Good morning,
Good afternoon,
Good evening.
So I'm just going to read a little something,
Which I think is a really important reading actually,
Really important message.
I've read it before,
But I've never really gone into it that much.
Expecting an epiphany.
A single moment of insight.
That will forever.
Banish the experience of fear,
Anger and neediness.
May it prevent us from noticing the slow and almost imperceptible ways that our practice subtly transforms us.
With patience and perseverance.
Our reactive patterns slowly erode.
Until one day we find ourselves in a situation that had always made us anxious and the anxiety is just not there.
And the reason.
.
.
I read that out is because.
.
.
The vast majority of us are looking for an experience.
And even if it's in the background,
There's hope that something will.
.
.
To certainly shift something.
Something will happen.
And everything's all okay.
Now from one perspective everything's always okay,
But from another it isn't.
So what I'm suggesting is.
.
.
Don't look for a destination.
Think of this as a lifelong journey.
So settle down the hoping.
Put aside the expectation that something is going to happen.
And you sit.
Experience what's here.
The sound of the birds,
The traffic,
The feeling of your bottom on the seat,
The breath.
Meet your thought with silence.
So even just that,
If you don't keep up.
Spinning the roulette wheel of thought.
If that courier doesn't keep spinning it,
What's going to happen to it?
And you're the courier.
It's going to stop,
It's going to slow down at least.
So this is an undoing.
But it doesn't undo through an explosion.
It's a gradual unwinding of the whole thing,
The whole mechanism.
Because it's a mechanism that's going on.
You built up over decades.
Or we didn't realize we were doing it.
Until you realize that you've been doing it.
So take that idea away and just put it to one side and just come right into this present moment.
Experience the best you can without any stories,
Any narrative.
When the narrative's there,
It's OK.
Meet you without drama.
Do your best just to not accept the invitations.
As that wheel will want to keep spinning.
That wheel of self-centeredness me and my life are.
Mean what's wrong with my life?
So it just gets simpler and simpler,
You realise it the less you do.
The mind just here,
Experiencing.
Is what actually does the transformation.
It's the opposite of.
.
.
What most of us believe.
Not sitting around doing the things we can do that can be helpful.
I'm just saying that.
Just take a few moments to settle in.
And we simply start to.
Experience what's here.
A sadness.
Every little anxious feeling.
Feeling relaxed and centred.
Little tension in the jaw.
Sound of a dog barking.
Doesn't matter what it is,
See?
Just being with life as it is.
We accept an invitation from mind.
It's okay,
Just put it down.
It's just thinking.
Just a thought.
That's all it is.
Nothing more.
Just spinning the wheel.
What's happening?
Not thinking about what's happening.
Meet it directly,
The feeling of the breath.
The hearing of the birds or the traffic.
You may notice that when you've been lost in thought,
Been spinning,
Spinning the wheel that the body contracts slightly.
And when you come back to the senses,
It certainly softens.
Where is the attention?
Is feeling into presence.
Nothing more complicated than that.
Begets too much.
Take a short break.
Open the eyes.
Stand up.
Moment by moment.
OK,
That brings us to the end.
First session this week.
