Beginning, Middle, and End

If you find yourself tuning out in practice, bored, or have a feeling of dullness, you might try getting a little more specific with your attention. A bored mind is a mind not really paying attention.

You can enliven even your breath awareness by noticing the very beginning of each breath, noticing the middle of each breath, and noticing the very end of each breath. Feeling the subtleties of breathing- the way the body opens to receive the breath, the way the body softens around the letting go of the breath. Letting this help you to stay connected to the aliveness of the present moment.

I often work with this idea in my own practice, trying to sense into my experience with curiosity and openness. When you get right down into the micro moments deeply enough, the whole of existence can open up.

Take good care,

kim

Taking the One Seat

You may have heard meditation described as taking the one seat in the center of your life, opening all the doors and windows and welcoming whatever comes to visit. This has always stuck with me.

This is no easy task, welcoming all that moves through a human life. It is however as task worth opening to. One thing that has helped me is a shift in my understanding of “welcoming” in this context. It does not mean that you need to like every experience but in the pushing away of experience, we end up adding pain and missing real moments in our lives.

Last year when I was on retreat, I cried for the first 3 days straight. I was not crying because I was reliving past traumas (though they were certainly in there). I was not crying because of the difficulties or stresses or how I hoped things could be different. I was crying because once I got really still, I was overcome by the grief of how many moments in my life I miss. How many moments happen with me not in that one seat at the center of my life. How many times my dear ones have been near and I was only half present, caught in replaying or rehearsing. All the smiles I missed, the closeness I didn’t really feel. Those moments that I can’t get back. While on retreat, I was overcome by the grief of that. As I sat with it, it solidified into my intention to stay dedicated to the practice. To take the one seat. To live more of the moments of my life present, and aware whatever those moments bring. I don’t want to miss one.

Wholeheartedly,

Kim

Pleasant, Unpleasant, and Neutral

When we first begin to deepen our meditation practice, one place we often begin is through awareness of feeling tone. Feeling tones are not the same as emotions, but are a way to notice our reactions to what arises in practice without being sucked into story. We simple notice if we find what arises to be pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral. Without judging anything as good or bad (notice how quickly that can happen!) , we work to approach our experiences with curiosity. It is natural to have preferences, notice the preferences as part of your practice as well.

You can notice the changing feeling tones naturally as they occur in practice. For example, you might find the first moments of your practice as you settle in and let go of the day and come home to yourself to feel pleasant. And then after a time , maybe your hip hurts and then you notice, unpleasant. You stay with the discomfort with curiosity and the sensation fades and you notice a neutral feeling tone.

You might also work with this in a more applied practice. Intentionally bringing awareness to a place in the body that feels pleasant and staying with it for a time, investigating it. Then you might notice a place where there is some discomfort and hold awareness in that space for awhile, noticing what it is like to be present with discomfort. Then locating a place that feels neutral and holding awareness there. Getting used to watching feeling tones come and go, cultivating the ability to be with those passing states with skill and grace will help us as we move along the deepening path of practice.

Wholeheartedly,

Kim

Opinions and the Judging Mind

It is 100 percent natural to have opinions about all aspects of our experience. we are designed this way. Opinions are not a problem. How we interact with and hold these opinions certainly can be a problem. A ridged, unexamined opinion can damage relationships, communities, nations.

Opinions held in the light of awareness can be sign posts that give us information, help us understand ourselves and others better. When approached with humility, opinions hold up a mirror and offer us the chance to see and grow and reroute our paths.

It is natural to prefer things that are pleasant to those things that are not. There is a natural desire to hold on to the pleasant and to push away that which is unpleasant. Pain and disappointment are inevitable when you engage in this way because of the changeable nature of all life. When we, through practice, get used to watching as things arise and pass away- including attachment and aversion- our life gets freer. We can be with the passing states with more tolerance, more understanding.

I am a very opinionated person. I care very deeply about things. I take the world seriously. I take people seriously. My opinions are not the only opinions, My opinions are colored by my own conditioning. Beneath my opinions, and those sometimes explosive reactions they cause in the body, is a deep dedication to justice and compassion. I trust that dedication. When I am able to hold my opinions lightly, it is after all not the opinions themselves, but what they point to, I am able to stay aligned with what really matters to me. I am able to move with the pleasure and pain in a way that doesn’t add extra hurt to that natural, inevitable dance of pleasure and pain that plays itself out through a human life.

One way that I work with this in myself is when a strong opinion (usually an angry one) arises, I feel it in my body, I take a deep slow breath and I sense what is beneath it, what matters about this to me, why it is important. I try to speak to that place. If I am worked up about an injustice I saw on the news for example, I might put my hand on my heart or face (touch is powerful!) and say, yes I know, you care that people are respected and safe or whatever it is… and then I might drop in a little Metta to honor that. “May all beings be safe and protected…”

Sensing beneath the surface of opinion can keep us from moving into judging mind. It can help us from getting caught in the snag of opinion. It can protect us from the difficult fallout of an opinion weaponized.

May you be safe and protected.

May you live in peace, with ease.

kim

Like Clouds in the Sky

I don’t know about you, but I have a history of taking my thoughts rather seriously. When thoughts are held in this way, as unquestioned truth, there can be a lot of confusion and hurt. Thoughts become another thing that pulls us around at it’s whim and makes it hard to find steadiness and peace.

When you begin to hold your thoughts lightly, to experience them as passing sensory information and open to the experience of yourself as the vast sky, life opens up. Even heavy thoughts become easier to bear.

Like the sky, which has no opinion about what moves through it- storms or sun, we too can cultivate the ability to be with what arises with the same patience, tolerance, steadiness. It is natural that we have opinions about what we experience. With practice however we can create space around our opinions. That space gives us the opportunity to decide what is really importance to us and allows room for wisdom to lead action.

This capacity of course, comes slowly over time and with practice. A great place to begin is simply by paying attention to our moment to moment experience, to what moves through. We can notice when we get caught by a thought, when we fall into judging or over identifying with a thought. When that happens (and it will happen!), we can simply open back up. Feel the spacious capacity of our awareness and watch, with kindness what comes and goes. We do this again and again. And then do it some more! And bit by bit, our life opens up and the grip of thoughts gets softer, and the world a little lighter.

Wholeheartedly,

Kim

Paying Attention

When it comes down to it, meditation is really just paying attention to your moment to moment experience with curiosity and care. When we pay attention in this way, we drop the expectation and judgement that we live so many of our moments colored by. We begin to shift from the story to the reality in a very simple and fundamental way.

We can begin by opening our awareness to the things that move through without any expectation that they should not be there. We experience each manifestation as simply what is arising in awareness. It can be helpful, grounding even to name what moves through. This is what thinking is like… this is how the body feels… this is sleepiness….whatever it is. name it. watch as it dissolves once you return your attention to the breath, or whatever anchor or home base we are working with in practice. We begin to see the changeable nature of experience. When we get used to moving with the natural flow and fluctuation of energy and awareness, life becomes less of a struggle. We can learn to be with things as they are, knowing they will change, enjoying, grieving, being with the full spectrum of a human life with grasping or pushing away any experience.

As my teachers say… Nothing is off limits. Everything belongs. Your practice can hold it all.

What a blessing.

Wholeheartedly,

Kim