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Talk + Meditation: Just Do the Right Thing
September 6, 2025

So often we get caught in worry, strain, and the constant pressure to do more — to fix everything, to control what we simply can’t. In this talk, I explore how to let go of what’s beyond our power, how to do the “next right thing” even when life feels overwhelming, and how to find balance between striving and simply being.

Also, I hope you’ll check out the meditation below that will help you steady the mind like a candle in a windless place—calm, present, and undisturbed.

Click here to join the free Wednesday Meditations – which are open to everyone!

Talk: Just Do the Right Thing

Download the Talk: Audio | Transcript

Timecodes & main topics:

02:03- Letting go of worry and tension — noticing, releasing, and softening into spacious awareness

04:07 – Facing helplessness — accepting what’s beyond our power to change

05:22 – Balancing effort and acceptance — caring and not caring at the same time

08:17 – Doing the “next right thing” — integrity and simplicity in daily choices

12:31 – Integrity in hard times — wisdom from Wendell Berry and others on persistence

14:24 – Staying in the arena — Teddy Roosevelt’s call to courageous effort

17:52 – Right effort in Buddhism — four clear categories of wise action

19:38 – Not halting, not straining — the middle way of balanced effort

23:40 – True nature and completeness — resting in awareness that’s already whole

30:33 – Two truths together — balancing gradual practice with inherent Buddha nature

A Meditation: Resting in Opening

Download the Audio of this Meditation

These teachings are offered freely, at no charge. 

And if you like, you may wish to participate in the age-old tradition of generosity through making an offering yourself – called “dāna” – to support Rick and the Wednesday Meditations. Generosity itself is a beautiful practice that opens and gladdens the heart, relaxes the contraction of “self,” and ripples out into the world to touch many people – and perhaps, eventually, even oneself. 

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