Sunday, January 31, 2021

Burma's new coup: Aung San Suu Kyi arrested

iNQBBC News (bbc.com, Jan. 31, 2021) edited and expanded by Wisdom Quarterly

Buddhist Burma (Myanmar)'s dictatorial military has confirmed it has taken control of the country after it arrested Aung San Suu Kyi and other political leaders in the early hours.

The coup comes after tensions rose between the civilian government and the military following a disputed election [mirroring the corruption seen in the U.S., except that after losing Burma's version of Trump, General Than Shwe, is taking the Capitol and imposing its will].

Ellen Elliot Page introduces Asia's Hitler, banal General Than Shwe

Aung San Suu Kyi, 2011
Hours after the arrests, the military junta appeared on television to confirm it was taking power for the next year. Burma, also known as Myanmar after the dictatorship changed the country's name, was ruled by the military for many years until such power brokers as U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton negotiated some window dressing the world has been calling "democratic reforms" beginning in 2011.

In November's election, Ms. Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) won enough seats to form a government. But the army alleges the vote was fraudulent, just as Trump claims about the national Democrats in the U.S.

The newly-elected lower house of parliament was due to convene for the first time on Monday, but the military was calling for a postponement. The military said it was handing power to Commander-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing.
The sites of Naypyitaw, dictators' new capital
Soldiers are on the streets of the new capital, Naypyitaw, and the main city and former capital Rangoon, the name of which was also changed by the dictatorship to Yangon.

Mobile internet data connections and some phone services have been disrupted in major cities, while the state broadcaster MRTV says it is having technical issues and is off air.

The BBC's South East Asia Correspondent Jonathan Head says that under the constitution the military has significant powers to declare a "state of emergency," just as Trump called for Washington D.C., but detaining political leaders like Ms. Suu Kyi is a provocative and very risky move, one which may well be strongly opposed, the BBC correspondent says.

NLD Spokesman Myo Nyunt told the Reuters news agency by phone that Ms. Suu Kyi, President Win Myint, and other leaders had been "taken" in the early hours of the morning.

"I want to tell our people not to respond rashly, and I want them to act according to the law," Nyunt said, adding he also expected to be detained. Soldiers also visited the homes of chief ministers in several regions and took them away, family members said.

What happened in the election?
Dictator Don Trump
The NLD won 83% of available seats in the Nov. 8th election in what many saw as a referendum on Ms. Suu Kyi's civilian government. It was just the second election since the end of military rule in 2011.

But the military has disputed the result, filing complaints at the Supreme Court against the president and the chair of the electoral commission.

Fears of a coup rose after the military recently threatened to "take action" over the fraud it alleges. The election commission has rejected these allegations.

Who is Aung San Suu Kyi?
Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi is the daughter of Burma's great independence hero, General Aung San. He was assassinated when she was only 2-years-old, just before Burma gained independence from British colonial rule in 1948 [when George Orwell, who lived and wrote about British Burma, composing his classic novel 1984 but inverting the last two digits of the year he finished it]. More

Rise and Fall of Burma's Suu Kyi explained


The Rise and Fall of Burma’s Aung San Suu Kyi Explained
NowThis
(NowThis World, 3/24/19) A non-violent freedom fighter? A war crimes apologist? Or is she something in between?

What kind of karma makes one a national leader?
Aung San Suu Kyi’s decades-long, non-violent struggle for democracy made her a heroine around the world. But once she was finally appointed to office in the Parliament (having been banned from ever becoming the country's official leader by the outgoing dictators), many say her leadership has been disappointing.
Born on June 19, 1945 in what was then Rangoon, Burma, Suu Kyi was destined to be defiant from the start.

Her father, national hero Aung San
Her father
was none other than national hero Aung San -- the former military general who negotiated Burma’s independence from the British in 1947. He became known as a national hero and the founder of modern-day Burma, which the dictatorship changed to Myanmar.

But in 1947, when Suu Kyi was just 2-years-old, everything changed. Her father was assassinated by a rival politician.

She went on to graduate from high school in 1964 and then studied with the global elite at England's Oxford University. There she met her to-be husband. Years later they settled in the United Kingdom, where they had two sons.

Dictator General Than Shwe
During this time Suu Kyi continued to watch as her country was sinking further into the grip of a military dictatorship led by General Than Shwe.

After nationwide protests against the one-party rule and the military dictatorship culminated in what later became known as the 8/8/88 Uprising protesters were in search of  a leader.

They looked to the then 43-year-old Suu Kyi to fill the shoes of her father -- as a fighter for Burmese democracy.

Saffron Revolution: Soldier bashes in head of a peaceful Buddhist monk for the dictatorship.
.
And that’s exactly what she did. She was under house arrest during the next big uprising led by Buddhist monks, the Saffron Revolution. The dictatorship committed atrocities to put it down.

But what was her journey to leadership and what would she do once she achieved her goal? And what would her leadership mean for the minority Muslim Rohingya in Rakhine state and the alleged ethnic cleansing was taking place in Burma?
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NowThis World is dedicated to bringing topical explainers about the world around us. Each week it explores current stories in international news by examining the facts, providing historical context, and outlining the key players involved. It also highlights powerful countries, ideologies, influential leaders, and ongoing global conflicts that are shaping the current landscape of the international community across the planet today.

Protests in Russia: Putin's police state (video)


GlobalNews
(Global News, Jan. 31, 2021) Russian "Robo Cop" Nazi police paratroopers use batons, jail over 1,000 at pro-Navalny/anti-Putin rally. More than 1,000 protesters were detained in St. Petersburg on Sunday as thousands gathered for a rally in support of Alexey Navalny.

Oh my Icon, he survived?! Oh sh*t. (Ya Libnan)
Riot police were seen using metal batons and electric shockers (cattle prods) against demonstrators. Some of them talked back or threw snowballs at police.

Navalny had called on his supporters to demonstrate after he was arrested on false charges last weekend when he returned to Russia from Germany for the first time since being poisoned.

Wife Yulia and Alexey Navalny (wiki)
The assassination attempt was on self-appointed "Czar" Putin's orders, and a nerve agent investigators say was slipped to Navalny by Russian state security agents in August.

The authorities had warned Russians to stay away from Saturday's demonstrations, saying they risked catching COVID-19 as well as prosecution and possible jail time for attending an unauthorized event.

But demonstrators defied the ban and, in at least one case in temperatures below -50 C, turned out in force. Leonid Volkov, a Navalny ally, called on them to do the same next weekend to try to free Navalny from what he called "the clutches of his killers." More
Russia arrests hundreds as crackdown on Navalny allies continues
(Al Jazeera English, Jan. 31, 2021) Russian police have detained more than 260 demonstrator as pro-change activists took to the streets across the country demanding the release of jailed hero, Kremlin critic, and former right wing politician Alexey Navalny.

There are "super soldiers" coming.
The first of Sunday’s protests took place in the Far East, including the port city of Vladivostok, where several dozen protesters gathered in the city’s central square despite police closing it off ahead of the rally. AJ's Aleksandra Godfroid reports live from Moscow.

How long should I meditate, Ajahn Chah?

Monroe InstituteAjahn Chah via Ven. Sujato, Ellie Askew, Dhr. Seven (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly

Incense for meditation
There are some people who light a stick of incense in front of them when they sit down to meditate.

They then make a dramatic determination that they will not get up until the incense has been completely reduced to ashes.

They then start meditating. But after only five minutes they feel as if an entire hour has passed. And when they open their eyes to check the incense stick, they get a surprise to find that the incense is still really long.

Western Ajahn Sumedho with Ajahn Chah
They close their eyes and restart their meditation, and in no time at all they are checking the incense again. Of course, their meditation gets nowhere.

Don't be like that. It's like being a monkey. Monkeys end up doing no work at all. One spends the whole period of meditation thinking about the incense stick, wondering whether it's finished or not.

Training the mind/heart can easily get to be like this. So don't attach too much importance to the time. AjahnChah.org

Contemplative photography as meditation

Militant Elvis Presley (center) and his and religious musical parents (historydaily.org)

(The Miksang Institute for Contemplative Photography) "Quiet Mind: Introduction to Miksang and Contemplative Photography."

Marilyn Monroe objectified by a nation
What's needed? The would-be student needs an open mind and an open heart able to provide for itself and others. Miksang is a Tibetan word for a way of looking that literally means "good eye."

How are we currently looking at things -- as a fantasy sold to us or as the reality with a dark underbelly we would rather not think about?

JFK and RFK had sexual affairs with Marilyn Monroe. The U.S. government spied on them. They revealed sensitive information, so the US assassinated all three. That's how the secret police (CIA, SS, FBI, NSA, NSC, DHS, etc.) works. Here the Kennedys are shown in the good old days (Archives).



Saturday, January 30, 2021

"Fake Famous" (film)


Fake Famous (2021): official trailer
(HBO, Jan. 21, 2021) An unreal social experiment. Fake Famous, the true story of a social experiment that reveals what’s really happening behind-the-scenes of influencer fame, premieres February 2 at 9:00 PM on HBO Max. #HBO​ #HBODocs​ #FakeFamous​. Stream on HBO Max: itsh.bo/hbo-max​.

More HBO

Hitler's prophecy (video)

PBS; Pathe; Wiki News; Sheldon S., Pfc. Sandoval, Seth Auberon (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

(American Experience PBS) In 1938, Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt broadcast a personal appeal (order) to German Furher Hitler, demanding he halt any further aggression. In reply, American pro-war propagandists say Hitler ridiculed the American president with withering sarcasm.


Hitler rally at the Reichstag, 1939
Hitler's prophecy was a statement first made 82 years ago by German leader Adolf Hitler in a speech at the Reichstag on Jan. 30, 1939:

"If international finance Jewry inside and outside Europe should succeed in plunging the nations once more into a world war, the result will be not the Bolshevization of the earth and thereby the victory of Jewry, but the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe."

Will you be impeached? - Nah, I'm good.
Hitler continued to invoke the prophecy throughout the war and referenced it in his last will and testament, such that the prophecy became a leitmotif of the Final Solution and is the best-known phrase from Hitler's speeches.

The historical significance of the prophecy is debated: Intentionalists view it as proof of Hitler's previously developed master plan to systematically murder the European Jews, while functionalists argue that "annihilation" was neither meant nor understood to mean mass murder, at least initially. It is also cited as evidence that Germans were aware that Jews were being exterminated. More

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Alan Watts: How to awaken from this illusion


(The Spiritual Library, Nov. 19, 2020) This is a sample from the live lecture series Wisdoms of the Mountains. If interested in these lectures, please go to alanwatts.org or alanwatts.com.

Reddit’s GameStop stock boost, MLB’s Hall...


(The Daily Show with Trevor Noah) Redditors purposely boost the stock price of GameStop to insane numbers to screw the big guys (hedge fund managers who were purposely depressing the price to profit from a short sell in a cynical move to destroy the company); the pandemic possibly creates a baby bust; and the Baseball Hall of Fame inducts NO new players this year.

Friday, January 29, 2021

How can I develop the Buddhist path?

Eds., Wisdom Quarterly, Pa Auk methold based on Ven. Thanissaro advice, Wisdom Quarterly
I would rather be MEDITATING in ecstasy, but I need easy entertainment like alt rock!
.
Breath Meditation Basic Instructions
In and out breathing meditation is one technique of many. It's available to everyone. Of all the meditation topics that exist, it may be the most beneficial for the body. For when dealing with the breath, it's air and "invisible life force energy" (prana) that courses throughout the body and animates it.

If we can learn to become aware of it and let it flow smoothly and unobstructed, we can help the body function better. This can give the mind a handle for dealing with physical pain.

We can "meditate" (develop singlepointed absorption for purity and calm or develop a contemplation for insight and liberation) in any of the four positions: lying down, sitting, standing, or moving. If we lie down too soon, we'll fall asleep. If we move too soon, we'll become distracted. Let's start with sitting and stand if we become sore then sit again.

Position
Sit comfortably and erect, in a balanced position. Allow the body to be neither stiff nor slack. Ramrod straight like a soldier is a mistake. Slack like a hippie is a mistake. Wake up. Relax. Avoid leaning forward or back, to the left or right.

Affirmation
Close the eyes and affirm, "May I be truly happy and free from suffering (dukkha)." It may sound strange, even selfish, to start meditating in this way, but there are good reasons for it. For one thing, if we can't wish ourselves happiness (sukha), there will be no way to honestly wish for the happiness of others.

Many of us need to remind ourselves constantly that we deserve happiness. We all deserve it, but if we don't believe it, we'll constantly find ways to punish ourselves. And we'll end up punishing others in subtle and/or blatant ways as well.

For another thing, it's important to reflect on what true happiness is and where it can be found. A moment's reflection shows that it's not found in the past or future. The past is gone, and our memory of it is undependable. The future is an uncertainty. The only place to find happiness is in the present.

But even here in the present moment we have to know where to look. If we attempt to base our happiness on things that change — sights, sounds, sensations in general, people, external things — we're setting ourselves up for disappointment. We're building a house on a cliff where there are many landslides. True happiness has to be searched for within.

Treasure hunt
Meditation is like a treasure hunt: To find what's of solid and unchanging value in the heart/mind, something that even death cannot touch, we have to look within.

And to find this treasure, we need tools. The first tool is doing what we're doing right now: We must develop goodwill (metta) towards ourselves. The second tool is to spread that goodwill to other living beings as well. Let's tell ourselves, "All living beings, no matter who they are, no matter what they have done to us in the past — may they all find true happiness, too."

If we don't cultivate this thought and instead carry grudges into our meditation, that's all we'll be able to see when we look inside.

The concept of the breath
Only when we have cleared the mind/heart in this way, having set others matters aside, are we ready to focus on the breath. Bring attention to the breathing. Breathe in a long breath and let it go a couple of times, focusing just under the nose. The breathing is easy to notice here. The mind feels comfortable focusing.

Stay with this spot, noticing how breath moves in and out as the body breathes. There's no need to breathe because the body will breathe all by itself automatically when left alone to do its business. Don't force it, don't fix it, don't make it more obvious. Don't soften it, don't smooth it out, don't hold it.

Allow
There's no need to bear down too heavily with the focus either. Let the breath flow naturally. Simply keep track of it. Take an interest in it, and watch that keen interest grow. If the mind wanders off, and it will, simply bring it back -- without criticism, frustration, or judgment.

There's no need to get discouraged. If it wanders off 100 times, bring it back 100 times. As many times as it drifts off, bring it back the moment it is realized that it has gone elsewhere. Start again. And again. Show it persistence, and it will eventually listen.

Rather than controlling or adjusting the breath, leave that to the body. The play of the meditator is to observe and be the watcher-consciousness that merely knows and is aware in real time. There's no need to reflect because the breath to be aware of is this one and only this one. Doing this keeps a meditator in real time, in the present moment, rather than wandering off.

Where is it?
Once the breath learns on its own to stay on that point of concentration right under the nose, or anywhere in that region below the nostrils (which may change a little, sometimes clearer here than there), the mind will see a counterpart sign (nimitta). Stay with the breath.

The sign is not the object of meditation; the breath is. By staying with the breath, the sign will come there and merge. If one makes the mistake of moving attention to the sign, it will go away and be lost. It is a precious thing, so ignore it until it merges with the breath. It is a creation of the mind because of the breath.

Let go, let go
If there is any tension or tightness in doing this, let it go and relax. We are not building tension. We are allowing serenity. If there's tension, adjust slowly so it can dissipate. If it continues, allow it to be. Often it is resistance that makes it uncomfortable. If craving for comfort develops, it will become a hindrance. So let it be as it is, just as it is, and notice it with dispassion and letting go (nonattachment).

Ever mindful just of the breath
If meditating at home or on a retreat, stay with the breath even when getting up. This is mindfulness of the breath meditation, so stay mindful of it. Avoid changing objects as one might in open-mindfulness. This is a matter of building momentum on this one object.

The longer we sit, the more momentum we generate. It will all be dissipated if we switch to mindfulness of walking or other distractions. Even in getting up and walking, we stay with the breath. The breath becomes the most important thing, the thing that sustains us and gives us life (prana) energy.

Build mindfulness of breathing rather than letting it dissipate by attention to anything else. This mindfulness culminates in absorption (jhana), which is the original meaning of "meditation" (dhyana, zen, seon, chan, one's kammatthana or "field of endeavor," bhavana, the second part of the Path of Purification, the first being harmless virtue that leaves the mind at peace and free of remorse and the third being insight-wisdom).

There are, of course, other types of meditation, contemplations, meditative practices, but this is the basic one, the foundation of all the others. Get good at this one, and there will be none one cannot do. We may find ourselves in the neighborhood of concentration, with access to concentration. That is good. It is not yet absorption, but it is good and may be enough.

Five Factors
When the Five Hindrances (sensual craving, ill will or anger, restlessness, sleepiness or boredom, doubt and uncertainty) come up, meditation will go down. When the Five Factors of Absorption (applied attention, sustained attention...
  • "The first absorption is free of five things (the Five Hindrances or nīvarana). And five things are present (the Five Factors of Absorption or jhānanga). Whenever the meditator enters the first absorption, there have vanished sensual craving, ill will, sleepiness and tiredness, restlessness and worries, doubt and uncertainty.
  • "And there are present applied attention (vitakka), sustained attention (vicāra), blissful rapture (pīti), happiness (sukha), and unification of mind (samādhi).
  • "In the second absorption there are present blissful rapture, happiness, and unification of mind. In the third, happiness and unification of mind. In the fourth, equanimity (upekkhā) and unification" (The Path of Purification, Vis.M. IV).
Keep awareness focused on the breath until the breath (now the nimitta) sucks in or absorbs consciousness. There is nothing to do but allow. The tendency will be to concentration, focus, shrink to a single spot.

And according to Ajahn Brahm, the other absorptions are right at the center of the previous one. Allow awareness to simply stay where it is, full of bliss. Eventually, as one passes through the first few absorptions, this effervescent feeling of bliss or piti is replaced by the much more comfortable and sustainable sense of calm and serenity. 

There's nowhere to go, nowhere to be, no time to do it, and nothing one has to do or think about. Enjoy the silence, and feel the bliss permeate every part of the body with a supersensual pleasure that saturates every cell like soap powder mixed with water until it is sudsy. Repeatedly practicing in this way, protecting the nimitta or sign from distractions, one learns to enter these states at will.

Now one is ready to take up insight meditation or vipassana in a very productive way. If only neighborhood or access concentration has been developed, it is still possible to begin systematic contemplation in line with the Four Foundations of Mindfulness sutra.

Now the fuel is in the rocket for progress to be made, such that with the practice of Dependent Origination, a breakthrough in insight comes. And one enters upon the stages of enlightenment.

Is "insight" more important than "serenity"?

Ven. Nyanatiloka, Buddhist Dictionary, Ajahn Chah talk, Dhr. Seven (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly


Isn't insight meditation or vipassana more important than serenity meditation or jhana (right-samadhi)?

The question is misguided, as Ajahn Chah points out, for there can be no insight without a foundation of right "concentration" (samma samadhi = the jhanas or neighborhood access concentration, but samadhi really means coherence or unification of mind, not the straining effort to focus or pay attention).

AJHAN CHAH: We sit in meditation to establish peacefulness and cultivate mental energy. We don’t do it in order to play around at anything special.

Insight meditation (vipassana) is sitting in samādhi [absorbed concentration, mental purity resulting from singlepointedness, unification or "all-together coherence" of mind] itself.

In some places they say, "Now we are going to sit in samādhi [serenity, tranquility]. After that we’ll do vipassana [insight-meditation]." Don’t divide them like this!

Tranquility is the base that gives rise to wisdom; wisdom is the fruit of tranquility. To say that "now we are going to do calm meditation and later we’ll do insight meditation," you can’t do that!

You can only divide them in speech. It's just like a knife. The blade is on one side, and the back of the blade is on the other. You can’t divide them. If you pick up either, you get both. Tranquility gives rise to wisdom like this. Source
  • [Editor's note: One could practice tranquility or samatha meditation, with all its blissful states and rebirths in celestial deva worlds of wonder, for eternities and never gain insight, the special contribution of a supremely awakened teacher (samma-sam-buddha). But for insight to arise, some measure of tranquility is necessary.]
What is insight?
Vipassanā
 or "insight" is the intuitive understanding flashing forth like light to expose the threefold truth of the impermanent, unsatisfactory, and impersonal nature of all mental and bodily phenomena of existence (namely, the Five Aggregates clung to as "self").

The true nature of phenomena or things is that they are ultimately transitory, disappointing, and not self. It is insight-wisdom (vipassanā-paññā or prajna) that is the decisive liberating factor in Buddhism, which has to be developed along with the two other trainings of virtue (morality, sila) and serenity or unification of mind (concentration, samadhi).

The culmination and fulfillment of insight practice (see visuddhi VI) leads directly to the stages of enlightenment (see visuddhi VII).

Insight is not the result of mere intellectualizing, or hammering things out by mere reasoning. Real understanding with the power to liberate must be penetrating, intuitive, and directly experienced.

Insight is realized or won through direct meditative observation of one's own bodily and mental processes, those being the five we cling to as "self":
  1. form (corporeal phenomena, the Four Elements)
  2. feelings (sensations)
  3. perceptions (cognitions, recognitions, apperceptions)
  4. mental formations (like emotions, volitions, etc.)
  5. consciousness (the impersonal process or stream of mind-moments and concomitant mental factors, cittas and cetasikas).
In the commentaries and the comprehensive meditation manual called the Path of Purification (Vis.M., Visuddhimagga), the sequence in developing insight-meditation is given as follows, namely the discernment of:
  1. the corporeal (rūpa, form),
  2. the mental (nāma, name),
  3. contemplation of both (nāmarūpa, i.e., of their pair wise occurrence in actual events and their interdependence),
  4. both viewed as conditioned (dependently arisen, which is realized by applying of the practice of Dependent Origination or paticcasamuppāda),
  5. application of the Three Characteristics of Existence (impermanence, unsatisfactoriness, not self) to all mind-and-body conditions.
Intensive sitting meditation is a good start.
The stages of gradually growing insight are described in the nine insight-knowledges (vipassanā-ñāna), constituting the sixth stage of purification beginning with the "knowledge of rise and fall" and ending with the "adaptation to Truth."

For details, see visuddhi VI and the Path of Purification (Vis.M. XXI). Eighteen chief kinds of insight-knowledge (or great insights, mahā-vipassanā) are listed and described in the Path of Purification (Vis.M. XXII, 113):
  • (1) contemplation of impermanence (aniccānupassanā),
  • (2) of unsatisfactoriness (dukkhānupassanā),
  • (3) of not self (anattānupnupassanā),
  • (4) of aversion (nibbidānupassanā).
  • (5) of detachment (virāgānupassanā),
  • (6) of extinction (nirodhānupassanā),
  • (7) of abandoning (patinissaggānupassanā),
  • (8) of waning (khayānupassanā),
  • (9) of vanishing (vayānupassanā),
  • (10) of change (viparināmānupassanā),
  • (11) of the unconditioned (or signless, animittānupassanā),
  • (12) of desirelessness (apanihitānupassanā),
  • (13) of emptiness (suññatāupassanā),
  • (14) insight into phenomena that is higher wisdom (adhipaññā-dhamma-vipassanā),
  • (15) knowing and seeing according to reality (yathā-bhūta-ñānadassana),
  • (16) contemplation of misery (or the danger inherent in things, ādīnavānupassanā),
  • (17) reflecting contemplation (patisankhānupassanā),
  • (18) contemplation of turning away (vivattanānupassanā).
Through these 18, wrong views and adverse ideas are finally overcome, for which reason this way of overcoming is called "overcoming by the opposite" (tadanga-pahāna, overcoming this factor by that). 

Therefore (1) dispels the idea or illusion of permanence, (2) the illusion of satisfactoriness, (3) the illusion of self, (4) lust, (5) greed, (6) origination, (7) grasping, (8) the illusion of compactness [the persistent idea that things are units rather than composites], (9) karma-accumulation, (10) the illusion of lastingness, (11) the conditions, (12) delight, (13) adherence, (14) grasping and adherence to the illusion of substance, (15) attachment and adherence, (17) thoughtlessness, (18) dispels entanglement and clinging.

Insight may be either mundane (lokiya) or supermundane (lokuttara). Supermundane insight is of three kinds:
  1. joined with one of the four supermundane paths (stages of enlightenment),
  2. joined with one of the fruitions of these paths,
  3. regarding the extinction, or rather suspension, of consciousness (see nirodha-samāpatti).
See samatha-vipassanā or calm-and-insight meditation (visuddhi, III-VII).

Further reading
  • Manual of Insight by Ledi Sayadaw (Buddhist Publication Society, Wheel 31/32)
  • Practical Insight Meditation and Progress of Insight by Mahāsi Sayadaw (BPS.lk)
  • The Experience of Insight by Joseph Goldstein (BPS.lk)

Thursday, January 28, 2021

January full moon meditation (live)

Meditation's boring! The mind-body problem

Olivia Kissper; Ananda (Dharma Buddhist Meditation), Jen B., Dhr. Seven, Wisdom Quarterly

(Olivia Kissper, 9/28/20) 💜 WARNING: Some meditation can get a person high, like this kaleidoscope psychedelic trip with visuals. This is a trippy audio-visual "meditation," a treat for the senses that culminates in a relaxing journey.


They say joy, energy, and clarity are possible. But sitting meditation is boooorrring. There, I said it.

I want to start the journey of making life how I dreamed. I meditated before, starting off on the path deep into myself and everything.

I started to discover how relaxed and at peace I could feel. But then it got boring.

I asked a teacher who said boredom is the result not of meditation but of expectations, craving, aversion, and delusion. "It's uncomfortable, and keep going." That was the advice.

To keep going, I reflect on the benefits of meditation (sitting, standing, walking, lying down) and mindfully doing everything else by monotasking to be in the moment instead of entertained and distracted.

We love our distractions and crave compelling entertainments to get there. So what are the BENEFITS to living meditatively and mindfully?
  • Rewired brain for optimal mental function
  • Increased balance and ability to handle life dynamics
  • Heightened clarity and creativity of all kinds
  • Greater peace of mind, relaxation, well being
  • Enhanced vitality and life energy
  • Better self awareness
  • Enhanced sense of purpose
  • Connection to inner guidance
  • Improved focus and concentration
  • Increased self-confidence
  • Softened pain, stress, tension (mental, physical, emo)

The old people to come (comedy)

Comic Lachlan Patterson, CBC, 12/18; The Villages; Pat Macpherson, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly

The new old people are going to suck (CBC Comedy) "Nobody wants to hear stories about your food blog, Grandma." Just ask Lachlan Patterson on the sixth episode from the 23rd season of the Halifax Comedy Festival on CBC Television.

CBC Comedy is a destination for funny Canadian web series, stand-up comedy, sketches, and clips from TV shows from the CBC, Canada's public broadcaster. Subscribe for videos from shows like Kim's Convenience, Baroness von Sketch Show, and Schitt's Creek. Check out cbc.ca/comedy​ for more original comedy.

Seriously, today's old people!
(YourMovieSucksDOTorg, Jan. 13, 2021) Quickie: Review of Some Kind of Heaven at the Villages

Is it time to join the KKK? (video)

Daryl Davis (KKK), comedian Jim Dore; Pfc. Sandoval, CC Liu, Seth Auberon, Wisdom Quarterly
Racist hate: Brotherhood of the Klans (Southern Poverty Law Center, splcenter.org)

Who in the world does Daryl Davis think he is? What in the heck does he think he's doing? Something. His TED Talk has gone to his heart. We have to get to the roots of our fear and ignorance, craving for our own selfish interests. (These are Buddhism's Three Poisons of the heart/mind). Davis is on a mission to do something about it.