Judy Lief

Buddhism – Shambhala – Profound Treasury – Making Friends with Death

  • Home
  • About
    • Activities
    • Bio
    • Photos
  • Media
    • Mind Training Series
    • Podcasts/ Online Classes
    • Videos
    • Selected Articles
    • Books
      • Making Friends with Death
      • Profound Treasury
      • Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche Books edited by J. Lief
      • Interviews
  • Schedule
  • Judy’s Blog
  • Contact

Blog 10: Begin the Sequence of Sending and Taking with Yourself

May 27, 2014 By Judy Lief

A year of Atisha slogans

10. Begin the sequence of sending and taking with yourself.
You may want to develop greater compassion and the ability to take on the suffering of others, but what about yourself? What about your own suffering? According to this slogan, that is where you start. You begin by recognizing your own suffering.

It is not always easy to look into our own discontent. But if we are to work with others we should try to understand our own suffering as deeply as possible. We need to look into our many layers of suffering, including everything from physical pain, emotional confusion, regrets, anxieties, fears, the whole deal. We cannot hide out. We may prefer to think that we are beyond that, and our situation may be very fortunate, but we need to bring out whatever is there.

Whatever suffering we dig up, from our surface to our depths, we take in as fully as possible. We breathe it in wholeheartedly. It is a part of us, it is real. Why does it fester? What keeps it going?

It is our avoidance and our fear. We don’t have to be heroic. We could start by taking just a little bit of our suffering and breathing it in. We could accept it little by little.

Each move we make in this direction, which sounds so difficult, in fact, is a tremendous relief. It is like the story of the return of the prodigal son, where the family is once again whole and there is rejoicing.

The idea of this slogan is to take in your own suffering first, and then expand that to take in the suffering of others. It is to be compassionate to yourself as well as other beings. Seeing clearly the nature of your own suffering is a way to understand more clearly the suffering of others.

Today’s Practice

In your sending and taking practice, this week place attention on your own situation, breathing in various forms of suffering and breathing out to yourself loving-kindness, openness, and strength. To conclude, reflect on other beings who suffer in similar ways and extend your loving-kindness to them as well.

 

Upcoming Events: Profound Treasury Retreat

20170624_194316_resized_1

8th Annual PROFOUND TREASURY RETREAT at Saco, Maine 

June 12-24 at Ferry Beach Conference Center, Saco, Maine

 

Living Dharma: The Joy and Challenge of Joining Practice and Action

 

 

“Mindfulness practice is not just about what is happening to you individually and personally—it is about how much you are going to transmit your sanity and your insanity to the rest of the world.”—Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche

 

“If you don’t live it, it won’t come out of your horn.”  Charlie Parker

 

Living Dharma

The Joy and Challenge of Joining Practice and Action

 

In these times of turmoil, it’s important to reflect on ways to bring our lifestyle and our actions into greater accord with the dharma.   If your life does not reflect your practice, what is the point of meditation and study?

 

The time spent in sitting meditation is much less than the time spent going about our everyday lives. Therefore, postmeditation practice is essential. The combination of meditation and postmeditation makes our practice complete—running through our entire life rather than something we turn on and off.

 

In this class, we will focus on the challenges of living a dharmic life, and how they are addressed in the three stages of the Tibetan Buddhist path.  We will work with the foundational or hinayana guidelines for living life with simplicity and contentment. We will study mahayana teachings on how to activate compassion and benefit others. Finally, we will explore vajrayana teachings on how to engage more freshly and spontaneously by cutting hesitation and fixed views.

 

___

Topics include:

The three essentials: discipline, meditation, and wisdom

Refraining from harm: working with the five precepts

Being of benefit: practicing the paramitas

Overcoming hesitation: engaging with the four karmas

Obstacles, mistakes, and fresh starts

 

From Judy’s Blog

Join my Email List

Join my email list to keep up with teaching events and other news from Judy Lief.

 

Judy Lief • 802-598-5832 • judy@judylief.com