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The greatest gift is the
gift of the teachings
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Dharma Talks
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2009-07-28
My Enemy, My Teacher
45:07
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Winnie Nazarko
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When we attempt to extend metta (loving-kindness) to difficult people, things get interesting. In order to expand our capacity to love, we must strengthen our motivation to do so and work with obstacles which may arise. Through reflecting on the value of metta in our families and communities, we find the courage to undertake this spiritual challenges. Includes guided meditation.
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Spirit Rock Meditation Center
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Insight Meditation
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2009-07-22
The Beautiful Qualities of Compassion and Equanimity
55:19
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Sally Armstrong
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The four Brahma Viharas are loving-kindness, compassion, joy and equanimity. The foundation practice is metta, or loving-kindness, which cultivates a friendly and kind attitude towards ourselves, others and all experiences. When this caring heart meets suffering, it naturally responds with compassion. But the last Brahma Vihara, equanimity, the quality of calm acceptance, is necessary keep the heart in balance and open to all the joys and sorrows of our lives.
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Spirit Rock Meditation Center
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Metta Retreat
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2009-07-22
Suttas 1 - Picking Up the Teaching
60:37
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Ajahn Sucitto
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A reading of excerpts from the Suttas related to how one gets encouraged to undertake the practice. 1) AN 3:65 – Kālāma Sutta; 2) MN 95 – Cankī Sutta; and, 3) MN 70 – Kīṭāgiri Sutta. Some common threads are qualities of self-questioning, questioning one’s motivation, knowing what’s reliable, knowing how to test it out.
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Cittaviveka
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Vassa Retreat
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2009-07-18
The Practice of Metta
48:58
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Sally Armstrong
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Metta, or loving-kindness, is the practice of cultivating a friendly and accepting attitude towards ourselves, our experience and all other beings. As we cultivate this quality through intensive practice, we can find that it can become our default response to life, rather than the conditioned habits of aversion, fear or grasping.
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Spirit Rock Meditation Center
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Metta Retreat
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2009-07-18
The Most Obvious Important Thing
48:04
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Ajahn Sucitto
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We have something in us that naturally searches for pleasure, searches for meaning. We go out to find it, but it’s actually right here in our embodiment. The indriya are expressed in our embodiment, they support embodied intelligence. Focus on the practises that establish these faculties. As they come together, everything rests, there’s a ceasing, you can relax.
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Cittaviveka
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Vassa Retreat
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2009-07-17
Dhamma Body is Nobody's
30:09
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Ajahn Sucitto
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A reflection on the tendency to attach to external forms. Can we make use of these systems and structures without getting so wrapped up in them? Cultivation of the 5 indriya helps establish appropriate relationship to the world. As they come together, you start to see the 4 Noble Truths. It’s the only thing that’s really sure!
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Cittaviveka
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Vassa Retreat
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2009-07-16
Growing a True Face
24:19
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Ajahn Sucitto
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A lot of practice is about working with difficult mind states, emotional currents, and personality patterns. With the establishment of basic ground, we bring together a unified Dhamma body that holds us steady. It gives us a reference point, a presence, that drains power out of the hindrances and allows us to meet difficulties that arise.
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Cittaviveka
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Vassa Retreat
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2009-07-14
Natural Mind - Strength, Warmth, Clarity
29:34
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Ajahn Sucitto
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With mindfulness there’s a deepening into mind. When established you feel the flow of natural responses. Mindfulness places us back into these fundamental qualities of basic strength, basic warmth, basic clarity. The practise is staying with that, letting confused restless energies settle into that. That’s where samadhi can arise.
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Cittaviveka
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Vassa Retreat
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2009-07-13
Five Faculties - Indriya
22:07
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Ajahn Sucitto
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The indriya (faith, energy, mindfulness, collectedness, discernment), sometimes called the governing faculties, are capacities we already have and operate through in some rudimentary form. This teaching gives a description each, and how they can be developed to become supportive faculties. When they come together, they merge in the deathless.
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Cittaviveka
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Vassa Retreat
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2009-07-12
Guide Meditation on Breathing
46:45
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Ajahn Sucitto
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Keep in mind, attention is on breathing rather than a breath – a process, not a specific thing. Making use of vitakka-vicara, linger and pick up the quality of breath-energy as it moves through. Hold the form, keep the inquiry, remain in the present moment. What is the breathing now?
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Cittaviveka
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Vassa Retreat
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2009-07-12
Lawless Order
23:57
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Ajahn Sucitto
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There are certain inclinations we have as human beings. These boil down to the indriya – dominating faculties – of faith, energy, mindfulness, concentration and wisdom. They can go wrong, become sources of suffering if they’re not balanced through awareness. Various examples of how they manifest, and how to keep them in harmony are given.
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Cittaviveka
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Vassa Retreat
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2009-07-11
Having Fun (Skillfully)
36:40
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Ajahn Sucitto
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The experience of having fun, enjoyment, is an energy. The problem comes when we locate it externally, then attach to it, self-orient around it. A skilful person knows how to cultivate pleasure in themselves. Practise with meditation. Find out what blocks it and what encourages it. The Buddha taught pleasure as a way to awakening.
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Cittaviveka
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Vassa Retreat
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2009-07-11
Walk Back to Center
18:31
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Ajahn Sucitto
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In whatever activity we engage in, meditation through the postures is a matter of returning to presence – to that awareness which can know. With walking, don’t do the walking, meditate the walking. Maintain a core presence that doesn’t participate and doesn’t shut anything out. Meet everything with openness and alertness, like a mother welcoming her children.
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Cittaviveka
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Vassa Retreat
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2009-07-09
Opening the Door
16:43
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Ajahn Sucitto
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Encouragement to make an effort with the retreat form. Give particular attention to posture. To clean and purify you have to open up the house, open up the body. Open up the world, the doors to heaven and hell. Whatever comes through, keep the door open, let the energies blow through. Body is where we can break the cycle of samsara.
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Cittaviveka
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Vassa Retreat
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2009-07-07
How Real is the Real World - Asalha Puja
54:33
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Ajahn Sucitto
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The so-called real world is concocted from our fears, beliefs, obsessions. All of which are changeable and conditioned. There is a real that the Buddha spoke of: he called it the peaceful, the sublime, the unbounded. It’s not located in time and space, but it’s experienceable. Form and function, when appropriately considered and applied, can serve as our vehicle to the real.
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Cittaviveka
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Vassa Retreat
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