Our Moving into Meditation class continues to draw inspiration from  Frank Ostaseski’s wonderful book about living with the awareness that we’re going to die.  His book distills what he’s learned into Five Invitations we can answer in living a conscious life.  In today’s class we worked with the fifth invitation to cultivate “don’t know mind.”  This invitation seems to mirror queries found in the ancient Tao Te Ching.  We drew inspiration from Ursula Le Guin’s elegant translation of the “Book About the Way and the Power of the Way.”  She described it as “. . .  the most lovable of all the great religious texts, funny, keen, kind, modest, indestructibly outrageous, and inexhaustibly refreshing. Of all the deep springs, this is the purest water. To me, it is also the deepest spring.” Continue reading →

Our Moving into Meditation class drew inspiration from the symbolism of darkness and light.  We used contemplation and movement to explore the different feeling states we have in association with darkness and light.  We used the breathing practices of Chandra Bhedana and Surya Bhedana to tune into the darkness and light in our experience and psyches. Zen poet Jane Hirshfield’s poem evoked imagery to further the journey.   We also discussed the concept of the shadow in Jungian psychology.   Continue reading →