Howdy, folks!
For your Almost-Daily Dharma today (I apologize for the silence these past few days–my life has been unusually full of other things…) I thought I would offer you the prompt that went out just now to the folks who attend the Thursday evening and Sunday morning meditation and discussion groups. I send out notices twice a week to remind people of the groups and to inform them of the topic if there is one. If you would like to join in, just let me know and I’ll sign you up. The topic for the evening is something that we may all profit from, I think. Here is what I said:
“At the monastery where I trained, just inside the door to the dining hall, there was this thing that we called ‘the sandwich board’. It was a place where various things were posted for periods of time for us to consider in support of our practice (and not, alas, a place to order sandwiches). Postings came and went according to some mysterious timeline. Some lasted a few weeks, some a few months. There were several that lasted for a few years. Here is one of those:
“Urgency is a sign that conditioned mind is at play.”
I’m thinking this posting might be fun and interesting to explore this evening. What do you see about that? How is it that urgency is a sign that conditioned mind is a play? What is ‘urgency’, anyway? What does our practice offer in terms of understanding the nature of urgency, and how to work with it? What is the centered alternative to urgency? Like that.
Once we figure out this urgency thing then we can go on to whatever else you would like to talk about. Be well, friends, take care of yourselves today, and I look forward to seeing you tonight!”
In peace,
David