Buddhism

Karainya Metta Sutta, excerpt

Let none through anger or ill-will
Wish harm upon another.
Even as a mother protects with her life
Her child, her only child,
So with a boundless heart
Should one cherish all living beings;
Radiating kindness over the entire world:
Spreading upwards to the skies,
And downwards to the depths;
Outwards and unbounded,
Freed from hatred and ill-will.
Whether standing or walking, seated or lying down
Free from drowsiness,
One should sustain this recollection.
This is said to be the sublime abiding.

(excerpt from the Karainya Metta Sutta, the Buddha's teaching on unconditional loving kindness or good will)

Contemplation on No Coming, No Going

Author: 
Thich Nhat Hanh

This body is not me.
I am not limited by this body.
I am life without boundaries.
I have never been born,
and I have never died.

Look at the ocean and sky filled with stars,
manifestations of my wondrous true mind.

Since before time I have been free.
Birth and death are only doors through which we pass,
sacred thresholds on our journey.
Birth and death are a game of hide-and-seek.

So laugh with me,
hold my hand.
Let us say good-bye,
say good-bye, to meet again soon.

We meet today.
We will meet again tomorrow.
We will meet at the source of every moment.
We meet each other in all forms of life.

No Time to Lose: A Dharma Response to Climate Change Part 2: Jack Kornfeld

No Time to Lose: A Dharma Response to Climate Change Part 2: Jack Kornfeld
This is the second post of notes from the Livestream event held on September 15th, a fundraiser for OneEarthSangha.org and in anticipation of the Climate Strike, led by students, to be held September 20, 2019.

Sunday, September 15, I attended No Time to Lose: A Dharma Response to Climate Change held at Spirit Rock, and to my gratitude, Livestreamed. As it was an all day event, I took notes from numerous speakers. I will post them over the next few days so that each person's words will have space to be digested.

The following are my notes of Jack Kornfeld's talk. The words and ideas are from him, which, once again, makes for an odd blog post.

Kornfeld told of asking his old teacher in Thailand about the struggle American students had with self-love and self compassion. The venerable answered that if the students went out in the woods and prayed for loving kindness, the students would soon include themselves. He then mentioned the Buddhist response to deforestation in Thailand was to go in the forest to ordain trees. They would ordain the largest, oldest trees as Abbots of the Forest. These sections of forest were left alone.

So the question is how do we live with climate change, and how do we practice with it?

It is best to return to the four noble truths.

One. Life has suffering.
Billions of tons of methane have been released. Glaciers and icebergs are disappearing. The polar ice caps which reflected the sun, and consequently the sun's heat, have shrunk almost to nothing in the North Pole, and actively shrinking in the South. The military and the shipping industry are just waiting for the ice to melt in the North Pole to open up shipping lanes. We are experiencing the sixth extinction.

Two. Causes of suffering.
Just as in our human lives greed, delusion, and hatred are the causes of suffering. The delusion is of our separateness. Every breath we take was breathed by someone before us, generations before us.

Three. There is an end to suffering.
Waking up from the trance of separateness.

Four. Eightfold Path.
And so forth.

Kornfeld followed with a story about Christiana Figueres, the former chief of the United Nations Framework Convention of Climate Change, who orchestrated United Nations climate negotiations in Paris, became suicidal while planning and orchestrating the Paris Climate Conference. She read Thich Nhat Hanh's books, and went to Plum Village, Thich Nhat Hanh's monastery in France, and was able to heal. She used the teachings not only to get through, but to teach others. One of the most important things was for countries to look at themselves not as victim, nor as perpetrator. One hundred and eighty six countries signed the accord.

Kornfeld emphasized, for us not to feel guilty. "Do not try to save the world out of anger, fear or guilt. Save the world as an act of love." He recommended a book called Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming, Paul Hawken, ed. http://www.drawdown.com

This book has a list of things we as individuals and as society can do to reverse climate change, in order of importance. Paul Hawken gathered together the worlds experts on each item. The most important, are reduce food waste, rebuild the kelp forest(kelp in cattle feed causes them to pass less gas), and educate and empower women.

The earth wants to renew itself. He mentioned Chernobyl. No matter how the government tried to cover up the accident, the winds told the story. Kornfeld also mentioned Wengaari Maathi, who orchestrated the planting of fifty-one million trees, one tree at a time, [side note: by empowering women].

"Save the world as an act of love. How you do it matters."

Kornfeld finished with a Molly Ivins quote. “So keep fighting for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don't forget to have fun doin' it."

No Time to Lose: A Dharma Response to Climate Change Part 1: Joanna Macy

No Time to Lose: A Dharma Response to Climate Change Part One: Joanna Macy
This is the first post of notes from the Livestream event held on September 15th, a fundraiser for OneEarthSangha.org and in anticipation of the Climate Strike, led by students, to be held September 20, 2019.

Yesterday, I attended No Time to Lose: A Dharma Response to Climate Change held at Spirit Rock, and to my gratitude, Livestreamed. As it was an all day event, I took notes from numerous speakers. I will post them over the next few days so that each person's words will have space to be digested.

The following are my notes of Joanna Macy's first talk. The words and ideas are from her, which makes for an odd blog post.

While she was practicing walking meditation one day, recently, a minor memory replayed over and over, in her head. She heard a voice: "Just Fall in Love with What Is." She had a vision of two curtains, one uncovered the IPCC report where we have twelve years, and the other revealed Bolsonaro's election. In essence, she was being told to stop her preoccupation with herself, and accept what is happening.

Macy told us that we are entering a time of "bardo," that is a huge change in the conditions of your existence, according to Tibetan Buddhism. Climate crisis is a bardo. Enter it together. Enter from the East where the Mirror Wisdom Buddha resides. The mirror is to us and our world.

There are three realities:

Business as usual

The Great Unraveling-which is accelerating

The Great Turning-Inspired by the wheel of the dharma

The world, maimed and burning as it is, is alive. You are a part of the earth. You are the earth. We cannot stop climate change to go back to what we were before. We can build a society that works within. We need to learn how to take care of one another. We need to find our way back to each other. Indigenous traditions show us how. Take stock of your response to a society in collapse so:

As I face the world collapsing, what I am grateful for is:

As I face the political economy collapsing, what I fear is:

As I face the political economy collapsing, what I will try to remember is:

Even though the economy is big and noisy, it institutionalizes the three poisons. 

Consumer, growth orientation: Greed

Military industrial complex: Hatred

Media: Delusion

Don't privatize your grief. It is a collective phenomenon. It's the other face of love. The political economy holds on to its power by pathologizing our grief.

Loving Kindness for Unitarian Universalists

A Metta Prayer for Activists

May I recognize happiness.
May I abet human rights for every single human being.
May I nurture sustainability for Mother Earth.
May I cultivate compassion for the suffering.
May I know enough.

May you recognize happiness.
May you abet human rights for every single human being.
May you nurture sustainability for Mother Earth.
May you cultivate compassion for the suffering.
May you know enough.

May they recognize happiness.
May they abet human rights for every single human being.
May they nurture sustainability for Mother Earth.
May they cultivate compassion for the suffering.
May they know enough.

The Eight Winds and a Fart

A student and a Zen master lived across the river from each other and they often discussed Buddhism. One day the student, whose name was Su Dongpo, felt inspired and wrote the following poem:

I bow my head to the heaven within heaven,
hairline rays illuminating the universe,
the eight winds cannot move me,
sitting still upon the purple lotus.

So here he is, and he is basically saying that he has attained a very high level of spirituality. He is no longer buffeted around by the eight winds. He is impressed with himself. Then he sends a servant to hand-carry this poem to the Zen Master across the river, Foyin. And when he reads the poem, Foyin immediately sees that it is a declaration of spiritual refinement. Smiling, the Zen Master wrote the word “fart” on the manuscript and had it returned to Su Dongpo.

So, Su Dongpo is there thinking he is pretty cool and expecting compliments and a seal of approval, and he sees the word “fart” and he gets really, really upset. “How dare he insult me like this, what a lousy old monk, he’s got a lot of explaining to do!” He gets his things together and, indignant, he rushes out of his house and he orders a boat to ferry him to the other side of the shore so he can set this guy straight. He wants an apology. However, Foyin’s door is closed, and on the door is a piece of paper for Su Dongpo. It says: “The eight winds cannot move me. One fart blows me across the river.”

The Prayer of Saint Francis of Assisi: My Past and Present, or, Spiritual Self-care for Today

Tree and Bell at Deer Park Monastery

When I arrived at seminary, I brought two documents with me, the anonymous, Norman, Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi, and Thich Nhat Hanh's Fourteen Mindfulness Trainings. Those two were what I modeled my life by, imperfectly, reflecting the kind of Christianity I wanted to keep, and the Buddhist precepts that best reflected my aspirations as to how I wanted to relate to the world.

My goal was to delve deeper into Buddhism, once I finished seminary. In the interim, the seminary library helped me keep my my sanity by having a large selection of Thich Nhat Hanh books. After graduating, my Unitarian Universalist tendency to question meant discerning whether Thich Nhat Hanh's tradition of Zen Buddhism was right for me. After looking at numerous other traditions, his Plum Village tradition appealed most in its profound reverence for the Earth, the primary focus on Peace, and that being queer was not a deal breaker.

Coming across a "Buddist Mantra based on the prayer of St. Francis" several weeks ago, I was inspired to craft my own Both/And prayer using phrases familiar to the Plum Village tradition. In these troubling times, I hope this might be useful to others, with the reminders for self-care.

Note: I need to add that UU Rev. Erik Wikstrom wrote a book called Simply Pray. It was a good manual on writing our own UU prayers. I rewrote the prayer of St. Francis to give it Buddhist language but keeping the structure, after I saw someone's version. I did not give Rev. Wikstrom credit, but it's where I saw it done first, or was encouraged to do it first. I had also collected various versions of the Our Father before that, trying to find something different, but had not thought to write one myself. The oldest translation of the prayer from the original French, which is out of copyright, served as the foundation.

Dear Thay, Dear Sangha, Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Taking refuge in the three jewels,

May I be an instrument of peace,

Where there is hatred, may I water the seeds of love and compassion, sowing metta.

Where there is offense, may I practice Beginning Anew.

Where there is discord, conscious breathing and walking,

Where there is error, mindfulness, to remind myself delusions and enlightenment inter-are.

Where there is doubt, return happily in the present moment.

Where there is despair, touch Mother Earth, remembering that so as seeds endure birth and death in each moment, so do I.

Where there is darkness, may I awaken to the light of my true nature.

Let me not seek so much

to be consoled, as to soothe strong emotions the way a mother soothes her child,

to be understood, as to realize the Dharma, Sangha, and Buddha are the way to understanding,

to be loved, as to cultivate a true love, a boundless love,

for I vow

to meet all sentient beings with kindness and compassion,

to meet suffering with patience and love,

to delve into the deeply into the teachings of the Buddha,

and to know in the very depth of my cells, the interconnectedness of all.

The Pure Land on Earth

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I've mentioned before that my family is what I call Chinese Buddhist - a mixture of Zen, Pure Land, and indigenous traditions. Most of you likely know about Zen, but you might not have heard of Pure Land.

The ultimate goal is still nirvana, as it is with all Buddhism, but Pure Land adherents believe in the existence of a Western paradise, created by the beneficence of the Amitabha Buddha. If one is fortunate enough to be reborn into this place of bliss, free from the distractions of suffering, one will easily attain nirvana. And one becomes so fortunate by praying to Amitabha for help. In his compassion for our suffering, he intervenes when we would not have made it by ourselves. One could call it grace.

And one can see why this flavor of Buddhism gained traction in China, particularly among the laboring class who struggled to feed their families. Pure Land says that 1) you are not alone - there is help, and 2) while conditions may be too difficult to attain nirvana now, there will be a time in the future,  when we’re in the Western Pure Land, when things will be good.

Contrast that with Zen where we are taught that we are all already Buddhas; we just need to remember it, to wake up, which can happen at any instant. Enlightenment is right here and now.

Zen and Pure Land might seem at odds with each other, and yet both exist in Chinese Buddhism for people to draw upon.

Last Sunday was Easter, which in traditional Christianity is thought of as the remedy for the Fall of humanity in the story of Eden. Adam and Eve, who represent us, lived in paradise, which was lost when they transgressed. Due to Jesus intervening for us, many Christians look forward to regaining paradise, heaven, in the future.

Now, most UUs would probably reject the idea of a Western Pure Land as most reject the idea of heaven. We Unitarians are known for focusing our attentions on this life and the needs of this world. As a dying Henry David Thoreau famously quipped when asked if he could see what's next, “One world at a time.”

And that is my take too. To me, the bodhisattva's vow to not cross over until every sentient being is free is a call to social action. Because the world is full of hardships that distract people from being able to attain enlightenment, we need to remove those hardships - such as racism, poverty, war, and environmental destruction - so that people have the space to practice. We need to create the Pure Land on earth, otherwise known as what Rev Martin Luther King called the Beloved Community.

It was this desire to create a better world that led to the first Earth Day in 1970, the creation of the EPA, and passing of key environmental legislation to protect our air, water, land, and sibling species. This life, this world.

Yet recently I've realized that even though my focus is in this world, I've still been holding onto a notion of a future mythic paradise. Perhaps you are too. Not a paradise in an afterlife, no, but when I think of the Beloved Community or the Pure Land on earth, I catch myself thinking of the future, not the present. A future where humans live in harmony with each other and with Mother Earth, and all beings have enough. We just need to keep working, keep educating, keep advocating for change until we achieve it.

I call this a mythic paradise because in my more rational moments I realize that such a future cannot exist. Not as a steady state. To think that someday we’ll live in a utopia with no more social ills is a belief with little more basis in reality than belief in heaven or a Pure Land.  I'm not saying that we can't succeed in fighting climate change and racism, etc. I believe that we can and will prevail. But even as those social issues are resolved, others will arise. The work will always be ongoing.  That's just the nature of things.  Eden didn't “fall” because of some moral failing in humanity. “The Fall' was inevitable because change is inevitable. Because we are conditioned beings subject to impermanence. Because, entropy.

So, if the Beloved Community, or the Pure Land on earth, isn’t a state that can be achieved, one might despair and ask what’s the point? Well, aside from the fact that without the efforts of people who care things would be worse, there is this. In Chinese Buddhism there is both Pure Land and Zen.  Pure Land says enlightenment will happen in the future, and Zen says that enlightenment is right here and now for us to see.  We work for a better future, as our ancestors did for us, AND, every time we meet the Other with loving kindness, we create the Beloved Community at that moment. The Pure Land, paradise, already exists here and now, created by us over and over again.

Meditation on Eating an Orange

Author: 
Thich Nhat Hanh

Meditation is a matter of enjoyment.
When you are offered a cup of tea, you have an opportunity to be happy.
You can drink your tea in such a way that you are truly present.
Otherwise, how can you enjoy your tea?
If you are offered an orange there must be a way to eat your orange that can bring you freedom and happiness.
You can train yourself to eat an orange so that happiness and freedom are possible.
If you eat an orange in forgetfulness, caught in your anxiety and sorrow, the orange is not really there at all.
But if you bring your mind and body together to produce true presence, you can see that the orange is a miracle.
Take the time to eat an orange in mindfulness.
Bring your attention to the fruit you hold.
Close your eyes and smell the fruit.
Imagine the orange blossoms in the orange,
The trees in the grove, standing the test of time and weather,
Their roots firmly planted and sturdy
The soil, dark and deep
See the rain and the sun that have gone through the orange blossoms.
The tree that has taken several months to bring this wonder to you.
Open your eyes.
See the orange in your hands once again,
Slowly begin to peel the orange.
Notice the fragrance, feel the coolness of the flesh
When the fruit is peeled, pull it apart with your fingers and choose a segment. Hold it between your fingers, notice the patterns, the colors, the different textures,
Bring the fruit between your lips and place it in your mouth
Bite into it, and close the eyes to concentrate fully on the orange flavor. The juice on your tongue and feel its sweetness in every part of your mouth Do not take another bite until the essence of the previous bite is gone.
Continue to eat every piece of your orange with this mindful practice.
Placing each segment in your mouth,
Tasting its sweetness with your whole being
Remember to pause occasionally to reflect on any new sensations you experience. When the fruit is gone, let the experience linger, awakening gratitude and joy.

The Difference Is the Practice

When I went to the People of Color retreat at Deer Park last week, I went in thinking only that it would be a place to connect with and spend time with other people of color who practice the Dharma. The theme of the retreat – healing – was incidental in my mind. I just took it as a “theme” that the organizers chose, something nice sounding that goes after the colon in the title. In past experiences, for example with General Assemblies, to be honest the chosen theme does not generally affect my experience of the gathering at all. (Justice GA was the one exception.)

I've been to many People of Color gatherings now, but never before in a Buddhist context and never before for so many days together. It was interesting to see how things were similar and how they were different. There was the same woundedness and rawness. The first couple of days, I kept thinking to myself, "So much pain here. So much pain here." Even as most of us expressed joy and gratitude to be gathered together. But around the second full day of the retreat, I started to understand the difference between this gathering and others I'd been to.

The difference is the practice. In many ways, the teachings of Buddhism can be likened to deescalation techniques. (In fact, sometimes I wonder whether that's where they came from, tho of course it's entirely possible the same principles have been discovered repeatedly over time.) The gist of it is that instead of reacting to what another person is doing and thus (most often) escalating conflict, we sit with it. Try to understand that their behavior is due to causes and conditions, and to understand what in us is reacting, being triggered, due to our causes and conditions. So instead of feeding and thus escalating conflict, we let that energy dissipate. NOT suppress it, which would be different, just not add to it, not make it stronger, bigger.

Most everyone at the retreat has an understanding of this practice, but the organizers and the monastics are especially versed in it. So, for the first day and a half or so, they just let folks express their anger and hurt and dissatisfaction, without responding in defensiveness. Whether or not they were as calm on the inside I do not know, but outwardly, they just let the criticisms be voiced. And once folks were able to voice their dissatisfactions without being told that they were wrong for feeling that way, that in and of itself was healing. And that allowed participants to open more as well, and be more gentle with each other. It was an amazing thing to behold. (Altho I think I personally spent more time observing it in admiration than actually allowing myself to be transformed by it.)

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