Lone Illusion?

 Sitting in a coffee store, I feel the diversity of people occupying the same room: the sense of so many different stories and conditioned lives that emerge from those stories. Is it true to say that all these individuals lead separate existences? Or is there a thread running through all stories that allows people to naturally connect, even without saying anything?
   I can say there is definitely a difference between being in a room by myself and being in a room with others. Even if I am not interacting with them directly, there is a felt presence in the room; a kind of bustling, sentient activity. That may not be enough to feel connected to them but it's interesting to contemplate where this overall "sense" of aliveness comes from. Is it coming from the collective experiences of everyone in the room, like a kind of "pooled" energy? Actually, it is really mind itself that is the source  of these energies. There is no "reaching out" to touch or converse with these phenomena at all. It's already present, whether one is talking or drinking, eating or sleeping, observing or not observing.
   I find it so easy to take human energy for granted because of my conditioning to think of humans as people with shared goals. We learn about collaboration and cooperation in schools, which is how humans pool their resources to shared ends. But I bet that few schools recognize an already present sentience that happens when people are together in the same room. This felt sense, if one is aware of it, can create a kind of calm joy. I sense that all the "loneliness" a person feels is actually the striving to go beyond this basic, shared sentience. It is as though a person, forgetting what is already in their skin, were to project that living presence into specific people and then longs to get back what is already theirs.
  What spoils this moment are two distinct things: one is the longing for a specific quality which we attribute to someone else, and the other is a self-consciousness that insists that this body be present to others. This is what leads people in social situations to feel alone and then compelled to somehow strive to cover up that alone feeling through a word, a gesture and a reaching out. But nobody can heal it because that alone feeling is an illusion that is created from a striving and a sense of a separate ego or self. Trying to heal it is like trying to fix a cloud in one place so that it doesn't block the sun.

Resolutions

 During the last meditation session of the year, I had asked the group if they had any new year's resolutions regarding their own practice. I had mentioned that one of my own resolutions was to try to bring more relaxation to my work. GuoXing Fashi had once mentioned while he was in Toronto that people feel a lot of tension at work because on a conscious or subconscious level, they are trying to compete with others in their team, whether for status or accolades, or even out of fear of being the one with the lowest outputs. I have to admit that I have had such a fear myself, being in a company where "lean" is considered a good thing, and the department is always looking for ways to do more with fewer people. But one of GuoXing Fashi's key points that I found remarkable is how one can learn to treat their work as a spiritual practice: a practice of learning to master their own dualistic thinking and let go of self-clinging. That's a very tough lesson to learn, I have to admit. His other key point is that one doesn't necessarily have to leave their relaxation to a silent meditation hall;  in fact, relaxation can be practiced anywhere and it can even be done in high pressure situations. It takes more emphasis on the body presence as well as the sense that my existence does not depend on what is happening around me: it is much deeper than the ideas that I have about myself, work and others. As hard as it is, I start to realize especially during the second half of the year that I was very tense at work, trying to meet very strict deadlines, and I felt it in the form of body fatigue. I am definitely not relaxed enough at work.
     Resolutions, I have found, are not so easy to keep. There are many reasons for this, but as Rob Nairn suggests in his excellent book Living, Dreaming, Dying, part of the reason is that people are governed by very complex unconscious forces. I tend to think of it a bit like the Greek pantheon: rather than there being a single "ruler" God who is standing over all His creations, Greek mythology suggests that the forces of nature and spirit were in continual conflict and flux, even as mortals were looking to the gods and nature for sustenance and wisdom. This is hardly a stable place where a person's sole injunction is to obey a single ruler: on the contrary, it is a highly contested space where a variety of different gods and goddesses compete for the spotlight. Could some of this pantheon perhaps symbolize the different priorities that one's mind contains at any given time in life? And, if that's the case, how can I even resolve with any certainty to do anything, such as give up a bad habit or take on a new challenge?
      Nairn's answer is that the path of mindfulness is one of being aware of these forces by quieting the mind, and thus allowing changes to naturally arise over time. With the mindful mentality, my role is not to control forces but to harness them in ways that come from a sense of familiarity with them. Imagine, for example, being so terrified of snakes that you are not even able to face them without becoming anxious or going into a tirade about how bad snakes are, finally stomping out of the room in disgust. But if I sat in front of the snakes and allowed all these thoughts to pop in and out of mind without avoiding the snakes, what happens then? A lot of things happen, ironically, because I am no longer trying so hard to put some counter-thought in front of the snakes. I am simply becoming aware of the full gamut of my reactions, seeing how they change over time and might even disappear without our intervention in any way. By not trying to consciously control the situation, things become more clear because I am creating psychic space for more unconscious material to come out. In this way, I start to develop new patterns without trying so hard to create these patterns myself.

Nairn, R. (2004). Living, Dreaming, Dying: Practical Wisdom from the Tibetan Book of the Dead. Boston: Shambhala

Of Shame

What is the difference between "healthy" shame and "morbid" guilt? This is a theme that I have encountered in a lot of Buddhist texts. Rob Nairn  notes that when there are things we feel ashamed of that gnaw at our conscience, our regrets take the form of the "furies" upon one's entering into the bardo states of death. Note that "Furies" come from Greek mythology and they refer to beings who taunt mortals as a form of punishment for things done badly in the past. I also see this kind of discussion arising in the theme of repentance. Many Buddhist masters are careful to point out that repentance is not about morbid reflection one one's guilt or "unworthiness". Such a preoccupation easily becomes self-absorbed, forgetting that people do in fact change and are capable of developing new insights and habits over time.
    I think there is such a thing as a healthy sense of shame. "Healthy" shame means that the person recognizes that their sense of shame is a reminder coming from themselves. Nobody can ever "make" a person feel shame. It's only when I am truly ashamed of some behavior or impulse that I am invited to reflect more deeply on it, from my own mind and heart. If someone is telling me that I should feel bad about something and my heart doesn't feel the same way, I can either explore what the other person means or might feel that the criticism doesn't apply to me. But if I am really pulled into it emotionally, I might ask myself what I really feel about it: do I truly feel that I should behave differently? What do I really feel or think about it? Here, I learn to own the sense of shame as an invitation to reflect more deeply on my actions and what I value in life. Sometimes it's only myself who creates shame, because what I am doing is not consistent with my beliefs in who I should be. So when I have a feeling of shame, I might want to explore that inner conflict between my behavior personal ideal (who I think I ought to be).
    Shame does not have to be seen as intrusive. It can be seen as the voice of one's own conscience or 'inner parent'. But this also does not mean that one should uncritically accept that voice. If the ideal I am striving for is unrealistic or unforgiving in some way, I might want to soften that voice or allow for more understanding. I might also soften that inner critic if need be. The point is to invite deeper exploration and curiosity.

The Answer in the Question

Continuing my reading of Rob Nairn's Living, Dreaming, Dying, I come across yet another interesting observation about the role of reflection in formulating questions. Nairn writes:

When we start to reflect, the mind engages the problematic issue as soon as effort is made to formulate a question...The act of formulating the question requires the mind to sift out all irrelevant and extraneous issues. In doing this it gradually exposes the main issue or issues, and then a conclusion isn't far away (p.215)

This process leads Nairn to evoke Krishnamurti's statement, "the answer lies in the question" (ibid). But as I am reading this, I am wondering, is it the wording of the question that matters, or the sense of urgency that propels the question itself? There is simply no method here to determine whether or not we have arrived at the "right" question, save for a vague sense of certainty. However, perhaps the point of all of this questioning is not to find the "right" question at all, but rather to generate the sufficient urgency and "doubt" sensation to undo a lot of our assumptions that can underlie our questions.
  Two processes come to mind here as I am reading this. One is "Socratic" method, a method found in many Socratic dialogues that is designed to force the participants to question the very foundations of what they think they know. The second process is the huatou method in Chan Buddhism, a method of raising an impossible question (such as "What is nothingness?") which is used to generate a doubt sensation and cause the mind to shatter its dualistic notions of self and other, as well as go beyond discursive thinking or reasoning when answering an existential dilemma. Both methods are not necessarily about raising reasonable answers, but focus on the ways our minds get ensnared in pat answers that only reinforce dualistic thought.
  Nairn proposes a very interesting methodology for engaging the deeper questions that don't have easy, factual answers. He notes: "We are learning to open up to the profound wisdom within us, wisdom that is usually ignored. The route involves presenting ourselves at the door, handing over the question, then sitting down to wait. Patience is needed." (p.216, italics mine). I find this technique to be an excellent reminder of how the rational mind often tries to jump in quickly to answer its own question, rather than giving time and space for a deeper wisdom to set in and provide an answer from a much deeper, less intervening space.
  Nairn provides a more detailed exposition of the method of engaging the mind in deeper questions, including a useful guided meditation which can be found on pages 217-219 of his text. What I will say here is that one of the advantages of this methodology is the way it expresses letting go of the striving to answer a question rather than let the question 'go'. I find this insight interesting because it reverses my usual tendency to blame myself when my problems chronically reappear as well as try to fix the problem prematurely before the main issues have had a chance to surface. The second advantage is that it actually improves one's tolerance for not having a clear answer , as well a the joy of sifting through possibilities. In the rush to solve one's problems, there is often little room for exploration and ambiguity. But what if the real changes one wants to have in life are not coming from rational concrete answers but actually come from cultivating the joy of uncertainty and tolerating an unreciprocated frustration/desire in not-knowing.

Nairn, Rob (2004). Thinking, Dreaming, Dying: Practical Wisdom from  the Tibetan Book of the Dead. Boston: Shambhala.

Bare Attention

In his very thoughtful book, Living, Dreaming, Dying: Practical Wisdom from the Tibetan Book of the Dead, Rob Nairn describes the benefits of bare attention:

Awareness of the thought process at this moment of arising is what makes freedom from thought possible, because when the mind is only at the stage of impulse arising , the energies haven't fully engaged. There is an almost impartial quality about the energy of the impulse. (p.175)

When a thought arises, it is not taken as being "my" thought or something that comes to my mind. Rather, there is a kind of energy that coalesces around a particular constellation of thoughts, and it's that energy that needs one's attention before it becomes very powerful or directive thoughts. To give an example, I might experience an uneasiness when a sound arises that seems unpleasant. That sensation of "unpleasant" gets translated to an attempt to compare the sound with a "more pleasant", desirable silence, and I am also going through the process of trying to figure out where the sound comes from and what I can do about it. All of these "actions" I am performing are adding to the strength of the original energy, by endowing it with all these characteristics that confirm its substantial nature. The sound even starts to seem more "real" and "solid" when it is associated with other impressions, but we often fail to recognize that the sound is really simply energy that is passing through the ear drum and being transformed into signals in the brain.
  I think it's a good practice not to take these energies to be substantial but to try to relax with them rather than forming a lot of ideas around them. In this way, one gets a fuller picture of them as part of a larger and much vaster context. Bare attention also allows a person to see that they are able to make decisions about perceptions and sensations before they turn into full blown judgments or stereotyped actions or responses. Knowing how to be in the moment before thoughts coalesce into "I" and "you" can be such a helpful and priceless skill that can awaken a more present, open and spacious mind.

Nairn, Rob (2004) Living, Dreaming, Dying: Practical Wisdom from the Tibetan Book of the Dead, Boston: Shambhala

Secrets to Gratitude ?

Are there complex secrets to gratitude and gratitude journals? I am starting to keep a gratitude journal now, to record points that I feel thankful in life. John P. Miller (2014) has written about the benefits of gratitude journals in many of his books, and this is an area that I would especially like to explore in education. For example, does the process of keeping a gratitude journal help teachers appraise their students differently, across a span of time? I would like to have teachers try out gratitude journaling for themselves.
   I have some theories, even after my initial "test period" (well, 2 days, to be exact!) of writing a gratitude journal. Here are some summary "tentative conclusions":

1) Writing only about gratitude definitely has an effect on one's mentality. If I simply write a journal about "anything", it's bound to become speculative or potentially critical of something, which is antithetical to gratitude. My current blog is not a gratitude journal, because it meanders into all sorts of philosophical detours. Forcing myself to write on a theme of gratitude is a bit like channeling water into a long funnel: it focuses one's thought patterns so that positive affect is more likely to emerge.

2) Sometimes, I hate to say it, but gratitude is difficult to cultivate with any modicum of sincerity. I was going to write this morning that I am "grateful to my morning coffee", but this does not feel sincere to me at all. It also lacks impact, because coffee cannot be extended to general principle of life, and its effects are limited to that caffeine rush in the morning. When I sit down to write in this journal, what pops to mind is actually things that are otherwise irritating or annoying to me (such as getting on the wrong bus) and how I can challenge myself to "refrarme" it in a grateful way. Is this more sincere than writing about coffee in the morning? I don't know, but I find that the act of reframing a negative situation into something positive feels very empowering to me.

3) A theory: could gratitude journals form a kind of transitional object that mediates between everyday suffering and the desire for something "better"? I tend to think of it similar to how the ancient Roman meditation of conjuring up "worst case scenarios" as a way of preparing them for the very worst, which is an interesting principle.

4) Gratitude forces me to be simpler in how I think. Do I like something or not? Why do I like it? What makes me happy to have it? And so on. I tend to be complicated in my regular blog, but my gratitude journal forces me to be more simple and immediate. Perhaps the problem with being a teacher or academic is that one has a tendency not to be direct, and gratitude journals ge more to the point.

More to be continued on this experiment!

Keith's Gratitude Journal: https://keithgratitude.blogspot.com/

Miller, J. P. (2014). The Contemplative Practitioner: Meditation and Education in the Workplace. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

Reflection on Suffering

 In his commentary on Shantideva's verses in A Guide to the Bodhisattva Way of Life, Dalai Lama advocates reflection on the suffering that arises from strong emotions and vexations, especially as a way of gaining insights into life as a whole. He notes, "While we find that there are many factors and conditions that cause pain and suffering in our lives, the conditions that would give rise to joy and happiness are comparatively rare." (p.27). Knowing that or moments of joy are a little bit pale in comparison with moments of happiness, can we reorient ourselves to suffering in a way that it becomes more like a blessing?
   I can think of at least two scenarios in which this would make sense. The first scenario is that we can think of suffering as a kind of teacher, who trains us in the art of tolerance and allows us to see our own reactions. If I experience irritation with a stranger, what does that say about me as a practitioner? In knowing how I interact with others, I can obtain a very sharp and clear (sometimes) understanding of where I might be stuck, and the places where I might need to find new coping strategies to frame healthy responses to the situation. The second scenario is that suffering can force us to a place of renunciation, where we no longer hold onto ideals that are untenable or dreams that don't have substance in our lives.
  The third value of suffering which is not mentioned in Dalai Lama's text was given to me at a Surangama Retreat held by Venerable GuoXing many years ago. GuoXing Fashi used the analogy of swallowing the hot pepper to describe one particular orientation to suffering when one is on the cushion. Some people might think that swallowing hot peppers is a form of torture, and might even question the sanity of the person who decides to do it. But there is actually something satisfying that comes from knowing that I can reverse a traditional equation of "pleasure" with "seeking" and "pain" with "avoiding" behavior. I can learn to see the frustrating or somewhat unpleasant experience in a way that I start to befriend it. I experiment with the idea that things around me are not desirable or undesirable in themselves, but are granted those traits by my attitude and relationship toward them.
   I want to use another example from Greek mythology and that is Medusa. Medusa was punished by Athena for an affair with Poseidon by being transformed from a beautiful maiden to a very hideous monster with snakes for heads. We rarely see Medusa as a pitiable character in Greek mythology who is worthy of compassion: all the mythical books immediately label her as a kind of villain simply by virtue of her appearance. Medusa is given the label of "bad", yet we never consider, what would life look like from her eyes? I think this extends to the idea that what we sometimes think of as an unpleasant experience is actually only one of many possible narratives we can select from to frame that experience.
  We can not only learn to experiment with different framing of things but we may also, in some circumstances, go beyond framing itself to contemplate where all these frames originate, and whether we, as "subjects" are really bound to stay in one particular frame or not.

Dalai Lama (2018). Perfecting Patience: Buddhist Techniques to Overcome Anger. Boulder: Snow Lion

Look a Little Bit Further

  Anna Sewell's Black Beauty is a good book to teach young learners about animals: how they think, how they feel, and (perhaps) what we imagine they would say if they had a chance to speak. What makes this book magical is that the first person narrator is a horse. Is Sewell indulging in presumption by making the horse a narrator? Well, I take this book to be an experiment in empathy; one which is actually meant to stretch one's ethical imagination to embrace something that is "different" or "other". I am reflecting that studying this book can help both children and adults alike reflect on the strengths and limits of using imagination to empathize.
  I don't think that a person can ever, with any sure confidence, absolutely step into the skin of another being. Two problems: the first is that we are not having access to a "live" experience of another person, aside from what they say, do or record on paper. Second, and related to the first, is the issue of time. Even if I write down on this blog every single thought I am having in this moment (a daunting task, and beyond my present typing speed), that view is already shifting: there is nothing whatsoever to capture, because the source of all this mental activity is infinite and boundless. Such is the danger of "framing" anything or anyone: one is only really using a model to temporarily capture a person's thinking, including one's own. If I pretend that Black Beauty is an authentic representation of a horse's experience, I commit the double presumption that a) I can know another being's thoughts; b) those thoughts are static and can be recorded for posterity. In fact, no words can capture the experience of a changing shifting life. I believe it's important to cultivate humility by respecting that shifting nature of being itself.
   I find it might be helpful in one's daily life to get into the habit of not simply seeing what's in front of them, but looking slightly forward, beyond what they are seeing. This requires relaxing the mind's habitual tendency to frame things and stick within the boundaries of those frames. Even when I believe I have figured out a person, a problem, or a situation, it doesn't mean that I have fixed (literally, stuck!) that person, problem or situation to a particular pegboard. It's okay to have that frame, but not to fall for the mind's tendency to take those frames as being an absolute "map" of all experience.
   Montessori also writes about this idea in Discovery of the Child (1967). According to Montessori, placing too many restrictions on how a child moves in a classroom can feel like "control" and "discipline", but it has the opposite effect of inhibiting a child's natural abilities to regulate their own actions gracefully. She points to evidence showing that children confined to desks and tables are much less capable of coordinating themselves in open spaces, because their bodies are not used to having an open space to move: it is as though the table literally becomes a "mental crutch" which prevents children from exercising their own God-given abilities to  coordinate their activities. In this way, too many "framings" in the classroom can unnecessarily define a person or reduce them to a kind of puppet without their own free self-determining abilities.

Montessori, M (1967). The Discovery of the Child. New York: Ballantine

Incorporating Our Obstacles, Letting Go of Fear

 I have noticed in myself a tendency to worry about pain as "taking over" my meditation practice or life in general. If something is blocked in my body, I will spend more time worrying about the blockage itself, when meanwhile the block is something that can theoretically be managed. An analogy might be something akin to seeing a mule lying on he road, and fretting over the fact that the mule is there rather than accepting that you might need to step over it or find an alternate route. In worrying about the obstacle itself, I am adding a layer of psychological or emotional stress to the experience that would not otherwise be there.
   Part of the problem, as I see it, is that I might have been conditioned to enjoy the sense of relief that comes from "lifting a burden" from my body or mind, and this conditioning becomes highly addictive. In retaining the memory of a sudden or unexpected solution to a problem (which, I repeat, often comes unexpected or as a pleasant, happy surprise), I expect that the next episode of challenges or problems will have a similar outcome. In fact, this is hardly the case; more often than not, the problems we carry stay with us as a result of previous karma, and they might just linger until the conditions have changed or the situation has naturally exhausted itself. Having such a belief in the timeliness of difficulties and their "natural life cycle" might mitigate the sense of expectation that they be resolved quickly or suddenly. It also allows me to include the obstacle in my daily life rather than struggling to get rid of it, which in turn reduces my anxiety and stress in not being able to control it.

The Inner Dramas

 In mediation practice especially, one learns that most dramas are actually internal conflicts. They have nothing to do with what's happening "out there", as though there were some place that is independent of the mind itself. So, knowing that there are these inner conflicts that can generate all sorts of vexations, what does one do?
   I think it's important that one get to the root cause of conflict and meet it head on. Conflict is not always met with an easy reconciliation: sometimes it reflects a need for a re-orientation of one's priorities and the repentance from old habits. If conflict resolution were simply a matter of letting different impulses, views and inclinations co-exist in the same awareness, then conflict would not even seem so difficult. It's difficult precisely because it entails some sort of sacrifice in some way. I cannot meditate and suddenly give into an urge to get up and have a coffee! Of course, this is a silly example, but it serves to point out that internal struggles are often resulting from not having proper sense of perspective and priority.
  There is a style of leadership called "Negotiator", which I often fall into, and that is someone who always tries to say yes to everyone so that nobody gets offended. Such a person often stands back and is afraid of "rocking the boat". Do we act like this in meditation? No, because such an approach is too wavering, and it lacks a sense of determination and sacrifice. Not everything can be entertained on the cushion, and serious practice involves knowing when to simply push forward and drop attached, clinging thoughts. Without a strong sense of prioritization, practice is likely to perpetuate internal conflicts and dramas to no end.

Looking and Leaning into Frustration

    It's interesting how Buddhist discourse and literature often describes desire (tanha, or clinging) as the root of suffering, and yet we rarely hear the word 'frustration' in the Buddhist translations. Is frustration a relatively new word in the lexicon? The Latin term for frustration is "frustrare" or to disappoint, yet I consider frustration to be the converse of desire. It's the feeling that one has in reaction to desires deferred or pleasures that are interrupted. For example, when I am at work and interrupted from a task to attend a meeting, a sense of frustration arises in response to the withdrawn pleasure of performing the task. Perhaps the reason frustration (or an equivalent term) is not often expressed in Buddhist commentaries is that people might consider it a secondary emotion whose primary root is desire itself. If it were not for desire, there certainly wouldn't be frustration, so it stands to reason that Buddhism would not spend a lot of time hacking away at the branches when there is a root that needs to be dealt with.
   So why would frustration be interesting to tackle? I sometimes think that people are craving new things because they cannot tolerate moments of frustration. The frustration is a sign that things are not going smoothly, and so the temptation is to try to look for an object or a diversion to go against the desire. But what if one simply sits with frustration rather than running away from it? Now this is tricky, because the way our minds work might be something like: okay, I will test to see how well I tolerate frustration by coming near what I desire and see how well I can tolerate non-doing. The problem with this approach is it's just another devious way for one to indulge in desiring! What I am talking about is leaning into the sense of deficiency that arises when there isn't a pleasing distraction or sense of smooth running in the things around us. I recently learned an expression in Mandarin, mei banfa
   One analogy I am particularly fond of is the snow covered path. If I am in a field covered in snow and no path has yet been made, my tendency is to try to look for some tangible "something" that will make the path smoother for me to travel: another footprint, for example, or a stick, or even a clearing of grass that prevents me from having to trudge through the unknown height of snow. In lacking a defining human tool that will help me navigate the snow, I fear drowning in something that's limitless and overwhelming. Of course, we need our methods to help us through; even in meditative practice, such methods are required to get us through a single sitting. But there are moments when all the familiar comforts that help us make our steps are simply taken away from us, and we are left with a puddle of festering "what next?"--that kind of panic-and then all we can really do is enjoy the sense of discovery, to wonder what is this sensation I am having? Can I live with it? Can I learn something from discomfort? Can I make more space for discomforts in general?

In chaos

 This year's end, I find myself in something of a bit of chaos.I believe that part of the problem I am in is that so much is uncertain about work and about what the future holds for me. So much about how I 'measure' myself is simply unknown, and hardly comes to reflect what I have done or what I have the potential to do. And so much in the future itself is simply not knowable at all.
   Being in chaos is not all that bad, as long as a person is not hankering for some pre-existing order. One of the things I am interested in learning with my junior class is the process of creativity and how it never yields neat results: there are cycles in which we are successful sometimes and are lost in other times. Being "lost" is often, in fact, the start of something new and exciting: it's "newness" hatching somewhere here and there in fact.
   I think being in chaos is perfectly fine as long as one is not being so ridiculously attached to order and rigidity. But chaos is sometimes the process of learning to negotiate some amount of order as one gets their bearings in a new place and new expectations.

Exploring Differences "Differently"

 About a year ago, I took a course in Buddhist sutras, where I came across the passage of Virmilakirti Sutra in which a goddess causes Saraputra to briefly transform into a woman. Saraputra is asked to transform back to his "original state" to which he responds that there is nothing to change back to. Saraputra realizes in that moment that the true essence of his mind cannot be reduced to male or female. The mind's essence is the same regardless of the male or female forms.
   Gender is a controversial topic, and one that still rages on to this day; I don't intend to add much more to it in this context. However, this passage has lead me to wonder, what "difference" "makes a difference", and which "differences" are only creations of the mind? Is there a clear way to distinguish between authentic differences and differences we designate through our conceptualizations? Or are all differences simply products of the mind?
    An example might be that of color.  Many people walk around convinced that there is an objective property in things which can be pointed to as "red", "blue", "green" and so on. But is color a property that we can say belongs to something, or is it something that is generated from the minds' conceptual apparatus? Many cultures have several names for what we call "green" and "blue" whereas other cultures don't have distinct terms for these, thinking of both colors as the same. In this case, what we designate as "green" or "blue" is entirely based on cultural naming and socialization. I am brought up to make distinctions and differences.
   Even so, can one even say that color itself is a property of a thing? Yesterday, I had an amusing conversation with my primary students, in which I asked them the classify in Ramona the Brave the experiences that are sensed by the eyes, ears, touch, nose, etc. One of the students remarked that "blue" can be tasted: after all, she can put something that is blue on her tongue, and thus taste the "blue object", so is she not tasting blue as well? But then I told her, blue itself is not a distinct "taste" or "feeling". I asked her to close her eyes and tell me which of the colored markers she picks is the "blue" one and how can she tell? The blue marker cannot be known simply through feeling. But who knows, maybe there is someone sensitive enough to sense blue things by touching them! In Surangama Sutra, it is said that practitioners who don't rely on the senses can actually "see" through their ears, "hear" through their noses, etc. This is because we are conditioned to sense through specific channels, but the mind is not limited to these narrow channels.
   To go back to my theme: difference is often exaggerated. We assign meaning to things based on a simple minor difference that we designate. We know that a lot of prejudice arises from attachment to difference: seeing more in the difference itself than what is there. Can we say that, between similarity and difference, we tend to err more on the side of difference than sameness? The error I see people making is that of taking difference as being so different that it gets exotified into something "other", and starts to assume qualities that we have rejected in ourselves. "Male" and "female" is a very good example of this, but it's also the case that anytime we are afraid of something, we are probably trying to assign qualities to the other that we cannot own in ourselves. To use the example of snakes, many people are terrified of snakes because of what they perceive as the fearsome, predatory or sneaky qualities of snakes. But I begin to wonder, how many people have died from snakes compared to the number of snakes who were killed by humans? Perhaps the fearsome qualities we see in snakes are really projections of our own ferocity in the eyes of the snakes.
 

Tragic Downfall and Happy Discovery

 I am preparing a lesson plan for the next class in the new year (2019!) and it's about tragic heroes and "happy discoveries". I am thinking about the differences between the narrative patterns of tragic downfall and accidental discovery. While the two may seem quite different, I find that the patterns have similar themes. One has to do with the importance and value of surrender.  The person in the throes of an "accidental discovery" (a comic figure, in some cases), is usually someone who is intensely bound up in some idea that is making them tense, narrow and focused on only one area of life, at the expense of a broader view. Such a person can be described as someone who sees the "trees" but "not the forest". This person's "flaw" is that they are not allowing enough serendipity to flow into their creative work, and their narrowness eventually takes them to a dead end where they cannot move forward even an inch. This might be comparable to someone who practices a spiritual tool or method and is like a "dog eating cotton": it's so dry, and yet there is nothing else to do in those cases but be in a tense state of "waiting" for something more spontaneous to appear or arise.  The happy accident is just what is needed for that tense energy to release into something wider and more expansive, but it flows from that person's ambition (which needs to relax into something bigger).
   The tragic hero has a somewhat different plight. In the beginning, one usually finds this person not in a place of intense anticipation at all. With tragic figures like Macbeth, for example, we witness the return of a hero from her or his exploits, followed by a kind of resting on a particular reputation that the character has incurred from the past, only to be followed by a tragic mistake arising from their "hamartia" (or flawed characteristic) such as ambition, pride, stubbornness, etc. The point is that such a character loses their position not necessarily in the anxiety or tension of keeping it, but more so the opposite: some small thing is overlooked, as though this person were seeing the forest but not the trees. I see this very much like in meditation practice, when a person reaches some state of mental unification and then concludes that all is well in the world, and there is no need to go further or face further difficulties. This person is prone to tragic falls because their focus is away from the details of their undoing and toward a false sense of unity. It's as though there were simply not enough attention to the details, unlike the happy accident type in the first paragraph and example.
   These two polarities, for me, represent particular phenomenological experiences of being. They symbolize the everyday situations that come up for us, such as being too caught up in details to find creative ways of seeing new things; resting on conceptual frameworks that don't capture the small details that can cause turbulence in a life; and having to work from the ground up to restore one's sense of the world, after what they knew previously was shattered or proven not so trustworthy. Certainly, I believe that young people can benefit from learning about tragedies and their antithesis, the comedies of accidents.
 

Loss as Gain

I am beginning to realize that in order to truly enjoy things in life, one must realize that they were never "theirs" to begin with. I am thinking of two examples: one about acquaintances and the other about "status". Whenever strangers meet, they treat each other as people who simply are a mystery to each other. Questions form in mind, until sooner or later discussions are completed and we officially become "acquainted". I wonder, is there any symbolic meaning in the fact that "acquaint" and "acquire" have the same prefix? They both suggest (as does the word "acquiesce") that one is taking something that was once new and making it a "given", or as something that belongs to them. Acquaintances "belong" to us insofar as they have a name we can remember, a number we can store for future reference, and a set of habits that we can expect from them from day to day. But in fact, do we really know the people we are with, or are those things we do only the habits we construct to ward off mystery and its overwhelming qualities? Could the opposite of "acquainting" simply be the fear of the unknown, spontaneous, or unpredictable? Sometimes- every so often in fact--it may be helpful for acquaintances to become strange to each other (in a figurative sense) before they can rediscover each others' intrigues.
   The second example has to do with status. "Status" is something I believe I have when I gain a reputation in a certain area, but then I wonder, is status perhaps over-rated? If a person is used to being a kind of "authority" in a community, then anyone who says something against their authority will be seen as a threat to their identity. Hence, authority gravitates toward those who uphold authority, and might even avoid those who challenge it. This is in fact, not a sign of a secure identity, but more like a sign of fragility. What happens when I am the one in the group without any recognized status whatsoever? In those cases, my strangeness to the group gives me freedom to speak out in it in ways that authority status would not allow. I can even inject new ideas into the group, because I am not the appointed "expert" who disseminates information based on the group's ideology. But there is always a downside to being a person without status, and that is, such a person is not relied upon to take care of the group or provide guidance.
   Perhaps what I am getting at is that one should never be certain that a gain is a gain and a loss is a loss. Sometimes things that seem advantageous, such as having a lot of acquaintances, can become too oblivious to the spontaneity of people's connections to each other. And sometimes status itself becomes a perceptual burden, because it prevents people from acting from a place of being able to challenge rules.

The Journey of Self Awareness

If you can say at the end of your life that you survived, and you are okay to have survived, how would you feel? If the only thing you could say for yourself after all the ups and downs is "I have lived thus", what would it be like? With all defenses down, life would naturally look like a sprawling abyss.
   But what if life were only just to survive this and to learn that there is a deeper being underneath the struggles, that doesn't get affected by the likes and dislikes, the wins and losses, and so on? What would life be like in that case?
   One thing it would not be would be trying to "prove" one's value to others. If people truly accept you, you don't need to impress with accolades or knowledge. All you would need is to be open and to show a wish to learn.
  Would this be a new way to affirm life, and to trust in the fundamental worth of its being, regardless of all the dark spaces that life sometimes takes us?

Take The Wrong Way Home

Today, I had the unfortunate experience of taking a bus route through an area affected by construction. By the time I arrived at Bayview and York Mills, I had decided that I did not want to be in the crowded bus. I hopped off and found my way northbound to Steeles. In retrospect, I now realize that this strategy did not do much good in getting me home sooner. However, I can appreciate the fact that I took a different way home from what I am used to.
   "New routes home" can symbolize very painful detours that arise from new decisions. Whenever I make a major decision that goes against my habitual ways, I always wonder whether I truly made the right decision, and my mind fills with anguish in those cases. But soon enough, a kind of accommodation sets in. In spite of my regrets or second thoughts, the mind manages to find some reason for why the decision was a "right" one after all, even if that right reason is simply to learn first hand what a "mistake" is. I think that what also happens for most people is that they find "new" reasons for doing things which have nothing to do with the initial motivation. That is, the chain of reasons continues even after one has made the decision.
   At the end of the day, even the terms of "right" and "wrong" are only relative to some reference point that is usually the self. Can we dare ourselves to "get lost" sometimes in order to find new bearings?

Savoring the Present, Seeing What Is

 One of the ways that I am finding it useful to savor the present moment is not to presume that I already know what it is. Have you ever thought about how labels can affect the way we look at even the simplest activities? At one time, lifting heavy blocks of wood was described as "just that", until later on there came a point where it was institutionalized as 'exercise' or "weight training", with the addition of knowledge of the body. But what about walking ? One can think of night walking as a kind of waste of time or, conversely as a refreshing way to get out of the house or away from the desk. How a person frames the things they do can be a way for them to see such things in totally new ways.
  If I see only the transitions from one event or experience to another, I will not be able to really enjoy the thing itself, because it is only a transition to another space. This is the importance of being able to respect the "in between moments" when one is not engaged in some task that has a deadline. Also, one must realize that life is short. Why not savor every minute one is in this world, rather than only focusing on the tasks that will always fall away eventually?

Staying With The Method

   Yesterday, I was teaching the junior class about the story of Odysseus. There is much to say about this story, since it contains a lot of different mythical elements, but one of the central tropes is how Odysseus manages to avoid all sorts of pitfalls and temptations on the journey home. For example, his men land on an island of the Lotus Eaters, where the men are so allured by lotus flowers that they don't feel compelled to leave the island. Another example is the Sirens, beings who make such beautiful music that they allure Odysseus away from his journey home. Odysseus, ever the wanderer, needs to have his men chain him to the mast of his ship to prevent him from being allured by the sight of the sirens or be tempted to jump off the ship altogether.
   I think that the things that prevent Odysseus from "returning home" is analogous to what prevents people from staying on their meditation practice. I am convinced that it's not "sensations" the pose the biggest distraction, but rather our fascination with our thoughts. When a pain arises in my body, I don't just "think about" the sensation itself. Rather, I tend to write an entire story about it, adding gruesome details about what could be happening in the body. But what if one simply stayed with the method of practice and did not dwell on these experiences? It would be coming home to the mind itself which is the source of all thinking and emoting.
  Odysseus, like everyone else, makes his share of mistakes and succumbs to all kinds of temptations and dangers. It's notable that all the other members of his crew are killed, leaving only himself to survive and reclaim the home that was taken from him by the suitors. What does this "sole survivor" signify? I think it signifies the way thoughts eventually exhaust themselves, leaving the discovery of the mind as the last frontier and homecoming. A thought that one obsesses over starts out as a fascination, but when it's repeated it eventually becomes something to be overcome. In other words, something repeated over and over again starts to lose its appeal, because we realize how imprisoned we are to the thought. It only leads to more repetition of the "same" rather than the liberation it promises.

How It Seems Wasn't How it "Was"

During the meditation retreat today I focused only on the method of my huatou, although for the second hour, I had a lot of drowsy thoughts that had very little meaning. It's one thing to have wandering thoughts that lead from one to another, but it's quite another to have "meaningless" thoughts which don't amount to anything. As I was walking to my class in the afternoon, I was troubled again by the idea of a high school reunion. Two questions that currently puzzle me: in the history of my own "walk" through various ideas, is there one single idea that defines my life story, or is something I could "take back with me" in my imaginary reunion with the people of life that is passing before me? And secondly, related to the first: can any life be "defined" with any kind of certainty?

   These questions frankly scare me, but that is the purpose of these questions: to make one think and to take stock of what has happened in the past. I personally think that the only idea I can "take back" to my previous life is the story of not clinging to the notion of a self. This is what lead me to Buddhism in the first place, which is to find the mind that is not locked in the self or self concept. Whether I have embodied this principle in my life or not is debatable, but I would say that the principles of Buddhism have most helped me in my journey in life. They provide me with a spiritual compass through which I can understand the reasons why I suffer and how anyone for that matter gets ensnared in the clinging to a static sense of self or reputation.

   At the same time-an even scarier thought---I don't really think that what "happened" in my teenage years could be said to have "happened" in any objective sense or point of reference. It's entirely my own imagination, memory and interpretation, and I believe that the idea of meeting others who have different interpretations is perhaps most frightening. It touches upon the fragile and tenuous notion of what it means to live a "full" life when there are an infinite number of lenses through which that life could have been lived, chosen and navigated. If there is even a single "one" path that ever defined me as a person growing into the world, I am sure that this one path is also a narration told in one particular moment in an unfolding, relentless stream of time.

      

Dream Like

 I just recently saw a facebook posting of a high school reunion event for my school. It's hard to believe, but in fact, it's been over 25 years since I had even entered my old school, and yet so much of my imagination and thinking seems to have originated in my thinking about it. Why high school, though? I think high school was the time when I first fell in love with ideas, starting with reading Freud's Interpretation of Dreams and then moving beyond that. What I gather is that what happens in a lifetime is often an inner shift or series of shifts, and part of what one is working out is a kind of harmonizing of different relationships and forces.
   I have no real desire to attend any reunion, because I see the whole life as a kind of dream. What things would I learn by attempting to go "back there" that would enrich the experience of what is happening now? In fact, everything is and always has been happening now. What has passed and is passing is only a series of reflections which illuminate some aspect of what is now, in this moment and always will be. The moments are only designed to awaken one to this moment in which all moments originate. So is there any "going back" to anywhere? Where does one think they are going, and what will be finalized through that connection? Dreams are only meeting other dreams.

Random Generosity

 People might be inclined to forget that the root word of "generosity" is the same as "generative"; both suggest the idea of an unlimited creative force that gives for the sake of giving. It reminds me of one year (2009, I think it was) when I decided to "say yes" to any request that someone made to me as a volunteer or in terms of helping out with something that needs doing. I don't regret making that vow, even though it often left me feeling tired. It goes to show you that when your heart and mind are open to trying new things and contributing one's abilities to others' lives, there is never an and to what "needs" doing. But note the quotation marks, because "need" is a relative thing. We give according to what's appropriate given our skill sets, time and other investments, not out of a dire need.
   I think it's important not to set up the trap of wondering why we give. The more one goes into their motivations for doing anything and whether it's "pure" or "impure", the more self-absorbed the entire project of giving can become. At the end of the day, one's motivation is not so important as the process of lessening ego attachment. Even if I am contributing to a famous charity with the aim of garnering personal attention, this form of generosity eventually becomes a way for me to learn that giving with self-regard is a source of tremendous suffering. There is simply nothing to prove when giving because giving never ends. Why should I count it as part of my "value" that I gave something today? Tomorrow will be a different set of requirements.

Consistency in Practice

 Consistency is very difficult in meditation practice when the body is tired and a person is busy. I think that one of the keys to consistency is not to try to "look for" it in a particular form, such as a meditation posture or frame of mind that is always the same. Doing so risks creating a dogmatic approach, not just toward meditation but to anything in particular. Ask yourself the question: in any job you have done or place you have lived in, has everything always been the same? Has it always been a bed of roses? Chances are, in any practice situation, one is going to experience all sorts of ups and downs, and it's best to ride it all out rather than picking one experience as the best one.
   Tonight, one of the practitioners in the group meditation had asked, what is the best way to deal with drowsiness during meditation, or those "dreamy" thoughts that one has just before falling asleep?  I thought about my own practice, and I realized that much of this kind of mental behavior has a kind of natural cycle. For one, those drowsy thoughts likely arise from a physically and mentally drained mindset. It is very hard in those moments to retain any method, but an attitude is possible. For example, if I am being judgmental, and telling myself "this is not the place or time to feel drowsy" then I am probably going to tire myself out in having those kinds of thoughts. If, on the other hand, I decide that I am not going to judge those wandering thoughts, my mindset becomes more relaxed, and I am able to go to, "where are all these thoughts coming from?" "What is their root basis?" And then all this tension over what is "good" practice turns to curiosity to know what is the mind that insists on "good" practice? Rather than relating to these dreamy thoughts in a mechanical, suppressing way, I start to investigate the source of them.
   My point is, practice is exactly what is happening right now, no more and no less. As long as the present becomes a method, it can be seen in a way that is not distracting but goes to the heart of all things.

From Pressure to Relief

 With my workload decreasing by next week, I hope to be able to release pressure from within myself. But I sometimes need a lot of reminders that "Pressure" never really comes from "outside" a person at all. It is more about harboring certain mental attitudes that keep a person tense and on edge.
   To give a simple example, at work,I am often driven by fears of having low stats, or not having any way to quantify what I do on a day to day basis. This is part of the whole karma of work life: the more I accumulate "good works" or what I can quantify as good, the more I can confirm that I am on the right path. This approach ignores the way that work is spontaneous and changes from day to day, but it somehow promises that work can be "quantified" in some way.
   But in fact, life is complicated because not everything can be quantified--including one's very own self and soul---and one can sometimes get into the habit of thinking that they are only really that "one thing" and nothing more. In fact, we are much more than what we think, and this is the beauty of being able to let go of one quantifiable thing that keeps us worried.

A Meditation on Sunrise

 I have personally found that early in the day is most conducive to meditation practice. Of the three weekly practices, it seems that the Saturday morning meditation practice is most conducive for me to settle my mind. I have found that if the mind can be made clear everyday, it is easiest for me to stay focused and concentrated. If my mind has all these residual thoughts or expectations, I will simply carry these with me into the present action, and my thought patterns will be very coarse and circular. So how can a person "reset" their mind in every moment?
  By "reset", I don't at all mean that the mind is clear of all its thoughts and memories. Rather, I am talking about the ability for the mind to "pick up" the present moment without attachment to the previous thought. This non-attachment is so important: it determines whether the mind is functioning according to its best capacity, or whether it's getting bogged down in the details of the past thoughts. Sometimes, one has to simply snap out of the repetitive thought behaviors of the past, by simply recognizing that the past thoughts are only just thoughts. The other point is to be resilient and not believe that the previous thoughts require any resolution: they have simply passed, and now one is faced with the new situation.
   The other point is about expectations: expectations are ideals that a person shoots for, not something that binds a person. When I have certain goals that I wish to achieve on a given day, I need to ask myself: are those desirable outcomes absolutely binding and determining of my value as a person? Not really, because the whole point of goals is to provide a natural way for individuals to extend their abilities in new ways. Not achieving a goal is actually a sign that the goal is sufficiently challenging that some struggle or effort is required. If I easily achieve every goal I set out to accomplish, it might be wise for me to consider whether the goal is "really" a goal, or whether it's just an easy target that guarantees a sense of success for me. Real goals entail the risk of failure, and yet that failure does not determine me to be a "failure". By not identifying goals with my identity or self worth, I can move through them with more clarity and not feel vexation when they are not necessarily achieved.
 Finally, one of the key aspects of resetting the mind is to find times to rest. Ideally the mind should always rest in the present moment; however, when one's mind is stirred and agitated, physically resting often helps! One should not underestimate the ability for a good sleep to clear the mind of too many agendas and attachments.

Guest and Host

 Next week, I will be teaching my students about the theme of "hospitality" in Greek times, using the Greek myths as a signpost and a guide. I find it interesting to reflect, in preparation for such a topic, on how all cultures throughout the world have simple etiquette rules which seem to be designed to identify and establish the roles of "guest" and "host". If hosts and guests don't behave in certain more or less prescribed ways, they will run the danger of alienating and overturning certain felt modes of mutual interaction that preserve social status and harmony.
    Hospitality is not just about preserving the moral codes of a society; it's also about the delicate relationship between hosts and guests, and how the host is careful to know and acknowledge the guest without overturning the household. The tale of Odysseus relates how Penelope becomes the host to many decadent suitors in the absence of Odysseus, until Odysseus's return. What does this signify? To me, it suggests the idea that we have to learn to entertain the best intentions, even when conditions around us are not necessarily to the benefit of everyone involved. Just as Penelope must practice patience with the suitors until her partner's return, so also we learn to reside in the midst of difficult thoughts until we have become a master of knowing the process of thinking itself. This is a bit like a trick because it involves not "threatening" our thoughts by trying to replace them with some meditative method, but rather to be aware of the thoughts without giving rise to secondary ones. In meditative contexts, it involves allowing the thoughts to be in the house, but not serving those thoughts tea!
  A practical outcome of this is to think of one's mind in terms of the delicate balances of host and guest. If I am not following the thoughts yet not suppressing them at the same time, the thoughts have no way of getting the better of me or affecting me in any way. This is  because thoughts tend to pray on two weaknesses in a person: the first being the tendency to get caught up in one's thoughts, and the second to try to suppress thoughts altogether. Neither of these approaches is effective for the guest and host relationship, since attaching leads to overturning mindfulness in favor of indulging in the thoughts... while the second approach leads to an active attempt to suppress thoughts, which ends up being exhausting. The best way in meditation is to see the guests as dust,while the host is the light pervading those dust particles, illuminating them to see their real nature.