Day 4 - Find a Teacher
- danmcneil14
- Sep 4, 2022
- 4 min read
I've been teaching most of my life. I started out as a high school math teacher, morphed into a technical trainer, and most recently certified as a mindfulness instructor. I love sharing knowledge but teaching meditation is different. Today I'll introduce you to some amazing teachers. They'll inspire you and move you. They may explain new techniques but the best teachers don't actually teach anything at all. Rather they show you the truths you already always knew, you just didn't know you knew it until someone gave you the words. If I'm lucky, through these posts, I'll shine a light and you'll recognize your own wisdom. Never forget, you are your best teacher.
In the meantime, allow me to introduce you to five of my spiritual teachers. I love these people and can't wait for you to meet them. Each has had a profound impact on my life. Click on their photos to discover a treasure trove of mindfulness resources.
Jack Kornfield is one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West and one of two primary teachers in my two year program to become a mindfulness instructor.
I challenge you to listen to any of his guided meditations and not be deeply moved.
"Being alive is finding ourselves in the midst of this great and mysterious paradox. There are ten thousand joys and sorrows in every life, and at one time or another we will be touched by all of them. We will all experience birth and death, success and loss, love and heartbreak, joy and despair. And in every moment of your life there are millions of humans just like you all over the world who are being confronted by situations just like yours, some that are joyful and some that are overwhelming where they are struggling to somehow learn how to survive them. What matters is the spirit you bring to each day."
Tara Brach founded the Insight Meditation Community of Washington, DC (IMCW) and the other primary teacher in my two year program.
If I had to pick just one meditation resource, her page could last me a lifetime.
"We are born with a beautiful open spirit, alive with innocence and resilience. But we bring this goodness into a difficult world. Imagine that at the moment of birth we begin to develop a space suit to help us navigate our strange new environment
The same space suit that protects us, can also prevent us from moving spontaneously, joyfully, and freely through our lives.
This is when our space suit becomes our prison. Our sense of who we are becomes defined by the space suit’s “doings,” its strengths and weaknesses.
When we become fused with the space suit, we begin living in what I call trance, and our sense of who we are is radically contracted. We have forgotten who is gazing through the space-suit mask; we have forgotten our vast heart and awareness. We have forgotten the mysterious presence that is always here, behind any passing emotion, thought, or action."
Devin Maroney practices and teaches Insight meditation, sharing the teachings of the Buddha so as to see through delusion and understand things as they are.
I attend Devin's weekly online Living Dharma class where he always challenges me to deeply explore what matters most.
"The first time I sat down to meditate and realized that I could watch the mind from a place that was not of the mind I felt a tremendous relief and even some joy. This was at a moment of deep suffering in my life, but this new experience was so profound that I felt lifted.
Since then, this joy of watching the mind from a curious and impersonal perspective has arisen thousands of times. On some occasions, when a strong desire is finally seen in the light of wisdom and released, the joy is quite intense. On other occasions the joy is subtle, like a little gust of wind.
Today I invite you to notice the joy that follows mindfulness, curiosity and effort."
Sebene Selassie embodies all that she teaches and was my mentor during my two year certification program.
Websites: https://www.sebeneselassie.com/
https://dharmaseed.org/teacher/744/
Meeting with Sebene each month probably shaped me more than anything else as a meditation teacher. Her presence is a tremendous gift. Subscribe to her monthly newsletter The Call for CONNECTION.
"Sati is the ancient Pali word that was translated as “mindfulness” during the Victorian era — the era that took complex Buddhist concepts and gave us riveting translations like “suffering,” “aggregates,” and “sympathetic joy.” In some ways, yes, mindfulness is a great translation for (part of) sati. It speaks to its attentional capacity. And, in some ways, mindfulness is a misnomer.
Sati is ultimately about training and increasing our overall capacity to be with life in a more easeful, non-reactive way — to experience freedom in any moment regardless what is happening. I have found the body to be the perfect place for this training. I believe it’s why the breath and body are objects for meditation in so many traditions."
Richard Rohr is a Franciscan priest, theologian, mystic and founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation.
Website: https://cac.org/daily-meditations/
Richard Rohr's daily meditation has been feeding my soul for many years. Go to the CAC website to subscribe.
"Spirituality is about seeing. It's not about earning or achieving. It's about relationship rather than results or requirements. Once you see, the rest follows. You don't need to push the river, because you are in it. The life is lived within us, and we learn how to say yes to that life. If we exist on a level where we can see how "everything belongs," we can trust the flow and trust the life, the life so large and deep and spacious that it even includes its opposite, death."
Can you believe all of this wisdom is so freely given? Once you start looking, you find it everywhere.
Practice Options
I encourage you to build a practice by meditating each day. Pick an option that most speaks to you or best fits your schedule.
This is my all-time favorite meditation from Jack Kornfield: Worldwide Healing of Love (14 minutes)
Here's one of the latest meditations from Tara Brach: Meditation: Breath by Breath (22 minutes)
Revisit Day 2 - User Guide meditation and see if your experience changes (10 minutes)
Try going solo. Set a timer and follow the breath.
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