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• Sitting Meditition - 20-30 minutes

 
• Welcome and Introductions

• Review of Skillful Understanding

• Before we can be motivated to seek a way out of Suffering, we must be convinced that Suffering is present in our lives. Two weeks ago we explored Dukkha - the First Noble Truth - and its cause: craving - the Second Noble Truth. We took special note of these Truths in our daily lives and noted them in our journals.

 
• Last Week we looked at the Law of Cause and Effect (Law of Karma)

• to see the connection between skillful intentions and the corresponding skillful actions that manifest in our speech and actions, which lead to harmony in our lives; and the connection between unskillful intentions and the corresponding unskillful actions that manifest in our speech and actions, which lead to disharmony in our lives.

 
• to see the causal connection between The Second Noble Truth: Craving, and The First Noble Truth: Dukkha: that unskillful action (craving) leads to suffering.

 
• to practice by observing intentions arising in our daily lives, to note the root of such intentions as skillful (generosity, loving-friendliness and compassion, and wisdom) or unskillful (greed, hatred, and delusion), and the result of such intentions in terms of the harmony or disharmony of our experiences.

• Sharing of Experiences (have class help me illustrate the Law of Cause and Effect and its role in The Four Noble Truths in their own experience).

 
• If we understand The Four Noble Truths in relation to our own life, this understanding naturally leads to renunciation -- or letting go. We let go of craving because we understand the harm that it brings in its wake.

 
• If we understand The Four Noble Truths in relation to the lives of others, this understanding naturally leads to the other two skillful intentions: loving-friendliness and compassion. We understand the suffering of others, its causation, and the effect of our actions as a causal factor in that person's life: that our skillful actions can promote peace and harmony and that our unskillful actions can increase a person's suffering.

 
• Skillful Understanding supports and conditions Skillful Thinking, and Skillful Thinking supports and conditions Skillful Understanding. Skillful Understanding and Skillful Thinking work together to counteract the three unwholesome roots of greed, hatred and delusion.

• Skillful Understanding erodes delusion. The complete eradication of delusion does not occur until the final stage of enlightenment (arahant), but each flickering of correct understanding contributes to its eventual destruction.

 
• The other two roots, greed and hatred, require opposition through the redirecting of intention. The antidotes to these unskillful intentions are thoughts of letting go, loving-friendliness and compassion. Since contrary thoughts cannot coexist -

 
• thoughts of renunciation dislodge thoughts of greed, and
• thoughts of loving-friendliness and compassion dislodge thoughts of hatred.

• What is renunciation? It's letting go. But letting go of what? Our material possessions? Our relationships, experiences and beliefs? Do we have to leave our family, friends and possessions and go to a monastery?


No. It means letting go of our attachment to material possessions, relationships, experiences and beliefs. It is our attachment to these things that keeps us bound to a world of suffering.

• Material Generosity

 
• Examples from the class - in what ways have you been generous with material possessions and how have you felt -- before, during and after that experience?

 
• Notice the tricks the mind plays to avoid the thought of generosity:

 
• Never having enough to give: "Just wait until I get rich, then I'll build hospitals and beautiful meditation centers to really help people"
• The pleasure from giving is a source of attachment: expecting a "thank you" or a smile -- some positive reinforcement, a payback.
• Giving to avoid unpleasant feelings: small change to a beggar to make him go away; or gifts to charity motivated by tax savings or to support the ego.

 
• Consider giving anonymously or without an expectation of anything in return.

 
• Recall the sense of lightness in the heart and openness in the mind when you have given spontaneously of your time, talents and resources -- free of craving, from a place of wisdom, grounded in loving-friendliness and compassion. This reflects back to the skillful state of mind that preceded it.

 
• Non-Attachment to People, Experiences and Beliefs

 
• We discover that pain arises from clinging to anything -- form, feelings, perceptions, mental formations and consciousness.

 
• Form: (1) other people in our lives (not loving, but possessiveness), and (2) our physical form and our belief that we are in control of it.
• Beliefs, Opinions and Ideas: the various ways in which we define ourselves. This leads to personal conflicts -- both within ourselves and with others -- and has been the leading cause of war.

 
•  Examples from the class - in what ways have you experienced clinging to people, experiences and beliefs and how have you felt -- before, during and after that experience?

 
• Renunciation does not mean that we reject people, experiences and beliefs. Renunciation is the natural result of non-attachment, where we:

 
• understand The Four Noble Truths in our experience and in the experience of others,
• let go of our clinging to concepts of "the way things should be", and then
• respond appropriately based on intentions rooted in generosity, loving-friendliness and compassion -- ardent, clearly aware and mindful.

• What is Loving-Friendliness?  "Loving-Friendliness, or Metta, is a natural capacity. It is a warm wash of fellow-feeling, a sense of interconnectedness with all beings. Because we wish for peace, happiness and joy for ourselves, we know that all beings must wish for these qualities. Loving-Friendliness radiates to the whole world the wish that all beings enjoy a comfortable life with harmony, mutual appreciation, and appropriate abundance." (Bhante Gunaratana)

 
• Like generosity, loving-friendliness begins with a thought.
• The main obstacle to loving-friendliness is anger -- it makes us feel miserable, it disrupts relationships, and it often does no damage to the person to whom it is directed.
• How does one deal with anger? By restraining from acting on angry impulses and by reflecting on its results.
• The best antidote to anger is patience. This gives us time to allow an appropriate response to arise.
• Examples from the class - in what ways have you experienced anger and how have you felt -- before, during and after that experience? In what ways have you experienced loving-friendliness and how have you felt -- before, during and after that experience?

 
• What is Compassion? - "Compassion is a melting of the heart at the thought of another's suffering. It is a spontaneous, wholesome reaction, coupled with a wish to alleviate another's pain." (Bhante Gunaratana)

 
• Examples from the class - in what ways have you experienced compassion and how have you felt -- before, during and after that experience?
• Practicing it often will open the heart to the suffering of all begins and will induce skillful actions in oneself and, consequently, in others.

 
• Summary of Skillful Thinking -- Renunciation (Letting Go), Loving-Friendliness and Compassion -- frees the mind of its attachments and self-identification, which prepares it for awakening and liberation.

 
• Assignment for next week:

• Homework Schedule (Review Exercises)
• Read/Review Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness - Step 2: Skillful Thinking
• Read Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness - Step 3: Skillful Speech

• Closing Meditation - Loving-Friendliness