If you would like to download this talk, please right click and select “save as” here.

Investigation Leading to Liberating Insight – A Practical Model For Working With Doubt
How can doubt based experiences be investigated in a way that leads to liberating insight? This is one of the fundamental skills of a good practice. This evening will be devoted to examining a practical, experiential and hands-on model of working with doubt.
While doubt can appear in many different places in our practice and our life, it usually acts as an undermining factor in our confidence, decision making and behavior. What is doubt? What is its experiential origin? What causes it to be present? What causes it to diminish and no longer be present? What can we do to work with it skillfully while it is present? A helpful handout of the model will be used as the outline for the evening.
As preparation for this evening, reflect on how doubt has influenced your experience and decision making in the last year, and come prepared with questions you have regarding your experiences.

If you would like to download this talk, please right click and select “save as” here.

The third in a talk series examining the purpose and nature of “Investigation” leading to Liberating Insight in meditation practice. If you have the time, you may want to visit the two prior talks on June 21 and May 24.
In this talk we explore two handout charts as the jumping off point for the presentation and discussion. The first handout details the actual development stages in the process of Investigation. The second handout depicts the way that Investigation is a source of resilience in practice and is internally renewing – it sustains and supports itself and every other part of practice.
The evening will include, among other things, a discussion of the distinguishing characteristics of both cognitive and intuitive Insight, a look at the unique quality of effort involved in the investigative process, and an examination of a number of obstacles to investigation producing Insight. See the third handout.

The Meaning and Practice of “Investigation” in Insight Practice – The principal purpose of Insight Practice is the creation of conditions that lead to spontaneous, intuitive Insight that liberates the mind and heart from suffering. This occurs through “Investigation.”
An exploration of the meaning of Investigation involves an examination and understanding of the most fundamental and radical viewpoints expressed in the teachings of the historical Buddha. Likewise, it involves how those viewpoints are operationalized into the Buddha’s instruction for practicing meditation and paying attention to our experience in everyday life.
Dennis’ talk explores these topics and the challenges they represent to evaluating our own individual meditation and daily life practices. The talk uses the Buddha’s teachings on the “Seven Factors of Awakening” as a jumping off point for discussion and exploration of this fascinating topic. It would be helpful to review the first 12 pages of the article by the same name by Piyadassi Thera which can be found at https://accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/piyadassi/wheel001.pdf.
This talk references the following handout:  Seven Factors Chart (.pdf)

If you would like to download this talk, please right click and select “save as” here.

Resolving Conflicting, Contradictory or Paradoxical Teachings –Part II
This is the second in a series of talks on the process of working through and unwinding confusion over what appear to be conflicting, contradictory or paradoxical teachings. What do we do? How do we do it? What are the conditions that need to be in place to help us do this exploration skillfully?
Dennis’ talk will use a number of specific, familiar situations as practical illustrations of the fundamental issues involved in working with issues from a Buddhist, rather than a conventional perspective.

Talk handouts:

• The Components of Buddhist Learning – Chart (PDF)
• The Nature of Insight by J.Goldstein (PDF)

To listen to Part I of this talk, click here.

If you would like to download this talk, please right click and select “save as” here.

The Arising of Wisdom – Experiencing “The Characteristic of Nonself”

Wisdom (Insight), from a Buddhist perspective, arises from “hearing” (listening to the Dharma), study and reflection capped by non-conceptual direct experience. This formula involves intentionally focusing the mind and attention on a number of different and particular experiences, supported by the underlying psychology outlined by the historical Buddha.
This will be the first in a series of interlocking talks about the arising of Wisdom (Insight) by focusing on the experience of “nonself” or “notself.” Dennis’ two most recent talks on the process of suffering thru clinging (becoming attached) to, then identifying with five separate, but tightly related features of human experience commonly referred to as the “Five Aggregates” will service as a foundation for these new talks.

• Audio from talk 20170619: The Arising Of Wisdom Through Engaging “The Five Aggregates”
• Audio from talk 20170720: The Arising Of Wisdom Through Engaging “The Five Aggregates” – Part 2
• Talk Handout (PDF):
  • Dalai Lama & Chodron: Short & Long Term Practice Perspectives on Emotions
  • Guy Armstrong: Foundations of Wordly Happiness vs Liberation & Piers Moore Ede: Whenever Possible, Basic Procedures Are Complicated

Please reflect on the comments of the Dalai Lama and Thubten Chodron about Short & Long Term Practice Perspectives On Emotions. What might this have to do with the nature of suffering associated with being and becoming, on the one hand, and the experience of nonself or notself, on the other???
For those who are using In The Buddha’s Words – An Anthology of Discourses from the Pali Cannon, edited by Bhikkhu Bodhi as a reference, please read the following: VII. The Path To Liberation – Introduction, pages 301-309, and suttas at pages 326 – 345.

If you would like to download this talk, please right click and select “save as” here.