#zenmister

[zenwords]

Inner Peace Searching for inner peace begins with the recognition of suffering. Creating world peace begins with the recognition of suffering. Recognizing suffering is easy, but it hurts. Whenever you feel hurt or notice someone hurting, there is suffering. Recognizing that is the first step to peace. If you are not feeling or seeing hurt and suffering, then you have found peace. The minute you begin to worry that the peace won’t last, you are back to suffering. The minute you realize that the peace will last, you have fundamentally changed your way of suffering. When you recognize that you can handle your suffering, you have found peace. — Zenmister, from Peace & Suffering #peace #suffering #innerPeace #zenmister #zenwords https://www.instagram.com/p/CnwtPGYux4N/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

#peace #suffering #innerpeace #zenmister #zenwords

[zenmister]

Dear Zenmister, recently my psychologist and my doctor suggested that i take antidepressants, and it scares me. i feel like i'm going downhill, but i can't seem to reach the bottom. how can i cope with this sadness? i feel like i'm locked in, with no way out. i try to breath but every time the feelings submerge me and everything feels hopeless.

Taking antidepressants is a good way to put the brakes on a downhill slide. Rock bottom never feels like the bottom until you start to go up again.

Breathing consciously is a good way to be with your sadness, but when it is so overwhelming it helps to be more proactively positive. Try to think of things you are grateful for, or about things you love in an uncomplicated way, like a pet or a favorite sweater. If possible, try to spend time with friends or supportive family, get exercise, drink water, and rest on little islands of comfort within the sadness.

If there is a specific circumstance that is making you sad, be patient with yourself as you come and go from feeling its intensity.

[carodyl100543]

ZenMist: Aromatherapy Bathroom Steamer for Serene Atmosphere

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Embrace the serenity of aromatherapy with ZenMist and make every shower a calming ritual for your body and mind.

[modernmonkeymind]

Favourite Tumblr blogs? 🙂

@panatmansam @lazyyogi @old-hippies

@deepinsamsara

@zenmister

[cyclicallife]

A Question / An Answer

Greetings dear friend, I have been in the midst of cancer for 3 years. It has, as you can imagine, altered my life. I keep looking back and thinking ‘oh back then! It was better/easier etc.” I can catch myself and I feel angry and guilty for thinking about this. Even during meditation I find I’m annoyed with myself.

Can you offer some advice about being gentler during such a rough time? Many thanks, Jeremiah                                                                      

Hello dear friend Jeremiah,

Thinking about how things were easier and better in the past is a natural part of grieving what you have lost. However, what you lost was not so much your health, but an innocence. It was easier then because your problems seemed of a lesser magnitude than your problems now. You still have plenty of innocence, you still don’t know what the future holds, but when you live with cancer you have all your other life problems plus cancer. You have a much deeper perspective that can’t ignore the fragility of life.

When you look back at your earlier self, you can think, lucky me, I didn’t know what was coming. Now you still don’t know what is coming, but you don’t feel as lucky or you may feel unlucky or cursed. Yet, you are vibrantly alive.

It is outrageously courageous of you to sit meditation. Meditation is where your deepest fears vie for the light of your attention. It is where your mind processes your grief. Thinking about a simpler time is a fine thing to do. Wishing for past and future heath is a big part of the process.  Feeling guilty and angry for having thoughts is a reaction. When you notice those reactions practice responding.

A response is an intentional reaction. When you respond you can include compassion. Meditation is a time to let go of thoughts. As your attention is on your breath, there is no other thought. You think about the past and notice the thought, then bring your attention to your breath. Your feeling guilty for having a thought you didn’t want is another thought, so notice that and bring your attention back to your breath. Your getting angry is another thought, notice that and return to your breath. You don’t need to sort your thoughts into good or bad, right or wrong, you just have to notice them and bring your attention back to your breath. That is repeatedly throwing out your mind. When you finish meditation, you can let your thoughts run again, but meditation is a time to practice dropping off your thoughts.

If dropping off thoughts isn’t working for you. Practice a more active form of mediation. Practice thinking about gratitude. Practice loving kindness mediation for all of the people in your life. Imagine how others suffer, breathe in their suffering and breathe out peace and wellness for them.  If you are in the hospital with other people, practice healing them. Breathe in their sickness, and breathe out peace and wellness for them. That kind of thing occupies your mind more than a more open form of mediation. Walking meditation is also good for that. You move and drop your thoughts off as you focus your attention on your feet touching and leaving the ground.

Overcoming a pervasive fear takes a lot of practice. Fear digs in and spins off things like guilt and anger. With practice though, you can change your pervasive habit.

In is still important to embrace not knowing. Not knowing brought you happiness before you knew, and you need to remember that you still don’t know. As you await test results, remember you don’t know. Not good, not bad, just don’t know.

As you experience the joy of a positive test result notice that nirvana of the fears going away. Pain comes and goes. When it goes that is bliss.

Peace,

Peter

#zen #buddhism #self aware #self love #kindness #meditation #zenmister #question #answer #help #helping others #Testicular Cancer #Cancer #American Cancer Society #Cancer Treatment #cancer survivor

[thelittlebigbear]

@sadarthagrunge @zenmister @tumblysock @anestesiamental @scoutoslosummer @themediocrebaker @amyramsey @wew34rbl4ck @jazzybomb @high-motivation-blog @epoxyx-w @lootylou @juneshollow @mmmmmhmmph @delinast @wanderingmind13 @buncer 

Ray-Ban Sunglasses

[radical-revolution]

It is not so easy not to think. Thoughts think up themselves. We think up ourselves. We think we are this and we think we are that and this and that are good and bad and true and false and right and wrong and black and white and grey. The simple answer of not thinking is not simple at all. It sounds idealistic and impossible, possible, possibly for highly trained monks and sages, but not practical for practical people. Not thinking is not possible for practical thinking people. However, the thought of not thinking is possible. We are constantly exposed to sounds we don’t hear, sights we don’t see, and thoughts we don’t notice. We systematically ignore all these things because we only have so much focus available to us. When a thought occurs to us that we are not good enough, smart enough, this enough, or that enough, that thought comes with an emotional value that demands our attention and takes our attention away from another thought that could be useful. All the useful thinking we do to try to protect ourselves from those kinds of thoughts get swept aside by the lurking possibility of what if that horrible thought is right? Right or wrong, that horrible thought is a thought.

— Zenmister, from the post What If I’m Right? 

[panatmansam]

What's out there beyond sensory experience?

Okay, in answering this question  I am changing out of my monks robe and putting on my hoodie and a pair of sweats. I am not giving the straight Buddhist response. To get that I suggest you start with MN10: The Satipatthana Sutta: The Discourse of the Buddha on Frames of Reference(Majjhima Nikāya) Then talk to a Mahayana Buddhism guy like @silentgong​, @zenmister​​ or @zenbwater. They’re all my friends are they’re all knowledgeable and cool.

I am also setting aside my skeptic’s propeller beanie because I am not sticking strictly to science in this one. I am going to interject anecdotal personal experience. I will say that I am so doing so the reader is warned. I am of course speaking of my personal experience in deep meditation.

It took a long time before I was able to reach the deepest levels, at least the deepest I have yet gone. My wife asked me to stop or at least slow down because she said I was “fading away”. I was also writing some odd things here on the blog late at night. I’d read them next morning and and do a full face Picard face palm and then delete them but not before saving them to Evernote, you know, for future reference. 

The trick was dealing with sleep. When you are in deep focused meditation, in my case focused on a candle with headphones playing delta wave binaural beats on full over the ear noise-cancelling headphones. I am sitting up in a chair comfortable. Covered with a fleece blanket like a cape I stare at a 4-hour white Shabbat candle as a 1-hour spiral sandalwood incense. The candle is my timer.

Starting about 1:00 I listen to suttas over the headphones as Leigh sleeps. Some I repeat several times over. Often I softly speak the words too. Then after the first change of incense I do “jhana” which is a combination of two meditative techniques taught by the Buddha himself insight meditation (vipassana) and calm meditation (samatha).

I will extinguish the candle and wear this fancy sleep mask that is feather-light on your face and doesn’t block your eyelashes when you blink. Then with practice I focus on my breath which syncs with the beats which sync with my brain waves or something. Whatever they actually do they are a great anchor for focus for me and they drown out distractions.

In the darkness I struggle at first to stay one-pointed. I will sometimes do a body scan then. One thing I can do through training is to reduce the sensation from my body. All sensation, pleasure and pain. That includes emotion. I have to get there first though. Its like struggling against a hurricane wind then getting safely inside and shutting the door. I know the storm is out there but I am safe, for now.

There used to be a ride at Disneyland when I was a kid. It was free back when you had tickets of different values. I loved it. You would “shrink” down and go all the way into an atom then expand again. There was a guy narrating it as if it were your thoughts. That is what the experience was like. Going deeper into a void. Into a blackness which was neither inside nor outside.

No sound, no sensation. No sense of distance. No sensation of movement. No fear of falling. I hear my breath. Very distant and soft. Then sensation stops altogether. I experience a flash of something. I feel sleep creeping in. I play with it. I push it back. Then let it come in again. I see something I don’t want to see. The night is over. The candle is gone. Leigh is awake and the coffee is made.

There is a place inside. A real place. I’ve seen what the forest sages have seen. Does that make me a sage? No. I’ve only seen the very edge of it. I am backing off. I’m not ready. I know this is it for me. This is what I was born to do. I know I didn’t answer your question. Maybe the sutta will. The Buddha was a wise man. A fully enlightened teacher, Shakyamuni Buddha! Me, I’m new to this jhāna thing. So far, its pretty exciting!

#Anonymous

[zenwords]

Listening to People If you practice listening to people, giving them your attention despite your lack of interest you will demonstrate caring even if you don’t feel it. Don’t judge what people say as being worthy of your attention or not. Build you capacity for attention by listening and focus only on listening. When you are distracted by your inattention, go back to listening, hear what they are saying. By listening to people and giving them your attention you learn to care. As you learn to care, listening becomes easier.
— zenmister #listeningToPeople #caring #judgment #mindfulness #zenwords #zenmister https://www.instagram.com/p/CkV2ezEue0a/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

#listeningtopeople #caring #judgment #mindfulness #zenwords #zenmister

[zenmister]

Dear ZenMister,

For political reasons my country and its people are under horrible threat of annihilation and terror. This threat may manifest and it may not. In the meantime I and my family are under terrible stress of the horrible situation we are in and the future of my children and family.

I know that Buddhism suggest I will deal with that which is present and not with the speculated future - but I cannot. I remain under horrible stress and fear.



I would be very much grateful for your council.

I am very sorry that you and your family are in such difficult circumstances. You are facing terrifying threats and an appropriate response is to be terrified. Living in fear, under threat, makes everything very difficult. When the present is frightening and the future holds more of the same, being content with the present moment is impossible.

You are in the most difficult circumstance, practicing compassion there is important. Physically releasing fear is one compassionate response you can use. Throughout the day notice how you breathe. Fear makes us breathe rapidly and shallow, so breathing slowly and deeply, helps ease the fear. Taking deep breaths is a way of telling the body that everything is ok, even when it is not.

As you breathe deeply to soothe your body, you can notice what you are thinking about. If you are thinking about something in the past, some traumatic event, engage with the memory, breathe with what comes up, and then wish for yourself and your family to be safe and well despite what happened. If you are worried about the future, notice the worry, breathe with it, and wish for your family to be well and safe despite what may happen.

As new traumatic and frightening things happen, be compassionate with yourself and your fear as it comes up. When you feel safe again, breathe and put the new fear away as well as you can. In any moment, being compassionate with yourself and those around you helps you work with any situation. The worse the circumstance, the more necessary compassion becomes.

I wish you and your family peace and safety.

[acalmpeacefulmind]

"...anger is a habit. Your anger habit makes you angry."

- Zenmister (via Tumblr)

#inner peace #understanding #self care #gratitude #yoga #wisdom #awareness #conscious awareness #consciousness #compassion #enlightenment #happiness #insight #inspiration #kindness #meditation #mindfulness #mindful awareness #quiet mind #spiritual journey #spirituality #spiritual awakening #truth

[thethirdi]

"[W]hen your heart breaks open there is just love. There is no lover, no loved, it is just free flowing love."

- @zenmister

#zenmister #love #heartbreak

[equanimity101]

Great Humility

Reblogged from zenmister’s post Great Humility

Humility can bring us back to reality from any ego trip. If we think we are something extra special, or lower than low, a little dose of humility can bring us back to center. Remembering our humility is especially hard when our ego is busy building us up or knocking us down, but that is when we need it most.

To remember our humility, we first have to discover it. That means realizing that we are nothing more and nothing less than anybody else. We are nothing better and nothing worse than we have been or will be. Realizing our humility is recognizing that we are challenged like anybody else and we have gifts like anybody else. Although we are special, we are nothing special. That is humility.

The habits of our ego obscure our humility. Some people impress us and some people repulse us. We want desperately to be more impressive than repulsive. When we start to think we are impressive, we take off on a little ego trip. When we begin to imagine we are repulsive, off we go in the other direction. Humility helps us go on those little trips and come back to ourselves without causing too much damage along the way.

The great thing about humility is that it allows us to be who we are. We don’t have to pretend that we know things we don’t. We don’t have to demonstrate our greatness with accomplishments and accolades. We don’t have to worry that we can’t measure up. All we have to do is remember our humility. It puts us in touch with all that we are. We’re no better or worse than the Buddha.

#humility #ego #zenmister #equanimity101

[yogasavvy]

For me yoga has been a journey that started as purely physical practice I loved how amazing it made my body feel and how good it felt to move together as a group and on my own but as I delve deeper my practiced shifted to self acceptance growing up as a competitive dancer I never felt good enough I was constantly comparing myself to the girl next to me where as with yoga the people next to me inspired me i have learned to love my body where I was at which then lead me to where I always wanted to be ❤️🙏🏼 next time you look at yourself in the mirror stop your thoughts and focus on what you love about yourself and work with wherever you're at now 😊✨ #practiceandalliscoming #yogasavvy #zenmister 📷@zen.words

#zenmister #yogasavvy #practiceandalliscoming

[lazyyogi]

Hi friend. Can you make another post of Tumblr blogs you recommend? 😊

Hey Mimi! Sure thing, soul sista. 

@floralwaterwitch@silentgong@eearth@panatmansam@thecalminside@naked-yogi@lazylucid@arcanalogue@zenhumanism@zenmister@ashramof1

If anyone knows of any other original content spirituality blogs I might like, comment here and I’ll check them out. 

Namaste :)

[panatmansam]

Why is it so often, that these wise masters never give direct answers? Hiding simple answers behind layers of things that just make you scratch your head and go .. what? ..oh umm yea sure?

Very good question and one that has been frustrating students for the last few thousand years. This is more of a Zen Buddhist approach and do not practice that tradition; however, it is a common question and here are some reasons offered:

The attainment enlightenment is not something which can be “thought”. Students tend to want “black letter” instruction such as we might find in a college class. Law School professors do this too.

The Masters want you to be confused at first. They want you out of your typical mode of thought. So they confront you with paradoxes which are insolvable intellectually but which the attempt to solve often leads to great insight. 

Think Kirk in the first Star Trek movie and the unsolvable training simulation the “Kobayashi Maru”. They want you to “think” about the meaning of these cryptic texts until your mind ceases to think and you begin experiencing the universe directly without conscious thought.

Not everything can be grasped intellectually and understanding this is an achievement in itself. This is a way to break the reliance of the student on the presence of the teacher and gain confidence and independence.

Now, this is my personal view, but I think they get a kick out of messing with us and noting our confusion and struggle and then our sudden realization.  It is kind of like watching a toddler walk and fall down a few times until they finally grasp the idea of walking instead of crawling.

Finally perhaps you may want to ask @silentgong or @zenmister. They are both very knowledgeable in that tradition and they may have more to add.

Blessings,

#Anonymous