This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Happy Hour: Awe, Sympathetic Joy, Equanimity, and Gratitude Through the Lens of the Total Eclipse. It likely contains inaccuracies, especially with speaker attribution if there are multiple speakers.

Happy Hour: Awe, Sympathetic Joy, Equanimity, and Gratitude Through the Lens of the Total Eclipse - Nikki Mirghafori

The following talk was given by Nikki Mirghafori at Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, CA on April 09, 2024. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.

Happy Hour: Awe, Sympathetic Joy, Equanimity, and Gratitude Through the Lens of the Total Eclipse

Hello and welcome everyone to Happy Hour. Today being the eclipse day, in North America many people were able to see the complete eclipse—the totality, as it's called. So maybe that will come into our meditation somehow. Whether or not we were able to see the totality of the sun being eclipsed by the moon, that might come into our practice. Let's sit together and be surprised, seeing what arises in the practice of Metta¹ and embodiment together.

I would like to invite you to arrive. To settle. Arriving in this moment. Arriving in this body.

Letting go of whatever has happened that has brought us to this moment. Maybe it's been busy, full, or challenging. Whatever it's been, can we release for a moment? Not pushing away—that's a different energy—but releasing for a moment to settle. This is a fresh new moment. How can we embrace this fresh new moment with our presence? Feeling our bodies sitting in this moment, and with our breath.

Can we invite this breath to be just as it is in this moment? Allowing and inviting the breath to embrace this moment of being, this freshness of being in this body. The in-breath and the out-breath like your friend—your calming, soothing lullaby.

Spend another few minutes cultivating embodiment and presence. Feeling the body, feeling the breath moving through the body in this moment. Right here, right now.

And now, as we are sitting allowing the breath to move as it does, we bring a sense of appreciation and awe. The same way that many have reported today seeing the total eclipse of the sun—a sense of awe. In some ways, every moment of experience is awesome. Amazing.

For a moment, just receive the sensations of the breath in this body with a sense of awe. Awesomeness. Let yourself play around with this. Perhaps with this sense of awe, we notice something new about the breath we hadn't noticed before, or a sensation somewhere in the body we hadn't sensed—or we sense it in a new way. As if we're watching a total eclipse—this worldly, otherworldly experience.

Just as the eclipse for us human beings does not occur too frequently given the span of our limited lives, this breath too—even though it is our companion from the moment we come to the world to the moment we take our last breath—in this body, in this unique being, it occurs briefly compared to the life of the universe. It is awesome.

It is such an uplifting state, similar to Metta, gratitude, compassion, and so on.

Now, let's switch if you like to Mudita² practice. Gratitude and Mudita—happiness for the good fortune of others.

If you did not see the total eclipse today, can you have happiness for those who are fortunate to be on the path of the celestial event? Be happy for their happiness as if it were your own, as if you had been privy to this. Happiness for their happiness.

If you are one of the lucky ones on the path of the eclipse today, can you have gratitude? Sharing your good fortune freely with others.

And for those practicing Mudita—vicarious joy—happiness as if it were your own. As if you had experienced this wonderful event. Let it uplift your heart. Expand your heart with gladness and goodwill. Happiness for other people's happiness. Notice that the more you allow your heart to expand and hold joy for the joy of others, the more joyful you become. Uplifted.

Considering all kinds of people—younger people who were able to see it, children, young adults, adults, older adults, people in their eighties and nineties, perhaps even hundreds. Happiness for their good fortune.

And now for the third part of this practice period, let's try something else on for size.

In ancient times, total eclipses were construed or interpreted as the end of the world or a very negative omen. It was taken so personally—something that was not personal at all. The movement of the sun, the moon, and the earth—human beings took it so personally. We were distraught. Distraught over something that was not personal at all.

Today we get that. We understand it. It's not personal. It's not because a people or a group behaved badly. It's not personal; they are celestial objects going about their way due to causes and conditions.

Is it possible to bring the same perspective into our lives when we consider something catastrophic? "I did this, it's my fault, it all rests on my shoulders." Bring the same sense of spaciousness of understanding wisdom. Yes, there are so many causes and conditions that have made this happen. Maybe I have a part in it, or was at the right place at the right time—or wrong place at the wrong time—or other factors. But it's not so personal. So many causes and conditions.

We allow this to bring equanimity³, spaciousness, and peace into our hearts.

And let's bring a sense of gratitude that as human beings we can see, hear, appreciate, and perhaps understand with appreciation events like this in the heavens and the stars. The celestial objects that we live on in Earth, with enough development in our science and our understanding to appreciate, to feel uplifted by events like this. Gratitude.

Gratitude that we live in a world where such a thing happens on this precious planet, and that we have appreciation. We can understand it in some ways much more than early humans did. Gratitude and appreciation for what is.

As we turn to close this period of sitting together, allowing ourselves to feel appreciation and gratitude for ourselves for having showed up as best as we were able to. Without attachment to outcome, however it was or wasn't, we've planted seeds. Trust it.

May all beings everywhere on this planet of ours, and everywhere in all celestial objects—all beings everywhere, all sentient beings—may they be happy. May they be well. Including ourselves.

Reflections and Q&A

Thank you so much for your practice everyone. So we did four practices today inspired by the total eclipse. The first one was the practice of awe. The second one was Mudita, vicarious joy—happiness for the good fortune of others. Then we did equanimity—not taking things so personally, things that aren't personal. And then we ended with gratitude. Of course, if you did see the total eclipse earlier, instead of Mudita you would have practiced gratitude as well.

Four different practices. Pretty rich. Who knew one could practice with a total eclipse and Happy Hour in these ways? Kind of fun.

I'd love to invite you to engage, to reflect, to share with one another as little or as much as you like. Sharing and reflecting on what worked for you in the practice, or maybe what has moved you with the total eclipse today as it relates to practice, as it relates to states of heart and mind. How can you allow it to open you up to bring more Metta, equanimity, Mudita, etc.?

[Breakout rooms]

Everybody's back. We have some time for reflections, comments, questions. How was it? You can raise your Zoom hand or share reflections in the chat. How was this practice for you today—this thematic practice with Metta, equanimity, and gratitude?

Participant: Hello. Thank you, Nikki. It was great. It was wonderful thinking about all those people standing out there looking up at the stars, the moon, and the sun, and all of them having at the same time this bodily, visceral experience of awe. And that this happened on a communal level. Just even for that brief few minutes in time, they had it. And then you mentioned, wouldn't it be nice if we had that all the time? Or every moment is kind of miraculous, isn't it? Not just that one moment. It was a beautiful meditation. Thank you, Nikki.

Nikki: Thank you so much for also bringing your sense of Mudita and joy really for others, for the kids. When you were saying that, I had this image earlier today. I saw on some website an image of these kids with these Mylar glasses⁴ and they were on the beach somewhere—maybe it was in Mexico. It was this festive occasion where there were so many kids in their bathing suits, and they had just bathed and they were looking at it. It was just so sweet. It just uplifted my heart so much that they got to experience this as well. And yes, every moment is pretty miraculous—this thing, our lives. So thank you.

Claire: I just want to thank you. I like the way you approached picking a way of seeing or reviewing the day. It was like having an assortment of lenses and picking the one that you wanted to look through and then seeing. I had a very busy day today, but I could sort of see the totality of it in a healthy way of seeing it basically. And through pulling it all together, it really was nice. So I ended up feeling like I've seen the whole picture and I knew what my takeaway was. It was great.

Nikki: Sweet. Oh, thank you, Claire. I'm delighted to hear this practice today really supported the integration of this full, busy totality of a day you had on the East Coast. That's great. And to say, yes, these are lenses. These are definitely lenses—ways of perceiving and seeing. Exactly right.

Ali: Hi, Nikki. Actually, I'll share some "sideshow" that was going on in my mind. I'm in this app where there are folks outside the country and they couldn't see it. This guy was where J is in Toronto, just shouting about all these moments in awe. "Oh my God!" and all that. My mind went straight into, "Those guys, they can't see it. They're going to get jealous." That's where my mind went. And I came back. It's like, it's not a big deal. I went to kind of ease it up. I saw it like seven years ago. I was just kind of explaining to them. I'm not trying to be funny either, but then the moment when you were explaining it at the first section of the meditation, I went to all the moments that I have as "oh, oh." But the third part of the show in my mind was... I went into the Dharma. It was a little bit of discussion of Dharma about how the light is going to come, it's going to go away. The dark is going to come, it's going to go away. And then this was really a big moment of awe for me, of all the awe that I had in the show, was how small we are. Like everybody in the whole world is united, and how small really I am—we all are. And yeah, those were the sideshows for me. Thank you.

Nikki: Beautiful. Thanks for sharing, Ali. I appreciate you sharing the sideshows. This is what comes up in our minds, right? Awe comes up, and then you say, "Oh, how about all the people who are in jail?" All this comes up. Let's have humor. Let's have humor and this sense of, yeah, this is the mind. The mind comes out with these things, comes out with its own show. And I also really appreciate what you added at the end with the sense of, "Wow, here we are, all these human beings on this planet." It's just a sense of awe again that naturally came up for you in a slightly different way. So I'm really touched by that. Thank you so much for naming that.

Patricia: I live in St. Louis, Missouri, and we were in 99% totality. I was at a very large park that has a big lake. There were many people—not too many people, but there were couples, families, singles. And the eclipse was very cool, but the solidarity that I felt uplifted my spirit. We were all there for the same thing. Everyone seemed to be quite happy and content and together. Everyone was so friendly and talking and joyous. It was so uplifting. The miraculousness of the eclipse was amazing, but the solidarity and the joyous feeling I had was even more miraculous.

Nikki: Beautiful. Yeah, thank you, Patricia. Thanks so much for bringing this in. And I think this is something also that Ali at the end was referring to. Another person I heard on the radio, an astronomy professor who had had this experience today of totality, was sharing that, "Wow, here we are." Especially with all the differences and—sorry to bring it up—but with an election coming up, with all the differences that we're having in this country and North America. And here we are just forgetting about all that and being humans together. That's so touching. Thank you for bringing this in, Patricia. It is possible.

Pma, I see your hand, I'll get to you in one second. I see one question that I want to address in chat first. One of you said, "I loved the meditation. I loved how the meditation had a part to be happy for others. Could you expand on it? I love that perspective."

So that is the teaching on Mudita—Muditā in Pali. Translated as vicarious joy or happiness for the happiness of others. It's a beautiful, joyful practice where we cultivate it. We start where it's easy—we think of people where we can easily be happy for their happiness—and then we expand to all beings. Being happy for the happiness of others. The Dalai Lama has said that if you're just happy for your own happiness, you have one chance to be happy. If you're happy for the happiness of others, your chances increase to seven billion, or however many number of people there are on this Earth. So happiness for the happiness of others is such an uplifting practice. There's much more on it and you're welcome to Google Mudita. Also there are many Mudita periods of just pure Mudita practice. In fact, we've done weeks of Mudita practice here at Happy Hour. If you search AudioDharma for Mudita, you will find many teachings on that. You are welcome.

So, Pma, I see your hand there.

Pma: Great, thank you. First of all, I apologize if I'm going to sound a little bit pessimistic today. My heart is very heavy today. I just couldn't feel the Mudita. I was feeling gratitude to of course everybody here and to myself, but I just couldn't get my mind off of a very young adult who lost his life this morning. So I wasn't even focusing on the eclipse. It was a friend of my daughter. It was just an accident in Big Sur; he fell and drowned. So I was like, okay, how do I feel Mudita for others? Even though I was feeling gratitude. But I just couldn't get my mind off of him and the family. So I was just wondering, is it okay not feeling... I know everybody's so happy here and I apologize.

Nikki: Of course. No need to apologize. And I'm so glad. Thank you, Pma, for the courage to speak up. This is so, so important. What is really important is to be truthful and honest to how you're feeling at a given moment. So you might come to Happy Hour and the topic might be happiness, or happiness of others, and you've had something tragic happen and there's so much heaviness and grief. And the heart goes, "No, I want to stay with compassion. I want to stay with sadness. I want to meet my sadness with kindness. Compassion is what's needed here for me, for the family who just lost their young child." And that's appropriate. So at any time, if you're practicing here, on a retreat, or anything, and the instructions are whatever they are and your heart is in a different place, then meet your heart, meet the truth of where you are with kindness. Because that's where you are. That's what's needed. We offer invitations and instructions which are kind of general, but be attuned to what's needed for you at a given time and be your own inner Dharma coach. So yeah, maybe gratitude works, but no—when we're dealing with this, we want to turn towards compassion. Oh sweetheart, yeah, this is hard. This is hard and that's perfectly fine. Thank you so much for bringing that in.

Jerry: Not to spoil it, but you mentioned in your own comment and then apologized for identifying geopolitical events...

Nikki: Oh no, you're going to go there? Okay, okay.

Jerry: Since you opened it. I just wondered how you sit when, like, I echoed many of the comments that people said, but sometimes I wonder if I'm just trying to stay in the moment when I think about these other things—some of which were mentioned—and say, "Well, things will work out." Is that naivety or denial? I guess that's what I just wonder.

Nikki: Yeah, it's a good question. And I don't mind that you're going there at all, Jerry, it's fine. It's part of our life, right? It's part of our world. I think there's a difference between naivety, equanimity, and definitely getting overwhelmed and so anxious that one cannot do anything. This practice is the practice of the Middle Way. So I know that personally for me, it does not help me to get overwhelmed. It doesn't help me at all. It's also not helpful to have the sense of resignation, because usually it's overwhelm that leads to resignation. Overwhelm leads to resignation—they kind of go hand in hand. I've heard from so many people that they get overwhelmed like, "Ah, it's all going to hell," and then it's like, "Ah, there's nothing I can do." So it's almost like a pair together, those two.

So what is skillful? To realize, yeah, things are challenging. And what can I skillfully do? What can I skillfully do to be ready to support, but to stay right here and not get into a state of either overwhelm nor resignation and depression? It's easier said than done, but that is the practice.

Thank you so much. So we've come to the end of our time together. Thank you so much for participating, bringing yourselves, your hearts to this practice. And also thanks for a very juicy, insightful, warm, multivaried conversation and really honest conversation we had at the end with reflections—what worked, what didn't work. All good. This is all great. So thank you all for your practice. May all beings be happy. May all beings be free, including ourselves. Thanks everyone. Take good care.