My focus in teaching is to provide the support that students need to turn their life to the dharma, to truth, and to find ways to come out of their pain and suffering. The retreat experience is an invaluable aid to this exploration; however, what matters more is how one integrates this under- standing into everyday life.
I care that students see through the illusory wall between formal meditation and their daily life. Then, what remains is a meditative attitude to all that occurs.
Vipassana practice helps us to become respectful and caring towards ourselves and others. This generates the conditions of mind and heart that allow us to awaken to the truth of who we are, rather than believing in our limited assumptions. As we see the impersonal nature of our own mind, we then experience a deep engagement with life that allows for a complete transformation of the heart. When we know this deeply, we can no longer unconsciously engage in actions that will lead to suffering and the ongoing destruction of our planet.
As a teacher, I am accessible and able to meet people at an intimate level. I am interested in how the language that we use can show where we are holding on. I look to the concepts about reality that people believe in as the key that unlocks the door to liberating insight. People can easily discount their experiences and forget that they hold the seeds to liberation, that the wisdom is already within them. As people speak what is in their hearts, affirmation brings about the confidence needed to take the next step, which can often seem confusing and daunting as one walks into the unknown territory of the mind.
When the small ego self begins to let go of it's self-centered position, the mind turns to the Dharma and sees the three characteristics of existence - impermanence, unsatisfactoriness and selflessness.
In itself, consciousness is pure, but it gets covered over with difficult patterns that bring about suffering. When these patterns are seen and released, a sense of well-being and clarity ensues. Three attitudes to bring to our practice that can hep us along the path.
Without wisdom and awareness, we can climb into our stories, both painful and happy stories, and not see how we are trapped and limited by what we believe is true. Looking at a bigger picture.
This talks describes how to work with mindfulness of Dharmas-the transformation of dukkha (difficult states) to sukha (happy states) or the 7 Factors of Awakening.
Drawing from the Buddha's teaching on mindfulness immersed in the Body, we cultivate a steadying presence as we open to wiser frontiers of our heart and mind.
NO matter how much I might wish for suffering to end, it will always be an intrinsic part of our existence. Opening to this truth, awakens our heart of compassion.
