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The greatest gift is the
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Dharma Talks
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2021-10-23
Death/Letting Go Meditation
28:47
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Amita Schmidt
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A progressive meditation on letting go that simulates the death process. Letting go of the senses, emotions, thoughts, and perception. See what remains.
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Tri State Dharma
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2021-10-21
The 7 Factors of Awakening, Part 2: The Enlivening Factors of Investigation, Effort and Joy
53:57
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Tina Rasmussen
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This free dharma talk is the second in a series on the "7 Factors of Awakening," which are factors that what we nurture and develop on the path of awakening, as well as being descriptors of the awakened state. Tina gives a series of three talks on the "7 Factors," providing practical descriptions of how to cultivate and recognize these factors in our practice, and in daily life.
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Insight Meditation Tucson
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2021-10-20
Befriending the Mind
42:02
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Jill Shepherd
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One common misperception of meditation is that it aims to stop thinking, but the true purpose of insight meditation is to develop a more skilful relationship to every aspect of our experience, including our thoughts and emotions.
During this talk, we will explore some ways to let go of unhelpful mental habits and to cultivate helpful ones: states of heart and mind that lead to greater ease, happiness, peace and freedom.
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Cambridge Insight Meditation Center
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2021-10-20
Wise Investigation: Dissolving the Trance
55:25
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Tara Brach
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If we are suffering, it is because we are believing something that is not true and caught in emotional reactivity. A key tool in meditation is investigation–actively inquiring into what is happening inside us. When we investigate with sincere interest and care, the light of our attention untangles difficult emotions and nourishes intimate relationships. As this light is turned toward awareness itself, it reveals the radiance and emptiness of our true nature.
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Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC
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2021-10-20
Returning to the source
41:08
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Ajahn Sucitto
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The protocols for cultivation of citta differ from those that operate in the sense world. Step back from the object and notice how it’s affecting you; notice how the subject is being affected. This leads to a purification in terms of engagement with phenomena, and draws away from clinging and passion. From this place of solidity and strength, turn back to the wisdom of your own heart and act from there.
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Cittaviveka
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Cittaviveka 2021 Rains Retreat - Closing Group Practice
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2021-10-19
Signs, distorted or uplifting
38:14
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Ajahn Sucitto
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In cultivation we’re learning to experience things directly as they really are. We come to understand that we are moved and triggered by signs, not things. A lot of practice is about turning attention away from unskillful signs and cultivating skillful ones – cooperation, generosity, goodness. Then you’ve got something precious that takes you through difficult places and makes you feel comfortable when you’re in a bleak state.
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Cittaviveka
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Cittaviveka 2021 Rains Retreat - Closing Group Practice
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2021-10-17
The Dharma of Difficult Emotions
62:35
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Amita Schmidt
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The dharma of difficult emotions. How to work with thoughts and emotions and find freedom through them. This talk is also on You Tube via Amita Schmidt. Here is the Spiritual Credo handout that goes with this talk: https://amitaschmidt.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Spiritual-Credo.pdf
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Cloud Mountain Retreat Center
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2021-10-15
Breath meditation, Q&A
1:29:40
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Bhante Sujato
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Breath meditation led by Bhante Sujato: developing qualities of softness, gentleness. Q+A: how to stay focused. About sadness. Talking about deep experiences. Nibbānadhātu. History of decline of Buddhism in India. Love and impermanence. Upanishads and suttas. Deductive and inductive logic.
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Lokanta Vihara
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2021-10-14
Web of goodness
36:43
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Ajahn Sucitto
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We live in a human context with its mixture of bright and discordant energies. Our individual internal contexts are no different. We cultivate to potentize Dhamma factors for our own benefit and the benefit of the world. Grounding in wholesome qualities and steadiness of body, we find a raft in this very flooded swampy saṁsāra from which we can meet and review the flood of emotions and impulses.
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Cittaviveka
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Cittaviveka 2021 Rains Retreat - Closing Group Practice
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2021-10-11
On Death | Monday Night Talk
58:46
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Jack Kornfield
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We live in a culture of denial and youth. How can we find a freedom of heart in this world of birth and death? We can start by acknowledging that everything is subject to change. Death is an advisor that can give us clarity about what really matters.
We can be the loving witness of this life, yet not cling to it. We can cherish life, yet in the end we will have to let go.
As Mary Oliver writes:
To live in this world
you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it
against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.
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Spirit Rock Meditation Center
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Monday and Wednesday Talks
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2021-10-09
A vehicle for liberation
38:34
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Ajahn Sucitto
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We can reach into that which is bigger than our personal form, where we don’t feel the separation, we feel held by something that never leaves us – the boundless heart. We’re never totally closed, we just have scar tissue, and it can be brought back to life. This is the medium – lovingkindness, compassion, measureless, unrestricted. This is a vehicle for transformation and liberation from being identified from the world of circumstance.
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Chicago Theosophical Society
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Brahmavihara Workshop
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2021-10-09
Q&A
22:29
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Ajahn Sucitto
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(1:20) Returning to the unfettered after restriction; (6:22) romantic love; (8:50) holding in between breathing in and out; (13:31) feelings of restriction; (16:37) where emotions tend to arise in the body; (19:20) mind is easily distracted.
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Chicago Theosophical Society
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Brahmavihara Workshop
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2021-10-09
Let the heart express itself
23:14
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Ajahn Sucitto
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Love can come to be seen as a reward for good boys and girls. But it’s not a reward, and it’s not a social courtesy. It’s unfettered receptivity to the felt experience of being human. Gently removing barriers and setting aside distortions, stay steady with the natural trembling of being touched and let the heart express itself.
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Chicago Theosophical Society
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Brahmavihara Workshop
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2021-10-09
Guided Meditation: Heartfulness – a natural quality
20:59
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Ajahn Sucitto
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As you come into presence, feeling body and breathing, mind naturally wants to wander off. Return because there’s something enjoyable and essential to nourish yourself with. Open up to the capacity for enjoyment of the qualities and energies that begin to be felt. Enjoy the present moment as it is – a gift.
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Chicago Theosophical Society
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Brahmavihara Workshop
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2021-10-09
Natural flowing of goodwill
18:49
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Ajahn Sucitto
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The brahmaviharā are often referred to as sublime abiding places. This is the realm of heart, not a sensory realm but a spiritual one. The heart is often troubled in daily life. With the removal of obstacles and the sense of separation, the natural flowing of heartful qualities is restored. These are part of our nature, treasures of the gone forth person.
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Chicago Theosophical Society
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Brahmavihara Workshop
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2021-10-07
Emptiness and the Big Perspective
50:29
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James Baraz
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The Heart Sutra teaching famously states: "Form is Emptiness Emptiness is Form." This liberating perspective is the gateway to understanding the inter-connectedness of all phenomena and the spaciousness and freedom that comes from seeing our place in the bigger scheme of things. The talk includes a recording of Apollo astronaut Rusty Schweikart's moving account of the profound shift he experienced upon seeing the Earth from outer space.
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Insight Meditation Community of Berkeley
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2021-10-06
Realizing Your Deepest Desires
51:26
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Tara Brach
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This talk differentiates between egoic intentions (driven by wants and fears), and our true aspiration (deepest desires) to manifest our full potential for awake awareness and love. We explore ways to realize and open to our deepest desires when we are stuck in self-promotion, grasping and conflict, so that our aspiration becomes a compass of the heart that can guide us in living with wisdom and compassion.
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Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC
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2021-10-06
Gathering allies for liberation
52:03
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Ajahn Sucitto
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As we practice, there can be an urge to get out of this world. Rather than follow that instinct, find a way to move through the world in a way that’s harmonious. By being heedful, lifting attention, disengaging and seeing the world clearly, there is the possibility to act rather than get swept up. The 5 indriya are our allies, protecting the heart as we put the teachings into practice in our lives.
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Cittaviveka
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2021-10-06
Dankbarkeit
45:28
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Renate Seifarth
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Wenn wir Metta für unsere Wohltäter üben, spüren wir eine große Dankbarkeit aufsteigen, die uns füllt und nährt. Eine kurze Reflexion während des Tages, was wir alles Schönes erfahren haben, führt uns den täglichen Reichtum vor Augen. Das braucht ein innehalten und Vieles nicht für selbstverständlich nehmen.
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Waldhaus am Laacher See
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Metta Retreat
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2021-10-06
The Seven Factors of Awakening
68:45
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Donald Rothberg
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After a brief review of the last two sessions that Donald has offered on traditional teachings about awakening and contemporary maps of the path of awakening, we explore the core teaching of the Seven Factors of Awakening: mindfulness, investigation, resolve or energy, joy or rapture, tranquility, concentration, and equanimity. We look both individually at each of the seven, and also suggest a number of ways of practicing with this teaching, whether in a particular meditation session, in daily life, or over a sustained period of time. At the end, there is some discussion.
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Spirit Rock Meditation Center
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Monday and Wednesday Talks
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2021-10-04
The Nature of Awakening: Traditional and Contemporary Maps
1:11:48
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Donald Rothberg
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While much of our interest in practice may be focused on finding some degree of peace and understanding, or on making workable challenging states of body, mind, and heart, it's helpful to keep the vision of how practice aims at awakening (bodhi). In this talk, we explore how the Buddha understood awakening and the path to awakening, as well as perspectives on the lived experience of awakening from later Buddhist traditions. We then ask the question about whether a contemporary path of awakening simply follows the traditional path of awakening. We explore how it's important also to include as parts of the path of awakening teachings and practices that help us work with both more psychological material (such as connected with difficult early experiences, trauma, limiting beliefs, etc.) and with our social conditioning (such as around race, gender, sexuality, class, age, etc.), areas that may not be adequately transformed only with the resources of traditional paths of awakening.
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Spirit Rock Meditation Center
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Monday and Wednesday Talks
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