What I most love in my teaching practice is seeing students become dedicated to their own liberation. As their spiritual practice matures, people light up from within when they begin to understand that personal freedom is possible. This commitment to freedom on the part of the student inspires me to find ways to express my deepest understanding and enthusiasm for liberation.
The mindfulness teachings of the Buddha are among the more direct, practical meditation techiques that we can cultivate. My focus is on sharing these practices in an accessable, down-to-earth way. How can we disengage from our habits of responding to the world through veils of confusion, greed, and hatred?
Mindfulness practice helps us recognize when we are responding to the world from the mental and emotional habits that obscure our true home, our radiant nature, which manifests as compassion and love. The Buddha's teachings show us that we are not isolated individuals who need to live defensive lives. Rather, we can learn to trust and live from our full potential as compassionate members of a connected planet.
As has been said, the self is a ghost that appears to exist only because it is not investigated. In this talk we explore some of the ways that we perceive experience inaccurately and create a view of lasting self. We also mention the advice of Achaan Buddhadasa to generate a contentment with emptiness.
The understanding of Dukkha - the first noble truth, as well as one of the three characteristics of phenomena - opens our hearts and minds into the peace of wisdom and the beauty of compassion.
The buddha said that the perception of impermanence, when cultivated, leads one to liberation. This talk explores some of the ways that we do not recognize this characteristic of existence.
The understanding of emptiness manifests in our experience as the intention of compassion. One way that compassion develops is through meeting our own physical and mental suffering with kind awareness.
