Reading Archive (Mindfulness)
Developing Mindsight
Dan Siegel
Oftentimes people hear the word mindfulness and think “religion,” but the reality is that focusing our attention in this way is a biological process that promotes health – as a form ...
Presence: The Quality of Consciously Being Here
Kabir Helminski
A common theme runs through all the great spiritual traditions. It goes by many names – awakening, recollection, mindfulness, dhyana, remembrance, zhikr, presence – and by no name at all. ...
Lessening the Power of Negative Emotions
The Dalai Lama
I profoundly believe that real spiritual change comes about not by merely praying or wishing that all negative aspects of our minds disappear and all positive aspects blossom. It is only by our concer...
Stay With The Breath
Thanissaro Bhikkhu
Put aside your old ways of using your eyes and ears and nose, tongue, body, and mind to focus on issues outside there in the world, to get your knowledge about the world, to figure out how to gain wha...
Don't Side With Yourself
Joseph Goldstein
Through mindfulness, our hearts become spacious enough to hold the painful emotions, to feel the suffering of them, and to let them go. But it takes practice—and perhaps several different practi...
Renaissance
Thich Nhat Hanh
This morning, at sunrise, a new bud appeared on the tree. It was born around midnight. The bark, the skin of the tree, split open under the incessant movement of its sap to make room for a...
Inclining Toward Freedom, Even Through Imperfections
Larry Yang
If we focus only on awakening, we miss most of the spiritual practice. I’m much more interested in how we practice with not awakening, with not being enlightened, because, frankly, those states ...
Wholeheartedness
Brother David
The end -- in all of the monastic traditions, of both East and West -- consists in cultivating mindfulness, being mindful. And "mindful" may be a little misleading, because it sounds a bit much like ...
The Grain of the Wood
Thanissaro Bhikku
There are two sides to the path of practice: the side of developing and the side of letting go. And it's important that you see the practice in both perspectives, that your practice contains both side...
Natural Unfolding
Gil Fronsdal
I believe that spiritual practice unfolds most smoothly when we find how to accord ourselves with nature. A useful metaphor for this is river. The river metaphor is expressive of a practice of accordi...
On Meditation
Thich Nhat Hanh
"During meditation, various feelings and thoughts may arise. If you don't practice mindfulness of breath, these thoughts will soon lure you away from mindfulness. But the breath isn't simply a m...
The Blooming of the Offering Within You
Thich Nhat Hanh
A poem is a flower you offer to people. A compassionate look, a smile, an act filled with loving-kindness is also a flower that blooms on the tree of mindfulness and concentration. Even thought you do...
The Attention That Arises From Caring
Andrew Cohen
Bare mindfulness, or attention from moment to moment, is a good technique as far as it goes, but I don’t feel it’s enough, unless you, whoever you are, care about your own effect in this world and...
Wherever You Go, There You Are
Jon Kabat-Zinn
Mindfulness is considered the heart of meditation but its essence is universal and of deep practical benefit to all. In essence, mindfulness is about wakefulness. Our minds are such that we are ...