We'll spend some time just bringing our bodies and minds into the space that we're in.
We'll take some time to do a brief body scan,
And then we'll do some recitations before I set a motivation,
And we'll go from there.
So one very simple way of bringing our mind to the present moment is just to pay attention to the direct perception of what is going on in our body with our senses right now.
So just pay attention to how it feels to have your feet in contact with the ground,
Or if you're on a cushion,
Then maybe how it feels to have your sit bones in contact with the cushion,
Your knees on the ground.
And spend some moments just guiding yourself through a body scan.
You can start with your feet,
Relaxing any tension you find there,
Bringing your attention to each part of the body.
Until you come to the crown of your head.
So now first we'll have some time for calm abiding meditation,
And you can choose to continue to focus on the image of the Buddha in the space in front of you,
If that's what's familiar for your mind.
Just to rest your mind there.
Or you can also focus on your breath if you prefer.
So just pick either object,
But just one object.
And you can focus on the rise and fall of the belly as you breathe,
Or the in-and-out sensation of air at your nostrils.
And any time your mind wanders away,
Just bring it home to your chosen object of concentration very gently.
If it gets distracted by direct perceptions of sound,
Smell,
Just notice that.
See if you can catch it at the stage of direct perception,
Before it goes into a story,
Before you get upset.
Oh,
You heard something.
That's all it is.
Come back to your object.
And now that we've spent some time focusing the mind by resting it on one object,
We'll use our focus to contemplate some of the points from the teachings we heard this morning.
And I don't know about you,
But in the past year with the outbreak of the COVID pandemic and then what we might call the racism pandemic in the U.
S.
,
I've experienced a lot of fear,
Anxiety,
And worry.
And what I found to be a helpful antidote to that is actually just to ground myself,
To ground my mind,
In paying attention to what I directly perceive.
So I thought this morning to give that a try and see if that might be helpful for you as well,
Especially if you've experienced fear,
Anxiety,
Or worry or still are due to whatever causes and conditions are arising in your experience.
So let's start by bringing to mind an incident where something occurred that caused fear,
Anxiety,
Or worry to arise in your mind.
But before you go down the rabbit hole of those disturbing emotions,
When you look back or slow things down,
See if you can pay attention just to what you saw or heard or smelled,
Touched,
Or tasted that brought about that response.
You might imagine if you were a video camera just recording data,
What would that incident just have looked like?
Or if like me,
You read something in the news,
Then you can ask yourself,
Is that direct perception?
What exactly in a news report or video were you responding to?
So let's spend some time just teasing out the direct perception of an incident that brought about fear,
Worry,
Or anxiety.
And so looking at these direct perceptions as the basis,
What did your conceptual consciousness then weave on top of them?
Based on just what you saw or heard or smelled or tasted or touched,
Can you identify the conceptual consciousnesses that arose out of that?
And as you look at those conceptual consciousnesses,
How do you know if they are valid or not?
Were any of them valid?
Were they based on reliable testimony of an authoritative person?
Like if it's printed in the New York Times,
It must be true.
Do you have mental direct perception that can see someone else's motivation to harm you?
So just check out what's the basis for all these conceptual consciousnesses that arose,
And how do you know if they're true or not?
And yesterday,
Venerable Jigme Phuntsok,
And yesterday,
Venerable Sangye Khadro encouraged us,
When we sit in meditation and observe what's going on,
To begin to pay more attention to the subjective side.
Right,
Not just on the object,
But to look at who or what is perceiving or conceiving.
So as you look back at this incident that provoked fear,
Anxiety,
Or worry,
And you see that there are moments of direct perception that then led to moments of conceptual consciousness,
And maybe they alternated between each other.
Can you find some kind of unified perceiver or conceiver?
Who was weaving some kind of story to bring about fear,
Anxiety,
Or worry?
Was there some master craftsperson in creative writing doing that?
Where is the anxiety anyway,
As you look at all these moments of consciousness and perception?
I want to emphasize too that the purpose of an analysis like this is not to discount our experience.
I don't know,
Maybe if you have a critical judgmental mind like mine,
Sometimes it can go into,
Oh,
You're just making it up,
Or really it was nothing.
Right,
No,
The purpose of this analysis is to look at how the disturbing emotions are generated,
And when we have this information,
We can be compassionate with ourselves the next time it arises.
So maybe you've gained some insight into some trigger or way of thinking that brings about fear,
Anxiety,
Or worry,
Just looking at this one incident.
So think about how you might help yourself the next time it arises.
In the heat of the moment,
I don't know,
I'm not likely to think about the emptiness or selflessness of myself or the anxiety,
But what are ways you can ground yourself in the reality of what's happening,
And to check up whether what's going on is actually harmful,
Or fearful,
Or anxiety-provoking.
Think of some ways you can help yourself the next time such an incident arises.
So in closing,
Let's really rejoice that we've used this time to familiarize our minds with ways to calm it down,
Ways to distinguish what is realistic or not,
And in doing so,
Then we're not slaves to our disturbing emotions,
But begin to have the ability to discern what to practice,
And what to abandon.
And that's just something so marvelous that so many other sentient beings don't actually have access to.
We can see what it's like when we've not met any teachings on how the mind works,
And we just follow whatever thought comes up,
Or whatever habits we are used to,
And how much harm that can bring to us and others around us.
So really rejoicing in our good motivation to bring about greater love,
Compassion,
And wisdom in our lives.
Dedicating all the positive energy,
All the merit we've generated through this session,
To all sentient beings.
