Spiritual Practice and the Death of a Loved One December 28, 2009
Posted by bodhidude in : Healing, Psychology, Spirituality, articles , 1 comment so far
A friend of mine recently lost a loved one to suicide and asked me to advise her on how she might benefit her friend now that he has died. This got me thinking about death again which is not so unusual for someone on the spiritual path but it takes on new significance when it strikes close to home. Most spiritual traditions have some kind of practice to benefit loved ones after death but rather than regurgitate those here I’m going to present my view on working with the death of a loved one. I present this from the perspective of a spiritual practitioner as well as a counselor.
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Feeding your Demons November 16, 2009
Posted by bodhidude in : Healing, Psychology, Spirituality, Transformation, articles , 4comments
Have you had the experience of having intentions, goals and aspirations that you are passionate about but never seem to fully come to fruition? Do you find yourself struggling with habits, addictions or feeling stuck in familiar patterns in your life that no longer serve you but resist your efforts at change? Do you ever feel like there is a part of you that is working against your wishes? Well for me the answer to these questions has been most definitely YES, and for a long time my response was to increase my effort and fight against the tendencies in me that I found to be obstacles or to throw up my hands in frustration and sink into depression. However I began to realize the more I struggled to rid myself of the qualities I didn’t like about myself, the more I tried to force change by sheer effort and willpower and the more I judged myself for not succeeding the way I felt I should I only made these seemingly opposing forces or qualities stronger. Recently I discovered a powerful practice that directly addresses this issue which is known as “Feeding Your Demons”. Having put it into practice I find my life transforming in amazing and powerful ways and I don’t find myself so much in conflict. Feeding your demons is an old Tibetan practice known as Chud which originated in the 12th century with a female Yogini named Machig Labdron. It is presented in a very simple and accessible Western context by Buddhist teacher Tsultrim Allione in her book “Feeding your Demons” (see resources section).
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Mindfulness and the practice of RAIN September 24, 2009
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Most people have heard of mindfulness, like meditation it has become a fairly common term in general use. It has also become more accepted in western psychology as having therapeutic benefit. Many books have been written on the topic and yet there remains much confusion in terms of just what mindfulness is and how to apply it on a daily basis to heal and find greater freedom, this is especially true with regard to difficult or emotional situations, its easier to be mindful of a sunset compared to the intense anger in a fight with a partner. While the definition of mindfulness varies I would describe it as a gentle, focused, compassionate attention. A quality of spaciously noticing what is happening whether it be within or without. In the west today there has developed a tradition of Buddhist training and practice that is mixed with western psychology. From this tradition, represented by Psychologist/Buddhist Teachers such as Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach, a very practical application of mindfulness practice has emerged that can be readily applied in daily life especially with difficult issues or situations.
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Dropping our story September 16, 2009
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Meditation has been one of the most powerful healing techniques that I’ve ever encountered and I’ve used it extensively on my own path as well as regularly offering it to those I work with. The power behind it lies in its ability to help one touch the core of their being, their inner most nature which from my perspective is limitless in every way, this includes limitless joy, abundance, power, love, healing and compassion. Meditation and mindfulness practice also help to break through the mental stories that we overlay on so many of our experiences and bring us back in contact with raw feeling and experience.
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The Warrior Archetype and the Reemergence of the Goddess July 26, 2009
Posted by bodhidude in : Divine Feminine/Goddess, Psychology, Spirituality, Warrior/Divine Masculine, articles , 1 comment so far
For the past few thousand years we have lived in a patriarchal paradigm where the masculine has been over emphasized at the expense of the feminine. This has produced not only the oppression of women, constant war and violence but also inner conflict for both men and women as each struggles to be whole human beings in a world where an imbalanced ideal is cherished. The result of the over emphasis on the masculine has resulted in it taking a negative form as the feminine is devalued and even systematically repressed. This negative masculine form is cut off from its feminine side and so is out of balance and taken to an extreme in a futile attempt to compensate for the lack of grounding in the feminine. This is symbolized by two archetypal patterns in particular, that of the Negative Father and the Warrior. The Negative Father is the authoritarian head of the household who rules the family and is often the source of abuse, sexual misconduct and control. This pattern is also seen in the authoritarian governments that have become the norm where the government represents the ultimate controlling punitive father figure for its citizens. This isn’t to say all fathers fall into this pattern but it is symbolic of a key aspect of patriarchal power. As a counselor I see many clients who have a figure in their lives in the role of the Negative Father and much of their work in counseling involves working through trauma associated with that as well as reclaiming their power from that figure and this includes men and women.
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Who needs work?! July 6, 2009
Posted by bodhidude in : Livelihood, Psychology, Transformation, articles , 2comments
For most of us working sucks which I think is why work is a four letter word. Have you ever really thought about why you work and what role it plays in your life? Most of us work because we think we have to, to pay the bills or really to survive. We might have a job that we can’t stand or we might even have a job that we like or no job but when whatever we do becomes work it takes on a quality of struggle. If we work for ourselves doing what we love often it becomes work when we struggle to make ends meet. Our society is built on work and struggle, the idea that you have to sacrifice much of who you are to survive. Right behind the struggle is lack, the belief/feeling that we are incomplete or lacking something that we must seek externally whether it is money, love or fulfillment.
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Meditation: Finding freedom in the present June 14, 2009
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There are two things about life that never cease to amaze me, one is how painful it can be and the other is how simple and beautiful it can be. When things are going well it is very easy to grab onto that experience and expect life to remain good and comfortable but inevitably it changes and we experience pain and difficultly which we tend to want to avoid or push away. You could say that this process of attachment and aversion is one of the main causes of suffering and dissatisfaction in life because we can’t hold onto the good stuff and we can’t avoid the painful, the one constant in this is change. Often we are not aware of the way we hold onto or push away parts of our life. We can pretty much count on almost everything being temporary and this is just a reality of life which doesn’t need to be a problem, but when attachment and aversion arise it quickly becomes problematic.
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Romantic relationship in the new paradigm May 28, 2009
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We are living in transformative times there is no question about it. It seems almost everything on an external as well as internal level is undergoing radical change these days. This is an exciting, powerful and often painful process to be involved in but the potential is amazing. Many of the structures from the old paradigm including government, religion, financial and social are beginning to crumble, the weight of their dysfunction finally beginning to overpower their momentum. As these old structures break down it is important for us to engage a creative process collectively to form new systems to take their place. New systems that reflect a new era and a different level of conscious and that redefine boundaries that reflect the next level of growth we are entering into as a society.
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Resting in stillness in the midst of chaos April 28, 2009
Posted by bodhidude in : Psychology, Spirituality, blog , 1 comment so far
How do you cope when you find your life in chaos? I’ve been experiencing increasing chaos in my life in many areas and its been interesting to notice my reaction to it. My process has involved trying to create a new livelihood so that I can create the resources I need in my life without sacrificing my heart. It has not been a easy process and the short term result has been very little money. My living situation is coming to an end this month so I’ve also had to deal with finding a new place to live with very little money. As a result my life feels like chaos, nothing stable, no stable work, no stable living space and no stable peace of mind.
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Struggle and conflict January 10, 2009
Posted by bodhidude in : Livelihood, Psychology, Spirituality, blog , add a commentIts interesting how patterns come and go in life and its also interesting how intense the rate and degree of change has gotten for many people. I came out of last year feeling pretty good, having created a new place to live, a new job and a new deeper commitment to practice. What I’ve experienced in the last few days can only be described as a tidal wave of energy uprooting my life yet again. What I didn’t realize was that in creating these things as wonderful as they were, they were also reflecting old patterns and I found that I created an illusion for myself. The illusion being imagined stability and peace in these things that I created. I felt grounded and stable and imagined this could be maintained in its current form for some time. I know better than that but not recently it seems.
What I didn’t realize is the process of change and growth that I have undertaken would not allow me to grasp on to these things in ways that I would in the past. In my job I created the perfect environment in which to do computer work. A worldwide Buddhist organization devoted to teaching and charitable work with an office that is as peaceful and conscious as I’ve ever experienced. A wonderful boss who seems to actually care about my happiness and well being, not something I’ve ever experienced in the workplace before. But this perfect environment essentially highlighted what I’ve been having so much trouble accepting for so long. I don’t feel called to do technology work anymore. No matter how much I try I simply cannot find any passion or interest for it. This is quite frustrating because I am very good at it and have more than 10 years of experience so it seems like the ideal way to make money and offer service. But its not to be anymore, this job has helped me see that, if I can’t do this work here then I can’t do it anywhere. So time to let go and face the edge again, if not technology work then I don’t know how I will pay the bills, its the unknown. Nothing to do but trust.
My living situation is similar in that I thought, great I’ve got a cool stable place for six months and then I’ll move on to something else. But its been anything but stable, with two roommates moving out in the first 2 months, utter chaos. Now come to find out that the landlords want us to pay the rent on any unrented rooms, so much for having a budget or knowing what to expect financially. Not sure how this will be resolved yet but there certainly seems to be no stability to be found here.
More than these things I’ve felt lately like I’m in conflict with everyone and everything. Like its an unending onslaught of problems, difficulties and interpersonal issues. I know I’m creating this buts its been absolutely exhausting. In group the other night it became clear that part of it at least is that I am feeling a great deal and not really allowing the emotion to flow. Feeling a lot around all the change and chaos, feeling a lot around my friend Sheleigh moving away to Arizona, feeling a lot about facing my fears of creating right livelihood, dealing with more change and attachment with my friend Kara, facing my fears and desires around relationship and on and on. There is a lot to feel but I’m still working on letting it flow, well really with letting everything in my life flow without grasping on so tightly. It hurts. Its terrifying. Its sad. And its also wonderful, freeing and filled with joy.
My practice has deepened which I know often brings more unconscious processes and feelings to the surface. It can cause a resurfacing of old patterns allowing them to be illuminated, felt and released yet again, another layer of the onion to peel away. Its a pretty intense time right now and I sometimes wonder if I will make it through but then again I know I will. My old Zen teacher Diado Roshi says that the process involves facing the edge and pushing it then inevitably pulling back into old forms of imagined safety, old patterns and then seeing that they don’t work and again facing and pushing the edge. A flow, no problem if you don’t try to hold on. Let go……..always.
Nurturing Ourselves November 16, 2008
Posted by bodhidude in : Healing, Psychology, Spirituality, blog , 2commentsI was spending time with a friend this evening and we were talking about nurturing ourselves and it occurred to me that nurturing myself has become a core practice. It seems that so often discontent and suffering comes from seeking to be nurtured from an external source rather than an internal one. Not that other people, things and situations cannot be nurturing but they really aren’t that satisfying if we aren’t first nurturing ourselves. So what do I mean by nurturing? I guess I mean taking responsibility for my own happiness, peace and well being and doing things to cultivate that in my life. Seeing that ultimately these things comes from within, others can share them and reflect them but cannot give them to us if we are not in touch with them in ourselves. In fact if we are not nurturing ourselves then we may seek it from others which makes our relationships problematic because we’re seeking things from people that they cannot give us and seeing them through the filter of our needs. That results in not being able to be in relationship with them fully as individuals and is quite unfulfilling.
I find that nurturing is a good way to look at each moment because in each moment I can ask myself the question, am I nurturing myself in this moment? Is what I’m doing right now serving my highest good. If I’m not I then have the opportunity to look at what I’m doing and refocus my attention in a new direction. It brings up the question of if anything in our lives does not nurture us why do we make it a part of our life. If my job does not bring me happiness, peace and well-being why am I there? Do I really need to be in a job that doesn’t. If a relationship doesn’t nurture me why am I in it? What am I getting out of such a relationship and what am I offering to the other person? I think if we nurture ourselves then we will draw in jobs, relationships, living situations and other things that nurture us because those external things will reflect what we are already doing for ourselves internally. This goes along with the idea that if you want to create something externally you must first make it a reality inside. The external world reflects the internal.
I was talking to my client today about keeping things really simple in working with our minds and I realized that nurturing ourselves is ultimately very simple because to do so all we really have to do is stop and become present, enter the now and touch the fullness, beauty and power of LIFE and we will realize that we’ve never been anything but nurtured. So maybe you could say its more like remembering our true nurtured self. I’m loving the simplicity.
Personal Power: Beyond Hope and Hopelessness August 3, 2008
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I’ve thought a lot about hope and hopelessness lately in light of my process of inner growth and also with respect to what is going on in the world. I know many people feel hopeless about the direction the world is taking as well as with their own life situation. They feel helpless to do anything to change it and frustrated that they can’t seem to create what they want and I know how they feel. On the other hand, I know people who feel a sense of hope that things will be ok and will be transformed. I see this especially with spiritually minded people and people who are into things like 2012 and other viewpoints that see a positive future.
For me however, both hope and hopelessness are two poles of the same continuum of powerlessness. In looking at this in my own experience and those around me I see two common elements of both hope and hopelessness. The first is giving away ones power and the second is focusing on the future at the expense of the present. When we feel hopeless we usually feel powerless to change an experience we do not want. We basically don’t want what the present moment consists of and we extend that into the future feeling as if we have no power to create something different. A hopeful feeling is similar in the sense that hope usually focuses on the future. We have hope that things will get better or change , in the future, because if they were the way we wanted right now there would be nothing to hope for. By hoping for a positive future outcome we are saying we are powerless to create this desired outcome now and so need to hope that it occurs in some imagined future by some unknown means. Hope and hopelessness are the same from this viewpoint expect in imagined quality of their outcome.
The future, whether we fear it or hope for it in a positive way does not exist. It is simply a thought mixed with various emotions in the present. Putting our hopes or fears into the future results in us giving away our power because our power, the essence of who we are exists only in the present. Nothing is ever accomplished except in the present. If you put something off until tomorrow you will still have to accomplish it in the present if it is to be accomplished. What I’m working on in my practice is letting go of the past and the future and putting as much of my attention and energy as possible into right now. I find it incredibly empowering and when I am able to be fully present there is no hope or hopelessness, there is only now and all the power and possibility that it contains. The present moment is not always pleasurable but it is always powerful and alive. If we can accept the natural suffering of life when it is present instead of fighting or avoiding it we have the opportunity in that acceptance to go deeper and experience real peace and power. To be free of pain and pleasure, good and bad, right and wrong and the whole dualistic delusion. If something needs to be done we know exactly what to do and when to do it because we function from a place of clarity and power. We are fully alive and a participant in life.
Happiness vs Peace June 18, 2008
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In my practice lately one distinction that is becoming more clear and at the same time up leveling my experience is the experience of peace compared to that of happiness. So much of my life has been spent seeking happiness at first externally but more recently internally. Wishing happiness for myself and others as well and working to create it wherever and whenever possible. I began to adopt the perspective that instead of anything out there creating my happiness I am the creator of it and thus its source is within. That shift from an external source of happiness to an internal one was quite powerful. However I’m beginning to see the focus on happiness itself as an obstacle because it still seems connected to the world of form whether its external forms such as people, money or experiences or internal forms such as an identity, a happy state of mind or conceptual ideas of love and compassion. This is still quite a limited experience and since it is still connected with the world of form it remains transient and subject to its opposite.
What now seems more powerful and freeing is peace. The deep peace that comes from being fully present, being connected with present experience without judgment, resistance or avoidance. The deep peace that in the stillness when thought has subsided and the mind is at rest shines through from the very core of being, the divine. From here happiness even in its most noble and selfless forms seems shallow and trivial. It still feels good but more like a passing shadow on the surface of consciousness. Pain and suffering too when one is connected with being still hurt but are seen as equally surface and temporary and are permeated with this energy of peace. For me this makes the temporary states of happiness and pain far less important, they are still necessary experiences and I sometimes get caught up in them but they just don’t seem worthy of very much attention anymore.
The seeking of happiness and the avoidance or resistance to pain consume so much energy, its amazing to feel that deep sense of peace from the level of being when I’m able to let that go for a time.
Who is the dreamer? June 8, 2008
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I’ve often engaged in the contemplation that this life is a dream and the enlightenment process is awakening from the dream and realizing it to be a dream thereby ceasing to identify with it as solid and inherently real. So from this perspective what is the dream? The dream is the fluctuating constantly changing world of form in which we live. Just like in a night dream when we don’t realize we are dreaming we are swept up in the content of the dream and so react to that content as if it were solid and real. When we become lucid in the dream we realize that we are dreaming while still in the dream. This realization allows us to cease identifying with the content of the dream and instead identify with the dreamer. We realize we are creating the dream and therefore can choose to end it, change it or engage it. We take back our power from the illusory dream.
If we think of waking life a denser version of dream although equally illusory and lacking inherent existence we can cease to identify with the waking dream of form and instead identify with the dreamer who is aware of it. Recently I was reading from Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth and he brings up the question of just who is the dreamer from this perspective. The dreamer is not me, the “I” or my sense of self because when I wake up from the dream and cease to identify with the world of form my “self” is recognized as equally illusory and part of the dream. But if its not me that awakens from the dream then who is it?
Tolle addresses this in an interesting way. “The dreamer is not the person”…..”The dreamer is the absolute reality in which all forms come and go…..the dreamer is consciousness itself. Awakening from the dream is consciousness freeing itself from form and becoming aware of itself. The universe becoming aware of itself through the channel of us……
Letting go, trusting and the present moment May 5, 2008
Posted by bodhidude in : Psychology, Spirituality, blog , add a commentAfter letting go of so many things in my life I am really in a place of recreating things at every level. What is interesting is that I’m being called to recreate my life in a totally new way. The old patterns are no longer working for me. Whenever I try to grasp at anything it almost immediately dissolves or slips away. Having let go of so much has illuminated my attachment and clinging in a big way both clinging to the things I am letting go of and trying to cling to the new things I am creating.
However fear based clinging is no longer working for me, not that it every really did it just appeared to. Now my experience reflects it immediately, whenever I’m grasping what I’m grasping at falls away quickly whether it be money, people or situations. What actually is beginning to work for me in this new phase is a three step process. The first step involves the practice of being in the present moment. When I am grounded in the present moment I am not tripping out about the future or brooding about the past. When I am in the present moment I have access to my truth or intuition, my creative power and energy and my passion. It is from this place that all things are possible and from here that I have access to limitless abundance. It is a fearless powerful rich place to be. The second step is to set conscious intentions as to what I want to create and from the grounded place of the present moment to place my attention and energy on what I seek to create. What we pay attention to is what we create. But the attention has to come from inner joy and creativity, from the present moment. The energy of the present moment is channeled into the intention and then by building that into a vision with all its glorious details the stage is set for actual physical manifestation.
The third step is dealing with things that obstruct this process like fear, doubt and lack. These negative thoughts and emotions come up because there is a habitual pattern of focusing on them. So when they come up instead of getting swept away by them which short circuits the creative process I consciously feel and acknowledge them and then let go and bring my attention back to the present moment and my vision. This becomes a process of slowly breaking the habitual pattern of fear and lack by releasing the energy behind it and continually bringing my attention back to the moment and my creative vision. I realize that each time I illuminate the process of fear and doubt and consciously bring my attention back to the present moment the pattern is weakened. Over time I know that it will be broken.
Karmic Habitual Patterns April 20, 2008
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Karma otherwise known as the law of cause and effect in Buddhism is a key aspect of how life in this world functions. The idea here is that our current experience is a result of our past actions of body, speech and mind. Every action we engage in produces a result that is similar in quality to the original causal action. Understanding Karma is essential in order to live a happy life according to Buddhism because if we want to be free of suffering and create more happiness for ourselves and others we must know what the actual causes of these are. If we want happiness and are not able to achieve it we need to understand what we need to do to create that happiness and how we are creating what we do not want so we can cease doing so. The law of cause and effect states that a positive result such as happiness can never be created by a cause that is not of the same quality, that is if we want peace we will never create it with anger and violence no matter how we might justify them.
In my work as a Buddhist counselor, I’ve been looking at ways of bringing the idea of Karma into my work and helping people gain an understanding of it that will help them work with their process in more effective ways. One way that Karma can come into play is in understanding deep long standing and painful habitual patterns. From the point of view of Karma, the more we engage in a behavior the more we are likely to engage in it again, it becomes a habit, whether positive or negative. It becomes a habit that is carried across lifetimes and can be strengthened and solidified over many lifetimes of playing it out. Often my clients are dealing with very powerful habitual patterns which go incredibly deep, carry enormous energy that cannot always be traced back to logical sources in this life, and resist change persistently. Having an understanding of Karma can help explain why some habits are so powerful while others seem to be much easier to change. If we can recognize that with our most difficult habitual patterns we are dealing with processes that have been playing out over many lifetimes we can begin to understand why it can take a good deal of time, effort and energy to change them which can help us not to get discouraged but rather to have a resilient attitude in working with them.
No matter how powerful and deep a habitual pattern might be it can always be change by first illuminating and understanding it and secondly by consciously engaging in the opposing behavior. Even one instance of resisting a habitual behavior and doing the opposite has an effect on altering the overall pattern, it creates a small crack in the larger pattern. If you create enough cracks eventually the pattern will fall and there will be a breakthrough. This simply requires persistence. We can change our painful dysfunctional habits we just need to be realistic about what is required to do so and be willing to put the effort forth.
A dissolving identity April 11, 2008
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With all the change and letting go I’ve done lately I’m starting to realize that I don’t really know who I am anymore. Many of the things that I’ve been letting go of and changing have been key parts of my identity. So this process is forcing me to redefine who I am to the core. I used to consider myself a committed partner, a computer guru, a stable firmly rooted person and a fairly cautious person but now I’m finding I am none of those things per se. I’m still interested in being in relationship but in a way that defies labels and roles. I’m still interested in computers but but I don’t work with them in the same way anymore nor do I put myself out to people as a computer person anymore, they’ve become nothing more than a tool for expression. Now that I’ve let go of my apartment (comfort zone) of 4 years and am staying in various temporary housing situations I don’t feel like a stable rooted person anymore, actually more of a floating free spirit. I’m also far more willing to experiment, take risks (conscious ones) and put myself in situations I would have never imagined in the recent past.
What I’m realizing from all of this is just how much many of these things made up my identity and put me in a box of who I thought I was. Now I feel like I don’t know who I am and that at once feels frightening and also free. Maybe I don’t need to know who I am, maybe I just am. I have less and less use for labels these days and much more use for the phrase – I don’t know. I don’t know who I am and I’m finding I’m less and less interested in the question.
The suffering of change April 10, 2008
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In Buddhism, the first of the Four Noble Truths states that all life in this world is characterized by suffering or unsatisfactoriness. It specifies three forms of suffering; basic suffering which includes obvious things such as physical pain, sickness and emotional distress, then there is the suffering of change and what is referred to as all pervading suffering based on our illusory sense of self and separation.
I’ve been experiencing all three forms of suffering lately as everyone is but most intensely the suffering of change. This type of suffering occurs because all things are impermanent and change both in the moment and over time. However we usually don’t relate to things with this understanding rather we become attached to those things we think provide us with comfort, safety, pleasure and security. When we lose these things due to inevitable change we experience suffering due to our attachment. What we don’t realize is that these external things are not the actual source of our pleasure, love, security and peace. Our mind is the source and projects these qualities onto these external objects.
I’ve been in an intense process of letting go of much that I held onto in my life, everything from my job and career to my way of being in relationship to my living space. I’ve shifted from working a regular job with a consistent paycheck to working for myself with the uncertainty, increased responsibility and freedom that entails. I’ve begun to let go of my need to be in traditional relationship and instead have started to focus on being in more open free connections with people including lovers. I’ve just moved out of my apartment of four years, one of which was with my partner, and into a shared living situation which is very fluid and uncertain. I’ve experienced intense pain, fear and sadness throughout this entire process because letting go of each of these things has illuminated my attachment and clinging to them, its illuminated what I was getting from them and relying on them for. It has also illuminated to the degree to which they had become part of my identity. The process has been quite scary and unsettling at times but also extremely illuminating and freeing.
Letting go of so much at the same time is not something I would necessarily recommend to everyone but it has forced me to go inward for my sense of peace and security, the very place it all originated from anyway. Without as many of the typical external objects on which to project my peace and security I’ve been able to more clearly see its inner source and find ways of accessing it directly. I’ve seen this as finding incredible freedom because I feel like I’m getting to the point of not needing external people, things and situations to be a certain way in order for me to be happy because I see how I create my own happiness and can therefore access it at will, if I can get out of my own way in doing so. This way of seeing things seems to allow for change and impermanence to flow more freely because I’m not needing to hold onto or solidify things as much.
Its an ongoing process filled with moments of freedom and bliss and moments of terror but its a process I have chosen.
Mindfulness Meditation and Transformation September 7, 2007
Posted by bodhidude in : Psychology, Spirituality, Transformation, articles , add a commentSince returning to the practice of counseling and therapy I’ve begun to develop an approach to working with people that uses mindfulness practice and meditation in a systematic way. Its begun to take shape as a four step process which first involves creating space for ourselves then using mindfulness to become aware of thoughts, feelings and behaviors. With this awareness the next aspect is identifying, accessing and feeling frozen or stuck emotional energy so as to release it. Following this, one is more able to connect with and access a deeper level of consciousness to find greater peace and happiness.
In order to get in touch with our experience in a more direct way I usually suggest to people that they create some sort of sacred space at home that they can use to spend quality time with themselves. Having a personal sacred space is a very powerful thing to create because it is a place to let go of the roles and dramas of everyday life and just be. This space should be peaceful and set to some degree away from the rest of the living space. It should be created with objects and images that remind one of peace and stillness and whatever one finds sacred. Creating it is a very personal experience. Once a sacred space has been created we can begin to spend time in it with ourselves, something much of our culture is designed to distract us from. This time initially should be unstructured without any kind of expectation or agenda and it can just be a regular time each day to be with ourselves. Here we can just sit and reflect or we can do some activity that grounds us and brings us peace but doesn’t distract us in a way that takes us away from the moment. Such an activity could be journaling, making art, listening to peaceful music or anything else that reflects who we are rather than who we should be. The creation and use of this kind of space is also a way to bring meaning back into our lives if we are feeling disconnected from ourselves and overwhelmed by life, it is a sanctuary.
Once a sacred space has been created and we have begun to spend some time in it each day we can introduce a mindfulness practice which is basically just being intentionally aware of what we are doing, thinking and feeling in the present moment. This sounds very simple but it can be quite challenging at first and also quite profound because we may not be aware of how much of our experience occurs unconsciously or without much awareness. If we are wanting to change our lives or experience we will not have much success doing that if the causes of our difficulties are unconscious so we need to start off by making more and more of our experience conscious. I usually ask people to start by being aware of their environment focusing on the sounds, smells, sights and sensations they experience as they sit in their personal space. Then we can add the body focusing on how our body feels and noticing all its nuances. Next we can start noticing our thoughts and feelings, the keyword here is noticing we just want to be aware of what’s happening at this point without judgment or shame regardless of the content. From here we can focus our awareness even more and bring it to something such as the breath.
Breathing meditation is a basic yet very powerful mindfulness practice. The breath is always available and is always connected to both the body and mind in the present moment. To practice breathing meditation we begin by sitting on a chair or cushion in a position that is comfortable but allows us to keep the back as straight as possible. Keeping the back straight enables our energies to flow more easily and aids in concentration however we can use support cushions or something else if needed because we want to balance that with comfort so we are not too distracted by pain. Once we have a comfortable sitting position we rest our hands in our lap or on our knees and tilt the head slightly forward while we rest our gaze on the floor a few feet in front of us. At this point we slowly bring our awareness from our environment to our body and try and let go of any tension we may be feeling. When we are ready we bring our awareness to our breath at first just being aware of the flow of the breath in and out. Next we pick a specific point to use to focus our attention. This could be the tip of the nose and the sensation of the air moving past it or it could be the rising and falling of the abdomen or some other area. The important thing is that you pick one place to pay attention to the breath that feels right to you and you stick with that place for the duration of the mediation.
To do the practice we now keep our attention on the breath at the place we chose. If we find it difficult or the breath too subtle to focus on we can mentally say “breathing in” when we breath in and “breathing out” when we breath out to help our awareness stay on the breath. Naturally our attention is going to wander and we will get distracted by thoughts, feelings and external distractions. This is perfectly normal so when we find that our attention has wandered from the breath we simply and gently place it back on the breath without any kind of judgment. This is a key part of the practice, focusing-realizing we are distracted-putting our attention back on the breath. Over time we will be able to remain focused for longer periods and the distractions will lose strength. When we have finished it is good to slowly allow ourselves to come out of the meditation by bringing our awareness back to our body in general and then to the environment and slowly rising from the cushion.
Initially it is good to do this practice for short periods of time and not to force the process but keep it light and gentle yet with intention. The most important thing with meditation practice is consistency; it is effective if its done regularly over a long period of time and the effects are cumulative. Ideally a short period everyday at the same time will eventually establish it as a pattern. You can work up to longer periods as you become used to the practice but its good to try and always finish a session when you still feel fresh so you will want to come back to it. One common misconception about this kind of meditation is that it is designed to help us stop thinking. This is not the case at all because directly trying to stop thinking is rarely effective and usually results in frustration. Instead we allow ourselves to have any thoughts or feelings that come up without any judgment. We however don’t give them our attention; instead we place our attention on the breath while the mind continues to do what it will. If we get distracted we return to the breath. Over time thoughts and other internal distractions will slow down on their own due to the lack of attention paid to them. Another obstacle people commonly run into is feeling like they can’t do the practice because of the state of mind they are in. If one is feeling angry or anxious its easy to feel like we can’t meditate or like we can’t sit still but this is often because we feel like we need to change our state of mind or we have judgment on ourselves for feeling such things. When these states of mind come up the solution is to accept them and allow them to arise, we simply practice where we are without trying to change it.
Once we have begun doing mindfulness practice and developing our concentration by focusing on the breath or some other object we can use that skill to go more deeply into our experience. In the practice we will begin to notice what’s happening in the mind, our thought processes and emotional patterns. Often people especially struggle with certain emotions that cause them suffering or discomfort such as depression, anger or anxiety. These emotional patterns can be caused by past traumas, conditioning and experiences that created an emotional response that was not fully felt and healed. We all carry such stuck emotional energy and it usually exists buried in the unconscious where it wreaks havoc on our experience and health without our conscious control. In my view, emotional energy is a free flowing aspect of life in the moment. It is energy that needs to flow freely as we engage life and have emotional experiences generated by it. If we carry significant amounts of stuck or frozen emotional energy the free flow is blocked and we are not able to fully experience life but rather we consistently re-experience the stuck emotional pattern. Our resistance to feeling these so called negative emotions openly is what keeps them stuck as does our judgment and shame for having them. We continually re-solidify them in this process rather than releasing them.
In our practice when we are feeling negative emotions we can apply our meditation technique to them in such a way as to facilitate their release. We do this by first being aware of the emotion using mindfulness. Then we give the emotion space and permission to fully arise while we make it the focus on our meditation practice much the way we did with the breath. We place our awareness on the emotion we are experiencing and allow it to arise fully. As we begin to feel it we can bring consciousness to the experience by understanding we are intentionally inviting the emotion to arise and seeking to release it. The only way to release it however is to fully allow ourselves to feel it and cease labeling it as problematic. During this process it is also important to bring in compassion for ourselves by realizing that we are human and feeling this hurts and that it’s natural for us to have these reactions but we don’t have to hold onto them anymore. In this way we can begin to more fully and openly feel our experience and break through the pattern of avoiding feeling certain unpleasant emotions while we chase after and try to grab onto pleasant ones. It becomes a process of accepting what is in the moment and allowing it to flow.
As we develop more mindfulness and awareness and learn to openly feel our experience allowing it to be what it is we can begin to access a deeper level of consciousness. This level of consciousness you could call your higher self, or inner nature or your truth. Whatever you label it, it is a deep level of consciousness that is unaffected by external situations and by internal states of mind. Its nature is clarity, joy, power and peace. This is the internal ground of being and is the ultimate source of happiness described in all the major religions and mystical systems. Ultimately this is what we need to get in touch with to find happiness, freedom and peace because the source of those things is within us and not generated by anyone or anything externally. By practicing mindfulness and meditation and learning to focus our awareness and by clearing away emotional baggage we open the door to this level of being because it is always there in the moment if we can learn to pay attention properly. The more we cultivate it the more power we will realize in our life and the more we will be able to create what we want and realize our full potential.
Contemplative Dream Integration January 29, 2007
Posted by bodhidude in : Psychology, articles , add a comment
In working with dreams both my own and with others I have begun to use a technique I call contemplative dream integration. I’ve been paying attention to dreams and their content for some time now but recently I have sought to work with them in a slightly different way.
From my perspective dreams (except lucid dreams) function at a subconscious level and reveal important information as to what is happening deep within our psyche both at a personal unconscious level and at a broader collective unconscious level. Given the level of consciousness from which most (not all) dreams originate, they usually cannot be interpreted literally nor can the greatest meaning be derived from them using conceptual analysis. This is because dreams take place at level of mind that is deeper than our usual rational conceptual conscious experience. Dreams communicate meaning in a symbolic language where symbols are infused with meaning that is specific to the context of the individuals life experience. There are many universal symbols found within dreams that are common among many individuals and even across cultures but they still need to be examined within the context of the individuals experience and this is most effectively done in my opinion using contemplative techniques.
The goal of my work with dreams is to access the symbolic experiential meaning they contain and bring that into conscious awareness so that it can be integrated and used to unfold deeper processes. The way I go about doing this is by doing a kind of dream meditation that is done immediately upon waking. If I have a powerful dream and wake up with it fresh in my mind I immediately get up and sit in meditation and take the dream as the object or focus of my meditation. I sit with the still fresh experience of the dream and hold the experience in my mind without thinking about it conceptually or trying to analyze it. I tend to specifically focus on any powerful symbols and feelings or emotions involved with the dream. The idea here is to really sit with the raw experience of the dream in all its richness. Sitting with the dream in this way allows the unconscious experience of the dream to be mixed with the now conscious aware mind. By sitting with the dream experientially and holding it in my mind there is space for the symbolic meaning to speak to me which often leads to realizations and epiphanies.
I find this approach far more effective than waking up and thinking about the dream or immediately writing it down because these techniques engage the conceptual mind which I find can drown out the deeper symbolic meaning of the dream. The time of waking up presents a unique opportunity because the dream experience and all its images, feelings and concepts are still fresh in ones mind and so they can be brought into awareness so that the unconscious meaning can be integrated into conscious awareness. Later more conceptual or analytical work can be done with the dream experience to more fully integrate it. This process seems to be most useful with powerful, repetitive or otherwise intense dreams that seem to have something to teach us. Dreams are a powerful aspect of our minds and they provide a deep realm of experience for us to work with if we are interested in using them that way.
The Fluidity of Feeling January 16, 2007
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Feelings and emotions are amazing aspects of life as a human being and they can take on qualities that are extremely blissful to experience as well as qualities that are extremely painful to experience. But what is it really that differentiates a pleasant feeling from an unpleasant one other than mind itself? In my practice and in my life I’ve come to see emotion as simply being the energy of raw aliveness. A constantly flowing, moving energy that comes from being fully engaged with ourselves and the world, being fully open and alive. We remain in a healthy state as long as this energy is allowed to flow freely. The times when I feel this energy flowing freely are the times when I’ve surrendered to my humanity and allowed the experiences of life to touch me deeply without resistance. I experience this free flowing energy as a constant exchange between me and the universe.
But why is it that so many of us have such a hard time feeling openly? In my experience I’ve come to see it as processes of grasping and resisting that freeze or solidify the normally free flowing fluid energy of feeling causing blockages and obstructions. We tend to grasp at emotional experiences we label as pleasant or positive and try to hold onto them not realizing the impermanence of the world we live in. We also tend to resist or push away emotional experiences we label as negative or unpleasant and avoid experiencing them because they feel threatening to us. Both of these patterns interrupt the flow of natural aliveness and create blockages. These blockages not only obstruct the free flow of energy but they get frozen in the unconscious mind from which they impact us in unhealthy ways including fueling destructive habitual patterns. Of course I think we all go through the process of dealing with our emotions in this way, its part of being human however what I’ve really come to understand is that the process of obstructing our emotional experience is one that we can change.
The ways that I have come to work with emotional obstructions are through processing them both contemplatively and experientially. In order to work with these obstructions however we need to get in touch with them and that’s usually easiest to do when they are triggered in some way. When an emotional pattern is activated I find that it can help to first have awareness of the fact that its activated because just the aspect of having that awareness presents the opportunity to work with it rather than react from it. Here one can contemplate the experience of the emotional pattern and try to unravel it to discover what is underlying the process. I have had to work with an emotional pattern of anxiety centered around my relationship partners which manifested as a fear of losing them and so contemplating it I would eventually get beyond just the experience of anxiety and see that underneath it was a fear of abandonment (a pattern from childhood) and going even further it was a fear of aloneness or being with myself (disconnection from the self) and ultimately a fear of loss of self (who am I really?). The point is our emotional patterns have many layers so it can help to begin to peel back the layers and work with what we find at each level. It can also help to do this sort of processing with a partner which could be a counselor, significant other or friend. Often it is other people who trigger our emotional patterns so if we have a person who is open and self-reflective enough we may have an opportunity to go into it with them. This has been the case for me with my anxiety because my last partner triggered it very powerfully so rather than react negatively toward her for “making” me feel this way I eventually decided to take advantage of her gift of shining a light on my stuck place and work on it with her help. I’ve found group work particularly effective with this as well as having the reflection of a group of people when you share a painful process can allow different aspects of it to be mirrored back, different people can pick up different voices for you.
The other way to work with these emotional patterns is experientially and I believe that in order to fully release them we need to get to this stage because if these patterns are essentially frozen feelings that we didn’t allow ourselves to experience we can only release them by fully opening up to them. For me this process has entailed doing the exact opposite of what we normally want to do with unpleasant emotions. Instead of running away or distracting ourselves, going into them when they come up and really allowing ourselves to fully and openly feel the emotion. We’re not doing this with the conceptual mind (not thinking about the emotion or experience) but rather from a purely experiential perspective. We’re just sitting with the feeling and giving it both permission and space to arise fully into our experience. When we resist an emotion we are not giving ourselves permission to feel it and when we distract ourselves from feeling we are not creating the space for the emotion to arise. This for me was initially terrifying but it became less so over time because I realized that the worst part of my anxiety was all the stories my mind had made up around it and actually just feeling the raw emotion wasn’t so bad and in fact it would arise and dissipate on its own if I would just let it be. Having a contemplative practice such as meditation really helps with this because it teaches us to sit with our mind and be in the present moment with it without judgment.
The amazing thing about doing this kind of work is that when you can really face, process and release emotional patterns it frees you in incredible ways to more fully experience life and be touched by your experience not to mention taking the power out of destructive habitual patterns that may be causing all kinds of problems. You can begin to welcome experience both good and bad and see it as part of this beautiful impermanent universe which we are all intimate parts of. You can truly flow with life again.
Emotional Weather December 17, 2006
Posted by bodhidude in : Psychology, Spirituality, blog , add a commentIts so interesting to me in the practice of meditation how emotional states as internal processes reflect the external processes of weather. The clear blue sky is like the innermost nature of mind; vast, clear and radiant. Clouds, storms and wind come and go and bring with them many different qualities. Sometimes you have thin white wisps of clouds with a gentle breeze, sometimes big puffy cotton balls, sometimes dark heavy gray clouds, sometimes violent stormy clouds and raging wind. But no matter what the weather the sky is always there unchanged and embracing whatever todays weather might hold. You can always take comfort in knowing that even though you may not be able to see it the sky is there behind the clouds and will show itself once again. So it is in meditation, the nature of mind is always there unsullied by the raging storms of emotions and thoughts that often seem like they will never end. One moment a joyous thought passes through and then the next a dark negative thought then maybe a wave of anxiety but in the end they are all just waves of consciousness on the sea of mind. No need to try to hold on to any of them, just let them be and they pass away just like that gray cloud up above my apartment building right now.
Confronting and Integrating Inner Darkness December 10, 2006
Posted by bodhidude in : Psychology, Spirituality, blog , add a commentI’ve had a recurring dream for some time that involves being in a house and needing to go down into a dark basement for some reason that cannot be avoided. The feeling of going down there is terrifying and it feels like a dark so black that its all consuming. Once down in the basement I come upon a door that leads to a descending tunnel into some sort of a dark abyss. There is no way to describe in words how much fear is associated with thinking of going down there. Its as if I will have to confront the devil himself, or something of pure evil. Anyway, I had the dream again the other night and I came to a realization just after waking up from it that the only danger in going down there is if I bring fear. Fear is the only real weapon that can be used against you by any evil force, internal or external. If I go down there without fear and bring love light and compassion then there is no danger and I have the opportunity to illuminate whatever is down there and greet it openly with compassion. I think the process of illuminating it will help me integrate it which is the transformative step of confronting your inner darkness or shadow, those parts of yourself that have become dissociated from consciousness. That was really a revelation for me although I still need to put it into practice.
I see this process of confronting our shadow or owning and integrating our inner darkness as an important one for psychological and spiritual transformation as well as to precipitate transformation on a larger scale in our world. Whats happening in our world right now could be and has been described (see www.awakeninthedream.com) as shadow projection on a large scale. People becoming dissociated from their darker side and so projecting it externally onto others that they then proceed to try and destroy so as to symbolically destroy their own inner demons. Carl Jung actually describes demons as autonomous complexes or parts of our own psyche that have become dissociated to such a degree that they have taken on a semi-autonomous existence of their own. Resisting and fighting such processes only makes them stronger and cause great chaos and damage, rather they need to be reintegrated into consciousness by being openly confronted and illuminated. This cannot be done from a fear based mind state but only from one grounded in wisdom and compassion. I think if we can all acknowledge our inner darkness rather than deny or project it we can heal at a very deep level both ourselves and our world.
The greatest darkness holds the greatest potential for light. A shadow can only be cast if there is light nearby, the shadow then points to the very thing the light is illuminating, the very thing to be integrated.
Seeing the world from other viewpoints… October 23, 2006
Posted by bodhidude in : Psychology, blog , add a commentIn so much of the debate that happens today it seems that there are very different perspectives, world views or paradigms conflicting in a lot of the discussion. Much of it is just good debate but there is also conflict as well. We all have our own way of looking at the world/universe whatever we identify it as. The question that really comes up is are we open to accepting that there is more than one valid way of looking at the world? I say “valid” here because we all know that there are multiple ways of looking at the world but are we open to there being more than one way to see things that yields meaning and usefulness.
If we are open to other ways of seeing things then a further question is can we fully step into another approach so that we can truly evaluate it and see if there is any value or meaning to it? What I think happens quite often is that someone coming from one world view or paradigm looks at an explanation or viewpoint from another world view or paradigm and judges it based on their approach but doesn’t necessarily step into the other viewpoint in order to see it from that perspective. For example if I am coming from a scientific viewpoint and I look at a Buddhist explanation of consciousness and apply scientific principles to that explanation then I might conclude that it is invalid because it doesn’t adhere to those principles. But this doesn’t really accomplish anything because the Buddhist explanation is coming from a different viewpoint and scientific principles have little or no applicability for it. In order to understand the Buddhist explanation you have to step into that system of thought and only then can you grasp the meaning behind it and determine if it has any value to you. I think its important to note that a particular set of principles may only be relevant within the system of thought in which it originated and may have little or no meaning within another system of thought.
Being able to step into seeing the universe, others and ourselves from different perspectives can loosen our sense of the world being a certain way and open us to a more expansive viewpoint as well as generating new knowledge and understanding derived from experience in other ways of knowing.
Fear and Illusion August 10, 2006
Posted by bodhidude in : Psychology, Spirituality, blog , add a commentI’ve stopped paying much attention to the mainstream media because I’ve slowly come to realize it is nothing but a propaganda machine. Real journalism and reporting is a thing of the past in this country as evidenced by the PROVEN criminal activity of our current administration going almost unreported and uninvestigated by the media. Instead of reporting the news the media today is delivering propaganda and fear. The propaganda takes the form of disseminating the “official” stories that the government wants us to hear while adding a paltry amount of argument to give the illusion of balance. This is followed by a systematic effort to squelch any stories that are really challenging to the powers that be either by avoiding them totally or covering them and discrediting the story. There are exceptions to this as we have seen when an issue gets too big to control such as Abu Graib or the Abramoff scandal but there really are few exceptions.
Right alongside the propaganda is the other primary aim of the media which is distributing fear. Fear is the mechanism through which the current administration is able to maintain power and to maintain its criminal activity and the central theme by which they create fear is terrorism. Today we see a new “plot” supposedly foiled. We’re told that this is a reminder that we are still at “war” and we see a new set of “alerts” and “warnings”. However if one researches what underlies this war on terror we quickly see that it is an illusion weaved by people who seek to dominate through fear. When their power is threatened they dish out more fear so today’s so called terror plot is right on cue as the November elections are coming up and the dominating party realizes that it is in trouble. Well it would be if we were actually having free elections. Expect more fear and chaos to be created in the coming weeks. It’s ironic that the president’s statement today was that “we are fighting Islamic Fascists”. This is the ultimate in projecting the shadow externally as they displace what they truly are onto others. In reality Bush is the fascist yet he projects that onto the “terrorists” to create fear and deception.
The path I have taken in light of this is to disconnect myself from the mainstream media in order to stop the flow of fear and disinformation. I think we need to acknowledge what the media has become and actively get our information elsewhere and with a high degree of discrimination followed by critical analysis. If we do that then we free ourselves from the matrix-like trance that the media is helping to create and we begin to hamper its ability to maintain that. If enough of us can pull out of this delusional world that has been created to keep us ignorant we can open up real possibilities for change. I have felt much more healthy since disconnecting from the fear machine and much more able to see how I can make a positive difference for change. Lets all wake up from this nightmare together and create a more healthy world……………
Overcoming stuckness, just do it…………. March 10, 2006
Posted by bodhidude in : Livelihood, Psychology, blog , add a commentI was connecting with people in this group I attend weekly the other night and the topic came up of people feeling stuck in trying to create the meaningful fulfilling things they desire in their lives. I also have experienced this especially with what I want to do for a living or right livelihood. I’ve worked in the technology field for so long and just have no interest in it anymore whatsoever. I feel so drawn to healing and helping people but I always approached it from the perspective of money. What kind of healing work can I do that will allow me to pay the bills? How will I make a enough money doing what I love. Then someone pointed out to me that maybe thats totally the wrong approach. I was approaching my lifes work from the perspective of money when money is not my priority or focus, helping and healing is my priority. My friend said to me ‘You know what you want to do, why don’t you just do it?’. I processed that and realized, yeah why don’t I just do it instead of analyzing it to death? What a release that was for me. So simple yet so profound. If I want to do healing work with people I can start doing it and let it develop over time into something that can sustain me. In the meantime I can help people right now in the moment with just what I have to offer and I have a job for now that can pay the bills while I develop my passion. It can be so easy to not believe in oneself yet such a drastic shift if we do. It blows my mind how when light gets shed on obstacles we create for ourselves, how quickly they can be overcome and how unreal they actually were in the first place. Makes me believe that the possibilities are just about limitless…….
Fear September 29, 2005
Posted by bodhidude in : Psychology, Society, blog , add a commentFear is the ultimate tool of control. All totalitarian governments have used it very effectively over the centuries and the American government is no expection. Without keeping people afraid you cannot maintain control and implement the measures that enable a repressive state. People don’t think rationally when they are afaid because they are caught up in an anxiety state, worried about their safety and survival and eager to accept anything they believe may alleviate the situation.
As the US has begun to transition into a more totalitarian state we have seen fear invoked in the classic ways with this perpertual war scenario, “the war on terror”. Our government feeds on the fear of the masses, I think its why we are always at WAR with everything. The war on poverty, the war on drugs, the war on terror, the war the war the war……… We are taught to be afraid of all these things, that they constitute a threat. This is a very dysfunctional way of relating to the world and it creates mental illness on a large scale because we can easily see what happens to people when they are kept in a state of fear and stress over a long period of time. Fear supercedes critical thinking and awareness and it has worked on the American people to allow the government to pass repressive laws, subvert the constitution, lie on a larger scale than ever before and avoid being accountable.
The only solution to this is to see it for what it is and consciously choose to remove oneself from the fear loop by not giving into it. By returning to critical thinking and seeing through the delusional games. By turning off the mechanisms of fear delivery, the mainstream media and entertainment, and getting your news and entertainment from a more conherent source and intentionally exposing yourself to positive experiences in your life. If we can remove ourselves from this cycle of fear we will be able to effect change and change the course of our society.