Notes from meditation class: guilt and resentment

Guilt and resentment stem from a lack of forgiveness of the self or other. Let go and accept. Music by D. Sanders - Recollect.

Last week, I attended a meditation class on anger and patience held at the Kadampa Meditation Center in Hollywood. This week's class was on letting go of guilt and resentment. Here are notes I took during class that I hope you'll find useful too:

Guilt and resentment

• Guilt and resentment don’t act in isolation. There is commonality between the two–both arc back to the past: we feel guilty about something that we did, or resent what others of what they did.
• Guilt and resentment is us holding on, grasping and rejecting–a lack of forgiveness of the self or other.
• Self-judgement and criticism indicate a lack of acceptance of who we are and where we are at. Resentment follows similar suit but towards other people.

How do we heal from this tendency to feel guilty or resentful?

• Ask yourself if you want to be trapped into being that person that did that thing
• Guilt is like psychic mental currency–"if I feel bad enough, that’s going to fix the problem" is like a penance, like you’re negotiating with yourself.
• Feeling bad is not a liberating path. 
• Guilt is completely useless because all the energy of feeling bad doesn’t go into changing.
• "Guilt is a weight. It’s like tying stones to the feet of a bird. We can’t soar to enlightenment with guilt shackling our mind."

Identification

• Look at anger and process anger as "Angry thoughts are arising, but they don’t define me" vs. "I am angry"
• Ask yourself: what am I identifying within me right now?
• With guilt, you’re identifying yourself with an action you deemed harmful or bad or wrong but you’re still identifying with being that person. With resentment, you’re conflating people and defining them by their actions. We become stuck.
• Learn to identify with your highest potential, your pure nature instead.

Remind yourself of your potential

• Remind yourself of the potential you’re becoming and refer to the space of who you are becoming
• Have distance and observe your mistakes, but do so from space from your highest potential, your pure nature
• Ask yourself: "Who am I becoming now? Who am I arising as anew in this moment?"

Forgiveness of self and others: Let yourself and others be anew

• "A seed has to go out of existence for a sprout to come out:" The person of yesterday had to cease for the person of today to come into being.
• We can give ourselves permission to forgive ourselves and others.
• Powerful way to stay present is to remind yourself of death–"I may die today. Is it worth staying unhappy? Do I want to be mired in self-hatred or hatred of others when I die?"
• Guide yourself back to your heart, connect to your pure nature and potential, love, kindness, wellness — use that in relation to what situation you’re in
• Create a new version of you and who you want to be in this moment. There is an intention to change when you meditate on who you wish to be: envision confidence, letting go, moving forward, happy, etc. Imagine it being existent now. Don’t delay it.

Notes from meditation class: anger and patience

Imagine your mind as an expansive sky. Captured in Downtown LA. Music by Jetson - + Archy. 

"Life is the nature of problems and difficulties. When we accept that, we can make spiritual progress by recognizing how we react."

Mental and emotional health is important to our well-being, our creativity and our community in music and beyond. I'm on a quest to cultivate as much knowledge and truth in my current spiritual journey as possible. I'll be using this space to share what I'm learning and gathering.

I went to a meditation class yesterday evening at the Kadampa Meditation Center in Hollywood. The topic of the class was "Patience: If the Mind Accepts, There is No Problem," focused on anger, patience and how to accept things as they are, bookended by guided meditations at the start and end of the class.

Here are notes I took from the class. I will be attending next week's class on "Impermanence: Letting Go of Guilt & Resentment," so I will share notes from that class as well. 

Anger

• Anger is on the continuum of rejection.
• Anger is not accepting what is.
• Anger is poison in the mind.

Alertness - be in the moment

• Courageously be in the moment and observe that “this doesn’t feel comfortable” feeling arising in your heart without rejecting, repressing, running away from or ignoring it.
• Catch anger early with alertness. Alertness is your wisdom. It keeps a look out, watches what happens within and scans for danger.
• Be motivated to watch out for what will rob you of your joy and peacefulness even in the face of something difficult or challenging.

Corrective measures

• Take deep breaths and recognize there are different perspectives to come at a situation: practice meditation, compassion, and gratitude and keep a happy mind.

Meditation tips

• Imagine your mind as an expansive sky. Imagine clouds as problems passing by and shrinking and going away.
• Imagine your mind as solid wood or stone and be still mentally. Thoughts racing will gradually soften.

Practice compassion

• Build into your worldview that people will be inconsiderate, say mean things, etc.
• Recalibrate expectations of people and the world to reduce your anger.
• If someone is frustrating you and angering you, practice thinking and asking yourself:
  • "I accept this person for who they are in this moment. I will not give away my inner peace to this person. They are acting out who they are in their mental development, just like I am."
  • "This person is so kind to allow me to practice patience."
  • What can I learn from this moment? What can this person teach me?"

Practice gratitude

• View your problem as your teacher:  “This problem is evidence of my good fortune.”

Keep a happy mind

• Most of our emotional problems is a failure to accept things as they are.
• If something could be remedied, why be unhappy about it? If there’s no remedy, there’s no point in getting or being unhappy.
• Instead of reacting blindly because of our emotional habits, we should ask ourselves if it’s helpful or useful to be angry. Trust and rely on your positive mind and attitude instead.
• You can be in pain and enjoy it for its meaningfulness. View your problem as "It’s terrible, but it’s good because I'm growing and learning."

Self-care for 2017

Happy New Year! In the spirit of new beginnings and positivity, I wanted to share some resources that have been helpful for my mental, emotional and spiritual health this past year and will continue to be in the new year:

• The Seven Chakras: I’ve learned about the seven chakras before, but in these past few months, I’ve delved further to understand them in relation to my current state. The seven chakras are energy centers in our bodies in which energy flows through. Sometimes blocked energy results from anxiety, stress and other things which not only affects our physical well-being, but also our emotional and mental well-being. You can take a test here to find out which of your seven chakras are underactive, overactive or well-balanced. Overall, understanding them has helped me to check in with myself more often and take the necessary steps to continue to nurture my energy.
   
• Brené Brown: Her book Daring Greatly has been greatly influential in my life, and I’ve learned to define, understand and process guilt, shame and vulnerability in ways that I had never done before. Feeling feelings are important. I'm currently reading Rising Strong. She writes, "If we are brave enough, often enough, we will fall." The book is focused on how to get back up stronger by recognizing the power of emotions to allow us to redefine our stories through courage moving forward.
   
• Oprah Winfrey’s Super Soul Sundays: These videos are meant to “nourish your mind, body and spirit every Sunday.” A lot of great nuggets of inspiration and motivation here, and I've been introduced to some spiritual leaders worth following as well. 
   
• Calm: I’ve developed a consistent practice of meditating every morning and night through this app. I’ve learned to use breathing techniques to calm me down during stressful situations. They have all sorts of guided meditations and sounds you can meditate to. I've lately been enjoying meditating to the sound of a crackling fire.
   
• Still Mind: My friend and artist Jarell Perry runs Still Mind which is a platform for creatives to gain inspiration through practice of thoughtfulness and stillness. Still Mind’s core values are “dialogue as inspiration, self-development as artist development, mindfulness as a creative source, community through shared vision.” 
   
• TED Talks: A lot of solid ones in the self category, but you can peruse a variety of other topics here too. 

I hope you find some of these helpful, and I'll continue to share more in 2017.

If you have any resources that have benefited you that you'd like to share, I'd love to hear about them, so shoot me a reply back.

May your 2017 be bright and courageous and full of good health and wisdom.

Onward and upward,
Jane

p.s. You can also find me on Twitter, SoundCloud and Instagram.

tinyletter

Wrapping up 2016

2016. What a year.

The Worst Year Ever, Until Next Year is an interesting read from The New Yorker:

“There is no limit to the amount of misfortune a person can take in via the Internet, and there’s no easy way to properly calibrate it—no guidebook for how to expand your heart to accommodate these simultaneous scales of human experience; no way to train your heart to separate the banal from the profound. Our ability to change things is not increasing at the same rate as our ability to know about them.”

— Jia Tolentino, The New Yorker

Despite the heartache and tragic events that happened in 2016, it was a great year for music. It provided me solace during moments of transitions this year and as always, gives me hope for the future. Thank you to all the artists, producers, engineers and writers working on their craft day in and day out.
 

16 of ’16

I selected 16 of my favorite songs of 2016. It’s a bummer Frank Ocean’s Blonde isn’t on SoundCloud, otherwise “Nights” would have been in there too. Anyway, peep the playlist.

Stillness in Wonderland

I've also been listening to Little Simz’s Stillness In Wonderland on repeat. In addition to the album, she has released a short film, a comic book series written by Eddie Smith and illustrated by McKay Felt and will be running her own mini music festival in February in London. I’ve had the honor to work with this hard-working, intelligent and talented artist. To see her grow over the years as an independent artist with an equally hard-working, passionate team is inspiring to say the least. Stillness in Wonderland is a testament to that growth and the journey of progressing forward. In every song, there are words that resonate with me immediately. It's an empowering album that's been comforting me and guiding me through my own journey. Cheers to artists who speak their truth. This Fader review "Little Simz's Stillness in Wonderland is the Year's Last Great Album" is a great read too.

Women’s Circle Panel

Ascension of the Female Artist: Mental, Physical, Spiritual + Emotional Health of the Woman

I attended a wonderful event on Sunday afternoon called Women’s Circle panel, organized by writer Denita Soleil that featured a panel of amazing women across various creative fields:
 

Tiffany Gouché, producer and singer-songwriter; Dana Washington, a photographer, director and writer; Kilo Kish, a designer, conceptual artist and vocalist; and Natasha James, a vegan pastry chef and owner of Rawcells, a vegan treats business.

Words from Denita in the program:

“The Women’s Circle was originally created to empower women through a foundation of sisterhood, encouragement, positivity and love. The goal is to always welcome my sisters into a safe space where we can be ourselves, express how we feel, share our work and encourage each other on a path to become the best version of ourselves. We live in a time where we need each other more than ever and this is why we have all gravitated to each other today. It is our time to speak up, it is vital for our voices to be heard. I spent so much time suppressing my voice because I didn’t know there were people out there willing to listen, it’s something I still do to this day, but I want you all to know that I am here for you. I hear you, I see you, and your voice matters to me. I thank you for taking time out of your schedule to be present with me and I hope it was worth your while.”

— Denita

It was awesome to share space with women of all walks of life and come together to build and share words and feelings openly, to promote the importance of community and self-care. It was also an energizing event that promoted reflection and positivity as the new year is on the horizon.

Here are some other takeaways:

• "There’s space for what you want to do." This was some of Tiffany Gouché's encouraging words in response to a question about accepting herself as queer that catalyzed her to write music for women and promote love through her music. It's a great reminder for those who are starting anew or consistently working at their craft, that there is space for you in any field or arena, wholeheartedly as you are. Even when you feel unsure of where you're going and your current path feels confusing or frustrating, don't give up and let fear of belonging get in the way. Create space, own your space and promote your space.
   
• Never compromise your integrity. Striving for success is great, but don't cut corners to get there. Be honest, do the right thing and stand by what's right and against what's wrong. Stay aligned with your moral compass. 
   
• Boundaries are important. Opening up yourself to people is great to build connections, but there are some things you should keep and protect for yourself. Little Simz sings in "Doorways + Trust Issues," "Everybody’s got some sort of faith inside them, gotta find where it lives.” This line stood out to me. I understood it two-fold: it’s about finding your light and faith that keeps you going and moving forward. It’s also the place inside your heart that you must keep sacred and golden so as never to compromise yourself. Maya Angelou has shared the same nugget of wisdom too as the best advice she's ever given: "There's a place in you that you must keep inviolate, pristine so no one has the right to treat you badly..."
   
• Calm the voices in your head when you find yourself overthinking and letting fear and doubt cloud you.  You are not your mind. The mind is so powerful that it can distort reality and narrate your experience in a way that you think you should be living. When you find yourself overwhelmed, step back, pause, take a deep breath and proceed.

With all this said, I hope your 2016 is wrapping up well. Thank you for supporting me and subscribing to these letters. As always, feel free to hit the reply button to say hello and share how you've been.  

Have a joyous holiday. I hope it's filled with lots of love, gratitude and rest. 

Much love,
Jane