Talks: Reflections on the Path
Healing Self-Doubt
Siddhartha Gautama’s last challenge before enlightenment was doubt, and to some degree, most of us live with limiting beliefs about our own worthiness and goodness. This talk looks at the tenacity of self-doubt and the power of mindfulness, investigation and compassion in releasing its grip.
Guided Forgiveness Practice (from fall 2013 IMCW retreat)
Instructions, then a guided forgiveness meditation.
The Heartspace That is Our True Home (retreat talk)
By dedicating ourselves to loving the life that is right here–ourselves–we discover the heartspace that holds this world. This talk explores the pathways of forgiveness, offering and letting in love, and gratitude that reveal the vastness of loving presence.
Part 2: Happiness
This 2-part series explores conditioned and unconditioned happiness: What blocks us from experiencing true well-being, and the skillful means that allow this natural expression of our being to shine through.
Satsang – Closing Prayer for Peace (6:58 min.)
A Prayer for Peace from Tara at the Monday evening satsang gathering. NOTE: Satsang means exploring and realizing truth in the gathering of spiritual friends. The word comes from Sanskrit – “sat” means truth – and “sangha” is community or company of spiritual...
Evening Satsang – “Peace is This Moment”
(published for the first time):
Question and response with Tara from 2013-10-14. Questions relate to a reading of Dorothy Hunt’s poem, “Peace is This Moment Without Judgment,” as well as to RAIN, meditation practice and self-judgment. The evening closes with a prayer for peace.
Part 1: Happiness
This 2-part series explores conditioned and unconditioned happiness: What blocks us from experiencing true well-being, and the skillful means that allow this natural expression of our being to shine through.
Mindfulness in Education: Enabling Children to Realize their Full Potential
This talk explores stress-related emotional suffering and how mindfulness and compassion practices can serve our children’s natural intelligence, creativity and openheartedness. Trainings in presence are the hope for this next […]
Loving Life, Loving Earth
What will it take to have us collectively awaken to the suffering of our earth and respond? This talk looks at how we are destroying our larger body, the earth; what stops us from recognizing and opening to the suffering of loss, and ways we can evolve our consciousness and act on behalf of this precious life.
Part 2: Entering the Wilderness
On all spiritual paths, we journey into the inner wilderness to discover the nature of nature – the truth of who we are. The entry is through bringing a kind and full presence to the life of our bodies. These two talks explore the conditioning that leads us to dissociation, and the blessings of full aliveness, open heartedness and wisdom that arise when we come home to embodied presence.
Part 1: Entering the Wilderness
On all spiritual paths, we journey into the inner wilderness to discover the nature of nature – the truth of who we are. The entry is through bringing a kind and full presence to the life of our bodies. These two talks explore the conditioning that leads us to dissociation, and the blessings of full aliveness, open heartedness and wisdom that arise when we come home to embodied presence.
Peace Work
The hope for inner and world peace lies in our evolutionary capacity to shift from Fight-Flight-Freeze reactivity to responding to aggravation with Attend-Befriend. This talk explores the three elements on this path of awakening that support us in this transformation:...
From Egoic to Unconditioned Loving
When we are caught in the sense of separation and unmet needs, our love is marbled with fear and attachment. This talk describes the chain of conditioning that perpetuates the constrictions of egoic love and explores several courageous activities–sharing our vulnerability, expressing love, extending and receiving love– that awaken us to the vastness and freedom of pure loving awareness.
Part 2: Relating to the Fearsome Deities
Whenever Mara–the shadow side–appeared during the Buddha’s life, his response was simple and liberating: “I see you Mara,” and,”Please, come…let’s have tea.” In that spirit, this talk explores three approaches to relating to fear with a mindful and compassionate presence.
Part 1: Relating to Fearsome Deities
Our relationship to fear shapes our life experience. If we are unconscious, and reflexively try to manage fear, our identity takes the shape of the body of fear. If instead we learn to attend and befriend fear, we discover the freedom of our awakened heart.
The Gift of Silence
(Tara was away this week – this is a favorite from 2007)
Through all spiritual traditions, there is a valuing of silence and stillness. When the mind has quieted, it becomes possible to see into the truth of what we are. Yet quieting can turn into a battle with the process of the thinking mind. This talk explores practices that allow us to settle in a natural way, the presence which is silence itself, and the wisdom and love that flows freely when we live from that silence.
True Belonging
We all have a longing to belong. When pursued at the egoic level–often through our good-personhood projects–there may be temporary satisfaction but our sense of separation is ultimately reinforced. In contrast, bringing mindfulness and compassion to whatever is arising dissolves the sense of separation and reveals the basic goodness of our own loving presence.
From Story to Presence
A fundamental skill cultivated through meditation is awakening from our stories and arriving back in the aliveness of the moment. If we investigate, we find that a large portion of our stories create physical and emotional stress, separate us from others, and obscure the truth of who we are. In this talk you are invited to identify several of your “top ten hits”, explore how these stories live in your body, and reconnect with living presence.
Three Gestures of Love
If we inquire “what is between me and presence” we usually find we’ve been caught inside a limiting story of self, contracted by wants and fears. This talk explores a simple yet powerful way of arousing loving presence and dissolving the narrow identification that keeps us from inhabiting our awakened heartmind.
Absolute Cooperation with the Inevitable
This talk addresses common misunderstandings about acceptance (allowing, “letting be”) and explores the challenges and blessings of opening to the raw emotions that we habitually avoid.
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