Relationship, Relationship, Relationship

     "All shall be well,
      and all shall be well,
      and all manner of things shall be well." Julian of Norwich (1342 – 1416) English Christian mystic

      “So long as one is merely on the surface of things, they are always imperfect, unsatisfactory, incomplete. Penetrate into the substance and everything is perfect, complete, whole.”
        Philip Kapleau. “The Zen of Living and Dying. A Practical and Spiritual Guide.” Shambhala, 1998. 

     How do we feel on reading such statements by saints, mystics & other serious meditators / contemplatives? Where do we land on this spectrum?: 

vehemently disagree
confused & lost
intrigued
intellectually agree
emotionally agree
completely agree (intellectually, emotionally & physically)

     The closer we are to vehement disagreement, the more aversion we have towards some aspects of our life & our selves AND the more craving we experience towards other aspects of our life & our selves. Powerful aversion to all (people, things & situations) that threatens our survival, health, happiness, wealth, status, etc, and craving & clinging to all that guarantees our survival, health, happiness, wealth, status, etc seems absolutely obvious, healthy & reasonable to most of us.
     YET, at the same time, we all know at least subconsciously, that our ability to control constant change, aging, sickness & death is an illusion. So most of us, for most if not all our lives, live "merely on the surface of things." We half-pretend (delusion) we can keep our "self" from changing, aging, getting sick & dying, AND at some level, we experience life as hard, cruel & meaningless.

     But an interesting change occurs when we stop pouring so much energy into aversion, craving & delusion. We start to experience intimacy with who we really are, everything around us, with all of life. This often happens after we suddenly realize that we only have a very short time to live (trauma-associated growth); following other major traumas ('shipwrecks'); during aboriginal sweat lodge ceremonies, vision quests, & other spiritual practices; insights, 'heart openings' & other mystical experiences during serious meditation practice. 
     Many of us have experienced more trauma than we may consciously realize. Psychotherapy would greatly help to free us from a prison of PTSD-like reactivity. Relying on spirituality alone when psychotherapy is necessary ('spiritual bypassing') prolongs needless suffering and obstructs spiritual growth.
     "On the surface of things," life does suck. But when we "penetrate into the substance," when we become intimate with reality, everything changes.

      "You learn about a thing ... by opening yourself wholeheartedly to it. You learn about a thing by loving it." Barbara McClintock - Nobel prize-winning geneticist

     "Anything will give up its secrets if you love it enough." George Washington Carver  

     "When we give our hearts to whatever we do, to whatever we experience, or to what is happening around us, without personal agendas or preferences taking over ... the space of awareness, is exactly the same."
       Amaro Bikkhu "Small Boat, Great Mountain." 2003   www.amaravati.org/downloads/pdf/SmallBoat.pdf 

     "All IS well,
      and all IS well,
      and all manner of things ARE well." Julian of Norwich (modified)

Everyday Mind's Blindness

     Most of us (sort of) realize that we don't "stop to smell the roses" enough. But who has time for such luxuries? After all, doesn't "everyday mind" insist that we're either a hunter or rabbit, and that it's always rabbit-hunting season?
     No wonder we miss out on so much - a huge chunk of life that doesn't involve survival / mating. Many people, events & things don't even enter our consciousness.

     “… organisms don’t pay much attention to … (things that are) not important in Darwinian terms (spreading genes). … 
     My older brother, after reaching the phase of middle age when women no longer paid much attention to him, said, ‘It isn’t that they think I’m bad looking. They just don’t realize I exist.’ Exactly! As a heterosexual woman walks down a city block, there are tons of things she could focus on, so the first job of her perceptual apparatus is to filter out things that, with the most cursory, even unconscious appraisal, are seen to not merit extended, conscious appraisal. Sadly, that category of things includes my brother …”
     Robert Wright. "Why Buddhism is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment." Simon & Schuster, 2017.

Watershed Wood Designs   watershedwooddesigns.ca

Minding the Mind

     WHILE feeling safe & loved, WE ENGAGE in exploration, play, & cooperation.
     WHILE feeling frightened & unwanted, managing feelings of fear & abandonment TAKES OVER. 
       Underlined words from: Bessel Van Der Kolk. “The Body Keeps the Score. Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma.” Penguin Books, 2015.

       How rarely we feel completely safe & loved! Perhaps even more sad is being so used to feeling frightened & unwanted, that we assume this to be "normal".

     Safe & loved feels like: 
• while hugging someone you love & who loves you; 
• while looking after a 2-year-old grandchild; 
• while holding a puppy's face in your hands & staring into each other's eyes; 
• while doing work that you find very meaningful & rewarding eg preparing a delicious, healthy meal for loved ones; 
• while "struck speechless" by the beauty of nature;  
• while quietly reading a book that you love; etc.

      Frightened & unwanted feels like: 
• "craving" - lacking, unloved, lonely, alone, small, vulnerable, afraid, anxious, longing, empty, hungry, thirsty, impotent, needy, wishing "if only I could have / do / be X, THEN I would be happy"; 
• "aversion" - angry, bitter, hating, intolerant, judgmental, disgusted, cynical, rigid, violent, wishing "if only I could avoid / prevent / eliminate X, THEN I would be happy"; 
• "delusion & confusion" - not being able to see things as they are, but only from the heavily biased perspective of our own troubled mind-heart. We feel disoriented, confused, troubled, bored, forgetful, hopeless, nihilistic, sick-and-tired of our repetitive thoughts / self-talk, moods & how our mind works, wishing for clarity, to wake up from what feels like a nightmare. 

     It's critically important for our own & others' quality of life, and even safety & survival, that we detect as early as possible, when we feel frightened & unwanted or any of it's many manifestations. 
     If this "life-or-death" alarm bell is a false alarm or gross exaggeration - and in modern times it almost always is - then we can, and I humbly suggest that we must, intentionally train ourselves to quickly shift back into feeling safe & loved with its associated wise, kind, conscious behavior.

     Of course we all tend to think that most others certainly behave from this primitive survival-based (frightened & unwanted) level of consciousness, we ourselves are, if not consistently, then mostly reside in the evolved wisdom-based (safe & loved) level of consciousness & behavior. 
     So how do these statements sound?: “No one to be, nothing to do, nowhere to go” and: "Whatever appears in the mind, just say ‘This isn’t my business. It’s impermanent, unsatisfactory, and not-self.’" 
     If these sound strange, if not irritatingly "against the grain" of all that we know, then we are usually in survival mode, and WHILE we are, survival mode is at least distorting if not completely controlling all our thoughts, emotions & behavior. We've all had varying amounts of trauma in our lives, but few of us think we've had enough to cause PTSD. But what if ALL of us suffer from some degree of PTSD?

    Mindfulness training involves learning practices with which we intentionally, consciously, continuously, notice as soon as we're in this primitive survival-based (frightened & unwanted) level of consciousness, accept it as our natural biological heritage, then effortlessly shift back into our natural evolved wisdom-based (safe & loved) level.

Katie Hoffman      "TU"      www.katiehoffman.com

Wise Wishes & Foolish Desires

     "Wanting to come on a meditation retreat, wanting to see the truth, wanting to gain insight – these would be classified as wise wishes. Wanting dessert after every meal or wanting to experience some blissful state so you can hang out there would be considered foolish desires. 
     There is indeed pleasure on the spiritual path; the Buddha frequently mentions the fact that gladness and joy are necessary components of the path. But you can't be hankering after that pleasure while working to generate deep concentration. The idea is to see where you are, to know what the instructions say to do at that point, and just do that – without what Ayya Khema called 'result thinking.' 
     As part of the practice for entering the first jhāna, when you recognize the mind has gotten to access concentration and been stabilized there for a bit, then the next step is the focusing on pleasure. That's just part of the path. Just stay focused on the pleasurable sensation and enjoy it. 
     There's nothing wrong with enjoying. It's the grasping and seeking that causes the problems; being there and just staying focused on it is not a problem. But if you are actively wanting the jhāna while you are meditating, that's a hindrance and it's going to prevent you from attaining access concentration, and with no access concentration there's no jhāna possible. This is actually a great example of the second noble truth: dukkha arises from craving."
       Leigh Brasington http://rc.leighb.com/more/Abandoning_the_Five_Hindrances.htm 

Maddy's Sky

 

Clinging to Suffering?

     “The entire teaching of Buddhism can be summed up in this way:

      Nothing is worth holding on to. 

      If you let go of everything,

            Objects
            Concepts
            Teachers
            Buddha
            Self
            Senses
            Memories
            Life
            Death
            Freedom 

      Let go and all suffering will cease. The world will appear in its pristine self-existing nature, and you will experience the freedom of the Buddha.”

       Jack Kornfield. “Living Dharma. Teachings of Twelve Buddhist Masters.” Shambhala, 1996.

Love, Peace and Happiness

     “Seeking and resistance veil our true nature, aware presence, and therefore veil the love, peace and happiness that is inherent within it or rather that is it.”

       Rupert Spira. “Presence, Volume II: The Intimacy of All Experience.” Non-duality Press, Salisbury, UK, 2011. 

     Greed (craving), aversion (hatred) & delusion (ignorance) are, in Buddhism, considered to be the "three poisons" - the basic mental states that cloud the mind, manifest in unwholesome actions, and cause suffering.

Desire, Craving, Clinging & Suffering

     "Our minds are governed by a cycle of craving what we don't have, finding it, using it up or losing it, and then being driven by loss, need, desire, or insecurity to crave it all the more. This cycle is at the root of all addictions: addictions to drugs, drink, cigarettes, sex, love, soap operas, wealth, and wisdom itself. But why should this be so? Why are we so driven, often at great cost to ourselves?"
       Marc Lewis. "Memoirs of an Addicted Brain: A Neuroscientist Examines his Former Life on Drugs." Anchor Canada, 2012.

     In 500BCE, the Buddha, through meditative contemplation, learned and taught what neuroscientists are starting to discover: the basic cause of human suffering is the "self" that "clings", craves, desires, etc. See: http://www.johnlovas.com/2014/09/unentangling-from-me-myself-i.html

     "If you get something that is quite nice, you simply want to keep it, or repeat it, or get something similar to it. Like being in debt, we must continually work to satisfy our desire for sensual pleasures, our wanting. There is no fulfillment to be found by obtaining what you want. Okay, you get some fulfillment for a bit, but no ultimate fulfillment. We usually assume that when we want something and we get it and that feels great, that feeling is due to the fact that we got what we wanted. But have you ever stopped to consider that it might be due to the fact that you stopped wanting? The relief from the wanting produces quite a bit of pleasure. So perhaps a more effective strategy would be to let go of the wanting."
       Leigh Brasington http://rc.leighb.com/more/Abandoning_the_Five_Hindrances.htm

     "Many people are not aware of this, but strictly speaking, the statues we see of the Buddha, as well as other Buddhist art objects, serve as representations of states of mind rather than of a divinity." 
       Jon Kabat-Zinn. "Mindfulness for Beginners. Reclaiming the Present Moment - and Your Life." Sounds True, 2012.

Dale Johnson   www.dpreview.com

Imagine Being Able to Love

               imagine letting go of fear,
               imagine letting go of anger,
               imagine letting go of craving,
               imagine letting go of obsessing about "self",

               what's left?

               freedom to love

P. Michael Lovas

 

Resting in Silence & Stillness

     Meditation provides a reprieve from two basic human anxieties: "I am not enough" & "I don't have enough".

       Mokshananda: Exploring the Nature of Reality
http://fora.tv/2012/10/26/Mokshananda_Exploring_the_Nature_of_Reality

William McIntosh   http://www.flickr.com/photos/mtsacprof/

An Open Question - a Koan

     "Any action that harms others is necessarily caused & accompanied by craving, aversion, & ignorance."                         S.N. Goenka

       Larkin G. Stumbling toward enlightenment. Celestial Arts, Berkeley CA, 1997.

Steve McCurry   http://stevemccurry.com/

On a Journey, with No Place to Rest

     Don't we crave security, certainty, safety, stability, predictability, the idea of being able to control our external & internal environment?

     How do we relate to the fact that none of these are real?

     What if the only "home" were a loving, conscious openness to the mystery of timeless, unpredictable, uncontrollable internal & external change?

Hungers Arising and Passing Away

yet another glimpse of a promise of completion
magnetic pull towards
hungry pull
the promise mere vapour

craving just this small part, ignoring the rest
bedazzled by a bubble

achingly releasing another fantasy
myriads of mud particles settling settling
vast clarity stillness

Cow Path by John England     http://www.fogforestgallery.ca/bios/bio_england.html

Wasting Time during Sitting Meditation

     "Vipassana meditation has to do with looking deeply into the mind and body to discern the various processes unfolding each moment that fabricate the virtual world of our experience. The riot of conceptual proliferation is often the first thing seen because it is the shallowest and busiest part of the mind. For most of us the monkey mind chatters incessantly as it swings from one branch to another, seizing first this thought, then that idea, then a host of miscellaneous associations, memories, and fantasies. The basic themes around which all this activity swirls, according to the insights of the Buddha, are craving, conceit, and views. We could watch this show all day and learn very little."

       Olendzki A. "Unlimiting Mind. The Radically Experiential Psychology of Buddhism." Wisdom Publications, Boston, 2010.

     Watch Olendzki's interview: http://www.tricycle.com/p/1762