As a monk, I bring a strong commitment, along with the renunciate flavor, to the classic Buddhist teachings. I play with ideas, with humor and a current way of expressing the teachings, but I don't dilute them.
Sitting in a field of fifty to eighty people really starts my mind sparking. Since I don't prepare my talks ahead of time, I find myself listening to what I'm saying along with everyone else. This leaves a lot of room for the Dhamma to come up. Just having eighty people listening to me is enough to engage me, stimulate me, and create a nice flow of energy. The actual process of teaching evokes ideas that even I did not realize were being held somewhere in my mind.
Different teaching situations offer their own unique value. In retreat, you are able to build a cohesive and comprehensive body of the teachings. When people are not on retreat and come for one session, it opens a different window. They are more spontaneous and I'm given the chance to contact them in ways that are closer to their "daily-life mind." This brings up surprises and interesting opportunities for me to learn even more.
I'm continually struck by how important it is to establish a foundation of morality, commitment, and a sense of personal values for the Vipassana teachings to rest upon. Personal values have to be more than ideas. They have to actually work for us, to be genuinely felt in our lives. We can't bluff our way into insight. The investigative path is an intimate experience that empowers our individuality in a way that is not egocentric. Vipassana encourages transpersonal individuality rather than ego enhancement. It allow for a spacious authenticity to replace a defended personality.
Q1 - What would you suggest as priorities for lay practice, recollections to establish a steady orientation to Dhamma?; 13:08 Q2 - Mindfulness when talking and using computers etc.; 18:30 Q3 - Energy, qi, anapanasati and integration of energy; 26:24 Q4 – I feel lots of unpleasant skin sensations when sitting, What might these be? 28:46 Q5 You’ve referred to integrating energy as a new way to consider. What does this mean? 36:09 Q9 Why couldn’t it be that nibbana is like chasing the unicorn; 37:23 Q10 Can you speak about wisdom and samadhi; 40:33 Q11 Can you provide some guidance on mudita, rapture (piti) and stability/ staying grounded; 44:52 Q12 Contemplating the arising of the ‘me’ sense, dependent on phenomena.
Based on a heart that integrates around goodwill, key features of letting go arise. These are a successive process of disengagement, dispassion, cessation and release (or relinquishment). For example bitterness and guilt can be felt as they are and move on.
The renunciate quality of retreat removes our psychological cushions. Therefore soothing, not intensity, is needed. Gaining health and psychological flex, we can disband the fantasies that haunt the heart.
Resonating with images and meanings of the Triple Gem generates positive waves that place one in the field of the True, the Good and the Beautiful – the best place for practice.
Bringing to mind and resonating with benevolent occasions in one’s life to build up a solid resonant sign to sit within – with 39 min silent meditation.
Citta/heart is like a lake with waves rippling through it. The unawakened response is to create walls to resist the unpleasant, and fences to retain the pleasant - and ‘me’ to hold it all. Awakening responses to the waves are the skills of samadhi and brahmavihara. These make the lake vast and able to allow waves to arise and subside. They are doors to the Deathless - the unconstructed that the citta can enter through non-holding.
The process of fruition through satipaṭṭhāna entails resources, obstacles, skills, release and integration. Nibbana can be momentary whenever the consciousness of subject and object deconstructs.
Q1 00:52 When you're walking around and brushing your teeth what's your experience of the sense world and nibbana? I'd like to experience more beauty and sacredness in the sense world and cultivate a relationship with the transcendent, but it feels so out of reach; Q2 17:43 Recently I listened to a talk by Ajahn Tanissaro and he said he didn't know any practitioner in the West who was a stream enterer. I was disheartened. Can you say something about this? Q3 28:09 can you give some advice on cell phones and technology please? They drain my energy quickly. Q4 35:34 (several questions) In mindfulness of breathing, does one proceed sequentially through the 16 phrases, or pick up the steps that seem to fit with whatever seems to be arising. Why is it presented as a graduated training? Also, can you speak about releasing the heart? Q5 44:18 What are the differences between attention and awareness? What are their Pali terms? Q6 49:42 "One reviews the extent to which one's mind is liberated..." In the Book of the 5s. If one's mind is non-liberated how do you go about it? Q7 52:59 How to relate when resistance arises in practice from feeling blocked, to discouraged or lost etc etc etc.
