Search results for: "Generosity"
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- The Skill of Happiness… That’s what the chants on goodwill are for, along with the practice of generosity, the practice of virtue so that we’re not harming anybody. But the prospect that there could be something that doesn’t change and that is true happiness: That captures our imagination, makes us curious. Is this true? When the opportunity is there, you don’t want to let …
- Ven. Ananda’s Awakening… You come to the practice ideally with a sense of joy, which may be a mental joy based on generosity and virtue, but it also can translate into a sense of physical ease—and that’s what you can spread through the body. The Buddha talks about spreading a sense of rapture, a sense of ease through the body. It’s not just a …
- Goodwill Is Respect… for happiness, there’s no way we can survive without it, so let’s look for happiness in a way that’s responsible. The Buddha lists three ways that are responsible: generosity, virtue, and meditation, learning how to turn within and finding the resources within our body and minds—our many minds—to see what we can develop that would lead to that happiness …
- Is the Buddha’s Wisdom Selfish?… Like the precepts, like the practice of generosity, it’s a universal gift.
- Meaning & Happiness… qualities like generosity, virtue, renunciation. As we’re sitting here right here, right now, that’s a type of renunciation: Renouncing our fascination with sensual pleasures and looking for something deeper. Discernment, endurance, effort, truthfulness, determination good-will, equanimity: These are all good qualities to develop inside. And a life devoted to developing them is a meaningful life. It heads some place. A life …
- You Are Not Redundant… by looking for happiness in ways that are harmless. This is something of inherent value. Wealth doesn’t have inherent value, nor does status, nor does praise, nor do sensual pleasures. Generosity has inherent value. Your virtue has inherent value. The development of good qualities in the mind has inherent value, and so you can choose to take part in that value yourself. There …
- Fire… But even on the way there, the treasures that we build into the mind – our conviction, our virtue, our sense of shame and compunction, our learning, our generosity, our discernment – are treasures that no outside fire can burn. Just make sure your inner fires don’t burn them up, and you’ll be safe.
- Cleaning Out the Stables… He talked about generosity and virtue. These are all really great skills to develop. He talked about the rewards, particularly the rewards that come in heaven: the best place you can be reborn in. But then you realize it’s almost like it’s a fiendish trick. You work so hard at being good—being generous and virtuous, getting to a place you want …
- Goodwill Permeates the Dhamma… The Buddha lays out some principles out for us in terms of generosity, virtue, and meditation, or virtue, concentration, and discernment. But for a lot of things, we’re going to have to depend on our own powers of observation: looking at our actions, looking at our intentions, being very honest with ourselves about our intentions. Don’t do anything that you anticipate would …
- Mindful & Grateful for Lessons in Freedom… The Buddha starts with generosity, pointing out that it is an act of freedom. In that moment when you’re generous, you’re free from your greed. You’re free from your attachment. You’re able to rise above these things. You get a sense of your worth as a person and that there’s a higher level of happiness that comes when you …
- Happy to Be Here… We train it through generosity. We train it through virtue. And we train it through meditation, like we’re doing right now. You give it something good to think about—something that’s easy, nearby, that can be restful, soothing. The breath. You can breathe in lots of different ways. You can engage in short breathing, long breathing, fast, slow, heavy, light, deep, shallow …
- Near to the Buddha… the practice doesn’t require suffering frustration all the time. There may be some times when it’s hard, but you’re being asked to do what? Honorable things, good things: generosity, virtue, developing the mind in meditation. All of these are good things to be doing. And in doing them, you get close to the Buddha. If you drop them, you’re far …
- Straightening the Arrow… seeing the value of generosity, seeing the value of virtue. Getting the mind in concentration, the Buddha said, is a perception attainment. You have to maintain the perception of breath and choose the proper perception of breath so that the mind can settle down with it, so that you don’t forget and wander off someplace else. The perception is the marker that keeps …
- Brahmaviharas at the Breath… Developing happiness through generosity, virtue, meditation, is a way of developing happiness that spreads around, and the dividing line between your well-being and other people’s well-being gets dissolved. So try to bring these attitudes to your meditation, develop them in your meditation, so that you become more sensitive to which of the attitudes is appropriate at any one time, and to …
- A Mind Without Inertia… Find the happiness that comes from generosity, the happiness that comes from virtue, from being principled in your behavior, and the happiness that comes from meditation. He compares these things to food—and particularly the sense of wellbeing, rapture, and refreshment that come from getting the mind into a good strong concentration. That’s your food and nourishment on the path. It gives you …
- Acceptance Isn’t the Issue… So appreciate it when other people are delighting in their generosity. Have some respect for them. If you can’t have respect for other people’s good actions, it’s going to be hard to have respect for your own, and this will be debilitating. As the Buddha said, thoughts that “I am a good person” or “I am a bad person” are the …
- Something Good to Cling to… We hold on to the concentration, we hold on to the practice of generosity, virtue, we hold on to our discernment, because these things enable us to strengthen the mind and give us a good place to stay as other things in the world come and go, so that as the other things that we tend to hold on to and we tend to …
- Saṃvega & Pasāda… try to cleanse your mind. What’s selfish about that? You’re willing to replace our common habit of feeding with one of giving. Instead of taking in, you distribute out. Generosity, of course, is giving material gifts. Virtue is said to be the gift of safety. You may not be able to protect everybody from other sources, but you are protecting them from …
- The Perfection of Freedom… word for that. The Pali word parami means what’s foremost: what’s of foremost importance in your life. But none of the qualities in the list can be totally perfected. Generosity: You can’t be perfectly generous, because there are constraints on what you have to give. Virtue: You can’t be perfectly virtuous. Even if you hold by the five precepts, the …
- Where the Brightness Is… The Buddha starts you off with generosity, asking to look at things you have and asking yourself: What would be good to share? That reminds you that you do have the choice. You don’t have to keep trying to hang on to things or grab things or trying to take things away from people. You also have the choice of sharing. As you …
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