be scattered, and we will not be able to gather in the energy that is being lost to distraction. When we can concentrate, all of this energy is returned to us. This is the potency that heals us.

If we practice metta, another major benefit is that we will die unconfused. Our habitual ways of thinking, acting, and relating to life tend to be the ones that are strongest at the time of death as well. If we spend a lifetime feeling separate, apart, cultivating anger, giving way to frustration, to fear, to desire, that will likely be the mental-emotional environment within which we face our death. But if we have lived our life in a way that honors our connectedness, reflects our oneness, and cultivates caring and giving, that is likely to be how we will die.

The last specific benefit the Buddha spoke of was being reborn in happy realms as a result of filling our hearts with lovingkindness. The potential for rebirth again and again in various realms of pleasure or pain is part of the Buddhist worldview. For someone who subscribes to this vision of life, rebirth in a realm where one can attain liberation is most important. For those who don't subscribe to this vision, the benefits of metta can surely be seen to come to us in this lifetime.

Metta is the priceless treasure that enlivens us and brings us into intimacy with ourselves and others. It is the force of love that will lead beyond fragmentation, loneliness and fear. The late Hindu guru Neem Karoli Baba often said, "Don't throw anyone out of your heart." One of the most powerful healings (and greatest adventures) of our lifetime can come about as we learn to live by this dictum.

Sharon Salzberg

Excerpted from "Loving-kindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness" by Sharon Salzberg, 1995, Shambala Publications.

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The power of the mind.

2010-11-15T08:38:00.000Z

Mindfulness - An All-Time Necessity
by C.F. Knight

Amongst the various attempts to define Buddhism is one that describes it as a system of mental discipline, or mind-training. Probably this is more accurate than most others, for whether we describe it as a philosophy, a religion, or a way of life, having regard to its goal — Nirvana — assuredly we find that “taming the mind” is the key to final liberation.

The importance of mindfulness, or mental discipline, cannot be over-stressed. “All that we are is the result of what we have thought,” says the Dhammapada. To give those words their full significance is to realise that in that pithy phrase is contained a full statement of the doctrine of karma. From our thoughts flow words and deeds of a karmic nature, the result of which (kamma-vipaka) is that all we are “is founded on our thoughts, is made up of our thoughts.” As our past thoughts laid the foundation for our present condition, so our present thoughts are further accentuating or modifying that condition.

In the Maha Satipatthana Suttanta of the Digha-Nikaya, the Buddha emphasises the importance of mindfulness. In opening the lengthy discourse he says:

"The one and only path leading to the purification of beings, to the passing far beyond grief and lamentation, to the dying out of ill and misery, to the attainment of right method, to the realisation of Nirvana is that of the Fourfold Setting up of Mindfulness."

In closing his discourse he further stresses its importance by saying:

"Whoso shall practise these Four Applications of Mindfulness for seven years, nay, for six, five, four, three, two or one year only, or even for six, five, four, three, two or one month, or for a fortnight, or even seven days in him one of two kinds of fruition may be looked for: either in this life Arahantship, or if there be yet residuum for rebirth, the state of him who returns no more. It was on account of this that was said which was said (at the beginning)."

The long variable range of time from seven years to seven days is a clear indication that while the setting up of mindfulness is the “one and only path,” it is still but a “path,” and not the goal. For some it may be longer than for others, according to their pertinacity and the insight acquired, and the hindrances and fetters to be overcome. It is mindfulness that enables us to become conscious of our shortcomings, but it does not eliminate them. That requires possession of the Seven Factors of Enlightenment of which mindfulness is but one in addition to a search for the truth, energy, joy, serenity, rapture and equanimity. Furthermore, the capacity for all factors will quite naturally vary from person to person. Still, the setting up of mindfulness is an all important prerequisite —“the one and only path.”

Such then is the necessity for the application of mindfulness insofar as our own spiritual progress is concerned in its most narrow and personal aspect. But it has a much wider application also. Mindfulness at a minimum is consciousness of actuality, awareness, or the grasp of facts independent of insight or intuition. Mindfulness in its broader sense invests every activity, through association of ideas, with a recollection, or calling to mind, of other facts or reactions. For example, mindfulness of a simple nature may be practised as we go about our daily tasks, observing in a specific way our actions, our immediate environment, the people we meet or pass, and so on. On a higher level, the offerings at the shrine and the repetition of the sacred formulas as we participate in our religious observances partake of a sacramental nature as mindfulness associates them with the object of our devotions. Again, in an even more simple form, it is mindfulness and the association of ideas that keep us from injury, from burning in the presence of fire, and on a higher level, it should make us conscious of the suffering created by the use of fire on other unfortunate beings as in warfare as waged today. As mindfulness protects us from pain and injury, it should also make us unwilling to inflict pain and injury on others. Mindfulness as applied to our personal lives is a necessity if we truly strive for perfection, and it should have a wider application in the appreciation of our relationship to our fellow beings. If we can “put ourselves in the other fellow’s shoes,” we can develop understanding and compassion in our dealings with him, and this is greatly to be desired today.

Before making mindfulness applicable to our wider contacts, our public life and its relationships, let us consider and understand them as they apply to us intimately in our own private lives. To engender love of our neighbour, compassion for him, and extend our help towards him, we must first be possessed of a loving nature ourselves; we must have before we can give. There are those who are more or less willing to assist in many ways others who are on a somewhat similar material, social, or spiritual level. Their sympathy and compassion, their generosity, is confined as it were to a horizontal plane, like a pebble dropped into a pool creating expanding ripples on its surface. They give where they can expect to receive in return. They seek for consolation from those whom they consider “will understand them.” Other strata of society are either beneath their notice, or regarded with envy as being “better off” and not in need of help or compassion. True metta and karuna — love in its widest sense, and compassion — should be like a gong struck in a silent room, from which the sound-waves are global in nature and penetrate to all six directions. To accomplish this, we must first discipline ourselves, and in order to do this we must understand our own make-up of foibles, eccentricities, short-comings, aspirations and ambitions, so mindfulness becomes a necessity and “the only path.“

Let us return to the discourse under consideration for guidance. The early portion of this discourse is introspective —know thyself — and is concerned with (1) the body, in physical structure and activities, (2) feelings, in their sensory meaning, and with regard to their instability, and (3) thoughts, with their ethical and karmic content. The latter portion of the-discourse leads on to (4) mindfulness of ideas, culminating in the perception of the Four Noble Truths, and living within the framework of the Fourth Truth — the Eightfold Way that leads to the “purification of beings, to passing far beyond grief and lamentation, to the dying out of ill and misery, to the attainment of right method, to the realisation of Nirvana.”

In considering the body mindfully we find it to be in a continual state of arising and passing away. We become aware of its movements and postures; aware of its need of clothing and sustenance, and how we supply these needs; aware of its component parts and their functions; and aware of its final disintegration — then we can say: “There is body.”

So too with feelings, as to whether they are pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral; whether they are of a physical nature or of a spiritual nature. We are fully conscious of our reactions to the stimuli affecting our feelings, recognising and classifying the cause and our reaction to it, until we can say: “There are feelings.”

Then we mindfully consider our thoughts fathered by our feelings. These cover our conscious life, our intelligent perception of action and reaction. We, at times, speak of our feelings being “hurt,” but do we ever mindfully reason as to why they are “hurt?” Probably we expected praise, or a gift that did not eventuate or thanks for services given. Or, maybe, we were censured or blamed unexpectedly. If we are mindful we will realise that the indifference, ingratitude, ill will or lack of generosity that ”hurt” our feelings belongs to another, and that vanity, covetousness, self-righteousness, etc, has been an error on our part.

That mindfulness of our thoughts is important we have already mentioned. It is in this realm that karmic volitions arise with their inevitable results to be experienced at some time in the future, in this life or another.

It is mindfulness that will enable us to recognise the three roots of evil arising from basic ignorance. Greed, hatred, and delusion are born of our thoughts due to an ignorance of their potentiality to reflect on our own lives the very results we are projecting towards others.

It is delusion which in turn gives rise to fear, superstition and intolerance on one hand, and on the other attachment, lust for sensual pleasures, craving and clinging.

It is from hatred that anger, malice and strife arise together with pride, resentment and revenge.

Greed is the source from which arises selfishness, avarice, covetousness, and the lack of generosity.

These evils — greed, hatred, and delusion — first arise to consciousness as the thoughts of our own mind, and later find expression as words and deeds. If we are mindful, it becomes most obvious that in the end we ourselves are the ones who suffer most from their arising.

This mindful self-analysis of our thoughts will enable us to subdue the unwholesome inclinations arising in the mind before they find irrevocable expression in words and deeds. In a like manner we should be just as conscious of wholesome thoughts and inclinations, and foster them. Also we should be conscious of the absence of wholesome thoughts and encourage their arising. Remember: “All that we are is founded on our thoughts, made up of our thoughts.” But, do not fall into the famous error of Descartes who declared: “I am thinking, so I exist” (cogito, ergo sum). What he should have said on that evidence was: “I am thinking, so there are thoughts.”

If the setting up of mindfulness has been successful so far, we know our body for what it is; we know feelings for what they are; we know thoughts with their fateful implications. Now we start to be mindful of the ideas that arise, the mental or psychological phenomena that are outside of the realm of sensory perception and reaction. If progress is to be made, first we must recognise and be mindful of any deterrents. Undue attachment to sensuous desire may gain admittance through any of the sense-doors, and mindfulness is the guardian of the gates. So too in respect to laziness and indifference, undue anxiety, worry and doubt. These should be promptly recognised and overcome or eliminated, while mindfulness itself should be a conscious factor in our determined search for truth, pursued with energy and joyous serenity and equanimity.

This brings us to the mindful recognition of the Four Noble Truths, the first of which is the all-pervasiveness of what is known in Buddhist circles as dukkha, a Pali word incapable of direct translation owing to the wide application of its meaning. The usual translations into “ill,” or ”suffering,” are inadequate, unsatisfactory, and misleading, giving rise to the popular criticism of Buddhism as being pessimistic. Dukkha does include ”suffering” ”pain” ”sorrow” and ”misery,” it is true, but it embraces a much wider scope of unease. It is defined as the ever-arising of new forms of existence; as growing old, with old age’s complements of decrepitude, hoary-ness, the wrinkled state, the shrinkage of life’s span, and the collapse of the sense faculties; as the laying down of the body in death; as the states of woe, heartache, and grief; as the visitation of calamity or illness; as the act and state of mourning, lamenting and deploring; as bodily and mental ill and pain; as the states of dejection and despondency and despair; as not getting what has been wished for.

Elsewhere in the scriptures it is further mentioned that dukkha is being separated from those we love and the things we are attached to; it is also being forced into contact with those we dislike, and having to bear with things which revolt us. Summed up, dukkha may be said to be all that amounts to disease in life. All the sorrows, the disappointments, the frustrations, and failures of our most cherished schemes are dukkha, but one cannot go into all these facets and details each time we wish to speak of the First Noble Truth, so we either use the imperfect and unsatisfactory translations or, better still, the untranslated Pali word — dukkha — rather than give an inadequate and wrong idea of it.

This is but one aspect of life as we know it. The Buddha did not eliminate happiness for either the layman or the monk. But happiness itself is based on an understanding of dukkha, its arising and its cessation. It is based on our individuality — our physical form, our feelings, our perceptions, our dispositions, and our mental activities as opposed to emotional volition.

The mindful absorption of the First Noble Truth may lend itself to the idea of pessimism if we fail to proceed to the subsequent Truths of its arising, its cessation and the Way leading to its cessation. These, while rebutting the idea of pessimism, are not on the other hand optimistic: they do not do away with the universality of dukkha, but they do lead to an understanding of why dukkha prevails and permeates our lives. By knowing it, realising its cause, and treading the Way to its final abolition, we are enabled to transcend the effect of dukkha, even to attaining the final goal of never returning to suffer again.

Now applying mindfulness to the arising of dukkha we can trace its rise to craving in one form or another, for this or that satisfaction that is so unstable and fleeting. It may be craving for the material things of this world, indulgence of the senses in sensual satisfaction, craving for fame and recognition, craving for the continued relationships of family life, craving for permanence in a world of constant change. Whatever form craving takes, it arises through the senses, through the imagination, or through the memory of past experiences, and only mindfulness will recognise the insidious growth of craving.

The cessation of dukkha is to the mindful person the elimination of that craving which gives rise to dukkha. At times we are faced with those who tell us any pleasure is an attachment and a source of craving, that it is wrong to like music, to admire a sunset, to enjoy one’s food, to appreciate odours, or to become attached to other beings. If this were so, then quite rightly Buddhism could be labelled as being pessimistic. But the Buddha and his disciples could admire the beauty of a tropic moonlight night. The Buddha could look back on Vesali and its beauty with nostalgia as he saw it for the last time. He praised those who cared for their children, and taught that the support of parents, the cherishing of wife and children, and the helping of relatives was of the highest merit. This applied to his monks as well as to laymen. He taught that brotherly love — association with the wise — was one of the highest blessings. The enjoyment of the good things of life was not condemned by the Buddha, although the acquisition of wealth added responsibilities in regard to its use. It is when craving for things not attained, or for the permanency of those which are attained, creeps in that dukkha becomes apparent.

Who has not suffered the loss of a loved one? Perhaps this is the most easy demonstration of attachment, craving, and subsequent dukkha. The reciprocal love that exists in a family is natural and virtuous in itself. From that untainted source grows the craving for an unbroken continuance of it. When death intervenes, as eventually it must, dukkha finds expression in the sense of loss and the grief that inevitably follows. If we realise that the most pleasant of relationships, the most desirable of experiences, the most fortunate of circumstances, are impermanent and unstable, then we can enjoy them while they last, and part from them with happy memories of the past, rather than with grief and sorrow as to the future.

And so we come to the Way that leads to the cessation of dukkha. It is also the Way that will enable us to give to others, to be mindful of their needs and, moreover, mindful of our obligations concerning them.

This Fourth Noble Truth has its eight sections, or steps, as they are often called. They cover a two-fold set of obligations for one who has set out on the holy life. The first is the further development of his own characteristics on the spiritual plane, and the other is his duty to his fellow men. There is another division usually used in dividing the eight steps, based on the development of ethics, concentration and wisdom. However, as we set out to show our obligation to others, for our purpose we will deal with them on the basis of us and others.

In regard to ourselves the first step is the acquisition of knowledge. By this is inferred a knowledge of the three Truths we have just examined — the mindful realisation of the universality of dukkha, its arising and its cessation. If we are going to be helpful and carry our beliefs into practice for the welfare of others it is obviously necessary that we must have an understanding of the cause and nature of the distress that is so evident in the world of today. This is called Right View.

Then we must be possessed of an aim or aspiration beneficial to others. We need and must have the aspiration toward renunciation in so far as ourselves are concerned — a detachment from selfish desires and ambitions and a willingness to make sacrifices for the good and welfare of others. There must also be the aspiration towards kindness and benevolence in our attitude to others. This is called Right Aspiration.

Our speech needs careful watching for this is so often the source of engendering anger and hatred in others. Lying, slandering, abusive terms, and derogatory statements in regard to others can but have the reaction of repulsion on their part, and lead on to active dislike or aggressive action as a result. To refrain from such speech is called Right Speech.

Speech leads to action as we have just mentioned. If our speech is right speech, our actions will be so influenced that the aspiration towards kindliness and benevolence becomes almost automatic. The incitement to acts of violence, the taking of life, stealing, or committing carnal offences against our fellowmen cannot arise unless preceded by wrong aspiration and wrong thoughts. To refrain from such behaviour is called Right Action.

The next step is one that is, I think, unique among the injunctions laid upon the devotees of any religion — Right Livelihood. Certainly, the Christian is advised not only to avoid evil, but also the appearance of evil, or what might be assumed to be evil by the critics. Right Livelihood is not only to refrain from actions which in themselves involve direct and immediate harm to others, but also to refrain from depending for means of a livelihood on such a trade or following as will indirectly harm others. The occupations of hunters, butchers, fishers, and the makers of arms, are some of the proscribed occupations. This raises a most difficult point for one who would fulfil all the requirements of the Eightfold Way in the world of today. In a day and time when the world population was so much less, and the opportunities for choosing a trade or following were greater, it may have been possible to avoid occupations which directly or indirectly involved a threat of harm to others. But today, under modern conditions, it is virtually impossible for any individual to avoid being in some way indirectly involved in the harm of others.

This injunction has been rationalised in some cases by, for instance, employing other religionists as butchers, by driving cattle over a national boundary and then importing the products of the slaughterhouse. Again, during a period of war, a sincere conscientious objector may refuse to be inducted into the army, but he cannot earn a living in any trade or profession without paying taxes to sustain the war effort of his country. Under these circumstances there is no choice, but if there be a choice, for instance, if one can work as a carpenter, and though a slaughter man can earn more than the carpenter, it would be wrong to change to this means of livelihood just for the sake of the extra money to be earned. Difficult indeed is it to avoid harm to others for the layman, and it is obvious that a mass invasion of the Sangha is out of the question!

So we come to what is really a key to all the Steps of the Way — the cultivation of effort. In this essay we are primarily concerned with mindfulness, rather than a general exposition of Buddhist doctrines, and, most of all, the application of mindfulness in relation to our fellow men. But it is not possible to separate any one aspect of the Buddha’s teachings and isolate it from all others. In dealing with the Eightfold Way at some length, we are only as it were setting out the personal prerequisites that will enable us to give of our best. It will require great effort on our part to fulfil the perfecting of right thought, speech, action, and livelihood, even though we have right knowledge and aspiration.

It also does require effort to take an interest in the welfare of others. The general tendency of today is to let others do our thinking for us and then drift along with the crowd, indifferent as to where we are heading, or on whose toes we are treading. It takes mindful effort to concern ourselves with people we scarcely know or whom we have never met. We read of a flood in the East, of an earthquake in the West, of the genocide of a nation in the North, or suffering of civilian population caught between the cross-fire of armies in the South, but they are only items of news — they do not affect us. We are not mindful of the tragedies involved for those who suffer. One of the epithets assigned to the Buddha was “The Awakened One,” and because of his Awakening the floodgates of his compassion were opened to embrace all living creatures. For the most part we could be described as “The Asleep” in regard to our relationships with our fellow-men, and compassion is indeed a rare and seldom met characteristic today. We need to be mindful of our lack in this regard, and overcome the deficiency.

The seventh component factor of the Way is this very mindfulness with which we have been dealing. If subjectively mindfulness is present we should be aware of it, cultivate it, and develop it. If our mental training has been even partially efficient there is a more or less conscious control of our mind. The subjective existence or absence of mindfulness should be noted and mental action taken to develop existing mindfulness, or to bring mindfulness into existence. The whole purpose of Buddhist mind-training is for the adept to be the master of his mind, and by that discipline and mastery perfect his life to his own liberation and the benefit of others.

Much interest today surrounds the hallucinatory drug LSD. Repeatedly we are asked for our opinion as to its effectiveness in gaining “enlightenment,” or as an aid to meditation. The key to the answer is already inherent in its scientific classification. It is technically described as a “hallucinatory drug,” and its use can only produce hallucinations. This is just the opposite of the purpose of Buddhist mind-training, or the objectives of meditation, and can only bring evil effects to the addict. It is a gateway to delusion, which is one of the three roots of evil the true Buddhist seeks to overcome. It is also one of the forbidden things of the fifth precept, which proscribes the taking of intoxicants and harmful drugs.

The eighth step is the development of mental concentration up to the degree of the meditative absorption, which is not pertinent to our present consideration of mindfulness in regard to our relationship and obligations to others.

Now, if we have developed any such mindfulness, not only have we to some extent become masters of our own mind, but there has been an awakening of our understanding of the problems that we as individuals and the world of today are facing. It is such mental training that enables one to set aside the propaganda of nationalism or expediency, and penetrate to the root cause of the unrest and distress that is so prevalent. Many today are acutely conscious of the immediate circumstances that are causing their distress, and of these some are rebelling against them, whether they be famine, armed conflict, racial discrimination, the uncertainty of the future, poverty, or just sheer boredom from a surfeit of ease and luxury, but few there are who can penetrate to the basic causes for the existing conditions.

Earlier we referred to the function of mindfulness in recognising the three roots of evil — greed, hatred, and delusion— and on a world basis these apply just as equally as on a personal basis, so also does craving as a source of widespread dukkha, for world politics and national interests are but the sum total of the characteristics of the individuals holding the powers of government, and moulding the destinies of nations. In view of this it becomes obvious that we must first develop and train our minds, and then use them, if we are going to be of any real service to our fellow men. We must eradicate greed, with its selfishness, copiousness, and lack of generosity; we must eliminate hatred, with its anger, malice, strife, racial prejudices, resentment and revenge; we must wipe away the clouds of delusion that give rise to fear and intolerance, craving for sensual pleasures, and a continuance of the status quo. In their place we must develop unselfishness and generosity, loving kindness, tolerance and understanding, patience, and equanimity, and so fit us for the task of changing national and international conditions to a sum total of these beneficent characteristics.

Such is our aim and aspiration as Buddhists. The culmination will depend on the effort put forth as mindfulness reveals the cause and cure of dukkha.

From 'Metta', November 1967 (BL052, BPS)

Narratives from the mind/heart.

2010-11-11T09:58:00.003Z

I am conscious of the need to create the time to be silent and still. To connect to a sacred place deep in the recesses of the psyche. One with life. I do this using a mantra/meditation. Practice is something I aspire to on a regular basis - without the tools to self-regulate I drift into EGO. Projecting into the past or the future. Forgetting that all that is real is now.

Going with the flow is easier when I ping back to now. I am a typical recovering Alpha -type who thrived on a high-anxiety driven lifestyle. 23 years ago I stopped the madness and slowly began to repair the holes in my psyche/soul - therapy, 12 step recovery based principles and traditions, meeting with spiritual teachers, and Qi Gong.

Slowly I noticed that there was a different energies emerging, lifting me phoenix like from the ashes of discontent. I began to want to embrace/accept challenges and change with confidence and courage. I had become teachable. Changing the seat whilst travelling as a passenger in the karma bus requires conscious effort. Thinking my way into change isn't enough. Action is essential.

Now, shifting life positions manifest as a natural/effortless state of being. Honoring my finely tuned mind/heart connection is essential for sustaining effortless equanimity. I can transcend the pathos of constant cravings by deepening awareness of my worldview.

Self-acceptance is key. Turing that key metaphorically each day allows the process of what is meant to happen- happen.We all possess within ourselves infinite possibilities - seeds that can germinate and then manifest as continuing healing. Our decisions affect because we live in a causal world - cause and effect.

I have that sacred place within. It is where I go to throughout the day. In an instant. I can change a negative choice into a positive action.

In my spiritual practice, I have habits created to flow with the seasons. Habits that connect me to my love of the beauty of that is nature. St Francis loved nature. His hermitage in Assisi is his peace legacy. Thich Nat Hahn talks often about peace in every step. Ghandi's home, Burla House in New Delhi, now a museum - has the footprints of Gandhi's morning walk to to his meditation room.

Which brings me to my choice for today's inspirational reading of love, wisdom and the truth. Last year, we travelled for weeks in India to visit sacred sites. Learning along the way, about the diversity of the paths to God. Without a doubt the most challenging time I have had in India and in life. The lingering lessons of life on life's terms are present day reminders that there is another way in which to be present.

The Life and Teachings of Hazrat Inayat Khan

Inayat Khan was born in Baroda, India on July 5, 1882. As a youth, Inayat was brilliant in poetry and music, yet his deepest inner calling was in spiritual matters. As a youth, one day as Inayat was praying...

... he thought to himself that there had not been an answer yet to all the prayers he had offered to God and he did not know where God was to hear his prayers and he could not reconcile himself to going on praying to the God whom he knew not. He went fearlessly to his father and said: "I do not think I will continue my prayers any longer, for it does not fit in with my reason. I do not know how I can go on praying to a God I do not know." His father, taken aback, did not become cross lest he might turn Inayat's beliefs sour by forcing them upon him without satisfying his reason and he was glad on the other hand to see that, although it was irreverent on the child's part, yet it was frank, and he knew that the lad really hungered after Truth and was ready to learn now, what many could not learn in their whole life.

He said to him: "God is in you and you are in God. As the bubble is in the ocean and the bubble is a part of the ocean and yet not separate from the ocean. For a moment it has appeared as a bubble, then it will return to that from which it has risen. So is the relation between man and God. The Prophet has said that God is closer to you than the jugular vein, which in reality means that your own body is farther from you than God is. If this be rightly interpreted, it will mean that God is the very depth of your own being." This moment to Inayat was his very great initiation, as if a switch had turned in him, and from that moment onward his whole life Inayat busied himself, and his whole being became engaged in witnessing in life what he knew and believed, by this one great Truth.

Inayat's early life primarily revolved around music, and he was given many awards and medals of honor for his magnificent singing. In 1903 Inayat published a Hindustani collection of some 75 songs as Professor 'Inâyat Khân Rahmât Khân Pathân.

Following a vision of meeting a Sufi teacher, he met Muhammad Abu Hashim Madani who trained him in the ways of the Chishti, Naqshbandi, Qadiri, and Suhrawardi Sufi orders.

... an incident of an amusing nature occurred as for the first time in his life Inayat heard his Murshid's words on metaphysics. He became so keenly interested and filled with enthusiasm about what was being said that he took a note-book from his pocket, intending to take notes of it. But as soon as the Murshid saw the pencil and notebook in his hand, he instantly began to speak of an altogether different subject. Inayat realized by this that his Murshid meant that his words must be engraved on the soul, they were not to be written with a pencil on the pages of a note-book.

He would return home silent and remain speechless for hours, pondering over the words which had fallen upon his ears. His friends began to wonder what could have happened to him in such a short time, that his whole life should be so changed. He had now become quite a different person in his speech, actions, ways, expression, in his attitude and in his atmosphere. In all these, he showed a marked and definite change. It seemed to them as if, while a traveler walking at a certain rate of speed should have journeyed a mile, Inayat had suddenly made such an advance as to cover a hundred miles in the same space of time...

[his Murshid] used to wear shoes embroidered with gold. One day, when Inayat's eyes strayed to these shoes, a thought arose in his mind: why Murshid with all his simplicity should wear such costly shoes? At once his conscience pricked him, he felt so guilty that such a thought of one who was above question should have entered his mind, that instantly his face turned pale. But the Murshid knew all about it and only said with a smile: "The wealth of this earth is only worth being at my feet."

In looking back on those days with his teacher, Inayat said:

I remember my murshid giving me, in blessing me, this wish, 'May your faith be strengthened.' Being a young man, I thought, 'Is that all he is saying to me?' - not, 'May you be inspired, or illuminated, or prosperous,' or something else? But when I think of it now I know that in that blessing there was all. When belief is strengthened, then there is everything. All that we lack in life is mostly because of our lack of belief. But again, it is not something that one can learn or teach or that one can give to anybody. This comes from the grace of God.

Inayat began a tour of the sacred sites across India, and early in that adventure, he met the son of Guru Manek Prabhu who asked:

"What has brought you here?" said he and Inayat replied: "I have heard that the home of Manek Prabhu is not only a religious temple, but a centre of music also and as I have taken this tour to pay homage to the holy men living on the soil of India, I first chose to visit this place." "But I am very surprised that you have chosen our place, instead of choosing the place of some Muslim Saint," remarked the astonished youth. To this Inayat replied: "Muslim or Hindu are only outward distinctions, the Truth is one, God is one, life is one. To me there is no such thing as two. Two is only one plus one."

... "Mukti (liberation) is the ideal of life; it is the rising above the various births and deaths, rather than being involved in the eternal wheel of births and deaths, which is continually running by the ever changing battery of karma (action)."

After touring widely in India and and briefly settling in Calcutta, Inayat began to realize that the time had come for him to begin a new phase of life.

Inayat lived in Calcutta for several years and there received the news of the death of his beloved father, which was to him a blow inexpressible in words, though thus his life became free from any duty binding him as a sacred tie, as he had felt his duty toward his parents to be. Soon after this another misfortune befell him, namely the loss of his medals. In a moment of abstraction the case of medals was left in a car, which could not be traced despite all his efforts. But in place of the disappointment which at first oppressed him, a revelation from God touched the hidden chords of his mind and opened his eyes to the truth. He said to himself: "It matters not how much time you have spent to gain that which never belonged to you, but which you called your own; today you comprehend it is yours no longer. And it is the same with all you possess in life, your property, friends, relations, even your own body and mind. All which you call 'my', not being your true property, will leave you; and only what you name 'I', which is absolutely disconnected with all that is called 'my', will remain." He knelt down and thanked God for the loss of his medals, crying: "Let all be lost from my imperfect vision, but Thy true Self, ya Allah!"

Shortly before the death of his beloved teacher, Inayat had been instructed:

"Fare forth into the world, my child, and harmonize the East and the West with the harmony of thy music. Spread the wisdom of Sufism abroad, for to this end art thou gifted by Allah, the most merciful and compassionate."

To fulfill that mission, Inayat along with his cousin and brother sailed from India to America on September 13, 1910. In his autobiography, Inayat wrote of that voyage:

I was transported by destiny from the world of lyric and poetry to the world of industry and commerce on the 13th of September 1910. I bade farewell to my motherland, the soil of India, the land of the sun, for America the land of my future, wondering: "perhaps I shall return some day", and yet I did not know how long it would be before I should return. The ocean that I had to cross seemed to me a gulf between the life that was passed and the life which was to begin. I spent my moments on the ship looking at the rising and falling of the waves and realizing in this rise and fall the picture of life reflected, the life of individuals, of nations, of races, and of the world.

I tried to think where I was going, why I was going, what I was going to do, what was in store for me. "How shall I set to work? Will the people be favorable or unfavorable to the Message which I am taking from one end of the world to the other?" It seemed my mind moved curiously on these questions, but my heart refused to ponder upon them even for a moment, answering apart one constant voice I always heard coming from within, urging me constantly onward to my task, saying: "Thou art sent on Our service, and it is We Who will make thy way clear." This alone was my consolation.

Initially, their public performances centered on Indian music and they accompanied dancers such as Mata Hari and Ruth St. Denis in both America and Europe.

I found Miss Ruth St. Denis an inventive genius, and I was struck with a witty answer she gave upon hearing my ideas about human brotherhood, uniting East and West. She said, "Yes, we, the people of the Occident and Orient may be brothers, but not twins."

In addition to the musical performances, Inayat gave Sufi lectures that were often held in bookstores or homes. Rabia Martin, of San Francisco, became one of his first students and was soon appointed as his American representative.

I had a vision that night that the whole room became filled with light, no trace of darkness was to be found. I certainly thought that there was some important thing that was to be done next day, which I found was the initiation of Mrs. Ada Martin, the first mureed on my arrival to the West and, knowing that this soul will spread light and illuminate all those who will come in contact with her, I initiated her and named her Rabia after the name of a great woman Sufi saint of Basra.

Inayat traveled widely in America and Europe from 1910 until 1920, when he set up a residence in France, where he focused on summer schools, classes and lectures.

His message was always aimed at unity, bringing together all of humanity, rising above the differences and distinctions that have separated us.

One day a visitor came to have an interview with Pir-o-Murshid. He was a lawyer, materialist and atheist, besides was greatly opposed to all those who did not belong to his nation, and had been turned against the work of Murshid by somebody. Therefore he began his conversation, expressing with vigor his attitude. But as he got answers, so it seemed as if the fire of opposition met with water, and as he went along in his dispute, he, instead of getting hotter became cooler. He had expected to hear from the Murshid spiritual beliefs that he could argue upon and to tear them to pieces, but he found Murshid's belief not very different from what he himself believed. He found no effort on the part of Murshid to force his ideas upon anybody. He saw in Murshid the tendency to appreciate every kind of idea, for in every idea there is a good side and he felt that the tendency was to be sympathetic rather than antagonistic. He saw that there was nothing that Murshid stood for, but only believed that the truth was in every heart and no-one else can give it to another unless it rose up from the heart of a person as a spring of water from the mountain. He became so softened in his tone and in his manner after an hour's conversation that he parted quite a different man from what he had come. He shook hands with Pir-o-Murshid and said, "We shall always be friends" and Murshid thought that it was not a small achievement.

In this uniquely western form of Sufism, there are no barriers of race, creed or religion, it is not a religion, but rather a way of life that enhances and fulfills every religion. As Inayat Khan said, "The Sufi sees the truth in every religion."

"You have nicely said to us, Murshid, how Sufism is one with all religions. Now please tell us, what is the difference between Sufism and other religions."

Then Murshid said, "The difference is that it casts away all differences."

Inayat promoted unity and understanding in every aspect of life, and said "religion is the foundation of the whole life in the world, and as long as an understanding is not established between the followers of all different religions, it will always be difficult to hope for better conditions."

In speaking about mankind's longing for the Divine message, yet rebelling against every messenger that has ever come to show the way, Inayat once wrote:

... who can answer this demand? He alone who is sent from above, who is appointed by God to deliver His Message, who is empowered by the Almighty to stand by them in their struggles, and who is made compassionate by the most Merciful to heal their wounds. Man wants something he cannot get, man wishes to believe in something he cannot understand, man wishes to touch something he cannot reach. It is the continual struggle for the unattainable that blinds man, and he forms such high ideas even of the prophet who is only a Messenger, a human being, one like every one else, and who is subject to death and destruction and all the limitations of life, that the prophet does not seem to come up to man's ideal until he has left the world, leaving behind the memory which again rises as a resurrection of the prophet, spreading the influence of all he brought to the world and pouring from above that blessing which arose as vapor and came back from above as a rainfall.

The Sufi Message of Inayat Khan is the echo of the same Divine message which has always come and will always come to enlighten humanity.

This is not a new religion or a new message; it is the same message of Unity and Brotherhood which has been given to humanity again and again, yet so few hearts are open to hear it.

The Sufi movement is a group of people, belonging to different religions, who have not left their religions but have learned to understand them better; and their love is in life, as the love for God and humanity, instead of for a particular sect.

The principle work that the Sufi movement has to accomplish is to bring about a better understanding between East and West and between the nations and races of this world. And the note that the Sufi message is striking at the present time is the note which sounds the divinity of the human soul – to make human beings recognize the divinity in the human soul.

If there is any moral principle that the Sufi movement brings, it is this: that the whole humanity is as one body; and any organ of that body, hurt or troubled can cause trouble to the whole body, indirectly. And as the health of the whole body depends on the health of each part, so the health of the whole humanity depends upon the health of every nation.

Besides this, to those who are awakening and feel that now is the moment; when they feel inclined to know about the deeper side of life, of truth; to them the Order extends a helping hand; without asking to what religion, sect, or dogma, they belong.

The knowledge of the Sufi is helpful to every person, not only in living his life aright, but in his own religion. The Sufi movement does not call man away from his belief or church – it calls man to live it. In short, it is a movement intended by God to unite humanity in brotherhood, in Wisdom.

Social Gatheka 28, The Sufi's Aim in Life, Hazrat Inayat Khan (unpublished)

Speaking to his students, Inayat described the central theme of his efforts as:

The central theme of the Sufi Message is one simple thing, and yet most difficult, and that is to bring about in the world the realization of the divinity of the human soul, which hitherto has been overlooked, for the reason that the time had not come. The principal thing that the Message has to accomplish in this era is to create the realization of the divine spark in every soul, that every soul according to its progress may begin to realize for itself the spark of divinity within. This is the task that is before us.

Now you may ask, what is the Message? The Message is this: that the whole humanity is as one single body, and all nations and communities and races as the different organs, and the happiness and well-being of each of them is the happiness and well-being of the whole body. If there is one organ of the body in pain, the whole body has to sustain a share of the strain of it. That by this Message mankind may begin to think that his welfare and his well-being is not in looking after himself, but it is in looking after others, and when in all there will be reciprocity, love and goodness towards another, the better time will come.

Addresses to Cherags, Our Sacred Task, Hazrat Inayat Khan (unpublished)

The need of the world today is not learning, but how to become considerate towards one another. To try and find out in what way happiness can be brought about, and in this way to realize that peace which is the longing of every soul; and to impart it to others, thereby attaining our life's goal, the sublimity of life.

Sufi Mysticism, Problem of the Day, Hazrat Inayat Khan

To further elaborate on the mission and the methods employed to develop one's inner life, Inayat wrote:

There are ten principal Sufi thoughts which comprise all the important subjects with which the inner life of man is concerned:

1) There is one God, the Eternal, the Only Being; none else exists save God.

2) There is one Master, the Guiding Spirit of all souls, who constantly leads all followers towards the light.

3) There is one Holy Book, the sacred manuscript of nature, which truly enlightens all readers.

4) There is one Religion, the unswerving progress in the right direction towards the ideal, which fulfils the life's purpose of every soul.

5) There is one Law, the law of Reciprocity, which can be observed by a selfless conscience together with a sense of awakened justice.

6) There is one human Brotherhood, the Brotherhood and Sisterhood which unites the children of earth indiscriminately in the Fatherhood of God.

7) There is one Moral Principle, the love which springs forth from self-denial, and blooms in deeds of beneficence.

8) There is one Object of Praise, the beauty which uplifts the heart of its worshipper through all aspects from the seen to the unseen.

9) There is one Truth, the true knowledge of our being within and without which is the essence of all wisdom.

10) There is one Path, the annihilation of the false ego in the real, which raises the mortal to immortality and in which resides all perfection.

The objectives of the Sufi path:

1) To realize and spread the knowledge of unity, the religion of love and wisdom, so that the bias of faiths and beliefs may of itself fall away, the human heart may overflow with love, and all hatred caused by distinctions and differences may be rooted out.

2) To discover the light and power latent in man, the secret of all religion, the power of mysticism, and the essence of philosophy, without interfering with customs or belief.

3) To help to bring the world's two opposite poles, East and West, closer together by the interchange of thought and ideals, that the Universal Brotherhood may form of itself, and man may see with man beyond the narrow national and racial boundaries.

The Way of Illumination, Sufi Thoughts, Inayat Khan

Inayat continued to travel widely throughout Europe and the United States, offering the message to all who were ready to hear it. His lectures were transcribed and edited by his students to create the series which is today often called The Sufi Message.

However, in 1926 as he was becoming physically exhausted from his schedule of travel and work, he decided to go home to India to rest. However, his popularity was so great in India that he found himself once again endlessly traveling to spread the Message, and while traveling he became ill with pneumonia.

Following a brief period of illness, Inayat Khan departed from this world in Delhi on February 5, 1927, at the Tilak Lodge on the banks of the river Yamuna. His dargah (burial tomb) is in Delhi.

Selfpsychology and separation from others.

2010-11-07T13:42:00.002Z

Give up defining yourself - to yourself or to others. You won't die. You will come to life. And don't be concerned with how others define you. When they define you, they are limiting themselves, so it's their problem. Whenever you interact with people, don't be there primarily as a function or a role, but as the field of conscious Presence. You can only lose something that you have, but you cannot lose something that you are."
— Eckhart Tolle (A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose)

Change your mind.

2010-11-05T08:38:00.002Z

The meditation practice I aspire to is Vipassana. It is an act of self love to want to detach from discontent. Through deepening awareness one can achieve greater emotional balance and less-pressured happiness. Constant cravings manifest as needs to quick-fix discomfort/dis-ease.

Often because of pre-conditioned patterns - self medication - using something outside of ourselves to escape from reality of the war within will be fleeting....
Ask for help. Learn to look out for tool or techniques to aid the process of changing negativity into positive affirmations- daily life is in constant motion and you can learn ways to support the process of change.

Dharma and Science - Prof. P.L. Dhar

Inquisitiveness is one of the fundamental characteristics of human beings. Right from birth, a child would like to know and understand the surrounding world. As the child grows up, he or she begins to understand the cause-effect relationship between various events: putting a switch down lights a bulb, putting an ice cube in a glass of soft drink cools it, placing a hand in fire heats it—and we say, the child is learning, gaining knowledge. Science is essentially a systematisation of all the knowledge that humanity has gained about the external world, with the help of our senses.

As the child grows into maturity and experiences the various vicissitudes of life, sooner or later, he or she begins to question: "What is the purpose of all this—being born, studying, earning, having children, rearing a family, getting old and finally dying? Why so much suffering—caused by illness, old age, separation from loved ones, association with the ‘wicked’?" He begins to contemplate and understand his own true nature, the real cause of his suffering, and the way out of it, and thus becomes wiser. Dharma is essentially a systematisation of all the wisdom gained by humanity.

Viewed in this way, Dharma and science emerge as two complementary aspects of human endeavour. As the Isa-Upanishad puts it, "He who has both spiritual wisdom (Dharma) and secular knowledge (science) together keeps death at bay through the latter and experiences immortality through the former."1

Science (especially its applied version, technology), gives us the necessary know-how to keep our body in good shape; Dharma provides us with an understanding of the very purpose of our existence, the "know-where". Clearly, for the harmonious development of any society—for the harmonious development of any individual—a proper integration of science and Dharma is essential. This is especially crucial in modern times, when the advances in science and technology have empowered us enormously. However, from a lack of "wisdom", of Dharma, this advancement in science is leading only to an increase in our sorrows: poisoning of land, air, water and of minds.

Misunderstandings about Dharma

The term "Dharma" literally means "natural law". Dharma is thus an exposition of the laws pertaining to our inner world, just as science deals with the laws pertaining to the outer world. The difference between science and Dharma is thus only a difference in the realm of enquiry—as there are differences between the various "departments" of science, such as physics, chemistry and botany. Yet there is a perception of irreconcilability between science and Dharma.
Many factors are responsible for this perception, the first and foremost being the erroneous understanding of both Dharma and science. Today, for most people, Dharma is synonymous with sectarian religions, with priestcraft; they see it as a mumbo-jumbo of words and elaborate rites and rituals, which can become the cause of internecine conflicts between neighbours, even though they may have lived like brothers for generations. Above all, Dharma has become synonymous with a stubborn resistance to any logical scrutiny of religious beliefs. No wonder the youth of today do not want to touch it with a barge-pole! A modern, rational person who is not willing to accept anything on authority—be it the authority of a religious teacher or a sacred book—is therefore tempted to reject it all often, even the eternal truths which are so badly needed to give direction to life will be rejected, thus throwing the baby out with the bath-water! This process is catalysed by a scientific temperament, which is equated with crass materialism—for hasn’t science got an explanation for every phenomenon on the basis of matter in motion under the influence of various forces? Therefore, anyone talking about the existence of reality beyond sensory perception is usually dubbed as unscientific—an ignorant fool living in a world of his own fancies. In such a scenario, the integration of science and Dharma is obviously impossible.

To change this situation there is clearly a need to present Dharma as a science, following a scientific method, shorn of all extraneous socio-political adjuncts and metaphysical speculations. The scientific attitude demands "induction from facts and not deduction from dogmas. We must face the facts and derive our conclusion from them and not start with the conclusion and then play with the facts."2 Secondly, we also need to understand whether materialism, a legacy of nineteenth-century science, is still endorsed by modern science. Fortunately, recent developments in science are questioning this traditional world view, and thus a proper understanding of these developments can give a fillip to the process of integrating science and Dharma.

Dharma as an Applied Science

The essence of the scientific approach was characterised by Thomson: "The aim of science is to describe impersonal facts of experience in verifiable terms as exactly as possible, as simply as possible, and as completely as possible."3

To become a rigorous science, Dharma must be presented as "the Law" which can be experienced by all, not merely a select few. The various propositions have to be presented as hypotheses to be accepted only on verification by experience, albeit personal and subjective,* and not on authority. Also, such propositions should be rational and logical.

The teachings of the Buddha, one of the greatest spiritual scientists, meet these requirements. His constant refrain to his disciples could easily be the advice of a modern humane scientist to young students:

Believe nothing merely because you have been told it, or because it is tradition, or because you yourself have imagined it. Do not believe what your teacher tells you merely out of respect for him. But whatever, after due examination and analysis, you find to be conducive to the good, the benefit, the welfare of all beings, believe and cling to that doctrine, and take it as your guide.

The essence of Dharma, as put crisply by all the Enlightened Ones is "the eschewing of all evil, the perfecting of good deeds, the purifying of one’s mind."4
The simplicity of this enunciation, devoid of any esoteric pronouncement, may sometimes conceal its profundity. However, its practical utility and universal applicability are quite obvious. Viewed in this light, purifying the mind of its baser instincts is the quintessence of Dharma, since this would quite naturally lead to performance of wholesome deeds. It also leads to the development of an insight into the basic characteristics of life. This process of purification is not a mystic knowledge beyond the ken of ordinary people. It is a strictly scientific technique open to anybody who is willing to learn and verify it.

Vipassana—
the Quintessence of Dharma

The process of purification of mind is analogous to cleaning the turbid waters of a lake. Two approaches are possible. One could use an external precipitating agent such as alum that chemically forces all the impurities to settle down at the bottom of the lake. Alternatively, one could go inside the lake, identify each and every impurity, and actually take it out. Clearly, the latter process is bound to be more messy and will need more effort, but its advantages are quite obvious. With the former method, we are only suppressing the impurities, but they are still very much there at the bottom. A major storm or churning of the lake can bring them to the surface again. However, with the latter method we have actually eliminated them and the lake will remain clean, so long as we do not add fresh impurities to it. The ancient masters recognised both these approaches, that is to say either suppression or elimination of the mental defilements.

If we divert our attention away from the defilements* as and when they arise (for example by listening to music, or having a drink, or chanting a "holy" name, or some lofty auto-suggestion) the intensity of these negative emotions abates quickly and we can get immediate relief. However these defilements are not actually eradicated, but only suppressed. Modern psychology agrees that they leave their impressions in the deeper recesses of the mind, in its subconscious and unconscious layers.

To remove the impurities of the mind, it is obviously necessary to identify them objectively, and it turns out that this detached "observation" of the mental-physical structure is sufficient to eliminate them. An incident from life of Swami Vivekananda illustrates this point. Once, as he was walking on a street in Varanasi, some monkeys started chasing him. At first Swamiji tried to run from them, but the monkeys kept pace and began to attack him. Just then an old man called out, "Face the brutes." Swamiji turned and confronted the monkeys, and when he did they all fell back and fled.

The impurities of the mind are like these monkeys and the only way to eradicate them is to face them squarely—to observe them without reacting. But how are we to observe these defilements? How does one observe anger, for example, without actually getting overwhelmed by it?
The ancient masters who unravelled the complexities of body-mind phenomena with penetrating insight discovered an important fact: "Whatever arises in the mind is accompanied by sensation" (sabbe dhamma vedana samosarana).5 They also found that all our reactions to various situations are in reality the reactions of the subconscious mind to bodily sensations. Now, while it is very difficult to observe objectively abstract emotions such as anger or passion, it is comparatively easy to train the mind to observe sensations (which carry the signatures of these emotions) in a detached manner. The continuous practice of observing these bodily sensations objectively is the crux of Vipassana meditation. Slowly, but surely, it grinds out the deep mental grooves of lifelong habits—craving for pleasant experiences, avoiding the unpleasant, and ignoring neutral experiences. It thus gradually lifts the veil which obscures from us the real characteristics of all body-mind phenomena: impermanence, unsatisfactoriness and egolessness.

To be able to observe the sensations which keep on occurring continuously in various parts of the body, a minimum level of concentration of the mind is obviously essential so that one does not get easily distracted by the external and inner noises which are the hallmarks of our modern life.

The training of increasing the concentration of mind can be done in a variety of ways. In Vipassana, the object of concentration is one’s own breath. This practice is called Anapana, which literally means incoming and outgoing breath. It involves bare observation of the normal, natural respiration with a firm and steady attention, free from any strain. Again, there is no mystery about the choice of breath as the object of concentration; there are many sound reasons for it. Firstly, breath is universally acceptable, being non-sectarian. Also, it is readily available at any time and it is a neutral object: no-one has any craving or aversion towards it. Focusing attention on such an object continuously for a long period of time is, of course, quite difficult, given our present disposition, which only seeks excitement through pleasant objects. But a systematic, persistent effort does make a dent in this stubborn habit.

As a result we receive a foretaste of the fruits of equableness—a natural feeling of peace and tranquillity accompanying the sharpening of the mind. One could have chosen an object of concentration for which the meditator has some attraction or reverence. This would have made the task of concentration much easier because of the natural attraction for the object, but, as is obvious, this would only strengthen the mental habit of craving and thus take us away from the goal of complete purification of mind.

An obvious prerequisite for such a training is the scrupulous observance of basic moral precepts—in particular, abstention from killing, stealing, false speech, sexual misconduct, and intoxicants—since their wilful violation would cause violent mental agitation, making it impossible to observe the mind-body complex objectively. Vipassana practitioners can thus learn by experience the importance of moral conduct for their own well-being. In this way morality and ethics thus become a scientific discipline, which one accepts on the basis of one’s own experience and not on account of social pressures or respect for a teacher. This was the fond wish of Albert Einstein, one of the greatest scientists of all times: "The foundation of morality should not be made dependent on myth nor tied to any authority lest doubts about the myth or about the legitimacy of the authority imperil the foundation of sound judgement and action."
From the above description of the basic features of Vipassana, it is apparent that it is an applied science, a technology for inner development. In the true scientific spirit, all that it involves is mindful observation, free from any admixture of prejudices or subjective judgements. Like any other modern technology, it has a scientific basis which can be easily understood; and what is more important, its results can easily be verified by personal experience, here and now. Ehi passiko, ehi passiko (come and see, come and see) was the constant refrain of the Buddha. There is no rite or ritual, dogma or a priori belief necessary for the meditation. Like any other technological skill it can be learnt by systematic practice irrespective of one's caste, creed, religious belief or nationality.

Though its most important objective is to purify the mind of dross, Vipassana is not a mere detergent to wash the dirt off the mental linens, and then to be left behind in the washroom after use. It is an attitude to life, a fragrance which naturally envelops practitioners as they develop more and more insight into the fundamental traits of human existence. It is an art of living equanimously in spite of defeats and victories, praise and criticism, falling health and rising prices. It is the art of transcending, and not suppressing, the sensory attractions. As the practice matures, one naturally develops a deep insight into the fundamental laws of life and becomes harmonious with these. One becomes established in Dharma.

Science and Materialism

It is historical fact that the rise of science in the post-Renaissance period was instrumental in spreading a general belief in materialism—a belief that matter is the sole reality. All the phenomena of nature, ranging from the motion of the planets to the tides in the seas, could now be explained rationally on the basis of well understood laws of nature. There was no need whatsoever for invoking divine intervention. Even the origin of sentient beings could be "explained" on the basis of the Darwinian theory of evolution.

Some people tried to further extend this theory to show that the simplest form of living protoplasm could arise from non-living nitrogenous carbon compounds under suitable conditions—thus exploding the age-old argument for the existence of God. Attempts were even made to explain consciousness and thinking as arising from the functions of the ganglionic cells of the cortex of the brain. The scientists of the last century firmly held that it should be possible to explain the universe with a few score elements and half a dozen elementary forces.7 No wonder, for most people today, the scientific approach is synonymous with a belief in materialism, a belief in the omnipotence of intellect, and any suggestion about "transcending the intellect" is seen as unscientific.

This picture has, however, undergone considerable change in the last few decades. New developments in science such as the theory of relativity and quantum mechanics, are bringing about a profound change in our common-sense view of nature. Many illuminating books have been written in the last two decades which bring out the various facets of this emerging change. We shall mention here only a few of these points which seem most pertinent for our discussion.

Fundamental Nature of Matter

The quest for the basic building blocks of matter led scientists to what are often called fundamental particles: electrons, protons, neutrons etc. The intuitive model of the atom which emerges from this research is similar to the planetary system—with a heavy nucleus (consisting of neutrons and protons) at the centre of an immense void, and tiny electrons whirling round it at very high speeds. Naturally, at first these fundamental particles were thought to be something similar to the classical particles, albeit ultra-small—something like specks of dust often seen in the path of a ray of sunshine entering a room. Belief in this concept has, however, been badly shaken by many discoveries. Experimental studies showed that these particles they could be "created" out of energy and could "vanish" in energy as predicted by Einstein's theory of the interconvertibility of matter and energy.

Now, since energy is a dynamic quantity associated with activity or with processes, the obvious implication is that "a particle has to be conceived as a dynamic pattern, a process involving the energy which manifests itself as the particle's mass".8 This is a picture which is in great contrast to our common-sense notion of "mass" as belonging to an object, but in consonance with the insight of ancient masters: "No doer is there; naught save the deed is... The path exists, but not the traveller found on it".9

It will probably take even the scientific community many more years to fully come to terms with the philosophical implications of Einstein’s theory of relativity. Even today the import of Minkowski's oft-quoted enunciation: "Space by itself and time by itself are mere shadows of a four-dimensional space-time continuum which is an independent reality".10 We do not understand because we have no direct sensory or even intuitive experience of this four-dimensional space-time continuum. Evidently our perception of the world based on the common-sense view of absolute space and time is in error. The situation is quite akin to the erroneous view of the prisoners of Plato's Republic, who never having seen anything other than the shadows on the walls of their underground cave, mistook these for reality.10

An experience of this independent reality would clearly demand transcendence of the senses, coming out of the "prison house of sight". This is a term which we find repeatedly in the ancient texts, but something which would have been anathema to the nineteenth-century scientist. As Fritjof Capra, quoting Swami Vivekananda, puts it, this space-time of relativistic physics is the Absolute of Eastern sages: "Time, space and causation are like the glass through which the absolute is seen. In the Absolute there is neither time, space nor causation."11 This conception thus gives scientific authority (probably needed for the sceptics) to the vision of the ancient sages. Having experienced the transcendent reality directly, they declared: "There is, brethren, an unborn, a not-become, a not-made, not-compounded."12

Understanding "Reality"

Another mind-boggling characteristic of these fundamental particles, which has defied all conventional explanations is their ability to exhibit both "wave" and "particle" behaviour under certain experimental conditions.

The fundamental particles thus do not seem to possess any intrinsic nature waiting to be revealed to an inquisitive observer. As summed up by Capra:

My conscious decision about how to observe, say, an electron will determine the electron’s properties to some extent. If I ask it a particle question, it will give me a particle answer. If I ask it a wave question, it will give me a wave answer. The electron does not have objective properties independent of my mind.

We could thus say, with Sir James Jeans, that, in the light of this discovery,

the universe begins to look more like a great thought than like a great machine. Mind no longer appears as an intruder into the realm of matter ... but ... as the creator and the governor of the realm of matter—not of course our individual mind, but the Mind in which the atoms, out of which our individual minds have grown, exist as thoughts.

Any further understanding of the nature of ultimate reality clearly demands an investigation into the subtle mental plane—self-analysis rather than analysis of the world around, thus merging Science with Dharma.

It is also evident from the above description that an intuitive physical model of these fundamental particles is not possible since our senses can only detect either particle motion, characterised by a localisation of the object moving in a definite trajectory in space, or a wave motion, characterised by a motion of the medium. This realisation forms the basis of one of the very important principles of quantum mechanics: the Principle of Complementarity put forth by Niels Bohr. That is, in any experiment with micro-particles, the observer gets information not about the "properties of the particles themselves", but about the properties of the particles associated with some particular situation. This includes, among other things, the measuring instruments. The information obtained under some definite conditions should be considered as complementary to the information obtained under different experimental conditions. Evidence obtained under experimental conditions cannot be comprehended within a single picture, but must be regarded as various sides (complementing each other) of a single reality—to wit, the object under investigation.15

The social and philosophical implications of this principle are profound. It gives credence to the insight of ancient masters that our attempts at understanding "reality" through the study of matter with the senses are similar to the attempts of five blind men trying to comprehend an elephant by feeling it with their hands. The evidence thus obtained can never be synthesized into the true picture. Clearly, it follows that to comprehend the "reality" of matter, it is necessary to use some other mode of gathering knowledge—aparokŒanubhuti or direct experience, as our ancient sages put it.

At the social level, this complementary principle points out that apparently contradictory views may emerge from the same "reality". Wisdom lies in treating them as complementary; this is a message of harmony needed so much in modern times when "appearances" often lead to unending conflicts. In fact Bohr fervently hoped that the complementary principle would, in the near future, find a place in school education.

A New World View

There have been many developments in other sciences such as biology, psychology, chemistry, neurosciences, etc. All of these indicate the emergence of a new world view which repudiates materialism, but is in consonance with the vision of the Eastern sages of yore. In fact many of the insights of these sages remained unintelligible to the masses, based as they were on the transcendent experience; but today they can be better appreciated in the light of these scientific facts.

One such fundamental insight, which is extremely difficult to comprehend on the basis of our common-sense view of nature, is that of anatta—the fact of egolessness. However, when modern science tells us that the basic building block of matter is not a "being" but a manifestation of energy, which is essentially a process of "becoming", this assertion seems to make sense. It is this seemingly solid physical body, "my body", which creates the stubborn illusion of individuality. Modern biologists point out that 98 per cent of the 1028 atoms of a typical human body are replaced annually from the atoms of the surroundings—the earth, the trees, the animals, in fact all living and non-living entities. It thus becomes evident that one cannot talk of individual entities localised in space and time; we are all partners in a biodance.16 Walt Whitman's poetic insight— "Every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you" —is thus a scientific fact!

Molecular biology associates our individuality with the uniqueness of the genes. But here too it is the pattern of the genes which remains the same and not the stuff of the gene—the thousands of individual carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and other atoms that comprise it, which are in constant exchange with the surroundings.16 So, even in the view of hard-core molecular biology, our individuality is a non-material "entity", an abstract pattern of arrangement of various labile molecules. When we couple this understanding with the impossibility of "exactly" locating any fundamental particle, as revealed by Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, and also with the fundamental interconnectedness at quantum level, one is forced to agree with Capra:

The quantum field is seen as the fundamental physical entity; a continuous medium which is present everywhere in space. Particles are merely local condensations of the field; concentrations which come and go, thereby losing their individual character and dissolving into the underlying field.

This quantum field is obviously an impersonal entity—the nearest symbol which one can possibly conceive of for the transcendent reality. As even a layman today would testify, a subset of this field—the electromagnetic field—does have the "power" to produce the splendid illusion of a "living being" in every home—on television! One can thus appreciate that the fundamental quantum field could be responsible for creating the illusion of the existence of the viewer of the television too. That this viewer is illusory is the insight of anatta!

Concluding Remarks

Both Dharma and Science enunciate the laws of nature; as applicable to the inner world of human beings and the external world. There can be no disharmony between them, for as Gary Zukav points out in his recent book,
[The laws of Science] are the reflection in physical reality—in the world of physical objects and phenomena—of a larger non-physical dynamic at work in non-physical domains. When Science and its discoveries are understood with the higher order of logic and understanding of the multisensory human,* they reveal the same richness that Life itself displays everywhere and endlessly... the paradigms... of Science also reveal the way our species has seen itself in relation to the Universe: Newtonian physics reflects a species that is confident in its ability to grasp the dynamics of the physical world through the intellect; relativity reflects a species that understands the limiting relationship between the absolute and the personalised conception of it; and quantum physics reflects a species that is becoming aware of the relationship of its consciousness to the physical world.18

It would thus not be an exaggeration to say that for a deeper understanding of modern science, there is a need to develop certain intuitive insights. These can enable us to have experiences more rich than those possible with the basic five senses. Clearly, the process of evolution of such a multisensory personality can be hastened by living life in conformity with the Universal Laws, the Dharma—that is, by practicing Vipassana.

The complementarity of science and Dharma can be succinctly put by paraphrasing the beautiful epigram of Albert Einstein: Science without Dharma is blind and Dharma without Science is lame—for Dharma gives us the vision of what ought to be done, and Science gives us the power to do it19. The developments in science have unleashed enormous power—but power can do as much harm as good. Today, there is a crying need to channel this power to ensure the very survival of humanity, for otherwise Man will destroy himself by misusing the same power. What we must do is reorient our lives in the light of the quintessence of Dharma, by practicing morality (sila), taming the senses by the practice of concentration (samadhi) and progressively purifying the mind by the practice of Vipassana.

Attachment Disordered Adults crave but are afraid of closeness.

2010-11-04T14:38:00.003Z

What is attachment? Why do we have such tremendous need for attachment? What are the implications of attachment? Why is one attached? When you are attached to anything, there is always fear in it, fear of losing it. There is always a sense of insecurity. Please observe it for yourself. There is always a sense of separation. And is attachment love? That is one point to note in our relationships.

Adult Attachment Disorder & Treatment

Unresolved childhood attachment issues leave an adult vulnerable to difficulties in forming secure adult relationships. Patterns of attachment continue through the life cycle and across generations. New relations are affected by the expectations developed in past relationships. There is a strong correlation between insecure adult attachment and marital dissatisfaction and negative marital interactions. If an adult does not feel safe with others, he/she will tend to be either rejecting of their partner or overly clingy.

Attachment problems are often handed down transgenerationally unless someone breaks the chain. As a parent, an insecurely attached adult may lack the ability to form a strong attachment to their child and provide the necessary attachment cues required for the healthy emotional development of the child thereby predisposing their child to a lifetime of relationship difficulties.

Depending on the genetic personality style of the individual and the early life events experienced, insecurely attached adults fall in one of two categories of insecure attachment:
AVOIDANT

Intense anger and loss
Hostile
Critical of others
Sensitive to blame
Lack of empathy
Views others as untrustworthy
Views others as undependable
Views self as unlovable or "too good" for others
Relationships feel either threatening to one's sense of control, not worth the effort, or both
Compulsive self-reliance
Passive withdrawal
Low levels of perceived support
Difficulty getting along with co-workers, often preferring to work alone
Work may provide a good excuse to avoid personal relations
Fear of closeness in relationships
Avoidance of intimacy
Unlikely to idealize the love relationship
Tendency toward Introjective depression (self critical)

ANXIOUS/AMBIVILENT
Compulsive Caregiving
Feel overinvolved and underappreciated
Rapid relationship breakups
Idealizing of others
Strong desire for partner to reciprocate in relationship
Desire for extensive contact and declarations of affections
Overinvests his/her emotions in a relationship
Perceives relationships as imbalanced
Relationship is idealized
Preoccupation with relationship
Dependence on relationship
Heavy reliance on partner
Views partner as desirable but unpredictable (sometimes available, sometimes not)
Perceives others as difficult to understand
Relationship is primary method by which one can experience a sense of security
Unlikely to view others as altruistic
Sensitive to rejection
Discomfort with anger
Extreme emotions
Jealous
Possessive
Views self as unlovable
Suicide attempts
Mood swings
Tendency toward anaclitic depression (dependent depression)

GOALS OF THERAPY
To establish a safe haven in which to make the unconscious known in order to heal and learn how to healithy attach in a mature way that invites recipriocity,dialogue and validation.
1. Identify early losses
2. Mourn the loss of that which never was but yearned for deeply
3. Provide closure to the unresolved relationship longings with parental attachment figures
4. Reorganize belief system and physiological reaction to attachment relationships

Gratefully, attachment styles are not fixed in stone and with either positive life experience or appropriate therapeutic intervention and a strong desire for change adults can alter their relationships and experience true intimacy and closeness.

Innocence. Play. Love.

2010-10-26T13:25:00.006+01:00

Relationships. I noticed a shift in perceptions yesterday. Often I am thinking in terms of the past or the future. I work at disciplining my body,thinking, feeling behaviour and life is beautiful - that is until something happens that cause me to react rather sharply!

Then I remind myself that it's not about me - what is my responsibility is how I respond in the present moment. Reacting warrants reparing a rupture.

Half-term is about spending time with my stepson. Making his life enjoyable for the short time he is with us. This time, like every other time he is happy to see us but he has his triggers. I know he continues to struggle with the loyalty/overly responsibility factor, and how to make sense or develop an understanding of why he has two homes, two lots of parents, friends etc.

It was a series of tipping point challenges when he was 5 years old, to come into his life. Now, soon to be 11 he is at the emergent age of reason.

A joy to chatter away with and watch him explain his current passion for anything Nerf!

Our home is filled with the sound of children's laughter. It doesn't need to get any better than that!

Children are wonderful teachers of how to live in the moment-I wish he could retain that as an attribute- that inner Zen ism - maybe he will!

The pain body constantly craves drama.

2010-10-19T19:43:00.000+01:00

What is Love?
by Brenda Schaefer

Love. Of all the mysteries that enchant us, love may be the one most sought after. On earth we have elevated love in art and song and at other times used the word love in such a sloppy manner that it has come to mean almost everything and nothing at all. The word we use for the enormous power has been known to shape wars and history, create national scandals, justify crimes of passion, turn strong men and women into weaklings, and make fools out of kings. And perhaps because of these same things we are embarrassed by love. We blush when we talk about love, we feel weakened when in it, ashamed we have fallen, and reluctant to admit to it.

But what is love, really? And what does it have to do with stress free living? Everything! Most of the issues I encounter daily as a psychotherapist can be downsized to the most over discussed, under experienced and misunderstood word in the human language, love. Clients ask me: "How can I love myself more?" "How can we have a more loving relationship?" "How can I heal from this failed love affair?" "If he loves me, why does he betray me with endless sexual affairs?" “Why am I afraid to love?” "Am I in love or am I in an addiction?” When I ask outright, “What is love?” clients stop dead in their tracks. Though desperate in their search for it, they have trouble defining that which they are looking for. The search for love too often results in loneliness, anxiety, depression, low self esteem, physical and emotional distress of all kinds.

What I can tell you is that love is real. It is alive. I knew this as a child and I know it again now. To get to an understanding of what real love is we must first know what love is not. This is important because living in fictitious love means less time being in love. To be sure, love is not co-dependency, sex, or romance addiction. These are the illusions modeled to us to self medicate trauma, fear and fill our loneliness. Nor is love a mere feeling, behavior, thought, or biochemical response. It is not a role, it cannot be earned, learned or bought. It is not dependent on an object and it is not limited. And, love is not a relationship. You don’t have to tell someone who’s suffering from a relationship gone bad that relationship and love are not the same thing. Almost every relationship problem is a love disorder problem. Not that love is the problem, but because love has been lost or denied, twisted, distorted, perverted or betrayed.

Love is a word that we have given to the enormous, passionate, alive, on fire power that is in us around us, above us and below us. In truth, we are in love already and we do not need an object of love to know that. Love is everywhere! There is no need to search for it. It is right at our fingertips and we need only plug into it. Love is home. Some say it runs the universe. Some call it God. Science is now confirming what the mystics and poets have been telling us all along. Love is the heartbeat of the universe, a resonance we can measure. An energy, there is no end to its supply. Love is free and available to all and everyone. Love does not care what you look like, what you believe, whether you are married or single or in a relationship at all. It couldn’t care less whether you are prince or pauper, sinner or saint. We are intended to be in service of love. And if you consider it, all human suffering results from denial or resistance to this responsibility.

Love is power and in fact there is growing scientific evidence to back up the claim that love is good for your emotional and physical well-being. And there is growing scientific evidence that some of the things we pass off as love are bad for your health, too.

According to C. Norman Shealy, M.D. and Caroline Myss, Ph.D., love of others and being loved are key factors in improving the immune system, adding to life expectancy and creating overall happiness. Their research shows that even bad habits like overeating and smoking have less of an impact on those who have loving support systems. A research project conducted by James House at the University of Michigan Research Center clearly demonstrated that doing good deeds pays off. Those people who did volunteer work on a regular basis and who interacted with others in a caring and compassionate manner, dramatically increased life expectancy, and overall vitality.

At Harvard University, a well known experiment conducted by psychologist David McClelland found an increase in an anti-body that helps ward off respiratory infections, immunoglobulin-A (IGA), can be generated simply by watching a film of Mother Teresa working amongst India’s sick and impoverished.

People “in love” have fewer colds. The unconditional love that pet owners receive from their animals helps lessen depression. In one study of Israeli men, high cholesterol and high blood pressure were less important to health than the quality of love in their marriages. Individuals who have close intimacy with others have higher IGA antibodies and less serious illness. Children whose parents love them unconditionally thrive, have good esteem and more zest for life.

E motional health is improved as well. Studies have shown over and over again that caring about others induces feelings of warmth, calm, and happiness, which significantly reduces depression. In fact, a study by Allan Luks found that 90 percent of a group of volunteers reported a “high” from their experience.

Love is the most cost-effective medical insurance policy and the cheapest medicine there is. And there is no end to its supply. In fact, the more love you put out, the more it generates. And it attracts love to itself. It generates joy, happiness, serenity, esteem, vibrancy, kindness, appreciation, respect, laughter, generosity, tolerance, tenderness, open-mindedness, respect, care, affection, goodness, service, appreciation, compassion, awe, wonder, bliss, trust… all of which have been proven scientifically to be good for your health.

Love may be a transcendent mystery and a healing power that can reduce stress, but it is also a down to earth experience. Though love is not a relationship, relationships are the way we step love down to earth. Love is perfect. Humans are not. On some days it feels like a bad joke. We have the ability to know an elevated love yet we are trapped in wounded egos and bodies or distorted cultural programs that prevent us from achieving it. Keeping our hearts open to love, remaining vulnerable, is our greatest task. We started out open and had every intention of harnessing love and putting it into life. But most of us, in a moment of intimacy or trauma, got hurt or felt betrayed. We felt a pain in our heart and our heart began to recoil. It just happened. We are all a bit love disabled, veterans of an invisible war we did not know we were in. Too much of our life is lost to safeguarding, calculating, planning, projecting, searching, or waiting for love. And then death arrives.

When you lose someone important to you, or realize that your own death is impending, you may understand that your life has been a dream, a play that you have written and produced. All the things you made important were not important after all. What you thought was reality was a dream. In the face of death you realize that the pleasures of the material world felt good but they did not assure love. At that magic moment, you recognize that a you will not be remembered for how much wealth you have accumulated, how many sexual encounters you have had, how much you have accomplished, how much you have pleased others, but how much love you have put into life. Surrendering, your heart opens. Facing death you lay down your arms and discover that love is in you, around you, above you and below you. You remember.

Excerpts from newly released Love’s Way: The Union of Body, Ego, Soul and Spirit, by Dr. Brenda Schaeffer, Hazelden, Center City, MN, 2001. This and her best seller, Is It Love or Is It Addiction?, are available at your local bookstore, http://www.loveandaddiction.com or by calling1-888-987-6129. Brenda Schaeffer, D.Min., licensed psychologist, author and certified addiction specialist, is an experienced therapist, teacher and international speaker. She has a private practice in Eden Prairie, MN. She can be reached by calling 952-903-9215 or via email: brenda@loveaddiction.com.

We do need others!

If you recognize symptoms of love addiction or unhealthy dependency in yourself or your relationship, you aren't alone. In our struggle to end our sense of isolation, pain, and irrelevancy, we often find ourselves snared in a web of needfullness, "Lets face it," says Schaeffer, "An ideal relationship is something we are always working towards.

We do need other people. We need to love and to share love in order to bloom to our fullest. We are the most highly evolved species on the planet. We continue to evolve. In our evolution, there is developing a awareness that we are linked with other people in a very profound way. Each individual's uniqueness contributes to the greater whole of humanity. Life is all about relationship! Our scientists have discovered the atom and its component parts. They now strive to categorize the substance which causes the particles of the atom to adhere together. Some teachers of physics suggest that love is also a tangible force, a power. This concept views love as a power as real as electricity, a divine mortar that cements the universe together--an electromagnetic force which draws the particles of the atoms together and takes form. It makes sense to know more about how we love - whether it is a dependent love aimed at ego enhancement and need fulfillment, or a mature love that has evolved over time and supports life. True love's characteristics are the opposites of those that characterize addictive relationships.

The Characteristics of Healthy Love

People in healthy relationships have the following characteristics.

1. They allow for individuality.
2. They experience both oneness with and separateness from another.
3. They bring out the best qualities in self and another.
4. They accept endings.
5. They experience openness to change and exploration.
6. They invite growth in the other person.
7. They experience true intimacy.
8. They feel the freedom to ask honestly for what is wanted.
9. They experience giving and receiving in the same way.
10. They do not attempt to change or control the other.
11. They encourage self-sufficiency of partners.
12. They accept limitations of self and other.
13. They do not seek unconditional love.
14. They accept and respect commitment.
15. They have a high self-esteem
16. They trust the memory of the beloved; they enjoy solitude.
17. They express feelings spontaneously.
18. They welcome closeness; risk vulnerability.
19. They care with detachment.
20. They affirm equality and personal power of self and other.