This Wednesday Night Meditation included a 32-minute meditation and a 47-minute talk from Rick’s series on Wise Effort, focusing on Releasing Receiving.
One moonlit evening in 13th-century Japan, the Zen nun Mugai Nyodai was carrying water in an old bucket made of bamboo strips. It suddenly broke and she had an awakening. I particularly like this version of her enlightenment poem from the writer Mary Swigonski:
“With this and that I tried to keep the bucket together
and then the bottom fell out.
Where water does not collect
the moon does not dwell.”
I hope you find it helpful, and you are welcome to join my free Wednesday Meditations – which are open to everyone!
Meditation: Releasing and Receiving
Download the Audio of this Meditation
Talk: Releasing and Receiving
Download the Audio of this Talk
Dāna offering:
These teachings are offered freely, at no charge.
To practice generosity through making an offering – called “dāna” in the language of early Buddhism – please enter your email and donation amount below. Once you click “Donate” you will be directed to PayPal, where you can pay via credit card (no PayPal account required) or your PayPal account.
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Generosity itself is a beautiful practice that opens and gladdens the heart, relaxes the contraction of “self,” and ripples out into the world to touch many people – and perhaps, eventually, even oneself.
Additionally, many expressions of generosity are not about money. People offer attention, encouragement, and patience many times a day. Sometimes we withhold when it would be so easy, actually, to listen quietly for another minute or to offer a word of appreciation or simply a look that says, “I’m with you.” Try being a little more generous for a day and see what happens.
The post Meditation + Talk: Releasing and Receiving first appeared on Dr. Rick Hanson.
The post Meditation + Talk: Releasing and Receiving appeared first on Dr. Rick Hanson.