--- ai_generation_date: '2026-08-11' ai_model: gemini-3-pro-preview audiodharma: talks: - date: '2020-08-17' mp3_url: https://audiodharma.us-east-1.linodeobjects.com/talks/11892/20200817-Diana_Clark-IMC-simplicity.mp3 speakers: - speaker_name: Diana Clark speaker_url: https://www.audiodharma.org/speakers/240 talk_start_time_seconds: 0 title: Simplicity url: https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/11892 video_unavailable: false location_city: Redwood City, CA video_unavailable: false youtube: id: yLLJlqe3G-0 imprecise_upload_date: '2021-05-04' title: 'Dharma Talk : Simplicity' upload_date: null uploader_str: Insight Meditation Center uploader_url: https://www.youtube.com/@InsightMeditationCenter youtube_url: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLLJlqe3G-0 --- # Simplicity - [Diana Clark](https://www.audiodharma.org/speakers/240) _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._ ## [Simplicity](https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/11892) I'd like to build on something that I talked about in the guided meditation, and that is this idea of simplicity—the importance of simplicity. I think many of us know this, but there's often a little bit more ease when things are simple. And of course, one of the Buddha's key teachings is a very simple and straightforward one. That is that there are causes, there are conditions that give rise to our contentment or our suffering. There are reasons why we are feeling some ease or some freedom, and there are reasons why we might not be feeling that, why we might have non-ease, non-freedom, and non-contentment. I'm not telling you anything you don't already know, but I'd like to point out that one of the conditions that supports contentment is itself just simplicity. Keeping things simple, not complicated, supports a greater sense of ease and contentment. I'm assuming that this might be obvious for some of you. There's a little bit more restfulness or ease when we're not multitasking, trying to do three or four things at once, and we're just in a relaxed manner doing one thing. That can bring a little bit more of a sense of ease. When our surroundings have some organization or not so much chaos in them—may I say that? I don't want to give the impression that things have to be perfectly neat and tidy all the time, but it often can be a sense of ease to walk into a place and think, "Oh yeah, okay, there's space here. There's some organizational scheme." I recently had to move, and I'm discovering this now that I'm rethinking where my objects that I own go, and why do I even own so many? Maybe I don't need so many. Because it's kind of nice that I still have these boxes that are filled with things, maybe I don't need to unpack them. Maybe they can find another home. So in some ways, I think many of us have this experience. Keeping our surroundings with not too much clutter or disorganization can bring a certain amount of ease. ## Mindfulness of the Body Just checking in with the pressure of the chair or cushion against your body right now—that's just a very simple movement. It's just a very simple experience, a simple sensation. Can we tune into and feel what that simplicity feels like? The experience of feeling the pressure of the chair or the cushion, or maybe hearing my voice. What is that experience like of just having this singular object of attention as best you can? This feeling can be a reference point for us in our daily life. Just knowing that it can be simple, that we can just be present for this present moment experience, is a way in which we can recognize or have an experiential understanding of what it's like when we are not simple, when we are not present. The contrast of really being busy and complicated versus the experience of just simply knowing this experience right now. One of the ways to keep things in a straightforward and uncomplicated way is mindfulness of the body. Of course, the body is always with us. It's obvious, it's tangible, and we can easily come back to it when we're lost in the machinations of the mind, for example. We can just come back to the feeling of our feet on the ground when we are getting lost in some conversation and feeling this pressure to speak. One part of mindfulness of the body that can help us keep things simple and not too complicated is to be mindful of movement in our daily life, like walking. I'm exploring and practicing with this. As I said, I had moved into this new place, and so I said to myself, "Okay, when I walk from this part to that part, I'm going to just have this be my mindfulness practice." Of course, I'm not mindful one hundred percent of the time when I walk from one area to the next, but I'm noticing that it's really helpful just to have this as an intention and an anchor. Many times a day I'm walking in this particular area and I'm not slowing down, I'm not stopping what I'm doing, I'm not forgetting why I'm going to the other room. But just this intention of recognizing the feeling of moving the body through space, feeling the feet on the ground, feeling the movement of the clothing against the body, is such a great way to get grounded, to simplify things, and to get connected to the present moment. So, in addition to some other formal practice you might be doing, or even if you don't have a formal meditation practice on the cushion, this is a way in which you can really find a great support for your daily life. To interrupt some of these long chains of discursive thinking we might get lost in, it's not hard to do this mindfulness of movement. Walking is an obvious one, but you might choose a different movement. The difficult part is just to remember to do it. But we might just practice in a relaxed, easy way. And the more we practice, the more it becomes like the default setting of our mind as we move about the day, to just bring our awareness to the sensations in the body. This can be a tremendous support, especially these days when there's often a lot of disturbing news that can lead to agitation. We can use this connection to the body as a way to simplify our experience and remember, "Oh, I'm just here having this experience right now." Not that we have to push aside, repress, or stop thinking, but just to interrupt some of the compulsive flavor that might get stuck in our thinking, going around and around. So that's one thing that we can do to keep things simple: to have a practice of connecting with our bodily experience. I offered walking and having a particular place where we might walk as a support for that. But that's only one. I'm sure you have some ideas of ways to keep things straightforward and uncomplicated, maybe not too busy or not multitasking. ## The Proliferation of Thought As I mentioned in the guided meditation, something that can also be a tremendous support for simplicity and for our practice is to notice when it's _not_ simple. What does the other end of the spectrum feel like? What is that experience? Gain some familiarity with that, understand some of the conditions that support it, and just get to know what it feels like when everything is complicated. When things are confused, with lots of things going around in the mind, or not knowing what to do next, or being completely lost in this compulsion of thinking and not being able to recognize that we are lost. It can be helpful to notice when there are these complications or elaborations, or this expansion of our thinking into abstract stories and thoughts. Ordinary thinking is an ordinary part of life, and we need that. It's an integral way we find our way through our daily life. But then there's also when it spins out into stories, and we start to lose touch with this actual moment and lose touch with reality in some kind of way. The Buddhists have a word for this. Some of you might know this word: it's called _papañca_[^1]. I just love the sound of this word, _papañca_. Maybe with the 'p' sounds it has a little _pop_ sound. And it's just a feeling like maybe one thought goes here, and another thought goes there, and then _pop_, there goes another thought. _Papañca_. Part of meditation practice is to learn how not to get lost in this _papañca_. How to interrupt or disrupt the getting lost in all these stories that really support a sense of being disconnected from what's actually happening. And one way to do that is to have an awareness of the felt sense of what it's like when we're lost in thought. For some people, there might be a feeling of all the energy being up in the head somehow, like there's a control tower up here, and we are somehow using that to view and experience the world. Again, it's not that we have to demonize thinking. It's just to recognize when our thinking is no longer the simple ways in which we're solving problems, being creative, or communicating with others, but instead has spun out into stories that are fanciful or disconnected. This idea of keeping things simple, using mindfulness of the body as a support for that, and recognizing when there's _papañca_—this proliferation of thought—encourages some investigation. The Buddhist teachings might be simple and straightforward, but they're not beliefs that we have to adopt and turn into some credo. Instead, there's the invitation to investigate them. Is this true in my experience? The way that I understand this, is this in accordance with my experience? ## _Sometimes_ by David Whyte I'd like to read a poem that brings these elements together in a different way, using different language and from a different approach. Sometimes poetry can speak to a different part of our understanding, maybe a different part of our being. This poem is by David Whyte[^2], who's a living poet. He was a Zen practitioner, so he has some meditation practice in his experience, but he's not writing from the perspective of a Zen practitioner. This poem is called _Sometimes_, and it goes like this: > _Sometimes_ > _if you move carefully_ > _through the forest,_ > > _breathing_ > _like the ones_ > _in the old stories,_ > > _who could cross_ > _a shimmering bed of leaves_ > _without a sound,_ I'll read that stanza again. > _Sometimes_ > _if you move carefully_ > _through the forest,_ > > _breathing_ > _like the ones_ > _in the old stories,_ > > _who could cross_ > _a shimmering bed of leaves_ > _without a sound,_ > > _you come_ > _to a place_ > _whose only task_ > > _is to trouble you_ > _with tiny_ > _but frightening requests,_ > > _conceived out of nowhere_ > _but in this place_ > _beginning to lead everywhere._ > > _Requests to stop what_ > _you are doing right now,_ > _and_ > > _to stop what you_ > _are becoming_ > _while you do it,_ > > _questions_ > _that can make_ > _or unmake_ > _a life,_ > > _questions_ > _that have patiently_ > _waited for you,_ > > _questions_ > _that have no right_ > _to go away._ I think this poem is quite beautiful. He's pointing to that when we simplify, when we get quiet, we move in a simplified way. Like if you were going to go across leaves and you don't want to make a sound, you're breathing like the ones from the old stories. We could imagine that he's pointing to some of the Buddhist teachings. "Then you come to a place whose only task is to trouble you with tiny but frightening requests, conceived out of nowhere but in this place beginning to lead everywhere." We might understand this idea of requests as a way of investigating what is happening here, what's going on. And the questions, and requests to stop what we're doing, to stop the becoming that we're doing. Sometimes a lot of the complications that we introduce into our experience are just a way to bolster, protect, or augment a sense of self. But instead, these requests to "stop what you are doing right now, and to stop what you are becoming while you do it." And then David Whyte ends this poem by saying: "questions that can make or unmake a life, questions that have patiently waited for you, questions that have no right to go away." We might imagine that a question could be: Is this leading to suffering, or is this leading to freedom? The stopping that I've just done, is this leading to more contentment and ease and spaciousness, or is it leading to stress and complication? Or maybe the question could be more about the bigger scope of what we were doing before we stopped. Was that leading to greater freedom? Was it leading to suffering? David Whyte, when he discusses this poem, talks about stopping what you're doing so that you can drink from a deeper well, to have some understanding that comes from a deeper place. He also says that the invitation with this poem is the understanding that almost always we are tiptoeing into the next moment which we don't fully understand. Yet, we think we understand it. He says that what is going to occur is unannounced, and how we will show up is unannounced. So often we're tumbling into the next moment thinking that we know exactly what it's going to be, but we don't really. We know what's likely to happen, but we don't always know exactly what the next moment is going to be. So can we just simply be with this moment, as opposed to having all these complicated, elaborate ideas about how things should be, or could be, or used to be? So maybe I'll close with reading this poem one more time. > _Sometimes_ > _if you move carefully_ > _through the forest,_ > > _breathing_ > _like the ones_ > _in the old stories,_ > > _who could cross_ > _a shimmering bed of leaves_ > _without a sound,_ > > _you come_ > _to a place_ > _whose only task_ > > _is to trouble you_ > _with tiny_ > _but frightening requests,_ > > _conceived out of nowhere_ > _but in this place_ > _beginning to lead everywhere._ > > _Requests to stop what_ > _you are doing right now,_ > _and_ > > _to stop what you_ > _are becoming_ > _while you do it,_ > > _questions_ > _that can make_ > _or unmake_ > _a life,_ > > _questions_ > _that have patiently_ > _waited for you,_ > > _questions_ > _that have no right_ > _to go away._ The more that we ask these questions that are important, the more that we're tuned into what's important, allowing us to show up for whatever is arriving and arising in our experience. And in that way, we can find our way through all these difficulties that we might be experiencing and enable ourselves to support and help others. So sometimes this poem by David Whyte can be a reminder to keep things simple. Thank you. --- [^1]: **Papañca:** A Pali term generally translated as "mental proliferation," "conceptual elaboration," or the tendency of the mind to spin out into complex streams of thought. [^2]: **David Whyte:** An English poet and author whose works often explore the intersections of philosophy, work, and everyday life.