The Ingredients for Selfing Part 2
The Ingredients for Selfing (Part 2)
Talk by Peter Carlson
In this conclusion to his two-part series, Peter Carlson explores the 25 wholesome mental factors (cetasikas) of Buddhist psychology (Abhidharma). Building on the foundational concepts from Part 1, Peter details how cultivating these beneficial conditioning factors leads the mind away from distress and confusion (dukkha) and opens the path toward self-state integration and liberation.
Key highlights of this talk include:
Universal Wholesome Factors: An overview of essential qualities present in every moment of wholesome awareness, including confidence (saddha), mindfulness (sati), moral shame, fear of blame, non-attachment, non-aversion, and equanimity (upekka / tatramajjhattata).
The Six Beautiful Pairs: A look at how the mind and its mental factors interact during deep practice to foster tranquility, lightness, pliancy, wieldiness, proficiency, and uprightness.
Virtue & The Divine Abidings: How abstinences (right speech, right action, right livelihood) and the Brahmaviharas (compassion, sympathetic joy, and loving-kindness) arise naturally as the mind settles.
Right Understanding (Samma Ditthi): The transition from conceptual belief to direct, experiential knowledge of the impermanent and selfless nature of experience.
Peter connects these classical Abhidharma principles to practical meditation, explaining how observing the mind with non-reactive curiosity helps quiet restlessness, deconstruct the habitual "selfing" process, and reveal a lasting, peaceful stillness.
(Includes a Q&A session with retreat participants discussing practical application and overcoming boredom in practice.)
