The Jack Kornfield Heart Wisdom hour celebrates Jack’s ability to mash up his long established Buddhist practices with many other mystical traditions, revealing...
Ep. 267 – Wise Speech, Speaking with Intention, Listening with Compassion
Exploring how compassionate speech and mindful listening can transform our lives, Jack shares how we can navigate culture’s web of lies by using the energy of Wise Speech to truly awaken.Transform your 2025 with Jack! Join “The Year of Awakening: An Intimate Monthly Journey with Jack Kornfield” a year-long online course beginning Jan 2025!“[Wise Speech] is really about compassion—it’s being aware of the power of speech, and using it to express what is conscious and what brings freedom.” – Jack KornfieldExploring the third step of the Eightfold Path, Jack mindfully shares on:Wise Speech / Right Speech as a factor of awakeningCompassion, non-harming, and embodying Buddha NatureRam Dass’s “Hopi-Hippie Be-In” and what it means to ‘speak the truth’Navigating culture’s and advertising’s web of liesSpeaking from your deepest truth and knowingBuddha and using the energy of speech to awakenWhat it means to truly listen to another human beingCompassionate communication and listeningDiscerning your intention and motivation when talking to peopleSpeaking like a Buddha and treasuring our speechThe simple pleasure of talking and communicationUsing your words for justice, truth, love, and wisdomLetting go of pride and needing to be rightA “Wise Speech” guided meditationChanting the seed syllable “Ah”“The key to listening and speaking wisely is the intention—our intention to learn, to discover, to hear something that we haven’t understood.” – Jack Kornfield“The possibility, if we are to live an awakened life, is to foster that speech that comes from our deeper knowing.” – Jack KornfieldThis Dharma Talk recorded in 1992 at Spirit Rock Meditation Center was originally published on DharmaSeed.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
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Ep. 266 – Election Decompression: 'A Loving Presence Amidst It All' Guided Meditation
Offering decompression from post-election intensity, Jack shares a guided meditation helping us maintain a mindful loving presence amidst it all.This episode is brought to you by Betterhelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/heartwisdom and get on your way to being your best self.“The seasons turn, elections come and go, whole nations and civilization arise for a time and pass. You are the witness to consciousness, the loving awareness that sees the mystery of arising and passing, and holds it all with love.” – Jack KornfieldIn this fresh episode, Jack leads a guided meditation on:Decompressing from the intensity of the electionTaking your noble seat amidst life’s Eight Worldly Winds and play of oppositesFeeling a stable and centered presence wherever you areResting in a quiet, open, mindful loving awarenessFeeling a true sense of loving kindness right hereBecoming consciousness itself, vast, timeless, spaciousWitnessing the arising and passing of all, and holding it all in love“With loving kindness, notice the energy of the mind—the stream of thoughts and plans, ideas, worries, imaginings, analysis, understandings, stories, images—a river of thoughts, feelings, images, and words. You can hold it all in loving kindness and say, ‘Thank you for all that work, I’m okay just now, you can relax.'” – Jack KornfieldThis episode was originally recorded for the Spirit Rock Meditation Center Monday Night Dharma Talk and Guided Meditation Livestream on 11/11/24. Learn more about Spirit Rock’s offerings at SpiritRock.org. Join Jack’s next livestream at JackKornfield.com/eventsSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
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Ep. 265 – Navigating Politics, Impermanence, Suffering, and the Great Turning of the World
Reflecting on the election, Jack explores how we can most mindfully and lovingly dance with impermanence, suffering, and ‘the great turning’ of the world.This episode was originally recorded for the Spirit Rock Meditation Center Monday Night Dharma Talk and Guided Meditation Livestream on 11/11/24. Learn more about Spirit Rock’s offerings here. Join Jack’s next livestream event here.“It’s not about an election one way or the other, they come and go. There’s such huge other forces happening right now—climate change, artificial intelligence, nuclear fusion energy—huge possibilities and huge problems. As T.S. Elliot says, ‘In my end is my beginning.’ Everything that turns offers a new openness and beginning for something else.” – Jack KornfieldIn this fresh episode, Jack mindfully explores:Navigating the election and politics in a changing worldReturning to the basics of Buddhism and living a wise spiritual lifeQuieting the mind, tending the heart, listening to the cries, and seeing with the eyes of wisdomWhat Ajahn Chah’s wisdom for the election results would beOpening to change, honoring impermanence, facing sufferingAnnica – the wisdom of uncertaintyNavigating the “Great Turning” of the worldShifting from exploitive and consumer consciousness to one of interdependence and mutual careFacing our suffering, warfare, racism, aging, death, loss, and changeThe Zen view of the “dew drop” worldHow annica, dukka, anatta connect with nirvana and unshakeable freedomTo end the illusion of separationPolitics as a form of ritualized warfareStanding up like Arjuna in the Bhagavad GitaHuman history as also containing compassion, courage, and sweetnessFinding refuge in Buddha, Dharma, and SanghaLiving from unconditional love and a freedom from fearThe transformative power of communityOur inexorable connection to all the great Saints, Gods, and to the Great Mystery“You get to choose your spirit. No matter what.” – Jack Kornfield"We know that we're not separate. You know it especially when you're on the mountaintop looking down after some amazing hike, or listening to a piece of music that transports you beyond the small sense of self. You know it when you make love, or take psychedelics, or have some profound meditation, or dance until you disappear. We all know it." – Jack KornfieldSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
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Ep. 264 – Right Attitude, Wise Aspiration, Mindful Thought
Helping us reflect on our daily habits and feelings, Jack shares how Right Attitude, Wise Aspiration, and Mindful Thought allow us to uncover the sweet joy of living in The Way.This episode is brought to you by Betterhelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/heartwisdom and get on your way to being your best self.“With Wise Attitude we begin to discover the power of kindness, the joy in not grasping, the delight in generosity, the ease in letting go, and the immediacy of freedom and liberation that is here in every moment.” – Jack KornfieldExploring the second step of the Eightfold Path, Jack mindfully shares on:Right Attitude, Wise Thought, the second step on the Eightfold PathSeeing directly the true power of mind and heartOvercoming habitual patterns of thought, action, and attitudeThe Buddha on nobility, integrity, and the heartOvercoming greed, hatred, and delusionKnowing the sweet joy of living in The WayWise Aspiration and the path of the BodhisattvaReflecting on our attitude around deathRumi, Stephen Levine, Martin Luther King Jr, Suzuki Roshi, and Alan WattsTaking what life gives us as “grist for the mill” of awakeningExamining spiritual teachings in our own life (what works, what doesn’t?)Trading ‘protection and defensiveness’ for ‘openness and curiosity’Accepting each moment as an unrepeatable miracleBeginner’s Mind and Don’t Know MindOpenness, respect, and compassion“It is knowing what is true that brings ourselves freedom. We don’t get free by making ourselves free.” – Jack Kornfield“It is only through mercy, through the kindness of compassion, that reconciliation happens, that what’s locked in suffering begins to grow and breathe new life.” – Jack KornfieldThis Dharma Talk recorded in 1992 at Spirit Rock Meditation Center was originally published on DharmaSeed.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
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Ep. 263 – Wise Understanding and the Wisdom of Insecurity
Intersecting the Buddha’s ‘Wise Understanding’ with Alan Watt’s ‘Wisdom of Insecurity,’ Jack illuminates the path of discovering lasting happiness.For an even deeper dive down the Eightfold Path, sign up for Walking the Eightfold Path with Jack Kornfield, an online course designed to guide you through the wisdom, compassion, and freedom of Buddha’s teachings. Learn more and sign up here.“Spiritual life is not about possessing or finding security, but rather it’s discovering what Alan Watts called, ‘the wisdom of insecurity,’ the capacity for freedom and compassion of heart, no matter what the circumstances. Right Understanding is a willingness to dedicate ourself to awakening, no matter how conditions change.” – Jack KornfieldExploring the first step of the Eightfold Path, Jack mindfully shares on:The Buddha, Enlightenment, the Eightfold Path, and Four Noble TruthsHow to live a wise, mindful, happy, and loving lifeThe Middle Path as the pathway to freedomWise Understanding, the first step on the Eightfold PathSuffering, it’s causes, and how to alleviate itWhere happiness actually comes fromWorking with clinging, grasping, aging, aversion, fearImpermanence, change, and the wisdom of insecuritySpiritual Direction and the journey of the soulThe seed of awakening your Buddha NatureUnderstanding the Law of KarmaFinding nirvana through our current circumstancesHaving compassion for what puts us to sleepTending your heart to tend the whole world“Buddha saw that the cause of happiness and the cause of suffering is not so much in life itself, but in the way that we relate to life.” – Jack Kornfield“Right understanding tells us that we can dedicate our life to something beautiful.” – Jack KornfieldThis Dharma Talk recorded in 1992 at Spirit Rock Meditation Center was originally published on DharmaSeed.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
The Jack Kornfield Heart Wisdom hour celebrates Jack’s ability to mash up his long established Buddhist practices with many other mystical traditions, revealing the poignancy of life’s predicaments and the path to finding freedom from self-interest, self-judgment and unhappiness.