04/08/2021 “What is Normal?” with Diane Wilde

To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.

After a year of pandemic isolation, we are slowly returning to “normal.” Many of us are now vaccinated, or will be soon, we are venturing out with friends and we might look forward to travel, eating out, movies, or long absent hugs. However, “normal” isn’t easily defined. Each individual is unique due to biology, personality and the causes and conditions that make up a life. Societies are different depending on values, cultural mores, spiritual traditions, political ideologies, and historical background. So, is there a universal “normal?” Is “normal” an achievable state? We will discuss what the Buddha and contemporary teachers have to say about striving for normalcy.

/by

04/01/2021 “How to Practice with the Bahiya Sutta” with Heather Sundberg

How to Practice with the Bahiya Sutta: Non-Reactivity at the Sense Doors

To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.

Here is the Sutta version that Heather used in this talk:

In the seen there is only the seen,
in the heard, there is only the heard,
in the sensed there is only the sensed,
in the cognized there is only the cognized:
This, Bāhiya, is how you should train yourself.

When, Bāhiya, there is for you
in the seen only the seen,
in the heard, only the heard,
in the sensed only the sensed,
in the cognized only the cognized,
then, Bāhiya, there is no ‘you’
in connection with that.

When, Bāhiya, there is no ‘you’
in connection with that,
there is no ‘you’ there.”

When, Bāhiya, there is no ‘you’ there,
then, Bāhiya, you are neither here
nor there
nor in between the two.
This, just this, is the end of suffering.

Ud 1.10
/by

03/18/2021 “Loving-Kindness (Metta)” with Dennis Warren

Loving-Kindness (Metta) – Elaborations & Further Guidance from the Historical Buddha

To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.

Our usual understanding of Loving-Kindness (Metta) comes from the Historical Buddha’s Karaniya Metta Sutta. In contrast, the most popular and widely used instructions on how to practice Loving-Kindness were not taught by the Historical Buddha. They were developed by others, and adopted as skillful forms of practice, long after his death.
It turns out the Historical Buddha provided elaboration and further guidance on the experience of Loving-Kindness, what it is and how to develop our capacity to experience it in a number of other talks. These are a value source of help in gaining a fuller, deeper, richer understanding of this pivotal quality of heart and the role it can play in our individual lives, in community and in the larger world. This is what we’ll explore Thursday evening.
You are encouraged to read this Karaniya Metta Sutta – The Metta Sutta several times, s l o w l y, as preparation for this evening. It’s well worth the effort. Topic headings have been added to support reading and understanding the sutta.
The subject matter of this evening is appropriate for all stages of practice. All that is necessary is showing up with an open, curious mind.

/by

03/04/2021 “Advice to Anathapindika on Not Clinging” with Walt Opie

To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.

When the generous lay supporter of the Buddha, Anathapindika, was ill near the end of his life, he was visited by the renowned monk Sariputta who offered him what was then considered an advanced training (for lay people anyway) on not clinging. In this talk, we will explore and discuss this teaching and compare it with some other teachings in a similar vein. You are welcome to read the sutta ahead of time (Majjhima Nikaya 143), although that is certainly not required.

/by

02/25/2021 “How Conceited are YOU?” with Diane Wilde

To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.

Conceit (“māna” in Pali) has a special meaning in the Buddha’s teachings; it has a broader and more profound definition than “stuck up”… the definition we usually associate with this word. Conceit in Buddhism can mean feeling superior, inferior, or the same as others. In other words, it is our habitual comparison of ourselves to others. Conceit is also the delusion that our experiences ARE ourselves, and that our self has boundaries and solid substance. According to the Pali canon, conceit is among the last defilements to fall away before full awakening. It is subtle and difficult to observe within ourselves… much easier to see in others! When we begin to experience conceit as it really is, we also begin understand and experience anatta: “No permanent self”.

/by

02/18/2021 “Experiencing Emptiness of Self” with Dennis Warren

Experiencing Emptiness of Self and Its’ Practical, Every-Day Implications

To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.

Understanding and experiencing the teaching on the Emptiness-of-Self (“No-Self” / “Anatta”) is considered is to be defining and transformative. But having the actual experience that makes this teaching immediate, direct and relevant to every-day life and relationships seems to elude us.
The focus of this Thursday night’s discussions will explore the Emptiness-of-Self through 4 questions:

  • Why is it considered so important from a practical perspective?
  • What is (and is not) the experience of Emptiness-of-Self?
  • What impact does the experience of Emptiness-Of-Self have on our understanding of ourselves, our relationships, our behavior and our place in the world?
  • What methods can help us understand and directly experience Emptiness-Of-Self in meditation and everyday life more often and more tangibly?

Community teacher, Rich Howard, gave an excellent traditional overview of the teaching on “no-self” or “anatta” on Thursday, February 4 under the topic of “Finding and Losing Yourself.” Dennis’ discussion this Thursday will be on the same teaching but from a different perspective and emphasis. Rich’s talk is posted to SIM’s Audio Dharma Library (click here).
The subject matter of this evening is appropriate for all stages of practice. All that is necessary is showing up with an open, questioning mind.

/by

02/11/2021 “Reflection on Patience” with Gullu Singh

To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.
/by

02/04/2021 “Finding and Losing Your Self” with Rich Howard

Who Am I? What Do I Want? What Do I Believe?:
Finding and Losing Your Self

To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.

The Buddhist concept of “not self” can be very confusing if we let it linger as a subject of philosophical speculation or distant conceptual notion. On the other hand, the Buddha taught the illusion of self (anatta in Pali) as one of the three universal characteristics of experience, along with impermanence and unsatisfactoriness; living an embodied insight into how this process works is one avenue to awakening.
Two of the basic processes we have taught often at SIM offer ways of seeing into how we construct and maintain the sense of self: the five aggregates of clinging and dependent origination. In this presentation, Rich will share some other approaches from classes he attended with Steve Armstrong and Kamala Masters at the Vipassana Metta Foundation and Jay Garfield at the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies. We will place particular emphasis on the ethical and liberating aspects of these teachings.

/by

01/28/2021 “Javana Hamsa: The Swift Swan” with Greg Scharf

To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.

Greg Scharf uses a Jataka story (Javana Hamsa: The Swift Swan) as an introduction to a talk on insight into impermanence and its relationship to what the Buddha called “An Independent Abiding”.

/by

01/21/2021 “Reconsidering Mindfulness” with Dennis Warren

To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.

Mindfulness is the operational centerpiece of good practice, sound problem solving and living well. It supports and enables all the different teachings, methods and psychology of the historical Buddha which are designed to help us live a rich, full, satisfying life.
One way of understanding mindfulness is that it has two interlocking dimensions: One is practical and functional. The other is oriented towards awakening or liberation. As a community practitioner, we can inadvertently slip into the habit of relating to mindfulness, and practice itself, as only functional and practical.
When this happens, mindfulness and practice can become self-restricting and self-limiting. Such an approach can accidently obscure, and potentially cut us off from, spontaneous discovery and the deep, intuitive, healing wisdom of our bodies and hearts. We can become disconnected from the beauty and power inherent in exploring the mystery, and the dilemma, of being human, of being in relationships and of being alive on this planet.
This is the territory we’ll explore on Thursday evening: functional mindfulness; awakening or liberating mindfulness; and the unifying and inspiring experience at the center of practice which is beyond words, language and concepts.
The subject matter of this evening is appropriate for all stages of practice. All that is necessary is showing up with an open, questioning mind.

The book that Dennis references: In Love with the World – By YONGEY MINGYUR RINPOCHE and HELEN TWORKOV

Zoom Chat

/by