Daily Meditation Recordings, with Martin Aylward – Week of January 11, 2021
Martin Aylward
We’re fortunate that Martin Aylward has generously offered to lead our daily meditation sessions for Europe and the UK. To find out more about Martin, and to view his other contributions to Sangha Live, click here.
This week’s theme is “Embodied Metta – The Body as a Pathway to Freedom”.
The Buddha’s teachings invite us to be with things as they are. This week, we’ll learn embodiment practices to help us cultivate true love, compassion and care for ourselves and for others. We’ll practice staying intimate with our body, mind and heart in daily life, in sexuality, and with (often unwanted) thoughts, feelings and emotions.
The pursuit of freedom and happiness in the Buddha’s journey holds significant relevance to our own lives, particularly during challenging times. Embracing uncertainty, stepping out of our comfort zones, maintaining integrity, and risking it all for the love of the Dharma are just a few aspects of his path. What if we were to perceive…
Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them, humanity cannot survive. – Dalai Lama
During this week we will explore how compassion informs and supports meditation practice and the deepening of understanding and wisdom. We will practice and inquire into different aspects of this powerful attitude and intention and taste for ourselves the impact it has on ourselves and the world.
This week’s topic is “A Path of Wisdom and Compassion”. Practicing Insight Meditation supports an understanding of how wellbeing is nourished, and how ill-being is conditioned. Attending to our own heart and mind with compassion and wisdom opens possibilities of freedom. Over this week of practice, we’ll develop wisdom and compassion, exploring creative responses to habits that appear to obscure these beautiful qualities.
The practice and realizaton of Right View is the first of the eightfold path. Holding to views and opinions is a sure way to suffering, says the Buddha. But can we live with no views at all? To realize Right View we have to look deeply into life, in order to free ourselves from wrong…
This week’s topic is “That Changes Everything”. The Buddha instructed us to “notice how all conditioned things change”. How we understand this instruction changes depending on which words we emphasise. If we emphasise ‘change’ it sounds like “that’s simply how it is”. If we emphasise ‘how’ and ‘conditioned’, it invites us to question and play a part.