Use code SUMMERPRACTICE for a 25% discount on all On Demand Courses through August 31.

Skillful Ways to Work with Difficult Thoughts in Meditation

With Lisa Ernst recorded on November 21, 2021.

Found our teachings useful? Help us continue our work and support your teachers with a donation. Here’s how.

There’s a misconception that thoughts are a hindrance to deep meditation and tranquility. Especially during this ongoing challenging time, certain thoughts may be persistent and difficult to release. Yet, thoughts themselves are not the problem; it’s our relationship to them that determines whether or not they impede our meditation. In this session, we will explore a number of skillful ways to work with difficult or persistent thoughts in meditation to support inner well-being and clarity.

Listen to the audio version below, or click here to download the mp3.

Discover more from the Dharma Library

  • Zohar Lavie

    Daily Meditation Recordings, with Zohar Lavie – Week of 20 January, 2025

    We’re grateful to have Zohar Lavie guiding our Daily Meditation sessions this week. May they support and enrich your practice.

    This week’s theme is: The Power of Refuge: Dharma for our Times

    Refuge is a practice of intimacy. Coming closer to the present moment experience, we open to it as a gateway to wisdom and compassion.
    During this week we will explore the breadth and depth of refuge practice; from taking refuge in the teachings as a place of rejuvenation and rest, to transforming suffering and its causes for all beings

    Our Dharma Library thrives through collective generosity. Your donation helps sustain this offering for our entire community.

    Read More

  • The Power of Change

    We wish for change. The time of the old is up. Its structures, habits and perspectives have lost their appeal. We sense the potential for something fresh to start. We can witness change. Feel victimized or beaten by it. Or find ways of empowerment and respond with wisdom. Meditation, mindfulness and reflection provide the tools…

    Read More

  • Ayya Santussika

    Relief – In This Very Moment, In This Very Breath

    Practicing mindfulness together with the four Divine Abidings (loving kindness, compassion, joy and equanimity), we develop our ability to bring relief to even the most challenging moments of our lives. We begin by strengthening our habit to increase our mindfulness as stress increases and then apply the Divine Abiding that is most appropriate for a…

    Read More

  • Blunt Suffering

    Let’s not flinch when we look at the lived experiences of illness, confusion, and relational pain. Let’s allow the texture of hurt to be known. Awareness remains brilliant, for sure. Any of us can experience this. Maybe the more we allow the blunt pain of the body-mind, the more we can sit squarely in awareness….

    Read More

  • photo of Martin Aylward smiling

    The Unshakeable Heart: Liberation as the Ultimate Resilience

    Is it possible to live and love freely amidst the greed, aggression and dysfunction of the world?⁠⁠Amidst so much suffering, can you nourish joy, lightness and laughter?⁠⁠When it feels as if you’re drowning, might it be that you are floating in an ocean of blessings?⁠⁠In times of political polarisation and dysfunction, broken societal modelling, a…

    Read More

  • The Noble Search: In the Footsteps of the Buddha

    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…

    Read More

  • Daily Meditation Recordings, with Shireen Jilla – Week of 29 September, 2025

    We’re delighted to have Shireen Jilla guiding our Daily Meditation sessions this week. May her teachings enrich your practice.

    This week’s theme is: Equanimity: Balancing at the Centre of the Seesaw of Life

    Every morning we will explore a different aspect of equanimity, this inner steadiness, and how we nurture it in our practice. What is this felt sense of spacious ease and how is it a wise check to overwhelming compassion? Actively engaging with our experience, how do we deeply let go? And finally, potently, we will explore equanimity as the gift of grace.

    Our Dharma Library thrives through collective generosity. Your donation helps sustain this offering for our entire community.

    Read More

  • Ralph Steele

    A Skilful Dance: The Three Characteristics Of Life and The Winds of Dharma

    (Please note that, due to problems with the video streaming platform on the day of this session, this talk was unfortunately not recorded in its entirety.) In this session Ralph explores using the Winds of Dharma to gain insight into the Three Characteristics of Life. The ocean of consciousness can be equated to life’s characteristics…

    Read More