Category: Performances

Posted on by joseph mauricio

THE FIRE HORSE

Hello everyone, and happy Lunar New Year.

I’m inviting everyone to join me this evening for a simple ceremony and conversation reflecting on the coming year. If the ancient traditions are to be believed, this year may be volatile. For many of us, life already feels that way. This may be a good time to speak with one another, to support one another, and to orient our minds toward compassion, empathy, and psychological and emotional health.

This invitation is very last minute, and I’m not assuming there will be a large attendance. But I’ve found—especially within the Dharmajunkies community—that when gatherings arise this way, the people who come are the people who need to be there. Recently, one of our members, Sherri Rosen, suggested that during this time of difficulty, change, and winter—communicating and being present for one another is especially important. I think it would be wonderful to follow that suggestion and gather tonight at 7:00 PM simply to be together: to celebrate, to find joy, and also to talk honestly about the joys and challenges we are experiencing.

 

THE FIRE HORSE

The Lunar New Year differs from the standard Western solar calendar in that it is organized around the moon’s cycles as they appear to us from Earth, rather than the Earth’s revolution around the sun. The solar calendar takes precedence in the West because it structures our daily lives and institutions, yet—as we see with leap years and uneven month lengths—it is not a perfect system. The lunar year, by contrast, is deeply organic. It aligns with the cycles of the moon, the tides, and many of our internal rhythms—the basic biological and ecological rhythms of life on this planet. Importantly, the lunar cycle corresponds across hemispheres, offering a shared global rhythm.

In many Asian cultures, each lunar year is associated with an animal that represents the energetic quality of that year. These animals combine with elemental forces—such as fire or water—to create a repeating cycle. Beyond being culturally symbolic (and, yes, the source of the placemats in Chinese restaurants), this system offers a way of reflecting on how energy moves through time.

Because lunar calendars differ slightly between cultures, some people celebrated yesterday and some celebrate today. This variability reflects the organic nature of human systems themselves. This year, many who observe the lunar cycle recognize it as the Year of the Fire Horse.

Traditionally, the Year of the Fire Horse is associated with intense energy, independence, volatility, and radical change. Fire combined with Horse amplifies passion, speed, and momentum. It is often seen as a year of disruption, upheaval, and breaking from tradition. It is linked to strong-willed individuals—especially women—who resist control. Historically, it has even been feared in some cultures as a time of social instability or misfortune. At the same time, it symbolizes fearless momentum, revolution, and catalytic transformation.

In short, the Year of the Fire Horse is fast, fierce, uncontrollable—and transformative.

Considering the upheavals we are already experiencing in culture, politics, and climate, this year feels like a kind of clarion call. That call may point to external circumstances, to our inner lives, or—most often—to both. While there may not be a direct causal relationship between how we feel and what is happening around us, the two are frequently in conversation.

Most people who observe the Lunar New Year live within Asian societies—some of the world’s oldest continuous cultures. These traditions often emphasize understanding natural rhythms as a way of relating wisely to present circumstances. While surface-level cultural expressions differ widely, beneath them we find shared human rhythms and basic truths.

The Buddhist traditions I study and practice center on the idea of Buddha nature—sometimes called basic or fundamental goodness. This view holds that all life, in its essence, has its own purpose and truth. While this fundamental goodness is often obscured by the conditions of social and psychological life, the teaching suggests that, at our core, we are not broken. We are already whole.

Whether or not one can prove this philosophically, living as though it were true can change how we relate to ourselves and others. Rather than assuming we are flawed and need fixing, we might experiment with the idea that we are fundamentally good and that our task is to uncover what is already there. The audacious implication of this view is that believing in our own goodness—and in the goodness of others—reduces the impulse toward violence, defensiveness, and overcompensation.

Losar, the Tibetan New Year, is traditionally a time of renewal and reconnection with this wakeful, good heart. From this perspective, working with the energy of the coming year begins with the assumption that the energy itself is not wrong or bad, even if it is challenging. If we believe in ourselves and in the basic goodness of humanity, then even volatile conditions can become workable.

Like learning to ride a horse, engaging this year’s energy calls for flexibility, clarity, and determination. We don’t dominate the horse, nor do we abandon ourselves to it. We synchronize. We adjust. We ride.

This year invites us to honor ourselves, to honor the spirit within us, and to learn how to ride that spirit toward the manifestation of goodness. It is a year to honor women. A year to honor change. A year to honor fear without being ruled by it.

By honoring fear, I mean respecting the warning signals that arise—ignoring them would be foolish. But red flags do not erase green ones. Pausing to regrip, to recoup, and to resynchronize does not mean we cannot move forward. Once we find our balance with this volatile but powerful energy, we may be able to let ourselves move with it—clearly, compassionately, and with discernment.

Posted on by joseph mauricio

BETWEEN THE BOXES

PART 1 – The Comforts of Limitation

I’ll admit a small secret: I watch cat videos. I particularly love cats in boxes, especially big cats. My favorite is a tiger fighting its way into a box far too small for its body. It squeezes, contorts, until it bursts the cardboard apart—and then lies there, content, half inside a ruined container that clearly offers no real protection. The perfect caption read: “He is a cat, after all.”

That image sent me down a cat rabbit hole. Large, ferocious animals squeezing boxes that could not possibly hold them, yet they somehow get inside and find peace. What became obvious is that support and safety was never structural. It was pure feeling. Even when the box fails, the animal still experiences safety in the feeling of enclosure.

Anyone who has lived with cats knows that cats find the smallest, darkest hidey-holes everywhere in the house. We shake the food bag, jingle the cat bell, call their name—only to discover them calmly folded into a space we didn’t know existed. Sometimes just glowing eyes in the darkness. This is ancient mammalian behavior: nesting, concealment, protection.

Humans are mammals too, but with a difference. We’ve developed cognitive reasoning that sometimes overrides instinct—and sometimes merely disguises it. Our protective urge is still alive, but instead of crawling into physical boxes, we build psychological ones. This is the humamamalian quandary. The predator and the prey both live inside us, and they both want shelter.

Serial killers are often described as animals or monsters, yet to their perspective many describe killing as euphoric, making them feel godlike. My ethical framework refuses to accept this as anything other than a catastrophic illusion—but the illusion itself is revealing. The experience of being “beyond the box” can feel like absolute freedom. The difference is crucial. The serial killer’s god-experience is ego at its apex: “I am at the center.” Awakening, by contrast, is the collapse of the center altogether.

The serial killer has a solid center and is a only a god only from the point of view of the mouse they feel themselves to be. Sometimes the box bears no resemblance to our reality.

Recovery programs talk about “rational lies”: the mind constructing stories to justify acting out. When we believe these lies, we fail to see the box that enslaves us. We hide inside frames that feel like full states of being but are actually partial. That limitation is the price we pay for comfort.

Humammalian boxes have evolved to be efficient in a modern society with its multifarious information streams. We don’t carry crates, we switch identities. The phone rings and it’s our mother—suddenly we are someone smaller, older patterns activated. We arrive at work and assume another form entirely, a professional self designed to manage stress, competition, evaluation. Each box offers a perspective and a presentation. We become the person of the box we’re in.

Like cats, we often enter these boxes even when no immediate threat exists. The mere sight of the box is enough. From inside, we forget the box and simply experience the world as “safe enough.” Sometimes we scan the environment. Sometimes we fall asleep.

The problem is not that boxes exist. They are adaptive. They can even be brilliant. The problem is that they are fragile and temporary, and we forget that. No matter how ferocious we feel inside a box, it will eventually fail. Like my cat Roger hiding in an empty suitcase to avoid the vet, all the box does is delay the inevitable. Roger still got his shot. At the end of his life, he hid under the bed, refusing comfort, choosing his own final enclosure. His last moments were on his terms, in his own way, in his own box.

We do this too. Especially when we’re afraid.

 

PART 2 – The Space Between Boxes

I’ve served as a hospice caregiver, and I’ve watched people approach death by crawling into familiar patterns. An old man who wanted a drink before he went. A woman who smoked until the very end. We retreat into behaviors that once soothed us, even when they no longer protect us. Sometimes especially then.

Alternately, I’ve seen those accomplished in meditation who met their deaths as a new beginning, or a next stage.  They have experienced their own ego deaths any times – each time they stepped from their box. From outside the box, they could see impermanence, they understood the box game and knowing there was nothing to hold on to, when the time came they were in acceptance.

But, for most of us, clinging to the frail and changing boxes we think are “me”, we are afraid of death as it will tear us from everything we are attached to. For this reason, we construct boxes everywhere throughout our life. Over time, these boxes harden. What once was adaptive becomes restrictive. Sadly, we begin to live beneath the bed long before we die.

In relationships, we say things like “don’t play games with me,” yet games are simply boxes interacting with other boxes. To see yourself manipulating another person for love—causing pain in order to secure pleasure—is fascinating – when we see it from beyond the box.  But if someone points out our manipulation, we might jump back in and defend the box. Threatened boxes become rigid. Our available responses narrow.

At any given moment, we are the box we’re in. And yet each box has an edge. Between boxes there is space. That space may feel an uncomfortable contrast to the supposed safety of a box. So we hop from identity to identity like the floor is lava: worker, rebel, lover, child, controller, pleaser. The space between feels like annalization.

Meditation is learning to tolerate that fall.

Contrary to fantasy, meditation is not about finding a better box called “a clear mind.” That, too, is a trap. Although a clear mind exists and is considered a mark of meditation training clarity appears, and will disappear. Cloudy mind replaces it. without warning.  Thinking mind. Dozy mind. The movement of mind is natural unless we freeze it. Turning any of these into an identity is a fool’s game. Literally, we are fooling ourselves into believing nothing just because we’ve frozen an idea in place.

The only box we need in meditation is the body. Sitting. Breathing. Not because the breath is sacred, but because it is present. Each time the past arises, we notice it, feel it, and return. Each time the future tugs at us with anxiety, we notice and return. Not to suppress—but to release the grip of limitation.

One of the sneakiest boxes is the one that says, “I am meditating.” It rejects experience in the name of progress. But awakening is not refinement; it is spaciousness. The difference between a god-experience and awakening is simple: one puts me at the center, the other removes the center entirely.

Animals reset. Humans accumulate. We carry neurological echoes of fear long after the threat has passed. Over time, the boxes we retreat into become fewer and more solid. Eventually, there is a final box waiting. But moment to moment, we are reborn into boxes constantly. Each unnoticed transition is another quiet imprisonment.

Buddhist teaching suggests that death removes the box entirely, and rebirth is shaped by the boxes we inhabited. Whether or not one accepts that cosmology, it is undeniably true psychologically. We are continuously rehearsing our confinement.

Liberation does not require destroying boxes. It requires seeing them. Feeling the discomfort of the space between them. Trusting that openness will not kill us—though it may unseat us.

The tiger rests because it feels safe enough to see the world clearly. Not because the box is strong, but because the animal is at ease. Practice is learning that same ease without needing the boxes.

That is real strength. Resting in the space between the boxes we can see the boxes as an ever morphing game. Like kids playing fort, we believe the game, yet know its not real life.

Can we rest in the space outside our boxes without being locked into them?

Posted on by joseph mauricio

A POLITICS OF SOUL

Believing, Really Believing, In Basic Goodness

Juneteenth is no longer a national holiday, just as the celebration of Doctor Martin Luther King is no longer a national holiday. The shameful history of slavery, the Reconstruction era, and Jim Crow are all being removed from textbook history. A powerful white right-wing coalition has risen, seemingly under our noses, to a prominence that allows them to affect great change in our nation.

How did this happen? Through the basic sleight of hand of the shell game, one of the oldest betting games we know. Three cups: you place the pea or seed or pebble under one, then move the cups quickly, giving the impression that you are revealing the right one. People bet, and then they pick a cup. All physical illusion — or the ledger domain, as it’s called — is based on this bait-and-switch idea. The mind goes in one direction while reality is hidden, perhaps to be revealed later.

Like a virus that lies dormant until circumstances allow it to ripen and infect, our country has changed into something many of us fail to recognize. One political bait-and-switch is to demonize someone or something, diverting attention while corruption allows wealth to accumulate behind the scenes. Recently, this has worked in two directions, which while pernicious is working brilliantly.

You blame immigrants, left-wing politics, protesters, and critics as the problem, amassing popular power by portraying deviance. But “draining the swamp” begs the question: who’s swamped, and what swamp? Yet people get excited to support cleansing — ethnically, socially, politically. Great change is coming, and if you follow us, you’ll be on the right side. Life becomes binary: you are either marching along or in the way.

The reverse bait-and-switch is when the resistance is allowed a misleading point to direct their ire. We might call the leader demented or crazy. We might denigrate the leader and their followers with virulent accusations. But this is a false pebble under the cup. We are still looking the wrong way. Who benefits while we demonize the leader? Who benefits while we demonize the scapegoat?

To find the right cup, ask: who benefits? Admit the takeover of society has happened. Kudos to the bad guys. Get over it. But who is gathering power that moves the country away from history, popular considerations, and compassion. Who is  turning us toward the mercenary transactions for a few?

I long for reporting that moves from denigration or blind support to actual facts. What is happening? Who benefits?

Let’s break it down. When a government loses touch with the people it purports to serve, it becomes more powerful than the people’s will and spirit. It benefits a narrow spectrum of supporters. Power is amassed to perpetuate their agenda. However, rather than dwell on horror, aggression and hyperbole we could hold to the spirit of humanity that is our birthright. We could recognize and empower our own basic goodness, continue to show up, and create a politics of soul — a doctrine of goodness and a spirit of nonviolent resistance.

In honor of Doctor King, who encouraged followers to act without violence because violence played into the scenario the power structure wants. They demonize resistance to see it as harmful and worthy of extraction. But those who’ve bartered their souls to gain power over the world are well versed in aggression and violence. So, a resistant alternative would have to find the power of goodness. But failure to act in times of change is supporting the problem. Yet, acting out of aggression only plays into the game. How can we move toward our heart, spirit, and higher mind in strength and fortitude.

Buddhists teach that each of us has Buddha nature, an enlightened spirit in our hearts and minds. Many harken back to the Buddha’s fundamental teachings: there is no independent solid self or spirit. Yet his later teachings introduced people to their indomitable essential nature —Buddha Nature, a fundamental goodness that is realized when we step beyond protecting, and renounce cherishing the self. Instead of adding to cruelty by advancing egoic ideals, can we find a soulful rendering of feelings and emotions that ignite the spirit? While we cannot absolve the world of hatred and evil, we can reinforce our own goodness and strength and allow that to inspire the world around us.

We could choose a politics of soul: doctrine of caring and kindness, a proclamation of the indomitable spirit of love and compassion. This does not mean hugging mask-clad aggressors or hoping for the best while everything collapses. It means building strength around our belief in goodness and keeping it intact at all cost.

At all cost. Whether or not this effects current turmoil, our spirit will eventually guide the greater humanity away from vicious self-interest. This may not happen as quickly as our attention-deficit culture desires, but compassion and the manifestation of goodness are developed in the long game.

The evening before his assassination Doctor King looked out into a darkened crowd and said: “I’ve been to the mountaintop. I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land.” He was killed the next day. Yet his spirit lives on. As does the spirit of those who endeavored to bring peace, kindness, equality, and liberation, despite attempts to kill it.

Dr King’s words are remembered long after we’ve forgotten J. Edgar Hoover. John Lennon will be remembered longer than Richard Nixon because, despite his faults, his dream of love and equality speaks to our Human Spirit. Gandhi presented the possibility of liberation that inspires us to this day.  We remember a love that lasts forever, because love is forever.  Love is quiet within the shouting but is ultimately stronger than aggression that momentarily seems powerful.

Please, do not fall for the sleight of hand of momentary power. Take a seat in your good heart and follow your true nature. Your awake nature. I stand for a politics of soul. I stand for a government of kindness. I stand for a world where compassion has a chance.

 

Posted on by joseph mauricio

CONNECTING TO ORDINARY MAGIC

The Ordinary Magic of Synaptic Receptivity and Connection.

As I walk down the street, or through a garden path, as I drive to the store or wander through the park, I become lost in my head, waging battles no one can see. This self obsession creates a moat between me and the life all around me. As I work out the details of my goals, the small and ordinary things of my life are passed by unseen. As though the birds and flowers and trees are less important than I am.

Children have a natural inquisitiveness. They are one in the joy of learning to learn, when everything is a discovery; the unbridled joy of discovering their own feet. When did we forget to be amazed by our own feet? When did we get so mentally complex that we forgot to be amazed at all?  When did we become so self-important that the very ordinary things of life became inconsequential? With meditation practice, we can reclaim this synaptic receptivity—the openness and willingness to connect deeply with the world around us. This is the ordinary magic of connection, allowing us to notice the moments that connect us to life, as it happens, in real time, all around us.

We usually cloud our connections with an overlay of bias, judgement, misapprehension. This misapprehension stems from the mind referring to itself in a limited loop, rather than connecting out to the life that is there. The mind wants what it wants, and so it limits information gathering to only that which supports its thesis. Instead of an open and childlike wisdom gathering, many adult minds are limited and dull. With regard to healthy brains, this dullness is a choice.

 

Isolation, Habit, and Self-Limiting Patterns keep us locked in cycles of ignorance.

Albert Einstein’s brain was ordinary in size and structure, but it had a profound synaptic receptivity—an openness to learn, notice, and connect. During his lifetime, Einstein’s ordinary mind had developed an extraordinary amount of neural connections. Is genius was making connections others missed. His mind had developed a willingness to learn.  We often lose this willingness. We replace connection with isolation and curiosity with self-limiting beliefs, compulsions, and habits. We look for answers we believe we already know, filtering reality through prejudice and bias. But the remedy is right in front of us. Literally. Here in the unspecial ordinary moments of life. By training the mind to notice even the inconsequential things, we are connecting to life itself, as it is. The mind loves connection. It learns and accumulates knowledge, but it is the ability to connect to new things, new ideas, new moments that physically develops its structure. This keeps it young, regardless of chronology.

A fundamental tenet of recovery from substance addiction is connection versus isolation. Isolation breeds addictive behavior, which further isolates us. This applies to all of us, regardless of substance use.  Attachment to habitual thinking and compulsive behaviors closes the mind’s receptivity. When we over-stimulate certain neural pathways through repetitive behavior, the options around those pathways begin to atrophy. Our world becomes narrow, centered on hunger, fear, and the constant search for comfort. The trajectory of this mind’s development is toward dullness and depression. Chogyam Trungpa referred to this trajectory as heading toward the “setting sun” as opposed to the rising sun of awakening.

This is neurosis: isolation that absorbs our attention and keeps us from noticing reality; birds building nests, clouds moving across the sky, or squirrels in frantic mating dances. We are drawn into fantasies, believing self-limiting stories: that enlightenment is beyond us and that the beauty of the world is unavailable until we sort the papers on our desk. A setting sun mind remains frightened, hungry, and disconnected.

 

Training Synaptic Receptivity Through Humble Openness 

Recovery from isolation is possible. It has been proven that an act of surrender, originating in desperation and defeat, can grow into ongoing acts of opening. This can be to actively thwart ego’s acquisitiveness and developing its inquisitiveness.  Instead of grabbing onto fantasies, we turn our mind to what’s here. Magic happens in the small ordinary places we are often too self-important to notice. As meditators, we employ the repetitive, simple behaviors to frustrate ego and retrain the mind to be here with what is; the breath, the body, the moment.  We are turning the mind to be inquisitive about life beyond the cushion. By directing our minds to see life as it is, we are positioned to see what we are becoming. We are facing the rising sun of possibility.  We train ourselves to be open, perceiving without bias, as if we were a pure lens, opening to the sacredness of ordinary moments.

In Meditation, each time we see ourselves caught in fantasy, we are strengthening our capacity to recognize what the mind is doing. Without judgment, we simply notice and return to the present. This choice to return builds neural pathways for connection and wakefulness. Recognition and returning render intentionality and agency. Realizations come and go, but our life is all around us, offering countless moments to build connectivity. Coming back to the present—even to the simple presence of the breath, our body, or our feet on the ground—builds the openness needed to experience the grand possibilities of mind.

To develop synaptic receptivity, we need connection. Connection to the breath, to the moment, to the ordinary magic of life around us. We learn to see the world, like Einstein did, as something to be part of, not to grab or conquer. When we have the humility to open to each moment, as it is, we discover that the beauty of the world in every step.

The ordinary becomes the gateway to discovery. This is Magic.

 

Posted on by joseph mauricio

MINDFULNESS: A CONVERSATION WITH NOW

Mindfulness is a word that’s used a lot, perhaps overused, which means it has many permutations and applications. Today I want to talk specifically about  offering our attention to the present in order to soothe and heal ourselves. I’m not talking about the ruler-on-the-knuckles, look-at-your-homework attention. I’m talking about recognizing the connection we have with the earth all the time in everyday life.

When Lord Buddha became enlightened, he was asked how he knew he was enlightened and he touched the earth and said “the earth is my witness.” This act of humility was simple and profound. Enlightenment to the Buddha was not some grand state of all-knowing; it was a state of acquiescence, acceptance, and presence. It was not rising above our circumstance, but simply being here. We can reconnect to that state of presence, everytime we touch the earth by making contact with the present. Feeling our feet on the ground as we walk, feeling our hands touching the knife as we prepare our meal, taking any and every opportunity to interrupt the grand narratives we script with ourselves at the center and allow ourselves to be present with whatever we’re doing. And today I would like to introduce how we might do that in a tactile and definite way. This simple engagement will transform your life.

A practice common to many contemplative traditions is to turn our mind toward connecting to the earth as much as we can, as often as we can. I recommend a second step. Each time we make contact with the present moment we offer ourselves a moment to go beyond the mental assertion of that contact into the felt sense, the feeling, the emotional and experiential connection to what we’re doing. The practice does not need to be lugubrious or overly religious; we need pause only long enough to go past the mental assertion into the felt sense experience.

Paulina Oliveros, the sound shaman and musicologist, would have her students walk around the room slowly enough to fully engage their feet on the earth. Then she would instruct them to “listen” to the earth through their feet. Now, the literal-minded among us might furrow our foreheads on that one, but we’re talking about an experience of allowing. We’re allowing the information of  our contact to the earth to register.

We’re looking at two stages: the contact and then the communication. Feeling our feet on the earth is a very common contemplative practice, but I’m recommending a second stage where  allow ourselves to register whatever information there is in that experience. This is just a matter of holding our attention on the placement of our mind just a tad longer than we would in a normal mindfulness experience.

Some might ask, “how can I do that all day long? I’m busy, I have things to do, I’m important.” Well, so is your life, and actually learning to reprogram the mind to feel and experience your life is quite profound. But as a practical measure, we don’t have to do this constantly. Whenever it occurs to us to do so, or as a practice when we are alone. We come back to the present, feel our feet on the ground, and see if we can’t feel into the experience that we’re receiving.

This two-step process can be seen as a yin and yang application. Yang is the assertive, some say masculine, action, and yin is the receptive or, you could say, feminine action. So while yang places the attention, yin opens and receives the information. During our day, we can place our attention on something in the present and then receive and register that placement. This has a very soothing effect on the mind and body.  This soothing is quite transformative.

Doing this practice in retreat, I changed my mind configuration entirely. This very simple process might seem very ordinary, but is actually quite profound. It is certainly mood-altering and can allow us to stabilize the energy of our inner being.

 

Let’s test out a practical approach:

Come into a settled state. You don’t have to be in a deep meditative state, just generally be here. Place your hand gently but intentionally on your thigh.

  • There are two stages: we’re placing the hand, that’s Yang, and then give a moment to let Yin mind register whatever comes back to you. What comes back might be informational, such as the bottom of my hand is warm, while the top is cooler. It might be emotional, such as I feel connected to myself. Or it may have no words whatsoever and simply be an experience. Of the various ways that contact registers, this wordless state may be the most profound.
  • Now take your other hand and place it on your chest. Be mindful of how it feels. You may have a physical response, an emotional connection or you may have a wordless connection simply experiencing the contact. Or you may have all 3 levels; body (wordless), spirit (emotional), mind (informational). In any case, avoid scripting stories and having judgements about the experience. Just be with the contact.
  • You could gently drop your hands and just become aware of that. Then place your mindful attention gently but definitely on your feet. Then allow a moment for yin mind to receive the fullness of that contact. You might feel something, you might have an emotional reaction, or you may have nothing but an elongated sense of contact. In any case, you are changing your brain.
  • Now stop, shake out, and just drop back to your normal listening posture and smile. Give yourself a really big smile.

Applied mindfulness is allowing yourself to feel your moment, your hands, your feet, your seat and all the contact points to the earth. And know you are being held by the earth, loved by the earth, and that you are part of the earth.

Welcome back.

 

Posted on by joseph mauricio

ANXIETY

 

FACING THE FACELESS DREAD 

Ugh, I’m anxious. I’m so busy and sometimes everything wants my focus. This feeling makes me want to fix change or medicate … uh, something. Something unsettling I can’t identify. Like I’m waiting for an existential jump scare. Washing dishes is good at times like this. Hahaha – but I can’t bring my kitchen sink whenever I get anxious.

So, what is really going on when I feel this unsettling faceless electric dread? Let’s look at it.

Anxiety is a future-oriented state of apprehension in response to perceived threat, uncertainty, or potential negative outcomes. It differs from fear, which responds to immediate danger we can see and touch. Anxiety is fear directed toward unseen speculation, leaving us without a clear framework for resolution.

In anxiety, our nervous and endocrine systems are on high alert without a definable cause. We become cut off, alone, in a state of amplified readiness, scanning for danger that isn’t clear.

At its base, anxiety is natural, it evolved as a survival mechanism that heightens vigilance and prepares us to fight, flight, or freeze. Aside from being a neuro-alert system, it can direct mental focus and enhance performance. When I teach to businesses in the city, I remind people that a touch of anxiety likely drew them to this fast-paced life. As a performer, I’ve learned that a bit of stage fright sharpens focus and presence.

However, chronic anxiety can harm us deeply. It enlarges the amygdala increasing reactivity, shrinks the hippocampus impairing memory and emotional regulation, disrupts the prefrontal cortex, making it harder to calm ourselves, and dysregulates the nervous system causing tension, digestive issues, and sleep disturbances. These affects create a feedback loop between the mind and our nervous system feeding itself with catastrophic thinking, rumination, and the urge to control the uncontrollable.

So how can we train the body/mind system to work with anxiety, so it can guide us without taking control.

Anxiety, Self-Harm, and Compulsions

When anxiety triggers us, we look for an escape like a wild animal. We often reach for habits that soothe in the short term, but ultimately leave us vulnerable and deflated. As a rule, unconscious behaviors ultimately entrench suffering. We might pick our skin, pull our hair, clench our jaw, overeat, drink to numb, or compulsively scroll. Each action offers a brief relief from the discomfort but often creates guilt, physical pain, or more anxiety, trapping us in a loop.

These habits are attempts to manage the unbearable energy of anxiety in the body. They are signals that we need to pause, return to the present, and tend to the body and mind directly, rather than seeking to escape.

Pause before you Act on Anxiety

One of the most helpful rules I’ve learned is to Never act on anxiety.

When we feel anxious, there is an urge to fix, flee, or figure out what went wrong. We want to act, to get rid of the discomfort. But action from anxiety often perpetuate further anxiety, leading to impulsive decisions or words we regret.

Instead, just pause. Allow the anxiety to be there, look at it without feeding it. Then check your body. Are you ready to jump out of your skin? Clenching your fists or jaw? Tapping your feet? On the edge of your seat ready to start doom scrolling at the meeting?

When we pause, we shift from reacting to observing, from doing to being.

The Practice: Stop, Drop, Open

🪐 STOP:

When you notice anxiety, pause. Cut the loop of feeding your brain and having it frighten you in return.  Acknowledge anxiety’s presence. Feel your feet on the ground. If you are walking down the street, rather than speeding up to outrun the discomfort, turn you mind to include the body, slow your pace, and rejoin yourself.

🌿 DROP:

Drop your attention from the spiraling thoughts into your body and breath. Notice the sensations: tightness in the chest, clenching in the belly, tension in the shoulders. Take three slow, deep breaths, lengthening the exhale on each breath to signal safety to your nervous system.

If you are at your desk feeling anxious, take a breath and notice the chair beneath you, the sensation of your hands resting, your feet on the floor. Let your awareness drop fully into your body.

🪶 OPEN:

Once you have paused and acknowledged the body, allow your breath to soften the areas of tension. Breathe into the tightness with warmth, like comforting a frightened child or a barking dog. Anxiety is the body trying to protect a frightened part of you; so treat it with kindness or you will only make things worse. Boycott judgement. Dont think about “relaxing”. Just open and become aware.

Opening means allowing the breath to flow fully and letting the body gradually release its grip. You can place a hand on your heart or belly, reminding yourself:

“I’m here with you.”

When our mind and body are present, we are more complete, as though we’ve returned home. There may be fear, but we can handle it together.

This practice counters the cycle of anxiety feeding on itself. By not acting from anxiety, by stopping, dropping, and opening, you shift from reactive patterns to responsive presence. You do not have to get rid of anxiety to learn to live with it.  Just remember it’s stories are never real. Drop the narrative  and feel.

Welcome home.

Posted on by joseph mauricio

THE DHARMA OF LAUGHTER

Context, Release and Healing with Humor

In times of seemingly relentless anxiety and stress, laughter might feel inconsequential or even inappropriate. But just as we often forget to breathe under pressure, we also forget to smile. And just as it’s helpful to breathe through stress, we can choose to smile—or even belly laugh—when things become hard. That may sound crazy, but maybe that’s the point. Laughter is an irrational counter to the over-thinking, rational mask we use to face the world.

There’s a saying in the Zen tradition: half an hour of meditation is like an hour in the bath, and a good laugh is like half an hour of meditation.

Laughter is a full-body release that gives us a moment of reprieve, allowing body, spirit, and mind to reboot. Rather than our habitual slumping or caving in when we feel depressed, we can sit up straight. This may seem irrational, but in fact, we are helping the body release tension more effectively. When that happens, the mind finds clarity and confidence.

Just as laughter in the face of anxiety or fear seems counterintuitive, humor allows us to step back from the attack and access a broader frame. This shift in perspective releases tension, helping us feel strong, confident, and in control.

Muhammad Ali was the greatest boxer of his generation. As boxing is physically degenerative over time, he developed a technique he called the “rope-a-dope.” When hit, rather than let emotion or pain overwhelm him, he trained himself to relax against the ropes, shielding himself from further blows—as he and the crowd watched. This gave him time to reset. It was especially effective when he’d been hit hard—disheartening to an opponent who knew they had landed a brutal blow. Ali just danced against the ropes, laughing. It was a tactic that, while hilarious, seemed very disrespectful to some—including his opponent and their corner. And that was also the point.

Humor can be subversive. It can upend expectations and expose guarded truths. It might seem inappropriate to laugh during a panic attack on the bus, but we can learn to smile inside and gain silent mastery over our panic. And just like meditation, we can practice laughter therapy—out loud—at home or in the theater.

Whether it’s a belly laugh, smile, or giggle, humor gives us the context to see the bigger picture. Stress is inherently reduced by space. Our habitual somatic reaction to stress is to tighten parts of the body in an attempt to defend ourselves from something that isn’t there. This squeezing increases pressure on the brain, which registers a problem—though it’s not sure what’s actually happening—so it overthinks and catastrophizes. This often subsides over time, but residual hormonal effects can linger. Untreated stress and tension wear down the body. And often—most of the time—there’s nothing really happening. Why don’t we see that as irrational?

Smiling in the face of panic might be the most reasonable thing we can do. Smiling provides context—a space in which stress can be reduced. Laughter is an actual full-body release, and humor, in any of its forms, allows us to step back from panic and see it in a different light.

Humor is not only subversive to the powers that be in society—it also overturns the temple tables of our own ego system. Instead of reflexively shutting down, humor gives us perspective. Smiling offers strength. Laughter provides the release that opens us to the world.

A venue of people laughing at the same joke is a profound experience—even if they all hear it differently. The joke is only the transport system. It’s the gut punch of the joke that does the heavy lifting for our release.

Jokes are good when they make us laugh—but even bad jokes are good when we’re thinking that way. A good joke is an expression of technique. But it’s the timing and delivery that make it special. And when that timing and delivery aim at social injustice or psychological limitation, there’s real depth. Humor punches through the walls of limited thinking and lets a bit of air and space into the equation. Sometimes it hurls itself headlong into the wall. But if it’s spot on, it will enliven us, release us, and bring us into community.

Interestingly, that “community of humor” can also be divisive. And in the best of times, it turns conflict into conversation.

And if we bring humor into our meditation, we might learn to not take ourselves so seriously. And this might provide the space to smile.

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The pictures in this post are of a Hotai, often mistaken in the West for the Buddha, who in classical depictions was actually quite svelte. (Think Keanu Reeves.)  The figure represents wealth, happiness, and the joy of life along the Buddhist path. It’s meant to bring good luck, good fortune, and a reminder to smile.

Smiling, laughter and humor are all indications of victory over adversity.

The second picture is one I use often because I just love it: a baby rhinoceros, which always makes me smile. Baby Rhinos are awkward and ungainly, yet so utterly joyful as they bounce around clumsily, as though they were puppies, completely unaware of how improbable they are.  

Both images remind me of the power of cheerfulness and joy.

Posted on by joseph mauricio

THE COURAGE OF AN OPEN HEART

Developing Compassion in Action

The word compassion evokes many ideas—some relatable, others unrealistic or vague. This lack of definition makes it more of an idea than an experience. We often equate it with kindness and softness, but rarely with strength and resilience. Can it be all of the above?

I want to look at compassion from a practical point of view. What is our lived experience? And how can we draw on that experience to remain strong amid the turbulence life throws our way? When frightened, we often retreat from experience and hide behind ideas.

Ideas are maps—they help us identify events, but they remain separate from lived reality. In Buddhism, we value experience over concept. And while it’s good to study the teachings on compassion, what does compassion look like in everyday life?

If we pay close attention, we might find that compassion, kindness, and love are available to us all the time. Petting a kitten, playing with a dog, holding a child—these simple moments of goodness are opportunities to communicate directly with life.

Rooted in loving-kindness, these ordinary acts help soothe our overtaxed nervous systems and reconnect us to the living world. Yet we often overlook their profundity because they seem so ordinary. In truth, compassion is happening all the time, everywhere—and, as the movie put it, all at once. Every time a flower blooms, a tree sways, or birds sing, nature is communicating. But because we’re conditioned to prioritize the negative, it’s negativity that often colors our view of the world.

When we face great difficulties, we assume we need powerful remedies. This “fight fire with fire” approach keeps aggression center stage. But it’s surprisingly easy to turn our minds toward the goodness available to us right now. Just breathing isn’t as glamorous as swinging a hammer against injustice, but we help no one if we can’t replenish ourselves with love. The birds singing outside my window, like Leonard Cohen’s “bird on a wire,” are an amazing and accessible reminder of our connection to life—if I care to listen.

That said, birdsong alone is no match for the hatred and destruction we encounter daily. The horrors of war, aggression, terror, and greed are very real—but they exist within the greater framework of a living, nurturing planet. If we look only at one side of this equation, we miss the big picture.

It would be a mistake to divide the good from the bad entirely. We live in a world that frightens us. We read the news, and it frightens us further. To escape, we go on retreat and cultivate compassion, kindness, and love. And for a moment, we feel relief. Then we return home, and within days that feeling fades. Deep self-care is valid, but the relief it offers is unsustainable unless we integrate it into everyday life. A mud bath does not encompass the full range of our experience.

Perhaps the healthiest and most practical approach is to weave together the negativeand the positive—to hold the full picture of existence. Seeing only the good is shallow and ignores the privilege many of us enjoy. Seeing only the bad can become a form of masochistic narcissism—doomscrolling until we’re depleted and numb. Neither extreme offers real respite, and both limit our ability to stay joyful and engaged. Either way, it’s still all about me.

If we stop viewing “positive” and “negative” as opposites and instead see them as energies—one promoting connection, the other disconnection—we can begin to use compassion as a tool for healing both personal and collective suffering. The teachings on compassion invite us to retrain the mind to see all things as equal parts of a greater whole. Just because we don’t like something doesn’t mean it’s evil. Do we have the hubris to make that call? Humility lies at the heart of the big view. Compassion invites us to STFU and see it all.

We will never eliminate pain, suffering, or injustice. But we can be voices for balance, comfort, kindness, and peace. “Peace,” in this case, doesn’t mean utopia. It means peace within turmoil.

I love the audacity of John and Yoko’s campaign: War is Over (If You Want It). It wasn’t just a slogan—it was a vision, splashed across Times Square in 1970. Can you imagine? Yet, as some readers will point out, Lennon was often aggressive, even violent. In response to accusations he had abused his wife Cynthia and assaulted friends, he admitted that his own violence was what taught him the value of peace. He had to confront himself and make a vow to change. His public message was an attempt to use his privilege to help the world.

The compassionate view isn’t that we can get rid of suffering, but that we can wake up and make conscious choices. We can share with others what we’ve learned about ourselves—the cruelty within our own psychology, and how we’ve worked to transform it. As the saying goes, compassion begins at home.

It’s unrealistic to think we can heal a chaotic world if our own lives are out of balance. But it’s equally dishonest to pretend we’re perfect. In fact, our imperfections can become bridges. Because we all share pain, our struggles can help us connect. Aligning with principles of goodness allows our lives to lean toward openness—and from there, wisdom can arise. But we must do the work: look within, face the damage, and also honor the goodness we’ve received. It is not a crime to notice the life and love all around us.

If we let cruelty defeat us, we burn out. But if we hold our seat and restore our inner strength—our windhorse—then simply by being awake, alive, and available, we can choose compassion before reacting from ignorance. When we pause to heal ourselves, we benefit our families, our communities, and the world.

We don’t need to fix the world. It’s not on us to change the course of ignorance. But if we want to cultivate compassion, it is on us not to contribute to ignorance. The world has existed for over four billion years and will go on long after humanity is gone. We may not destroy the planet, but we can certainly destroy ourselves. And even if ecosystems collapse—as they have five times before—life will return. Life is resilient. It grows from rock, from ash, from mud.

And that same resilience lives in us.

We can draw strength from the world’s goodness. We can tune into that growth. We can learn from it. We can become like seedlings pushing through the cracks in the asphalt—proud of our strength, humble enough to take our place. As we grow, we nourish the world simply by being alive. And we reduce harm by reducing self-importance.

We are not more special than anything else in nature. But we do have the gift of conscious choice. And we can use that gift wisely if we remain conscious. Too often, we turn self-reflection into a weapon—against ourselves and others. But maybe we can stop using our wisdom as a cudgel, and instead cultivate true awareness—not self-centeredness, but self-knowledge that sees beyond itself into the fullness of life.

And maybe we can learn to care for ourselves and be more present in our lives.

I don’t know why I posted the picture below, except that I love this lady. She makes me smile. And everytime I smile, an angel in my brain gets wings. But she’s also inspiring. She’s fine with her looks and weight. She seems unbothered by the defensive skin she’s covered in. That’s her way. Much of her life may be hard—but in this moment, she doesn’t seem to mind. She just naturally does the next right thing.

And I feel like she loves her mother very much.

Posted on by joseph mauricio

COMPASSION IN ACTION

The Strength of an Open Heart

The word “Compassion” evokes many feelings and ideas—some relatable, others unrealistic. This lack of clear definition can render it more a concept than a living, breathing experience. In Buddhism, we value experience over concepts because what we imagine is always a few steps away from what is. And while it is certainly good to study teachings on compassion, we can point to our everyday experience and see how much we are already experiencing. From there, we can become more aware of the natural goodness 0f our mind and the world.

Petting a kitten, playing with a dog, holding a child—these are simple moments of basic goodness. In these simple moments, we are profoundly communicating with the universe. Rooted in loving-kindness, these ordinary acts help heal our overtaxed nervous systems and reconnect us with the living world. Everytime we smile we turn on the lights. And everytime we turn on the lights we are building connections to life.

Compassion is something most of us experience daily, but we often don’t recognize this because these moments seem too ordinary. In fact, compassion is happening all the time, everywhere, and—to quote the movie title—all at once. Every time a flower blooms, every time a tree sways, every time birds sing from their nests, nature is alive and communicating. Yet because we are conditioned to value negative experiences more than positive ones, it’s negativity that often colors our view of the world. When I say “view of the world,” I’m referring to how concepts cut us off from physical contact with life. We live sequestered from life, locked in our minds. Like kids searching social media in a darkened basement, we scroll through the doom looking for something real. And war and hatred feel so true to us.

Birds singing are not an antidote to the horror and destruction of war, but they are also not irrelevant. The horrors of war, aggression, terror, and greed exist within the greater framework of this living, loving, eternally nurturing planet on which we live. It would be a mistake to separate the good from the bad entirely. We live in a world that frightens us. We read about it in the news, and it frightens us further. To escape, we book a retreat upstate and cultivate compassion, kindness, and love for all beings. And for a moment, we feel relief. Then we return home, and within days that feeling may wane.

But both of these experiences are true.

Buddhism speaks of the inseparability of samsara and nirvana. The healthiest and most practical approach may be to weave together the negative and the positive—to stay aware of the full picture of our existence. If we stop seeing “positive” and “negative” as opposite, and instead see them as energies—one promoting well-being, the other promoting disconnection—we can begin to use compassion to help heal both our personal suffering and the broader suffering of the world.

We will never eradicate pain, suffering, or injustice entirely. But we can be voices for balance, comfort, kindness, and peace. And “peace,” in this case, doesn’t mean utopia. It means peace within turmoil.

I love the audacity of John and Yoko’s ad campaign: “War is Over (If You Want It).” It wasn’t just a slogan—it was a vision, displayed boldly on billboards in Times Square.

The compassionate view isn’t that we can get rid of suffering, but that we can wake people up to make conscious choices. We can show others what we’ve seen in ourselves: the underpinnings of cruelty within our own psychology, and the ways we’ve worked to transform them. As the saying goes, compassion begins at home.

It’s unrealistic to think we can heal a world in chaos if our personal life is full of turmoil and imbalance. That doesn’t mean we have to be perfect. In fact, our frailties can become our bridges. Because we all share pain, our struggles can help us connect. We need to align with principles of goodness, so that our lives lean more toward openness—and through that, more wisdom can shine into the world.

The idea is simple: fully see, feel, touch, and participate in your world. Then do what you can—for yourself, and outwardly for others. We can lead by example. We can lead by sharing our journey and our pain. Not by being pristine, but by being real. We’re in the trenches with all of humanity, trying to find goodness in a world where goodness and cruelty are fused.

If we let cruelty discourage us, our energy will deplete. But if we hold our seat and secure our own balance—so that our windhorse, our inner strength, is high—then simply by being awake, alive, and available, we are helping to heal ourselves, our families, our communities, and the world itself.

We don’t need to fix the world. The world has existed for over 4 billion years and will continue long after humanity. No matter how ignorant or greedy we become, we cannot kill the Earth—we can only destroy our own possibility for life on it. And even then, when ecosystems collapse—as they have five times before—life has always returned. It is resilient. It is eternal. It grows from rock, from ash, from mud. It cannot be stopped.

But we can tune into that growth. We can learn from it. We can become like seedlings pushing through the cracks in the sidewalk—proud of our strength and capacity to grow. And as we grow, we nourish the world around us simply by being.

We are not more special than anything else in nature—except that we have been given the gift of conscious choice. But we must use that choice wisely. Trees don’t second-guess their worth. Birds don’t worry about becoming lunch. They just are. Yet we, with our gift of reflection, often turn it into a weapon against ourselves.

Let’s stop using self-awareness as a cudgel of self-criticism. Let’s develop true awareness—not self-centeredness, but self-knowledge. Let’s see clearly the tiny part we play in the vast unfolding of life, and take responsibility for our role.

We may not be able to shift or free anyone but ourselves. But every time we liberate ourselves from a habitual pattern, every time we turn our minds toward freshness and truth, we benefit the whole.

In recovery programs, they say: “Keep your side of the street clean, and take the next right step.”

We could all benefit from that kind of humility.

We could all benefit from the humility of persistence—of simply carrying on, representing goodness in a world of turmoil.

Would you like to develop this into a talk, a post, or a longer piece (like a short book)? I’d be happy to help shape it accordingly.

Posted on by joseph mauricio

FEELING THE FEAR

LIBERATION FROM OUR STRUGGLE WITH FEAR

A dedicated, consistent meditation practice will uncover our body/mind experience and awaken our innate awareness. We begin to see the world more clearly, but also begin to understand ourselves more deeply. Our burgeoning awareness uncovers psychological and physical blockages that inhibit our deeper knowing. We begin to see obstacles that we have unwittingly created as a reaction to fear.

As we gain confidence in our process we find the strength to take ownership of these obstacles which, in turn, give us the opportunity to overcome them. When it comes down to it, it’s about fear. We all have fear – in fact it’s a necessary part of our psychology. But, from a transformational point of view, Franklin Roosevelt was wrong. Then, as now, there is much to fear. The issue becomes how we react or respond to those fears. Can fear lead us to opening? Or will it ever relegate us to patterns that keep us locked in to ourselves?

When our body registers fear, its usual reaction is to grip to itself in protection. This gripping actually amplifies the fear, and closes us away from uncovering a sane response. As these gripping fears, and their associated constrictions, become apparent in our meditation practice, we begin to understand how much we have limited ourselves and our lives. This highlights a claustrophobia we had heretofore felt mostly unconsciously. So, as the obstacles to our liberation become more apparent, this claustrophobia feels heightened.  We see how we’re hiding from our life, yet the most effective form of relief, however, is not escape—but recognition. Mindfulness of our fear, and taking responsibility for our reactions to it are uneasy and disquieting, but nonetheless essential to liberation from our fear. We are reprogramming ourselves not to run from the discomfort, but to use the discomfort to see ourselves. Perhaps, this is what we’ve been looking for. Not love, not the great job, not an escape. Maybe what we’ve been looking for us to understand ourselves so we can move beyond our grip.

When we learn to stay present with our experience and gently redirect the mind toward strength, presence, and compassion, something opens. Many of the limitations we face are fear-based, rooted in early childhood trauma or even inherited intergenerationally. Language itself, shaped by culture and survival, may carry trauma. These influences can cause us to shut down in subtle or dramatic ways, shrinking our sense of freedom, openness, and understanding. Love has the power to will open us to the world and so we seek it out. But the fear of losing love keeps us locked into patterns of manipulation and coercion in order to establish a power we have never had. The power is love itself. As soon as it becomes “ours” it becomes limited. When we lock in the love, we also lock in the fear and close ourselves off to understanding.

Shutting down—often a reaction to fear—gives rise to ignorance: not-knowing. This is an obstacle to developing wisdom. And wisdom is key to freeing ourselves from these cycles of suffering.  We begin to see a distinction between a “locked-in” self—constructed in response to fear and doubt—and our deeper, more dynamic existential being. Some might call this “essential being” or even “soul,” though in general, Buddhism doesn’t regard the soul as a fixed entity destined for reward or punishment. Instead, it recognizes an inner spirit—the energy of development, change, and awakening. It is up to us to encourage that development if we choose.

This spirit is not defined by fear-based structures. Yet we nonetheless fabricate constricting forms to safeguard the very spirit they are limiting. This is like having open windows on a beautiful day and decide to close them in order to keep the fresh air in.  Our reactions to fear obscure our natural expression—our basic goodness, our Buddha nature. The remedy is to open to the windows and step back from the fear. Recognize and accept it so we can have a conversation with ourselves. Our luminous nature is bound in a straitjacket, with parts of us internally scratching at the ground, yearning to be free. This friction—this discernment—can give birth to wisdom if we’re willing to take a moment to understand.

The precursor to the process of uncovering ourselves to recognition and acceptance. The point is to see the fear, to see how its limiting us. and to feel the claustrophobia we have wanting to be free.  Yet, liberation is not an escape. Its an acceptance of our condition so that we can have a loving conversation with ourselves. We will never be free of fear – if we’re awake we’ll see much to fear. But with dedicated practice with the view of training the mind to see beyond itself we can let fear be an ally. Instead of following thoughts propelled to imagined catastrophes, we can take the very brave step and turn inward back to ourselves and feel. Not think about what we feel, but come back to ourselves again and again until we gain the strength to face what is actually happening.