Krishna Das looks at the full experience of opening the heart and explores questions around navigating the spiritual path.
Show Notes
What is This About? (Opening) – Krishna Das reflects on difficulties that come with opening ourselves along the journey of awakening. He looks at some of the delusions we carry about ourselves and what spiritual practice is really about.
The Seeds of the Name (8:35) – We learn more about why chanting can be so transformative, even when we don’t understand what is being said. Krishna Das shares a parable from Ramakrishna about the seeds we plant when we chant the names of the Divine.
“Through this practice of the repetition of the name, gradually this ‘me,’ which is the center of all our issues, is dissolved. All that is left is whatever you want to call it: God, Buddha nature, love, truth, presence, or reality. We are not gone, we just know ourselves in a different way. When ‘me’ disappears it’s not nothing, its everything.” – Krishna Das
Further explore this parable on Ep. 50 of the Pilgrim Heart Podcast.
Opening the Heart (18:35) – Krishna Das gets real about the experience of opening the heart; it’s not all compassion and love, its EVERYTHING. He talks about the role that family life played in his own heart opening.
“I hate to tell you, but opening the heart has nothing with feeling groovy. When the heart is open, it means you are present. When your heart is as wide as the world there is room for everything to come through and you are right there with everything, not just the pleasant stuff.” – Krishna Das
Addiction and Faith (27:30) – KD addresses questions from his live audience about overcoming addiction while on the spiritual path. He looks at the critical role that faith plays in moving past the destructive habits and thoughts we have become addicted to.
“What I am saying is that we really don’t have any faith. ‘Faith,’ that’s one of the words that makes Westerners want to puke because we associate it with ‘blind faith,’ which is a whole other thing. This is faith based on your own experience, you could even call it confidence that something is true.” – Krishna Das
Our Little World (43:00) – We reflect on what opening our heart to the suffering of others can teach us about where we are at. Krishna Das talks about how mindfulness and meditative practices can help manage how we relate to physical suffering.
