Tea with Mara

Seems like everywhere you turn, things are stressful. This week in Two Hands Sangha we talked about using the teachings of the Dhamma to just simply get a little bit of relaxation from our mental and physical stress. It's the first step of a deeper dive into the practice. I hope you'll enjoy and leave a comment sharing your favorite mindfulness technique for simple relaxation!

A very short talk on wise speech, specifically in relation to politics. No Dharma Talk tonight, just this introduction to a period of community sharing and catching up, which was not recorded for personal confidence purposes, but I added a recorded bit at the end, encouraging you to leave a response to the podcast and share your own feelings or thoughts on whatever you're feeling these days. We're in some challenging times, and you can share here or contact me if you want to share your thoughts. Thank you for listening!

Dharma talk and meditation on working with the shadow side of ourselves and some practices that can help you get through difficult aspects of your own experience. This has been very necessary for me lately and I hope you'll find it useful in these turbulent times as well.

Two Hands Sangha Dharma talk, after a month hiatus, the sangha came together tonight, and what better way to do so than with a reminder of why Sangha is so important and a call to action for those who haven't attended regularly since the Pandemic. A gentle reminder and an equally gentle invitation to make in-person Sangha a priority. Enjoy!

Pitfall Harry, from the 1982 Atari 2600 video game classic "Pitfall" shares his wisdom in this Dharma talk and guided meditation on how to deal with some of the pitfalls, or secondary challenges, that might come up as we work through rumination and anxiety, such as negative self talk and social avoidance. I hope you enjoy listening as much as I enjoyed offering this talk. Enjoy!

Dharma Talk and Meditation on the topic of Rumination complimenting, or extending, what I wrote about in the recent TRIPP Blog Post on rumination. That was a secular approach, and this is the dharma view of the challenge of rumination. I hope you'll find it useful and I look forward to hearing from you about this one!

TRIPP Blog Post

Short Dharma talk with no meditation on MN 60 The Incontrovertible Teaching, on of my favorites. Sadly, the full talk and meditation was not recorded last night, by mistake, so I had to re-record the talk portion this morning, minus any of the spontaneous parts that came up last night. Sorry for the trouble, but this talk was important to me to put out so I hope this version will serve as a good substitute.

Dharma Talk and Meditation on the topic of ill-will. Today was a hard day. I almost didn't offer this talk, but in the end it was just what I needed and I hope it will be helpful for you as well. The talk is on ill-will and some ways to work with it. I hope you will enjoy it!

Dharma Talk and Meditation on the topic of sensual desire, and how we can learn to understand the mind and work with it to overcome cravings of the senses. A dash of Moana, a sprinkle of Johnny Depp from Once Upon a Time In Mexico, and a lot of dharma. I hope you enjoy!

Dharma Talk and brief meditation on the topic of clinging to rites and rituals, or "mere rules" and rituals. When do our little rituals and habits lead toward lasting happiness and when do they get in the way of our practice, or even obscure it. We discuss in this talk and I hope you enjoy it!