Duncan Trussell Family Hour - 473: Jack Kornfield

Episode Date: November 12, 2021

Jack Kornfield, one of the great Buddhist teachers living today and a very sweet slice of love cake, re-joins the DTFH! Check out Jack's website, JackKornfield.com, for classes (including many free ones), and more information for budding Buddhists. Original music by Aaron Michael Goldberg. This episode is brought to you by: ExpressVPN - Visit expressVPN.com/duncan and get an extra 3 months FREE when you buy a 1 year package. Shudder - Use promo code DUNCAN for a FREE 30 Day Trial! Purple - Visit Purple.com/Duncan10 and use promo code DUNCAN10 for $200 Off any mattress order of $1500 or more!

Ghost Towns, Dirty Angel, out now. You can get Dirty Angel anywhere you get your music. Ghost Towns, Dirty Angel, out now. New album and tour date coming this summer. A bubbling lavender bath laying naked on the forest floor. Sex-positive pornography and solitary masturbation rituals. Buying something just for yourself for once. That's self-care by Laura Dandy and the New Car Mudgeons,

and it's available on Paramount Multiplex Records. A great song and I'm happy for Laura Dandy's success and I understand why people are currently bashing self-care. We all know that the self-care movement is just a rebranding of selfishness, something clearly innovated in the PR department of a lotion company by a team of demons trying to trick people into making the primordial mistake of seeking happiness through gratifying the senses via an overpriced eucalyptus bath bomb. But on all this self-care bashing, something that's being left out

is the fundamental duty of every human being to immediately start loving themselves. You just have to figure it out. It's literally the most important thing you can do in your human incarnation and the longer you put it off, the more your life is going to suck. The truth is that the longer you wait to stand in front of the mirror and engage in the cheesy activity of looking yourself in the eye and saying, I love you so much, thanks for keeping me alive. Thanks for effortlessly keeping my heart pumping blood

and thanks for digesting my food and thanks for doing exactly what I want you to do even if sometimes that means putting bad things in my mouth and thanks so much for representing the healing of my ancestors and the possibility of transforming my entire lineage into something a little kinder and friendlier and most importantly, thank you for giving me orgasms when I rub my genitals and even more importantly, I'm beautiful and wonderful and doing my best in this strange human realm.

The longer you put off saying something like that the longer you're going to experience anxiety related to not allowing yourself the enjoyment of your own existence. If you start doing this right now, as in right this moment if you manage to find the strength to go in front of a mirror overcome every level of coolness in your being and just say sweet things to your reflection then you will experience an instantaneous shift in consciousness

that will seem absurd and yet amazing and you'll begin to be kinder to everyone around you because the cliche is true, you are everybody and everybody deserves your love but you have to give it to yourself first, do it! Boy do we have a great podcast for you today Jack Cornfield is here with us we're going to jump right into it

but first, this any hacker on the same network can gain access to your personal data it doesn't take much technical knowledge to hack someone just some cheap hardware is needed a smart insidious 12 year old could easily do it your data is valuable hackers can make up to a thousand bucks per person selling personal info on the dark web

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that's E-X-P-R-E-S-S-V-P-N dot com slash Duncan and you can get an extra three months free expressvpn.com slash Duncan and we are back look I know it's cheesy alright it's not supposed to feel normal

you're not supposed to talk to yourself in the mirror I don't know why it works but it's as simple as that it's not supposed to be easy you're supposed to need increasing levels of complex initiatory rituals via some online class or shaman or teacher

you're not supposed to just be able to go in the mirror and say I fucking love you thank you, I can't believe we made it this far I love you, you're beautiful I love every fat role in your body I love your bald spot and your weird beard

and your weasel nose I love it all I'm sorry for ever being a jerk to you I love you, you're wonderful just try it I mean don't use those exact words that's what I use for myself but I'm sure you have your own thing

that you reject about yourself just try it, just embrace it it's not cool we're not talking about that we're talking about realizing this shit isn't a dress rehearsal this is it you're on stage right now

it's time to figure it out and the first step, you just start loving yourself and then you eat the cake you eat every slice of cake that's offered to you by this great incredible, infinite, ever-expanding seemingly sentient universe Sweeties, before we jump into this episode

I want to invite you to join my Patreon www.fordslashDTFH sign up, you'll get commercial free episodes of the DTFH and if you want, you can join us for our weekly family gatherings and weekly group meditations it's all there waiting for you

patreon.com www.fordslashDTFH and now I would like to offer you a very sweet slice of love cake Jack Cornfield is one of the great Buddhist teachers

living today he is amazing I don't know how I get to have these conversations with him for time to time it's one of the great joys of my life interacting with him whenever I get a chance to do so

he has a wonderful website that you should go to right away, JackCornfield.com he gives classes there are many many many free classes there for you a lot of the times when people ask me about Buddhism I point them in the direction of this

wonderful human being so now everybody please welcome back to the Duncan Trussell Family Hour podcast the great JackCornfield border it's the Duncan Trussell family

practising welcome back to the DTFH so great to see you my pleasure to be here good to see you Duncan how have you been thank you for asking, I've been good I've been good and I have been studying Buddhism

I have a lot of questions for you based on my confusion regarding some of the words that keep popping up even though I think I may have asked you these questions before I feel like it's the first time I've asked them so I wonder if I could wait, wait, you're studying Buddhism

is this a good thing or a bad thing great, it's the best thing I think, I mean, I can't stop I just love it and I can't seem to quit thinking about it wake up thinking about it sometimes go to bed thinking about it when I'm not doom scrolling through the internet

well, I understand you have a wife and children I would hope that they would also figure into your misuse of time well you know what, thank you because that is a fantastic lead in

to a question that I have for you and I would really love to resolve this question which is once and for all and this is not really an esoteric question this is a real world question that

whenever I'm ear-beating someone about Buddhism this is something they will bring up as this is a terrible religion the entire thing is based on a man abandoning his family to go and

study his mind yes, it was to ease or to end the suffering of all beings but that's not a good enough reason to leave your family and might I add when I've been listening to some of these

Buddhist texts, the Way of the Bodhisattva Shantideva, some of the Dolgokinse Rinpoche stuff or interpretations of texts by Dolgokinse Rinpoche it's not like that idea just disappears again and again this invitation to

leave your homeland leave your family leave it all behind and go out into the forest or some remote place and take up the Dharma

and I would love to know your thoughts on this because anyone who is a householder instantaneously experiences like well I'm never gonna do that I would be a sociopath so how can we make this

work in a way that isn't splitting up humanity between the monk class and the householder class well first of all I'm struck by your phrase leave your homeland given homeland security

something one might actually well consider a worthy thing but probably you'd want to take your family with you but the homeland is having a pretty stressful and painful era quite honestly

so I just want to kind of breathe in with that and say that's part of what we're holding you listeners and Duncan is that we're in some rough waters so that's the first thing to say and our journey

was like the voyage of Odysseus we've hit some of the really difficult times now going back to your fundamental

question I don't have an answer that's satisfactory to everybody and that's because answers don't satisfy people is their own experience and their own practice

and because the Buddha taught for 45 years as the story is told anyway this is what we get in the history wandered around the dusty roads of India he taught all kinds of things he taught

stuff for householders he taught stuff for monks he taught his son he taught his ex-wife he became enlightened whatever that means and whatever that was worth but he had to leave home apparently to get enlightened and come back

and teach his kid so he wasn't completely a dead beat dad in fact when he went back and his son was like seven years old he said alright now now I have a worthy inheritance for you come with me

and he taught him this isn't some excuses leaving home it's actually to look at it through a kind of archetypal lens because there are different levels to it one is that the Buddha felt that for

people in his era anyway maybe even now leaving the entanglements of the world left your heart and mind free to contemplate the mystery of life to find a freedom that didn't have to worry about the rent

taxes or or the other kind of entanglements so he said this is the most suitable way for people who want to dedicate themselves and their life fully to a spiritual search whether one agrees or not

that was the principle and underlying it was this deep sense that to be free we have to find kind of we have to abandon our attachments

to the things of the world doesn't mean we don't live in the world he also lived in a body and he had to feed himself and he created an institution that's along with the Jains it's the oldest pre-standing continuous

organization in human history that we know of maybe there is in some native communities still I don't know where the era coordination goes back and so forth but it's certainly one of the oldest ones

and a successful one and you could say was he a success well he changed the lives of a billion people with both with virtue, with generosity with inner compassion and freedom

that's a pretty successful run so he said in his time and archetypically leave your attachments to the world is probably the best thing you can do now because he talked for all those years that's not what he said to everyone

he didn't go and say to everyone you should do that depending on their circumstances he said oh you who are a merchant you who are a government official or you who are a courtesan

or you who are you know a farmer here's a way you too can find freedom of heart and spirit and that's really what matters for us you could have an opinion one way or another it was a deadbeat dad whatever

he said I only teach one central point suffering and it's end and then if you look to say well I have to model myself after the Buddha or somebody else you don't

because that's not the end of your suffering you have to actually find in yourself where is that Buddha and that awakening within myself now I've just been going on and on about that because people like to talk about it

these are the kind of questions that there aren't any answers to Duncan there's just reflections about it you can turn back and say well what are my values and how do I find freedom and that's what matters because you can be at the DMV

and pull your hair out although I don't have a lot of hair being mostly bald at this point my three year old grandson Desmond looked at me he was two two and a half and he said Baba that's what he calls me he said Baba

where did your hair go it was like some Zen master I said it went away what can I say you know but anyway the DMV you go there and you can

pull your hair out if you have somewhere have a conniption or just have a neurotic fit or get frustrated because often there's long lines and it's terrible the waste of time in a spirit I listen to this story

from a man who had been falsely accused and imprisoned for I don't know something like 16 or 26 years I'm terrible miscarriage of justice and was out and he said

I got to tell you I went and I was standing in line in the DMV and I was the happiest man on earth he said we stood there for two hours I looked at these people I could have walked out the door there were clouds in the sky

I was wearing some nice clean clothes that I'd gotten what's your problem people so the Buddhist teaching is that actually that freedom of spirit is available to you and to me no matter

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is this freedom of spirit is it something that exists like a primordial illusion like a a fundamental quality of reality

or is it something that exists as a byproduct of being in a society where we've been conditioned so deeply that we've lost track of our connection to the spirit or to the

fundamental joy that both of us are seeing you and you and you've seen it in your children me and my children now and if is it emptiness is this what they mean when they keep saying emptiness is that what they're talking about

what makes you ask this question Duncan I will I'll tell you you get I get confused the reason I'm asking the question is because I'm confused because

I feel like I've caught glimpses of this emptiness and then when I'm reading Alan Watts or when I'm sort of you know we're eating Chogyam Champa or any of these brilliant minds right away there's like this

it's almost as though it's designed to like annihilate that thought of like oh I've caught a glimpse of emptiness you know Chogyam Champa Rinpoche says disown it Alan Watts you know Taoist talks about you know the Tao that can be named as not the real

Tao and so then I think oh these glimpses and I'll finish this part of it up with I'm sitting on my couch and realize I've been just casually imagining that I'm empty and so then I've

started looking at the emptiness that I've been thinking like oh yes I'm really think I'm getting empty now and I realize this is as far away from this is the least empty the empty that has ever existed it's all thick and you know and graspy and ego

so one reason I might be asking is I'm looking for you to give me some kind of like metal or something then another reason I'm asking is because I do feel like I've had these brief encounters with something that must be this emptiness that they keep talking about

and then the other reason is legitimate confusion regarding the endless endless repetition of that phrase in all of the various ways it gets interpreted and translated

yes this is what confusion is like it's a state of mind different way to approach it and now what you're wrestling with and maybe you're just reading too much of that stuff quite honestly I think

you know as Ramdell said you get the message and you hang up the phone I don't know that you want to keep reading about emptiness and then you're looking for it is this it well maybe I had it here like it's you could go out to Nordstrom

and order a box of it and bring it home or something or wherever it is that you want to go to India on the banks of the Ganges someone says hey special deal for you I'll give you a little emptiness you know you give me

so many whatever I love that so here's a very different way to approach a dust dunk and I guess I also have to say besides you know since you're also a humorist we have to play a little bit

yes which I appreciate you're seeing the confused mind you're seeing the doubting mind you're seeing the grasping I want emptiness mind so you're seeing all those different minds yes okay my teacher Ajat Chah

after he'd been a monk living in the forests back in the day this was back in the 50's 40's 40's whenever he practiced very ardently

and he had all kinds of interesting experiences as one can I had them too doing these retreats and monasteries and so forth to dissolve your body into light and feel like your whole sense of identity opens and you're one with the trees and the water

and then have it all go into silence or you're in a state of bliss or you're in a state of of wonder or all the traumas of your life come and you feel the weight of the suffering of the world and you reap

all the kinds of insights okay so he went to the greatest master of the day this other Ajahn our teacher Ajahn Man and he said I've been practicing for some years in the forest really ardently and

had these experiences of Samadhi and Jhana states a very deep concentration I've had these deep insights into permanence and I've had this experience in that can now what should I do can you give me guidance

and the master looked back and said Ja dude or less because he didn't use some honorific like teacher Ajahn Jha kid you've missed the point these are just experiences

they're like movies on the screen there's a war movie there's a documentary there's a romantic comedy you know there's a rock and roll movie he said

the point is not to get some particular movie because they just come and go the point is to turn your attention back to awareness itself turn your attention back and this is not something esoteric or some kind of weird

Tibetan thing that you'll get when you go you know climb you know around Mount Everest and find the secret monastery he said become there's a secret monastery around Mount Everest yes there is and you could go there but

then you'd have to leave your children for seven years and I'm not sure you want to do that even though the Buddha did something like that I think your children would miss you anyway so there we are and you've missed the point

instead of focusing on getting any particular experience in meditation become sikibuto become the knowing it's also translated as the one who knows so even as someone who are listening or you and I are talking

Duncan there are these words and the meaning of it there's also an awareness an awareness of your body sitting there awareness of other sounds along with these words you know awareness all this so there's the content of experience

and then if you relax you can sense that there is also the knowing of the experience and that they're different the knowing like a vast sky allows the different appearances

sometimes you could call it the storms, the clouds, the rain the rainbows all these things appear but awareness remains and if I say to you Duncan I want you to stop being aware alright I'm gonna

in a minute I'll count to count to three and I'll give you 15 seconds to do whatever you can grind your teeth close your eyes okay are you ready on your mark get set stop being aware go and

you're shaking your head you can't do it no way out it's there isn't it you it's not the awareness is there so you can say no way out you can hear my voice you feel yourself thoughts come feelings come those are all the content on the screen

and the place of freedom lies in resting in the silence the openness the receptivity of awareness that includes

all things which is also why Ram Dass called it loving awareness love is that which connects all things and this is an awareness that includes that embraces that holds it all and says yeah all of this all of this

so you want to find emptiness it's exactly where you're sitting it's the shift from the content of experience to becoming the awareness itself yeah

there are other dimensions to emptiness because the universe is so interestingly and intricately constructed there are other meanings for example that it's all temporal what happened to the year your first

child was born gone right what happened to y2k for those who were around for the year 2000 it's back with the dinosaurs and the pyramids you know and Kubla Khan

and you know whatever the Incan Empire they're gone what happened to yesterday gone what happened to you're earlier this morning

it's gone everything roomy says it comes trooping out of emptiness that is it appears disappear and then it vanishes so this is another dimension of emptiness that nothing

lasts and so those images are used it's like a rainbow or a dream or a flash of lightning in the summer cloud because every moment appears and then deconstructs itself and so you start to see so it's there's no state of emptiness

okay now I have it on the screen you know emptiness is a description that everything appears and then disappears emptiness is the fact that all the things that come to us as experiences

are known by the vastness of awareness awareness doesn't have limitations of space or time it just is or loving awareness to bring in our dear friend Ramdas loving awareness

just is is this loving awareness this just is this emptiness the same thing that they're talking about when they talk about Bodhicitta is that what they're talking about I don't know they like to talk about all that

stuff and then you go to these Tibetan retreats and they're these fantastic and wonderful teachers and is this Bodhicitta do I have it did I touch it do you have Bodhicitta yeah right well I don't know if you do Duncan but most people do no anyway

Bodhicitta points to from what I understand Bodhicitta points to that seed of awakening that's in us that's in everyone

I'm gonna read you a poem from Juan Ramon Jimenez entitled in Spanish you probably know it I am not I I'm this one

walking beside me whom I do not see whom at times I managed to visit and at other times I forget the one who remained sweet when I talk the one sorry the one who remained silent when I talk

the one who forgives sweet when I hate the one who takes a walk when I'm indoors the one who will remain standing when I die and we all have the sense I'm not this one

engaged in whatever activity but rather managed to visit the one who remained silent when I talk the one who forgives sweet when I hate there's a sense that we're not just this body

the body's always changing you're a little kid or an adolescent or a young person, an old person you're not your feelings they're always changing you're not your thoughts thank god at least I hope so I mean you don't want to be that so there's this sense

that all of this play of body and mind there's a sense of being the witness of it wow having a tough year this one right or this is hard or this is fantastic boy I wish this could last there's something back behind

the identification with experience that we know and you'll find it when you die you'll say wow what an incarnation that one was shoo you know I learned some stuff went through you'll see is death a condition

is death the condition for this realization not in the slightest not in the slightest our conversation is the condition for in fact Machado's point I mean one Ramona met us is pointing to the fact that

we know this this is annihilatory though the way you are articulating it is sweet and beautiful and this is why you're one of the great teachers of this stuff but when I'm alone at night waking up in the middle of the night

just freaking out over something that I know with my logical mind is like it's not I mean if you knew the things that I freaked out over Jack I don't even know if you would do this if you do a podcast with me give me an example I do want to know

you know this is forensics I want to look at the corpse tell me okay let me see this is what's really hilarious is you know I'm having trouble remembering what I woke up about last night upset about um

um well I mean the I think we've resolved it but an ongoing topic of conversation with Aaron and I has been like do we stay here do we go back to sunny California and so I've been like going through every

phase of spiritual bypass you could I've thought to myself well you know if I was more enlightened I'd like it here I should enjoy the winner why don't I like the winner there's got to be in my say everything's a projection of my mind if I don't like it here really I don't must not like my own

mind is Aaron also not like her mind do we both not like our own minds if we liked our minds wouldn't we be happy living in a small town is this some sickness is it a fungal creep of materialism on and on and on and so I have that going is the main

harmony in this rotten song this is mixed in with Jesus I need to sleep I got it we got to wake up we're doing marriage counseling tomorrow I can't I got to get up I got now I can't sleep and so now and then in there I think okay

I think of you Jack sometimes I think of something you told me about what's all this in what's holding all this how big is the thing holding all that I think of Bob Thurman at the retreat talking about like the this thing that you are so beautifully describing I

and sometimes I can hold the like that thing in it and then I fall asleep and it's the best but a lot of times I can't I just more like it like I'm so firmly identified

or in in this state of like it's like a muscle spasm or something you know and it's so it's cute until you're in your 40s and it's like it you know what I mean and then it's just like this is unrelenting you know so that's it I mean that's

as much that's as descriptive as I can get of it it's very sour it's suffering it's very painful it's not cute anymore like it's getting to be a real grind alright so I'm listening to you as a friend

and taking it in first of all I feel the suffering you describe that in the middle of the night and as you know there you have a lot of companions who are awake at night suffering in their own way and you're suffering

from worry or anxiety like what should I do what's the right and doubt and so the you know the first thing is just to acknowledge this is the doubting mind doubt is tremendously painful because the mind

wraps itself up it gets tighter and tighter and then doubt morphs into fear and anxiety as well well if I don't make the right decision who am I are we enlightened are we not should we make is there more enlightenment in the sun of southern California

or maybe I should go to a tougher place I should you know find some place where it's really demanding and then I'll get you know and the mind has no pride and it will do all of this stuff and not because you're making it

because it doesn't own its own and people all over are you know in many cases in very real ways should I move should I change my job or if it's even worse than that if they're a refugee you know how will I

survive yes so you're really talking about first second chakra stuff also survival and you're lying in the bed thinking how do we make a happy life and even how do we survive well yes

so the interesting question is how to practice with it you know and you said you know there are moments when you can hold it in a different way and then you sleep so the first thing is what you've done is to

acknowledge but maybe even works explicitly oh this is the suffering mind this is doubting mind and this is anxious mind you're frightened mind and the moment that you do that

that you name it to yourself already you're stepping back a little like Ajahn Chah's master said step back and you know begin to name what's there in the story

of the Buddha again Mara who is the incarnation or the Indian god of greed and hate fear and all the kind of most painful states comes to test the Buddha under the Bodhi tree

as he's trying to get enlightened at least in this great archetypal story with all the temptations and desires and that doesn't work and then the armies of Mara he's with aggression anger and so forth and finally with doubt what rights you have to sit here and so forth

the interesting thing is that Mara reappears 40 more times in this in the text in the stories of the Buddha wandering around so it's not like Mara just now you defeated Mara and Mara slinks away and it's you're done. He comes back

Mara comes back Mara's part of this story you know and Tignan Hanukkors talks about inviting Mara in for tea when Mara returns but Mara comes back so what we're describing is the human condition

what the Buddha does in those texts is he will look and he'll say oh is that you Mara I see you Mara I see you Mara and in that moment I see doubting

mind oh this is the doubting mind oh this is the fearful mind this is the anxious mind in that moment already there's a disidentification there's a shift from being in it doubting and wrestling

and you know suffering to noting oh this is suffering this is doubt this is anxiety so that's the first step and it's immensely liberating to just begin to name the different visitors that come how Mara appears

and to not resist them but Tignan Hanukkors suggests sometimes you give them a little tea but I think there's a simpler way to do it and very genuine and that's to say thank you because they're trying to protect you

these thoughts are trying to put your family in the best place for your kids and your wife right yes these thoughts are trying to keep you from the suffering of the cold of winter and then all your mental machinations

because you're thinking it's too cold and icy and I should be saying they're all trying to protect you so you could say to the doubting and the fearful mind I see you thank you for trying to protect me for trying to keep me sane

or make me safer it also shifts your relationship to the content of your experience now you're becoming more of the gracious witness thank you and then you say a third thing you say I'm okay just now

you can relax you can relax I'm okay just now because there you are lying in your soft bed I hope comfortable bed with your beautiful wife you know and you actually are okay the other part that's not okay is

the doubting mind and the fearful or the judging mind you say okay I'm okay for now you can relax and you come into the reality of experience which is that at that moment you are

and these have functions you need to think you need a plan so you can consider a problem is that 99 or 90% of our thought is repeats

it's reruns it's like you're stuck in Moctel 6 in the middle of the night and the shopping channel is on and you can't get the TV off and it just keeps going right your mind does that you need to be able to think but you could probably do it with 5% of the amount of

airtime that you spend on that on these doubt channel and whatever but here you can't stop your mind you can't say well there are ways to do it but it doesn't last very long so basically the mind secretes thoughts like the salivary gland secretes saliva

I quote you on that all the time and it just says okay here's the doubting mind I see you more I see you doubting mind I feel the suffering I see fearful mind thank you for trying to protect me I'm okay now just now you can

relax and that whole left then brings you to a place of freedom independent of the different states that arise right right it's so

frustrating though my god it's so frustrating and it's so endless it's so endless well okay so here we're talking about it's endless thoughts are endless they're like waves of the ocean the ocean shouldn't have waves

dude you have water you have waves you have a mind it has mind waves where what's the real problem much thanks to purple

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they're like waves of the ocean the ocean shouldn't have waves dude you have water you have waves you have a mind it has mind waves

where what's the real problem you know what is interesting what is the real problem right you haven't answered well no I don't know

this is when you're saying these things then I start thinking oh is it a malfunction the mind has waves it's waving it's thinking that's one part that's true and then another part of you that says

I hate this yes and it's like you're standing by the ocean saying I hate waves yeah but the ocean isn't telling me to look up porn it's not like I'm standing at the ocean the ocean's like hey why don't you go watch some online porn

hey what happens if you go broke if you ever considered you might be going insane my god do you realize do you remember that picture of the back of your head do you see how bald you're getting the ocean just makes these wonderful sounds is it smashes into the rocks so the comparison kind of

you think that unless you're the fisherman or somebody who lives by the ocean and has to watch the storms and the big waves and what gets caught and what's thrown up the ocean is not as benevolent the ocean is a big is a huge force

the mind is a big force too so all these things come this is suffering and you're describing suffering your mind gets caught in a tattoo okay I'm gonna go watch porn then I'm gonna go eat as much chocolate until I'm bloated like a balloon yes yes right

now I'm you know I'm gonna go and seek revenge against this person who dissed me before and I've been thinking about it do you listen to my thoughts at night are they keeping you up too the mind has no pride right so you see that that's what minds do

so there are a couple things you can do the first is you acknowledge it you say thank you for trying to make my life better I'm actually okay just where I am okay then there's another thing that you can do which takes some practice but the mind is actually

client and malleable and can be trained like the puppy we talk about sits day you could then shift the channel to loving kindness or compassion and you start with self-compassion may I have compassion for this one

lying here suffering so much on hold yourself kindly if you if you saw a person especially somebody you cared about maybe when your kid is a little older and there your boy is lying there

and his mind is storming about all these kind of things yes suffering and not able to sleep what would your response be to hold him if I could help to pick him up and rock him to sleep rock him to hold him

this is just thinking but actually you're saying if you're okay it will get worked out a day at a time a step at a time so this is mindful self-compassion also it's seeing that this is just

human it's only human it's common humanity minds do this they get worried we're wired to survive so we think how do I survive and how do I thrive if I get all the pleasures and get rid of all the pain

and if I move to the right place and all of that you say thank you to your mind and you hold him so you bring in self-compassion and then you start a loving kindness practice for yourself your family the people you care about your community one at a time

and you could spend all night if you don't sleep then you might as well do metapractice send love to everybody you can think of one at a time until you fall asleep because it gets so boring you can't stand it anymore hold out love right

yeah it's you know not to belabor the point here because I do hear you and that's kind of the perplexing anytime I get to be around you or any of the teachers it's all makes sense

oh yes of course but then and again this probably is belaboring the point Jack but it's the intensity of the suffering

the and also the I love that you keep saying the mind has no pride the and I don't want to use it's a self-effacing word but there's something so pathetic in it there's something so

um just painfully pathetic and I know hold that and love to and all that but it's just so really what you're saying my friend

you are a public neurotic yeah some kind of horrible you're a public neurotic but I want to reframe your neurosis okay I mean we all like that

but you're a public neurotic okay this is this is like but here's the here's the deal Duncan I want you to listen closely after you stop okay laughing at the intensity of your suffering this is your game

you make a you make a fucking living from this you gotta thank it if you didn't have these stories to tell about how you were there you know with the intensity of your suffering and people want to listen to you and I like

to connect with you in these ways um because you're so honest so there's something and people go oh yeah me too right yeah boy I'm glad mine only last two hours he's up all night you make people your neurosis

trumps there there's something like that right um you have to thank it it gives you your livelihood it makes you makes you the comedian and the spiritual you know guide warped though it be

so it's actually this is the the stuff it's as if you were a poet and you'd learn really great language or an artist and you had a gift for you know depicting things this is a particular gift you have

my god who who they thought so you have to thank it thank you so smart wow okay wow that is wild thank you oh wow yeah well

great I'm like some kind of some kind of stripper maybe yeah there you go you're some kind of stripper you're a mental stripper but you're right I see what you're saying yes I see what you're saying and and that is true and I thank you for making

me laugh at my suffering that's well and also you know you call your mind pathetic you know so you have in that whole field you have all these judgments which is part of part of what keeps the game

going if you didn't care about it you said oh yeah this in my mind is just having a kind of mental melt down so what yes I'm going to go cook some fried eggs and have a little snack and go actually right if you didn't judge it or care about it it would

just be go on its merry way and you know have a snack and go back to sleep right no but you look at it and you just think what what is this why are you even whining about this you're so lucky you are in a soft bed you are in a house and look at you in the middle of the night waking up with

just this again so yes and it's but and there is some equality in it that seems some kind of dumb you know and and also it's like I get to talk to you magnificently dumb you just have to admire it

can you do can we talk about that we we have about 15 more minutes but magnificently dumb this is something that is stuck with me that the chogum trumpet wrote about which is something about how if you stop ignoring yourself

if you do acknowledge it as it is that you can find beauty in the dumbness it's okay to is it okay to look at parts of ourselves and say this is legitimately dumb or is that off limits you're not supposed to make this totally fine to look at things like

that and say that you just have to kind of you know have a little turn up at the corners of your mouth some amusement right it's neurotic but some of it is really deep suffering too some of it is the angst we have as human beings

lost of not knowing or seeing the world falling apart and that wakes you up and you say wait my children my grandchildren climate pandemic come on humanity because as we've talked about

no amount of technology is going to save us the internet and computer and artificial intelligence and space technology and biotech and nanotech none of that is going to stop continuing warfare continuing racism continuing

environmental destruction because these are all rooted in the human heart and mind and they come out of greed and hate and fear and it's really clear you know human suffering arises out of greed

hatred and fear and ignorance and the more we promote it whether it's in the media or in you know online or whatever the more we suffer on the other hand we have the other possibility

which is to meet the praise and blame and pleasure and pain and gain and loss of light and dark of life generosity instead of greed you know or with some kind of appreciation with love instead of hate with understanding

kind of perspective or wisdom instead of ignorance you know with truth instead of falsehood and those all that capacity is the shift from being caught in things

to appreciating to loving this serious human incarnation and saying wow we got what a wild one we got born into you got born into Duncan Trussell imagine that well not just that

Duncan Trussell with a family in counseling today we're both you know acknowledging like well what part of the apocalypse do you want to move to like what do you want do you want floods or fires do you want earthquakes

where things are so seemingly endlessly in upheaval right now and I'm so lucky that I can even contemplate moving a lot of people can't and I wonder if we could just maybe wrap up

there's 100 million people in refugee camps are running away from the very things you're describing as we talk now caring almost nothing except maybe their children you know that our human circumstance

now has a great deal of suffering and these people are being painted as villains Jack I mean if you God forbid you should watch Fox News but it's like you see these videos of these you know refugees that they're trying to make out to be some kind of

terrorists and it's you know it's mothers carrying their kids it's you know what you know and my daughter and her beautiful non-profit called Oasis Legal Services they're getting asylum for LGBT

people whose lives are in danger all around the world you know they'll have a gay guy from Uganda who would be stoned to death if he went back or a transgender woman from Saudi Arabia or

a lesbian from you know or some part of Mexico where they've been raped you know and tortured and so forth so yes the situation the circumstance for

refugees of all kinds is terrible Chokin Trump has said an interesting thing at one point he said the Buddhists take refuge in Buddha Dharma teachings community he said you should consider when you take refuge

you should consider yourself becoming a refugee that in some way you align yourself with all those who understand that it's all impermanent and that you're not settled but anyway this weighs

on us and we can't sleep some we I think our hearts resonate because we're connected with one another so here's Joanne Macy one of our great Buddhist sages she says there's a song that wants to sing itself

through us we've just got to be available maybe the song that is to be sung through us is the most beautiful requiem for an irreplaceable planet that's dying or maybe it's a song of

joyous rebirth as we create a new culture that doesn't destroy its world but in any case there's no excuse for not singing this moment you're alive wherever you are you can dial up the magic

and sing wherever you are how is the story going to end it seems that these times are almost orchestrated to bring forth from us the biggest moral strength the greatest courage and creativity I feel because

when things are this unstable a person's determination and care and direction how much they choose to invest their energy and heart and mind can have a greater effect on the larger picture than they could imagine

so this is an exciting time to be alive if not somewhat wearing emotionally so she puts herself in it in the last sense but this is the time we're in and some of us have privilege

as I do and so I'm shielded in ways that the refugees were talking about or people who just live in target communities because of the continuing economic disparity and racism and so forth

I live with a lot of privilege and I also feel the weight of the suffering of the world both of those are true and then what do you do well that's a Bodhisattva which is to say if you want to talk about one

interesting concept in Buddhism there's probably two to talk about now is somebody, is a being who says I'm in it to alleviate suffering to bring joy and freedom well-being

beings as I can to myself and those around me and that becomes a direction it becomes a it's a setting of the compass of your heart where you say yep we're going through tough times

will I collapse you know will I run away in fear we have all those things or can I be the one that helps people into the lifeboats can I be the ones that help of course so we don't run into the next iceberg or whatever it is

can I it's not your task to save the whole world but can I reach my hand out and mend a place that I can touch what is it whether it's you know changing the way you plant your garden

or use the electricity and power and car and that's a little piece of it whether it's adopting a child or a community or helping in all kinds of ways or bringing meals to someone

or working politically you have a gift we each have gifts and I don't think you sleep well if you're not giving your gift somehow when you think about that when you say thank you

for all the worries now I want you to remember that I'm actually I'm doing something and now let's go to sleep you know that you feel like okay I can make this contribution I can make a difference and as Joe Adamasey says these small things then start to add up

Jack cornfield thank you so much for this thank you thank you thank you thank you I will never be able to thank you enough for these conversations it's always a pleasure Duncan I'll be thinking of you late at night

hoping that you wrap your arms around yourself like you would your boy who was having a little nightmare and saying oh Mara I know oh this is suffering and your heart weeps those are called the tears of the way because your heart's open and you feel the

troubles of the world and you hold that tender heart and you say yes yes I feel the tenderness and oh yeah this is doubting mind fearful mind thank you for trying to protect me I'm okay just now you can relax

is there anywhere that I can direct people Jack do you have any classes coming up? yes jackcornfield.com there's classes retreats seminars mindfulness daily

for free 40 days of 15 minutes a day of instruction and meditation a whole course on how to work with breath and body emotions relationships loving kindness compassion 15 minutes a day

free on jackcornfield.com such a deal that's an incredible deal you should start charging we'll talk about that later Jack I'm just kidding thank you so much Jack

Jack cornfield will be at jackcornfield.com thank you and that was Jack cornfield everybody all the links you need to find Jack are going to be at jackcornfield.com he's amazing

thank you so much to all of our sponsors and thank you for listening we'll be back in a few days with a new DDFH until then Hare Krishna a good time starts with a great wardrobe next stop JCPenney family get-togethers

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