Tag: Present moment

When we cannot see the way

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Autumn is a “Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness” according to Keats. The last few days have certainly been misty, with low cloud obscuring the changing colours on the trees. Traditionally, mist has signified a difficulty in seeing and distortion in our understanding of the reality of things. Over the weekend I have being aware of some people who are coping with the descent of  mist, fog and darkness in their lives. And like driving in real fog, working with the fog of confusion and loss can be dangerous in our mental life, because I find it hard to keep an awareness of both aspects which Keats writes about, the presence of mist and the reality of fruitfulness. Often when the fog of my emotions are strong,  I tense around them, and lose the sense of my direction and goodness underneath them. I cannot see  my way, believing the truth of the story connected with the emotion and not the fact of my own inner goodness. I find it hard to connect with my heart and see the fruits produced by its simple acts of kindness. I always demand brighter, bigger truths in times of darkness. I try to strengthen and protect my sense of self.

However, some times we have to accept the passing of low clouds. They obscure but do not take away the reality underneath. Just as the trees and the vines give up their fruit under the mist, we too may be at our most fruitful. We see these thoughts for what they are, self-judging thoughts which keep us obsessed with ourselves. Have you ever noticed that we prefer to give our experience labels like “I am falling apart“, “I am a mess” rather than just staying with the experience? It seems to comfort us somewhat. Our practice is to stay with the experience as felt in the body, without adding to it. The fog is just fog. It comes and goes. Then there will be sun. Neither of them are the essence of the tree. We work with seeing the fog as a mind state which can be held in our awareness. When we do this we can see depression and suspicion, paranoia and fear as nothing more than changing weather systems in the mind. They do not belong to me and affect who I truly am in any way.

Can we realize that thoughts about myself—I’m good or bad, I’m liked or disliked—are nothing but thoughts, and that thoughts do not tell us the truth about what we really are? A thought is a thought, and it triggers instant physical reactions, pleasures and pains throughout the bodymind. Physical reactions generate further thoughts and feelings about myself—”I’m suffering,” “I’m happy,” “I’m not as bright, as good-looking as the others.” That feedback implies that all this is me, that I have gotten hurt, or feel good about myself, or that I need to defend myself or get more approval and love from others.

In using our common language the implication is constantly created that there is someone real who is protecting and someone real who needs protection. Is there someone real to be protected from words and gestures, or are we merely living in ideas and stories about me and you, all of it happening in the ongoing audio/video drama of ourselves? Can there be some awareness of defenses arising, fear and anger forming, or withdrawal taking place, all accompanied by some kind of story-line? Can the whole drama become increasingly transparent? And in becoming increasingly transparent, can it be thoroughly questioned? What is it that is being protected? What is it that gets hurt or flattered? Me? What is me? Is it images, ideas, memories?

Toni Packer, What is this me? Shambala Sun

Sunday Quote: On change

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Everything is in process. Everything—every tree, every blade of grass, all the animals, insects, human beings, buildings, the animate and the inanimate—is always changing, moment to moment.

Pema Chodron

Let go…move on…have no preferences

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This week some things occured which were unexpected and which disrupted some directions which have seemed right for some time. However, they were out of my capacity to influence. In cases like this I have found that the practice of “no preferences” really helps. Even though I can feel that there is a much easier way to do things, I  try to work with having no preferences as to how things have turned out. This has given a perspective with regard to some news I received which I feel was unfair. In mindfulness, we try to see that difficultes and happiness are of of equal value.  I find this very hard but I try to work with what is.

It strikes me how much can change in a week. Last Saturday I was at an inspiring conference in Lerab Ling,  bringing together some of the finest researchers on meditation in the world.  I listened to a incredible talk on meditation by Sogyal Rinpoche as well as a moving reports on mindfulness by Jon Kabat Zinn and a beautiful talk on emotions by Erika Rosenberg. At the end of the day I felt that there was very little distance between experience and reflection: it just was and I felt whole.

This week I was made more aware of our capacity as humans to create distance between ourselves and our experience. We make life complicated by our continual reflecting on it and an excessive evaluation of it. We are never content to let things just be. I  find myself wishing for the simpler times of last week. But it is not to be. So I try to make  my practice to accept, let go and move on. Mindfulness is based on the belief that deep down things are naturally one and good. And even though others or circumstances make them complicated,  I find that I can drop into that natural calm in meditation.  However, moving on is still hard. Happiness is related to peace of mind. In difficult times  I work with that sense of peace and natural goodness. Therefore, on one level nothing can disturb me. However, on another level I struggle.

Pleasant conditions change into unpleasant ones, and unpleasant conditions eventually become pleasant. We should just keep this awareness of impermanence and be at peace with the way things are, not demanding that they be otherwise. The people we live with, the places we live in, the society we are a part of – we should just be at peace with everything. But most of all we should be at peace with ourselves-that is the big lesson to learn in life. It is really hard to be at peace with oneself. I find that most people have a lot of self-aversion. It is much better to be at peace with our own bodies and minds than anything else, and not demand that they be perfect, that we be perfect, or that everything be good. We can be at peace with the good and the bad.

Ajahn Sumedho

Fragmented

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We are fragmented into so many different aspects. We don’t know who we really are, or what aspects of ourselves we should identify with or believe in. So many contradictory voices, dictates, and feelings fight for control over our inner lives that we find ourselves scattered everywhere, in all directions, leaving nobody at home.

Sogyal Rinpoche

Exaggerating or denying

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A similar quote on meditation to yesterday morning’s one, noticing the tendency of the mind to use different strategies for avoiding simple, direct contact with life as it actually is. We prefer exaggerating our stories about life, often, to how things actually are. The mind likes to produce simulations of future or current events in our life, often making the anticipated difficulty seem bigger than it actually is:

Meditation practice provides  provides the perfect context for observing our beliefs and recognizing the tug-of-war we have with our experience. Just sit quietly for five minutes and watch what happens. Unless we have some accomplishment in meditation, we won’t know what to do with all the activity. We become overwhelmed by the energetic play of the mind, pummeled by our own thoughts and emotions, bewildered by our inability to sit in peace. We will want to do something. And we really only have two means of escape from all this mayhem: we can either spin out into thought, which is an exaggeration of reality, or we can suppress or deny it.

Exaggeration and denial describe the dilemma we have with mind, and not just in meditation. Exaggeration and denial operate in conjunction with all our fantasies, hopes, and fears. When we exaggerate experience, we see what isn’t there. And when we deny it, we don’t see what is. Both exaggeration and denial are extraneous to the true nature of things, the nature we experience when we can just stay present.

Elizabeth Mattis-Namgyel, The Power of an Open Question

As close to real as we can be

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Things that are real pose no danger to the mind. The real dangers in the mind are our delusions, the things we make up, the things we use to cover up reality, the stories, the preconceived notions we impose on things. When we’re trying to live in those stories and notions, reality is threatening. It’s always exposing the cracks in our ideas, the cracks in our ignorance, the cracks in our desires. As long as we identify with those make-believe desires, we find that threatening. But if we learn to become real people ourselves, then reality poses no dangers.

This is what the meditation is for, teaching yourself how to be real, to get in touch with what’s really going on, to look at your sense of who you are and take it apart in terms of what it really is, to look at the things that you find threatening in your life and see what they really are. When you really look, you see the truth. If you’re true in your looking, the truth appears.

Thanissaro Bhikkhu