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Introduction

Good morning, and I am happy to be here with you. We now have a different bhikkhuni^[1] (nun) on the altar. Patacara^[2], as I mentioned, is a statue that was here before, but is still curing and drying out. It started to crack, so it is going home to the Insight Retreat Center in Santa Cruz, where it is a little more humid and in cooler conditions than Redwood City. We took it down there to try to minimize the continued cracking of the wood.

In her place, I put her elder in the monastic lineage, a woman named Mahapajapati Gotami^[3]. She was not only the first Buddhist nun, but was the one who requested permission from the Buddha to be ordained, and therefore opened the doors for many, many women afterwards to become Buddhist monastics. Patacara was one of them. I'll say a little more about this later, and maybe on Friday. So, that's a little introduction to what you see here that's different.

Guided Meditation: Meditating with Determination

One of the useful qualities for the ongoing, day-in and day-out, breath-in and breath-out practice of meditation and Buddhism is a quality called resolve, or determination. It is a quality that can easily lead us to the idea that we're supposed to strain, push, and grit^[4] our teeth, perhaps. But it's possible to be resolved and determined on being relaxed, determined on being peaceful. This idea is a built-in protection from determination becoming a strain or a heavy work. But still, there's a real dedication—I like the word dedication—to something that has some strength behind it.

One of the ways this is talked about in the early Buddhist tradition is with a word that can mean in English "to stand." I take this to mean to take a stand, to really stand in your place, and to have your place be clear. What that place is that we want to take a stand in, is here in the present moment. In mindfulness practice, we take a stand in offering—I use that word intentionally—our presence and our attention to our embodied experience of the present moment.

To take a stand in this present-moment experience is not to be strained or to have a heavy thing, but to really have a strength, a determination, a clarity: This is where I stand. This is the grounding for where my life will flow from. This idea that our life can flow and arise out of the creative potential of really being present here is a radically different way of living than for those of us who sometimes live in our heads, in the future, in fantasy, planning, and desires. That's often the ground from which things come.

So, here we are in meditation for the next few minutes. To take a stand metaphorically, let yourself be rooted here.

Begin with your posture. The posture is meant to be a physical expression, a way that we manifest physically a kind of devotion or dedication to being here, present, rooted, and taking a stand in the present-moment experience. Our physical body shares with us in providing moment-to-moment attention. Let lived awareness be an experience that is so much supported by all the different ways the body experiences itself.

Then, close your eyes. If it is comfortable to close your eyes, doing so is also meant to be a reminder of taking this stand, taking this place. In Buddhism, we sometimes talk about taking our rightful place here in this world, in this time. It's enough to be alive and rooted here. So, closing our eyes.

Part of this ritual of resolve, determination, and grounding here can be a loving and gentle taking of deeper breaths. It is kind of like we're filling out into the lived experience of the body as we breathe in deeply. I like to think of the breathing as beginning in the very core of our being and spreading out from there as we expand on the inhale. Then, the exhale is a coming back to the center, to the core. Returning, letting go, and returning to the place where we are perhaps most centered or grounded physically.

Then, let the breathing return to normal. Perhaps as you breathe in a normal way, notice the activities and energies of the mind. As you breathe in, and as you exhale, relax those activities of the mind. Let go of your thinking, or quiet your thinking.

As you exhale, perhaps let go into the body. Relax the body. Relax the muscles of the face. Relax the shoulders. Relax the belly. Relax into the core of our being in a gentle and loving way.

Allow your immediate physical, embodied experience to be the place of grounding, the place where you stand, with a gentle determination and resolve. Don't mind if you wander off; just on the next exhale, reestablish yourself here in this experience. Be content to do so for however long the momentum of present-moment awareness goes. And then do it again, here and now.

One of the sayings describing meditation practice is to "be still and gaze upon everything kindly." The idea of "everything" is central to this little saying, and everything includes the world around us.

I hope that as we learn to deepen and develop our meditation practice, we're learning the ability to have a stand, to be rooted in a place of attention, in a place of clear mindfulness that's not easily pushed around or agitated. In this mindful stand, our care and kindness extend outwards in all directions. Meditation practice itself acts as a support for being in the world caringly, kindly, and compassionately.

Dedication of Merit

At the end of all kinds of Buddhist events and practices, there's a custom to do a dedication of merit. I translate this as actively considering how the benefits that we receive from the practice can be shared with others. How can the benefits of how we practice be turned outwards for the welfare and happiness of all beings? Maybe in small ways, we treat others more kindly and care for others compassionately.

This is an important part of the practice because it's the way of discovering that our inner peace and inner freedom can only remain peaceful and free if, in fact, we are open-hearted, compassionate, and looking kindly on the world around us. The alternative is in some ways to shut down, close off, or be preoccupied.

So, may the benefits of our practice today spread from us out into the people we have contact with, our neighborhoods, our towns, and out across the lands, with the aspiration and dedication that:

May all beings be happy.
May all beings be healthy.
May all beings be peaceful.
May all beings be free.