We are constantly drawn to problems that have technical, or political, fixes, rather than to the larger and more spiritually impactful inquiry that eludes definitive answers—the mystery of the human heart. To what do we dedicate our lives? How can we have the right to claim being fully human? To what do we aspire in practice? This inquiry begins every time we come to meditation. At that moment, we are challenging our assumptions about being limited and bound to habit. We open to a state of vast and infinite possibility.

What is meaningful to us? We are a culture obsessed with money, and other perceived sources of power. Often our personal aspiration is very small. Why not go for the whole enchilada? Why not aspire to be completely free for the benefit of all beings everywhere? We can have such aspirations that bring joy even in the midst of our suffering.

Can we have the courage to walk the heartful path? Can we be inspired to join individual and collective action toward meaningful social change? And what is social change but the movement of each individual heart towards freedom?

Faith is an essential ingredient in our spiritual journey. In the teachings, it is one of the five spiritual faculties necessary for understanding and awakening. Faith is usually first because it is the ground on which our awakening unfolds. When we have faith in the practice, we are willing to put energy and effort into it. Our determined effort to be present leads to deepening mindfulness. Mindfulness leads to concentration. And when the mind is concentrated, focused and clear, wisdom and compassion, necessary ingredients of awakening, arise.

The Pali word saddha, translated as “faith,” implies trust, confidence. This does not mean believing that things will be as we wish. Nor is faith trusting something outside ourselves or our linear intelligence. It is a deep inner connection to what is true that assures us we can meet our life openheartedly. Often the word “faith” is understood as an unquestioning devoted belief in doctrine or a teacher that overrides or ignores our own experience. The faith to which the Buddha pointed actually arises from awareness itself. We see for ourselves that awareness awakens our hearts and minds to greater goodness. We might be inspired by our teachers or words we read, but it is the practice itself that deepens and confirms our inner wisdom and inevitably, our faith.

Having trust in our capacity to meet every moment with wise attention gives us the courage and faith to be awake to our life. What do you trust? Got faith?

What are your intentions for this New Year? According to traditional Buddhist teaching, every mind moment involves an intention. This suggests the profound subtlety with which each choice operates in our lives. Our bodies are rarely still, except perhaps in meditation; and each of our constant bodily movements is preceded by a volitional impulse, usually unnoticed. Intentions are present even in such minute and unnoticed decisions as where to direct our attention or which thoughts to pursue or drop. These decisions influence the trajectory of our lives repeatedly. The accumulation of these small choices shapes our lives.

Our intentions–noticed or unnoticed, gross or subtle–contribute to our suffering, our happiness, even the path to freedom. Intentions are seeds–the life garden you grow depends on the seeds you plant, nurture and water. Long after a deed is done or a word said, the trace or momentum of its intention remains, conditioning future happiness or unhappiness. If we nurture intentions of greed or hate, their inherent suffering will sprout, both while we act on them and in the future in the form of reinforced habits, tensions and painful memories. If we nourish intentions of love and generosity, the inherent happiness and openness of those states will become a frequent companion in our life. A daily sitting practice is the ground from which the seeds of our intentions sprout. Spending time each day reflecting on our deepest intentions nurtures those seeds. What are your intentions for each moment, each day of this new year?

It’s the Season of Giving. Dana or generosity is the foundation of the Buddhist path and its cultivation is the beginning of spiritual awakening. We like the idea of transformative & transcendental meditative states, and often we are willing to put our effort into that. However, the springboard for genuine meditative states is the cultivation of generosity and integrity. These qualities of heart allow insight to occur most gracefully and easily.

Generosity has tremendous force because it arises from an inner quality of letting go. Being able to let go, to renounce, and to give generously all spring from the same source, and when we practice dana, we open up these qualities within ourselves. Letting go gives us profound freedom and many loving ways to express that freedom.

The Buddha said that a true spiritual life is not possible without a generous heart. Generosity is the very first parami, or quality of an awakened mind. The path begins there because of the joy and openness that arise from the generous heart. Pure unhindered delight flows freely when we practice generosity. We experience joy in forming the intention to give, in the actual act of giving, and in recollecting the fact that we’ve given. I invite you to practice giving joyously this season.

Every endeavor requires effort. No matter how much raw talent or passion we have for an undertaking, no progress can be made without effort. Indeed, on the night of his awakening, the Buddha said “I shall not give up my efforts until I have attained whatever is attainable by perseverance, energy, and endeavor.”

Accordingly, he taught Wise or Right Effort as the first of the three factors of the Samadhi or Concentration mind training aspect of the Path. Wise effort provides the energy needed for mind training and right mindfulness the applied collectedness necessary for penetrating or insightful awareness.

Effort must be balanced—like the strings of a musical instrument: neither too loose, nor too tight. Right Effort doesn’t mean “efforting” in a grasping way, but steady, persevering and determined energy.

Right effort is divided in the texts into four “great endeavors,” to: prevent the arising of unarisen unwholesome states; abandon unwholesome states that have already arisen; to arouse wholesome states that have not yet arisen; and to maintain and perfect wholesome states already arisen.

Unwholesome states require dormant defilements be prevented from erupting and active defilements be expelled. Wholesome states require undeveloped liberating factors be brought into being, developed to full maturity.

Right effort is not to change ourselves, our personalities—it is deeper: to understand our own minds. Through that understanding, we come to know the world as it is—its mystery, joys and sorrows. What effort are you willing to make for your own wisdom and liberation?

So what is Wise Livelihood?

From the description in the suttas it seems to boil down to not harming others. That is, do not earn your livelihood in a way that causes harm. Most of us today, in this country are fortunate enough to be able to avoid the types of business that cause direct harm, at least on the surface. Our investments, the collateral damage of our companies, etc.—these are another story. We must be vigilant to make sure that we are doing what we can to avoid making our living from activities that despoil the planet, fill the world with weapons, support inequality & injustice, and promote substance abuse.

Wise Livelihood is far from simple. We need to consider right intention and right view when we analyze right livelihood, otherwise we can become simplistic and smug about “good” and “bad” jobs. In addition, we may focus too much on the work we do at the expense of looking at the way we do it. It is not enough to avoid selling weapons; how we behave when we are making our living is an important aspect of Wise Livelihood. Someone in a “good” job may spend most of their time figuring out how they can beat the competition or get a few more dollars out of the clients’ pockets or chronically lose their temper and belittle their assistant. The butcher who is doing his work mindfully, compassionately with concentration focused on the development of the path may be free. The salesperson or business owners who are offering services in a competitive market may be free or not, depending on the degree to which they see things as they are and devote the fruit of their actions to the benefit of all beings, not in a theoretical, but in a practical way—moment to moment.

On the Noble Eightfold Path, the grouping of Integrity consists of wise speech, wise action and wise livelihood. While it is useful to focus on the individual parts of the path, it is important to remember that looking at the Eightfold path as a list of separate items is like thinking you can realize the full impact of a stream by analyzing its photograph.

Analysis and discussion of the snapshot of the stream is useful. We can break the scene apart. Learn about the bank, the water flow, and the stones. But the photo doesn’t capture the complex dynamic movement of the rushing, swirling water or the relationships among the earth, the water, the rocks, the air and you, the viewer. While a single visit to the stream allows the full experience, it takes many visits over years to see the effects of time and the dynamics of the elements. As with any complex system it is necessary to experience it over time to get a full sense of its real nature.

So, the eightfold path, like the stream, is a complex system. There are relationships among the individual elements both in the moment and over time. It is only in this complex context that we can understand and, more importantly, apply each step in our lives. Next week we will continue our exploration of the path with a look at wise livelihood, until then you can find our exploration of the first 4 steps (and of the Four Noble Truths) here.

In the wake of the hurricane that blew through our region and touched everyone, we are once again reminded that our ability to weather these inevitable meteorological events are not unlike our ability to weather the inevitable emotional and psychological storms in our lives. Both call us to remember that we have qualities needed for resilience already within us. Some of these qualities will be called upon in the coming days, especially in an election season fraught with deeply opposed philosophies.

In an article in the New York Times a few days ago entitled “Learning to Bounce Back” we were told that what psychologists and neuroscientists say is needed for our resilience is “the reach of our social networks…quality of our close relationships [and]…..our beliefs and habits of mind.”

When we practice mindfulness and kindness, we cultivate and develop qualities and habits of heart and mind that strengthen our resilience and help us to bounce back from the storms of life, whatever their accompanying hardships. Compassion, the “fluttering of the heart in response to suffering” is one such strengthened quality—it is an emanation of loving kindness, not grounded in pity or fear but, rather, a deep supportive response of the heart based on the dignity, integrity and well-being of every single creature. It is the spontaneous response to the suffering and pain we encounter. It is our feeling of mutual resonance and natural connectedness in the face of the universal experience of loss and pain. In this election/hurricane season, can we cultivate compassion, starting with compassion for ourselves?

We start with compassion for ourselves, which gives rise to the power to transform resentment into forgiveness, hatred into friendliness, and fear into respect for all beings. Compassion for ourselves allows us to extend warmth, sensitivity and openness to the sorrows around us in a present, truthful and genuine way. True compassion arises from a profound sense that the heart has a fearless capacity to embrace all things, to touch all things, to relate to all things.

Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche called this the spiritual warrior’s tender heart of sadness. He said:

“This sadness doesn’t come from being mistreated. You don’t feel sad because someone has insulted you or because you feel impoverished. Rather, this experience of sadness is unconditioned. It occurs because your heart is completely open, exposed. It is the pure raw heart. Even if a mosquito lands on it, you feel so touched…It is this tender heart of a warrior that has the power to heal the world.”

What is it like to move through the world with that open, exposed, raw heart? Can you bring that tender heart to your experiences and to the experiences of all of our fellow beings who have weathered the storms to differing degrees?