Mindfulness Meditation Podcast - Mindfulness Meditation with Lama Aria Drolma 04/11/2024

Episode Date: April 19, 2024

Theme: Reimagine Artwork: Buddha Shakyamuni; Swat; 8th century; bronze; Rubin Museum of Art; C2006.71.10; http://therubin.org/388Teacher: Lama Aria DrolmaThe Rubin Museum of Art presents a weekly meditation session led by a prominent meditation teacher from the New York area, with each session focusing on a specific work of art. This podcast is recorded in front of a live audience, and includes an opening talk, a 20-minute sitting session, and a closing discussion.The guided meditation begins at 15:16. This meditation is presented in partnership with Sharon Salzberg, teachers from the NY Insight Meditation Center, the Interdependence Project, and Parabola Magazine.  If you would like to attend Mindfulness Meditation sessions in person or learn more, please visit our website at RubinMuseum.org/meditation.If you would like to support the Rubin Museum and this meditation series, we invite you to become a member and always attend for free.  Have a mindful day!

Welcome to the Mindfulness Meditation Podcast presented by the Rubin Museum of Art. We are a museum in Chelsea, New York City that connects visitors to the art and ideas of the Himalayas and serves as a space for reflection and personal transformation. I'm your host, Tashi Chodron. Every Thursday, we present a meditation session inspired by a different artwork from the Rubin Museum's collection and led by a prominent meditation teacher from the New York area. This podcast is a recording of our weekly in-person practice. In the description for each episode, you will find information about the theme for that week's session, including an image of the

related artwork. Our mindfulness meditation podcast is presented in partnership with Sharon Salzberg and teachers from the New York Inside Meditation Center, the Interdependence Project, and Parabola Magazine, and supported by the Frederick P. Lenz Foundation for American Buddhism. And now, please enjoy your practice. Good afternoon, everyone. Tashi Delek. And welcome.

Welcome to our weekly mindfulness meditation at the Rubin Museum of Art. I'm Tashi Chodron, Himalayan Programs and Communities Ambassador. And I'm delighted to be your host today. So I'm kind of curious to know how many of you have been attending attending this on a regular basis thank you for raising your hand and then how many of you are first time wonderful fantastic and in between all right and so for those of you who are first time we are a global hub for Himalayan art home base in New York City and we're so glad to have all of you join us for this weekly program where we combine art and meditation. Inspired by our collection, we will first take a look at work of art. We will then hear a brief

talk from our teacher Lama Aryadroma. So wonderful to have you back many times and many more. Lama Arya Doma will guide our meditation for 15 to 20 minutes. So let's take a look at today's artwork. The theme this month in April, we are exploring on the theme of re-imagine. And the artwork for today's session is hand-picked by our teacher from a selection of art that we sent. And this is this beautiful sculpture of Buddha Shakyamuni with Maitreya.

I think that Maitreya is on the left as he's holding this beautiful vessel here and then Avalokiteshvara on the right side. So this is from Swat Valley, present-day Pakistan and it's dated 8th century bronze and it's a beautiful small sculpture about almost seven into two and a half inches. Connection to the theme, our theme, as I mentioned, for April is re-imagine. This month, we invite all of you to re-imagine your state of being. Let's reawaken our vision of our transcendent self and work towards actualizing that. In fact, in the Vajrayana Tibetan Buddhism, we believe that each of us are born with the Buddha nature. So we can try to reawaken that and tame and reduce the afflictive emotions.

And this exceptionally well-preserved sculpture dates from the 8th century of Common Era. It was made in Swat Valley, which is today's Pakistan. The central figure is Shakyamuni Buddha, as you can see here in this beautiful sitting in the full lotus position, often it's also referred to as Vajra position. He is known as the Shakyamuni Buddha or in Tibetan, Shakya Thupa, often referred to as the historical Buddha. And then to his left is the Maitreya Buddha, who is known to be the future Buddha. And to the right side of Shakyamuni Buddha is Avalokiteshvara, the Buddha of compassion. In fact, all three of them, Buddha has been a bodhisattva before he reached fully enlightened. So the Maitreya Buddha and Avalokiteshvara both are the bodhisattvas

who will be benefiting and all beings eliminate our suffering. So now let's bring on our teacher for today. Our teacher is Lama Aryadroma. Lama Arya Doma is an ordained Buddhist teacher in the Karmakarju tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, who has completed over a decade of monastic study and meditation training. making them relevant in our everyday lives, helping us to cultivate loving kindness and compassion and bringing about a transformation of contentment and a genuine sense of well-being. Lama Arya Doma, thank you so much for being here and please help me in welcoming Lama Arya Doma. Hello and welcome everyone. Thank you all for coming in today. And thank you for the warm welcome, Tashi. It's such a pleasure to be here.

And today I chose this artwork. They give us a couple of artwork and we can choose one. And I chose this specifically because of what it symbolizes. So today's theme is re-imagine and the artwork I chose was you know Buddha Shakyamuni represents enlightened being, the wisdom of enlightenment and And then Maitriya Buddha, Maitriya means friend. So he embodies loving kindness. And of course, Avalokiteshvara also represents compassion. He's the Lord of compassion. So the idea is reimagine if you lived in a world where people are filled with loving kindness and compassion. Really, I mean, what a kind world this would be. of either Shakyamuni Buddha or Maitreya Buddha or Avalokiteshvara,

it symbolizes for us what they embody. And so I'm a big advocate of living intentionally in the sense what in today's world we see so many people getting depressed they have anxiety there's stress and so on and so i really would love to share this intention with y'all that as you get up in the morning really really set your mindset set have an intention Have an intention that today I am going to live a positive life in the sense, instead of waking up and probably reaching up for your phone to see all the news, rather set your mind to having a positive mindset. And how would you do that? Simple technique would be when you get up in the morning, think of three things of thoughts of gratitude. And literally as your eyes flicker, you say to

yourself, I'm going to live very intentionally today. So bring to your mindset three thoughts of gratitude and then followed by three thoughts of gratefulness. And be very mindful that as your mind wanders off into things that trouble you or stresses you, that you're going to keep bringing your mind back and say, I am going to have a positive day today. I'm going to set my mind into positive actions. So that is something I totally, totally recommend because thoughts are so powerful. I don't know if I told you the story last session, but I saw this wonderful documentary and it was called One Field. I have no connection to that, but I just wanted to share this because as we are studying mindfulness meditation, I also want to give you all scientific information. How setting your mindset into a positive way of thinking also sets the tone

around you. You know, when you are positive, it reflects on the people around you. You share that thought process around you. And the highest mindset is compassion. If you are in a state of compassion, it's the highest mindset you can be. And I want to share a beautiful story as all of you know I'm a monastic and I live in the monastery I've been a monastic since 2011 and my teacher shared this wonderful story of compassion and the story goes like this. There was this monk who was training so hard and his goal was to be enlightened because as a human being, our highest potential is also to be enlightened. You know, in the Buddhist tradition, there is this thought process that we are going to be reborn and reborn again until we become fully enlightened. So how do we become

enlightened? Through practicing compassion, through practicing loving kindness. Being in that positive state of mind leads us to eventually to enlightenment with practice, with studies, understanding the wisdom, the truth. So going back to the story about this monk, he was practicing so hard. He was so diligent. And then, you know, he was so far from any realization. And there was one time and his master encouraged him to keep practicing, practicing compassion,

altruism, positive mindset, all his practices. But no whale, nothing happened to him. And one day as he was walking in the forest, he was going back to the monastery, he saw this dog and this dog had a huge wound on its thigh and they were all maggots on that thigh. And this monk was so sad to see this dog and he went and bent and the dog was helpless. And he had such deep compassion for this dog because this dog was in so much pain and he couldn't do anything, lift those maggots from his hands because it would hurt the dog. So he literally bent down and with his tongue, he took out all those maggots just to save the dog and the dog is not going to be in pain. The minute he did that, the dog became a Buddha and blessed him and he became realized.

And I love the story. But soon after I heard the story from my master, I went crying to the master. I said, Master, I can't do maggots. I'm so sorry. I'm okay to give away all my shoes, all my possessions, but I can't do maggots. I'm very squamish. And my master, he was such a kind master. And he looked back and he said, don't worry.

The Buddha will only give you what you can handle. And so this is a true story. So I really urge you all to have compassion in your heart, to really, and compassion is something, when you have compassion for yourself, you have compassion, you are, you're able to give compassion to others, to really incorporate compassion into your life. And there is a wonderful meditation, and I always love this meditation which is called Tongling and this meditation Tongling it's 2500 years old and it's an old tradition that they still we still practice it and the Tongling is a meditation of compassion and Tongling means receiving and sending. But it's all fantastic to have compassion for others. But what about

compassion for yourself? And that is what I'm going to be talking today, having compassion for yourself. Apparently, there was a huge study whether self-esteem or self-compassion was more important. And, you know, they did a lot of studies in school giving children self-esteem, but apparently it didn't work because most of the children became narcissists. And so they had to go back and re-evaluate. And these are researchers, I couldn't believe it, that they incorporated self-compassion. And what is self-compassion? Most of us, we are so wonderful about giving love and kindness to others, our friends, our family. But when it comes to ourselves ourselves we are not that confident you know we don't we really are like very troubled by we think it's a little selfish but no self-compassion is the most

important aspect and self-compassion don't think self-compassion is pity but self-compassion is loving yourself being patient with yourself. There are so many things that are going to be happening as life goes on, you know, and you will make mistakes. Having self-esteem, you know, they promoted perfection. How many of you are perfect here? It's impossible. We are humans and we make mistakes. And these are the times when you make mistakes, when you are feeling low, that's when you feel love, compassion for yourself, self-compassion.

And be very, very gentle with yourself. Be kind to yourself. and most often we are not how many how often we've probably hurt our feet and we call ourselves stupid you know because we bumped into something right we think it's our fault so how do we do this self-compassion meditation so here's the instructions as we do we can all sit upright and sit be comfortable whenever you sit upright for my mindfulness meditation be comfortable when you sit on your chairs it's also wonderful to put your legs parallel you know there's a lot of energy within our body the air that flows in our body and here's the instructions for a self the self-compassion

meditation and so first when we start we'll start with three breaths taking in very deep breaths and breathing out so when you breathe out just breathe out all the stress you feel for you know all the stress you've collected today the week or so so on. And then what we'll do, as we sit upright, bring to your mind stream someone you love deeply. It could be your friend, it can be your mother, it can be your father, brother, someone you love very deeply. Bring that into your mind stream. And then in your heart center, visualize this wonderful bright white light.

And then visualize yourself sitting in front of you. And it can be yourself who's sitting in front of you, can be any age. You can be 2, 3, 6, 12, 21, 81, whoever you want to be. And from your heart center, send out this beautiful white light to yourself sitting in front of you. Fill yourself with white light and instantly be transformed. Be more joyous and happy and all the positive aspects who you want to be. Forgive yourself. So we will start now and I will ring the bell.

So we'll take in a deep breath and breathe out all your stress out and like so. Breathe out all your stress. And your second breath again, breathe in deeply. Breathe in deeply. Let go of all your stress. And your third breath, breathe in again deeply, and now breathe normally at your own pace breathe in and breathe out

and as you breathe in just visualize this beautiful white light in your heart center and then visualize yourself sitting in front of you, facing yourself. And bring to your mind stream the thought of unconditional love. And from your heart center,

send out this beautiful white light to yourself sitting in front of you filling you from head to your toes with the light of loving kindness compassion and visualize yourself fully transformed. All your negative obstacles have disappeared

and you're shining with this beautiful light. You're filled with joy and happiness. Let's sit for a few moments. Breathe in normally. normally relax your shoulders your jaws your abdomen relax completely And it's okay to shift a little if you want to cough, play your throat, It's okay. Inhale and exhale. Breathe normally. Breathe slowly. And bring to your mind stream the feeling of unconditional love, facing you, whatever age you want yourself to be.

And just visualize from your heart center a beautiful white light going towards you, filling you from your head to toes. This beautiful light, the feeling of unconditional love touches you. And all your negative obscurations just disappears. just disappears and you're transformed instantly into this joyous compassion person

and let's sit for a few moments breathing in and breathing out at your own rhythm and space. Thank you. Inhale and exhale. Breathe normally at your own rhythm. Bring to your mind stream the feeling of absolute and unconditional love. The love you feel for a friend any family members any being

fill your space with that unconditional love and from your heart center this beautiful white light and visualize yourself facing yourself in front of you. And from your heart center, this beautiful light fills you from your head to toes. And you're instantly transformed and all your negative aspects all the negative things you've been carrying on

just let go of it and you're transformed into this feeling of loving kindness and compassion you're filled with it and let's sit for a few moments loving kindness and compassion. You're filled with it. And let's sit for a few moments. Thank you. If your mind has wandered off, that's no problem. You just say thinking, label it as thinking, and just bring your mind's attention back and observe your breath. Inhale in and breathe out.

Keep your mind's attention on your breath. and again breathe in and breathe out gently at your own rhythm and bring to your mind stream the feeling of unconditional love. And from your heart center, visualize this beautiful white light surrounded, embodies this loving kindness and compassion. and visualize yourself in front of you, whatever age yourself to be facing you, and from your heart center,

this beautiful white light enters you and fills you with this loving kindness and compassion, and you are instantly transformed all the negative baggage you are carrying just disappears and you are filled with this light of loving kindness and compassion and let's sit for a few moments

paying attention to your breath going in and coming out And compassion. And let's sit for a few moments. Paying attention to your breath going in and coming out. Okay. Relax everyone. Open your eyes. There was a lot of compassion going around. Thank you. Thank you so much, Lamarie Doma.

That was beautiful. That concludes this week's practice. To support the Rubin and this meditation series, we invite you to become a member at rubinmuseum.org membership. And to stay up to date with the Rubin Museum's virtual and in-person offerings, sign up for our monthly newsletter at rubinmuseum.org slash enews. I am Tashi Chodron. Thank you so much for listening. Have a mindful day.