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: Mindfulness of Desirelessness

So good morning everyone and welcome to Insight Meditation Center. It used to be that that was identified with this building that I'm sitting in, but now more and more over the course of this pandemic and doing these YouTube sittings, I think of IMC as something much broader and wider, and maybe even international. Maybe we should call IMC International Meditation Center. So thank you for being here and for expanding the meaning of what our sangha is, and being part of this.

One of the really valuable aspects of the discoveries of this practice is a way of being, the quality of mind, a capacity of the mind to be desirelessness, to be desireless, to be without desire.

And it's probably a pretty foreign idea to the way most minds work because most minds are kind of going from one desire to another. But to be without desire is to be without any compulsion, any attachment, any kind of need for something to happen. And I know that this goes against what's necessary for much of ordinary life.

So, do not think of it as "this is how we're supposed to be," the ideal way of being, but rather it's kind of like if you have been working in the garden and you're dirty and grimy, then it's good to be dirtless for a while to take off the dirt and refresh, and then we can go back out into the world. To spend a few moments without desire is a way of refreshing, a way of cleansing, a way of opening to something different, as a way of tapping into another way of being in the world where there is a response, where there is wisdom and intelligence that can operate. But it seems to come from a very different place than where ordinary desires come from.

And it's a place where we don't identify with our desires. We don't make a self out of desires, or we don't tie the desires to self-fulfillment, self-enhancement, self-protection, all kinds of things. So what would that look like for you to sit and meditate without a desire? And maybe it sounds like a very foreign idea, but maybe just assume that something in you knows what that is. And maybe also assume that it's something precious, something valuable, something that is, maybe once we tap into it deeply, inspiring.

So, to assume a meditation posture.

Maybe you can adjust your posture a little bit. Maybe sway back and forth, sideways a bit. Maybe move your shoulders in a circle or something, and kind of loosen up a little bit in your body. Then, taking a posture that supports being alert, and hopefully the same posture is one that supports relaxation. Gently close your eyes, and take a few long, slow, easygoing breaths, as if you have all the time in the world to exhale.

Allow the exhale to extend itself as long as it's comfortable. Sometimes by extending the exhale, it's possible to soften and relax parts of the body that otherwise wouldn't be felt or known.

Let your breathing now return to normal. As you continue now with a normal breath in a comfortable way, see if with the exhale you can let the exhale continue a little bit longer. Exhale at the end mostly by releasing and allowing a fuller exhale without any special effort except letting go or allowing. At the end of that exhale, perhaps make a very short pause. Not so much making the pause, but rather allowing a pause, or allowing yourself to wait a moment to feel the urge to breathe in. A very simple urge, and then allow for that inhale.

Perhaps receive the inhale. As you inhale, see if you can attune yourself to the fullness of that experience of breathing in. Without strain, but an attunement that's more of an allowing the experience of inhale to be experienced.

And at the end of the inhale, see if you can have an allowing, releasing of the exhale. Allowing of exhale.

Take a few moments to more fully feel what it's like to allow and receive. To allow the exhale, to receive the inhale, without any other desire. Almost as if it's a release of all desires. And in the release of desires, there's an openness in awareness to the experience of breathing in and breathing out, where desirelessness is closely related to allowing and receiving.

If you notice there are desires or thoughts, desirelessness is more found in letting go of those, or letting them be. Desirelessness is not picking anything up or getting involved. The kind of letting go that is not even letting go, just letting be. Closely related to receiving, allowing whatever happens in experience.

In becoming attuned to that part of your experience that is free of desires, even if there are desires present as well, don't prioritize the desires. Don't live in desire. See if you can live in the place that is content, open, receptive. Being with what is, not what we want.

For a few minutes, experiment to the best of your ability being free of desire. Being content to do so, even if you're at the edges of it. Being able to be content even if it's just an intuition or feeling for what it's like to be that way. Noticing what comes alive in you when there's no desire, that is obscured by the presence of desires.

Desires often come with a lot of baggage associated with them: beliefs we have, aversions we have, ideas about who we are and what we need. And all this baggage can obscure something deeper. To allow ourselves a chance to be free of desire can allow for the wellsprings of a warm, caring heart. It can allow for compassion and love. It can allow for a simple warmth and goodwill for others. A warmth and goodwill which has no resemblance to ordinary desires because it's not tied to me, myself, and mine. It's deeper, more intimate within than thoughts, ideas, and feelings of self.

Perhaps in these last minutes of the sitting, maybe you can intuit, or imagine, or feel a place within which is not governed by desire, but which is a source for warmth, and care, and love. Where, in a sense, nothing needs to happen, but where we can allow for that warmth, and love, and care, the tenderness, without complicating it with shoulds and shouldn'ts, anxieties about caring for ourselves.

In the last minutes of this sitting, perhaps, if you can, sit quietly with a sense of warmheartedness, tenderness, care for the world that maybe, in a certain way, is free of desire to do anything. It has also a momentum, a motivation, a wish that all beings be well. That others be happy, have the opportunity to feel safe, have the opportunity to be at peace, and to be free.

And then as we get ready to end this sitting, now maybe is a time for desire. And maybe your desire can be to contribute to that possibility. May you live your life to make this a better world for others, for everyone, you and others. May you contribute to the happiness and welfare of all beings.

Dharmette: Greed (4 of 5) Composting Greed

So welcome now to the fourth talk on greed. Today's talk is going to be about composting greed, or letting it become transformed. It's not an original idea with me. Sometimes in Buddhism, where this kind of idea exists, it is sometimes seen as kind of a more advanced practice. Because it's best not to do it in a way that we get all too easily into the old habits of mind and habits of self coming along and getting entangled in this practice of composting greed. That's why having a strong foundation in mindfulness practice, the basic practice, is really important. This is something I tried to talk about a little bit yesterday. We need to learn to have this really strong, clear recognition of desire, of greed, of wanting anything, where there's a little bit of freedom, a little bit of distancing or opening in relationship to what's going on.

And this clear recognition, when it's practiced with vipassanā^[1], often involves a clear recognition of the details of experience, rather than lumping it all together in one big, maybe amorphous idea of what something is. We start seeing the components of it: the components of the body, the bodily expressions, the emotional aspects of it, the motivational aspects of it, the cognitive aspects of it. As each of them becomes highlighted and seen as distinct, then the kind of amorphous whole doesn't grab us as much, and we don't get so reactive to it, or caught in it, or greedy about it. We start seeing the underlying conditionality of it, the underlying changing nature of it in a very powerful way. So this is a core aspect of the vipassanā practice. Something that is tremendously valuable, something to love and to care for, and it's so liberating.

Sometimes it's a little bit like wanting to take a really good look and really recognize what a bicycle is. So you look at the bicycle, and you get your tools out, and you begin taking apart all the pieces of the bicycle and separating them. Unscrewing everything and laying everything out on the ground, so you can really see what a bicycle is and all the parts of it. That's fascinating to see, maybe. But when you do so, that thing that was the bicycle no longer rolls. It no longer works as a bicycle. In order to really let a bicycle be a bicycle, you don't take it apart. You have to let all the pieces be together and work in harmony, and then allow it to roll.

Sometimes that's true also with our inner life and with desires and greed. Sometimes if we do this deeper look of vipassanā, or if we get deeply concentrated and bypass the desires, the greed itself, then the rolling of the bicycle of desire and greed has been interrupted. Sometimes that's a tremendous safety. To be caught and involved in greed can cause so much damage to ourselves and to others. It's very stressful, it's very alienating, it's disconnecting. It sometimes lends itself to an assertiveness and aggressiveness that objectifies others, or doesn't really see others as human, and bulldozes over people because our desires are more important than even other people's welfare. It's horrible what can happen in this world in the assault of people's desires and greed.

But if we learn how to have this clear recognition, learn how not to be involved in the greed, not to be entangled with it, then we have the opportunity to compost it. What I mean by that is to not be caught in it, but also not interrupt it. Not interfere with it. Not to go deeply analytical, not get concentrated so that it changes the inner landscape so dramatically it's not there, but rather to let the greed be. Allow it to be there.

One way to allow it to be there that's safe, that protects us from getting caught up in its thoughts, ideas, and goals, is to feel it in the body. That's why I call it composting it in the body. I said before this is an advanced practice, but sometimes it's not necessarily only for more well-matured practitioners. It's also for people who have no other option because the greed is so strong that they know it's going to take over if they don't do something, and maybe there's no access to this deeper mindfulness that I talked about yesterday. So instead, just coming back to the body. Feeling it in the body. Grounding in the body over and over again and letting it move through in an embodied way. Feel the momentum, feel the urges. Grounding in the body does a number of things.

One thing is that it takes us away from the thoughts, the ideas, the hopes that exist in the mind that are often what's compelling it, what's feeding it. It also takes it a little bit away from the emotions just in and of itself. It allows whatever emotions are connected to the greed to be grounded in the physical body here. It has a root; it's in the present moment. The body is always present. Also, we start feeling it in the body, feeling the sensations, the impulses of greed in the body. When we meditate with our body, the body is in some ways bigger than what we think of as our body. It's like there is lots of space in the body.

So, to allow the momentum of greed and desire to course through the body, keep opening space to it, allowing it to be there. This what I'm talking about now is best done in meditation, where you're committed to not moving, not acting on it. You sit there and just let the greed course through your body, the feeling sensations of it. When you get out of the way of it this way, but also don't enact it, don't get involved in it, then there's a composting, there's a transformation, a change that goes on. I think of it as akin to the way the body can be self-healing at times. Sometimes when we get sick, or if we injure ourselves, if we allow for the right conditions—keep a wound clean, or if we break our arm, have a cast on and have the bones lined up again—then the body has an amazing way to find its way to health and to healing.

The same thing with emotions, desires, and greed. Greed is a little bit like being sick, an illness, and the system knows how to move to health if we create the right conditions for it. One of the right conditions is to not enact it, not be compelled by it to do anything, but also not to push it away, or not allow it to move through and course through our body. As we do so, it's kind of like we get out of the way and allow it to be here. Then something begins to shift and change. Sometimes it just simply settles. Sometimes it changes into something a little bit different. There are layers in our inner life, and then we go through those layers.

For example, greed itself in some circumstances might be a symptom of something deeper that's going on inside of us. As we do this composting, this transforming, allowing it to be there, that deeper thing begins to show itself. That deeper thing begins to bubble up as well, and that's much more important. For example, some greed might be a symptom of fear, that we're really afraid of something, and we really want something because we think that's going to make us safe. Or we might have really strong lust, even sexual lust, but if we look underneath it, there's a deep loneliness. That deep loneliness is looking desperately for something that we think is going to fill and take care of it, that's really impactful, powerful, and kind of like real assurance that we're not alone, that someone connects to us. Sexual engagement sometimes is the ticket, we think.

And to feel the fear that might be there, or the loneliness that might be underneath greed, or the anger that might be underneath it. Sometimes a strong anger propels us to want to do something, maybe something harmful even. Or as we go through these layers, for example, if there's fear, there might be underneath that fear a sense of vulnerability or tenderness. There might be a sense of hurt that we have, or a deeper, quieter fear that doesn't really have an object, but just kind of exists there more existentially.

As we go through and transform and allow these, then the transformation, the composting begins happening, the movement towards health. But it often requires going through these layers and discovering that greed is just a surface manifestation of something, a symptom in a sense. So don't act on the symptom, don't kill the symptom, it's just a messenger. But to sit quietly, allow it, so we can hear more deeply, see more deeply what's really going on inside of us, so we can connect more deeply or allow the deeper movements and revelations of what's really happening here to show themselves.

So there's a composting going on, a transformation going on. Occasionally that transformation of something like desire and greed—because greed is a kind of wanting something, just like compassion is in Buddhism, and faith is a kind of desire for freedom—as we get deeper and deeper down, we start finding that part of the transformation might be the discovery of an appropriate desire. A beautiful, healthy desire that is really there at the base, but we've never figured out how to express it or live it or trust it. So quickly the self, and the ego, comes into play. Selfishness comes into play, or the care of protecting ourselves, or the anxiety around things, or all the cultural beliefs we have around self and others come into play that obscure the deep beautiful desires that compassion is, or the movement towards liberation might be.

So to compost. How I know to compost when things are strong is just to keep returning to the body. When greed is strong, it might keep coming back, it might have thoughts as part of it. We just allow all of it to just be there. It's kind of like: come back, be here with it. And then be here with it. And just keep coming back. Keep coming back. It's like you're turning over the compost pile so that it can keep burning properly, decomposing. You're turning yourself over, just coming back. Feeling the body, feeling the body, feeling the body.

And if you keep doing that, that is a protection against getting involved. Getting involved in the thoughts, the ideas, getting involved in the desires. Just don't get involved. Stay here, stay here. And if what I said today doesn't make sense to you or is confusing, then maybe just ignore what I said. I said it's a little bit of an advanced practice, and maybe it'll become clearer as you trust the basic practice of mindfulness. It's so powerful, so effective, so useful and meaningful. Trust it, and when the time comes, you might get some sense of what I'm talking about when I talk about composting. So thank you very much.