The Eight Worldly Winds That Blow Constantly

The eight worldly winds that blow constantly are praise and blame, gain and loss, pleasure and pain, fame and disrepute. The Buddha asks of anyone on the path in our sitting or walking to be present for life as it is their own true nature. So what do we do with pleasure and pain and gain and loss and praise and blame? Two strategies. One is to close, to ignore it, to deny, to be fearful, to harden, to struggle. The other is too bound to it, to soften, to meet the joys and the sorrows of our experience with compassion with the heart of a Buddha.