Practicing for Life

I believe this needs to be said.

A meditation practice is a great and wonderful thing. It's fantastic, in fact. Why is that? Because it helps a human being live a life that has a deep, abiding, realistic and true connection to the universe and to all other beings. If all we do is focus on minutia, on microscopic effects, on psychedelic events, on the bliss on the jhanas, then we will miss the bigger picture. The bigger picture is about our connecting to each other and seeing exactly how we're really and truly connected to everything in this world, and why it matters that we see things as our practice leads us to see them. Clearly. Love, compassion, caring about people and events, cherishing our relationships to others, even being there for them to help them with their own suffering, is just really, really, really freaking important.

How do you connect your practice to your real, everyday life? Are you?

Thanks for listening.

Well said. I won't get into service activities that I do. Internally I feel more, have more compassion, am kinder.

jack

My main motivation has always been my wife and not treating her badly but making her as happier as she can be. And that meant doing all the things I did practice-wise in order to refine and then drop the tendencies that led me to be a cranky, moody arsehole to her and anyone else for that matter. My practice for the last few years has been aimed at being a kind and caring partner/husband more than anything else. I don't talk about it too much as it just seems to be a given that we practice to relieve ourselves of suffering in order to be better human beings to other beings.

I would say I have been quite successful as of late with the lack of arseholishness being replaced with intimate listening, caring, being there for her regardless and considering and attending to her suffering over Nick. It's now easier to do due to practices done.

Wooooooot!

Nice.

+1

This is a question that I want to ask more often. Making a positive connnection with this world is my ultimate preference and source of inspiration. Most often I default to closing myself to this option and that is something that I work to remedy.
.

We all know how anger and hatred can cause us to hurt others. Recently I've been struck by how deeply our own suffering can hurt others indirectly. There are many things I've done in life which I recognize were done simply because I was so caught up in my own problems that I couldn't be bothered to think about how my own behavior affected anyone else. And the shocking part for me was that they my problems weren't even major; just the desire to feel good, the inclination not to care much about how the world is turning when I felt good so as not to lose that feeling; and the inclination to avoid the stress of dealing with how the world is turning when I felt bad.

Each day, I hope I'm able to move a bit farther away from hurtful attitudes like those.

How do we, as practitioners of Practical Dharma, reconcile our sometimes microscopic focus with our day to day interactions with other human beings?

A friend of mine recently asked a Tibetan monk what he thought of the Theravada. He said "the Mahayana sees only the sky; the Theravada sees only the trees." Kind of an interesting answer. At times in my life, I've been disconnected from the important minutia of my own body and mind by trying to do a sky-focused spiritual bypass; at other times, I've missed the bigger picture that Chris refers to because I've been obsessed with the trees--stuff like where I am on the maps, why I'm not making the progress that I'd like to see happen and other minutia related to my own suffering and its theoretical end.

I wish I was better at uniting heaven and earth, so to speak, in real time. That seems to be the key to having skillful and beneficial interactions with other people.

"
How do we, as practitioners of Practical Dharma, reconcile our sometimes microscopic focus with our day to day interactions with other human beings?

"

One way to do this is to try to build a culture that doesn't dismiss or ridicule efforts to explore such questions. (The critique of the mainstream dharma world has its place, but also seems like a paradigm that we could move beyond at a certain point.) I love the idea of a culture that promotes transparency about states and stages but also wholeheartedly embraces the brahma viharas. We've been seeing more threads on KFD that seem to be moving in this direction.
The "pragmatic bodhisattva"--best of both worlds, right?

My feeling is that Practical Dharma, if it is to go anywhere, needs to be accessible. This means that it needs to be at least in some ways welcoming, and people from "outside" need to be able to relate to it. Some folks quickly relate to it, of course, but they're generally the ones who are frustrated by other practices, approaches or even traditions. That was how I got to this and that's been my reading of many of the folks here and elsewhere.

Sometimes Practical Dharma goes overboard in criticizing other traditions and practices, and that becomes off-putting. I also believe there is a reluctance to relate what we practice, and how we practice, to the larger picture of our every day life and how we live it. In the end that's what really matters, so....

"
How do we, as practitioners of Practical Dharma, reconcile our sometimes microscopic focus with our day to day interactions with other human beings?

"

I have not noticed any need to reconcile the two in my own practice. I work on the tiny details, and from that, my limitations as a human being grow clear, and I see how and why I should change the way I think and act towards others. One flows directly from the other, no "bridging" needed.

Except when I was a cranky dark nighter and my ever patient psychologist wife (lucked out) bared the worst of me, I don't think much bridging was needed either. I do think though there may be a lack of talking about the content of life, the human relationships and how they are improved or affected by our practices. It wasn't really part of the earlier pragmatic dharma culture to do so. Perhaps threads asking for specific examples from people's daily lives and how their lives and relationships have improved due to practice might help change the image many may get from the technical hardcoreness mostly discussed in places like this.

Last night during our group here in Atlanta we talked a bit about using noting practice to disembed from "judging thoughts"' about another person. Kenneth has described the practice of going right to body sensations while in conversation. There's a lot of room for discussion of the examples Nick referred to. While bridging happens naturally enough for some people, others might struggle with it. Couldn't hurt to share "best practices" on how to translate pragmatic dharma into skillful action in the world. A side benefit is that this would make the warm and welcoming side of pragmatic dharma more apparent to people discovering it for the first time.

I'll be blunt: I started this practice because I could no longer stand the chronic anxiety, punctuated by phobic spikes when my particular traumas were engaged (highway driving, playing the violin in public). It is miserable to live that way. Now that I'm in the practice I'm realizing how much other suffering I've simply accepted as a baseline, mainly isolating myself from other people, or even distracting myself with rage over national politics, office politics, you name it. Right now I'm in the process of moving beyond the dukkha nanas, hoping for the happiness that is not dependent on conditions. I have no idea how I'll be experiencing my phobias a year or even a month from now.

"How do you connect your practice to your real, everyday life? Are you?"

My practice helped me reduce the following harmful behaviors:
- Interruptions
- Raising my voice
- Being rude
- Aggressive
- Being fearful
- Arrogant
- Excessive control
- Codependence
- Getting satisfaction from fights, etc.

All of which have affected my wife, parents and some of my friends. The results I've been seeing lately (after 4 years of practice) have been wonderful: I listen, I feel them, I'm caring and practical.

Right now, abiding in a selfless nature is helping me with the paramitas. Specifically, I'm focusing in the 2nd, 3rd and 4th paramitas: morality, patience and dilligence. I've been discerning selflessness in myself and others and this has allowed me to be more open. This space is respectful and it knows how to wait for the right moment to act, speak, answer, and even step on the gas when driving. It is very, very practical.

The obstacles right now have to do with laziness, but when I connect to the openness of the selfless nature, I just act and do the work. Laziness feels like a gigantic mountain, and after practicing it feels like a gigantic cloud that dissipates when I start working. I am very happy I found the Dharma.

"
How do we, as practitioners of Practical Dharma, reconcile our sometimes microscopic focus with our day to day interactions with other human beings?

"

Being microscopic helps me reveal the subtle harmful patterns in my experience (grasping, aversion and hopes), so that I can release them little by little or suddenly.

When I read these boards I don't see a lot in the way of commentary about relating what we do in daily life, other people, metta, giving back, paying it forward, things like that. We are most often very focused on our maps and our localized, personal practices. What do you folks think the effect of that is on the casual interested observer who stumbles upon this particular site?

Does this matter to anyone here? Should it, or should we stick to our practice knitting and disregard these other issues?

What is the intersection between practical dharma and social issues, political issues, and the like? Is there one. or.....?


(BTW - please understand that I'm not criticizing. I am, though, raising some questions that I think are important.)

Just to say this, in case anyone is wondering, I believe practice, practical dharma or not, needs to be integrated into our lives. To my way of thinking that means we should think of our practice in ways we don't typically discuss here. But maybe we should. So I am

Chris, I think this depends on where a person is in their practice and life. I started to practice as an extension of the Grand Self-Improvement project - even when it was for the benefit of others - *I* wanted to be the best father and husband I could be. Unless a person was born a saint, I don't see how their motivation could be anything other than the best kind of selfishness.

You are at a point in your development where selfless action is now possible and natural - let's applaud everyone's efforts just working to get to that point.

It was only once a lot of ignorance was cleared for me that I could see how the practice of compassion is the bridge between the mutual truths of the absolute and relative.

"Selfless compassion" is just another concept and rightfully met with skepticism unless it becomes an experiential truth in one's life IMO.

I say this not to disagree with Chris, but for the sake of those who dont yet feel it in their hearts.

"Chris, I think this depends on where a person is in their practice and life. I started to practice as an extension of the Grand Self-Improvement project - even when it was for the benefit of others - *I* wanted to be the best father and husband I could be. Unless a person was born a saint, I don't see how their motivation could be anything other than the best kind of selfishness.

You are at a point in your development where selfless action is now possible and natural - let's applaud everyone's efforts just working to get to that point."

Hi all - I've been lurking a while, and feel inclined to jump in on this particular thread if you'll excuse me. I agree with Orasis that there are points in practice where a very deep self-involvement is typical and normal. But I have found it quite interesting and beneficial at many times - even or maybe especially during those periods - to find myself dropping in at a Buddhist center and doing metta practice, for example. At the darkest times, or when one is immersed in the bizarre dissolving vibrations of experience, to turn ones mind to others actually helps create a release and openness that not only benefits others (at least on some theistic magical spiritual level) but benefits the yogi by the shift in perspective. It points to the breakdown of the boundary between self and other. So even from a pragmatic practice perspective, bringing ones practice to the world is beneficial, no? I really like hearing people talk about how their practice has benefited their lives, because the fact is - almost in grand opposition to traditional dharma teachings - it is so little spoken of in the pragmatic/hardcore dharma world that one fears it doesn't happen at all. (Leaving my old screen name alone to save the bother, but my real name is Ona.)

"Selfless compassion" is just another concept and rightfully met with skepticism unless it becomes an experiential truth in one's life IMO."


Not to put too fine a point on this but I think it's a bit of a myth that one cannot find compassion and heart at any time in their practice. It does nat have to be selfless compassion. Sometimes any compassion is just fine and we all have some level of compassion, love, or empathy. It's part of being a human being. And I have to agree with Ona that finding and actually using those qualities helps to open us up. We tend to learn important things when we open up. There aren;t enough Buddha's around and there's an awful lot of suffering. Too much.

To the point, from personal experience -- there was a time when my daughter was having some very serious problems. I was not all that far along in my practice but I'm convinced that *just having a practice,* even at that stage, was immensely beneficial to my being able to attend to her. Not "selflessly" in a cosmic Buddha-like way but as a father would want to just be present with a child who needs help.

It's easy to practice when all is well, life is good, there are no problems. There will be times when all of us encounter difficulties, grand or small, but it is at those times, wherever we are in our practice, that just having a practice, even if it's a new one, is going to help. That's just pragmatic.

Chris, very similarly, not many months after I began practicing my husband was injured in an accident and needed a fair amount of physical assistance for a while. Much to my surprise both our practices - not terribly deep at that point - helped us not utterly freak out at the massive amount of pain and stress that was going on.

I - like probably a fair number of people in the pragmatic/hardcore dharma circles - had the fire lit under my practice by the idea "I can get enlightened? Damn, I'm doing that!!!" But seeing those kind of personal changes happening was really important and transformative for me. I've come to think that the insights that arise during the course of practice and the practical results they have in how one relates to the world are actually significant markers of progress. I'm watching a couple of friends who just started meditating in the last year, and the changes in their behavior and tone are dead giveaways, to me, of the "internal alchemy" going on.

"Does this matter to anyone here? Should it, or should we stick to our practice knitting and disregard these other issues?
"

Here's why it's important to me: I believe that what Kenneth is doing has real value in helping people cut to the chase and better cope with their suffering. As he said, "it doesn't have to be this complicated." The whole point is to help people make progress and to avoid years of aimlessness and not knowing what to do.

I also buy that there's a difference between samatha and vipassana and that insight practice matters. The clearcut way in which this stuff is explained in the pragmatic dharma movement is potentially very helpful to people. Therefore, as Chris pointed out, it should be accessible.
You don't have to be an egghead. You just have to follow the instructions. That means people who would have no idea what, say, a vipassana jhana is could still actually practice this stuff and do better in life. I played one of Kenneth's talks in our group and at least one of the yogis went to this site. But of course, the appeal of pragmatic dharma is that it isn't watered down or silly. The Buddhist magazines kind of make me sick with all of the saccharine stuff in there. Obviously, we're not at risk of crossing that line anytime soon.