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Introduction

Greetings, Sangha^[1]. I hope you are safe and well wherever in the world you are. Wonderful to join you and to be joined by so many of you in this moment to practice together.

We're going to continue our exploration of the five reflections—five recollections that the Buddha suggested that all practitioners, whether lay or monastics, practice every day. What we have been doing this week is to explore each of the reflections one by one, each day. Today is the third day, and it's time for the third reflection, which has to do with our own mortality: "Just like everyone, I am subject to death. I have not gone beyond death."

Contemplating, making peace, accepting, facing, or being mindful of our own mortality has many benefits. It can align us with our own values. Realizing how short this precious life is, saṃvega^[2]—spiritual urgency—can arise, along with many other benefits. I'll talk about them in the dharmette afterwards.

Guided Meditation: The 3rd Reflection; Dharmette: I Am of the Nature to Die

For the guided meditation this morning, similar to the previous couple of days, we will start by settling into the body. Mindfulness of the body, mindfulness of the breath to invite the mind to settle a little bit. And then we're going to drop in the reflections. We will drop in all three reflections. We will drop in the first one, the second one, and then spend more time with the third one, which is the focus of our exploration today together.

Again, just to remind us, the way we will drop in these reflections is not so much to think about them as we drop them in, but as if we were dropping a pebble into a body of water, letting it reverberate. When the waters have become calm and receptive, really feeling the reverberations, being more sensitive to the reverberations.

I would like to invite you to get into your meditation posture. If you need to sit up straight a little more, to have a sense of integrity, of sitting upright, more awake and more alert. Or perhaps you need to lie down. This is what the body is asking you right now to do. Or to soften and relax, whatever is appropriate for you. Check into the body and see what the body needs in this moment.

[Sighs] Arriving. Arriving in this moment. Arriving in this body, this moment in time.

Landing. Landing in the body. Landing in the sensations of this body. This body, alive and breathing.

And breathing. Allowing the breath to move through the body. Softening, relaxing. As if the breath were moving in every part of the body, awakening, enlivening, bringing more energy, vitality, aliveness. And also softening and relaxing.

Feeling the breath invited, the in-breath and the out-breath in the abdomen. Enlivening, bringing more energy, more awakeness, more alertness. And also softening and relaxing as the abdomen receives the breath.

Each breath, feeling more settled, more present.

Receiving the breath in the chest. Allowing more awareness to be receiving the breath in the chest. The sensations. Perhaps there is more aliveness, energy, and also more relaxation and ease. They are not opposites. Energy, aliveness, relaxation, and softness can happily coexist.

Inviting the breath to be received in your neck and shoulders. Ease and softness.

The breath received, felt, opened up to your face. Softening your jaw. Relaxing the forehead. Feeling more present in your face and your head, softer. The eyes relaxing, resting in their sockets. Feeling the ease with which the breath is received, moves.

Inviting your arms, your hands to soften, but also feel energized, alert, and awake, as if the breath was moving through them, opening them up. Every cell to aliveness, to sensation, as if you were a pop-up doll that was deflated, becoming more full with the breath. Your hands, your arms, all the cells getting nourished. The sense of presence, alertness, awareness breathed into every cell of your body.

Moving back down. Feeling the chest, the backside, the upper back, the lower back, the abdomen, and your sit bones touching the cushion or the chair, filled with the breath. With awareness. Enlivened. Maybe even feeling the tingling, as well as a sense of letting go, relaxing, being soft.

Moving down, letting the upper legs receive the breath, the knees, the lower legs, and the feet connected to the earth. Feeling the sensations. The legs and the feet, more alert, more awake, more alive as they're touched by awareness. Receiving life-giving breath.

Allowing the whole body to receive the breath. It's not so much that you are breathing. No need to make it effortful or into a project. Just letting the body breathe as it knows how to do. And all the doing that you do is just to be aware, just to receive, have a receptive attitude.

We'll spend a few minutes in silence with mindfulness immersed in the body. Every part of the body in the breath.

I would like to invite us now to drop in the first reflection into the body. Not to think about it, but as I say it out loud, let us drop it in like a pebble, feel the reverberations, and just sit with what arises, or if nothing.

First reflection: Just like everyone, I am subject to aging. I have not gone beyond it. Just like everyone, I am of the nature to age. I have not gone beyond aging.

And now the second contemplation. Let's drop that in.

Just like everyone, I am subject to sickness. I have not gone beyond sickness. I am of the nature to sicken. It is inevitable.

And now the third contemplation, which we're introducing today in our community practice.

Just like everyone, I am of the nature to die. I am subject to death. I have not gone beyond death. It is inevitable.

Letting yourself be rooted, stable in the body with the breath. And if ruminations arise, bowing to them, offering them up, letting them go for this reflection. Maybe just dropping in the reflection one more time and just sitting with it, or sitting with silence.

Just like everyone, I am of the nature to die. I have not gone beyond death. It is inevitable.

I am of the nature to die. It is inevitable.

And for the last moments of this practice period together in silence, I'd like to invite us to hold ourselves with care and kindness for whatever arose, or did not arise, during this practice period, without judgment. Whether there were a lot of emotions or a lot of thinking, or if you fell asleep, it's all okay. You've aligned your intentions with your actions. Showing up, doing your best now, without attachment to outcome, which is born of many causes and conditions.

Offering yourself appreciation, friendliness, and kindness. Appreciating your own goodness, your intentions. And collectively, let us offer and share whatever goodness is generated from our reflecting together on our impermanence and our human condition. May it support us in our awakening. And may it support all beings in their awakening. Freedom, happiness, and ease.

Dharmette: I Am of the Nature to Die

Greetings again, everyone, wherever you are in the world right now listening, or perhaps listening after this recording.

Today we turn our attention to the third contemplation about our mortality. This one in particular, I think, might be a little more challenging perhaps than the first two about old age and sickness. Because in many ways, we experience aging. We feel our body change and shift. Whatever age we're at, we are more in tune, in touch with the shifting nature of our bodies. And sickness, of course, we all experience sickness. Childhood, adulthood, a cold—we have a visceral feeling. We're in touch with the experience of sickness.

Death, however, we don't have a firsthand experience with this body dying until it happens, and then we're not here to contemplate! So, it's more of a stretch. We may have experience with other people dying, loved ones, people we care about, or if we're in professions where we are in touch with death. However, to contemplate our own—for our own ego to contemplate its own demise—is really challenging, and there is a psychological resistance, actually, to doing it.

This is beautifully captured in a story in the Hindu epic Mahabharata, where the wise person Yudhishthira^[3] is asked, "What is the most amazing thing in all life?" And the wise person answers that a human, seeing others die all around him, never thinks he will die.

It's pretty amazing in many ways. We know we're going to die. Yes, we know, of course, we're going to die. But this observation that Yudhishthira made is actually very crucial. It's an amazing observation because, as humans, we are intelligent and rational creatures, and yet we think we will never die. We live our lives as if we're going to live forever. We know we're going to die, but we live as if we're going to never die. "Oh, if it's going to happen, it's going to happen way, way, way sometime in the future. Oh, not now."

And especially sitting with this practice right now, in the time of the pandemic, these reflections are more profound. Especially now, to share with you, in Northern California—and I see many people are also commenting on YouTube—there are wildfires. Where I'm sitting, I'm smelling smoke right now. As I was guiding the meditation, there was a fire truck, there are ambulances driving outside. We never know. We never know.

Making peace, observing, contemplating, knowing, and facing our own mortality has many benefits. As some of you already know, this topic, maraṇasati^[4] (mindfulness of death), is one of my favorite topics to teach about. I've taught seven-day retreats, daylongs, and various lectures. So if any of you are more interested, on AudioDharma there are a lot more resources available, and also on my website, on mindfulness of death.

I want to share a couple of things to support our practice with this reflection today, which I'd like to invite you to really take with you and keep close all day today. One of the benefits is that facing our mortality, as I mentioned earlier, brings up what's called saṃvega, which is spiritual urgency. This sense of: "Life is short. How do I want to spend my life?" As the Buddha says, "The days and nights are relentlessly passing. How well am I spending my time?"

Research suggests that even though we may have certain goals and values—the way we want to live our lives—we actually end up spending a lot of time doing things, for example, watching television or surfing the web, things that are not exactly aligned, not proportional. We spend an inordinate amount of time on things that are not aligned with our values. Spending some time to relax, of course, it all makes sense. But there is this problem, called a misalignment problem, that the way we live our lives tends to be misaligned with our values, the way we show up.

Maybe an important value for us is generosity of heart, letting go. Maybe an important value is kindness to others. And maybe that's not how we show up. But if we realize our time is short and we really don't know when we're going to die—that yes, we are going to die. Of course, I'm of the nature to die, and I don't know when it's going to happen. We have no idea. We might have assuming images, "Oh, we'll be 120 years old on our deathbeds." But who knows? Really, really, who deeply, deeply knows?

Living with a "don't know" mind supports us in waking up. It supports us to live more fully, more presently, this precious, precious human life. This reflection can really awaken us to our preciousness, the preciousness of our lives right here, right now, and also to make peace with what is going to happen. So when we are on our deathbeds, or in an accident, there is not a sense of horror. We can actually be calm and approach this experience with awe, with mystery. We have no idea. There might be something. There might be nothing. It might be beautiful. It may not be. We just don't know. But having your mind calmed and free, expecting the inevitable, is a gift.

It's the ultimate gift that you're giving yourself and your loved ones, too, because you allow them not to have to take care of you in your fear, in your terror. Similarly, if you've made peace, if you've faced your own mortality, then you can really support your loved ones in their passing, because they don't have to take care of you. They don't have to emotionally support you and be worried about you. They can have a sense of peace. You offer them a sense of peace to be in their own process of transitioning, whatever it might be. A "don't know" mind, really holding it with a "don't know" mind, no expectations.

This third reflection is something we can spend days, weeks, months, years with, just this reflection as a practice towards waking up. There are many specific practices for maraṇasati, mindfulness of death, towards waking up. For today, with this topic, my invitation is that we embrace it. We embrace this reflection as an enlivening, as one that actually supports us in our waking up—waking up during life, and also waking up during the moment of death. To be prepared for it, to let go gracefully into death, and perhaps into the deathless. There are teachings about waking up to the deathless, to nibbana^[5]. "Deathless" is another translation of waking up, nibbana, awakening in the moment of death.

So this is a very rich contemplation, and the invitation today is to keep this reflection close with you. Both feel your sense of aliveness, vitality, and also "I am of the nature to die." To sense that you are going to die, you've not gone beyond it, and when and how it happens, you have no idea. But one thing is for certain: we're all going to die. And it's just part of life. It's part of the grace, the mystery, the impermanence of being human, coming, offering our gifts to the world, offering our gifts of awakening to this being that we're the steward of, and then passing on.

Keep this reflection alive with you, feeling your aliveness and also the mortality. As Carlos Castaneda says, "Keep death on your shoulder as a wise advisor." And today, maybe you will choose to have a memento mori^[6]. Actually, you can simply take a Post-it and write, "You're going to die," or "I am of the nature to die. I have not gone beyond it. It's inevitable." Whatever words work for you. Put the Post-it somewhere you can see it—your fridge, your monitor, your bathroom mirror. Really bring this reflection in with you.

It is so important. Mindfulness of death has been a major part of my Buddhist practice, and I bring it into my reflection, into my life every day. And I feel most alive, most aligned with my values when I'm aware of my own mortality: that time is short and I have no idea when I'm going to pass. This is a challenging, juicy, wonderful practice. I'm so grateful that you're joining all of us today, the whole Sangha, in taking this practice with you.

It's 7:45, and I have one question for those who are still here. I'll ask again tomorrow. There is an option to have a group conversation on Zoom on Friday, after the fifth contemplation, for us to discuss these contemplations together in community and meet. I would be happy to host that if there is interest. So if you may be interested in discussing these contemplations and delving into them a little more with others, please indicate that in the YouTube chat, say "I'm interested," so that I just get a sense of how much interest there might be to host one or not.

May you be well, may you be safe, and may you have freedom, and be awake. Take good care. Till tomorrow.