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

Good morning. Can you hear me okay?

From where I'm sitting, I can see outside. It's a cloudy morning here in San Francisco. It brought up the thought for me, as we start to sit, to in a very simple way just notice: where am I? What's the surround of this moment? And then also, what's the interior activity or surround of this moment?

In a deliberate, maybe even a leisurely way... you know, like meditation is not another thing, but it often is another thing on our to-do list. But actually, it's also asking us to sort of shift gears. This is a time for simple presence. For noticing what's going on.

How is your mind now? Are there thoughts? Are there particular mental dispositions? And your emotions... is there a sense of ease or a sense of dis-ease? Is there any particular mood to your state of consciousness right now?

In a way, in just that kind of noticing, it's a reminder of the proposition of meditation. In mindfulness, in awareness, to simply be present and experience whatever's happening in that moment. In a way, that's the wisdom aspect: it is what it is. And then for us as humans, it's enormously significant when we open to it. It's a way in which we make more sense of who we are to ourselves. We're noticing and acknowledging what's going on, this state of mind, of these emotions.

Then, as we notice that, to let that same simple attention come into the body. There's something essential, primitive, fundamental to our physical being. In a way, our psychosomatic being registers the notable experiences that occur for us. And to start to bring attention to the body and notice: how is the body? Does it feel settled? Does it feel spacious and open? Are there some points of tension?

But then from the wisdom side, it is what it is. It's beyond good or bad, or as it should be, or as it should not be. It is what it is. And we take it personally. The continuance of me is in the balance of what's being experienced right now. It's to allow the body to be reflecting this moment, this day's version of me.

And when you relate to me as a body, it's a different me from the one that's caught up in thinking. The thinking... it's reconstructing reality, it's judging its own constructions, it's having feelings about its constructions, it's drawing conclusions and judgments. And to just remind ourselves that that's not going to stop because we've decided to meditate. That will, in fact, be a significant attending to that experiencing. The construction, the judgment, the memories that the mind creates... these are today's versions of me.

And as we embody, can we invite it to be palpable? The experience of me in this moment. And can we breathe? Can we breathe in the thoughts, the feelings, the sounds? And can we notice: how does that register? Is it pushed aside by thinking? Is it imbued with emotion, either pleasant emotions or unpleasant emotions?

And however it is, can we remind ourselves to hold it tenderly? Our human existence thrives when it's related to benevolently. We just let that thought, let that disposition become part of our breath. Giving something permission to be itself.

Can you breathe in, in a way that's inviting the body to be expansive? Inviting the body to... it's almost like opening downwards. Can the chest relax and open? Can the mid-region, the stomach relax? Can the abdomen relax? And sometimes it can, and sometimes it can't, but to invite that in a benign way. It's as if we're very softly saying to ourselves, "It's okay. It's okay." Compassion practice.

And as we start to settle like this, then noticing: are there many subtle adjustments? Subtle adjustments to our posture? More settled, more at ease? Are there any adjustments to how we're involving awareness in our being? Can it be invited to be allowing and accepting? Can there be a softening of doing, and opening to be?

And as you make these subtle adjustments, can you notice what the consequence of it is? It's like noticing is soaking up what's being experienced.

And if the attentiveness of noticing is starting to dissipate or has wandered, just return to the basics of body and breath. Physical sensations. Has your posture shifted? Has some part of your body tightened?

It would be helpful to put some emphasis on allowing the inhale to be deeper, or allowing the exhale to be a little longer.

Noticing if there are particular thoughts that keep repeating. Or is there an emotional disposition that's coming into being? And the opening to it, it's a teaching about me. It's not an interruption, it's a teaching.^[1] What does it register in the body? Does it affect the breath?

Sometimes it can be very instructive to watch the shift that happens within us as we shift from meditating to whatever's next. Sometimes it can be a teaching about attention. Involvement that affects consciousness expresses itself as some kind of doing or not doing. So try to notice what happens. What's the shift when the bell rings?

Dharmette: The Teaching of Difficult Emotions

So good morning again. You know, the process of meditation, of mindfulness, in the context of stimulus, it offers us an opportunity to heighten our senses, to enhance our capacity to experience. And so sometimes that's a wonderful gift, especially when it's a pleasant experience. Something energizes us, something that is soaked up as a kind of nourishment. Something opens up our gratitude, our appreciation for the moment.

I think sometimes it's unpleasant, that something in us is agitated, distressed. The challenge of practice is to engage them both. Maybe in a human way, we could say the engagement of the pleasant is a kind of encouragement to our practice, it's a kind of reassurance. Maybe we want to tell ourselves, "Oh, I'm making some kind of progress." And maybe we are, if you want to think of opening to the pleasant as progress. And for most of us, it is a beneficial thing, and it helps to create a reassurance and a trust that the life we're living, the being we are, can be validated and embraced for just what it is.

And then there's a way in which engaging the unpleasant can actually have the same qualities. Yesterday I quoted Martin Luther King, where he said challenging experiences can be both educational and transformative. Yesterday afternoon I was at a meeting at the Zen Center, and I'm scheduled to lead a one-day sitting Saturday after next. It was a planning meeting. In the planning meeting, someone said, "Well, we haven't advertised it." And I thought, "What? Haven't advertised it?" And then I said, "Well, maybe we should cancel it." But actually, as I attended to my own experience, there was a kind of frustration that it hadn't been advertised. There's a way in which I took it personally. This impacts me. And that statement, even though I said it in a matter-of-fact way—"You know, maybe we should cancel it"—in an emotional way, it was an expression of my frustration and disappointment.

And then that group of us, it's about five people, and usually we get along very well. Usually, the feeling in the room when we're going through these planning things is kind of fluid, cooperative, and appreciative. So having that feeling of frustration, disappointment, and agitation was in contrast to how I usually feel. And so this often happens for us. Our meditation and our dedication to it helps to create a benevolence and a spaciousness, and then that stands in contrast to our moments of contraction, our moments of disappointment, our moments of frustration. And in a way, they become more poignant. It's like we're more open to them and we feel more.

So one of the challenges of practice is to, despite that, despite the intensity of the unpleasantness, to still find within ourselves the resource to notice and acknowledge, "Okay, this is how it is." And so yesterday, when I was noticing and acknowledging that, what happened to my mind was then I asked, "What happened? How come that had turned out the way it turned out, that it wasn't advertised?" Actually, it was a complicated but logical reason. It wasn't that someone had done it with the intention of hurting me. It was like there was a miscommunication. This person puts it on the website and this person connects it to the online program, and they hadn't communicated, and so it hadn't been promoted.

But as I listened to that, as I took in what's going on... you know, we have an experience, and something in us takes it personally, positive or negative, that's our inclination. But there's also a different kind of anchor: "How come?" How come this moment or this interaction has come into being? Not so much that our mind gets busy making a story, but that we're opening up to what's going on. Especially when we're relating to others, I think opening up to their perspective. Because usually there's some variation between their perspective and ours. I think there's something for us to learn in the moment.

So this way in which our emotional response, even when it's unpleasant for us, if we can remind ourselves to meet it with inquiry. And sometimes the inquiry is the interaction between ourselves and others, and then sometimes it's internal. What was I feeling, or what am I feeling, and what for? What thoughts, what perspectives, what conclusions am I really recreating in relationship to that feeling?

And then as we relate in that way, in that process of discovery, an extraordinary thing can happen for us. We start to see what's happening and we start to see through it. We start to see, "Oh, okay, this is what's happening in this moment." And we start to see it's just this moment. It's the occurrence of this moment. It's not the totality of reality. Even though my mind wants to conclude, "Oh, this is how it is," judging others, "Oh, this is a negligent person." And when we can explore, "Oh, and how did this come to be?" If we look at the process interactively,^[2] then we listen to others. And then intrapersonally, we look at how we had the feeling, what the feeling evoked in terms of thoughts and judgments, and how that led to conclusions. We see it, and we see through it.

The very interesting thing for us, as we do that, it invites us in an affirming way to trust our practice. Ah, when we learn something about who we are, about how we're interacting, it evokes within us a certain kind of trust and confidence in the practice. And as Martin Luther King said, it can also have a transformative quality. Because as we see it, and rather than just drop into our habitual way of responding, we see the possibility of a different response. And when we take that different response, something in us is relieved. Something in us is heartened by the discovery of possibility.

But even difficult experiences, unpleasant experiences, challenging experiences, frustrating experiences offer us something. And if we can remind ourselves that even though the first response can be one of pushing away—which is essentially what frustration, annoyance, and agitation is, it's a kind of "No, I'm not going to go with this. I don't like it. Somebody's to blame for being wrong"—when we can go beyond that, we can not let that be definitive, conclusive, end of story. When we can turn towards it and notice it and experience it, it can have a teaching for us. It can create another story that can create an alternative conclusion, and that's encouraging for us.

When we have the difficult experience and we fall into habitual disappointment, discouragement, frustration, that's discouraging for us. When we evoke this alternative, we're encouraged. As Martin Luther King says, we're educated, and it holds the potential for transformation.

So maybe today when you feel something disappointing or discouraging, you can remind yourself of that and see what's going on. And maybe it's interactive, like when I asked the group yesterday—when I asked one person in particular, they explained it to me. When they explained it to me, I thought, "Oh, well that makes sense. This person did that, and then they went on vacation, and so this other person drew a conclusion from what they've done and didn't advertise it." It all made sense. It was something that needed to be mended, but still, it made sense.

So maybe today you'll be blessed with something that annoys you, you'll be instructed by something that frustrates or disappoints you.

So thank you. Whatever the day turns out to be, may you enjoy it and be supported by it. Okay.