Exploring how to direct energy in a wise way, Jack shares how embracing Sacred Effort nourishes joy, ease, beauty, equanimity, mindfulness, and loving kindness in your life.
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"Right Effort, or Wise Energy, most fundamentally is the effort to pay attention, the effort to be present, awake, and see what is true in front of us. Out of all the kinds of efforts we can make, the most fundamental wise effort in spiritual life is to be where we are and see it clearly, to be conscious, or mindful." – Jack Kornfield
In this episode, Jack mindfully explores:
Directing the energy of your life to be awake, aware, and present
Seeing the Eightfold Path as a lotus or mandala
Carlos Castaneda, impeccability, and becoming a spiritual warrior
How to wake yourself up from sleepwalking through your life
Having a full heart, deep attention, and clear seeing
The two levels of spiritual friends and spiritual practice
Using suffering to develop a wise heart
Remembering death and impermanence
What Jack taught his daughter about death
Bowing to our difficult emotions and moving on
Disentangling ourselves from greed, fear, and obsession
Nourishing equanimity, ease, joy, beauty, and loving kindness
Tending each moment as if you were planting a seed
Balance and the Buddha stringing the lute
Ramana Maharshi and the wisdom of letting go
Making your life and activity an expression of the Tao
"The teaching of Right Effort or Wise Effort is a reminder of our nobility. It is a reminder of the human inspiration of spirit not just to get through our lives, but to honor it, to respect it, to be present for it, to delight in it." – Jack Kornfield
"Unclench the heart, steady yourself, and be present for things as they are, and then your activity becomes an expression of your awakening, it becomes a vehicle for the Tao." – Jack Kornfield
This Dharma Talk recorded on 3/1/1992 was originally published on DharmaSeed.
