Half Day of Mindfulness Saturday December 16 on Zoom: Resting in the Ultimate Dimension

                                                COMMUNITY OF MINDFULNESS/NEW YORK METRO

Inspired by the Teachings and Practice of Thich Nhat Hanh

    invites you to

Resting in the Ultimate Dimension: A Day of Mindfulness with Dharma Teacher David Flint

Saturday December 16: 10-1:30pm on Zoom

 

In our time together, we share the Practices of Sitting and Walking Meditation, Total Relaxation, Dharma Sharing, and more: all grounded in mindful breathing and noble silence.

10:00: Sitting Meditation

10:30: Walking Meditation/Mindful Movements

10:45: Sitting Meditation

11:15: Walking Meditation/Mindful Movements

                                      11:30: Deep Relaxation [AKA Total Relaxation]

12:30: Dharma Sharing

               1:15: Closing: Three Refuges/Sharing the Merit

David has been a student of Thich Nhat Hanh for over 30 years. He received Lamp Transmission from Thay in 2011. David is a Co-founder of the Community of Mindfulness New York Metro and the Riverside and Queens MorningStar Sanghas. David currently works as a Home Hospice Social Worker for Calvary Hospital. David is interested in bringing a Zen Attitude and Zen Questions to our Breath Awareness practice.

Zoom:  https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82053139543?pwd=bWhMT004bW5XSEZXRkF2Y1J2ZVVrQT09  Meeting ID: 820 5313 9543     Passcode: peace

Dial-In: 6469313860,  Passcode: 162600  Meeting ID:    820 5313 9543

Teachings For Contemplation

“When we see there is already a precious jewel in our pocket,

We give up every attitude of craving or coveting…..

Seeing that we are the sun, we give up the candle’s habit of fearing the wind.

Seeing that life has no boundaries, we give up all imprisoning divisions.”

[Breathe! You are Alive, 3rd edition, Kindle location 841]

__________________________

“the effect of meditation is the fire under a pot, the sun’s rays on the snow, and the hen’s warmth on her eggs….there is no attempt at reasoning or analysis, just patient and continuous concentration….  “[We] follow our breathing and meditate on the beginningless and endless nature of ourselves and the world.” 

[From The Sun, My Heart]”

___________________

Patacara 

[A Buddhist Nun' at the time of the Buddha]

With plows the fields are plowed;

With seed the earth is sown;

Thus wives and children feed;

So young men win their wealth.

Then why do I, of virtue pure,

Doing the Master's Teaching,

Not lazy nor proud,

Nibbana not attain?

Having washed my feet,

Then I watched that water,

Noticing the foot-water

Flowing from high to low.

With that the mind was calmed

Just as a noble, thoroughbred horse.

Having taken my lamp,

I went into my hut,

Inspected the sleeping-place,

Then sat upon the couch.

Having taken a pin,

I pushed the wick right down, and

Just as the lamp went out,

So all delusions of the heart went too.  — Theragatha 112-116

______________________________

“Just as flowers and leaves are only part of a plant, and just as wavers are only part of the ocean, perceptions, feelings and thoughts are only part of the self. Blossoms and leaves are a natural manifestation of plants and waves are a natural expression of oceans. It is useless to repress or stifle them. We can only observe them, because they exist we can find their source, which is exactly the same as our own.

When we meditate we seem to have two selves: one is the flowing river of thoughts and feelings and the other is the sun of awareness that shines on them. Which is our own self. Which is true, Which False, which is good, which bad. Please calm down my friend. Lay down your sharp sword of conceptual thinking. 

Don’t be in such a hurry to cut yourself in two. Both are self. Neither is true. Neither is false. They are both true and false.

When the sun of awareness shines on the river of our perceptions the mind is transformed. Both river and sun are of the same nature.”

___________________________________

“The present moment 

Contains past and future. 

The secret of transformation 

Is in the way we handle this very moment. 

Transformation takes place 

In our daily life. 

To make the work of transformation easy, 

Practice with a Sangha   

Nothing is born, nothing dies. 

Nothing to hold onto, nothing to release. 

Samsara is nirvana. 

There is nothing to attain.

  [From the “Path of Practice” verses, in Transformation at the Base]

Unborn and indestructible [Song---   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_ct0L0cZLk]

Unborn and Indestructible

Beyond time and space, 

I am my teachers, I am my friends, 

I am one and yet I am many, 

I am none, I am all, no beginning, no end. 

Unborn and indestructible,

Beyond time and space, 

This body is not me, 

These perceptions are not me, 

And I am not limited by this body, 

I am one with all life, I have always been free.

Song---   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_ct0L0cZLk

The Old Mendicant

Being rock, being gas, being mist, being Mind, being the mesons traveling among the galaxies at the speed of light, you have come here, my beloved. And your blue eyes shine, so beautiful, so deep. You have taken the path traced for you from the non-beginning and the never-ending. You say that on your way here you have gone through many millions of births and deaths. Innumerable times you have been transformed into firestorms in outer space. You have used your own body to measure the age of the mountains and rivers. You have manifested yourself as trees, grass, butterflies, single-celled beings, and as chrysanthemums. But the eyes with which you look at me this morning tell me that you have never died. Your smile invites me into the game whose beginning no one knows, the game of hide-and-seek.

O green caterpillar, you are solemnly using your body to measure the length of the rose branch that grew up last Summer. Everyone says that you, my beloved, were just born this Spring. Tell me, how long have you been around? Why wait until this moment to reveal yourself to me, carrying with you that smile which is so silent and so deep? O caterpillar, suns, moons, and stars flow out each time I exhale. Who knows that the infinitely large must be found in your tiny body? Upon each point on your body, thousands of Buddha fields have been established.With each stretch of your body, you measure time from the non-beginning to the never-ending. The great mendicant of old is still there on Vulture Peak, contemplating the ever-splendid sunset. Gautama, how strange! Who said that the Udumbara flower blooms only once every 3,000 years? The sound of the rising tide— you cannot help hearing it if you have an attentive ear. [Thich Nhat Hanh in Call Me By My True Name]