When Your Mind Won't Stop, Try This | Vinny Ferraro

12:17If it's all allowed and nothing was turned away, nothing left out,

12:34what heart quality is accessible right now? Thank you.

13:13and then we let that be enough. The sincerity of the invitation, right? Wherever it leads us, we say, okay, I surrender, and I care about whatever arises.

14:03We carry this kind of care with us throughout our days. At any moment, we need to come back, feet on the floor,

14:15breath in our body, and on our belly, our hearts, and we reach out and say, I'm right here.

14:44And when you're ready, lean back out into this shared space.

14:52And noticing, how does awareness change with the presence of others? What happens?

15:04I like to keep meditating, even though my eyes are open, sometimes I open and close them. It's good to play with awareness because awareness is always aware of something. Yeah. Yeah, thank you. Thank you, Vinny. Great job. What's your answer to that question? How does awareness change if you're meditating with other people? It depends, right? Sometimes I see others. It's like, whoa, all of a sudden there's distance. Sometimes there's great connection where I'm like, wow, look at this house mirror. you know with now with this is like 650 eyes looking at us i guess it's 1300 so here we are in this little box right and we know that there's hundreds of people listening and so what does that do to awareness it makes it very kind of a precious right i'm like oh my god we gotta make sure this is good

16:05in the dharma there's this emphasis on you know the three jewels the buddha the dharma and the sangha the buddha is the buddha the dharma the teachings of the buddha and the sanghas the community what's your sense is online community a distant second place to in person or what well you know that's like saying well what meditation is the best How are you going to compare these things? You know what I mean? What have we learned after COVID? Because I never did online stuff. You got to be in the room. It's like, yeah, but how about if we couldn't be in the room? COVID taught us that like, oh shit.

16:44No, it's not the same as in person. But just like every practice bears a different fruit, this kind of interaction bears a different fruit. So I try to not compare it so much because a lot of us don't maybe live in San Francisco or New York or, you know what I mean? So the accessibility opens up. Can I feel connection through these little windows? And the answer, definitely yes. Yeah. I was kind of relieved. I was surprised because I never liked this kind of technical stuff until I was forced to. So like was Joel kicking and screaming toward my own liberation, you know? You've been looking at screens for decades, bro.

17:28I think one way broadcasting, which I did for a long time and was reflected in my interpersonal communication style, is not the best for this. And I do think there's massive power to in-person, which is why I've tried to organize more in-person events over time. But there are massive logistical hurdles. You can't do it every Tuesday afternoon. So just doing it digitally is really helpful. I find these sessions incredibly enjoyable. personally? Yeah. You know, when the mind's not in the way, right? Because the comparing mind just arises, right? They said even that's the last fetter to break. The last link in the chain is comparing mind.

18:13And that was relieving to me to think that the Dalai Lama sitting there like, you know what? This cat next to me, I'm not sure, man. You know what I mean? Like, even him, we're in good company. You know, that's not like some kind of penalty. It's like, oh, the comparing mind, of course. So I'm comparing this to in person. I'm like, well, I'd rather be able to get you in a headlock. That'd be nice. You know what I mean? Same room. I try to not compare it too much and try to see how much the accessibility that's changed everything because I do a lot of work at the end of life stuff. They can't be in the room.

18:50It wouldn't even be responsible for us to be in the same room. It's opened up so much. And even the work in the prisons. Now we could talk to people that are on the other side of that wall. It's brought a lot of gifts to my life. A lot of people are saying in the comments that they don't think of this as digital, like this really is their sangha. I love to hear that. That's what gets me out of bed. That's what I want to do. So I have some questions for you from the sangha. I might mangle the pronunciation of this, so apologies in advance, but I think it's Cage Smith. Please have VF talk about soft belly practice from one who consistently has a tough belly.

19:26Yeah, man, that's my wheelhouse, bro. Thanks for teeing that up. I mean, you know, I don't know about you, but I really felt the bracing against life. Just moving to my world, moving to my days, when Stephen Levine started talking about soft belly, I was just like, are you out of your mind? What are you talking about? Because we come from this world where it's like six-pack abs and everybody's armored up. And I had no idea how the nervous system really follows the belly softening. So when we talk about the armoring that naturally happens in life, particularly if you've had a hard run of it, how do we let that all float in something softer?

20:15right that's really the key it's not that I have to push away these difficulties it's more like okay can I be a bit broader in my awareness and how I'm holding things and say okay I don't have to have my guard up so hard can I just let myself feel a little bit more and can it be held with care like that's a big question for me is like can I allow it So sometimes we'll lose someone we love or somebody has a brand new baby or somebody gets married, whatever the event is. Where's my belly in this? So I'm in the habit of reaching to my belly because that's kind of like the seat of my practice. So usually if I'm sitting, there's a point in every sit where I reach out to myself.

21:05There's a way to connect with that part of myself. It kind of lands me in the body and I feel the softness. it doesn't matter what tightens my belly up. So can I come back home and just soften even a little bit? I felt a great release of what Stephen used to call unattended sorrow. What I noticed, Dan, is when I started allowing that to be there more, I had more access to joy, more access to happiness. because when we armor up those parts of our hearts, it's not just the difficult that we keep out, right? So the soft belly has been a 30-year practice for me and some days it feels possible. In other days, I just have to let the hardness float in something softer.

21:59I'm curious, when you say the belly, are you using that as interchangeable with the body or is there something specific about the belly? Well, I think the belly holds a lot. A lot is stored in the belly. There's a lot of nerves. Even call it the second brain in the belly. Yeah. So that's where I mostly feel things. When something changes for me, I can feel the breathing stop. I can feel the belly tighten. I have a lot of awareness about my belly just from practicing. And so I am using them interchangeably, but I don't usually feel those things in my legs, my arms, my hands, even my feet. My feet are unaffected.

22:43So the way I practice with my feet is just that fundamental okayness of touching the floor. I probably do that at least a dozen times a day where I'll be moving faster than I want to move. And then I'll say, hold on a second. I just sit down and I just feel that. not the story, not the concept, but what's the felt sense of my feet touching the floor? It's like, oh, I got to kind of remind myself, you're actually okay right now. It's like, oh, cool. All right, begin again. You know what I mean? I agree about the arms, legs, and feet probably not being where you're storing, or at least for me, where I'm storing my stuff.

23:23But I do feel a lot of it in the chest, you know, like a swarm of bees in the chest or sort of like a separating wound in the chest a couple of inches north of the solar plexus or the heart. So for me, it's not just the belly, although I would agree the belly is an incredibly potent spot. Yeah, I mean, I'm not using it interchangeable with the body, but I am using it interchangeably with the trunk. Okay. Because I do have a lot of sensations in the heart that's higher and even in the throat, right? Sometimes when my anxiety comes up, that's where it comes. So here I am. Here's this feeling. Can I tend to it?

24:06The first part for me is I would say, this is not mine. I'm not the origin story of anxiety. So then I open up. Okay, how many beings know this feeling? Billions. Okay, now I'm in the presence of Sangha. That's the route for me on how I deal with cruelty when it arrives in the body. It reminds me a little bit of, are you familiar with the work of Kristen Neff? Oh, of course. For people who don't know her, she's really the godmother of self-compassion, which isn't an ooey-gooey concept. It is a rich field of study for psychologists. She is a researcher at the University of Texas in Austin, and she has this kind of three-part strategy for dealing with hard moments like anxiety.

24:55the first is to just be mindful of it oh yeah yep this is anxiety this sucks the second is to call to mind what she calls common humanity a billion people are probably feeling exactly what i'm feeling right now i'm in the presence of sangha and then the third is can you talk to yourself the way you would talk to your kid or to a good friend and you know this can be accompanied by a hand on the on the chest or the belly and i found it to be i had a lot of resistance just like you said before, being dragged, kicking and screaming toward liberation, it seemed cheesy. And with all of my sort of male of a certain age conditioning, I was like, fuck that.

25:32I don't I'm not I'm not doing any of that. But it really is helpful as much as I hate to admit it. Yeah, man. I mean, I lived it for years. I just sent rays of hate toward the teacher. I was like, I hope you can feel that.

25:50Because I'm sending something toward you. Literally, I was just hating it. And then that ended up being what actually helped. That's what released so many, yeah, a lifetime of holding. So, you know, it's always the same, right? And that's why eclecticism is so dangerous. Because, you know, I would, oh, I want to chant with the Sufis and I want to break bread with the Krishnas. I was like, well, with the Buddhists. I was like, yeah, as long as I pick and choose, I'll always cherry pick around what's actually going to transform me. You know what I mean? Because I just don't want to do what's uncomfortable.

26:25That's why any path, you want to do the completeness of it. There's nothing wrong with being inspired by other paths, but I just see whatever you're doing, just do the whole thing. That way you get the benefits that actually have that transformational quality. if you're gonna eat a burrito eat the burrito the whole thing bro yeah I feel you Joyce Fisher has a question Joyce says I'm struggling with staying focused in my meditations which in turn fuels my skeptic mind to not do it I know the benefits of meditation but the story I find myself telling is I'm too stressed to meditate which obviously feeds the anxiety suggestions I always love Vinny's perspective and I can relate to him so much I am confident you guys will help me.

27:13Oof. This is Mara, right? This is the mind appearing real again. You have this intention, and then the mind says, ah, this is too much, right? It's such an immersive experience thinking. It's so convincing, and it's all about me. that's how we know you're you know we're really mired in delusion at that point right so as long as we make practice optional there'll be a thousand reasons to not do it it's like i had a hard day i had a great day i don't even need to meditate like we're trying to fix something right so for me it's like okay can i hear those thoughts and show up anyway with. Can I actually just say, all right, I'm stressed.

28:10I actually need this more than anything else is to just rest my nervous system for a few minutes. That would be a great gift to someone that's stressed out. Just arrive. And that's why I always try to start with, don't try to meditate. Stop with all the striving. Just let yourself rest in your own awareness, right? Just for a few minutes. That does wonders. But as long as we believe the thoughts, then we're kind of lost. We're lost in the world of the mind where nothing is ever enough. You know? How do you do it when you don't want to sit? Well, it depends what the perceived obstacle is. You always were talking about stress.

28:59So what do you do? I could imagine you have some stress, Dan. Yeah, I have a little bit of stress sometimes. Not right now, but I don't have that problem. I'm 16 years into this thing. I know that if I'm stressed, it's mindfulness bell to go sit. It's more like, oh, today I've run out of time or I'm too tired or I'm too physically restless because I get a lot of physical restlessness, which is one of my little bugaboos. so in those scenarios I allow myself to do a different kind of meditation walking meditation is great when you're tired or restless I don't really ever quote-unquote let myself off the hook not because I'm kicking my own ass to do this thing although I have had those stages in my practice but more because I've done it long enough to know that when I don't do it my inner dialogue is just so much more obnoxious yeah I love the walking instruction too you know you ever heard do you know the Buddhist, she was a German nun, Ayakama?

30:03I've heard her name, but I don't know her. She had a phrase that I used in my walking and it just changed everything. That was another thing I just thought was bullshit. I was like, oh, walking, cool. You're on these 16-hour-a-day meditation retreats. It's like, oh, you get to take a piss, grab some tea, grab a cookie, you know what I mean? And then 10 years in, I was like, dude, you're only doing half the retreat. So I read these words from Maya Kemba. She would take a step and have a little mantra. And there was like three steps, basically. It was like, nowhere to go, nothing to get, no one to be.

30:42Nowhere to go, nothing to get, no one to be. And my awareness would become panoramic in a certain way. Because it wasn't Vinny trying to be a good Buddhist and walking in nature or whatever I was doing. It wasn't shrouded or tainted with identity and self. It allowed awareness. There's nowhere to go. There's nothing to get here. And there's no one to be. It was very profound for me. I've heard it rendered as nowhere to go, nothing to do. It's already here. I like that too. Yeah, I think the no one to be for me is that that's the linchpin. That's the one. You know, there's so much self in here.

31:25So I like that the becoming piece is just so exhausting. Say a little bit more about that. That is a bit of a Buddhist term of art, becoming. What does it mean to you? You know, in some sense, it's like postponing arrival because I'm always coming something, right? I'm going to become a teacher. I'm going to become more compassionate. It's always down the road a bit. So there's this delusion baked into it because it's reaching for something that's not here. So I'm becoming, anytime I can let myself off that hook, like you said with how you heard that Iachemma quote, it's already here. So no one to be is pointing at the same thing.

32:16That's a great kindness that we give to ourselves. that I'm not on my way somewhere. I'm right here. If the, Dogen said, if the truth is anywhere, it's right here. Keep setting the compass to right here. Not when I finish this retreat or when I find the right teacher or when I sit every day. That's when it's going to be on. It's all bullshit. It's three-card monsters. Like, holy shit, man. I'm running game on myself. Okay. Come back. Right here, right now. Here we are. So you said that there's no one to be, and it's already here, kind of pointing to the same thing. Another phrase that, for me at least, seems to point in that same direction is the meditation instruction that Joseph Goldstein has been using recently.

33:04What is being known? Hmm, yeah. I mean, Joseph, man, what a gift.

33:16What is being known, right? that's kind of a little bit of the same flavor of how I tried to end the meditation around like what is awareness aware of right because it's always aware of something right and so there's something about just allowing ourselves to stay current because it's always fresh awareness is always being aware and I love that thanks for sharing that bro it's a pleasure let's see if I can sneak in another question or two I do want to make one quick comment. Rhonda commented that sometimes gearing down our nervous system in order to sit is difficult, especially for people with ADHD.

33:57And I just wanted to highlight for you, Rhonda, that that is very real. This is why I'm a big proponent of walking meditation. For people who really have a lot of trouble sitting still, it can be a great warm-up practice. It can be a great supplementary practice. It can be something you do instead. and it's not cheating, it's not recess, it's not, I mean, it's real practice. So it's not something you need to feel guilty about. Stacy writes, I love Vinny. No question, I just wanted you to hear that. Maria writes, Vinny, how can we have compassion and develop forgiveness for evildoers? This is a tough one for me.

34:37Who is that not tough for? You know what I mean? like evildoers, that's really, really difficult, right? So someone who's actively doing harm, let's say, right? Because I'm not sure I believe in evil. I've been working in prisons for decades and I have yet to find the evil. But I think people do a lot of unskillful things and very desperate, you know? And I myself have done very bad things. so how do we rectify that in this boundless freedom and heart space that we're exploring i try to go back to myself and say all right i know that every time i've done harm it's been out of my own pain and out of my own confusion yeah so it wasn't malicious and and so i imagine that that's what it's like, that everybody's doing their best.

35:33Now, it's so hard to believe, right? Like, I could believe it in a principle, and then I see what people do in the world, and it's like, damn, man. I cannot believe that is your A game, player. You know what I mean? That's just really hard to believe. Even for the parts of myself, because that's where I want to start there, and I want to, like, radiate that out. The parts of myself that I've done harm are they forgivable? And a big part of the forgiveness practice is to separate the actor from the action. Some acts, unforgivable. But can we look at the actor and say, all right, this is a confused person that's filled their pain out on me or me them.

36:20And I know what that's like. I've been on this path a while and I still make incredible mistakes all the time. I just came for my father's 80th birthday this weekend. And my therapist was like, all right, man, how are you orienting toward this weekend? He's been a complicated person for me, you know? And I said, well, I want to go there and I want to celebrate my freedom in the face of this complicated person. I do love my pop and I want to celebrate him and I want to stay in that. Now, did I find myself in a momentary lapse of reason and have him in a headlock at one point? Yes. And then I woke up halfway through the headlock.

37:05Hold on, hold on. Emancipation, freedom, okay. Sometimes I can be very forgiving and very open. And other times I feel tighter. And I try to see what am I clinging to? What is the story that is sponsoring this suffering? Oh, they shouldn't be like that. They shouldn't do that. Well, that's true. but what am I contributing right now energetically to this world, to this body? So I try to get in touch with that. Can I care about that? You know, harm being caused. Is that natural for me to be compassionate toward the people involved? Yes. I'll share a short one with you about my wife a little bit.

37:51We're living in Oakland and somebody got mugged on our street. and they snatched the pocketbook and then they hit the woman with a hammer. She got taken away by the ambulance and my wife was in the bedroom crying and I went in there and I said, look, she's going to be all right. She said, look, I'm thinking about the person that hit the person. You know what I mean? What does it take to do something like that to somebody? Sometimes the othering that happens with evil, as we call it, Like, can I find those deluded parts of myself, those desperate parts? Because that was the scariest thing in my life for me, is when I lost to my own goodness.

38:37Whenever I dedicate the merit at the end of the sit, it's always the same. It's for all beings in all directions, without exception. They remember their goodness, but maybe they remember their belonging. Right? because if we know that we belong to each other, it's really hard to do harm. So I try to keep that in mind. My wife helps me. Well, your wife sounds incredible. And I've been influenced in this regard by Father Gregory Boyle, also incredible. I'm not a big Christian, but I'm not a Christian at all, actually. But Father Gregory Boyle is an amazing person, deeply influenced by the Dharma and runs the largest organization that works with current former gang members in Los Angeles.

39:24And he says that he does not think in terms of good and evil. He thinks in terms of healthy or unhealthy. I think there's a Native American or indigenous expression, like somebody who does harm is somebody who has no relations. You have to feel really cut off and be isolated and armored to hit somebody in the head with a hammer or to do some of the shit we're seeing in Washington right now. That doesn't mean you don't resist it. That doesn't mean you let a guy with a hammer hit somebody. You can take affirmative action. It just doesn't have to come from the othering and labeling as evil. None of this is a recipe for passivity or quietism or resignation.

40:08It's just an orientation inwardly and outwardly that allows you to act fueled by something cleaner burning than hatred. Yeah. Well said, bro. And I love Gregory Boyle's work, man. Homeboy Industries was just a beautiful offering. Yeah.

40:37Anything else in your mind that's worth talking about before I let you go?

40:45yeah I think it come out of the doll and it said you know I'll just pull it up because it's a lot better than I'll say it out the liberated soul it talks about right liberated is the soul which sees all human behavior as either an act of love or a call for love how do I understand what I'm witnessing in the world. What am I going to contribute? So you're contributing in your own way. I'm contributing in my own way. I hope whoever asked that question, we're trying to, this is a big old seesaw that we're involved in here. So as much as we're seeing, we want to do that much on the other side. You know, the ancient law is hate doesn't cease by hate.

41:37All our exemplars said this. so what does it really mean to call somebody in even in our imagination Ram Dass used to have a picture of Trump on his altar that's the advanced course you remember the story about Sharon in India she almost got abducted she was with meningitis and she finally shows up what happened she goes you know I had to fight somebody to get here to try to take me and he said I hope you hit that person over the head with your umbrella with all the love in your heart and I love that you know cause it's not passive it's like look man this is a really big old world that we live in and can I find the places in me that I've done wrong and can I really bring some more goodness into this world

42:40you're the best. We've never had this many people come to one of these paid subscriber sessions. I've never seen as many hearts, emojis. I know I'm not supposed to be inflating your ego, but you're great. So I appreciate you. Thank you so much, Dan. It's a real pleasure to hang out with you again, bro. Someday we have to meet in person. Yeah, man. First headlocks on me, bro.

43:07All right, I'll hold you to that. To be continued in ways we can't imagine, yeah? Exactly. Thank you for doing this, and thanks for everything you're doing for us and for the world. Thank you, Dan. Take good care, bro. Thank you, everybody. Thanks again to Vinny. Love that guy. Don't forget, if you want to come to our weekly live meditation and Q &A sessions, you can just sign up over at danharris.com. If you sign up, you'll also get guided meditations that come with our full-length Monday-Wednesday episodes. The idea there is that you learn a lot, hopefully listening to the conversation, and then we give you a guided meditation to deepen your understanding.

43:46Finally, thank you so much to everybody who works so hard on this show. Our producers are Tara Anderson and Eleanor Vasily. Our recording and engineering is handled by the great folks over at Pod People. Lauren Smith is our managing producer. Marissa Schneiderman is our senior producer. DJ Kashmir is our executive producer, and Nick Thorburn of the band Islands wrote our theme.