[201] Discovering Inner Goodness: Meditation, Neuroplasticity, and Community Healing with Andrea Loreto

10:16PM Apr 8, 2025

Speakers:

Stephanie Ramer

Keywords:

meditation

life coach

community building

body scan

awareness

love and compassion

wisdom

neuroplasticity

innate goodness

grasping and aversion

breathing exercises

mindfulness

personal growth

interactive session

mindfulness practice

Good evening, everybody. My name is, is Andrea lorito. I am a meditation teacher and a life coach, and I'm very excited to be here, in spite of the in spite of the delay, and I was extremely excited when, when Andrew actually invited me, first of all, because I, I think it's a great it's a great meditator and, and really it's, it's a pleasure to listen to his to his thoughts, but also because, I, because they would give me an opportunity to really share meditation with with you, with other people, and, and that's and that's amazing, because if you have to do a long, a long journey, if you do it with with trusted friends, the journey is way more, way more pleasant. Okay, so I wouldn't I had here some some ideas on how to on how to actually handle this at this meeting. But basically, I would like, if you can, to add also your your city and your and your and the nation where you are from, because that would be that would help me, really to have an idea of who I'm talking to. Then, of course, I would like also to be sure that we have a kind of that is not just me talking. And of course, there will be a lot of meditation together. But I would like to have this, this meeting, to be sort of interactive as much as possible. So please, please feel free to ask question. Please feel free to to to take part to the conversation that would be, that would be really, really great. So I, I have been meditating for a while now, and I have to say that meditation really changed completely my life and and it changed it for the better, because actually it's now I'm a totally different person that when I ended, when I started. Of course, meditation can be, can be demanding, can be boring, can be sometimes painful, but, but it's really, it's really worth the effort of going through it. So, of course, I don't know you. I don't know if you are experienced I assume that you are experienced meditator, because if you're here, that's, that's, that's usually what happens, but, but also if you are. So if you are, if you are an experienced meditator, please bring your child like curiosity to this meeting and and be kind and patient. If you are instead a brand new meditator, I hope that you will learn something that will be probably stay with you for the rest of your life. So I think there will be a benefit for for everybody. So yeah, also, I would like to, I would like to stress that this meeting should be, should be really a way to know each other better and to build community. So to build and take part in a community that is, that is safe and and the for I will ask you to be to keep a confidentiality of whatever we do in here. So, I mean, don't keep it, keep it for yourself, because sometimes we share, we share things that can be, can be a bit a bit delicate. Anyway, I will stop talking, and I will jump into meditation with you, because I think that again, today we there's been some some problems. Therefore, with better, with better, start meditating together. Okay, so please take your meditation posture that basically simply means to sit in a position that is comfortable and stable. You can be on a cushion, on the on the on the floor. You can be on a chair, but the important thing is that your spine is loosely straight, so not too tight and not too loose. In addition to that, if you want, you can actually tuck your chin a tiny bit like this, so that basically it helps elongating the final part of your spine and really be more more erect.

Now just breathe, breathe normally and try to relax as much as you can. You

Your eyes can be open or closed. If they're open, just keep a soft gaze somewhere in front of you, maybe on the floor a few feet away, but don't really focus your. Gaze or your attention on anything in particular,

just relax as much as you can and

now let's try to rub the palms of your hands together.

Okay, put your you can put your hands down and just try to be aware of the feeling in your hand.

Maybe there's a tingling. Maybe they're warm. Maybe nothing happens there. Whatever sensation you feel that's perfect, that's just the way to be. No sensation is as good as any other sensation, provided that you realize that you're aware that you don't have sensations

at this point, let's go through our body slowly together. Let's start with your head, with the top of your head. Try to bring attention to the top of your head awareness

and then slowly bring your attention down to your forehead,

from your forehead to your eyes,

from your eyes to your mouth,

just discover what's going on. There no judging, just awareness. Then bring your attention to your jaw. Maybe it's tight. Maybe it's relaxed, anything is as good as it is.

Then keep going down from your jaw, bring your awareness to your neck and

and then to your shoulders,

try to be aware of what's what's going in there. Maybe there is some tension, maybe some pain, maybe nothing. I

the only important part is to be aware of what's going on. Now, keep scanning down your body. Check in with your body and Now bring your attention from your shoulder to your arms and then again to your hands.

No hurry, just stay there a few minutes.

This may bring up thoughts or emotions, and that's natural. But if it feels too intense, focus on something else, like a science, like a sound in your environment, or any other thing that can actually you, that you can be aware of. Otherwise, if. Just feel the way of your body, where it touches the floor or the chair and

now, let's keep working on our body scan, and let's bring awareness to our Chest and our belly,

how to move up and down. Let's feel the air that gets in and out and check the movement. Maybe we don't even feel any movement, and that's perfectly okay. Do

notice your breath, AI, goes through your nostrils and inside your lungs. And okay, and now it comes out bit warmer. If

you find yourself getting lost in thought, or you feel bored or restless, that's okay. Just notice it. Notice that it's happening, be aware of that, and then recognize reconnect with your body. You

now from your chest and your belly go down to your hips and your legs,

and your knees, your sheens,

And finally, your feet and

Now, just feel the present of your Whole body.

Be aware of it.

Be grateful and

Okay. Now, as you transition out of this practice, just look around and take in some of the beauty of this moment. Try to appreciate small details that are around you, and be grateful to yourself that you take the time and the patience to come here, to wait for me, to appear, and to meditate and. Okay, so I think that that was very nice. I hope you enjoyed it. And I'm open to suggestion, comments, discussions, ideas, what I am because what I would like to do with these, with these sessions that will be recurring, and it's just to have, I have an idea of what, what I would like to do, but I would like also you to give me some, some feedback. Okay, some, some, some, some, some different ways of showing things. If you want more meditation, more discussion that that will be, that will be very helpful. Anyway, going back to going back to me. I didn't have really the time to introduce myself properly, because we were in a rush, and I really wanted to start meditating with you, because I think that that's the that's really the core of our of our meetings. But as I said, I am a meditation teacher and a life coach. My My main teacher is Mingyur Rinpoche that probably all of you know or have followed, and I have been really privileged to attend some, some of his retreat, and also the meditation teaching pro teacher program that the offer that was actually in the first cohort and and it was an Amazing experience, long and complicated, but really, really nice. So for for for mean, GE Rinpoche, and, of course, for myself, meditation is something that doesn't stop on the cushion. Is not just something that we do by ourselves at home, of course, is that that's part of it, but it's also, it's also a way to to interact with other people. It's also bringing meditation in the real world. It's really something that I believe is extremely important, and that's where and that's where community comes out. That's why I am so happy to be here, because together we can, we can share something precious and something and something beautiful. So ideally I would like to, I would like to go through, through to a sort of curriculum, if you want to call it, I mean, this is a sort of guideline and and today, what I, what I would like to to discuss about, is the is the concept that meditation is a is a journey of discovery. Meditation is not something that help us build something. Is not something that create anything. It's just a way, a very profound way, to get in touch with something that is already in here, because each of us has already is already perfect as they are. There is a source of goodness in each and every one of us. Meditation is basically a way to get in touch with this internal goodness that we have. So what is this internal goodness, and how can we found it right? Because someone can say, No, I don't have goodness inside or Yeah. But what does it mean? This internal goodness, the seeds of goodness that each of us have is basically awareness, love and compassion and wisdom and and actually, over, over the weeks, I will try to to help you get in touch with each of these components of our own innate goodness. So that's there will be some times on which we shall we shall concentrate a tiny bit more on awareness, some other on love and compassion, some other on wisdom and but then again, this is just, this is just a general guideline that I would like to, that I would like to use. But you know, if you prefer meditate more and listen less to me blabbering, we can do that. If you want to do the other way around. I can talk more. I can actually go on talking for a long, long time. Please, if I, if I exaggerate, let me know. Okay, any, any, any comment about the meditation or about this idea that I threw out there. And does anybody want to introduce themselves?

Hello, yes, please. Laura, yeah. Oh, glory, go ahead, please.

Hi. I'm actually new to this, so I would, I'd like to say hello. I'm welcome. First time here at this in this meditation group, really first I just joined the night class. Last week. So I'm pretty new. I'm I live in California, and I did do some meditation a long time ago, very, long time ago. In terms of your questions, I would like more meditation because I'm curious and the curriculum sounds good, perfect. I'm surprised by it. I did not expect that would be. Like the three things would be something that we could Yeah, a surprise to me. Well,

I hope it was a good surprise. And, yeah, no. Thank you very much. There will be, there will be a lot of time for meditation. And actually, I would like in in a little bit, to close our meeting with the with some more meditation. So that's already in in the stars, and you will really have opportunity to practice it. Thank you very much for for sharing it. It's, it's a pleasure to have you here and and again, I apologize for the for the rough start of the session, but I mean, here we are. That's good. Laura, you wanted to say something I saw your hand up

to say, Hello, I'm Laura, and I very much appreciated the meditation today. Was really nice, and no problem at all that you were late. I was actually also late, so it made me feel better and and I really like having a balance of having some time with meditation, as you did today, and sometime hearing you speak, you know, speak to us, giving some teachings. So I hope we will have a nice combination of both of those things. And I've been in nightclub almost since the beginning of nightclub and and I I've been in various sangas. My Buddhist practice has been I've been increasing my focus on it. In recent times, I've got some health issues that I'm dealing with, and I'm just very grateful. And the timing is good too. I like this meeting time, and so I look forward to it. Thank you. Where

are you based? Laura,

I'm sorry. Well, I am. I live in southern Mexico on the Southern Pacific Coast, in a small, fishy village, but I probably will be going back and forth a bit to Los Angeles because of my health treatment, medical treatment that I'll be getting. I'll be back and forth.

Very good, you see, because the idea of these, of these new series of meeting is basically to to facilitate the to facilitate the European, the European fan of Andrew, to get to have something that works better on in their own, in their own time zone. So that's why, basically here is nine o'clock in the morning, but ideally, in in, not ideal in Central Europe, should be six o'clock in the afternoon. So, I mean, it's probably in a time that would work very well. So hi, Myra. I just saw you arriving. Welcome, welcome, welcome. It's a pleasure to have you here? Yeah, you know my right, I guess right. She's, she's a famous meditation teacher, and she's been

real student, always a student. And I think Laura and I've been in this cup for that long, but I just wanted to welcome and I love your energy. I love to learn with somebody that has learned a lot close to Rinpoche. And I especially liked the way that your instructions, although we hear those instructions from different people in different ways or different order, I think the way that my body felt with your scanning, it was fabulous. And thank you so much. I think you, you're gifted.

Thank you coming from you. It really means a lot. Thank you very much, Mayra, if I

don't join you more frequently, I wish it would be a Saturday. Would be easier? Those Saturdays are difficult because I'm still a full time. I'm still a full time. I need to work to pay the bills, and so today I'm taking like a little window, like I have a hearing with the judge in a few minutes. So if I sign off with nothing personal, I just wanted to do, welcome to the co op. And I love the waters being expanded. And your piece was very good. I think we should go back. Would you tell Andrew and the team, we should go back to having a host all the time, because it makes you know the connection thing at the beginning had to be a little nervous.

Yeah, actually something, something very silly happened. Because, I mean, I was here, we actually, I was here 830 just to be safe. Different sound, but I realized it later. I didn't enable the, how you say, the waiting room, so I didn't see you people coming, and then I panicked. Oh, okay, so thankfully enough, I mean, someone gracefully opened it for me, and here we are anyway. That's great. Thank

you. Thank you. Thank you so much. And Welcome. Welcome. I hope it's a very long and lasting friendship.

And thank you very much for taking the time you see, because it's, I mean, people are busy, and actually showing up here is great. It's a sign of great. Great, something that really makes me proud of what I'm doing even more. So thank you. Thank you.

Yeah, if I go in and out, it's just that I want to hear you for a little bit I may have, but just five minutes helps.

Thank you. Okay,

thank you.

Okay, so I would like to say that it's the the concept that I was, that I was discussing before, of having, of having an innate goodness inside each of us, is extremely important and and we can And basically, there is a very famous traditional image of a of a birds that get out of their nest in the morning and they go very, very far away and but then at night, they always come back. They always come to their own to their own nest. In our case, often we are like birds that left the nest in the morning but got lost, and so we cannot find our way home. And so we stay out, we stay out, but but we still long for this home, for this for this center of goodness that we have. So we are. What is that actually pull us out? Pull us away from our own internal source of goodness? It's just grasping and aversion. So grasping is the desire to have more and more and more and more, maybe a car, maybe a job, maybe more money, maybe more health, maybe more friends, maybe more time. We really are. We really are grasping for, for, for things that, that we want, and and the other, the other great distraction, as Andrew would say, is, is aversion. So basically the opposite. So the desire, I mean, the the fear of things, the not accepting ugly things, not accepting pain, not accepting suffering, and really wanted to be free from those kind of of, this kind of feeling, and really pushing them out. So this is something that that is very common, that everybody have you see one way or another. It's what one, one of my teacher says that it's these is so it's not feeling at ease with ourselves. And this is often very common, very common anyway, meditation can help us in this. Can help us in this because will give us the will give us the tools to really get in touch with this, with this little nest of peace, of quietness, of relaxation, of well being that we have. I will stop here, and let's go. Do you have any, do you have any, any question, any comment, any anything to add or that maybe I didn't explain clearly enough. If you do, please don't be shy. I mean, we are friends here.

Okay, so at this point, I think that we should probably do another meditation in order to close our meeting. And so let's take your meditation posture, however, however you are sitting on the chair, on a cushion or or an uncomfortable armchair wherever you are, just take a moment to breathe normally, but please be aware of your um. Of your spine, okay, your back should be straight, not too loose, not too tight. Your eyes open or closed.

Just breathe normally and try as you can to relax.

There is not much to do here, as Andrew says, we are doing nothing, but we do it very well. If

so just sit, but please keep in mind that this meditation is not meant to help you only,

but it's meant to help all sentient beings, whether you realize it or not, Just keep that on the back of your mind. You

music Now, bring your awareness to your breath. Don't force it just let it be normal, relaxed.

Breathe in and breathe out at your own pace. You

now I would like you to follow me in a very easy exercise. You breathe in, you breathe out, and then you stop there, maybe one second before the next inhale. Let's try. Let's try to do it together a few times. But if it's complicated or you're not able to follow my rhythm, doesn't really matter. Do it on your own. I just do it to give you a sort of idea of how this is very, very simple practice, work, so breathe normally. Now, breathe in, breathe out, stop for one second and now, breathe In again,

breathe out

stop,

breathe in again. Try to do this at your own pace. Must not be effortful. Must be something natural. It just made this should just simply help you to bring awareness to that, to the time to the to the moment between your exhale and your inhale. It's an extremely precious moment where absolutely and nothing happens. And just enjoy it briefly and.

That's just a sip of Space, as Andrew would Say. I

Okay, now you can stop the exercise if you Want, and just relax

just be here. Don't meditate. You

in Your Rinpoche used to say, non meditation is the best meditation. You

especially if you are new to meditation, maybe there are thoughts that come to your mind. Don't try to send them away. Don't try not to think that's what mine does.

It's unstoppable.

Just let your thoughts come and go and

just let your thought. Let your thoughts be like clouds in a clear blue sky and

clouds come and go the Sky, it's Always there and

Okay, if your head, if your eyes were closed, slowly, gently open them,

come back here on your cushion in your room, look around and be proud that you dedicated This little time to yourself and to others meditating together.

Okay, I think that we did our second meditation, and I'm very excited that we went through it, and I enjoy it personally.

Okay, so now it's probably you. You all have heard about about neuroplasticity, right? That is the the capacity of the of our brain to actually change, change in in time, and then change in according to, according to two things that usually we cannot, we cannot control. So life happens and our brain changes, and our and the relation between our neurons change as well. And so we start thinking in a certain way, and this in certain type of of thoughts become recurrent. And one could say one could feel pretty, pretty important we would you don't know how to do that. You don't know why this thing happens. You would like your brain to be different. Maybe you don't feel happy, you don't feel satisfied, you don't feel calm. But actually, meditation in any form is just one way in which we can change our brain, literally, meditation changes the way we think. Meditation mechanically change our brain. Our brain gets during meditation, our brain builds different new neuro pathways, and we and we start thinking in a different way. Of course, it doesn't, doesn't happen overnight. It's not that I meditate and I'm happy. No, it takes, it takes time. It takes patience and and really it's, it's it's an effort, because sometimes meditation, it can be hard, can be painful, can be boring, but it's something that I strongly believe it's essential in everybody's life, and it's essential especially in today's world, because we have so many things on which we don't have control, that are annoying, that are frustrating, or that are external of us, or even our bodies are saying, Hey, man, I mean, I'm aching and I've got problem, you know. So all these things are things in which, unfortunately, we don't have much, much we cannot do much about. But meditation, in a way, really help us bring into a sort of wisdom, so to see things in a different in a different way, nothing changes, but we change how we see the world, and that's very important.

I don't know if any of you want to share something before we before we close this real small, small section. But again, I apologize, but I mean next time it shouldn't happen if I remember to push the right button, you

okay, I see Friedrich is Friedrich is really share something in the chat? I don't know. Probably everybody can see it. But first of all, thank you very much. You're very you're extremely nice, and so I'm happy that this idea of doing meditation at this time in the morning, that the meditation group, it helps, helps Europeans, because this is really one of the reasons why we are here at this time, just just to offer something that is a bit more convenient that maybe. It 2am for you. So you guys in Europe, and so that's, that's great. And, yeah, you see in bridging you, you mentioned bridging the gap between my meditation seat and my work day. That's really, that's really the whole point of meditation for me, because if we if we meditate, we become friends with ourselves. We know more are, are our brain, we know more our mind, and that makes us better person and people. Sees it. You see, they really, they really realize it one way or another. So they they open. If we open to them, they open to us. And I know it sounds a bit cheesy, but it's really, it's really the truth. I'm deeply convinced of that. Okay, then, yeah, 2/3 two thirds, meditation, 1/3 philosophy, okay, we can do that. We can That's perfect. That's perfect. So Okay, before we close, I would like, of course, to thank you all, because it's been, it's been a pleasure, and thank you for the for for your taking part in this discussion, either in person or via the chat, that's beautiful. That's exactly what I was looking for and what I was hoping. Thank you for meditating with me and see you in two weeks same time. And before we close, let's take maybe just a few moments to dedicate the merit of our meeting to the benefit of others. Let's just, let's just think about it on our own for few seconds. May all the merit that I gain through this meditation be for the help.

Thank you so so much for your Patience. See you in two weeks. Bye. You