The following talk was given at the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California.

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Hello and good morning for those of you here.

You're living in places where it's dawn and morning and good day for everyone else.

And there is a dangerous teaching in Buddhism.

So dangerous that I've been told that in one Buddhist country in South Asia,

that the government forbade Buddhist monks from teaching it, it's so dangerous.

And that's the danger that I'll be offering you today.

So I want to contextualize a little bit, or first I'll tell you what the danger is,

and that is practicing contentment.

And the reason why governments don't like it, business corporations' capitalism doesn't like it,

is that then people, if they're too content, they won't consume more.

If they're too content, they won't push themselves to work harder and build more, make more, make more money.

And in a certain way, many economies are based on discontent, so they can keep going.

Imagine the headlines.

The world became content, and economies failed everywhere.

So it's a dangerous teaching, and maybe it's not always appropriate.

So one of the ways of beginning a meditation practice is to settle down a little bit,

and then check in with oneself, and discern how you are.

Sometimes what's needed to just simple basic mindfulness.

Sometimes what's needed is a little bit of more focus on concentration to overcome a distracted mind.

Sometimes what's needed is truth telling, to really admit to oneself what's happening,

...