Mindfulness Meditation a 6-part/week program This six-week program is a training to help participants see how we get caught in suffering in a trance where we are identified with our thoughts, emotions and mind states and explore the practices and teachings which free us. In particular the focus is on how we cultivate a mindfulness and heartfulness that include ourselves and all beings. Week One: The ways we get caught up in stress and suffering, in the trance of a separate self, and the way mindfulness and the cultivation of other positive qualities (skillful effort, self-compassion, wise intention ) can help us find freedom from suffering. What is mindfulness? Mindfulness and stress; posture for meditation; bringing a friendly attitude to whatever we re experiencing, Q&A. How we experience stress and suffering mind caught up in wanting things to be a certain way; fear and anxiety about future; lost in distraction, fantasies; ruminating on past experiences and the sense of separation that goes with it Talk about what mindfulness is bringing a kind and non-judging awareness to your own experience and how it helps us open to things as they are without judgment Mindfulness enhances all aspects of our experience it allows us to be present to experience joy, love, happiness, as well as sadness and difficulties at the only moment when we can really be alive, in the present moment Mindfulness is a simple practice, but not easy. Simple just be here now. Not easy because we have habits and conditioning that take us away from our experience and make it hard to open to it We can train our minds recent scientific studies show how in just eight weeks the brains of participants in a mindfulness course were changed in positive ways, enhancing well-being and limiting stress and anxiety Importance of cultivating a wise attitude in meditation opening to what is, not striving or judging, recognizing and allowing our experience to be as it is Reflect on the intention you bring to this practice. Why does it feel important to take the time to practice? What are your motivations? If you have meditated, how and in what ways have you found it helpful in your daily situation? Importance of self-compassion being kind to ourselves, which is essential if we are to practice and express kindness and love for others find times to pause during the day to come back to awareness of your breath and body Week Two: Develop practice of working with the breath; cultivating a friendly relationship with thoughts, coming back to breath or awareness of body sensations; Q&A. Mindfulness Meditation 2011 page 1
Talk about why it is helpful to develop a focus or anchor in meditation. In mindfulness meditation we normally use what naturally arises in our experience breath, bodily sensations, sound rather than external object or mantra. No right or wrong way; what is most helpful? Reflect on how much of our stress and suffering comes from not being aware of our thoughts letting them go wherever they go, treating them as though they were true, etc. Bringing awareness to the process of thinking (rather than the content of thoughts) can help limit stress and suffering significantly Breath is helpful focus or anchor for many people it s always available, closely tied to our overall feelings of stress or well-being, and in coming back to our breath there tends to be a natural relaxing Using sounds as meditation object can help open to more spacious awareness; awareness of the body seat, feet, hands, sensations in body as a whole can help ground us and move us out of conceptual thought Normalize thinking we re not doing something wrong; thinking is not a problem in meditation; just be aware of how the mind moves from awareness of breath, etc, into thought planning, remembering, daydreaming, etc and in a kind and nonjudging way come back to your object note main qualities of meditation periods, e.g. busy mind calm concentrated sleepy a mixture of experiences find times to pause during the day to come back to awareness of your breath and body Week Three: Strengthening mindfulness and concentration through awareness of the breath; working with difficulties that can arise in meditation discomfort, tiredness, restlessness, doubt It s natural that when we take our attention inward and open to our experience that we will experience difficulties can you make the difficulties into the place of practice? If you experience pain or discomfort, notice the tendency to pull away and see if you can invite a welcoming attitude, allowing what is present tingling, pulsing, pinching, etc to be just as it is. Can you notice how things change? Whatever comes up in meditation can become the object of awareness and when this happens things can shift. Notice the difference between being caught up, carried away with anger over something or towards someone and feeling that same anger but being aware of it. It can be like the difference between being on a wild Mindfulness Meditation 2011 page 2
horse and going wherever the horse wants to go and riding a difficult horse but being in control We tend to associate happiness with getting the things we want and getting rid of what we don t want or like. But it is possible to find a deeper and more reliable happiness and joy through letting go of wanting and aversion by opening to what is. Renunciation tends to be thought of in negative terms in our culture (being deprived of something) but it is more like letting go of or renouncing addiction. There is great freedom in renunciation, letting go of clinging and addiction find times during the day between activities to pause, breathe, come back to awareness of your body Week Four: Working with difficult emotions and mind states; strengthening practice of mindfulness through awareness of breath, body and other experiences. Difficult emotions and mind states can be challenging to work with we tend to take them personally. This feels like my anger. The invitation is to bring an attitude of welcoming the guests the sadness, the anger, the moments of calm or peace and let them express themselves and pass in their own time. Can you experience a strong emotion as like a weather system that is passing through opening to it and allowing it to be as it is? Can you experience the wave the strong emotion or mind state and know the stillness of the ocean the awareness that is not affected by the strong wave of emotion? When difficulties are present, can you feel the space around them? Can you move your awareness to a larger framework not to avoid the experience but rather to know that it is part of a larger field of awareness that we can become disconnected from? This investigation of our experience is really being interested and curious about what is happening with kindness rather than analysis or a story about what we re experiencing. If it is helpful, mention the five Hindrances sense desire, aversion/ill-will, sloth/torpor, restlessness/worry, and doubt. These can be a source of suffering and obstacles or hindrances to practice and to freedom, if we do not bring mindfulness to them. But if we are mindful of them they can become a gateway to freedom they can be experienced as energies of the body and mind that are impermanent, selfless, unreliable Introduce the acronym R-A-I-N, if appropriate: Recognizing; Allowing; Investigating bringing a kind and intimate attention to our experience; Not identifying Importance of cultivating self-compassion in working with difficult emotions and mind states Mindfulness Meditation 2011 page 3
practice bringing mindfulness to areas of daily life at work, driving, walking, eating; note any insights and bring to class Week Five: Bringing the heart fully into our practice; cultivating loving-kindness to help awaken the heart; bringing awareness to and cultivating positive mind states (peace, joy, calm, equanimity ); continue practices from first four classes. Difference between mindfulness bringing awareness to our experience as it is and loving-kindness and other heart practices which invite a cultivation of positive qualities of heart and mind. And the two practices are completely complementary mindfulness involves bringing a kind and loving awareness to our experience; and the heart practices involve the cultivation of a calm, focused mind Bring awareness to those times when difficulties are not present what do you notice? Our minds tend to focus and at times fixate on the difficulties and problems. Our minds tend to be like Velcro for the negative and Teflon for the positive (R Hansen) Can you be aware of those times when difficulties are not present? When you are aware of positive qualities calm, peace, well-being, happiness can you allow yourself to know what this feels like? How does calm feel in the body, in the mind? Allow yourself to feel these positive qualities of heart and mind; let them permeate your mind, heart and body practice bringing mindfulness to daily life walking, eating; interactions with others; note any insights and bring to class Week Six: Practicing walking meditation; give instructions; practice for 10-15 minutes; Q&A; bringing mindfulness into daily life. Practice walking meditation; walking meditation is an opportunity to bring the practice of mindfulness out of the stillness of sitting meditation into movement, which is closer to what we are doing much of the time during our daily lives Bring awareness to the body in movement aware of the sensations of lifting, moving and placing the foot; noticing whatever else arises and letting it pass The essence of the practice of mindfulness meditation is not how well we meditate on the cushion but how we live our lives Mindfulness Meditation 2011 page 4
Living ethically and with a spirit of generosity is an essential part of the practice of mindfulness meditation we cannot live our lives in ways that harm ourselves and others and expect the mind to be calm, peaceful, and amenable to seeing things as they really are. We can train ourselves to bring mindfulness, compassion, and wisdom to our speech and communication, our actions, and how we make our living Mindfulness allows us to open to whatever arises in our lives with greater awareness, kindness and wisdom. We can see the possibility of being less a hostage to our emotions, habits and impulses and more able to see these when they arise and let go/be It is a practice things don t tend to change overnight because we have a good intention. Most of us have had our habits for decades and it takes time to create new and healthier patterns and habits to develop new neural pathways in the brain. So, patience and self-compassion are very important. Notice when the habitual mind jumps in to say, I should be doing better than this because or I can t do this and see it as a movement of the mind that does not have to be believed or followed We can practice mindfulness in our daily lives by taking a sacred pause amidst the activities of our days pausing to bring awareness to the breath or the body between activities, in meetings, walking from one place to another and can use the signals from the world (traffic lights, phone ringing) to take a pause for 2-3 breaths and come home to yourself practice bringing mindfulness to areas of daily life at work, driving, walking, eating; note any insights and bring to class Mindfulness Meditation 2011 page 5