The Spiritual Image Is The Shadow Of Unworthiness | Retreat

For our focus today,

I'm going to start with a story about Nasruddin.

In Sufi tales,

Nasruddin is often depicted as the wise fool,

Always doing something foolish,

And yet he's always pointing to something powerful and wise at the same time.

So in this particular story,

We find Nasruddin down on his hands and knees underneath a street lamp.

And one of his friends comes along and he sees him crawling around on the ground.

And he says to Nasruddin,

What are you doing down there?

And Nasruddin says,

Oh,

I'm looking for my ring.

I lost my ring.

It's so very precious to me.

And his friend,

Being a good friend,

Says,

Oh,

Well,

Let me help you.

Let me get down on my hands and knees and help you look for it.

So after about 20,

25 minutes,

They're kind of just walking around each other in circles.

And the friend realizes,

Like,

The ring is not here.

So he says to Nasruddin,

He goes,

Tell me,

Where did you last see the ring?

To which Nasruddin replies,

Oh,

That's easy.

I saw it back at my house.

And the friend goes,

Well,

Then why are we looking for it here?

And he says,

Ah,

Because the light is better.

So initially,

Nasruddin is playing the fool for us,

Right,

Looking for something where it cannot be found.

But actually,

He's being very wise and sharing with us,

Asking us this question.

Are we looking for something that is very precious to us,

Something that we really want?

Are we looking for it in the wrong place?

And I know for many of us here,

We looked for our peace,

Our lasting peace,

Happiness,

Freedom.

We looked for it in the wrong place.

When we were chasing our happiness in careers and in material goods and in recognition and praise,

Right,

We recognized that,

No,

That's a fleeting happiness.

It's not actually the lasting peace and happiness that I'm looking for.

It's not freedom.

And so for many of us here,

We came on a spiritual path,

Right?

And then we come on the spiritual path,

And we're so sure,

Well,

Now I'm looking for my lasting peace and happiness for what is most precious to me in the right place.

I'm meditating every day.

I'm practicing mindfulness.

I'm listening to the Dharma talks.

I'm reading the Dharma books.

And yet,

That lasting peace,

That happiness,

Contentment,

Connection,

Freedom still eludes us because even on the spiritual path,

Most people are looking in the wrong place.

We have,

And particularly I would say this in the West,

Although it's starting to happen in the East now as well,

We have conflated materialism and self-improvement and self-help with spirituality.

We are using spiritual tools in service of our ego.

So we have swapped out the chasing for happiness in the new car,

In the promotion,

In the recognition,

And we have swapped it out for me,

The new image of me,

Improved,

Better,

More realized,

My highest self.

And what we find is that we don't find the peace and happiness that we're looking for.

And it's a little bit confusing because there is some improvement,

Right?

We've been using these tools and we are a little less stressed,

And we're more calm,

And we're less reactive in certain situations,

But all we're really doing is still putting the carrot out in front of us.

I just need a little bit more improvement.

I just need to be a little bit more realized.

I just need to be a little bit more spiritual.

And the lasting peace and happiness that we are looking for always stays just a little bit in front of us.

We just never quite get there.

And we don't understand why I'm doing all the right things.

But what we are doing,

What we are continuing to do on the spiritual path,

Is we are seeking our peace and happiness in another image of ourselves.

And what we are seeking cannot be found in an image.

It's just the ego dressing up again.

But now it's dressing up as something spiritual,

As my higher self,

As I'm more realized,

Right?

And it loves,

It loves to dress up in spirituality,

To imagine how much more realized I am,

How much more conscious I am,

To hold that over everyone else.

It loves to do that.

But whatever image you can imagine yourself as will always have its opposite.

You can't have the positive image without the negative image.

Whatever is relative in this world,

Whatever you can imagine,

Has to be referenced to its opposite or you couldn't even imagine it,

Right?

You couldn't have up without down,

Black without white,

Hot without cold,

Spiritual without unspiritual,

Realized without unrealized,

Improved without unimproved.

And of course all the qualities that go with that as well,

Because if I'm not realized,

If I'm not spiritual,

If I'm not improved,

Then I'm still broken.

There's something still wrong with me.

I'm still lacking in some way.

I need to be fixed.

That's the image we're really feeling.

You can't have the positive without the negative.

They are inextricably linked together.

But we get pulled into this image,

Into the lure of it,

Into looking for our peace and happiness in the wrong place.

Because in the beginning,

It feels good.

It feels good.

Right?

We're a little bit,

Especially in,

Again,

In reference to,

Maybe we're a little bored.

We're doing some mundane task.

We're doing something on autopilot.

We're running errands.

We're on a long car drive and the mind starts wandering.

I'm a little dissatisfied with my life right now.

This doesn't seem very realized.

This doesn't seem very spiritual.

So let me just start imagining myself more realized,

More spiritual,

More improved in the future.

And in the beginning,

It feels kind of good,

Relatively speaking.

What we don't see,

Because we're so locked into the image of believing that this image is something I'm going to become,

We don't recognize the stress that's actually arising,

The striving for something.

We don't see that at all.

And in fact,

What we're also not seeing is that in that stress,

In that striving is the unworthy image as well.

The lacking.

I'm not enough.

I can't accept myself.

I'm such a loser.

Everyone else is doing this but me.

I'm broken.

Something's wrong with me.

So these images tied together,

Every time we're getting lost in it,

We get pulled into it from the good feeling and because I'm bored and relatively speaking for a few moments I feel better.

But then inevitably,

Something happens.

Something happens.

We get a little disappointed.

We got a text.

And we're a little disappointed because whatever we'd asked someone,

They didn't give us the response that we wanted,

Right?

Or someone,

You know,

You'd sent some email off and you'd sent,

You know,

All this work that you'd done and they sent back an email and just said,

Totally dismissing everything that you've done.

And so you're not feeling appreciated,

Right?

Or someone was a little bit rude to you.

Someone's a little bit unkind,

Right?

Because this is the reality of life.

This is how things happen.

And that image,

That good image was so fragile to begin with,

So fragile like a little soap bubble just gets popped,

Shattered so quick.

And what we then find in its place is this opposite,

The unworthy image.

And what we realize that actually the whole time I was feeling that positive image,

I was actually fueling the unworthy image and I didn't even realize it.

So this is when we go running back to our mindfulness practice,

Back to self-compassion,

Right?

And what we find then is that these tools are a little bit more inconsistent than as they were sold.

They don't always work because too often we're going to mindfulness,

We're going to self-compassion because we're trying to get back to the good image.

That's what we want.

We don't like that we've got the bad image now and we're trying to get back to the good image.

And that is not what mindfulness and self-compassion is meant to do.

Mindfulness is meant to shed a light on our experience,

To help us see,

Recognize what's happening,

Investigate,

To see where our suffering is really coming from.

That our suffering isn't coming from what that person said to me or how this person disappointed me and how this is so unfair.

That's not where my suffering is coming from.

My suffering is coming because I can't let go of this unworthy image and I can't stand myself right now.

And that's why we spend so much time lost in the stories when we're suffering because we're so desperate to get out of it,

How can I fix this so I can get back to the good image?

This is what we are continuously trying to do,

Is to get back to the good image.

And mindfulness is helping us to see this.

The good image is connected to the bad image.

Don't get caught up in it.

Don't be tempted by the lure of that little bit of a good feeling of a three-minute fantasy for three hours of suffering.

It's not a good trade-off.

Any image is suffering.

And the more that we can recognize this,

The more that we can be more mindful of these images,

The image of me improved.

And again,

In this improved image where I'm more perfect,

I don't say the wrong thing and nobody says the wrong thing to me.

Nobody is ever unkind to me and I'm never unkind.

I'm never stressed.

I never disappoint anyone.

This unrealistic image that we create in our minds about this is the new and improved version of me,

Right?

So we can see,

Like,

There's the new and improved version of me.

There's the realized version of me.

There's my highest self image of me,

Right?

Or there's just the image of me that wants to be on the other side of this meal or on the other side of this class or on the other side of these dishes,

Right?

Catching it again and again.

There it is.

There it is.

Because there's the image of me again in the future.

Whatever you want to paint it as,

It's not what… whatever you paint it as,

If you reach out to it,

Even though it's going to give you a little bit of a high in the beginning,

It will turn into suffering every single time.

So to be more mindful of the image,

To recognize it when it's happening,

To see it.

I see you,

Mara.

Right?

For those of you that have done my class and,

You know,

Sometimes we'll call the ego Mara from the Buddhist stories.

I see you,

Mara.

I'm not fooling for you this time.

Right?

And we can breathe,

Slow down,

Pause,

Come back into our experience,

Move a little bit more slowly,

A little bit more intentionally,

Right?

Ah!

Ooh!

There's the freedom in seeing the image and pulling myself out of it.

There's the freedom.

It was here,

Not there.

Right?

So we keep bringing ourselves back again and again and again.

And this is our practice,

To not get caught up in the images so that we can flow more easily with life,

To flow with life's ups and downs.

Because there is not an image in the world that is going to protect you from the eight worldly winds.

Praise and blame,

Gain and loss,

Pleasure and pain,

Fame and disrepute.

The winds are always changing.

And every time we're making an image out of something,

I'm only winning,

I'm only feeling pleasure,

I'm only getting praised,

My reputation is,

I'm only popular.

Right?

Every time we get attached to that and then the winds of change come in.

Now we're lost in the suffering of the unworthy image.

And we can't stand it.

And we wonder why on this path,

Why is this lasting peace and freedom and happiness,

Why does this still elude me?

Because we have conflated spirituality with materialism,

With self-help,

With self-improvement.

We're still chasing images.

We're still looking in the wrong place,

Just like Nasruddin.

And ironically,

When we let go of the images,

We find the peace,

The freedom,

The contentment that we were looking for.

That it was here the whole time.

Every time we let go of it,

We find what it is that we're looking for.

Because what it is that you are cannot be made into an image.

There is no image for what you are.

Each of us is an interdependent arising,

Changing moment by moment by moment,

Interdependent,

Interbeing like Thich Nhat Hanh says.

This is our nature.

We are not a thing.

We are not a noun.

We are a process.

We are a verb.

You can't make an image out of what we are.

And any time you try to make an image of spirituality,

Of the highest self,

Of being more realized,

Awakening,

Enlightenment,

It's just the ego.

It's just the ego disguising itself once again.

And we find ourselves looking in the wrong place once again.

So this is what I want us to do.

This is what I want our focus to be on for this retreat.

Is to really look at these images.

Look at all of the images that you've been creating for yourself.

And I'm going to give you,

Again I'll put them in the comments here,

But they're also on the group page,

Or they will be right after we end this.

A series of journal prompts in your private retreat time to really look at these questions and ask yourself,

To keep going deeper into this,

To understanding these images that you have been creating about yourself and how that is the trap.

How it's preventing you from knowing your true nature.

Because as long as you are locked on to thinking you know what this is,

You will not see it.

You will always miss it.

So,

We're going to do a meditation in just a couple of minutes.

And in the meditation,

We're going to focus,

As we do a lot in our meditations,

Or at least we ask the question a lot,

But we're going to focus a little bit more on what it is we most want.

Let's be really clear.

And while we use words,

Peace,

Connection,

Love,

Freedom,

Right?

Notice these aren't a thing,

But they're pointers that are helping us to remember what it is that we really want.

It's so easy to get distracted.

You know,

One minute we say,

I want lasting peace and freedom,

And the next minute we want fame.

It's like,

Oh,

Which was it,

Right?

Or the next minute we want a new car,

Or we want something else new,

That's something else to add on to ourselves.

So,

Again,

Being clear what it is we most want.

And we're going to focus on that a little bit more in the form of feeling it.

Because I think another challenge that we have on the spiritual path is the feeling of peace,

The feeling of freedom,

The feeling of contentment,

Of connection,

Of being whole,

Of being complete,

Is not a very familiar feeling to us.

We're much more familiar with the feelings of stress and anxiety,

And just that little bit,

Kind of we walk around so much of the time with something's not quite right,

Right?

We're much more familiar with that feeling.

And we have a lot of difficulty trusting this feeling of being okay in the present moment,

The feeling of peace,

The feeling of freedom,

Of not being tied to any image.

So I also want to use in the meditation a way to help you feel more,

Connect into the feeling more of what it is this feeling is.

Because the more familiar you are with it,

The easier it is for you to find your way back to it.

And then after the meditation,

I'll go through the instructions for how you're going to spend the two hours on your own for the private retreat.

So I'll give you instructions on how to structure your time.

And then we'll come back at 4 o'clock Pacific time in the U.

S.

To,

Again,

To share a little bit more,

Maybe do another meditation together,

And just to see what we all realized in our private retreat.

So does that all make sense to everyone?

Before we hop into the meditation,

I just want to check,

Does anyone have any questions related to the topic,

Ideally,

Or actually related to the topic?

You're a good Libby.

Linda,

I'm so glad this worked.

So Linda,

Is this Linda Selby?

Did you?

Oh,

It is.

So it was Crow,

Or you were probably on Safari.

I should have realized that.

Okay,

Looks like everyone's good.

Hi,

Sandy.

Hi,

Monica.

I'm glad this was connecting with you,

Stephanie.

Hi,

Chris.

Good to see you.

Okay.

Okay,

So we're all good?

Joanne,

You're good?

Great.

Okay.

Oh,

How many?

Donny,

So,

Or Donny,

Sorry.

So in two and a half hours from now,

Two and a half hours.

Yeah,

Where are you dialing in?

Oh,

You're in Australia as well.

Okay,

Good.

I am so glad.

We have a few Australians on here,

And a Kiwi,

So,

Because this was for you.

This was,

This random Friday afternoon time was for you guys,

And I know it was still pretty early,

But I also had to make it work with my schedule,

And I go to bed super early.

I get up really early,

But I go to bed early,

So.

Okay.

All right.

Heather,

Good to see you.

Monica,

You're good.

So we'll do,

We'll do a 20-minute meditation,

And then 15 minutes will be more than enough time to go through the instructions.

Oh,

Good.

I'm glad you feel special,

Libby.

You're all special,

Yes.

Okay,

So just make a few adjustments in your seat,

Just to make sure that you are comfortable.

And just close your eyes.

And take a few deep breaths,

In and out through your nose.

So,

At your own pace,

Really opening up,

Filling up.

And as you slowly exhale,

Feeling the body relax.

Inhale,

Really big breath,

And feeling that sense of release on the exhale.

And one more really big inhale,

Feeling your whole body inflate.

And as you exhale,

Feeling your whole body relax.

And allow your breath to be natural.

And focus your attention on your breath at your heart center.

In the center of your chest,

Just below your breastbone.

Imagining as if you're breathing in and out of your heart center.

And we'll rest here for a couple of minutes.

Just allowing any thoughts to settle down.

There's always still some thoughts swirling around in the beginning of our meditation.

And your job is simply to focus your attention on the breath.

Allow the thoughts to swirl by.

You don't have to give them your attention.

It's like when we have a lot of dirt in a glass that's being stirred.

And all the dirt's swirling around,

But once you set the glass down,

The dirt will still swirl for a while,

And then eventually settle at the bottom.

And so as you rest your attention on your breath,

That's just allowing the glass to be still.

There's still some momentum of the thoughts swirling around,

But nothing for you to do with them.

Just keep your attention on your breath.

They'll settle down on their own.

And now ask yourself,

What is it that you want more than anything else in the world for yourself?

Looking internally for what it is you want to feel,

What it is you intrinsically want to know.

Something along the lines of peace,

Connection,

Freedom,

Contentment.

It doesn't have to be any one of those words,

But something like those words pointing to something.

And now take your answer,

And imagine the letters written across your heart center.

And as your breath naturally opens and releases,

You see the words,

Or excuse me,

The letters expanding and contracting.

And then silently say your answer as a mantra,

Saying the word or the words in sync to the rhythm of your breath,

Not rushing the words.

Anytime your attention wanders,

Just bring it back to your breath,

Back to your mantra,

Seeing the letters written across your heart center.

And now let the mantra go.

And imagine the letters of your answer dissolving into your heart center and taking your attention from the breath to the feelings in your body,

Noticing if there are any pleasant sensations,

Any tingling sensations maybe on the surface of your skin,

A light energy around your heart center,

Really doing your best to connect with the feelings that are here right now,

The feelings of presence,

Of spaciousness,

Of freedom,

Of peace,

Contentment.

Anywhere you notice a pleasant sensation,

Your hands,

Your feet,

Rest your attention there.

Know this feeling.

If you're unsure of what it is that you're feeling and this is confusing for you in any way,

Just return your attention to your breath at your heart center and maybe try again in another minute or so.

Ride the wave of these good feelings.

Know what freedom feels like,

What peace and contentment feels like.

Notice there is no image here,

Just infinite space,

Openness,

A feeling of being whole and complete,

Connected,

All found here in the present moment.

You cannot find what you are looking for in an image.

Any image is looking in the wrong place.

You are so much more than any image.

Infinite,

Changing,

Expansive,

Spacious,

A process continuously changing,

Nothing to hold on to,

Nothing that you could possibly become.

But in letting go of all that you think you are is the only way that you see what you truly are and know the peace and the freedom that comes from this realization,

Not of becoming something else,

But simply by letting go of what you thought you were and allowing yourself to be that which you are.

And we'll slowly begin to come out of the meditation,

Becoming more aware of the breath.

And when you're ready,

You can open your eyes.

Hopefully we feel very connected with what it is that we want,

Right?

It is important that we're always reminding ourself of what it is that we want,

What's most important so we don't get distracted.

And also to really know what that feeling is.

What is it?

What does spaciousness feel like?

Openness,

Freedom.

The more familiar we are with it,

The more easily we trust it,

We come back to it,

And we start to trust those images less.

The images are just taking us where we don't want to go.

You will never find what you're looking for in an image of yourself.

Spiritual,

Realized,

Material,

Self-help,

You will never find it.

That is not what we are doing here.

We are not taking one image and replacing it with another.

That is still the ego.

And the ego is the master of disguises.

And it's why we have these talks,

And why we have these retreats,

So we can go a little deeper into seeing how we've been fooled into looking in the wrong place for what it is that's most precious to us.

So,

For our retreat today,

So we'll have two hours that you're going to be on your own for,

So whatever time zone you're on,

We'll come back and meet again in two hours and twelve minutes.

And for your retreat,

I'm going to recommend Noble Silence.

So,

Put your phone on Do Not Disturb.

I mean,

You can have it on for a moment,

Because I am going to direct you to the group page.

Right after we disconnect,

I'll put the questions there.

I meant to do it before class,

And I just forgot,

So sorry about that.

But after that,

Put your phone on Do Not Disturb.

Try to have,

Ideally,

No interaction with other people.

If you have people in your household,

Just let them know what you're doing.

You're doing a retreat for a couple hours,

You're going to be on your own.

And always good to say to,

Like it's your partner,

It's your children,

To say,

Hey,

I'm going to do this for a couple hours,

I'm going to be on my own,

But when I'm done,

Let's go do something that you want to do.

Let's go grab a meal,

Let's go for a walk,

Let's go to the park.

It's always good to make sure that what we're doing is creating,

Is not creating an I'm going off on my own,

And then alienating someone in your family,

But they see it as,

Yeah,

Dad's going off to do his retreat for a little while,

And he's always so much happier when he comes out of it.

And then we're going to go to the park.

So it's actually just a good way to kind of balance that out.

I would also recommend no music during this time.

While music is fine,

It does have a way of,

It does alter our minds,

And what we're trying to do is really see very clearly in the retreat.

We want to create the right conditions for introspection,

For contemplation,

For reflection.

So going on do not disturb,

No music,

Try and have as little interaction as possible with other people.

And what is most important whenever you are doing a private retreat is having a schedule.

When you go on longer retreats,

There's always a schedule.

So when you're on a private retreat,

You have to create your own schedule.

The schedule is everything.

It doesn't have to all be meditation,

Everything being mindful,

Of course,

But there's a lot of things that we can be doing that we just want to have a schedule for.

You might want to do some sitting meditation.

In fact,

Right after this,

You might want to do some walking meditation because you've been sitting for an hour.

You might want to do some mindful movement,

Some yoga,

Some tai chi.

You might want to go for a mindful walk in nature.

You might be hungry.

You might want to do some mindful eating.

And you might want to do some journaling.

And in fact,

I'm going to really emphasize journaling in this retreat time because I'm going to give you those journal prompts.

But still,

The first thing you do once you get the questions is write out your schedule.

Okay,

And it might take you 10 minutes or so to write out the schedule,

So you might start at,

You know,

If you're on the East Coast of the U.

S.

,

You'd say,

Okay,

At 5.

15,

I'm going to do 30 minutes of journaling.

I'm going to tackle the questions first,

And I will encourage doing the questions first again to kind of have the theme.

So from 5.

15 to 5.

45,

I'm going to do journaling.

I'm going to answer all the questions.

And then I'm going to go for a mindful walk in nature.

And in fact,

It can be a contemplative walk in nature because you've answered these questions,

So I'm going to go for a 25-minute walk in nature.

Okay,

No problem.

That's next on the schedule.

And if you're doing a contemplation while walking,

Just to remember that there's a topic,

There's a theme.

It's not just letting the mind wander all over the place.

It's not thinking about what you're going to eat when you're going to get back.

It's not thinking about how realized you're going to be after this retreat.

It's just about,

Ah,

There's the image again.

Wow,

How have I been getting trapped in these images?

What are all these images?

Because some of the questions are about what are all the images that you have?

So many of them are just floating under the surface.

We're not as aware of what they are.

So if it's a mindful walk in nature,

A contemplative walk in nature,

Our theme is looking at these images that we're creating for ourselves,

Seeing how they have their opposite,

And noticing how we're looking in the wrong place for what it is that we want.

That's what we want to be very clear on.

So you know,

You might have 25 minutes of that.

Definitely would be time to eat something at that point.

You might say 20 minutes of mindful eating.

There's maybe 10 minutes of mindful prep in that eating.

Maybe 15 minutes of contemplation meditation sitting,

Where again you're contemplating the topic,

You're thinking specifically about the topic.

There's a lot of spaciousness still in a contemplation meditation.

We still start with some breathing,

Relax the body,

Let the thoughts kind of slow down a little bit,

And then we introduce the topic.

Hmm,

How have I been getting trapped in these images?

How have I been getting lost in these images of who I think I'm going to be in the future?

And how are they creating these unworthy images?

So again,

You can be doing some contemplation,

You can just,

You can be doing some breath work,

You can be doing mindfulness meditation,

But just to have it all,

So to have your two hours scheduled out,

So that you don't find yourself like,

Oh well,

I did the questions and what should I do next?

Well,

You know what,

I think that was probably good enough.

I'm good for the day.

I've done it.

It's very easy to do that if we don't have a schedule.

So we really want to try and stick to the schedule.

So the first thing when we hang up is the schedule.

Sorry,

It's the questions.

I'll put them up here in one minute.

And then I would recommend some journaling,

And then whatever you feel is appropriate for you.

Some mindful movement,

Mindful walking in nature,

Walking with your dog like Sandy's going to do,

Some mindful eating,

Some walking meditation,

Some sitting meditation,

But just to have it all,

You know,

Just to have some time for each thing,

And you don't have to be rigid about it.

If you give yourself 25 minutes,

30 minutes for the journaling and you're really gaining a lot out of the journaling,

Like you don't have to stop right at that moment.

But again,

It's just there to give you some parameters.

Okay?

So let me pull up the questions because I don't even have them up here.

If you go to my teachers page,

There should be something that says group there.

And when you see it,

I only have the one group and it says Sangha.

And if you go there,

Then you should be able to see all the questions listed there.

Okay?

So we'll have two hours on our own.

You'll have the questions to help guide you to be to go a little deeper into this question of these images,

And just to be a little bit more reflective and honest about your own experience,

About how much this is happening.

No question it's happening.

No question it's happening.

And that's what we're just trying to bring it up more to the surface and to be more more understanding of what it is that's happening with these images so we can be more mindful.

And we can catch them.

They're not taking us where we want to go.

We're looking in the wrong place and missing and missing what it is that's here.

So okay.

I'm going to go ahead and sign us off because I do want to give you guys the two hours on your own.

And then we'll meet back here in two hours and see kind of what you guys discovered,

Answer any questions,

And we'll just and we'll also talk.

I'll talk as well about how to incorporate more mini retreats into your daily routine.

Okay?

Oh,

You're very welcome,

Chris.

Very welcome.

Okay.

I'm going to go ahead and end us so that we're on track for the retreat.