This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video above. It likely contains inaccuracies, especially with speaker attribution if there are multiple speakers.

Guided Meditation: Resting in the Integrity of Mindfulness

Good morning. Good morning, Global IMC Sangha. How are you today? As always, it's just lovely to see all the names. Excuse the feedback.

I just love seeing all the greetings. Sorry about the echo there, it is an imperfect process using technology to connect with the rest of the world. But gosh, it has some beautiful, beautiful qualities to it, doesn't it? So I'm just waiting to hear if the sound is okay. So when you get a chance, please give me a sound check to make sure it's no longer looping or distorted on your end. Thank you. Wonderful.

Great, wonderful. So the invitation is to—I don't know how it feels to be helpful giving feedback with this sound, and notice how it feels to be in connection. In connection with this far-flung virtual Sangha that this community has built over these past years. And then drinking that in. Gathering it up, and when you're ready, bringing it into your heart and softening your eyes, perhaps closing them.

Doing whatever works for you to settle in, settle into meditation. Perhaps one or two slightly longer, slower breaths. Allowing your belly to relax. Really allowing the exhale to release, let go of any excess tension, anything extra it took to get here. Maybe like me, you had to play with the technology to get it to work right.

Just relaxing, noticing. Noticing your surroundings, perhaps distant sounds outside your window, or the soft hum within your home or room. Noticing the immersion. The immersion of your body, your heart, your mind in the moment.

Contact of your feet against whatever they're resting on. Grounding, if you're sitting, the contact of your hip points and buttocks in the chair or cushion. The contact of your skin on cool air, perhaps your hands or some other part of you is touching. Noticing how that feels on the outside of your skin, and then noticing how it feels to be present inside. All the ways we know we're alive.

And perhaps noticing the integrity of your skin, and the strength of your spine and your bones. They hold this body upright. Allowing your muscles to relax around the bones. Allowing your belly and your chest to soften. And your life's breath to move unimpeded, in and out.

As we settle in, noticing too the quality of the inner posture, the mind, the heart, and setting the intention of kind, generous awareness. To be kind, generous, discerning with whatever arises. Even if your thoughts are a bit of an echo chamber this morning, it's okay. It's okay to step back and rest. Rest in present moment experience of breathing, body, or sound. Even resting in the present moment flow of awareness.

If you notice your mind has wandered, seeing how kindly and generously you can greet the re-emergence of awareness, the integrity of mindfulness.

In the last moments of this meditation, the invitation is to gather up, notice any little moment or a long stretch of pleasure or positive quality. Any little glimmer of trust, peace, mindfulness, concentration, kindness, generosity, or many other. Gather it up and soak in it, be nourished by it. Appreciating this practice we've done together.

And then casting your internal gaze, the gaze of your heart, outwards into your life. Wherever you are, whoever you encounter, and if it feels right, generating the aspiration that they too may benefit from the fruits of your practice. May the others in our lives be happy, safe, peaceful, and free. And may our practice, our actions, in some small way help support that. Thank you.

[Laughter]

Thank you for the sincerity of your practice.

Dharmette: Ethical Consistency Evokes Harmony

Oh, good morning. Good morning, Sangha. A delight to be with you, and a special welcome to those who tiptoed in a little bit late into the live stream room today.

I'm going to continue the theme of this week, which is qualities of mind and heart conducive to inner and outer harmony. We've covered so far this week mindfulness and wisdom, applied to benefiting ourselves and others in the broader world. We covered that on Monday. And then on Tuesday, we covered how the cultivation of mettā^[1]—kindness, goodwill—can be a huge support for our progress and maturation of meditation and spiritual practice, and in our relationships. And then yesterday, we covered the quality of sharing or generosity, and how that too is a profound support on the path and in daily life in our relationships.

Today's topic is the value of consistently showing up. Consistently showing up with persistence ethically with ourselves internally, and with others externally. It's walking our talk. And again, this is one of a number of principles, qualities the Buddha taught in the Sāraṇīya Dhamma^[2], often translated as the principles of cordiality. Like so many things the Buddha taught, cultivation inward and cultivation outward both are beneficial.

This principle in particular, this way of being, consistency of showing up, is something that the Buddha says creates love and respect. Showing up ethically creates love and respect both internally and externally. And there are a wide range of ethical virtues that the Buddha talks about in the ancient teachings, far too wide to cover in one little 15-minute talk. Many of you are familiar with the basics for those of us who are not ordaining as monastics: the five precepts. They were covered in detail a few weeks ago in the 7 A.M. talks. In brief, just to recap, they include not killing, not stealing, abstaining from sexual misconduct, and not lying or engaging in harsh or divisive speech. And finally, not engaging in heedless behavior due to intoxication.

So we could list many, many more, including this week's: practicing with wisdom, keeping our own benefit and the benefit of others in mind, kindness, sharing, and generosity. So my invitation is for you to call to mind, reflect in your heart, on what you consider virtuous. Is there anything you'd like to add to the list? Just reflect on it formally.

Regardless of how we define them, expressing virtue consistently with persistence is key. It builds beneficial habits internally and externally, and it builds a momentum—a momentum in relationship and a momentum in practice. So that quality of persistence, consistency itself is a kind of virtue, or can be if wisely applied. Showing up over and over is the fundamental prerequisite for gaining skill in anything really, including meditative and spiritual progress, right? It's just like going to the gym and working out. If I go lift weights or if I go running once a year, I'm not going to see a very big difference. But every other day, three times a week, every morning, something begins to shift, to change. Even within a meditative session, as Matthew pointed out last week: beginning again, starting over, returning consistently—that's a profoundly helpful action.

Another way that this kind of quality is really helpful, and this is a completely classic practice, is to internally silently reflect on and value your own good qualities, your own virtues, any and all of them. It's considered to be a kind of preparatory practice, especially for practicing mettā or goodwill meditation. And virtuous behavior in general is associated with progress on the path. In fact, it's one of the key factors associated with readiness for awakening, as well as expression of awakening.

This comes from a discourse entitled the Practice for a Trainee. The Buddha is quoted as saying, and I'm paraphrasing here for simplicity: "Just as a hen has eggs she covered, incubated rightly, even though she might not wish or intend for her chicks to break out through the eggshells, still it's likely that the eggs will hatch." In the same way, when a practitioner is consonant, consistent in virtue, and develops meditative skill and concentration, they too will break through to freedom, to awakening. One of the ways this works is by building confidence and trust in the practice, and in our own hearts and minds.

And it's also true, and this again is probably obvious, but it's worth saying out loud: consistently and persistently showing up with others ethically also increases our own confidence and that of others even more. Robert Anton Wilson writes, "The conduct of our lives is the only proof of the sincerity of our hearts." The conduct of our lives is the only proof of the sincerity of our hearts.

So this persistent kindness, virtue, generosity is especially under pressure. It's a repeated theme throughout the Buddhist teachings and the teaching stories, the myths, the fables that evolved later. So it's not just when things are easy, but rather when things are tough, times are tough, that's when our strength shows. When things aren't going well, showing up with consistency, virtue, kindness, it can really build an unshakable confidence with others. If others also value integrity, ethical behavior, it can also build a really deep appreciation and reciprocation, deep bonds. I've seen this in my own work when one of us experiences a really difficult time in the hospital. The way we show up, and the way others show up with us, helps cement these beautiful, beautiful bonds of trust.

The Buddha is quoted in the Numerical Discourses saying—I think it's a verse in Pali, but in English the rhyming doesn't come through: "Generosity, kind words, beneficial help, and consistency in the face of events, in line with what's appropriate in each case. These bonds of fellowship function in the world like the linchpin of a moving cart." The linchpin that holds our friendships, our bonds, our communities together.

I recently heard a psychologist, a research psychologist I believe, Dr. Marisa Franco, say: "When we are around other people, they're kind of like an advertisement for ways we can show up in the world." And it's true. Perhaps even more to the point for practitioners or spiritual aspirants is this: that when we are around other people, we are a kind of advertisement, exemplar, for ways others can show up in the world. People notice our behavior more than we think and pick up on it. Just like emotions are contagious, virtue is contagious too. Or to put it another way, we teach other people how to be with us and how to simply be, in the way we act, in our attitudes, our frame of mind.

So to bring together these internal and external benefits to harmony of showing up with ethical consistency, just a brief anecdote. And this is from ancient Buddhist legend, kind of an introduction to the legends called the Jātaka Tales^[3]. And the myth says that the Buddha-to-be, the Buddha that we always talk about, Shakyamuni Buddha^[4], many millennia ago encountered the Buddha of that time, and he was so inspired that he decided that he was going to practice not just to awakening, but to full Buddhahood. The ancient Buddha saw this in him and gave him one piece of advice: to hold to virtue, to hold to truthfulness, and move consistently through the world, it said, the way that the star of Venus moves through the sky. To move through the world the way the star of Venus moves through the sky.

I really like this little anecdote. It points to the combination of aspiration, persistence, consistency of a kind of guiding constellation as a way of moving through life, moving through our worlds. And as Venus has a connotation for us, the underpinning of that, at some level, it's a kind of love.

So tomorrow, if you wish to take any homework with you, you might just notice: how do or how might the qualities of consistency, persistence, and whatever virtues, kind of behaviors that you feel drawn to—how do they benefit you? How do they benefit your practice? How do they impact the others around you and your relationships?

So thank you, dear Sangha, for your returning attention. It's a delight to be with you, and we'll just dedicate the merit very briefly here: May all beings everywhere benefit from our practice here together. May all beings be safe, happy, peaceful, and free.

[Laughter]