by Peter Carlson | Jul 13, 2017 | Listen to Dharma Talks
This week’s talk involved a guest speaker, Armando Garcia, who recently wrote a book entitled “Buddhism & Existentialism-Not Self, Nothingness And Being”. This was the topic of the evening’s discussion. Armando explained the basic assumptions of existentialism, a Western philosophy developed in the late 19th and 20th centuries in Europe. This philosophy has striking similarities to the concepts of anatta (the absence of an enduring as autonomous self) and anicca (the transient nature of reality). What is absent in existentialism is clarity about the nature of dukkha (dissatisfaction, distress and confusion) and the ways and means to resolve dukkha. Existentialism describes “bad faith” as the absence of responsibility for the consequences of the inevitable choices life presents to human experience, and proposes life as presenting the opportunity to repeatedly choose an “authentic” life. This has similarity to the nature of dukkha, but existentialism doesn’t provide the Noble Eightfold Path strategies for cultivating authentic responses to life.
Armando’s book can be purchased through Amazon.
Next week’s discussion will resume the exploration of the Paramis with “Truthfulness”. This Parami can be understood as the attainment of an existentially “authentic” life.
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by Peter Carlson | Jul 6, 2017 | Listen to Dharma Talks
Patience is the ability to train the mind to be non-reactive enough over a period of time for effective, mindful investigation to function well. Most often, impatience is driven by urgency and attachment to an expected outcome, and is experienced as reactive impulsiveness. During this talk, using the Four Noble Truths model, Peter suggested different focal areas that might stimulate impatience along with how the cultivation of stable, serene attention (samadhi/passadhi) through mindfulness of breathing cultivates patience. The simple act of becoming mindful of the craving and clinging that accompanies an itch and learning to be patient with the experience of discomfort and urgency can provide the capability to be patient with other circumstances, such as being patient with a person’s behaviors or an unexpected turn of events that counter one’s plans.
During the discussion, the participants were invited to fill out a worksheet regarding how to recognize impatience and how to address the urgency of craving and clinging effectively. The insights derived from this exercise might inspire a person using the worksheet to contemplate for a period of time how often impatience affects daily experience and how to use mindfulness and renunciation strategies during the day to cultivate patience. Here is the worksheet: Patience Worksheet
Here are the notes prepared for this discussion: The Benefits Of Perfecting Patience
Next week’s meeting will involve a guest speaker, Dr. Armando Garcia, a practicing Buddhist who has written a book entitled “Buddhism And Existentialism-Not Self, Nothingness, and Being”. Existentialism is a philosophy developed during the 20th century that emphasizes the fabricated nature of human experience and the responsibilities that emerge from that creative process. Buddhism has strong elements of existential considerations that predate by many centuries this philosophy. Dr. Garcia will talk about the congruence between Buddhist insights into reality and existential philosophy.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:04:08 — 117.4MB)
by Peter Carlson | Jun 29, 2017 | Listen to Dharma Talks
This week’s talk focuses on the perfection of viriya, typically translated as Energy/Right Effort/Persistence. Peter described contemporary understanding of energy as the provision of glucose and oxygen to the neural pathways associated with wholesome or unwholesome self-state organizations. This awareness suggests that the process of awakening involves careful attention to the flow of the energy of attention and channeling it towards minimizing craving and clinging. Right Effort is comprised of 4 applications: to notice and channel attention away from arisen unwholesome states, to notice the potential arising of wholesome states, to promote the fulfillment of arisen wholesome states, and the notice and prevent the arising of unarisen unwholesome states. The progress towards Awakening occurs initially in “starving” the five hindrances, then channeling the energy of attention towards nurturing sufficiently sophisticated internal investigation for discovering the characteristics of subjective reality, that is, impermanence, nonself, and the distress and confusion that comes as the result of craving and clinging. When Right Effort is sufficiently developed through persistent practice, the renunciation of duality, that is, self-and-other, supports the realization of nondual awareness.
Here are the notes prepared for this talk: The Benefits Of Perfecting Right Effort And Persistence
Next week’s talk will focus on the Parami of patience.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 59:18 — 108.6MB)
by Peter Carlson | Jun 22, 2017 | Listen to Dharma Talks
This discussion continues to explore the qualities of mental functioning called Paramis (or Paramitas in Sanskrit), and the focus is on Wisdom (Panna, pronounced pahn-yah). This quality represents the product of the application of the Noble Eightfold Path, that is, the realization of anicca (impermanence), anatta (nonself), and dukkha (the distress and confusion that is the result of craving and clinging). Peter suggests a different rendering of Wisdom in practice: substituting Clear Awareness for Right Understanding, and Benevolent Intention rather than Right Intention. Clear Awareness is the flow of experience free from the five hindrances, and Benevolent Intention is the orientation towards kindness, compassion, generosity and patient tolerance in one’s thoughts and actions. This explanation was followed by discussion of how Wisdom is cultivated.
Here are the notes prepared for this talk: The Wisdom Parami
Next week, the focus will be on another Parami, Energy/Persistence.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 59:19 — 108.6MB)
by Peter Carlson | Jun 1, 2017 | Listen to Dharma Talks
This evening’s project is to use the worksheet attached below to list various beliefs, values and expectations we experience on a hierarchical scale, in order to practice noticing how craving and clinging occurs as well as how to activate and strengthen nekkhamma, renunciation, to free the mind from attachment to outcomes in daily life experience.
A significant portion of the evening’s discussion involved participants talking through the examples, while Peter commented on how that relates to renunciation.
Here is the worksheet developed for this exercise: RENUNCIATION WORKSHEET
Peter will be away for a few weeks. Various guest teachers will present their discussions over the next few meetings. These talks will not be recorded for posting. During Peter’s next talk on June 21, the Parami of Wisdom will be explored.
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by Peter Carlson | May 25, 2017 | Listen to Dharma Talks
This talk explores the benefits of the Parami of renunciation, which is the ability to disregard any self-state organization that interferes with the process of liberation from distress and confusion. Peter quoted excerpts from an article that describes different applications of renunciation: from physical phenomena, from mental formations and from craving and clinging. The practice of noting what has distracted attention from breath awareness, then renouncing the distraction to redirect attention back to the breath was described as the fundamental practice of renunciation. Renunciation is related to detachment from mental phenomena and dispassion regarding mental phenomena, essential capabilities required for liberation. Peter then described the neurological processes related to renunciation, that is, an enhanced executive function of the prefrontal cortex, which regulates the reactivity generated by the amygdala and nucleus accumbens. This explanation was followed by discussion of the concept of renunciation by those in the meeting.
Here are the notes prepared for this discussion: THE BENEFITS OF RENUNCIATION
Next week’s meeting will involve exercises related to the practice of renunciation.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:03:04 — 115.5MB)
