Category: Teaching

Yesterday was Mother’s Day. I’m missing my mother. Trudy was an angel and someone who loved me unconditionally. Each mother’s day seems to echo in the silence of her absence. Yet, my promise to her is to develop my heart to love as hers did.  With that view, it’s not helpful to wallow in my sadness. The root of our meditation training, points to the possibility of holding our hearts open even as they break.

Yesterday was the anniversary of the racially motivated shootings in Buffalo. And if that tragedy takes a moment to mentally reboot, perhaps it says a lot about the morbid new normal we’ve come to live with. And I am moved to think of the mothers who have lost children in senseless gun violence that plagues our homes, neighborhoods and schools. And all mothers who have loved unconditionally despite their loss. We live in a difficult and violent society that nonetheless needs our love and attention.

The Mahayana Buddhist teachings liken compassion to the experience of a mother bird who’s chick has fallen from its nest into a flowing river. Her heart breaks with no recourse but to love and experience loss. When faced with tragedy she could shut down in a vain attempt to protect herself, or she could open up despite the pain and care for the life still around her.  Her reason for being is the life that depends on her.  Of course, this is an ideal look at a mother. Many have had complicated relationships with their mothers and some may not equate their mother with selfless care and love. But the experience of compassionate love is available to us all. We can’t fix anything. But we can train ourselves to love someone somewhere unconditionally. With that foothold we can work to develop that feeling of love for all sentient beings. That is the view. But, will this help?  Will it fix a sick world? Maybe not. But when a child is sick we don’t love it less. If the child dies, we don’t stop loving them.

Our hearts breaking inthe open space of sadness is a profound experience. The Mahayana Buddhist system regards service to the world as our prime directive despite our pain.  We are not here to squeeze all the joy out of life that we can.  Nor are we here to continually nurture our wounds. Healing comes as we learn to find joy in our broken world as it is. We find authentic joy when we remain true and loving despite our wounds. We become strong when we stay true and loving despite our doubts. We become mothers of the world when we decide to let ourselves love unconditionally.

Another ideal statement of Mahayana Buddhism is for us to regard all beings as our mothers. The classical reading of the teachings refer to the fact that we are all part of the continued recycling of life in our realm. The ancient texts say that we have lived every conceivable life countless times over. Included in that reincarnative dance was that all of us have been everyone else’s mother and because of that, we owe all beings a debt of gratitude. A more progressive reading of the teachings might suggest that we are all part of the loving regeneration of life. We are interconnectedly woven as part of the fabric of life. Although life dies in its corporeal form, it is connected to the life from which it came even as it continues in the regeneration of life to come. The idea that we are connected to all other life is a very compelling thought. The fact that all life ends is accompanied by the truth that life is continually reborn. Thus sadness and joy are the experience of all sentient life. Love is large enough to encompass both. Love encompasses all experience.

Perhaps we are mothers of our world right now. If we turn away in judgement or disgust, we renege on a responsibility to care for our charges. As we are interconnected to that life, when we turn from our world, we turn from ourselves as well. Maybe today, we can remember the love of a mother whether literally or figuratively as an inspiration for developing  selfless love. Will that selfless love change the world?  Possibly not. But with the development of great compassion, we might transform ourselves.

“Working with Grief” implies that grief, as profoundly sad and disheartening as it can be, is something with which we can make a relationship. From a Buddhist perspective, we never demonize feelings. As uncomfortable as some emotions make us feel, attacking them, or distancing ourselves from them, only makes problems worse. Emotions are unavoidable. They are an expression of being human.  Learning to work with them requires patience and acceptance.

Grief is a particularly challenging emotion in that there is usually a definite object. Whether it be the untimely passing of a loved one, the end of a relationship, or some personal trauma we’ve endured, there is an event at the core of our grief to which we attach a conceptual narrative. Thus grief instigates an emotional environment that is a lot for s to work with. And grief, as we know, can be overwhelming. The very first step in working with this is to be kind to ourselves. We can begin with simplifying.  By clearing out the debris we can work with our immediate concern: how we are feeling now. A lot of our ancillary concerns are past regrets or future anxieties. BUt the Buddhist approach is to begin right now. “Start where you are” Pema says. So, what is happening now?

Our feelings are happening now. When we focus on the object, we forgo processing the feelings. Instead of healing, we seek to work through the story, finding blame, justification, or reasons why.  We get stuck in our head. Causality and consequences seem to offer solace, but stories are not feelings. In order to heal we have to acknowledge and accept how we feel. The stories and the frames are a temporary balm, but they only mask the energy we need to acknowledge and accept.

When we fixate on the event we are focusing our energies on things in the past that we cannot change. Wishing someone would change their mind, or that things could be as they once were is just a way of torturing ourselves. We can’t change anything but ourselves. But that can be a relief. I don’t have to fix anything!  I can just hold space for myself. I can turn my attention back home so that I can begin to heal. Healing begins with acknowledging and accepting. What is happening now?  And how can I best hold space for that, so the feelings can be here with me?

And with regard to an intense emotion like grief the best approach is to allow ourselves to heal. Patience is key and non-(self)judgement is essential.  So when I am working with grief, I make a commitment to be here with the feeling as long as it takes. Then I try and employ the old “RAIN” trope. These steps to recovery can be consecutive or random. They don’t have to be done perfectly. They are just ways to guide our minds from creating further suffering from an already painful situation.

Recognize. We are experiencing an emotion. It’s not our fault, nor is it a punishment. It is a natural part of our human experience. It just is. We don’t have to find a reason, justification, or an excuse. We don’t have to be embarrassed. Grief is shattering. It needs the space to be with us.

Accept. We can stop struggling, it’s only making it worse. Grief is completely natural and unavoidable. While grief is common to all beings, the suffering we create for ourselves is optional. We have a choice. We can turn away from the story and toward the feelings. The story is not all about me, but the feelings certainly are. 

Internalize. When we are ready, opening up to the feelings is an essential step in our recovery. I use the breath. This stage is like a conversation with my broken heart. Feeling the breath – in – out – in – connects us to ourselves. In the midst of our grief we can make a commitment to ourselves to stay here with our feelings for as long as it takes. Grief can stay in our system for years. This need not be disheartening. If we stop struggling with grief, and make friends with it, we have an energy that allows us to evoke empathy and compassion. There is a saying “may I never outrun my heartbreak.”  Our heartbreak keeps us human. In a world that pulls us into competition and materialism remembering our pain is how to stay human. This is so important to our spiritual growth. Rather than getting rid of our grief we can take the very brave step of becoming one with it. Challenging emotions offer us an opportunity to evoke lovingkindness for ourselves. 

Non-Identification (Letting go). Understanding that grief is not a punishment allow us to see that we are not at fault. We can let go of guilt. We can let go of struggle. We can let go of identification. “There is grief.” It will leave in its own time, but I can let go of all the struggle I create around it. We can let go of blame as we have no one to apologize to. We can hold ourselves up with dignity, as we are doing the work. And because we are doing the work of feeling the feelings, we have learned first hand what others are going through. Our grief connects us to the grief of our fellow humans. We are not so alone after all.

And while we don’t have to fix anyone – including ourselves – we can share and connect to those who might benefit from knowing how we feel.  In this way, we are letting go of self-importance and being willing to be humble, helpful, and present. In the midst of the direst of situations helping others is a ray of uplift.

 

 

 

Patience is like a welcome mat to the gateways of life.  We have moments in which different karmic streams seem to converge.  Equally frustrating is their opposite, when nothing seems to move at all.  Yet while the clash of life’s dynamic forces can be opportunities for chaos, they can also yield great clarity depending on how well we hold our seat and open our awareness. The key is to have the confidence to remain on our seat until clarity dawns.  That is patience. 

 

A heron waits in the reeds of a lake, silent and unmoving. She may be looking for food, or predators. She may be looking for nothing at all. But she is not hurried. Waiting is an essential part of nature’s survival game. Interesting. The key to survival in nature is not panic. And while quick defensive action is sometimes necessary, it must come at the right moment, when there is actual danger.  Human consciousness, by virtue of its large processing ability, can out-maneuver and out-strategize predators.  Unfortunately, this processing power comes at a cost. We are not always clear on what constitutes actual danger. Compared with other forms of carbon on the planet, we are relatively young in our development. It is as though we were thrust headlong into the maelstrom of survival. And despite our esteemable intelligence, we have not had the evolutionary time to develop the practical wisdom to differentiate actual danger from our imagined anxiety. For this reason humans are in a state of perpetual anxiety and unclarity. LIke the mythical ouroboros, the being that eats its own tail, our unclarity feeds our anxiety, which feeds our panic and locks us further away from clarity.  As important as our survival is, our fear of death only instigates behaviors that hasten the very thing.

 

The key is that when we feel the need to act, if we are acting out of anxiety caused panic, we are jumping blindly into the maelstrom. But jumping blindly is wildly random, with a low percentage of a safe landing. One of the erroneous ways humans create the feeling of safety is to employ the same patterns of behaviour, in the same situations, again and again. For all our intellect reacting habitually to danger – especially when we’re not sure if its danger at all – is a very poor survival strategy.  But should we not jump off our seat, this moment of fear can be seen as a gateway.  We can choose the same unseen panic reactions because habit feels like safety, or we can pause and wait until we are free of the momentum of panic. Then we might act spontaneously and creatively to the natural changes in our life.

 

The spontaneous response is dependent on our being able to pause and assess before we act. In meditation parlance we call this allowing the gap. That moment of pause allows us to stop and see. It affords a moment to regain our balance.  In this way, we have the opportunity to act mindfully rather than react blindly. That is the idea of the welcome mat to our new opportunity. Patience is a place to wipe our feet before we go in, tracking our negative karmic footprints all over our fresh start. 

 

In his Dharma Art teachings, Trunga, Rinpoche referred to the principle of “square one” as the idea of interrupting the momentum of our karmic streams. We come back to square one and begin fresh. These interruptions are anathema to ego, as egoic mind thrives on blind momentul. When we’re on a roll every interruption feels like a great annoyance. Likewise, when we are panicked and fighting for survival, we are driven to act and we hate the idea of waiting. And fairly, sometimes we don’t have a lot of time to wait, but we always have a moment to stop, breathe and return to the present. This reboot may be all we need to resynchronize and act from wakefulness. To those well-trained in meditation, patience might be a moment to breathe and reboot. But the training might require months of rest and learning to wait. Whatever it takes to begin to learn to give ourselves a break and get off our own backs. Pema calls this “learning to stay.” Sakyong Mipham refers to this as taking your seat and ruling your world. The patient monarch has created the space to see all the options available. Patience is the mat on that ground. Patience is the landing point.

 

Patience is not resignation. It is not grin and bear it as though we were stoically subduing our feelings until a storm passed. It is waiting until the ego pressure subsides in order to see the next right move. In this sense rather than grin and bear it we might say, “smile and bare it” as we cheer up and drop the artifice. Patience is remaining open to what is happening without interjecting ourselves. Patience is not shutting down. Patience is opening by allowing what needs to happen to organically arise. After years of aestheticism, activism and extreme yogiic training, the Buddha finally sat. He left the cities, the universities, the temples behind and sat beneath a tree in nature. Upon his awakening, Buddha attracted beings of the 6 realms. An old person stopped and asked who he was. With no need for a name, a designation, or a title he simply looked to her and said “I am awakened”. Skeptical, she asked “How do you know? Who can verify this?” He placed his hand on the ground.

 

“The earth is my witness”, he said.

 

The natural things of life need no shingles, credentials or diplomas.  THe natural things just are, and as such, connects effortlessly to the life that surrounds it.  Natural things are interdependent with all of nature. Our meditation can be like that. Natura and interdependent with all of nature. The mind our meditation uncovers can also be natural and connected to all of nature. Natural mind is the point. Natural mind happens as we develop the patience to be as we are.

 

Whether she is feeding, resting or about to flee, the heron is not motivated by anxiety, guilt or shame. Free of self-doubt, she waits silently until the moment she doesn’t.  She is taking her seat like a warrior connected to all the life around her.

 

How do we know?  The earth is her witness.

 

DOUBT

At our core, we all have a strong innate life force energy. Although sometimes it doesn’t feel this way, we have everything we need. We just doubt that we can do it. It’s a cornerstone of materialist culture that we always think we need more. The implication here is we’re not enough as we are.  Yet, we fundamentally don’t need to increase our sense of wellness via artificial means such as caffeine, drugs, or other dopamine precursors. In fact, some of those might deplete us in the long term. Sometimes we confuse the things we take for energy for our life force.  Coffee is not windhorse. Neither are our attachments or addictions. Although any of these may provide a temporary uplift or distraction.

 

The point is, distractions are not the point. We are, at the core, enough.

 

OKay truth is, I love my coffee in the morning. While good coffee, rousing music, falling in love, or cranking ourselves up on Instagram can make us feel alive for a while, sometimes we’re masking deeper needs. This creates a drain on our spiritual being. And while there is nothing inherently wrong with any activity we enjoy, there seems to be a problem when we believe we need it to get out the door. When we become reliant on these attachments, they become obstacles that block the flow of our life force. While we don’t need to increase our life force by artificial means, we can block our life force and sense of wellbeing quite easily. We can behave in ways that erode wellness. From a meditation perspective, we look at clinging and grasping – our attachments – as blocking the flow of our life force. So, the question is, what are the blockages to the flow of our life force? And how can we work with them?

 

Many meditation traditions refer to blockages as obstacles or hindrances. They are usually places we are holding on out of anger, desire, or ignorance. We may be holding on in our belly, or our shoulders. We may be holding on to an idea or philosophy. We may be holding on to a resentment toward another. Regardless, we are grasping at straws as way to escape the torrents we experience in life. Whether or not we recognize or acknowledge these attachments, they are causing blockages to the flow of our life force, our joy, and our life.

 

Throughout history, the image of a flowing river has been used by meditation traditions as a practical analogy. The flow of our consciousness is akin to the flow of a river. Sometimes we let go into the process and other times we get distracted by something compelling on the shore. This impedes our flow as we hang on. If we are very triggered, we might grasp at straws we believe will save us. Sometimes we hold on white knuckled for dear life. All of us have places that we can’t let go. And this takes self-forgiveness. We don’t have to fix everything. But we can begin to see the places that we are holding on and refusing to evolve.  External circumstances may have caused our suffering, but we are nonetheless holding on.

 

Whether minor distractions of major post-traumatic reaction, we can feel these blockages in our bodies as we grip. Grrrrrrrrr.

 

From the Buddhist perspective, the eye-level process to recovery is to identify obstacles and then find communication with them.  We begin with recognition, and then acknowledging that this is not our fault, it’s a fear-based reaction to pain. Then the next level is to look into the experience and find whatever issue they are trying to communicate. In extreme cases, we may not be able to access the core of our trauma, but we usually can see what we are experiencing in the moment. This is what the Buddha referred to as “removing the arrow first.” WE might notice “I’m frightened” or “I’m worried”.  And that may be enough to begin the conversation.

 

As we develop awareness, we become familiar with these panicked voices. As we gain familiarity, they become less threatening. In time, we have the opportunity to become friendly toward them, and this is the real healing. This is developing and employing compassion. Once we become friendly with the problem we can begin to try and understand it. This 4-step method (RAIN) is a skillful means to develop compassion.

 

The Shambhala Teachings highlight a category of blockages known as the “Trap of Doubt”. Doubt belies confidence and creates an energetic depression that gives way to clinging to any number of self-limiting patterns that are further blockages, or obstacles in our life. When our life force (windhorse) is low, our emotional / psychological immune system becomes compromised and we become vulnerable to adventitious emotional ailments. When our windhorse is low we doubt ourselves and fall victim to our mind and our environment.  We become prone to indulge in the grasping actions that further block our windhorse. On the other hand, virtuous thoughts and actions remove obstacles and allows energy to flow naturally. When our lifeforce is high mental afflictions roll off our backs.

 

So, to reverse the pathological effects of doubt, we can look into our experience and avoid the things that rob our life of energetic meaning. Here is a list of actions that the Shambhala School has identified as obstacles to experiencing joy. We can look into these in order to help release our minds into the flow of life.

 

Categories of Doubt

1. Anxiety
2. Jealousy
3. Forgetfulness
4. Arrogance
5. Slandering / gossip
6. Body and Mind are not Synchronized.

 

So, how do you experience self-doubt? How does this doubt lead to unhealthy attachments that further block our lifeforce? As we recognize doubt, we can begin to relax our attachments and let the flow of life – already in progress – resume.

 

Our picture today was photo I took from FIT’s graffiti board on 7th ave. 

UNDERSTANDING PROCRASTINATION

I’ve been planning on writing this post for years. Recently, my notes have been buried somewhere in a pile of papers on my desk. I’ve been planning on going through that pile for a while. 

Why is it we find doing the things we want to do, so hard to do?

Many of us will do what we have to do. We’ll show up for work when we’re sick so as not to waste a sick day when we’re not able to enjoy it. I’ll push myself to complete tasks when there are pressured demands, but find it hard to exercise, walk, meditate, write, or do any of the things that would enrich my life. It’s as though I’m not worth the effort. Of course, I am worth it. But what’s blocking me?

Some of us go in the other direction, spending too much time on things we think we want at the expense of the things we need. These excursions seem justified “I need to care for myself.”  But are distractions actually enriching us?  Caring for ourselves is important but when do we know when we are just being avoidant? We deserve to feel joyful about our lives. One of the things blocking our joy is all the things we have to do first – before we can relax.  I can’t go for a walk until I’ve finished my taxes. And I can’t get to my taxes until I’ve cleaned off the desk. And I can’t bear to look at the desk because I’m cooped up and claustrophobic. But looking at that pile on my desk just deflates me, so even tho I haven’t done anything, I’m too tired to go for a walk. I’ll just sit here chained to this stew and marinate.

It’s hard to get started when we feel defeated by the little things everybody else seems to accomplish so easily. It feels like we’re the only ones who put off till tomorrow what we maybe should do today. But this phenomenon is more common than we realize. Most of us have a pile of something somewhere that needs attention. The problem becomes compounded when we hold those things over our head and fail to do the things we need for our spirit, because of the material things we feel have have to take care of first. I can go for a walk. Who has the time? So we fail to address the piles on the desk, in our closet, down basement or clogging our inbox.  And that keeps us from doing the things we want to do for our heart. Our life becomes a ledger of things we need to do and what we haven’t done. That is a sad way to view our life.

So why don’t we do what we need to do? It may be that we are lazy, indulgent or undisciplined. That’s the way we’re programed to look at it.  Self-condemnation is a convenient default. But does berating ourselves do anything but  support the behavior?  Maybe what is actually happening at the core of our dysfunction is fear. Maybe we are scared of change and so lock away from our own life. In this sense, we are isolating from ourselves, cut off from our spiritual being. As the shaman asked the depressed person “When did you stop dancing?” “Why are you no longer singing in the morning?” “When do you last connect to your natural being in nature?”

But what about my pile?!

Maybe the pile, or the to-do list, the closet, is how our fearful mind is holding on.  As long as we have these undone things, we remain stuck. And when we’re stuck, we’re protected from change.  We hold ourselves in place with white knuckles and grit teeth. In the meantime, we are not only avoiding the thing we’re procrastinating, we are also not doing the things that encourage wellness and joy. We are bound up tightly in a ball of stuck.  This makes sense as the underlying energy is fear. We are protecting ourselves from change. Unfortunately, this also “protects” us from growth. We are stuck. That’s really all it is. Fear and stuck.

This is especially true when through guilt we begin to feel inadequate and incapable. It’s like a clamp locking down the weight. We are not lazy. We are fearful, and all the undone things in life are simply weights holding us down. We might be more fearful of our self-anger than whatever it is we’re avoiding. Usually, we do this to avoid stepping out of the cocoon. Getting anything done implies forward movement. And moving forward is moving out of the protective cocoon.

Okay then, if it’s about fear, maybe I should relate to myself as I would to someone fearful.  Are self-admonishment or recrimination appropriate responses to someone who already feels beaten down and overwhelmed?

Acknowledgement, acceptance, loving kindness and forgiveness are useful tools.  Acceptance of what needs to be done, acceptance of our fear of completion, taking the time to engender loving kindness and compassion for the unfinished work, and then removing our burden through forgiveness and letting go.

Acknowledgment means we are not running from the unfinished work. We are facing it. Acceptance means we are touching in with our fear and eschewing all self-judgement, then we can triage and isolate ONE THING that we can do to begin. We can then apply loving kindness meditation to this. Feeling ourselves generate love for the work we are about to do. Then we can forgive ourselves and turn back to love whether or not we have completed the task.

As we develop a loving acceptance for ourselves and our piles, we are better positioned to let go into the work of completion – one step at a time. Here are some pointers: 1) Do less than your ego demands, Just do what you have to do today. 2) avoid all negative self talk. It is not helping. 3) apply loving kindness practice and 4) let go into forgiveness. Care for your heart and spirit. These are the most important things we need to stay resilient and present.

Then, forget the pile, get out of the house and take a walk.

 

 

 

 

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