by Peter Carlson | Mar 5, 2026 | Listen to Dharma Talks
This talk, provided by Lezlie Laws, continues reviewing elements of the Four Foundations of Mindfulness Discourse, focusing in the Third Foundation, Mindfulness of the Mind. Lezlie uses a Zen question to foster internal understanding of how the mind creates a self: “What Is This?” The question is not intended to be abstract and intellectual, but rather to invite direct subjective knowledge of how the mind is created in and ongoing way.
During the talk, Lezlie refers to a YouTube interview involving Ezra Klein and Stephen Batchelor, a well-respected Buddhist teacher and author who suggests the value of this question. Here is a URL recording that conversation: https://secularbuddhistnetwork.org/ezra-klein-interviews-stephen-batchelor-on-what-is-this/
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:06:14 — 60.6MB)
by Peter Carlson | May 23, 2024 | Listen to Dharma Talks
The Third Foundation of Mindfulness focuses attention on investigating the characteristics of a person’s consciousness–alert or dull, filled with desire or free from desire, among other categories. During this talk, Peter reviews the various categories, supplemented by current neurological research that supports the views developed by Buddhist practitioners and scholars over a thousand years ago. How mindfulness of breathing practice supports investigation of the mind is also reviewed.
Here are the notes prepared for this talk: Reviewing Mindfulness Of The Mind
The next talk will begin a review of the Fourth Foundation of Mindfulness, focusing on identifying and setting aside the Five Hindrances.
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by Peter Carlson | Jul 20, 2023 | Listen to Dharma Talks
This review, provided by April Koester, focuses on the Third Foundation of the Four Foundations of Mindfulness, which is intended to describe how the characteristics of various states of consciousness can affect our self-experiences. The mind operates like a filter, “coloring” perceptions through various states such as desire, aversion, dullness, agitation, etc. The goal of mindfulness and internal investigation is to understand the conditioning of the filtering process and, through Right Effort, create qualities of consciousness that provide an unfiltered view of the impermanent and non-self characteristics of subjective experience.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 58:48 — 53.8MB)
by Peter Carlson | Aug 4, 2022 | Listen to Dharma Talks
The Third Foundation of Mindfulness, cittanupassana, is a contemplation of the various ways consciousness reflects subjective experience; the goal of this contemplation is to realize that the mind is impersonal, not a self. This review also includes discussion of contemporary scientific concepts such as complexity theory, which validate the concepts about how the mind operates that were developed millennia ago by Buddhist practitioners.
Here are the notes prepared for this talk: Mindfulness Of The Mind Review
The focus for next week’s talk will be a review of the first concepts of the Fourth Foundation of Mindfulness, contemplation of the Five Hindrances.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 59:37 — 54.6MB)
by Peter Carlson | Jul 1, 2021 | News
The topic for this Dharma talk is the Third Foundation of Mindfulness, Cittanupassana. During this review, the appropriate section of the discourse is described in more detail regarding various states of mind that can be known through well-developed mindful investigation with the understanding that what is observed is a phenomenon of nature, not an enduring/autonomous self. Contemporary neuropsychological insights are also reviewed, such as complexity theory, chaos theory and the strange attractor concept, which, although derived from mathematics and physics, are also applicable to how consciousness operates. There is a “Guided Mindfulness of Mind Contemplation” recording posted and archived that is intended to accompany this talk.
Here are the notes prepared for this talk: Mindfulness Of The Mind Review
The next talk will provide a review of the first element of the Fourth Foundation of Mindfulness, a contemplation of the Five Hindrances.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 58:01 — 106.2MB)
