Modern life is anxiety-ridden. A surprising number of my students have diagnosed anxiety disorders. Things don’t always go our way, and often it feels like they never do. We spend inordinate amounts of time planning and...
As a society, it's fair to say that we have a fraught relationship with food.
We eat our feelings. We starve our feelings. We binge. We purge. We use food as a tribal signifier. We throw away the leftovers and leave the cake out in the rain....
I suspect I may never forget the details of this last week, seared into my memory through shock and mass anxiety. Yesterday morning on my commute, the disappointment of several passengers was palpable. Their expressions were downcast, and their...
As a condition of employment, I took a creepy personality profile that revealed I am more “people-oriented” and care more about building rapport and being liked than I would like to. If any suggestion can provoke the sort of rage that that one has,...
After many years of training (much of it with the Interdependence Project) and many more years of personal practice, I crossed a new threshold recently by taking formal precepts and becoming a novice priest in the Five Mountain Zen Order. This...
I was recently in Australia and heard an aboriginal D'harawal people's dreaming story that discussed what are known to them as the Three Truths. Gawaian Bodkins-Andrews defined the Three Truths as:
There is no you. The story of the Self is useful up to a point, but it is a complex work of fiction, and it has become a pernicious fiction.
Ponder a recent experience, such as peering at traffic from a bridge or noticing an unusual piece of litter...
Recent news of killings and shootings in the U.S., and terrorist acts abroad have created a lot of discussion about the causes and conditions which allow violence to occur. Some suggest that mental illness is the cause, others suggest that...
Like many people, I have been wishing for more balance in my life recently. The political and social worlds seem chaotic and heartbreaking. I spend many days chasing after deadlines that I am not sure I care much about. I would...
Perhaps you've taken a day off from your meditation practice. Perhaps it became a week and stretched over months. Perhaps you've fallen off the cushion.You're allowed to forgive yourself. There is a lot to be distracted by, more all the time. You're...
I have never been on a Buddhist meditation retreat before, and I had no idea what to expect from it. I was nervous at first because the longest I had ever meditated in one sitting was 25 minutes straight, I could not imagine doing that on and off...
Last week I had my first MRI. I’ve been having back and neck pain since December and had tried a number of treatments to no significant avail, so this was the next course of action in finding out the cause.
I can only speak for myself, and I am pretty good at doing that. Like many of us, I am quite accomplished at weaving my own narrative.
The internet has broken down many - if not most - of our collaborative cultural tapestry-narratives by giving each...
Meditation and mindfulness apps are all the rage these days. There are literally hundreds. I’m not particularly interested in debating the merits of these apps (if you are interested in this, I highly recommend the comments section of this article...
Before we reach real understanding and wisdom about our emotions, we first need a clear idea of what they are and how they work. Emotions get their power from a simple but deep-seated source: our lack of self-knowledge.
What does meditation look like beyond mindfulness? I made this infographic to offer a quick overview of the three levels of meditation: Presence, Stillness, and Inquiry. Feel free to share.
The first time I learned lovingkindness meditation, or metta, I was at a weekend retreat a couple of hours away from my house. As I drove home, I sent the standard wishes to the other drivers -- May you be safe, may you be happy, may you be healthy...
The New York City Subway is not exactly the first place that comes to mind when we hear the phrase “Lovingkindness.” Lovingkindness, or “Metta,” is a meditation practice that captures the expression of tenderness towards oneself and other beings.
This last week of the Real Happiness Challenge is about practicing Metta, or Lovingkindness meditation, which means meditating on wishes of goodwill toward a set of people or beings in a variety of categories.
The meditation which has been most beneficial to me, and both the easiest and most difficult to practice, is Lovingkindness or Metta meditation. Week Four of the Real Happiness Challenge is devoted to Metta, which involves repeating phrases of...
