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Dharma Talks Access for Retreatants
at Common Ground Meditation Center
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Buddhist Studies Course - Mindfulness of the Mind and Mental Qualities
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| This eleven week course focuses on the last two foundations of mindfulness outlined by the Buddha. With mindfulness of the mind and mental qualities, the Buddha invites us to notice whether the mind is with or without greed, with or without anger, and with or without delusion. We learn to discern the qualities of the mind in any moment; contracted, distracted, open and or settled. Learning to acknowledge the shape of the mind is the first step toward freeing the mind from the weight of attachment. In these teachings the Buddha encourages us to study the mind in terms of skillful frames that illuminate the moment to moment skillfulness or unskillfulness of the mind’s activity. |
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2016-01-11 (71 days)
Common Ground Meditation Center
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2016-03-01
Buddhist Studies Course - Mindfulness of the Mind and Mental Qualities - Week 8 - The Seven Factors of Awakening
63:58
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Mark Nunberg
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| Tonight we will review the Buddha's teaching on the Seven Factors of Awakening. There are the inherent qualities of mind that when recognized and developed in balance with each other inevitably lead onward to awakening. They include mindfulness, investigation, energy/persistence, joy, tranquility, concentration/steadiness and equanimity. Joseph Goldstein calls these factors, "The sap that runs through the Buddha's tree of liberation; a powerful healing medicine that we must actually develop in our own minds."
In the Buddhist tradition, it is thought that just to be reminded of these inherent qualities, to bring them to mind, is considered to be deeply healing and protecting. Are we willing to learn to recognize them, and learn how to feed or strengthen these aspects of the mind.
Here is a link to the Ahara Sutta, a discourse of the Buddha's where he describes how to strengthen and weaken the factors of awakening This discourse also describes how to feed and weaken the five hindrances |
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Attached Files:
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Ahara Sutta
by Thanissaro Bikkhu
(PDF)
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Seven Factors of Awakening
by Insight Meditation Center
(Link)
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