After decades of practice and teaching, what inspires me are those moments when I can see the habitual as if it were for the first time. If such moments occur while I'm giving a talk, then the teacher in me can hear its own words imbued with the freshness imparted by those who truly listen -- the multiple aspects of myself being part of the audience as well. Thanks for your participation in the process.
This talk starts with an introduction on the futility of amassing knowledge. It then examines the genesis of our implicit belief in the permanence of things, and explores ways to unlearn it.
As the Buddha showed, clinging gives birth to the I. The I, in turn, keeps puffing itself up by further clinging. When we understand that this generates nothing but suffering, we are ready to unlearn the I, that is the "Me."
As we come to the end of the old and begin anew, is this "new beginning" just a gambit to circumvent a situation, or are we embarking in a genuine process of transformation? The practice provides invaluable support for the latter choice.
Much anguish and insecurity results from a sense of being separated from our fellow beings and from the world. The strategies we use to try to overcome this often involve the fabrication of additional partitions (e.g.; "us vs. them"), and thus backfire. The Noble Eightfold Path offers a better way.
In our dark moments we tend to look for "the light at the end of the tunnel." In doing so, we end up constantly trying to be where we are not, and we miss the opportunity to learn from the darkness itself.
Bowing has two parts: the bowing down in full acceptance of what is, and the coming right up in readiness to do what needs to be done. Each part is incomplete without the other. To realize this non-duality is to open the door for transformation.
