Excerpt from John J. Prendergast's book: Relaxed Groundedness is posted here. Below is my reflection to the article:

Who am I? What is reality? Is everything changing? Is there something unchanging? Am I born with it? How do I know? I have been exploring these kinds of questions for quite some time. When my mind is silent I have a clear felt sense of open awareness. My mind is clear. my heart is open. I rest in the deepest ground which John J. Prendergast calls our home ground or groundless ground.

There is a continuum of groundedness. The author lists four broad experiential stages of groundedness:
(a) no ground: I am not in the body.
(b) foreground: I am in the body.
(c) background: my body is me (as open awareness).
(d) homeground: Everything is my body.

When I meditate I go through these stages of natural awareness.
(a) I realize that I have a body but I- the soul-am not the body.
(b) My soul is in the body.
(c) When I become aware of the boundless nature of the soul I realize that my body is contained in the container of natural awareness.
(d) The disconnect between different parts of my self goes away. I am in the homeground. I have difficulty in understanding what the author means by saying " Everything is my body."

Natural awareness without inner obstructions helps me grow in my senses of groundedness. when I practice Mindfulness Meditation, my mind becomes attentive and does not get carried away by wandering thoughts, feelings, and desires. Meditation opens up doors to be connected with what is happening in the present moment. Meditative experience is not bound by time and space.
Namaste!

Rachel Naomi Remen is a best-author of many books. Excerpt from her book, My Grandfather's Blessings is posted in the Awakin.org website. Below is my reflection to the wonderful article.

This story narrated by the grand daughter is very timely as we are approaching the gift-giving Christmas time. The conventional way of buying gifts is so terribly time consuming and people feel confused and inadequate about what to give. The spiritual approach for gift-giving is very simple. We do it as a service to God without getting anything in return. My experience of gift-giving is simple and uncomplicated like the experience of the granddaughter Neshume-le. I can easily relate to what the grandfather told his granddaughter, it is not the water the seeds need to grow but" All it needs is your faithfulness." Faith is the foundation of all relationships and of all spiritual practices.

Blessing life is the most effective way of creating and nurturing life in all forms-human and natural. There are times when relationships thin out or break up. Giving unconditional love from the heart based on the foundation of faith repairs and heals our fragile relationships. Several years ago I had an agonizing and depressive experience in my life. It was a heart-breaking experience. It took time for me to recover from it. My deep faith in the goodness of heart helped me emerge from the hurting heart to the healing heart. It was a transforming experience for me.

The best teacher is within ourselves. What we need is calmness, patience, empathy, compassion and above all faithfulness. Life offers many opportunities for working on ourselves to repair and heal our relationships. It is a daily metta, loving kindness practice that heals me and others. It is blessing from the heart.

May we relate to us and others with the loving light of faith and kindness!
​
Namaste!

Upeksha means equanimity. To remain still, unwavering, centered and rooted in the midst of small or big changes taking place in our life. Upeksha is also considered a vihara out of four viharas. They are Loving Kindness, Compassion, Peaceful Joy and Equanimity. We can use one word for Equanimity- Even Mindedness .

We all know how difficult it is to remain centered and rooted when all of a sudden a season of life changes. How can we remain steady and solid in the midst of life’s seasonal changes. How can we remain rooted like a mountain facing dark clouds and bright clouds, rain and snow. The Bhagavad Gita uses the word Sthitaprajna. A sthitaprajna is a person who is well established in wisdom.

Rumi describes equanimity poetically in his poem The Guest House. We will read it at
the end of our experiential equanimity session.

<- Go Back to Pragna Paramita

 Ilie Cioara has written an interesting article here and here is my reflection to it:

We all have a deep longing for Happiness. It is the Sacred within us. It is an egoless Presence with no time and space boundaries. It is Universal. It is Within us. It is Divinity within us. It is Pure Consciousness. It is Holy.

I feel the presence of Happiness when my thinking mind is quiet. I feel the presence of Happiness when I let go of searching for Happiness. It is always within us like pure love, clear light, complete silence. I experience such Happiness when I am fully present with myself or with others; when I am fully absorbed in what I am doing. These are the times when I in the Flow of Happiness.

Daily practice of Mindfulness Meditation, serving others selflessly, loving others kindly and unconditionally helps me. I am not against thinking mind. I need to think to solve the problems when I encounter them. I use my mind to make wise choices. I am thinking when I am responding to these questions. I am happy to reflect on this wonderful reading close to my heart.
Namaste!

Nancy Collier has written an interesting article and below is my reflection to it:

The self-image that I create is only the reflection of the outside of me. It is like stagnant water rather than the flowing river. My life is dynamic. It is not static. It is becoming. It is a process and not a product. The image of me is not my identity which is vibrating with energy and changing. The outside of me does not represent the inside of me.

We all have potential to grow horizontally and vertically. The horizontal axis represents the expansion of my consciousness-my organic connection with nature and people. The vertical axis represents the depth of my relationship with nature and people. In order to experience my inner world, my true identity, I need to be with me fully without getting caught up in mentally narrating what happened in the past or worrying about what will happen in the future. It is flowing with the present. This happens when I do mindfulness meditation and practicing mindfulness in different contexts of my everyday life. This practice helps me grow on both horizontal and vertical axes. It happens when I am listening to me and to others with an open mind and an open heart. It happens when I listen to music or get absorbed in reading a book or contemplating.

Non-judgmental awareness of my inner and outer world helps me avoid the trap of using life as a product to protect my image. Knowing that posting my image on a smart phone is not my true identity. Knowing that my shadow is an unrecognized and unaccepted part of darkness within me and working on it frees me from my self-created bondage. This is a life-long process. There is light within me that keeps me awake in the journey of my life. That light is my guide, my savior.
Namaste!

.John Yates is the author of 'The Mind Illuminated'. An excerpt from the book is published here. Below is my reflection to the article:

Our minds discriminate between right and wrong or this and that. What is being discriminated takes place in our unconscious sub-minds. In that sense I is the narrator of the experience or I is the product of a collection of the unconscious sub-minds. How do I know that? What is that I? It is awareness. Awareness is like an observer. It is pure witnessing consciousness untouched by the collection of sub-minds. That helps us from being caught up in mistaken identity.

When I need to or want to make an important decision about what to choose I do not act impulsively or by my habitual patterns of rushing without pausing. From my experience of such actions I have learned not to be controlled by the voices of unconscious sub-minds. This way of making wise choices is an ongoing process. It is worth doing to prevent or avoid myself from falling into a pit of suffering.

The light of awareness helps me when I am moving toward the dark zone-the wrong zone. When I am aware of what is going on in my mind and refrain myself from doing harm to me and to others, my action becomes a blessing to me and to others connected with me. Mindful actions bring blessings and prevent curses.
Namaste!

Ashley Whillans has written a nice article on importance of time. Following is my reflection on it:

When my mind is divided between two cognitive polls like I want to do something leisurely and enjoyable such as reading a book and checking important email messages I feel trapped by time and feel time poverty. When I do something which I enjoy doing without technological interruptions and technological invasions I feel time affluence, a relaxed, gratifying and joyful state of mind. When my time is fragmented by two demanding tasks, I feel stressed out and not satisfied with either of the two tasks. Time confetti fragments the time of leisure, peacefulness and restfulness. Technology saves time but at the same time takes time away. It's like I have saved time but also I have lost time. Gain and loss at the same time! This is indeed the autonomy paradox.

Good life is choice making. I use discretion when it comes to spending my time. I do not make every situation urgent unless it is really urgent. I have intentionally and wisely broken habitual patterns of automatically and mindlessly responding to tempting and distracting stimuli. It takes time to disengage from the grip of time confetti. I maintain a balance between demanding work and leisurely play. This is an ongoing process.

As Ashley Whillans says, " Working toward time affluence is about recognizing and overcoming the time traps in our lives." It amounts to controlling impulses that captivate my mind. It means cultivating the virtue of wisdom and the virtue of patience leading to wise choices and wise actions.
​
Namaste!

 Metta, Loving Kindness is one of the ten virtues of wisdom. There are three ways of cultivating skills of loving kindness. Before we learn how to practice loving kindness we need to know what hinders or obstructs the cultivation of loving kindness.
There are five hindrances.

1. Ill will
2. Greed or craving
3. Sleepiness and tiredness.
4. Doubt
5. Monkey mind.

We need to work on these hurdles before we cultivate the skill of loving kindness. Otherwise our progress will be slowed by the hindrances.

The first way or version is for the monastics. As the Metta Sutta describes,” Come, monastics, give up these five hindrances, corruptions of the heart that weaken wisdom, and meditate spreading a heart full of lovingkindness to the whole world-abundantant, expansive, limitless, free of enmity and ill will. “

The second way or version is for the worldly people. As the Metta Sutta describes, “ Just as a mother would protect her only son, with her own life, so one should develop toward all beings a state of mind without boundaries.”

We broadcast these emotions of loving kindness like a conch blower or horn blower spreading the sound everywhere, in all directions. This practice is to change the way our unmindful mind works. It is to make our mind malleable and fluid without bounding, spreading all around in all directions; to shift the focus of our mind from unskillful emotions like ill will, resentment, anger or hatred to the skillful emotions like loving kindness towards all beings. Changes do not happen in a short time. We need to practice loving kindness on a consistent basis. You may select one person per day and expand your circle slowly. Do not rush. It is like planting the seeds of loving kindness in a small pot and slowly expanding the pot.

The word love has many faces. In ancient Greek language three are three different words for love:

• Agape-pure, universal Divine Love.
• Philia-brotherly love. Love for family, mother child love, love for friends, even strangers who extend their helping hands unconditionally.
  
• Romantic and sexual love.

Loving kindness is pushing us toward agape and philia from the limiting romantic and sexual love. It does not mean not to enjoy life. In fact life becomes more joyful when we free ourselves from the shackles of unmindfulness and unawareness.

When we start practicing Metta, we begin with being kind and loving to us. May I be safe. May I be healthy. May I be kind. May I be peaceful. May I be at ease. May I be loving. Select three areas of your relational life which are relevant to you at this time in your life. Then replace them and expand the areas. From the self we expand to family, friends, neighbors, strangers and others. The last circle is our enemy or adversary. This is not easy to do. This is our spiritual practice that embraces all beings without boundaries and barriers.

<-Go back to Pragna Paramita

​Dr. Marshall Rosenberg has done pioneering work in the field of nonviolent communication.

Purpose 
The purpose of nonviolent communication is to contribute to the well-being of the persons involved in the relationship. It is aimed at relating to each other with authenticity, empathy, compassion and openness. It is meant to connect with each other without judgment, to resolve dividing differences and build human bridges. 

Four Steps 
The following four interrelated steps are involved in learning and practicing nonviolent communication. 

1.  Describe the specific behavior of the person that has caused disturbing feelings in you. Describe such a behavior without using evaluating, judgmental and labeling words or phrases. For example: you are a liar; you are rude and insensitive; you don’t care; you never listen; you will never learn; you are a nag; you are a jerk; how can I trust you? Such expressions invariably result in reactive, defensive, avoiding, distancing and alienating behaviors. In other words, they are counter- productive. We need to change our vocabulary and the ways we communicate our feelings. The right way of communicating would be specific, clear, descriptive and to the point. For example: When I talk, you interrupt me before I finish my sentence. You do not look at me when I talk. You do not follow what we agreed upon. Describe the specific situation rather than describe it in generality. 
2. Make I feeling statements. For example, when you do not do what you said you would, I feel frustrated and upset. I feel disappointed. Feelings words are different from thinking words. For example: I feel you are not listening to me. I feel that he is angry. 
3. Make I need statements. I felt upset when you did not listen to me. I need you to attend to me when I speak. I need to be recognized. Needs and feelings make us alive. How we express our needs and feelings makes our  communication and our relationship helpful or hurtful, constructive or destructive. 
4. Make a request and not a demand. Request: I would like you to look at me when I talk. I would like you to be fully present when I talk. Demand: Look at me when I talk to you. Do not text messages when I talk.

Empathic Connection 
What do I want the other person to do for me? What does the other person want me to do for him? How do we create and sustain our connection? This requires connecting with the needs and feelings of each other. Empathy for oneself and empathy for the other person is one of the most important ingredients of connecting with ourselves and with each other. Empathy is the language of the heart, not of the head. Empathy creates aliveness in our communication. It creates aliveness in us and in the other person. We feel someone cares for us and is willing to understand what we are going through without passing judgment. 

What are my needs that are not fulfilled? How do I feel about it? When we explore ourselves empathically, compassionately and authentically, we understand ourselves and work on ourselves. What does the other person want me to do? What are his needs that are not fulfilled? And how does he feel about it? When we explore ourselves in relationship with each other, we become more alive and explore ways and means of sustaining this aliveness in our relationship. We make it sure we do not blame us or the other person for not having our relationship alive. Blame, guilt, shame, humiliation block the flow of aliveness in our communication and relationship. 

Communication is a bipolar process. Both of you, the receiver and the giver, will have an empathic and open minded stance in listening to each other. Both of you will reveal your inner world of unfulfilling needs and feelings to each other. Both of you will implement the model of nonviolent communication: describe the specific behavior displayed, specific feelings experienced, specific needs fulfilled or not fulfilled, and request to fulfill mutual needs. 

In empathic communication, we remain fully present with each other. Our body language, our eyes, our posture, the words we use and the tone of our voice are powerful indicators of our empathic connection. Am I fully with you? - is an important awareness question for us in empathic connection. This is a very potent aspect of communication. 

What we need to change in us and between us can be explored with each other openly and compassionately. Change within ourselves and the other person takes time. It can be done slowly but steadily in the environment of empathy and positive regard. This way, we contribute to the well-being of each other and make our relationship fulfilling. 

It will be very helpful to share and discuss one specific experience you have had with someone in your family. Apply this model of nonviolent communication and see how it works. It is a good idea to keep a journal recording what worked, how it worked and what you learned from your experience.

Our intention in interpersonal communication and relationship is to understand and to be understood empathically and compassionately. In order to realize this intention follow the following steps: 

1. Identify the specific observations or events you want to discuss. 
2. Express your feelings about events without accusing the other person in the relationship. 
3. Investigate and identify the deeper human needs that need to be met.
   
4. Request, not demand, to fulfill your needs. 
5. Focus on creating a quality of connection that is conducive to collaboration. Connect before you correct. The less blame and criticism in our words, the easier it will be for others to hear us. We are not trying to win or prove them wrong. 

Empathy
True empathy is three dimensional.

1. Cognitive or intellectual dimension for understanding another.
   
2. Affective or emotional empathy means being able to feel what the other person is feeling.
   
3. Somatic dimension. The ability to sense another’s experience in an embodied way. This is visceral, gut-level understanding. Chronic angry, fearful , anxious and hopelessness feelings damage the brain, block airways, rip muscles, crack bones, damage teeth, cause headaches and heartaches. 

Lack of empathy creates separation in relationships. How do we face this challenge and create building blocks in relationships? 

The first step is connecting more deeply with our own experience through Mindfulness. Self-awareness is the basis for empathic connection. As we experience the inner landscape of our own life, so grows our ability to understand the inner lives of others.
The following are the building blocks of interpersonal communication or dialogue. 

1. Silent empathic presence-listening, “feel into” what the other is saying.
   
2. Paraphrase. After listening, summarize the gist of what you have heard, the key features of what you have heard.
   
3. Empathetic reflection. After listening check that you got it right. This may include what they need and how they feel. How can you feel them heard? 

Marshall Rosenberg points out four key aspects of non-violent communication. 

1. We learn to phrase actual observations that are most relevant to a situation.
   
2. The emotions associated with these events, the deeper needs and concerns from which these feelings arose. 
3. Specific requests that might move the conversation forward. What happened? How do you feel about it? What makes you feel about it? Where do we go from here?
   
4. Specific requests for cultivating wholesome relationships.