Episode 107: The Five Elements

 [This episode originally aired on February 7, 2023]  Early Buddhist meditators spent quite a lot of time alone in retreat in remote, rugged areas  •  as a result, they were very much in tune with the the five basic elements of earth, water, fire, wind, and space  •  they observed that everything inside is mirrored by what is outside, and everything outside is mirrored by what is inside  •  we can observe these elements for ourselves, and we can emulate their qualities  •  the earth element has the quality of being solid, embodied, unmoving; it is connected with the sense of presence and the “thingness” of so many forms around us  •  the water element has a quality of flowing, cleansing, and cohesion  •  the element of fire is connected with warmth, compassion, and burning through obstacles  •  the element of wind is powerful and energetic; it is connected with movement in our nervous system, a constant energizing and moving quality  •  finally, the element of space is like the sky: it is vast, unbounded, open; in terms of our internal experience, it's connected with consciousness  •  in life and in our practice we can bring these elements into balance and harmony for the benefit of ourselves and all beings.

[This episode originally aired on January 31, 2023] A common idea about the spiritual path is that it is punctuated by gigantic breakthroughs, by big revelations  •  but many deep and important insights don't come in that way; they come in through glimpses  •  glimpses can be sudden or they can just kind of seep in; they are little openings or gateways into a sense of the whole  •  in some ways glimpses are similar to a jigsaw puzzle  •  we have all these pieces, and we have little insights that this piece fits into that, or this piece doesn't fit into that  •  we begin to put some things together and we kind of swim around and we don't really know actually where it's going to end up  •  but eventually, step by step, the complete picture begins to emerge  •  the whole notion of practice and study is that we're deepening our understanding, but it doesn't happen in a linear fashion  •  it happens through glimpses, and sometimes those glimpses can be shocking; they can completely upset our whole view of things.

[This episode originally aired on January 24, 2023]  Through infusing mindfulness awareness into our everyday actions, we can invoke or evoke a magical quality to existence, a natural wisdom, which is known as “drala”  •  there's a famous line from the movie Field of Dreams that's often repeated: “If you build it, they will come”  •  in some ways, through our mindfulness and awareness, we're building a world that will attract this magical quality, this natural wisdom  •  if we build our mindfulness and awareness, something is transformed, something magical descends — and it connects us with something very deep and fundamental, not just within us, but within the the world altogether  •  the basic approach is paying attention and organizing your own environment so it becomes sacred space, harmonizing both the external and the internal environment  •  in this way we can invite a quality of greater sacredness and delight.  

[This episode originally aired on January 17, 2023]  A large part of our reality involves talking, or working with our speech; it is one of the main ways we connect with our world  •  but our speech can also get us into a lot of trouble, including using it as a way of escaping from reality  •  Trungpa Rinpoche said that paying attention to speech is a way of paying attention to reality  •  but often we use speech just in the opposite way — as a way to avoid dealing with what is actually going on, covering it over with as many words as we can so we can just get through it and not experience it  •  the Dharma is transmitted through spoken words, so speech is very much honored; but it's also recognized that we fall prey to patterns of harmful speech  •  the four traditional categories of harmful speech are: lying; intrigue; destructive, critical, or harmful speech; and gossip  •  in every moment of ordinary conversation, the way we use our speech can bring us closer to — or farther away from — our connection with reality. 

[This episode originally aired on January 10, 2023]  The image of remaining like a log comes up in a number of different traditional Buddhist texts  •  think of a log rotting slowly in an ancient forest — it just lies there placidly, providing sustenance and a home for various critters as it gradually dissolves into the forest floor  •  sometimes remaining like a log is talked about in terms of vigilance: maintaining vigilance over one's mind and heart  •  usually we associate vigilance with putting a guard at the door; so what does the remaining like a log have to do with vigilance?  •  there are many ways that we lose our minds and hearts: our mind strays, or we're captured by some attachment or aversion or mental dullness  •  the idea of remaining like a log is that when we notice our mind is captured by the bandits of emotional chaos, mental fixations, distractedness, fickleness or wildness, we simply remain like a log — we recognize these tendencies within ourselves and just stay put  •  It's not an image of struggling; it’s an image of simply grounding ourselves, letting ourselves settle into our own particular forest floor of in the midst of our mental and emotional chaos.

[This episode originally aired on January 3, 2023]  In exploring the idea of transmission, we're looking into how the teachings are passed on, how the teachings are taught, and how the student can access the teachings  •  but what do we mean by transmission?  •  a helpful analogy is to think of music: you can learn to play all the notes in a song, but the music is not there  •  so what makes the actual music?  •  there's a famous jazz phrase: “it don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing” •  that “swing” is related to the notion of transmission: it’s something that happens beyond the notes, beyond the words, beyond the videos  •  something alive and essential to what dharma is all about is transmitted, but it’s not the same as the words, the teachers, the students, or the rituals  •  transmission can be thought of as the living essence of a tradition;  that living essence is non-conceptual, but we are pointed to it by various conceptual and physical means  •  it is that direct, non-conceptual understanding that brings the dharma alive, that brings us fully alive, opening and energizing wisdom and compassion for the benefit of ourselves and all beings.

[This episode originally aired on December 27, 2022]  I'd like to introduce three simple short meditation practices that help us tune in to the rich and ongoing process of exchange that marks our lives altogether  •  we're always giving something out to the world and receiving something from it  •  we are affected by others and we affect others in so many ways; and we're also quite susceptible to the energies and the outpourings from those around us  •  in the first practice we begin by looking at the simple and ordinary process of breathing, feeling the qualities of the different rhythms of the breath  •  this is working with exchange at the simple bodily level  •  the second practice is referred to as meeting suffering with kindness and compassion  •  to begin with, you could look within to see how much love and compassion is there  •  how do you experience that? what happens when you send it out? can you send it out? does it flow out or is it more buried within?  •  the third practice is connected with the idea of space  •  here, you relate to the outbreath as letting go into space; when breathing in, you let that outer spaciousness mix completely with the spaciousness within you and your state of mind and consciousness  •  you're simply stirring space and infusing space with tenderness and love. 

[This episode originally aired on December 20, 2022] One of my favorite nursery rhymes contains quite a bit of wisdom: “Row row, row, row your boat gently down the stream; merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but a dream”  •  if we think of the stream as a stream of teachings, then we could consider the Buddha as the source of the stream  •  from that beginning a great river continues to flow over thousands of years  •  where does this stream flow? It flows into an ocean, which you could say is the awakening of the practitioner  •  you have a boat to carry you down this stream, and you have a set of oars to row with  •  what kind of effort do you apply? it's a steady effort, but it's also a relaxed effort: you're rowing gently, but regularly and persistently  •  and how are you doing all this? you're doing it merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily  •  it's not a big struggle; there's a sense of delight  •  in fact it could be dreamlike because it's not so solid, it's not so frozen  •  we're in a shifting and changing world; it's so dreamlike and so unreal in so many ways, but so beautiful and colorful at the same time. 

[This episode originally aired on January 15, 2024]  The phrase, “When you lose your mind, come back” describes a lot of what happens in meditation: repeatedly losing our minds, and repeatedly bringing ourselves back  •  the moment we’ve noticed we’ve lost it is the moment we can return  •  what are we returning to? the simplicity of the present moment  •  another phrase Trungpa Rinpoche used quite a lot was, “Don’t think too much”  •  what are the benefits and what are the limits of thinking and conceptual understanding?  •  in the Buddhist tradition scholarship is highly valued  •  however, to be a realized person, to live a dharmic lifestyle, you don’t need to be a scholar; you don’t need to be all that clever  •  “coming back” in this context could mean coming back from the tangle of conceptual notes and fascinations to something immediate and basic and close to the heart  •  Trungpa Rinpoche used the term “intellect and intuition” when referring to these two streams  •  they are not in opposition or at war; there’s a sense of sophistication in the interplay between these two. 

[This episode originally aired on January 8, 2024]  At our core is our tender heart, tinged with a touch of sadness  •  it is sweet and vulnerable  •  this soft spot may be deeply buried, but it is always there  •  even very simple or momentary experiences can connect us with this heart: you might watch a pair of swallows fly back and forth, over and over, bringing food to their hungry chicks, and something melts or softens in you  •  it is so beautiful to be touched in this way  •  but this inner core of tenderness can also make us feel threatened and vulnerable  •  so we learn to armor up, to wrap that tenderness in layers of protection  •  we begin to buy into the dichotomy between strength on the one hand and vulnerability on the other  •  and little by little, we dull our feelings to hide our vulnerability  •  but as we hide that openness and vulnerability, we also cut off the tender wellspring of kindness and compassion  •  the posture of meditation, with its strong back and soft belly, symbolizes the integration of strength and vulnerability  •  when these two are in harmony, we may discover that our vulnerability is not actually a weakness, but our greatest source of strength  •  when we bring vulnerability and strength together in harmony, we begin to live in this world in a more confident, fresh, and vivid way.