Metta practice offers a radical and yet simple approach and training: To bring kind and wise presence and response to every situation. We incline toward an expansive friendliness, and see what gets in the way of metta. This is an approach centering on kindness and love which finds many echoes in many other spiritual traditions. And yet it can be a very challenging training; we look at a number of the common difficulties of metta practice and how to work with them, particularly distraction and lack of stability of attention, sleepiness and restless energy, difficulty in accessing the kind heart, and the arising of difficult emotions, thoughts, and body-states. As we practice, we integrate mind, heart, and body, increasingly touch our depths and learn how to manifest metta in the world.

We begin with an acknowledgment of the Winter Solstice, and the importance, in a time that is often very busy, of slowing down, like the earth in the Northern Hemisphere, of being relatively still and opening to the generative dimensions of darkness. We then review the main elements of what we explored last week, pointing to the main aspects of the Buddha's teaching on "views" (including belief, positions, etc.), explored through four core texts, and three ways of practicing with views. We then bring some further ways of practicing with views. One is opened up by working with the model, from Chris Argyris, of the "Ladder of Inference," in noticing tendencies to go from direct experience to generalizations (obviously very useful at times), and how sometimes reactivity drives us "up the Ladder" to generalizations. A second is in working with relatively unconscious or half-conscious views, whether about oneself, others, or the nature of things. We close with discussion, intentions, and the dedication of merit.

Practicing with views, beliefs, opinions, and narratives is a central part of our practice (in relationship to ourselves, to others, and in the larger society and world) and was strongly emphasized in the teachings of the Buddha. In this talk, we explore how the Buddha taught on views, emphasizing four core teachings. We then inquire into what is particularly problematic in our relationship to views is the way that we potentially are reactive in relation to views--habitually grasping and pushing away with our views. We then suggest three foundational practices for working with views and beliefs. There is finally about a twenty-minute discussion period.

After some foundational mindfulness instructions, there's an invitation to track for views and beliefs when they appear, whether just for a few moments or in a more sustained way, linked perhaps with reviewing an interaction with someone or something that happened. Near the end, there's guidance to bring to mind a situation in the last few days in which there was a strong sense of a view taken and then explore the experience of holding a strong view.

We explore how to practice with the intention to take everything as the opportunity for learning--an approach which is named in different ways in Buddhist and other traditions, including the Zen saying, "The obstacle is the path," and the Tibetan Lojong teaching, "Turn all obstacles into the path of practice." How do we follow this intention as individuals, groups or communities, or whole societies? We look particularly at ways to take everything as practice as individuals and some of the challenges of such an approach. A key is opening to challenging or difficult experiences when they are in the "workable" range and not overwhelming, with mindfulness, wisdom, and compassion. Out of such a process may come gifts and the "cleaning up" of our residues of compulsive greed, aversion, and delusion!

After foundational mindfulness instructions, there is guidance, just after the core instructions and then briefly twice more during the session, on approaching the silent sitting in the spirit of our talk theme, taking every moment as practice, as an opportunity for learning.

One of the central intentions of our practice is to learn from all experiences. This is not easy, both with difficult experiences or with wonderful experiences; we might in both cases revert to habitual forms of consciousness and behavior. We explore ways that we might "turn all obstacles into the path of practice" (as is said in the Tibetan Lojong teachings), or see "the obstacle as the path" (as in Zen). Central is our practice particularly with unpleasant or difficult experiences, studying and transforming our reactivity. We also see how sometimes there are important gifts that come from painful and/or difficult experiences; we share together in the group some of these kinds of experiences. We end with an invitation to practice with this basic intention to learn from everything in the next week!

We start with a brief review of the last three Wednesday sessions on "Dukkha and the End of Dukkha," including briefly summarizing the teachings of "The Two Arrows" and "Dependent Origination" (going from pleasant/unpleasant to grasping/pushing away); grasping and pushing away are interpreted as the most important meaning of dukkha as reactivity. Then there is an acknowledgment of Yom Kippur occurring on this day and its relationship to our practice. The core of the talk is exploring ten fundamental ways of practicing with reactivity (a pdf of the ten ways will be posted linked with the talk). The talk is followed by discussion.

After some brief initial instructions in posture, setting intentions, cultivating stability of mind, and basic mindfulness, there is a period of settling, followed by brief instructions on being mindful of any moments of reactivity, and then, some time later, on being mindful of any moderate or greater (while still workable) moments of pleasant or unpleasant experiences, noticing any tendencies to move from pleasant to craving and grasping (one form of reactivity), and to move from unpleasant to not wanting to pushing away in some way (the other main form of reactivity).

In this third of three talks on "Dukkha and the End of Dukkha," perhaps the core teaching of the Buddha, we first review what was covered in the first two talks, starting with examining the multiple meanings of dukkha in the Buddha's teaching and the fact that most meanings of dukkha don't help us make sense of "the end of dukkha." Only a sense of dukkha as reactivity, as taught in the Two Arrows and in Dependent Origination suggest what the end of dukkha means. We then review ways of practicing with reactivity in individual practice, and in our relationships. On this basis, we then go further exploring the nature of reactivity in the larger social context, whether in individuals' reactivity or in various forms of institutionalized reactivity. We then look at two ways of practicing, first exploring our various forms of social conditioning, typically linked with reactivity, and then looking at how nonreactivity in Buddhist practice maps very closely onto the traditions of nonviolence from Gandhi, King, and others. This is followed by discussion, in which we in part look at some of the complexities and challenges of this approach.