Train your brain to cultivate wholesome or pleasant states of mind to enhance enjoyment of good things and build resilience during bad times.
Adopt a pragmatic approach to spiritual practices, focusing on what genuinely works for you in practice rather than adhering strictly to doctrine.
Actively test spiritual teachings and meditation techniques in your daily life and practice to determine if they are applicable, useful, and make sense for you.
When encountering new information or teachings, immediately consider how you can apply it in your present life and what actionable steps you can take.
Shift your attention from past and future thoughts to the present experience of your body to gain deeper understanding and reduce discursive thinking.
Become aware of your “feeling tones” (pleasant, unpleasant, neutral) to avoid being unconsciously controlled by desires to grasp the pleasant, flee the unpleasant, or ignore the neutral.
Practice mindfulness of your current mind states (emotions, moods) to prevent them from controlling your reactions and behavior.
Pay close attention to the transition of your mind from difficult or afflictive states (e.g., closed, judgmental, cruel) to beneficial and wholesome ones (e.g., open, understanding, caring).
Engage in practice with the intention of fostering more harmonious relationships with both loved ones and strangers, recognizing relationships as a key to happiness.
Cultivate your “best mind” qualities, such as those found in the seven factors of awakening, to effectively navigate conflicts and unexpected difficulties.
Develop your “best mind” to fully appreciate, soak in, and be transformed by beautiful, meaningful, or rich experiences.
Foster your “best mind” qualities to enhance your capacity for learning and understanding new information.
Seek deep, experiential insight into what is skillful versus unskillful, recognizing that understanding and compassion can disentangle life’s complexities more effectively than hatred.
Cultivate a lived, internal experience of self-kindness and compassion, moving beyond intellectual understanding to embodied practice.
Deepen your understanding of the impermanent and changing nature of all phenomena (emotions, thoughts, health) to foster mental relaxation, peace, and kindness.
Cultivate acceptance by developing insight into the impermanent nature of all things, recognizing that clinging to what doesn’t last leads to suffering.
Utilize the seven factors of awakening to cultivate conditions for deeper insights into reality and to improve daily conduct, making you a more agreeable person.
When facing a challenging or exciting situation, consciously invite a “measure of curiosity” and a “measure of calm” into your mind, as the mind can be suggestible and pliable.
Engage in compassionate self-talk, such as “my love,” to gently invite qualities like curiosity and calm into your mind, especially before difficult conversations or tasks.
Acknowledge mental rigidity when it arises, but still attempt to bring a little curiosity or energy to a task, especially if you know it will be helpful, even if the mind initially resists.
Honestly acknowledge mental resistance without bypassing it, then gently inquire if it’s possible to introduce a little curiosity to the situation.
When experiencing anger or perceiving wrongdoing, introduce curiosity by asking open-ended questions like “What happened for you?” to understand the other person’s perspective.
Cultivate mindfulness by approaching every moment with a sense of newness and freshness, recognizing that you have “never been here now before.”
Practice mindfulness by directing sensory experiences (e.g., breath sensations) straight to consciousness without engaging in discursive thoughts or judgments about them.
During meditation, reframe personal experiences (e.g., agitation, thoughts) as universal human phenomena rather than solely “yours,” fostering a sense of connection to human nature.
In conflict, shift from personal identification with your reactions to viewing conflict as a universal human phenomenon, which can help you hold the situation differently and reduce self-blame.
In mindfulness practice, “investigation” means lucidly experiencing phenomena as they unfold, rather than intellectually analyzing their origins or causes.
Cultivate energy in practice as a continuous, calm knowing of change, maintaining a steady and vital attention without over-efforting or under-efforting.
Approach challenges with “wise energy” by maintaining effort without forcing (which leads to exhaustion) or abandoning (which leads to being carried away).
Learn the appropriate level of “wise effort” by experimenting with both too little and too much energy in your practice, using mindfulness to observe the results.
Aim for “just enough energy” to connect with and sustain your attention on a chosen object of meditation, avoiding both excessive strain and insufficient engagement.
To cultivate desirable qualities like mindfulness or calm, intentionally spend time with people who embody and express those qualities, allowing for transmission.
If a physical community of meditators (sangha) is unavailable, create a “virtual sangha” by listening to podcasts or guided meditations from teachers who embody desired qualities.
Cultivate joy by observing the fleeting nature of experiences (thoughts, sounds, mind states) during meditation, leading to a direct understanding of impermanence.
Experience joy and satisfaction by recognizing and disidentifying from habitual negative thought patterns or grudges during meditation, realizing you don’t need to carry them.
While pleasant experiences like rapture can arise in meditation, avoid clinging to them or striving too hard to achieve them, as excessive effort can prevent their natural occurrence.
To cultivate calm amidst anxiety, bring to mind a person you easily care for and genuinely wish them well, as this practice can gather and settle the mind.
To find calm, locate areas of unrest in the body (e.g., chest, head) and then intentionally shift awareness to areas where there is less tension (e.g., feet, legs) or to external, unmoving space.
When experiencing panic, use positive self-talk to remind yourself that your brain might be lying, you are not in danger, and you can ride out the sensations without fighting them.
When an emotion arises (in yourself or others), begin by acknowledging it with “of course,” fostering acceptance rather than judgment or resistance.
Cultivate concentration by simplifying your focus to one thing at a time, such as the sensation of stepping, the breath, or actively listening to another person, rather than letting your mind wander.
Practice equanimity in daily tasks by maintaining composure and balance when faced with obstacles or unexpected difficulties, allowing you to adapt and continue effectively.
If an insight resonates, become interested in it, explore it further through learning, and actively try to locate its presence in yourself and others.
Cultivate a stable, curious, and pliable mind to enhance creativity and adaptability, enabling you to gracefully meet challenges and find solutions.
Develop qualities like mindfulness, curiosity, and calm to improve your relationships, reduce interpersonal trouble, and become a more attuned and beneficial presence to others.