Good morning. Or today, hello. And here to give the second talk on the mindfulness check in, and how to use mindfulness, the classic mindfulness teaching on the three foundations as a way of freeing ourselves from unhealthy and useful preoccupations with the challenges difficulties we have in our life. It's not a denial that we have challenges. But it's possible all too easy for us to become fixated on them in on useful way. We can get preoccupied, we can ruminate, we can repeat the same kind of fear based thoughts about what will happen what it all means what's going to happen to us, we can possible to steam in, in anger and just kind of be caught up in the endless story of blame and who did what and just angry and about someone. Of course, there might be reasons, to be afraid reasons to be angry. But to ruminate with it to to persist in it and spin in it is use one way an unhealthy way of placing our life energy placing our attention. And it limits, it narrows the scope of a way how we can be present for what is here. And so, and even you're spending a lot of time thinking about things, eliminates our lives. Thinking has a role, but to be lost in thought. So when the Buddha taught the four foundations of mindfulness, there is no obvious place in there to be mindful of thinking, we often will teach mindfulness of thinking as though there is a place but in that teachings of the Buddha, there is no obvious way. And I think he knew very well that people think a lot. In fact, he gives instructions elsewhere of how to work with distracted thoughts. But I think in the in the classic teachings on mindfulness, he offers a different way of being present for our direct experience. That's not mediated so much through our thinking. And that is rather than see things through the lens of what we're thinking and how we're thinking, and is to drop into these four different areas to kind of tease apart these four areas of the totality of our experience. And that is to be aware of how things are experienced physically in the body, how things are either pleasant or unpleasant. The pleasure or the discomfort of things. The mind states, and then the mental processes. Today, the topic is the second they what's called the feeling tone of experience. And when we go through the checklist, and say, Okay, I'm having some difficulty. And and it didn't happen today, but almost happen coming down here to IMC to teach a little bit late later than usual. And so I could be could have been preoccupied about, oh, I need to get here I'll be late what will happen? And how am I going to be efficient when I get there to set everything up and and that can be spinning that way. So that would be the challenge, the challenge of being late and my preoccupation and, and worry around that. Once I noticed that's happening, then I give myself the checklist. Now what's happening the body, I'm agitated, what's happening, feeling tones, it's unpleasant. What's happening, much they it's gotten narrow and tight. And what's happened in the mental processes, I'm caught up in a certain degree of worry, a certain degree of, of, of a little bit of aversion to feeling the way I'm feeling. And then if I look at that checklist I see Well, the most interesting place maybe the strongest place is actually it feels uncomfortable, that whole thing. Let me look at the discomfort. Let me that that's the important place to bring attention to. And sometimes that's enough, because that's enough to me to recognize that I'm tense. And so then I can relax. I can soften around this how I'm feeling and that kind of opens the afield and relaxes the whole thing without having to figure it all out in my thoughts and ideas and be stuck there. So that's a simple way that mindfulness can work. But for the Buddha, the attention to the feeling tone, can be revolutionary. And it was for the Buddha, because when he discovered some of the pleasures and joy of meditation, he asked himself, do I need to be afraid of this? And he said, No, it's okay to experience this pleasure. And this kind of in a very, you know, distant way, is little bit a little bit mimics my experience of meditation over these years, I've meditated. That in the first 10 years of meditation or so, I had no idea. Exactly, I was discouraged from feeling any pleasure, if you went to the meditation teacher and talked about your feeling pleasant or pleasure, you were told, let go of that just kind of stay present, be with the emptiness of things be with just just sit and not focus anything, just let go of it like, Oh, and there was no way of acknowledging and even though I would sit meditation in that tradition, and have sometimes really good feelings of being present, they were never validated or given a place. And when I started studying Vipassana, I eventually discovered there's actually a very important place. And it's okay to experience pleasure, it's part of what it means to be human being is to have pleasure. But in fact, don't be attached to it. Don't strive and struggle to have it, don't expect it. But do allow yourself to feel it. And it can be revolutionary, when the mind is preoccupied with what's uncomfortable. If the mind spins out in fear, or an anger or distress, or grief or sadness, all those emotions are part of human life and certainly don't want to deny them or or cut them off directly. But, but the preoccupation with them. And the preoccupation with these kinds of difficulties and challenges, becomes the fuel for the challenge to be bigger and persist longer. And so we have to somehow be able to moderate or monitor how we're what we're fueling, and what we're feeding and growing and in pursuit and maintaining. And so it isn't that we're not supposed to feel some discomfort. But maybe it's unnecessary to feed it. And there's something powerful that happens if we start tuning into the pleasure, that pleasantness of the moment, that isn't, doesn't not meant to be a denial of what's unpleasant. But it's a way of, of moderating or finding our way with what's unpleasant. There's a different reference point, there's a different way in which our attention is being fed, our attention is being conditioned, it's been conditioned by what's pleasant rather than persisting with what's unpleasant. So some people might protest around this kind of idea. And that's, you know, maybe reasonable to some degree, but if your pay careful attention to our minds reactivity, and what we what we're feeding what we're influenced the ruminations the spinning of the mind is having, and you find out that a persistent way of thinking and persistent way of kind of being caught and is fueling your feelings fueling the distress fueling the sense of emotional challenge that's going on. That also is not very useful. It can actually spin out. And, you know, if you really spin out in a panic attack or really spiral downward, it's really good to, to go do something different, that's enjoyable. Go find a kitten to play with. Many years ago, I used to take long showers when I was really spinning out with with fear, and that would somehow settle anything the pleasure of the shower, go for a walk where you can enjoy trees and skies or something. And finding something pleasant to do when we're in danger of spinning out with our preoccupation is a very good intervention and to settle the nervous system to quiet things down and, and then we'll be in a better least to come back and address the issue. Not a few people have found that taking a pleasure break,