Transcription
Good morning, everyone. I want to talk a little bit about practice this morning. For now on the retreat, we want to be emphasizing the energy body, okay? Just for now. Now, I'm not going to repeat much at all about the energy body, because we've asked you to listen to all those talks, and explaining lots of stuff about it, right? So you're all good with that. I will say just a little bit. I just got a note. There will be a chance to ask questions about this later today, so we'll announce when that is. If you feel like you're unsure, if there are certain experiences that don't make sense, how it fits together, there's a chance later on. I'm not going to go into all the instructions and possibilities about that, because that was one of the stipulations of the retreat.
Just to say very, very briefly about the energy body: what are we talking about when we say 'energy body'? It's a little bit different than the usual mindfulness of sensations that we're used to in the Insight Meditation tradition or in the mindfulness teachings -- so, "Ouch, I hit my knuckles on the wall, and I feel the sensations there," "I can feel the coolness of the air on my skin," "I can feel the sensations on the hands with the water running from the tap." This is all what we're used to, mindfulness of sensations. So this overlaps with what we might call mindfulness of the energy body. They overlap. But I would say we're tuning with a different sensibility when we talk about energy body. So it overlaps, what we're talking about, but it's a different kind of tuning. That ability to tune that way grows with practice. At first, and you probably know this, it's "What is he talking about, this strange thing? What are they on about?" But as we do it more, it becomes familiar. It becomes just part of one's life, that kind of sensibility to the body. We're really talking about this space, a little bit bigger than the physical body, that field of vibration, of feeling, of texture, of energy. We're talking about a sensitivity to that, a tuning to that, what's there.
So in some ways, we might say that when we use a word like 'energy body,' it's as much that we're talking about, or, if you like, more that we're talking about a kind of awareness, a kind of sensitivity, a sensibility. We're talking about a subtlety of attention more than a particular experience. More we're talking about a kind of way of paying attention than about the body per se, or a certain experience. A person will say, "I remember when I had this flow of energy. That's what the energy body is." No, that's a certain experience. We're talking about paying attention in a different mode, a different way. It's a way of feeling the body. It's a way of attending or attuning to this field, this space here, the space of and the space around the body.
Why do we do this? This should all be recap. Why are we doing this? There's a number of reasons, I would say. (1) One of them is for the sake of what I would call samādhi, meaning the chance to energize the body and the mind, to nourish the body and the mind, to rest body and mind, to let that whole field here, this space here, with the awareness, become bright and calm. That serves as a real resource in our lives. There's so much that we can benefit from, from learning to harmonize the energy body, and dwell in that, and let the awareness spread in that. So that's one reason -- that the energy body is an integral factor of all samādhi, and it's a way of approaching samādhi.
(2) Second reason is it's really, really helpful in relation to our emotional life. What reverberates, what resonates in the body, in the energy body, it expresses and reflects our emotions, sometimes very, very subtle micro-nuances of our emotional life. To have some facility with that, to have a way of approaching it and holding it via the energy body can be really skilful, really helpful, when there's difficult emotion but also when there's lovely emotion, and also surprisingly helpful when there's very subtle emotion, not really much going on. Really, really helpful.
(3) Third reason for the energy body, the focus on that and emphasis of that is that it can serve as a kind of navigator, a kind of indicator of when we're on the right track. It serves to help guide us in practice, whether that's imaginal practice and the sense of soulmaking, or in emptiness practices, or samādhi, or mettā, or whatever, insight practices. There's a way it can serve well to give us a sense of when we're on track. When things feel in harmony, we're on the right track. Something's opening, softening, loosening, energizing, whatever it is. So all these reasons, and more perhaps.
When we come to talk about imaginal practice and cosmopoesis and the kind of things that we're talking about, we can't do that all day. Imaginal practice all day is kind of too much for the psyche, really. [laughs] We want to be going back and forth between practices. This is one of the things we really want to emphasize on this retreat, is this flexibility. I'll say more about that. Flexibility between different approaches at different times, sensitive to what's helpful. But whatever we do, the energy body is going to be a part of it. We're not going to lose connection with the energy body; that's the encouragement. Whatever direction or orientation, any time in practice, the energy body is an integral part of that and is involved. We're connected with that, we're sensitive to it.
As I said, today -- we'll unfold instructions as the week goes -- today, really to have more emphasis on the energy body, on being aware of that, on playing with that, and dwelling with that, whether that's just collecting in the samādhi, or just sensitive to the emotions there, or whatever. A bit more emphasis on that. But even now, starting today, you can be fluid between these different practices. You can move between images, and let an image resonate with the energy body, and come back to the energy body, or from images to feeling the energy body, then go to the samādhi. You get a sense for how you can move between these? Yeah? Or you might be dwelling with an emotional resonance in the energy body, and then that gives rise to an image. So there is flexibility. But today, a bit more emphasis on just dwelling with the energy body. But there's that fluidity.
[8:52] Maybe you got the sense listening to those talks that anything goes. Anything goes here. The range of creativity and ways of working with the energy body -- it's like, whatever works, it's fine. Even if you think, "This is the weirdest thing that I have ever experienced," if it's working, it's fine. Really, this encouragement on this retreat, from both Catherine and I, to really be creative. Let yourself be creative. When we talk about energy body, we're talking about a kinaesthetic, felt feeling of energy. You might be working with a visual image or whatever, but it's always going to be coming back to this felt sense.
Okay. I'll talk at the end about walking in the energy body, but maybe just to say some general things about practice, and about this retreat, about practice on this retreat. Let me say two things about teachings and listening, actually, just briefly. It's interesting how we read and listen, as human beings. Often we read and listen from within a certain box of what we understand. That's sometimes really necessary, because we need to build these boxes, these containers of understanding, and sort of let them grow, consolidate them. The downside of that sometimes is that we don't hear what's outside of our box. We're hearing from a certain framework, and we don't hear what's new. We sometimes literally don't hear it, or we chop a bit off it, or we convert it into something so it sounds like what's already in my box: "I'm not really hearing anything new here."
This is tricky. It's a balance. We need to consolidate structures of understanding, and at the same time, we need to be aware of this human tendency not to hear the new, almost not to be challenged. So, holding both those poles in mind, I wonder sometimes if it's possible to listen, in general, on this retreat or reading a book or whatever it is, other retreats, and actually listen in a different way. I'm listening for what doesn't fit into my box, listening to grow, listening to stretch, listening to challenge. Yeah?
Second thing, and related to that -- and related also to the sort of dichotomy there -- is sometimes we listen or we read, and we really focus in on one thing, one real small detail that seems to us to be helpful, or that fits in our box and resonates. This is really important; we're listening for that richness of detail. For most people, for most of us, it's a little harder to listen or read what I would call 'structurally.' So listening for the wider relevance: "How does this fit into the bigger picture of what's being presented? Or how does all this fit together?" Oftentimes we don't really listen; we just hear this bit or that bit. We don't listen in a wider way. But there's something about listening and getting a bigger picture that will help the details, and will help confidence in practice and growth in practice.
So again, it's not easy for us as human beings. For most human beings, we don't have minds that work that way. If you're not sure, "Why on earth are you going on about ...?", I remember a talk years ago; I was saying something about quantum mechanics, and someone said, "Oh, I just thought you got lost on a tangent." [laughter] It was very relevant for the whole point, but it was obvious to me what the relationship was; I should have made it clear. If you're not clear, ask. But there's something about listening what I call structurally, listening for the greater relevance of what's being said, how it fits together. Okay?
Now, I want to say something about the emphasis of practice in this retreat. So this is general now. I'm not giving so much nuts and bolts instructions this morning, because you should be familiar with that. I'll say some stuff and hope you can remember this over the retreat, because what I'm talking about is also habits of orientation. Generally -- they're general points, but -- in the Insight Meditation culture, and also in other spiritual traditions, there are certain, if you like, attitudes, or orientations, or emphases, inclinations, and assumptions that kind of get pretty entrenched for us -- so much so that we often don't even realize that they're operating as a kind of bedrock of our practice. It's just how we think and what we do. They become quite dominant in the culture and in our individual practices. They're very prevalent. And what we would like to do, what Catherine and I would like to do is actually a little bit break that up, loosen these up.
(1) One of them is to do with concentration. And I mean that in two modes, okay? Especially if you're familiar with the Insight Meditation tradition, there's a lot of emphasis on continuity of mindfulness, right? Not here. [laughter] I don't care about that. No, more than "I don't care," I'd rather you weren't. I'll explain what the alternative is, okay? Mindfulness becomes a way to live: "If I could" -- we acknowledge that it's not possible, but if I could -- "it would be best if I was continually mindful." I would like to question that and disrupt that, and replace it with a notion of flexibility of ways of looking. I mean deliberately moving in and out, consciously in and out, of different ways of looking, rather than trying to be mindful all the time, trying to create mindfulness as a way of life, as if it's an end in itself.
We could say a lot about that. We may or may not come back to it on this retreat, but I don't want to dwell. Rather than continuity -- and we have to ask, "Why continuity?" I'm not going to answer this, but why has this become so central and such an unquestioned assumption in the Dharma? What's underneath that assumption? Actually, there's quite a lot underneath it. Maybe later.
Second aspect of concentration. First is continuity; second is not just the continuity of mindfulness, but the continuity of focus. I hear people, really what they're trying to do is stay with one object, usually the breath, and sometimes decades of frustration at trying to do that. Now, I'm not saying that's not got its place, but so often it gets prioritized, this focusing, staying with one thing, keeping the attention steady. When we use the word samādhi, we're talking more about this harmonization, well-being in the energy body, and less about focusing the mind and keeping it on one thing. I don't know, some of you [laughs], some of you can recognize this. You're probably hearing this, how we become wedded to certain ideas. For this week at least, we'd like to shake a little bit of this up, loosen it.
(2) Second thing is what we might call atomism. Related to what I just talked about, there's this kind of shrinking the mind to smallness, as if seeing small details -- the moment-to-moment process, or how finely this or that sensation can be revealed to consciousness -- fine, it has its place; it's also limited. It's not something on this retreat that we're that interested in, both in terms of attention and also in terms of understanding, as if the atomistic process is something kind of 'real,' that there really are moments, that there really is all that.
(3) Third -- we'll come back to this in the retreat -- is a kind of realism or reificationism. Everything that we're doing is not based on reality claims or truth claims. Maybe this sounds abstract. I don't know. But once you start questioning, one realizes just how much of most teachings and most practice orientations, most psychotherapies, etc., are all based on some kind of reality claim. What is it to just take that away? What does that free up? What does that allow? Extremely radical.
(4) Another one -- we touched on it last night a little bit -- is just the emphasis on sort of solitude and self-sufficiency. If we can open that out, as Catherine mentioned last night. Yes, there is a place for solitude, but what is it to open up more to the togetherness and the relationship? Again, Insight Meditation, Theravādan Buddhism, has a lot of focus on the solitude and self-sufficiency. It can become for us a sort of, "It would be better if I could be more self-sufficient and solitary."
(5) And just generally, how much we absorb ideas from the cultures that we're in, the wider culture but also the Dharma culture, and we don't quite realize how much power they have. They have a tremendous amount of power. All kinds of ideas about where we're going, how we should be, "it would be better if this." So much power and prison, really, from these kind of things.
So part of what we're doing is wanting to question these kinds of things. None of them are bad. None of them are wrong, these things I've mentioned. It's just they tend to get overemphasized and dominant, even to the point of exclusion, like the opposite doesn't have a place. In that, our practice gets limited. They are limiting ideas. As much as some of them are helpful, they're also limiting.
[21:12] Okay, so, rather than all that, to replace it with this idea of flexibility of ways of looking: deliberately moving in and out, consciously, of different modes of being, perception, ways of looking. Why? This is what reveals to us the dependent arising of things. This is what reveals to us the emptiness of things. If I'm just mindful, I will not know that. It will not come. I will not have that depth of insight. I need to move flexibly, in and out. I see: when I look this way, this is what the world looks like, this is what appears. When I look another way, that's what appears. Dependent arising, emptiness. But as well, what we want is really to develop this flexibility and this availability of different ways of looking. This, to me, is really, on this retreat, but in general also, what we're interested in developing. Sometimes we really find it's okay to not practise, to have periods where you're not -- I mean, there's some basic mindfulness, but you're actually not practising. What's more important is the deliberate, at times, moving in and out, and noticing what happens. We'll talk more about this.
Sometimes people wonder about precision: "Where's the precision? If I'm not practising in my usual way of close, mindful scrutiny to the details of my experience, what happens to precision in practice?" Precision is not in the microscopic consciousness or the microscopic understanding of things. In what we'd like to say, the precision is more in a kind of subtlety and clarity of differentiation, discerning between different ways of looking: "What exactly is involved in this way of looking that I'm engaging in right now? What exactly is involved? How is this way of looking that I'm sensing in, knowing in right now, how is it subtly different from one that sounds quite similar?" Not easy. Different orientation of thinking about practice. What exactly are the effects, in this moment, of this way of looking, on my emotions, on the energy body, on my sense of freedom, on my sense of self, on my sense of another, on my perception of the world? This is where the precision is, noticing these subtleties, and why. "Why is it that when I look this way, I see like this?" We're talking about just a different way of approaching practice, a different core idea underneath practice. That's where the precision is, rather than in the microscopic detail, or the microscopic concepts.
One of the things that I would say we're interested in opening the door to is the possibility of subtlety. The possibility of a subtlety of awareness, a subtlety of sensibility. We're not making a hierarchy here; it's not like [claps], "Okay, not focused, but subtlety is what we're going for." Rather, to put it another way, we don't want to prevent subtlety. We want to keep the door open to subtlety. Gross is good too. It's not always about being subtle. But there's something about deepening, more generally. In meditation, generally speaking, I would say deepening involves and to some degree corresponds to an increase in subtlety. Again, this is not something we usually think. We think, "How long can I stay with the breath?" or whatever. So just to introduce another domain or dimension of experience that we tend not to think about so much.
Again, the subtlety is not in the microscopicness of attention, or this moment and how fast I can split up a second or whatever. When we use words like 'subtlety,' it's really subtlety of the vibrations, for instance, in the energy body that we're aware of, or the tones, the emotional tones, or the wavelengths. We become more sensitive to more subtlety there, to the subtlety of resonances, the subtleties of emotional movements and states, shades of emotion, refinements of perception in general. So this is actually, I would say, quite important to be able to open to, gradually, gradually, more and more, over the months and years of practice.
I'm going to leave a bit out. I don't want to overload you guys. Yeah. There will be a chance for questions. I'll leave something out.
There are going to be a lot of practice suggestions and instructions and things on this retreat. It won't be very linear. Or rather, apart from this energy body emphasis at the beginning, it's not like, "First you do this, and then we're going to get more advanced over the week." Sometimes you might think, oh, on day five, "I wish you'd said that at the beginning." Or vice versa. It's just the way things are; they have to unfold in time. But hopefully that's okay. Don't get overwhelmed. Stuff is being recorded or whatever. Just try what feels like it resonates and works, and let it go if you want to. Don't worry if it feels like too much and you're not getting it, in terms of the different practices, or you're not getting this one, or you missed that one or whatever. In a way, everything that we're talking about is kind of connected with everything else. It's kind of inseparable, but we have to separate it just to communicate things in time and in chunks. You can't kind of download it all in an instant. That's just the nature of things, and to be flexible around that.
[28:40] What we are engaged in -- and again, it might be different from the way many people tend to think of practice, which is just sort of 'being,' and being with the body, and sort of waiting for what comes up. This comes up, and then I'm with that, and then after a while something else comes up, and then I'm with that, in a kind of receptive, passive practice. Very beautiful way of practising. But it's only a mode of practising. I think, lovely as that is, it will be quite limiting if I'm only practising in that way.
We're going to give lots of suggestions and practices, and actually ask you to deliberately engage a way of looking. Rather than just, "I'm hanging out and being with what is," etc., actually moving in and out of deliberate ways of looking. That's usually not our habit, and especially when we come to talk about imaginal practice and practices of enchantment or cosmopoesis, that tends not to be our habit, (A) for a lot of people to enter into kind of cosmopoetic ways of looking, but (B) to actually deliberately do that. It's a different approach, really. A lot of this stuff with images and cosmopoesis can come up spontaneously, and that's great. And it's deliberate.
With everything that we're offering, we might offer something, and you say, "Oh, that didn't quite work. Let me get that to work now." Careful about this. Really an encouragement to use the energy body and use the sense of soulfulness as your guide: "This practice, I can feel it resonating, something in the soul. Okay, I need to refine it," or whatever. Let that be your compass, the energy body and the sense of soulfulness, rather than banging on at something that actually doesn't stimulate a sense of soulmaking in you.
You know, in classical tantra teachings, you might have a prescribed thing to work with -- a deity, image, or something like that. But our encouragement is to pursue and to stick with or try again only those practices that resonate, resonate in and for the soul. Even if it seems like that practice was initiated in a kind of contrived or external way from our suggestions, it doesn't matter. What matters is the soul-resonance and the sensitivity to that. Then you're onto something. That sense of soulfulness, let it guide you. If not, if we don't, there's a danger that these kinds of practices -- or any kind of practice -- can just be lifeless, soulless, pointless in a way, except perhaps as an exercise in concentration or an exercise in visualization or something. Nothing deep or significant for or in the soul is really being touched, stirred, moved (in both senses of the word), brought alive, enriched, deepened. It's that sense of soulfulness that tells you when you're onto something: "This is gold for me. This is a treasure for me." It might still be difficult. It might be confusing. But there's gold here. Yeah?
We're going to say this so many times [laughs]: really the encouragement to play on this retreat with these practices, to experiment. Let yourself be creative. We're going to be offering a lot, but think of it like we've got a big artist's studio here, and we just opened the doors. There are all kinds of paints and canvases, and stuff you can make sculptures on, and video equipment. You can just play, okay? You can decide what you play with. And you can be really systematic if you want. You can stay with one thing or whatever. But can we have that approach to practice?
What's the point? [laughter] What is the point? [laughter] This actually is a really important question. Sometimes we lose a little track of what the point is of practice. Especially I'm talking for long-term practitioners. What's the point? Or else the point becomes hardened into something that part of us no longer really believes in. It's no longer really alive for the soul, the point of practice; I'm borrowing some Buddhist words or something I just keep hearing in loads of talks or in books. Is it my point*?* Is it the point for my soul? Or is my point half dead? This is human. We'll revisit this, probably a lot on the retreat, but just to say right now, what's the point of all these practices that we'll be offering? It's certainly not to try and believe this or that, or Catherine and I trying to make you believe some kind of new religion or something. It's not to believe this or that about the self, about life, or about world. Nor is it, I think, to try and achieve any particular perception: "I got a perception of my body being a red energy body," or whatever it is. Great. Okay. And wonderful. Or some other perception. But rather, through all these practices, through this exercising of the flexibility of ways of looking, through exploring an attitude, a relationship with practice that's more like art, more like poetry, in relation to perception -- through these things, loosening happens. Actually, many kinds of loosening happen. That, to me, is a big point. Many kinds of loosening. What are the different kinds of loosening that happen?
[35:50] This is of fundamental importance, the different kinds of loosening that happen. But even more than that, a sense, a perception, a knowing comes through all these practices. Something, if you like, maybe vague, maybe undefined, unarticulated, maybe a lot of variation in your experience or other experience, because of the ways of looking -- but a sense, a perception, an opening, a knowing, a deepening of the sense of beauty, of sacredness. This is more, if you like, the central point. Not a particular; it can happen in all kinds of ways. And even more, you know, a knowing of eternity, a knowing of the eternal, of the timeless. Many possibilities here. These possibilities, they open, they deepen, they widen, and they become more and more accessible in our lives, more and more available to the being, more and more frequent. So I would say, at the bottom of it, that's the main point of all the practices.
I said today this dwelling in, being with, emphasizing the abiding in the energy body as the primary thing, that will be the main emphasis today, as much as possible. Within that, there are different orientations. So, again, orient towards the cultivation of the harmony, the sense of harmonization, well-being, in that field, and the mind dwelling in that and enjoying that, moving towards that, gently encouraging that. That's one orientation.
At other times, it might be just sensitive to the energy body, and it might be there's some difficulty there or emotional resonances, maybe difficult, maybe lovely, maybe neither, just subtle. There's a way of being with the energy body, just paying attention, or working skilfully, gently, helpfully, with whatever is going on emotionally as it's playing out in the energy body. If images feel like they are coming, arising in relation to that, or feel helpful in relation to that, letting that come and go too. Letting yourself be flexible. But the energy body is always involved. We're not losing connection with that. We're not losing the sensitivity to that, or rather we're encouraging the sensitivity to that as part of what's going on.
[talk briefly moves into guided meditation] Opening, opening. There will be a tendency for the awareness to shrink. Just opening again. It's really about, then, tuning -- tuning the attention. Not so much in terms of location, as in terms of wavelength or vibration, if you like, resonance in the space. It may be at times about location, but it's more about the tuning, the kind of awareness. [guided meditation ends]
Okay. So, what we're going to try on this retreat is to have an open schedule, just see how that goes, which means you can come and go in terms of this space here, the main hall, as you like. You can come and sit for three hours straight. You can come and sit for ten minutes, any time. Obviously just try and be relatively quiet, but basically it's an open space. So you kind of find your rhythm with the sitting and the walking and the standing meditation, etc. Is that clear enough? Yeah? Careful if you prioritize sitting. It may be that the action, really, the fruit, is in the walking or the standing, or whatever. So much about, just find what's really helpful for you. But there's an open schedule. Let's see how that goes.
With the walking meditation for today, can we do the walking meditation, again, emphasizing the energy body? Many of you are familiar with what does it feel like in the soles of the feet, or in the legs, the mindfulness of sensations. Let's do it differently, and see: can I walk up and down on my walking path, sensitive to this field, the energy body? Yeah? Or some of you may be walking, and there's a sort of vast, panoramic awareness of the whole space and the sky. All of these are wonderful. I think, for us, today, let's see if we can do the walking, and walk up and down with the sensitivity to the energy body, just the same with the sitting.
As in all practices, you might need to experiment a little bit. What's helpful? Do I need to walk slower to allow that at this time? And maybe half an hour later it's faster. Or do I need to walk really fast, or what? Play, for instance, with the pace of the walking that allows you to get the sensitivity to the energy body. You can stop and stand at any point. So halfway through your walking path, you might stop and feel, "When I'm still now, actually this feels good. That's helpful with the energy body." So really the rhythm of the walking, the pace. And when you stop and stand, you might end up standing most of the walking period. No problem. Just really what's helping this awareness of the energy body.
Now, there's formal walking -- walking up and down between two points, which you're all very familiar with -- and there's informal walking: I'm going to lunch, I'm going to a group or whatever it is, I'm going to get a cup of tea. See if you can take some of those opportunities too. Just what is it to walk from here to get my cup of tea and be in the energy body, or back to the Hermitage Wing or wherever you're staying, and actually just walk in the corridor in the energy body? Just for a little bit. Play with this. In general, probably, for most people, as you're walking around the house, it's good to slow down. That will help this energy body awareness -- again, not because we're aiming for microscopic awareness and really slow, but just the slowness will help the energy body awareness for most people.
