Class 1 | Meditation & Mindfulness: Why We’re So Stressed

Why do we feel so stressed even when we're perfectly safe? In the first class of this Meditation & Mindfulness series, we explore how the thinking mind and survival brain create chronic stress — and how meditation helps us see our thoughts more clearly, rather than getting lost in them.

Meditation practice included.

Transcript

We are starting a new series right now,

An Introduction to Meditation and Mindfulness.

So this is the first class of seven classes,

And it's really going to take us from start to finish with really understanding why we're meditating,

What's happening in our mind,

In our brain with our thoughts,

Really relating a lot of that thinking and kind of these impulses that we have,

Relating that to different survival systems in our brain,

And really seeing how those systems are backfiring on us due to the amount of thinking that we're doing.

And so today's class is going to be very much about meditation,

About thinking,

And just really looking at the survival systems there that we're activating a lot with our thoughts,

And then understanding how meditation works,

What it's doing to our brain,

What we're seeing in our mind when we're meditating,

How we're benefiting through meditation.

And then next week we'll do,

Or actually not next week,

Next Sunday,

Which is just coming up in a few days,

Because normally we meet on Sundays,

But because it was New Year's Eve,

And I thought we should start this on our New Year's Day,

I thought we should start this on New Year's Day.

So Sunday's class is going to be all about the mind-wandering part of our brain and bringing mindfulness to that,

To be more aware of what's happening in our mind there when we're off the cushion.

And then the following five classes after that,

The following five Sundays,

Are going to be really looking at the most common ways in which our minds wander,

Which are all the same,

Right?

We're all having the same thoughts,

They're not that unique,

We think we're the only ones having them,

Everyone's having them.

And the more that we can bring awareness to the ways in which we're thinking,

The ways in which we are distracting ourselves,

And taking us further away from what it is that we want,

The easier we can start to change that behavior,

Kind of that default behavior of just getting lost in our thoughts.

So it gives us that opportunity to really start to shift things.

So,

And I'll just say hi to Noni,

And Alexis,

And Ashley,

And Sandy,

I saw you on there as well.

And a couple others,

I think Karen Marie.

And just to say,

Ashley,

All of the times,

All of the times,

Whenever you look at the times listed on Insight Timer,

They're listed in your time zone.

So it's noon mountain time for me,

So it's always going to be this time every Sunday.

And I do record all of these classes,

And I put them up on my Insight Timer page.

I probably have,

Gosh,

I'd have to say well over 200 talks on there.

So they'll all be up there,

The recordings for you as well.

And I will just also say this,

That while we are building a foundation through this seven-part series,

Each of the classes do pretty much stand on their own as well.

So if you've popped in and out,

You're not going to feel lost.

If you haven't had time to catch up with one of the recordings,

You're not going to be lost.

So they do all pretty much stand on their own.

So with that,

We'll jump into the first class.

If we were to ask most people what it is that they,

What it is that they want,

And after they would list off all of the material things that they want,

We would start to get an idea that what most people want is really happiness,

Right?

We want happiness,

We want more pleasant states of mind,

And we want to avoid unhappiness.

And I don't think there's anything too controversial with that.

I don't think there's anything wrong with wanting happiness and,

You know,

Not really wanting to have unhappiness.

The problem is that we spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about how we can get happy and how we can avoid unhappiness,

And the results are that it's making us very unhappy.

And so we have these,

These two main mind movements that I'm really talking about here.

One where we are thinking about ourselves in the future,

We're imagining how happy we're going to be when we,

When we get the praise,

When we get the acknowledgement,

When we get the,

The new object,

The car,

When we get the latte,

The chocolate cake,

When we get the holiday,

When we just,

When we get to some other moment than where we are now.

And so through all of this thinking about me being happy in the future,

We end up being completely oblivious to the me that is right here and is feeling a lot of contraction,

A lot of tension,

Because I believe in that moment that my happiness is somewhere other than where I am.

And so there's a lot of tension.

There's a lot of tightness in our current experience when we're imagining this.

And all of this is happening for really a relatively fleeting moment of happiness.

We,

We get the object,

We got the praise,

We got the acknowledgement,

We got the latte,

And it was all good.

But then it just kind of slips through our fingers,

That happiness slips through,

And we're on to the next thing.

What next?

What next?

What next?

So we're going to talk a lot in class three about this,

This wanting mindset,

And talk a lot about also one of the brain survival systems that we are activating whenever we are lost in these thoughts that,

That kind of together really create a lot of that tension and stress for us.

So the other side of wanting happiness is,

Of course,

Pushing back on that which we think is going to bring us unhappiness.

So thinking about that we don't want to receive the criticism,

We don't want to receive the blame,

We don't want the big bill,

We don't want the discomfort,

We don't want the interruption.

And it's almost as though this system is kind of,

It's coming into play because we're constantly in this movement of going forward,

Thinking our happiness is in the future,

Is in the next moment.

And so anytime there's a delay,

Anytime there's something unpleasant,

We're putting on the brakes then,

So we've got the accelerator going and then the brake,

Because it's like,

Oh no,

No,

This is delaying me,

This is stopping me from getting to my happiness.

And of course,

What all of this is doing,

This constant wanting to be somewhere other than where I am,

Thinking my happiness is over there,

And then pushing back on all of the things real or imagined that we think are infringing on our happiness or creating unhappiness,

That all of this is creating a good deal of unhappiness within us.

And so if we were to think about what we really mean by happiness,

I think,

I believe that really what it is that we're searching for,

While we do like the happy states,

We like the excitement states,

There's nothing wrong with those states,

But I feel that what we're really looking for is that feeling of peace and contentment inside,

That feeling that I'm okay,

That I belong,

That I'm safe,

That this is what we're really spending all of this time trying to find.

But the result of constantly thinking about our happiness and pushing away unhappiness in our mind makes us feel separate and disconnected and anxious and agitated and stressed.

And all of this,

Not because we are in any physical danger whatsoever,

But simply this habitual mind movement of always,

You know,

Just the endless desires,

Endlessly trying to fill up this empty hole inside of us,

And constantly just pushing back,

Just constant pushing back.

And this mind movement has been around,

I mean,

I would say it's probably been around 5,

000 years,

6,

000 years.

And what I'm talking about is beyond survival,

The movement of what I want beyond survival and what I don't want beyond survival.

And the reason I'm saying 5,

000 years is because the Buddha,

Of course,

Was almost 2,

600 years ago,

And he was very much describing this predicament.

And in fact,

He would use this great analogy for the endless desires of trying to,

Of like trying to quench our thirst with salt water.

Like it doesn't work,

We find that we're just more thirsty.

But we can also go back a little bit further to the Upanishads,

The Vedic texts,

What we would now call Hinduism,

Because they were also describing something similar.

So this mind movement is not new,

But I would say that it is greatly amplified and exaggerated by our modern lifestyles.

Because,

You know,

In today's modern world,

Where,

You know,

Technology is very good,

And of course,

You know,

We're using technology to be able to connect here right now.

But the downside is that we're always connected,

We're always available.

We have access to so much information,

Like too much information,

We could know what's happening in every part of the world at any given moment.

And it's a lot of information for us to take in.

Or if we think about the number of relationships that we have that our ancestors wouldn't have had,

Because just the sheer size of interactions that we have,

Most of us kind of move a few times within our lives,

Picking up friends along the way,

Through technology,

Again,

Being able to stay in contact with more people than we normally would be able to through social media.

And then this constant trying to upkeep all of these relationships and over scheduling ourselves.

So always trying to fit one more thing in,

Putting things back to you know,

This fear of I'm going to miss something else.

So we're constantly,

You know,

Constantly trying to squeeze more things in,

Really,

At the expense of our emotional well-being and happiness.

And so we have this,

You know,

We have this mind movement already,

The wanting,

The not wanting,

The chasing,

Resisting.

And then you add on top a modern lifestyle that just amplifies that.

And then you put that on top of a brain that has been evolving for tens of thousands of years to keep us alive,

Not to make us happy,

But to keep us alive.

And so you add all of that on.

And what you find is that we are getting burned out.

We're becoming overwhelmed because we are constantly finding problems within our world.

Our brain evolved to focus on what could go wrong,

Not what could go right.

So this is what it's always doing.

We have this detection system that's always looking for things that could go wrong.

And when you have an inordinate amount of relationships,

You know,

The complexities of our jobs,

Of our finances,

And the stock market,

And just all the variables that we face with our modern lives,

We are constantly finding problems.

And so we can,

You know,

Just think of a scenario where it's the end of the day.

And we're sitting at home,

Sitting on your sofa,

Maybe you're having a glass of wine,

You're having a cup of tea.

And all day long,

You are telling yourself,

I will be so happy when I get to the end of the day and I don't have anything left to do.

So all day,

We're rushing from one thing to the next and putting this carrot out in front of us that I will be so happy when I can get to the end of the day,

And then I can just relax.

But then we get to the end of the day,

And we don't relax.

We're sitting there,

And then our mind starts scanning,

Starts replaying conversations,

Going through all the interactions that we had,

Looking to see,

Was there a problem somewhere that I missed?

And inevitably,

In all the interactions that we're looking at,

There might be one that we land on them,

And we think,

Oh my God,

Did I offend that person?

I hope,

Gosh,

Did I say that and I forgot about what they were going through?

Or something,

We're reframing it in a way that is seeming as we have done something wrong in offending this other person.

Or maybe it's an email that you got during the day from your boss,

And she wants to meet with you the next day.

And during the day,

You were all okay,

You were all on board with like,

Oh yeah,

Yeah,

We'll meet tomorrow,

We'll talk about the project.

But now,

You're kind of in this mindset of replaying and scanning.

And now you're thinking,

Oh,

Is there a problem?

Something wrong?

Did I do something wrong on the project?

What is it that she wants to discuss?

And so,

Our brain is hearing this as a threat,

That just thinking about,

Oh my gosh,

Did I offend that person?

Right?

Our brain is hearing that as,

Oh my God,

You're going to get kicked out of the tribe.

Because if we had offended someone when we lived in small tribes,

And then maybe we were going to get kicked out of the tribe,

It would have meant certain death.

And so,

In that way,

You know,

Our brain kind of picks up on this just thinking about a relationship,

Just thinking about the potential that we might have offended someone,

And it's perking up as though this is a real threat.

And even just with the thinking about our job,

We didn't even have to get an email.

We just,

The way we just go over our job thinking about things and starting to worry about certain projects,

And whether things are getting done or not,

And how is all this reflecting on me?

And our brain is hearing this as,

Oh my God,

We're going to get fired.

We're going to be homeless.

Because it only has a very much a binary way of looking at the world.

It's either a threat,

Or it's not a threat.

And so,

There we are,

Sitting on the sofa,

Perfectly safe.

Not an immediate threat in the world.

Nothing in front of us is threatening.

But in our mind,

We imagine all of these threatening scenarios.

And so,

Our brain,

Because it feels threatened,

Initiates the stress response,

And releases cortisol,

Adrenaline.

And the next thing we know,

Our heart rate's up,

Our blood pressure's up,

We're breathing more rapidly.

And all the available glucose is going to our large muscles to prepare us to fight or run away from the potential threat.

But there is no threat.

We just thought about something that seemed a little bit scary,

That seemed like a problem.

And from there,

It escalated.

And then,

The problem with the stress response is that once we get stressed,

And if the threat came from a thought,

Then it's very hard to put that thought down.

Because the stress response is meant to keep us laser-focused on the threat.

And so,

While we're maybe,

It's the evening,

And maybe your partner's arrived,

And they're telling you a little bit about their day,

You're doing your best to follow it along.

But every now and then,

It's just,

You keep getting pulled back into this worry,

This fear that you're having.

You keep thinking,

No,

I've got to think more about it.

I've got to keep thinking about it.

Because there's a threat.

And it's very,

Very hard to let these thoughts go once we feel stressed out.

And so,

The thoughts just multiply and multiply,

Becoming bigger and bigger,

Until we eventually exhaust ourselves,

Or we just have some type of,

You know,

Outburst.

Right?

Which is very often what happens.

Because so often,

So much of the time,

You know,

We're just stacking stress throughout the day.

And we're not regulating as well.

So,

We're not managing our emotions throughout the day.

You know,

We're experiencing disappointment.

We're experiencing,

We're a little bit rushed in one moment.

Someone said something that was a little bit offensive.

We got cut off on the freeway.

All of these little stressors stack up.

And then,

It doesn't take much.

You know,

We come home,

And maybe we find the kids haven't done the dishes,

Or the house is a mess,

Or your partner says something.

And then,

We just launch into them.

Because all day long,

We felt like the wolves have just been nipping at our heels.

But it's just that the stress has been accumulating.

And we never had time to really let it move through us.

Right?

We never regulated our emotions throughout the day.

We just let it continue to build up.

And then,

It was just like something threw a match on it.

And we have this outburst.

And so,

Stress doesn't have to be,

Doesn't have to be a big outburst.

It can just be this kind of low level,

Just,

Oh,

Kind of something doesn't feel right.

Right?

Just that kind of anxiety that we walk around with.

It's just that little bit kind of in the background,

Just not feeling something doesn't feel quite right.

And so,

Why this is so difficult for us is because stress was supposed to be an on-off system.

You either got away from the threat,

You either got away from the tiger,

You got away from the snake,

Whatever it was,

Or you didn't.

But one way or another,

It was meant to be over.

But for us,

Stress is chronic because it's created so often in our thoughts.

And it just keeps going and going and going because one stressful thought becomes another stressful thought becomes another stressful thought.

There's no end.

And with stress,

With stress where it's meant to give us this kind of superhuman strength and energy to deal with the stress in that particular moment.

So,

It's allocating a lot of resources to systems to really help us kind of deal with strength,

Deal with speed.

It's downregulating,

Our brain is downregulating other systems in the body,

Like our immune system,

Our reproductive system,

Our digestive system.

And then also key areas in our prefrontal cortex are no longer available to us when we're stressed.

Areas that are responsible for rational thinking,

Complex problem solving,

The ability to manage our emotions to weigh up the consequences of our behavior.

All of these things go out the door when we get stressed.

So,

All of the executive functioning that we need to deal with 21st century problems simply goes out the door whenever we get stressed.

And I do think that we all know that this is true,

That after we've had a stressful episode and we're able to settle down,

We know in that moment,

Like,

Oh my God,

I was so believing my thoughts were real,

I so thought I was being threatened.

I mean,

Hopefully we didn't do anything to respond in that moment because we know we're not acting in our best self in that moment.

We know we're not thinking clearly,

We're not able to have a larger perspective.

And so,

It's really,

You know,

When we look back,

We can see just how irrational we were.

But when we were in it,

It all felt so very,

Very real.

And so,

There are real consequences,

Negative consequences to being in chronic stress.

So,

You know,

Our health,

Obviously,

Because,

You know,

Again,

Our immune system,

Our digestive system,

Our reproductive system,

Constantly getting downregulated for long periods of time.

I mean,

We need these for long-term health.

Cognitively,

Because this really is,

Again,

We keep downregulating the prefrontal cortex,

It's doing damage to the neural connections there.

And,

You know,

We can see this with a lot of cognitive diseases these days,

Or a lot of,

Even we can talk about,

You know,

Just the dementia that seems to be so common these days,

Or Alzheimer's,

Not that stress is the reason for these things,

The cause for these things,

For these cognitive declines,

But it's always a common factor.

And I will,

Janice,

I will get to your question there about the community,

And I will get back to the other questions.

Once we kind of just get through the talk,

I will address all the questions.

So,

You know,

There are real consequences to our physical health,

There are real consequences to our cognitive well-being,

To our emotional well-being,

To our mental well-being,

Because it's,

You know,

Most of the time,

Most of the time we are safe.

We are safe.

I mean,

Yes,

There are going to be periods of time where we're not.

And this does not apply to everyone in the world,

Because,

Of course,

There are people that live in conditions where they're not safe.

So really what I'm talking about is for most of the time we are safe,

And yet our internal conditions are not matching up with our external conditions.

We feel threatened when,

In fact,

We are perfectly safe.

And so it's not that thinking is the enemy.

I mean,

Thinking is good.

Thinking,

You know,

Thinking took us from caves to high rises.

You know,

There's a lot of creativity that comes from thinking,

From learning.

Thinking is not our enemy.

But the quantity of thoughts and the quality of our thoughts is the problem.

And why meditation is so helpful is because it gives us a window into our minds to see what's happening.

It's not that we have all these problems in the external world.

It's just that we're relating to all of these things that are in constant,

You know,

We have so many things going on at once,

At different stages.

And it's the way that we're relating to all of these things.

And so the first,

You know,

The first thing that's really happening in meditation is that we're noticing our thoughts.

Right?

I mean,

In the past,

Every thought that would come along,

We just believed it unquestioningly.

We would just run with the stories.

And we would react based on what we were telling ourselves in that moment.

And so meditation is really teaching us how to notice our thoughts,

How to see them instead of being lost in them.

And there's a huge difference between being caught up in the thought and having the awareness to step back and see the thoughts as they're happening.

And as we continue to meditate,

And as we will also do as we progress through this course,

You start to become more aware of the habitual ways in which we all think.

And in class four,

Where I am going to give you a little bit of homework,

Also to really get clear about your specific ways,

Your tendencies,

Your unique tendencies for a particular thought.

Again,

They're all common,

We're all having the same thoughts,

But we also do have a preference for,

I don't want to say preference,

A habit towards certain thoughts versus others.

And the more that we are aware of the ways in which we're thinking that are taking us out of the present moment,

Then we can notice it and we can change the behavior.

So instead of being reactive and responding in ways that ends up usually causing more problems,

We start responding with wisdom and compassion.

So very different response.

So for the practice of meditation,

And the type of meditation that we're going to be doing today,

Which is a foundational meditation in Theravadan Buddhism,

There are thousands of different types of meditation.

But the foundational practice that we're going to do is just mindfulness of the breath,

Mindful breathing.

So we're going to use the nose,

The tip of our nostrils as the focus to be the anchor for our attention,

To anchor our attention on the breath,

To feel the breath as it's entering and exiting our nostrils.

And you can feel,

There's a little vibration coming in,

You know,

You can kind of feel the air as it's coming in,

A little bit cooler coming in,

A little bit warmer coming in.

Sometimes the length of the breath changes,

It becomes shorter,

It becomes longer.

We're not controlling the breath,

We're not trying to force the breath,

We're letting the breath be completely natural.

And so as we have our attention on the breath,

After maybe two or three breaths,

Little thought comes along and start thinking,

Right?

We're thinking about maybe something we've got to do later.

What are we going to have for dinner tonight?

Do I need to go to the store?

Maybe we're thinking about something that happened earlier.

And then there's that moment of noticing,

Oh,

I'm thinking,

I'm thinking,

Right?

There's all of a sudden before we're just thinking,

Thinking,

Thinking,

And just going with the thoughts.

Now we're noticing,

Oh,

I'm thinking.

And so in that moment of noticing that our attention has left the breath,

And we're lost in thoughts again,

We've kind of pulled back,

There's an awareness of,

Oh,

The thinking.

And then we very gently,

Very,

Very gently,

With a lot of kindness,

No judgment whatsoever,

Just bring our attention back to the breath,

Right?

And then a few more breaths go by,

And our attention wanders again,

And goes off with a few thoughts.

And then eventually there's this noticing,

I'm thinking.

And very gently,

Again,

We bring the attention back to the breath.

We're not trying to force our attention,

We're not trying to control our attention.

It's almost like in that noticing,

Right,

There's that,

Ah,

The noticing,

And there's already a little release on the noticing,

And almost just kind of falling back to the breath again.

So one of the challenges when we start meditating is that we try and hold our attention on the breath,

Right?

We think that the more effort I apply,

The more that I strive,

Um,

The better my meditation will be.

But it is just the opposite.

We're not trying to control or force anything.

That's what we've been doing in all of our thinking.

This is simply noticing,

Thinking,

And then returning very gently,

No judgment,

Just returning our attention back to the breath again.

Again,

And again,

And again.

It doesn't matter how many times your attention wanders.

Our job is solely to notice that,

And then our attention returns back to the breath.

Now in the beginning,

Um,

In the beginning of our actual meditation when we're sitting,

Our thoughts do seem to be at their most active,

Because maybe we're transitioning from something,

Uh,

That we were just thinking about,

And the mind's just going back to wanting to think about that.

So in the beginning,

There tends to be,

Tends to be a lot more thoughts.

And so I want to give you an analogy to use to,

To help you see how,

Again,

You're not trying to make your mind settle down.

You're not trying to force or control your mind to settle down.

You're just giving it the space for it to settle down on its own.

So if you think of,

Like if you have a,

A glass of water,

And you were to put some dirt in the water,

And you would use a stir,

Uh,

Spoon and stir all that dirt up,

You would see all the dirt swirling around the water.

And if you wanted the dirt to settle at the bottom of the glass,

You would simply stop stirring.

That's what you would do.

And so it's the same with our mind.

As the thoughts are kind of swirling around,

And we're not upset that we're having thoughts,

Because you're going to have thoughts in meditation.

It is a misnomer that you're not going to have thoughts in meditation.

But you notice the thoughts,

And then you just return your attention very gently back to the breath,

And even to the point where you could even just,

Even see some of them swirling around,

But you're not so engaged in them,

Because you're recognizing it's not a problem.

It's just the movement of the mind that's kind of carried over from what it was that I was just doing.

And it's just going to take the mind a little bit of time to settle down.

So the more relaxed that you are about it,

The more at ease you are,

Instead of this frustration,

Oh my mind's so busy,

Instead of being frustrated about it,

And just notice when you get engaged in the thoughts,

When your mind gets a little lost,

And very gently,

Very kindly,

Just keep bringing your attention back to the breath.

And typically what happens is over time,

The space between the thoughts becomes greater and greater.

And what you notice is that it's very peaceful.

It's very pleasant.

That the feeling of being okay,

The feeling like you belong,

Like you're connected,

That you're safe,

It was always here.

All of this time,

Excuse me,

All of this time,

We have been chasing this feeling as though it's something outside of us,

Pushing back on everything unpleasant,

As though if we could just do that,

We could get to this feeling.

But it was always here.

The peace never left us.

Our attention keeps leaving the peace.

And that's what we start to see.

We start to notice that it was always here.

It was never out there.

And we start to trust this more,

Because this is in fact what it is that we've been looking for.

It was never separate from us.

Simply our attention had left it.

So over time,

As we meditate,

We start to trust the present moment more.

We start to trust the safety and the peace that's here.

And we trust less our thoughts,

Not because we've suppressed them,

Not because we've distracted ourselves from them,

But because we've seen over time,

It's just the same thoughts,

One after another.

I want something,

I don't want something.

Chasing,

Resisting.

Just this constant churning of these same thoughts as though I'm going to get something out there.

And we start to see,

Excuse me,

I'm just getting over a cold.

And we start to see and really know that the peace was always here.

No matter the conditions,

The peace is always here.

If I stop fighting back.

And that even applies to those days,

And we will all have them,

We'll all have them,

When we just have a busy mind meditation.

When that's just for whatever conditions,

There's been a lot going on,

There's been a lot of busyness,

A lot of stress,

And maybe some appropriate stress,

Because we're going to still feel stress,

We're still going to feel emotions.

It's not about not feeling it.

It's not about imagining through meditation,

We're always just going to be living in love and light,

Right?

Because of course,

We're still going to feel things and things are going to be happening.

And we're going to have those meditations,

Those days when the mind is just super busy.

And even in those meditations,

It's really important to sit with them,

To not be upset,

And just to acknowledge like,

Oh,

Busy mind meditation today.

Okay.

All right.

I don't have to fight it.

Because again,

This tendency we have is to want to control,

Is to want to kind of force,

This is the way the meditation,

I can make the meditation happen.

And this is what we try to do in the beginning of our meditation practice.

But anyone that's been meditating for a while knows you don't do meditation.

It happens.

It happens.

Not by pushing back on what the mind is doing,

Not by judging,

Not by berating what the mind is doing,

But just acknowledging this is what's happening.

Okay,

There's a lot going on.

But my practice is still just to notice,

Notice the thinking,

Notice when I'm getting lost in it,

And very gently return to the breath.

And if you have that mindset of whatever it is that's happening in the mind,

It's okay.

And you can have a sense of ease and spaciousness around it.

Even within that,

There is peace.

You're no longer bothered.

And it is so important on those days to really sit for until the bell goes,

Until your insight timer bell goes.

Because often when we have those kinds of meditations,

And particularly when we think meditation is about controlling and forcing the mind,

And we think that meditation is about not having any thoughts,

Often we'll tell ourselves,

Well,

This just isn't working today.

I might as well not meditate.

It's not doing anything.

But in fact,

It's doing a lot.

Because the more we can sit with a busy mind,

Which is in the beginning can be a bit uncomfortable,

The more we can be with something that's just a little bit uncomfortable,

And then finding that ease within it,

Because we're not pushing back on it,

Right?

We really are finding that our peace is not dependent upon what's happening in the mind,

And to a relative degree what's happening in the external world.

Again,

I'm talking about,

You know,

That we are mostly safe most of the time.

And most of our thoughts are self-created suffering.

They are at best slight exaggerations,

At worst outright lies,

That we are distorting our perception of reality in a way that makes us feel threatened and unsafe.

And therefore,

That sense of ease,

That sense of feeling safe,

That sense of peace,

Of contentment,

Of feeling like we're okay,

Of feeling like we're belonging,

Is nowhere to be found.

I was debating over the last few days whether I'd be able to do class or not,

See how long my voice holds out before the coughing becomes too much.

So,

Just to recap on the meditation.

It's not about not having thoughts.

It's not about trying to force or control the mind.

It's simply noticing the thoughts,

And then just gently,

Very,

Very gently,

Releasing back,

Returning back to the breath,

Again and again and again.

And really just being okay with what's happening in the mind is what helps the mind settle,

Even if it's still a busy mind,

Relatively speaking.

As you progress through the meditation,

Relatively speaking,

It will,

You will feel more relaxed,

You will feel more at ease,

The mind will be less busy,

Relatively speaking.

So,

This simple practice,

This just,

It is such a simple practice of sitting,

Noticing,

And returning to the breath,

Does have huge benefits to our brain.

It's really,

It is changing our brain.

So,

It's strengthening cortical areas and key areas of our prefrontal cortex,

So that we can think more clearly,

More rationally,

That we're better able to pay attention,

To be able to focus,

So we're not constantly being distracted and being pulled into different things.

Improving meta-awareness,

Where we're more aware of thinking,

Right,

So as we're doing this,

Of course,

We become better at noticing when we're thinking,

Better at being able to manage our emotions,

Better at being able to reduce our stress.

It's improving in our insula,

Which,

Among other things,

Helps us to notice what's happening in the body,

Because so much of what's happening in our,

In fact,

Whatever it is you're thinking about,

There is a corresponding feeling in the body.

And it can be a little contraction,

It can be a little tension,

To a lot of contraction,

A lot of tension,

But there's always this little gripping as we're thinking about ourselves.

Sorry,

I want to clarify that,

As we're thinking about ourselves,

What I want,

What I don't want.

There's always this little bit of a contraction.

And really,

We're so disembodied,

Because we walk around,

Most of the time,

Very wound up inside.

And it feels like it's so normal,

Because it is,

I mean,

It's how we feel most of the time.

We don't really question it.

So we also start to become more aware,

More mindful of when,

You know,

When we're getting a little out of regulation,

Right?

When the stress is starting to build up,

Because we do have busy lives.

I saw a comment earlier,

Someone,

You do have families,

We have commitments,

We have things that we need to do.

We're not running off to go live in a monastery.

So there are things that we need to do,

But we have things,

Commitments,

In our lives.

So there is going to be periods of time where there is going to be a little bit of stress,

Where there's a little bit greater uncertainty than there normally is,

That maybe it's making things feel a little bit more unsettled,

Or just in the busyness of families,

Getting the kids off to school.

You know,

There's going to be periods where things speed up and you're having to rush a little bit.

And that's okay,

Right?

That's okay,

Because we want to live our lives.

But then to recognize when it's like,

Oh,

Now I can feel like,

Yeah,

I'm getting a little dysregulated here,

Right?

I need to pause for a few moments,

Not reach for my phone to be distracted,

But just to pause for a few moments and just breathe mindfully,

Right?

And just let our system kind of regulate back again.

So we're really getting more in tune with that through the insula.

And then just another,

You know,

There's so many things that are happening in the brain,

But another area of the brain that increases in thickness,

In cortical thickness through meditation is the hippocampus,

Which is a part of the brain responsible for converting short-term memories into long-term memories,

And also in memory retrieval.

And with Alzheimer's,

This is one of the first parts of the brain that shows damage.

And so,

You know,

Meditation is really,

And I'm not saying that,

You know,

The hippocampus is the cause of Alzheimer's or even it stresses,

But stress is a big,

Actually stress is a factor in reducing,

Shrinking our hippocampus.

So through meditation,

Because of course we're becoming less stressed,

And then through regulating our system,

Our nervous system being more balanced,

You know,

So many of our systems that we need for the 21st century to manage our lives are performing better,

Measurably better.

So it's helping our health,

It's helping us cognitively,

It's helping us mentally,

It's helping us emotionally,

It's helping us to match our internal conditions to our external conditions,

Because we are almost always safe,

Almost always.

And if,

Claire,

In your question,

You know,

If you're feeling anger in meditation,

I would breathe a little more space into that,

Come into the feelings,

Right?

And we're going talk a little bit more on Sunday when we talk about mindfulness,

And we're going to talk a little bit more about regulating more difficult emotions,

But because you've brought this up,

I will just give a quick touch to it.

Because anger,

You know,

We usually were lost in the story of anger.

So if you're meditating,

And you're noticing you're angry,

And you keep going over the conversation,

Or what you would say to this person,

Or how wrong it was,

Or however you're feeding the anger through the story,

Because that's what we're doing.

It's just,

You know,

From there,

I would drop from the nose,

And I would just drop into feeling it in the body.

And breathe and feel it in the body.

Because anger has a,

You know,

Real tightness,

A real tension in the body.

And once we've dropped the story,

And we've dropped a little bit lower into the body,

And then opening and creating space for the anger to be here,

Because we want to be with what's here in meditation.

We want to be here with what's here.

And as you breathe,

Maybe a little more deeply,

Right?

Opening up a little bit more,

Creating space for the feelings of anger to be here,

Not the story,

The feelings.

And as you do that,

As you're with the feelings,

The physical sensations,

And because the story has dropped now that was really fueling so much of the anger,

Now you're with what's here,

Right?

There's still an unpleasant sensation,

Because the anger doesn't feel good in the body.

But it's no longer,

You're no longer in that reactivity mode.

You're no longer in this,

Oh,

I've got to keep coming up with the right thing to say back to them,

Or I've got to put them in their place.

And that's what keeps fueling the anger.

So now you're changing and saying,

I'm just with the anger,

That it's okay.

It's okay.

And it's okay to feel anger.

Sometimes anger is appropriate,

Right?

Just as sometimes stress is appropriate.

Sometimes anxiety is appropriate.

It's not that,

You know,

It's that we are feeling all these things too much,

Where we're exaggerating things,

We're overly reactive to things.

But when you feel the anger in the body,

And you start to get a little more settled with it,

And you're starting to feel as though it's less personal,

So it gives you more perspective,

Because that's also what's happening in the prefrontal cortex.

Your perspective,

You know,

Strengthening through meditation,

Your perspective becomes greater,

Right?

You're able to hold two sides of the argument.

Well,

I wonder how they saw that.

Oh,

Maybe they saw it from this viewpoint.

Yeah,

Why did I see it like this?

And so you're starting to,

You're able to be more,

You know,

To see things a little more clearly once you're in the body with the anger.

And so you're no longer as reactive to it.

You're able to be with it.

And then you just stay with it.

And because you're not fueling the story any longer,

The physical sensations do,

Relatively speaking,

Become more mild,

Right?

And as they start to lessen,

Too,

You start to feel okay again.

And yeah,

Maybe there was a difficult conversation,

Maybe there was an argument with someone,

But you're no longer in this,

I was threatened mode.

It's like,

Yeah,

That was inappropriate what they said to me.

Yeah,

I need to really think about this relationship.

Maybe it's someone I need to set some boundaries with.

Or maybe it's someone I do need to just have a conversation with.

But now that I'm settled down,

Not from this place of reactivity,

Because I'm going to just put them on the defensive,

And they're going to be defensive,

And it's just going to keep escalating,

And we see how that goes.

So yeah,

So we're really,

You know,

We're trying to be with what's here,

To feel what's here,

To come more into the body,

To notice what's here,

Because it's the stories that are distorting our perspective of reality,

Making us feel threatened,

When in fact,

We weren't really threatened at all.

I'm not denying that someone might have done something that was inappropriate,

Or that was not thoughtful,

Or something along those lines.

But we exaggerate it to this degree that our brain hears it and thinks that we're about to be killed.

And then we're in this heightened state where we can't think clearly.

We feel we've got to react right away.

And so very,

Very often,

So very,

Very often,

There's misunderstandings,

We're misinterpreting things,

Because we might already be starting from a place where we're already feeling a little bit stressed.

Or just for whatever reason,

There was a misunderstanding.

You know,

And we're not very forgiving in those situations.

We're not,

Again,

We're not able to see anyone else's perspective,

But ours.

And I would suggest,

And to look for yourself to see if this is true or not,

I would suggest that the perspective that we hold in that moment is wildly exaggerated about how we were affected.

Wildly exaggerated.

I'm not suggesting that meditation should turn us into doormats,

That we let people walk all over us.

In fact,

I find that people do that all too often,

Because they're afraid to speak up and say something.

There's too much fear around it.

And I think it gives us the courage to be able to speak up and say,

No,

What I need matters here as well.

So,

Yeah,

So,

You know,

Being with the anger,

Really feeling it,

You know,

Really feeling it in the body.

And Terry,

So you're saying,

You know,

Should we walk away and not say hurtful things,

Even if they are true,

When angry,

Then should we walk away?

I would always suggest,

If we're in the heat of the moment,

Unless you can really,

And this is where mindfulness is going to come more in next week,

Or Sunday,

Sorry,

Where if you can come into your body in the middle of the conversation,

And you're feeling it,

And this takes some practice.

So in the beginning,

You might be better off walking away and just saying like,

Hey,

I just feel like,

You know,

We both need to calm down maybe a bit,

And let's regroup later on.

Walk away might be your best angle.

But in that moment,

Sometimes there's a situation where you just can't,

There is going to be no regrouping later.

And so just as best you can to stay in the body to feel what's here,

To really keep the bigger perspective,

Like,

You know,

Again,

When we feel anger,

We so want to hurt the other person,

Whether it's putting them down,

Or we get so attached to our views and opinions,

I need to be right,

Right,

You know,

We're so tightening onto everything,

Holding on to everything.

And,

And the more that we can breathe and kind of feel that sense of I'm okay,

That it can,

It can guide us then in a way where we hopefully can dial down some of the tension to have a conversation like again,

Maybe someone's getting really maybe it's a political conversation,

And they're,

They're starting to get really intense.

And you think,

Oh,

I didn't really,

I didn't really want this.

And you can see where it's going.

And,

And just breathing mindfully,

Right,

You can even just say,

You know,

Hey,

I just,

I feel like this conversation is getting a little intense.

I feel like we're getting off track here,

Because I think,

You know,

We're starting to,

You know,

It's starting to become personal,

And it shouldn't be as we're having these types of conversations.

So the more that we,

What's so important about this practice,

Meditation and mindfulness,

Is while we're quieting down,

You know,

The feeling of being threatened,

You know,

The stress,

The anger,

The hurt,

What's arising in its place is the wisdom and compassion,

Right,

To be able to think how we can manage the situation.

And it may be then after we walk away,

And we kind of feel we've settled things,

But we think,

Well,

I don't really want to engage with that person,

Or I don't want to talk about politics with them anymore,

Or whatever it is,

You can,

You can say like,

Yeah,

I'm probably not going to engage in those types of conversations.

But,

But I'm not going to keep dwelling on it,

Because it happened,

It was uncomfortable.

I stated what it was that I needed,

I stated that I felt we were getting off track.

And that's not what I want in this relationship.

And now it's over.

But typically,

What happens is that we,

We,

You know,

We walk away from a conversation.

And then we just keep replaying it over and over and over again in our heads.

And we just cannot put it down.

Because remember,

Stress is meant to keep us laser focused on threat.

And so three hours later,

We're still thinking about it.

It's like the person isn't even here.

And yet in our mind,

We keep saying,

I'm not going to see that person anymore.

And yet we've let them live in our heads for the last three hours.

And so the more that we can just come in and feel and to help us come more into the body,

Being with the unpleasant feelings,

Not pushing back on them,

We are never pushing back on,

This is not a pushing back practice.

It's opening,

It's noticing and opening to what's here and feeling what's here.

Okay.

So I have found personally,

That this is a much better way to navigate through life doesn't mean it doesn't mean Terry,

That sometimes you don't say the wrong thing,

Or the wrong thing hasn't come out of this mouth,

Of course.

You know,

We all have our moments,

But we're also a little more forgiving to ourselves as well.

Like we're still allowed to be human as well.

So I hope that helps.

I hope that helps.

And Sandy,

But Sandy,

You are you're absolutely right.

You know,

Someone grabs your wife's purse,

You may clobber him with your umbrella for sure.

For sure,

You know,

And we would defend ourselves.

We wouldn't still be thinking about it three days later,

Five days later.

Yeah,

Yeah,

It doesn't mean that we just lie down and say,

Oh,

Take everything,

You know,

Because I'm just practicing compassion,

You know,

Kindness.

No kindness should have wisdom in it real kindness.

And we can clobber the person and do what we can to get the purse back.

But not be thinking about it three days,

10 days,

You know,

Two years later,

As though we're a victim,

Because there are going to be people in the world that do bad things.

That is the world that we live in.

And this is what we're trying to do.

You know,

Through meditation and mindfulness,

Is really teaching us to live in the world that we live in.

Sometimes people are kind,

Sometimes they're not.

Sometimes we get praise,

Sometimes we get criticism,

Sometimes we win,

Sometimes we lose.

This is everyone's experience.

Everyone's experience.

I don't care who you are,

How wealthy you are,

How famous you are,

How much,

You know,

How much power you have.

This is everyone's experience,

But it's how we relate to these things that changes how we feel inside.

So we're definitely responding,

Hopefully more appropriately to the situation,

Not overreacting.

And when we have those difficult situations to be with it,

Be fully there with it.

And when it's over,

It's over.

It's over.

We don't have to keep carrying all these things around with us.

So Char,

You're saying,

Is it possible that the anger was already there,

But the meditation brought clarity and connection to what we're actually feeling?

Yeah,

For sure.

Yeah.

Yeah,

I would definitely say that's true.

I mean,

Sometimes we're rushing so quickly from one thing to the next,

Like the anger does get a little buried.

You know,

We don't realize how often we're unconsciously suppressing our emotions,

Going from one thing to the next.

The moment we settle down,

We're reaching for our phone.

We're always looking for that stimulation to not be alone with our thoughts.

So yeah,

Then in the meditation,

It's like,

Oh,

There's nowhere left for it to hide.

Yeah.

And that's a good thing.

That's a really good thing,

Because we want to know what's going on in the body.

We want to feel what's here.

Hello,

Alice.

Happy New Year.

So you're asking,

Is it helpful or important to know if a thought is from your ego,

Or if it's a functional or even a creative thought?

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

And we're you know,

We don't want to just assume that in our meditation practice,

When we're sitting and meditating,

Oh,

Thank you,

Dinah.

Thank you for the donation.

When we're sitting and meditating,

Because we're just trying to notice what's going on.

Now,

Again,

To your situation,

Claire,

When the anger came up,

So if something's coming up,

Even sadness,

Regret,

And it's something,

There's a little more intensity,

Right,

Than just kind of what am I going to have for lunch later?

What do I have to do later?

There's a little bit more intensity to it.

Just drop into the body and feel.

Just drop into the body and feel what's here.

Be with what's here.

And in the meditation,

Though,

I would just say just to try until you feel a here with it.

But our mindfulness practice,

And you can still do this,

Of course,

In your meditation as well,

Is to then start to be more discerning about our thoughts,

Right,

To start to question a little bit more like,

You know,

Where did this thought come from?

How am I,

You know,

What is it that I'm believing here that maybe isn't true?

Is this useful?

Is it helpful?

Because when we're in it,

It feels like we're doing something,

Like when we're angry,

And we're feeling,

And Abigail,

I'm going to use your example,

And hi,

Mari,

And hi,

Vasudha,

Glad you're here,

Because I just,

Out of the corner of my eye,

Saw your comment,

So I'm going to use your your question here as an example.

You know,

When you're angry because you got cancer,

And I am so sorry,

I am so sorry.

My mother had cancer last year,

And it is just,

It is a horrible,

Horrible disease,

Horrible disease.

But the anger towards it,

So noticing first off,

Noticing the anger,

And coming in and breathing and feeling it,

Right?

Because when you're lost in the thoughts about the anger about the cancer,

Every time you do that,

You are feeling more and more threatened.

You're feeling more disconnected,

You're feeling more separate,

You're feeling more agitated,

You're feeling more stressed.

You've taken what is,

You know,

A painful situation,

And layered on a story on top,

Which is creating suffering.

And it feels like in that moment,

Though,

But no,

I'm fighting it,

I'm doing it,

I'm thinking about how horrible it is,

I'm thinking about how it's turned my whole life upside down,

And oh my god,

This is the worst thing in the world.

And in all the ways that we keep fueling the anger,

We keep fueling this cycle of stress,

Of feeling worse and worse and worse and worse.

And while cancer itself is brutal,

I'm not sure if you're doing chemo or radiation,

Or if you've had surgery,

Where you are on that spectrum,

But you know,

The ups and downs,

And the uncertainty as you're going along.

I mean,

There's a lot going on there.

But even in something like that,

What we miss,

Then,

Because we're fighting the cancer the whole time,

Is having the compassion for ourselves,

Because we are going through something incredibly difficult.

We're missing being kind to ourselves,

Creating some space within to allow the anger to be here in a way that does offer compassion,

In a way that opens us up to our experience,

Because within that anger is also some hurt,

And some sadness,

And some grief.

And,

You know,

It's not just one thing,

But as we start to open up to it,

We start to see that there was more than one thing in here.

And maybe we also start to notice,

Because maybe you have some friends that have been helping you.

Maybe they're taking you,

You know,

To your treatments,

Or someone's bringing you over food,

And that kindness,

And that connection of people really coming together to help one another in times of need,

That is as tragic as cancer is.

And it's awful,

And you would never want for it to happen,

Of course.

But it's here.

It's what's happening.

And so that anger is not helping us to heal.

You know,

It's not helping us to open up to the compassion and kindness that we could have for ourselves.

And so,

What I would recommend,

Abigail,

And I'm not sure how far along you are in your practice,

And what you've been doing,

And this is something we're going to talk about next week,

But I also want to bring it up here,

Is self-compassion.

You know,

Pet yourself,

And oh,

Sweetheart,

This is really tough.

This is really tough.

And just notice how that language,

We're not denying what's happening,

You know,

But being kind,

Even if you,

Further up you go in the petting,

The more intimate it feels,

The more safe.

It's like if you were seeing a little child,

And you'd be like,

Oh,

Sweetheart,

This is really tough.

This really hurts.

This is scary,

Right?

And so just,

In fact,

Let's just go there.

Look at the support,

Right?

And notice how that feels in your heart.

Notice how that feels.

Like,

We look at things in such a binary way,

Right?

It's good,

Bad.

Happiness,

Unhappiness.

Gain,

Loss.

Pleasure,

Pain.

Healthy,

Sick.

You know,

That so much of this mindset is just everything's very binary.

This is good,

Or this is bad.

And yet,

The more that we sit with what's here,

The more that we actually come in and feel,

And we bring self-compassion.

And like Char was saying,

Loving kindness.

The more we open up to realize that even in tragedies,

And sickness,

And coughs.

This might be a little tricky to finish the class here.

What we find is there's a lot more going on.

A lot more going on.

And so,

You know,

Being with what's here.

The anger is your clue that something's going on,

You're pushing back.

And anger is a form of pushing back.

It shouldn't be happening.

Now,

That doesn't mean that we don't do things,

That you don't do the chemo,

That you don't do the radiation,

That you don't go to your doctors.

It doesn't mean that we're not doing things,

Or maybe you're out protesting,

You know,

Thinking about something else.

You know,

It doesn't mean that our anger means we do nothing.

We do what we can do.

But we open up to what it is that's happening.

We start pushing back on it,

Because if it's what's happening,

If that's what's happening,

And we just keep trying to cover over it with anger,

We never come in and experience it.

And while your body is healing,

You know,

At the same time,

Because through all that anger,

Your heart is closing up,

And you want your heart to be open as well.

Because what we're seeing in this practice is that our peace is not dependent on our external conditions.

And it doesn't mean that we always experience good conditions.

It doesn't mean that.

And it doesn't mean that maybe you're experiencing chronic pain.

But even in chronic pain,

There are moments of relief where the pain isn't as intense,

That we never tend to notice because we're so locked into the story of why this shouldn't be happening.

And so we're really trying to be more with what's here,

Open up to what's here,

With kindness and compassion.

And there is wisdom in that.

There is so much wisdom in that.

So I hope,

You know,

Abigail,

Lots of people here sending you love and support.

Feel that.

Feel that.

You know,

And Amanda,

As you're saying,

There are a lot of people that are hurting in the world.

There are a lot of people that are hurting.

And they're not at their best.

But I would suggest that there are a lot more people in this world that are kind.

We tend to,

Again,

We focus on the negative.

It's where our attention goes.

We evolve to focus on the negative.

If you give a talk and 20 people tell you they thought you did a great job and one person says they thought it was horrible,

You will focus on that one.

But they were one person out of 20,

Right?

This is how we exaggerate things.

It's like if you had a bad hair or you had a haircut,

Nine people said it looks great.

One person says it doesn't.

And now you're doubting and thinking about that one person that doesn't.

This is how we evolved.

And I would suggest that the world,

There are definitely people in the world that are suffering,

That are suffering.

When we are suffering,

We are not our best.

We are not particularly nice.

We can do some pretty horrible things in those conditions.

Fear can really motivate us to do some pretty horrible things.

I'm not saying we would roll over for those people and let them do horrible things for us.

I'm not saying that I would want to go and spend time with those people.

But I wouldn't want to frame the world as being,

You know,

A place that you don't want to be a part of because you are in this world,

Amanda.

We're all here.

And there are a lot of wonderful,

Kind,

Loving,

Compassionate people in this world.

Don't let the ones that are doing this,

That are suffering so much and causing pain to others,

Don't let them cause any further pain to you.

I'm not saying you can't do something,

Right?

I'm not saying that you can't do something.

But notice what it's doing to your heart.

Notice what it's doing to your heart.

And so you've got to go,

You've got two businesses you're taking to court because they don't follow consumer law.

And now you have to go to small claims court.

Okay,

You're doing something.

Good.

Continue with what you're doing in the external.

Take care of the internal as well.

Take care of your,

Of your heart as well.

Because going through the courts is frustrating.

There's going to be ups and downs and just a lot of challenges.

And so you're taking care of what you need to do in the external world.

Great.

My recommendation would be take care of your internal state.

Not to sacrifice your peace and contentment as you go through this.

I mean,

This is kind of how we treat our lives,

Right?

Oh,

Once I get through this,

Then I can finally be happy.

You know,

And happiness again,

As I'm saying,

Peace,

Contentment,

The sense of it's okay.

So you walk your dogs.

I've got three dogs too.

I love to walk my dogs.

And if it's draining,

You know,

And I'm not sure if you are meditating,

But I would definitely recommend some meditation.

I would recommend some loving kindness or some tonglen.

I've got meditations and talks on that on my Insight Timer page.

A little bit of Netflix,

But maybe not a lot.

Because I get what you're saying.

It's so draining.

And it's like,

All you can do is check out.

And there's going to be days where you just want to check out.

So again,

Some balance here.

But in a way,

If we're always just,

We're getting drained and just kind of giving our attention to something,

Some TV show nonstop,

The anger is still just festering below.

It's just,

You know,

It's not going away.

It's not going away.

And so you're still learning.

Okay,

Good.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

And you're walking your dog too,

Abigail.

Great.

Okay.

And so you're still learning.

So let's just talk for a few more minutes,

Because we did kind of take a little detour.

So let's just talk a little bit about our meditation practice as it relates to just some instructions.

So the first thing is our posture that I want to talk about.

Most people,

Many people today,

I think meditate in a chair most often.

So if you're meditating in a chair,

Just make sure that your legs are uncrossed and your feet are firmly planted on the ground,

That your back is straight,

And you can just let your hands rest comfortably in your lap.

If you're meditating on a cushion,

Just if you're doing Burmese style or if you're doing full lotus,

Just make sure that your knees are supported.

They're either on the ground where you've put cushions there to support them.

Or if you're sitting maybe back against the wall,

Legs out straight.

We want to make sure that we're not cutting off any circulation and that your posture is in a way in an alert,

Upright position.

And then ideally,

If your environment can be somewhat quiet,

Especially in the beginning,

We won't always be able to have quiet meditations.

But you know,

When we can,

It's nice if we can go off into a room by ourselves,

Turn off your phone,

Absolutely use your insight timer bell.

Don't use an alarm to come out of your meditation.

And what I would say for those of you that are brand new to meditation,

So Philippa and Alice and Richard and Stacey,

This does not apply to you guys because you've been meditating for a long time.

And Kathy and Michelle,

Both Michelles.

But for those of you that are brand new or,

Or,

If you really have,

Your practice has been absent for a while.

What I want to recommend to start with,

And we'll start,

We'll slowly increase this as we progress through this series over the next seven weeks.

Minimum one minute meditation.

Minimum one minute.

What I'm going to suggest you do on your insight timer meditation bell,

Set the meditation for five minutes,

But set the interval bell for one minute.

And the reason for this is that starting a practice like meditation,

Starting to do it,

You know,

And ideally we're doing it every day.

It takes a while before it really becomes a daily practice.

And so we really want to get that consistency in,

In the beginning.

So many people,

I cannot tell you how many people I hear that say,

Oh,

I tried meditation and it didn't work for me.

And usually it's just,

They started meditating,

They got a little too gung-ho in the beginning.

They're,

I'm going to sit for 30 minutes.

And then,

You know,

They do it for a couple of days and then,

And then they miss a day and then they miss another day and then they miss another day.

And then they go,

Oh,

Well,

Meditation didn't really work for me.

So we want to make sure we want to give you the best possible chance for success.

We can do anything for one minute.

And so much of what usually deters us from going to our,

To our,

To sit is we're thinking,

Oh,

I've got to do 20 minutes or 10 minutes.

And it's like,

Oh my God,

I've got all these other things I need to do.

And,

And it's just,

You know,

Our attention is drawn more towards productivity.

Our brain really isn't seeing this as something of survival,

Not short-term survival,

At least.

And,

And we just easily talk ourselves out of it.

We think,

Oh,

You know what?

I'll do it tomorrow.

I'll do it later in the day.

So try and do it early in the day so that it's done.

And,

And that you get the benefit of kind of knowing again what a calm nervous system feels like.

And then,

And then as you sit,

You're just going to focus on the breath,

Maybe start with a couple of deep breaths,

And then just focus on the breath at your nose,

Your nostrils.

Notice and come back,

Notice and come back.

When the interval bell goes off after one minute,

You can stop.

You can stop.

Right now,

That's all we're really looking for.

If you feel like you'd like to sit a couple minutes longer,

And up to,

Only up to five minutes,

Because again,

We want to make sure we get this consistency of practice done first.

If you want to sit longer,

You can,

Up to five minutes.

And typically,

You will,

Because the hardest part of meditation is getting yourself to sit in the first place.

And just to get past that first minute,

That is the hardest part.

And we eliminate that difficulty by giving ourselves a complete out,

One minute,

No problem.

You want to get up after one minute,

No problem.

As you do get up out of the meditation,

Don't jump up,

Don't leap up,

Like,

Try to keep a little bit of the continuity of the meditation going.

And just in the morning,

That's all I'm going to ask you to start with right now.

So if you're brand new to meditation,

If you've had a gap of several weeks in your meditation,

And you're using this class as a way to get back to your practice,

Then this is for you as well.

For all of you that I know that have been on here a long time,

And meditating a long time,

That does not apply to you,

Just stick with your meditation practice as usual.

And if for some reason,

Though,

If for some reason you do have a day where you don't meditate,

Whatever,

You know,

Something happened,

You woke up late,

And you really even didn't get that one minute,

Okay,

No problem.

But then just get right back to it the next day.

Okay,

We always have a built-in part of our practice is begin again,

Begin again,

Begin again.

Whether that's we're lost in our thoughts,

We got lost in our thoughts for a while,

We got lost in our anger for a while,

We're not judging ourselves for it,

We're not being punitive towards ourselves,

Oh,

I recognized I'm doing it,

Begin again,

Right,

Begin again.

And with our meditation practice,

If it does fall off,

Just begin again,

Begin again,

Begin again.

So,

So let's do,

Let's do a short,

We're just going to do a very,

In fact,

We're just going to do a five-minute meditation,

Just to start,

Start us off,

So that you all get your meditation in for the day.

So just,

Oh,

Thanks,

Patricia,

Thanks.

So let's just make sure we're in a closed your eyes,

And we'll take a few deep breaths in and out through the nose,

And just going at your own pace.

So really filling up on the inhale,

Feel that sense of release on the exhale.

And at the end of your next exhale,

Just let your breath be natural,

And just feel your breath as it's entering and exiting at the tip of your nostrils.

When you notice your attention has wandered,

Very gently,

Very softly,

Bring your attention back to the breath,

Back to the peace and the stillness of your breath.

And as we begin to come out of the meditation,

Slowly,

With a big inhale,

Take your arms up over your head,

With a big stretch at the top.

And as you exhale,

Gently lower your arms and slowly open your eyes.

So five minutes isn't a lot of time,

But it does have an impact.

Every minute that we put towards meditation,

Where we're not distracting ourselves,

We're not suppressing what's going on,

And we're here with our experience,

Is really benefiting us every minute.

It is the opposite of what we do.

And yeah,

Wendy,

That was five minutes.

Yeah.

It has a huge impact on us.

So what I'm going to suggest,

So again,

Minimum one minute,

No more than five minutes for those of you that are new,

And those of you that have really fallen off of your practice and really do need some kind of to get that foundation back.

Just focusing on the breath.

That's it.

There's going to be thoughts.

That's okay.

Expect them.

They're going to be there.

Thinking is not our enemy.

But just this relentless,

Unchecked thinking,

Well,

Again,

I'm not going to say is our enemy.

It's distorting our perception of reality.

It's really distorting the way we feel inside,

The way we perceive ourselves in the world,

And the way we perceive our situation in a way that skews towards the glass half empty.

And this isn't the case for everyone on this planet.

I mean,

There are people living in war zones and famines,

And really,

Truly,

They are surviving.

But for many of us,

We have survived.

The fact that your New Year's Day,

You're spending on a meditation talk,

You have a computer,

You have a phone,

You have internet,

You have the time,

Even if you've got a family,

You've got a busy career,

You've been able to cut out some time for this.

So I would argue you've survived.

You've survived.

And you will probably continue to survive.

And so it's taking this time to say,

Okay,

I have these good conditions.

Why do I not feel it?

Something's happening inside that's distorting and making me feel threatened when I'm not threatened at all.

And so much of this thinking that is really layering on top of brain systems that were meant to keep us alive,

They're backfiring.

They're backfiring on us.

They're not helping us.

And they will be there.

Stress will be there if we need it,

When we need it.

These systems will be there when we need them,

But we're overusing them.

We're overusing them,

And they're not helping.

They're not helping us.

So Terry,

For beginners,

Yes,

You can do guided meditations.

Generally,

I would say,

Why don't we just start while we're doing this course,

Terry?

Because we're also going to bring in some mantras in two weeks,

Or in 10 days.

We're going to start bringing in some mantras to really show us the ways in which our minds are wandering the most commonly.

So we're going to use the mantras,

They're English-based mantras,

As a way to help us also get more familiar with what's happening in our minds.

So I'm going to say for this series,

I would suggest not to.

And again,

All I'm asking right now is one minute to start,

You know,

One minute minimum,

Five minutes max.

And yeah,

Amanda,

So this is a seven-part series that we're doing right now.

And so we'll keep,

So Terry,

I'll keep increasing the amount slowly as we go.

The one minute is always going to be our backstop,

Always going to be our backstop.

And in the beginning,

And again,

I'm going to say just five minutes,

Just don't do more than five minutes to start.

So,

Yeah,

In fact,

Terry,

You are right about that.

Time does seem to be faster when meditating in a group.

Do you know why that is?

And you know why that is?

Because it was like that in the morning class that I did here.

And it always is when we're in a group.

We do tend to settle more easily in a group meditation.

So group meditations are very helpful in the beginning as well.

And time is very much related to the sense of me.

And so when we're meditating and we're focusing our attention on the breath,

And we haven't set up this big time ahead of us,

We've kind of taken out some of the things that the little me would get freaked out about,

The sense of me is much less.

And that's why it seems timeless.

So Vasudha,

The themes across the sessions are,

So today was,

Of course,

The basics of meditation,

And then just thinking as it relates to the stress response.

Sunday's class is going to be about the mind-wandering part of our brain,

Which,

And again,

Mind-wandering is not bad.

Mind-wandering is helpful.

None of these things are bad in and of themselves.

It's just that we're overtaxing them.

So mind-wandering and mindfulness is what we're going to talk about on Sunday,

And talk about how to practice mindfulness,

So different ways that we can come in and feel our emotions and be more discerning about our thoughts and help us to regulate our stress even just throughout the day.

And then the following Sunday,

And all these classes are already up on my teacher's page.

The lives are already set up.

The following Sunday is all about the chasing mind.

So we talked a little bit about that chasing mind,

But we're going to really understand what it is we're trying to get when we're chasing happiness,

And how that is activating the motivation-reward pathway,

And really,

Again,

Just backfiring on us.

And yes,

These will all be on Insight.

All the recordings will be up one day.

I will try and edit out some of the coughing.

Then the following class after that,

Vasudha,

Is going to be about resisting.

So again,

That we talked about it today with stress,

But I wanted to talk about it just to give more of an emphasis to the ways in which we push back on things in our thoughts.

And again,

Real or imagined,

But to really just give more of an emphasis on how we're spending so much time resisting things,

Like resisting a person,

A difficult person that's in our lives.

Like we spend so much time thinking about that person when they're not even here,

Right,

That we're still thinking about them.

So I want to give a lot of attention to that.

And there we go to comparing,

Because comparing is something that… comparing is not bad.

It's something… there's a usefulness to comparing.

It's gotten out of control.

Judging,

Not bad in and of itself.

It's gotten out of control.

And then the final class is really just this constant narrating of the story of me,

Which feels very innocuous in many ways,

Just kind of thinking about ourself.

But I always kind of think it's kind of like the gateway into the other ways,

Like,

You know,

Because it just,

It doesn't take long before we start finding a problem,

Before we start thinking,

Oh my God,

You know,

And we just,

We think about ourselves all the time.

You know,

I use this analogy often,

It's like we put this VR headset on and we're,

We're,

Excuse me,

We're watching this little image of me.

You know,

What am I doing?

What am I pushing back on?

Who am I arguing with?

You know,

How am I planning my day?

How am I getting over there?

And we're more interested in that than the reality of me that's right here.

And the reality of me that's here is suffering by everything that's happening in this little VR headset.

And,

And while thinking about ourselves can be helpful and planning and reflecting,

There's nothing wrong with those things in and of themselves,

There's some usefulness there.

It's just,

We spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about ourselves,

And it does not bring us happiness.

It does not bring us happiness.

Oh good,

I'm glad this is bringing a helpful perspective for what you're fretting about,

Yeah.

Yeah,

Because,

You know,

So much we're fretting about things that are never going to happen,

Right?

And if they did happen,

We would handle them far better than we think we will.

So it's,

It's really,

We're trying to just get out of this default habit of just the fretting,

The worrying,

The chasing,

The resisting,

The comparing,

The judging,

These mind states where we're just,

You know,

We kind of feel like we're a little frightened squirrel.

And that's just not the conditions that,

That many of us,

Not all of us,

But just not the conditions that so many of us live in.

And we should,

We should match up,

You know,

Our internal state should match up with our external state.

Yeah,

I mean,

Abigail,

That you're,

You're acknowledging,

Yeah,

The anxiety over things that never happen.

Like we all did it,

You know,

We all,

It's so,

So no beating yourself up,

Right?

Now,

You know,

You're starting something new.

And we're starting to look at these things to see how they're,

It's not helping us.

And again,

What we do through meditation and mindfulness is not suppressing emotions,

It's not distracting ourselves,

We're not trying to say,

Oh,

I shouldn't think that.

But what we're just coming in is to feel what's here,

Feel the anxiety.

Right?

When there's anxiety,

Feel it.

Be with it in the body,

Not the story.

The story is what's distorting it.

The story is what's distorting it.

Now,

I know when I started the talk,

There were a lot of questions.

Again,

I can't get back there because we've had all these other ones,

Sorry.

So always when I start these out,

I do try as best I can to just stick to the,

The Dharma talk to start,

Which is,

Is usually not as long as today's was.

There was a lot of information to get out today.

Every now and then I try not to look too much in the comment section because it will distract me from the talk.

But just generally,

That's how I'll kind of give the talk,

We'll do the meditation,

And then we'll go into Q&A.

But,

You know,

We'll kind of be a little flexible on that,

Of course,

Because sometimes something comes up that really is just like,

Oh,

I'm right there talking about it.

So,

And I can't remember who had it in about the anger,

But it was like,

I'm right there.

So let me just,

Let me bring that up right now.

So,

Yes,

And I will,

Philippa,

I will also post the reflection questions in the,

We have a,

A group chat on my teacher's page.

And I think it's just called Sangha.

And,

And so I always,

After a few days,

I'll post some reflection questions as well,

Just if you want to think a little bit more deeply on the topic.

Okay,

So do we have any,

Does everyone feel good?

Are we,

Are we pretty clear about one minute minimum,

No more than five minutes,

Just focusing your attention on the breath at the tip of your nostrils.

That's,

That's as far as we want to go.

And,

Oh,

Good,

Paul,

I'm glad it was a good start.

And yeah,

We'll just,

We'll keep building on this and keep hearing into our minds and seeing what's going on in a way that,

That really does ease our nervous system,

Opens our hearts,

Like really,

Yeah,

I mean,

It just changes.

It changes.

In fact,

Someone had said,

Oh,

Judy,

Thank you.

Is this Judy from Massachusetts?

I think,

Is this Judy from Massachusetts?

It is.

Good to see you again,

Judy.

Oh,

Thank you,

Kim.

Thank you.

And I just want to see who,

Someone made a comment,

And I didn't say anything about it,

Though.

You've been,

Someone's been meditating 25 years today,

Or 20 years today.

Here it is.

Sorry,

Chris.

You've been practicing meditation for 20 years today.

It was magical.

Okay,

Great.

So,

I mean,

It's,

You know,

It's,

It really,

I mean,

I can say,

Honestly,

For myself,

It changed my life.

I really think of my life pre-meditation and post-meditation.

I mean,

It was,

You know,

Before I meditated,

Just living in my head,

Constantly stressed,

Constantly worried,

Constantly feeling badly about myself,

Feeling down about myself,

And believing it was so true.

And it's not that you don't have these thoughts anymore.

It's not,

I mean,

They're very far and few between,

But your response is different.

You know,

It might be self-compassion sometimes.

I might just be coming in and feeling and being with what's here,

Right?

But it's that we change our habitual response to it,

To what's happening.

And what we find,

That really,

The peace that we have been seeking our whole lives,

That contentment,

That feeling of ease,

It was always right here.

It was always here.

It never left us.

Our attention left the peace.

Our attention left the peace.

Thank you,

Wendy.

Thank you for the donation.

Oh,

Moj,

And I'm so glad.

So glad.

And thank you,

Filippa.

Oh,

And I'm glad,

Michael,

That that seems to coincide.

No,

In fact,

Abigail,

That's what I was saying.

The anger,

When you mentioned that,

I was like,

Oh,

That's right here.

I do want to kind of talk about it.

So no,

That was great.

So sometimes I will.

Sometimes I'll catch something and think,

Oh yeah,

You know what,

That's really,

That's going to be a little helpful or something maybe I didn't,

You know,

Didn't emphasize as much.

So yeah,

And DR or doctor.

So well,

I'm going to post the recordings on my teacher page.

So I'll just say it'll all be on my teacher's page.

It'll probably take me,

I probably am not even going to put it up until next week because I've got Sunday's class to prepare.

Oh,

And Char,

I just want to,

Well,

You're saying so much of our lives is fostering connections with others,

And you found meditation as a way for you to calm and truly connect to your inner world,

Thoughts and feelings.

So much in modern days,

Fostering disconnection,

Absolutely.

Yeah,

You know,

And,

And,

And,

You know,

We do want to be able to connect with others.

This isn't about going off and,

And being,

You know,

Isolating.

I mean,

I do,

As I say that,

Because I do spend a lot of time on my own.

But,

But when I am engaging with others too,

Like you're there,

Like you're fully there.

And,

And I find that,

That even though I do spend a great deal of time on my own,

I don't feel lonely.

I don't feel lonely.

I feel,

Of course,

I do have my three dogs,

But I,

I feel like there's this sense of connection with others because I'm not creating that sense of separation that's,

That's happening when we're,

When we're so habitually lost in our thoughts.

So it does have,

It does have such a magnificent change in our lives,

Really does.

And,

Oh,

Thanks,

Philippa,

For helping out there.

Thank you.

Oh,

Janine,

I'm so glad to hear that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay,

Libby Liu,

And I hope you're doing well.

Okay.

Yeah,

And Michelle,

You're saying,

I mean,

Everyone who starts meditation says this.

It's,

It is a life-changing practice.

It is a life-changing practice.

And not because it means that we don't get sick,

Right?

It doesn't mean that we don't experience difficulties,

That we don't experience loss.

Like,

You're still going to experience all those things.

And that we kind of focus on a bit in class four,

Where we talk about the,

The aversion and resistance.

Because even in all of those things,

You know,

Nothing is ever one thing.

You know,

When we're feeling sick,

You know,

It's like,

Be kind to yourself,

Right?

Be kind to yourself.

You know,

If you're,

You had a tough day,

If you,

If you put your foot in your mouth,

Be kind to yourself,

Right?

Because we all do it,

Right?

It happens.

It's just,

We really do,

We're more aware of what's happening and,

And our response is more appropriate.

And when we've put our foot in our mouth,

And we've said something,

And we need to go and apologize,

Or we need to fix it,

Like,

Yeah,

We go and do it.

But not because,

Oh,

I can't live with myself now,

Because I feel like I'm a bad person,

But because we can understand I,

I,

I hurt someone.

And that wasn't my intention,

But we're all human.

We're all human.

Your Moodle is enjoying the talk.

I'm so glad,

Amanda.

I'm so glad.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And thank you for the tongue line for my cough.

Oh,

Thank you,

Michelle.

Thank you.

And wonderful to see you all.

So we know our meditation,

We know what we're going to be doing.

And then we're going to meet again on Sunday at,

At the same time.

So we've been meeting at the same time.

And we will continue on with our series.

So thank you all for the donations.

Thank you so much for that.

Thank you all for the great comments,

For the great questions,

For your kind words.

Thank you all.

Thank you,

Char.

Thank you so much.

Wonderful ending,

Char.

May we all know peace and connection in our day.

Yeah.

Reviews

This is part one in a series of new talks. The talks covers into the genesis of meditation.