Ayya Anandabodhi: Cultivating a Boundless Heart

So I've just been co-teaching a retreat with that in Kovilo and One of the things we were looking at well, we were looking at the internal and the external and both and one of the things we were looking at was the the limitless nature of the mind and both the mind and the heart so the Chitta you could say and and Often it might not feel like that, you know when we're reacting to things or or If you know if we just we just forget actually we can just forget The potential that we have even though we probably glimpsed it here and there Or maybe we've never seen it and so we just assume that we're this small mind inside of a Skull or or a rib cage and So there was a So we were inviting a perception of Limitless mind or let's say boundless boundless mind boundless heart So that wasn't that doesn't mean you have to make it go as far as possible into the into every direction but it's more that You take away you recognize any boundaries that you're putting on the heart or Mind and take them away so one of the ways you can do that is is to start right at this at the heart center and Just to just to sort of find your awareness here at the heart center Feel what you feel here and it might be comfortable or uncomfortable pleasant or painful I feel contracted or expensive So you just start from wherever you are and then the breathing into the heart space And breathing out just have a sense of it of the of the outbreath expanding the heart space and And if it feels if the heart feels very tight, you just see whether it could be porous So that it's not Holding everything back and then just inviting the mind to To open and to to spread To take up more space To have more room And then if you find an age to that Just dwell at that edge for a moment And then see what is beyond that age? So the mind itself is boundless There's no need for it to be small and tight But sometimes it gets cluttered with 10,000 things Things we want things we don't want Things we like things we don't like Things we fear things we hope for And then it gets all tight and pulled around and cluttered So taking a breath See if you can find space if your mind is very cluttered with thoughts See if you can find a little space around the thoughts Between the thoughts Between the words If they're in words As you breathe breathe into that space make more room And then it's also important what we do with that space So if we're just going to fill it with more thoughts That's probably not a great plan Boundless mind full of thoughts And if we have a lot of negativity And then we have boundless mind but it's boundless negativity It's not a great plan either Boundless greed No But the mind is boundless And we can cultivate These qualities of Of the heart Equanimity Coolness and spaciousness Acceptance Appreciative joy Warmth and celebration Joyfulness Compassion And feeling With The suffering of others or Feeling the deep wish for All beings to be free From suffering and the causes of suffering And then meta Loving kindness or friendliness Can imbue the limitless mind with meta Even if it just has to seep in around the The words and the thoughts and the cracks Just let it wash in like water So to remember that the mind isn't just in the head But the chitta often you can point to the heart center It's like the seat You could say the seat of the mind It's at the heart center And you know we can live just from the head As a personality In the world Involved in all kinds of things And then we can miss the Depth and beauty and potential of this heart So it's so important to let Our attention come down from the head into the heart space And to find the space here To find a little warmth and Spaciousness And sometimes we can't see it You know we can't feel it because we're too Identified with the thoughts and the feelings The moods of the mind So then we want to see if we can expand And come to the edges And then go a little bit further And see what we find Because around the thoughts there is Limitless space Around the feelings there is Boundless heart Always We just forget to look So I say this is a reminder Because we forget And we may have tasted this already And then Forgotten because the The world is turning fast And we can be bombarded with so many Thoughts and images and scenarios and Situations But we do really need to take care of our heart and mind If we don't take care of this Our own heart and mind then Nothing goes well So it's not that we only take care of our heart and mind We take care of our heart and mind so that we can So that we can arise in the world So that we can show up in the world In a way that is authentic and Reasonable well And Can meet Whatever we need to meet So this is a way that we can take care of our heart and mind Is to remember That it isn't all the thoughts It isn't all of the feelings It isn't all of the memories It isn't all of the fears and hopes It's much greater than that It is a great capacity A great capacity for Love, compassion, kindness And for wisdom to arise So if we stay in our head We can think about that But we won't be able to Really taste it So it's such an important journey to come down from the head into the heart And take care of this heart And remember its capacity Is limitless When we go through lots of challenges and difficulties It's the heart contracts And then the difficulties get harder So This is very natural And this is what happens And It can be a practice In the midst of a situation If you're able to pay attention to the heart Heart space Then in a situation where you want to contract And you notice that Oh, contracting, withdrawing, averse Then in that moment of mindfulness Once you notice I'd like to invite you to explore Not following that way And just to see, what is it like if I stop With drawing and contracting and pushing away In those challenging moments And instead take a breath And invite the heart to open a little And recognize the feeling isn't comfortable But contraction doesn't have to be the response Invite the heart to open a little more And remember that the heart is limitless The mind is limitless, boundless So we tend to constrict When things are difficult And it gets more painful So learning how to Make space, open up Give room Maybe bring a little kindness Or compassion into that space And you don't have to stop the space from opening This allows it to be bound less Not bound, not binding it Not limiting it So sometimes just taking a breath helps Makes it a little more room And then taking another breath So I think it's about most important At this time of, you know There are great challenges in the world Maybe in just the world Or maybe in our immediate world That we take care of our heart We take care of our mind We remember our potential And we don't just get lost in the old habits Of contraction, aversion, greed Me, mime, what I want But we take, instead of me and mine And what I want, we're Attending with kindness and wisdom To this heart, this heart space We don't have to call it me and mine Although it is our heart space That we're attending to And just letting the personality be what it is It is what it is We've all got these different ones, you know We're just not letting it We're not letting the personality run with Greed and aversion As best we can So the wisdom that dwells at the heart centre And is limitless and expansive It knows when we're acting from ignorance It knows we're acting from kindness, compassion, wisdom So when we take care and attend to our heart mind It also takes care of us By showing us what we need to Showing us when we're off and when we're not So this is at most important