Dharma Talk

The Experience

2011-01-30T06:09:00.000-08:00

Kabir (1440 - 1518)

When "I" was, the Divine was not,

now the Divine is and I am no more:

All darkness vanished,

when I saw the Lamp within my heart.

The effulgence of the Supreme Being

is beyond the imagination:

Ineffable is its beauty,

to see it is the only "proof."

It was a good thing the hail fell on the ground,
for it lost its own selfhood:
Melting, it turned into water
and rolled down to the pond.

That which I went out to seek,

I found just where I was:

It now has become myself,

whom before I called ‘Another.’

When love renounces all limits,

it reaches truth.

With the load of desires

which you hold on your head,

how can you be light?

Wherever you are is the entry point.

Just throw away all thoughts of imaginary things,

and stand firm in that which you are.

Three Hard Teachings

2011-01-28T15:54:00.000-08:00

Teaching 3: Liberation Through Equanimity

(This is the final posting based on a public talk given by Joseph Goldstein on January 4, 2011.)

On any spiritual journey, there are countless pitfalls and booby traps lying in wait for the unsuspecting traveler. Some of these hazards can be big and overwhelming, but most are tiny and easy to miss. Until you get ensnared.

One such tiny trap on the path of mindfulness meditation is using the practice in order to make something unpleasant go away. This is what I have come to call the "Self-Soothing Trap" (see my blog of 1/18/10). If we use our meditation practice as a method for self-soothing, there is always the danger that we will become attached to this outcome and become trapped in it. If we have this expectation of relief, and the feeling we don't like does not go away, we will suffer.

In this practice, we are taught to turn toward pleasant or unpleasant experiences with equal attention. This is one definition of "equanimity": the ability to move into the unpleasant experiences just as deeply as we move into the pleasant ones. In his public talk, Joseph Goldstein said that "being with something in order for it to go away" is a strong indication that we are clinging to an outcome, or resisting something unpleasant through aversion. He suggested that we adopt an attitude that tells us, "If it stays for the rest of my life, it will be okay." So if you are looking to this practice to help you get rid of fear, for example, you are already caught up in clinging to an outcome.

As mentioned above, "turning toward" the experience is the skillful and appropriate response toward pleasant or unpleasant events. Turning toward them in order to make them stop, however, would be an example of being stuck in expectations. If this is the case, then we will never become truly liberated from the fear.

Furthermore, we need to examine any tendency that might be present to resist the experience. The smallest resistance to something can, once again, lead us into a mind trap of clinging, aversion, and resultant suffering.

So what's the point of having a practice that doesn't help us feel better? Isn't the point of all of this to relieve suffering? The point, as Joseph wisely noted in a Dharma talk some years ago, is that "anything can happen, any time." When we are able to consciously witness the changing nature of things, without interfering or imposing our desires upon them, we develop a new kind of relationship with the unpleasant as well as the pleasant. This allows us to see these experiences from different perspectives, and in doing so, the situations themselves actually change on their own. It may not mean that an unpleasant thing will go away, but it will mean that there can be less suffering around it.

Naturally, of course, our preference would be to not have pain, fear, sadness, loss, and so forth, but this is not possible to control, since anything can happen at any time. That is why I consider this to be a "hard teaching." I believe we would do better to cultivate an attitude of gently cradling our experiences, and our life, in a soft, open hand, rather than constricting it within a closed fist. When the tight, grasping hand is opened, we and our suffering are set free. So in reality, liberation is as easy as remembering to unfold the fist.

Blessings,
Roger

Three Hard Teachings

2011-01-22T07:34:00.000-08:00

Teaching 2: Don't Give the Arrows a Place To Land

(This is the second of three blogs inspired by a public talk given by Joseph Goldstein on January 4, 2011.)

In the previous blog, I mentioned the Parable of the Second arrow from the Samyutta Nikaya. Here is an excerpt of the first part of that parable:

When touched by a feeling of pain, the uninstructed run-of-the-mill person sorrows, grieves, and laments, beats his breast, becomes distraught. So he feels two pains, physical and mental. Just as if they were to shoot a man with an arrow and, right afterward, were to shoot him with another one, so that he would feel the pains of two arrows.

So it really comes down to this: For the arrow to hurt, it has to have a place to land. In other words, if we understand that all of our suffering is created by the mind, we must also understand that there is no "self" other than what the mind creates.

In his program, Joseph called this process of creating a self where none exists "selfing." I had never heard that word used as a verb before, and it turns out to be quite apropos. According to Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary (1973), when "self" is used as a transitive verb it means "to pollinate with pollen from the same flower or plant" (p. 1048). So when we "self" we are engaged in a sort of inbreeding feedback loop. First the mind receives a sensory stimulus, then it creates information (accurate or not) about that stimulus. When we come to believe that information, we create "I, me, and mine." A self is born.

(Perhaps not incidentally, the online Urban Dictionary defines selfing as "the act of saying something ridiculous, with absolute self-righteousness behind it, only proving how much of an idiot the person actually is." And apparently - according to their website, at least - it has become slang for describing masturbation. Who knew?)

Meanwhile, we still have that pesky first arrow to contend with. In the Samyutta Nikaya, the Buddha concluded that a person who does not create a self based on the sensory stimulus of the first arrow:

...feels one pain: physical, but not mental. Just as if they were to shoot a man with an arrow and, right afterward, did not shoot him with another one, so that he would feel the pain of only one arrow. (From "Sallatha Sutta: The Second Arrow" SN 36.6, translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu. Access to Insight, June 7, 2009.)

The cultivation of "no self," or anatta as it referred to in Pali, the language of the Buddha, is perhaps the hardest teaching in all of the Dharma. Because of this, however, it is the most valuable. Anatta offers us a way out of suffering while still allowing us to be fully engaged in life. It is not the same as denying the existence of the "sense of self" created by the mind, Nor is it a trick of somehow detaching mentally from an unpleasant predicament. It is, however, about knowing every experience that arises for what it is, and being able to live skillfully in the midst of it, without creating more suffering.

Again, as I said in the previous blog, and as the Buddha says above, there really is legitimate pain in life. And good luck trying to avoid it. What we may be left with are horrible memories that can torment us for the rest of our life. The cultivating of anatta is a process of knowing those memories for what they are - objects of mind - and not as facts that are happening in the present moment. In this way, even the most painful images from the past can be allowed to simply move through us, just as the second arrow does when it has no place to land.

Blessings,
Roger

Three Hard Teachings

2011-01-18T16:41:00.000-08:00

Teaching 1: We Are Responsible for Our Mental Suffering

Recently, I went to see the esteemed vipassana teacher, Joseph Goldstein, give a public talk. Joseph was one of the first Americans to be granted permission to teach vipassana in the West back in the '70's, so I believe he knows whereof he speaks regarding Buddhadharma. (Although he will be the first to tell you not to believe anything he says, but rather to experience things for yourself.)

I have been sharing the Dharma for a while now - coming up on ten years - and although I may never have the gravitas of a Joseph Goldstein, I know a little bit of what it is like to be up there presenting these sometimes (often times) difficult to understand and accept teachings. They are hard.

In the first part of his talk, Joseph spoke about compassion. A nice, easy subject that isn't too controversial and doesn't make people squirm in their seats. After all, this was not his sangha, and he did not know the "experience level" of the audience, so keeping things light is a good way to start.

The pitfall of this kind of approach, however, is that it can give rise to contradictions. If I'm talking about one of the main hallmarks of compassion as being the desire to help someone, I am contradicting the teachings of the Dharma that are clear about releasing attachment to desire to change anything (more on that in a forthcoming blog). This is exactly what happened to Joseph.

When it came time for the Q&A portion of the evening, however, he was able to take the temperature of the audience, and he could see that they were open to a bit more than just the vanilla Dharma talk he had presented. Finally, in answer to a question, he replied, "You may not want to hear this," (I love it when Dharma teachers begin a statement like that), "But we are one hundred percent responsible for the suffering in our own minds."

This means that any mental suffering that we experience, we create ourselves. It does not mean we are responsible for abuse perpetrated upon us, or for any physical illness or pain we may experience. It means that we are responsible for the suffering that comes after those events. If I was abused as a child, the initial responsibility for that abuse rests with the abuser. The continued suffering I carry with me is my responsibility.

It is the same principal as the Parable of the Second Arrow (see 10/31/09 & 1/16/10 blogs). If I am shot with one arrow, that is legitimate, physical pain. If I curse the shooter, lament my sorry situation, and go into a panic, that is the suffering created by the mind.

An antidote to this suffering is to deploy the first three of the Four Noble (or Knowable) Truths. If you find yourself suffering over some past event (the First Knowable Truth), ask yourself, "Is this thing happening right now?" The answer, of course, is "No. It happened a long time ago." So the suffering is caused by clinging to the memory of that experience (the Second Knowable Truth). To stop (or at least ease) the suffering, you merely need to release the tight, clinging fist from around this memory (the Third Knowable Truth). (For more on the Four Knowable Truths, see my series of blogs on the subject from July 18 to 23, 2010.)

This does not mean that we deny the experience happened, nor does it mean that we condone the harm that was done to us. It means that we can be with the memories of the experience in a new way - a way that promotes seeing the events clearly for what they are: objects of mind. When we cultivate this kind new relationship with these past events, we decrease our level of suffering around them. We can then understand more fully that the memories are thoughts, and not facts.

Blessings,
Roger

Uncle Bob

2011-01-17T16:31:00.000-08:00

This past weekend, I had the pleasure of meeting my 95 year-old uncle Bob for the first time. He is my father's half-brother, and both of them were the sons of Percy Llewelyn Fison. Until just a couple of years ago, uncle Bob was unaware that he had any living relatives. Thanks to the internet, and a timely posting of Fison family information by my cousin, and indefatigable family historian, Susan, he discovered that he had dozens of relations, some living only a few miles from his Carlsbad, California home.

My paternal grandfather, Percy, was a bit of a rake, you might say. He was a dreamer and a schemer, too, always chasing rainbows in every direction, never staying in one place - or with one woman - very long. And he never made his money the conventional way. For example, I have a picture postcard of him with one of his wives - a souvenir that they sold to finance their successful attempt to walk from Colorado Springs to New York City on their honeymoon in 1912.

Family myths have arisen around this Will-o'-the-wisp opportunist. My dad told us that Percy painted advertisements on the sides of barns in the Ozarks region (perhaps this is where he met my grandmother who was a resident of that area).

Another myth is that he tried to get into the motion picture business during the industry's "gold rush" days in the early 1920's, moving my grandmother and infant father to Los Angeles. Like so many fortune hunters, he never found gold, and the best he was able to do was a few days here and there as an extra. My grandmother, however, like so many other pioneer women, supported the family by dreaming up the idea to provide "boxed lunches" for the extras. So while she stayed home cooking fried chicken and biscuits, Percy sold them to his colleagues on the studio lots.

More than one family source has commented that he could never pass by a piano without playing it, although he'd had no musical instruction that anyone is aware of.

It seems Percy had a very bad habit of either marrying or taking up with various women, having children with them, and then abandoning them all when the whim took him. My own grandmother fell prey to this pattern twice, and uncle Bob was an innocent victim of Percy's wanderlust, as well. He says he has no memory of his father being there during childhood, and never met his father as an adult.

Like his other half-brother, my uncle David, Bob has been a minister, and continues to possess an abiding faith in the power of prayer. No doubt, he must have prayed for a family at some point in his life. And in their season, those prayers have been answered.

Bob's daughter told that he is not well, and has been diagnosed with lung cancer. He seemed vital and mentally agile when we met on Saturday, however, and his wife of more than 65 years, aunt Sylvia, moves with an ageless sense of grace, although she is 87. A spiritual center seems to be an important ingredient to longevity. It has been proven so in recent studies, and my own family appears to confirm it.

In comparing notes with my family in recent years, I have been struck by the similarities that run through the Fison clan. Percy's father, Sherwood Fison, was a minister, and two of Percy's sons became ministers as well. (My uncle David commented to me that I have a ministry as well in the form of the meditation sangha I have been leading for ten years.) Like Percy, my father never liked working for anybody else, and always told me to "be your own boss." That's the way it's been for me all of my adult life. I even came to California looking to strike it rich in showbiz.

Like Percy, all of the Fison men are musical and/or artistic. My dad played harmonica, uncle Dave plays the saw (no joking), and I've played guitar, mostly by ear, since I was nine. Now my own son, Zachary Sherwood Tatum-Nolan, cannot pass a piano without tinkling out a few phrases. And of course, he is completely self-taught.

It would appear, therefore, that the Dharma of interdependent causes and conditions that give rise to everything, exist within the family structure, as well.

Blessings,
Roger

The Power of An Empty Chair, Part 2

2010-12-14T14:29:00.000-08:00

In the last blog, I wrote about Liu Xiaopo, the Chinese dissident and writer who was awarded this year's Nobel Peace Prize in absentia because he is currently serving an 11-year prison sentence. Here is another perspective on what happens when those in power try to silence the voices of truth and reason.

"What He Thought"
by Heather McHugh

For Fabbio Doplicher

We were supposed to do a job in Italy
and, full of our feeling for
ourselves (our sense of being
Poets from America) we went
from Rome to Fano, met
the Mayor, mulled a couple
matters over. The Italian literati seemed
bewildered by the language of America: they asked us
what does "flat drink" mean? and the mysterious
"cheap date" (no explanation lessened
this one's mystery). Among Italian writers we

could recognize our counterparts: the academic,
the apologist, the arrogant, the amorous,
the brazen and the glib. And there was one
administrator (The Conservative), in suit
of regulation gray, who like a good tour guide
with measured pace and uninflected tone
narrated sights and histories
the hired van hauled us past.
Of all he was most politic--
and least poetic-- so
it seemed. Our last
few days in Rome 
I found a book of poems this
unprepossessing one had written: it was there
in the pensione room (a room he'd recommended)
where it must have been abandoned by
the German visitor (was there a bus of them?) to whom
he had inscribed and dated it a month before. I couldn't
read Italian either, so I put the book
back in the wardrobe's dark. We last Americans

were due to leave
tomorrow. For our parting evening then
our host chose something in a family restaurant,
and there we sat and chatted, sat and chewed, till,
sensible it was our last big chance to be Poetic, make
our mark, one of us asked

"What's poetry?
Is it the fruits and vegetables
and marketplace at Campo dei Fiori

or the statue there?" Because I was
the glib one, I identified the answer
instantly, I didn't have to think-- "The truth
is both, it's both!" I blurted out. But that
was easy. That was easiest
to say. What followed taught me something
about difficulty, 

for our underestimated host spoke out
all of a sudden, with a rising passion, and he said:

The statue represents
Giordano Bruno, brought
to be burned in the public square
because of his offence against authority, which was to say
the Church. His crime was his belief
the universe does not revolve around
the human being: God is no
fixed point or central government
but rather is poured in waves, through
all things: all things
move. "If God is not the soul itself,
he is the soul OF THE SOUL of the world." Such was
his heresy. The day they brought him forth to die

they feared he might incite the crowd (the man
was famous for his eloquence). And so his captors
placed upon his face
an iron mask
in which he could not speak.

That is how they burned him.
That is how he died, 
without a word,
in front of everyone. And poetry--

(we'd all put down our forks by now, to listen to
the man in gray; he went on softly)-- poetry

is what he thought, but did not say.

From Hinge & Sign: Poems, 1968-1993, from Wesleyan
University Press, 1994. Copyright 1994 by Heather McHugh.

The Power of An Empty Chair

2010-12-10T17:11:00.000-08:00

Until this morning, I had never heard of Liu Xiaobo. He is a Chinese writer who has been imprisoned and held incommunicado by his government for the past year, charged with inciting to overthrow the regime. Today, however, he was thrust onto the world stage as the the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. For the first time in 75 years, nobody was there to accept this award - Liu's wife and relatives are either in jail or under house arrest - and so his award was draped over an empty chair during the ceremony.

When will the oppressive totalitarian regimes of the world learn that by trying to silence the voice of one person, you give more volume and credence to that person's message? I would never have given the story about the Nobel Prize a second glance, had it not been for the controversy of Liu's detainment. If the Chinese government had allowed him to speak freely before, there would be no reason for him to even be nominated.

The empty chair on the stage of the Oslo City Hall, with the picture of Liu Xiaobo gazing down in mute testimony, was more powerful and potentially damaging to the Chinese government than any words that one person could ever utter.

Because he could not speak, today, I have excerpted a portion of "I Have No Enemies: My Final Statement To The Court" which was delivered by Liu on December 23, 2009, after he had been sentenced to 11 years on prison. It was read today by actress Liv Ullmann as part of the Nobel Prize ceremony.

I still want to tell the regime that deprives me of my freedom...I have no enemies, and no hatred. None of the police who have monitored, arrested and interrogated me, the prosecutors who prosecuted me, or the judges who sentence me, are my enemies. While I’m unable to accept your surveillance, arrest, prosecution or sentencing, I respect your professions and personalities.

For hatred is corrosive of a person’s wisdom and conscience; the mentality of enmity can poison a nation’s spirit, instigate brutal life and death struggles, destroy a society’s tolerance and humanity, and block a nation’s progress to freedom and democracy. I hope therefore to be able to transcend my personal vicissitudes in understanding the development of the state and changes in society, to counter the hostility of the regime with the best of intentions, and defuse hate with love.

Freedom of expression is the basis of human rights, the source of humanity and the mother of truth. To block freedom of speech is to trample on human rights, to strangle humanity and to suppress the truth.

Blessings,
Roger

A Lifetime of Temporary Relief

2010-11-13T07:38:00.000-08:00

Late one night a bunch of years ago, I was up watching television when I saw an advertisement for the Craftmatic Adjustable Bed. This modern marvel of sleep technology resembles the kind of bed you find in hospital rooms. It allows you to adjust the angle of the feet, legs, and head so you can sit up in bed and read or watch television, or elevate the knees to ease the lumbar spine. "All with the push of a button!" according to the voice-over announcer.

At the end of the commercial came the slogan: "The Craftmatic Adjustable Bed. For a lifetime of temporary relief from low back pain." Now obviously the legal department over at Craftmatic must have gotten hold of the script and insisted on this wording, but the absurdity of it still makes me chuckle.

In a way, though, this silly slogan sums up the experience of vipassana meditation. The back pain is equal to the suffering we cause ourselves from getting into the uncomfortable positions of clinging and aversion. These postures gives rise to a sense of self ("I want this/I don't want that") which can cause us discomfort. The "temporary relief" is the practice we learn through vipassana of being able to release the tight fist of clinging, or to abandon the aversion, and return to the present-moment reality.

Because the mind is tenacious, however, the thoughts that give rise to clinging and aversion will probably come back sooner or later, and we have to repeat the process all over again. And again. And again...

When you find yourself suffering because of ruminative, repetitive thoughts that are useless and upsetting, first begin by asking yourself, "Is this thing that I'm thinking of happening now?" Perhaps these thoughts come to you at night when you are lying in bed (whether Craftmatic or ordinary, it doesn't matter). This is a time when we are particularly vulnerable to negative thoughts and ideas. Obviously, the thing you are fearing in the future can't be happening in this moment, so you turn your attention toward a present-moment event, such as the feeling of the body breathing, or the feeling of your head lying on the pillow.

The mind has a built-in bias toward the present-moment experience, and will always favor the present-moment experience over a thought about an imagined future event. You can test this by trying to conjure up the taste of pickles while you're mindfully eating chocolate ice cream. The mind cannot hold these two things at one time, so it makes a choice to pay attention to the event that is actually taking place in this moment. (This would be a desirable trait in terms of human evolution. For instance, the intense concentration required for hunting would not have been possible if the mind had no mechanism to filter thoughts from present-moment reality.)

I really like these bits of empirical evidence that prove how mindfulness can actually work. It gives me a lot of confidence in my practice, and provides a real solid framework from which to teach these techniques to students and patients.

Remember, however, that the relief from the troubling thought will only be temporary. It will probably come back again, sooner or later. Therefore, do not expect miracles. These ruminative thought habits have been with you for a long time, so they are not likely to go away completely in one try. Nor are they ever likely to stay away once and for all. However, if you become diligent with this kind of practice of returning to the present-moment reality, and apply it throughout your day, it will become the new habit of mind, and your temporary relief will be guaranteed.

Or your money back.

Blessings,
Roger

Time Changes

2010-11-07T17:21:00.000-08:00

The time change from Daylight Savings Time to Standard Time took place this morning. I always welcome this one because it seems to give me an extra hour in the day in which to be productive. For one day, at least, I have enough time to do everything that I want or need to do on a Sunday. I can cafe sit with Kathy. There can be a leisurely walk with Sam the dog all the way to the park where we chase squirrels, run with other dogs, and watch the Tai Chi practitioners. The New York Times Sunday Edition can be savored, not just scanned. I can write a blog, cook dinner, then watch a movie with the everyone.

Time changes also bring home to me the fact that hours, minutes, days, and years are artificial concepts developed to help us to understand change.

When we meditate, however, we enter into the present moment where there is no time. Instead, it is always "now." Therefore, it appears that we exist in at least two realms: the world of time, and the world of no time. This may explain why a forty-five minute meditation can seem like only a few minutes, or like an eternity. When we are immersed in a timeless place, we don't have the movement of a clock or sun with which to judge the passing of the minutes.

The same experience happens when we are deeply absorbed in a task or project. Paying attention in the present moment in this way seems to hold a key to the timeless, the birthless, and the deathless.

So enjoy your time, as we begin the final descent into the darkness of the winter season. Connect with time through connection with nature, and connect with the timeless through your meditation practice.

Here is a poem by Mary Oliver, one of six pieces that appeared in today's New York Times to mark the end of Daylight Savings Time:

Lines Written in the Days of Growing Darkness

Every year we have been
witness to it: how the
world descends

into a rich mash, in order that
it may resume.
And therefore
who would cry out

to the petals on the ground
to stay,
knowing, as we must,
how the vivacity of what was is married

to the vitality of what will be?
I don’t say
it’s easy, but
what else will do

if the love one claims to have for the world
be true?
So let us go on

though the sun be swinging east,
and the ponds be cold and black,
and the sweets of the year be doomed.

Blessings,

Roger

Making Conscious Choices

2010-11-02T12:06:00.000-07:00

I just got back from voting. It always makes me feel good in a mushy, patriotic-y sort of way. I was in the first wave of eighteen year-olds to be given the privilege of voting in 1972, and I'm still proud to say I voted for George McGovern. Which may explain the strong streak of cynicism that gets mixed in with my nice mushy feeling. I heard Lily Tomlin say that she was concerned about her own cynical nature: "I worry that not matter how cynical I get, it's never enough to keep up."

As I left the South Pasadena Library wearing my "I Voted" sticker proudly on my chest, I thought about the citizens of Iraq and Afghanistan, and how they have to dip their finger in purple ink to show they have cast their ballot. Except, unlike the situation in those places, I am fairly confident that nobody in South Pas is going to kill me for voting.

We often take a long time of reflection and contemplation before making our choice at the polls. We carefully study the ballot propositions and the candidate's positions. Then we make sure that we punch the correct hole next to the correct number, making sure we leave no chad hanging after the debacle of 2000 (there's that cynicism again).

We tend not to bring this same level of care and attention into the choices we make in daily life, however. Most of the time, the "choice" is simply to go with the auto-reflex reaction of the mind. As Deepak Chopra wrote, "Like it or not, we are all infinite choice makers." At any point we can put everything on PAUSE and take a reflective moment before making our choice. All it takes is a momentary awareness of the situation, and then feeling a breath or two coming and going. This pause can create a bit of space between the situation and the response toward that situation. Responding mindfully, rather than reacting automatically, can make the difference between an effective choice of action, and a disaster.

Too bad we don't get little stickers every time we make skillful choices that say "I Took A Reflective Pause."

Blessings,
Roger

Hallows Eve

2010-10-31T13:42:00.000-07:00

Tonight is Hallows Eve, the night when the veil between this world and the Otherworld is at its thinnest, and the ability to communicate between the two worlds is at is greatest.

By some estimates, upwards of 80% of the United States believe in some form of afterlife. Personally, I'm not sure. I've had some pretty dramatic psychic experiences that make me wonder though, including a series of events that led me to precisely where I am right now. I believe it was a path prepared for me by the spirit of my dead father.

Roger Sherwood Nolan, Sr., who was born The Ides of March, 1921, died on February 10, 1990. At the moment of his death, I was in or near Atlanta, Georgia, where I was fulfilling a contractual obligation as the spokesman for a chain of regional grocery stores. My dad was in a hospital in Irvine, California, in the final stages of colo-rectal cancer.

I had been conflicted about traveling so far away from him. When I asked dad if I should go he adamantly answered in the affirmative. He was always a "make hay while the sun shines" kind of guy. My older sister, Gloria, was there keeping vigil, and he was in good hands. So I traveled to Atlanta, trading in my First Class airline ticket for two Coach seats so that my wife, Judy, could go with me, along with our then-infant son, Zach (Judy was born and raised just outside of Atlanta).

Judy and Zach were staying at her mother's house, while I was being billeted at a hotel near the studio where we were shooting the commercials. To save money, I was using a small pickup truck that had belonged to Judy's father, who had passed away a few years before.

At the end of the first day's shooting, I was returning to my mother-in-law's house, and looking forward to a home cooked Southern dinner. While waiting at a traffic light, I felt what I can only describe as a cold wind blowing through me. It was a definite "presence" that I immediately sensed as being Otherworldly.

My first thought was that I was being visited by Judy's dead father. The human mind wants to make sense of these kinds of things, and it seemed logical since I was driving his truck. I may have even said something like, "Ed, is that you?" The feeling passed, the light turned green, and I continued on, logging the experience in my memory to tell Judy when I got home.

I'm not sure if I mentioned the event the first thing upon arriving, but within a few minutes a phone call came for me. It was Gloria. "Dad's gone," was all she said. I knew in that moment that the feeling I had in the truck was the movement of his spirit in some way. "I know," I replied. "I felt it." As powerful as this experience was, however, it could not compare to what would come next.

A month or so later I found myself back in Atlanta shooting more commercials for the grocery store. Judy and I were using the opportunity to visit some friends of ours who lived on a wooded, and at that time at least, secluded river.

One evening, after everyone else had gone back up to the house to fix dinner, I stayed behind to meditate, sitting on a large boulder in the middle of the river. My thoughts turned to my father, and I called out to him silently. Within seconds, I felt like I was surrounded by some kind of perceptible energy field. It was like being in the middle of a swarm of butterflies, their thousands of wings beating lightly against me from head to toe.

Then I heard my dad's voice. It was very clear. How long we "spoke" together I do not know. As far as I remember, I never opened my eyes, so there was no physical presence, only an internal dialogue. In answer to my questions, he assured me that he was fine, that the death experience was pretty much as advertised, complete with the bright light and his mother there to help him through. He told me that he was now omnipotent, and that he was enjoying the experience because now he could really be of help to other people.

To that end, he informed me that he was preparing the way for me and my future. I did not ask him the specifics of this plan, but assumed it meant that I would have a successful and lucrative career as an actor, my main pursuit at the time. He assured me that he was available whenever I needed him, for a while at least, and he signed off by saying "as amazing as all this is, love is what makes life worth living."

Then he was gone. The beating of the butterfly wings subsided, and I finally opened my eyes. It was now quite dark. I got up and walked slowly, and very thoughtfully, up the hill to the house. Everyone was already sitting down to dinner when I appeared. I sat down without a word as every eye in the room stared at me. "What happened to you?" someone finally asked. "You look so different!"

And I was.

That experience led me seeking out a psychic in Los Angeles who had a sweatlodge in her back yard where I started attending sweats once a month. Where I met another attendee who practiced yoga. Which got me back into the practice I had neglected for some years. Which led to my quitting acting to become a yoga teacher. Which led me to vipassana meditation. Which led me to Spirit Rock Meditation Center and Jack Kornfield, Phillip Moffitt, and other teachers. Which led me to leading a meditation group in Los Angeles. Which led me to returning to school to become a psychotherapist. Which led me to leading mindfulness-based groups. Which led me to Kathy. Which led me to writing this blog. Which led me to this exact moment.

Thanks, dad. You prepared the way very well indeed.

Happy Hallows Eve,
Roger

#365

2010-10-29T10:18:00.000-07:00

A year ago tomorrow, October 30, 2009, I received an e-mail from Kathy saying that she had set up a blog for me. When I went to the site, I saw the blog title: Roger's Daily Dharma. I'm still not sure if it was intentional on her part to force me to write something every day (it's quite possible, since she is one heck of a good writing teacher), but it worked.

I loved the title. It reminded me of The Daily Word from the Unity Church that I used to read religiously (pun somewhat intended). It contains a daily dose of spiritual wisdom based on a single word or phrase. I have a lifetime subscription. However, the Buddhist publication, Tricycle, already has a blog called "The Daily Dharma," so I decided to change it to Dharma 365, the intention always being to create 365 blogs in one year.

And so, here it is. Three Six Five.

A year ago, this moment seemed so far away. So unattainable. So daunting! What would I find to write about every day? It reminded me of a scene from Our Town by Thorton Wilder in which the parents of a young man about to be married discuss their own marriage over breakfast on the day of the wedding:

Dr. Gibbs: (After a slight pause; laughing) Julia, you know one of the things that I was scared of when I married you?
Mrs. Gibbs: Oh, go along with you! (Eats)
Dr. Gibbs: I was afraid we didn't have material for conversation more'n'd last us a few weeks. (Both laugh heartily) I was afraid we'd run out and eat our meals in silence, that's a fact. Well, you and I been conversing for twenty years now without any noticeable barren spells. (Eats)
Mrs. Gibbs: Well, good weather, bad weather, 'tain't very choice, but I always find something to say.

Then there was the matter of discipline. Would I be able to keep this kind of thing up for a year? My pattern has always been to maintain some project or lifestyle change quite diligently for a short period of time, but then to lose interest, or get lazy and quit. One thing that writing this blog has shown me is that this is not necessarily true when it comes to the Dharma. I've been practicing vipassana pretty diligently since approximately 1997, and teaching it every week since January, 2002. So in one area of my life, at least, discipline does not seem to be an issue.

Now it seems that the year has gone by rather quickly and fairly effortlessly. I've never run a marathon, but I would imagine that the mind tells those who do that the finish line is too far away and they must stop. For me as well, at some points along the way, it seemed like I could not go on another step. Indeed, there were days when I had nothing in particular to say, and those were usually the days when I found a poem or quote to fill the space. Thank you to all the poets and collectors of quotations from whom I borrowed so freely.

Thank you, as well, to my students from whom I also borrowed. Many times, a chance comment during a class or sangha would be filed away and expanded upon the next day. As best I could, while maintaining anonymity, I always gave credit where credit was due for these nuggets of wisdom. If you were one of those inspirational folks and I did not give you proper attribution, I apologize.

Of course, my greatest inspiration over this year has been Kathy - my life partner, my best friend, my lover, my wife, and my Dharma. (Come closer so she doesn't hear this, but you see, she is the real writer. I am merely reflecting her brilliance.) She has influenced me on this journey beyond measure. She was always there to answer the most basic questions when I had them, and to give me praise when I wrote a particularly good posting. As she once wrote:

One of the ways I try to figure out if I'm on the right track is to ask myself - without fear or ambition - whether it's the path with heart. The answer is always immediately apparent. What I do with that knowledge is up to me.

And so, for putting me on this path, and for starting my feet moving in front of me, I dedicate these 365 blogs to Kathy.

Finally, thank you for reading this, whoever you are. Feel free to leave a comment, good, bad, or indifferent. It has been a great joy and totally unexpected surprise when people tell me they read this stuff. My gratitude is infinite.

So, in the spirit of invoking help from great writers, I will close this last blog of the project with the last line from The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. I think it sums things up rather nicely:

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

Blessings,

Roger

On Patience

2010-10-28T18:37:00.000-07:00

The fool thinks he has won a battle when he bullies with harsh speech,

But knowing how to be forbearing - that makes one victorious.

The worse of the two is he who, when abused, retaliates.
One who does not retaliate wins a battle hard to win.

Knowing that the other person is angry, one who remains mindful and calm
Acts for his own best interest and for the other's interest, too.
He is a healer of both himself and the other person also.
He is thought a fool only by those who do not understand the Dharma.

~ The Buddha from The Dhammapada

The Great Pain

2010-10-27T09:04:00.000-07:00

After a meditation practice a few days ago, a new student said, "It seems ironic that a practice that is supposed to end suffering causes us to suffer." This paradox brings up a very important point about vipassana.

First or all, to say that the practice causes suffering is not quite correct. Suffering can arise at any time. In vipassana, we are merely becoming aware of suffering when it occurs, and then we get to practice accepting it, allowing it, and letting it be. In this way, suffering becomes a teaching path that can lead us toward important insights about how the mind reacts to various stimuli, including physical pain.

It is not unusual to feel intense sensations of many kinds during our meditation practice. Pain is merely one of these events. Accepting that the pain is here, allowing it to be here, and and then letting the pain be can be a really insightful process, as long as we are not causing ourselves injury.

In Who Dies? An Investigation of Conscious Living and Conscious Dying by Stephen and Ondrea Levine, the subject of working with pain is given very detailed analysis:

It is important to recognize that there are various levels and intensities of pain. That all pains may not be able to be opened to with the same ease or perhaps even opened to at all. If we have waited until "the great pain" to open, it is quite possible that we will not have the spaciousness for deeper examination, because there has been so little preparation for such openness. But if we begin to play the edge of lesser pains, disappointments, fears, the wobblings of the mind, the contractions of the heart, in a gentle, day-to-day meeting and expansion, it prepares us for what comes later. It is the daily opening to the little pains that prepares us for the great pain. Playing the edge of our pain should be done with great compassion. Though it takes a certain steadfastness to maintain our concentration on, and openness to, pain, we should be aware of that quality of endurance that subtly creeps in to create some sense of a separate self with its accompanying resistance to life.

Blessings,
Roger

The Path of the Householder

2010-10-26T21:58:00.000-07:00

In an essay on monastic life, Thomas Merton wrote:

In a world of tension and breakdown it is necessary for there to be those who seek to integrate their inner lives not by avoiding anguish and running away from problems, but by facing them in their naked reality and in their ordinariness.

Most of us who follow the path of insight and enlightenment do not have the luxury (if that is the right word for it) to escape our daily lives and sit in contemplation day in and day out in a monastery. However, as householders, every time we touch the truth of life as it is being lived, even for only a moment, we embody the monastic ideal. Bringing even momentary awareness to those things that we have previously tried to hide from ourselves can have a profound impact on the choices we make in our daily life.

Blessings,
Roger

The Group Experience

2010-10-25T07:41:00.000-07:00

Many students over the years have commented upon how much more intense the meditation experience seems to be when practiced with others. I wholeheartedly agree. Whether with one other person, or more than one thousand, as I have experienced at some conferences, there seems to be something going on in the group that doesn't happen when practicing alone.

Don't get me wrong. I am not advocating that we only practice with others. In fact, many of my most powerful and life-changing insights have occurred during solitary practice. The sweetness of being still within one's being is truly unparalleled.

Yet, something occurs in a group context that cannot be denied. Maybe it's the fact that humans are gathering and doing one thing together that imparts a greater sense of purpose and importance to the practice. Maybe it's because we really are connected to each other by some invisible thread of consciousness that is perceptible when practicing with others.

Or maybe it's more akin to the way Anne Lamott speaks of her own inner experience: "My mind is like a bad neighborhood. I try not to go there alone."

Blessings,
Roger

From "Demian"

2010-10-24T12:07:00.000-07:00

By Herman Hesse

There is no reality except the one contained within us. That is why so many people live such an unreal life. They take the images outside them for reality and never allow the world with the body and mind to reveal itself.

The Roses of Bereavement

2010-10-23T23:56:00.000-07:00

I was talking with a friend who had lost his partner to cancer earlier this year. "How long has it been?" I asked. He paused and looked into the distance, his eyes heavy with tears. "Eight months and two days," he said quietly.

Bereavement is never easy. It's especially difficult when the person who is gone is young (she had just turned 44), has a family (a young son and daughter), and possessed a certain ability to bring life to the world (she did). I knew his partner only briefly, and she was one of those people you never forget: self-possessed, assured, strong, yet full of love and life force. After she died, the nursing staff at the medical center where she spent many months in treatment produced a video of tender and moving memories of her that was played at the memorial. She was that special.

So my friend has spent the past eight months and some odd days doing what? Gardening. He saw that the flowers at the church where her memorial was held needed tending, and he has been there practically every day since. The roses have flourished under his skilled attention. They grace the church alter on Sunday mornings, and he brings them regularly to the Starbuck's he and his partner considered "theirs."

As we were talking, it reminded me, again, that we touch so many lives in ways we will never know. The dozens if not hundreds of customers at the Starbuck's may not know who brought the roses, but they are seen, and a hundred days are brightened by just that much. In this way, the bereavement it channeled and transmuted into a gift for everyone. And a young life that has ended continues to change the world.

Blessings,
Roger

From "Knots"

2010-10-22T15:20:00.000-07:00

By R.D. Laing

I want it
I get it
therefore I am good

I want it
I don't get it
therefore I am bad

I am bad
because I didn't get it

I am bad
because I wanted what I didn't get

I must take care
to get what I want
to want what I get
and not get what I don't want

What Fear Fears Most

2010-10-21T11:19:00.000-07:00

On my way to Orange County the other day, I saw a new billboard advertising the annual Halloween extravaganza at a local theme park. The slogan for this year: "What fear fears most!"

It often comes down to that in our day-to-day lives: we fear what we fear. In the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, Text Revision (aka DSM-IV-TR) we can find this experience in the diagnosis of Agoraphobia. Most people think of Agoraphobia as meaning simply the fear of open spaces. This is only partially true. The first criteria for this disorder in the DSM-IV-TR is:

Anxiety about being in places or situations from which escape might be difficult (or embarrassing) or in which help may not be available in the event of having an unexpected or situationally predisposed Panic Attack or panic-like symptoms.

So Agoraphobia is basically the fear of being afraid.

We all remember Franklin Roosevelt's words at his first innaguration in 1933, with the world in the grip of an economic depression:

Let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.

I see this paralyzing fear in almost every psychotherapy session, and I know it to be present in my own life, as well. Mindful awareness has helped me in many ways to recognize that most of my fears are only about feeling fear, and that there is nothing in most situations that really warrant feeling fear beyond that.

Perhaps if we can simply stop for a moment when the habitual feeling of fear arises, and reflect upon what exactly we are afraid of in that moment - or better yet, what in that moment is there really to be afraid of - perhaps we can see the impostor of fear more clearly for what it is: a simple thought, and a habit of the mind.

Blessings,
Roger

From "The Country of Marriage"

2010-10-20T19:38:00.000-07:00

By Wendell Berry

Sometimes our life reminds me
of a forest in which there is a graceful clearing
and in that opening a house,
an orchard and garden,
comfortable shades, and flowers
red and yellow in the sun, a pattern
made in the light for the light to return to.
The forest is mostly dark, its ways
to be made anew day after day, the dark
richer than the light and more blessed,
provided we stay brave
enough to keep on going in.

What's The Point?

2010-10-19T17:34:00.000-07:00

A couple of days ago, an 87 year-old friend of mine confided to me that she is ready to die. "What's the point of going on?" she asked. "I don't do anything useful. I don't contribute to society. I'm just a drain on everybody, and it's only going to get worse with time."

So we discussed this very interesting question. What is the point? Alan Watts once said that "the point of life is reached in every moment." If that is true, then this moment is the point. Just this.

I also remembered the Frank Capra film It's A Wonderful Life, with Jimmy Stewart as a man who decides life is just not worth the struggle any more and wishes he had never been born. An angel sent to help him gives him his wish, and the rest of the movie is about all the things that were different because this one man never existed. "One man's life touches so many other lives," Clarence, the angel, tells him.

So I reminded my elder friend that she has the potential to affect the life of every person she meets. Even a momentary conversation on an elevator or in line at the grocery store has the potential to offer a new perspective that could alter the course of history. In this way, as long as she can make contact with the world, she has usefulness in the world. Without her, the world would be a different place, and when she goes, the world will be poorer for it. That is the point.

Blessings,

Roger

2010-10-18T17:46:00.000-07:00

From Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy: A New Approach to Preventing Relapse by Zindel V. Segal, J. Mark G. Williams & John D. Teasdale.

Because the theme of connecting to the present moment is examined in sitting meditation, participants are asked to observe in the body these reactions of aversion or attachment that arise during the practice. They are invited to notice how such reactions are powerful competitors for attention and often take awareness away from the breath, moving the focus to other, seemingly vital thoughts or feelings. The practice of mindfulness can be a powerful ally, allowing us to notice when this has occurred and to regain the ability to choose where we wish to place our attention in this moment. Note, again, that the aim of the practice is not relaxation or even happiness. Rather, it is freedom from the tendency to get drawn into automatic reactions to pleasant and unpleasant thoughts, feelings, and events. But getting drawn into such thoughts and imaginings still happens - even for experienced meditators. The promise of mindfulness practice is not that such mind wanderings will be prevented, but that a person will come to find it possible to extricate him- or herself from it in a non-judgmental way when it does occur.

All The Hemispheres

2010-10-17T17:38:00.000-07:00

By Hafiz

Leave the familiar for a while.

Let your senses and bodies stretch out

Like a welcomed season

Onto the meadows and shores and hills.

Open up to the Roof.

Make a new water-mark on your excitement

And love.

Like a blooming night flower,

Bestow your vital fragrance of happiness

And giving

Upon our intimate assembly.

Change rooms in your mind for a day.

All the hemispheres in existence

Lie beside an equator

In your heart.

Greet Yourself

In your thousand other forms

As you mount the hidden tide and travel

Back home.

All the hemispheres in heaven

Are sitting around a fire

Chatting

While stitching themselves together

Into the Great Circle inside of

You.

From: 'The Subject Tonight is Love'

Translated by Daniel Ladinsky

Fluorescent Rocks

2010-10-16T23:27:00.000-07:00

As I've often said, nothing special happens in vipassasa meditation. It's just the everyday, ordinary stuff of life that occurs. The content of these events does not change. What changes is how we pay attention to them in a state of mindful awareness. This changes the ordinary into the extraordinary.

It's like those rocks in the Natural History Museum that appear very plain and drab when seen under normal lighting, but which display beautiful fluorescent colors when seen under ultraviolet lights. The content of the rock has not changed, just the way the rock is being seen.

Blessings,
Roger

Managing Fear

2010-10-15T07:35:00.000-07:00

An acquaintance and I were discussing life the other day, and among the topics was the subject of happiness. "How would you define happiness?" I asked her. "The absence of fear," she replied. Then she thought for a moment and continued, "And acceptance."

That last piece is pretty important. We may never experience the total absence of fear in our lives. However, we can learn how to turn toward it, acknowledge it, and let it be.

Many years ago, I felt paralyzed by fear. At the time, I was making my living as an actor, so this kind of paralysis is not a good thing. On the advice of a counselor, I began to imagine my fear as an inanimate object. I found a little rubber ball with an ugly, menacing face on it in a toy store, and I would secretly carry it with me wherever I went. For example, when I had an audition, it went with me and waited patiently in my briefcase until I was done. When I began to see my fear as no more threatening than a piece of rubber, I was able to manage it much more easily.

A few years later, I was in my early vipassana practice, when I began to feel that paralyzing fear again. During one sitting, the fear was so strong I was practically shaking. Finally I'd had enough. I "turned toward" the darkness where the fear was hiding and shouted inwardly, "Okay, you asshole! Let me see you! Show me what you've got!" Out of the shadows came the face on my rubber ball, which had been lost for quite some time. "Boogah-boogah!" it seemed to say, trying to frighten me. "That's it?" I laughed. "That's the best you can come up with?" The face seemed to grow very sad, and it slunk away back into the shadows never to bother me quite so much again.

Our fears are not real. They are objects of our mind. They are thoughts about an imagined future based on a remembered past. They have no more reality than this. When we can face them, and see them for the impostors that they are, then we have a chance to experience acceptance and, perhaps, happiness.

Blessings,
Roger

Sins of My Father

2010-10-14T22:38:00.000-07:00

Kathy and I watched a very good documentary tonight called Sins of My Father. The film follows Sebastian Marroquin,the grown son of the late Colombian drug lord, Pablo Escobar as he attempts to pay some of his father's karmic debts.

As the head of the Medellin drug cartel in the 1980's and '90's, the elder Escobar was extremely wealthy, powerful, and dangerous. When he tried to enter into Colombian politics, he was exposed and denounced by his chosen party, and subsequently ordered the assassinations of the two party leaders. The documentary shows Sebastian reaching out to the sons of these leaders, asking for forgiveness and healing.

Three things stood out for me while watching this film. First and foremost, it exemplifies the Buddha's teaching that "Hatred never ceases by hatred." Sebastian's decision to end the cycle of violence that had been his father's legacy results in peace and understanding between everyone involved.

Another theme of the film is that Pablo Escobar was, at heart, a family man who made his fortune in a way that was extraordinarily unskillful and harmful to countless other people. No villain walks around gloating to the world about how evil they are, and Escobar was no exception. Seeing him in family home movies playing with his children, and hearing the sadness in Sebastian's voice as he remembers these happy family times, one is reminded that we are all just human beings looking for love.

Finally, the documentary reminds us that when we get what we think we want, we are still subject to suffering. Toward the end of the film, Sebastian recounts how his family had to huddle together inside the money vault his father had built in their home which was under siege by Colombian drug police. "We were starving," Sebastian said. "Here we were in a room with millions of dollars, and we didn't have anything to eat." All the money that his father had amassed, paid for with the misery of so many others, was absolutely worthless.

Blessings,
Roger

Cooked People

2010-10-13T17:58:00.000-07:00

Unformed people delight in the gaudy and in novelty. Cooked people delight in the ordinary.

~ Zen Saying ~

Ancestry Dot Com

2010-10-12T21:16:00.000-07:00

I saw a commercial this morning for Ancestry.com. A woman was giving a testimonial, saying that thanks to the research into her family tree, she discovered that her great grandmother had borne five children, but that only one had survived.

This was an obvious comment upon how precious and mysterious the interconnected web of causes and conditions actually is. For those of us who are familiar with the doctrine of interdependent co-arising, this is not new information.

Nice to see it utilized in mainstream advertising, though.

Blessings,
Roger

The Everyday Made Exciting

2010-10-11T08:31:00.000-07:00

Zen is not some kind of excitement, but concentration on our usual everyday routine.

~ Shunryu Suzuki ~

Harnessing the Wandering Mind

2010-10-10T21:46:00.000-07:00

In vipassana practice, the breath is usually the primary object of attention. This is not to say that we must always have the attention on the breath or we have failed. It is impossible for the human mind to maintain attention on a single object indefinitely either by force of will or through training. Inevitably the mind will wander or become distracted, if only for a moment.

Many times I have said that the wandering mind should not be viewed as an obstacle in meditation practice. Instead, it is actually an opportunity to help us awaken. The mind is the most powerful force we know of, and its power can be harnessed and utilized in service of enlightenment and insight. It is the same principle that allows a stream of water to be put to use turning a wheel to grind grain or to create electricity.

When we begin our practice, we usually devote as much attention as we can to the feeling of the breath. This helps the mind to gather and collect more fully in the present moment (a phrase I learned from Phillip Moffitt). Once the mind has become more present, we can then turn our attention toward objects of mind (thoughts) as they arise in much the same way we devote attention to the feeling of the breath. By doing so, we can gain insight about how the habits of our mind.

For example, let's say I've been sitting for a while in meditation, feeling the body breathing in and out, getting the mind to become more present, when I notice that one of my legs has fallen asleep. I can make the choice to turn my attention toward that experience, and then I can notice the almost immediate experience of the mind creating a preference, judgment, or story about the physical event. I can witness, and at the same time participate in, the mind wanting things to be other than the way they are right now. I can see clearly all the stories that the mind tells about the leg - how I'll never be able to walk again, for instance. Then after the insight is gained, I can return my attention back to the breath.

This is the same process as noticing the wandering mind earlier in the meditation practice, but now I am able to keep my attention on the thoughts in a mindful way and store this experience as insight. This insight may be able to serve me in daily life when I notice the experience of wanting things to be other than the way they are.

In addition, by not trying to fix or change the situation in the meditation practice, but rather by allowing it to continue, I am creating new habit patterns in the brain that will help me in daily life as well. These new habit patterns may help me to make more effective choices instead of automatically reacting toward situations.

So again we see that everything that arises during our practice (and at any time during our life) is not only grist for our mill, but can also provide the power to run the mill.

Blessings,
Roger

I Find You In All These Things

2010-10-09T22:52:00.000-07:00

By Rainer Maria Rilke

I find you in all these things,
to which I am a brother in all,
in which minuscule seed you minutely hide yourself
and in the Great, you greatly reveal yourself.

This wondrous game of power
which unfolds itself in submission:
stretching through the roots, thickening in the trunks,
and resurrecting though the treetops.

(Translation by James Hollis)

2010-10-08T19:31:00.000-07:00

When we are meditating on the breath and the mind wanders, this is an opportunity, not an obstacle.

1. The wandering mind means that a) we have temporarily drifted into a mindless state, and b.) sense of "I, me and mine" has arisen. This is useful information because often we are not often aware of either of these conditions.

2. When we become aware of the thought that led to the mind wandering, we have an opportunity to know what we are thinking. Again, we are often either not present with our thoughts, or they take place below the level of consciousness. By knowing what we are thinking while we are thinking it, we have the opportunity to see the pattern of ruminating thoughts that might be arising.

3. The wandering mind offers us the opportunity to awaken when we become aware that it is wandering.

4. We then have the opportunity to make the conscious choice to return the attention back to the breath. In this way, we are gently training the mind to disengage from thoughts, and return to the present moment reality of the breath.

Blessings,
Roger

A View From the Bridge

2010-10-08T17:44:00.000-07:00

From Aphrodite In Jeans: Adventure Tales About Men, Midlife, and Motherhood by Katherine Shirek Doughtie (Nolan).

This summer I stood on a small bridge overlooking a stream in Vermont. and I had an interesting thought: If I were a leaf floating on that stream, what I'd be most aware of, in fear of, and consumed by would be the rocks.

The rocks would always be in my way, forcing me to go one way or the other, making me crazy to avoid them, but they would appear in front of me again and again. If I were a leaf, my life would be all about the rocks.

When viewed from above, however, the thing that's most interesting about the stream is its direction and flow. It's obvious from the bridge that the rocks have nothing to do with anything. They add beauty. They add texture. but the do nothing to impede the leaf's journey. That leaf is traveling downstream, whether it wants to or not.

The obstacles simply do not matter. Even the destination does not matter. The movement, the flow, the act of navigating the waters - that's what it's all about.

Asking yourself - without fear or ambition - if a direction is a path with heart tells you if you're poised on the edge of the river bank. The call to adventure is the invitation to jump into the river and find out what's going to happen next.

Blessings,
Roger

A Family Is Like a Garden

2010-10-07T17:41:00.000-07:00

A family is a place where minds come in contact with one another. If these minds love one another the home will be as beautiful as a flower garden. But if these minds get out of harmony with one another it is like a storm that plays havoc with the garden.

~ The Buddha ~

Invite and Allow

2010-10-05T15:56:00.000-07:00

One of the hallmarks of vipassana meditation practice is the concept of "inviting and allowing." We invite anything that is present to be known. Then, when it is known we acknowledge that it is present, and then allow it to continue.

In this way, anything that happens during our practice can bring us insight. An itch on the nose can become an insightful experience as we note and allow the itch to continue. Then, in turn, we acknowledge and allow all the aversive thoughts that accompany the itch to be known. If we had simply reached up and scratched, we would never had been given the opportunity to gain insight about the habitual workings of the mind.

Blessings,
Roger

The Dharma of Sesame Street

2010-10-04T15:45:00.000-07:00

For those of you with children, you no doubt are familiar with "Sesame Street." In this morning's New York Times is the obituary for Dr. Gerald S. Lesser, a Harvard psychology professor, and chief adviser to the the long-running PBS series. Dr. Lesser helped create one of the most popular characters on that show: Oscar the Grouch.

Oscar lives in a trash can. He helps show children that perspectives can exist in the world that may be radically different from their own. Whereas most people don't like a lot of loud noise, Oscar loves it. Most people think trash is yukky, but Oscar thrives in it. For me, one of the most memorable songs from the show was Oscar's magnum opus, "I Love Trash."

The mind tends to put up preferences and judgments about things based on our personal perspectives. We can see these perspectives quite clearly in vipassana meditation practice. If I am meditating and a loud car goes by outside, I will probably have a thought something like, "I hate those guys with their loud cars who are always bothering my meditation!" However, if I was a big NASCAR fan, I might find the sound of a loud car to be a pleasant experience, evoking fond memories of some experience I had at the track.

When we note our preferences and judgments in meditation practice, or in daily life, we can take a moment to remember that they are habits of mind brought on by our perspective on the world. When we hold these experiences in this way, with a more open hand instead of clinging to some way we wish it were, or instead of trying to push the experience away out of aversion, we can be more relaxed and easy-going.

In his own way, Dr. Lesser has helped generations of young people to be more understanding of the perspectives of others. The hope being that, when they grow up, these kids will be more tolerant and compassionate toward those with different cultures, beliefs, and traditions. Because of his work, there is a little less suffering in the world.

To see Oscar singing "I Love Trash," click on this link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1SiSUrvUnk

Blessings,
Roger

When Conditions Aren't Perfect

2010-10-03T18:18:00.000-07:00

There was a time in my meditation practice when I couldn't do it unless I had everything in my environment just right. I had to be in the right place with the right sitting cushion. The temperature had to be just right. There couldn't be much noise around me or other distractions.

When I began teaching, I would find myself getting upset if I was leading a meditation and there was any kind of noise from outside. Because of my need to have everything perfect, I was projecting that need onto my students, fearing that the noise was upsetting them as well.

Now, when I am practicing by myself, or when I am leading a practice, I welcome the imperfect in all its many forms. I have grown quite fond of meditating in the noisiest places I can find. Airport or airplanes are particular favorites. These days, when the Athens Disposal Company truck arrives in the alley behind the yoga studio where we meditate on Thursday mornings, I welcome the sound. I know that it will give me and my students an object toward which to turn in order to see clearly the way we habitually greet these kinds of experiences. This insight can serve us later when faced with daily life situations and we have the opportunity to experience these reactive states in real time. It may mean the difference between reacting mindlessly, and responding skillfully.

Blessings,
Roger

Surrender

2010-10-02T21:23:00.000-07:00

In today's meditation sangha, one of the participants shared with us a great definition of "surrender:"

"Letting go of resistance to the way things are."

Blessings,
Roger

Watch The Thought

2010-10-01T18:22:00.000-07:00

The thought manifests as the word; the word manifests as the deed; the deed develops into habit; and habit hardens into character. So watch the thought and its ways with care, and let it spring from love born out of concern for all beings.

~ The Buddha

Like This...

2010-09-30T13:34:00.000-07:00

My teacher Phillip Moffitt is very fond of using the phrase "like this" to help describe and teach how to deal with events as they arise. If a leg falls asleep during meditation, he'll say, "my leg falling asleep is like this." If there is strong sense desire during practice, "desire is like this." If I am overcome with a strong feeling of joy, "joy is like this." To anything that happens in our life we can add the words, "like this."

These two words are extremely helpful and powerful in moving us toward an ability to accept "what is" in each moment. It is not a capitulation or surrender. It is not a denial that we might want things to be other than the way they are. "Like this" means that we are acknowledging the fact of the present moment, which is the first step toward effective action.

In your practice, and in daily life, apply the words "like this" to any experience or situation that arises. Note what happens to the experience, and note as well the inner adjustment that takes place toward the experience. You may find that your relationship toward the event changes dramatically, and that your level of suffering decreases as a result.

Blessings,
Roger

There Is A Pain So Utter...

2010-09-29T21:15:00.000-07:00

599
By Emily Dickinson

There is a pain — so utter —
It swallows substance up —
Then covers the Abyss with Trance —
So Memory can step
Around — across — upon it —
As one within a Swoon —
Goes safely — where an open eye —
Would drop Him — Bone by Bone.

The Discrepancy

2010-09-28T18:44:00.000-07:00

A lot of the time in our lives, there is a discrepancy between the way things are and the way we wish they could be. In the Doing Mode state of mind (see yesterday's blog), we are usually concerned with trying to close the gap between these two polarities. By focusing on the discrepancy, however, we may be missing a bigger, and potentially more useful perspective.

When we are trying to change, manipulate, or get rid of something in order to close the gap, our focus is very narrow, and our happiness is dependent upon the achievement of a particular result. Sometimes we might be able to affect useful change, but a lot of the time, these things are out of our control.

Rather than trying to close the gap right away, it might be better to just sit with the experience of things not being the way we want them to be in that moment. This is an example of bringing "Being Mode" to bear upon the situation. This approach can not only decrease our anxiety about the situation almost immediately, but it can also engage a wider and wiser way of seeing things. When we "decenter" from the obsession with fixing the gap, and when this kind of "wise mind" is deployed as a result of the decentering, solutions that we never considered before begin to present themselves. (For more information about wise mind, see 5/19/10 blog.)

Blessings,
Roger

Doing Mode vs. Being Mode

2010-09-27T18:09:00.000-07:00

In Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy, we recognize two basic modes of mind: "Doing Mode" and "Being Mode."

Doing Mode is where most of us spend a lot of our time. Doing Mode is focused on achievement and outcome. It is result oriented. An example of Doing Mode might be that if we are traveling on a road trip, we would be obsessed with getting to our destination and we would miss all of the scenery going by. It would be more important that we get from point A to point B in a certain amount of time, and we would only see the trip as successful if that time coordinate is met.

Being Mode is not concerned with the ultimate goal or outcome. Being Mode is all about the process, not the result. We notice the scenery as we move through it, and we enjoy the journey itself, moment-by-moment, rather than concerning ourselves with the future outcome. When we are in Being Mode, we are in the present moment, and we are available for everything that moment has to offer - pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral though it may be.

Being mode is probably best summed up in the old saying, "The journey is the destination."

Blessings,
Roger

Fear Leads To Anger

2010-09-26T08:59:00.000-07:00

My 15 year-old stepson loves movies, and he can remember dialogue almost verbatim from one viewing. He's also decided that he wants to explore being an actor. He has many natural gifts for such a field, such as intelligence, a great sense of humor, and an uncanny talent for impersonation.

The other morning, Kathy and I were in the kitchen talking about anger as being a secondary emotion that arises out of the primary emotion of fear. Out of the living room, and with impeccable timing, there came the voice of Yoda from Star Wars (being channeled by my stepson):

"Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering."

Blessings,
Roger

Building a Platform

2010-09-25T17:18:00.000-07:00

When we practice vipassana, or mindfulness meditation, the primary object of attention is always the feeling of the breath. Since the breath and the senses are always present moment events, feeling the body breathing draws the mind into the present moment as well. When the mind is more present, it can see more clearly its own habitual tendencies toward the world it perceives.

I tend to describe this experience of paying attention to the breath as being like building a structure - a platform - from which we can see things more clearly. The more we practice, the quicker and easier it is to build the platform. Pretty soon, the structure of mindfulness is available any time we need it during our daily life. We can bring momentary awareness to a situation or event, or to a thought or feeling, and in that short time of paying attention, we become mindful. The platform is immediately built, and we can see more clearly from this new perspective.

All of this takes place in just a second, and yet that moment of reflection can make a huge difference. In that moment, we can see clearly the habitual tendency of the mind in that situation. If that tendency is potentially ineffective or even harmful, we can make another choice. The choice might be to simply continue observing the mind and any emotional reactions that may be resulting from our thoughts without taking any action.

For me, this reflective moment has been one of the most important and useful benefits of vipassana practice. Having the ability to bring momentary awareness to a situation has prevented countless unskillful and unnecessary reactions. This has led to countless opportunities to limit or eliminate suffering, which is the ultimate aim of vipassana.

Blessings,
Roger

B.Y.O.Z.

2010-09-24T18:27:00.001-07:00

The only Zen you can find on the tops of mountains is the Zen you bring up there. ~ Robert M. Pirsig

Thoughts About Change

2010-09-23T20:23:00.000-07:00

Recently, a client asked me to define how I see the process of change in the context of psychotherapy. What changes, and how does this happen?

I told him that we all have our habitual ways of reacting to certain experiences, situations, and people in our lives. These habit "pathways" are pretty deeply grooved over a period of years, and they are very difficult to change. I believe, however, that these habits are exactly what we are attempting to change in therapy.

I also believe that we may never be able to completely change or get rid of these habitual tendencies. We can learn to make more skillful and effective choices through awareness of these tendencies. We can sometimes cultivate new habits that will take their place. We might start to go down those old neuropathways and then catch ourselves and make a course correction. Or we might even get completely swept away by the habitual tendencies as though we were never aware of them at all. Get rid of them once and for all, though? I doubt it.

These habitual tendencies are a huge part of our personalities, and changing our personality is not the goal of psychotherapy, in my opinion. That would be like saying, "I'm going to change the person I think I am," and that seems way to difficult. The process, therefore, is not about changing who we are, but about changing our relationship to who we are. It's not about changing our thoughts, but about changing our relationship to our thoughts.

When we are offered another place to stand, from which vantage point we can see things more clearly, we have a chance to do all of the above. It begins, of course, with coming into full awareness of the present moment just as it is, and then seeing that moment for what it is. When clinging, aversion, or wanting things to be other than the way they are arises, we can see that, too, and notice the habitual habits of the mind toward the experience of that moment.Then we just sit with it, allow the experience to continue, and let it be

By not acting out habitually toward an aversive experience during our meditation practice (which is what I was describing above), we groove new neuropathways in the brain and the habits begin to change by themselves. In daily life, when we come up against the same basic experiences, we might have the chance to take a reflective pause before choosing our actions. If we do this enough times, we will have changed profoundly how we relate to the world around us, and our suffering will be reduced.

Blessings,
Roger

Parking Ticket Yoga

2010-09-22T21:53:00.000-07:00

Are we still swimming against the stream? Maybe not.

The city of Cambridge, Massachusetts now gives parking violation citations that include diagrams of yoga postures and short breathing exercises to help recipients relieve their stress and anger from getting the ticket.

Blessings,
Roger

Blues Dharma

2010-09-21T19:07:00.000-07:00

I remember the first time I saw the word "dharma." It was not in a book about the teachings of the Buddha, nor was it in the writings of Jack Kerouac. It was on the back of an album jacket. I was probably 14 years old at the time, and the album was "An Anthology of British Blues, Vol. 2." One of the bands featured on this compilation was the Dharma Blues Band, and they performed on two tracks: "Dealing With The Devil" and "Roll 'Em Pete."

Music, like everything else, is subject to the laws of dependent origination (see blog from 12/2, 12/3, & 12/4/09 for more on this subject). This seems especially evident when looking at the history of the blues in the twentieth century. The acknowledged "Cradle of the Blues" is the area in and around the Mississippi Delta. Impoverished black sharecroppers would sing during their work in order to help pass the time while doing backbreaking labor. In the evening, improvised instruments might be played as accompaniment for the voices. Guitar, banjo, and harmonica were the instruments of choice. One performer would pass his knowledge onto another, and soon a tradition was firmly in place.

As an adolescent in Overland Park, Kansas in the late 1960's, I was unaware of the roots of the rock music I was listening to at the time. Soon, however, as I began to read about my favorite musicians and bands, a pattern emerged. My generation's musical idols, Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Steppenwolf, The Rolling Stones, and on and on, were quick to acknowledge their antecedents and influences. Names like Howlin' Wolf, B.B. King, T-Bone Walker, Junior Wells, Blind Willie McTell, Muddy Waters, and the most legendary of them all, Robert Johnson were cropping up over and over again. I began to steep myself in their music, which is how I came upon an obscure collection of British blues in the record store.

Oh, yes, the dharma of Dependent Origination... Well, I have two little stories that illustrate this in relation to the blues. The great slide guitarist, Muddy Waters, was playing at a blues festival in New York in 1965. He had just been "re-discovered" by white audiences, and was enjoying a good measure of attention. He was visited backstage by another blues musician named Son House. Mr. House not only taught Muddy Waters how to play guitar, and was also an influence on none other than Robert Johnson. When the younger members of Muddy's band saw the skinny House with his loping stride, a couple of them began to imitate him. According to Son House's manager, Dick Waterman, Muddy immediately pulled them aside and said angrily, "I seen you mockin' that man. Don't you be mockin' that man. When I was a boy comin' up, that man was king. King! If it wasn't for that man, you wouldn't have a job. If it wasn't for that man, I wouldn't be here now."

The second story is a personal one. When I was 16, I saw Chuck Berry at a sparsely attended concert in Kansas City, Missouri. I only had tickets to the first show, but when I ran backstage after the curtain came down and accosted Chuck who was putting away his guitar, he had the grace to invite this over-eager white kid to "stick around for the second show." In the audience that night was a friend of mine named Barry Shank. On Monday, we exchanged stories about the concert, and shortly thereafter, I loaned him a copy of "Chuck Berry's Golden Decade," a greatest hits album.

Cut to my twenty-year high school reunion in 1992. Barry came up to me at one point and told me that, until he saw that album, he had no idea that music had any kind of history. But because I loaned him that record, he became interested in the subject, and is now a professor of music history in the Department of Comparative Studies at Ohio State University. He has also authored several books and many articles on the subject.

Just as the practice of meditation is passed from warm hand to warm hand, so too is the dharma of the blues. And on it goes.

Let the Good Times Roll,
Roger

Enlightenment Is Like...

2010-09-20T21:50:00.000-07:00

Enlightenment is like the moon reflected on the water. The moon does not get wet, nor is the water broken. Although its light is wide and great, the moon is reflected even in a puddle an inch wide. The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in one dewdrop on the grass.
~ Dogen

The Passing of a Teacher

2010-09-19T17:01:00.000-07:00

Last week we learned of the death of perhaps the most beloved academic teacher at the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts (LACHSA). Dallas Russell taught my son math during Zach's tenure at LACHSA. He also taught my oldest stepson who is a senior this year, and would eventually have taught my youngest stepson, now a freshman.

He was a mountain of a man. His large, expressive face was almost always smiling. Not just smiling, but more like exploding with joy. He was a stutterer. Yet when he fought to bring forth the word he sought, his voice took on an almost syncopated rhythm. When Zach arrived at LACHSA, he, too had been in speech therapy for a slight stutter. Mr. Russell helped him realize that it could be overcome.

His classes seemed like they could actually be fun. On Back To School Night, his presentation was always the most interesting, and I always looked forward to math period. That could never be said of any other academic class, I'm afraid. He was always uplifting his students. Even when they were average, he called them "Champions," or "Math Jedi Masters." I doubt that any student ever left Mr. Russell's class feeling unsuccessful. He had the power to empower.

Even though he was not a member of the arts faculty, he attended every performance any student ever gave. Zach formed a theater company his senior year, and the summer after graduation, Mr. Russell came to see their premier production. He came to the next one, as well. He knew his support was needed, not just in the classroom, but backstage after a kid had poured his heart out for his art.

He was funny, too. He never shied away from a good joke on himself, and was not afraid to look foolish in front of his students. At "Moondance," the annual LACHSA film festival that showcased the work of the students, he was always featured in the opening short, along with other teachers. His stuff was always the funniest. Because he wasn't part of the arts faculty, his work always seemed to have more honesty and sweet innocence than the acting teachers he shared the screen with.

The last time I saw him was just before school started. We were standing in separate checkout lines at Pavillions in South Pasadena. "Hey, Mr. Russell!" I called over to him. He didn't respond. He was staring into space, as though contemplating a very heavy subject. In retrospect, it looked like he was gazing into eternity. I finally got his attention, and we talked about Zach, and my stepsons. I told him to look out for the younger one, and he promised to take care of him. We continued talking into the parking lot, and he reflected on what a special time of year the beginning of school always is. He shared with me that he had just been thinking about that when I had called to him. We said our "See ya laters," got into our cars and drove off into the night.

The number of kids Mr. Russell touched in his teaching career is probably immeasurable. I'm sure they must all remember him vividly. I was only around him for a few minutes at a time and he left an indelible impression on me. Good teachers can do that. You may like them or loathe them; love them or hate them. You might even make fun of them behind their back. In the final analysis, though, they touch you.

Forever.

See ya later, Mr. Russell. Your like will not pass this way again.

Blessings,
Roger

The Guru

2010-09-18T13:57:00.000-07:00

An elderly Jewish lady in Brooklyn sees a story in the paper about a guru in India who is attracting followers by the thousands. She reads with interest that the wait is so long to have an audience with him, that the devotees are only allowed to speak three words before they are ushered out to make way for the next person.

Immediately she calls her travel agent. "I want to go to India," she tells him. The travel agent tries to dissuade the woman, telling her the country is dirty, the food is too spicy for her, and you can't drink the water. "Why torture yourself?" he asks her. "I don't care," says the woman. "I want to go to India."

And so she makes the arduous journey to the guru's ashram. She takes her place in the long line of people waiting to see him. After two days of standing on line, she finally reaches the door of his temple where she is firmly given instructions to say only three words to the guru.

At last she is ushered into the inner sanctum of the temple, and again she is reminded, "Remember! Only three words!"

Finally, she stands before the guru. Instead of bowing like everyone else does, she folds her arms across her chest. fixes her gaze upon him, and says, "Sheldon, come home!"

Blessings,
Roger

Nothing to Cling To

2010-09-17T19:21:00.000-07:00

Dharma teacher Rodney Smith once told the story of meeting a Tibetan monk in at Ajahn Buddhadhasa's monastery in Southeast Asia. At the time, Rodney was himself a monk at the monastery, and he queried the Tibetan visitor about what kind of practice he employed. The Tibetan monk began to tell Rodney about all of his various practices and observances. The monk told about his devotional practices for a whole pantheon of different deities and imagery meditations using tankhas. There were complex mantra practices given to him by his guru, for whom he had extreme devotion. According to Rodney, "He probably talked an hour non-stop. I was just amazed. And I have to say, I was quite envious of him and all the things I could do. Then he asked me about my practices, and because I couldn't think fast enough and come up with anything more exciting I said, 'Well, I just try to see things as they are'. He was not impressed."

We cannot comment upon the Tibetan monks practice, because we do not know his experience of it. But Rodney now says that he is very proud of that phrase, "I just try to see things as they are." As he puts it, "There are not a lot of trappings [in the practice of vipassana]. There are not a lot of inducements or activity. And as I began to understand the mind more clearly, I began to understand how it is that need for activity is really a need for self-perpetuation. And this practice doesn't hold a lot of that."

When we practice vipassana meditation, we are left with nothing to cling to. We can't cling to the feeling of the breath. We can't cling to any experience that arises because it will change or go away. We cannot hold onto the pleasant; we cannot push away the unpleasant. All we are left with is to see things as they are.

Blessings,
Roger

Ignorance

2010-09-16T21:49:00.001-07:00

During a dharma talk at a retreat, Jack Kornfield once asked rhetorically if anyone in the group had ever experienced anything that was permanent and lasting. Surprisingly, a retreatant raised his hand and said, "Ignorance. It's been with me all my life!"

To paraphrase Frank Zappa, "Some scientists claim that hydrogen, because it is so plentiful, is the basic building block of the universe. I dispute that. I say there is more ignorance than hydrogen, and that is the basic building block of the universe."

Blessings,
Roger

Two Boats and a Helicopter

2010-09-15T10:24:00.000-07:00

During a torrential rainstorm, a man is sitting on his front porch as flood waters begin to rise. A woman floats by in a boat, asking if the man needs help. "No, thank you," says the man, "I'm trusting in the Lord." The water rises higher, sending the man upstairs. Pretty soon, a raft full of people floats by his second story window. "Get in," they say, "there's plenty of room." "No thanks," says the man, "I'm trusting in the Lord." The water keeps rising, pushing the man up onto the roof. A helicopter swoops in and hovers overhead, lowering its ladder for the man. "Thanks anyway," shouts the man, "I'm trusting in the Lord." Finally, the man is swept away in the torrent and drowns. At the gates of Heaven, the man says to God, "I put all my trust in you and you let me drown. Why didn't you save me?" "What are you talking about?'' replies God, "I sent you two boats and a helicopter!"

Blessings,

Roger

Giving Up Hope

2010-09-14T16:36:00.000-07:00

For A Better Past

There is an old saying that I first heard from Jack Kornfield: "Forgiveness means giving up all hope for a better past." Forgiveness and reconciliation can be extraordinarily powerful practices.

Recently, a friend of mine forgave and was able to reconcile with an old friend of his who had acted very unskillfully many years ago. For all this time, my friend had been carrying the weight of his hurt, anger, and resentment in his heart. He began to feel blocked, and may have developed more than one psychosomatic illness as a result of this impeded flow of energy.

The more he became connected with his feelings as they are now, rather than dwelling in the his memories of the past, the more he felt he could get beyond his resentments. He contacted his friend, and they met for dinner at one of their favorite hangouts from happier times. They sat together for more than six hours, eventually moving to the parking lot when the place closed around them. My friend later described the experience as being liberating and joyful. He had a peace and ease that I had not seen in a couple of years, and he was now able to move on in his life.

He told me, "It was really about being conscious and present with my current thoughts about my friend that enabled me to start noticing that I was missing him and that my thoughts about him were more about the good things that we used to have, rather than about the bad things he had done. The key thing is to be aware of the present moment -- which, for me, shifted from feelings I had had two years ago that never felt like they were going to go away."

When we are unable to forgive, that part of us that holds the pain is locked up and is rendered unusable. Nothing can flow into that part of us, and nothing is allowed to flow out. In essence, we lose a piece of who we are. In addition, being unable to release attachment to our pain in this way causes us more suffering.

Forgiveness and reconciliation are not synonymous with condoning harmful behavior on the part of others. It does not mean we become a doormat that can be trampled upon and taken advantage of. Forgiveness and reconciliation merely mean that we will no longer close our hearts off to anyone.

I heard a story once about a group of Americans held prisoner by the Viet Cong during the Vietnam War. Many years after the conflict had ended, they been allowed to visit their old prison and to meet with their former captors. It was, by all accounts, an extremely emotional experience for both sides. Later, two of the former P.O.W.'s were discussing the reunion, and one said, "I'm so grateful that I've been able to forgive them. It really takes a load off my mind." The other one, however, said, "You know, I don't think I'll ever be able for forgive them for what they did." To which the first man replied, "Then it sounds like you're still in prison."

Blessings,
Roger

P.S. For more information on the power of forgiveness and reconciliation, see my blogs from 11/3 & 11/4/09 and 4/30/10.

Do I Hear Bells?

2010-09-13T14:38:00.000-07:00

So I'm driving my car last week, when I noticed that every time I accelerated or turned a corner, I would hear the sound of a tiny bell ringing. I soon discovered that I had left two of my meditation bells on the back seat floorboard. By chance, they were just close enough to each other to make contact when the car moved forward or back, left or right. The bells became a little reminder to become mindful while driving. As Kathy said, it was like a little call from the universe saying, "Wake up!"

One of these days, I suppose, I'm going to have to remove them from the car. Or maybe I'll try to figure out a way to make them permanent.

Blessings,
Roger

A Pebble in the Pond

2010-09-12T12:15:00.000-07:00

Yesterday (9/11), I dedicated both meditation classes I taught to the subject of expanding the practice of vipassana from a purely personal, individual pursuit, to a practice with potentially global significance. This teaching was done within the framework of the 2001 terrorist attacks, as well as the recent news stories regarding the planned (and thankfully abandoned) burning of the Koran by a misguided religious leader in Florida.

When we allow ourselves to sit quietly and see things clearly, we are better able to witness and participate in our life as it is being lived. In particular, this includes the habitual and automatic tendencies of the mind to create a sense of self where none actually exists. This sense of self, of "I," "me," and "mine," is perhaps the single most destructive force on the planet. It has given rise to countless struggles between individuals, clans, religions, and nations, and these conflicts continue to this day, some spanning many generations.

If we can see the suffering of our own life as resulting from the arising of a sense of self, perhaps we can begin to act more skillfully and effectively in our world. If we can know more clearly the habitual and automatic reactivity of the mind, then perhaps we can take a moment to reflect upon a better response toward situations, people, and things. If so, our suffering will be decreased. And when our suffering decreases, the suffering of our loved ones and those around us decreases. We become like a tiny pebble tossed into a still pond, creating concentric circles of positive influence in our world.

From Arun Gandhi:

I was once told by my mother, who along with Father spent all her life working for nonviolent change, that there is a big difference between throwing a pebble in a pond and throwing a big rock. The pebble causes gentle ripples that go a long way. The rock makes a big splash that quickly disappears.

Blessings,
Roger

A Poem for 9/11

2010-09-11T07:19:00.000-07:00

At a Spirit Rock retreat, a few short weeks after the attacks on September 11, 2001, Phillip Moffitt read this poem by Wendell Berry:

Now you know the worst
we humans have to know
about ourselves, and I am sorry,

for I know that you will be afraid.
To those of our bodies given
without pity to be burned, I know

there is no answer
but loving one another,
even our enemies, and this is hard.

But remember:
when a man of war becomes a man of peace,
he gives a light, divine

though it is also human.
When a man of peace is killed
by a man of war, he gives a light.

You do not have to walk in darkness.
If you will have the courage for love,
you may walk in light. It will be

the light of those who have suffered
for peace. It will be
your light.

Blessings,

Roger

Dividing Things Fairly

2010-09-10T16:26:00.000-07:00

On this eve of 9/11, a little wisdom from Islam might be in order.

One day, the Sufi holy man, mystic, and fool, Mulla Nasrudin, was walking through the town when he came upon two children who were arguing with each other. They had found a bag containing twelve marbles, and they were disagreeing about how to divide the toys between them.

When the children asked the wise man to settle the disagreement, the Mulla asked them if he should divide the marbles the way a human would or the way Allah would. The children replied, "We want it to be fair, so divide them the way Allah would."

So the Mulla counted out the marbles and gave three marbles to one child and nine to the other.

(Adapted from The Pleasantries of the Incredible Mulla Nasrudin, edited by Idries Shah)

Blessings,
Roger

Coming To Rest

2010-09-09T17:52:00.000-07:00

Jack Kornfield sometimes starts his sitting instructions with the suggestion that we "come to rest." Resting is an important component of vipassana meditation. We come to rest in the body, feeling it sitting; feeling the quality of energy in this moment just as it is. We then let the attention come to rest in the feeling of the body breathing. We are not trying to manipulate the experience in any way, but we are just resting out attention in this experience.

When we come to rest in the present moment experiences of the body and breath, the restless mind begins to collect and gather (and rest) in the present moment as well. From this resting place in the present moment, we can begin to see things more clearly as they arise. For example, during this morning's meditation, a garbage truck could be heard collecting trash from the containers in the alley behind Mission Street Yoga. Very few people would call this sound pleasant or even perceive it as wanted, if it were even noticed at all. From our place of rest, however, we could hear the sound as an arising event that had a time of duration, and then ended in stillness.

We could also see how the mind reacted habitually to the sound. First it created a name for it based on past experiences. Then an image arose of the garbage truck and trash bin was making the sound. Then the tendency to either like or dislike the sound could be perceived, and then the stories about the sound or the people making the sound arose, creating a sense of self - of "I," "me," and "mine" where none actually existed. This was merely a sound and had nothing to do with any of us in the room.

This is just a small example of the kinds of insights we can gain when we allow the mind to come to rest in the body and the senses. Where even a garbage truck becomes an object of enlightenment.

Blessings,
Roger

Suffering and the End of Suffering

2010-09-08T21:19:00.000-07:00

As in yesterday's post about Rabbi Hillel, some time in the 5th century BCE, the Buddha was asked to explain himself. He replied, "I teach about suffering and the end of suffering."

In the 20th century, Suzuki Roshi said he could sum up all of the Buddha's teachings in three words: "Not always so."

Blessings,
Roger

Do Unto Others

2010-09-07T18:00:00.000-07:00

The great Rabbi Hillel, who lived in the 1st Century, BCE, and into the first few years of the 1st Century, CE, was once challenged by a would-be convert to recite the entirety of Jewish Law while standing on one foot. Rabbi Hillel obliged the man. Taking his stance on one foot he said, "What is harmful to you, do not do to any person. This is whole Torah, and the rest is merely commentary."

Blessings,
Roger

The Uncertainty of Paradise, Revisited

2010-09-06T16:08:00.000-07:00

On May 30, I posted a blog about our friends, Brian and Nancy, who basically left their day jobs behind to become organic farmers up in Paradise, California. This past weekend, Kathy and I went to visit them again. This has been a tough year for their little farm. Erratic weather, the vagaries of seed quality, the need to experiment and sometimes fail with new crops, and on top of all the rest, the death of Brian's father, have made things more uncertain than ever.

At one point, however, Brian waxed philosophically about everything. We had been awakened several times last night by the sound of strong winds. Sure enough, upon inspecting their property in the light of morning, Brian discovered that about sixty feet of fencing had been blown down. If it wasn't repaired quickly, it would serve as an open invitation for the families of deer in that area to avail themselves of the freshest salad bar in town.

A half-day's work repairing the fence loomed before them, along with the expense of replacing posts, connectors, and other hardware. And they still had to harvest the produce for tomorrow's farmer's market. Eventually, Brian said, "You know, when you look at all the things you have to do before you do them, they look so daunting. Then afterward, you hardly remember them as being a big deal."

"A Farm-Picture"
by Walt Whitman (1819-1892)

Through the ample open door of the peaceful country barn,
A sunlit pasture field with cattle and horses feeding,
And haze and vista, and the far horizon fading away.

Blessings,
Roger

Mindless Television

2010-09-04T10:04:00.000-07:00

On the road again to Paradise (California, that is) with Kathy. As on our last big road trip in May, we are staying at the Hampton Inn and Suites in Madera.

As is ubiquitous in these modern marvels of hyper-efficient modular bedrooms, each morning there is offered up a free breakfast. You can make your own waffles. You can eat egg, steak, and cheeze (sic) scramble with a side of seasoned breakfast potatoes. In a nod to a balanced diet there is fresh fruit and yogurt.

And there is television.

The television is a flatscreen jumbotron that sits at one end of the dining area so it is visible from every table in the room. There is no escape. As I trundle my breakfast goodies to a somewhat secluded corner (it takes two trips), the local NBC affiliate is blasting a story about the brutal beating death of a local woman and the trial of her alleged killer. And everyone just eats and gazes toward the flickering light of the screen and they nod their heads and go back to refill their coffee ("I think I'll try to the 'Robust' this time").

It all becomes suddenly surreal. How can you be eating breakfast here with your children and listen to this kind of story without a sudden and violent visceral reaction? Have we become so desensitized to violence that it becomes just be another choice on the breakfast buffet? ("Would you like some rape and sodomy with with your bagel?")

We are mindless, most of the time. We have become adroit androids, expert at compartmentalizing our lives. Of shutting out what we don't want to see and filling our minds with distractions until we have no more bandwidth for real loving kindness, compassion, and joy. I, too, shut out the horrible news story and tune in again when the weather report comes on.

Maybe that story serves as a necessary reminder that my family is alive and safe. Maybe we need to know that there is justice in the world, and that the karmic debts of our past actions must be paid. But do we have to hear these lessons while we're eating breakfast?

And apparently nobody sees the irony that the next news story after the bludgeoning is a consumer reports piece about the effectiveness of air cleaners.

Blessings,
Roger

The Jobholder

2010-09-03T17:53:00.000-07:00

by David Ingnatow

I stand in the rain waiting for my bus
and in the bus I wait for my stop.
I get let off and go to work
where I wait for the day to end
and then go home, waiting for the bus,
of course, and my stop.

And at home I read and wait
for my hour to go to bed
and I wait for the day I can retire
and wait for my turn to die.

From At My Ease: Uncollected Poems of the Fifties and Sixties. © BOA Editions, Ltd., 1998.

Outcomes

2010-09-02T22:19:00.000-07:00

One of the pervasive misconceptions about mindfulness practices is that we have to release attachment to our goals or desires. Actually, having goals and desires is not something that we need to avoid. What we need to release is our attachment to the outcomes of these objects.

As I am fond of telling my yoga classes, there is no need to strive for a specific outcome, because the outcome is here now. This moment is the outcome, just as every moment is the outcome. So we set our intentions, and then release our attachment to how those intentions get delivered.

The Answer is Always "No"

2010-09-01T07:00:00.000-07:00

A handmade sign next to the cash register at the Great Harvest Bread Company in South Pasadena:

"The answer is always 'no' until you ask the question."

Blessings,
Roger

Deep Listening

2010-08-31T19:18:00.000-07:00

It has been my pleasure to sit with Thich Nhat Hanh on several occasions. Often when he rings the bell at the beginning of a practice, he will say something like, "Let the sound of the bell invite you into stillness and deep listening."

For a long time, I did not know what he meant by "deep listening." I thought perhaps I was supposed to be on the alert for subtle sounds within my body. Or perhaps he was referring to the "still small voice" within. Over years of practice, however, I have decided that what Thay is talking about is synonymous with "mindfulness." It means having a thought, and actually knowing that we are having that particular thought. Then it means knowing how that particular thought leads to, perhaps, an emotional sensation in the body.

During our daily life, we have a lot of external distractions. When we sit in mindfulness practice, we are shutting down these externals and turning within. We may still be aware of the external things, such as sounds or temperature, yet we now experience them in a new way, knowing that we are experiencing these events as they occur. Furthermore, this experience takes place from a place very deep within us. These experiences are always available to us, if we listen deeply enough.

Blessings,
Roger

Kitchen Wisdom

2010-08-30T23:55:00.000-07:00

From a wall-hanging in our kitchen (a gift from Xia):

"If there is light in the soul, there will be beauty in the person. If there is beauty in the person, there will be harmony in the house. If there is harmony in the house, there will be order in the nation. If there is order in the nation, there will be peace in the world." ~ Chinese Proverb

Blessings,
Roger

The Sun Never Says

2010-08-29T10:01:00.000-07:00

by Hafiz

Even

After

All this time

The sun never says to the earth,

"You owe

Me."

Look

What happens

With a love like that,

It lights the

Whole

Sky.

Blessings,
Roger

Lessons From A Snail

2010-08-28T14:19:00.000-07:00

I heard a lovely story on NPR's Morning Edition today. It was an interview with essayist and short-story writer Elizabeth Tova Bailey, who has just released a new book from Algonquin Publishing entitled, The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating. It recounts her experience with a mysterious illness that struck her in her mid-thirties and made her so weak that she could not even sit up.

While confined to her bed, a friend brought her some violets in a glass bowl to brighten up her bedside. At the base of the flowers, Ms. Bailey discovered a snail. Since she was unable read or watch television, the snail became her constant bedside companion and entertainment. She began to figure out its patterns of movement, and the more she became involved in this tiny creature's life, the more connected they became.

Because she could not move at all, watching the snail go about its laborious and painstakingly slow travels around the plant took on special significance. "It moved at a speed that was actually faster than my own speed," she told NPR's Scott Simon, "And so it really was peaceful to watch it. It moved so smoothly and gently and gracefully, it was like a tai chi master."

Ms. Bailey remarked that her experience with the snail reminded her of this poem:

I Heard A Fly Buzz (465)
by Emily Dickinson

I heard a Fly buzz - when I died -
The Stillness in the Room
Was like the Stillness in the Air -
Between the Heaves of Storm -

The Eyes around - had wrung them dry -
And Breaths were gathering firm
For the last Onset - when the King
Be witnessed - in the Room -

I willed my Keepsakes - Signed away
What portions of me be
Assignable - and then it was
There interposed a Fly -

With Blue - uncertain stumbling Buzz -
Between the light - and me -
And then the Windows failed - and then
I could not see to see -

To read and hear more about this interview, go to: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129475625


Blessings,
Roger

E-Mail Apnea

2010-08-27T19:56:00.000-07:00

My e-mail is running slow, today. It's annoying, inconvenient, and makes me realize just how addicted I am to this means of communication. Ironically, one of the e-mails I've been able to open is from my niece, Karen, who sent me a link to a Huffington Post blog by Linda Stone. She raises the possibility that we may be unconsciously holding our breath when we read e-mail or texting on our i-Phones and Blackberries.

Check in right now and see how (or even if) you are breathing. Take a moment and allow the abdomen to soften, letting it gently expand with inhale and contract with exhale. This kind of breathing automatically engages the Relaxation Response, sending important signals to the nervous system that everything is okay right now. Holding the breath, or breathing shallowly into the chest, helps engage the Fight, Flight, or Freeze response. This is the kind of breathing we do when we are under stress or in emergency situations.

Abdominal, or diaphragmatic breathing, can not only reduce blood pressure and heart rate, it can also keep you healthy. Chronic states of Fight, Flight, or Freeze can lead to, among other things, a decrease in immune system activity. If you counteract this situation by conscious abdominal breathing, the long-term systems of the body, such as the immune system, can function more efficiently. When the body constantly perceives threat through holding the breath or breathing into the chest, it is only concerned with the immediate needs for survival, and the immune system is not one of these needs.

For more information about the psycho-physiology of diaphragmatic breathing, see my post on June 8, 2010: http://rogernolan.blogspot.com/2010/06/diaphragmatic-breathinig.html

Here's a link to the Linda Stone's blog: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/linda-stone/just-breathe-building-the_b_85651.html

Blessings,
Roger

Codependency

2010-08-26T18:28:00.000-07:00

From Codependent No More:How to Stop Controlling Others and Start Caring For Yourself, by Melody Beattie.

A codependent person is one who has let another person's behavior affect him or her, and who is obsessed with controlling that person's behavior.

The other person might be a child, an adult, a lover, a spouse, a brother, a sister, a grandparent, a parent, a client, or a best friend...

But, the heart of the definition and recovery lies not in the other person - no matter how much we believe it does. It lies in ourselves, in the ways we have let other people's behavior affect us and in the ways we try to affect them: the obsessing, the controlling, the obsessive "helping," caretaking, low self-worth bordering on self-hatred, self-repression, abundance of anger and guilt, peculiar dependency on peculiar people, attraction to and tolerance for the bizarre, other-centeredness that results in abandonment of self, communication problems, intimacy problems, and an ongoing whirlwind trip through the five-stage grief process.

More About Digital Distraction

2010-08-25T18:43:00.000-07:00

Following on from yesterday's blog about how digital input keeps us unfocused and might actually fatigue the brain, even while the body is resting, here is another New York Times article. It discusses a study that shows a direct relationship between auditory input and exercise. Volunteers on stationary bikes listened to music of their own choosing with headphones. During some rides, researchers played the songs at normal tempo. On other rides, they increased or decreased the tempos by 10 percent. Here's what they found:

When the tempo slowed, so did their pedaling and their entire affect. Their heart rates fell. Their mileage dropped. They reported that they didn’t like the music much. On the other hand, when the tempo of the songs was upped 10 percent, the men covered more miles in the same period of time, produced more power with each pedal stroke and increased their pedal cadences. Their heart rates rose. They reported enjoying the music — the same music — about 36 percent more than when it was slowed. But, paradoxically, they did not find the workout easier. Their sense of how hard they were working rose 2.4 percent. The up-tempo music didn’t mask the discomfort of the exercise. But it seemed to motivate them to push themselves. As the researchers wrote, when “the music was played faster, the participants chose to accept, and even prefer, a greater degree of effort.”

Again the take-home message from this little experiment? Do one thing at a time. That's all your brain can reasonably handle with any consistency.

Here's a link to the NYT article: http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/25/phys-ed-does-music-make-you-exercise-harder/

Blessings,

Roger

The Upside of Downtime

2010-08-24T19:15:00.000-07:00

I read an interesting article in the New York Times today that reports the findings of some studies suggesting that our brains need to have a certain amount of downtime away from digital stimulation, such as computers, television, and i-Pods. Apparently, a constant diet of these devices prevents us from successfully processing the information we are receiving. The result is that this information never solidifies into a learned memory. In addition, what we think may be relaxing us (e.g., surfing the net or watching television), may actually be tiring us out.

Quoting here from the article, "Even though people feel entertained, even relaxed, when they multitask while exercising, or pass a moment at the bus stop by catching a quick video clip, they might be taxing their brains, scientists say. 'People think they’re refreshing themselves, but they’re fatiguing themselves,' said Marc Berman, a University of Michigan neuroscientist."

More and more I see people walking, jogging, and riding bikes with earbuds in place. I have not yet succumbed to becoming surgically attached to my i-Pod, but on a trip back east a couple of years ago, Kathy let me use hers during a train trip from New York City to Connecticut. I was amazed at the effect it had on my brain. It was like watching a movie of my life playing out in front of me, while the soundtrack played inside my head. Indeed, I had a hard time concentrating on what I was seeing as my brain tried to multitask between the aural and visual stimulation.

One solution, of course, is to have time during the day when we turn off the stimulation. All of us have at least brief moments during our day when we can just be. The tendency is now turning toward filling these "micro-moments" with texting, mobile gaming, and checking e-mail. I would suggest that these ways of "killing time" are incrementally killing our ability to process our lives as they are being lived.

So maybe the answer is as simple as leaving the i-Pod at home and taking a walk while listening to the sounds of the real world.

Here's a link to the New York Times article: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/25/technology/25brain.html?src=tp

Blessings,

Roger

Golden Hours

2010-08-23T22:20:00.000-07:00

You must have been warned against letting the golden hours slip by; but some of them are golden only because we let them slip by.
~ James M. Barrie

Zen Story

2010-08-22T22:19:00.000-07:00

After winning several archery contests, a young and rather boastful champion challenged a Zen master who was also renowned for his skill as an archer. The young man demonstrated remarkable proficiency when he hit a distant bull's eye on his first try, and then split that arrow with his second shot. "There," he said to the old man. "See if you can match that!"

Undisturbed, the master did not draw his bow, but rather motioned for the young archer to follow him up the mountain. Curious about the old fellow's intentions, the champion followed him high into the mountain until they reached a deep chasm spanned by a rather flimsy and shaky log. Calmly stepping out onto the middle of the unsteady and certainly perilous bridge, the old master picked a far away tree as a target, drew his bow, and fired a clean, direct hit.

"Now it is your turn," he said as he gracefully stepped back onto the safe ground. Staring with terror into the seemingly bottomless and beckoning abyss, the young man could not force himself to step out onto the log, no less shoot at a target. "You have much skill with your bow," the master said, sensing his challenger's predicament, "but you have little skill with the mind that lets loose the shot."

The Experiential Platform, Part 2

2010-08-21T19:31:00.000-07:00

Following on from yesterday's posting, what we discover when we entice the mind into reacting to arising experiences is the sense of self. We are, in essence, watching the mind create "I," "me," and "mine" in front of our eyes. Well, not really in front of our eyes, but this phenomenon is definitely perceivable by our sensory awareness.

For example, a sound arises, which is essentially a neutral experience and contains no self at all. Yet as soon as the mind perceives the sound, it jumps in with a name for the sound, and then a preference of like or dislike, and so forth. In other words, it creates a self where there is no self.

Through the practice of observing and participating with the mind as it creates self, we can then be more attuned to this experience in daily life. When we are more aware of how the mind habitually reacts to things as I, me, and mine, then we have a chance to be able to make a more skillful and effective choice as to how to deal with situations as they happen.

Blessings,
Roger

The Experiential Platform

2010-08-20T23:40:00.000-07:00

A large part of vipassana practice is enticing the mind into creating habitual thoughts based on some present-moment experience. Here's what that means...

We purposefully sit still and be quiet, then direct our attention to a present- moment object, usually the feeling of the breath, and returning the attention to that object whenever the mind is caught wandering. After a while, the mind is sufficiently concentrated to then move the spotlight of attention to other objects as they arise (e.g., sounds, body sensations, or thoughts). We can then perceive these objects in the same way the breath is perceived: as events that we can participate in and observe.

In this way, we are building what I call an "experiential platform" from which we can observed and participate in these events. From the perspective of this platform, we can see more clearly how the mind reacts to the events as they arise and continue. Segal, Teasdale, and Williams, in the Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy manual, compare this process to a cat who is sitting, watching a mouse hole waiting for the mouse to appear. The cat is our present-moment awareness, and the mouse is the mind going through its habitual reactions to things.

Blessings,
Roger

On Playfulness

2010-08-19T18:20:00.000-07:00

The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his information and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him he is always doing both. ~ Zen Proverb

The moment you start seeing life as non-serious, a playfulness, all the burden on your heart disappears. All the fear of death, of life, of love - everything disappears. One starts living with a very light weight or almost no weight. So weightless one becomes, one can fly in the open sky. Zen's greatest contribution is to give you an alternative to the serious man. The serious man has made the world, the serious man has made all the religions. He has created all the philosophies, all the cultures, all the moralities; everything that exists around you is a creation of the serious man. Zen has dropped out of the serious world. It has created a world of its own which is very playful, full of laughter, where even great masters behave like children. ~ Osho

Blessings,
Roger

The Complexity of Simplicity

2010-08-18T18:42:00.000-07:00

For the past three weeks, our mindfulness study and discussion group has been exploring the concept of "voluntary simplicity." In our last meeting on this subject, we agreed that simplifying your life can be very complicated.

What kept coming up, over and over again, was that we are tremendously attached to our things. Somehow they define us. Many of us answered "yes" when asked if the idea of paring down our possessions to, say, a hundred or so items, brought up feelings of fear. The idea of getting rid of all the stuff in our lives that we do not use is, indeed, kind of scary. One participant put it this way: "Why would I let go of attachment? It's the only thing that makes life worth living!"

Abundance of things led us into a discussion of how rich we are in terms of the people in our lives. It was generally agreed that family and friends are more important and ultimately bring us more joy than possessions. Richness of experience was also discussed. As someone said, "A trip to Hawaii will bring me more happiness than a new sofa."

This, very naturally, led to a discussion of the ultimate attachment object: our body. Is it possible to release attachment even of this object? After all, this body that we are inhabiting is not "ours," it is really more like a rental which we have to return at the end of the contract. Again, a complex issue. On his deathbed, the Venerable Ajahn Chah was visited by his student, Jack Kornfield. As Jack recounts the story, he was holding Ajahn Chah's hand and discussing death and attachment. "Well, you always taught that we must relinquish attachment to this body," said Jack. The venerable teacher squeezed Jack's hand tightly and said, "Don't speak so lightly about it! This is hard!"

So I guess the best advice I can offer is to take it easy. Find balance between possessing things and purging them. Realize that no possession will give us lasting and permanent happiness or satisfaction, and that someday, everything must be released.

And, yes, it is not easy.

Blessings,
Roger

Depth of Practice

2010-08-17T16:31:00.000-07:00

As you may be aware, I have been teaching hatha yoga for more than 15 years. When I first started my own practice, I was very intent upon attainment and achievement. As I have aged, and through my experience as a teacher, I have profoundly changed this attitude. Now I am constantly reminding my students not to push themselves to try to break through to some new level. My suggestion, instead, is to go as far as they can comfortably, then hang out there for a while. Paradoxically, they will be able to move through to attain their goals more efficiently and easily in this way, rather than from pushing or straining. And with fewer injuries.

The primary focus of this kind of practice is awareness of each posture or movement as fully as possible, thereby deepening into the posture or movement more completely. Even the simplest posture, such as Child's Pose (Balasana), when practiced with mindfulness, can become a place of deep insight as well as great physical benefit. My point is this: if you can't experience Child's Pose fully while you are doing it, how will you expect to experience the deep insights of a difficult posture, such as Triang Mukha Eka Pada Paschimottanasana (which is not that difficult, by the way, but it has one of the longest names of any posture so I like to use it as an example)?

Simply put, the depth of your yoga practice has no relationship whatsoever with the difficulty of the postures you do. So when you see workshops or retreats that promise to help you "deepen your practice," find out if they refer to the physical dimension of yoga, or the depth of inner awareness. In my opinion, the latter exploration is a much more rewarding, and potentially less injurious.

Blessings,
Roger

Working With Fear, Panic, and Anxiety

2010-08-16T20:23:00.000-07:00

From Full Catastrophe Living: Using the Wisdom of Your Body and Mind to Face Stress, Pain, and Illness by Jon Kabat-Zinn.

Working mindfully with highly charged thoughts and feelings does not mean that we do not value the expression of strong feelings or that strong feelings are bad, problematic, or dangerous and that every effort should be made to "control" them or get rid of them or suppress them. Observing your feelings mindfully and accepting them and then letting go of them does not mean that you are trying to invalidate or get rid of them. It means that you know what you are experiencing. It also does not mean that you won't act on your thoughts and feelings or express them in their full power! It simply means that when you do act, you are more likely to do so with clarity and inner balance because you have some perspective on your own experience and are not just being driven by mindless reactivity. Then the force or your feelings can be applied creatively to solve or dissolve problems rather than compounding difficulties and causing harm to yourself or others, as so often happens when you lose your center. This is another example of the way in which the emotion-focused perspective and the problem-focused perspective can complement each other in mindfulness.

As we change our relationship to our thoughts by paying attention to the process of thinking, we will also come to see that perhaps we should change the way we think and speak about our thoughts and feelings altogether. Rather than saying, "I am afraid" or "I am anxious," both of which make "you" into the anxiety or fear, it would actually be more accurate to say "I am having a lot of fear-filled (or fearful) thoughts." In this way you are emphasizing that you are not the content of your thoughts and that you do not have to identify with their content. Instead, you can just be aware of it, accept it, and listen to it caringly. Then your thoughts will not drive you toward even more fear, panic, and anxiety but can be used instead to help you see more clearly what is actually on your mind.

The Miracle of Sympathetic Joy

2010-08-15T22:24:00.000-07:00

Sympathetic Joy, mudita in Pali, the language of the Buddha, is one of the natural abodes that are cultivated through the practice of meditation. It refers to the joy we feel at the good fortune and joy of others.

Some years back, I came into possession of a sitar. I had never considered learning to play one of these instruments, even though I had been playing guitar since I was nine. The sitar, however, is much more complicated. Besides the seven playable strings, it also has sixteen "sympathetic" strings. These strings are not plucked, but merely vibrate sympathetically when the main strings are played. This is one of the familiar sounds of the sitar: the resonating tonal buzz after striking one of the main strings.

Sympathetic Joy has the same quality. It is not we who are directly experiencing the joy. We are merely vibrating in resonant sympathy with the person who is having the joyful experience.

Sympathetic Joy can be a useful antidote to negative emotional states, such as jealousy, envy, or ill-will toward someone who is experiencing good fortune. When we are attacked by jealousy about someone else's experience, we can bring to mind how much pleasure that experience must have given the other person. I have used this panacea many times, and I can actually feel myself tingle with a sympathetic vibration. For a moment, at least, I can allow myself to feel the joy the other person must have felt, and for that moment, the joy is mine as well.

Blessings,
Roger

The Path of Desire

2010-08-14T07:00:00.000-07:00

From Open To Desire: The Truth About What the Buddha Taught by Mark Epstein, M.D.

The Buddha's path did not focus on desire as an enemy to be conquered but rather as an energy to be perceived correctly. The Buddha was interested in teaching us not only how to find our own freedom, but in how to stay in affectionate relationship to other people. While he counseled his followers to be lights unto themselves, he also recognized how much we need each other to make freedom possible. There is as much emphasis on compassion in the Buddha's teachings as there is on wisdom, and it is clear that one route to the development of such compassion is through the investigation, not elimination, of one's own desire. (p. 14)

Blessings,
Roger

A Thought From Alan Watts

2010-08-13T13:22:00.000-07:00

"No work or love will flourish out of guilt, fear, or hollowness of heart, just as no valid plans for the future can be made by those who have no capacity for living now."

Blessings,
Roger

A Retreat To Remember

2010-08-12T17:19:00.000-07:00

In April, 2002, I was on a ten-day retreat in Yucca Valley, when Jack Kornfield delivered some startling news before the mid-morning sitting practice. "It is my very sad duty to inform you," he said, his naturally soft voice nearly at a whisper, "that one of our retreatants has died." There was a collective gasp form the 125 attendees. Then Jack gave some sketchy details of how the man, Phillip Behrens, had apparently died during the night before. All of us were stunned, whether we knew Phillip personally or not.

The remainder of the retreat was devoted to his memory. Over the next days, teachers read passages from the Tibetan Book of the Dead, such as:

Remember the clear light, the pure clear white light from which everything in the universe comes, to which everything in the universe returns, the original nature of your own mind. The natural state of the universe unmanifest.

Let go into the clear light, trust it, merge with it. It is your own true nature, it is home.

The visions you experience exist within your consciousness, the forms they take are determined by your past attachments, your past desires, your past fears, your past karma.

These visions have no reality outside your consciousness. No matter how frightening some of them may seem they cannot hurt you. Just let them pass through your consciousness. They will all pass in time. No need to become involved with them, no need to become attracted to the beautiful visions, no need to be repulsed by the frightening ones. No need to be seduced or excited by this sexual ones. No need to be attached to them at all.

Just let them pass. If you become involved with these visions, you may wonder for long time confused. Just let them past to your consciousness like clouds passing through an empty sky.

Fundamentally they have no more reality than this.
Remember these teachings, remember the clear light, the pure bright shining white light of your own nature, it is deathless.

If you can look into the visions, you can experience and recognize that they are composed of the same pure clear white light as everything else in the universe.

No matter where or how far you wonder, the light is only a split second, a half-breath breath away. It is never too late to recognize the clear light. ~ Translation by W.Y. Evans-Wentz

These words were originally intended to be whispered into the ear of a person who has just died and as they pass through the "bardo" - the space between worlds. When I heard this invocation in the space between worlds during my own vipassana practice, I began to have some of the most intense and profound altered-state experiences I have ever known.

I, too, began to "go toward the light," which had seemed to appear behind my closed eyelids. As I drew closer to the light, I could feel a sensation similar to the peeling away of layers of my body. It was as though I was shedding a lifetimes worth of psychic junk that I had come to regard as "I," "me," and "mine."

Soon, there appeared before me a translucent, golden curtain, and behind it was the clear light. In the glow of the light I could see what looked like a shadow play created by beings moving in a gracefully choreographed danse macabre. Fortunately, the weight of ego and self prevented me from reaching the curtain, and soon I was pulled back down to earth and my cushion.

Toward the end of the retreat, we were asked to give a written offering to be placed on an altar dedicated to Phillip. These offerings were later delivered to Phillip's widow. In the spirit of the Tibetan rinpoches, I composed a "spontaneous Vajra song:"

"For Phillip"

Your Spirit merged with mine and
we journeyed together toward the Clear Light.

But this Spirit of mine,
heavy-laden with leaden ego,
and small sense of self,
had to stay behind,
content to stand at the curtain's edge.

And yet, even from here could be seen
wonders of the Unmanifest and the Light,
veiled though they were,
as if too powerful for mere mortal eyes.

Thank you for taking me this far.
I know you are dancing in the light, now.
I look forward to
following you in freedom.

Blessings,
Roger

(A meditation bench honoring Phillip's memory can be found at the Spirit Rock Meditation Center in front of my favorite statue of the Buddha, just north of the dining hall.)

The Poison of Multitasking

2010-08-11T17:32:00.000-07:00

First of all, credit for the title of this posting goes to my wife, Kathy. She said it while we were exploring various aspects of bringing simplicity to daily life with my Tuesday night Mindfulness Study and Discussion Group. To be precise, it should be noted that we are concerned here with human multitasking, since the term originated as a reference to multiple simultaneous computer functions.

When we multitask, we appear to be doing more than one thing at the same time. Studies have shown, however, that during multitasking, we are actually getting less done and tend to make more mistakes. In his book, Crazy Busy: Overstretched, Overbooked, and About to Snap! Strategies for Handling Your Fast-Paced Life, psychiatrist Richard Hallowell goes so far as to describe multitasking as a "mythical activity in which people believe they can perform two or more tasks simultaneously.”

From the neurobiological perspective, the brain requires time to take a moment to refocus its attention when performing multiple sequential functions. Therefore, when we are trying to do lots of things at once, at best we are only able to devote enough attention to each one to skim over them and pick out bits of information here and there. In reality, as Kathy noted last night, "We are not really present for any of it. Instead of a task having a beginning, a middle, and an end, when we multitask there are only middles." Nothing really gets accomplished and we can rarely feel a sense of accomplishment for bringing a task to completion.

Thinking that we are getting a lot done when we are actually aren't is a hallmark of methamphetamine and cocaine addiction, as well. As I have mentioned in this blog, the same chemicals that are released in the brain when we take these drugs are also produced when we are under high stress (see 1/25/10 blog). Multitasking is often the result of (and results in) stressful feelings. The resulting chemical release may lead to the same overblown sense of our ability to get things done as reported by meth and coke addicts.

As I have mentioned before, one answer to this problem is to just do one thing. When you are talking on the phone, resist the urge to surf the internet. When you are talking to your spouse, or your child, or your co-worker really listen and be present for them. Turn off the television, talk radio, and computers when you are having dinner. When you drive, just drive. Acknowledge the accomplishment of completing one thing before moving on to the next.

For me, creating a blog every single day for a year has been a daily exercise in focusing my attention. There is a marvelous sense of success and accomplishment that I feel every time I click the PUBLISH POST button. Don't get me wrong - I, too, find myself giving in to the compulsion to multitask all the time. Yet having to pay attention so completely to this one thing has been a great practice. Of course, the sense of satisfaction is impermanent because I will have to come up with something else to post tomorrow.

Kathy suggested that maybe that's the deeper reason underlying why we are so attracted to multitasking: it keeps us so busy that we never get done with anything. That way we don't have to acknowledge the impermanence of our accomplishments.

But I think I'll save that tangent for another day...

"The best-adjusted person in our society is the person who is not dead and not alive, just numb. A zombie. When you are dead, you're not able to do the work of society. When you are fully alive, you're constantly saying "No" to many of the processes of society: the racism, the polluted environment, the nuclear threat, the arms race, drinking unsafe water, and eating carcinogenic foods. Thus it is in the interests of our society to promote those things that take the edge off, keep us busy with our fixes, and keep us slightly numbed out and zombie-like. In this way our modern consumer society itself functions like as an addict." ~ Anne Wilson Schaef

Blessings,
Roger

What's The Point?

2010-08-10T16:54:00.000-07:00

From Alan Watts:

"We could say that meditation doesn't have a reason or doesn't have a purpose. In this respect, it's unlike almost all other things we do, except perhaps making music and dancing. When we make music, we don't do it in order to reach a certain point, such as the end of the composition. If that were the purpose of music, then obviously the fastest players would be the best. Also, when we are dancing we are not aiming to arrive at a particular place on the floor as in a journey. When we dance, the journey itself is the point, as when we play music the playing itself is the point. And exactly the same thing is true in meditation. Meditation is the discovery that the point of life is always arrived at in the immediate moment."

Blessings,
Roger

LIghten Up a Bit

2010-08-09T19:25:00.000-07:00

Vipassana meditation can get pretty heavy, sometimes. Or maybe it's just me. Perhaps I tend to emphasize sitting with the difficult, the uncomfortable, the unpleasant, and the suffering, and I fail to notice the awe-inspiring, the uplifting, the joyful, the peaceful, and the just plain fun that this kind of practice can open up to me.

So yesterday, during a daylong retreat I was leading, I changed things up a bit. After lunch I suggested that we turn some attention to the miraculous nature of existence, both our own, and that of the entire cosmos. Contemplating the interdependent relationship of all things is, for me, a sure-fire way to open up a bit of joy and wonder in my practice. As the saying goes, "If you're not in awe, then you're just not paying attention." When we actually do pay attention to this process of "interbeing," as Thich Nhat Hanh calls dependent co-arising, we can see clearly just how wonderful being alive really is.

As you practice, or go through your day, reflect for a moment on how an infinite number of causes and conditions came together to make you. The countless number of chance meetings, unexpected encounters, and serendipitous happenings that brought your parents together, and their parents, and their parents, and so on and on, over countless generations. Contemplate the geologic, cultural, historic, and cosmic events that had to align, as well. You can take this all the way back to the Big Bang, if you like.

Enjoy the trip...

"Strange Miracle" by Hafiz:

Oh wondrous creatures,

by what strange miracle

do you so often

not smile?

Blessings,
Roger

Doing the Best We Can

2010-08-08T06:56:00.000-07:00

When you are involved in a conflict with others, always try to remember that everyone involved is doing the best they can with where they are and with what they know in that moment. We are all works in progress.

(Many thanks to Jane Murphy, MFT, for these insights.)

Blessings,
Roger

Ravings of a Thought-Crazed Lunatic

2010-08-07T15:50:00.000-07:00

Last night I sat on my patio as the sun was setting, and watched myself being tortured by my mind. I was sitting with a particularly upsetting issue that had arisen (an old, hot-button issue), and I closed my eyes and simply allowed the feelings of anger, hurt, resentment, and old abandonment stuff to burn within me. I watched the workings of the mind as it pored over the upsetting events of the day, and I knew even as it was happening that I was being hit with what the Buddha called the "Second Arrow."

I've discussed the Second Arrow many times in this blog. It is when the mind creates more problems than the actual event or situation warrants, often creating problems where there are no problems to begin with. Last night, however, as I sat in awe and observed the workings of this crazy mind, it felt like I was being hit, not with a single arrow, but with thousands of them every second. The rapidity of the arising of negative thoughts and their subsequent emotional reactions was astonishing.

After being with this experience for a while, I turned my attention as fully as I could to the feeling of the body breathing. This was difficult at first because the volume and intensity of the thought contents practically blocked out all ability to focus attention. Finally I felt a few breaths, disengaging momentarily from the onslaught of the thought tsunami.

Then the thoughts took over again, and I was back on the wave, only this time, they seemed a little more distant and not so immediate, as though a little space had been placed between my awareness of the thoughts, and the thoughts themselves. Because of this space, it was much easier to come back to the breath, which I did over and over again. Each time I disengaged from the thoughts and went to the breath, the thoughts got weaker. The area around them more spacious, and soon the upsetting thoughts were gone and normal, present-moment thoughts had taken their place.

This is sometimes the process of Present-Moment Sensory Reality: we have very loud, troubling thoughts that have us trapped in suffering, and our ability to disengaged is limited, at best. We get a moment of respite from the thoughts by coming to our senses, and then the thoughts are back again, and so we disengage again, and on and on it goes.

At first, this kind of process may make you think you really are going crazy. It can feel as though there is a ping-pong match going on in your head, moving rapidly from thoughts to breath and back again. By staying with the process, however, the thoughts will eventually quiet down a bit, and a sense of spaciousness opens up. In this space, we can then access Wisdom Mind, that part of our consciousness that can help us find more effective and intelligent alternatives to our habitual reactions to situations.

Blessings,
Roger

Mindfulness Is...

2010-08-06T18:21:00.000-07:00

By Donald Fleck

1
Mindfulness is
Noticing the sound of a bird's song,
Feeling my feet upon the earth
And a breeze upon my face.

Mindfulness is smelling a dandelion
While noticing the mud ooze between my toes.

Mindfulness is waking in the dark, not knowing where I am... and smiling.

2
Mindfulness is thinking of the past, and noticing.
Thinking of the future, and knowing I am doing it,
Being in the present, inhabiting it... right now.

3
Mindfulness is everything that I'm aware of, with intention to notice.

4
Mindfulness is taking a step back and noticing life with awareness.
Mindfulness is jumping into the fullness of life.
Mindfulness is knowing that my joy and pain are interrelated with that of all other beings.
That my progress is good for all beings.
That my compassion can extend to all beings, even to myself.
Mindfulness is knowing life... and illness... old age... death... and suffering... and still intending to take the next right action.

(For more information about therapist and meditation teacher Donald Fleck, DCSW, please visit http://www.donaldfleck.com/)

Blessings,
Roger

The Things That Bug Us

2010-08-05T15:09:00.000-07:00

Last night, we threw a very modest party to celebrate our youngest's 15th birthday. Historically, any kind of gathering, whether it be for one person or one hundred, causes me to get nervous about everything coming out well. I am embarrassed to say that this nervous state has caused me to become reactive and somewhat short-tempered (can you tell that I'm sugar-coating things here?).

With the advent of my mindfulness practices, however, these reactive states have become fewer, and when I do succumb to them, they are less intense and more short-lived. Now, when I find myself edging toward anger because of stress, I am much more aware of the situation than I have been in the past. I can disengage from the catastrophic thinking that my mind is churning out and in many cases clinging to, and I can just feel myself breathe. This movement from a thought about the situation to the fact of the present moment creates some space around whatever it is that I am getting nervous about. In this way, the stressor becomes "softer," and I can allow my body to relax a bit, even if I am in rapid preparation mode.

This reflective moment also gives me access to Wisdom Mind, that part of me that knows that everything is just fine in this moment. Wisdom Mind also helps me to find novel solutions to problems, if they should arise, thus deceasing my stress level even more. Finally, and most importantly, Wisdom Mind lets me see clearly that there is really no need to act out reactively; that this is supposed to be about having fun, and not about getting upset. From here, it is a very short journey to releasing attachment to an imagined outcome, or to being attached to the idea that there is only one way to solve a problem.

My suffering decreases, and so does the suffering of those around me.

Cheers!
Roger

The Trap of Mind-Reading

2010-08-04T17:54:00.000-07:00

A Zen Teaching Story

One day Chuang-tzu and a friend

were walking along a riverbank.

"How delightfully the fishes are

enjoying themselves in the water!"

Chuang-tzu exclaimed.

"You are not a fish," his friend said.

"How do you know whether or not

the fishes are enjoying themselves?"

"You are not me," Chuang-tzu said.

"How do you know that I do not know

that the fishes are enjoying themselves?"

Blessings,

Roger

Seven Tips for Giving Up Gossip

2010-08-03T11:15:00.000-07:00

By Bhikshuni Thubten Chodron

(This sidebar appeared in the article "The Truth About Gossip" in the current issue of Tricycle, The Buddhist Review. It is reprinted here with permission.)

1. Recognize that gossip doesn’t undo the situation you’re talking about. It only puts in motion another situation based on negative feelings.

2. Know that comparing yourself to others is useless. Everyone has his or her own talents. In this way, give up jealousy and the wish to put others down.

3. Be aware of and transform your own thoughts, words, and deeds rather than commenting on those of others.

4. Train your mind to see others’ positive qualities and discuss them. This will make you much happier than gossiping ever could.

5. Forgive, knowing that people do harmful things because they are unhappy. If you don’t make someone into an enemy, you won’t want to gossip about him.

6. Have a sense of humor about what you think, say, and do, and be able to laugh at all of the silly things we sentient beings carry out in our attempt to be happy. If you see the humor in our human predicament, you’ll be more patient.

7. Practice saying something kind to someone every day. Do this especially with people you don’t like. It gets easier with practice and bears surprisingly good results.

To see the entire article, click on http://www.tricycle.com/-practice/the-truth-about-gossip

Blessings,
Roger

Letting Go

2010-08-02T18:29:00.000-07:00

Two monks were traveling together down a muddy road.
A heavy rain was falling. Coming around the bend,
they met a lovely girl in a silk kimono and sash,
unable to cross the intersection.

"Come on, girl," said the first monk. Lifting her
in his arms, he carried her over the mud.

The second monk did not speak again until that night
when they reached a lodging temple. Then he no longer
could restrain himself. "We monks don't go near females,"
he said. "It is dangerous. Why did you do that?"

"I left the girl there," the first monk said.
"Are you still carrying her?"

Blessings,

Roger

Clinging to Aversion

2010-08-01T19:38:00.000-07:00

During yesterday afternoon's sangha one of the participants came out with a phrase that I had never heard before. After a long sitting practice, during which we investigated the Three Characteristics of impermanence, dissatisfaction (or suffering), and the doctrine of "no self" (see 4/11/10 & 4/12/10 blogs), we were discussing how easy it is to become attached to wanting this moment to be different from the way it actually is. The sangha member mentioned that in those cases we were "clinging to our aversion."

Clinging and aversion are often considered to be the root actions that cause us to suffer. We want more of a pleasant experience, so we cling to it, experiencing dukkha, or dissatisfaction, when the pleasant thing ends. On the other side of the coin, when we are having an unpleasant experience, we want less of it and so we try to get rid of it. This results in more dukkha because we might not be able to change the situation, or it will change by itself into something we find even more aversive.

So we often find that, when we are in aversion to the way things, are we will cling very tightly to this position. The mind might scream at us, "No, dammit! I DO NOT want things to be like this!" Of course, all we need to do to reduce our dissatisfaction, and our suffering, would be to accept that this is the way things are and release our attachment to wanting things to be different.

Remember that this does not mean that we have to like the way things are, it just means that we have to recognize, as best we can, that this moment is like this. Right now, this moment must be this way and we have no choice in the matter. We may have a choice about the future, but for now, this moment is the way it is. Clinging to the notion that we want it to be otherwise will only perpetuate and increase a level of suffering that is already in motion.

Many people misunderstand the idea that we must accept this moment as it is. They may think I am suggesting that we simply give up trying, or that we cannot or should not do anything to change the situation. Legitimate human suffering, such as natural or man-made disasters, war, famine, poverty, oppression, abuse, and so forth, are some examples of situations that people should rightfully want to change. I am not suggesting that we stand by and allow a situation such as starvation to continue if there is something we can do to alleviate it. However, effective action can only occur when we first understand that this is the way it is right now.

In our daily life, when we notice that we are clinging to our aversion toward the way things are, we only need to release our attachment to the aversion itself. We can still have our desire to change the situation, and we can still take action to remedy it. If, in that moment, there is nothing we can do to change things, then through our releasing of our attachment to a specific outcome, we can endure the situation with a lesser degree of dissatisfaction. Only through recognizing that things are the way they are, and then releasing attachment to our desire for things to be different, can we break the cycle of suffering in which we find ourselves stuck

Once again I must repeat: We are not releasing the desire itself, we are only releasing the attachment to our desire that things be different. We can still have that desire, but now we hold it with an open hand and have come into a new relationship with it so that we might be able to see it in a new way. Then, and only then, do we have the ability to respond from the unpleasant situation rather than reacting to it.

Blessing,
Roger