Encore: ISmile69 – The Three Stages of Practice: Recognition, Resistance, & Renunciation

This podcast was originally offered in August of 2005.

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If it’s all only Spirit, why should we meditate? Couldn’t it be that meditation is designed to fail in getting us closer to what’s already totally present? In this talk, Michael discusses these questions and suggests how practice unfolds along three stages. Beginning with Recognition, where we are essentially invited to the party, ego fuels our search. Following this, practitioners can often lose their footing when the “dark night of the soul” arises in the phase known as Resistance. Crossing this arid plane, practitioners learn how to commit to an engaged Renunciation where we, and all that arises in our Awareness, are informed by the stillness that we’ve been practicing. Questions deal with: attempts at kind speech when we feel challenged.