Homework

1. Sit every day: Try sitting for a minimum of 15-30 minutes per day. (more if you are able) Please practice your meditation in silence
   (if you use an app to sit try only using it a few times in the week)
2. Gratitude Practices: Gratitude is the capacity to take delight, to let ourselves feel joy, wonder. Our life is the gift of many lives!
   • Text or e-mail a classmate 3 things you are grateful for each day. Can be anything.
   • Cultivate a sense of appreciation each day.
   • Thank someone every day
3. Joy Daily Life Practices:
   Joy is our hearts capacity to celebrate!
   • Create a list of easy ways that you can increase the amount of joy and/or delight in your daily life.
   For example: What are some of the obvious activities, actions, events or aspects of nature/beauty in your daily life that you often overlook that would bring some degree of joy if you really noticed? (You can add to this list during the week)
   Please bring the list to class.
   • Practice a couple of easy ways on your list.
   • What affect does joy have on you-your body, heart, mind?
   • Text or e-mail your buddy. Share what you learned.
4. Extra Credit: Notice if in the midst of a life with 100,000 thousand joys & the 100,000 sorrows you can simply attend to the how you are present. Allow the body to be still, the mind to settle, attend to this moment however it is. In the midst of the delightful or the difficult, we make our home in our capacity to embrace, include & care of the well-being of our heart.

HAVE FUN!

1. Sit every day: Try sitting for a minimum of 15-30 minutes per day. (more if you are able) Please practice your meditation in silence.
   (if you use an app to sit try only using it a few times in the week)
2. Gratitude Practices: Gratitude is the capacity to take delight, to let ourselves feel joy, wonder. Our life is the gift of many lives!
   • Write down, say to partner or friend and text your buddy 3 things you are grateful for each day. Can be anything.
   • Cultivate a sense of appreciation & Thank someone daily.
3. Joy Daily Life Practices:
   • Reflections: What helps you feel ease, contentment or joy? What are the activities that most easily bring you joy? Is it some kind of physical activity? Are you more likely to feel joy when you are with others or when you are alone? Do you experience joy that is not dependent on any particular activity? If so, what conditions bring about that joy? How easy is it for you to be in touch with the sources for your joy? Please ask yourself these questions during the week.
   • Practices: At the end of each day reflect on when you felt the greatest sense of well-being, joy or contentment. Is there a consistency to the rhythm of your sense of well-being on most days; e.g. do you feel the most ease in the morning or evening? Or does your sense of well-being depend mostly on the activities you’re doing? If possible, try meditating at different times in the day; e.g. early morning, lunch time, early evening or late evening. Is there a time of day when you feel more of a sense of well-being & ease in your meditation?
   • What affect does joy have on you? Register joy in your body, heart & mind whenever you experience it. Breathe into it, know it within.
   • Set an intention for joy, (well-being, happiness, contentment, delight, ease, aliveness) Trusting that you can make a heartfelt intention, to do your part to make that happen. Set the compass of your heart. Repeat your intention before you sit & throughout your day.
   • Ten Second Pause Practice: Relax the body, Ask, what is happening right now? Listen deeply. Let go. Rest & Be in the body-feel your feet, hands. Recollect your intention. Practice pausing several times a day.
   • Text or e-mail your joy buddies: Share your Gratitude’s & what you learned. Just a couple of sentences. Please Have FUN!

1. Sitting Practice:
   • Sit every day: for a minimum of 15-30 minutes per day. (more if you are able) Please practice your meditation in silence (if you use an app to sit try only using it a few times in the week)
   • Set an intention for joy (well-being, happiness, contentment, delight, ease, aliveness) before sitting & throughout the day
   • Practice Being at ease & Being comfortable with discomfort
2. Gratitude Practices: Gratitude is the capacity to take delight, to let ourselves feel joy, wonder. Our life is the gift of many lives!
   • Write down, say to partner or friend and text your buddy 3 things you are grateful for each day. Can be anything.
   • Cultivate a sense of appreciation & Thank someone daily.
3. Pause Practice: –Ten seconds-repeat- several times a day
   • Feel your feet on the floor, shift into relaxation (Relax muscles anywhere you feel tension: shoulders, jaw, eyes, belly)
   • Ask, “What is happening right now?” Listen for the answer & let it go.
   • Notice how the body feels. Pay attention, as if listening to the body. Widen attention over the entire body – Inhabit the body -Be in the body-feel your feet, hands.
   • Move into the next moment with ease as you recollect your intention.
4. Joy Daily Life Practices:
   Reflections: How do you know when you have a sense of well-being, contentment or joy? Is it more of a physical sensation or a mental sensation for you? How is feeling joyful different than feeling ill-at-ease or uncomfortable? What affect does joy have on you? What happens to your thinking and level of pre- occupation when you are joyful?

   Practices: Spend more time than you normally would with activities that support a feeling of well-being or joy. Notice how your body feels when you feel content or satisfied. Also notice your mind state and emotional state when you have this feeling.
   Is the feeling of joy consistent or does it fluctuate?

• What affect does joy have on you? Register joy in your body, heart & mind whenever you experience it. Breathe into it, know it within.

• Text or e-mail your joy buddies: Share your Gratitudes & what you learned about joy- Just a couple of sentences. Please Have FUN!

INFO AND RESOURCES FOR SEPTEMBER 13th MEETING

This month, we’ll examine white supremacy culture, and what goes into building anti-white supremacy culture.
To make the best use of our time together, we’ve asked you to please download and read Tema Okun’s article on the characteristics of white supremacy culture. IN ADDITION, please listen to this podcast in which Dan Harris interviews Resmaa Menakem (1 hour 18 minutes), and read Lyla June’s essay “The Vast and Beautiful World of Indigenous Europe”.

Just like last month, we’ll meet for two hours, with breaks. We’ll sit together; check-in about how race, racism, and whiteness have been in our awareness recently; connect about the personal challenges we face in confronting white supremacy; and set intentions for our individual work of uprooting racism and systemic oppression. As always, all are invited, regardless of their level of experience investigating race and whiteness. We look forward to seeing you there!

INFO AND RESOURCES FOR OCTOBER 11th MEETING

This month’s topic: what is action?

• Other than supporting (allying with) BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and People of Color*) what is the work of white people? What actions should we initiate-what actions are we responsible for? *There are pros/cons with this acronym that the article linked to discusses however the term is current in equity/inclusion work.
• At this moment in time, white people hear conflicting messages about what they should do, but how do we discover and do our work?

And because Tema Okun is a white woman who’s been doing this work for decades, prior to Sunday, please listen to this interview with her on the Finding Refuge podcast with Michelle Johnson.

INFO AND RESOURCES FOR NOVEMBER 8th MEETING

Our RESOURCE is the letter from the Sangha Life Committee about upcoming Sangha Circle meetings starting in January 2021. Please read before Sunday.

In light of the SL Committee’s work to help create a multicultural CIMC, we come to you with a question: how do we create warm, embodied culture within the White Awake Sangha (WAS)? What work do we want to do among ourselves?

We’re listening to Resmaa Menakem:
“We will not end white-body supremacy- or any other form of human evil- by trying to tear it to pieces. Instead, we can offer people better ways to belong, and better things to belong to. Instead of belonging to a race, we can belong to a culture. Each of us can also build our own capacity for genuine belonging.”

It’s both/and work. We do the internal work within WAS, and participate in the Sangha Life Circles to learn and listen for what’s needed to build a genuine welcoming culture at CIMC. But we have to begin the work within WAS.

Our framework is the same: meet in community for two hours, with breaks, meditate, connect in small breakout groups and in the larger group, review where our hearts are in this moment and set intentions for our individual work of uprooting racism and the work of building community at CIMC.

• How has perfectionism shown up in your life this month? As you think about the ways perfectionism has shown up for you – or about perfectionism in general – what bodily sensations, emotions, or images arise?
• How would you apply the antidotes to perfectionism* to the contexts that came to mind in response to the first question? What other opportunities to apply these antidotes exist in your life?

As usual, we’ll meet for two hours, with breaks, breakout groups, and opportunities for open discussion. All are invited, regardless of their level of experience investigating race and whiteness. Our goal is to build community as well as resilience, capacity, and commitment for the work of fighting systemic oppression in our hearts, communities, and (most especially) our beloved Center. We look forward to seeing you there!

*antidotes to perfectionism: develop a culture of appreciation, where the organization takes time to make sure that people’s work and efforts are appreciated; develop a learning organization, where it is expected that everyone will make mistakes and those mistakes offer opportunities for learning; create an environment where people can recognize that mistakes sometimes lead to positive results; separate the person from the mistake; when offering feedback, always speak to the things that went well before offering criticism; ask people to offer specific suggestions for how to do things differently when offering criticism; realize that being your own worst critic does not actually improve the work, often contributes to low morale among the group, and does not help you or the group to realize the benefit of learning from mistakes

INFO AND RESOURCES FOR JANUARY 10th MEETING

• How has perfectionism shown up in your life this month? As you think about the ways perfectionism has shown up for you – or about perfectionism in general – what bodily sensations, emotions, or images arise?
• How would you apply the antidotes to perfectionism* to the contexts that came to mind in response to the first question? What other opportunities to apply these antidotes exist in your life?

As usual, we’ll meet for two hours, with breaks, breakout groups, and opportunities for open discussion. All are invited, regardless of their level of experience investigating race and whiteness. Our goal is to build community as well as resilience, capacity, and commitment for the work of fighting systemic oppression in our hearts, communities, and (most especially) our beloved Center. We look forward to seeing you there!

Addendum (1/11):

After the events of Wednesday, January 6, we decided to pivot from using our first breakout group to explore perfectionism and claim some space for embodied anti-racist practice time to register our physical responses to Wednesday’s attack on the Capitol.

The prework for today’s White Awake Sangha is to listen to this Minnesota Public Radio news program hosted by Angela Davis with guests Resmaa Menakem, BraVada Garrett-Akinsanya, and Qorsho Hassa.

The prompts for the first breakout room will be as follows:

• Recall the images and sounds of a predominantly white angry mob storming the Capitol in support to Trump’s attempts to overturn the election.
• Notice if the muscles are relaxed or tight, the quality of the breath, deep or shallow? What’s the heart rate like, has it sped up, slowed down or stayed the same?
• You may experience sensations, impulses, emotions or images in your body. If you did, please describe them.
• Or you may not feel anything. If so, what does this lack of feeling feel like… numbness, blankness, perhaps like you’re not quite in your body?
• Notice if you have the impulse to fight, flee or freeze? Or if you want to shut down and override what you’re experiencing?
• Is there a movement or sound your body would like to make that might help you discharge some of the unwanted energy? Please explore this movement or make this sound.
• Notice any felt shift in your body. Do you still feel like you did at the beginning, or did something in you settle or become more present?

1. Sit every day. Try sitting for a minimum of 15-30 minutes per day. More if you are able. Please practice your meditation in silence.
2. Formal Practice: Standing & Walking: Practice standing meditation at least once in your day. Practice walking meditation at least once during the day as you move through the world.
3. Gratitude Practice: Text or e-mail your 2 or 3 buddies from the workshop 3 things you are grateful for each day. Can be anything!
4. Intention: Remember your intention, dedication or vow. If you haven’t completed writing it please do so and store it in a special or safe place. Read it as often as you wish and/or read or recollect your intention before sitting & throughout your day.
5. Pause. Stop-Tune into your heart. That is where love, wisdom, grace & compassion reside. With loving attention, feel what matters most to you. Yes, there maybe anxious thoughts, worry, grief, trauma, but don’t let your heart be colonized by fear. Take time to quiet the mind & tend to the heart. Go out or go to a window & look at the sky. Breathe in & open yourself to the vastness of space. Sense the seasons turning. Breathe out & rest in loving awareness. Practice Steadiness & Equanimity-Learn from the trees. Learn from Nature-They are still in the center of it all- They are nature-You are nature. Be still in the center of it all. Do this as often as you like.  -Jack Kornfield with tiny changes
6. When the Buddha spoke about the Four Noble Truths, he stated what they were: the truth of suffering, the truth of the origin of suffering, the truth of the cessation of suffering & the truth of the way out of suffering by means of the eightfold noble path.
7. The 1st activity in relationship to the Four Noble Truths:
   Is the instruction to understand suffering, to study it, to get to know it really well. Some will complain that, by studying suffering, dukkha is kind of pessimistic. But the purpose of focusing on suffering is to understand it so that we can be free from the causes of suffering, so that we can be truly at ease or happy.a) Explore Dukkha, the meaning of dukkha. The truth of dukkha. Contemplate the First Noble Truth- that there is discontent, unsatisfactoriness, sorrow, anguish, in life. The Buddha said, Come & see, take a look at the nature of the body, heart, mind-investigate for ourselves. “one abides contemplating dhammas –here, the first noble truth- internally, externally, and both. So we investigate how we actually experience dukkha, internally, in ourselves and externally, in the world”How do you experience Dukkha? Birth is Dukkha,, sickness is Dukkha, Aging is Dukkha, Death is Dukkha. Pain, grief, despair are Dukkha. To be separated from the pleasant is Dukkha. To be united with unpleasant is Dukkha. To not get what one wants is Dukkha. Check it out—Is this so? “whatever is felt is Dukkha” (unsatisfactory, unreliable, uneaseful-due to the changing nature of all things)

   b) Ask: what allows me to open to Dukkha? What stops me from opening to Dukkha? Remember: we can open to the painful experience in the mind & body-we are investigating & realizing the 1st NT for ourselves The Buddha said, “Here one knows, as it really is-“this is dukkha”. Remember this exploration brings two great results. It is the gateway to awakening & the arising & nourishing of compassion.

    

8. Just start to contemplate the Second Noble Truth. Explore the cause of dukkha, which is craving. What is craving & how do we experience it?  Thirst-craving-clinging, grasping, desire-endlessly wanting – something more or different from what’s there. This is the human condition. That’s what moves us forward: Thirst-craving, grasping, clinging & desiring something that isn’t there) .”Oh,, as soon as I HAVE  this kind of craving-grasping, PURSUING very quickly after that, I HAVE You can ask yourself: What allows me to open to, to get to know Craving? What stops me from following Craving? (we will explore this more next class)
9. Please text or e-mail or call your buddies once a week and share what you have leaned. Don’t forget this is the middle path and it’s ok to HAVE FUN!

Awakening is a radical shift in perspective not confined by thought that occurs both suddenly and over so-called time. We see clearly in this moment, our only moment, life exactly and completely as it is; continually moving, nothing hidden or separate, thought and reactivity completely still, and no separate, solid “me” doing anything to make any of it happen and no experiencer experiencing. This begins to change every aspect of how we live.

For your practice this week:

1) Begin to notice those moments when there is a waking up from the dream of thought/fantasy/internal narrative, when you are fully back simply doing what you’re doing. Also notice how thought can quickly backfill that timeless moment of intimate clarity.

2) In your daily formal practice, spend at least some time allowing yourself to simply be the “now” that you are: breath moving, hearing, seeing, sensing, thoughts coming and going from and to nowhere. When you notice waking up out of the dream, you’re easily back to simply being the “now” you are and the knowing that is intimate and effortless with that.

3) See if you can begin to raise the question: Am I doing anything to make any of this happen? And pause at the end of that question and just notice. If you’re inclined you can play with being more specific: Am I making the breath happen the way it is? Is there a “me” making hearing happen or hearing that sound? Did I make these thought come and go? Did I choose when the mind lost itself in fantasy or when it woke itself up?

The Buddha saw life as it is. It changed him forever. This is truly our greatest adventure. Enjoy!