Writing – Page 16 – Joseph Mauricio

Posted on December 5, 2022December 5, 2022 by joseph mauricio

BECOMING YOUR BEST NON-SELF

Ego is a term used to indicate an aspect of our psychology that we identify as “me”. However, on closer inspection, there seem to be a number of “me’s” that we employ – and believe – depending on our circumstance. There is the me that I find at work, the me that I feel when relaxing, the me that meditates and the me that can’t sit still.

These self-identities are important to our emotional and social wellbeing. They offer a reference point from which we can communicate to our milieu. Psychologists label a “strong sense of self” as being important to create healthy relationships in life. As ego states are defined partially by the specific situations to which they are linked, a healthy sense of ego, it would seem, is one in which we do not cling too tightly or believe too literally. Looking closely to their make up we see that these ego states are comprised of habitual patterns or behaviors. Each particular ego state is like a program that employs a series of functions. Frequently these disparate selves lie in dissonance to one another. For instance, the child self may behave differently than the adult self. This dissonance becomes conflict when we cling to the identity. We cling so tightly that we don’t see around ourselves. We are like fish who don’t recognize that water we live in. It becomes an ocean of “Me”. We sometimes believe there is only Me and whatever we are going through. In this way, inflamed ego states are essentially narcissistic.

The tighter we cling to these ego states the more inflamed they become and the more real they feel. This self-clinging causes obscurations in our ability to see, and understand, others. The more pressure we feel in life, the tighter we cling to our identities, the less we understand what is going on around us. As we do this, the habit patterns associated with those identities become ingrained in us. The fact that these identities are not consistent, doesn’t seem to sway us. Lost in the moment “who I am” becomes all important.

As we develop mindful awareness in meditation practice, we begin to see the space around “Me”. In time, we awaken into the water of context – we become aware. This awareness allows us to understand that these identification states are fictitious. As compelling as they feel, ego states are merely comprised of patterns. And as we develop awareness, we develop the ability to choose which of these patterns we find helpful and when to employ them. In this way, we become freed of the grip of self-identification. Or, as is said, we become free of the bondage of self.

From a Buddhist perspective, the problem is not ego – or the sense of self, itself. The issue is our clinging to the sense of self. This clinging is what creates our imprisonment. The tighter we cling to this provisional identity, the stronger the patterns are, and the more limiting those patterns become. As these patterns happen unconsciously, we don’t see our self-clinging, but believe we NEED whatever it is we think will protect “ME.” We compulsively cling to objects in our environment that we feel will enhance or protect our sense of self. BUt, of course we don’t see this. We only see the things we think we want. That hamburger, that lovely piece of jewelry, that person who looked our way. We mistakenly believe that the things to which we cling will protect us. We miss the fact that at the core of this process we are clinging to our ego. As our ego state isn’t actually there, we ultimately feel bereft and this drives our compulsion further.

The more empty we feel, the more we cling to things we believe will fill us. And the tighter we cling, the less we see. The less we see, the more imprisoned we are in the limiting patterns of “Me”. Our ego is no longer a device to secure us socially, but has become a series of patterns that we employ without conscious consent.

Meditation practice is the practice of training the mind to see the space around itself. And, it allows us to connect to an essential sense of wellbeing. As we return to the breath, we are returning to our heart. As we return to the heart, we are building a connection to ourselves that strengthens us. This unconditioned confidence is a sense of wellbeing that is not dependent on clinging. In fact, it is radiant. Rather than continually taking from life, we are able to give back.

When we develop the confidence of self-awareness, we are free of the bondage of self. We have less need to cling to ourselves and everything around us, as if we are drowning. Liberation in meditation means freedom from the compulsive attachment to the limiting patterns of “Me”. In truth, we are much more than our fear based beliefs. We are capable of great love. Feeling love for ourselves is not egotistical. It is an appropriate non-codependent action that reinforces our essential sense of wellbeing and diminishes the need for clinging. Rather than blindly gripping to self, offering ourselves self-love and radiating that love to others, gives us the confidence to see past our defensive and limiting patterns.

For me, this process has begun to feel light and free. As there is less to defend, there is so much more to enjoy. The less “Me” there is in my life, the more life there is for me to live.

Posted on November 28, 2022November 28, 2022 by joseph mauricio

Developing A Healthy Self-Regard

Developing A Healthy Self-Regard is not Egotism.

Self-love and self-encouragement are so important to our physical, mental, and emotional wellbeing. Yet, the question of what it is to love oneself is not always clear. Is it giving in to the ½ gallon of ice cream, or making it to the gym? And I think many of us struggle toggling between the poles of indulgence and abstinence.

The question may have to do with the “self” part of the equation. We unconsciously accept ourselves as a consistent, self-existing “Me-thing”. But, in truth, we have many selves. These partial-selves can be seen as defensive systems that enact programs of habitual thought and action. Some of these aspects of the self are benign and the attendant programming helpful or innocuous. But some of these defensive selves are rather destructive and self-defeating. The problem is, they all appear as Me, so we assume they are right. For instance, when something happens that we find challenging, we will sometimes feel attacked and evoke the victim-self that has a series of strategies it employs for our survival. There are a host of partial selves that invoke habitual responses that are frequently at odds with our best interests. We hurt those we want to be loved by, or love those that can’t return our love. We employ a host of strategies to try and get what we want. And while some strategies seem to work in the short term, few of these serve our inner growth. We are employing a shifting whack-a-mole defense when life feels threatening. We get lost trying to fix everything.

My meditation teacher would say we are pointing at the world, holding the wrong end of the stick.

In Meditation theory we refer to this complicated process as ego. This is not strictly ego in the Freudian sense, but in meditation theory, ego is self-will run rampant. It is “Me” trying to make “Me” happy. But there is a higher state of being, which is common to all life. Spiritual traditions talk of God, or Goodness, but the feeling of well-being need not be tied to any spiritual tradition. It is simply a feeling of wellness that we feel effortlessly within ourselves. So, rather than tackle the slippery slope of self “love” perhaps we might say that our mental health is predicated upon a sense of self-regard.

We are aware of our being and accept ourselves right now.

In meditation, we are training to be in acceptance of ourselves in the present moment. I say the present moment as opposed to the theoretical moments of our past or projected futures which may or may not meet our approval. The past or the future are fraught with speculation and complication. But how you feel right now – in the present – is the self that meditation practice seeks to contact and develop. By contacting that essential self we build an unconditional confidence. This is a long process that requires patience, and care. But the process is nonetheless quite simple. We return to ourselves in the present by simply being here. This is not the partialized tectonics of our shifting guises, but our true complete being. The way to contact this essential self is to simply return to the present.

Again, and again.

We return to the present with no judgement or elaboration. Just gentle loving acceptance applied as needed. Then questions of “ice cream” or “the gym” are seen as strategies to make “Me” feel better. This implies there is something wrong with me right now, or wrong with the way I feel so I have to change it. This seems to be missing the point. We are pointing the stick in the wrong direction. Rather than fixing ourselves, perhaps we can learn to be with ourselves. In this way, we diminish our partialized defensive postures and begin to make a connection to our full self. Not fixing anything, just getting to know ourselves. The very simple process of coming back to our being in the present moment, again and again, is an act of loving acceptance of ourselves that, in time, breeds confidence.

And confidence that is built upon self-knowing is unconditional confidence. It is not the ephemeral confidence built on material things that come and go. Yes, nice clothing feels good and there is no shame in that. But those clothes will go out of style, our bodies will develop and our minds will change. We can scramble to keep up with trends that we mistakenly feel define us, or we can find something lasting and constant in a feeling of unconditional self-regard. We come to know ourselves just as we are and, in time, well being seems natural.

As consistent daily Meditation practice in time, transforms our partial selves into a comprehensive experience of well-being, we may continue to toggle between our partialized defenses and a grander sense of wholeness. We will be momentarily lost in regret of the past, or delusions of the future, but if we train the mind to recognize this and develop the power of recollection, we return to ourselves in the present.

Recognize, Remember and Return. Then we are holding the stick upright in a statement of our wellbeing. In this way, ice cream and the gym become expressions of our self-regard.

Not fixing but being.

Like dating. If you begin with manipulation, or a defensive posture, you may thwart connection. But if you begin with listening, and being present, the you and they have the time needed to know each other and feel comfortable.

And, who knows, maybe then you might fall in love.

_______________________

This week’s practice suggestion:

Sit in a comfortable posture, which is both connected to the earth in an expression of acceptance while rising upright in an expression of confidence.

Before you start your meditation just be there for a moment. Try to avoid “doing”. Each time you feel you are wasting time or “should” be doing something differently, just notice that and relax back into the moment. Just tell yourself it’s okay to be here with you right now.

Just come back to now without doing or changing.

See what it’s like to just be.

Feel your whole being, and when you’re ready,

step back in your mind and feel yourself in the space around you

If you are anxious, love that. Hold your heart and accept the feeling.

Don’t change anything.

Just come to know you.

You might think – or even say – to yourself “I’m here with you. Thank you for being here with me.”

Posted on November 21, 2022November 21, 2022 by joseph mauricio

MINDFUL AWARENESS

The balance of mindful awareness allows us to navigate life and practice.

Mindfulness is an overused term these days. It might refer to anything from a meditation practice, to a lifestyle choice, to a fragrance. I wanted to narrow the focus down to a practical application of the term. Mindfulness refers to the natural function of the mind to contact an object in the present moment. MIndfulness allows us a tactile connection to our world that is psychologically grounding.

In meditation practice, we generally choose an object to be our contact point. Intermittent connection to an object of meditation is a reference that allows our practice to stabilize. Once we are grounded in the present moment, we are naturally able to relax into the meditation. This relaxation leads to an expansive and open awareness. That open awareness is the source of insight. Yet, that openness is dependent upon the grounding we develop by contacting the present with our mindfulness. The ideal practice situation can be seen as a balance point between mindful contact to the present and a larger sense of awareness around that contact. We are mindful of the breath, but also aware of our body and the space around us.

This mindful awareness practice easily translates to life. MIndfulness of the steps we take going down the street, allows us to relax and open to the flow of the traffic around us. In Meditation as in life, this is a balancing act. If we are too nervously connected to our mindful contact, we lose the fun and inspiration of the space around us. The point of a walk is more than our feet on the ground, just as the point of our meditation is more than our breathing. The point of a walk is to get to where you’re going,but also to enjoy the process along the way. The point of our meditation is liberation from the dull authority of our egoic limitations, which is to say, waking up. But, if we get too fixated on our insights, or become lost in the space around us, we might lose contact with reality and begin to live in our head. Living in our head often translates to falling on our head.

So, in meditation, as in life, we are balancing the practical humility of present contact, with a letting go into the space and movement of our process. It is very much a dance. Like a dancer who trains long hours to gain the muscle memory of the choreographed steps of their piece, the point of the training is to let go into the flow of the music and the performance. Just as the dancer has trained themselves to be mindful of the steps, just so we can train ourselves to be mindful of the moments of our life. While, mindfulness implies the humbleness to be simple and connect to the moment, we need not feel restricted or leaden. That would be like a dancer who just looks down at their feet, never smiling. We have the humbleness to contact the present and the confidence to let go and relax into the space.

The balance point is in the body. I use the heart or the gut as the energetic centers of my meditation. Breathing into the gut is extra grounding. It calms the nervous system which, in turn, allows us to relax into the movement of our practice. The conjoining of Mindfulness and Awareness is an experience of flow;. We are always moving forward in time. It’s a misunderstanding to believe that the present moment is sedentary. Contacting the present is grounding, yes. But the point of that grounding is to let go into the flow of the practice, just as we let go into the flow of our life.

Awareness of life is the point of our practice in the first place. But we can become lost in that space without the grounding contact of our mindfulness. In this way, mindfulness offers the ground that allows the confidence to let go into the enjoyment of the process. In my day, I am aware of balancing between getting lost in the flow, and hence submerged into non-awareness. The remedy is to reconnect to the earth, feel the breathing in the body, and then relax and let go into life. Mindfulness is not an imprisonment. It’s the intermittent contact to the present that keeps us on course.

Posted on November 14, 2022November 15, 2022 by joseph mauricio

INTUITIVE INSPIRATION

INTUITIVE INSPIRATION

Intuitive inspiration refers to bringing our feelings and wisdom into parity. It’s a process of feeling ourselves into wakefulness which is a full application of our mind – or Mindfulness.

Being culturally binary, we tend to separate instincts from our higher sensibilities. The gut seems personal and the higher mind universal. But universal wisdom is not always accessible, especially when it’s most needed. Sometimes we need to rely on the guy instinct. When we feel attacked our impulse is to tighten the gut and react. This is not gut knowing, it is defensive reaction. We might punch back, run away, or freeze in place. But reactions happen with our eyes closed. We think we are defending ourselves, but we are usually lashing out blindly in the dark. And blind reactions are rarely an effective defense. Blind reactions are hijacking the mind, not employing its full potential.

Meditation training works to create space between impulse and reaction. By recognizing our thinking and returning to the breath, we create space in the mind. This space acts as a buffer that keeps us from blind reactions that intentionally, or unintentionally, cause harm. Instead of blind reaction, we have a gap in which we can open our eyes and be present. This is what is meant by mindfulness. Our mind has enough space to use a fuller capacity to understand what is happening. With mindfulness we are able to respond rather than react. Reactions are often reliving past injuries that have little relevance in the present.

But while an honest response happens in the present, we may still feel the residual pain of past experience. If we commit to mindfulness, we can allow gaps created by our meditation experience into our present experience. This gap creates the buffer so we can allow the panic from the gut to inform our present understanding without hijacking our awareness. We can feel our pain without reacting to it. In this way, we are keeping our eyes open to both our visceral and our higher mind.

A word of caution here is that Mindfulness is balancing our lower instinctive mind with our higher wisdom. Should we bypass the lower instincts and grasp on to the higher mind, we are just running away. We are closing our eyes and hoping the universe, god or some powerful entity will save us. This is not accessing our higher mind and is still a reaction that will likely lead to painful situations. Mindfulness, on the other hand, is the practice of combining the wisdom of our higher perceptions with the experience of our past so we can have an intelligent and fully felt experience.

Instinct is wisdom that comes from is our personal experience as well as the collective experience of humanity. There is a lot of helpful information here which is nonetheless mixed in with personal trauma and confusion. This is why we need the higher perceptions of wisdom mind to help clarify the experience. In a state of non-reactivity, we can “feel” our intellect and “see” our feelings. With Mindfulness our gut and our mind combine for a fuller interpretation of an experience. Accessing intuition requires feeling in to our experience, and accessing wisdom is an act of letting go. Touching in and letting go.

In the Shambhala Tradition we call this “Joining Heaven and Earth.” We are grounded in past experience and inspired by the possible. You might say, Mindfulness is awareness of present moment that is informed by the past, but also open to the future. We feel the gut, and we let go into the possibilities beyond. In this way, our experience is quite regal. We are grounded and aware. A good ruler is one who is in touch with the present needs of the people, but also has awareness to move them forward. In traditional Indian Buddhism, meditation was likened to the gait of an elephant. Strong, definite, and grounded, but with a panoramic awareness of life around it. A Wisdom Monarch is strong and grounded and both nurturing and protective to their tribe.

When we are joining heaven and earth, we have natural leadership. And while this can mean leadership of our world or society, it most importantly means leadership of our personal mind in every moment. When we feel in and open out, we join heaven and earth, and access the kindness to nurture ourselves and the wisdom to see beyond to liberation.

Posted on November 7, 2022November 7, 2022 by joseph mauricio

IT’S MONDAY

It’s Monday!

Ugh.

Another week. And whether it’s pushing through the same old grind, or a critical mass coming to a head on our head, we frequently look at our week as if it requires heroic doses of caffeine just to face the face in the mirror. Along with stimulants, we kick ourselves into gear with any manner of sloganning. “Today is the first day of the rest of your life!” “It all starts now!” “I gotta do it!” “Just do it!” “I can do i!” Sure,. I just need more discipline.

No wonder a part of us wants to stay in bed.

This conventional way of looking a discipline would be fine if we were living in a TV commercial. But we are more than 2-dimensional caricatures of ourselves. We are full beings with a full scope of feelings ideas and needs. We have many important voices within us. A part of us wants to move forward, while another part is eyeing the cozy unmade bed.

But Monday is and a perfect time to look at life and how a meditator can look at their discipline and work ethic – from the point of view of the Dharma. Taking a Dharmic approach begins with acceptance and self-connection. Before we rush out the door and push ourselves into a life some parts of ourselves are still resisting, we can pause and be with ourselves for a moment. Whether that is meditation, prayer or contemplation a moment of acceptance allows us to synchronize with our whole being. It’s possible that all the opinions will not reach agreement, but our meditation is a way of engaging an executive voice that can organically lead the process. With kindness, evenness and non-judgement we can encourage ourselves forward. Instead of dragging ourselves kicking and resisting, or conflating our experience into platitudes, we can synchronize with ourselves with a kindness and care that addresses our full being.

In Meditation theory we call this addressing our body, spirit and mind. And that connection to our whole being leads us to the practice of the Paramitas. Paramita refers to an action that “goes beyond” the 2-dimensional conflated sloganning we conventionally employ. A paramita is said to be a “transcendent” activity that goes beyond ego. Generosity, Patience, Discipline, Effort, Meditation and Wisdom are six categories of practice that are foundational to the Mahayana Buddhist path. These differ from the standard readings of these words, as Paramita is a transcendent activity. The paramita of discipline, or Sila in Sanskrit, is transcendent discipline. It goes beyond self-defeating puynishment or expectation which is in service to our overbearing egos. Transcendent discipline begins with the heart, continues with encouragement and ends with a connection to our world that is helpful and kind.

So, instead of beating ourselves up and then taking it out on everyone else we are employing mindfulness and awareness which leads to an action that benefits our world. But right action in the world begins with connecting to ourselves. They say that the Mahayana Dharma is vast and profound. Profound in that we connect deeply within ourselves and vast in the expansive ways we can reach out to others. In a very basic binary, when we are kind to ourselves we can be naturally generous to others. When we are understanding of ourselves, we can be patient with others. When we are clear with ourselves, we can be helpful to others. When we have discipline without aggression, we can be effective in our world.

Today, Dharmajunkies moves back to Mondays, and tomorrow we have an election. It’s a perfect time to engage our life and synchronize with our higher purpose. Sarah C. Whitehead will lead us in a deep dive discussion of Sila: The Practice of Transcendent Discipline.

Posted on November 3, 2022November 3, 2022 by joseph mauricio

REMEMBERING TO STAY HUMAN

Halloween. A time when goblins and angels cavort together. Superheroes bent on saving humanity, or at least Gotham, walk hand in hand with super villains and serial killers. It’s strange to see these polar archetypes working together when our political parties cannot seem to get along.

Vajrayana Buddhist teachings suggest we are entering a “Dark Age” where the good and evil in the world will increase and come to climax. Dickens was prescient when, in 1859, he wrote, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.” Those run-on sentences are as applicable today as they were appropriate then.

These are challenging times. Many of us suffer from an existential dread that has kept us locked away from ourselves and our world. Meditation practice is an act of healing that allows us to reconnect to humanity each time we return to the breath. Learning to work with fear and anxiety is an important practice for anyone trying to maintain balance in their lives and it is especially important during difficult times. Meditation can be seen as a stabilizing act of kindness. Regular meditation practice will help calm the impact of our hectic lives and, over time, allow us to build resilience and emotional balance. From that point of balance we we can face our fears and recognize the anxiety-based behaviors that actually increase insecurity and isolation.

We can then choose to turn from that punishing behavior toward healing and reconnection.

Healing and connection are fundamental properties of humanity. They are an expression of our basic goodness. Healing and connection are possible because they are inherent in our being. Each time we choose to return to the heart, we are reconnecting to our humanity. But when we are frightened and act out of anxiety our goodness becomes obscured by our defenses. Our defenses feel so right in the moment that we overlook the simplicity of reconnecting to our heart. We would rather lash out in violence than soften our hearts and listen. This is because we feel strong when we feel right. This drive to surety causes us to cling to beliefs that support defensiveness even when those beliefs are self-destructive and self-defeating. When we feel powerless, we would rather follow paths of obvious destruction as long as they offer us an illusion of strength. As these attachments are blind, they only serve to enhance our insecurity. We actually grow weaker. And when we feel weak, we are dangerous to ourselves and each other. When we give ourselves over to aggression, we deny our humanity and live wounded, isolated lives.

On the other hand, if we surrender this false strength, we are able to connect to our heart, and reconnect to our humanity. And from that basic goodness we can communicate with other humans in a supportive and encouraging way. This decreases some of the harm that has been caused by violence which offers the space for others to express their own basic goodness. Every time we choose to turn from a panic reaction to a mindful response, we are healing ourselves and helping our world. In this way, Mindfulness is an act of Loving Kindness. In time, our meditation practice can help us change our allegiance from defensive reaction to cooperative kindness. We do this by offering a loving pause, then returning to the heart.

Learning to feel love for ourselves, we can step from protective isolation and engender love for others. Each time we return to our heart we are stepping out of our heads and back into our humanity. Then no matter how crazy the world is, we can return to a sane and powerful balance. And from that point of view, we can offer that sanity and balance to a world very much in need of healing.

We don’t need to be superheroes to save the world. We can just be ourselves, simple honest, direct and willing to show up. Coming back to the heart of our being, we are here at the heart of the matter. Remembering to stay human, as my cat would tell me. Just be kind and remember to feed me, she would say, then let’s hang out on the couch together and feel safe. That human connection is healing to ourselves and, by extension, to our world.

Posted on October 27, 2022October 28, 2022 by joseph mauricio

FEELING THEJOY

When we talk about joy, we think of moments of pure happiness. But, it is said that joy is deeper than simple happiness. Happiness exists in the absence of suffering, even if that absence is temporary. We are happy for the moment. And moments of happiness are very important for stress release and building mental resilience.

Joy, on the other hand, is a deeper experience. It exists in times of happiness but also, quite poignantly, in times of suffering or sorrow. Joy is an extension of our wellbeing, which stems from our very life force. It is an expression of being alive. Therefore, Joy is unconditional and not dependent upon external circumstances.

Joy is a natural feeling of aliveness that is always there, whether we recognize it or not. There is nothing we need to do to make it so. We don’t need to invent, capture or increase it. We need only release it. In order to experience more joy, we can open up to life and allow its energy to flow. In this sense, Joy is more of a verb than happiness, which seems rather noun bound. Joy flows, if we open to it. We can’t hold it, but we can feel it. Happiness is a thing we can hold, barter or commodify. It is also conditional as it needs us to satisfy certain criteria to secure it. For instance, happiness may be dependent upon things like the weather, other people’s approval or the amount of caffeine we’ve had. So, happiness is a thing and can be increased. The path to happiness is finding the things in life that increase our happiness. This keeps us maneuvering, expecting and anticipating the dopamine reward of its experience. Our coffee is perfect, the sun is shining and the person sitting across from us is nodding approval of our intelligence. But, all of this sets up expectations. And should the person across from us look away toward someone else our Jenga tower might fall into disarray.

Happiness engenders hope. And hope leads us to an expectation of reward. When the reward is thwarted we feel saddened or deflated, and so scurry to rebuild the tower with new pieces. And, in this way, we oscillate through life in excitement and decline, trying to satisfy the fickle criteria that supports our happiness.

However, as Joy is an expression of self-existing aliveness, the path to feeling joy is simply to recognize what blocks our experience of being joyful. What are the things in life that block the flow and radiance of being alive? Some of the ways we block our joy is to do the very things we do to make us happy, such as drink too much caffeine or seek others approval. In the Shambhala teachings we see a lack of confidence in ourselves as the root condition of these blockages. Our teachers refer to this as “The Trap of Doubt”. When we doubt ourselves we attach to material things external to ourselves to try and prop up our towers. But, this play of ego turns the truth on its head. As we look for things outside of ourselves that we feel others will admire, we become less and less confident in our true selves. As we emphasize our relational selves, we lose the truth of our wellbeing. Other things determine our happiness and we are cut off from the source of our joy. When we look to others for their approval, we cut ourselves off from the source of our life.

It is important to interact with our community. But, a non-codependent approach would be to seek feedback rather than approval. In this way, we are canvassing our community in order to build a deeper understanding of ourselves rather than throwing ourselves away in comparison.

Meditation practice connects us to this deeper, more authentic sense of ourselves. This is not the ego self, clinging to our world in a desperate attempt to find happiness. It is the true self that knows itself and can rest in its own wellbeing. This profound feeling is joy. And joy cannot be manufactured. It is already there, if we find the time to just allow it to be. Meditation is the practice of returning to this essence again and again until we begin to engender the confidence to let ourselves be. With that unconditional confidence, we rise above the trap of doubt, and feel gratitude for being alive.

Confidence and gratitude connect us to the wellspring of joy.

Posted on October 13, 2022October 13, 2022 by joseph mauricio

HOW TO GET EVERYTHING YOU WANT

HOW TO GET EVERYTHING YOU WANT

From the moment we first cried out for our bottle to the time we sidled up next to someone at the bar hoping to have them buy us a drink, we’ve learned to manipulate our world. More specifically, we’ve learned to manipulate our feelings in order to manipulate others into the impression that we can get what we want. The fact that we frequently don’t know what we want doesn’t seem to deter us.

The notion that desire is problematic to our mental balance and serenity has long been a topic in meditation theory. But many current teachers suggest that desire is not the problem. Desire is appreciation, after all. Problems arise when we clamp down on the object of our desire. This clamping leads to clinging and attachment that serves to change our relationship to the thing we desire. All of a sudden, we have gone from appreciation to acquisition. Our attachment becomes more about “Me” than whatever it was that initially moved us. The clinging becomes more important than the object of our desire. Clinging seems create a sense of security for ourselves. Because we are internally programmed to feel successful when we are getting what we want, getting what we want becomes more the point than the object itself. And then, of course once we have it, we have to hold on to it and defend it.

We have hormones that activate in the anticipation of getting what we want and endorphins that are released when we get it. We become slaves to these hormonal feelings. We feel excited when we want something and rewarded when we receive it. This game propels us through life. Unfortunately, that propulsion runs its course, and we are left deflated and in need of another fix. This cycle continues feeding itself again and again and is largely unconscious. While we buy in to the objectification game on its surface, we are blinded to the feelings within, as well as the consequences that lie ahead. Buddhists would refer to this as being ignorant of karmic cause and condition.

In this way, desire, anticipation, reward, and depletion keep us locked in this semi-conscious cycle as we focus on objects rather than ourselves. We are compelled to fill the space we feel inside by clinging to externals. While this may feel good momentarily, it is not what we really need. Therefore, it is ultimately unsatisfying. We fall flat and feel empty again until we perk up looking for our next neural adventure. Gripping to the things we think we want and ignoring what we actually need makes us poverty stricken and emotionally anorexic. The space we seek to fill becomes emptier still. Hence, we cling ever harder to the objects of desire and the manipulative games they engender.

But why do we want what we want?

Sometimes we try to get what we want because we feel it will raise our status among our clan. There is research that suggests that this has roots early in our social evolution when we were driven to need the approval of our milieu when clans were a primary source of survival and protection. Making ourselves valuable to our community assured us of those protections. In our modern society, this dynamic manifests as a highly competitive and transactional way of looking at the world. We don’t just want to fit in with our milieu, we want to impress them, we want them to want us, we want them to need us, we want them to love us. The more we feel loved by the community the more we actually feel protected by that community. How much of our social negotiations stem from wanting our mother’s love, or our fathers care? It is said that the initial attachment of a child to its caregivers sets a primary behavioral template.

I was asked recently by a student if we could discuss how our meditation practice could lead us to greater control over others and lead us to the idea that we could better manipulate the world. The answer to that is that meditation practice turns that whole question on its head and suggest instead that we create a sense of well-being within ourselves so that we reduce the need to cling and grasp, and in so doing reduce the suffering we endure in our lives. When we reduce the need to have these facile material connections to our societal caregivers, we reduce the need to manipulate or cajole or seduce or cry for our bottle. Our emotional baseline becomes a sense of contentment with who we are that might lead to contentment to what we have. That doesn’t mean we can’t flirt for a drink, or cry for attention. It doesn’t mean we can’t try to do our best and it doesn’t mean we can’t want to be loved by the world. It just means that none of that speaks to what we really want. What we want is to find completeness and contentment in our life, and to be helpful to others.

There is a Buddhist parable about a person who when walking the world could either pave the world in leather to protect their feet, or to wear leather on their feet to protect themselves. The moral seems to be that wearing leather is a more efficient way of walking through life. As meditation practitioners our work is to develop and refine ourselves so that we can be of service to ourselves and to the world. In this way our position in the clan is more secure as we are truly of benefit to the society. A sad aspect of life is that people are most attracted to those who can benefit them. Many of us play a common game of throwing ourselves to the ground in supplication to the world. We want someone to help us. We want anyone to carry the burden. We want the universe to save us. But the truth is, until we can do those things for ourselves, no one will be there in any lasting, meaningful way. Until we have the strength to help others, we have little meaning to ourselves and to our world.

So, the way to get everything you want in life is to, of course, want what you have. And once we have it, all we can do is share it. If we are looking to find security, it comes not from clinging, but from letting go.

Posted on October 6, 2022October 6, 2022 by joseph mauricio

PATIENCE, THE KEY TO SYNCHRONICITY

Learning to work with anxiety is an important practice for anyone trying to maintain mindful balance in their lives. How often are we thrown off-course in life due to reacting unmindfully when prompted by our fear. Something feels wrong, and before we can look into what that may be, we spring forward as if to escape the discomfort. I can’t count the times I have made missteps in my life by lurching blindly.

The alternative is to breath out and take a moment to break the blind momentum. Learning to live mindfully requires this application of patience.

Anxiety prompts us to move. And although we register being anxious as a problem, anxiety is natural to anyone with a nervous system. It’s the inflammation of our largely unseen neurological system. In spiritual and wellness traditions this energy system is seen as our lifeforce. Whether we call it “prana”, “Chi” or “Windhorse” this lifeforce is how we feel. Although it holds sway over a good portion of our experience, it remains a silent partner to our consciousness. When we are in balance that life force flows evenly, buoying our spirits. But when the lifeforce is impeded or provoked in a defensive response, we feel uncomfortable. Anxiety has a triggering effect that causes programmed places in the body to seize up and grip in a neurological reaction. This is interpreted as signaling danger. These places of gripping in the body distort the flow of our lifeforce, which in turn, channels our thinking and wellbeing. Anxiety registering in the body triggers what Jon Kabat-Zinn referred to as catastrophic thinking. We go immediately to the “nuclear options” of fight, flight, or freeze.

This unease might register with a tapping of the foot or a clicking of the pen. But before we know it, we are moving. As if trying to shed this reactive skin we need to run, drink, eat, dance or lash out against someone we love. We are barking at the shadows in our mind in blind attempts to free ourselves. Anxiety moves us more surely than any inspiration or aspiration. Yet, the blindness of reaction means that we are not mindful of this movement. So, we often jump further into the fire.

Meditation practice works to calm the nervous system. In time, consistent daily practice will create a buffering space between impulse and action – and specifically between anxiety and reaction. We can train ourselves to feel uneasy and not react in animal action but to pause, just a moment, in order to allow our higher functioning to inform the process. We allow ourselves to feel uneasy long enough to make a beneficial decision.

Buddhist teachings refer to the paramita of Patience as an important practice in allowing us to develop mindfulness. But in our culture, we place a moral spin on this otherwise practical tool. We mistake the tool of patience for resignation as we ‘grin and bear it’. However, in Buddhist Paramita Practice Patience is seen as a pause in our reactic=ve momentum that leads to greater tolerance, understanding and offers us a fresh start free of habitual reactions. Rather than reacting, we are responding. And if our view is to develop mindful awareness in our life, anxiety can be seen as a prompt to take a beat and see what is actually happening. In this case, employing the breath to calm the nervous system is a very simple but effective tool. When in the throes of a panic reaction, the idea of taking a beat, or taking a breath seems innocuous. When we are in an anxiety state we mistake our panic for reality. And we become very important to ourselves. This brings about the catastrophic thinking Kabat-Zinn referred to. The more important we feel our problems are, the more important we seem to become. Ironically, this disconnects us from ourselves as our mind and body become desynchronized and we enter a very impacted state of being.

Yet, the remedy is simple. We ignore our inflammed ego and simply pause and connect to the experience of our breathing. Our breathing is largely happening in the body and our awareness will allow the nervous reaction to settle. As the body relaxes it releases some of its gripping tension and the mind can rest in the present where it can do its best, most effective work. In meditation parlance, this is called synchronizing mind and body. And when mind and body are in synch, our lifeforce returns to balance and flow. We are synchronizing with our life in the present. Rather than agitating our life by reacting to anxiety, we are accepting the anxiety with patience and responding to life accurately.

The practice of meditation is the basic template for developing the patience that leads to a mindful understanding of ourselves that is deeper than the reactive worlds we inhabit when fueled by anxiety. In this way, when we sit like a Buddha we are learning to wake up.

Posted on September 29, 2022September 29, 2022 by joseph mauricio

THE UNRELIABLE NARRATOR

The unreliable narrator is a technique used by writers to tell their story from a point of view that is changing, altered, or diminished in some respect. This creates a sense of un-ease in the reader. However, despite its temporal unreliability, this technique often reads as organic as it feels closer to how our minds actually work. One mistake uncreative the writer makes is to try and force the organic flow of reality into a two-dimensional, linear narrative. There is a sense of comfort in aligning the forces of our life inside the lines, but it is simply not the way our mind naturally flows. Nor, is it how the reality around us actually works.

Meditation Master Chogyam Trungpa would sometimes tell his students, “You are not a reliable witness.” Simply said, life is organic. It flows, changes, and develops. Navigating life requires a great deal of letting go. Life also returns to themes. So, by watching our own mind at work, the meditator learns to recognize patterns rather than grab on to specifics. Specifics become real to us as we cling to them, but that interrupts the organic flow of our mind, and it decreases our ability to see the space around that to which we cling. We lose context. And the clinging builds a sense of expectation. We try to straighten the wavering lines of the narrative into a form we find comforting. Then we make up our version of the details.

Our version of the details often coalesces around themes we find self-identifiable. “We are at fault and the world is punishing us”, “we are misunderstood and always alone”, “we are amazing, and life is great.” Perhaps each morning we shout in the mirror “I believe in myself, and life is what I make it”, but then end our day in despair because we’ve turned into the same dissatisfying game again. We all have central points around which we build the (false) narratives of our lives. As this is not how we really are, nor how reality works, our self-story creates a cognitive dissonance with life. It is as though we are always fighting upstream. Trying to fit square pegs into round holes, we end up pounding our way through life. But our meditation experience suggests our journey through life might be much more elegant. Through the self-awareness we develop in meditation practice, we see the stubborn attachment we have to make our story fit the circumstance. It seems we have it turned around. Maybe we’re going about it backwards.

Letting go of our attachment to having life make sense, we find that life is about discovery. Any given moment is its own thing. Each moment is not obligated to our interpretation. Reality just is. In the Vajrayana tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, they refer to “just so”, “life as it is” or “things as they are” as the highest understanding. The comedian Lenny Bruce startled his milieu by asking his audience to see ‘what is’ rather than ‘what should be.’ This shift in narrative requires us to look beyond the solid points in our story and see what is truly there. This means seeing beyond our looking. It means seeing beyond our expectations. Our meditation practice gives us the familiarity with our patterns, narratives, and stories to be able to recognize them and to let them go. So, it is our work to recognize the patterns, let go and see beyond. Perhaps what we see is less definable than we find comfortable. Maybe, ‘what is’ is unclear and yet to be revealed. But, if we smile at our story, and continue to let go and see beyond, this journey through life becomes a discovery rather than a rote striking out of the things we think we should be doing. Maybe today our world will be revealed as more alive than we think.

The writer who follows the flow and patterns of their story as it reveals itself to them allows the story to tell itself. A creative writer is, at their base, simply an observer. They may be a chronicler or even a director of the narrative flow. But it is essential for the story to have integrity and for the story to reveal itself as it develops. It is said, believe half of what you see and less of what you hear. Mediators might add none of what you think. This is not to say, we go through life blind. Far from it. We are removing the blinders of ego-warped misperception and beginning to see what is there.

The great playwright Harold Pinter grew up in the rough east end of post-World War 2 London. He endured violence, antisemitism, and poverty. He said the most frightening experience was the blank page inserted in his typewriter each morning. While many of the dangerous elements in his life led to predictable outcomes, with the blank page anything might happen. And so, Pinter might have shuttered his eyes and written formulaic drawing room comedies that reiterated familiar story lines. This would have made him financially comfortable, but would have robbed us of the perplexing, unsettling explorations of moment-to-moment existence that perplexed audiences and transformed modern theater. His plays eschewed stage description, backstory, and character explanation in favor of moments on stage that simply led to the next moment. And in this way, without over-explanation, the story was revealed as it happened in a way that made little sense, but felt absolutely real.

Maybe there is only one thing worth having on our bucket list. To allow life to reveal itself.