Mindfulness Meditation Podcast - Mindfulness Meditation with Sharon Salzberg 07/25/2024

Episode Date: August 2, 2024

The Rubin Museum presents a weekly meditation for beginners and skilled meditators alike. Each episode is inspired by a different work of art from the Museum’s collection and is led by a prominent meditation teacher.The episode begins with an opening talk followed by a 20-minute meditation. In this episode, the guided meditation begins at 16:11. Teacher: Sharon SalzbergTheme: RebirthArtwork: Wheel of Life; Tibet; 19th century; pigments on cloth; Rubin Museum of Art; Gift of Shelley and Donald Rubin; This program is presented in partnership with Sharon Salzberg and teachers from the New York Insight Meditation Center, the Interdependence Project, and Parabola Magazine and supported by the Frederick P. Lenz Foundation for American Buddhism.Learn more about the Rubin Museum’s work around the world at rubinmuseum.org.

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. Hello, everybody, and Tashi Delek! Welcome! Welcome to the Mindfulness Meditation at the Rubin Museum of Art.

I am Tashi Chodron, Himalayan Programs and Communities Ambassador, and I'm so delighted to be here with all of you. So I'm kind of curious to know how many of you have been attending this on a regular basis? All right, wonderful. And how many of you are first time? Wow, that is so wonderful. Thank you. And then in between. All right. So those of you who are first time, we are a global hub for Himalayan art with home base in Chelsea, 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 Sharon Salzberg and then we will have a short sit about 15 to 20 minutes for the meditation guided by her. And so the artwork for today's session is this beautiful Thangka painting, a scroll painting, a mineral pigment on cloth. And this is Wheel of Life, origin Tibet or Mongolia. And it's dated 19th century, mineral pigments on cloth. And it's about 61.5 inches, 39.25 inches. And this is a painting, a scroll painting in Tibetan. It's called Thangka.

And the Wheel of Life is called Sitpe Korlo in Tibetan word. Each month we have a theme, and this month, July, the theme is Rebirth. The connection to the theme, Rebirth, we invite all of you to reflect on how we can integrate change, transformation, and renewal into our lives and blossom into new form. Another sipekolo, the wheel of life, explains the concept of rebirth. explains the concept of rebirth. And in fact, there is a word called korwa in Tibetan, which means samsara in Sanskrit, the ancient language. And the closest translation is cyclic existence or the cycle of existence, which is, as you see here, so many circles, right? And it's what is called the birth and the death and the rebirth. So that's the circle.

And based on the Buddha's teaching says, based on our own action, we will come back in one of these six realms. There are three upper realms, the god, demigod, and the human realm, the realm that we are all in. And then the three lower realms, you see in the circle, and the sixth division, that is animal, hungry ghost, and the hell realm that every religion and culture talks about. Now, if you look in the center most, that is the three animals you see, and those three animals

associates the rooster or the bird-like associates with desire, clinging, attachment, clinging, attachment, which brings so much suffering. And then the snake here symbolizes anger, hatred. If you look around in the world, because of anger, because of hatred, we create so much suffering. And then this very stylish figure here is the pig, stylish pig. The pig symbolizes ignorance. And if you look closely, all of them, like from the pig's mouth, they all are connected, tied to each other. And the pig symbolizes ignorance, which is considered the root cause of all the suffering. And so these three are often

referred to as the three poisons. Dhocha, Sh shedang, timu in Tibetan word. So those are three poisons. And now because of these, we created so much afflictive or conceptualized different things and all that emotion. And based on that, we have good karma, meritorious deed, and we create negative karma. And so this half is the dark one and now based on all of that then we are reborn in one of these realms that's explained as in the next circle from the center people move upward to the higher states of consciousness and then downward to afflicted states their actions polluted by the po, propel them into a continuous cycle of rebirth into the six realms of existence depicted in the large segments around the two

inner circles. These are the realms of gods, demigods, hungry ghosts, and then the hell realm animal realm and so forth so the figure that's holding this whole wheel is the lord of the dead and he's the one that one great master here when he gave public talk he said nobody can escape this side whether we believe in next life or not it seems nobody can because he's there holding the scale of your good action and bad action or whether some of us commonly known as karma right your action and based on that we are reborn um and and have our own face the cause and effect and condition there is so much more just this can be explained for hours and weeks and months. But it's a very powerful image that is often you will find if you go in India or Tibet or outside the monastery where these are on the mural wall. Okay, so let's bring on our teacher

for today. Our teacher is Sharon Salzberg. Sharon Salzberg, co-founder of the Insight Meditation Society in Barrie, Massachusetts, has guided meditation retreats worldwide since 1974. Her latest books are Real Life, The Journey from Isolation to Openness and Freedom and Finding Your Way, meditations, thoughts, and wisdom for living an authentic life. Sharon is also the author of several publications, including the New York Times bestseller, Real Happiness, The Power of Meditation, Faith, Trusting, Your Own Deepest Experience, Loving Kindness, The Revolutionary Art of Happiness, Real Love, The Art of Mindful loving kindness the revolutionary art of happiness real love the art of mindful connection and real change mindfulness to heal ourselves and the world while running our own podcast the meta

hour and interviewing 100 plus influential voices in meditation and mindfulness movements sharon has regularly contributed to many on-stage conversations at the Rubin Museum. Sharon, thank you so much for being here and please help me in welcoming Sharon Salzberg. Thank you. I'm so happy to be with all of you. I'm so happy about this choice of art. This has long been one of my very, very favorite symbols in all of Buddhism, and I've looked at it a lot over many years, replicas of this kind of work. And the topic of rebirth, course is fascinating i think because it exists in so many different layers there's the moment to moment rebirth there's hour by hour rebirth there's big changes in lifestyle or choice or all kinds of things and so we talk about rebirth of

course we're talking about change and change has many faces there's the kind of poignant letting go you can't hold on to anything it's even it's like moving too quickly you know like where did these years go where did that year go like where does life go it's it's too fast and uh so there's that side change. And then there's the other side of change, which is about rebirth, beginnings and springtime and renewal and opening and so many aspects that are beautiful and full of possibility when we think about change. That's rebirth. change that's rebirth and then of course in the larger or more symbolic expressions like through this art we have the question of rebirth through lifetimes and so one of the many things i would ponder looking at at something like this this tanka this work of art would be the relationship of the mind and body that if we cultivate we nurture we strengthen we nurse hatred

what does that do physiologically and you can look in a mirror and just to play even you know just to to get a sense of like what happens when I am not just feeling something, not just feeling something strongly, but I'm really into it, you know, and I'm like deep into it and I'm immersed in it and I'm trying to strengthen it because I think that's the route to happiness or something like that. And just look in the mirror and you see what happens. And so i would imagine these different realms you know if we cultivate hatred for a lifetime might we not have

physiological consequences if you take you know that cosmology to mean another life awaiting. If you cultivate love and openness and boundlessness and connection and clarity, what does that do in terms of the realm in which we are not only living in the moment, but perhaps reborn into? And so, of course, many people don't have that kind of worldview, that sense of cosmology. It always made sense to me, although, I mean, it's not a question of proving unless you believe the accounts of people who've traversed, you know, a few times and report on it. And not everyone believes those.

and report on it and not that not everyone believes those so um rather than sort of deal with it that way i would more take it to mean like what are the implications for me of that kind of worldview of many possibilities of rebirth of uh the the things we care about the qualities we cultivate, where we put our hearts, where we put our energy, having some consequence even beyond the very real consequences and very evident consequences of this life. And so for me, oddly enough, or maybe not oddly, I don't know, or maybe not huddly, I don't know,

it really became a sense of assessment of kind of ethics or morality in that and really compassion, I think, more than anything in that according to that model that we see in that depiction of the art, if you take that idea of rebirth, we're not just reborn like forever into one particular realm. We kind of keep moving life after life. And so for me, that became a symbol of the fact that the single most illogical kind of emotion we could have is that of self-righteousness.

I am perfect because I never ever could possibly have done that despicable thing you have done way over there. Because guess what? We've done it. We've all been one another's friends and enemies and those of us here right now together we've saved one another and we've harmed one another and we've left with one another and we've cried with one another we've all done everything and that doesn't mean we lose the sense of right wrong or or clarity about anything but that kind of isolation that sense of rigid removal and self-righteousness that makes no sense in that kind of model and of course one could have a kind of understanding of that totally not using that sort of cosmology i've've often said, well, two things. One is no one, and I imagine this is still true, has yet invented the machine we could like plug into someone's brain so that

every thought they had while meditating would be audible to the rest of us. Because that would be entertaining, right? Like, oh, it looks so nice when i first saw the earth i came you know because we have these impulses these uh urges you know for everything it's not that we act on everything sometimes through wisdom upbringing background sheer good luck we haven't carried out that really weird thought that came through but to imagine we are so perfect that that thought never arises it's not there and then to realize that we we don't lose that sense of clarity, of even moral urgency, but we can have compassion for somebody just as we have compassion for ourselves. Like they're lost in whatever. And so to use a model like this, of course it depends on how you use it,

but it's been a useful model for me. So let's sit together now. Don't worry about what thoughts may come. We have not invented that thing. Sometimes the really mischievous part of me says, well, because we don't have the chip to implant, we can just ask someone to act out every thought that comes up in their minds and the rest of us will keep our eyes open.

But we won't do that either. So you can sit comfortably, close your eyes or not, however you feel most at ease. Close your eyes or not, however you feel most at ease. Start if you like by listening to sound, the sound of my voice or other sounds. It's a way of relaxing deep inside, allowing your experience to come and go. And within that space, bring your attention to the feeling of the breath, just the normal, natural breath, wherever you feel it most distinctly. Maybe the nostrils, the chest, or the abdomen.

You can find that place. Bring your attention there and just rest. See if you can feel one breath. See if you can feel one breath. Without concern for what's already gone by, without leaning forward for even the very next breath. Just this one. If you like, you can use a quiet mental notation like in, out, or rising, falling to help support the awareness of the breath. But very quiet.

Report the awareness of the breath, but very quiet. So your attention's really going to feeling the breath, one breath at a time. Thank you. And if images or sounds or sensations or emotions should arise, but they're not very strong, you can stay connected to the feeling of the breath. Just let them flow on by. You're breathing. It's just one breath. They are strong, and they pull you away. See if you can notice what's come up, joy, sorrow, some sensation in the body.

Recognize it. See if you can let go. Bring your attention back to the feeling of the breath. And for all those perhaps many times you're just gone, lost in thought, spun out in a fantasy, you fall asleep, truly don't worry about it. You can recognize you've been gone with great compassion for yourself, see if you can let go gently. Just come back. Shepherd your attention back to the feeling of the breath. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And when you feel ready, you can open your eyes or lift your gaze and we'll end the meditation. Thank you so much for that beautiful session, Sharon. Thank you. 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 a monthly newsletter at rubinmuseum.org slash e-news. I am Tashi Chodron. Thank you so much for listening. Have a mindful day.