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Happy Hour: The Joy of Non-Striving, Non-Becoming

Introduction

...and Hugh from San Diego. So I think the space is warmed up. I feel all the love from all the different places in the world and different time zones, so I invite you to feel into it too. And thank you, Neil, for sharing information about the Happy Hour Google Groups. We have a low-traffic mailing list, and if you're not on it, you're warmly invited to join. It's what I like to say: it's low in traffic but big in heart.

At this point, I've changed the settings so that unmuting won't be possible, so the space stays quiet. Chats will only come to me, but let's not send any questions during the guided meditation as it can be very distracting. I'll open up later for reflections after our meditation together. And last but not least, I'm going to turn on the recording for the sake of Audio Dharma. Here we go. Great.

Okay, so hello and welcome, everyone, to this rendition of Happy Hour. Lovely to be with you in cyberspace, if not in the same space, but in time—and maybe not in time if you're listening to Audio Dharma. But just lovely to feel each other's presence coming together with our intention. That's it. And the dimension of intention, we're definitely all coming together to practice together. So I'd like to invite us to just start sitting, and the aim for tonight will be revealed during the guided meditation. So without further ado, let's sit. Let's practice together.

Guided Meditation

Ah. Arriving. Arriving in this body. Arriving in this moment in time and turning our awareness inward. What's happening? Greeting. Greeting the body. Sensations of the body. Sensations of the breath.

How can I be kind to myself in this moment? How can I be a friend to myself in this moment? As if with each breath we're singing this song, gently, kindly. How can I be kind to myself with this breath in this moment? How can I care for my heart or my body in this moment? And the answer that comes up for me is, oh, sitting in stillness with awareness. But the breath is calming, soothing. It's nourishing. The act of self-care at this moment.

Notice I'm not saying, I'm not inviting us to focus on the breath. That gets the mind too tight. Please don't do that. Instead, relax. Relax the body and receive the breath. Receive the breath like a lullaby, like a song. Like you wish for your own well-being. Make a blessing, a whisper in your heart. Expansive in your abdomen. How can I be kind to myself? Relax and receive. Whisper the song of the breath with kindness.

How can I be kind? How can I be gentle for this being who is me in this moment, this mind and this heart? Treat them with care as a practice for treating others with care. And I let go, put down preoccupations, thoughts, plans, entanglements, just to take refuge in kindness with this breath. And if thoughts arise, I can release them. Say, "Thank you, dear thoughts. Not now, please come back later." This moment is perfect just as it is. Thank you very much. Nothing more needed.

And I'd like to invite you, if you would, just as you are, sitting or lying down or standing and feeling your body feeling breathed. Each breath, one breath at a time. See if with your mind, with your heart, as if it were a radio, a receiver, you can tune into. Tune into the joy. The joy, the pleasantness of just sitting here, being breathed. Nowhere to go, nothing to do, this moment of respite. You can tune into the delight, the joy of that. And if the judgmental mind comes along, "Oh, you're not doing anything." Thank you, judgmental mind. Thank you, I know you're trying to help, but I'm actually tuning into appreciating the joy of non-doing. There's a joy to it, a joy to non-grasping, not becoming. There's a freedom, a joy. You just feel into this for a moment, just a brief moment to taste it. Later you can become all you want, but right now see if you can tune into this delight, this wholesome goodness of non-striving. Just being.

Thank you. The joy of not doing. You see, do you feel something release? Do you feel lighter, perchance? Notice, what does it feel like, this subtle delight? And you savor it, help it grow. Again, the puritan judgmental mind can come, "Okay, alright." Dear judgmental mind can rest, take a break. You're working so hard, I'm exploring something different. The joy of not becoming and striving. Just being.

It's a deep, profound place of rest. This joy of not becoming, not doing, and it's right here. So accessible, right here. Relax and receive.

The mind doesn't have to race. Nothing to be, to become, to solve. It can release. The heart also doesn't have to solve all the problems of yourself or your life, the world. Just resting on the tip of release into joy. A refuge. Refuge of deep kindness, care. Refreshing. Refreshing for wisdom. Joy of not doing, not becoming, not grasping.

Whatever arises, you can release every thought. I don't have to follow this one. If I release into the joy of non-becoming, not becoming this thought, and rest there at that tip. Joy of not becoming, of release.

Thank you.

It's letting go into the joy of non-doing, not becoming. A place of deep rest. The refuge. However this meditation was, whether there were moments of rest, refuge, peace, joy, or not, it's perfectly fine. You showed up. You showed up, you did your best given all the causes and conditions. Appreciate yourself. Yay, I showed up. Thank you for showing up. I trust you've planted seeds. Please trust you've planted seeds. They will come to fruition in their own time, not according to our demands or schedule. All we can do is to do our part, to show up with our wholehearted intention, and you've done that. Whether the mind is distracted, lots of visitors, all plans, memories, sadnesses, agonies arising in this moment, we don't have control so much. So appreciating that you showed up, practiced, seeing your own goodness, and together as a community, sharing the merit of our goodness, the merit of our practice, of our wholeheartedness. Offering it to ourselves and offering it to all beings everywhere. May our practice be of benefit to not just ourselves, our loved ones, our families, our own liberation. May it support, may it be helpful to all beings everywhere in ways we cannot imagine. Trust that it is. May all beings be free. May all beings be happy, including ourselves.

Reflections

Thank everyone, thanks for your practice. So what we did today, just a quick review. We started with feeling the breath while calming the breath and relaxing, receiving the breath as a lullaby. Yes, calming and soothing. It's this nourishing of the breath and tuning. We start to tune into the breath as a blessing, as something beautiful. And then I invited you to try something we haven't tried here before, which is exploring the joy of not becoming. Of non-becoming, of non-being, non-doing, non-striving. And the way to explore that joy was to release, was to release into non-being. If a thought came about, "I plan to do this," it's like, "Oh sweetheart, you don't have to, it's alright. Later I can think about all this stuff and become all I want later, but right now, what if I just release that and then turn my mind to the joy, to the delight of non-being?"

Wow, that can be such a place of ease, rest, and release. It's just like the tip of... I had this image of... I think there's a saying of how many millions or thousands of angels can dance on the head of a pin. That's it, thank you. Head of a pin. Support is right there in the chat for me, waiting for me on the head of a pin. So there's so much ease, so much relaxation and peace on this tip of this pin of not becoming, not doing, just releasing into that.

So interesting. An interesting exploration. I hope you found your way, your relationship into it, either through this meditation or maybe some other time. And of course, the mind, the judgments can come, like, "Oh, you're not doing anything." It's okay, sweetie, it's alright. I'll do everything, the becoming can all happen later. But it's so freeing to explore, even for a moment if it's accessible. Like wow, the mind can just let go, release into non-becoming, not wanting, not becoming. Not around this samsara^[1], this continuously thinking and becoming and wanting. It remembers, like even for a moment through the past 30 minutes if you felt into that, wow, that can be such a deep joy. Release into that.

Instructions for Breakout Rooms

So with that, the invitation is to now transition, if you will, to being with one another in small breakout groups. And maybe nothing needs to be said. If you're very quiet, if you just had a deep release, you don't want to become. You don't want to become this talking head. That's perfectly fine. Let that be your guide. What if we show up with others without this need to say, to be, to become, to share? Maybe we'll just show up with peace, with silence, with non-becoming. What does that look like? I don't know, let's explore that. Maybe there will be a lot of silence in the rooms, and maybe there will be a movement to perhaps share something from the experience, or maybe not. It's very free-floating. Or maybe you'll just sit together with eyes open for the six minutes in silence, and that's perfectly fine. Maybe just wishing each other metta^[2], wishing yourselves well, wishing each other well. So let it be really low-key. And also notice if there is the desire for becoming, for wanting to impress. Especially if there's a desire to perhaps share. Just be with goodwill.

I know these instructions, these invitations for the small group sound unusual. It's not the usual prompt to "discuss this." No, it's actually a different way of being with other human beings. Does that make sense? So the invitation is in the small group of roughly size three or four, what if you showed up without any desire to be anybody or show up in any particular way, just being with a sense of ease? Let's try that on for size, dear practitioner. So I'm going to create the breakout rooms. Be kind, take care of yourselves, take care of each other. No questioning, please. This is not a time to ask anybody any questions. If you want to share from your experience, you're welcome to. If you want to hold silence with metta and non-becoming, what does the heart and mind feel? Be curious. That's it, lead with curiosity. Not becoming, be curious. Alright, the rooms are created. I'm going to open them now. Take care of yourselves, take care of each other. Here we go.

Q&A and Reflections

Come back, and let's take a couple of reflections. You can type them in the chat if you like. It's open now to everyone, or to me privately. Or you can raise your hand if you haven't spoken recently. How was this practice for you? What did you discover? Any aha moments, or any challenges you want to ask about? Ditto about the small groups.

Bill asks, "What is becoming? What is non-becoming?"

Ah, non-becoming, not unbecoming. Non-becoming, but becoming. Yeah, thank you for that question. In the Buddhist teachings, there's this idea that we calcify around a want, something that we want to become. For example, there's so many different ways to think about this, but let's relate it... Let's say you have a memory, and then all of a sudden you're upset and you're angry, and you become this angry person. You become because of the thought you had. Or the thing I mentioned a couple of sessions ago, the idea of this Hungry Ghost^[3], which in Buddhist cosmology is a creature that has a huge stomach and a tiny neck and a tiny mouth, so it can never be satisfied. It's always hungry, always greedy. So maybe you see something or you think about something, and you become a Hungry Ghost. It's becoming. It's this always becoming. You're always becoming this, becoming that. And so that's the idea, Bill, of becoming and taking birth into these unwholesome states of mind, which again could be thought of as different hell realms. We take birth into these different hell realms, we keep becoming these unhelpful versions of ourselves instead of just not taking the bait.

Bill asks, "Becoming is related to greed and aversion?"

Yes, yes it is. Exactly right. This becoming is related to the three unwholesome roots: greed, hatred, and confusion. Actually, the confusion, the delusion, gives rise to the greed and hatred. So that's exactly right. Through that cycle, we keep becoming, we keep taking birth. You can think of it as multi-life. We keep becoming in the multi-life model if one believed in rebirth. Or in a one-life model, you keep becoming the next moment. You become something more, it's different. Instead of just releasing and being. There's a sense of release, ease, and releasing into goodness, service. So that's the teaching there. And I appreciate you asking these questions. You're welcome, Bill. Excellent questions. I hope it was helpful for others too.

Someone sends a direct message, "That was a beautiful exercise, thank you."

You are so welcome. Thanks for practicing this. And if you want to raise your hand and say more, because I don't remember hearing from you, you're welcome. Not to put you on the spot, but you're welcome to raise your hand.

Amy says, "Our group sat quietly without unmuting, being with, and at random times we just grinned at each other."

Oh, this is sweet. I love it. There's a sweetness to what you shared, Amy. It's very sweet. "Being with, and at random times we just grinned at each other." It makes me happy, it's very sweet. Not becoming, together. Yeah, it's exactly right. [Laughter]

Well, it feels like a rich exploration we've done together. A rich exploration that I invite you to practice not just on the cushion, but in daily life. When you're about to become something which may not be ideal, you don't want to be, pause: "Do I want to become this? Or do I want to release into non-becoming?" Release that tantalizing thing, whatever it is. That fishhook into anger and aversion and greed, whatever it might be. "Can I just let go and not become? Can I let go into contentment in this moment and explore that?"

So thank you all. Thank you for your practice. Thank you for your wholeheartedness, dear Sangha^[4]. May we all be free. May we all be happy. May we all have joy in our hearts. Explore the joy of non-greed, non-hatred, non-delusion, which actually is the joy of generosity and love and wisdom. May all beings be well. May all beings be free. Thanks everyone. Be well, take care. I'll see you on Monday.