Hey everybody,
It's Judy Cohen and this is Wake Up Call 512.
Okay,
So I hope you had a good Thanksgiving weekend.
And yeah,
I hope you found a moment to summon whatever gratitude was available,
Share it with whoever you could share it with.
We had a very sweet time,
We had two of the three kids and their families with my daughter's family at the moment,
Consisting of these herself and these two huge,
Beautiful husky mix puppies.
So it was a lot of playfulness and joy around the house.
So before we looked at gratitude last time and at why practice the time before we'd been exploring the Eightfold Path,
Which is the fourth of the Four Noble Truths,
And we'd been looking at wise mindfulness,
Which is the second step.
And the eight steps you probably remember are the three Samadhi steps that help us to cultivate stillness and attention and love,
The three Sila steps,
Which are about how to cultivate an ethical life,
And then the two steps of Panya or wisdom.
And so we'd been looking into how to practice wise mindfulness,
Working through the mindfulness definition of present moment attention,
Courage,
And grace,
Or with courage and grace.
And we'd look briefly,
And this is a huge exploration in and of itself,
At how to cultivate present moment attention through the four foundations of mindfulness,
Mindfulness of the body,
Feelings,
Mind,
And the formations of the mind.
And so now let's look at how to cultivate courage and grace,
Because,
I mean,
This is me,
But I just have to say,
Like,
Courage feels like such a necessary element.
And it's because when I sit down 35 plus years into my practice,
I still see so much evidence of unskillful states of mind,
Greed and grasping and clinging.
And of course,
I tend to name them by more socially acceptable names and constructs,
And hatred,
Also named by more socially acceptable words like irritation or frustration.
But they're all the same kind of graspy and aversive states of mind,
As opposed to simply being with what is,
Right?
And maybe,
And I hope this is also true for you,
They're not those solid blocks of kind of ice and fire that they once were,
But they're still present.
They're still present,
Right?
So courage is required.
It's a required element,
Right?
Because otherwise,
I think we just couldn't bear it,
Or I couldn't bear it.
I'd want to turn away or run away or jump off my cushion.
And there'd be an inner dialogue that ran something like,
Really,
Judy,
After all this time,
Right?
And that dialogue still happens sometimes,
But it would be really persistent.
And it would be easy to get discouraged,
Which funnily breaks down as discouraged,
Right?
It would be easy to get discouraged that,
Yeah,
Yikes,
Here they are again,
My old enemies,
My old friends,
My old frenemies,
Greed and hatred,
Right?
But knowing that they might show up or that they will show up,
Right?
I can have my choices ready,
Right?
And I have the choice to get swallowed by those states,
Swallowed by the thoughts that support them.
I have the choice to not get swallowed,
But still hate that they've arrived again.
Or I can follow Pema Chodron's instructions and die to them,
Right?
Really see them,
Acknowledge them,
And agree,
Agree that,
Yeah,
They're here.
Here's greed again.
Here's hatred again.
And not try to wish they hadn't arisen or ignore them or hate that they're there or fuel them,
Right?
But that last choice requires courage.
And I mean,
In some ways,
I like that it's the difference between bravery and courage,
Right?
Because bravery is when we act without fear.
We might be scared to death,
But we either deny the fear or we stuff it in our backpack or we bury it in the yard.
And then we draw our sword and we charge,
You know,
And soldiers are taught to be brave and lawyers are taught to be brave,
Aren't we?
So and where does it get us,
Right?
All this not attending to how things really feel,
All this turning away from or denying the existence of our own afflictive emotions and feelings and sensations,
Right?
It makes us numb in all directions,
Or that's where it got me,
You know,
Not to a good place,
To a kind of autopilot life.
Because of course,
Turning away from whatever is present is just turning away from whatever is present,
Right?
It becomes a habit.
And then I was turning away from everything,
My anger,
But also my joy,
Right?
And we kind of know this,
Right?
Our practice points this out if we're paying attention.
Okay,
So courage,
On the other hand,
Is being terrified,
But knowing we're terrified or furious or shaken to our core and deciding to see,
To see that,
To see what's arising in the moment,
The fear,
The sorrow,
And then also deciding to care because yikes,
Right?
Those moments of being with,
Of continually dying to whatever is present,
It can feel really challenging for me.
And you know,
I can only learn to do that by doing it over and over and over by being with whatever emotions,
Thoughts,
Sensations arise,
Right?
Being with,
Being with,
Being with,
Which is,
You know,
What all the teachers are saying,
What Pema means,
I think,
What James has taught me,
And what I've heard in many different other ways,
You know,
Is that we do this,
We do this courage,
Right?
By seeing and being with,
We do this courage by summoning the courage to see and be with,
And that's how we cultivate courage.
And it's both as simple and as profound as saying over and over,
This moment is like this,
This moment is like this,
You know,
And we give in to this moment because it's just like it is.
It's not other than it is,
And it can never be other than it is this moment,
Right?
It's putting aside all the work that we can do in the world to change many things,
The power that we have,
The responsibility that we have,
But in this moment,
This moment is like this,
Right?
And so here's the thing about cultivating courage.
When I'm sitting in silence and stillness and taking the opportunity to investigate what's happening,
I can feel safe,
Right?
No one is there reading the thought bubble over my head,
Right?
No one can see that thought bubble.
No one is there to criticize or chastise or hate me because I have hate or because I have greed.
It's just me doing the being with.
So I can get used to being with these states,
These really,
Some of them sticky,
Uncomfortable states in those few safe moments.
And this is the heart for me of this training in courage.
It's not that I'm getting used to these states in order to encourage them to persist,
Right?
So part of the training is to abandon them.
And I'll say more about that in another wake up call.
For sure,
Part of the training is to abandon unwholesome,
Unskillful states.
But when they arise in learning over and over day after day to be with my sticky,
Uncomfortable states and surviving those moments,
In dying to those moments every day,
I'm creating,
We're all creating a little more freedom from wanting things to be other than they are,
Right?
Building courage,
You could also call it resilience,
That then comes along with us out into our everyday life.
So that when we look at the news,
We have the courage to be with whatever we see,
Whatever arises,
Full stop.
When something happens at work,
We can sit,
We can look,
We can be with whatever or whoever it is,
You know,
That feels so challenging.
You know,
So courage becomes portable and enables us to bear the world because every day we're practicing bearing the microcosm of world that arises and passes away on our own cushion in our own small,
Safe space.
So this is the training in courage,
As far as I can tell.
And then training in grace is not different,
It's just the next step.
Training in grace is deciding how to relate to the things that I am summoning the courage to see and be with and die to,
Right?
And so on the cushion in a safe place at home,
I remember,
As often as I remember to remember,
I remember,
Right?
To say to myself,
Since this moment can only be what it is,
It has to be beautiful just as it is.
And so do I,
Right?
So I use this word grace,
But maybe the word is love.
Maybe the word is love.
So that's what I've got for how to practice present moment attention,
Courage by learning over and over to be with the truth of what is.
And grace or really loving whatever or whoever is part of that truth.
Okay,
So let's sit.
Finding your posture and also as you settle in,
Finding that sense,
If it's available to you,
Of safety in this moment,
Of physical safety in this moment.
Sometimes it's helpful.
I find it helpful to keep my eyes open for a moment or two and look in front of me and physically do this.
Look to the side of me,
Look behind me,
Look above,
Look below,
And just know that for the next seven minutes,
There's safety right here,
And then beginning to notice the breath,
To bring the attention to the breath,
And then to gently widen the lens and just begin to notice what is arising and passing.
And whatever is noticed is just what it is,
And seeing if you can just stay with what is being noticed,
And of course it'll change.
So not holding on to anything,
Just noticing as things are arising and passing away,
Emotions,
Thoughts,
Sensations.
And whatever you're noticing as things arise,
Yeah,
Can you shine some love on that?
Or if that's difficult,
Shine some love on yourself for being able to see,
Being willing to see.
Thanks,
Everybody,
For being on the wake-up call,
It's good to see you.
Hi,
Kesha,
It's good to see you out there in Warsaw.
People from all over,
Love you all,
Be safe,
Take good care.
