Exploring the liberating step of Right Attitude, Jack illuminates how we can break free from our automatic habits by becoming fully conscious of them.

“There’s a strength of heart that comes when we don’t just follow our habit. It’s a strengthening of heart that brings a sense of wellbeing or purity. Because we begin to train ourselves that we don’t have to follow all our habits and all our desires.” – Jack Kornfield

In this episode, Jack mindfully explores:

• Right Attitude / Right Thought as one of the steps on the Buddha’s Noble Eightfold Path
• The three aspects of Right Attitude: openness/exploration, renunciation/effort, love/non-harming
• Working with our unique personality in this incarnation
• The importance of adding fire to our spiritual practice
• Breaking free from our automatic habits by bringing conscious awareness to them
• Ram Dass and becoming a “connoisseur or your neurosis”
• Transforming our life from automatic pilot to being fully conscious
• The story of Larry Brilliant helping cure smallpox and what he learned about surrender and interconnectivity

This Dharma Talk from 07/01/1984 at Spirit Rock Meditation Center was originally published on DharmaSeed.

“I think love really manifests when things get difficult. That’s when you really know it. That’s the fire that melts whatever barriers we ever have in our hearts. And our hearts want to be melted. The pain isn’t so bad; it’s much better than having it still solid and barricaded.” – Jack Kornfield

For more podcasts like this from Jack, Trudy Goodman, Ram Dass, Sharon Salzberg, and more, please visit the Be Here Now Network family of podcasts.