Charlie Chaplin's first talking picture, The Great Dictator (1940), was an act of defiance against Nazism. It was filmed and released in the United States one year before the U.S. entry into World War II. A genuine piece of old film footage with added modern images, creates a profoundly moving and uplifting message to the human spirit for the New Year!

I am really baffled by how often I hear my students mention that their boss could use Mindfulness At Work training and when I ask, "Why don't you tell them?" They respond, "Oh no, she doesn't care. She just wants to get things done and done them her own way. She'd never go for it." Or say, "They don't care about AWARENESS, they just want us to do more using the same strategies that don't work."

Sitting at our regular Tuesday night sitting group my entire body felt in alignment with my mind in a space of deep concentration and alertness. As I sat in meditation all parts of my body were locked-in together like a very solid building structure. I felt no urge for movement, no pain or discomfort in the body meant anything. Even when the teacher rang the bell and it was time to get out of meditation, my mind and body completely at ease, alert and stable did not wish to stop meditating. I think I sat there for the rest of the night with my eyes closed and without much movement. It just felt right. I was alert, I heard every word of the dharma talk and every word that our sitters had shared. I wasn't tuned out. I was right there, stable, present and solid.

Breaking the Fear Barrier is a book by Tom Rieger published by Gallop. The article printed on Gallup Management Journal on Aug 18, 2011 explains "The biggest threat to an organization's success: the fear that lives within its own walls."

Manijeh Motaghy on Real Food Inspired Blog Radio.

Here is the point to the discussion which I intentionally didn’t answer on Saturday. It is in response to the question:

“What is the point of meditation if everything isn’t going to work out and we are still going to get old, get sick and die?”

Here is the answer:

“To find a dependable happiness and well-being that isn’t subject to the circumstances of our lives – a happiness that does not depend on pleasure or getting rid of displeasure.”

Mindfulness is one of those skills that is both difficult and extremely rewarding to learn. It is simply difficult because we've lived unskillfully in the area of awareness all our lives and now we try to learn it. So, be patient, allow yourself to fail and expect it to be difficult, but every moment you notice how difficult it is to be in the present moment, that's the moment you realize how your mind has ran the show so far.

On Tuesday nights, our sangha or meditation community meets in Sherman Oaks for a 40 minute meditation, a check-in (where members tell about the progress of their meditation practice or ask questions) and about a 30 minute lesson from our instructor, Daniel Davis. Here is what we learned this week:

In meditation, what is skillful and what isn’t?

Equanimity -– for example, imagining that we are mountains who can withstand all kinds of weather; that we are “solid” no matter what the “conditions” – is a tool for discerning what can be changed and what can’t.

What we are learning is how to use tools skillfully. Sometimes we might have the right tool but use it in the wrong way, and sometimes we may have the wrong tool altogether.