Christina Feldman

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Articles

Mindfulness as a Spiritual Power

Oct 1, 2024 | tricycle.org | Christina Feldman

Playing 1 of 1 Mindfulness as a Spiritual Power Download Transcript It has been edited for clarity. Subscribe or Log in to Download Transcript Mindfulness is the embarkation point of a path. It is central to the process of awakening and transformation.
Working With the Five Hindrances: Restlessness and Worry

May 11, 2024 | tricycle.org | Vanessa Zuisei Goddard |Christina Feldman

“But I just can’t sit still!” This is the most common argument new meditators make to explain their aversion to practice. Yet restlessness (Pali: uddhacca; Skt.: auddhatya), as one half of the fourth hindrance we encounter in meditation and life—the other half being worry (Pali: kukkucca; Skt.: kaukritya)—is an obstacle that can stop all of us regardless of our level of experience. Restlessness is the body that won’t settle; worry is the agitation that blocks our awareness.
Joy Is Not Something That Happens TO Us

Jan 28, 2024 | tricycle.org | Christina Feldman |Jaya Rudgard

This excerpt has been adapted from Tricycle’s online course, “The Seven Factors of Awakening,” with Christina Feldman and Jaya Rudgard. Find a preview of the course here and learn more about Tricycle’s online courses here. Christina Feldman: One of the most important teachings of the Buddha around joyfulness is that joy is not dependent upon having ideal or perfect conditions in our lives. Rather, joyfulness is a quality that is inwardly born and generated, possible in all moments.
Meditation Isn’t Magic

Apr 29, 2023 | tricycle.org | Christina Feldman

Intention requires an ongoing renewal. It’s not enough for most people to set an intention at the beginning of their days to be kind, collected, and gathered. We need to be sensitive to all the moments when agitation or fragmentation is happening, hear the sounds of this in our minds and bodies, and bring new intentions in those moments. Say, “I can return to the touch of my feet on the ground.
How to Stop Hurrying

Jan 29, 2023 | tricycle.org | Christina Feldman

For a year, I took upon myself an intention to stop hurrying. This didn’t mean that I couldn’t move quickly, but I discovered how much hurrying is a state of mind. Do we find ourselves in that state of mind where we’re leaning forward into the next moment, into the next thing we need to do? Can we, instead, move as needed, slowly or quickly, without being hostage to that state of mind?
Restraint at the Sense Doors

Jan 21, 2023 | tricycle.org | Christina Feldman

In every moment in our lives, as we move through the world, we are flooded with a torrent of sensory impressions: sights, sounds, sensations, scents, taste, touch, and thoughts. Most of this we do not control and we’re asked to meet. An image that is used in the Buddhist tradition is of a house with five open windows and an open door. Through the open windows and the door flows this world of sensory impressions.
Why Intention Is So Important in Meditation

Jan 20, 2023 | tricycle.org | Christina Feldman

With samadhi, there is a space to investigate and understand Mara, the personification of the patterns of mind that bind us to distress. We can begin to do this with applied intention and attention. We set the intention to be present with just one breath, one moment, but we find that our attention does slip away. So we reapply it. We renew those intentions. We don’t make one intention to be kind or one intention to be patient and think that that’s it.
How Samadhi Blindfolds Mara

Jan 18, 2023 | tricycle.org | Christina Feldman

We can have so many wise and skillful intentions in our lives—to be generous, to be patient, to be kind, and to live compassionately. Yet we can feel so frustrated when our intentions are forgotten or sabotaged. The greatest saboteurs of intention and attention are the veiling factors of craving, ill will, agitation, worry, dullness, and doubt.