The Imperfect Buddhist

00:05 Welcome to the Imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss present moment awareness and incorporating Buddhist principles into modern life. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney, and today's episode is titled Buddhism and Warry. 00:37 I have a long history with Warri. I remember being on a road trip with my family during the summer. It must've been like five or six coming up with all of these Warri thoughts about if we had enough gas or how far it was gonna be to the next place that offered food. And my dad, who was great with nicknames, came up with a nickname for me. He called me the designated warrior. My family laughed about it, 01:06 Worried what he meant by that. 01:10 Through my early adolescence and teen years, I was prescribed anti-anxiety medication and I took that up until I was about 18 or 19. My early 20s, I came into contact with my worried thoughts again. And from my early 20s up until now, I've been practicing meditation as a way to find some grounding in the midst of worried thoughts. 01:39 I just got back from a week long work trip up in Cincinnati. We do this a couple times a year. There's a bunch of people in the office and new people that I'm meeting for my new position as a business development representative. During this work trip, I noticed that my anxiety or worry was turning up to a new level, getting home from socializing, I would think, oh no, did I make a bad impression? What if they didn't like me? What if they thought I was too quiet? 02:08 We all do it, some of us more than others. Maybe not everyone, but most people will have these what ifs and if we're not careful, they turn into habits of negative thinking. 02:22 Worry, like many other patterns of thinking, compounds on itself. So we may have a worried thought. In my instance, I'd have the worried thought, oh, did I make a bad impressions on my coworkers? Then I think maybe I was too quiet. And then if I go to try to fix it and act from that worry, I might say, oh, tomorrow I'm going to do a better job of shaking people's hands and looking them in the eyes and smiling at them as we talk. I'm going to do a better job of that. Oh, but then what if they sense that I'm being fake? 02:52 Oh man, this doesn't feel very mindful. I'm not being a very good Buddhist. In those moments we are completely in our heads and our bodies and it's hard to step outside of it because the what-ifs feel so real. I'll continue worrying if I don't decouple from the thought that worrying is keeping me safe. We don't worry for no reason and in some way there's some justification inside. Whether it's subconscious or conscious that 03:20 Boring will keep me safe. It'll keep me on the right path. It's gonna keep me going in the right direction or the direction that I desire. 03:28 We can slow down enough and step outside of the worried habits of thinking and negative desire. Desire that's based on external circumstances being a certain way. So as we slow down, we use techniques that are available to us to become more present, whether that be awareness of our breathing, awareness of the room we're in, the sounds in the room, whatever we can do to bring our attention back. As we slow down, we can start to 03:57 Find our own intentions and look at what our intentions are in life. How are we coming at life? Some of the good news about the mental energy of wari is that it's a pretty pronounced energy. It's not as subtle as some other things that we may work with in our meditative practices. Wari is pretty obvious, it's pretty flavorful, pretty strong. It's a good opportunity for us to tune in and become more aware, more present. 04:25 Warring may have kept us safe in the past. We may have had to worry or think ahead or plan our next move to survive. And there's nothing wrong with planning or thinking ahead. We can really look out for the energy or thought when we start to notice it saying what if. We know that it's usually unnecessary worry. The energy of fear...

00:00 Hey, so before we start this episode, I do want to give you a heads up that we will be talking about some adult subjects. So if you have any people in your life that you're listening to this podcast with, or you yourself are somebody that feels like you don't want to hear about some very personal subjects, then you might want to listen to one of the other episodes or put on a different podcast. You've been warned. 00:27 Aware of the suffering caused by sexual misconduct, I undertake to cultivate responsibility and learn ways to protect the safety and integrity of individuals, couples, families, and society. I am determined not to engage in sexual relations without love and long-term commitment. To preserve the happiness of myself and others, I am determined to respect my commitments 00:57 and the commitments of others. I will do everything in my power to protect children from sexual abuse and to prevent couples and families from being broken by sexual misconduct. That's out of Thich Nhat Hanh's 5 mindfulness trainings. 01:25 I want to welcome you to the Imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss mindfulness and incorporating Zen principles into modern life. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney, and today's episode is titled Buddhism and Masturbation. 01:44 Bye! 01:59 First, I want to say thank you so much for joining me on this path together as we learn about and share experiences of incorporating mindfulness, Buddhist or Zen teachings into our modern lives. Thanks for choosing this podcast out of all the other Buddhist podcasts and mindfulness podcasts that are out there. It really means a lot. 02:23 Understanding Buddhism, Zen, and Sexuality. Anybody familiar with Zen or Buddhism will be familiar with the concept of mindfulness, which is the teaching that one can train themselves to place their awareness in the present moment and through this awareness one can come into contact with truth or the way things are with the Dharma. 02:50 If you were to look at old school Buddhism, old school Buddhist teachings, the Dhammapada, a lot of these teachings seem to be aimed at monks, people living in a community where practice was at the forefront of their life day in, day out, when they would eat, there was a ceremony, a practice that they would do, when they would sweep the floor, when they would meditate, when they would sleep, all these things were regimented and they were not allowed to. 03:18 have any type of sexual relations with other people in the organization or outside the organization, strictly forbidden. And in some Buddhist teachings, it was taught that sexuality or sex lust were a defilement of the mind, that they led to endless suffering and rebirth and negative karma. 03:47 self-pleasure. Sure, some people within monasteries or even lay practitioners view sexuality or sex in the same way that it's a defilement and a distraction from the path of liberation. But then in modern times you also have the Thich Nhat Hanh flavor, which I read that at the beginning there that it's not saying that there's anything inherently wrong with sexuality. It's as natural as eating. However, just like with eating, 04:15 they recommend a mindful approach, being present, being aware in sexual activity, being present and aware with whom you have sexual relations with, what are the impacts, what is the karma related to these sexual relations. 04:32 Zen Buddhism has an emphasis on direct experience and awakening through the present moment. Through our meditative practices, whether that's zazen, walking meditation, which is known as kinnhin, or other different various awareness training techniques like oriochi, which is a ceremony, a formal way of eating that's there to cultivate awareness. The core aim is this direct experience. 05:01 of reality in Zen. And so it's never really been a contradiction in my mind when it comes to base sexuality, meaning not using porn to stimulate the mind or live in some type of fantasy and...

00:07 Welcome to the Imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss present moment awareness and incorporating Buddhism into modern life. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney, and today's episode is titled, Buddhism and the Sacred Power of the Present Moment. 00:54 What is the present moment? It's this very instance, this little sliver of experience where everything's happening. 01:05 Living in our fast paced world, we're told we need to think about what we want to become when we get older. Most of us never really feel like we ever get older. We're always waiting for that big moment to come. The raise, the promotion, the perfect person to come into our life. That moment when we'll feel happy, completed, and everything will be just the way it should be. Our fast paced society doesn't leave a lot of room for the present moment. If someone's caught staring outside the window, 01:35 at wind rustling the leaves outside on a fall day? They might be asked, what are you looking at out there? Oh, you're daydreaming. 01:49 I was out to lunch with a friend. A couple weeks ago, Chris and I were sitting down to enjoy an Italian sub. We were talking about religion. Him and his partner are Christians and they've been practicing for a long time. I said, I really don't feel like what the heart of Zen Buddhism talks about is very religious. And I looked at him and I was like, where else do you think God is going to contact you? 02:17 Can God contact you in the future, worrying about the future, dreaming of the future? Is he going to contact you somewhere in the past in your mind? Or is God going to contact you now in this very moment, this present moment? 02:31 The heart of Zen Buddhism is cultivating and polishing our awareness and connection to what's happening around us and becoming more and more aware of the subtleties that exist on multiple levels beyond just the surface. The present moment holds huge transformational potential when we start to bring our attention to what is happening in our bodies, minds. 02:58 experiences, we start to see them as phenomenon. We start to see that thoughts come and go. We start to see that emotions come and go. We start to see the people come and go. We start to see that life conditions come and go. Rich, poor, sick, healthy, young, old. We come in contact with the transitory nature of life. 03:30 And so then we start to recognize that those things cannot be counted on for any type of security or self. Because if these things are all changing, then who are we? 03:43 Our sense of self begins to change and what we are is more and more revealed. We are the presence that is experiencing life, experiencing all these changes. We start to identify with the presence that witnesses all of phenomenon. 04:02 I read on a YouTube quote, one guy left a comment and he says, the longer I continue to do my spiritual practice, the more that I realize that true spirituality is not about becoming something you're not, but it's about letting go of what you're not until the true you is revealed. So that's why Zen Buddhism, it doesn't really force a whole lot down your throat. Yes, there's some precepts and there's some different teachings that you can read, but the real emphasis is on Zazen. 04:32 practice. The real emphasis is on sitting and being present. Because when you do that, all this stuff that's talked about by the Buddha, you start to experience it yourself. So there is no real need for someone to shove anything down your throat if you are experiencing it in your own practice. But where else can we connect with the sacred other than this present moment, this very instance? When we call it this instance, we lost it. 05:01 as James Brown would say, in the cut. I'm in the cut. You're in that very instant. 05:08 I remember early on in my practice, just noticing how my mind wanted to go off so much into the future, into the past, and daydream or complain. And I was really bringing my attention and my awareness...

00:06 Welcome to the Imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss mindfulness and incorporating Zen principles into modern life. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney and today's episode is titled, Buddhism and Intrusive Thoughts. 00:51 It really doesn't surprise me that I was drawn to Zen Buddhism. And this is an important episode for me because as some of the most listened imperfect Buddhists out there might know, I've struggled with intrusive thoughts or impulsive thoughts for about the last 14 years. And it really was probably the reason I got into meditation at all. The message of Zen Buddhism that we aren't our thoughts. 01:21 that we are the awareness around and experiencing our thoughts was very helpful to me in those early days and still is. To be able to see our minds as passing clouds, we practice what's known in Buddhism or even now some hippie culture, something called mindfulness. Mindfulness is the deliberate turning of our attention to the present moment and whatever we are doing in that moment. 01:50 Mindfulness can be emboldened and strengthened through a practice known as Zazen, which is meditation in Zen Buddhism. We do these practices to help us be mindful in our daily lives. And intrusive thoughts or impulsive thoughts, they happen in our daily life while we're feeding the cat or driving the car. Before we delve deeper into the topic of intrusive thoughts and 02:20 Buddhist philosophy. I want to take a moment to understand a little bit more about what these terms mean and how they impact people's lives. Intrusive thoughts can be described as reoccurring, unwanted, or usually distressing thoughts, images or urges that pop into your mind. They're usually intrusive, hence the name, in nature, and they appear and disrupt 02:50 well-being. Some people would say that impulsive thoughts are more characterized by sudden urges or impulses to act and usually without consideration for the outcome and these impulses can arise seemingly out of nowhere. They compel people to engage in certain behaviors and as the name suggests, they're hasty or impulsive. In my practice, I've dealt more with intrusive thoughts than impulsive thoughts. 03:18 Intrusive thoughts and impulsive thoughts can create intense anxiety, turmoil, and they can create a feeling of being out of control. If we don't have a way to deal with them or work on them and they're left unchecked, of course it's going to affect our relationships, our work, and overall quality of life. Throughout this episode, we're going to explore practical approaches to working with one's intrusive thoughts. And I'm going to share some of my personal experiences of 03:47 the start of these intrusive thoughts along with some of the success that I've had along the way. 04:15 Zen Buddhism is a storehouse of antidote for this type of affliction, namely intrusive thoughts and impulsive thoughts. Shunryo Suzuki said that to follow the path of Zen is to realize that your thoughts come and go of their own accord. You need not serve them tea. And in Buddhism there's this character known as Mara. Mara is the affliction of the world, suffering. 04:45 and essential what he's saying is that Mara may come into your house. As long as you don't serve Mara tea, he won't stick or she won't stick around. Dogen Zenji said, in the landscape of silence, thoughts appear like passing clouds. They come and go, but the sky remains unchanged. How does one develop a state of being where the last little quotes I read 05:13 become something that one experiences. One can begin to experience their own thoughts and emotions through the practice of mindfulness, through the practice of developing present moment awareness. And so hence we have the importance of mindfulness in one's daily life. Zen Buddhism offers various practices for cultivating awareness so that when that image pops into one's mind. 05:39 eventually you can see it as phenomenon. You can see it as static electricity, if you will, the...

00:00 To love is to recognize. To be loved is to be recognized by the other. Thich Nhat Hanh 00:20 Welcome my friends and fellow travelers to the imperfect Buddhist, where we get annoyed when our kitties walk all over our recording equipment when we're trying to record a very serious podcast. I'm your host Matthew Hockmahoney, and in today's episode, we're talking about relationships. This episode is titled Buddhism and Relationships. 01:08 I remember I told my coworker Christy that I was Buddhist, and shortly after she said something along the lines of, Buddhists don't believe in relationships. Sorry Christy if you're listening to this if I completely butchered what you said, but it was pretty much that sentiment. I guess some people outside of Buddhism, or maybe even in certain sects of Buddhism, 01:29 don't believe in relationships or perhaps in the past in the monastic days they didn't believe in relationships. I know they definitely didn't allow them in most monasteries. There appears to be a wide spectrum of people's interpretation when you say Buddhism and relationships. You have people say that Buddhists don't believe in relationships and then you have like a self-help book on dating written from the perspective of the Buddha. 01:56 In a more general sense, we have the central idea in Zen of cultivating awakening through present moment awareness. And I think this is a great way to enter into the conversation of Buddhism and relationships. As we grow in our capability of being present with ourselves through meditation or meditative practices, we develop an open, embracing awareness. 02:25 We practice that on ourselves in silent meditation and our various other ways of practicing. We can extend that same loving, open awareness that we cultivate in meditation to people in our lives, including significant others. 02:45 When we cultivate that present moment awareness, we also get to experience more of the best things in life because the best things in life are happening in the present moment, including our relationships, our interactions with our partners, our interactions with everybody in our life. It happens right now. 03:06 you 03:16 A more generalist view of how things are going in the relationships department in society right now. Relationships seem a lot more complicated than they did back when our parents or grandparents dated. Why is that? I think it's pretty obvious. If you start to look at modern dating, you see some pretty obvious things that stick out as far as dating apps, social media, but then there's some other things that seem like they're maybe not as obvious. 03:45 A lot of people lack communication skills or the ability to connect to others through conversation, holding a conversation. I know personally, in my early 20s when I left the house, I found it hard to hold conversations with anyone, let alone a woman I found attractive. That kind of put a damper on my romantic life. Not really being able to hold a conversation with someone I felt was attractive because I didn't know how to navigate it. I didn't know how to 04:17 The way relationships start these days is pretty different. We talked about social media and dating apps, people connecting more on a surface level, obviously looking at somebody liking the way that they look, you can swipe right or left. Also connecting more surface level with what they decide to tell you about themselves in their description. So we have a veneer that we interact with in the dating world. A lot of people 04:45 We're very self-preoccupied and part of that comes with our culture and social media and the self-preoccupation that our culture pushes through advertising and through media. There's a hero in almost every movie or show that you watch and it's all about that character. And so in a way that starts to form the mind in a way that it's like you're the main character in your movie. So you start to look at your world in that way. 05:16 I'll...

00:00 Who will master this world and the realms of Yama and the gods? Who will select a well-taught Dharma teaching as a skilled person selects a flower? 00:21 Welcome to The Imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss mindfulness and applying Zen principles to modern life. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney and today's episode is titled Buddhism and the Mexican Petunia. 00:46 Lately, my wife and I have been trying to cut back on our use of the TV as a distraction device. We've experimented with taking the plug out of the TV or taking the batteries out of the remote, and it's never really stuck. This time, we've made it about three days. I've been trying to take more inspiration from nature. I've been trying to take more walks outside along our 1950s neighborhood streets. I've got these brick houses. They all look pretty much the same. 01:15 This morning I went for a walk at about 6.30 a.m. as the sun was rising. I've been trying to pay attention to the natural world around me and notice things and try to look at the trees and the flowers and the plants without labels, looking to see what this being is in front of me. It's a lot easier for me to do that than it is with human beings. Human beings, we have all of our emotions and projections and wants and desires and all that stuff. So it can be easier for me to start with 01:45 tree beings and plant beings and bug beings. 01:50 The name of this episode's an interesting one, Buddhism and the Mexican Petunia. You might be wondering where I'm going with this. But today's episode, we're gonna talk about this Mexican Petunia that's growing outside of my window and the little lessons that I've learned from it over the two years that I've been living in this house. We're gonna learn from this unassuming flower, resilience, embracing impermanence, finding beauty and simplicity, growth and transformation. 02:19 and non-identification with labels. That's a lot for a little plant that most people consider to be a weed to teach us. 02:38 We bought our house about two years ago. When we moved in, there really wasn't a whole lot of landscape and we have the classic front and backyard grass. We have a magnolia tree that's beautiful in the spring that has beautiful white flowers. We have various other plants and shrubs. My wife pulled up some and I remember distinctly when we first moved in, there was this one plant that was growing near my office window down the ground, scrubby looking little thing. It looked different than a lot of the other plants around. 03:08 mowing the yard. I was wondering should I mow it down? And my wife said, oh no don't do that. That's a Mexican petunia. Some people think it's a weed, but it's actually a really pretty flower. So we can just leave it. And the plant wasn't anything special. It has these long spear-like leaves to it. It's got a really dark green, pretty skinny small stem. And so some time went by and I think one or two little purple flowers popped up on it and I just 03:37 was so blown away that a lot of people would consider this flower to be a weed or a pest. I was really surprised when I saw how beautiful the purple flowers were. Over time, we left it, we let it grow, and a couple small offshoots turned into a whole bush. After being here for a year, springtime rolled around again, and all of a sudden we got all of these beautiful purple flowers, and they're blooming right below my office window, so... 04:05 I'm sitting at work and I look out the window and this purple flower will catch my eye. I noticed a heavy rainstorm would come and all the flowers would drop. And I was like, oh man, I really like to look at those. And the next morning there'd be brand new flowers. I remember telling my wife, holy crap, like this is an amazing plant. It drops its flowers and it has brand new flowers the next day. 04:31 The Mexican petunia is very resilient too, with all the really strong storms we get here with wind and heavy rain, or when it gets...

00:01 When you do something, you should burn yourself up completely, like a good bonfire, leaving no trace of yourself. Shunryu Suzuki 00:25 Welcome friends and travelers along the path. This is the imperfect Buddhist. I'm your host, Matthew Hock Mahoney, and today's episode is titled Buddhism and Leadership, leading by example and the ripple effect. 01:07 Leading by example can have profound impacts on our relationships, our spiritual development, and the world around us. In a time where so many people, including myself sometimes, want to inspire action in others around them through using force or coercion of some sort, or I guess telling other people how to think and act. I believe leading by example is the ultimate way to make change in the world. 01:36 This is something that I've been thinking about quite a bit lately, especially with all of the political unrest and people screaming at each other across the aisles on how we should think about gay rights or how we should deal with women's rights and their right to bodily autonomy with abortion. Bud Light in an attempt to appeal to a different demographic, adding certain controversial imagery. 02:06 and messaging to their cans and being ostracized by both sides of the argument. 02:15 with things like climate change and starting to think a little bit about how can I play a part in changing people's thoughts around me that don't agree with me. My uncle Tim, for instance, I visited with him on 4th of July and he has some very strong opinions about climate change, that it is a conspiracy, that all climate scientists or the ones that are reporting on this are actually funded by the government. And so how can I get him to see things the way that I see them? How can I get him to see? 02:44 The science that says, Uncle Tim, our oceans are hotter than they've ever been. Uncle Tim, we've never seen weather patterns like this ever. Uncle Tim, how are they keeping it quiet that certain scientists have been receiving this money? I wanna go into this argument and start to tell him how to think about the subject. So I started thinking more about what does leading by example mean in this situation? Segment one. 03:12 the desire to change others and leading by example. 03:22 It's pretty normal to wanna change others instead of leading by example. Maybe it takes less energy or we have the illusion that it takes less energy that if I could just lambast my Uncle Tim, bludgeon him to fucking death with scientific data. The numbers, Uncle Tim's go to the beach, let's go to the water. Dip your toes in, how hot does it feel? Tim, I want you to see things the way that I see them. 03:49 Maybe it's for some fucked up reason of control. Maybe it's for some other daddy issue. Or maybe it's because I truly care about the environment and I'm freaked out by what's happening and someone I love, my uncle Tim, doesn't see it. And it scares me that he doesn't see it. And I want someone I love to see it and to work with me to make a better situation. Maybe it's easier for me to 04:18 Point out to Uncle Tim all this stuff and talk about the science, talk about the data, because it's really hard for me to look at my own life and see how am I playing a part in making the situation worse? How am I a contributor to climate change? What are the things that I'm doing or that I could change that would make the situation better? Why do I want to control? Why do I want to bludgeon with my ideas, convince, influence? What are these desires? 04:48 where actions come from. Looking inside, they come from a strongly held belief, one that I am certain is correct. So there might be the desire to have someone I love or care about see something the way that I see it. Why is that important? Because if they don't believe what I believe, maybe that means they're lower intelligence and I just can't stand for that. Or maybe it's some type of ego gratification where 05:14 If they're disagreeing with me, then...

00:09 Welcome to the imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss mindfulness and incorporating Zen Buddhism into modern life. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney and today's episode is titled Buddhism and Love. 00:52 Thank you for stopping in and listening. Whether this is your first episode or I don't know what episode I'm on, maybe your 50th. I really appreciate you sticking with me and stopping in. It's been a while since I've shared with you. It's amazing how the days blend together. When I'm working from home, it seems like weeks can go by, months. And even the last couple years seems like they've gone by very fast. And I was looking at... 01:19 episodes and realized, wow, I haven't talked with you in a while, so I wanted to change that. 01:26 Love and Buddhism. I had a friend recently when we were talking about Buddhism bring up the idea that some Buddhists don't believe in relationships as far as sexual, physical relationships or marriage. I think I've heard that from other people before. When we're talking about love though, we're talking more about the concept of seeing yourself in someone else, seeing unity. I quote, 01:55 When you love someone, you have to offer the best you have. The best thing we can offer another person is our true presence. Thich Nhat Hanh. It's being present with somebody, seeking to understand, and eventually even seeing your true identity, which is the presence that witnesses, realizing that's in that other person. You recognize your oneness. Please know that I'm not there yet. This is the imperfect Buddhist. I didn't say I'm completely at this place yet. 02:24 But I have had visions or insight moments where I've felt that connectedness, oneness, and had moved from my head of thinking about this concept of oneness and actually experiencing it. 02:51 Love and our culture. How does this topic or concept of love relate to our culture? Love is a word often used in titles for Netflix shows, like Love is Blind. It's used a lot in songs, song lyrics. People say, hey, I love ice cream or I love pizza. I think a lot of people don't have a very deep definition of what love means. 03:20 We have a culture around love, which is this commercialized version. We have sayings about love, love your neighbor, or I love that pizza, but what does this really mean? 03:32 I've been married for almost... Oh my God, don't tell my wife I'm forgetting our anniversary, but I wanna say we've been married for six or seven years. At the time when we were dating, I was reading this book called The Road Less Traveled. It had a pretty profound impact on my life and the way that I look at reality. When I met Amanda, we both read that book together, and it has a really great definition of love. And so I'm gonna read that for you. M. Scott Peck, the author, defines love as... 04:00 The will to extend oneself for the purpose of nurturing one's own or another's spiritual growth. Actually, that was my first real definition of love. It gave new meaning to the word love. Before that, love was something that was thrown around in songs or in pop culture or something you'd say in a sentence, but it didn't really have any real meaning. 04:30 My own journey with the concept of love has been evolving quite a bit lately. I recently started the book A Course in Miracles, which is definitely not in Zen or Buddhist tradition, but it has a lot of powerful things to say about love, about human experience and what it means to be connected with other people. The author claims that they... 04:58 channeled this work and it seems to be written from the viewpoint of Jesus. I know that is enough to make most people's eyes roll and typically would make my eyes roll, but I gave it a try because somebody that I really respect in the mindfulness teachings mentioned it and said this is a really powerful book and make up your own mind. So I did and I have gotten a lot out of it, especially around the concept of love and action in 05:26 love's...

1. Introduction (00:19): - Title: "Understanding Mindfulness and Conscious Living through Buddhism" - Introduction: Matthew Hawk Mahoney, host of "The Imperfect Buddhist," delves into the significance of patterns in mindful living. 2. Mindful Living and Recognizing Patterns (01:07 - 02:34): - Understanding the role of mindfulness in recognizing and altering life patterns, fostering conscious decision-making and personal growth. 3. Understanding Life's Cycles and Patterns (03:17 - 04:18): - Highlighting the concept of interconnectedness and life cycles, emphasizing the significance of patterns in mindful and Buddhist philosophies. 4. Cultivating Present Moment Awareness and Mindfulness Practice (04:18 - 06:32): - Emphasizing the importance of mindfulness and present moment awareness as fundamental practices in conscious living and Buddhist teachings. 5. Mindful Relationships and Conscious Communication (06:32 - 09:45): - Applying mindfulness to foster healthy relationships, emphasizing the importance of conscious communication and understanding patterns in interpersonal dynamics. 6. Transforming Patterns through Mindfulness and Gratitude (09:45 - 11:56): - Exploring methods for transforming deep-rooted patterns through mindfulness and expressing gratitude, aligning with Buddhist principles and conscious living practices. 7. Conclusion: Embracing Mindful Living for Joy and Fulfillment (11:56): - Encouraging readers to embrace mindful living and conscious awareness, fostering joy, love, and well-being in alignment with Buddhist teachings and principles. Transcript 00:19 Welcome to the Imperfect Buddhist. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney, and today's episode is titled Buddhism and Patterns. 01:07 Patterns have been a key theme in my life lately. Particularly patterns that I would like to cease or change or augment. Maybe I'm halfway there. Maybe half the battle is knowing that I have patterns. Patterns have been playing an important part in my life right now, in my marriage and my personal life. Decisions I make with my health, how I spend my time, how I show up in my relationship. 01:35 Do I show up with a approach of love and growth and wanting to learn about myself and my partner? Or do I show up with feelings of jealousy, of control, of needing things to be a certain way? How does my partner show up? Is my partner showing up with patterns she created in her past? Certain family dynamics that shaped her at a young age? Is she showing up to me with those patterns? 02:04 or she's showing up with a mindset of love, growth, honesty. And let's not forget fun. My dad, of all people, because he has some serious habits and patterns in his life, he told my sister, I don't know if he told me, I think he told my sister, but it's a thing that we bring up every now and then in the family where he said, you know, Amanda, everything's a pattern, everything's a circle. When it comes to our habits, seems to be the case, seems to be true. 02:34 When we're unconscious, as can happen with anybody, even the most serious meditators in the world, we find ourselves at the end or the beginning or the middle of a habit. We ask, how the hell did I get here again? Some of us might believe we have no control, that this is just how it is, this is just my life, and it's your fault. It's her fault, it's his fault, it's their fault that I'm acting this way. 03:17 Patterns are a part of life. And to try to say that we should be devoid of patterns, goes against human nature, goes against nature itself. Look at the sun, look at the moon. They rise and they fall, usually around the same spot in the sky depending on the time of year. It rains, it's sunny, trees grow leaves and the leaves fall down to the ground and nourish the soil and the soil nourishes the tree. The tree makes new leaves. 03:47 The leaves fall down and nourish the soil. Our bodies, we inhale. Our lungs fill with air and pulls oxygen into our bloodstream. And we exhale...

Uniting Mind and Body in the Present Moment It's easy to feel disconnected from the present moment and overwhelmed by the chaos of our thoughts. However, the wisdom of ancient traditions like Buddhism offers a simple and effective way to regain control of our minds and connect with the here and now – the breath. The Witnessing Presence In our quest for personal growth and self-awareness, Mahoney emphasizes the importance of returning to the breath as a constant anchor. When our thoughts scatter, when we worry about our future, or when we become consumed by concerns, the breath becomes our refuge. By becoming aware of each inhalation and exhalation, we access a quiet stillness that exists at the beginning and end of every breath. Witnessing Thoughts and Emotions The practice of witnessing our breath serves as an effective tool for those who find it challenging to observe their thoughts and emotions objectively. Rather than getting caught up in the emotional turmoil of our internal narratives, we can take a step back and label our thoughts and feelings. By observing without judgment, we cultivate a state of non-attachment to these thoughts, an essential component of meditative traditions. Breath as an Anchoring Point Our breath becomes an ever-present anchor, a constant that allows us to be present in any situation. In the same way that some individuals use prayer beads as a meditation tool to center their attention, breath awareness offers a tangible and always accessible source of mindfulness. It helps to slow down our racing thoughts, enabling us to be fully present. Cultivating Witnessing Presence As we practice witnessing our breath, we also cultivate a witnessing presence. This state of awareness doesn't label experiences as good or bad, positive or negative – it embodies the essence of "don't know mind" or "beginner's mind" found in Buddhism. We can extend this awareness to our thoughts, allowing us to approach them with greater clarity and detachment. Breath Awareness in Daily Life If you find it challenging to incorporate breath awareness into your daily life, consider integrating it into your meditation practice. Set aside dedicated time for silent meditation, with the primary aim of witnessing your breath. When your mind wanders, it's not a failure – it's part of the process. Even a single minute of breath awareness during a 20-minute meditation is valuable. The Direct Experience of Truth By observing your breath, you tap into something real and tangible, allowing you to experience the truth directly. It's a truth that's always present, always solid – your life, the life energy that animates you and the world around you. You can let go of the restless energy of your mind, the constant search for solidity through thought, and simply be present with your breath. Using Your Thinking Mind The key is not to abandon your thinking mind but to use it wisely. Don't let your thinking mind control you. Rather, harness its power to enhance your awareness and understanding. As Thich Nhat Hanh suggests in his book "Peace in Every Breath," Transcript: The breath is a powerful bridge connecting life to consciousness, and through it, we can unite our body with our thoughts. By consistently returning to our breath, we can achieve a profound witnessing presence, enhancing our awareness and embracing the richness of the present moment. So, take a deep breath, be present, and discover the transformative power of the breath in your own life. 00:00 Breath is the bridge which connects life to consciousness, which unites your body to your thoughts. Whenever your mind becomes scattered, use your breath as the means to take hold of your mind again. 00:18 Welcome to the Imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss present moment awareness and incorporating Zen principles into modern life. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney. And today's episode is titled Buddhism and the Breath. We're not talking about stinky breath. We're not talking...

About this episode: In our fast-paced modern world, the pursuit of mindfulness and spiritual growth can often feel elusive. However, at the heart of Zen philosophy lies a profound truth: everything in life is usable for awakening. Embracing this concept means seeing imperfection, challenges, and difficulties as tools for personal growth and enlightenment. It's a pivotal moment in our spiritual journey when we realize that suffering and imperfection can crack open the shell of ego, leading to humility and compassion. Eckhart Tolle, in "The Power of Now," beautifully captures this idea: "If you had not suffered as you have, there would be no depth to you as a human being. No humility, no compassion. Suffering is necessary until you realize it is unnecessary." The key is to confront discomfort without judgment and listen to our inner wisdom." Thich Nhat Hanh, in "The Miracle of Mindfulness," reminds us that even mundane activities can be opportunities for awakening. Mundane experiences become gateways to mindfulness and a deeper understanding of the present moment. Positive experiences, too, can be savored without worrying about their end, teaching us to appreciate the now. Challenges, whether they come in the form of new experiences or difficult emotions, have the power to transform us, shedding illusions of weakness and conditioning, revealing our true selves illuminated with awareness. In conclusion, the concept that "everything is usable" reminds us that every moment, every experience, and every emotion in life can be a stepping stone on our journey toward awakening. Embracing imperfection and challenges with open hearts and minds unlocks our potential for personal growth, mindfulness, and a deeper connection to the world around us. Ultimately, it is through these experiences that we become more fully alive and aware of the beauty of our existence. Transcript: 00:16 Welcome to The Imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss present moment awareness and incorporating Zen principles into modern life. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney and today's episode is titled, Everything is Usable. Today's episode is all about using what is at hand, what is in our life for awakening, whether that's pain, joy, or just boredom. 00:42 We'll talk about the concept of everything is usable. The concept that we can use all of life's experiences for our own awakening. 01:09 At some point in our spiritual life, we decide to embrace imperfection. We start to embrace challenges in our life. This will be a shift for us. Some people, maybe if their parents were on some different level, maybe they helped their children accept and embrace challenges and difficulties. But for the most part, most people will have to learn how to do this in their own way. At some point on the spiritual path, we begin to embrace 01:37 difficulty and imperfection in our life. We start to see imperfection and difficulty as teachers. We start to see imperfection and difficulty as fodder for awakening, something that can fuel our personal awakening and the endeavor of meditation. 01:58 Eckhart Tolle in his book, The Power of Now says, If you had not suffered as you have, there would be no depth to you as a human being. No humility, no compassion. Suffering cracks open the shell of ego. And then comes a point when it has served its purpose. Suffering is necessary until you realize it is unnecessary. 02:21 This idea that suffering or imperfection can be used in our own awakening is something that I'm becoming reacquainted with in my own practice. My wife and I this year have been endeavoring to reduce our technology use and to start picking up old hobbies or being comfortable with it just being quiet in the house staring out the window. And so I've been noticing that through eliminating our TV use or trying to limit our technology use that I'm... 02:48 Becoming more acquainted with this underlying feeling of dissatisfaction, like this kind of anxiousness that's been...

"Some people live as though they are already dead. There are people moving around us who are consumed by their past, terrified of their future, and stuck in their anger and jealousy. They are not alive; they are just walking corpses." - Thict Naht Hahn Welcome, welcome, welcome to the Imperfect Buddhist. A podcast where we discuss present-moment awareness and incorporating zen principles into everyday life. I am your host Matthew Hawk Mahoney and today's episode is titled Returning. There is the willful return or the forced return. Some of us choose whether we willfully bring our attention back to the present moment's razor's edge. Some don't know they have a choice or forget and are forced to return through some tragedy in life or persistent emotional pain. Some know the return process but are frightened by all that the shining blade of truth may cut off. We return by bringing our attention to the present moment. To our emotions, mind, body, relationships, and life as they are with a witnessing presence. "The moment you realize you are not present, you are present. Whenever you are able to observe your mind, you are no longer trapped in it. Another factor has come in, something that is not of the mind: the witnessing presence." - Eckhart Tolle Why do we turn away from this moment? We dissipate our energy in worries about the future and past regrets. We do this from an illusion of control. Somewhere inside, we believe this behavior will somehow change the past or control the outcome of future events. Perhaps we have trauma from our past that bubbles up as strong emotions, turning horrific images from our history over in our minds if we allow it. Our day turns upside down by dwelling on these pictures and feelings for too long. At our customer service jobs at the grocery store, call center, or restaurant, we dream of when we will own that farm, thinking how much better things will be when we are released from this type of work. We are all just temporarily embarrassed millionaires here in the United States. We may think that we will return when circumstances are better, or our life is more stable in the future. Whatever your life is, your life circumstances, situations, and pain, you can return. Your life is workable now, and any fantasy that salvation lives somewhere in the future is a myth and functionally impossible, as the future doesn't exist. We cannot experience the peace that surpasses all understanding by listening to the Imperfect Buddhist, reading every Thict Naht Hahn book, or talking about mindfulness with our friends. We must do the work ourselves and shine the light of awareness on our lives. No book, teacher, or podcast can push you into a real connection with the truth alone. Your effortless effort must be there, and a willingness to see what is true no matter how bad it hurts. We reclaim our true identity as the being who witnesses by seeing the hurt and not losing ourselves in identification with the pain. We let go of egocentric identification with our pain, past, and worries about the future. Yes, these waves may continue to flow, but their grip on us loosens, and we start to identify with our true identity, the one who witnesses. There are many spiritual paths but one destination. To return to the same place but to see it for the first time. In this very instant, we are to be in connection with life, truth, god, and the dharma. Wisdom is no longer something we seek outside of ourselves but comes from our core and intertwines as the fabric of life. I define love thus: The will to extend one's self to nurture one's own or another's spiritual growth" - M. Scott Peck. Equilibrium is possible for you, and love is who you are at your core. The appeal of psychedelics lately shows people's desire to experience the truth and let go of their limiting ideas of self. Citizens are suffocated by limiting beliefs about themselves and how the world works. Psychedelics represent the lazy American...

Auto-Transcribe/Please Excuse Errors Welcome to the Imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss present moment awareness and applying Zen principles to modern. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney, and today's episode is titled Buddhism and Creativity. This episode will be a little bit of a freestyle. The last couple episodes I've had a bit of a agenda that I follow . I want to come into this conversation with you from a place of stillness, from a place of. No agenda and I wanna see what happens. So thanks for joining this creative experiment with me. My talks are edited, usually in between what I'm saying there is long pauses quiet, where I sit with what I'm about to say or allow what I'm about to say to come up. You may not actually hear it in the edited recordings, but there's a lot of space in between. What I say, Through stillness. We're able to connect with the source of creativity through life. Creative ideas don't really come from thinking and overthinking something, having a big agenda. What color should I use? What notes should I use? What note goes here? What note goes there? My proudest creative moments have come from a place of stillness. I listened to a podcast. Joe Rogan interviewed Rick Rub. Rick Rubin is a major producer and he's been on many major records. Everything from, top hiphop albums to, heavy metal to pop. He's done a lot of projects and this is a really inspiring podcast episode . He talked about how a lot of the times the best stuff that he's done has come from a place of letting go and tuning into the creative. There's a process in recording where you turn on a microphone and you have the song playing through , maybe it's a 4 0 4 thing. Dun it dun, it dun. And over the top. They will start to record and they might just say words of gibberish like, Yeah, you, I been new, often falling. You record over the top of the song as many times as you want. These are all recorded in their own separate takes where you could go back and listen to each individual one. From this process, you go in and you start to notice real words that you started. In that thing that I just did, I said a lot of gibberish, but then maybe I said, taken down you, and so they start to pick out these actual words or they start to say, Well, what did that sound like? It could have said. From that they write these lyrics sometimes these lyrics turn out to be powerful, profound, and inspired , many people think, , to write something like that or to create something of meaning, I have to use my brain, I have to really think about it. I have to overthink it and I have to apply all this mind energy to creating something. What I'm finding and a lot of other creatives are finding is that when they tap into the stream of creativity in their art amazing inspired moments happen. From stillness, we may create something or we may not, in this age of. So much being created, so much being made, so much noise. Someone being quiet and holding that space for a time is a greater gift. The most creative, ingenious people that we hold on high pedestals talk about their greatest ideas coming to them in moments of rest the space in between thinking. It was Einstein that would talk about some of the greatest ideas he ever had coming to him. Between that moment of sleep and waking He would have this big flash of insight of creativity that would hit him in that moment when the thinking mind quieted down enough to. The subconscious or life's creativity, whatever you wanna call it, come through with a breakthrough We talked about hustle culture a few episodes back, this has a lot to do with where our creativity is now as a society, I notice a lot of stuff is very algorithmic, people say, Oh, well I like all the music except country. But if you listen to country today, how different is it than pop? How different is it than mainstream rock? When you really get down into the nitty gritty of the mechanics of what's going on in the music, you have the same...

Auto Transcribe/ Please Excuse Errors One day I offered a number of children, a basket filled with tangerines. The basket was passed around and each child took one tangerine and put it in his or her palm. We each looked at our tangerine, and the children were invited to meditate on its origins. They saw that not only their tangerine, but also its mother, the tangerine tree, with some guidance, they began to visualize the blossoms in the sunshine and in the rain. They saw petals falling down and the tiny fruit appear. The sunshine and the rain continued, and the tiny tangerine. Now someone has picked it and the tangerine is here. After seeing this, each child was invited to peel the tangerine slowly noticing the mist and the fragrance of the tangerine, and then bring it up to his or her mouth and have a mindful bite in full awareness of the texture and taste of the fruit and the juice coming out. We ate slowly like that. Tick not. Welcome to the Imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss present moment awareness and incorporating Zen principles into modern life. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney, and today's episode is titled buddhism and food soothing. My wife and I. Just got back yesterday evening from a trip up to Nashville, Tennessee and Asheville, North Carolina. We spent a couple days in Tennessee with her sister and we did the tourist stuff. Rode one of those buses around and saw the different music history site. So we went to the Pathon, which is a replica of the Pathon in Greece. I got to see some really historic locations for country music. We went down Music Row, which is interesting because it's like these houses that pretty much like their original studio. There was a house that someone had bought and then used to start recording music, and then someone else came along and bought a house next door so on, so forth. And you ended up with all. Residential houses starting to be used as studios, so it's interesting. You drive down through there, you're going through a neighborhood, but it's where nationally, worldwide release music is being written and recorded. Asheville, North Carolina. Right now it's October 17th and the trees are at their peak. Most of the trees, desiduous trees, leaves are changing, so there's orange yellow and browns mountains of these trees. It's just so beautiful Something else that comes along with vacation is I'm out of my normal. Routines and it's like, Oh, do you want to go eat Taco Bell or, Where do you wanna eat today? It's, it's very food centric because you're traveling around and there's all these exciting foods to eat and try. And so we got home yesterday and I'm noticing my heart is feeling like my literal heart and not, some, not in the spiritual sense. My heart, no, my, my literal heart there's a tightness and then like a little bit of a pinching feeling and it's got me a little bit concerned. Starting to think about my diet choices on the trip and also leading up to the trip. Really got me thinking about diet and food and my relationship to food. My wife and I have been talking about doing Whole 30, so it's been on my mind a bit. I've been reflecting on my relationship to food from a young age , my dad would, sit downstairs on his leather chair with the 49ers game on and he'd have chips and salsa. He'd be dipping a chip in the salsa and popping in his mouth and going, going, going maybe a bag of night. Of course we would sit with him and watch shows and eat chips and salsa. And then my mom, same thing, she would have the TV on and she'd be putting some type of food in her mouth or drinking something. That's, where we were raised , we'd be watching a movie or something and mom, Oh, you want some ice cream? And so you have some ice cream and you're watching tv and being raised that way. And then all through my teenage years pop in the pizza rolls and the microwave and sit down in front of the TV and eat. It was TV and food reflecting on it, it's a dreamlike experience....

Auto Transcription/Please Excuse Errors what is this word? Efficiency. Sometimes it seems a close cousin to death. We are encouraged not to linger, not to enjoy life, to hurry up and get done. So we'll have time for something else. Something else. What efficiency is a destroyer? Millions upon millions of living dead done in by the electric can opener and the automobile progress is our most important product. Babies are our business. Time is money. Life is cheap. Modern technology, modern business, the modern state, gives us everything we need except breathable air, drinkable water, edible food, meaningful work, freedom from fear, freedom to love. Freedom to be ourselves. Courage, pride, friendship, hope, the moral of the story is don't be in such a hurry. Beware, creeping efficiency. Slow down and live. Paul Williams DOS Energy. Welcome to the Imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss present moment awareness and incorporating Zen principles into modern. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney, and today's episode is titled Buddhism and Hustle Culture. Maybe you're a musician, maybe you're a photographer, a painter, Maybe you're someone that repairs shoes, you know, a Cobb. Maybe you run a daycare or maybe you work at an office building and you post pictures of your latest food adventures. Maybe you've heard of this concept of having to post on Instagram or Facebook a certain amount of times in a week or a day to stay. As a musician, maybe you've heard the concept of writing and releasing songs once a month. Singles albums seem to be dead. . Maybe you've been asked, Hey, What's your side hustle as if it's just a normal thing, a prerequisite to you being a modern American . Maybe you've watched Gary V on YouTube. Where he talks about hustle culture and grinding , his energetic caffeinated personality and voice coming through the speakers urging you to hustle, hustle harder. You gotta really want it. If you wanna make it are we allowed to enjoy the present moment? Auto Transcription/Please Excuse Errors Without worrying about how much time we're wasting, how much money we might be potentially losing, how many leads we may be missing out on. I mean, hey, we worked 40 hours already. Is it okay for us to enjoy the weekend? Is it okay for us to enjoy the hours after work? Is it okay if we only post a picture on social media when we feel so inclined to all those questions will be answered in this episode of the imperfect Buddhist Hustle culture as a concept actually goes further than social media or side businesses it also bleeds a little bit into success overall in life where. People start to feel like we're being left behind by the pack. Oh no, this person hustled and got this college degree working after hours after they left their nine to five, this person got his real estate license outside of work . This person selling handmade hats on Etsy, on their off hours. What am I doing wrong? What's wrong with me? It can extend into things like having a nicer car. The concept of keeping up with the Joneses, . I know at times I've felt the push as a musician . That I need to be pushing out a song every so often that if I don't put out something once a month and post at least every other day on my social media, I'll become irrelevant. I've felt that pressure watching any YouTube video about. What it takes to be successful in the music industry. Of course, they will tell you post often and share music often. Put out a song every month, have a monthly release schedule 12 songs a year. The idea of content creation. Sickens me at this point. It's like, let's just create content. I want to create content, content, content. Do we need more content? And maybe even a little bit with this imperfect Buddhist podcast. I know that all the statistics would say, Okay, post often, post, regularly hustle. Get that episode done on the weekend, hustle, post it on every Wednesday morning at 5:30 AM Rigorous content creation when it comes to art,...

PLEASE EXCUSE ERRORS / AUDIO-TO-TEXT TRANSLATION Our view of reality is like a map with which to negotiate the terrain of life. If the map is true and accurate, we will generally know where we are and if we have decided where we want to go, we will generally know how to get. If the map is false and inaccurate, we generally will be lost. While this is obvious, it is something that most people, to a greater or lesser degree choose to ignore. They ignore it because our route to reality is not easy. First of all, we are not born with maps. We have to make them, and the making requires effort. The more effort we make to appreciate and perceive reality, the larger and more accurate our maps will be, but many do not want to make this effort. Some stop making it by the end of adolescence. Their maps are small and sketchy. Their views of the world narrow and misleading. By the end of middle age, most people have given up the effort. They feel certain their maps are complete and they are no longer interested in new information. It is if they are tired, only a relative and fortunate few continue until the moment of death exploring the mystery of reality ever enlarging and refining and redefining their understanding of the world and what is true. M Scott Pick. Welcome to the imperfect Buddhist. Where we discuss present moment awareness and incorporating Zen principles into modern life. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney, and today's episode is titled Buddhism and Maps of Meaning. I've had a couple of experiences recently that have pushed me to talk a little bit about maps of meaning and how we navigate our. The way that we label our world as we move through it how that can differ from how other people have overlaid the different experiences of life with different meanings. Maps and how we associate with the world and what it means PLEASE EXCUSE ERRORS / AUDIO-TO-TEXT TRANSLATION can really create a lot of struggle between mother and son, father and daughter, best friends, enemies, lovers, all because of how we interpret. The chaos of life. The different meanings we can assign to a certain look someone gives us when we tell them a joke. We're really excited for them to hear. When we give someone a gift, how they say Thank you. This could all mean very different things for different people. I moved to Florida and started working at this grocery store. After working there for a year, we hired a kid at the time he was a kid named Daniel. And we started hanging out and talking. He was into some of the same philosophies as me, a little bit more yoga, it was cool. So we connected on that. We connected on music . We had both stopped working there. We continued to hang out and he mentioned to me, he was like, Hey, I'm going down to this Michael Singer talk. And I was like, What? What do you mean Michael Singer talk? He's like, Yeah, dude. He has a teaching center here in Florida. It's called the Temple of the Universe. I was pretty surprised. I didn't know that. It kind of peaked my interest. It'd be cool to hear this guy talk. Flash forward about a. We plan out to go down on a Sunday we leave Jacksonville around 7:30 AM and make our way down to outside of Gainesville. And it's beautiful. The temple's out in the countryside and you drive a winding road probably 10, 15 minutes off the highway and then you take another right turn down, another more narrow. Road and then a left onto a dirt road, and the dirt road turns onto this paved road that you follow, that winds its way up to this temple that I think it was built. Don't quote me on this, but it looks like it's a little bit older. Maybe it was built in the eighties or the late seventies, early nineties. And so we get there and it's this wilderness retreat center. it's almost like you're hiking. Through a forest and you come upon this retreat center, we park the car and we make our way up to this building all these shoes are out front. We take off our shoes and we come inside. It's...

VOICE-TO-TEXT TRANSLATION. PLEASE EXCUSE ERRORS. To see our own mind clearly without being caught up in its movement to watch thought, without trying to do anything with or about it, simply seeing it and letting it go. This is the way to freedom Welcome to the imperfect Buddhist, where we discussed. Present moment awareness. Applying Zen principles to modern life. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney and today's episode is titled Buddhism and screen addiction. Everybody has a smartphone in their pocket. And if they don't, we wonder what's wrong with them. The price of big. Screen TVs. They get bigger and bigger. Every year are getting cheaper and cheaper. New iPhones come out every year with better cameras. They make special blue blocking glasses now to help protect people's eyes from all the screen. Increasingly, I see more and more kids at restaurants with little portable TVs that their parents bring along to help keep them distracted. Five year olds are starting YouTube channels and eight year olds are starting TikTok. I'm starting to develop a hump on my neck. Bending over to look at screens too much. I used to make fun of my mom when I was 14 years old for the same thing, rubbing her neck saying, mom, how'd you get this thing? Teenagers also have these humps on the back of their necks. A new name is sprouted up for this condition. It's called tech. I have been working from home for a little over a year. This means I'm on the computer for work 40 plus hours a week. I've really found it challenging to maintain a level of mindfulness when I'm looking at the computer. I've really found it challenging , to maintain a level of mindful awareness. I have three monitors. I the laptop screen. On the left side, a computer monitor and on the right side, a computer monitor. wake up in the mornings and sit at 8:00 AM for about 20 minutes every morning. I try to bring that mindful presence into my Workday. But I notice after looking at the screen for even 10 or 15 minutes, this haze kind of comes over my present moment awareness and I'm sucked into. What's going on on the screens. Maybe this is its own form of flow, but I don't really feel aware of what's going on around me as a more spacious awareness. It's a very pointed area of focus, almost like daydream. I'll tell myself, I'll say, okay, Matt, like, there's not a lot. You can do about the screen time for work right now. But when you get off work, you can not use your phone. You could not play video games or watch TV with your wife. You have a choice there sometimes I'm successful. But a lot of the times I find myself getting off work or taking a moment away. The computer work screens to look at my phone, I'll walk away and sit on the couch for a minute and look at my phone. I noticed this dizzy Sick feeling, but I still continue to scroll through images on Instagram or look at my friends posts. I'll get a day off on a Saturday, beautiful sunny day. And I'm like, oh man, I have, I don't have to do, I don't have to be on the computer. I don't have to do any of that. What do I wanna do? Oh, I'll play Pokemon. Go for the day and look at my, my phone screen for six hours today while I catch digital Pokemon. It's kind of an addiction at this point. I've been having some success lately with present moment awareness and catching myself. Before I get pulled back into the phone or the computer or the TV. I've had moments where I'll deny. Myself that and leave it off and just sit there and listen to the birds outside and the wind running through the autumn leaves or the dog barking down the street. And I've found moments of peace through this, but this is still a struggle for me. I'm still finding that. At the end of my 40 hour work week on the computer, I still get on the TV and play a video game, or unfortunately, work on music on my computer. I use software called Ableton to record my music. If I wanna do music, that's gonna be done on the computer as well. It's a bit...

Voice-to-Text Translation. Please excuse errors. Take time to pray. It is the sweet oil that eases the hinge into the garden so the doorway can swing open easily. You can always go there. Consider yourself blessed. These stones that break your bones will build an altar of your love. Your home is the garden. Carry its odor hidden in you into the city. Suddenly your enemies will buy seed packets and fall to their knees to plant flowers in the dirt by the road. They'll call you friend and honor your passing among them. And when asked who's that, they'll say, oh, that one has been beloved by us since before time began. Give everything away, except your garden, your worry, your fear, your small-mindedness. Your garden can never be taken from you. Welcome back to the imperfect Buddhist. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney, and today's episode is titled Buddhism and anxiety. I've been working from home for the last year and two months. I've been trying to find any way to get out of the house. So the other night, my wife suggested that we get ice cream, and I never turn down ice cream, unfortunately. And there's a little local spot here in Jacksonville, Florida called Dreamette. It's been there since the 1950s. It's a cool little old-school spot. A neighborhood called Edgewood, and we like going there. It's fun. A lot of families there and we walk around the neighborhoods , we showed up, and they were closed. So we went to a part of town that we don't usually go to much busier. There's a main highway there. It's a brand new mall area, so there's a lot of traffic, a lot of people, and we got our ice cream. Of course, I got a pumpkin spice-flavored ice cream. I'm basic. I know. And we sat down in front of Coldstone. I just took in what was going on around me. I saw all this traffic flying by, people coming and going and really loud cars out on the highway. I had a little flashback to when I worked in customer service. I had a couple of customer service jobs. One of the busiest was Starbucks drive-through & cafe. And that has to be the busiest job I've ever worked. I still sometimes have nightmares about making pumpkin spice, lattes, or caramel frappuccinos with extra caramel. I had this flashback to all the anxiety I used to experience, and even experiencing the anxiety of that present moment where there's so much going on. So many people going here and there and loud sounds and an ugliness that comes along with roads, pavement and new construction before the decorative plants, have had time to grow. You end up with this very industrial feel. So I was struck a bit by how anxious things feel in society , not only in. our life when we're out in the marketplace, for instance, at a little strip mall that I was at, but also in media, YouTube, for instance, I see these financial podcasters that I've watched from time to time. Every time I'm on there now it's like the great collapse is coming. China's economy is destroyed and how to prepare for the, the great impending doom. Apocalyp. And it's tempting to click on 'em sometimes, but then I'm just like, what the heck? And so there's just this flavor of anxiousness. There's a thick schmear of anxiety. Lately in my life, I've been a bit cloistered. I've been. In my home office, which is also my music studio and podcasting studio. I have up these sound panels, these four inch thick base traps that absorb a lot of sound. And to me it feels pretty darn peaceful in here , but it wasn't always like that. From the age of 19 to 24, I experienced deep sometimes paralyzing states of anxiety and panic attacks. I turned 18 years old. I dropped out of high school to join a band. And this was my dream, but this where the really deep experiences of anxiety started to happen. My introduction of adult life, like what it meant to be in charge of myself and also open to all of the things that can happen. And the, the, all the responsibilities that come along with being an. Touring around smoking at least...

Welcome to the Imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss Mindfulness and Incorporating Zen Buddhism into everyday life. I'm your host Matthew Hawk Mahoney, and today's episode is titled Buddhism & Anger Pt. 2 So, I did it again! Outside of my body, I watched as my voice fell into a lower frequency, my volume raising as I said, "This is bullshit!." My boss's eyes widened. My poor coworker was caught in the middle looking down and away from the zoom camera call. "This is bullshit!" I said, "I refuse to accept this because it isn't fair. How about you thank me? Huh?" I finished, my face tight with the fire beneath my skin. My boss calmly said, "Alright, I will talk to you guys later." Hanging up. Now three days later, in the pit of my stomach, there is a weight, a sadness underneath the surface. The rage hangover. I know this now. I have seen this before. I look out of my window at the yellow Florida winter day. Tears well up in my eyes. Yes, I have seen this one before too. This experience is called Helplessness. I have been sitting every day for the last couple of years and practicing off and on for 11 years. I have also added exercise and cleaned up my diet. Yet, here I am, regretting my latest tantrum. I have told myself before, "It's not worth it, Matt! This causes more problems than it solves." and yet here I am again, feeling hopeless. So, what is the wise answer here? Desirelessness is Moksha Liberation, one of my favorite sayings, but how does it apply here? Until recently, I could only use this concept after the tantrum, letting go of the desire for what happened to be anything other than what it was. Digging for answers, typing in "Sudden Anger" into doctor google, a Reddit came up, as they usually do. A person talked in the post about her struggles with irrational and disproportionate bursts of anger while driving, which I also experience sometimes. In the comments, someone responded with something that hit home for me. They said, "We get angry because there is something that we desire very strongly" they continued, "We want this so badly that we get angry to try and attain that thing or correct a certain behavior." What did I desire at that moment? I wanted my boss and coworker to see me as competent; I didn't want to be blamed for something I didn't do. I desired so badly that I burst out in anger, throwing a total rage fit. Where does Buddhism end and Mental Health counseling begin? This is a great question, one that I am still exploring. At times I get tastes of an answer; however, only small. Many masters say that we don't practice Zazen to change anything. Zazen allows us to come into contact with what is. Well, what is, is that I barf up these rage fits, usually out of nowhere, surprising myself and others. Full of regret, I feel isolated and without recourse. I seriously resolved in the past to shrug my shoulders and write it off as the imperfection of life, as promised by the buddha. This is the trickiest Karmic pattern I have encountered yet. The second is jealousy, and the third is Nicotine. This one is challenging because it arises suddenly, strongly with what appears to be no premeditation. There is no buffer room from "this upsets" me to "rage fit." Zen brings us into contact with what is. Sometimes seeing what is in the brilliance of clear sight can change the thing we see clearly. Other times, for instance, my current dilemma, more profound work will need to be done. The wise counsel of a trained professional. The wonderful thing about this latest outburst is that it puts me into contact with humility. Driving home after dropping my wife off at work, I put on the latest Imperfect Buddhist episode, Buddhism & Resistance. What a juxtaposition. Starting the episode, I say calmly into the mic, "Peace exists on the other side of your resistance." going on to share some insights about peace and letting go. Not one day after the episode was released, I am having a big anger outburst at work....

Peace exists on the other side of your resistance. The noise, talking, and eating of the holidays, A haze cast over the clearer vision I had developed with my practice. Awareness of wholeness seems to slip away little by little until I am binge eating all those sweets I swore I didn't want and rubbing my Magic the Gathering headache. How come the lived experience of peace is so easy to forget and the mechanical habits so enticing? Getting ready to head back to work after this long holiday break, I decided to get back into my regular sitting practice. Sitting down into my Zazen posture, it took only minutes until my awareness touched the confusion and irritation in my body. Becoming aware, I saw how the confusion in my body moved to churn thoughts in my head and this aversion to what was happening, resistance to what already was. The thoughts sounded like this: "Why did you eat so much sugar? You're lazy. Why didn't you offer to help wash the dishes? You really feel like shit now, don't you? What is wrong with you?" Seeing the energy and thoughts clearly, I smiled. I saw my mind flicker as if to say, "Well, if you don't resist this, then what?" As I let go of that thought, instant peace came over me. The "negative feelings" didn't change, but my awareness reclaimed its seat in freedom. I let go of the desire for this moment to be anything but what it was. Many teachers talk about this concept of naming what is happening in our bodies and minds. Here is an excerpt from an article on the website growmindfulness.com "In his book, Mindsight, Dan Siegel argues that we "Name It to Tame It" – in other words, by naming our feelings, we are better able to control them or, at least, lessen their impact... To say "I feel angry" is a very different statement, both in content and impact, then the words "I am angry". The latter tends to define us as angry people, whereas the former helps us to recognize that we are not our feelings – we are a lot more than what we feel. Feelings come and go in nature and intensity – our essence remains. Naming our emotions in a gentle, non-judgmental way affirms our self-worth and opens up the opportunity to master our feelings." - growmindfulness.com I like what was said here. However, I don't like the statement, "master our feelings," as this continues the legacy of war between our thoughts and how we want things to be. As we become truly aware of what is happening in our bodies and minds and hold that truth in open awareness, there will be no need to "Master our feelings." Once we encounter the truth in and around our complex emotions, that reality fundamentally changes the challenging emotion itself. Yes, better controlling our emotions is an admirable skill and is undoubtedly a by-product of Zazen. However, we don't sit in Zazen to change anything. Speaking of the distraction of the holidays, I like the idea of embracing distraction. I and many others have tapped purposefully on their phone screen, deleting Instagram and Facebook, writing a very heartfelt post to my friends explaining my decision to leave social media alone. All this to find myself redownloading the apps or sneaking a peek of Facebook through the browser. Embracing distraction as a lay practitioner may be the only way to go. It is a path of nonresistance. Can we find the middle path with all of this technology? If you've found the path and been able to walk it, please let me know. I have yet to be able to walk it. The only skillful way to reclaim my attention and original Mind is through a regular sitting practice. After all of the holiday noise, food, and waves of experiences, it is easy to get pulled back into the flow and pushed around by things. If we have a regular sitting practice, we build our reconnection to original Mind into our schedules. We remove the stumbling block of missed Zazen practice by ensuring our reconnection to the Dharma through regular, scheduled training. Just like when we were kids, our...