An Integrating Presence Meditation: Deeply Sensing Body Areas — July 28, 2021 At Fat Cat Longevity

This meditation (recorded live) aims to strengthen and deepen the 32 Parts of the Body portion of Body Contemplation in the Four Foundations of Mindfulness — not meant as regular practice or substitute. Partial inspiration comes from this Four Foundations of Mindfulness visual:

“Just as if there were a double-mouthed provision bag full of various kinds of grain such as hill paddy, paddy, green gram, cow-peas, sesamum, and husked rice, and a man with sound eyes, having opened that bag, were to take stock of the contents thus: “This is hill paddy, this is paddy, this is green gram, this is cow-pea, this is sesamum, this is husked rice.” Just so, monks, a monk reflects on this very body enveloped by the skin and full of manifold impurity, from the soles up, and from the top of the head-hairs down, thinking thus: “There are in this body hair of the head, hair of the body, nails, teeth, skin, flesh, sinews, bones, marrow, kidney, heart, liver, midriff, spleen, lungs, intestines, mesentery, gorge, feces, bile, phlegm, pus, blood, sweat, fat, tears, grease, saliva, nasal mucus, synovial fluid, urine.” ~The Foundations of Mindfulness — Satipatthana Sutta

Materiality And Mentality | (7/27/2021 — “Ask Us Anything – LIVE” With Denny K Miu And Guest Beth Upton)

For this month’s regular open-audience, open-discussion “Ask Us Anything LIVE” — continuing discussions about meditation and related topics — Denny and I chat with meditation teacher Beth Upton most significantly about the Dependent Origination link Nāmarūpa, or Materiality and Mentality, which, according to Wikipedia, is “used in Buddhism to refer to the constituents of aContinue reading “Materiality And Mentality | (7/27/2021 — “Ask Us Anything – LIVE” With Denny K Miu And Guest Beth Upton)”

Images For The Minds Of The Three Kinds Of People In The World

The three types of people in the world are likened to a person with a mind like an open sore, a person with a mind like lightning, and a person with a mind like diamond.

“And who has a mind like an open sore? It’s someone who is irritable and bad-tempered. Even when lightly criticized they lose their temper, becoming annoyed, hostile, and hard-hearted, and they display annoyance, hate, and bitterness. They’re like a festering sore, which, when you hit it with a stick or a stone, discharges even more. In the same way, someone is irritable and bad-tempered. Even when lightly criticized they lose their temper, becoming annoyed, hostile, and hard-hearted, and they display annoyance, hate, and bitterness. This is called a person with a mind like an open sore.”

Illustrated: The Buddha’s Five Themes For Addressing Unskillful Thoughts

In the Vitakkasaṇṭhāna Sutta — The Relaxation of Thoughts (MN 20) the Buddha provides five themes to attend to at the appropriate times for those intent on heightening the mind. (The full post includes images and passages with explanations)

1) Small Peg Knocking Out Larger One (to attend to another theme)

2) Disgusted By Wearing Carcass (to know certain thoughts are unskillful, blameworthy, and resulting in stress)

3) Looking Away (to pay no mind to unskillful thoughts)

4) From Running To Walking To Standing To Sitting To Lying Down (to relax thought fabrications)

5) Clenching Teeth (to crush unskillful/evil mind with awareness)

An Integrating Presence Meditation: Breathing Nine Beneficial Energies Into Embodiment — June 29, 2021 At Fat Cat Longevity

In this (now recorded) mediation we worked with breath to embody the beneficial energies of:
• Smiling
• Our most relaxed experience
• Gratitude [and/or appreciation and thankfulness]
• Forgiveness
• Service
• Loving-kindness
• Compassion
• (Vicarious) joy [and/or gladness]
• Equanimity
• [Additional beneficial energies not mentioned:]
◦ various ideal blessings
◦ energies from (being around) your spiritual entourage
◦ goodness
◦ generosity

Form And Formless | (6/29/2021 — “Ask Us Anything – LIVE” With Denny K Miu)

For this month’s regular open-audience, open-discussion “Ask Us Anything LIVE” — continuing discussions about meditation and related topics — Denny draws from, and summarizes the teaching of Shifu Ji Ru to link together the Four Great Elements, Four “Mighty” Postures, Four Right Knowings, Four Foundations of Mindfulness, Three (or Four) Dharma Seals, and Three Gates of Liberation.

June 2021 Full Moon Dhamma Gathering: Truth

Due to a major interest in truth, I answered the call to read a Sutta at Beth Upton’s June 2021 full moon gathering. Each of these monthly online get-togethers explores a different topic and offers “a chance to deepen our connections with each other through group meditation and Dhamma discussion.”

Amongst other things, this blog post includes the text I read along with a passage from another text I considered reading; relevant quotes about truth; the main questions we explored and some we did not

An Integrating Presence Meditation: Classic Mindfulness Imagery — June 2, 2021 At Fat Cat Longevity

This semi-formal guided meditation practice include these classic mindfulness images and similes:
◦ a relaxed cowherd after the harvest
◦ surgeons probe gathering information before action
◦ ploughshare to prep the ground for wisdom
◦ elephant’s neck supporting the head of wisdom while turning the full body to look, not just the head, for full attention
◦ climbing a platform with detachment for an broader perspective and overview
◦ town gatekeeper knowing who to keep out and able to direct who comes in
◦ wheel spokes connecting the hub of the body to the outside of the wheel of our experiences while helping to steer
◦ hitching post to tame and keep animals from wandering off all the while the strong post remains unmoved
◦ balancing aspect like walking with bowl of oil atop the head

Towards Everyday Implementation Of The Universal Beautiful Mental Factors

Dhamma and meditation teacher Beth Upton — who’s other chats I’ve posted — recently held a three part event with Dharma Gates called “Truth, Suffering and Liberation”. I’ve edited out most everything except my responses to Beth’s questions and her responses to me so please watch the full video at the end of this post especially if requiring more context.

Beth read an excerpt of the Aggañña Sutta about the origin of human kind on planet earth then linked our suffering, caused by the defilements (dramatic depicted in the sutta) to the Buddha’s antidote: the The Universal Beautiful Mental Factors (sobhanasādhāraṇa). Beth then offered a short teaching followed by a guided meditation and discussion on her condensed and more practical version of these Mental Factors from the Abhidhamma which are:
• Faith
• Mindfulness
• Non-greed
• Non-hatred
• Morality
• Balance
• Tranquility
• Lightness
• Softness
• Flexibility
• Uprightness/Authenticity/Truthfulness
• Proficiency

This post includes my responses (in an edited video) to Beth’s group-guiding questions along with a few new written responses.

Dharma Questions: Miscellany — Part 3

This irregular “Dharma Questions” series deals with “dharma” meaning both the truth of the nature of reality and some Buddhist teachings. Amongst other things these questions can be:
• thought experiments
• borderline musings not meant to be answered
• from laziness of not contemplating or researching them yet

There’s 19 (groups of) questions. Here’s a sampling of two:

How do sankhārā [formations/mental formations/volitional formations] come from ignorance? What is the process?

How does effort for vitakka wax and wane? How does vitakka turn into, or allow, or go along with vicāra?