MINDFUL PSYCHE

A Buddhist Declaration on Climate Change

2011-12-13T09:58:00.000-08:00

The Dalai Lama was the first to sign this. Let's all get behind it.
http://www.ecobuddhism.org/bcp/all_content/buddhist_declaration/

The Time to Act is Now

A Buddhist Declaration on Climate Change

Today we live in a time of great crisis, confronted by the gravest challenge that humanity has ever faced: the ecological consequences of our own collective karma. The scientific consensus is overwhelming: human activity is triggering environmental breakdown on a planetary scale. Global warming, in particular, is happening much faster than previously predicted, most obviously at the North Pole. For hundreds of thousands of years, the Arctic Ocean has been covered by an area of sea-ice as large as Australia—but now this is melting rapidly. In 2007 the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) forecast that the Arctic might be free of summer sea ice by 2100. It is now apparent that this could occur within a decade or two. Greenland’s vast ice-sheet is also melting more quickly than expected. The rise in sea-level this century will be at least one meter—enough to flood many coastal cities and vital rice-growing areas such as the Mekong Delta in Vietnam.
Glaciers all over the world are receding quickly. If current economic policies continue, the glaciers of the Tibetan Plateau, source of the great rivers that provide water for billions of people in Asia, are likely to disappear by mid-century. Severe drought and crop failures are already affecting Australia and Northern China. Major reports—from the IPCC, United Nations, European Union, and International Union for Conservation of Nature—agree that, without a collective change of direction, dwindling supplies of water, food and other resources could create famine conditions, resource battles, and mass migration by mid-century—perhaps by 2030, according to the U.K.’s chief scientific advisor.
Global warming plays a major role in other ecological crises, including the loss of many plant and animal species that share this Earth with us. Oceanographers report that half the carbon released by burning fossil fuels has been absorbed by the oceans, increasing their acidity by about 30%. Acidification is disrupting calcification of shells and coral reefs, as well as threatening plankton growth, the source of the food chain for most life in the sea.
Eminent biologists and U.N. reports concur that “business-as-usual” will drive half of all species on Earth to extinction within this century. Collectively, we are violating the first precept—“do not harm living beings”—on the largest possible scale. And we cannot foresee the biological consequences for human life when so many species that invisibly contribute to our own well-being vanish from the planet.
Many scientists have concluded that the survival of human civilization is at stake. We have reached a critical juncture in our biological and social evolution. There has never been a more important time in history to bring the resources of Buddhism to bear on behalf of all living beings. The four noble truths provide a framework for diagnosing our current situation and formulating appropriate guidelines—because the threats and disasters we face ultimately stem from the human mind, and therefore require profound changes within our minds. If personal suffering stems from craving and ignorance—from the three poisons of greed, ill will, and delusion—the same applies to the suffering that afflicts us on a collective scale. Our ecological emergency is a larger version of the perennial human predicament. Both as individuals and as a species, we suffer from a sense of self that feels disconnected not only from other people but from the Earth itself. As Thich Nhat Hanh has said, “We are here to awaken from the illusion of our separateness.” We need to wake up and realize that the Earth is our mother as well as our home—and in this case the umbilical cord binding us to her cannot be severed. When the Earth becomes sick, we become sick, because we are part of her.
Our present economic and technological relationships with the rest of the biosphere are unsustainable. To survive the rough transitions ahead, our lifestyles and expectations must change. This involves new habits as well as new values. The Buddhist teaching that the overall health of the individual and society depends upon inner well-being, and not merely upon economic indicators, helps us determine the personal and social changes we must make.
Individually, we must adopt behaviors that increase everyday ecological awareness and reduce our “carbon footprint”. Those of us in the advanced economies need to retrofit and insulate our homes and workplaces for energy efficiency; lower thermostats in winter and raise them in summer; use high efficiency light bulbs and appliances; turn off unused electrical appliances; drive the most fuel-efficient cars possible, and reduce meat consumption in favor of a healthy, environmentally-friendly plant-based diet.
These personal activities will not by themselves be sufficient to avert future calamity. We must also make institutional changes, both technological and economic. We must “de-carbonize” our energy systems as quickly as feasible by replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy sources that are limitless, benign and harmonious with nature. We especially need to halt the construction of new coal plants, since coal is by far the most polluting and most dangerous source of atmospheric carbon. Wisely utilized, wind power, solar power, tidal power, and geothermal power can provide all the electricity that we require without damaging the biosphere. Since up to a quarter of world carbon emissions result from deforestation, we must reverse the destruction of forests, especially the vital rainforest belt where most species of plants and animals live.
It has recently become quite obvious that significant changes are also needed in the way our economic system is structured. Global warming is intimately related to the gargantuan quantities of energy that our industries devour to provide the levels of consumption that many of us have learned to expect. From a Buddhist perspective, a sane and sustainable economy would be governed by the principle of sufficiency: the key to happiness is contentment rather than an ever-increasing abundance of goods. The compulsion to consume more and more is an expression of craving, the very thing the Buddha pinpointed as the root cause of suffering.
Instead of an economy that emphasizes profit and requires perpetual growth to avoid collapse, we need to move together towards an economy that provides a satisfactory standard of living for everyone while allowing us to develop our full (including spiritual) potential in harmony with the biosphere that sustains and nurtures all beings, including future generations. If political leaders are unable to recognize the urgency of our global crisis, or unwilling to put the long-term good of humankind above the short-term benefit of fossil-fuel corporations, we may need to challenge them with sustained campaigns of citizen action.
Dr James Hansen of NASA and other climatologists have recently defined the precise targets needed to prevent global warming from reaching catastrophic “tipping points.” For human civilization to be sustainable, the safe level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is no more than 350 parts per million (ppm). This target has been endorsed by the Dalai Lama, along with other Nobel laureates and distinguished scientists. Our current situation is particularly worrisome in that the present level is already 387 ppm, and has been rising at 2 ppm per year. We are challenged not only to reduce carbon emissions, but also to remove large quantities of carbon gas already present in the atmosphere.
As signatories to this statement of Buddhist principles, we acknowledge the urgent challenge of climate change. We join with the Dalai Lama in endorsing the 350 ppm target. In accordance with Buddhist teachings, we accept our individual and collective responsibility to do whatever we can to meet this target, including (but not limited to) the personal and social responses outlined above.
We have a brief window of opportunity to take action, to preserve humanity from imminent disaster and to assist the survival of the many diverse and beautiful forms of life on Earth. Future generations, and the other species that share the biosphere with us, have no voice to ask for our compassion, wisdom, and leadership. We must listen to their silence. We must be their voice, too, and act on their behalf.

Real Peace Dharma Talk

2011-09-23T20:35:00.000-07:00

I have uploaded a recording of the dharma talk I gave on Sunday at the Marin Sangha.
This talk celebrates International Peace Day.
Download it here: http://www.lisadalemiller.com/RealPeace.xml

Mingyur Rinpoche: A True Yogi

2011-08-14T19:18:00.001-07:00

In early June, 2011, Mingyur Rinpoche left his monastery in Bodhgaya, India to begin a period of extended solitary retreat. He departed in the middle of the night without telling anyone. He did not take any money or belongings, just the clothes he was wearing. The day after he left, his close friend and attendant, Lama Soto, found this letter in Mingyur Rinpoche's room.

"I write this letter to all the wise and pure-intentioned individuals who rely on me, both the monastic communities and lay practitioners throughout India, Nepal, and Tibet.

From a young age, I have harbored the wish to stay in retreat and practice, wandering from place to place without any fixed location. I also received an ocean of instructions from my glorious and kind root gurus. Though I have attempted to stay in retreat and practice, I have passed the rest of my time in laziness and diversions, letting my life come to nothing more than a distraction.

I have made a firm decision, based on the advice of the great masters of times past and my own heart's desire, to, as the example goes, take the reins into my own hands. Our lives are as fragile as a bubble and the activities of this life are as endless as the waves of the ocean. Yet whatever we do, we should rely upon and place our hopes in the Buddha's sacred and divine teachings. It is the Dharma that will benefit both us and other sentient beings. For this and other reasons, I have become disillusioned with the experiences of this life.

With genuine conviction in the lineage and instructions I have received, along with a motivation to be of benefit to others, various causes and conditions have prompted me to make the decision to wander alone, without fixed location, in remote mountain ranges. Though I do not claim to be like the great masters of times past, I am now embarking on this journey as a mere reflection of these teachers, as a faithful imitation of the example they set. For a number of years, my training will consist of simply leaving behind my connections, so please do not be upset with my decision.

As I have recommended before, throughout this period it is important to study, contemplate, and meditate. With a sense of harmony and pure discipline as a basis, it is important to study and contemplate the traditional scriptures of the Buddhist tradition, and [to learn] the traditions, practices, fields of knowledge, and other disciplines [taught in our lineage]. It is especially important to not always focus your attention outward, but to apply the teachings to your own mind. You should calm and pacify your own mindstream. It is important to bring benefit to the Buddha's teachings and to your fellow sentient beings.

There is no need to worry about me. After a few years, we will meet again and, as before, gather together as teacher and student to enjoy a feast of the Dharma. Until that time, I will continually pray to the Three Jewels and make aspirations on your behalf."

Tulku Mingyur

What an inspiration!

This is your body... really!

2011-07-25T19:55:00.000-07:00

Shift your perception of yourself in about a minute. A great short video about your miraculous body.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4GtimvTX6Q&feature=player_embedded

"When The Iron Bird Flies" preview film

2011-07-23T12:26:00.000-07:00

Watch this wonderful preview of the film "When the Iron Bird Flies" about Tibetan Buddhism's arrival in the West.
http://www.vimeo.com/26610713

Excellent Interview with the Dalai Lama

2011-07-21T07:46:00.000-07:00

Please watch this fantastic interview with the Dalai Lama. He discusses our political crisis, as well as China, and the new Tibetan government.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dW7YX6kMIU&feature=player_embedded

Shifting from attachment to experience, to awareness of experience

2011-07-17T19:32:00.000-07:00

"Therein bhikkhus, right view comes first. And how does right view come first? In one of right view, right intention comes into being; in one of right intention, right speech comes into being; in one of right speech, right action comes into being; in one of right livelihood, right effort comes into being; in one of right effort, right mindfulness comes into being; in one of right mindfulness, right concentration comes into being; in one of right concentration, right knowledge comes into being; in one of right knowledge, right deliverance comes into being. Thus bhikkhus, the path of disciple in higher training possesses eight factors, the arahant possesses ten factors."

Buddha, Mahacattarisaka Sutta, 117, Majjhima Nikaya

The eightfold path begins with right view or right understanding. At first it might seem like right view is an unlikely place to start. If one considers right view to be the ultimate outcome of practicing the other seven factors it might even sound like putting the cart before the horse. Especially if we consider right view to be the direct realization of the empty, insubstantial nature of all things, including the self.

While that might be true, the fact is we have to begin somewhere. So why not begin with right view, which is essentially the best motivation for embarking upon the eightfold path. It is so important to have a true sense of why one would practice at all from the very beginning.

First and foremost, in the Four Noble Truths the Buddha taught that we suffer mentally, physically, and emotionally from over-identification with mind states of craving and aversion. Once we have this information we can then inquire about the source of that suffering and how it proliferates in the form of thoughts, emotions, beliefs, doubts, fantasies, wishes, fears, suppositions, and assumptions. This knowledge cultivates right view and inspires us to continue in our practice. The other seven factors of the eightfold path allow us to actually shift our view from attachment to experience, to awareness of experience. This is critical to achieve right view. We must seat ourselves firmly in awareness of the flow of internal and external phenomena in order to directly know our true nature.

Through repeated practice on the cushion and in daily life we soon realize that the root of suffering is a misperceived conception of a separate, permanent, self. Whereas we once thought of ourselves as the one who thinks, believes, hates, wants, fears, and hurts, gradually we realize that all of that internal activity is just part of the flow of phenomena and not a part of our true nature, which is awareness itself. This is right view. When we have right understanding, our fears, doubts, worries, anguish, depressions and anxieties start to melt away in the clarity and stillness of awareness. And as the Buddha states, ultimately direct perception of right view leads to right knowledge and right deliverance, the qualities present in the realized mind of an arahant.

Relaxing into the Hindrances

2011-06-25T21:36:00.000-07:00

I thought I would write a bit about cultivating tranquility and peaceful states of mind. Most people think they need to have certain conditions in order to have peace of mind: everything in its right place, no problems, or the presence of unperturbed happiness. Here is another perspective from the Buddha:

“All experience is preceded by mind,
led by mind, made by mind.
Speak or act with a peaceful mind,
and happiness will follow
Like a never departing shadow.”

Ultimately, what Buddhist psychology offers us is freedom from the conditioned mind. This means that our internal state of mind is not prefaced or dependent upon perfect external or internal conditions. What keeps us believing that our identity is state-dependent is our identification with ego-generated, moment-to-moment reactions to phenomena as they arise.

The Buddha termed these distressful reactions the five hindrances: unwholesome desire, fear/anger, laziness/inertia, restlessness, and doubt. It is no wonder that when we are mentally under the influence of the five hindrances, that being present with distressful experience seems so difficult to achieve. Much of the time we resist life; fighting to defend ourselves against phenomena that feel dangerous for us mostly because we fear our own reactivity.

“When we are pushing against our experience, fighting it off, it doesn’t have the opportunity or space to be itself. And if it doesn’t have the chance to be itself, it doesn’t have the chance to unfold. And if it doesn’t have the chance to unfold, it doesn’t have the opportunity to reveal its nature.” A.H. Almaas, from The Unfolding Now

I invite you to cultivate tranquil states of mind by trying the following practice in your daily life. In any moment that you notice the presence of one of the five hindrances, pause and allow the mind to become aware of the hindrance and how it is manifesting in your awareness; it could be any kind of physical, mental, emotional, agitation or reactivity. Then allow the mind to soften into that experience with a gentle, relaxed attention. Renounce the desire to run from or fight against the hindrance. Just allow the experience to unfold naturally, and observe what happens. The more you soften, the more experience will naturally dissolve, and eventually all that will remain is the clear, radiant, luminous awareness that is always present in every moment of existence.

If we return to the Buddha's words above, what he is saying is that all experience, internal or external is mind-generated. So if the mind’s true nature is radiant and pure, then it follows that all experience that arises in our awareness is also in its true nature, radiant and pure. Even difficult experience at its essence is nothing other than an expression of radiant, clear mind. When we embrace the hindrances with awareness, even the dreaded hindrances become the royal road to unconditioned tranquility.

Healing Anxiety with Loving-kindness Meditation

2011-06-15T19:15:00.000-07:00

Recently I received an email from a British woman saying, “I just wanted to say thank you. I found your loving-kindness metta meditation on iTunes and when I have a panic attack, its one of the only things that brings me back from the brink of all the negative emotions I experience. Thank you so much for posting this, it has really helped me!”

When I read it, I was truly surprised because metta is not usually the first meditation practice I teach patients who seek help for panic disorders and severe anxiety. I loved her phrase, “back from the brink of all the negative emotions.” It is so expressive of the actual experience of panic, which can feel like desperately trying to stave off a complete loss of control of fearfulness. And this person really pegged the actual phenomena of panic in the mind: an emotional storm that grips the ego into complete fixation upon a mental fantasy of imminent annihilation that is not actually occurring in reality.

Normally like many of my colleagues, I begin by improving a patient’s mental skill of presence in the here and now. Orienting them away from the habitual false, negative, anxious mental narration of experience and toward direct perception of the actual here and now body and environment reality perceived through the five sense doors. Being able to discern what is and what is not and whether emotional responses are generated by associative memories arising in response to phenomena or by the actual phenomena themselves, is a key part of healing panic disorder.

Those of you who are Buddhist practitioners will recognize this skill as mindfulness. Eventually, one can direct this mindful awareness to the actual mental and emotional contents of mind as they arise and pass away, seeing the habit mind in action; proliferating negative, fearful narrative thoughts about experience that overwhelm the here and now accurate perceptive capacity of mind. This clear-seeing of panic-laden and anxiety-producing habit thoughts reveals them to be nothing more than thoughts, much the way the Wizard of Oz was ultimately revealed to be no more than a small man with very little power. When we know distressing thoughts and emotions as they are, we are liberated from their awful grip.

Mingyur Rinpoche retells his personal journey of healing childhood panic disorder in the book, The Joy of Living. “And ultimately, I realize, this is exactly what happened when I sat alone in my retreat room trying to overcome the anxiety that had made me so uncomfortable throughout my childhood. Simply looking at what was going on in my mind actually changed what was going on there.”

Metta practice is different from mindfulness and adds something so powerful to healing anxiety. It opens the way for greater connection with our basic kindness: something most people who suffer with anxiety do not feel very often, especially toward themselves. When we see ourselves as human beings deserving of care, and actively send wishes for increased goodness, health, happiness, and ease, we naturally become more caring toward ourselves. The virtues of patience, kindness, generosity and openness are not fertile ground for anxiety to grow. So I can see how metta would absolutely bring one back from the brink of negative emotions and I thank this wonderful woman for opening my eyes to this beautiful use of the healing power of loving-kindness.

You can download my metta meditations from the free mindfulness meditations link.

Dharma Moment

2011-05-25T09:16:00.000-07:00

Three days ago I woke up with an idea. Each morning I would randomly open one of my many dharma books and scriptural texts and post the passage on a blog along with a short personal commentary (of sorts). Normally, I take time to actually follow through on impulses like this, but for some reason no resistance arose in my mind and I went onto Blogspot and created Dharma Moment, which can be found at http://dharmamoment.blogspot.com.

The first morning, I chose the Connected Discourses of the Buddha, and opened the book to one of my favorite passages, “The Fingernail.” The second morning, Ajahn Buddhadasa called to me. Lo and behold, the book opened to yet another favorite passage on clinging. This seemed auspicious. This morning I grabbed the Jewel Ornament of Liberation by Gampopa. And below is the passage I turned to with commentary. Hard to say how long this will continue, (all things are impermanent!) but I love being of service in this way. I will continue to write this more substantial blog for Dharmawisdom.com.

“If you do not have patience and hatred enters into your mind, it is like a poisonous arrow piercing your heart. You will not experience joy, happiness, or peace because of the pain in your mind. You cannot even sleep well. Engaging in the Conduct of Bodhisattvas says:

            My mind will not experience peace
             If it fosters painful thoughts of hatred.
             I shall find no joy or happiness,
            Unable to sleep, I shall feel unsettled.
And:
             In brief, there is nobody who lives happily with anger.”

The Jewel Ornament of Liberation, Gampopa

________________________________________________________

We all struggle with distressful states of mind such as anger and hatred that often arise without warning; triggering mind and body states of such ferocity. The taming of the mind seems almost impossible when we are swept away in a moment of anger.

I once heard Joseph Goldstein, one of my most revered Buddhist teachers say, "Anger feels so good because of our clinging to the sweet taste of self-righteousness." I know this sweet taste very well. These are the moments when I find myself gripped so firmly in the need to be right, holding my hatred and anger like best friends rather than my greatest nemeses. When I feel anger or hatred, I try to turn my attention to find aversion, the root of all anger and hatred. Maybe I am not getting what I want, need, or expect. Maybe someone is treating me with unkindness, disrespect or judgment. Maybe I am faced with responsibilities or tasks that I would rather avoid. Any one of these possibilities is so human... and the fertile soil for aversive states of mind.

The key is to awaken to the presence of aversion in the body, mind, or heart. And care for it deeply, kindly, and with compassion. Then turn that caring toward others who may be catalyzing hatred or anger within us or directing their own anger and hatred at us. With this we achieve the Bodhisattvic intention: liberation from suffering for all involved.

The Wisdom of Restraint

2011-05-15T16:35:00.000-07:00

The treatment of emotion dysregulation is one of the most common contexts in which psychotherapy professionals have their first introduction to mindfulness. Though most of us don’t experience consistent problems with our emotions, human life is filled with lots of moments of intense emotion and emotional responses. So we can all relate to our emotions feeling like a tidal wave towering over us. This can cause harmful reactivity, over-excitement, or create fears of being swept away, overwhelmed, or drowned by emotions.

Mindfulness helps us wake up in moments like this so we can know directly what we are feeling. This knowing can transform a tidal wave of emotion into a manageable wave that will rise and fall in due course, allowing emotions to freely take their natural course, unimpeded by our own over-excitement, fearfulness, or catastrophic internal narratives. Then our perception becomes wise and we know emotion “as it is.” When we perceive strong emotions as they are, we can meet them with the kindness and generosity they deserve.

The combination of wise, compassionate knowing of distressful or over-exaggerated thoughts and feelings is probably the single most-used intervention in my work with patients. Learning how to apply these skills helps us know when and how to exercise restraint, a quality that was highly regarded by the Buddha. Restraint is probably the most important skill for living a wise and conscious life. Knowing when to act is as important as knowing how to act wisely.

There are so many passages throughout the Pali Suttas where the Buddha talks about restraint. He often refers to mindful guardedness as the proximate cause for cultivating restraint of the six sense bases (the five senses and the sense base of mind or consciousness.) So let’s look at the instructions for cultivating restraint that the Buddha gave Kandaraka the Ascetic, in the Majjhima Nikaya Kandarakasutta 51:

“Seeing a form with the eye, one does not grasp at its signs and features. Since if one left the faculty of the eye unguarded, unwholesome states of covetousness and grief might invade him/her. One practices the way of restraint, by guarding the eye faculty and undertaking restraint of the eye faculty. On hearing a sound with the ear… on smelling an odor with the nose… on tasting a flavor with the tongue…on touching a tangible with the body… on cognizing a mind-object with the mind, one does not grasp at its signs and features. Since if the mind faculty was left unguarded, unwholesome states of covetousness and grief may invade her/him. One practices the way of restraint, by guarding the mind faculty and undertaking restraint of the mind faculty.”

We make contact with external experience through our five senses and internal experience through mind. As information is processed in the brain, the perception of phenomena can trigger a range of responses from desire to aversion or ambivalence. The Buddha teaches a method of non-grasping at external or internal phenomena. Non-grasping happens when we meet experience with mindful guardedness; watchful of our response to what he calls unwholesome states of mind—like hatred, anger, jealousy, or overwhelming desire—that may arise in the presence of strong emotion or intense experiences. This watchfulness creates the conditions for applying restraint.

The Buddha continues, “Possessing this noble strength of the faculties, one experiences within a bliss that is unsullied. They become one who acts in full awareness when going forward and returning; who acts in full awareness when looking ahead and looking away; flexing and extending his limbs; when eating, drinking, walking, standing, sitting, falling asleep, waking up, talking and keeping silent.” So restraint becomes the path of wise action and pure bliss.

Further on in this passage the Buddha goes even further in his extolling the rewards of applying restraint, “This is the kind of person who does not torture oneself or others—the one who since he torments neither him/herself or others is here and now hungerless, quenched, and cooled, and abides experiencing bliss, having become holy.” Ultimately, restraint clears our perception allowing pure awareness to be known. Therefore, all emotions, whether pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral, when known with restraint, are equal and become the cause for the equanimity of an awakened mind.

The Tibetan Buddhist teacher Anam Thubten says it another way, “Full awareness doesn’t judge anything. In that way, accomplishments and disappointments are actually one, and are merely aspects of that ever-changing wave of human experience in the sea of vast consciousness whose true nature is the mind of the Buddha. All of our experiences are in a constant state of flux; the feeling of a constricted heart or one of melting into love. They are like the cyclical movements of the moon waxing and waning… while the sky is like the unchangeable state within, or unmanifested consciousness.”

So the next time you find yourself in a moment of big emotion, remember you can bring full awareness to that moment, mindfully recognize emotions as they are, apply compassion and kindness to any difficulty you might be experiencing, wisely apply restraint, and freely allow the mind to relax into its own true Buddhanature of bliss, clarity, and unimpededness.

Remembering our Precious Human Birth

2011-05-04T12:39:00.000-07:00

Four days after returning from retreat I sat down to write this blog entry on our precious human birth. After googling quotes from the Samyutta Nikaya, I felt a strong impulse to look at the NY Times online, where I saw that the President was about to make an announcement. So I waited, knowing the rarity of a President addressing the nation at such a late hour.

When Obama announced that Osama Bin Laden had been found and killed, I experienced an intense rush of conflicting emotions. The New Yorker in me, the daughter in me, was elated. I felt waves of relief knowing that my 79-year-old mother, still residing on the Upper East Side, would awaken to news that might help her feel more safe than she had in the last 10 years since 9/11. The dogmatic Buddhist in me felt ashamed of my joy at the killing of another human being. The Buddhist psychotherapist in me searched for a way to hold the tension of these two opposing streams of emotion by honoring my basic humanness through compassionate recognition of my own imperfection. I realized that in that moment I was experiencing why the Buddha felt it so necessary to remind us of the preciousness of receiving the gift of being born in a human body. We so easily forget who we truly are and the purpose of this life.

The next morning I awoke to the flood of media commentary about Bin Laden’s demise. The videos of Americans, especially young Americans, gathering at Ground Zero, the Pentagon, and in Times Square, chanting feverishly of America’s might, as though they were in a sports arena. I felt horrified and empathetic. They were an externalization of my own inner cheerleader who rushed into my awareness, pom-poms and all, when I heard the news. Then came the inevitable rush of comments on Facebook, most of which reflected the mood of elation and retribution against Al Qaida and Bin Laden.

But by noon, a profound quote from Martin Luther King began making its rounds through cyberspace, “I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that." I felt deeply met by these words of wisdom from a man who epitomized Christ’s insistence that when faced with injustice we should eschew retaliation and turn the other cheek.

Yet I remained quiet, my blog unwritten (until today,) holding the tension of my conflicting emotions and my strong desire to communicate the Buddha’s teaching that even one who causes so much suffering and ignorance in the world, is still the bearer of a precious human life, and is therefore, deserving of respect, compassion, kindness, and generosity.

Remembering our precious human birth can be a great inspiration for practicing especially when conditions are difficult. At Savatthi, the Buddha taught about the preciousness of this human life by placing some soil in his fingernail and asking the monks, “Which is more: the soil in my fingernail or all the soil on the earth?” The monks replied, “Surely all the soil on the earth.” The Buddha agreed and reminded them that, “Those beings who are reborn among human beings are few. More numerous are those who are reborn elsewhere than among human beings. Therefore, you should train yourselves by dwelling diligently.” (Samyutta Nikaya, The Fingernail.)

Knowing that a precious human birth is rare provides an opening for the practice of compassionate holding of distressful emotions like anger, hatred, and fear. Mindfulness allows us to know when the mind/heart are gripped in anger, hatred, or fear, without fighting against or trying to stop these difficult feelings from arising. These emotions deserve our tender care, regardless of whether their arising occurs within our own mind or in the minds of others. Knowing directly gives us the opportunity to hold these feelings with compassion and kindness.

Thich Nhat Hahn says, “To grow the tree of enlightenment, we must make good use of our afflictions, our suffering…. Embrace your anger with a lot of tenderness. Your anger is not your enemy, it is your baby.”

The same practice can be applied toward our perceived enemies. When people create harm for us or speak harshly to us, we suffer. When we react in kind toward them and make them suffer, it only leads to further escalation of suffering on all sides. When hatred or anger arises, look within and care for your hatred and anger by compassionately holding yourself as a precious being that is suffering. Our feelings of fear, hatred and anger deserve our kind attention; not our reactive clinging to their harshness. This is the path to liberate ourselves from causing additional internal or external harm.

Then gaze with compassion upon the other: a precious human being who also suffers. Who’s actions arise from their own suffering. Seeing with compassion opens our heart even more to the ubiquitousness of human suffering and can inspire the Bodhisattvic intent to free all beings from suffering. This is the path of being with suffering as a motivation for ending suffering, rather than falling into creating more suffering when suffering is aroused.

And ultimately, practitioners can look with the eyes of mindfulness and see the ultimate reality—our own luminous, cognizant, empty nature—which exposes the relative reality of two or more minds mired in the shared delusion of their own separateness, attachment, aversion, or fearfulness. This true knowing liberates the mind from experiencing any further suffering.

So it is our path as Buddhists to embrace every moment (especially those of great suffering) as an invitation to recognize the preciousness of each human life, knowing that no matter how much pain a being may cause or experience, they are—due to their precious human birth—ultimately fully capable of awakening and ending their own suffering.

The Path of Awareness

2011-04-08T21:22:00.000-07:00

“There are only two paths: the path of awareness and the path of non-awareness.” Anam Thubten

Those words represent the most fundamental of the Buddha’s teachings and they are my life raft, particularly during times of great upheaval. When my life turns upside down, I try my best to view it as an opportunity to practice; especially when it is my own unskillfulness that has caused harm to others or myself. And practicing can very hard to do when we suffer with a broken heart, or a mind mired in fear and doubt or fixated on mistakes and regrets. These are the times when remembering that there are only two paths—awareness and non-awareness—gives us the courage to practice by stepping back, observing, and asking ourselves: “How I am showing up at this moment?” “What is really happening right now?” “Is my fear or anger or shame narrating a story about what is occuring that prevents me from knowing things as they are?” “Am I resisting what is happening, wanting another outcome, or desperately needing certainty and control?” “Am I unwilling to fearlessly know the longings of my heart and express it to others?”

Just writing those questions wakes me up. As you read them maybe you also felt a stirring in your thoughts or emotions or even some bodily sensation. I always question how much of the time I am actually asleep in my experience. Even in the therapy room with patients, where I make such an effort to be present, mindful, and caring, I still have times when I find my mind wandering in non-awareness.

Though many of us have spent long hours on retreat cultivating awareness, to learn how to wake up on the fly, right in the middle of the muck of life, is the most effective way to increase the amount of time we spend on the path of awareness. So how do we do this?

First we have to understand what is awareness? Here are two answers from Anam Thubten. The first may seem somewhat esoteric, “Awareness is the luminous, unfettered dimension of our consciousness.” The luminous aspect of awareness is it’s innate quality of knowing. When objects present themselves to awareness, we can know them. The unfettered dimension of consciousness refers to an awareness that is untainted by our own mentally generated concepts about phenomena, such as opinions, likes and dislikes. In addition, awareness is self-luminous, so it can know itself. This what we call pure awareness.

Anam Thubten’s second answer tells us more about how to recognize the path of awareness in any moment, “If you simply let go of all your thoughts and perceptions, don’t hold to anything in your consciousness, including the illusion of self, then the luminosity [of awareness] reveals itself.” This letting go refers to a mind that does not cling to any ideas as solid, permanent, and self-existing; including our own “precious” notions of self-identity, which feel so real and so solid.

Imagine in a moment of anger choosing the path of awareness, and from that directly knowing the limitation of holding tightly to that painful, reactive emotion. Feeling it in the body; knowing the harsh thoughts that arise with anger. The luminosity of awareness naturally opens us into a more accepting attitude toward our anger, allowing compassion and wisdom to arise out of a moment that could have caused so much suffering.

This is what is referred to as, “not believing in your mind.” When you are not believing in your mind, there is awareness. When there is awareness, there is liberation from suffering. And every moment of our lives is one where we get to choose the path of awareness or non-awareness. Try this tomorrow as you go though day. See what happens when you pause to not believe in your mind and instead, consciously choose the path of awareness.

You can watch Anam Thubten give a beautiful talk on this topic:
http://www.dharmatafoundation.com/teachings/teachings.aspx?f=74

"Being With" Disaster

2011-03-18T17:53:00.000-07:00

This past week has brought home the importance of dharma when grappling with massive suffering and increased uncertainty. The devastation wrought by the earthquake in Northern Japan and subsequent tsunami was horrible enough, but the continuing uncertainty of uncontainable nuclear disaster makes it hard to imagine how the devastated citizens of Japan can “be with” distress of this magnitude.

It is easy to see how disasters like this can force the three marks of existence (impermanence anicca, suffering dukkha, not-self anatta) onto the center-stage of our awareness. We witnessed the reality of impermanence and suffering in the washing away of whole villages. We understood the meaning of not-self through lives torn asunder in the flash of an eye by water and shaking earth. Who are we when we have lost everything? What do we identify with when livelihood, family, home and village are erased by natural forces that dwarf human efforts to build legacy and permanence? How does one cope with the specter of future radiation contamination in food, soil, and community?

These very tough questions find answers in the experience of life after disaster. It is so true that extraordinary circumstances like this remind us that human beings when faced with great adversity, are capable of astonishing inner strength and resilience. Think of those brave individuals continuing to work at the Fukushima nuclear site, risking their own lives to save the lives of others.

Inner strength and resilience arise out of qualities of mind and heart that the Buddha emphasized in his teachings. These qualities make it possible to create the internal conditions so the mind can “be with” experience; even horrific events. The qualities I think of most are: Mindfulness, Clear Comprehension, Loving-kindness and Compassion, Equanimity, Renunciation, Generosity, Diligence, Patience, and Skillful Means.

Mindfulness is our internal and external gauge during and after a disaster. The mind does have the capacity to know things as they are; even in the middle of shock, fear and flight. In fact, some people report that during a traumatic event their thinking became intensely clear and focused, and some experienced their bodies as capable of superhuman strength and endurance. Conversely, mindfulness is also an invaluable tool when trauma is sustained in body and mind. The ability to feel into the here and now, to know one has survived, is critical for healing trauma.

Clear comprehension makes it possible to know what has happened, how we are, and what can be done. Clearly seeing the nature of human existence as uncertain, impermanent, and insubstantial helps us avoid the wrong view that life is unfair, meaningless, and hopeless.

Loving-kindness and compassion help us cope with uncertainty, regret, fear, anger and loss by opening the heart to the ubiquity of suffering and our innate capacity to free ourselves and all beings from further suffering. Often, our own lack of kindness and care toward others and ourselves can make unfortunate circumstances seem intolerable. Generosity and renunciation are the building blocks of magnanimity, sacrifice and selflessness. Visioning a future, picking up the pieces of a devastated life, going on without those we love, seems impossible without the help of others. Selfless giving and reaching out to community resources is so important in times of need.

These aforementioned six qualities create the conditions for equanimity, patience, diligence and skillful means to flourish in the mind. When the mind opens to all of these qualities, the door to liberation opens as well. No matter what adversity we may face, know that liberation can occur in any circumstance. In fact it is often during the most challenging times that we have the greatest potential to awaken to our true unbounded nature through suffering or relieving the suffering of others.

I spent almost four years living in Tokyo during the early 1990’s and my heart truly goes out to every Japanese citizen suffering from loss, fear, and mental/physical pain. May you all be free from every manner of suffering.

New Study Strongly Links ADHD and Food Allergies

2011-03-17T15:34:00.000-07:00

This post draws heavily on an NPR article published March 12, 2011
This month a new study published in The Lancet journal, strongly linked ADHD symptoms in children with food allergies. The study's lead author, Dr. Lidy Pelsser of the ADHD Research Centre in the Netherlands was interviewed on NBRP and said that, "64 percent of children diagnosed with ADHD are actually experiencing a hypersensitivity to food."
Researchers determined this by starting kids on a very elaborate diet, then restricting it over a few weeks' time. "It's only five weeks," Pelsser says. "If it is the diet, then we start to find out which foods are causing the problems."

Dr. Pelsser added that teachers and doctors who worked with children in the study reported marked changes in behavior. "In fact, they were flabbergasted," Pelsser said. "After the diet, they were just normal children with normal behavior," she says. No longer were they easily distracted or forgetful, and the temper tantrums subsided.

Some teachers said they never thought it would work. Pelsser added, "It was so strange, that a diet would change the behavior of a child as thoroughly as they saw it. It was a miracle, a teacher said."

Dr. Pelsser cautioned that diet is not the solution for all children with ADHD. "In all children, we should start with diet research," she says. If a child's behavior doesn't change, then drugs may still be necessary. "But now we are giving them all drugs, and I think that's a huge mistake," she says.

Also, Pelsser warned that altering your child's diet without a doctor's supervision is inadvisable.

"We have got good news — that food is the main cause of ADHD," she says. "We've got bad news — that we have to train physicians to monitor this procedure because it cannot be done by a physician who is not trained."

If you want to listen to the NPR interview, here is the link.

http://www.npr.org/player/v2/mediaPlayer.html?action=1&t=1&islist=false&id=134456594&m=134494078

Remembering Alan Marlatt

2011-03-14T16:43:00.000-07:00

Alan Marlatt, PhD passed away this morning from complications of cancer. He will be missed among the addiction research and treatment community worldwide. Known as the father of relapse prevention therapy, Alan did more than anyone in the field to advance the use of CBT for addiction, harm reduction, and in the later part of his career, mindfulness meditation to treat substance use disorders.

He was a gracious and wonderful teacher to many of us in the field. Alan had a wonderful way of nurturing talent. It was under his guidance that Drs. Sarah Bowen and Neharika Chawla birthed the Mindfulness-Based Relapse Prevention program.

Alan showed me great kindness as he mentored me to become a teacher of MBRP. We also shared our love of Buddhism and Buddhist meditation practice. I will never forget him and all he gave to me personally and professionally.

My latest dharma talk is up on iTunes

2011-03-09T17:52:00.000-08:00

The recording of my dharma talk titled "Awakening" from my most recent visit to the Marin Sangha is now available. I spoke about how we can experience nibanna in daily life.

Download the mp3 from my web site:
http://www.lisadalemiller.com/Awakening.xml

Download from iTunes
http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/awakening/id424757992

Mingyur Rinpoche's Losar Message

2011-03-09T10:07:00.000-08:00

Mingyur Rinpoche, one of my most dear teachers, is celebrating Tibetan New Year at his Monastery in Nepal. He uploaded this New Year Message which I found poignant, direct and aimed at the heart of experiencing happiness. In May he will go into three year meditation retreat. More information about attending mahamudra meditation courses can be found at the Tergar International web site.

Losar Greetings from Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche

Happy Losar, friends, students and fellow meditators,

I am now at my monastery in Nepal, where we are just beginning to celebrate Losar, the Tibetan New Year. As I sit here, surrounded by family, friends, and the monks of Osel Ling Monastery, my thoughts turn to all of you with whom I share a connection. My deepest wish is for each of you to experience abundance and joy in the year to come, and for all beings, wherever they may be, to have some measure of peace and joy in their lives.

Losar is a time to reflect on the year that has passed and to set one's intentions for the year ahead. For me, this is also a time to reflect on what meditation is all about, and to make sure that I haven't lost sight of the precious instructions that I received from my teachers. With this in mind, I thought I'd share with you some of my thoughts on the heart of meditation.

Over the past twelve months, I have traveled all over the world teaching people how to meditate. Whether I am talking to a large group or chatting with a few people in private, it seems that everyone wants to know the same thing: Where is lasting happiness to be found? True, not everyone phrases this question the same way - some people may not even know this is what they are asking - but when we reduce our many desires, hopes, and fears down to their essence, this is usually the answer we are seeking.

For those of us who follow a spiritual path, we may think we know the answer. Anyone who studies the Buddha's teachings, for example, will be able to tell you that true happiness is found within. But if we really understand that our basic nature is already whole, pure, and complete, why do we continue to act as though our level of contentment depends on the size of our paycheck, the quality of our relationships, or on the number of pleasurable experiences we can surround ourselves with. In other words, why do we expect things that are ephemeral and changing by their very nature to provide us with something stable and secure?

The answer is quite simple: It's a bad habit. We have believed this myth for so long, that it takes a while for any new understanding to filter down to the core of our being. What's more, we often bring this same mindset - the expectation that temporary experiences can produce lasting happiness - into our meditation practice as well. We mistake fleeting experiences of peace and relaxation for the true relaxation of feeling at ease with whatever manifests in the present moment. We think that calming the mind means to get rid of thoughts and turbulent emotions, rather than to connect with the natural spaciousness of awareness itself, which doesn't get any better when there are no thoughts or any worse when there are. And we chase after ephemeral experiences of bliss and clarity, all the while missing the profound simplicity of awareness that is with us all the time.

What I'm getting at here is that we need to be patient with ourselves, and with the process of loosening this deep-rooted conditioning. The good news is that everything we hear about meditation is actually true. Our essential nature really is completely pure, whole, and infinitely spacious. No matter how trapped we may feel by anxiety, depression, or guilt, there is always another option available to us, and one that doesn't ask us to stop feeling what we already feel, or to stop being who and what we are. Quite the contrary, when we know where to look, and how to look, we can find peace of mind in the midst of raging emotions, profound insight in the midst of complete confusion, and the seeds of compassion in our darkest moments, even when we feel completely lost and alone.

This may sound too good to be true. In fact, I must admit that the first time I heard this, it did seem a little too easy, and too convenient. It took me a number of years, actually, before I stopped using meditation like a hammer, trying to beat all of my painful feelings and cruel thoughts out of existence. I can't tell you how hard it was to be confronted continually with the tempest of my own anxiety while still holding onto the idea that difficult thoughts and emotions were keeping me from tasting true peace of mind.

It wasn't until I gave up in desperation that I finally saw the truth of what my teachers had been telling me all along. What they taught me over and over again, waiting patiently for me to see in my own experience what they had learned themselves, was that love, compassion, and wisdom are manifesting all the time. It's not that we are pure way down in the depths of our being, but somehow up on the surface everything is messed up. Rather, we are pure inside and out. Even our most dysfunctional habits are manifestations of this basic goodness.

There is only one problem: We don't see this true nature in the present moment, and even less so the innate compassion and wisdom that arise from it. Even when we understand intellectually that we have buddha nature - the potential to awaken ourselves from the slumber of ignorance and suffering - we rarely acknowledge this innate purity in the present moment. We see it as a distant possibility, as something that we can experience sometime in the future, or maybe even in another lifetime.

Nevertheless, these enlightened qualities really are present, even right now in this very moment. Don't believe me? Well, let's take a moment to see if this rings true. Why are you sitting here reading this letter? Why are you interested in meditation at all? I'll bet that at least part of the reason is that you want to be happy. Who doesn't? That wish to be happy is the essence of loving-kindness. Once we recognize this basic desire in ourselves, seeing how it manifests all the time in so many little ways, we can begin to extend it to others. Similarly, the flip side of wanting to be happy is the wish to be free from suffering. Once again, I'll bet that in some way, the drive to be free from suffering is motivating you at this very moment. This simple wish is the essence of compassion. And finally, it must be said that even though we want to be happy and free from suffering, we often do things that bring us the opposite result. Reflect for a moment on what it feels like in those moments. When you are looking for lasting happiness somewhere it can never be found, in switching on the TV, for example, can't you feel it in your gut that something isn't quite right? Isn't there a subtle nagging feeling that perhaps you are looking in the wrong place for happiness? Well, that is your buddha nature calling, your innate wisdom.

So you see, we don't have to look outside the present moment to experience wisdom, compassion, and the boundless purity of our true nature. In fact, these things can't be found anywhere but the present moment. We just need to pause to recognize what is always right in front of us. This is a crucial point, because meditation is not about changing who we are, or becoming better people, or even about getting rid of destructive habits. Meditation is about learning to recognize our basic goodness in the immediacy of the present moment, and then nurturing this recognition until it seeps into the very core of our being.

Now that Losar has arrived, each of us has a fresh opportunity to take this message as the heart of our practice. The fact that you are reading this letter now shows that you are not only interested, but ready to wake up to your true nature, to directly experience the purity and richness of your own heart and mind.

Before you get up to do something else, please take a few moments to rest in this recognition, whatever that means to you right now. Simply let go and relax. Allow everything that is happening in and around you to be as it is. Then, as you carry on with your day, see if you can let this experience linger in your being. Whatever you do and wherever you go, remind yourself to let go and relax from time to time.

I will keep you in my heart and prayers. My sincere wish is that you find true happiness within, and that you share this joy with all other beings. May the year ahead be filled with blessings and peace.

Yours in the Dharma,
Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche

"Awakening"

2011-03-07T20:08:00.000-08:00

The dharma talk from my most recent visit to the Marin Sangha is now up on my web site. I spoke about how we can experience nibanna in daily life. Here is the link to download it.
http://www.lisadalemiller.com/Awakening.xml

Teaching Marin Sangha

2011-02-15T18:35:00.000-08:00

For those of you who are local to San Rafael, Ca, I will be teaching Phillip Moffitt's Marin Sangha on Sunday evening February 27. Here is the link with location, directions, etc.
http://www.lifebalanceinstitute.com/dharmawisdom/event/marin-sangha-with-guest-teacher-lisa-dale-miller

Zen Brain IV rocked!

2011-02-14T15:36:00.000-08:00

All three days of lectures from this year's Zen Brain retreat are up on Upaya's web site for download.
https://www.upaya.org/dharma/zen-brain-2011-consciousness-and-the-fundamental-nature-of-mind-series-all-7-parts/
It is a great gift to hear this knowledge for yourselves.

Vipassana meditation in prison

2011-02-08T10:00:00.000-08:00

A terrific NPR story on 10-day vipassana courses for inmates. Dramatic reduction in problems in this prison which has been one of the most problematic in the state. The warden has recommended the staff take the 10-day course to dispel misconceptions about meditation.
http://www.npr.org/2011/02/08/133505880/at-end-of-the-line-prison-an-unlikely-escape

Interview with Joseph Goldstein

2010-12-03T08:25:00.000-08:00

Watch this terrific interview with one of my most-loved Buddhist Meditation teachers, Joseph Goldstein.
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/video/beliefs-meditation-meditate-guru-joseph-godlstein-11919688&tab=9482930%A7ion=4806329&playlist=4806330%20%5D

Lisa's Radio Interview on Awareness, Addiction and Recovery

2010-09-30T15:28:00.000-07:00

I was interviewed on Wellawareradio last week by Lori Granger, MFT a mindfulness-based psychotherapist in Fresno, CA. We had a lively, informative 30-minute discussion about the role of mindfulness and awareness in recovery from addiction. The show also features an interview with Dharma Teacher Stephanie Tate, who leads both the Dharma Punx and Dharma & Recovery Sanghas in San Jose, CA.

You can listen on to the show on this web site:
http://wellawareradio.blogspot.com/

Mingyur Rinpoche speaks at Google

2010-09-01T08:23:00.000-07:00

This is a wonderful introduction to Mingyur Rinpoche, one of my most beloved Buddhist teachers. In these talks at Google he teaches beginning practice of open awareness meditation. He also tells his life story as a young boy suffering with panic disorder, where he cured himself of this condition by using panic disorder as support for his meditation practice. Mingyur Rinpoche is the author of the NY Times Bestseller "The Joy of Living" and is truly one of the most brilliant Buddhist teachers of our time (I can say this from personal experience after having sat on retreat with him for a month.)

You can find these talks on Youtube at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kaNO09cPS6c&feature=player_embedded#!

Make sure to watch Part two as well:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1tw5sowFyM&feature=channel

Buddhist Meditation Practices and Relapse Prevention Skills

2009-09-05T18:20:00.000-07:00

You may attend a sangha when you can and do some meditation practice. But you also struggle with a substance use problem or maintaining a sober lifestyle. You might be dependent upon pain medication to dull chronic pain, or maybe you rely upon alcohol or marijuana to de-stress at the end of the day, or upon drugs/alcohol, food, gambling, or sex to ease negative emotions. You may have tried unsuccessfully to moderate or quit using your substance of choice. You may have thought that meditation alone would end your reliance upon drugs, alcohol, food or sex. Sound familiar? You are not alone. Substance use is still common among Buddhists in the West. There are even some Buddhist sects that include the use of substances in their rituals.

Like so many people that come to Buddhist practices seeking relief for suffering, you too may be ready to liberate yourself from substance abuse or dependence. I recommend Buddhist practitioners who struggle with sobriety take advantage of the increasing use of mindfulness meditation in clinical interventions for substance use disorders.

The primary mindfulness intervention for relapse prevention is Mindfulness-Based Relapse Prevention (MBRP) an eight-week psycho-educational class designed to help prevent future relapse. MBRP was created at the Addictive Behaviors Research Center at the University of Washington. It uses empirically supported interventions from Relapse Prevention Therapy (RPT), Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), and Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT).

The MBRP program employs the same Buddhist/mindfulness meditation practices you learn at your sangha or practice on retreat. However, we add proven relapse prevention tools to help support a sober lifestyle when one is off the cushion. All MBRP participants are asked to do 30-40 minutes of mindfulness meditation practice 6-7 days each week of the eight-week course. I have yet to see anyone who has taken this class that has not benefited tremendously from the mindfulness meditation practices, which help one perceive the inner-workings of the addictive mind and experience some measure of liberation from its dictates.

I always recommend that people come to MBRP with an open mind, an open heart, and a willingness to know their own true nature from the inside out. MBRP does not require one to either hold or not hold the 12-step philosophy, though my experience is many of my participants are very involved in AA/NA groups and they so appreciate the skills they learn in MBRP as a necessary adjunct to the support they get in their 12-step groups.

The clinical research on MBRP shows it is more effective than treatment as usual (TAU) for reduced relapse, reduced days should relapse occur, and reduced craving. (Marlatt, 2005, Bowen et al., 2006, Bowen & Marlatt, 2008). MBRP is relatively new and the first professional clinical training takes place in September, so there should be more facilities offering this intervention in 2010.

I am currently offering the MBRP program in a live Internet classroom on eMindful.com. The next class begins on September 28, 2009. This is an incredible way to do the MBRP class; it is just like being there with me in the same room. I am astounded at the depth of experiences and radical shift that participants have doing the MBRP program online. You can get more information about this class on eMindful.com.

I’d like to end with a wonderful passage from the Dhammapada, where the Buddha beautifully describes the skills we teach in the MBRP program that truly make a difference in helping people create a joyful, sober life worth living.

“Master your senses
What you taste and smell,
What you see; what you hear.

In all things be a master
Of what you do and say and think.
Be free.

Are you quiet?
Quiet your body
Quiet your mind.

By your own efforts
Waken yourself; watch yourself,
And live joyfully.

Follow the truth of the way.
Reflect upon it.
Make it your own.
Live it.
It will always sustain you.”

Next Calm the Mind/Open the Heart in November

2009-08-13T07:59:00.000-07:00

Calm the Mind/Open the Heart
A Two-Session Mindfulness and Heartfulness Class
Offered in a live internet classroom on eMindful.com!

Fridays, November 6 and 13
12:00pmET - 2:30pmET
(11:00amCT/10:00amMT/9:00amPT)

Course Fee: $59.00 USD
To enroll please visit the eMindful.com web site

Is your mind continually busy worrying about the future or obsessing about the past? Do you find anxiety or negativity keep you from relaxing into your life, opening yourself to new opportunities or relationships? This is the class for you. You will learn formal and informal mindfulness and heartfulness practices that decrease over-activity in the mind and lessen destructive negative emotions such as, self-loathing, self-judgment, and self-doubt. Develop peace of mind and open yourself to greater acceptance and kindness.
*This class is appropriate for both beginning or experienced mindfulness meditation practitioners.

Watch Lisa's interview about teaching online MBRP

2009-07-19T08:52:00.000-07:00

Kelley, McCabe, the founder of eMindful.com interviewed a few weeks ago on my experience teaching MBRP in the eMindful.com live video classroom. Here are links to the edited version of this interview.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIOMNIoZbio

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxAfECYmcDU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etPcHP00IxM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-zbZyHJeuo

We also talked about telemedicine and healthcare reform, though this part of the interview has not yet been released. I spoke about the important role of mindfulness-based interventions for delivering wellness and preventive care. The eMindful classroom is an effective method to make this happen for people all over the country who have no access to MBSR, MBCT, or MBRP groups.

Enjoy! Hope to see some of you who are local at my talk on Friday for SCV-CAMFT. The details are listed in the previous post.

Harmlessness

2009-06-21T11:40:00.000-07:00

The Summer Solstice represents fullness. Today, in the Northern Hemisphere, the sun rises to its highest point in the sky and stays visible for the most hours of any day of the year. So too, should we contemplate rising to the highest form of awareness and conduct and showing up today, and every day, as best we can, abiding the principles of wisdom and compassion.

To inspire you on the Summer Solstice here is a teaching from the Buddha:

Harmlessness

"All beings tremble before violence.
All fear death.
All love life.

See yourself in other.
Then whom can you hurt?
What harm can you do?

He who seeks happiness
By hurting those who seek happintess
Will never find happiness.

For your brothers and sisters are like you.
They want to be happy.
Never harm them.
And when you leave this life
You too will find happiness.

The Buddha from the Dhammapada

Forgive my inattention to posting!

2009-06-18T18:34:00.000-07:00

It was a very busy Spring. A lot of presenting, writing and teaching. I am busy creating my schedule of classes for the Fall and will post it by next week.

Preview of my emindful.com offerings will include:
8-week MBRP
4-week Mindfulness/Heartfulness skills class

Register for the online MBRP group starting on April 20

2009-04-13T09:23:00.000-07:00

The next online MBRP group is filling up and it starts in one week on April 20!

STAY SOBER MINDFULLY!
Mindfulness-Based Relapse Prevention (MBRP)

Offered in a live online classroom on eMindful.com
VISIT THE EMINDFUL.COM WEB SITE

Use this link to register
Course fee: $425.00
includes CDs and MBRP handouts

Eight Mondays
April 20, 27, May 4, 11, 18, June 1, 8, 15,
6:00pmET-8:00pmET
(5:00pmCT/4:00pmMT/3:00pmPT)

Saturday Retreat, May 30
12:00pmET-5:00pmET
(11:00amCT/10:00amMT/9:00amPT)

Mindfulness-Based Relapse Prevention (MBRP) is an 8-week psycho-educational class specifically created for clients in recovery from substance use disorders and is designed to help prevent future relapse. MBRP uses empirically supported interventions from Relapse Prevention Therapy (RPT), Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), and Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT).

The MBRP curriculum integrates mindfulness meditation practices, mindful yoga or chi gong, with CBT relapse prevention strategies. The program teaches effective skills to reduce stress, manage urges and cravings, and cultivate compassion and acceptance. Participants will be expected to do home practice. All participants must have at least 30 days of active sobriety.

TO FIND OUT MORE ABOUT MBRP VISIT LISA'S WEB SITE

Happiness Research

2009-04-12T20:56:00.000-07:00

NRP's wonderful radio program "To the Best of Our Knowledge" produced a terrific hour on happiness research featuring neuroscientist Richard Davidson, philosopher Richard Schoch, psychologists Robert Biswas-Diener and Sonja Lyubormirsky, and spiritual activist Satish Kumar.
Here is the link to the program description and the link to the podcast itself.
It is definitely worth a listen!

Hope to see many of you this Saturday at my mini-retreat in San Jose on "Finding Freedom in Uncertainty: Mindfulness for the Tough Times." You can view the details just below or visit my web site

Dalai Lama's Conference on Attention

2009-04-07T16:18:00.001-07:00

For the next 5 days the Dalai Lama is meeting in Dharamsala with scientists at a Mind and Life meeting on Attention. The Mind and Life blog is offering daily reports on the meetings and the research being presented. Richard Davidson, B. Allan Wallace, Roshi Joan Halifax and others are there. I wish I could be there! I will see the Dalai Lama in Boston in a couple of weeks at the Meditation and Psychotherapy Conference.

The Awakening to Mindfulness conference was a huge success and I so enjoyed presenting and meeting so many wonderful clinicians doing great work. I look forward to the next one in October in Seattle.

Finding Freedom in Uncertainty Workshops

2009-02-19T11:51:00.000-08:00

Finding Freedom in Uncertainty: Mindfulness for the tough times
Two mini-retreat workshops with mindfulness-based psychotherapist Lisa Dale Miller, MFT

April 18th
9:30am-1:30pm
Suggested donation: $25.00

Divine Science Community Center
1540 Hicks Ave., San Jose, CA 95125
Please RSVP your attendance: 408-919-7008

In difficult times like these, our lives can feel particularly unstable, unpredictable, and uncertain. Though uncertainty can cause feelings of fear, anger, avoidance, helplessness, distrust, worry, inertia, and impulsiveness, it is also an invitation to recognize what truly matters by grounding ourselves in the here and now through the cultivation of stillness, compassion, and wisdom.

This mini-retreat will offer effective tools to deal skillfully with uncertainty. You will learn meditation practices and cognitive strategies to increase clarity, equanimity, contentment, and peacefulness.

Please bring a snack to share, a yoga mat if you have one, and a meditation cushion if you wish to sit on the floor.

Finding Freedom in Uncertainty Dharma Talk

2009-02-18T06:52:00.000-08:00

On February 15, 2009 I gave a dharma talk at Phillip Moffitt's Sangha in Marin, Ca. The subject of the talk was how to find refuge in the uncertainty of each moment, and the uncertainty that these times of turmoil present to each of us. Enthusiastic participation by the sangha members through great questions and insights added so much to my prepared remarks. Below are links to the recording of this talk. May it be of benefit to you as a guide to cultivating equanimity in these times of continuing uncertainty.

Download this podcast
Download iTunes Podcast

Stillness as a response to turbulence

2009-02-07T08:41:00.000-08:00

It is difficult to avoid the onslaught of information that reflects the daily reality of these turbulent times. Over the last two weeks, I have noticed interesting shifts in the national mind. Joy and relief for our new President, excitement in those first days of actual change, disappointment at the same old behaviors of the entitled, fearfulness for the massive loss of jobs, sadness and anger at the continued selfish contempt and rancor offered by the minority party. Like waves arriving on shore—large and small—when we pay close attention, each wave indicates the condition of the vast ocean from which they spring.

Internally, stillness has seemed an appropriate response to the upheaval (hence the temporary silencing of this blog.) I observe the hysteria over a collapsing economy and mindfully look within to see what responses arise in my own mind. Fear, anger, distrust, hopefulness, relief, uncertainty, inertia, impulsiveness, prognostications—all these states of mind continually lead me to one choice: recognize what truly matters, revel in what actually is, and remain still.

The freedom of wisdom arises when we no longer allow ourselves to be a slave to the reactive mind. Freedom of heart arises when we no longer rely upon projections of future security for our happiness. Contentment resides in the now, and only in the clear comprehension of the ever-shifting, yet continually, newly created now.

The Buddha said it best:

Master your senses
What you taste and smell,
What you see; what you hear.

In all things be a master
Of what you do and say and think.
Be free.

Are you quiet?
Quiet your body
Quiet your mind.

By your own efforts
Waken yourself; watch yourself,
And live joyfully.

Follow the truth of the way.
Reflect upon it.
Make it your own.
Live it.
It will always sustain you.

from the Dhammapada

Generosity in times of financial hardship

2008-12-22T07:42:00.000-08:00

Back in October, I wrote about unwholesome and wholesome states of mind. Today a new reader of this blog, read that post and left a comment thanking me for clearly defining what constitutes wholesome and unwholesome in Buddhist psychology. He inspired me to reread that post, and I was surprised and saddened by its continued relevancy as we face an ever-deepening world financial crisis.

Since this is an annual time of generosity, I thought I would repost this entry, in the hope that it might inspire generosity of giving, especially during this time of financial belt-tightening when we all have so much less to offer the needy and the charitable organizations that help them directly. Some may think, "Oh, I am so financially strained this year, how can I help anyone else?" Just remember that giving feels good for both the giver and the receiver, and there are numerous ways to be generous: we can offer our time, energy, money, creativity or skills. This said, here is the repost of the information on wholesome and unwholesome states of mind.

Buddhist psychology delineates six basic mind states that characterize most affective or cognitive activities of the mind. These six are divided into two groups: three wholesome mind states—Generosity, Love/Compassion, Wisdom; and three unwholesome mind states—Greed, Hatred, Delusion. The overall quality of our lives is primarily dependent upon the amount of time we mentally spend with any of the six mind states. Suffering arises from over-involvement in any of the three unwholesome mind states. Liberation is an outcome of intentional cultivation of one or more of the three wholesome mind states.

The current freefall of the world economy has highlighted the end game of a global over-indulgence in the three unwholesome states of mind. Since the 1980’s the cultivation of greed in business practices has mushroom out of control and like a virus, infected all aspects of the global economy. The ever-increasing desire for more wealth created dysfunctional world markets that have for the last 15 years gorged upon the delusion of permanent expansion as a fact of life. The best example of this would be the directive after 9/11 to display our patriotism by consuming as much as possible.

Greed breeds hatred. Hoarding implies withholding from others; withholding is an outcome of separation; the ideation of separateness from all other existent phenomenon is the primary delusion at the source of all greed and hatred. The desire to remove ourselves from others is rooted in non-caring. Cultivation of the three wholesome mind states decreases the incidence and influence of unwholesome states of mind. Generosity is the antidote for greed. Compassion and lovingkindness are the antidotes for hatred. Wisdom is the antidote for delusion.

As we witness the external collapse of world financial structures, we are presented with a golden opportunity to look within and honestly appraise our own involvement in the three unwholesome states of mind. Radical appraisal requires a bare attentiveness to actualities that can be very painful. Cultivating the three wholesome states of mind—Generosity, Love/Compassion, and Wisdom—helps us bear the pain of staying present with painful insights.

This bare attention is best applied with generosity and compassion toward our own failings, misperceptions and deeds. We must extend this generosity and compassion to include the insights that arise from radical appraisal. Insight combined with compassion and lovingkindness toward self and others blossoms into wisdom. And wisdom ensures our ability to behave more skillfully as we move through this period of crisis and the future rebuilding of a global economy built upon principles of fairness, inclusion, conservation, thoughtfulness, and basic human kindness.

The Shoe Incident: A Buddhist psychological view

2008-12-15T18:54:00.000-08:00

“As Mr. Bush was speaking, Muntader al-Zaidi, a 29-year-old journalist, rose abruptly from about 12 feet away, reared his right arm and fired a shoe at the president’s head while shouting in Arabic: “This is a gift from the Iraqis; this is the farewell kiss, you dog!” Mr. Bush deftly ducked and the shoe narrowly missed him. A few seconds later, the journalist tossed his other shoe, again with great force, this time shouting, “This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq!” Again, the shoe sailed over the president’s head.” NY Times December 15, 2008

“In Iraq throwing a shoe at someone means that you despise that person. If you want to insult someone, you would put his head under your shoe. So throwing a shoe expresses hatred of someone. In Iraqi tribal law it would be a big deal: it cannot be erased or forgiven. This guy [Mr. Bush] is the unluckiest guy I ever knew. He started his time with 9/11 and ended it with two shoes. I feel sad for him, I don’t want to be in his shoes.” NY Times Journalist Atheer Kakan, who was present at the press conference.

Consider this: You are a reasonable man who, (after eight long years of living with continual death and destruction of your country and your fellow citizens perpetrated for reasons that have been found to be groundless and ill-considered) is listening to the very person who instigated all of it and is now standing before you for the last time seeking approval and recognition of his personal delusion of success. What person in their right mind could stand in the presence of such hubris and lies without breaking somewhere deep inside.

Buddhist psychology has much to offer us when we consider all sides of this incident. When we recognize the pain of others, even in the face of great distress or direct attack, we can hold their suffering with compassion and understanding. As Bodhisattva Langri Tongpo wrote in the Eight Verses of Thought Transformation:

When I see beings of unpleasant character
Oppressed by strong negativity and suffering,
May I hold them dear—for they are rare to find—
As if I have discovered a jewel treasure!

Imagine if Mr. Bush had had the presence of mind to see the truth of his own culpability in the suffering of the Iraqi people and recognize that the thrown shoes were a pure expression of this man's intense suffering. Imagine if in that moment Mr. Bush offered his deepest regrets, and spoke his desire for the suffering to end for all Iraqis. Imagine how that might have transformed the moment from one of intense pain to one of humility and forthrightness.

In order for this to have happened, Mr. Bush would have had to renounce his own egoic need to remain in denial of his mistakes and the immense suffering that has occurred as a result. He would also have had to renounce feelings of hatred or aversion for his attacker and instead self-reflected upon his role in bringing harm to this man. Again Bodhisattva Langri Tongro:

In all my deeds may I probe into my mind,
And as soon as mental and emotional afflictions arise
As they endanger myself and others,
May I strongly confront them and avert them.

As to the actions of Muntader al-Zaidi, the Buddha was very clear about what constitutes right speech. "One speaks at the right time, in accordance with facts, speaks what is useful; one's speech is like a treasure; uttered at the right moment, accompanied by understanding, moderate, and full of sense." He chose the way of desperation and reactivity. Though one might not agree with his methods or timing, I applaud his courage to speak the truth of his outrage in the language of his culture. Mr. al-Zaidi refused to allow Mr. Bush a clear path to continuing to perpetrate lies of omission.

Greed, Hatred and Delusion

2008-12-15T10:42:00.000-08:00

A 50 billion dollar ponzy scheme, that no one says they knew about? Co-workers? Hard to imagine an entire investment company not-knowing the whole operation is a fraud; unless we consider greed, and its power to shroud truth and create delusion in the mind. Investors? A year when every other stock/investment fund has seen losses, the investors in this company got statements that showed a 6% return and no one questions it? Once again, greed shrouds truth and creates delusion in the mind.

A smart, capable, well-respected man chooses a sociopathic path of unprecedented criminal behavior. People gasp and wonder how it can happen? Yet we are all continually involved in the mental activity of denying aspects of experience as it arises; the craving for the continuation of pleasurable experience or the end of unpleasant experience happens automatically in the mind. Sometimes protection is the motive: protecting ourselves from pain, or protecting our ideas about who we are, or protecting our reputation when we can’t admit our own failings or mistakes.

Our discomfort with humility, vulnerability, and selflessness creates the attachment to greed, hatred of distress, and the ability to continually create the delusion that hides us from seeing how greed and aversion rule our thoughts, feelings, and actions.

In Buddhist psychology, mindful, compassionate, spacious awareness of our fears as they arise, gives us access to choice about how we wish to respond to our mistakes. We can always choose to deny the automatic egoic/protective response and instead invite in an open, receptive, acceptance through the practice of humility and compassion toward harm we cause to self and others.

Though the cultivation of non-greed, non-hatred, and non-delusion takes effort and awareness, in right measure, clarity of mind and heart lead to freedom from suffering and renunciation of the internal prison we create when we get caught in greed, hatred and delusion.

Best Wishes for 2009!

2008-12-14T15:31:00.000-08:00

The infectiousness of Happiness

2008-12-05T15:00:00.000-08:00

A 20-year study released today purports to show evidence that happiness is infectious. (As my brilliant sister said to me this morning, “I could have told them that without 20 years of study!”) It appears that our closest relatives, friends, and neighbors exert the most potent influence, and our own happiness can be increased by people who are two-or three-degrees removed from us.

There are many forms of happiness in Buddhist psychology; some distinctly associated with the experience of annata or non-self. There is the unconditioned bliss associated with the recognition of parinispanna or emptiness (interbeingness and interdependence) and the bodhichitta or altruistic intention to cultivate compassion through the recognition of and desire to relieve suffering.

Emptiness and compassion are the building blocks for the cultivation of the Brahma Viharas, the positive mental states of lovingkindness metta, sympathetic joy mudita, generosity dana, equanimity upekkha, and contentment sukkha. Each of these “divine abodes” generates waves of joy in the mind that radiate out, and produce similar feelings in others. At times we intentionally practice metta or compassion meditation for others; at times for ourselves.

The Buddhist texts are replete with instructions on how to cultivate positive states of mind from the mundane to the supramundane. However, bodhichitta, the desire to heal the suffering of others, is state of happiness in the mind/heart that we can generate in any moment of our lives through intention and action. The 1st century Indian Buddhist teacher Nagarjuna, initiator of the Mahayana form of Buddhism and the Madhyamaka School describes the tender openheartedness of the cultivation of bodhichitta:

May I be as dear to sentient beings as their
Own life and may they be very dear to me…

As long as space endures,
As long as sentient beings remain,
Until then, may I too remain
And dispel the miseries of the world.

As you can well imagine, this kind of heartfelt intention to be of service to those who suffer, would naturally give rise to deep states of happiness in the mind, which would in turn lead to happiness in others.

One of the researchers of this study recognized the profound impact his own mental state has upon his family, “This now makes me feel so much more responsible that I know that if I come home in a bad mood I’m not only affecting my wife and son but my son’s best friend or my wife’s mother,” Professor Fowler said. When heading home, “I now intentionally put on my favorite song.” (New York Times, Dec 5)

Think about the joy you will experience generating happiness as you arrive home from work, or greet your family as they arrive home at the end of the day.

Abhidharma and Revelation

2008-12-01T19:24:00.000-08:00

“There is no Buddha apart from your own mind. We do not have two minds. There is just one mind that is either deluded or undeluded.” Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche

It has been a productive and interesting few weeks. My apologies for not contributing to this blog during this time.

A couple of months ago, I was asked to present about mindfulness at a conference this coming March on addiction treatment. My first inner reaction was, not another presentation on mindfulness! Then I thought what topic would be really challenging and interesting for me and for the conferees? I realized that we talk a lot about mindfulness, yet the Abhidharmic teachings on the nature of mind and consciousness are rarely presented to audiences outside of Buddhist circles. I had been studying the Abhidharma and marveling at it's depth of vision and complex phenomenology. The Abhidharma not only presents a detailed framework for the actual functioning of mind, it also reveals a topology of mind extending out to include supramundane realms of conscious awareness. When we tell patients that mindful awareness is a powerful tool, we rarely talk about the full extent of this power.

Mindfulness as it is most often taught in clinical settings is single-mindedly focused on symptom reduction (right in line with our allopathic medical system, huh?) It seems radical to speak of the endgame of concentration and insight meditation techniques as tools to liberate the mind. Yet this is exactly their purpose: to cultivate clear comprehension of our true nature as thoroughly interdependent upon all other simultaneously arising phenomena, and totally devoid of inherent, separate self-existence. As Kalu Rinpoche says, “When you understand, you will see that you are nothing. And being nothing you are everything.”

One of the slides I created for the presentation I will give on the Buddhist psychological view of addiction, elucidates the trajectory of profound revelation that can be realized through the practice of a concentration meditation like mindfulness of breath. Most people think they do this practice just to calm the mind. Yes, tranquility is a dramatic effect of mindful attention to breath at the nostrils. Yet, tranquility is a necessary precursor to unification and stabilization of the mind, which reveals the mind's natural inner luminosity, eventually leading to realization of mind states of unconditioned bliss and deep revelation.

Imagine telling a patient suffering with depression or anxiety that you are going to teach them a simple practice which will in time, with dedicated practice, liberate them from identification with any mental construction that includes physical, mental, or emotional limitation. Sounds perposterous doesn't it? While it might be inappropriate to state it in these terms, it is absolutely true; and for me this is the true joy of sharing these tools for enlightenment with those who are suffering.

A New Day after an inspiring week!

2008-11-09T16:23:00.001-08:00

What a beautiful week. An election that brought a sense of relief and optimism around the world. A very inspiring daylong on mindfulness and addiction yesterday where I managed to put forth what I call the Abhidharmic view of addiction to a group that seemed to truly resonate with it. Will write more about this in future posts.

How to enliven non-dual awareness in the therapy room

2008-10-11T07:16:00.000-07:00

This is a continuation of the previous blog entry.

In the therapy room it is best to hold the intention to not force a micro perspective (non-dual awareness) upon the client. Instead using a range of interventions that I will list, the therapist allows the client to experience a widened menu of perspectives that can be perceived at any given moment with a spaciousness that lessens reactivity and increases skillful choice of response.

The interventions are a mix of formal and informal practices to help clients cultivate mindful awareness, receptivity/flexibility of mind and body to experience, and compassionate holding of difficult emotions/thoughts internally and externally. These practices are delivered in a titrated way simultaneous to any psychodynamic and/or trauma work that needs to be done during therapy sessions.

The insights about the existence of the micro world and its relationship to the macro world, as well as the loosening of attachment to the belief in "me and mine" arise naturally as a result of the practices.

This is the work I teach when I offer mindfulness interventions trainings for therapists and when I present at conferences.

Micro reality does not cancel out the macro reality

2008-10-09T06:42:00.000-07:00

This is a response I wrote on another web site about the nature and function of ego. Thought it might be interesting to include in this blog. The other writer was commenting on a common misunderstanding about the non-dual perspective of reality. He sited Buddhist philosophy and quantum physics as sources which hold the position that the transcendent reality cancels out the physical reality most people experience day to day. Here is my reply.

From the point of view of both Buddhist psychology and quantum physics, reality has states and traits that carry particular existent properties which are perceived depending upon one's point of view. The mind perceives a solid body where there actually is none. However, the mind is evolutionarily geared to perceive the body as a solid mass rather than its reality as a continual flow of particles/waves structured by the quantum information these particles/waves possess at any given moment. The micro reality does not cancel out the macro reality. This is why when the Zen master kicks the student's shin he feels pain. The physical body is wired so the brain processes pain upon pressure. The ego is constructed to feel that all experience including that pain belongs to it: the pain is me and mine. Again, this is a mental construction, a particular point of view that comes from an undeveloped mind.

When we undertake mental training in the practices of shamatha (concentration/tranquility) and vipassana (insight/mindfulness) we develop the more refined cortical functions which allow us to perceive the micro-informational aspects of reality along with the macro aspects of reality. Again, one does not cancel out the other. All realities enfold and are inclusive and simultaneously arising with all other realities.

Wholesome and Unwholesome States of Mind

2008-10-08T13:30:00.000-07:00

Buddhist psychology delineates six basic mind states that characterize most affective or cognitive activities of the mind. These six are divided into two groups: three wholesome mind states—Generosity, Love/Compassion, Wisdom; and three unwholesome mind states—Greed, Hatred, Delusion. The overall quality of our lives is primarily dependent upon the amount of time we mentally spend with any of the six mind states. Suffering arises from over-involvement in any of the three unwholesome mind states. Liberation is an outcome of intentional cultivation of one or more of the three wholesome mind states.

The current freefall of the world economy has highlighted the end game of a global over-indulgence in the three unwholesome states of mind. Since the 1980’s the cultivation of greed in business practices has mushroom out of control and like a virus, infected all aspects of the global economy. The ever-increasing desire for more wealth created dysfunctional world markets that have for the last 15 years gorged upon the delusion of permanent expansion as a fact of life. The best example of this would be the directive after 9/11 to display our patriotism by consuming as much as possible.

Greed breeds hatred. Hoarding implies withholding from others; withholding is an outcome of separation; the ideation of separateness from all other existent phenomenon is the primary delusion at the source of all greed and hatred. The desire to remove ourselves from others is rooted in non-caring. Cultivation of the three wholesome mind states decreases the incidence and influence of unwholesome states of mind. Generosity is the antidote for greed. Compassion and lovingkindness are the antidotes for hatred. Wisdom is the antidote for delusion.

As we witness the external collapse of world financial structures, we are presented with a golden opportunity to look within and honestly appraise our own involvement in the three unwholesome states of mind. Radical appraisal requires a bare attentiveness to actualities that can be very painful. Cultivating the three wholesome states of mind—Generosity, Love/Compassion, and Wisdom—helps us bear the pain of staying present with painful insights.

This bare attention is best applied with generosity and compassion toward our own failings, misperceptions and deeds. We must extend this generosity and compassion to include the insights that arise from radical appraisal. Insight combined with compassion and lovingkindness toward self and others blossoms into wisdom. And wisdom ensures our ability to behave more skillfully as we move through this period of crisis and the future rebuilding of a global economy built upon principles of fairness, inclusion, conservation, thoughtfulness, and basic human kindness.

Equanimity within a sea of turmoil

2008-09-29T20:20:00.000-07:00

"True peace is not indifference or emotional resignation; it is the still point, the living reality of the present." Jack Kornfield, PhD, The Wise Heart

This last week has felt like we have all been on a communal financial roller coaster. America in its insistence upon increase, greed, and consumerism, has strayed far from its roots in the values of simple human kindness, caring, and sharing.

So many moments I have found myself feeling fearful and uncertain about the future. And each of those moments have been an invitation to use my mindfulness practice. Whenever I notice my mind becoming gripped with strong emotions, this is the time to find my center in the here and now by drawing awareness to my next breath and fully, completely, enjoying the experience of breathing. Once I find myself in the present, my mind can release itself from the fear of the future, realizing this is a future of its own creation, not what is real in the here and now.

This process of finding oneself in the present is not about banishing distressful emotions. Quite the contrary. It is a fully mindful, compassionate embrace of experience as it actually is, not what the mind fears it is. This is the peace of mind Jack refers to as the "still point within the living reality of the present." How I truly am is my embodied now experience: not my mental ideation about the past or future I am experiencing in the now. A mind that is not present will hold onto regret, sadness, fear, and uncertainty, creating a narrative about it that feels very real. Yet what a straying mind misses is the awareness of self and body, here and now.

Within the turmoil and worry about personal/communal financial well-being is a continuum of still points in each successive moment. We can all have access to the stillness whenever we wish, by noticing where the mind is and bringing back to the reality of the here and now. Even if your here and now experience is full of the recognition of loss, your mind is still capable of finding freedom from suffering through the recognition of the beauty of the living moment just as it is. This is my wish for us all as we surf these next days of uncertainty.

2008-09-15T11:20:00.000-07:00

“All experience is preceded by mind
led by mind, made by mind.
Speak or act with a peaceful mind,
and happiness will follow
Like a never departing shadow.” Buddha, Dhammapada

Let’s continue the discussion of tranquility and peaceful states of mind. Most people feel they need to have certain conditions present in order to have peace of mind: everything in its right place, no problems, or the presence of unperturbed happiness.

Ultimately, what Buddhist psychology offers is freedom from the conditioned. This means that our internal state of mind is not prefaced or dependent upon external conditions.

What hooks us into believing that our identity is state-dependent is our identification with ego-generated, moment-to-moment reactions to phenomena as they arise. The Buddha termed these reactions the five hindrances: unwholesome desire, fear/anger, laziness/inertia, restlessness, and doubt. It is no wonder that when we are mentally under the influence of the five hindrances, that being present with distressful external experience would be almost impossible.

Much of the time we resist life; fighting to defend ourselves against phenomena that only feel dangerous to us because we fear our own vulnerablility to internal reactivity. In his new book The Unfolding Now, A.H. Almaas, writes:
“When we are pushing against our experience, fighting it off, it doesn’t have the opportunity or space to be itself. And if it doesn’t have the chance to be itself, it doesn’t have the chance to unfold. And if it doesn’t have the chance to unfold, it doesn’t have the opportunity to reveal its nature.”

As stated in my entry on tranquility, only a calm mind can relax into its true nature, which is radiant, clear and pure. So if we return to the quote at the top, what the Buddha is saying is that all experience, internal or external is mind-generated. So if the mind’s true nature is radiant and pure, then it follows that all experience that arises in our awareness is also in its true nature, radiant and pure. Even difficult experience at its essence is no other than an expression of the radiant, clear pure mind.

So one way to allow the mind to contemplate this truth is to cultivate peacefulness by bringing relaxed attention to the arising of the five hindrances in each moment. Renouncing our reactivity to their influence, and instead allowing experience to unfold naturally, revealing its and our own true nature to us, in each moment.

2008-09-12T08:48:00.000-07:00

STAY SOBER MINDFULLY!
Mindfulness-Based Relapse Prevention (MBRP)

eMindful.com presents MBRP in a live online video/classroom!

Mindfulness-Based Relapse Prevention (MBRP) is an 8-week psycho-educational class specifically created for clients in recovery from substance use disorders and is designed to help prevent future relapse.MBRP uses empirically supported interventions from Dr. Alan Marlatt's Relapse Prevention Therapy (RPT), Jon Kabat-Zinn's Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), and Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT).

This MBRP group will be facilitated by Lisa Dale Miller, MFT, mindfulness-based psychotherapist and member of Dr. Marlatt's MBRP training team. The MBRP curriculum integrates mindfulness meditation practices with cognitive-behavioral strategies to support clients and promote vital lifestyle modifications for a healthy life of recovery.

The program teaches effective skills to reduce stress, manage urges and cravings, and cultivate compassion and acceptance. Each of the eight MBRP classes includes mindfulness meditation and mindful movement, along with cognitive-behavioral strategies to maintain and reinforce sobriety. Participants will be expected to do daily home practice. All participants must have at least 30 days of active sobriety.

STARTS OCTOBER 13, 2008
Eight Mondays, Oct. 13 - Dec. 1
6:00pmEDT-8:00pmEDT
(5:00pmCDT/4:00pmMDT/3:00pmPDT)

Saturday Retreat, Nov. 22
12:00pmEST-5:00pmEST
(11:00amCST/10:00amMST/9:00amPST)

Visit eMindful.com to enroll
Pre-registration is required
Enrollment will be limited
Course Fee $425
(includes meditation CDs and MBRP handouts)
CMEs are available for all MD's, psychologists, nurses, and nurse practitioners.
CEUs for MFT's & LCSW's (California only.)

ENROLLMENT REQUIREMENTS:
All prospective participants must have at least 30 days of active sobriety.
All prospective participants will complete an MBRP questionnaire* and class agreement.
All prospective participants will have a short interview by phone with Ms. Miller to discuss suitability for the MBRP class.

For questions contact:
Lisa Dale Miller, MFT
408-919-7008
www.lisadalemiller.com/mbpsych.htm

Tranquility

2008-09-04T07:55:00.000-07:00

Tranquility is a necessary component for contentment. Tranquility is also the proximate cause of insight. This is the primary reason why a meditator is taught concentration practice prior to learning insight or vipassana meditation. Only a calm mind can relax into its true nature: radiant and pure.

Humans are blessed with breath; an ever-present biological function that acts as a conditioner for the body and mind. The quality of breath has a direct influence upon the quality of mind and body. When we are stressed or fearful, breath is fast, short and often we even find ourselves “not breathing.” When we are content, happy, and restful, breath is slow, long, gentle, or deep. You may have noticed that when you feel anxious, if you put your attention on how breath is and slow it down or deepen it, often anxiety abates.

When we bring awareness or what is called “relaxed attention” to breath in a focused way, breath itself becomes a gateway to calmer states of mind and body. Staying with breath long enough, leads to calm, which leads to interest in the mind, and joyfulness in the heart and body. Eventually, the excitement gives way to a contentment, which arises from the direct experience of the mind knowing its own radiance and clarity.

If radiance and clarity is the true nature of mind, why do we not experience these qualities of mind all the time? Primarily this is due to the presence of habitual thought-generated mental hindrances, such as unwholesome desire, anger, laziness/inertia, restlessness, and doubt that grip the mind and pull it away from experiencing its own true nature.

In concentration meditation we learn to stop feeding the hindrances by starving them. We train the mind to stay present with an object like breath, which naturally leads to calm, clear, and contented states of mind. Continually choosing over and over again, to turn away from distressful states of mind and turn toward the experience of breath eventually gives us the confidence, to turn the mind toward the hindrances, and stay present with these distressful states of mind to engage in the inquiry of vipassana meditation practice.

Two of me?

2008-08-16T16:58:00.000-07:00

I recently heard an interview with Eckhart Tolle on the wonderful NPR program “Speaking of Faith”. Eckhart talked openly about the depression and anxiety he suffered with throughout his teens and twenties. He spoke about how, at the age of 29, in the depths of a depressive episode, he had a direct insight that opened the door for his spiritual awakening of the ground of being.

Tolle recounted his experience, "I awoke one night with this thought, I can’t live with myself any longer. And that phrase went around in my head a few times. And suddenly I was able to stand back and look at that phrase… I thought, that is strange. Who am I, and who is the self that I cannot live with anymore? Oh there must be two of me here! I didn’t get an answer to this question, but just the questioning itself stopped the stream of negative, depressive thinking…. I awoke that morning and everything seemed much more alive than it use to be. Everything was precious and alive, almost as though I was looking at it for the first time. Everything was very beautiful. I suddenly felt at peace, though I had no explanation for it.”

Though it took years for him to conceptually understand the implications of this experience, it is a fantastic example of how when we become aware of the pure awareness that continually observes the ever-changing contents of the mind, an immediate shift in chronic symptomatology can occur. For more on the conceptual aspects of "two selves" read some of my earlier posts, particularly "The sense of I".

Relaying Tolle's experience seemed very appropriate on the eve of my departure for a 10-day silent meditation retreat. I am so grateful to have this time to drop deeply into the essential nature of mind; the ground of being, Prajnaparamita.

May you enjoy these last two of weeks of summer!

Dukkha: the unsatisfactoriness of experience

2008-08-14T08:48:00.000-07:00

Let's look a bit more closely at the use of compassion. Sometimes when I introduce the idea of "bringing compassion to direct experience" I am met with expressions of perplexity. It can be difficult for a western psyche to think of direct experience as something we participate in, not just passively experience.

Previously I wrote that the senses, the portals of perception—eyes, ears, touch, smell, taste, consciousness—all interdependently and simultaneously co-arise with percepts. Each of these arising phenomenon have a concurrently arising feeling tone known in the Pali language as vedana. Buddhist psychology notes three main categories of vedana: pleasant, unpleasant and neutral. The core teaching of the Buddha was the recognition that experience of, and identification with, each of the three feeling tones leads inevitably to dukkha, a sense of unsatisfactoriness (often translated as suffering.)

When we experience pleasure, our motivation is for its continuance. This craving for unending pleasure and the effort to hold onto the idea of it as lasting, can only lead to suffering when faced with the uncertainty and impermanence of all phenomenon: all things are of the nature to arise and pass away.

When we experience pain, our motivation is to move away from it or wish it to end. This craving for an end to unpleasantness creates strong aversion in the mind and the necessity for its immediate end. This too can only lead to suffering when we are unable to recognize the reality of uncertainty and impermanence, reminding us that all things naturally arise and pass away: they do not last forever.

When experience feels neutral, the mind can fall into states of lethargy, boredom, and disconnection. This too leads to the dukkha of confusion, ambivalence, restlessness and a craving for stimulation.

The results of dukkha are what psychotherapists work with all the time. From a Buddhist psychological perspective, healing occurs when we directly recognize the source of unsatisfactoriness: the identification with the ever-shifting mental landscape of thoughts, feelings, and sensations as the total sum of "I".

Through mindfulness, we can directly perceive the process of arising phenomenon, its co-arising feeling tone, and subsequent internal response, as the true source of suffering. This is where the active application of compassion to distressful experience is absolutely necessary for mindful acceptance and clear comprehension. Without compassion self-loathing, self-judgment, self-blame, and feelings of powerlessness or overwhelm will predominate. Compassionate acceptance is a tremendous helpmate in the effort to stay present with difficult internal and external experiences. Compassion allows the mind to stay with "what is" without reflexively needing to deny it, run away from it, or fix it.

Of course it is important to understand that compassion is in no way analogous to agreement or passivity. Compassionate acceptance of "what is" creates a spaciousness around distressful experiences, lessens reactivity, and enables our capacity to respond to "what is" with thoughtful caring and mental clarity.

Here is a simple compassion practice which can be applied when we are in the throes of distressful experience or practiced as a meditation to cultivate spontaneous compassionate responses to experience. As you repeat these phrases, actively open the heart, and direct the loving intention of these phrases to yourself.

May I have compassion for my pain and suffering.
May my pain and suffering be eased.
May I be at peace (with whatever arises).

Wisdom and Compassion

2008-08-11T20:31:00.000-07:00

“For the bird of enlightenment to fly, it must have two wings: the wing of wisdom and the wing of compassion,” Zen Buddhist adage.

Mindfulness of breath meditation is a doorway to awareness of all kinds of internal and external phenomena which were previously unknown to us. Thoughts which seemed random or of little consequence, are revealed as repeated impediments to achieving calm, collected states of mind; or even powerful agents of negativity toward self and/or others. We notice how often the mind gets caught up in feelings of fear, aversion, irritation, restlessness, boredom, impatience, intolerance, drama, self-blame, self-criticism, self-loathing. How resistance to unpleasantness increases the strength of negative states of mind.

Increased awareness gives rise to insight. And insight is best met with compassion. Why compassion? Mindfulness polishes the mirror of perception so we can clearly comprehend the internal mechanisms of mental automaticity that create suffering from moment to moment. So when mindfulness is directed toward destructive patterns of thought and behavior the insights that arise can be quite painful.

So we meet these stark realities with a compassionate acceptance of what is: opening the heart to hold distress, while attending to pain as mindfully as possible, without rejection. Together, compassionate presence in the face of suffering and clear comprehension of the sources of suffering support the full flowering of the wisdom that leads to liberation from suffering.

From this perspective, it is easy to see why mindfulness practices work so well to enhance the effect of other psychotherapeutic interventions. When clients can stay with distress, and not give in to or increase negative states of mind, the opportunities for understanding and transformation are greatly increased.

The first step: steadying the mind

2008-08-08T21:26:00.000-07:00

In my last post I spoke of Buddhist psychology’s progressive steps for direct inquiry into the nature of mind. In order to create the conditions for insight, it is important to steady the mind through mental training. The principal beginning meditative practice for cultivating calm, steady mind states is mindfulness of breath meditation or anapanasati (Pali trans.) Bringing the attention to the actual physical experience of breath, either in the belly or at the nostrils, trains the mind to stay concentrated upon an object of awareness or “anchor”.

One of the translations of sati, (the Pali word for mindfulness) is remembering. True mental training happens during concentration practices when we remember to return the attention to the anchor. This process of remembering and returning happens over and over again during the practice when we realize the attention has strayed from the breath to thoughts, emotions, body sensations or other distracted mind states like boredom, sleepiness, racing mind, etc. The nature of an untrained mind is to wander; so we train the mind in a way that allows it to naturally attenuate to calm, collected, focused attention for longer periods of time.

Though generally considered a beginning meditation practice, anapanasati (anapana=breath, sati=mindfulness) is actually a complex set of 16 progressive meditation instructions for full realization of the ground of being.

I have recorded a Mindfulness of Breath Meditation for Beginners that is available on my web site for free download. Click on the “Free Mindfulness Meditations” link on this blog page to get to my site.

Emptiness and self-existence

2008-08-07T08:30:00.000-07:00

“The apparent duality of “self” and “other” is a manufactured set of reference points that arises as a panic-response to the uncertainty, openness, and groundlessness of the “basic ground” of primordial awareness.” Reginald Ray, “The Secret of the Vajra World” pg. 308

What is this basic ground of primordial awareness? It is pure presence; a depth of unthinkability that is ever-present, non-dual, empty of form and substance, and non-changing. Direct experience of pure presence is available in each moment through the recognition of the basic emptiness and insubstantiality of all phenomena arising from the ground of being.

You might be asking yourself, how does emptiness and unthinkability apply in psychotherapy? Our patients feel they are truly suffering. How can it possibly help to tell them the pain they consider “theirs”, the confusion and helplessness that feels so real, is actually insubstantial and empty of self-existence?

The concept of emptiness in Buddhist psychology is not characterized by nihilism, disassociation, anhedonia, or a sense of deficiency in the self. Rather emptiness points directly to the reality of the interconnectedness of all arising phenomena as dependent upon interrelated causes and conditions. This fact renders all arising phenomena empty of self-existence apart from all other phenomena.

"The apparent world of “I” and “other” as existing realities is a false conceptualization, overlaid on our experience and completely unreal. The dependent nature, which arises in dependence on causes and conditions, possesses no more than a relative reality; it is not real in the ultimate sense of having an abiding essence or definitive character.” Reginald Ray, “The Secret of the Vajra World” pg. 309

So this emptiness extends even to the portals of perception; the senses—eyes, ears, touch, smell, taste, consciousness—all of which interdependently and simultaneously co-arise with percepts. It is Manas—the energy associated with consciousness experienced as craving for separate sense of self—that creates the false subject/object reality of an unenlightened mind. (see the previous post)

Buddhist psychology is a roadmap for realization that progressively allows the psyche to naturally drop into the ground of being through a process of direct inquiry into the nature of mind itself. It is this process of direct inquiry into the nature of mind, which this blog is dedicated to elucidating.

The sense of "I"

2008-08-05T17:56:00.000-07:00

In Buddhist psychology, consciousness is thought of as a "sixth sense" and is therefore, like our other five senses, an organ of perception and misperception. Manas is the energy associated with consciousness, and this energy is characterized by a craving for identity; particularly a separate sense of self. Manas is constantly engaged in the calculation of defining what is and what is not "I" and ultimately is the progenitor and generator of our dualistic subject/object perspective.

This attentiveness to "I" leads to moment to moment generation of a sense of egoic separateness that causes experience to be perceived as personal: "This is happening to me, in me, around me, because of me, in spite of me, etc." It is truly remarkable how we assume without question that we are our perceptions, thoughts, and feelings and that these perceptions, thoughts, and feelings are the ultimate empirical definers of reality. Descartes' famous pronouncement, "I think therefore I am" is emblematic of this way of defining identity.

Neuroscience has been hard at work trying to understand the process of cognition and identity. Yet for all their efforts so far they have only confirmed what the Buddha taught 2500 years ago about the nature of self: there is no actual self to be found anywhere in the human mind or brain. In fact, finding the mind itself has proven equally elusive. Our concept of self seems to be constructed in each moment of experience through a complex process of perception, recognition, categorization, and reaction. Though our states of mind continually shift, the conceptual sense of and identification with an "I" as the owner of emotions, thoughts, sensations and experiences remains intact.

Given these facts, one might wonder about the insistence of western psychology on caring for the self. More on this later!

Mindful Psyche is Born!

2008-08-04T09:52:00.000-07:00

Today, Mindful Psyche arises from the ground of all being. This blog has the sole intention of documenting the cultivation of the perfection of wisdom on and off the cushion.

What we call life is a steady stream of perceptions and reactive responses created by a mind, clouded from the imperfections and complexities of its own information collection and dissemination processes, and its constant reliance upon belief in a individual self to create an identity. Mindfulness provides the means, in any moment, to clear a clouded mind, and compassion is the vehicle to fully embody insights that arise from mindful inquiry.

Together, mindfulness (sati) and compassion (karuna) lead to clear comprehension (samprajana) of the self as independently non-existent and empty of form. Instead, the mind opens to Prajnaparamita, the ever-present, pure wakefulness and source of all perceptions, thoughts, feelings, and sensations that mind normally identifies as "self". This perfection of wisdom is the realization of the human mind as a conduit for ever-present awareness of Prajnaparamita, the ground of being.

Interestingly, Prajnaparamita is personified as female. She is the Mother of all Buddhas. Psyche, the Greek personification of soul/mind is also envisioned as female. Psychology, the scientific study of the human mind and its functions has largely been dominated by men. Buddhist teachings have also largely been realized and disseminated by men.

As a female psychotherapeutic professional, a teacher of meditation and a visual aritst, I view this blog as a vehicle to bring a female voice to the forefront of the discussion on how to practically, conceptually, and creatively cultivate enlightened states of mind as a desired outcome for psychotherapy.

I invite you all to join me in this process, collaboratively co-creating clarity of mind, openness of heart, and pure presence.