“This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.”
The Dalai Lama: A Policy of Kindness (1990)
Welcome
Dear Friends of Bhavana community,
I would bet that practicing more kindness is not at the top of your priorities in this time of so many anxieties; coronavirus, racial and gender inequity issues and the ongoing political unrest with the country in conflict about the presidential election. However, since the Covid lockdown in March, the Monday evening study group has been exploring the teachings on kindness through a program called Universal Empathy which is offered by Tricycle Magazine and Bodhi College. The teachings have provided a stable and comforting resource while we navigate these troubling times. We felt the teachings were so important that we wanted to practice more consistently ourselves and to share the teachings with as many people as we could. This project emerged from group consensus and we began to explore ways to make that happen. We agreed that if we were to have a 30 day program that we could commit to and were accountable to the group, we would all be more likely to take it seriously. This program is the result of our personal commitments to increasing kindness in ourselves and we are sharing it in hopes that others will join us for this project. To get on the e-mail list, sign up at the top of this page. To just follow along, feel free to check the website and just see where we have been. We love it that you want to practice. You don't have to belong.
Here’s what we learned
- Kindness isn’t always easy. We don’t like the way someone else is doing something and we get mad at them. We don’t like the way we do something and we get mad at ourselves. We aspire to be kind, even in the worst of circumstances because it is the only way to find personal peace of mind and to create universal peace.
- Kindness can be cultivated and it starts with mindfulness. We set an intention to notice when we experience kindness and when we have ill will. We just notice, not seeking kindness nor pushing ill will away, just learning what we can from our direct experience. What do those two experiences feel like inside our mind/body? This is mindfulness practice.
- What we practice grows stronger. Practice means we spend our mind time experiencing kindness as often as possible. When we feel kindness, we encourage it and when we feel ill will, we discourage it. We don’t force ourselves to have a particular experience; that would be unkind. We simply encourage the ones that are skillful and discourage the ones that are not.
- Kindness happens when the environmental conditions support it. When we mindfully notice the conditions that were present when the feelings of kindness or ill will arose, we can see what leads toward kindness and what leads away from it.
- With this knowledge, we can make wiser choices. The ultimate goal of mindfulness is not just stress management, it is wisdom. Kindness is a wise choice.
Here’s what you get by joining with us
- Each day for 30 days, we will post a new quote, a link for a guided meditation, a video or book to read. The links are being collected by our community from internet sources on mindfulness meditation, psychology, and Buddha’s philosophy. On each of the four Sundays in September, there will be an optional community check-in with a brief guided meditation on the theme for the week along with an opportunity to check in and share anything that may be coming up for you around the cultivation of kindness. There will be a Zoom link to the meeting on the website page, and on Facebook for the project. Click at the top of this page to sign up to receive a daily email for the 30 days of the project rather than going to the website or to Facebook.
- There is no charge at all for participating in the program. Generosity is a kindness practice and our time putting this together is our generosity practice. If you would like to see more programs like this, feel free to donate here . We also support students taking additional training, we pay for online programs like the Universal Empathy course at Tricycle and we bring visiting teachers from other traditions on the Buddha’s path. We also maintain a small community center and yoga studio which has been closed for Covid but will reopen as soon as it is safe to do so.
- At the end of the month, all of the daily postings will be collected and made available as an e-publication so you can print it yourself or load it on your electronic reader.