Mindfulness Meditation Podcast - Mindfulness Meditation with Sharon Slazberg 12/13/2021

Episode Date: December 16, 2021

Theme: Interdependence Artwork: Sherab Chamma "Loving Mother of Wisdom"; Tibet; 19th century; pigments on cotton; Rubin Museum of Art; [http://therubin.org/336] Teacher: Sharon Salzberg The Rubin Museum presents a weekly online 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 a recording of the live online session and includes an opening talk and 20-minute sitting session. The guided meditation begins at 14:23. This meditation is presented in partnership with Sharon Salzberg, teachers from the NY Insight Meditation Center, the Interdependence Project, and Parabola Magazine. To attend a Mindfulness Meditation online session in the future 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, Dawn Eshelman. host, Dawn Eshelman. Every Monday, 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 practice, currently held virtually. 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 Insight Meditation Center, the Interdependence Project, and Parabola Magazine.

And now, please enjoy your practice. Welcome, everybody. Welcome to Mindfulness Meditation Online with the Rubin Museum of Art. My name is Dawn Eshelman. Great to have you here with us. And for those of you who are new to us, we're a museum of Himalayan art and ideas in New York City. And it is a pleasure to have you all join us for our weekly practice, where we combine art and meditation online. We're talking about interdependence today. So this idea comes forth in this time of year that for many of us is a time of gathering in one way or another, virtually or in person, or just feeling our connectedness.

And sometimes, you know, recognizing when we don't feel that as well. But often, you know, thinking of or looking to the collective as this core part of our experience together. So today we're going to look at work of art from our collection that will inspire our sit together today. And we'll hear a brief talk from our teacher. Today we have the exquisite Sharon Salzberg. And luckily we get to have her next week as well.

And then again in the new year. So a nice dose of Sharon Salzberg for you. Today with Sharon, we will hear a brief talk from Sharon, then after that we'll sit together 15 or 20 minutes. Let's take a look at the theme and artwork for today. So this is Cherub Chama. This is the loving mother of wisdom, and this is from 19th century Tibet. This is the loving mother of wisdom and this is from 19th century Tibet This is actually a deity of the bone religion. So bone the religion that's indigenous to Tibet to the Himalayas and Tibet Central Asia

and bone has really flourished despite the popularity of Buddhism in the region as well and over the last thousand years and through many different and political environments and this is a very important figure in that tradition share of drama the loving mother of wisdom and the primary role of the loving mother of wisdom is that of a compassionate mother figure that embodies the nature of wisdom as the nature of wisdom she is the mother of all bon deities and enlightened ones and the four principal deities in the bon religion are known as the four transcendent ones and cherub jama, is the only female, and she's the first.

And she's known by many different names. Maybe we'll hear a little bit more about that later. And has numerous forms also, so peaceful or wrathful. We see so many figures here in this painting, but just bringing this forward, this to you today, under this umbrella of interdependence, this to you today under this umbrella of interdependence connectedness this concept of compassion that really underlies that connectedness and that concept for us so she's both a meditational deity and a protector and she's one of the most frequently mentioned figures in the bun religion and extends her protection to religious and secular folks and just exudes this concept of compassion, of connectedness. So let me bring on our teacher today, Sharon Salzberg, who is the co-founder of the Insight Meditation Society in Berry,

Massachusetts, has many wonderful books, real change, real love. She's just such an important person for us here at the Rubin and has incredible teachings and books that I think are really useful for practitioners of many different levels. And delighted to have you back, Sharon. Thank you so much. It's wonderful to be back. So I'm still in New York City. So I just want to warn you, I may be bringing you the sounds not only of sirens and traffic, but of nearby construction. So that's just how it is. I do apologize, but it is how it is, which brings us to the topic of the day, which is interdependence. Another way of approaching that is reality, like what's real. We spend so much of our time battling what's real or not noticing what's real or ignoring

what's real, but when we hone our attention, even just to be present, it's not anything like super fancy, to be present, to be open, to be interested, then we can see what actually is much more clearly in a less cluttered kind of biased way. And one of the main things we see over and over again is the truth of interdependence. And, you know, we can see many faces of interdependence that we are relying on others. Sometimes, you know, well, now it's so obvious in sort of pandemic times or in that flow of events.

But even before that, I'd walk down the hallway in my apartment in New York City and I would just think, I hope nobody like, you know, falls asleep smoking or something like that. You know, like my life is really in the hands of the behavior of others. And so too are other people's lives in the hands that I have to work with to make choices from. That we live in a way that we are really, even if we don't notice it, relying on one another. And sometimes that's scary. That's not always that beautiful.

The beautiful face of it is embodied in something like that piece of art. It's compassion. It's the kind of compassion that's so natural that it's like breathing out. It's the kind of compassion that happens because there is no other way of being. It just doesn't make any sense when we are responding to what's real, that we're kind of all in this together, that we need one another, that our lives are connected. this together, that we need one another, that our lives are connected, which is very different than liking somebody or approving of them or cheering them on, hoping that they have tremendous success in their endeavors. It's very, very different.

It's that bone-deep knowledge that our lives have something to do with one another. And we respond. It's just the natural response of that worldview. You know, in imagery and metaphor, often people say things like it's like realizing one of your hands or one of your fingers is hurting. And so you respond. It's not actually that we all mush together into one kind of blob, but we have that knowledge. It reminds me of, in Mahayana Buddhism, there's this very beautiful image called Indra's net, where the entire universe is depicted as a net. And in each place

where, say, the strings with the cords meet, there's a crystal. So every crystal is reflecting off of everything else. And that's really said to be reality. And so we don't force ourselves to see things that way, but we really try to pay attention to notice. way, but we really try to pay attention to notice. We notice how alone we can feel when we are apart from that. We notice the profound sense of connection when we recognize

that our lives are intertwined. Maybe even before we sit, we can do one of my favorite reflections together, which is a little bit like that. And then after that, we can go into the meditation. And the reflection is basically just considering for a moment. You just be relaxed. You don't have to close your eyes unless you want to, but just see who comes to mind when you consider who all might have had any influence on your being here today listening. Maybe somebody is taking care of things at home so that you have some free time and you can do this. Or at work, so you can do this. Or somebody long ago told you about mindfulness or about the Rubin Museum. Somebody read you a poem, played you a piece of music, showed you some art.

And you started thinking about layers of reality and different perspectives. home, played you a piece of music, showed you some art, and you started thinking about layers of reality and different perspectives. Because no one was like channel surfing, right? I ended up here. There are causes and conditions, there are relationships, conversations, connections that are just streaming together to bring us all here in this moment. So who comes to mind? When I do this reflection, I often think about the Board of Regents of the state of New York, which dispenses scholarships for state universities.

And I went to one of those universities with their scholarship that they awarded me. And that was how I was able to go to college. And it was through a college program that I ended up going to India. So in a very direct way, they're actually part of why I'm here with you all now. And sometimes I do this reflection. I think about those people whose actions have really hurt me, not just the ones I find annoying or I get impatient over, but those times in my life where I really felt like I was at an edge and I thought I'm going to have to start

seeing things differently or work to be different, to have a better perspective, to be happier because they're part of why I'm here right now too. You think about the food that you've perhaps eaten today, even if it was not a distinct animal product, somebody planted seeds in some soil, and creatures live in that soil, and someone did that planting. Someone harvested a crop, transported it, sold it to us, or created a dish and sold it to us.

Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh is very famous for back when he was publicly lecturing he'd hold something up like a string bean and say, now see the world see the sunshine, see everything that affected the quality of that soil see the hopes and dreams of that farmer see the hopes and dreams of that farmer. If we look at anything, we really can't see the world because everything is linked, everything is intertwined.

And the consequence of that is that we realize we're never alone, however alone we might feel. alone, however alone we might feel, and that we have kind of a responsiveness to others that is commensurate with that worldview. We recognize and appreciate those who've helped us. We take a moment to do that. We reach out, especially if someone has reached out to us. We kind of pay it forward in a way that's not, you know, labored and like lecturing yourself and having a kind of pretense in any way.

But it's so natural. We see the world as it really is. And this is how every element of our being is just lined up to respond. So interdependence is really, in so many ways, it's like the core understanding that we come to when we pay attention carefully. So let's sit together. You can close your eyes or not. And in this web of interconnection, start by listening to sound, which is not yet that really difficult sound of sawing and drilling and whatever. Just whatever sounds come and go.

See if you can relax deep inside and allow them to do just that. And bring your attention to the feeling of your body sitting, whatever sensations you discover. See if you can feel the earth supporting you. Feel space touching you. Bring your attention to your hands and make that move from the more conceptual level, like go fingers, to the world of direct experience, picking up the sensations in the moment that you're feeling. Coolness, warmth, pressure, whatever it might be. You don't have to name these things, but feel them. Thank you. And bring your attention to the feeling of your breath, the actual sensations of the in and out breath.

And this is just the normal natural breath. You don't have to try to make it deeper or different. And find that place where the breath is strongest for you or clearest for you. Maybe the nostrils, the chest, or the abdomen. Bring your attention there and just rest. See if you can feel one breath. Thank you. As various other things arise, thoughts, feelings, sensations, please notice them, recognize them. See if you can let go of them and return your attention to the feeling of the breath. And for all those perhaps many times your child is gone, spaced out, lost in thought,

or you fall asleep, truly don't worry about it. You realize that? Here too, we see if we can let go and just begin again. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. When your attention leaves the breath, see if you can notice what you're experiencing without judgment, without holding on, without pushing away, just recognizing, oh, this is what's happening right now. And then see if you can let go and come back to the breath. breaths. 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, Sharon.

That concludes this week's practice. If you'd like to support the Rubin and this meditation series, we invite you to become a member. If you're looking for more inspiring content, please check out our new podcast, Awaken, hosted by Laurie Anderson. The 10-part series features personal stories that explore the dynamic path to enlightenment and what it means to wake up. Now available wherever you listen to podcasts. Thank you for listening, and thank you for practicing with us.