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Guided Meditation: Is My Inner Speech Gentle?

Greetings friends. Greetings from Mountain View, California, and unceded Ohlone^[1] land, where I'm joining you in this moment in time. Whether it's morning or whatever time it is in your time zone, it's wonderful to be joining you and practicing together today.

We've been exploring wise speech this week, and we'll continue. Let's practice together. I'll give us some invitations for exploring our inner speech. I'm excited about sharing more about this very important topic during the dharma^[2] talk.

So let's begin to sit together. Choosing an intentional posture that is supportive for you in this moment in time. If you are sitting (you could be lying down or standing as well, but if you are sitting), allow your back to have an upright sense, a sense of integrity. As if you're sitting tall like a mountain. The integrity of your body mirroring your inner integrity, your inner intentions for integrity. Let there be a brightness, a form that feels wholesome in your posture, but not effortful.

You might be able to imagine an invisible thread connected to the top of your head, pulling your head gently up, supporting you up invisibly. Your spine straightening vertebra by vertebra, and yet the rest of your body, the soft tissue, the muscles, can relax and give their weight to the earth.

Bringing down the center of gravity that's often in our head, somewhere around our head with thoughts. Bringing the center of gravity of your being down through redirecting your attention down. Down, down your face, down your neck, and your chest, and your heart center. The proverbial heart center of the chest. A place of wholeheartedness, emotions.

And then continuing to move your awareness, the center of gravity of your beingness, down through your diaphragm, your lower abdomen, your sit bones. And let the center of gravity be in the lower abdomen, sit bones, maybe touching into the upper legs, lower legs, and feet as well.

But receiving the breath in the lower abdomen as if the body itself is an organ of perception. Perceiving, receiving the breath, knowing the breath, knowing sensations. Not from the control tower of the head. Letting the body, the heart, be soft, relaxed. Upright and relaxed in this moment in time.

And if any thoughts arise, any inner speech, gently, kindly know it's important to know: what is the tone, what is the quality of this inner speech, of this thought?

We started with inquiry: is it true, is it factual? Is it true for self-judgment? "You're a terrible meditator," or some such opinion. Is it even true? Yes, is it even factual? Bringing a sense of humor, challenging the facts of this opinion.

If the thought is about others, is it divisive? Is it harmonious? Now today, especially noticing, is it gentle, or is its inner speech tone harsh, especially when it's directed towards ourselves? Oh sweetheart, no need for any harsh tone. No need. Kindness.

And after knowing the landscape of the mind, releasing, and letting the breath in the lower part of the body, the sensations of the breath, take center stage in our awareness. That's all.

Is the way you're receiving the breath, you're listening to the breath, the sensations of the breath—does it have gentleness or harshness in your listening? In your receiving of the sensations, what's the posture of the mind, of the heart?

Our bodies are a tuning fork. Paying attention by knowing what's happening in the body. We know what's present in the mind, the quality of intention, speech, inner speech. By calming the body with kindness, we can realign and soothe a mind.

And as we bring our sit to a close together, appreciating if there was just, say, one moment of awareness and aligning with our values. Celebrating that you showed up. You've done your best, letting go of outcome, non-attachment to how things should be or should have been, but appreciating yourself for your engagement. Recognizing the goodness for showing up, being part of the Sangha^[3].

And together with generosity offering our goodness, offering our best to all beings everywhere, to the world. Our good intentions, our integrity, our kindness. May all beings everywhere, especially those who are suffering with natural disasters right now in parts of the world, our siblings—may they have ease, may they be free from suffering, may they be safe. May all beings everywhere be free from suffering. May all beings everywhere be safe, happy, healthy, have ease. May all beings everywhere be free, including ourselves.

Wise Speech (3/5) Is It Harsh or Gentle? Do No Harm through Speech

Greetings everyone.

Today is our third day of exploring together the topic of wise speech. On Monday we started with the first question to ask ourselves. And by the way, all of these go together, all these six that I will be sharing. So if one of the conditions is not met—and the last one I want to give you a heads up, the last one I'll be sharing on Friday is, is it timely, is it the right time? So even if it's not divisive, and it's true, and today we'll talk about gentleness, it's not harsh, it's kind, everything is satisfied—still, if it's not the right time, then we don't say it. So all of these go together.

I wanted to add a little bit of nuance to the teachings from yesterday and the day before, before we go into the new question today to ask ourselves: is our speech harsh, abusive, or is it gentle? On Monday we talked about, is it true and factual? And yesterday the question was, is it divisive, or does it create harmony?

A couple of nuances to add to the teachings. One, as I already mentioned, they all go together. The other nuance is regarding truthfulness. Is what we're about to say true? But it doesn't mean that we just blurt out everything that is true all the time, because of course there is wisdom in what is appropriate to say, when, how—all of those other considerations come in.

Often folks bring up this hypothetical situation: "If I were alive during World War II and I was giving safekeeping to people who were persecuted at the time, and I was hiding them in my basement, and soldiers, Nazis, knocked on the door, would I have to tell them the truth?" I appreciate the people who think this way and really try to engage with what truthfulness actually means. There was a bigger question of what is of benefit, what is kind—360 degrees, what is of benefit, what is of least harm. So in this case, telling a lie that saves a life, in this case of someone who's persecuting, the bigger picture of all things, of course it makes sense. It's not about sticking to a particular rule without context, without this wish for greater goodness and non-harming in a bigger way.

So it's so important always to bring in the context. In a more casual way, when somebody puts on a dress and asks you, "Do I look fat?", you don't blurt out "Yes". You just have to be a little kinder. Other aspects of kindness come in. Nevertheless, this precept of not lying, not shading the truth, really has to do with the intentions. It goes back to the intentions, and that's something I've been trying to stress. How does it feel in the body? Why are we lying? Is it for our gain? Is it because of hatred? What is the underlying intention or motivation? Really let that be the guide. Are we deceiving in order to get some gain?

Similarly with what I mentioned yesterday with the question of, is it harmonious or divisive? Also there's wisdom there. You don't want to not divide people up because you want your friends to just be your friends and break people up, taking joy in discord. It comes back to the intention. However, the Buddha also has teachings about, if something has happened and another person is invited to say, "Did you see something?", that person is supposed to say what has happened, what did they see.

If your friend is about to, let's say, hire someone who you know is going to be a really bad match, and it's not going to work out for a variety of reasons, of course it's not wise to hold back, thinking "Oh, I don't want to be divisive." What is the intention here? Out of kindness for everyone, with a heart of loving-kindness for everyone involved: "Given these facts in the past, maybe you share, but this is what you need to know." Again, out of kindness. It always goes back to the intention and what is happening in the body and in the mind in terms of intentionality.

So now with those nuances—very important nuances, adding more and more layers as we continue this week—the third question to ask is: is it harsh, is the way I'm about to speak abusive speech, or is it gentle?

The Buddha instructs us to abandon speech that is spoken in anger, or with a mean sarcasm intended to demean, to insult, to cause pain, to make someone feel bad. It has shards in it. Speech that has shards in it. This kind of abusive speech, said in an angry tone, is often rooted in aversion. The root of it is hatred, one of the three poisonous roots^[4]: greed, hatred, and delusion. Aversion is its root, and it's often impulsive. It doesn't involve forethought the same way that slanderous and divisive speech that we talked about yesterday did. Slanderous speech has doubly heavy karma^[5], because it both has hatred as its root and it involves forethought. This has a slightly lighter karma because it's impulsive. We just angrily and in a mean way say something, and maybe later we feel bad. And yet, ouch! We both hurt our karma, we hurt the other person, the ripples in the world, the ripples and the way it's affected us. Ouch, ouch, ouch. Still unskillful, even if it has a lighter negative karma, of course.

The antidote to this type of unskillful speech is patience. The paramis^[6], the beautiful quality of patience. So if you find yourself to be someone who just blurts something out and regrets it later, in an angry tone, in a sarcastic, rebuking, demeaning, insulting tone, and you feel "ouch", patience in that moment. You could pause, come back to the body. Just not speaking is the best thing. Causing the least harm is the best method, and later when you have your calm, the right time, then you can address it. Patience, patience, patience. A beautiful quality of the heart.

And of course, when speaking wisely is just impossible in a particular situation, our secondary goal becomes causing the least harm. The least harm to ourselves, to our own karma—really causing ourselves harm with unwise speech—and of course to others and to the relationships that we have with others.

Then the Buddha instructs us to not just abandon harsh speech, but speak gently. I love these words. The Buddha directs us to speak words that are soothing to the ear, affectionate, go to the heart, are polite, likable, and agreeable to the people. I'll read them one more time; it's like poetry. One speaks words that are soothing to the ear, affectionate, go to the heart, polite, likable, and agreeable to the people. This reading goes to my heart and feels affectionate. It's almost as if I hear his affection and kindness through the ages. "Yes dear, yes dear, this is how you should speak."

So as we go throughout the day today, my invitation is to notice: is it harsh, is it gentle? And another thing I want to add especially with this one in particular, not just external speech—our external speech might actually be gentler than our internal speech. Sometimes we speak to ourselves in tones that we would never ever bear or want to use with others. The tone can be so harsh. Notice the "ouch" of that. And it's not needed. Can we bring kindness? Can we bring compassion? Can we bring gentleness? Can we say the same thing but in a very gentle way?

So as we go through the day, I'd like to invite you to notice the tone of your speech, the inner speech and the outer speech. Is it soothing to the ear, affectionate, goes to the heart, polite, likable, and agreeable to the people? Or is it harsh and abusive?

Okay, thank you so much for your practice, for your cultivation, dear Sangha. And I look forward to our continuing this exploration with wise speech tomorrow. Take care, be well.