Author: meditation

Giving

Today is Colorado Gives Day. So what better time to discuss Giving than today? As you know, we have been discussing six perfections for the past couple of weeks. After Gratitude, this is my favorite topic. Let’s talk about another perfection—Giving in today’s session.

Giving is a virtuous mental intention to give. It can also be helping with bodily or speech actions with the mental intention to give. There are three types of giving: 1) giving material things; 2) giving Dharma or spirituality; 3) giving fearlessness.

If we have difficulty giving material things, it helps to think about the disadvantages of miserliness. Miserliness is a tight, uncomfortable mind, that leads to isolation. Giving on the other hand is a joyful mind that leads to abundant resources in the future. There is no point in clinging to our possessions because wealth acquires meaning only when it is given away or used for the benefit of others.

There are many benefits of generosity. When we give away material things, it reduces our attachment to the material world. According to a Canadian research study, generosity can reduce blood pressure, reduce depression, reduces stress, decreases anxiety, and more. Generosity also improves our relationship with the people around us. When we give, we are creating positive momentum and hope it catches on and other people carry on with that torch.

I saw an interesting research piece from the John Templeton Foundation on generosity. They found that people who give on their own accord, tend to be happier. Happy people tend to be more generous so it creates its own ecosystem. They also found that donating money releases the same neural pathways in our brains that are activated by other pleasure activities such as food, sex, etc. People tend to be more generous when they see other people giving. As Americans, we are the most generous nation on earth. We donate more than $500 billion per year. That is a staggering amount.

Giving also needs to have the right motivation. For example, if we give something expecting something in return it is not really giving. It is just bartering. Giving also should be without pride. If we give with pride that washes away the benefits of giving. Buddha said that having pride in our giving is like eating a feast of a meal with poison sprinkled on it. It does you no good.

Giving for the sake of giving is what we need to learn to practice. When we begin to do that, we do it out of contentment, and as a result, happiness follows.

And we have touched on this before but giving does not mean giving material things only. One can give our time, our skillsets, our compassion and care, our attention, and so forth. Giving away one’s skills and abilities without any thought of return is giving out of compassion. That is what true generosity looks like.

Why is generosity important you might ponder? Generosity by definition diminishes one’s ego. If we cultivate generosity, we will slowly take a stab at reducing our ego.

One thing to keep in mind is that we should only give away all of our possessions when the time is right. If we give away everything that we have, we won’t be able to function and help people in need for a long time. So one way to practice giving is to mentally dedicate all of our possessions for the benefit of others and then physically give them away when it is most appropriate. This is similar to nonprofit organizations that keep funds in the reserve and do not spend every donation they get right away.

The amount of merit we receive by giving also depends upon the nature of the recipient. If we give to spiritual causes or to our parents or to people who are sick and poor, we accumulate more merit.

The next type of giving is giving Dharma. When we teach someone spirituality with the right motivation, we are accumulating merits of giving Dharma. This is much more beneficial than giving material things because material things help someone in this lifetime but spirituality helps them in this lifetime as well as in future lives. If we are not able to teach another way to accumulate merits of giving Dharma is dedicating our virtues to peace and happiness of all living beings.

The last type of giving is giving fearlessness. To give fearlessness is to protect other living beings from fear or danger. This can come in many forms. For example, if we rescue someone from a fire, or natural disaster, or protect them from physical violence, this is all types of giving fearlessness. Our first responders who do this on a daily basis are accumulating tremendous amounts of merit. If this is not possible for us to do, we can still accumulate merits of giving fearlessness by praying for those in danger.

I hope this inspires you to practice giving on a regular basis and not just one day a year!

Patience

We started discussing the six perfections in detail last week with the perfection of moral discipline. I thought we would talk about one of the other perfections—patience today. Now if you talk to anyone who knows me, they would tell you, I am the least qualified person to talk about patience! So today is the “let’s do what the teacher says and not what he does” kind of lesson!

In “The Boddhisattva Vow” Geshe Kelsang Gyatso defines patience as a virtuous mind that is able to bear harm, suffering, or profound Dharma. Patience is useful whether we are interested in spiritual growth or not. You see, without patience, we are prone to anxiety, frustration, and disquiet. If we lack patience, it is difficult for us to maintain a relationship with others.

Patience is the opposite of anger. We have all seen what anger can do. At a minimum, it prevents us from judging the situation accurately and causes us to act irrationally. Worst of all, it destroys our peace of mind. Anger normally is triggered by something very insignificant, such as a comment we find offensive or a habit we find annoying, and so forth. It leads us to do and say things that create harm to us and others. If we look at all the wars in this world, there is no doubt that they were caused by angry minds. External enemies harm us in slow and subtle ways. Anger, on the other hand, harms us from within.

Patience helps us in this life and all our future lives. The famous Indian sage Shantideva once said, “there is no evil greater than anger, there is no virtue greater than patience”. With patience, we can accept any pain that is inflicted upon us. With patience, nothing destroys our peace of mind and we do not experience any suffering. There are three types of patience:

  1. The patience of not retaliating
  2. The patience of voluntarily enduring suffering
  3. The patience of definitely thinking about Dharma or spirituality

To practice the patience of not retaliating, we need to be mindful of how anger can destroy our peace of mind and be alert when situations arise when we might get angry. We need to think that if someone hits us with a stick it is not the fault of the stick. Similarly, when someone tries to harm us, it is their delusion to be blamed and not themselves. I know, tough to reconcile, right? Another way to think about this is to realize that when someone harms us, it is our Karma that created the situation. We must have harmed them in the past and by patiently accepting the situation, we are able to pay off that karmic debt.

The second kind of patience is the patience of volunteering enduring suffering. If we don’t have this patience, we will give up our tasks as soon as they become difficult. We will become more and more frustrated and we will end up accepting mediocracy. We often come across unpleasant conditions and misfortune. By voluntarily accepting these adversities, we eliminate sufferings from our lives. That does not mean the pain goes away, but it need not cause suffering within us. Instead of self-pity, we strengthen our resolve. We recall that these unpleasant conditions or misfortunes are the results of our previous negative karma and resolve to avoid negative karma moving forward. If we are able to endure adversities, we will be able to reap great rewards. Our present sufferings will diminish. Also, suffering helps us dispel pride, develop compassion and abandon negative karma.

The third type of patience is the patience of definitely thinking about Dharma or spirituality. If we listen to, contemplate, and meditate on spirituality and Dharma, we are practicing patience of definitely thinking of patience. So every Tuesday, when we meet for meditation, we are practicing patience of definitely thinking about Dharma. This is important because it creates a happy and patient mind.

So hopefully, we can all try a little harder to develop the type of patience that we need to work on. We may find a particular type of patience more difficult to practice than others depending upon karmic tendencies. But important thing is to make progress and not get discouraged.

Moral Discipline

In the past, we briefly touched on the six perfections. Six perfections are the guide to living a life on the right path the path that leads to enlightenment. Now that is a tall order for sure but practicing these six perfections would certainly make our daily lives joyful and would bring joy to people around us. So today, let’s talk about the perfection of moral discipline.

In “The Boddhisattva Vow” Geshe Kelsang Gyatso defines moral discipline as a virtuous mental determination to abandon any fault or any action that is motivated by such a determination. That’s it. It is that simple. If we know something is wrong and we make a determination to avoid that, and follow through with it, we are practicing moral discipline.

There are three types of moral discipline; 1) the moral discipline of restraint; 2) the moral discipline of generating virtuous karma; 3) the moral discipline of benefiting other living beings.

Let’s look at each one in detail. The moral discipline of restraint is abstaining from non-virtuous acts. You see to practice this type of moral discipline we first need to understand the dangers of committing negative actions, make a promise to abandon such negative actions, and then follow through on it. Simply not doing something without knowing that it is wrong is not moral discipline. For example, a two-year-old does not know that killing is bad. If they abstain from killing they are not practicing moral discipline. Now, on the other hand, a five-year-old knows killing is bad and then avoids killing ants, they are practicing moral discipline. So if we understand the dangers of ten non-virtuous actions that we have talked about at length during our karma series, promise to refrain from them, and then follow through on that promise, we are practicing the moral discipline of restraint. If we are not ready to abandon all of the negative actions at once, we can take a vow to refrain from one particular type of non-virtuous action for a certain period. Once we keep that promise, we can increase the duration of our promise for a longer time in the next iteration.

To practice this, we need to rely upon our M A C technique. We need to be mindful so we don’t forget our vows. We need to stay alert so that when delusions crop up, we can use our conscientiousness to avoid non-virtuous actions.

Next is the moral discipline of generating virtuous karma. To me, this is easier than the first one but like anything else depending upon our own karma we find one type of moral discipline easier than the other. In this moral discipline, we need to try and generate virtuous karma. Again, it is important to be mindful of what it is that we are doing for that to be considered moral discipline. I am sure there are some benefits of accidental positive karma but positive karma created by mindfulness had the full effect if you will.

The last type of moral discipline is of benefiting living beings. This is the moral discipline of helping others in whatever way that we can. We can offer material help if someone needs it or we can offer advice to them if they are going through a difficult stage in their life or we can teach them dharma or we can pray for them at a minimum. When we help others, we should be sensitive to their needs, state of mind, experience, and point of view. If we come down as Hollier than thou, no matter how good the advice may be, they are not likely to follow it and we are not doing good to anyone.

There is an interesting story of a Tibetan monk. He had a good size following and one day he was giving teaching from a throne to a few hundred followers. There was this lady in the village whose daughter was sick and someone told her that if she put the daughter in the monk’s care, that would save her daughter. So the lady takes a few-month-old daughter in a basket to the monk when he was giving a lecture and said out loud, here keep your daughter. She is your daughter so you raise her. Then she quietly told the monk to save her daughter. Monk just nodded and took the baby in his lap and continued with his teaching. Over the next few years, he raised this baby like she was his own. Once the lady realized that her daughter was healthy she came back to pick her up. Now talk about the moral discipline of helping living beings! Most people would have worried about their reputation and whatnot. Not this monk. He wanted to help and realized that if he challenged the lady, he would not be able to help the baby.

I know none of us are monks but if we apply some of these teachings at a small level in our lives; the world would be a better place.

Financial Uncertainties Got You Down?

I was talking to a group of people who are in the mortgage business over the weekend. This is one of the most stressful times for this group in the past 13 years. Most of them earn their money on the commission they make from loan origination. As you can imagine, loan originations have come to a screeching halt in the past four months. This uncertainty about the future is creating a lot of anxiety—which is natural. So I thought how about we discuss how we can embrace these uncertain times and see what kind of possibilities might open up? Let’s dig in.

Let’s face it. There is comfort in certainty. We as human beings love routines. It gives us this sense of security. You see our brains have a bias against change. Change means things can get worse—it could get better but there is a possibility that it could get worse. This means there is a possibility of a painful experience. No matter how small that possibility might be, from our caveman days, we have wired our brains to avoid pain at all costs. That means regardless of the potential for upside, our brain will try to avoid uncertainty.

When we start living by avoiding all uncertainty, we tend to isolate ourselves from the world. This creates its own set of problems. Sometimes, people start on a negative feedback loop and create mental health issues for themselves. I am sure you know someone in your life who is in a job they absolutely hate. They have told you that in that many words. They have been complaining about it for years. However, they feel that a change of job is uncertain and would not pull the trigger. For them, it is the choice between the devil you know versus the unknown. If instead, they develop the courage to embrace the uncertainty, they may find there indeed are greener pastures on the other side. In these times of uncertainty, it may be time to look for what else is out there. Although, it is tough for someone in the mortgage business to manage finances arguably this is the best job market to be looking for a job in multi-generations.

There are a number of things we need to adopt in order to embrace uncertainty. First thing is to realize that there is no such thing as a certainty. We talked about this before and the only constant in life is change. Similarly, the only thing certain in life is uncertainty. The sooner we accept this, the better we will be. Once we embrace the uncertainties in life, we will be able to see opportunities that present us. I was recently talking to a retail day trader. Quite possibly, he is the most successful retail day trader in history. He has had days better than Goldman Sachs on occasion! I asked him what he thought made him successful when 98% of the people who try end up failing. He said something interesting. He said he never goes into a day expecting something from the market. He said I am here for what the market has to offer. I don’t hope for the market to go one way or another. Now here is the guy who has truly embraced uncertainty.

You see when we stop hoping for things, we are embracing uncertainty. This leads us to become excited about possibilities. When you don’t know what is coming and have embraced it, all of a sudden you have a kid’s curious mind. You are now wondering what will happen instead of hoping for a particular outcome.

Embracing uncertainty also allows us to learn more about the fear within. It allows us to learn about who we really are. But embracing uncertainty and thriving in uncertainty is not a quick thing. It happens over time. It actually is a process where we learn how to avoid judging ourselves.

When we embrace uncertainty, we are accepting the fact that we don’t have all the answers. That is such a liberating feeling. It also helps us find better ways. Now that we accepted our ignorance, it allows us to ask questions and find answers. We tend to throw a wider net when we know we don’t have the answers. This broadens our horizons.

I strongly encourage all of you to embrace uncertainty. You will be amazed by the change for the better.

Is Money A Drug?

I was on a long flight recently. On the flight, I decided to watch a documentary about how sugar is addictive and how it is a drug stronger than hard drugs such as cocaine. They were showing how when they gave more sugar to rats in the experiments, the rats got used to the sugar and they needed more and more doses for their brains to show signs of excitement. That got me thinking—does money have the same effect on people?

I mean think about it. When one does not have money, one would get excited about $100. Look at your college days. I remember I used to get excited about a free T-Shirt for filling out credit card forms! As you accumulate more wealth, that excitement does not last anymore. One needs more money to get excited as one makes more money. I am sure at your first job, you were thrilled with a $ 2-an-hour wage increase. If someone offered you that at the peak of your career you will consider that an insult right? What changed? $2 per hour is still $2 per hour. The value of $2 for you changed when you started making more money.

So I started to research this topic for this episode. It turns out there is some interesting research on the topic. One I found most interesting was from the University of Minnesota study in China. They gave a group of students money count and other students just paper to count. After the counting was over, they asked them to put their fingers into a bowl with 122-degree hot water. The group that counted the money before did not find any discomfort in the hot water! This was a similar result to when people had their loved ones next to them when dipping their fingers into hot water. So our brain equates money to love. Go figure…

So if money is a drug, can it be addictive? It sure can. An interesting thing is that there are some obvious signs such as gambling or indulgence in luxury items that you may not be able to afford. But here is something I learned that was unexpected. It turns out that excessive saving habits can be a form of money addiction. It turns out that people who save excessively tend to believe that more money will bring more happiness and they don’t think it is ever enough no matter the size of their savings account.

According to Kabir Sehgal, author of the book Coined, the effect of money on your brain is similar to that of cocaine.

Neuroeconomists—I didn’t know there was such a thing—have performed several brain scans on individuals who were about to make money, and the results were staggering, says Sehgal. The studies show that these people had the same neurological response to making money in their “pleasure centers” as someone high on cocaine.

Money is a powerful addiction and creates good feelings when you get it and bad feelings when you lose it. Here is the difference between money and hard drugs. Cocaine, heroin, and crack will kill you if you do too much, but not money. Money won’t harm physically you. But it will destroy your mental peace just as any other addiction would.  

So how do you make sure you get your mental peace back if you think you may be on money drugs? Of course, the first thing to do is realize that it may be a problem. And that it is unhealthy if you are thinking about money all the time.

After that, it is important to realize that it is our attachment to money that drives our addiction to money. So the easiest thing in my opinion is to try and reduce our attachment. One good way to remove attachment is to start giving away money. Make a habit of giving away 10% of what you make to a good cause. When you begin to give away money, usually you will do it to causes that you feel strongly about and you think are worthy. That creates a state of compassion in our minds. That coupled with the generosity you demonstrate by giving money away reduces the attachment towards money.

Please realize, I am not saying money is bad. I am just saying excessive concern about money is not healthy. And when I look around, it seems that more and more people are giving more and more attention to money than ever before. We need to change that for the mental health of our society.