07/25/2024

Dear Friends,

Like many of you, I have been inundated with political content related to the upcoming United States Presidential Election, and the volume of information leaves me feeling burned out. Since the debate between Biden and Trump on June 27, this race has become a frenzy of new developments (seemingly every hour) that fundamentally change its character and outlook.

How can one respond to such rapid fluctuation? In these uncertain moments, I come back to the practice of meditation for stability.

Concentration on the breath provides me with much needed healing and nourishment. And sometimes there is insight. I can realize that the stress and anxiety I had thought was rooted in external conditions (e.g., the price of gas, the bleak housing market, the growing climate crisis) is actually arising from internal conditions (e.g., habitual thought patterns, wrong perceptions, inflexible beliefs). With this insight, I look deeply in order to understand and remove the unwholesome conditions giving rise to my negative mental formations like anger, hatred, restlessness, and greed, and I take intentional action to create more wholesome conditions in the garden of my consciousness so that the flowers of love, compassion, and equanimity might be allowed to grow and blossom.

Thanks for reading,
Kenneth