Solar eclipse: Stay inside and meditate

Solar eclipse: Why some will stay inside and meditate instead of watch

(Axios) Instead of going outside and looking to the sky during the total solar eclipse on the morning of April 8, 2024, some will stay inside with the curtains closed.

The big picture: For centuries, people have turned to rituals and mythology (prayers and astrology) to honor and make sense of the solar eclipse.

Zoom in: Members of the Navajo Nation traditionally treat the solar eclipse as a sacred time to stay inside and quietly meditate, Henry Fowler, a math educator at Navajo Technical University, tells Axios.

He says that when the solar eclipse happens, it's believed that the sun is dead, "but it's going to rejuvenate, rebirth itself in the cycle so that we're able to live in harmony with the natural laws again."

To "honor the order of the cosmos," Fowler says Navajos (Dine) don't drink water, eat, sleep, or use the restroom during an eclipse.

• 

  No, inside, Dummy, inside! Don't sit out here.

  [My mother reports that in Mexico, it is believed that pregnant women had better stay indoors, for if the shadow should fall on them, their children may be born with clef palate. People have to make sense of what happens, so what better way than to look at anything happening at the same time? It's human nature, and it serves us on occasion but can go too far and enter the zone of superstitions.]
• [To add mayhem and biblical significance to this scary event, a plague of locust-like creatures (three different species coinciding) will emerge in the trillions to cover lands in the path of totality.]

The Navajo don't look at an eclipse out of respect and because they worry the powerful event could lead to "unbalance in that individual," Fowler says.

Obey Science, not matter what it says

Context: In other cultures, there are stories that the solar eclipse is caused by a supernatural creature or monster [an asura or Titan named Rahu, rahula meaning "burden"] swallowing the sun [Suriya], James Deutsch, curator at the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, tells Axios.

The Apapocúva-Guaraní people of eastern Paraguay and northern Brazil say eclipses are caused by a bat or jaguar chewing on the sun or moon.

In Norse culture, mischievous Loki is to blame for the darkness, because he lets his giant wolves swallow the sun and then the moon.

In Choctaw legend, it's a black squirrel trying to eat the sun.

The Pomo, an indigenous group in the northwestern United States, have a story about a bear taking a bite out of the moon.

In Hindu [Buddhist, and Jain] mytholog[ies], Rahu gets his head cut off after stealing and drinking the elixir of immortality. Then his bodiless head tries to swallow the sun.

Zoom out: The solar eclipse is a major international event.

• VIDEO: Final preparations underway for Monday's solar eclipse (KTVU FOX 2 San Francisco)

We know the Moon better than anyone.

Although we now know the NASA version behind it, the total solar eclipse remains a multisensory phenomenon where the light suddenly turns to darkness and the temperature plummets.

Experiencing one feels like "the most unnatural natural thing you'll ever see in the sky," astronomer and artist Tyler Nordgren tells Axios.

Many people make loud noises when they view the event, just like people did hundreds or even thousands of years ago when they tried to scare mythical creatures away, Deutsch says.

Get the rundown of the biggest stories of the day with Axios Daily Essentials. Solar eclipse: Why some will stay inside and meditate instead of watch (msn.com)

• Carly Mallenbaum, Axios, 4/7/24; Ashley Wells, Sheldon S. (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Today is the Spring Equinox (March 19)

Rachaeal (13 News); Bridget Nielsen; Ashley Wells, CC Liu, Dhr. Seven, Wisdom Quarterly

Meditation reveals the real world.

Today is the first day of spring (March 19, 2020, 8:49 pm west coast, 11:49 pm east coast) in the Northern Hemisphere. It is the change of seasons as Los Angeles goes from winter rains to spring showers all in the same day.

The surrounding mountains are full of snow. The rain devas (and chemtrails) are washing away the new flu virus the media is whipping us into a frenzy about. What is an "equinox"? Night and day look equal. How?

Science has a theory for everything, even if those speculations are often mostly wrong. Don't worry. Someone will imagine a new theory to replace each theory as it becomes untenable. We are NOT told the truth much, but we should probably figure it out ourselves. How? We can meditate to regain the mental powers that allow us to see directly for ourselves. Until then, science and mysticism are all we have, indirectly. Like fools we live on faith.

(Bridget Nielsen) Five ways to prepare for spring 2020, Ascension update

First we hear from the boring world of high school science explanations and the priesthood of white-clad (lab coat) scientists then the exciting expanded reality of Contactee Bridget Nielsen preparing for Ascension on March 20, 2020. We'll take "witchy" women's wisdom with the patriarchal platitudes forced down our throats for a little balance.

Habit: How to keep a resolution (video)

Matt D'Avella, Dec. 31, 2018; Ananda, Dhr. Seven, Jen, Ashley Wells (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Get help. Spiritual progress is an inside job.

What we need is committment, discipline, and GRIT. That's passion and perseverance combined. Passion gets us started then fails us, so we then switch to perseverance that doesn't need motivation or emotion, just committment. That's the discipline. Get help, a party to be answerable and accountable to. Be a friend, and you'll have a friend. Keep at it until the habit forms. Then it gets easier. Join a group if necessary. The more resources we have, the richer and more successful we get.

Get your New Year's resolutions to stick

Matt D'Avella (patreon.com/mattdavella) has advice, and his channel is ad-free. He helped and asked for help from:

• Ground Up with Nate Green (nategreen.org)
• that helpful TED Talk abot grit (goo.gl/qDoojm)
• Park the ego at the door, and watch get help.
• Matt makes new videos every week and new
• podcast episodes every Wednesday.
• Podcast (groundupshow.com)
• Newsletter (mattdavella.com/unstuck)
• instagram.com/mattdavella
• twitter.com/mattdavella.

Is a daily meditation practice the goal -- to someday be serene and find enlightenment? Then here's the chance of a lifetime at Los Angeles' Dharma Buddhist Meditation group sitting: meetup.com/zen-07.

Rudolf Steiner on patience and progress

Rudolph Steiner via Ven. Sujato, Ellie Askew, Dhr. Seven, Wisdom Quarterly

The Seven Apocalyptic Seals as drawn by Rudolf Steiner in his edition of The Apocalypse of St. John (1907). These seals were also inscribed in the Goetheanum in Switzerland (wiki).

.

Steiner 1892 (etch/Otto Fröhlich)

The founder of Anthroposophy, German philosopher Rudolf Steiner, eventually realized:

"Patience attracts the treasures of higher knowledge; impatience repels them. In the higher regions of existence, nothing can be achieved by haste and unrest. Above all things, desire and craving must be silenced, for these are qualities from which all higher knowledge quietly withdraws." So meditate.

The Teachings of Ajahn Chah

Ajahn Chah (The Teachings of Ajahn Chah: A Collection) edited by Wisdom Quarterly

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Fragments of a Teaching

All who have believed in Buddhism for many years now usually have done so through hearing about Buddhist teachings from many sources -- especially from various monks and teachers.

In some cases Dharma (Pali Dhamma) is taught in very broad and vague terms to the point where it is difficult to know how to put it into practice in daily life.

In other instances, Dharma is taught in high language or specialized jargon to the point where most people find it difficult to understand, especially if the teaching is taught too literally from the sacred texts.

Lastly, there is Dharma taught in a balanced way, neither too vague nor too profound, neither too broad nor too esoteric -- just right for the listener to understand and practice to personally benefit from the teachings. 

 

Today I would like share with you teachings of the sort I have often used to instruct my disciples in the past; teachings which I hope may possibly be of personal benefit to those of you here listening today.
 
One who wishes to reach the Buddha-Dharma

One who wishes to reach the Buddha-Dharma must firstly be one who has confidence or faith as a foundation. One must understand the meaning of Buddha-Dharma as follows.

• Buddha: the "one-who-know," the one who has purity, radiance and peace in heart.
• Dharma: the characteristics of purity, radiance, and peace which arise from virtue, concentration, and wisdom.

Therefore, one who is to reach the Buddha-Dharma is one who cultivates and develops virtue, concentration, and wisdom within oneself. 

 

Walking the Path of Buddha-Dharma

Naturally, people who wish to reach their home are not those who merely sit and think of traveling. They must actually undertake the process of traveling step by step, in the right direction as well, in order to finally reach home.

If they take the wrong path, they may eventually run into difficulties such as swamps or other obstacles which are hard to get around. Or they may run into dangerous situations in this wrong direction, thereby possibly never reaching home.

 

Those who reach home can relax and sleep comfortably -- home is a place of comfort for body and mind. Now they have really reached home. But if the traveler only passed by the front of home or only walked around it, one would not receive any benefit from having traveled all the way home. 

 

In the same way, walking the path to reach the Buddha-Dharma is something each one of us must do individually ourselves, for no one can do it for us.

And we must travel along the proper path of virtue, concentration, and wisdom until we find the blessings of purity, radiance, and peacefulness of mind that are the fruits of traveling the path.

However, if one only has knowledge of books and scriptures, sutras and commentaries, that is, only knowledge of the map or plans for the journey, even in hundreds of lives one will never know purity, radiance, and peacefulness of mind.

Instead one will just waste time and never get to the real benefits of practice. Teachers are those who only point out the direction of the path. After listening to the teachers, whether or not we walk the path by practicing ourselves, to thereby reap the fruits of practice, is strictly up to each one of us.
 
Progress without practice?

Please help me! - Take my medicine (practice).

Another way to look at it is to compare practice to a bottle of medicine a doctor leaves for a patient.

On the bottle are written detailed instructions on how to take the medicine, but no matter how many hundreds of times the patient reads the directions, one is bound to die if that is all one does.

Reading is not enough. One will gain no benefit from the medicine. And before one dies one may complain bitterly that the doctor wasn’t any good, that the medicine didn’t work! One will think that the doctor was a fake or that the medicine was worthless, yet one has only wasted time examining the bottle, reading and re-reading the instructions. One hasn’t followed the advice of the doctor and actually taken the medicine. 

 

However, if the patient actually follows the doctor’s advice and takes the medicine regularly as prescribed, one will recover. And if one is very ill, it will be necessary to take a lot of medicine, whereas if one is only mildly ill, only a little medicine will be needed to be cured.

The fact that we must use a lot of medicine is a result of the severity of our illness. It’s only natural and you can see it for yourself with careful consideration. Doctors prescribe medicine to eliminate disease from the body. The teachings of the Buddha are prescribed to cure the diseases of the mind [heart], to bring it back to its natural healthy state.

So the Buddha can be considered to be a doctor who prescribes cures for the ills of the mind. [Indeed, he was often called the "master physician" because he could so effectively cure others.] He is, in fact, the greatest doctor in the world.

Mental ills are found in each one of us without exception. When you see these mental ills, does it not make sense to look to the Dharma as support, as medicine to cure your ills? Traveling the path of the Buddha-Dharma is not done with the body. You must travel with the mind to reach the benefits.

We can divide these travelers into three groups:

1. The first level is comprised of those who understand that they must practice themselves and know how to do so. They take the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha [the community of enlightened practitioners] as their guides and have resolved to practice diligently according to the teachings. These persons have discarded merely following customs and traditions [in hopes of enlightenment], and instead use reason to examine for themselves the nature of the world. These are the group of “Buddhist believers.” 

2. The middle level is comprised of those who have practiced until they have an unshakable faith [which happens with no falling back upon winning the first stage of enlightenment] in the teachings of the Buddha, the Dharma, and the [noble] Sangha. They also have penetrated to the understanding of the true nature of all compounded formations.

These persons gradually reduce clinging and attachment. They do not hold onto things, and their minds reach a  deep understanding of the Dharma. Depending upon the degree of non-attachment and wisdom they are progressively known as stream-enterers, once-returners, and non-returners, or simply, noble [i.e., enlightened] ones.

3. The highest level is comprised of those whose practice has led them to the body, speech, and mind of the Buddha. They are above the world, free of the world, and free of all attachment and clinging. They are known as arhats or "free ones," [fully enlightened] the highest level of the noble ones.

 

How to purify one’s virtue

Virtue (sila, ethics, personal morality) is restraint and discipline of body and speech. On the formal level this is divided into classes of precepts for lay people and for monastics. However, to speak in general terms, there is one basic characteristic -- that is intention. When we are mindful or self-recollected, we have right intention. Practicing mindfulness (sati) and self-recollection (sampajañña) will generate good virtue. More

Taming the Mind and Heart (Part 1)

Amber Larson, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly; Touristing (flickr); F.L. Woodward (trans.), PTS

Bathing the Buddha, backed by deva, at Saturday Station, Shwedagon Pagoda (Touristing)

 

The Book of the Ones

Numerical Discourses (Anguttara Nikaya)

Burmese bhikkhus on Shwedagon stupa

The Buddha made these declarations to meditative audiences of laypeople and monastics (monks and nuns). They were recorded by monks, who remembered them as being directed at them as bhikkhus. It is clear from the context as well as the meaning that they are addressed to all "hearers" (savakas), all Buddhists, and all people who would practice and strive for enlightenment no matter what other teachings they follow. So we translate the opening word, bhikkhave (lit. "O, bhikkhus!"), to reflect this.
 

Meditating sayadaw (Touristing)

31. "Meditators, I know not of any other single thing so intractable as the untamed mind [heart]. The untamed mind [heart] is indeed an untractable thing. 

 

32. "Meditators, I know not of any other thing so tractable as the tamed mind. The tamed mind is indeed a tractable thing.

 

33. "Meditators, I know not of any other single thing so conducive to great loss as the untamed mind. The untamed mind indeed conduces to great loss.

 

34. "Meditators, I know not of any other single thing so conducive to great profit as the tamed mind. The tamed mind indeed conduces to great profit.

 

39. "Meditators, I know not of any other single thing that brings such woe as the mind that is untamed, uncontrolled, unguarded, and unrestrained. Such a mind indeed brings great woe.

40. "Meditators, I know not of any other single thing that brings such bliss as the mind that is tamed, controlled, guarded, and restrained. Such a mind indeed brings great bliss."

— Gradual Sayings, "The Book of the Ones," Chp. IV translated by F. L. Woodward

Taming the Mind
PTS edited by BPS (further editing and Dhr. Seven), "Discourse to Ganaka-Moggallana" (MN 107)

The Enlightened One (Chngster/flickr.com)

Thus I have heard. At one time the [Buddha] was staying near Savatthi in the palace of Migara's mother in the Eastern Monastery.
 
Then the Brahmin Ganaka-Moggallana approached, exchanged greetings and, having conversed in a friendly and courteous way, sat down at a respectful distance.

Sitting there, the Brahmin Ganaka-Moggallana spoke thus to the venerable one: "Just as, good Gotama [Sanskrit Gautama], in this palace of Migara's mother there can be seen a gradual training, a gradual doing, a gradual practice, that is to say, as far as the last flight of stairs [in a seven-storied palace, explains the Commentary, which is not to be built in a day] so, too, good Gotama, for these Brahmins:

"There can be seen a gradual training, a gradual doing, a gradual practice, that is to say, in the study [of the three three Vedas, which cannot possibly be done in a day] so, too, good Gotama, for these archers there can be seen a gradual... practice, that is to say, in archery. 

"So, too, good Gotama, for us whose livelihood is calculation [ganana, which is this Brahmin's profession, giving him the name Ganaka-Moggallana, explains Editor of The Wheel], there can be seen a gradual training, a gradual practice, that is to say, in accountancy.

"For when we get a pupil, good Gotama, we first of all make him [it was only offered to males] calculate: 'One one, two twos, three threes, four fours, five fives, six sixes, seven sevens, eight eights, nine nines, ten tens,' and, good Gotama, we also make him calculate a hundred.

"Is it possible, good Gotama, to lay down a similar gradual training, gradual doing, gradual practice in respect of this Dharma and discipline?" Continued in Part 2: "The Gradual Training"

Buddhism East and West (travel)

Ashley Wells, Seven, Amber Dorrian, Wisdom Quarterly

Golden Buddhas in Thai Grand Palace (Steveohim/flickr.com); trekking Himalayan foothills, West Bengal, Singalila Nat'l Park, Darjeeling district, near Sikkim (Biswarupsarkar72).

 
As the world was ending, most of us gathered in Los Angeles, the mecca (Bodh Gaya) of world communication right at the planet's throat chakra. But two of our editors took a trip to the far reaches of Buddhistdom, which is just outside of Christendom and the world's other Vedic/Hindu offshoots.

One went east, the other west, one to India, the other to Europe. There didn't seem much use in traveling to world-class cities to find Buddhism hiding out in the city. We can get that at home.
 
No, all spirituality resides, as it has for millennia, in and around the Himalayas. It's the rooftop of the world. The "Rebirth Stories" (Jatakas) tell of the Bodhisat resorting to quiet Himalayan caves.

"Enlightenment does not perfect personalities;

it only perfects perspective."

Saints may be jerks, but you can't let that get you down.

We need to stand right where we are and begin our climb.

  

Island peak on Indian Sea (NH53/flickr.com)

Alas, what did we find? Travel is amazing, amazing beyond imagining. Get a backpack, and get on the road! We recommend it to everyone. If only because it lifts us out of the provincial, the biases we never even think to question.
  
Buddhist Europe is more Central Asian, having traveled up from its co-origins in ancient India/modern Afghanistan. Kalmykia is a lot like being in a second or third world Asian country but with Caucasians.

Bhumi (Earth) is a great place to learn.

Better to spend time on top of the world with a guide like Bish. But what is there to find? Talk of the food, talk of the pain, talk of toilets, talk of dreams, talk of pushing limits, talk of past misgivings -- but for all that what we find is that YOU CAN STAND IN THE PLACE WHERE YOU ARE. That is, you can begin right where you are, wherever that may be.

 

Kukulcan pyramid naga temple (wiki)

We should have all gone to Mexico together and danced at the foot of Kukulcan temple pyramid in Chichen Itza and danced with the Aztecs. Right here, right now, this is where it's at. We dreamed of going there (anywhere) to begin. But we have to stake our ground and set up our mats-and-cushions (zafus and zabutons) and do our sitting (zazen) until dhyana/jhana (zen). Then on to insight (vipassana).

None of this takes a plane ride, a bus tour, a train hop, or a suicide-by-taxi bid. It can all start right NOW. Stop, drop, and roll (out a sitting mat) and see. One can start meditating right here, right now. Or, if one prefers to stand, R.E.M.'s lyrics may make a little more sense. So sit.
  

"Stand" as performed by Legos and R.E.M.

"Losing My Religion" by R.E.M. live on MTV

• Where in the world is God?
• And what about the Son-of-god?
• Buddhism's "31 Planes of Existence"

Meditate

Seven, Wisdom Quarterly

Monastics in Thailand under the Buddha entering nirvana (Dharma Quotes/Flickr.com)

  

What does it avail a person to know everything yet practice nothing? Meditate. 

  

A thousand useless lines could never match a single word leading to peace, serenity, and insight. Meditate.

  

When all we will have done is done, what will we have done? Meditate. 

  

There is that which -- visible here and now with an unclouded mind, liberates the heart. Meditate. But clouded we wander:

  

All asking,

none knowing. 

All talking,

none showing.

All searching,

none finding --

Traveling roads

that go on winding. 

  

Meditate.

"Hurry up and Meditate: Starter Kit"

David Michie (bio for Snow Lion Press); DavidMichie.com

Hurry Up and Meditate: Starter Kit, Inner Peace, Better Health

"I believe that constant effort, tireless effort, pursuing clear goals with sincere effort is the only way" - the Dalai Lama.

A meditation practice can be likened to a river flowing through our lives. In the early stages, like a mountain spring, our practice is fleeting and undeveloped. There may be a fair few leaps and crashes before we settle into a more regular rhythm.

Little by little our practice continues to grow and mature until eventually it becomes like a vast river, attracting everything else to it, no longer a small trickle in our life, but the most compelling force of it.

The river may still encounter obstacles, but they are of little consequence. It will simply flow over or around them, having developed a smooth, calm, but unstoppable momentum.

It is a metaphor and an entirely appropriate one, judging from both my own personal experience as well as my observation of much more advanced meditators.

The question is, How do we get from the Andes to the mouth of the Amazon? How do we develop our own meditation into a calm and steady flow of unstoppable power?

"Through regular practice" is the simple, unspectacular answer. As much as we might wish for a short cut to the blissful state of a mind untroubled by anything it encounters, the reality is that such a mind arises only as a result of regular practice over time. More

Meditation in a High-Tech Age

(WQ) Since altered states are a natural human ability, people desire them from a young age. Children spin themselves spontaneously for example. Teenagers experiment with illicit substances. Adults seek more stable and sustainable means of altering consciousness. Historically, one of the most common means sought out everywhere in the world is rhythmic movement (dance), repetitive pulses (drums/music), endurance exercises (ordeals, endorphin-releasing, second wind), or a combination of these. Church services and social functions have long tried to co-opt and sublimate these natural impulses, fearing the alternatives and their predictable excesses. Raves and extended art/music festivals (Woodstock, Bonnaroo, Burning Man, etc.) are, unfortunately, often combined with the consumption of deleterious intoxicants rather than potentially helpful entheogens and legitimate sacraments.


"Dance Trance" (rhythmic movement and drums) as meditation? Video clip for the Psysurfeur track "Sacred Tree Portal."

"Body Scan" guided Buddhist meditation can be used initially as a deep relaxation exercise. Practiced methodically with equal tranquility and awareness, as a form of mindfulness meditation, this practice can give rise to insight (Vipassana). The scan brings awareness to bodily sensations. For the most part this quiet exercise is relaxing. If it becomes overwhelming or distressing, merely redirect attention to something outside the body until calm is restored. Also available as an MP3 file (buddhanet.net/audio).

"Body Scan" seated guided Buddhist meditation technique led by Malcolm Huxter

Guided Meditations (audio)

Michael Mackenzie (Project-Meditation)

More guided meditations arranged by Michael Mackenzie for relaxation and healing.

Move to Yogaville

NPR Radio "Day to Day," Your Money segment

• Broke and Jobless? There's Always Yogaville

Where do you go when you run out of money? One alternative to mom's couch is an ashram in rural Virginia. People who were recently laid off are welcome, so long as they're willing to clean, forsake beer and meditate daily.

Day to Day (March 17, 2009) · Where would you go when you're running out of money? As the economy continues to sputter, I've turned this question into a hypothetical game of sorts.

At gatherings held by my (mostly unemployed journalist) friends in Los Angeles, a city where the jobless rate now stands at 20 percent, we'd rank the obvious options: parents' house, friends' futon, military. Then there's the less obvious ones: laboring on an organic farm... More>>