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: Finding the Saught in the Seeking

Hello, everyone. Contentment is a little, maybe, problematic when a person is broadcasting to hundreds of people, in that for a few moments here, I was just content to sit here and was not thinking about the fact that I'm supposed to speak. So, it's nice to be here.

I want to begin with a story that hopefully you're generous in going along with the interpretation of, because the point is the moral of the tale, not how well it fits the moral.

There was a spiritual seeker who was very sincere, dedicated to the spiritual path, and wanted to find something. But they had been doing it for a long time and hadn't had any success, whatever that might mean. They went to find one of the most senior, elder, wise people in that spiritual tradition and explained the difficulty: they had been practicing for a long time and searching for a long, long time to no avail.

The teacher said, "Oh, okay. What you're seeking is not far away from you, but you have to seek, search, look, and practice wholeheartedly."

The person asked, "What do you mean wholeheartedly? I've been sincere and dedicated."

The teacher replied, "No, no, you have to practice wholeheartedly. Do that for a year and come back."

So the person did that. They weren't quite sure what "wholehearted" meant and tried all kinds of things. Sometimes they strained too much and learned that that couldn't be wholehearted. Sometimes they practiced wholehearted relaxation, but that didn't seem to be quite it. Sometimes they evoked all the faith they had in the spiritual path, but that didn't seem to quite do it. But they kept trying, kept engaging, kept trying to find out: what is wholehearted?

A year later, they went back to the teacher. They said, "Well, now I've been doing this for a year," and described what their practices of wholeheartedness and efforts had been.

The teacher said, "Very good. You've been seeking. So now, turn the attention around 180 degrees and realize that what you're seeking, what you're searching for, is in the seeking."

And with that, the person was set free.

This is the story of searching for something out there that we're going to attain. But maybe there's something very profound to be discovered—not in the "what," not in some realization, not in some understanding, not in some experience, but rather in our capacity to be aware. The capacity in which we know anything, which we gaze upon and see.

Sometimes we're blinded and don't see the seeing because we're looking for something, we're involved in something, thinking about something. To take that backward step, that 180-degree turn, and to appreciate and find maybe even freedom in the seeing, in the knowing, in the awaring, is a radical paradigm shift from how many people live their lives and how they find meaning in their life.

So, assume a meditation posture that will be the support for a wholehearted awareness practice. Wholehearted: just being here with the experience now.

I like to interpret wholeheartedness not as straining or pushing or trying a lot, but as a complete willingness to enter into this moment of experience. Wholehearted means to enter wholly into the experience of now.

Gently close the eyes, taking a few long, slow, deep breaths, relaxing with the long, extended exhale. Continue with some longer, deeper breaths, hopefully in a comfortable way.

And then, at the end of the next exhale, hold your breath for as long as it's comfortable. While you do so, feel your body and let your body relax more, until you feel the strong pull, the strong urge to breathe in. And then gently breathe in deeply.

At the end of the exhale, hold your breath for just long enough that you start feeling the body relax. And maybe holding your breath at the top of the inhale, that pause before exhaling, there's a heightened attention to the body, to the urge to exhale, but also maybe a heightened sensitivity to the body that allows the body to relax more. Holding your breath, for most people, puts them more fully in the present moment.

And then, returning to normal breathing without holding anything, and on the exhale, continue this process of softening and relaxing your body.

Is there a way that you can be aware of the present without trying to be aware? To be aware and allow yourself to be aware. Where wholeheartedness is not trying harder, but rather allowing fully, holistically, globally for awareness to be here and now. Not trying, but allowing the present moment awareness.

And, in a sense, allowing breathing at the center of it all to come to you, to come to awareness. Rather than you directing the attention, the attention receives the experience of breathing.

And then wholeness, wholehearted awareness. Whole awareness of the moment. Let that include honesty, an honest recognition of what is happening within you. Thinking, feeling, wanting, not wanting. An honesty that needs nothing, wants nothing. Honesty that's not judging, just an honest recognition of what's happening now.

And then, to turn the attention around 180 degrees, to find freedom in the searching. Rather than being aware of freedom as something external from awareness, to be aware of—to know—the freedom of awareness.

Is there a sense of freedom and non-attachment in the simplest acts of knowing, sensing, seeing with the mind's eye? Even if it's just a hint, rest back in the freedom found in awareness, in being aware.

Imagine yourself sitting back in an easy chair—maybe you are even. Nothing's required of you, nothing you have to do or say, but just be present here and now.

And the people of your lives start coming in, and they sit down around you, with you. Neighbors come in, strangers come in. The whole town, the whole county, the whole state, everyone comes in as the walls of your house expand bigger and bigger.

Nothing's required of you but to be present. Nothing you have to say or do. And maybe it's possible to be aware of them all with the freedom of awareness. The awareness that doesn't get stuck anywhere or attached to anything.

Kind of like looking out across the ocean: just not fixating on anything, seeing the ocean. Relax at ease, gazing upon all these people that have come to you.

And perhaps bring forth goodwill and friendliness. A goodwill that simply is wishing them well. May it be that they have lots of benefits, lots of happiness, lots of safety, lots of peace. May they be well. May they be safe.

Gazing upon all beings kindly while staying calm. May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free.

Thank you.

Dharmette: Meaning (3 of 5) The Big Questions

Hello everyone, and here we are at the third talk in this five-part series on meaning. The meanings we have for ourselves, the meanings we have for life, can come to bear on our meditation. There's a connection with it. Sometimes the sense of meaning we have animates and activates our meditation. Searching for meaning, staying close to it—sometimes it agitates it. Sometimes you get caught up in these topics of meaning. The important meanings we have can influence how we meditate and why we meditate.

So, beginning to look at the meaning-making aspects of the mind and the meaning-making aspects of how we live our lives is important all around. But it's also important to really clarify what we're doing in meditation, what meditation is about for us. This is both so that we can have a wholehearted engagement—we know why we're doing something—and also because sometimes the meanings we assign to meditation, or connect to it, are not helpful. They actually get in the way of the depth and full potential of meditation.

There's this idea of meaning sometimes connected to the big questions of life that people are very strongly motivated to find, live by, or establish for themselves. Something as big as: What's the meaning of life? Or, What's the meaning of my life that I want to have? There are these big questions about death: What happens when we die? What happens to us after we die?

People are trying to understand that, and that affects their relationship to meditation. Meditation, for some people, is a strategy to deal with death. For some people, it's understood that mindfulness meditation is one of the best preparations for dying, so they want to die well or die freely and not die with difficulty. For some people, meditation is not about dying well, but about being reborn well—or not being reborn in the future. There's a strong momentum in approaching Buddhism about practicing in order to become free of rebirth^[1]. For some people, that's really important for what they do, and that informs and animates their whole dedication to meditation.

Some people mistrust meaning-making and don't see a need for it. For them, meditation is not about the big questions of life, but has to do with the simplicity of the moment, just living this moment in a nice way. But that also is connected to meaning somehow—the idea that just living fully for this moment in a simple, clear, free way is meaningful. That's important. That's a valuable way of living this precious life that we have.

So, what interpretation, what understanding do we have about what this life is about? These are things to reflect on. By reflecting on what's most important for us, and the value of really spending time with that and looking at it, we can then ask the question: How does my meditation support what's most important for me?

It's possible that if meditation doesn't support what's most important, maybe you shouldn't meditate. Maybe there are better things to do, things that actually support what's most important. But if meditation in fact does support what's most important, then maybe it's easier to do it, or you're more motivated to do it. You see the connection, and it encourages us to be more fully involved with it all.

We also realize that, consciously or unconsciously, we have these large existential questions, or large existential answers that some of us live by. Then it's possible to investigate more deeply. We turn the attention around 180 degrees to really look deeply inside: Where do these existential beliefs, where do these ideas come from? What is fueling them? Where do they arise out of? What's the source of them inside of ourselves?

Rather than accepting it as a given—not necessarily questioning the philosophy or the beliefs that are there—we question or look deeply into what is motivating that. What animates them? What is the fuel for thinking this way or being this way?

I'll give you some examples. Some people will ask, What's the meaning of life?—some big question like that. And I might ask, What's the emotion that is fueling that question?

Some people will say it's fear. Fear of missing out, fear of not doing it right, fear of failing this life, or fear of not really understanding what the purpose of my life is. If fear is motivating it, then the practice of mindfulness is to turn the attention around to really attend to the fear before we attend to the big questions. Really go deeply into it, and be present until that fear dissolves.

And when the fear dissolves, then what has happened to those questions? If those big questions or those big meanings of life are not fueled by fear, what fuels them? Or if they're not fueled, what happens to them? Does our relationship to them change? The beliefs might still be there, but if they don't have the strength and the power that comes from fear, what happens to it then? The same thing goes with death. Concerns with death might have to do with fear, and we can look at that fear deeply.

Sometimes what fuels these things is conceit^[2]. Somehow it's about me and myself, and I have to prove myself. I have to do what's right. I have to account for myself. I have to show that I'm a good person. I have to prove something. And so these big existential questions are very tightly connected to ideas of identity, of conceit, to attachments to self. I'm using all of these terms in the context of how they involve attachment.

So we investigate that. We bring our attention to that. This idea of turning around 180 degrees is really looking deeper and deeper. Rather than letting the big questions of life, the big existential conclusions and ideas, hover there in our life as if they're a fixed thing to stay with and live by, mindfulness meditation involves looking deeper and deeper. What animates it? What is the source inside where these kinds of beliefs and understandings come from? What fuels them?

It's a paradigm shift, in a sense, from being concerned with something that we can be aware of, think about, or believe, to something that's deeper than what we think about or believe. We turn around and look: What is it like to be believing? What is it like to be searching? What is it like to be holding on to these ideas that it has to be this way? Or feeling that if I don't believe this, or hold on to this, everything will fall apart, and these beliefs keep me safe?

So these big existential questions, in this mindfulness tradition, are important to see. The big existential conclusions we've come to are important to see. But then look more deeply: what's going on under the surface? What is the source for them inside? What are the feelings, the emotions, the fears, the conceits? What is the complex it's all about?

How this all connects to meditation is that it turns out these existential questions, these big answers we have to the big questions of life, more often than not, will interfere with the full potential of meditation being a full releasing of all attachment. When all our attachments have been released, what happens to our relationship to these big existential questions? These big existential answers that we might be trying to live by? They don't necessarily go away, and the answer still might be relevant for us. But it's a whole different world to live in with them if we've been able to take meditation all the way to its potential, to a full release.

So what is your relationship to the big questions of life? To questions of meaning, questions about life and death, questions of what's most ultimate? Questions of God, heaven, rebirth, and purpose. Do you have something that you believe is ultimate, or are you searching for that? Respect that. Whatever it is you're doing, respect it deeply.

But then turn the attention around and look more deeply at what's underneath that. What's fueling it? What's animating those beliefs and that involvement? See what you find there, and see if that might help you to become quieter, stiller, more at ease, more centered here and now—in that place where there can be no attachments.

Thank you very much. We will continue this idea of meaning tomorrow.