Tag Archives: compassion

Jan's Blog

A Day in a Life: Peaceful Mind

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So Chuck and I have lately been writing about mindfulness meditation with the goal of achieving compassion, for ourselves and others. We both spent some nights dreaming with the Dalai Lama, thought to be the incarnation of the Buddha of Compassion, and indeed his life has centered on bringing the concept of compassion to the modern world. But what about mindfulness, what is it and how does one achieve it?

Some mindful reading aids...

I like to think of mindfulness as a practice of achieving a peaceful mind, the true nature of mind. By constantly reminding myself that my life is a journey, and by acknowledging that everything that happens in a day and in a lifetime is an important part of my learning experience, I am able to bring myself closer and closer to achieving the goal of peaceful mind. Sometimes I get there for long periods of time, and other times I may only touch down for a few minutes a day, but the more I remind myself of my goal the easier it becomes to quickly experience peacefulness of mind.

Even during recapitulation, when in the throes of a memory, one can use the practice of mindfulness to ground the self and stay in the adult present self. Reiterating often that life is a journey of self-discovery helps anchor one in reality, even while another part may be experiencing something from a painful past. Mindfulness is that anchor, the anchor of awareness that we are all on journeys, that we are all in our lives to learn something, that we are all sentient beings capable of incredible feats. The first incredible feat is to remember these things, to change how we think about ourselves and our lives by constantly bringing our attention back to these truths. The second incredible feat is learning to let go of what normally fills our minds so that we can rest a moment in the peacefulness of empty mind. Mindfulness is building awareness of ourselves beyond the usual cogitations of the mind, awareness that the perfect state of mind is peaceful. It is what our minds seek most of all.

It is possible to begin training in mindfulness simply by bringing attention to what we are doing throughout the day, staying mindful of the moment. In such mindfulness practice peace exists. Now I am mindful that I am sitting at my computer and writing, but I am also mindfully aware of my breath, of my calm heart, of words flowing out of me.

Calm and empty peaceful mind...letting thoughts go...

In a little while I will make a cup of tea. I will sit calmly with my tea and drink it mindfully, focusing on its nourishment, letting thoughts go as I remind myself that “I am drinking tea, I am drinking tea.” When I take a walk, I remind myself that “I am walking now, I am walking.” I focus on my breathing and my next step, letting thoughts go. As thoughts return, as they always will, I simply bring my attention back to what I am doing. “Oh, yes, I am walking!” When I go to yoga class I calm my mind by saying, “I am in yoga class now, I am present in my body in yoga class.” I constantly remind myself to come back to the moment, to where I am and what I am doing in the moment. In so doing, I allow all else to escape the confines of my mind, leaving room for a few moments of empty, peaceful mind.

This mindfulness practice of constantly re-anchoring in the moment, aids in allowing worry and stress to be absent, however briefly. Given a reprieve it will often leave of its own accord, for in reality it does not exist if we do not give it a home to exist in.

Begin the process of mindfulness meditation in everyday life simply by being in the moment and then re-focusing on being in the moment. It doesn’t need to be something that we sit and do at a certain time each day, though that is perfectly acceptable too. In the end, by simply allowing it to become a natural part of everyday life, it grants us its gifts more frequently. By constantly reminding ourselves to be mindfully aware, we train our awareness to be mindful more often and pretty soon we find that it comes to our rescue when we most need it, such as in a moment of intense recapitulation as I mentioned.

Being able to anchor ourselves in the awareness of now, reminding ourselves of the truths of our journeys upon this earth and the desires of our spirits to learn and grow, helps greatly as we face our recapitulations. The more we are mindful, the easier it becomes to be mindful again and again. One day we might notice just how peaceful our minds are and, however brief the moment may be, take it as a sign of achieving the goal of mindfulness.

Empty mind...

With mindfulness comes compassion; it just naturally seems to lead the way there. We find that compassion does not really need any explanation. One day we just find ourselves experiencing it because we have already taken on the biggest enemy of compassion: the old mind with all of its directives, judgments, condemnations, repetitive voices and tiresome criticisms. By letting it go we become open to new ideas, new thoughts, and incredible feats of mind never before thought possible. One day we find that all of our thoughts are compassionate ones, all of our ideas embrace a new paradigm, encompassing a broader worldview where everyone is equal.

By opening the mind to peacefulness we allow new energy in, and it comes in calmly, aware that something is different now, that the mind is no longer accepting the old way, for it is only interested in peaceful emptiness for all.

Peace,
Jan

Chuck's Blog

Chuck’s Place: Hello Lucky!

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Evolving dream mandala...

Jan and I spend a full night in dreaming with the Dalai Lama. The actual practice incorporates waking and sleeping. With each waking, a quarter turn of the body into the next quadrant of the full circle of sleeping positions is made—from side to back to side to stomach—as the night goes on. With each turn there is a return to sleep for further dream teaching, as the unfolding mandala of our dreaming progresses.

At the end of the night the Dalai Lama is dying and I anxiously ask him who will be his successor, the next Dalai Lama. Secretly, I hope it will be me!

Finally, the dying Dalai Lama turns to me and says: “My successor will be LUCKY.” And with that he dies.

Earlier that evening, Jan and I had watched an interview with the Dalai Lama conducted by Arianna Huffington on the steps of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London as he celebrated the Templeton Prize, awarded to him for his decades of focus on the connection between the investigative traditions of Buddhism and science, seeking to advance the world.

In his somewhat challenged English, the Dalai Lama talked about the reality of neuroplasticity, the scientific validation of real growth and alteration in the brain directly caused by the practices of mindfulness meditation and compassion. The brain grows by developing new regulatory circuits leading to deep, contented calm through these practices.

The Dalai Lama downplayed religion as a catalyst of change, even suggesting that religions will never agree. On the other hand, science, he said, validates that we can change ourselves, and our planet, through the practices of mindfulness meditation and compassion for all beings. Through these practices, inner peace is achievable, with the added benefit of relieving the environment of the burdens of our over-consumptive attempts to soothe ourselves by other means; using drugs, alcohol, etc., combined with our desires for material goods and comforts that, in the end, have little real meaning but greatly impact our human potential and the earth.

Try a little meditation...it's not that hard

The Dalai Lama decided to award the 1.7 million dollar Templeton Prize to the Save the Children Foundation. He envisions a movement to teach compassion and meditation to children in school, at an early age, as a foundational way to balance young minds and change the world.

So, who is LUCKY, the next Dalai Lama?

In researching the meaning of the word “luck,” I was struck by the juxtaposition of two worlds—spiritual and scientific—in its meaning. The spiritual dimension suggests that luck is prescribed by supernatural or spiritual forces that cause fortuitous events. From a scientific perspective, luck is a random or fortuitous event that is willfully generated or logically explicable. Since spirits can’t show up for scientific method, they can exist only in science fiction, not hard science. However, the results are the same: something happens!

So, my dream Dalai Lama, as well as the living Dalai Lama, while acknowledging a spiritual dimension, lays emphasis on generating luck—LUCKY—through hard science. He points out that neuroplasticity is hard science. Neuroplasticity, with its contented neural pathways, generates GOOD LUCK! He tells us not to bother with spirituality but to instead engage in practical science: Change the brain through mindfulness meditation and compassion and bring LUCKY to life!

LUCKY is the end of a singular line of Dalai Lamas. My dream Dalai Lama tells me that we are all LUCKY if we are willing to engage in the practice of mindfulness meditation that leads to pure compassion. Compassion is first discovering the Buddha or Lucky One in the Self, then seeing the Buddha—or LUCKY—in everyone, using mindfulness-based meditation leading to compassion.

Just Mr. Potato Head or Lucky?

I am awestruck at how the ancient family trees of Tibetan Buddhism and Carlos Castaneda’s line of Shamanism have evolved from their homelands into Everyman’s Land. Castaneda ended his line of shamanism in its traditional format by launching the practice of Tensegrity and introducing the idea of the new Nagual in all of us. My dream indicates that the Dalai Lama’s exodus from Tibet, with Buddhism’s diaspora throughout the world, offers us all the opportunity to be the next Dalai Lama, if we follow the scientific practice to grow our brains through neuroplasticity into LUCKY, the compassionate beings we truly are. These are the offerings of the ancient roots of these traditions: we are all embodiments of Buddha, the Nagual, God.

Where these two ancient/modern traditions converge is in the practice of recapitulation, either through using the ancient magical passes or in a mindfulness meditation practice, as the present self takes the full journey to change through revisioning life lived. These evolutionary practices of change promote brain growth—neuroplasticity in action—offering the circuitry for the real experience of compassionate detachment with love. Ultimately, finding the pathway to true compassion means being able to find the Golden Buddha in even the cruelest of tyrants.

In the end, aren’t we all LUCKY?

Chuck

Jan's Blog

A Day in a Life: Recapitulation & Breathing

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During the process of recapitulation it helps to have support. This support can come in many forms. During my own recapitulation, not only did I work closely with Chuck as teacher and guide, but I also did a lot of yoga and meditation. Specific breathing practices and gentle, self-caring yoga helped immensely as I recapitulated a lot of old and unpleasant stuff. I also did Embodyment Therapy to aid in the physical release of memory. These practices were extremely helpful and right, fitting my personality. In the beginning I also used physical exertion as a means of countering the mental and physical stresses that arose as a result of recapitulating, running and walking off a lot of the onslaughts of infinity, and doing specific magical passes to aid in bearing the tension. However, the deeper I went into my recapitulation the more important it became to allow for and find support for long buried feelings and emotions that needed not only release but to become acceptable. There also comes a point where compassion for the self and others, including the petty tyrants in our lives, becomes necessary for true evolution to take place.

The shamanic sweeping breath, a magical pass, was one of the most helpful of all breathing exercises during recapitulation. Breathing in fresh positive energy and expelling old negative energy belonging to specific memories, people, and places was one of the most important parts of my recapitulation process. This breath not only stirs up memories but vivifies them as well, bringing details of experiences to fuller clarity. As we breathe out we release energy that does not belong to us, replacing it, on each in-breath, with new energy for ourselves alone.

Yoga breathing supports and brings clarity to deep inner work, aiding what is happening in the unconscious and in the physical body. Learning to breathe into specific areas enhances and clarifies where our deepest needs, vulnerabilities, and issues lie. Breathing into the chakras can lead to encounters with our unknown selves, unlocking the mysteries of why we feel bruised or pain in certain areas of our bodies, releasing long buried memories physically buried in our very muscles, sinews, and bones. There are yoga breaths to open passageways into the body for fuller release, but there are equally as many breathing practices to slow down the onslaughts of infinity, bringing stability and calm, so that balance can be restored and maintained. Healing and self-caring breaths are as important as releasing breaths during recapitulation.

Tonglen breathing during meditation, or at anytime, is another supportive and life-changing process, leading to a level of enlightenment that gradually allows us to experience the world as energetically interconnected. As we breathe in the negative energy of guilts, fears, emotions, etc. and breathe out compassion, fearlessness, happiness, lightness, etc., we energetically send that positive intent out into the world. As we turn compassion for others into compassion for ourselves we learn how to let go of our ego’s needs and desires and replace them with loving kindness for ourselves and all sentient beings.

I recently had a personal experience of Tonglen breathing, experiencing it ultimately as the power of the energetic network that we are all hooked into whether we are aware of it or not. I was about to encounter a person with a lot of negative energy, a person I admittedly do not enjoy being with, one of my petty tyrants. Normally I gear up for such encounters by asking for help, guidance and accompanying good energy, by breathing and calming my own energy, and by continually reminding myself, while I am in the presence of this person, that I am just like this person, that I am the same, and that in order to truly heal myself I must achieve true compassion for this person.

As I was preparing to meet up with this person I decided to shift myself, to allow the possibility for this encounter to be different by practicing Tonglen breathing. I started as I left the house, first breathing in, one at a time, the fears, judgments, criticisms, negative attitudes, depressed energy, etc. of this person and breathing out compassion. Then I breathed in my own fears of this person, my own judgments, dislikes, uncomfortability, negative attitudes, etc. towards this person and breathing out compassion. I did this while I drove, a trip of perhaps fifteen minutes at the most. Upon arriving at my destination I continued to meditate upon compassionate loving kindness for this person, holding this uppermost in my thoughts, wanting to stay connected to this intent. This was all I carried with me at that point, feeling immensely lighter and relieved of my normal agita because of the breathing I had done.

Upon my arrival I was greatly surprised by the energetic lightness of this normally dark and negative person. It was immediately clear that this person had energy, and not just nervous or agitated energy, but actual calm and clear energy. The normal judgments and critical language, the depressed thoughts and oblivious actions that I associate with this person were overridden by this new energy. The lightness and clarity of this person’s energy lasted through most of our time together, waning only towards the end. My own energy, while I was with this person and even later, remained soft and compassionate, kind and open.

It was not until I was back in my car that it dawned on me that the Tonglen breathing I had done actually worked on an energetic level, as I have never experienced it before. It worked on behalf of the energy of another person, with quite dramatic results and it certainly worked on me, for I have no doubts about my own energetic experiences of that day. I walked in a new world with this person that day, in a world that had energetically shifted, in which we were freed of our normal business, relieved of old energy and old patterns of behavior. And it all happened on an energetic level without one word being spoken between us. It just was.

I am humbly grateful for the petty tyrants in my life, for the people who challenge me to confront my feelings and my normal means of coping, for the people who have hurt me, rejected me, abandoned me, for the people who criticize, judge, and dismiss me, for they are the ones who greet me on the path to enlightenment and ask me to change. At each encounter with a petty tyrant I am offered the opportunity to practice loving kindness and compassion, to energetically let go of what holds me bound and turn it into fresh, new, positive energy that really does make a difference, as I experienced.

Recapitulation is a many-faceted process. As we encounter memories we discover that they carry more than just the recall of an event. We encounter old energy, thoughts, feelings, emotions, judgments, criticisms, guilt, envy, pain, etc. We may also encounter many positive aspects of ourselves at other times in our lives. What we are also offered is the possibility to transform our perception of ourselves and others, as well as our view of the world. Finding support in even the most natural of life giving energy, in breathing, which we all do, is a practical and kind step to offer the self as the journey continues.

If you wish, feel free to share or comment in the Post Comment section below.

Sending you all love and good wishes, and good breathing too!
Jan

NOTE: A definition of Tonglen breathing can be found here or in Pema Chödrön’s book When Things Fall Apart.

Chuck's Blog

#661 Chuck’s Place: Compassion is Ruthlessness

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Welcome to Chuck’s Place, where Chuck Ketchel expresses his thoughts, insights, and experiences! Many of the shamanic and psychological terms used in Chuck’s essays are defined in Tools & Definitions on our Psychotherapy website.

Shamans define ruthlessness as the place of no pity. In their nomenclature, the place of no pity represents a shift of the assemblage point where one enters a different reality, which is far more comprehensive than ordinary reality. Shamans assert that the familiar world of ordinary reality is fixated on the position of self-pity. From this place of self-pity we cling to the archetypal roles of family, long beyond actual necessity. We fund these archetypal roles of mother, father, child, spouse, etc., with all our available energy, leaving no energy for life as a separate being on a solo journey of awareness; the journey we are all really on.

We pity the self that ultimately must die alone and so we cling to the illusions that spin what the Buddhists call the Wheel of Life. To quote Esther Harding, from her book Psychic Energy:

When, before his enlightenment, he was meditating under the Bo Tree, he [Buddha] asked himself: Why are there these endlessly repeated lives? Why do people, and animals as well, go on with the senseless round of birth and suffering and death? Why does life continue exactly the same—why do men not outgrow this barbaric and immature stage? His meditation grew deeper and deeper, until at last he had a vision that revealed the answer. He saw the wheel of life, consisting of the endless round of existences, of births and deaths and rebirths, of heavens and hells, and the earth with its many faces.

Buddha saw the illusions we cling to that construct and maintain the world of what the shamans call ordinary reality, a world that strictly adheres to an endless round of living our repetitive archetypal roles.

Buddha arrived at the place of compassion for beings who cling to their illusions. Compassion is not pity. Compassion is the acceptance, without judgment, that all beings must cling to their illusions and go round and round again in their cosmic Groundhog Day,* until they are ready to awaken. That is, to take personal responsibility to face the true nature of reality beyond the archetypal roles; to allow themselves to let go, to detach from the pity that clings to the illusions in a childlike grasp for safety and security. Buddha saw that all must arrive at that place individually. No one can take another’s journey. No one can give another enlightenment. That will always be an individual task. Only when an individual is finally ready will they take the journey, the solo journey, devoid of archetypal props. Compassion, then, is loving all who cling, but remaining unattached, fully stalking the place the shamans call ruthlessness.

Ruthlessness completely stares down pity. Ruthlessness fully allows all beings to be what they truly are: independent travelers on an infinite journey. Ruthlessness sees beyond; it detaches from all the archetypal bindings, lovingly allowing sons, daughters, parents, husbands, and wives, etc., to fully take their journeys. Ruthlessness is compassion. Ruthlessness remains unattached to the illusions; it gets out of the way of others taking the journeys they must. Ruthlessness is compassion without pity. With ruthlessness we stalk the position that lifts the veils. On the one hand, ruthlessness is a loving acceptance of wherever another may be on the wheel of life and, on the other, it is standing as a beacon to the evolutionary journey beyond the wheel.

If you wish to correspond, please feel free to post a comment below.

Until we meet again,
Chuck

* Refers to the Bill Murray movie.