..續本文上一頁erritory—that”s why you have a tendency to go away. When you look at television, this is an escape. You take refuge in the TV in order to forget yourself. If you are a responsible king or a responsible queen, you can go back to your territory in order to re-establish harmony and peace, but this is something you don”t want to do. You look for an escape. Escaping your territory--in our society, this is how most people behave. We are afraid to go back. We always try to escape, and that is why things become worse every day.
"The Buddha suggests that we have to go back, that we should use mindfulness in order to come back to ourselves. Of course, there are too many pains in us, and we don”t want to go back to these pains. But the Buddha said that with the practice of mindfulness you will have enough courage and energy to go back to yourself, and re-establish things the proper way. You have to go back to your physical body, embrace your physical body, to take care of the physical body. You should go back to your feelings, your emotions, even if these feelings are very unpleasant, even if it seems that they may destroy you, you should go back to them in order to embrace them, in order to help them to transform. If you are still afraid, you should call your Dharma brothers and sisters, and ask them for support, because practice can also happen in groups. As with deep relaxation, we can practice as a Sangha. One friend, one brother, one sister, can sit with you, and they can give you mindfulness energy so that you can go back home with strength. “My brother, I know that the pain in you is very deep, and I am here for you.” Now, let us practice deep breathing. Let us calm our bodies, and let us try to breathe deeply in mindfulness and embrace the pain that you have in yourself. So your Dharma brother or sister will sit next to you and practice with you and give you a lot of energy. A mother can help her son or daughter to practice this. The husband can help his wife to practice; the wife can help her husband to do the same thing. There is solidarity between the members of a Sangha, and meditation is inpidual, but it is also a group practice.
"If you think that by yourself you cannot go back, and you cannot embrace feelings or emotions, you can ask one, two, or three brothers to sit next to you and to help you with their support. This is always possible. To live as a Sangha is very good, because you can always benefit from the collective energy of your Sangha, in order to be able to go back to yourself and embrace the suffering in yourself, the fear, the anxiety, the despair. We have to call these things by their names, but you can do this only if you already have a little bit of this energy that we call mindfulness. By practicing walking meditation, by practicing mindfulness of breathing, taking your meal in mindfulness, you cultivate this kind of energy, and with this energy you are able to come back and embrace the block of sufferings that is in you. We are here, brothers and sisters in the Dharma, to support you in your practice. If everyone in the family knows the practice, then the situation is going to be able to transform very quickly.
(bell)
"In exactly the same way that you embrace your physical body, you will say, “Darling, I am here for you.,” in the realm of feelings. “My suffering, my despair, I know you are here. I am here for you.” You recognize the presence of your suffering, of your despair, and with this energy of mindfulness, you take into your arms this block of suffering. This is the practice. If you have the support of brothers and sisters around you, then this practice of transforming pain will be a success. Keep mindful breathing alive, and continue for ten or twenty minutes.
"This energy of mindfulness—wha…
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