II: The Next Steps

Improving Your Meditation
  • Concentration
    • The Three Necessities of Mindfulness
      1. Concentration: being in the now
        • Recognize
      2. Sensory Clarity: awareness of present moment sensations
        • Feel
      3. Equanimity: non-friction; holding what is happening as it is
        • Soften
    • It is impossible to focus on more than one thing at a time.
    • The Three Anchors
      • Breath
        • Breath is a precious opportunity to be in real-time with ourselves.
        • Follow it, notice where you feel it in your body.  Belly?  Chest?  Nose?
        • Long exhales relax nervous system (good when upset/anxious); long inhales energize nervous system (good when sleepy).
      • Sound
      • Body
        • If bored with an anchor, try another and stay there!  Body tends to be a very interesting place to be with if breath or sound are feeling uninteresting.
    • Samādhi: concentration, one-pointedness of mind
      • We must have the foundation of concentration (focus) to sense what we are feeling and to be with this as it is.  Insight can arise once focus is intact.
      • Noting enables focus.
        • Ex: walking meditation.  Label "lifting, swinging, placing" for slower pace, or "this is what walking is like" for faster pace.
        • Noting provides an anchor for us, a connection to this present moment experience.
        • Transfers experience from midbrain (reactive, evolutionarily old) to the very front of the brain (responsive, evolutionarily young), where creativity, cognitive functioning, and logical reasoning take place.  Here, we can engage our attention and focus, enabling concentration.
      • Concentration allows us to engage our stability.
    • Purification: meeting whatever comes up in our consciousness in its pure form, not adding to the story or adding preference.
      • "Love these parts to death"
      • Not a self-improvement practice; about being with what is, and "loving to death" the parts of you that you may resist or not like.
      • Potential for emptying
      • More and more natural over time
  • Effort
    • Active perseverance gets us where we want to be; we must make the effort to catalyze life, and to practice!
      • Persevere until meditation does us.
    • We want to effort in a balanced way.
      • Not too focused or too broad; in between.
      • Too zoomed out = we can't see detail; too zoomed in = we can't see big picture.  Balance = seeing clearly what is there.
    • How to Have a Regular Practice:
      1. Be gentle with ourselves as we develop our habit.
      2. Prioritize sitting.
      3. Why am I sitting (motivation) and how will I sit (intention) (<- set these every practice; will change day-to-day or moment-to-moment.  Helpful to remind us why we sit!)
      4. Be kind with ourselves.
    • Three-Step Check-In
      1. Mind: what are my thoughts?
      2. Mood: what is my affect?
      3. Body: how does this feel?
      • Use throughout practice and throughout day.  Effort on the cushion is great, but extending that effort out into full life is transformative.
  • Mindfulness in Daily Living
    • In the Body
      • Conscious embodiment: experiencing the present moment from within the body
      • Experiencing Emotions in the Body
        • Using information from the body what is going on mentally/emotionally.
        • Tune in to our habitual responses; these can indicate and teach us what our experience is.
        • Our bodies as biofeedback systems.
        • Hold space for feelings; body more useful for information about what's really going on with us than thoughts.  
          • Habit = mind; option = body.
    • In the Mind
      • Noticing our thoughts rather than believing them.
        • Paying attention to our thoughts without believing what we think.
      • We are creative thinking machines!
      • Working with Thoughts
        1. Bringing ourselves into the present moment, mind and body
          • Feel the ground.
        2. Identifying thought patterns/habits; "I know you!"
          • Often ingrained from early life/childhood
          • Noticing these patterns can help us identify them early.
          • Bringing habits to the front brain, working with them creatively, kindly, and with curiosity
          • Front brain brings perspective.
        3. Not taking these thought patterns/habits to heart
          • Non-identification
          • "Meet them at the door laughing"
        4. Choose how we want to proceed
      • Pain vs. Suffering
        • pain x resistance = suffering
          • Resistance = fighting what is.
            • "I don't want this to be this way"
          • The more we resist, the more we suffer from the same pain.
          • Pain is not within our control, but suffering is.
            • The less we resist, the less we suffer.
          • Resistance often comes from something we do not understand.
        • People often don't realize they are suffering!  Acknowledging suffering reduces resistance, decreases fighting with life.
        • Opportunity to not suffer so much: choice.
          • "The wolf that wins is the wolf you feed."*
      • Notice when you are feeling okay; savor and install!
        • Feel what it is like to feel happy, safe, joyful
      • It is not our conditions that determine our experience, but how we meet these conditions.
  • Doubt
    • Doubt is a normal part of the human experience.
      • Can be helpful when healthy doubt; observing insecurity like a scientist
    • Unhealthy doubt: the trickster mind
      • Can make us question whether we should abandon what we want
      • Can make us question whether we should abandon mindfulness
      • Do not believe the trickster mind!  Just because something is hard does not mean we should stop.  Thus...
      • DOUBT THE DOUBT!
        • Question the doubt; is there wisdom here?
    • Steps for Dealing with Doubt
      1. Awareness.  
        • "This is doubt."
        • Awareness in body and mind.
        • Love the doubt to death by feeling in the body.
      2. Question.
        • "Do you have something to tell me?"
      3. Remind.
        • Remind ourselves why we are doing this (our motivation).
      4. Doubt.
        • Doubt the doubt!!
        • The more we question the doubt, the more confident we become.
    • The opposite of doubt: confidence.
      • Practicing builds confidence!  Get your tush to the cush!
  • Wisdom
    • Defining Wisdom
      • Wisdom is deeper than intellect; akin to organic intuition, or insight.  
      • Wisdom counters doubt.
    • Cultivating Wisdom
      • In our lives, we so often live in "what is next," that we miss out completely on the "now."
        • Instead, ask: "What is now?"
      • Layers of wisdom arise when there is space.
        • Body as anchor of stability and insight.
        • Insights arise when there is space for them!
        • Memories and habits arise.  Hold with curiosity and space, notice attachment, and skillfully work with it.
        • Gives us insights into ourselves, and thus, insights into humanity.
      • Wisdom mind: insight into the human condition
    • Steps for Cultivating Wisdom
      1. Concentration
        • Get self into frontal brain.
        • Enforces stability, awareness, compassion.
      2. Connection
        • Opening our eyes to our connection to everything.
        • Noticing the "ripple effects" of our actions
          • Everything is causes and conditions.  What you put out affects everything and everyone.
      3. Impermanence
        • Recognizing that everything is always changing.
          • Easier to let go when we understand this.
      4. Trust
        • The result of wisdom.
        • Trust in ourselves and in our wisdom.
      • Understanding the fundamental truth that WISDOM IS ALREADY WITHIN US.
  • Helpful Guidelines
    • When you sit...
      1. Focus: choose area of concentration
        • Choose how you are going to meditate at the beginning of each practice and stick with it.  This will focus your attention for the practice.
        • Anchors: breath, sound, or body
        • Once concentration on object of focus is achieved, keep this for awhile.
      2. RAIN: work with what arises
        • Recognize, Allow, Investigate, Non-identification
      3. Re-focus: stay with the present, cultivate stability
        • Feel the space.
        • Can return to initial object of focus if so drawn, move on to another object of focus, or transition to a cultivation practice.
      • End every practice with a smile.  Bring in some appreciation - you did it!
    • The more we do it, the more natural it becomes.
  • Practices
    • Mindful Activity
      • Choose an activity you do daily (like brushing your teeth, making the bed, folding laundry, washing dishes, etc.) and make it a mindful activity.  Do activity with presence and awareness.  Do this every day for a week and see how it feels.
    • Choiceless Awareness
      • Following the attention wherever it guides you.
      • Not fleeting; staying with whatever sensation draws you until it is complete, then moving to the next sensation and doing the same.
      • Take something in, feel it in its entirety, then move to wherever drawn next
      • Noticing the fluidity of our experience.  Constant flux, movement, dynamic change.
      • We can do this on the cushion and throughout life!

* This refers to a story in which a grandfather describes to his grandson two wolves fighting inside him: one that is evil (angry, jealous, vengeful, and miserable), and one that is good (peaceful, kind, joyful, and happy).  The boy asks, "Which wolf will win?"  The grandfather answers, "The wolf you feed." *
Notes from MARC MAPS II: Next Steps: Improving Your Meditation, taught by Gloria Kamler, March 7, 2018 - April 18, 2018.

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