New Years and Resolutions

Yesterday, I heard that there is a plan to shorten the New Year's festivities at Nathan Philips Square due to predicted low temperatures throughout the city. While I have never been a big fan of this celebration (not being one to savor crowds), I started to reflect on why people like to congregate on New Years, and what the significance of being together in one place happens to be. It is interesting to reflect on the notion of parties, and how big celebrations often create feelings of anticipation among large group of people. Is it possible that "the bigger the crowd" that can be generated, the more anticipation there will be? I recently read that in New York, people will get up very early and wait at Times Square so that they can be one of the first (and closest) to see the New Year's ball drop. They will even wear diapers, knowing that there are very few washroom facilities open at around midnight in New York City. Why do people do this, then?
   I often use New Years as an opportunity to reflect on my resolutions, or what I hope to achieve at the end of a given year. In other words, there is an opportunity to reset one's mind as needed and make some kind of vow or promise to myself. The problem is that,, often, our resolutions are completely based on the moment and the circumstances we happen to be in. Many people take prolonged vacations during the holiday season, where they have many opportunities to reflect on all the things they want to achieve over the next year. They may not be aware that because they are completely unoccupied and have less responsibilities in that moment, they may dream very big. It's a little bit like that experience of going to a supermarket on an empty stomach: I end up buying a whole bunch of things I don't really need, because it reflects the empty stomach of that moment rather than the realistic workings of the body from day to day. Honestly, do I need that many mangoes or grapes if I am not so hungry as I might be when I enter the supermarket?
   The same thing, perhaps, goes with resolutions. I might promise myself to do something for the new year but I need to have a day to day plan to make it happen. I am not saying not have resolutions but rather, one needs to be realistic about one's resolutions. Is the goal really to "get rid" of a craving one has or might a more realistic solution be to be able to bear frustration of not having what one craves? The former is very romantic: I have a problem and all I really need to do is just stop indulging it and it will go away. But this kind of goal does not consider the consequences. If I decide not to indulge what I like, I do need to face the consequences of the emotions I might feel (deprivation, loneliness, withdrawal, etc.). Can I look at these emotions as they are without trying to turn them into something else? Well, this is where day to day life starts to kick in, and one has to learn to bear the more mundane aspects of renouncing cravings and facing the everyday. It's good to set goals, yes, but it's also good not to romanticize goals or think that achieving them will be easy or fun all the time. What they do provide is the opportunity to befriend difficult or challenging emotions.

Compassionate View of Desires

Desire is often thought to be something we are entitled to. We live in a society that values permissiveness, but we need to ask ourselves: is it compassionate or even beneficial for parents to allow their children to do whatever they want? Compassion can be firm and unyielding as much as it can be gentle and allowing; it doesn’t necessarily entail allowing people to do whatever they want, whenever they want. But there is more to it than this. Actually refraining from doing what one desires the most or wants can, in itself, be a very joyful experience. Through a process of talking gently and compassionately back to our desires, we can create safe spaces where frustration can be endured and even enjoyed, if we so choose to do so. Even the act of doing something unpleasant can be reframed in a compassionate way so that we can fully embrace the act of doing the unpleasant. It takes practice to be able to do so, but I believe it’s achievable.

Why is it enjoyable to do what we don’t like to do? In order to understand this, we need to know how the mind works. The mind is not bound by categories. Even if I react to a situation by saying “I like this, I don’t like that”, we are really only imposing our previous learned categories. We can be in a situation and not be bound by those old categories, simply because our mind is both the categories and more than these categories. When I relax body and let my mind be completely relaxed as well, I can acknowledge that thoughts are only thoughts. I can then choose to disregard thoughts that are either not appropriate to a situation or are not healthy or conducive to the well being of sentient beings. Anger doesn’t need to be acted upon: it can be seen compassionately as the result of prior conditioning or assumptions, especially around a very limited or narrow sense of self.

To use an example of the latter: many times, a person might be in the habit of thinking that they have things or abilities which belong uniquely to themselves. Hence, we speak of “my habits, my things, my talents”, and so on. What we often might not realize is that everyone around us has the same thoughts about the self or “what belongs to me”, and we are not so unique as we believe in this regard. When I drop the sense that I am this single isolated person with their own “unique” thoughts and ways of being, I can realize that I am not as different from the others as I think. Many of “my” thoughts are actually the result of conditioning that happens from the moment I am born into the world, so I can’t necessarily claim that these thoughts are “my own”, and define “me” as a person. So I start to loosen the idea that I am fixed by my previous ideas or am defined by them.

Just as we consider ourselves unique by our thoughts, so we also identify ourselves with our likes or our wants. I define myself as “a coffee drinker” because I happen to like the taste of coffee, for example. What’s more is that the more I identify with what I like or what I prefer to do, the less tolerant I might be of other ways of being which might threaten that sense of self. In the book Gulliver’s Travels, Jonathan Swift satirizes this point by describing two warring factions who are fighting over what side to peel an egg from (the smaller top part or the broader bottom). What happens when we choose to refrain from doing what we desire is that often we become afraid of losing that sense of self which we identify with the desires we have habitually indulged in. It’s no longer a matter of giving up a feeling, but now there is a heavy sense of self invested in that feeling.

To really be able to give up desires, we often need to reflect that there is no concrete enduring self that is “desiring”. Even if I vehemently hate or am irritated with what’s in front of me, or strongly wish for that circumstance to go away, is there really a “self” that is permanently in a state of hatred? Often, what we think is permanent about us is really just a set of conditions; once the conditions are removed, the feeling is no longer there. How and why did we think there was an enduring self to defend there? This is the illusion of the self, which has sometimes been compared to a circle that is created when we twirl a torch of light rapidly. The “circle” is an illusion based on the tendency to connect previous thoughts with present thoughts in time. It’s not a substantially real and enduring circle after all.

It’s therefore not necessary to defend the self that desires something so much. Conversely, it’s not necessary to “train” the self either. Where, after all, is this self? No matter how hard I might try to replace my “bad” thoughts with “good” ones, is there ever an enduring self that permanently embodies good thoughts? Actually, even this good self is illusory, because it’s only an object or a concept that exists in mind. The idea is to know that there is no resting point for the self and to practice questioning whether there really is a self there at all.

Choosing the Pain One is Willing to Handle

I am reading a book by Mark Manson titled, quite elegantly, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, a Christmas gift I received. Albeit humorous, this book is interesting in the way it describes how we have no choice in terms of pain and frustration since all human lives contain some measure of pain and frustration.  Inevitably, we are going to encounter situations which don’t accord with our innermost wishes, and we have no choice but to anticipate that life will have its share of inconveniences. However, what we can choose are the kinds of pain we want to adopt in our life. That is, we can choose pain that is actually fulfilling and has a purpose. While I don’t agree with some of Manson’s comments about what constitutes good/bad values and what are “valuable” ways to suffer, Manson raises the interesting point that it’s not happiness we are choosing but the kind of pain that we want to learn from and handle.

I am wondering if, rather than looking at pain as choice or even a larger project, we can instead look at pain in terms of recursive relationships from which we can potentially learn and mature, provided that we are willing to surrender ourselves to the experience somewhat, or at least be open to new things. While it’s true that we choose the kinds of “pain” we want to have, I can’t help but think that pain itself is only one part of a larger dialogue in which we choose to participate or not participate at all. According to Guo Gu in his book, Passing Through the Gateless Barrier (2016, p.139) painful or frustrating moments can actually become turning points for existential realizations; our previous attitudes and expectations are shattered. In order to embrace such a journey, I can’t help but think that we have to loosen the rigid boundaries of what we call self, in this current moment.

I am reminded of the Buddha’s story as I am thinking about this topic. The Buddha himself went through periods in his early years as an ascetic when he drove himself to very “unproductive” sorts of pain, only to realize on the verge of death that this kind of pain wasn’t going to take him to any further realization or spiritual insights. At the same time, I have to wonder, was this “unnecessary” pain not in fact a necessary step for Buddha and his followers? After all, had the Buddha not gone through the extremities of the ascetic life, he (maybe) and his followers (yes) would not have known that it is not the middle path, and self-denial through bodily deprivation is not quite the way forward, at least not according to Buddhist teachings.

So, can we say that the Buddha’s pain was “necessary” in the evolution of his thinking? If we take this line of argument, we might say that any pain that we experience in life is necessary to our spiritual growth and realization. I have to say yes and no-it depends on how you are framing such an experience. If I continue to experience the same painful situations and am not able to contextualize them as part of an evolving whole, then I am hard pressed to say that this pain is “necessary” because it doesn’t fit into a larger process.  But what often happens is that if I realize something beyond the pain itself, I am able to say that the pain has its place; it’s neither necessary nor an obstruction, but it’s part of the territory of being. Knowing pain in this way, it starts to become meaningful…but if divorced from a bigger picture, pain is either fetishized or it’s ignored, which are both not healthy ways of looking at pain.

Guo Gu (2016). Passing Through the Gateless Barrier: Koan Practice for Real Life. Boulder: Shambhala

Manson, Mark (2016). The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A CounterIntuitive Approach to Living the Good Life. New York: Harper Collins.

Process and Result in Writing

  I am reflecting tonight on how I tend to think mainly about results when it comes to writing, as well as "overarching" trajectory. It's almost as if I want to reduce the process of writing (or distill it) down to one particular thing or theme. It's something that has been socialized in me, and I suspect that as many people get to university, they are pressured to specialize in some way. Thus, rather than writing about several things at once, we are asked to whittle our interests down to one or two sizable subjects. The pressure in writing is often not to expand one's thoughts but to distill them and to put them in focus. Otherwise, we will end up cluttering the page (or the screen, in this case) with too many ideas and thoughts.
   This mentality of trying to distill our thinking into one or two ideas is quite good, and it's the basis for writing in general. But sometimes what it results in is a kind of premature narrowing of one's thinking before creative ideas can really come out to the fore. I suspect that when I come to write, I am so determined to have a single point or purpose in writing that I forego the "painful" process of brainstorming or free-flowing that should probably precede any proposals or written work. Could it be that I have become so attached to the "final result" of a written piece that I might try to forego the messier dynamics of arriving at a writing topic that is original and worth exploring using new lenses?
   What I think might be missing or somewhat lacking here is the trust that what seems chaotic and disconnected will eventually resolve, with time and effort, into new discoveries or connections. Time is actually perhaps more crucial than effort: there are many times when I have read accounts of creative people who tried too hard to push for a resolution to their unresolved questions and doubts that they ended up exhausting their ideas, only to find a novel solution when their mind seemed least focused on it. We form connections, but sometimes the conscious mind only puts together the more obvious ones, which have been used time and again.
  What I am arguing is to forego specialization for a while in the initial planning stages of the creative process, and to allow things to be a bit messy without concluding that this is a kind of failure.  It's only when I have many different ideas laid out on the table that I can later pick and choose the ones that might make for intriguing research topics or ideas. However, if I push too hard for ideas to conform to a "master idea" that I am already enamored with from the get-go, I fail to see more intriguing or novel connections that can come when the mind is simply open, and not discriminating one idea as "good" or the other as "bad". I think this also requires the maturity of knowing that published (or publishable) results are never final ones, and that the process is always recursive and branching further into new possibilities.

Celebrating the Joy of Others

    Mudita is one of the four brahma-viharas, or boundless qualities found in Buddhist teachings, which corresponds to feeling joy without a self center. Often, people refer to it as sympathetic joy which refers to being able to share the feeling of joy that others exude.  Perhaps it's fitting to explore this idea since many of the holiday carols talk about joy in different spiritual contexts and traditions. When we sing such songs, do we feel the authentic joy that the song evokes, or is it sometimes artificial? How do we get to feel a joy that is not necessarily "ours" or corresponding to our own experience?
     I was at a restaurant earlier this evening and I overheard a conversation across from me where a couple were announcing to their friend that they were expecting a baby soon. The other was so struck with joy, and to my embarrassment (perhaps due to my proximity), I was in a situation where I felt I should feel their joy but in fact did not. It made me wonder, what is it about joy that it only infects those who know the joyful person? Is it possible for strangers to also feel or share in the joy of those who are in happy moments? When I talk about this, however, I am not talking about sympathy, where I felt the same feeling as the other due to a similar experience, or envy, where I feel the longing to have or do what others have or do. Rather, there is almost a kind of suspension of the self, or ego, that tends to evaluate the feelings of others in terms of whether or not they relate to me in any way. To give an example of the previous experience: had I been practicing intentional "mudita", I would have been able to celebrate the others' success, even though I am not particularly interested in having children myself. In order to do that, I would have to bracket my own personal sense of likes and dislikes, and simply celebrate what the other has been able to find joyful for themselves, regardless of the nature or content of that joy.
   In the article "Unselfish Joy: A Neglected Virtue" (1971), Natasha Jackson identifies mudita as a kind of "appreciation"of the other, citing Buddhist scholar Edward Conze as one of the first to suggest that mudita is a prerequisite to loving kindness and compassion (to of the other brahma viharas). Jackson notes, "mudita tacitly implies looking for the good in others and learning to recognize and admire what good there is."  Rather than being a "blanket" emotion that a person might automatically bestow upon others, mudita thus needs to be practiced with a felt appreciation for individuals and the kinds of good that they possess already. In fact, I find that this is quite different from loving kindness (metta) where the focus is on spreading a well wishing upon all sentient beings.
   With this appreciation comes a sense of optimism about the capacity of human beings in general. I think that this appreciation is a counter-balance to the misconception that Buddhism might be life-denying or nihilistic, as well as the general sense shared by some religions that human beings are in a fallen state and are in need of redemption by something that is outside of themselves. It also counterbalances the sense that Buddhism emphasizes relief from suffering without being able to positively appraise or share one's happy or good conditions. What's also the case is that when we accept each other unconditionally and are able to celebrate each others' high points and successes, then we are capable of reversing our tendencies to compare ourselves or think that success only happens to some people. If I can intentionally let go of the anxiety that success and happiness is taken away from me when it is seen in others, this can reduce the tendency to compare or even to inflate the ideals of success to the point of feeling jealous or somehow inadequate.
   As I am reading about mudita, I almost get the sense that genuine joy in others requires working on the anxiety of "not finding happiness" ourselves. We tend to think of happiness as some kind of "thing" that needs to be pursued or even "grabbed" and grasped. It might take the form of something tangible, like a special position or a published paper in a journal. It might also come from a sense of validation or a confirmation that I have "done enough" to satisfy my inner requirements as a person. If I am really able to see through these self-validation schemes (sometimes referred to as "conditional self-acceptance- see Ellis, 2001), I don't attach to them and yet I can celebrate them in others without anxiety. In order to make room for celebrating the joy found in others, one often needs to paradoxically stop attaching to this kind of temporary, conditional joy. Otherwise, the celebration of such joy will come with a sense of pain or inadequacy, or even a reminder that I may not have "done enough" to achieve similar joy in my life.
  If the joy of successes (getting a promotion, becoming educated, marrying etc.) are temporary, why celebrate them at all? To me, our successes represent the culmination of the efforts to work on certain things we care about in our life, which we value as something that uplifts others. Not everything that we find joyful is necessarily belonging to this category (such as the joy of eating candy, or the joy of robbing a bank). But I think that what we perhaps celebrate is the ability for people to work on things that matter to them which can benefit the community in turn. But I agree with Ellis that we should not take this to mean that our value as people should be based on what we have "achieved". Although human potentials can be celebrated, it's perhaps a mistake to think that we should value others only by what they do or by the results they have achieved. It seems that in order for mudita to be genuine, one must feel confident that celebrating the joys of others does not relate to human worth in general. What we are essentially doing is validating the happiness of others as essential aspects to their growth.

Ellis, Albert (2001). Overcoming Destructive Beliefs, Feelings and Behaviors. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books

Jackson, Natalie (1971). "Unselfish Joy: A Neglected Virtue". From https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/various/wheel170.html#intro

Unconditionally With Others

 Today was a snowy and wet day, but it was beautiful overall. I had a chance to facilitate the last Saturday group meditation session for the year, followed by a trip to the Distillery Christmas Market downtown with friends from Dharma Drum Mountain. I would have to say that what characterized my day was the sense of unconditionally relaxing in the presence of others, without any particular need to take on a role or a position. This is hardly a way of being that I am used to, since most of my life is pretty scheduled between work and other duties. But that ability to be present with others felt very healing and nurturing to me nonetheless, and it inspired me to think about how I can change my attitude in the coming year to something that is less "role" driven and more present.
  Part of the anxiety that I think people feel when they are with others (at least from my experience) is that they never fully feel accepted, either by themselves or by others. I remember reading a book by Charles Taylor, the Canadian philosopher, which said something to the effect that this kind of mentality comes from a Puritan sense of identity that has become predominant from the 19th century onward: work defines who we are, what makes us "important" to others, and even what gives us a sense of self-worth at the end of the day. Even when I was with fellow Chan practitioners and volunteers today, I felt this inner pressure inside of me which made me want to confirm that I am "on the right track", as though there is a track that is somehow based on what a person accomplishes. Yet, the sense that I have is that I am around people who accept me fully as I am, and there is no need for me to put on any special airs with them: they see my strengths and weaknesses as a whole package, yet are willing to be with me. I did feel touched by this as I was going home from the distillery and dinner.
  These kinds of experiences convince me that the best we can ever be to others is happy within and content with ourselves. This is a gift that we can give to others that is the highest kind. I am not too sure at this point, looking at myself, how this is accomplished. While one of the things I have stressed throughout this blog is meditation, I doubt that using meditation forcefully to try to reform one's personality or reject certain phenomena is really the proper approach. Sometimes simply relaxing in the moment without even that hidden "agenda" that I sometimes carry around meditation is really the best way. I do believe that there is a real value in just hanging out, and just being with others, without anything to prove whatsoever.
  The other thing I am realizing is that sometimes our deepest soul (?) knows what we need in the moment. If it's music, the soul will create its own music to uplift ourselves. If it's a compelling story, then the soul knows how to make that story. There is no need to suppress these inclinations or try to steer clear of them, when they often have ways of making us feel happier in the presence of others. After all, the point of social life is not just to network or be physically connected in the same space. It's rather to mutually uplift our souls, which already contain some pretty interesting materials as it is, if only we allow these materials to surface. When I am feeling disconnected from the world or others, I often do come up with new music in my mind. Perhaps it is my way of being happy in the moment, or a survival mechanism, but it ends up that this music allows me to carry on a sense of connection with others even if the topics we are sharing are not resonating with me in that moment. Amazingly, it seems that the soul already has the things inside of it to pull people through and heal their imbalances. But a lot of times, we don't trust that soul anymore, and we have substituted a series of techniques and "strategies" for the wisdom of the soul.

Truths in Fiction

Richard Gerrig's book Experiencing Narrative Worlds has given me much to ponder recently. It's somewhat strange that this book managed to "find" me (and not the other way around). But it was a green book that was just sitting in the desk beside me when I was at the OISE library. Upon perusing the book's curious cover and topic, I immediately was caught by the topic and the idea.
   One  of the key claims made by Gerrig in this book is the way in which "the only experiential distinctions between fiction and nonfiction are those that readers effortfully construct...all information is understood as true until some is unaccepted. My general conclusion is that fictions will fail to have a real-world impact only if readers expend explicit effort to understand them as fictional" (p.240).
   This is quite interesting because it makes me wonder what the mind actually experiences to process something as fictional as opposed to non-fictional. I have read many stories (among them by Phillip Roth, Saul Bellow, Susan Sontag and others) that felt so real to me precisely because the observations being made felt like reality. But then what does "reality" feel like anyway? Gerrig seems to evoke for me the idea that reality is a kind of set of frameworks that are used as reference points, a little bit like a net that surrounds every new idea or concept. But what makes Gerrig's findings unique is that he positions the reader as someone who needs to believe in the validity of fiction before she or he can establish whether it should not warrant inclusion in our lived worlds. This makes sense to me, because it positions literature as a little bit like having a conversation with a stranger. Although we are not going to dogmatically accept everything a stranger says as absolute "Truth" or gospel, we are just open enough to that stranger to entertain the possibility that her or his life intersects with ours. Even when we haven't experienced the things which they have or traveled to places to which we haven't gone, we have faith that their experiences have a relevance to our world. It's only when I might hear a person ranting about an obsessive idea, such as a lost ancient civilization that has scant factual evidence, that my stance toward that person switches from engaged to somewhat ironic or skeptical.
   In the same way, fictional worlds might be thought of as conversations, in which readers are willing to step into the world under the implicit faith that no world is ever completely alien to one's own. Even when the literary world in question looks sinister (such as in the paranoid world of Burrough's Naked Lunch), we bring to it a kind of spacious attention which says that we are willing to try to figure out what it might mean to ourselves and how it fits into our acquired schemas and identities. As Gerrig suggests, it's only when I make a judgment that the world is perhaps dangerous to society (as Plato did in many cases) that I stop swimming in it or engaging in its signs and symbols.
   Gerrig reaches the somehow frightening yet exhilarating suggestion that we take things to be real even though there is no objective "proof" in an external source. Then comes my question: what makes us understand that our books are "fiction" and not "non-fiction"? I think it always comes down to context, regardless of whether it's fiction or nonfiction. That is: it's only in the process of making sense of the text, the narrator's stance, my intended role as reader, and the way the text relates to other life texts, that I can tell whether the work is to be taken as fiction or non-fiction. In other words, I am really not appealing to a fixed "external" reality when I am reading books. In fact, when you think of it, this 'external' reality is an illusory thought. What could possibly be "out there" beyond my senses which clarifies that the words I am currently processing are referring to "real" things? The idea of a factual objective "out there" is a comforting reality indeed, but it doesn't accord with the way we experience and process texts.

Gerrig, R. (1993). Experiencing Narrative Worlds: On the Psychological Activities of Reading. New Haven: Yale University Press

The Anxiety of Getting Things Wrong

 I have a sense that the education system drills it into people that getting things wrong is terrible. I was thinking about this at lunch time, in light of my own fear of criticism at work. When you think about it, it doesn't take very much to do this. For example, when marking incorrect answers, teachers will often use heavy red ink with extensive strike-throughs, which is reminiscent of the kind of red markings that plants and animals often display to tell you to "stay away" or to beware of danger. Red is the universal color of mistakes, even in the natural world. Yet, instead of seeing mistakes as opportunities to learn, the education system often acculturates people to think that all mistakes are somehow forbidden or even unforgivable.
   While we rarely have this kind of red ink in our adult life, I believe that the anxiety around making a mistake carries forward into adulthood, often to the point of becoming somewhat traumatized by it. Many people have even internalized the notion that without the anxiety around doing something wrong, one will not be sufficiently motivated to stay on the correct path in the future. I think it's an important part of one's spiritual education, however, to be able to look through the anxiety very clearly, and know that the anxiety is not itself going to harm a person. Even though that feeling is certainly uncomfortable, one need not associate it as being a death sentence.
   With the ability to stay with the anxiety, comes a different approach, and that is to question whether there is actually a permanent "me" who is making the mistake in the first place. Even when the mistake is a very bad one (as they often are, at times), is that making the person universally and always bad? Many therapists such as Ellis (2001) have brilliantly expounded upon these ideas through a more clear-minded approach to looking at one's self-judgments. According to Ellis, while it may and often is healthy to look upon one's mistakes with regret and a desire to change those mistakes into learning lessons, it's not a good idea to judge oneself as bad in the process of doing so. Even from a Buddhist perspective, this "self" to which one feels shame isn't really the true self. It's a kind of image that is the result of social habits that often collectively grow in a society, based on a society or community's shared and transmitted values.
   When I make a mistake and feel ashamed to see the reflection in the mirror, what exactly am I ashamed of? The image in the mirror is just a series of shapes and colors, and a few minutes ago, I had no reaction whatsoever to them, taking them for granted as "the image of myself". But is it really, after all? The shame I feel has nothing to do with this body at all, but it relates to associations and thoughts I have around the image of this "me". And that "me" is not a single unitary set of ideas after all. So why should I be ashamed of myself? Should I not simply feel a shame for the actions, and then work hard to correct the actions, rather than adding a layer of judgment to the image?

Ellis, Albert  (2001). Overcoming Destructive Beliefs, Feelings and Behaviors: New Directions in Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy. Amherst, NY: Prometheus.

Everyday Diligence

 I think that when present moment is experienced for what it is, there is an ability to let go of attachments, but this does not necessarily mean that one should just encounter the world with a lax attitude. This evening after meditation, our group read on Avatamsaka (Flower Ornament) Sutra a passage which describes why people hear the Dharma teachings but still behave in the same way as they have done in the past. As a reply to this question, the sutra warns against laziness, using colorful metaphors like people who try to scrape up the ocean's water using thin reeds of grass, and musicians who are deaf (!), unable to appreciate what it is that they proclaim.
   I have come to appreciate in my work how "letting go" does not entail not caring about work at all. Nobody in our company can afford to have such an attitude, no matter how much they are told not to get too stressed out over the small stuff, and all those other messages about stress management. I think that what Buddhist teachings in particular espouse is the idea of not getting out of the flow of work itself, through some self-preoccupation. If I come to work with the attitude that there is this fixed definition of success, and my day won't be 'accomplished' unless I achieve those fixed ends, then I am bound to get stuck when I realize that things rarely unfold as planned. I even have to come to work anticipating the unexpected, which will shatter my view of what success is supposed to mean on a given day.
   Another way of looking at it is to think of every moment as effort, but not to get stuck on past efforts, or use them to predict what needs to be done in the present. This mentality is often antithetical to one which tries to standardize our motions, even to the point of doing time studies to see how we can maximize our movements to achieve the most results. Contrary to this view, I surmise that diligence requires the openness to keep redefining or reframing what diligence requires in a given moment, whether it is more swiftness, greater attentions to little details,  more listening, more presenting, and so on. No two moments are going to be alike in terms of what they ask. But we can still do this kind of thing with a relaxed mindset: I don't need to apply all my past experiences or standards to what I am doing now.
   Yesterday, I heard and interview with a prominent musician about the passing away of his musical partner recently. He mentioned how one of the things that might have prevented them from collaborating on new material before the partner's passing was the past success of their music, which created a very daunting standard for them to try to equal or possibly outdo. I am afraid that sometimes I approach work with this same attitude: thinking I need to continually outdo or equal what I have done in the past, when in fact they may not even be comparable. Times change, so why would I want to hold up the same standards I had five years ago to what I am doing today?

The Juggling Metaphor

 In his book Conquest of Mind, Eknath Easwaran has used a very colorful and apt metaphor to describe how people can transform their emotions about things: namely that of juggling. Easwaran notes his early fascination for juggling, remarking on how each time he was able to extend his skill with juggling and keep challenging himself to do things he wouldn't normally do. He uses this analogy to talk about how we juggle likes and dislikes. He notes:

This kind of juggling begins not with eggs and eggplants but with likes and dislikes. This is only for the adventuresome, but it makes an excellent test of spiritual awareness. Can you change your likes at will? When it benefits someone else, can you turn a dislike into a like? If you can, you have really made progress. (p.48)

Although Eawaran doesn't quite put it in this way, I would suggest that the metaphor of "juggling likes and dislikes" might be like a continual "re-imagining" of a disciplined life, where a person learns to extend their likes to embrace dislikes. Just as I orient myself in a forgiving and gentle way toward my likes, so I learn to extend this orientation or even redirect it along the lines of what I resist or dislike, given what I have experienced among my likes.

One time a year or so ago, I had asked a monastic at the meditation center where I practice how a person can be loving and kind toward everyone in a crowded room. Which person, I asked, do you choose to be kind to? The monastic mentioned that we can start with the people we feel most attached or interested in, and then develop the aspiration and the heart from the deep relationships with those people. To go back to the analogy of "extension", there is a sense that the more people can practice with things they like, the more they can extend to that which they dislike. While this is one way of looking at it, however, it it hard to make that jump, because it's easy to become attached to one's likes.
 
Another analogy that I have heard is that of daring oneself, which is something that we do when we eat things like hot peppers. Even though hot peppers are painful to eat, we end up loving the challenge because we can see where we are based on our ability to take the intensity of the pepper.  When I orient toward the food as a kind of challenge to myself rather than as a succulent flavor, my attitude might change to a more observing disposition: I am not trying to judge the food or whatever it is as "good" or "bad", "pleasant" and "unpleasant", so much as I am observing dispassionately my reactions, without a trace of judgment. This, I feel, is a perhaps more realistic way of looking at why feelings of like might extend to dislikes. It is also a much more forgiving attitude, where I am able to see all my reactions equally by deciding not to reject some and seek others.

Easwaran, Eknath (1998, 2010). Conquest of Mind. Tomales, CA: Niligri Press

Narrative Expectations

I am reading an interesting book by Richard J. Gerrig, Experiencing Narrative Worlds (1993), in which he cites research by Allbritton and Gerrig (1991) to suggest that our hopes and expectations of narratives often shape our experiences of these narratives. The authors note, regarding their study that they sought to demonstrate how "the mental expression of hopes and preferences could directly affect the representation  of textual information" and that "[O]ur intuitions were shaped by the experience of narrative worlds in which outcomes did not follow our preferences" (p.69). Allbritton and Gerrig's theory is intriguing because it suggests that narratives are often co-constructed based on the hopes, expectations and previous experiences of the reader, and are later shaped or potentially even thwarted through the narrative trajectory itself. Gerrig's text abounds with many examples where text contains material which evokes meaning without spelling it out. Readers use a combination of making inferences and participating in the text itself (that is, engaging emotionally in the text) to evoke meanings that might not be in the words themselves. According to this view, readers are active participants in the meaning of the text and how it actualizes for them in daily life.
   As I am reading Gerrig's examples, an intriguing possibility occurred to me that literature and text offer people interesting opportunities to explore disconnects between the narrative and our anticipations and expectations toward the narrative. From a contemplative learning perspective, I can see how one could explore the differences between reading a text "just as is" and using the text along with a contemplative practice like meditation. Would reading a text "as is" add layers of filtering and expectation that reading + meditation would not? According to contemporary thinkers and theorists on mindfulness and meditation, being "mindful" would open new or unexpected possibilities to explore a text in novel ways that render it more interesting or fascinating. That is, we would expect that meditating alongside reading a text would make learners drop expectations of what they hope the text could mean and be more open to its more subtle meanings.
   The case could also be made for how passages from spiritual traditions could be seen differently depending on the context and the way that they are being recited over time. Does reading a spiritual text "as is" have a different feel from reading it alongside meditative practice? Of course, spiritual narratives are a little bit different from narratives from literature or novels, but it would be interesting to compare how expectations are played out in a spiritual as opposed to a non-spiritual text.

Gerrig, Richard J. (1993). Experiencing Narrative Worlds: On the Psychological Activities of Reading. New York: Yale University Press.

Vulnerable Observer

I was first introduced to the term "vulnerable observer" today, a term coined by Ruth Behar, from a chapter by Oren Ergas called "Knowing the Unknown" in  Toward and Spiritual Research Paradigm (2016). Here is a beautiful quote in Ergas' chapter:

The standards by which the quality and rigorousness of this strand of [spiritual] research are assessed, are not the replication of an experiment, as is customary within objectivity-based natural sciences, but rather resonance and emotional evocation. Anthropologist Ruth Behar (1997) expresses this in proposing a science based on a “vulnerable observer”. She calls this an anthropology that “breaks your heart” (p.17).

As I am reflecting on this paragraph, I am wondering what the conditions are by which this vulnerability can be induced. I do believe that the researcher needs to meditate regularly to keep a clear and calm mind, as well as to see the interconnectedness in all things. To be willing to break one's heart in the continual observation of things around us is a truly great feat, and I would imagine how hard it is to do this without seeming forced or sentimental. I think that what it really requires as well is the sense of not separating the researcher from the environment, which entails a sense of egolessness. It is not so easy to attain, but honest reflection coupled with spiritual practice seem to be two major and important factors or elements.
    Research often carries with it misleading ideas that the researcher has these tools at her or his disposal to see the world in an objective way. In reality, I believe that perhaps good research requires the ability to be broken in many ways: by complexity, by uncertainty, by the need to continually change and revise, and by the very depressing (at times) prospect of realizing that one has reached a dead end or may need to revise their questions and topics completely. I wonder, do courses in research actually prepare researchers for these emotional realities and spiritual insights in doing research? Or are these aspects of the spiritual life of researchers perhaps under-studied? Research in and of itself is a spiritual journey which involves continually questioning the researcher self, as well as allowing the researcher's heart to be broken many times.

Ergas, O. (2016). Knowing the Unknown. In Toward a Spiritual Paradigm: Exploring New Ways of Knowing, Researching, and Being. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing Inc.

Language Learning and Contemplation

 I have been reading quite a bit recently on the connections (if any) between language learning and contemplation and holistic practice. When I say "if any" I mean that learning a new language has hardly been explored from a contemplative perspective, not even from a spiritual perspective. Spiritual teachers often seem to take a hard line approach toward language in general, particularly Chan and Zen where there is a tendency to think that language and discursive thinking only serves to confuse or go against practice. What I am really wondering is, can contemplative or meditative practices help in learning a new language? If so, how do they help the person learning a new language, such as Mandarin? I would certainly be interested in taking part in a study of that nature.
    Language isn't just something that is isolated or standalone. It touches upon conversations that people have, and it's connected with the shifting environments that are around a person. To teach language as though words had these definite, fixed meanings is a little bit strange, like trying to teach words only through a dictionary. Although dictionaries can certainly be valuable and useful tools in learning vocabulary, they cannot possibly capture all the contexts in which words are used. In fact, the contexts of words are often being actively negotiated between speakers, as van Lier (2004)
has noted.
   Can language be seen in such a way that learning it is part of a person's unique, unfolding soulful life? That sounds like a stretch, but can language be seen with such a sense of wonder? How do we get away from the stereotypical view that language is taught only as a "drill" or a fixed kind of technical skill? These kinds of questions are quite intriguing, and alas I don't have any answers to it yet.

Van Lier, L. (2004), Ecology and Semiotics of Language Learning: A Sociocultural Perspective. Boston: Kluwer Publishers

Story of the Snake

In Complete Enlightenment, Master Sheng Yen remarks about a man who performed certain bad actions after which he became a snake. He lived a very miserable life, since it turned out that he had a voracious appetite, and he was not very good at hunting. He found a way to die by going to a city gate and waiting for people to spot him, whereupon they started throwing things at him, causing him to die. The snake mistakenly believes that he is now liberated from his karmic retribution, only to find himself reborn as a snake yet again! When he is informed that he is reborn as a snake again as karmic retribution for his unpaid debts, he decides to fully accept the consequences of being a snake, whereupon he is reborn as a human. Master Sheng Yen remarks, in regards to this story, “[I]f we face dangers and difficulties as they arise, accepting them and dealing with them, then they will no longer be perceived as dangers and difficulties” (p.149).

For some time, I have thought about the import of this story. For me, the wish to die is like trying to kill one’s thoughts: I replace one thought with what I think is a more “savory” or “pure” thought, only to find that an even greater retribution awaits me. If I come to realize that the thought is the result of the perfect previous conditions, then I don’t try to feed my vexations by adding another thought to correct it. Rather, I accept that the thought is already arisen, and one can only accept with a mind that is not seeking another thought in turn. I am also reminded from this story that the desire to end suffering and desire is also itself a desire, which is subject to the same suffering as other desires. Although it seems more pure to want to end suffering than to perpetuate desire after desire, there is still an impure mentality in wanting to escape from it. That impurity is distinguishing between the “I” in this world and the desirable “Pure” world where there is no desire.

Even more profound about this story is Master Sheng Yen’s later conclusion: “if we accept our bodies and everything in our environment as being no different from eternal, unchanging nature, then we are one with enlightenment” (p.150). It’s so profound to reflect that the body and everything in it is already the eternal nature. But like the snake, I am afraid that there are times when I think this life is imperfect, and I long for a more “Perfected” one. This is for sure the root of vexations, to think in this way.

Shengyen (1997). Complete Enlightenment: Translation and Commentary on the Sutra of Complete Enlightenment. Elmhurst, NY: Dharma Drum Publications.

No Filters

I am continuing to read and enjoy Master Sheng Yen’s Complete Enlightenment, even though I don’t fully understand it, and there are times when it simply boggles the mind. Here is one example of a passage that struck me:

After enlightenment, the six consciousnesses become pure, unlimited, and unmoving. They are still. The mind does not run off in every direction after what it likes or away from what it dislikes. Naturally, when this happens all other things become pure, unlimited, and unmoving as well. It doesn’t mean that your nose will grow to an unlimited size. Rather, because you have given up your attachment to your nose and its function, it becomes limitless in its ability. (p.145)

What’s interesting about this passage is that the consciousnesses are already quite powerful, but because of the limited way that it’s used and restricted, we’re not able to see such powers. As Master Sheng Yen later remarks, in the sutra, “everything up to all the dharani doors fully pervades the dharmadhatu” (ibid). Only when the mind is not running after likes and dislikes that things can start to be seen in their fullness.

I am not sure if I fully relate to this passage, but I do feel that it has applications in daily life. Often, I approach things with a mindset of classifying things as beneficial, neutral or harmful. I run after the things which I feel are beneficial, avoid what doesn’t benefit me and often ignore what has neither effect. Somewhere in between (and often missing in the literature) are emotions of ambivalence; having a variety of mixed emotions over the same thing. In these kinds of situations, the mind doesn’t even know what to make of the situation: it moves toward then avoids the object.

What happens when we just relax the tendency to want to move toward or avoid the things around us based on how beneficial they are to the self? As Master Sheng Yen points out, the senses in those moments become unlimited in their abilities. I not only smell what is pleasant or unpleasant, but I am also capable of so much more of a nuanced connection with smells in general. In other sutras such as the Surangama Sutra, it even comes to a point where the nose can participate in all the other senses—seeing, hearing and so on. This is quite amazing and, again, mind boggling to behold. But they suggest the mind to be calm and ummoving when we approach objects: not wanting to seek or reject them in any way due to previous experiences or encounters with them.

Another thing I have noticed in my own life is that when my mind is less stirred up by good and bad news, I am able to appreciate the quieter moments when nothing in particular is happening. I think this is because feelings of thankfulness for what is can’t happen when the mind is emotionally troubled by things or judgments. Sometimes one might interpret this as “being comfortable with boredom”, but even boredom carries a subtle judgment with it. To give an example, when I listen to Christmas songs, I often feel a sense of aversion, because I do find them to be boring and artificial. But if I am able to temporarily suspend these habitual judgments, I can see that the music is a complex arrangements of notes that has no inherent meanings in and of themselves. By letting go of my habitual “filters” of judgment, I am not as tense in my relationship to them: it’s not “same old” because I am not comparing the present to the past anymore. When I let go of these judgments, there seems to be a space to enjoy the moments without necessarily enjoying the music itself.

Shengyen (1997). Complete Enlightenment: Translation and Commentary on the Sutra of Complete Enlightenment. Elmhurst, NY: Dharma Drum Publications.

“Ultimate” Equanimity

In Complete Enlightenment (1997) Master Sheng Yen’s comments on a story of a famous person in Taiwan whose wife decides to run off to someone else (p.141). Rather than taking action against her, he decides to feel joyful that his wife found someone she really loves, and accepts that she is therefore with the right person. However, he adds that “If she eventually decides that I’m not a bad person and comes back, then it means that she still cares for me and she should be with me” (ibid). The actor further suggests that he was not wrong in his judgment of his wife if she truly is cared for by the other. However, when she later comes back to him, the man maintains that the marriage is “like a diamond”, “unbreakable” and “will never go bad” (ibid). While Master Sheng Yen agrees that this attitude is a very healthy one, it is still not “the ultimate stage—the stage where everything is equal and unchanging” (ibid).

As I was reading this passage, I started to ask myself, why isn’t this ultimate equanimity? Isn’t this good enough? Master Sheng Yen uses other examples to suggest that truly seeing everything as the same in essence is the ultimate enlightenment. He uses the example of the four elements (see previous blog entry) to suggest that everything is simply transformed, and is never destroyed. The water on my toothbrush is used to wash my teeth, but once it goes down the drain, it comes to function in other ways. The essence remains the same, but it just functions in different ways under different situations.

To go back to the example of the married man: did he truly see his wife and the situation with ultimate equanimity? I think perhaps the reason Master Sheng Yen doesn’t think it’s the ultimate stage is (perhaps) that the man still clung to ideas about good and bad, “best” and “worst”, and so on. Even though he had reached an insight that there are no absolute good and bad situations, he still harbored the view that his marriage “will never go bad” and is indestructible, based on his wife’s behaviors. In this regard, his feelings about the marriage are flexible, but still conditioned by what his wife does and the outcome of her actions. Had the husband perhaps realized that there is no ideal state of marriage, he would have become closer to an ultimate view of equanimity.

Shengyen (1997). Complete Enlightenment: Translation and Commentary on the Sutra of Complete Enlightenment. Elmhurst, NY: Dharma Drum Publications.

Complete Enlightenment and Four Elements

Reading Master Sheng-Yen’s commentary on the Sutra of Complete Enlightenment, I am drawn to many of the descriptions and ideas about how our bodies and existence are united, for better or for worse. As with many Buddhist scriptures, certain passages of this sutra indicate impurity, and our need not to get attached to impure things. Here is one description I am reading from the passage where the Buddha answers questions raised by the Bodhisattva of Universal Vision :

They [bodhisattvas] should always be mindful that the body is a union of the four elements. Things such as hair, nails, teeth, skin, flesh, tendons, bones, marrow, and brain all belong to the elements of earth. Spittle, mucus, pus, blood, saliva, sweat, phlegm, tears, semen, urine, and excrement all belong to the element of water. Warmth belongs to the element of fire. Motion belongs to the element of wind. When the four elements are separated from one another, where is this illusory body? (p.120)

I find this passage interesting because not only are the four substances described graphically in their grosser details, but they are mainly characterized as transient. Master Sheng Yen points out in his commentary that these shifting substances are even shared between all beings, and thus don’t even belong to one body. What seems unpalatable about one person’s body is actually shared wit me. One example is that of germs, which are literally being transmitted from one body to the next when we catch a cold. Master Sheng Yen remarks, “Our bodies are excreting things into the atmosphere every second. It may sound unclean, but are you willing to claim that it isn’t happening? Do you think that you’ve never taken anything from another individual or that you’ve never given any part of yourself to others?” (p.124)

I have to admit that for the most part, viewing our bodies in this way is not an easy practice. It goes against the habitual way we view bodies as a) complete, and b) separate, and therefore non-interactive. Not only that, but as soon as we see people, we often classify them according to what they put on their bodies (clothes, hats, etc.) and what this supposedly says about them as individuals. But if I contemplate the ways in which the body is a composite of different substances which are shared, I can start to re-envision the ways that we are not that different. Water is a good example, because it’s pretty obvious how easily it transfers across different bodies. I recently read a piece of writing from a colleague and friend which described a project where students studied the local water system, including the organisms and chemicals that reside there. Once the children started to realize what goes into their bodies by way of the water they drink, they started to become more curious about experimenting with water and trying to discover its benefits and mysteries. Soon, the children even became social activists who tried to raise awareness among other students about the risks of water pollutants and other issues related to water. What I gather is that the students must have become more attuned to how connected they are to others just by way of this simple medium.

Master Sheng Yen concludes about this section, “In order to practice well, you must detach yourself from worldly phenomena. Whatever you gain you may lose. You should also consider any thing or any being in the world as part of yourself” (p.124). As I was reading this passage, I started to reflect that really, everything we are doing is receiving and giving in turn, and nothing stays with us. Even if I am born with a special aptitude or talent, there is no guarantee that it will stay with me (in this lifetime or after) unless I am applying myself diligently to using it for some kind of benefit. The facility is a function of my vow or aspiration to use my body and mind in the limited time I have to hone in on my skill. But if I cherish the skill as though it were “me” then I will suffer tremendously at its loss. I recently read an example of a famous musician who suffered mentally because he damaged his wrist to the point where he could not play piano proficiently enough. It’s a tricky balance, to use one’s skills diligently while not attaching a fixed self to them, or becoming too proud of those skills and abilities.

Shengyen (1997). Complete Enlightenment: Translation and Commentary on the Sutra of Complete Enlightenment. Elmhurst, NY: Dharma Drum Publications.

Is Disappointment a Form of Attachment

 Ever since I left the Buddhist Text Studies class last week, I have been haunted by questions that are analogous to: is it ethically wrong to mourn at a funeral, from a Buddhist perspective? According to the strictly doctrinal interpretations of Buddhist scriptures about death, weeping during a person's death is bound to create difficulties as the consciousness transitions to a new existence. Some have proposed the answer to be something like: weep and mourn inwardly, but don't "outwardly" express it, and try to stay calm and grounded for the other. Yet, this entire question raises related questions for me, such as, are there truly illegitimate expressions of emotion in Buddhism? Aren't humans entitled to emotional expressions to cherish the lives of other beings? Such questions have me wondering.
  Now my latest question to wrestle with: is disappointment a form of attachment? This again is a tricky question, because what do we mean by "disappointment"? I would have to propose from the outset that disappointment is attachment. After all, is the act of being disappointed not a sign that we have attached an image of who we think someone is, thinking it is a real person we are seeing? At the same time, however, I am ambivalent about this, because some forms of disappointment might come across as forms or at least signs of love and care. Consider a mother's disappointment that her daughter does not call her to say she is coming home late after a party. The daughter might argue with her mom (if she is a Buddhist) by saying that mother is too attached to her daughter's whereabouts, and suffers as a result. However, we would not expect mothers to be like this to their children? It seems to me that 'disappointment' with a child's behavior might be one of the job hazards that go with the territory of being a parent! And the same goes with all relationships in general. As long as we have expectations, we will occasionally feel disappointment over their not being met. Can we learn to simply let go of expectations altogether when it comes to loved ones? I suppose the answer depends on how well our spiritual practice has been going.
   I think that ethically speaking, at the end of the day, we need to be clear about where our emotions come from. It's not about saying "this emotion is bad; get rid of it", but more a question of being able to discern its nature and origin. If I am clearly aware that there is nobody in the universe who ever makes me feel disappointed with someone's behavior, then I can take ownership for the emotion itself. It's there and I can observe the emotion much as I would watch the breath during meditation practice. If I know that the emotion is created from my mind's way of seeing and relating to things (with cravings, aversion, ignorance, and so on), then I can accept the conditions that give rise to the disappointment without blaming anyone in the process (including myself). It's as though the disappointment were clinically observed through a microscope, then let go of over time. Is there any need to suppress that emotion? Not really because when we are not trying to figure out who caused the emotion, it naturally goes away on its own and loses its power, because there is no narrative built up around self/others by way of that emotion.

Random Thoughts on Soul/Spirit

Contemplative education seems to have two very distinct streams: one might be called “spiritual” while the other might be referred to as “soulful”. There is a strange intersection between the two which is quite interesting.

Spiritual education seems to be explored through embodied practices such as meditation, yoga, qi gong, etc. where the aim is a non-dualistic experience of the universe, coupled with a more disciplined encounter with one’s emotional and personal identity. Here, Foucault’s “Care of the Self” most comes to mind. The aim of such an education is transpersonal: coming to have a unified and all-embracing compassion, opening up the universe, and transcending the self/other duality are the aims of such an education. We see this kind of thing most particularly explored in how teachers develop themselves in loving kindness meditation, embodied self-care, learning of one’s spiritual tradition, spiritual modeling, etc.  I find that these practices are fairly straightforward, in the sense that they follow the path of many ancient spiritual traditions (Christian, Buddhist, Judaic, Islamic and so on).

“Soulful Education” is more problematic and dangerous, because I find that it focuses on integration of personality, achieving congruency, authenticity, etc., and exploring the darker elements of the personality which are not often considered spiritual. Examples of soul work are explored through Jungian psychology, dreamwork, Tarot, less conventional kinds of traditions such as Tantra. The problems with integration are legion: there are times when this kind of work confuses the spiritual with the sensual, and introduces erotic elements which may not be consistent with the spiritual teachings we read about in scriptures. The ‘bringing together’ of these two terms (soul and spirit) under one umbrella term “Spiritual/Contemplative Education” disturbs me or troubles me somewhat, because I worry that there may be a mixing of very different things. While exploring erotic identity, for example, may be one aim of Tantric or soul work, I wonder if this work might be construed as a form of spiritual realization when in fact it becomes a form of attachment or enmeshment which deepens one’s inner obstructions. It’s troubling for me to try to map out/distinguish things which are soulfully integrating and experiences which lead to spiritual realizations. I believe that while the two might have an intimate connection with each other, they need to be clearly distinguished. Otherwise, one might confuse an instance of soulful ‘integration’ with spiritual realization, when in fact the two are quite different.

An example of what I am describing might be ambivalence. Freud described ambivalence as a kind of uneasy complex of feelings which comes partly from social repression and splitting of the self into acceptable and unacceptable elements. For teachers, being angry with students might be considered unacceptable in light of a dominant archetype of the teacher as a servant, a martyr, or a Mother figure. What happens for teachers, then, is that they cultivate an ambivalent relationship with their anger: desiring to channel their anger, yet feeling forbidden to do so, can create an intensified relationship to their anger as well as a splitting of the teacher personality. The same can be said of love, which is problematized by the fear that teachers will relate to their students in inappropriate ways. A ‘soulful’ exploration of these dangerous or socially forbidden emotions might be one way for teachers to develop a less divided attitude toward themselves. Through a process of journalling, teachers can develop a more wholehearted acceptance of their authentic selves, and this self-acceptance can spill over into the classroom where the teachers find healthy ways to balance their professional role and their expectations of students. Teachers can learn to state clearly what they expect from their students rather than repressing their emotions under a false service to a socially dominant “archetype”. Soulful authenticity can allow teachers to focus their energies rather than dividing their energies in unhealthy or self-sacrificing ways.

While I applaud these efforts to integrate the self through soul work, I have to caution that these practices may nor may not be transpersonal in nature, much less spiritual practices. I suggest that what would make a practice spiritual is that it allows the person to become less invested in the ego or self, through a process of letting go of investment in the ego. Now why do I caution against soulful integration as “not to be confused with spiritual practice?” The reason is that the person who integrates their personality may not necessarily have attained a realization of no-self, much less a transpersonal view of the self as lacking in substance. If I am invested in my “teacher soul”, I am still attached to the soul as though it were a kind of permanent substance. I might even become attached to the idea of authenticity, not realizing that the ‘authentic’ self is actually another construct of the mind, which changes and shifts depending on the situation. In other words, with soul work, there needs to be an accompanying realization that the self exists in multiple contexts, is always shifting, and is ephemeral. If one approaches the soul as though it were a definite substance that can be defined, one only gets deeper into enmeshment with that sense of self. It also creates power imbalance, as the soul seeks to nourish itself at the expense of other “souls”.

What I propose is that soul-work has to be seen as transitional in nature, not an end in itself. Integrating different parts of the self is a necessary process in getting to know our tendencies and karmic obstructions. However, it’s risky and dangerous to get stuck there, because the soul is also a changing and illusory construct. I can never point to my “soul” because it’s really about energies that are continually shifting. If I lack the perspective to understand that soul is a shifting nexus of energies that interconnect with other energies, I run the risk of reifying the soul and investing attachment to this ‘big self’ which is the result of integration.

Balancing View and Attitude

During the talk on Sutra of Complete Enlightenment, Venerable Chang Hwa used a very interesting analogy when she was describing the proper attitude of detachment in daily life. She mentioned how, if someone rIeally doesn't like someone else and wants to avoid that person, she or he will be so vigilant and attached to wanting to avoid the person that they cannot let go of them. In fact, as Chang Hwa asserted, denial or avoidance are both forms of grasping and attachment which cause a lot of suffering. After all, if one does not feel any need to avoid a person or seek them, then there is no vexation in the mind: one simply faces what they need to face without attaching to the conditions. Venerable Chang Hwa asserted that if one feels vexation in avoiding someone, one makes the mistaken of thinking they are real, and thus all sorts of vexations and grasping arise in trying to avoid them.
    This is all very good, but what happens when a person takes the attitude: "well, since everyone and everything is a dream, and only a dream, then there is no use caring about anyone, since everyone is just a puff of smoke coming and going"? The problem is that this is still grasping the concept of detachment, as though it were an object that I am supposed to 'get' in order to put aside my vexations about 'others'. In other words, it still brings about vexation! So what's the proper attitude, and what mistake am I making in thinking this way?
   What I have observed in myself is that whenever I am thinking or practicing solipsistically, there is an underlying strong sense of the self as an uninvolved observer, or as a disengaged spectator who is yet beyond phenomena. When I practice in this way, two problems arise. The first is that I start to treat phenomena as obstructions to my sense of self which is 'observing' the phenomena, because I think there is a real "I" that's watching the illusory dream. Thus, it's not long before I become averse to the phenomena, believing that they take me away from a permanent sense of self. The second problem is that I lose a gentle and more even-minded approach to phenomena, thinking that by denying phenomena I will achieve something spiritually. This view is also wrong because it treats phenomena as separate from mind, not recognizing that it's the mind that generates the phenomena.
   Venerable Chang Hwa at one point showed us the video of a dancing image-- one which, when looked at in different ways, can be seen as moving clockwise, counterclockwise, or a combination of both. Her point was to suggest that most people are not aware that they construct what they see using a complex process of cognition and volition, rather than being passively moved by the conditions to judge a certain way. What we see or don't see is often influenced by our intentions. If I really insist on my view being correct, I will often make efforts not to see what others are seeing, or to argue that my way of seeing is the only way. This is because I don't want to acknowledge the impermanence and emptiness of all views, for fear that it will open me up to uncertainty and endless possibility. In the same way, any view can be held in such a way that it prevents me from seeing my own self-grasping and subjectivity. Even what appears to be a correct Buddhist teaching such as "all phenomena are illusory" can be adopted with the attitude of contempt and avoidance of phenomena, thinking that the phenomena are blocking the right view or are a hindrance to enlightenment. In reality, however, phenomena are just different expressions of the mind, much like steam and ice are 'expressions' of H2O.
    When I reflect on a concept in Buddhism, I need to ask myself: what's my intention, and how does this view or assertion reflect or affect the way I treat the phenomena? If my treatment of phenomena is dismissive, fearful, angry or resentful, then chances are I am not seeing phenomena's true source. Instead, I am taking the phenomena as subtly real, even when I vehemently assert they are unreal. This is a little bit like the person who says, "God doesn't exist, and anyway, God is not good." One's thinking says it's unreal but one's feeling is to try to protect oneself from it, which doesn't make sense. Sometimes, our assertions against something or someone are only forms of denial and avoidance, rather than fair and thorough insights into the true emptiness of those phenomena. To know emptiness is to see things with fairness and compassion, not fear or resentment. But this is the challenge of practice itself, which takes a while to cultivate.

The Spiritual Void

 We had our discussion group tonight, and we talked about the spiritual void.  The idea behind it is that people often feel an inner void within themselves that can come from an insatiable greed or desire for external things. When people are too attached with the satisfactions of the external world (or the constant pressure to survive and succeed) then they will start to experience a kind of void in themselves and be terrified of it.
  I have a slightly different take on this, and that is not to take the spiritual void as a lack but more so as an invitation to the spiritual life. So often, people are terrified of that sense of lack that they hardly see it for what it is, namely as a form of decompression that happens when we experience times of non-striving, or non-satisfaction. These instances of void often fail to happen in daily life because we happen to be surrounded by many distractions that can take the edge off the pains of withdrawal and decompression. But once we are caught in the cycle of desire, the fear of lack becomes so much greater and more awesome than the actual sense of lack in and of itself.
   Taking walks and even being alone can be good ways to reintroduce the void, along with meditative practices. Acquainting oneself with times of non-progress and "not getting anywhere" can yield profound experiences, such as the realization that "needs" are really only wants. Once we stop believing that our wants are our needs, there is this burden that is lifted off our shoulders, and we start to see ourselves more for who we are, not all of our strivings and addictions.
   If we think about the case of someone with substance abuse, it's not hard to realize that the substance and its accompanying pleasures are just a mask for the fear of void. But this void is not a bad thing at all: it's an opening to an experience of non-striving. But because I think this void means that I lose my self, or sense of self, I feel panic and anxiety. I think that the void experience does need to be taken in small doses, to acquaint oneself with the differences between want and need, and to realize that the sense of self is not so solid and real that we will die in not having it around.

Interdependence Vs Dependence

 The more that I interact in group meditation, the more convinced  am I that it's through group practice that people can negotiate dependence and interdependence. This is because group meditation relies on a dynamic that is entirely one's own mind and attitude, giving people a space not to seek approval or respect from others, but to go deep into their own space of mind and heart. Even the very simple act of "being present" (even if it's uncomfortable initially) is one way to get away from the dramas that we often play out in our minds regarding who we wish to depend on, who we go to for help, who we can trust, etc.
     The way that I see it is: whatever I feel or think about someone is entirely coming from the mind and previous experience which makes me feel a certain way. This is to say, I am never really interacting directly with anyone, but only my own thoughts, memories, experiences, and so on. Knowing this allows me to get distance on my reactions, and not to think that it's the person who "causes" me to feel a certain way (as this would be quite absurd, like saying that my hand forced me to eat something). I believe that this is the correct way to look at life, because it avoids the disappointment of believing that the person one sees in front of them has to conform to whatever pictures, inclinations, thoughts etc. exist in our minds about that person.
   Interdependence seems to be knowing that there are determinants in one's thinking and feeling (conditioning) that come from our mental factors. It's that awareness that it comes from being sensitive that conditions can be influenced by a whole variety of things. Dependence seems to come from a false belief in something that is eternal and fixed, such as a root cause for one's problems. Knowing the difference between these two seems crucial to changing one's attitude toward what happens to them.

How People Heal

In the past two weeks, I did have a bad situation with my left foot, and slowly, I find it healing (pardon an unintentional pun). And it did seem miraculous to me in a sense, because about a week ago I thought that I was in very dire straits. I went through panic, and now I am just feeling the need to take better care of my body and know that any mindless twist or turn might send it into injury again. But I think what this experience taught me was how many emotions and thoughts come to be associated with being physically challenged in some way.
   I also notice that whenever I have an unexpected situation come up, my tendency is to try to seek whatever help I can. But I notice that there is no magic cure except for what the body can do to care for itself: better rest, for example, and finding more adaptable ways to move the body without upsetting the painful spot. Does the body, then heal itself? I think that only the body can cooperate in the healing process. If for example, I continued to ignore the pain, I would only make things worse. But it's somehow a good thing that nature endows us with an inherent low capacity for pain tolerance, since pain can alert the body to slow down or find more safe ways to move in the world.
  Another thing that this experience has taught me, perhaps to my detriment, is to be really vigilant about future injury. If I feel even the slightest bit of discomfort in my leg or knee, I will now start to shift position slightly, as though anticipating that it might worsen the condition of the body in some way. There is a tricky part to this, however, and that is not to let pain get the body into a frozen state. If this happens, then the body will continue to get stuck or immobile in some way, all due to the previous memory of the pain.
    A lot of what I am describing somehow has analogies to the mind. To be mindful itself seems to be a balance between care and not getting paralyzed by situations which demand care. If I am too attached or sensitive to pain, I start to develop armor or defensiveness, including thoughts only make the situation worse, such as "I will never walk again." On the other hand, being insensitive to pain is also not quite the way, because the pain gives a person good information on how to move more carefully and re-engage muscles of the body, or perhaps emotional resources we didn't think we had. Pain can open up new avenues of resources as well as close off ways of being that are reckless or unappreciative of the body's gifts. The same is true of our mental pains and ailments.

Good Mourning

 Whenever a person feels a strong emotions toward something and someone, there is usually something psychic that needs to be worked on until it can be fully seen for what it is. Once that feeling is known for what it is, one can also see the other for who they are as well, and those strong feelings can then become deeper and more nuanced. This isn't to say that the feelings suddenly go away; they just transform into something more interesting and balanced.
  During the last session of the Buddhist sutra studies class tonight, we talked about the Buddhist notions of not wanting to 'show mourning' toward those who are about to pass into the next life, for fear that the mourning feelings will cause the consciousness to want to stay on earth to comfort the mourner. The goal in a lot of Buddhist systems  and philosophies is not to attach to worldly things, so it's considered a kind of obstacle if one shows mourning toward the person who is in the final stages of life. But as I heard this discussion, I came to appreciate that we often communicate different things when we mourn the loss of something. The most obvious or perhaps blatant form of this is wanting something to remain the way it is. But there are other kinds of loss which don't necessarily come primarily from a desire for things to be the same as they were. For example, I can lose something and feel great mourning, but that mourning may not be attached to wanting the thing to remain as it is. It may be a kind of sad acceptance of reality, coupled with a genuine affection for what we lose. I find that this affection is sometimes even more genuine than the previous one, because it does not insist that what we are losing stay with us to comfort us. Rather, we are able to hold the pain of loss in one hand and appreciate the loved one on the other, with a kind of sad joy and respect. I don't quite know how to say this, but I think this is a richer and deeper form of mourning, but it isn't engendering the notion that one must keep the loved one fixed in one state of being.
   It's very hard to hold the pain of loss and the joy of another in the same instance. I am not capable of it myself, so why would I bother to write about it? It's because I am exploring what it means to enjoy what we enjoy and mourn its impermanence, while embracing its ability to come out and then come back into our life again.