So I invite you to take a posture that's upright and comfortable.
And that feels supportive for your practice.
And maybe set an intention to allow the body to be still.
Trying to be still throughout the practice.
But not a forced stillness.
But allowing or letting.
The body be that way.
Once the body becomes settled.
Tension and tightness reduced.
We'll turn towards the breath for a few moments.
With an awareness that the body we inhabit simply breathes.
And we're letting go of desire to control.
Count or change the breath.
Unless you really feel the need.
So during this practice,
We'll get to know the last four of the paramis,
Of the perfections.
Truthfulness resolved.
Love and kindness in equanimity.
The idea is that we.
.
.
Practice with them.
So we get to know them better in the body.
In the heart.
And then the mind.
One way to consider truthfulness is that it's wise speech.
One of the.
Parts of the Eightfold Path.
There's not many ways to speak wisely.
If we are speaking untruths.
Or as we contemplate.
Truthfulness.
Try to bring to mind.
And experience.
Where someone was truthful.
Honest.
And you knew it.
How did that make you feel?
Did you notice it in the body?
If you can,
If you can bring it back as you recollect.
Did something show up in the heart?
Or the mind,
But thoughts arose.
As you had this conversation or listen to this person speak to you.
And remembering that this is a practice.
This is something.
.
.
To really go deeper with what we need to do.
A number of times to really gain the experience.
To really get to know what it feels like when we turn towards truthfulness.
Now we're going to turn the tables a bit.
And see if we can bring to mind an experience when we were the ones speaking.
And it was our turn.
Be truthful.
To be honest.
To speak from the heart.
And if you can recall,
What was that like?
As you were speaking.
What showed up in the body?
How did the heart feel?
What thoughts,
If any,
Did you have in the moment?
Or before,
Or after?
And the last way we are going to explore truthfulness.
And it's from the opposite of being truthful.
Deception.
The opposite of wise speech.
As we contemplate this aspect.
And try to see how it feels from the other side.
We can choose when we are the one who's being dishonest,
Being.
.
.
Or speaking without wisdom.
Or receiving.
Having someone speak to us in a way that.
.
.
As best as we could tell.
Was not true.
It didn't have the aspects of.
.
.
Kind and wise speech.
How did that feel in the heart,
Being lied to or lying to another?
Is there tension in the body?
Maybe we were angry at being lied to or hurt.
By investigating what it feels like from the other side.
How harmful it can be.
And we see just how important it is.
To be truthful.
In our speech and our actions.
Next poll.
Turn to resolve.
This is also found in the.
Noble eightfold path,
Resolve or intention.
Bringing our mind towards.
How we're going to move forward.
In the moment.
In our lives.
Practicing.
Repair me.
And resolve.
Really begins with.
Wise view.
Right view.
Samadhi.
The intention to be curious.
To investigate that willingness to understand another person,
A situation,
The environment we're in.
Whatever it may be.
And out of this desire,
This curiosity.
Is where Resolve grows from.
A piece that makes it a perfection.
It's connected to the other perfections.
Dona or generosity.
Kindness.
Truthfulness.
Patience.
And on and on.
We can understand something perfectly well.
And still set an unwise intention.
But if our mind and our heart and our body.
.
.
Operate.
Beginning with generosity.
Going all the way to equinemity.
More often than not.
What we intend to do,
The intentions we set,
Will be coming from a place of kindness.
The willingness to.
Help others.
Compassion.
So thinking about resolve.
Try to bring to mind.
The situation where.
You put your mind to it to be helpful or supportive or kind.
It was something you really set yourself up to do.
As you're exploring this Experience.
A result.
Again,
Where might you notice it?
Within the body.
In the heart.
Are in the mind.
The third parami for tonight is metta,
Or loving kindness.
Most likely one that you're more familiar with.
We've done meta-meditations,
Practiced the heart practices.
It's something that we talk about.
Quite regularly.
And when we practice metta as a meditation.
We bring someone to mind.
And we offer them these loving and kind phrases.
May you be at ease,
May you be happy,
May you be free from suffering.
Beautiful.
Wonderful intentions.
What a powerful thing to do for the mind.
And for relationships,
The way we walk in the world.
But tonight,
As we consider Metta,
And from a different angle.
We bring to mind a situation where someone was kind to us.
Or were you a kind to another?
It could be to a person.
To an animal,
A tree.
Doesn't matter.
As we're bringing to mind this experience of experiencing kindness,
Or offering kindness.
Again,
Looking in these three areas,
Body,
Heart,
And mind.
What was the experience?
Doesn't matter if you can't put it to words.
A sensation,
A feeling.
And last is equanimity.
Equanimity is.
In many of the Buddhist lists.
It's the last of the four qualities of love in the heart practices.
It's the last of the awakening factors.
It's the 10th.
Paritta.
When we're fully equanimous.
With everything and everyone.
I guess we would be a fully awakened being.
Equanimity has a few different Not so much different,
But.
.
.
There's a number of ways to describe what it means.
One way is having equal courage.
Regardless of the situation being.
Pleasant or unpleasant.
The ability the practice of maintaining a balanced.
.
.
And open.
Mind.
As life changes from moment to moment.
And ability to stay calm.
When there's a tornado spinning around you.
To be okay anyway.
Equanimity is not something that we can force.
I don't think we can choose it.
I think when we experience it,
When it shows up.
.
.
When we behave in a way that's equanimous,
It's because we have cultivated enough of the other Perfections we have practiced.
The teachings Enough.
But in the face of whatever the situation is,
We're able to be a quantumist,
At least to.
.
.
A degree.
These two are different.
So if you can bring to mind the situation again.
Whether it's your personal experience.
Or seeing another being.
Meet what shows up with equal courage.
And what did that do for the heart?
Of the mind.
