229 episodes

The Jack Kornfield Heart Wisdom hour celebrates Jack’s ability to mash up his long established Buddhist practices with many other mystical traditions, revealing the poignancy of life’s predicaments and the path to finding freedom from self-interest, self-judgment and unhappiness.

Heart Wisdom with Jack Kornfield Be Here Now Network

    • Religion & Spirituality
    • 4.7 • 1.2K Ratings

The Jack Kornfield Heart Wisdom hour celebrates Jack’s ability to mash up his long established Buddhist practices with many other mystical traditions, revealing the poignancy of life’s predicaments and the path to finding freedom from self-interest, self-judgment and unhappiness.

    Ep. 229 – Expectations

    Ep. 229 – Expectations

    Talking Kabir, breakups, LSD, and Ram Dass, Jack shares how we can unfurl from the suffering of our expectations in order to live the mystery.

    Today's podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. Click to receive 10% off your first month with your own licensed professional therapist: betterhelp.com/heartwisdom

    "Awareness has this quality of allowing change or openness to take place, because you're not trying to make it a certain way... you're observing it." – Jack Kornfield

    In this episode, Jack mindfully explores:

    - Kabir and waking up in this very life

    - Grief, breakups, disappointment, and letting go

    - How expectation creates suffering

    - Meditation and "manufacturing the light"

    - Expectations, battling reality, and opening to the mystery

    - How the mind measures, but the heart loves

    - What Ram Dass told Jack about dealing with the death of his father

    - Moving past the content of mind, and truly experiencing life

    - The essence of Buddha's practice of mindfulness

    - Labeling/noting feelings as a way to release them

    - Albert Hoffman and LSD

    - Relationships and how to make commitment without expectation

    Want to learn how to follow the Buddha’s path to freedom in the modern world? Sign up for Jack’s new online course Walking the Eightfold Path with Jack Kornfield. The live version begins March 18! Sign up here: https://bit.ly/3T7Aafp

    "Now, what's interesting to discover in meditation, is as you pay attention inside, it's the mind which measures, the mind with thought. The heart doesn't measure, the heart doesn't have that capacity, actually." – Jack Kornfield

    "This is an amazing thing—bodies, and life, and cars, and planets hanging in space, and big balls of fire that we name stars and no one knows where they come from...beetles, insects, and strange things. What is this? So we sit and make ourselves a little bit quiet in order to turn the heart and the mind together to face directly this reality, this changing reality of birth and death, of change of life." – Jack Kornfield

    This Dharma Talk from 10/10/1988 at Insight Meditation Society was originally published on DharmaSeed.

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    • 49 min
    Ep. 228 – Clouds of the Mind

    Ep. 228 – Clouds of the Mind

    Going back to the basics, Jack explores how we can skillfully navigate our dynamic mood states by experiencing them as clouds of the mind.

    Want to learn how to follow the Buddha’s path to freedom in the modern world? Sign up for Jack’s new online course Walking the Eightfold Path with Jack Kornfield beginning March 18!

    "Moods are actually kind of mysterious and quite impersonal. They're like the weather. It's been kind of cool this year, then we get our rainstorms, and the sun comes in between, and the wind comes and dies down, and we don't have any control over it whatsoever. It just comes. It's due to certain conditions." – Jack Kornfield

    In this episode, Jack compassionately illuminates:Experiencing moods as clouds or weather—arising and passing naturally from impersonal sets of conditions The six flavors of experience in Buddhism Finding the middle ground between acting on feelings and suppressing them The "vipassana romance" and understanding the "siren call" of desire Diffusing desire with humor, mindfulness, and noting Moving past attachment and aversion by leaning into them Techniques for overcoming doubt Letting go and becoming more happy and more live


    "The optimist wakes up and says, 'Good morning, God!' And the pessimist wakes up and says, 'Good God! Morning...' It's the same experience, but the mood somehow changes it." – Jack Kornfield

    "One sits and practices, and let's these experiences come and fill us. We bow to them, name them, soften in the heart and say, 'Okay, show me your stuff, give me the whole thing.' And you know what happens after a while? If you make this spaciousness in the heart and that still point, at some point it ends. Because everything does. You say, 'Wow that was a big storm of desire, wasn't it?' And there you are, and there's this sense of freedom that comes that that's not who we are most fundamentally." – Jack Kornfield

    The Dharma Talk from 4/1/1988 at was originally published on DharmaSeed.

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    • 56 min
    Ep. 227 – Codependence and Compassion, What's the Difference?

    Ep. 227 – Codependence and Compassion, What's the Difference?

    Illuminating the subtle but crucial difference between codependence and compassion, Jack outlines how to set boundaries and live from our unique truth.

    Today's podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. Click to receive 10% off your first month with your own licensed professional therapist: betterhelp.com/heartwisdom

    "Codependence means being an accomplice, a kind of complicity with someone who's acting in a self-destructive way, being dependent on their behavior, or supporting it somehow for your own security." – Jack Kornfield

    In this episode, Jack sheds mindful light on:The subtle but crucial difference between compassion and codependenceTrying to fix it or save someone instead of allowing them to taste the fruits of their karmasFeeling locked into supporting someone's destructive behaviorThe lack of feeling secure leading to needing to over-controlNeeding to fix someone else's problems because we can't live with it in ourselfHow we are all accomplices to a codependent societyMother Teresa and seeking to love the world instead of trying to fix itThe necessity of balancing compassion practice with equanimity practiceThe spiritual importance of disharmony and the value of sufferingBoundaries and the ability to say "no"Ownership, possessiveness, and the trouble with believing our rolesThe Bhagavad Gita and acting from our hearts without attachment to the fruit of the actionLiving our our unique truth amidst the mystery


    Want to learn how to follow the Buddha’s path to freedom in the modern world? Sign up for Jack’s new online course Walking the Eightfold Path with Jack Kornfield beginning March 18!

    "We are all heirs to our own karma, we have created our own lives. We can love and assist others, but in the end, no one can create a life for someone else, no one can change another person's fate. We are the ones that create what will happen for us." – Jack Kornfield

    "Can we seek to love the world instead of trying to fix it? It is possible to be in a codependent relationship with the ills of the society, so we have to start looking within ourselves. What does it mean to do good? Mother Teresa taught in her work in Calcutta in the death and dying centers, 'We're not social workers. Our work is not to take people off the streets and clothes them and feed them. The government could do that. Our work is to bring to the people that we touch the spirit and the love of God that has touched us. The rest of it is just the vehicle to communicate that spirit.' It's a very different way of approaching solving a problem.'" – Jack Kornfield

    This Dharma Talk from 9/1/1989 at was originally published on DharmaSeed.

    See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    • 46 min
    Ep. 226 – The Courage to Recognize Truth

    Ep. 226 – The Courage to Recognize Truth

    Sharing spiritual wisdom on meditation, abundance, intimacy, and the astral body, Jack helps us cultivate the courage to recognize truth.

    Want to learn how to follow the Buddha’s path to freedom in the modern world? Sign up for Jack’s new online course Walking the Eightfold Path with Jack Kornfield beginning March 18!

    "In one important sense, meditation is an exercise in truth, an exercise in opening to what is true, to what is here in front of in the most direct and obvious ways." – Jack Kornfield

    In this episode, Jack compassionately illuminates:Meditation as an exercise in truth Jesus and the Buddha following their deepest inner truths Dharma and direct seeing from the heart Buddhism's three characteristics of life: impermanence, suffering, selflessness Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche's view on the rebirth of our bad habits The difference between our physical 'fear body' we inhabit during the day, versus our expansive 'astral body' we expand into at night Mindfulness, spaciousness, and Buddha Nature Abundance and intimacy in spirituality The 16th Karmapa as the Dharma King A beautiful (and funny) story of an end-of-life guided meditation


    "Somebody asked Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche, the Tibetan Lama, 'If there's no self, what is it that is reborn in Buddhism?' He smiled and said, 'I hate to tell you this, but what's reborn is your bad habits.'" – Jack Kornfield

    "To note what's present is the first task. The second task is to see or sense what happens to it. These are both important. So, sadness comes and you note, 'Ah, here's the feeling of sadness.' And then you name it for a while, you stay with it and see what it does, 'Sad...sad...sad.' Maybe you name it five to ten times and it disappears. Then itching comes and you name, 'Itching...itching...' You don't just name it and hurry back to your breath. You name it and see what it does, 'Itching...itching.' Then, it spreads and your whole face is tingling, 'Tinging...tingling... I'm gonna die if I don't scratch this... Dying...dying...' Then if you stay with it, dying passes, tingling passes, itching passes. If you let yourself stay with things, naming them as long as they are there and seeing them happen, they show their true nature—which is to arise, change, and pass." – Jack Kornfield

    This Dharma Talk from 7/11/1990 at was originally published on DharmaSeed.

    See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    • 57 min
    Ep. 225 – Letting Life Breathe

    Ep. 225 – Letting Life Breathe

    Illuminating the deepening levels of spiritual practice, Jack explores how to let life breathe while setting your heart on gold.

    Today's podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. Click to receive 10% off your first month with your own licensed professional therapist: betterhelp.com/heartwisdom

    “What we’re doing in practice is feeling the actuality of how life is pulsing, moving, flowing and swirling, fast and slow, rhythmically, within our own body, within our own direct experience.” – Jack Kornfield

    In this episode, Jack mindfully explores:How to let life breathe while setting your heart on goldThe importance of balancing our concentration, effort, and equanimityHow the quality of presence can help the gold of the heart and mind shineRiding the body’s rhythm of breath as our main focus of attention and restTo feel of how life is pulsing, moving, and flowing through our experienceWorking with our loneliness, suffering, grief, fear, and longingsAwakening into the present moment to see past the body of fearHow recognizing spaciousness and impermanence helps us overcome our difficultiesThe power of trust, letting go, and letting life breathe


    “People sometimes feel like it’s not worth it to practice. In the beginning it seems like you’re here 2% of the time, but if you continue and look honestly, you might be here 4% of the time. In one way, that’s discouraging statistically that you’re off 96%, but in another way it says you are now here alive and present twice as much as you were two days ago.” – Jack Kornfield

    “The insight into the true path comes when we discover that we’re not trying to hold onto a single thing, not a perception, not a pleasant experience, not the calm of meditation—those are all parts of the waves of experience that rise and pass in space. The idea isn’t to hold your breath when you get something good to see how long it can stay, that doesn’t work very well. The idea is to let all of life breath. As we do, we let go moment by moment, more fully. We learn to trust, like the goldsmith, blowing on it, sprinkling water, softening, cooling, and a lot of time just giving presence so it’s beauty can start to show.” – Jack Kornfield

    This episode from 10/09/1983 at Insight Meditation Society was originally published on DharmaSeed.

    Want to learn how to follow the Buddha's path to freedom in the modern world? Sign up for Jack's new online course Walking the Eightfold Path with Jack Kornfield beginning March 18!

    See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    • 59 min
    Ep. 224 – Loving Kindness Guided Meditation

    Ep. 224 – Loving Kindness Guided Meditation

    Wrapping the world in the heart of loving kindness, Jack offers a meditation to help us into presence, relaxation, & loving awareness.

    Jack originally shared this guided meditation for the Spirit Rock Monday Night Dharma Talk and Meditation. If you would like to join Jack online for his next livestream, register here.

    "Living in loving kindness opens the doorway to happiness and joy." – Jack Kornfield

    In this episode, Jack leads a guided meditation to help us:Enter into presence, relaxation, kindness, and loving awarenessWrap the world and our experiences in the heart of loving kindnessLearn what it feels like to truly wish well for others and yourselfUse the power of our imagination to visualize and experience transformative blessingsGradually and incrementally extend our metta to encapsulate all sentient beingsOffer our hearts and direct our loving kindness to those suffering throughout the worldTake the "advanced class" by extending our metta to those causing sufferingListen to our intuition and allow our heart to direct itselfLive in happiness and joy, and bring loving kindness to all we touch


    "Extend the feeling of loving kindness across the world, to those in difficulty, the families the children who are fleeing danger in so many places—Myanmar, Sudan, Ukraine, Gaza, Palestine, Israel—across the world. You picture them—the families the children—and send rays of love, metta, and strength, 'May you be safe and protected, may you find ease and graciousness, may you be held in loving kindness, and in whatever ways you can, may you be happy.'" – Jack Kornfield

    See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    • 32 min

Customer Reviews

4.7 out of 5
1.2K Ratings

1.2K Ratings

The Buddha Guy ,

Great wisdom from Jack

The amazing thing about Jack’s teaching is that every episode is different. They also each contain profound truths and wisdom accumulated over decades perhaps lifetimes. Googling for the answer is not the same. Very profound.

FreeParking ,

Chicken soup for the soul.

Jack is a treasure! I have found so much comfort and wisdom in these podcasts. If your feeling down or disconnected, listen to some stories, and consider some ancient wisdoms.
The only thing is I hate to say it but I don’t like the new introductions by the other guy. It feels completely inauthentic to know Jack was doing these talks separately and some other dude is choosing specific talks to throw into a podcast. Just skip that guy he adds no value, sorry new guy, I know you mean well.

loomasauris ,

Amazing Show !

I love this podcast especially the introduction that explains the history and backstory of the episode. Jack is a treasure! Thank you!

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