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Happiness and Joy Part 2

Uh so then I want to ask you a songs were on the phone here together what do you conceive on construct is the obstacle to you experiencing that more fully and more frequently tasting grandma's thinks we'll part one is living in the northwest that's an obstacle for tasting grandma's pick number one group in the south so you know we're not being that literal right okay um uh I'm sure connection uh frequency um bringing that back to me you know that what is that memory how that memory resonates I'm not sure if I'm answering her well you know for example it could be a simple is this you've touched something now you need to remember it so this is a very in buddhist practice recollection is a huge part of the practice just remembering the things that you know that's a golden dot principle the golden dot is really grandma's fig tree if you want to look at it that way so what I think you could do is have a friend here there's a lot of artistic people who care about you have somebody render it ...

for you and put it up someplace and let yourself flash on it look at it first thing in the morning you know and uh then even I have I have a feeling there's somebody here who could do that for you is that right? Yeah yeah you were gonna giulio stick figure like you so can we talk to online card again? A little bit? We can absolutely actually, I will show it seems to me a lot of people now are mentioned in their grandmother's. Grandmother's do seem to have this effect on us maybe it's because it's one pair of removed I was very close to my grandmother's and much more so than my own mother's it's interesting, I will share a story of my own. I have a very good friend is inactive very successful tv series in the uk was a little bit scary for young children so young children used to bury themselves in their grandmothers whenever the show was on. Just a little bit of protection on this actor says whenever he sees grandmothers in the street now their faces light up when they see him because they are associating the warmth of their grandchildren. Whenever they see him, they reminded of him and it makes them very happy. Yeah, so it's an interesting one that is very interesting. Now lorraine online is saying she's I think she's in the uk is saying thank you very much for including the worldwide audience here. She's she's for you that's, that's making a very happy but when you talked about scandinavia, says she's grabbing her passport thank you ron button it ninja is joining us from the philippines and inger is saying that she lives in a very, very small village but she gets happiness from going to even smaller villages to experience something you know even maura motive is more and calls it small towns with big heart that's uh that's a great title yeah it's a small town with big madonna well, somehow this world has gotten out of size, you know, that's sort of one of things we're doing with this size and um something about basic goodness is returning to the small town returned to the grandmother it's like that it's it's uh you know, um we can look a ce far out in the cosmos is we want to go and you're going to have a hard time finding something to match what you're talking about here that's the truth of the situation so the grandmother's wisdom is actually talked about into in tibetan buddhism in buddhism in general it's like the grandmother gives advice, you know, that's very earthy and very learned and very wise, you know, so and it's amazing to me how many people do feel their grandmother they have a grandmother or an aunt or something like that who embodies this for them? So we're not talking about something necessarily further out than that and that's finished thing thing to reel it back in in terms of happiness but maybe some people have some ideas of happiness is being a very grand scale event it seems so far we've touched on it is a sort of sweet, innocent local personal kind of moment um does anybody have an idea about bigger versant vision of happiness? Kelly uh it's ah strange correlation of how big things can be that uh happiness you can feel well maybe I can't I can't speak for anybody else I don't know sometimes just feel guilty for being happy because there's so many people that are not happy or have it badly or whatever it might be and even you know I'm thinking about my mother and the difference or what not illegal I shouldn't feel so happy because she's not always happy how can I justify that yes what where does that take you? Follow it along a little bit more how could you extend that into a kind of a course of action or that's what I'm trying to figure out do you see how that relates to the practice that we did earlier today? The mantra presents extending it out towards the people we love like your mom that's how obviously something you wanted to extending towards oneself extending it towards all the beings that we don't really know that well and extending it even towards people we don't really care for so you know that's a big project there's a lot of implication to that and um even in shambala in the teaching that I'm studying and working within presenting, we have the notion of creating enlightened society so in that in that vision of the buddhist arc the idea of we can't stop until we've actually gone that far with the project you know, and a lot of people I feel this is a big thing to talk about big topic are working from different places to come to that that we recognize that we have to heal the whole the whole situation in order for anybody to be truly happy that our happiness is gonna be limited unless we really think thinking big about the situation so it's sort of the small we want to get, you know, grandma's victory on every in every house you know, I wish I had a grandma nothing tree what was your deal in my life? Not not not um yeah, yeah okay. See, there you go. No, thank you. No grandma, didn't wei have some online actually something coming up in conversation about feeling so guilty about being happy and being raised, possibly in a certain dogma where there's a sense of guilt so that without going off into detention you're right this is coming up with a few people now started mentioning christian religions, you know, I'm a reformed catholic, so I can sort of understand with where they're going what is it formed of a lot of things actually time to go back in there but it is I have noticed that something's just beginning to creep in now internet chat rooms that people are talking about how in a way they felt they had to deny happiness uh in in their understanding of their tradition yes right and and definitely relating tio what you were saying kelly about that on becca says the grander vision of happiness realizing that we're all in this together that's a grander vision yes. In fact, zen lp was one the people saying they were raised catholic and they find that the guilt of it all is very heavy yeah and that's that's last many my experience of it as well yeah, yeah, well, you know, there are so many forms that we have been raised with that may or may not fit our own personal journey and it's like just something that is a matter of personal exploration. You know, one of the interesting things about the dalai lama's he says you know, he's not trying to convert people to buddhism he thinks they should explore their own native traditions at least this much if it possible so um I think that's a matter of personal choice I always have um but if we do feel there's, some ups obstruction or our obstacle to us really and you know, the guilt becomes a stronger agenda than actually sort of transcending that I'm from the school of like do what you need to do it's like the uh kilt is a pretty heavy thing and uh other people's I think a number of people have mentioned other people's judgements of them being a kind of obstacle await so in a way, even though we need to respect those those, uh, close friends and relatives my personal taking me to be kind of fierce uh in terms of I agree with your swimming analogy um because ultimately we can't liberate people by trying to save them and that's sort of built into the fabric is it's actually not a tradition that is based on trying to save somebody else? You can help somebody else you khun you can communicate with them, but you actually cannot save them. So couple with that is is this sort of knowledge or wisdom that inside each person's individual journey there actually is the potential for them to work with their own situation and that may be what they need to be doing for a long time. So this idea of us saving others is is kind of like interesting thing to throw into question and um being kind of brave enough to to step out at times you know, to step out, I'm sure all of us have stepped out uh and to do it without any kind of aggression you see a lot of examples of that I think in different communities of people stepping out uh working with their own kind of sense of freedom and individual individuality and uh without any kind of aggression towards the others that's always very powerful when that happens that's that's to me is real transformation when you see that happening so um I hope this was sort of helpful too to us to have a look it's not meant to be guided in the sense just maybe the framework is something you bring in to take a look at your own p h I on dh together then if we get the ph I high up enough we look at the g and h the gross national happiness you know and how we can feed into that um certainly if we have that intention there's nothing wrong with that to um wishing for the happiness of oneself and others is the essence of the practice that we learned today they're loving kindness, practice and it's very ancient it's twenty five hundred years old that practice so I thought we could maybe uh always return back to a little bit of our sitting practice, you know? And, um if anything for the three days that we've been together if if this got across that this is a really viable powerful uh uh uh way to use your time and energy and start to scheduling it in and I'm going to talk about in the fourth sector and how you can really sort of schedule in time for yourselves to practice and how important that is uh, so if we can just to maybe, you know, a period of sitting practice together because we're on, you know, amita media kind of platform, you know, we're limiting these sessions to five minutes just so that if somebody comes in that they're not completely bewildered but what's going on, um, but at home, please feel free and everybody here feel free. Teo teo, bump that up a little bit, I think, you know, fifteen minutes is a good kind of minimum sitting session at home it's really not that much time, and it allows you to settle a little bit deeper in, um and keeping the practice a little bit so let's just sit together for five minutes and just let go of what we just talked about waken just, uh, rest in the kind of mindfulness of the breath at the moment a good time to have a little stretch, as we mentioned before, if you're at home and you're sitting u can get up and move around a little bit, as I mentioned earlier, sometimes we would do a period of walking meditation um we'll have to say that for the next workshop and figure out how to do that in three d cameras brian, do we have three d keep capacity here? Okay, so we'll we'll include the idea that you know, you could go out at some point after this and take a walk in nature um and just kind of allow your self to practice being mindful, aware in a very pleasant environment and of course if you get good at this, you can do it right in the middle of times square. No problem whatsoever be an appropriate moment just mentioned lorraine who we talked about earlier is in the uk could you please explain about the bell ringing? Because often you've chimed once and sometimes there's been multiple rings after contemplated meditations why do you select different repetitions? Well, it's kind of a simple code and when you enter a sort of more continuous practice environment like a retreat center or even monastic environment the bellis indicating the beginning of a period of cracked this so for example in the morning if were in retreat we might ring it three times the first time of the day and then um uh maybe, um, twice to break for lunch or something like that uh, simplest way is just the beginning and end of sitting meditations clearly synchronizes us all up houses to practice together the ring down she's talking about it's just traditional in the my tree practice at the end to do what's called a roll down on the gong and it just kind of allows a transition that happened because we're kind of in a fairly deep space in a way when we're doing them at practice. So it's uh kind of they didn't think they getting intended it in the detonating anything thing ended in anything and it's allowing you to make a transition back into another space. So these are all really traditions from the, uh, contemplative meditation environments and ways of communicating and it can get very formal and, uh, in a practice environment there's conscious and bells that gather people together um it's sort of synchronizes up everybody's everybody's activities and I know you like to keep things simple, but is it bringing out a certain note or does it is it just sort of whatever comes out? Um there are two notes that air worked very well for the bell one is be natural and the others see sharp be natural wait, don't be flat no there's there's if you like these kind of things thes guns could be you know, I mentioned to you could buy your cushions that samadi cushions and online, but they would also have these kind of meditation what would you call in paraphernalia all kinds so the bells sometimes they're quite huge you could get yourself if you have the budget for a big gun because born you know it's very inspiring sound and they built links for a long time but this is my little traveling bell so it's kind of nice concise size yeah just right for times square yeah just right for you know, for a suitcase and getting on the plane yeah you know what a successful songwriter you're I don't know what what I do know why belle reminds me of the note that introduces john lennon's final hit just like starting over it starts with two chimes doesn't think it's exactly that tones very poignant record because it was released a couple of weeks before he was murdered I look back on youtube and to my amazement you can see this on youtube but john lenin and paul simon actually gave the award for best record of the year when midnight anyway says was nominated for that you can see that on youtube and you can also see gladys knight singing the five songs that were nominated for best song which is also also nominated for and then you can cut flat flash cuts to me in sitting in my tuxedo with my beard so you know are these days of digital whatever our past will haunt us so be careful where you are what you're doing you know anybody with a cell phone can immortalize you you know I just tell you in advance that the fourth segment is pretty open because I feel like you may have realized now that we've covered a lot of material so I want to make sure that we have a chance to regroup review what we did look at any questions that you might have a lingering any insights you might have that kind of emerged from it on de so there's not a lot of new material other than how to take it forward in the fourth sector so we'll have a chance to really go into some depth with whatever questions um you all out there in cyber space have come up with and short of that uh if there's any way we have you know a few minutes for a couple of questions or comments now does anybody have anything based on the happiness let's just stay with the topic of this segment because we just and then we'll just brought in the focus for the last segment so I want to ask you how do you feel right now do you feel vulnerable good go spent spent huh ah engaged on uh unfolding I was gonna use the word calling I was telling julie at the lunch break that I know I could hear emotions all around me during that meditation and I'm like oh my gosh I'm not doing this right now it's just not unlocking, or it just wasn't going the way I thought it should go. So so but I, but I did feel it was a thought. Yeah, please, everybody, you're on pace.