mindfulness Archives - The Inner Monk

In This Age of Anything Goes, What’s Left to Believe In?

I always took it for granted that as I aged the world would change. For most of us who grew up in the mid-twentieth century, ‘change’ meant exciting technological change, and sure enough there’s been tons. It’s no surprise that younger generations don’t know (or care) what it means to, ‘dial a phone,’ ‘roll up a window,’ or, ‘play a record.’ Why would they?

They also may not know what it’s like to see political opponents treat each other with respect, debate with intelligence and compromise wisely. In our youth the great example on the world stage was the United States of America, which Ronald Reagan described as the, “Shining city on a hill…teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace.”

Today, the states of America are hardly united, and the values of moral fiber, integrity and honor are deprecated each day.

These values were once mainstream, part of religious instruction which is now widely mistrusted. The sad thing is that the inner life is our greatest gift—more valuable than anything on Amazon or Facebook. There are plenty of tools to explore it and there are teachers and guides of all sorts to lead and encourage, but only a few even bother to try. Everyone else is busy with stuff, preoccupied or overwhelmed.

By ‘inner life’ I don’t mean the supernatural. I mean a simple counterpoint to the consumerism that monopolizes our attention while simultaneously fragmenting it. We don’t have to live like this. We are sentient and more. We have the power to question ourselves and change. We can be awed. For all our faults and weaknesses, we look to the stars.

It’s easy to be superficial, whereas to live fully means exploring our deepest needs and turning to personal growth and transcendence, giving meaningful moral service to ourselves and to those in our world. All this takes self-awareness, emotional balance and commitment. It’s work. It never ends.

Having values doesn’t mean you have to adopt a whole belief system. Just figuring out right from wrong is hard enough, and there’s no better character-building exercise. Only the amazing creativity of the human brain and heart can overcome incuriosity, cynicism and moral laziness.

The world is not as we wish it to be—never was and never will be. It’s up to each of us to adapt, find meaning and keep the flame burning bright. Integrity, compassion and moral courage are not outdated—but they are sorely missing. By fighting for them, we not only improve our own lives but also inspire those around us to take the time to weigh their values and find their balance, just as we do ours.

To Become More Real, Question Yourself

Of all the Buddhist texts I studied, none excited me as much as lo-rig—types of mind. It’s often referred to as ‘Buddhist Psychology,” and is a map of fifty-one mental factors, including attention, mindfulness, anger and compassion.

Apart from the mental factors, it also defines ‘mind’ itself, in three simple words: “Clear and knowing.”

I remember my first reaction. Really? That’s it?

I was still confused about mind and brain. It took me a while to understand that while brain is tangible, mind is not—it’s a verb, not a noun. Your brain (and nervous system) mind you—they keep everything running, sync the various bodily systems, process information into complex sensations, emotions and thoughts.

We think we decide our lives, but we’re pre-programmed with natural instincts. Once born, we start minding in earnest and by the time we’re grown we’ve developed a ton of artificial instincts—ways to react to the stresses we’ve had to face. These learned patterns characterize us. We tend to identify with them.

We don’t have to. Everything learned can be unlearned. Being human, we have choices. We’re free—potentially.

But freedom is scary. Why risk change when we could just lean back into those learned patterns? They always worked in the past. Why not just rely on them now?

It takes courage to question how you mind your life. It’s not just a one-time thing. It opens the floodgates of guilt, regret, denial and the baggage of a lifetime. To see what lies behind those walls you first have to climb them. Why oh why, when you have the choice not to? Wouldn’t you rather not know? You’ll end up with that one silly little question:

“Who am I?”

It’s embarrassing, humiliating, depersonalizing, confusing. And yet in mindfulness circles, in psychology journals and right across the business blogosphere, people are in search of their ‘authentic’ self.

That may be why you’re here. If you’re breaking through the rigidity of reactive patterns and working to be free, good on you! The world needs people like you, with the courage to be yourself—even if you’re still figuring out what that means.

The Happiness Illusion

What gets you out of bed in the morning? Is it the thought of money, connection, status…or just caffeine? Whatever motivates you, it's some sort of hope, big or small.

Everything we hope for comes down to a longing for happiness, but happiness lies at one end of a spectrum. If we didn’t know sadness, how would we recognize happiness? Life constantly cycles through these and other ranges of emotion: security and anxiety, contentment and frustration, patience and anger. The reason we recognize any of these states is because they change into their opposite and then back again—over and over. That’s life.

It’s remarkable how much we resist this obvious truth. As a monk living in a community I always felt pressure to represent the monkhood in a positive light. I tried to always be happy and smiling. Sometimes it was genuine, but sometimes it was fake. It took me a while to realize this. In the process I understood that my chief concern was denial, not unhappiness.

The truth is that life can capsize at any time without warning. We find ways to stay upright, but it's a constant struggle. We wish for an end to the struggle, but it’s unrealistic. The day we can lean back in peace with dissatisfaction, unhappiness and sorrow behind us once and for all is pure fiction.

Buddha said we were all deluded. It's not hard to make the case. We read today's awful news and feel that we've lost some sort of pristine happiness, but when we look back honestly we see that it was never like that in the first place. Then we feel that the inevitable happiness we expect in our future is anything but inevitable. Looking for happiness in the rosy past or in the hopeful future only sets us up for disappointment. Everything that actually exists is now.

This inconvenient truth becomes more evident during dark periods such as the world’s going through today. The growing interest in mindfulness is no accident. It reminds us that the past is a memory and the future is speculation. Past and future are thoughts about reality but not reality. Focus on the present moment and you feel immediate physiological and emotional changes. Your breath deepens, your blood pressure stabilizes, your mood changes. It’s all documented but you don’t need to research it. Just do it and see for yourself.

These benefits are temporary of course—like everything—but they’re real. Spending a little time each day in the present moment reminds us of life’s ups and downs and gradually replaces the illusions of happiness with an understanding that it's fleeting. You shed expectations and emotional baggage. You become less judgmental of yourself and others. You get better at navigating life. You find balance.

Expectations: Finding Balance and Letting Go

The problem with subliminal expectations is not so much that they’re expectations as that they’re subliminal.

Subliminal expectations creep effortlessly into our relationships, our goals and our outlook on life. Because they’re subliminal we trust them without question—and when they don’t come true we feel disappointed—even ripped-off.

Suckers for convenient beliefs, we assume that relationships are supposed to be easy, or that negative emotions are simply a bad habit we should be able to shake off at will. By highlighting the things we most want to believe, expectations blind us to unpleasant realities, making us inflexible.

They strain relationships, block personal growth and promote a sense of of failure.

And then, when our expectations prove false, we draw false conclusions and punish all the wrong people—including ourselves.

But we’re not helpless. The problem with subliminal expectations is not so much that they’re expectations as that they’re subliminal. By bringing your conscious attention to the fore you notice them, you learn to see through them, you distrust them, and eventually you let them go.

However, all that doesn’t happen overnight. It takes practice:

Remind yourself daily that ups and downs are inevitable and that expecting life to look after you guarantees disappointment.
Cultivate self-compassion along with self-awareness: A mindful, caring lifestyle helps you detach from expectations and can see your mental patterns in real time. Stay focused as they arise. In time, you’ll see how they impact your feelings and your decisions.
Question your expectations. Are they valid? Are they based on reality or do they reflect social pressures and self-limiting beliefs?
Remember: you’re not alone. Everybody’s subject to unrealistic expectations, every day. Being conscious of them enables you to learn and grow from life’s setbacks.
Be deliberate in all you do. The techniques and reflections we practice in Mindfulness Live will help you stay grounded.

Letting go of expectations creates space for acceptance, growth, and genuine connection. Nevertheless, it will feel unfamiliar, perhaps uncomfortable. That’s because you can’t discard expectations without embracing uncertainty. Recalling, “I don’t know,” is the key to a curious, open mind.

FREE MONTHLY WORKSHOP: CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS

It Begins with Silence: INTRO

To train the mind you need a basic appreciation of how it works. Books and explanations offer some direction, but in the end you really have to look for yourself. Both the questions and the answers that really matter lie within your mind, so the substance of this book consists more of clues, encouragements and challenges than of explanations.

Mindful reflection is a lifestyle. If you’re looking for a convenient technique to escape your problems and be transported to a stress-free peace of mind, you won’t find it here. In fact, you won’t find it anywhere. Despite our weakness for convenient solutions, we all know deep down that personal stress is inseparable from the way we live and deal with ourselves and others. Facing up to this fact of life demands a depth of integrity that can be intimidating, but that’s also deeply rewarding. The alternative, avoidance, pretends to be an easy way out but actually resorts to subconscious trickery – a taxing and fruitless denial of our true feelings.

What you will find here is a depiction of consciousness in transformation. The way of mindful reflection is not to simply replace ‘wrong’ thoughts with ‘right’ ones, but to gradually refine your thinking until you’re able to let go of compulsive explanations altogether, and face reality head-on. By directing your attention inward, you identify conceptual knots, find breathing room and begin to change. What happens is neither magical nor superconscious – but it is intuitive and paradoxical. For example, as you learn to quieten the thoughts, your power to reason and conceptualise grows sharper; as you detach yourself from expectations of life, its joys are enhanced.

The Buddha didn’t advocate mindful reflection just for the high-minded pleasures of living in the here and now. This common misunderstanding both trivializes and undermines its full potential. Used as a tool and applied with energy and patience, mindful reflection can bring to your attention the endless shifting of all you know and the consciousness with which you know it. The stressed mind leaves its shaky trail in the imbalance provoked by life’s persistent uncertainty. Our gut reactions to this uncertainty set up the defensive illusions through which we try to secure ourselves, but which only keep us running round in circles. This repeated observation alone, without any additional rationalisation, is a profound enabler of long-term change. However, the Buddha didn’t stop there. All that he taught points this change toward awakening to the full potential of consciousness – a permanent letting-go.

I wrote this book for the same reason I teach. To share the gift I received from my teachers, to refine my own understanding and to address a matter of fundamental importance to us all – human happiness. I wish for you the reader, and for all my students, the same fulfilment I’ve found, and more. To purchase It Begins with Silence on Kindle, or as an old-fashioned book, click here.

The True Meaning of Mindfulness

Concerns of a Former Buddhist Monk

A psychotherapist commented to me the other day that, “Mindfulness has little or nothing to do with introspection. It’s about learning to be in the ‘here and now,’ living in the present moment.”

Such simplistic notions of mindfulness upset me, especially coming from a healthcare professional. The fact is, simplifying life isn’t simple—it takes lots of clear thinking. Watching the breath may distract us from our anxieties for a while, but to truly get past them we have to drill down. There’s no magic.

The present moment is not some sort of thought-free zone of undefiled experience. There’s crap in the here and now. And then there’s the sheer volume. You feel cold and shudder; you hear a leaf blower and react angrily; you remember your doctor’s appointment and just have to go over the details; you find yourself preoccupied by a long-forgotten argument. Meanwhile, moods fluctuate and, as every meditator discovers, there’s an endless stream of apparently random thoughts that aren’t actually random at all.

And that’s just one moment! We can’t attend to it all. The choice of where to place our attention is either made consciously, or it happens unconsciously. This is the crux. When mindfulness is absent, automaticity steps in and we’re drawn to the same old patterns of denial, escape, numbness, self-deprecation and fear of rocking the boat.

In time, regular mindfulness practice lays bare the roots of automaticity. THAT'S ITS POWER—to directly and consciously undermine the whispering, self-limiting beliefs that are so harmful—especially, “I’m not good enough,” and “I don’t deserve better.” Without conscious attention, patterns of shame and guilt, as well as plain anxiety, effortlessly take over. Turning around and facing them is a big deal, the best thing we can do for ourselves.

Health professionals should never take this for granted. Indeed, they shouldn’t even talk about mindfulness until they’ve established a practice of their own and gained real clarity into their own mental patterns.

What we do in Mindfulness Live

Peer-pressure, shame, embarrassment, fear of judgment—these are some of the reactive mental patterns that trigger our behavior. In Mindfulness Live we talk about reactivity all the time, focusing on one pattern per week. There are the negatives, like guilt, anger, denial and fear, as well as the positives, such as increased attention, empathy, discernment and insight. The list is as long as human behavior is complicated, but by taking them one at a time they slowly become manageable. The first goal is to see that all these negative feelings are natural products of the human mind—no reason for shame or guilt—and that with regular practice we start to change our response.

Last week’s topic was wishful thinking. For an example I recalled my very first expectations of meditation—that it would cure all my ills. All I had to do was, “Watch the breath.”

I did. For years. It felt good while I was doing it, but I always ended up back in the same old world with the same old baggage. Where’s the freedom in that? It didn't stop me wishing, and it didn't get me anywhere either.

Before we can let go of old patterns, we have to catch ourselves in the act of hanging on to them. That’s the real purpose of mindfulness. It’s not pretty, and the instinctive human response is to turn away. “I didn’t do it!” Denial works well in the short term, but as a long-term strategy it’s disastrous. Seeing the consequences of denial takes consistent but gentle attention, and recognizing them without shame or embarrassment raises them from the subconscious to full consciousness, finally giving us a say in them. The great obstacle is defensiveness. The payoff is the freedom of not taking things personally.

Think about what that would mean for you. It’s a real life-changer.

When you’re the only meditator in your household, keeping up motivation can be really tough. TO stop our perpetual engagement in the world of people we have to STOP, and that goes against all social norms. We need support in our dissent, and it’s heartwarming.

We laugh a lot, cry a little and wonder where we belong in this great universe. Not that we expect an answer. Those big questions are different. They leave us on the knife-edge of the sublime—being without needing to understand—witnessing the flux of life. What matters is to celebrate what we have, and to do it as consciously as possible.

MindfulnessLive.ca: where you'll keep up your practice, guaranteed!

My Father Tamed Lions, but he Couldn’t Tame Me

Perhaps it was because Dad was a lion tamer that I ended up funny. Yes, a lion tamer—and no, I don’t mean comic. This was all in his past by the time I was born, and since he was an absent father—there but not there, like so many men of that generation—I got to know him through his memories, or at least what I imagined were his memories. These I formed myself, from a pile of old photos that he stubbornly refused to talk about. He was ashamed of something.

He’d run away from his native Calabria in the 1930s to join his cousin Blacaman, who was touring South America with lions and alligators as the, “Hindu Animal Hypnotist.” When he fell out with Blacaman and ran off with his girlfriend Koringa to Paris, he managed her before moving on to an acrobatic dancer called Gwenda. Koringa was exotic and French. Gwenda was respectable and English. Dad admired England. Handily avoiding Mussolini’s call to arms, he ended up interned on the Isle of Man. They married and she became like him, an enemy alien. That ended their performing days.

These are the people who raised me. At least, they tried.

“Dad, where was this picture taken, and who's that girl with you?” No answer. Just a grimace. He'd get mad when I pleaded, and I'd get mad right back at his silence. A child needs the stories of the parents, preferably from their own lips. Mum told me everything, but she was no male role-model. He controlled us at home and I vowed never to be like him. But of course I never really knew him, so it was a difficult vow to keep.

The only person he spoke to—in absolute privacy—was his priest. He’d maligned Holy Mother Church for years and had more regrets. He clung to his newfound English and Catholic respectability like a talisman, but the life that I witnessed never inspired me quite like those old photos.

They empowered me to live passionately and uncompromisingly—just as, I supposed, he'd done when he was young and interesting. So when at the age of twenty-two I got to choose between a life as a social scientist and the opportunity to go native with a pride of learned Tibetans, it was a no-brainer.

I didn’t see my decision as an escape but it was. Just as Dad got away from the priests and mafia of his childhood Calabria, but he never escaped his unresolved past. I didn’t want to end up like that.

I knew he’d thrown everything to the wind, and I did too. He joined the circus. I became a Buddhist monk. He tamed lions and alligators. I tamed my mind (or tried to). He abandoned Catholicism temporarily. I gave it up for good. “You’re just like I was,” he’d say. Everyone would nod sagely and turn away.

I turned away too, of course—but not only from them. Eight years later I abandoned Buddhism and found myself on the margins of two cultures. I didn’t even aspire to fit in anywhere. I wasn’t happy and didn’t expect to be. Did he feel that way too, despite his success as a respectable restaurateur, husband and father?

Monastic life had given me more respect for my mind than I’d ever had before. I studied history, computer science, typography, design, book production, psychology, neurology. I wrote a memoir and other books. I fed my brain and developed my skills as assiduously as I avoided my heart.

I called many people ‘friend,’ but never got from them what I needed. I only realised it when I made a new friend, someone who recognized my passion for mindfulness and encouraged me to teach it. I’d trained for eight years. Why didn’t I use it?

That’s when everything changed. I became happy. She helped me put on workshops. I loved public speaking and wrote books. I’m often thanked for my teaching and praised for my intelligence, but there’s still a voice in my head that says I'm not enough. It no longer does the damage now that it once did. When it shows up I see it, counter it and refuse to follow.

This is the process of self-acceptance. My work has shown me how hard it is for others too. We’re all susceptible to shame and the defensive, defeatist voices in our head—but that’s no reason to give up or to even attempt escape. I married that friend, though the belonging part is still elusive.

What did I learn from Dad? Escape is not only impossible—it makes everything worse. My work fulfills me because it requires me to be ruthlessly honest. Teaching, writing and communicating this sort of deep meaning and emotional intelligence fills my life in many ways.

End of story: I avoided being like him, more or less. I’m happy to share my stories. I hide nothing. I catch my reactivity better than ever, and face those voices without any desire to escape. I connect the dots. Perhaps he did that with his parish priest. I’d like to think so.

________________________________________________________________________
MindfulnessLive.ca: where you keep up your practice guaranteed!

Mindfulness & Civility

I was trained as a Buddhist monk, so to me mindfulness means more than stress reduction. Already, thousands of #MBSR practitioners have found that it also delivers resilience and a deeper sense of purpose.

Even more rarely discussed is its role in ethical life. Sadly, the words 'ethical' and 'moral' have become quaint, old-fashioned and apparently irrelevant. You can now choose your preferred reality, and whether it's really real or not matters little. Instead of evidence, we rely today on consensus. As long as enough people agree with me, I’m not wrong, and damn you if you say I am. This lazy old attitude is no longer a subconscious bad habit. It’s now a mainstream choice. People refer to their beliefs as a 'right,’ meaning that personal preferences trump rational decision-making.

When people have every right to be wrong, to stick to their opinion and to disparage anyone who disagrees, it’s no surprise to see where we’re at—familiar, secure, old-fashioned, civility all falling apart.

There IS a difference between right and wrong, between helping and harming, and between hating and collaborating, but the more we call for renewed dialog, the more discouraged we become that no one listens. Comparing notes is becoming a rarity as people dig into their point of view and close their eyes to alternatives.

I don’t wish fear on anyone, but we should be afraid.

We know that mindfulness opens your mind. It can also open society. Good leadership is rare today, but that’s no excuse. It’s up to each of us.

The Buddhism Experiment

Buddhism began a new experiment in the 1970s. After being prodded and explored by a few eccentric Victorians, there was now talk for the first time of ‘Western Buddhism.’ It wasn’t clear how it would turn out, but it felt immanent. What’s grown since then isn’t western so much as modern—not a product of any one culture. Religious Buddhism still exists in various ethnicities, but those who come to Buddhism for its mindfulness teachings are usually looking for a rational, objective and secular approach.

Hundreds of Buddhist centers were established all over North America, Australasia and Europe in the last half century. Wanting to become a teacher, I joined an exclusive group in Switzerland under the Tibetan monk Geshe Rabten, a refugee from Chinese atrocities and a debate advisor to the Dalai Lama. A dozen of us crammed into a tiny four-room house in the tiny four-house hamlet of Schwendi, and got to work on our Tibetan—the only language of instruction.

It was all very old-fashioned. We were given texts to memorize, then we learned to debate them. This was presented as the most authentic way to train, and that’s all that was expected of us. For Geshe Rabten it was a straightforward, tried and tested curriculum. However something weighed on us: how to present this to a modern audience. We tried talking to Geshe about it, but he didn’t understand the biases of a modern, scientific education, or the challenge we faced.

What we realized, and what we knew our Tibetan teachers wouldn’t like, was that in addition to becoming teachers and translators, we were becoming interpreters of Buddhism. This entails separating culture from dharma. Buddhist authorities—including our Tibetan lamas—insist that ‘being a Buddhist’ requires all sorts of beliefs—including reincarnation and karmic law. These aren’t easy for modern minds—nor even necessary, say secular Buddhists like Stephen Batchelor.

Stephen was one of us in Schwendi. Alan Wallace was another. Both had intensely scholastic minds, but they couldn’t have been more different. While Alan’s Buddhism is entirely traditional, right down to the practice of guru-devotion, Stephen’s approach is evidence-based and skeptical. His book Buddhism without Beliefs is the most influential modern book about Buddhism—clear, simple and existential. Alan also takes pains to integrate faith-based Buddhism with modern scientific values, though his books are more sophisticated and intellectual.

Year by year, the religious approach seems increasingly cumbersome to me—especially since mindfulness based stress reduction (MBSR) and other clinical adaptations of Buddhism have done such a marvelous job of delivering practical tools. Nevertheless, the Buddha is a powerful metaphor for the mindful life, and I continue to explore his life and times with great fascination. When you take a historical, scientific approach, the Buddha turns out to be surprisingly three-dimensional, quirky and human—quite different from the mythical ‘Perfect One.’”

I've spent my adult life studying, practicing and teaching Buddhism. The philosophy can get a little complicated at time, but the practice is straightforward. The difficulty all people face is how to integrate it into their daily lives. I’ve found that nothing stimulates regular mindfulness practice more than stories of other meditators—and the Buddhist literature is filled with great archetypal stories that anyone can relate to.

I teach a 30-minute mindfulness class three times a week—rain or shine—and will begin a ten-week course in the New Year entitled: Buddha: Man or Myth—decoding the origin of mindfulness.