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MAGAZINE
BRI E F TE AC H I N G S

Brief Teachings
Select wisdom from sources old and new
By The Editors
FA L L 2 0 1 8
Illustrations by Mirko Cresta

EVERYDAY SPIRITUALITY

W e have an absolute life and a relative life—the eternal and the everyday—
that exist together without separation. It’s important to recognize this dual
quality of our nature, otherwise we’ll attach to one side without noticing or appreciating
the other. We should avoid thinking, “Daily life is more important,” or, “Spiritual life is
more important.” We live in both realms simultaneously, and if we don’t notice this, we
will be off balance.

From A Sense of Something Greater: Zen and the Search for Balance in Silicon Valley, by Les Kaye and Teresa Bouza ©

2018. Reprinted with permission of Parallax Press. Les Kaye studied with Shunryu Suzuki Roshi and is the head

teacher at Kannon Do Zen Meditation Center in Mountain View, California.

T H E H E A RT O F M E D I TAT I O N

What is meditation? Please try this example out. While you’re reading, be aware of your
breathing. Once you’ve made that adjustment— being aware of breathing and aware of
reading—see if you’re more grounded, more able to connect personally to what you’re
reading, more available to digest whatever’s especially true for you.

Good news! You can do this all the time! You can breathe while you sit; you can breathe
while you walk. You can breathe no matter where you are or what you’re doing—in a car
or in an elevator, washing a dish or waiting in line. You’re breathing!

Our mind wanders, but our body’s here and now, breathing. Conscious breathing can be
our anchor. We can get dragged back into the past, which can lead to depression, or we
can become anxious about the future, which can lead to fear. Conscious breathing
returns us to the here and the now, where we really belong. It’s a process requiring care,
like training a horse: a slow learner in the beginning but, eventually, a champion.

From Pause, Breathe, Smile: Awakening Mindfulness When Meditation Is Not Enough, by Gary Gach © 2018.

Reprinted with permission of Sounds True. Gary Gach is an author, translator, poet, and teacher living in San

Francisco.

SUB TLE SURPRIS ES

A true practice is a repeated activity with mystery. We pick something that suits us and
we do it over and over again, but it’s really not so much because we think we are going to
get it perfect, or even exactly right. It’s more because the repetition silhouettes the
changes, and the format of constancy lulls us into the best surprises when the internal
continuity breaks up. Because we keep doing the same thing, the fact that it’s never the
same keeps yielding the surprise we need.

From A Buddhist Journal: Guided Practices for Writers and Meditators, by Beth Jacobs, PhD © 2018. Reprinted with

permission of North Atlantic Books. Beth Jacobs, PhD, is a clinical psychologist, a lay teacher in the Soto Zen

tradition, and the author of four books on writing and Buddhism.

Illustrations by Mirko Cresta

TO P R AC T I C E I S TO T R A N S F O R M

No matter what Buddhist practices you do, training and transforming the mind is always
the ultimate goal. Perhaps you are doing special Buddhist ritual practices or specific
meditations. Whatever you are doing, if there is no inner change, no transformation,
then this isn’t truly a Buddhist practice. Without inner transformation you are cheating
yourself, and maybe cheating others too.
From Karmamudra: The Yoga of Bliss, by Dr. Nida Chenagtsang © 2018. Reprinted with permission of SKY Press.

Dr. Nida Chenagtsang is the cofounder and medical director of Sorig Khang International, which trains

students in Tibetan medicine.

EXONERATING PLEASURE

It is important to understand that there is nothing wrong with experiencing pleasure.

The path to awakening does not involve torturous self-denial and asceticism; the
Buddha opposed such activity. Pleasure is not a problem. We run into trouble when we
become attached to the pleasure and to people and things that bring it. It’s the
attachment, not the pleasure itself, that leads us to lie to get what we want, to steal
others’ property, or to kill to protect our possessions or honor. So the trick is to
experience the pleasure without clinging to it, being depressed when it’s gone, or trying
to recreate it later.

From The Compassionate Kitchen: Buddhist Practices for Eating with Mindfulness and Gratitude, by Thubten

Chodron © 2018. Reprinted with permission of Shambhala Publications. Thubten Chodron is a student of H.H.

the Dalai Lama and is the founder of Sravasti Abbey in Washington State.

AN AGENT OF CHANGE

We resist change. We fear the unknown. But everything is changing all the time—the
waves, the clouds, and us. If we are quiet and still in the moment, we can witness change
and accept it as inevitable. We can learn to surrender into it, become friends with it.
That doesn’t mean that we don’t work to relieve suffering within that change— we
might, for example, do everything we can to heal ourselves or others from cancer, but
we try not to deny or become angry that the cancer is there. We can acknowledge it, look
at the choices we have, and then act in a loving way.

From Walking Each Other Home: Conversations on Love and Dying, by Ram Dass and Mirabai Bush © 2018.

Reprinted with permission of Sounds True. Ram Dass is the author of numerous books, including the spiritual

classic Be Here Now. Mirabai Bush is the founder and director of the Center for Contemplative Mind in Society.
Illustrations by Mirko Cresta

L O O K I N G B E YO N D T H E N O S E

The opposite of death isn’t life but birth. The door swings both ways: we enter, live for a
time, and then exit. We take our first breath and, not so long after, take our last. In
between is our lifetime, basically a momentary display of color, sound, movement,
feeling, awareness, and complex dramatization in which we’re ever so briefly immersed.
We might pity insects that have a maximum lifetime of just a few days, but we’re in the
same basic position from the perspective of what animates the infinite galaxies of form.
Recognizing this at our core is immensely and wonderfully humbling; we see our
extraordinary tininess and brevity in the boundless presence of all that is, and we end up
not in despair or existential shadowlands but in deeply sobering awe, embodying an
openness that holds it all.

From Bringing Your Shadow Out of the Dark: Breaking Free from the Hidden Forces That Drive You, by Robert

Augustus Masters, PhD © 2018. Reprinted with permission of Sounds True. Robert Augustus Masters, PhD, is

an integral psychotherapist. His many books include Transformation through Intimacy and Spiritual Bypassing.

ALWAYS ASPIRE

A prayer or chant is a way of creating an imprint in your mind to one day perceive and
experience something favorable. It’s a way of actively setting aspiration through a
process of cultivation and familiarization. What you think you become. If I take refuge in
my unworthiness, I engender unworthiness, I stew on unworthiness, and I turn my
attention toward and fill my lifestyle with actions that reinforce my unworthiness.
However, if I take refuge in my basic goodness, I cultivate kind thoughts, I balance my
emotions, and I practice a lifestyle consistent with healthy pride and mutual respect. In
so doing I remember (become mindful) that I’m fundamentally good, decent, and
worthwhile.

From Gradual Awakening: The Tibetan Buddhist Path of Becoming Fully Human, by Miles Neale, PsyD © 2018.

Reprinted with permission of Sounds True. Miles Neale, PsyD, is assistant director of the Nalanda Institute for

Contemplative Science and coeditor of Advances in Contemplative Psychotherapy.

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