The practice of mindfulness meditation is so simple: coming back to the sensation of being in the present moment, coming back to the breath, letting go of what carries us away. Why yoke the Noble Eight-fold Path to this wordless and elegant vehicle? Well, you don’t have to. And yet…but still…it turns out that theContinue reading “Flash Flood Sutra”
Tag Archives: Allowing
A Net That Catches Us
On Sunday, I showed up to teach mindfulness meditation with no voice, or almost no voice. When I opened my mouth to speak a rasping, breathy whisper came out and sometimes (when I really felt moved and enthusiastic) there was a layer of squeaking and gasping. In the acoustics of my own head, I soundedContinue reading “A Net That Catches Us”
Advent 2014
Sunday was the first day of Advent. It is a dark time, but also charged with the sense that something new is coming, something that is outside the archives of memories contained by the brain’s default network. Ordinarily, we live in a daze of projection, a haze of memory–new events trigger old emotions. Christmas lightsContinue reading “Advent 2014”
Thanksgiving Meditation
The model for our modern Thanksgiving was a celebration that happened in 1621, at the Plymouth Plantation in Massachusetts. The Wampanoag Native Americans helped the pilgrims cultivate the land and fish, saving them from starvation. Giving and gratitude was a way of life for Native Americans, not just a special celebration of safe passage. TheirContinue reading “Thanksgiving Meditation”
Pickpocket Sutra
Last time, I wrote about practice as a way of return, of recollection, of remembering—coming down out of our thoughts and memories and dreams to experience of being in a living, breathing body here and now. I wrote about how this movement of return can feel like a last resort, something we turn toContinue reading “Pickpocket Sutra”
The Art of Returning
Dear Noble Friends, I’ve been away a long time. Now it feels good and right to come home. Late yesterday afternoon, a group of us gathered to practice mindfulness meditation and do a bit of yoga and talk in a beautiful yoga studio in Tarrytown (Yogashivaya.com). The yoga studio was filled with the golden naturalContinue reading “The Art of Returning”
Tracy Cochran 