Transcript
[0:02] Alright, so welcome to
the second Q and A Webinar
[0:08] for the Real Happiness
meditation challenge.
[0:10] I'm Lily,
[0:12] and I work with Sharon
[0:14] and run this challenge for her every year.
[0:18] And of course this year, all
of it is happening virtually.
[0:21] So it's just nice to come together
[0:24] and in a virtual space to
kind of cross the divide
[0:30] since we're really from all over the world
[0:35] for this particular year.
[0:38] And so the flow of how this
evening is going to move
[0:45] is we're gonna start with
the guided meditation
[0:47] from Sharon.
[0:49] And then I'll be asking
questions to Sharon
[0:53] and kind of moderating questions
that have been emailed.
[0:57] If you have not sent in a
question and you have one
[1:00] the way to do that in Zoom
is to use the Q and A option.
[1:05] We're going to be closing
down the chat itself.
[1:12] And if we have more questions
[1:14] then there's time for them.
[1:16] We're gonna keep track of them.
[1:17] And either we're a little
undecided (laughing)
[1:22] we're either going to
send you written responses
[1:26] from Sharon for your questions
[1:28] or we may just record
another, not a live Zoom
[1:32] but an audio session
[1:34] of Sharon answering
questions to make available.
[1:37] So it'll be one or the other
[1:39] but definitely ask the
questions that you have
[1:44] and we'll find out the
best way to answer them
[1:46] whether it's here or in other formats.
[1:51] So having said that, I'll
pass it over to you, Sharon
[1:58] so you can start things off.
[2:01] - Alright, thank you
for everything Lily.
[2:04] And thank you all for coming.
[2:08] I'm tuning in from Barre, Massachusetts.
[2:10] The Insight Meditation
Society is just to the forest,
[2:14] in that direction.
[2:16] Joseph Goldstein is on retreat
[2:18] just a few yards away in that direction.
[2:22] And earlier, before it got dark,
[2:24] which was actually quite some time ago,
[2:27] Lily said, "Where are you?
[2:29] It looks like it's midnight."
[2:31] And I said, "Well, that
always looks like that here."
[2:33] But before then I was
watching the snowfall,
[2:35] so I'm assuming it's still falling.
[2:41] And we have been looking
at your questions.
[2:45] We'll get to as many tonight as we can
[2:47] and in one way or another
[2:50] be able to respond to the rest.
[2:53] So why don't we begin with this sitting,
[2:57] just for a few minutes
to more fully arrive.
[3:03] You can close your eyes or not,
[3:07] however you feel most at ease.
[3:15] See if your posture could be
straight but not like stiff
[3:21] and find that place where you
feel like you're in balance.
[3:31] You can start by listening to sound,
[3:34] whether it's the sound of
my voice or other sounds.
[3:39] It's a way of having a sense
of space, relaxing deep inside,
[3:48] allowing experience to come and go.
[3:51] And of course we like certain sounds
[3:53] and we don't like others.
[3:56] But we don't have to chase
after them to hold on
[3:58] or push away.
[4:00] Just let the sound wash through you.
[4:21] Bring your attention to the
feeling of your body sitting.
[4:26] You can feel the earth supporting you
[4:34] Feel space touching you.
[4:40] Usually we think of touching
space and it's very active
[4:43] like poking our finger in the air,
[4:45] but space is already touching us.
[4:49] We just need to receive it.
[5:07] Bring your attention to your hands
[5:10] and see if you can make the shift
[5:14] from the more conceptual
level like fingers
[5:17] to the worlds of direct sensation,
[5:20] picking up pulsing, throbbing pressure,
[5:24] whatever it might be.
[5:25] You don't have to name
these things, but feel them.
[5:49] Bring your attention to
the feeling of your breath
[5:51] just the normal natural breath,
[5:54] wherever you feel it most distinctly,
[5:57] nostrils, chest or abdomen.
[6:01] When you find that place,
[6:02] bring your attention there and just rest.
[6:06] See if you can feel one breath.
[6:11] And if the breath doesn't serve you
[6:13] as this kind of home based
use some other sensation
[6:16] in your body, just a place
to rest your attention.
[6:35] And as images and sounds and
sensations arise and pass away,
[6:40] these two, you can allow to come and go.
[6:45] You don't have to follow after them.
[6:47] You don't have to fight
them, simply breathing.
[7:10] And if you find you've just
been gone, completely lost,
[7:14] wrapped up in a fantasy,
[7:16] when you fall asleep truly,
don't worry about it.
[7:21] Once you realize you've been distracted,
[7:23] see if you can gently let go
and just bring your attention
[7:27] back to the feeling of the breath
[7:31] or whatever object you are
resting your attention on.
[10:40] And then when you feel
ready, you can open your eyes
[10:43] or lift your gaze and
we'll end the meditation.
[10:56] - Thank you, Sharon.
[11:03] One thing that I didn't mention earlier
[11:07] which might be helpful for some people
[11:09] is you are able to ask anonymous
questions as part of this,
[11:14] if that's something that's
more comfortable for you.
[11:17] And the first thing is that
[11:21] I've gotten several people asking,
[11:24] seems like a good place to start.
[11:26] "Do guided meditations count? (laughing)
[11:30] Are they real meditation?
[11:31] Is it cheating?"
[11:35] Any comments you have on that?
[11:36] - I think they count and I
don't think it's cheating.
[11:40] I do have a kind of personal bias
[11:44] which I've expressed, you know, a lot,
[11:46] which is that I think people should do
[11:49] whatever form of meditation
and with whatever aids
[11:53] are gonna help them, that's fine.
[11:56] But to spend like, just
a little bit of time
[12:00] with kind of like nothing extra,
[12:02] just because one of my
desires in teaching meditation
[12:06] is that people will be
able to pick up some tools
[12:09] they can take with them
anywhere like they're commuting
[12:13] and maybe they can't find the
app for the guided meditation
[12:17] or they're at work
[12:19] and they can't start
running around the room.
[12:22] People say, you know I
get my best meditation
[12:24] when I'm running or whatever,
[12:25] but you can't actually
logically do that you know,
[12:28] and so what, what do we have?
[12:31] We have the body, we have
the mind, we have the breath.
[12:34] And I think it would be good to spend
[12:36] even a small amount of the time
[12:39] just using that, you
know kind of bare bones,
[12:43] nothing extra, no equipment
[12:46] so that you feel confident
in taking it with you
[12:49] wherever you go.
[12:50] And if the rest of the time
you wanna listen to guidance
[12:53] I think that's great.
[12:55] Some people cannot
stand guided meditation,
[12:58] so it's a very personal thing.
[13:08] - Just as a reminder to folks,
[13:11] several questions have come in about
[13:13] what happens at the end of the month.
[13:15] And everyone, all participants,
[13:18] will have access to
the challenge materials
[13:22] until the end of April.
[13:24] So you have a lot of time left with them.
[13:27] And after that, the recordings themselves,
[13:30] the audio recordings are
available through Happify.
[13:34] But because Happify owns the recordings,
[13:38] we don't sell these exact
recordings or have them available.
[13:42] in other means, so just to answer that
[13:46] instead of making you answer it, Sharon.
[13:50] So we've had a few questions
[13:54] really around dealing
with challenging emotions
[13:57] from this past week
[13:59] and a few different kind of
angles on similar questions.
[14:06] One is just that when
someone's doing the meditation
[14:12] bringing up a difficult emotion,
[14:14] it's really staying with
them for the rest of the day.
[14:18] And they're wondering just
how to deal with that,
[14:22] is that correct?
[14:23] Or are they doing something incorrect?
[14:25] Any thoughts you have on that?
[14:28] - I don't think you're
doing anything incorrectly.
[14:30] I think that it's fine.
[14:32] It's not easy and therefore
I'm trying to think of a way
[14:36] of having a stronger sense of closure
[14:38] at the end of the meditation
or before the end.
[14:44] Actually combining it, you know,
[14:46] we bring up difficult emotions
[14:48] so that we're less afraid of them
[14:49] and we can be with them in a
kinder, more compassionate way.
[14:54] And that extends then to
compassion for others.
[14:57] And, you know, so I would like
emphasize the compassion part
[15:01] and maybe do a little lovingkindness,
[15:03] it's sort of jumping ahead, but why not?
[15:05] You know bring in some lovingkindness
[15:07] or combine it with a
meditation on looking for joy,
[15:13] you know, looking for even small
pleasures that you can also
[15:18] just to create a different
kind of balance at the end.
[15:21] And I would even at the end
of the session, you know
[15:25] do a kind of dedication,
which is also jumping ahead
[15:28] but sort of offer the fruits
of your meditation to others
[15:32] so that you have a feeling
[15:34] that you're connected to bigger world.
[15:37] And that would also be a good
thing to experiment with.
[15:44] - There's a similar question,
[15:46] which is why do we seem to go
directly to negative feelings,
[15:51] emotions or thoughts almost
as an automatic default?
[15:56] - As human beings, I guess you know
[15:58] people say evolutionary
biologists say we're wired there.
[16:02] I don't know that we actually go directly
[16:05] to a direct observation and
realization of painful feeling.
[16:13] I think many of us have just
societal cultural family
[16:17] conditioning of like, look anywhere else,
[16:20] you know, don't look there.
[16:21] And so in terms of meditation,
it's actually a choice
[16:26] you know, to, I mean, not always,
[16:29] of course things arise
and pass away on their own
[16:31] but when difficult or painful state arise
[16:37] as we make the choice
to kind of cuddle there
[16:42] to turn our attention
around, to look at it plainly
[16:46] and see if we can avoid adding
isolation and condemnation
[16:51] and shame and all of those
other things and just realize,
[16:55] okay this is what's happening right now.
[16:58] But in order to do that,
[16:59] we do need a certain
measure of self-compassion.
[17:02] You know, it's not that easy
to just look at painful states.
[17:07] And so that also is a
kind of personal question,
[17:11] like what's helped me build,
[17:14] what helps me build the kind
of openness and flexibility
[17:20] and kindness, so that I
can look at all this stuff
[17:23] and it will be somewhat
different for different people.
[17:27] For some people will be kind
of lovingkindness aspect
[17:33] to their practice, which would
be important to bring in.
[17:38] And for some people,
the balance is gonna be
[17:43] in allowing the beautiful or
the good, even for a moment
[17:47] to occupy our attention because
we don't actually go there
[17:52] necessarily to the painful
states. to look at them clearly,
[17:58] it tends to be a more
distorted relationship.
[18:02] You know, we go there,
evolutionary biologists say
[18:05] our first, because we are
trained to do that in the jungle.
[18:10] You know, it's like we're
wired for danger for threat.
[18:13] It takes a kind of
conscious effort to say,
[18:15] well what's good today?
[18:17] But that might be an
important thing to do as well.
[18:22] - And what about when in
this same type of meditation
[18:27] it kind of crosses over into
remembering past traumas
[18:32] and that it's really activating
[18:34] and kind of a different realm?
[18:38] - I think it depends on
what you mean by remembering
[18:41] you know, because the question
is really how are we relating
[18:48] to the feeling, to the visualization
[18:51] or whatever may be coming up.
[18:53] And if it feels like we
are kind of sucked in
[18:57] that's activation, you know
[18:59] if it's present and we are present with it
[19:04] in a more open way, kinder
way, then that's healing.
[19:09] You know, so it's real self evaluation,
[19:13] not of what's happening,
not of what's arising,
[19:17] or even its intensity, but how
we are able to relate to it.
[19:21] In other words, what's the
environment we are creating
[19:24] around that experience?
[19:27] And is it helpful or not?
[19:28] And sometimes we just don't have it.
[19:30] You know, we haven't slept
or we've got a lot going on.
[19:34] We're just tired anyway.
[19:35] And we don't have the
sheer energy it would take
[19:38] to be with such difficult
material in a different way
[19:42] but it's that difference
that's really the point
[19:45] and that's one way or another
with maybe several approaches
[19:51] or whatever it might be.
[19:53] That's the place we grow to come to
[19:56] which is where we are very different
[20:00] in response to anything that may arise.
[20:03] And so this is a kind of freedom there.
[20:12] - The question from Judith,
[20:14] "When anger hits me, it hits like a flash
[20:17] and sometimes it's over
like a flash as well.
[20:20] I don't feel like I have
time to engage in it
[20:23] or deconstruct it.
[20:25] How can I deal with anger
that rises so quickly
[20:27] and also sometimes ends quickly?
[20:31] Is it rather like a pressure
cooking, letting off steam
[20:33] and once the steam is
released, the anger dissolves?"
[20:39] - Just before I get to that,
I wanna go back for a moment
[20:41] and to the previous question
and just remind people
[20:46] of you know, stuff we've
talked about before
[20:48] which is that balance looks different
[20:51] for each of us at different times,
[20:54] because of all kinds of different factors
[20:56] including whether we
slept last night, you know
[20:58] and balance looks different
[21:00] between people at different times.
[21:03] And so for talking about
a balanced relationship
[21:07] to very difficult emotions, for example.
[21:13] Sometimes that's gonna
mean like taking a breath,
[21:16] reminding yourself, you're okay,
[21:18] reminding yourself you're
an adult, whatever it is.
[21:22] And looking more directly what happened,
[21:24] at what's happening.
[21:26] So as balance looks like,
take a walk for God's sake,
[21:29] you know like go look at the sky
[21:31] and it's not like right or wrong.
[21:34] It's really hard and really
important to understand
[21:36] that the goal is the balance.
[21:39] And we just do different
things at different times
[21:43] to help deepen that.
[21:44] And the same holds true
for looking at anger.
[21:47] I'm not totally sure if you're saying
[21:49] you feel these flashes of anger,
[21:51] which are like a storm
moving through your body
[21:54] or you yell at her quickly
over it, or, you know there's
[21:57] you send that email and then you think,
[22:00] oh, maybe I was angry and
those are very different.
[22:03] The gap we're actually
looking for at first
[22:07] is between what we feel and how we act.
[22:14] It also makes us, I think,
less afraid of our feelings
[22:17] the anger, the desire,
whatever it might be
[22:20] because we don't have that
extra kind of concern like,
[22:26] oh am I gonna like ruin this relationship?
[22:28] Or am I gonna grab that meditation show?
[22:33] Or no one's looking or whatever.
[22:34] It's like we feel,
[22:35] okay, I can look at all these things
[22:39] with that sort of boundary
that I've agreed to, you know
[22:44] that I've taken on in
terms of my own behavior.
[22:47] And that's really helpful
[22:50] 'cause then we can look
at all those feelings
[22:53] and it's in a different way
[22:55] and we can come closer to
them without feeling like,
[22:58] oh, this always takes me over,
[23:00] this is gonna take me over
[23:02] cause we've learned how
not to have that happen.
[23:05] So I think there's
[23:06] those are actually two
different questions.
[23:08] If you're saying you're quickly angry
[23:10] and then you get over it,
[23:12] it just passes in the expression of it.
[23:15] Then I think it depends on
your particular relationships
[23:19] and the agreements that
you have with one another.
[23:22] And is that okay?
[23:24] Is it okay if you apologize?
[23:26] Is it okay if you say what
you maybe had meant to say
[23:30] but it wasn't coming through so clearly?
[23:32] Perhaps, you know because of the feeling.
[23:35] At the main part of feeling anger
[23:38] in the meditation like the feeling is like
[23:42] it can be like a storm moving through.
[23:44] You don't have to take it apart,
[23:45] you don't have to deconstruct it,
[23:47] you don't have to see what
other emotions are there,
[23:49] you just have to watch that process.
[23:53] 'Cause that shows us something too.
[23:55] It shows us however powerful it is,
[23:59] it isn't permanent,
[24:01] that we don't seem to have the
kind of control nobody does
[24:05] over in our minds where we can say
[24:08] that's not gonna happen anymore
[24:10] and have that come true,
but we can be different.
[24:15] And what happens in that process
[24:17] when it can pass through you like a storm,
[24:21] is that you do have a chance
to capture the energy of it
[24:25] because you're no longer in
the grip of like the delusion
[24:28] or the burning
[24:31] but you can actually take the energy of it
[24:33] and decide to do something
about some situation.
[24:36] So, you know, we try to
come closer to the feeling
[24:40] before the action as much as possible.
[24:45] - Thank you.
[24:48] So we also had a number
of questions coming in
[24:51] around the meditation on positive emotions
[24:56] and a number of them where
participants are expressing
[25:05] that they don't feel like
they deserve good feelings
[25:09] or that they'll come with a cost
[25:13] or that in one person asked
about the book "Optimism Bias"
[25:19] and that like being optimistic
[25:22] can actually make us ignore deeper issues
[25:25] so just wondering if you
could just speak all of that
[25:28] a little bit.
[25:32] - I understand the problem.
[25:33] I think it actually is a problem
[25:35] and I think so much of the time
[25:41] in my experience in meditation
[25:43] in early years of study and teaching
[25:47] kind of the main challenge
really was to open to suffering,
[25:54] with emphasis on the opening to, you know
[25:57] to not add those things
that we tend to add,
[26:01] which take up a lot of space,
[26:04] sense of isolation, sense of guilt.
[26:08] I brought this on all kinds of things,
[26:11] you know, it's only me, I'm all alone
[26:14] it's only gonna be this
forever and we work hard.
[26:19] I think it developing a more spacious,
[26:21] kinda more compassionate relationship.
[26:23] and a little later on,
I've noticed, you know,
[26:27] in one's years of practice,
[26:31] sometimes there can be a shift
[26:32] and you'll face the challenge
of really letting in the good
[26:36] the beautiful, the wonderful,
which is also a challenge.
[26:40] It's not the same challenge
[26:43] because we to have different conditioning
[26:45] but not all that conditioning
is that wholesome.
[26:47] You know, we may feel
something pleasant or wonderful
[26:51] and grab it.
[26:52] We're so afraid it will ever leave us.
[26:55] And that doesn't work,
[26:57] it just adds tension to the
situation whatever it is.
[27:01] Or maybe we have these strange
standards of perfectionism
[27:07] like nothing is ever good enough.
[27:09] Or maybe we have that pattern,
[27:11] you know, I don't deserve it
[27:12] or there's too much pain in this world,
[27:15] I can't let the sin, or this
is a superficial or whatever
[27:20] but it's all about,
[27:21] it's almost like the science of resilience
[27:23] and the science of restoration.
[27:26] It's like any one of us should be looking
[27:30] at how we ourselves tend
to cultivate resilience
[27:38] and whether we're actually
doing those very things.
[27:40] I think people are generally
exhausted right now
[27:44] and this has been a long,
long, long ordeal and sorrow
[27:49] and so many things that are difficult
[27:53] and it makes it even harder to think about
[27:56] taking in the joy, but, you know
[28:03] for us to get out of bed and
to try to have a better life
[28:08] or make a better world for others,
[28:11] whether it's our family
or community or whatever,
[28:14] we need some energy
[28:15] and we have to look at
where that comes from.
[28:18] Not that it will be at the same level
[28:21] every single moment as well,
[28:22] but we have to learn restoration,
we have to learn renewal,
[28:27] we have to learn resilience
[28:28] and some of that is very
personal looking back.
[28:31] I mean, I think in every program
[28:34] where I've talked about this,
[28:35] people have talked about like
[28:36] listening to music or something.
[28:39] Certainly for me, meditation
has been a big part of that
[28:43] and taking in the joy, simple joys
[28:45] like it wasn't that joyful
looking at a snowfall
[28:49] but it was pretty, you
know, and looking at the sky
[28:52] or just a small thing and
look at how it affects you
[28:57] and understand that that's not selfish,
[28:59] that's actually building
a kind of reservoir.
[29:16] - Following up with that,
[29:19] here's a question from Beth.
[29:21] When I'm sitting in meditation,
[29:24] strong emotion doesn't tend to arise
[29:26] but I wake up in the night
with unprocessed emotion.
[29:32] Can you speak a little bit to this pattern
[29:35] and why it might be happening?
[29:40] - You know, the long
view everything happens.
[29:45] So, you know, and so sometimes
meditation is one way,
[29:48] sometimes it's another way.
[29:50] It's all fine truly.
[29:52] You don't have to think about catharsis
[29:54] and as the only valuable
meditation or anything.
[29:58] Whatever it feels like is fine
[30:00] and it's always challenging.
[30:02] If the feeling tone is
kinda medium or neutral
[30:06] then we have the challenge
[30:07] of really trying to connect in the moment.
[30:10] 'Cause it's not stimulating
enough to sort of draw us in
[30:14] we have to really be present.
[30:18] There's always some kind of challenge
[30:22] and that's fine.
[30:24] I would say you can also expand your view
[30:26] of what meditation is.
[30:27] It's like, if you wake up in the night,
[30:31] you're awake you know, you
don't have to sit up in bed
[30:34] or get out of bed,
[30:36] you can lie there in any posture
[30:38] and just pay attention,
[30:40] pay attention to the interplay
of your body and mind,
[30:43] you know you get a certain sensation
[30:45] that produces an emotion
or the other way around,
[30:48] and you watch things go back and forth
[30:50] and have that sense as much as possible
[30:55] as emotions being like weather patterns
[30:58] moving through your body, you know,
[31:01] sometimes intense, sometimes milder,
[31:03] but it's just moving through.
[31:05] Do some lovingkindness for yourself
[31:08] and see what that produces.
[31:11] Do some lovingkindness for the world.
[31:13] There's something about lying in bed
[31:16] or those hours where they're
just as a greater sense,
[31:23] I find of kind of unmediated space,
[31:25] you know, you feel more like
[31:28] your lovingkindness for
all beings is moving.
[31:32] And so that's the time to
really apply those tools.
[31:44] - Here's a question from Kathy.
[31:49] "I experienced an emotion frequently
[31:52] that I've not heard Sharon
mention in these lessons, guilt.
[31:56] I feel guilty about everything.
[31:58] Not making my bed, not brushing my teeth,
[32:00] not sticking to a diet,
not calling a friend.
[32:04] These are just simple daily tasks
[32:06] and the guilt is so ingrained
[32:08] that I don't even know I'm doing it,
[32:10] self-taught self sabotage.
[32:12] It leads to a constant
feeling of I'm not okay.
[32:16] Can you talk about guilt?"
[32:20] - The way it's usually talked about
[32:22] in say the Buddhist psychology is
[32:27] it's claim of fine use
of language you know,
[32:30] and that is to see guilt as a state
[32:34] that's distinct from remorse or regret.
[32:38] So in all these mental states we looked at
[32:41] or emotions you could say I looked at
[32:45] the grid, the analysis is
what leads to suffering
[32:49] and what leads to less suffering.
[32:52] And so the terminology would be
[32:56] that which is skillful
leads to less suffering,
[32:59] leads to more happiness,
more connection, more wisdom,
[33:03] and that which is unskillful
[33:06] is that which leads to more suffering
[33:08] for ourselves or others.
[33:10] And so in that analysis
[33:13] remorse or regret are considered skillful
[33:16] and guilt is considered unskillful.
[33:19] And this is the difference you know,
[33:23] this is very beautiful
statement from the Buddha's
[33:25] that said, when he said,
[33:28] "If you truly loved yourself,
you'd never harm another.
[33:32] If you truly loved yourself,
you'd never harm another
[33:34] 'cause you see that harming another
[33:36] is like harming yourself."
[33:40] And sometimes when we
remember times we've spoken
[33:44] you know, harshly, or we did something
[33:48] and it really broke the harmony
of a group or something,
[33:53] we feel the pain of that,
[33:55] we feel the lack of
self-love that came with,
[33:57] we feel remorse like
[34:02] I wish I had seen things more clearly then
[34:05] this is, you know we feel the pain of it
[34:07] and we're able to let go
[34:11] and move on with a determination,
like lessons learned,
[34:15] I'm gonna try to be better in the future
[34:18] and also an appreciation
that no one is perfect
[34:20] but there's that kind of effort,
[34:23] the reconstitution effort
like, yeah, I really blew it.
[34:27] Then now I see that at
least leaves a residue
[34:31] even all this time later,
I'm gonna try to be better.
[34:34] So in effect we forgive
ourselves and we can move on.
[34:38] Whereas guilt is like staying stuck there.
[34:40] It's not just an action or behavior,
[34:43] it's more like essential to our being
[34:45] like I am bad, I am lazy, I am whatever.
[34:50] And we just go over it
and over and over it
[34:52] and we don't have that same sense of like,
[34:54] okay, lessons learned.
[34:56] That was not a great thing to do.
[34:57] I'm gonna try harder in the future.
[35:00] We just can't go on.
[35:01] We're stuck and so it's not healthy,
[35:04] it's not considered skillful,
[35:05] it's not onward leading,
[35:07] it's not gonna give us
the energy to be better.
[35:11] And so the first thing we try to do,
[35:14] you know that's the guidance is,
[35:16] see if you can feel the difference.
[35:19] and remember that the
remorse doesn't feel good,
[35:23] but it is a good state.
[35:25] 'Cause we're also not super identified
[35:27] like I am just that
idiot who did that thing.
[35:30] It's like that was a mistake
[35:32] or that was an action
that wasn't so helpful.
[35:35] So see if you can feel the difference
[35:36] and if you're more in the guilt terrain,
[35:39] that too is time, first of all,
seeing it clearly will help
[35:43] and understanding that
it's just conditioning,
[35:46] it doesn't mean that you're lazy
[35:49] to not have the guilt
[35:50] you know, because you can
have the recognition like,
[35:53] ooh, that was not a great thing to do
[35:56] but you have the ability to go on.
[35:58] And this is really very very important
[36:00] and some lovingkindness for yourself
[36:02] is really at the root of that.
[36:09] - Here's a question about anxiety
[36:15] from Susan,
[36:16] "With health anxiety I find it
extremely difficult to cope.
[36:21] I get the slightest symptom
[36:23] and then it turns into a full blown panic,
[36:26] but it's something terrible.
[36:28] How can mindfulness help me
with this ongoing problem?"
[36:34] - Well, it's not an uncommon problem
[36:36] I mean, especially in these days.
[36:41] Psychologically I guess we'd
call that catastrophizing
[36:46] and here I refer to my friend,
[36:50] my colleague Sylvia Boorstein,
[36:51] who describes herself as a
recovering catastrophizer.
[36:58] The idea again is that
we're not gonna be able
[37:00] to stop certain patterns from emerging
[37:04] or certain thoughts from arising.
[37:06] The question is cultivating the strength,
[37:09] the dexterity, the presence,
the balance, the kindness,
[37:14] to be with those thoughts
in a different way
[37:17] so that they don't just take your weight
[37:19] and then drag you into action.
[37:22] They don't leave you suffering,
[37:23] you know for a good long time.
[37:26] And so don't despair if
those thoughts still come,
[37:30] everything here too is gonna depend
[37:32] on how we relate to them.
[37:34] So Sylvia got into meditation practice
[37:38] because she was suffering so much
[37:40] from clinical anxious rumination.
[37:45] So she would describe herself this way,
[37:47] she's 82 or 83 or something like that.
[37:51] So her children are adults.
[37:53] And she said, "I'm the kind of person
[37:57] who would call my grown child
[37:58] and they don't answer the phone.
[38:01] So they must be dead."
[38:03] She said, "I never think
they're taking a shower
[38:06] or that maybe they fell in love,
[38:07] they don't feel like
talking to their mother,
[38:09] it's like they must be dead."
[38:10] And she was so haunted
by that kind of thinking.
[38:14] I'm sure it was very hard on her family.
[38:16] That's just how she got into meditation,
[38:18] you know many years ago.
[38:20] And I think what happens is really that
[38:24] those thoughts would come
[38:25] she would see them much more
quickly for what they were.
[38:30] She'd have a way to kind of reground.
[38:32] I mean people like what I say to myself
[38:35] with that kind of anxiety
is you don't know,
[38:38] you know you've already diagnosed yourself
[38:40] and sent yourself to a a facility
for the rest of your life,
[38:44] but you don't know, right, and that helps.
[38:49] Just something, it could
be a grounding exercise,
[38:51] just the kinds of things people do
[38:54] like look for what you're saying
[38:55] look for what you're hearing,
look for what you're feeling,
[38:58] anything that you learn.
[39:01] And you will find that
there is a kind of kindness
[39:06] that comes in, that you
extend it to others.
[39:08] You see people having terrible
experiences of anxiety.
[39:13] And it's sort of like
sometimes I say to myself,
[39:18] you can go through this three times
[39:20] or you can go through it
once if the worst happens.
[39:24] You can go through it,
like live through it,
[39:25] you know, in horrified anticipation.
[39:28] You can go through it
when it actually happens
[39:30] and you can go through
it because you're stuck
[39:34] but we don't need to do that.
[39:35] And there's so much more joy
[39:37] and kind of lightness of being
[39:38] that can come even with that habit,
[39:41] you know, still somewhat prevalent.
[39:46] - Thank you.
[39:58] Well, here's a question from Catherine.
[40:02] "My question relates to how
to embrace a transition,
[40:06] even one that you're dreading.
[40:08] My maternity leave is ending soon
[40:10] and although I'm trying
to embrace the idea
[40:13] that every ending is a new
beginning, I still feel very sad.
[40:17] How can I honor these feelings
[40:19] while remaining present in
my last days of this leave.
[40:22] I want to model this for
myself and my young child.
[40:25] Thank you so much."
[40:27] - I think it's both.
[40:29] I don't think,
[40:31] you know it reminds me in a
present moment kind of way
[40:35] of what sometimes quote,
Roshi Joan Halifax.
[40:43] When I wrote a book called "Real Love"
[40:47] which was two books ago,
[40:52] I was quite late turning in the manuscript
[40:55] and then they turned it in
[40:56] and I got an away message
from my publisher.
[41:00] Like they're on vacation.
[41:01] And I thought, well, great
[41:02] I could have had another
two weeks, but I didn't.
[41:05] My publisher wrote me finally,
[41:07] he said, "I really liked the book.
[41:11] And the part I liked the most
[41:13] was when you quoted Roshi Joan
Halifax saying something like
[41:18] we shouldn't try to force
ourselves to see the traumas
[41:21] of our past as gifts, they're givens.
[41:27] And my first thought
was, well, first of all
[41:29] the part of my book he likes
the most I didn't even write,
[41:32] Roshi Joan Halifax wrote it.
[41:34] But I actually agreed with him
[41:35] because it's a very important lesson.
[41:39] There can be a lot of pressure to feel.
[41:40] I have to be grateful for this
[41:42] and I have to figure it as a gift
[41:45] and that's just unreal.
[41:47] And in many cases, and
that's not the point,
[41:49] you know is to just get into
some super-imposed state
[41:53] that we think we should
be feeling or not feeling.
[41:57] And so it's a given it is, it's true.
[42:02] So I would hopefully, you
know want that to relieve you
[42:05] of a big burden right away.
[42:07] You don't have to be grateful for it.
[42:09] And of course you're sad,
[42:12] but when that gets enveloping
[42:14] when that takes over and it can,
[42:16] the anticipation of
something coming to an end is
[42:20] and often the reason
we don't enjoy the end
[42:24] because we have been for
sometimes a long time so caught up
[42:29] in what's what's coming next.
[42:34] So you wanna be able
to enjoy every moment,
[42:36] and you wanna be able to
accept, yes, this is a given,
[42:38] this is the truth of things
[42:41] and enter the unknown,
recognizing that it's unknown.
[42:48] I'm trying to think if it was Lily
[42:52] or someone else in my life
[42:53] when I was subletting an
apartment in New York city
[42:58] and I was losing it for some reason
[43:01] and I had to find another apartment
[43:05] and I felt really bad
about it and whoever it was
[43:12] they will maybe like
the next apartment more.
[43:15] And I felt like it never
occurred to me not for a moment.
[43:18] (Lily laughing)
[43:20] Okay, maybe it will be even better.
[43:22] I never had proof of that, you know,
[43:25] so it's it's all three things.
[43:26] It's like honoring what you're feeling,
[43:28] enjoying what is right now
[43:31] and recognizing that this is
the truth, it's gonna change.
[43:35] And then seeing you don't
know what's coming next.
[43:40] - Thank you.
[43:43] So we've had a couple
of questions coming in
[43:48] kind of specific to relationship
[43:51] that I thought we could talk about now
[43:53] and then we'll move
into a lot of questions
[43:56] about lovingkindness.
[43:58] So there've been in a number of questions
[44:02] just about kind of what
are the general benefits
[44:06] of meditation in relationship,
but in particular,
[44:10] like in partnership or
intimate relationship
[44:14] and also the loss of relationship
[44:17] and a number of questions
about people who, you know
[44:22] whose relationships look very different
[44:25] in particular right now
because of the pandemic.
[44:30] - Yeah. Well, I mean, I think
it's easy to extrapolate
[44:35] and in general, it'll be very personal
[44:37] but in general you can kind of tell,
[44:42] you know there's the
ability to listen better.
[44:49] You know, everything we do
internally translates externally.
[44:55] The ability to listen more,
[44:56] that helps noticing what we're adding on.
[45:00] You know, somebody, a partner let's say
[45:08] starts telling a story
[45:09] and you think I know
the ending of the story
[45:11] while they're telling a story, you know
[45:13] but maybe we realized that and we can say,
[45:16] well let me just listen,
lemme actually get here.
[45:22] You know, once we see we're distracted,
[45:24] we've cultivated the ability
to gently let go and come back.
[45:29] We apply that all the time
in order to be more present
[45:34] and to make for new beginnings, you know,
[45:37] because that's a part of things.
[45:40] What am I letting go of?
[45:41] What am I moving on to?
[45:44] And being aware of that.
[45:46] So I really think
everything we do internally
[45:51] gets manifested externally
[45:54] and we can bring that
awareness very consciously.
[45:57] Usually when we talk about being
mindful throughout the day,
[46:00] the easiest thing to be
aware of is one's body
[46:03] the feeling of your feet against the floor
[46:05] or your hands touching
[46:06] or where your breath, something like that.
[46:09] And so very often we just get in the habit
[46:13] of using those means in
order to almost be more aware
[46:20] during a conversation, during
a gathering, during a meeting
[46:24] whatever it might be, because
it allows us to just notice
[46:29] and in all the same way
as we have to be given
[46:31] again and again and again.
[46:32] We have to do it here too
and to be much more in touch
[46:38] with what you're feeling actually
[46:42] and then have enough
space around that feeling
[46:46] to have a choice, like, I wanna
say it this way or that way,
[46:54] something like that.
[46:55] And they're all just like
important skills in life
[47:00] and that's ultimately why
we actually practice them
[47:04] in meditations.
[47:06] And the loss of a relationship
is a very profound loss.
[47:11] I think maybe last time we were together
[47:14] I quoted something that I
quoted in real change which is
[47:19] that grief is love that doesn't
have a normal place to land.
[47:25] The person, the dynamic, the situation,
[47:30] the ideal, the expectation,
[47:34] the place, something is gone
[47:36] and something that can be very helpful
[47:39] is looking back and recognizing,
[47:41] well, there's love at the core of that,
[47:45] even though it's not the same
[47:47] that that love is still very alive
[47:50] and a nourishing kind of thing.
[47:55] And so here too, you know we've practiced
[47:58] just like moving our attention
and admit what we don't know.
[48:06] Here, you know with many of
these situations, it's tough
[48:12] because, you know we live in a society
[48:14] that is not necessarily
providing a lot of help,
[48:19] you know, a lot of tools, a lot of skills,
[48:21] you know, a lot of understanding
of just the universality
[48:24] of suffering and change and so on.
[48:27] So we have that to counter as well.
[48:31] The way family relates to us,
[48:33] the way friends relate to us,
[48:35] expectations, things like that.
[48:37] But it's very possible I think,
[48:40] to just create a very different
sense of what one feels
[48:49] and knowing that it's okay to feel it.
[48:53] - Thank you
[48:56] So we have a number of questions coming in
[48:59] around lovingkindness and compassion.
[49:02] And we'll start here.
[49:07] Question from Amanda.
[49:11] "I wonder if you've ever used
this Metta type of meditation
[49:15] with 12-step program
approach, something like,
[49:18] may I have serenity in my life?
[49:21] May I be courageous?
[49:23] I was dumbly present in all my actions."
[49:28] - I think that's a
beautiful set of phrases
[49:31] and the major criteria for the phrases,
[49:35] are they feel okay to you?
[49:37] They may not feel wonderful
to you, that's all right.
[49:40] They're words and it's difficult
[49:42] but you need to not feel
you're in struggle with them.
[49:47] And the other thing is
that they'd be broad enough
[49:50] so that you can make
that offering to yourself
[49:52] and then to others, maybe not all others,
[49:55] there may be certain situations
where very specific phrases
[50:00] kinda come along with a person
[50:01] but mostly you don't wanna
be thinking all the time.
[50:04] What about you? You know, what about you?
[50:06] So those are beautiful phrases.
[50:11] - And then we've had a few
questions about lovingkindness
[50:18] and the difficult or challenging category.
[50:21] Here's an anonymous question.
[50:25] " Should we send lovingkindness
to those who stand
[50:27] for social and societal injustices,
[50:30] for example, those in groups like the KKK
[50:33] or those that incited the
insurrection on Capitol?
[50:37] If so, does sending lovingkindness
[50:39] to these types of people get
easier the more we practice?"
[50:46] - Certainly it gets easier
the more we practice.
[50:50] One of the underlying principles
[50:53] of lovingkindness practice,
[50:56] which speaks for the need
[50:58] for a lot of flexibility and creativity
[51:01] is that it's meant to be done
in the easiest way possible.
[51:05] And that's just something to
keep reminding yourself of.
[51:09] So for example, the sequence
and the classical order
[51:13] of lovingkindness
[51:16] which you don't try to do
in every single session
[51:18] but you practice over time
[51:22] is starting with the
offering of lovingkindness
[51:24] to yourself.
[51:26] Then someone known as a benefactor,
[51:28] someone who's helped you, or you admire,
[51:31] a friend, a neutral person,
[51:33] someone you don't especially
like or just like,
[51:36] a difficult person, which
is what we're talking about,
[51:40] and then all beings
everywhere and all of life.
[51:43] So that implies that we ourselves
[51:47] are supposed to be the
easiest person of all
[51:49] to send lovingkindness
to because we're first
[51:52] in the classical order.
[51:53] So that is clearly not
true for a lot of people
[51:57] and sometimes untrue to the
extent of a real struggle
[52:01] in which case I always go
back to the classical order
[52:05] and say, put yourself in later,
start with the benefactor,
[52:09] start with what's easiest
[52:11] and then you can even have
fun including yourself,
[52:14] like people have said to me things like
[52:17] "I didn't know for myself lovingkindness
[52:19] till I was offering lovingkindness
[52:21] to all beings everywhere."
[52:24] And I would like pop up
[52:25] like a pop-up ad in a computer and say
[52:27] "You are, you too, you know, me too."
[52:30] something like that.
[52:31] And you can have fun with it,
but do pay attention to that.
[52:35] So when we get to the difficult
person along the same lines
[52:39] we're instructed not to start
[52:41] with like the most
unthinkable person or people
[52:45] who have hurt us so badly
or hurt others so badly,
[52:50] behaved so terribly in our
view on the world stage
[52:52] that it's just not real.
[52:56] Again, it's not realistic.
[52:58] And remember also lovingkindness
[53:00] doesn't mean you adore somebody
and you or even like them
[53:03] but that you feel the
sense of connection to them
[53:07] that our lives are intertwined.
[53:10] But anyway, so they
say, start with somebody
[53:13] you feel like a little
bit of a problem with
[53:17] because as we do it, we are
putting in building blocks
[53:23] of kind of embodied wisdom to
some very difficult questions.
[53:29] Like what does it feel
like to have lovingkindness
[53:31] for someone and from myself?
[53:34] And what does it feel like
to have lovingkindness
[53:36] for someone and so dislike their actions?
[53:40] That you think I am
gonna do everything I can
[53:43] to try to stop them, but
not from a place of hatred.
[53:49] What does it feel like
to have lovingkindness
[53:52] for someone and you
realize I can't fix it,
[53:55] I can't make it all better?
[53:58] And we sit right in that place,
[54:00] even if you don't have the words for it
[54:02] you've kind of done it
over and over again.
[54:05] You feel it.
[54:07] And then it's easier
to offer lovingkindness
[54:09] to a really difficult person.
[54:12] So understanding what lovingkindness means
[54:14] and what it doesn't, putting
the building blocks in place,
[54:18] and I'd also say,
[54:21] it's a time often of a lot of flexibility.
[54:24] I have taught lovingkindness
in several occasions
[54:28] both with a lot of
personal trauma behind one
[54:34] and kind of global trauma, or, you know
[54:40] more collected trauma,
[54:44] where the phrase the person
themselves came up with
[54:49] in offering lovingkindness
[54:50] to someone else who's
maybe free of hatred.
[54:54] And I thought, that's great.
[54:59] It is what they actually
would wish for this person,
[55:02] also believing that
the less pain we're in,
[55:05] the less pain we cause others.
[55:06] So I would play with it, but don't
[55:10] first of all, this person,
these people wanted to do it.
[55:12] You know, you don't have to
think, this is like obligatory
[55:15] or I'm not a good human being,
[55:18] but it also does free us.
[55:19] So then I'll just close
with what I remind myself of
[55:23] which is if they say the Buddha taught,
[55:25] lovingkindness meditation
is the antidote to fear.
[55:29] So that's an interesting
twist on, on and or so.
[55:34] - And one follow-up question
about practicalities
[55:39] of lovingkindness practices.
[55:41] The question from Beth,
[55:43] "Can you send lovingkindness
to a deceased person?"
[55:48] - And you can in a
couple of different ways.
[55:55] It's a little tricky,
partly because of, you know
[56:00] Eastern belief systems about rebirth
[56:01] and Western belief systems about rebirth.
[56:04] Sometimes in the West,
people are for lovingkindness
[56:09] to a person who's deceased.
[56:11] And it's almost more like it's
an honoring of their memory.
[56:15] And that's fine, that's
a beautiful thing to do.
[56:20] In the East where they
do believe in rebirth,
[56:23] they actually believe this is
an energy that can connect us
[56:26] beyond the body, beyond birth and death,
[56:29] beyond time and space.
[56:33] And so it's done kind of in that spirit.
[56:36] You can do it in the way
we do lovingkindness,
[56:41] or you can do it,
[56:44] there's a practice called Sharing Merit,
[56:46] which is like at the end of a sitting
[56:47] or the end of a contribution to something
[56:52] or phone call reaching out,
seeing if someone's lonely,
[56:57] some good deed
[56:59] then you just kind of feel
the positive energy of that
[57:02] and you offer it in the
form of lovingkindness
[57:05] to friends, to those
who've helped you often,
[57:08] to those who've died
[57:09] 'cause it is a kind of
living memorial, you know
[57:14] like your own goodheartedness in that way.
[57:20] - So we have a couple of short questions
[57:24] I think that we can fit
in before we finish.
[57:27] We're getting a lot of questions about
[57:28] what does your practice
look like, Sharon, and
[57:35] if you vacillate in
between different types
[57:38] of meditation, how long you
sit, when in the day you sit,
[57:43] (Lily laughing)
[57:44] all these things.
[57:47] - Well, again, we can divide
meditation into two parts.
[57:54] You could say, one is a
formal dedicated period
[57:56] of sitting or walking or
lying down where, you know,
[58:00] 10, 15 20 minutes an hour, whatever it is,
[58:03] where your intention is just
to try to deepen mindfulness
[58:07] and kindness and things like that.
[58:10] And then there's the
whole range of activities
[58:12] that we call short moments
many times, you know
[58:15] trying to drink a cup of tea
and only drink the cup of tea,
[58:19] not also be checking your
emails at the same time.
[58:23] So you have a much deeper
acquaintance with the cup of tea.
[58:27] Now you can feel the warmth of the tea cup
[58:29] and smell the tea and
taste the tea and all that.
[58:33] Don't pick up the phone on the first ring,
[58:35] let it ring three times and breathe,
[58:37] or don't press send right
after you wrote the email,
[58:43] you know take a few
breaths, read it again.
[58:47] Just like interject these
moments or sprinkle these moments
[58:51] of mindfulness and lovingkindness around.
[58:53] So my life looks really
different than it did,
[58:57] year and a half ago.
[59:00] I'm not traveling all the time
[59:02] and there's a lot more captured time.
[59:05] So certainly with the kind
of short moments many times,
[59:12] leading into shorter sittings may times
[59:16] like I got on to do a tech check here
[59:20] at 6:30 and we were done very
quickly and then I had time.
[59:24] So part of that time I
spent just eyes closed,
[59:30] feeling my breath.
[59:33] And it's kinda wonderful,
[59:34] just seeing, you know, two
minutes here, three minutes here,
[59:36] five minutes there, what it does.
[59:38] I do have a sitting
practice kind of more formal
[59:40] every morning.
[59:42] And that's between 20 and 40 minutes.
[59:44] I do both kind of mindfulness practice
[59:51] and a lovingkindness practice.
[59:56] For a long time, my more formal
[59:58] or my clearest lovingkindness practice
[1:00:02] was like walking down
the streets of New York
[1:00:03] or in some activity,
which you can also do.
[1:00:07] But now, that I'm not
walking to the streets
[1:00:10] of New York,
[1:00:12] I'm sort of dividing
sittings between techniques.
[1:00:17] - We actually had the question last time
[1:00:19] that we didn't get to.
[1:00:21] Caroline Welch asked,
[1:00:23] "Now that you're not
walking down the streets
[1:00:25] of New York city,
[1:00:26] are you doing it in
other ways for people?"
[1:00:32] So we also had a lot of
questions coming in about
[1:00:36] kind of what the suggestion
is at the end of the month.
[1:00:40] And a lot of these I think
are going to be answered
[1:00:43] in this week and in the final lessons.
[1:00:45] So stay tuned.
[1:00:48] There's plenty coming your
way about that specifically.
[1:00:52] And I wanna throw one more question
[1:00:56] at you in this session,
[1:00:58] because it seems like a good revisiting
[1:01:01] from where we started
[1:01:02] which is that we had the question come in,
[1:01:06] What is happiness?
[1:01:10] - Well, since I've been in the position
[1:01:12] of having many of the
book titles given to me
[1:01:15] with the word happiness,
[1:01:17] I've had to really answer
that for myself very much so.
[1:01:22] So I wrote at the time of
my book, "Real Happiness"
[1:01:24] which was the title given
to me by the publisher.
[1:01:28] I started to finding happiness
as a sense of inner resource.
[1:01:33] Like not feeling depleted,
[1:01:34] not feeling just in battle with the world,
[1:01:37] just sense of inner resource.
sometimes inner abundance,
[1:01:40] at least inner sufficiency.
[1:01:42] So there's something we can reach.
[1:01:44] It's not dependent on circumstance.
[1:01:45] Of course we get happiness
[1:01:47] from lots of different circumstances,
[1:01:49] but they are very transitory.
[1:01:51] So a more enduring or
sustaining kind of happiness
[1:01:55] I think is something else.
[1:02:01] So think about it.
[1:02:02] You know, it's an interesting question.
[1:02:07] - Well, thank you for
answering all of these.
[1:02:12] For everyone who's listening and watching,
[1:02:15] this is gonna remain available on Facebook
[1:02:18] but also we're going to be
posting it inside Teachable
[1:02:20] so you can revisit things later.
[1:02:22] And once we decide what to do
with the unanswered questions,
[1:02:27] we'll either be indirect
touch with those of you
[1:02:31] who've asked questions
with a written answer
[1:02:33] or we'll be putting out
another recording with answers.
[1:02:37] So anything else you wanna
say before we close Sharon?
[1:02:41] - No, thank you all for
coming and it's great.
[1:02:45] It's lovingkindness
week, it's very exciting.
[1:02:49] - It's lovingkindness week.
[1:02:50] Well, thank you very much
[1:02:51] and have a wonderful evening you all.
