THE COMMUNITY OF CONTEMPLATION

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This past weekend, I attended the International Symposium for Contemplative Studies in Boston. There were lots of luminaries in the fields of neuroscience, psychology, education, philosophy, and the humanities. Counted among these were the Dalai Llama, Jon Kabat-Zinn, Daniel Goleman, Arianna Huffington, and so many more whose are well-known to those in the field, reflecting the explosion really of mindfulness into all aspects of our modern society.

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Some presenters shared results of mindfulness programs they have implemented in particular clinical settings, or in business, and several neuroscientists provided the latest in their research findings on what is happening in the brain during contemplative practices and where in the brain it is happening. The goal of all this being the very mission of the conference: to “advance our understanding of the human mind, reduce human suffering, and enhance our well-being.”

Perhaps needless to say, among the 1700 participants, there was a palpable energy, an electric environment eager to engage with this multivalent subject of contemplation. As a long time student and teacher of contemplative practices, it felt akin to my all-time favorite third grade class trip where we went to a historic New England village. I remember waking up that morning excited with the sense that there would be new to things to learn, ideas and practices that made up their way of life that were ancient and those that were contemporary to them in their place and time. Contemporary and contemplation not coincidentally sharing the root, ‘contemp’, which means ‘together with time.’ This idea of being present to the current moment in ways that speak to our interior lives and the life of our communities within the wider society.

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This connection is a vital one. While contemplation and contemplative practices have become synonymous with meditation and a sense of personal transformation (and in some traditions this includes prayer as well) AND this can be profoundly true; this definition is only a part of the larger living meaning of contemplation. It must begin with one’s self, but ultimately goes beyond one’s self, to serve.

Contemplation, our modern definition stemming from the Latin ‘contemplatio.’ translates with broad concepts: thinking deeply and at length, examining, meditating, or looking thoughtfully. Yet these roots grow from another word, ‘templum’, which is a piece of ground consecrated for a building or space for worship. These ideas are both prisms of the diamond of contemplation, containing a process personal and worthy, that touches in to our deepest core and brings us together in community for a higher purpose.

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Taking this language further back even still we discover that the Proto-Indo-European base ‘tem’ means ‘to cut’ and the base ‘temp’ means to stretch and often referred to a “place reserved or cut out” as a cleared space in front of an altar.

We are cutting down and reshaping ourselves as the early pioneers at that long ago field trip depicted and as a society we continue to cut down and to stretch ourselves and make for us individually and collectively a clearing space.

In the process of observing IN THE MOMENT, whether that be thoughts, feelings, sounds, our breath, not adding any judgment to these observations, we too are paring down and making room for what is worthwhile. As the early pioneers who learned to thrive depicted on that long ago field trip, we too are stretching the limits of what is possible in our human experience.

“The ultimate value of life depends upon awareness and the power of contemplation rather than upon mere survival.”- Artistotle

OPTIMISM REVISITED

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wendyAs far back as I can remember, I’ve wore rose-colored glasses.  This tendency to see the best in people and life in general is not something I particularly worked at or read how-to books about. I guess you could just say it’s in my nature.  It’s part of my genetic makeup. And I do believe that my positive energy has attracted a lot of good people and situations in my life.

Globally we know hundreds of research studies have confirmed that optimistic leads to greater health and better outcomes after illness, bereavement, and other major life changes. Not surprisingly what has followed is a plethora of books about how to raise optimistic children, pets, or even your own positivity IQ. Everybody, it seems, wants to ride on the sunny side of the train.

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I DON’T KNOW

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Whether your brand of faith is organized or something more organic, practicing an attitude of trust in whatever is happening in your life right now without the certainty about what it means or how it will turn out,  takes a willingness to be okay with these three little words: “I don’t know.”

We know that it is true that we don’t REALLY know how things will turn out, but it is still hard to not run from this reality. Security is in many ways hard wired into all of us. But saying and meaning “I don’t know” provides you with a little space to pause for a bit. In response to any sense of inner or outer urgency you may be experiencing, you can wait and get a little comfortable with the unknown. Without reaching for the metaphorical security blanket, a blanket that comes in a million forms, you begin to see things as they are.

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LOVING KINDNESS MEDITATION

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There is an ancient and transformative meditation that the Buddha encouraged that elicits a gentle spirit, towards ourselves and others.

It is a practice that opens the heart toward forgiveness, even towards those who we may have deemed enemies. We may have people in our life who have caused us great pain or we may feel have stolen from us our essential self.  This, of course, is an illusion (though it can hold a powerful and long lasting spell on us if we are not awakened to it).  With loving kindness meditation, we can be restored to remember who we are, to listen our own good heart, our own best Self.

We can discover the wisdom to open the doors and windows of the Spirit.  It begins, always,  with a loving kindness towards ourselves.  It is after all, almost impossible to truly love others…until we know, love, and accept ourselves.  From this touchstone, we can spread our ability to love towards those in our inner circle, and then out into the wider world.

Begin with the breath of mindfulness, it is the breath that calls us to this moment.  It is life’s breath.  It is the breath that breathes through you, that you do not have to control, that you do not ultimately control. Be in your body.  It is a good body, and worthy of your care and respect.

Each day, for as many days as you can be present, repeat these ancient words:

“May I be filled with loving kindness/May I be well in body and mind/May I be safe from inner and outer dangers/May I be happy/Truly happy and free”*

*(taken from Jack Kornfield’s Audio Meditation on Loving Kindness)

I do this, dear reader, and it is changing me.  I watched a woman laughing on a 100 degree day in Charlotte, NC with her labrador retriever, getting cooled off in a beautiful fountain in the park.  She was directing her dog to the places that he could catch a drink of water.  She maneuvered him so deftly, so joyfully…it was only as I left that I realized that she was blind, and that this dog was her eyes.  Or perhaps something more?

With loving kindness, we are given eyes to see.  She was seeing, though not without the aid of  natural sight.

And last night, I caught a glimpse of early summer evening light on two church steeples and the glint  of their brass weathervanes…signs of old New England, and felt blessed, blessed to be exactly where I was.  Steeped in love and kindness towards myself, the ones I have been given to love, and towards those who crossed my paths…all bathed in this light.

YOU ONLY LIVE ONCE?

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“You only live once? False.  You live everyday.  You only die once.”  footprints

The first time I read this quote, I found it rather jarring. I guess it’s often the case that the truths we would rather not think about are that way. Yet often In order to wake up, it is only the words that slap like a splash of bracing cold water first thing in the morning that can bring us sharply to our senses. Doses of reality are commonly experienced as unpleasant.  Yet, they are helpful means to rearrange our perspective right here and now.

We do live everyday.  Mostly, we just do everyday. We do this and we do that. From one activity to the next text, we are getting things done.  And some of this is good!  It feels good to accomplish things each day, on a grand or humble scale. And it is easy to lose our balance and what we know to be true for our self if we don’t practice mindfulness along the way. We lose sight of our intentions behind the actions and our greater purposes can get pushed aside for yet another day.

cairn over rocksStopping daily, on purpose, to be present to what’s happening here in and around this body of ours is an antidote for this.  What are the sensations and thoughts happening right now? Can you invite awareness into this moment, no matter what is happening? This discipline flowers into a subtle but profound shift in how we are in the world.  If we keep at it and practice, practice, practice.

We will no longer need a two by four or thirty geese overhead or a full moon so big and iridescent it practically bowls us over to be arrested by the wonders available to us if we have the presence to be with them.

When you do die, which WILL eventually happen, as my father once said, “There will still be stuff in your inbox to do.”  These items will either get done by someone else or die themselves from lack of attention. Someone else will feed the dog, answer the phone, pay the bills, and so on.  Many traditions practice dying before you die meditations, which essentially encourage you to see the impermanence of all things and so to worry less and perhaps release a bit the compulsion to fit in one more thing, and live just this once.

Today, for five minutes, “die on purpose” to the big agenda, and see what’s here already, ready and waiting.

REALLY URGENT

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What does REALLY URGENT mean?

Here are some of my first responses to this question:

1. Someone in your vicinity (including you) is on fire.    ??????????????????

2.  Someone in your vicinity or related to you:  is on the phone right now and has had a car accident* (the cause of which could have been the phone, but that is a story for another day), has had a fall down a flight of stairs, is in the deep end of a pool near you and obviously can’t swim, or appears to be having a heart attack or stroke (perhaps your own).

I think you get the gist.  There are life and death situations that need your immediate attention.

dreamstime_11087921 (1)AND YET we tend to live our lives like everything that calls to us needs our immediate attention.  It’s a pervasive sense of urgency and it’s filling our days with tight muscles and knee jerk reactions that reflect annoyance and judgment.

To further instill this idea, people have been telling us since childhood the necessity and even glamour of accomplishment.  All aspects of our culture champion those who DO the most each day, the multitaskers, the captains of industry.  These are the ones who always manage to squeeze in one more appointment, errand, or e-mail. Does this sound familiar to you?

dreamstime_12677239 (1)I’m inviting you to try something different today.  More accurately, I am encouraging you to test how true this belief in urgency is.  Watch for the tendency towards hurry and the need to get more things done.  When you feel a strong sense of urgency, try slowing down, stopping on purpose.

See what’s happening in your body, in your mind, around you, right now.  Investigate.  Can you sit with that overwhelming impulse to do anything at all besides just be here now, and look behind it for a moment or two?

Writer Mark Nepo points out wisely: “The doorway to our next step of growth is always behind the urgency of now.  …now more than ever, when the weights you carry seem tied to your wrists, you must not run or flail.”

???????????????????????????????Because being here brings you back to yourself. What is most important to accomplish today gets remembered in a way that reflects best your own authenticity and integrity. Today, for me, it’s noticing light snowfall, blackbirds flying over the gray landscape, writing and a few meetings, a dog walk.

Perhaps you will discover that choosing to be present to your moments and to take time to stop and be mindful, that one or two things on your “to-do” list don’t get done each day. And that the things that do get done are completed with more clarity and enjoyment and precision.

These are what Thoreau coined acts of voluntary simplicity.

Today, the tax prep sheets will not get done, (I have another few weeks), there will be no visit to the grocery store after working (there is enough food for today), so that I can present to my life without ceaseless rushing.

Here is a short meditation to get you here in your own life:               090223a2484 (1)

  • Center yourself and feel the urgencies that pull at you.
  • Feel the tension of each like a string stretched taut.
  • With each breath, untie yourself, one urgency at a time.
  • However briefly, breathe freely, even for a moment, untied to any urgency at all.

PUTTING YOUR STORY DOWN

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For some time now, my three children (20-somethings) share this little mantra with me, often accompanied by a big grin. It goes like this: “Just do you, Mom!”

be yourselfWhether that means wearing a funky flowered hat, leading a guided meditation on the quad of a local campus, or making friends in line at the RMV, I find this call to just be myself a lovely affirmation every time I hear it.

I believe their call to me is an echo back from my daily attempts to encourage their discoveries about themselves ever since they began that discernment process.  Of course, like all of us, they have shifted and morphed as they “tried on” various versions of who of “being them” might include: jock, artist, rock star, philanthropist, hipster, or adventurer.  Some they have tossed out of hand.   Others have become integral pieces of who they are.

And of course, like all of us, they have suffered. There have been grave losses, illness, dark times, and broken dreams.  Yet, I have seen these unwanted crucibles, time and again, transform them in miraculous ways to  live life fully present.  There seems to be no profound personal or spiritual advancement without them.

However, the most challenging experiences, in fact all experiences, can also be places where we can get stuck. 070711a7017 (1)

The journey of who we are and why we are is a life-long one. The task is made more difficult when we hold onto particular stories in our personal history, identities about ourselves that don’t tell the whole story.

Students come to my classes to reduce stress, alleviate anxiety, depression, chronic pain, and  illness. There is much relief in discovering there is a common thread of suffering among participants.

Sometimes their first identifier when introducing themselves to the group is  along the lines of, “I am a recovering alcoholic,” “I am a survivor of abuse,” “I am a divorced single mother,” and so on.

It is powerful and healing to share these parts of ourselves as sources of demonstrated strength, resilience, and a tenacity to rise above.  Both speaker and listener are inspired and connect deeply with one other. They are living proof that we as humans can go through the worst and come out the other side.

Even more generally, an introductory description may be,  “I am a Mom/Dad/Lawyer/Nurse/ _” (fill in the blank.) There is a natural tendency to identify with our roles at home or in the workplace.

020206_trdp_s6 (1)All of these experiences, the challenging and the fulfilling, are hugely important facts.   These experiences help to shape us. AND THEY ARE NOT US. Each of us is much more than the sum of all our stories.      

Clinging to your personal history as it IS you, is at best incomplete and at worst, leaves you unable to see clearly what is here for you in the present. Self-descriptions are a good deal about what has happened to you, how you dealt with it, the work you do, and the people in your lives.

061006_cr_5659 (1)To widen our perspective, we become aware of what is around us and within us now, in this moment. Embracing your past and your roles from this perspective, you have a spaciousness to see that all your stories are not the final truth.

Honor and accept where you have been and what you “do”, utilizing it in the present where need be. But release the tight attachment to your stories.  They will not disappear if you let go of your over-identification. Nothing gets lost.

“Just doing you”‘ is the quiet call to the present…the modern version of “just be you”. Releasing our stories, if only for a time, allows us to widen the container of our life.

In this container, there is no need to put labels on who we are.  We can live unencumbered by our own or other’s definition of who we are, we see things with fresh eyes.

“Just do you” is the vibrancy of noticing what’s around you right now: a smooth pottery coffee mug, cloud formations or rain at the windows.  People and animals, landscape and cityscape, offering themselves for your enjoyment.

The authentic you arises naturally from this place. Try it.  You may discover a lightness and a rightness about being you in this moment.

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FOLLOWING YOUR INTUITION

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This past summer, I attended a silent retreat for a week in Northern California.  There was lots of guffawing (yes, I did say guffawing) from friends and family back East. “You are going to be  silent for a whole week?” they asked incredulously.  It is true (I admit it), I can be shamelessly fast talking and a little flamboyant….at times.  And it is also true that I can and do shake off the trappings of my ego self and return to right size when I am consistently being present to what’s here right now.

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The moment was ripe to deepen my meditation practice. There were some persistent “gut feelings” I couldn’t shake regarding major decisions at work and with a few close relationships. I knew hard choices were going to be required that would have life altering implications for me. And while I am an intuitive type by nature, I still wasn’t clear on how or when to respond.

In other words, I wasn’t sure if I could trust my intuition. I mean, what is intuition exactly?  Carl Jung said that intuition was “perception via the unconscious.”  He called it the right-brained ability to understand something immediately without the need for conscious reasoning (left-brained activity).

Even that idea appeared questionable to me.  Checking one half of the brain at the door while making some of life’s most important decisions? That doesn’t seem, well, logical, right?

shadow cairnAnd yet, there are different ways to know things and varieties of knowledge.

The knowing I was seeking was not why moths are attracted to light or why is it that my washing machine is shrinking everything lately. No, it was a fuller knowledge of self that I was after.  With that discovery, knowing I could trust my timing and decisions. From that place, I hoped to pluck the courage to act.

Arriving at the retreat, there was the excitement and anticipation of new faces and new beginnings.  Yet the first few days of the retreat were arduous ones.  Like a house in need of a purging, I hosted a vast clutter of disparate thoughts in my mind and the “ground” of my being was covered in nagging lethargy. But I just kept coming back, coming back to the sensations of breathing, the sounds of my body and the room, to now.

By the middle of day 3, I was able to sit and walk and work in silence without much inner chatter.

On day 6, clarity, that innate human capacity available to us all, if we can stop long enough, began to bubble up naturally. Through the persistent practice of mindfulness and attending meditation, insights were arising without my direct efforts.

While we learn much about the world around us by others, intuition and insights are something we discover experientially. Others can share their opinions or guide us. We can analyze facts and figures. These all are valuable.

Yet, in the words of Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu (6th BCE), “At the center of your being you have the answer; you know who you are and you know what you want.” And we can only get there through the daily practice of seeing what’s here.

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The mind is like a machine rife with cogs and wheels. It accumulates “dust” of distractions, busyness, and resentments that dull our core. All too often we ignore these “mites” until we are sidelined by illness, pain, or a pervasive lack of clarity.  As Thomas Merton relates, “without realizing it, life without (daily) meditation desensitizes us so that we can no longer perceive grace, listen to our inner voice, or receive intuition.”

So today, consciously tap into being aware of what is happening around you and within you. With intention, being your attention back to this moment.

Cultivate this heightened sense of observation. Together, with the reservoir of empirical data available to you in any given situation, you will find a clear path to “cut through the thickness of surface reality” to get to the truth of the matter.

This is intuition. May you learn to trust yours.  IMG_0994

FULL CATASTROPHE LIVING

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Our title today is taken from the ground breaking book, Full Catastrophe Living (1992) by premier leader in the field of mind/body training and the founder of the University of Massachusetts Stress Reduction Clinic at UMASS Medical School, Jon Kabat-Zinn.     dreamstime_7048996 (1)

This book  has long since been dog-eared and worn thin by its continual use as an invaluable instruction manual for me. “His major research interests which include mind/body interactions for healing, clinical application of mindfulness meditation for people with chronic pain and stress-related disorders, and the societal application of mindfulness,” align with my own.

While I entered this stream of contemplative practices long ago from the opening of spirituality vs. the current tide of science and medicine; they are in some ways one and the same stream.

In living the full catastrophe, we accept the pleasurable experiences of life and the painful ones with a quiet balance towards them, not getting too wrapped up in clinging towards one or running from the other.  Understanding in a deeper sense that both of these are just passing phenomena, we can be with either.  

For instance, this morning my mind continued to play the daily theme it has done for some weeks now. With frigid temperatures continuing, along with my chronic, cold induced cough, I think,  “I need a vacation.” Perhaps you’ve had this thought recently too? Many, many others thoughts follow this, but they are all stem from this one.

100414a1266 (1)And there is nothing wrong with this thought (or any other for that matter).  Vacating your life for a bit, whether for a week, a month, or even a long weekend (especially if there are turquoise waters involved) can push the refresh button on our minds and bodies.  We log in so much information and activity every day. The amount we can or choose to delete never really a significant de-cluttering of brain space.

And here is some more thinking, “Some warm weather may help me with this winter cough…”

But what if  we can’t take a vacation or we got to take a vacation and it didn’t “take?” Whatever problems we have, whatever inner turmoil, doesn’t necessarily or even likely cease just because we have gone somewhere other than where we are.

If you have been struggling with sadness, anxiety, or anger before you left, chances are there will be moments while you are away that these emotions still arise.  The saying  “wherever you go, there you are”(a title of another book by Kabat-ZInn by the way) is an undeniable truth.

Since you ARE here right now, being here is always an option.

You can make room for moments right now that are exceptional and rich by not going anywhere. How? By engaging with the art of non-doing.  By being present to comfort and discomfort alike, with no particular preference.  By not judging yourself for not doing, but instead just seeing what IS here.  

As Jon Kabat-Zinn points out, “The flavor and joy of non-doing is difficult for Americans to grasp because our culture places so much value on doing and on progress. Even our leisure tends to be busy and mindless.  The joy of non-doing is that nothing else needs to happen for this moment to be complete.  The wisdom in it, and the equanimity that comes out of it, lies in knowing that something else surely will.”

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Right now, there is sunlight peeking through the frost covered windows of my bright alcove in my office. A host of bird songs are making themselves known on the evergreens outside.  Cars are speeding past this little cottage while my dog sleeps.  I can breathe in warm steam and hot tea and smile at this fortune.  I can send out thoughts of healing for myself and everyone else who is coughing this morning. I can notice how warm my feet feel in these slippers.

All this from non-doing.  What is in this moment for you?

   

THE FIERCE SWORD OF COMPASSION

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Today’s post is about compassion, what it is AND what it isn’t.

Linguistically, the word compassion has its roots in Latin and Old French.  From the Latin compassionem, com (with), pati (to suffer), ion (state of), it means “the act of suffering together.”  When we feel another’s sorrow:  at a friend’s husband’s funeral, with a mother whose child is undergoing chemotherapy, we often weep with them and for them. On another level, we feel the anguish also for ourselves.  We too are not immune, we all have experienced or  will experience pain and death, of one kind of another.

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There is much healthy connection in feeling sympathy for another’s pain.  If we have experienced similar tragedies, we may have something insightful to contribute to alleviate the suffering.  Yet, even if we have never had that experience, as humans we contain the urge and strong desire to end or at least, ease their suffering. Our willingness and openness to become a vehicle for healing can, in and of itself, bring comfort. 

One’s presence can and does provide a palpable sense of strength, a buoyancy,  when  I will stand with you in your pain and you stand with me in mine; and we bear it together.  We CAN bear it.  It is the opposite of fearful aversion that does not want to look, that feels like it can’t look. The kind that keeps us tucked away in our separateness. There are those who hold on for dear life with the denial that such and such could never happen to me. This contains the seeds of suffering for everyone.

Yet, there is no escaping our connectedness.  In fact, an Italian scientist named Giacomo Rizzolatti and his colleagues discovered a class of brain cells called “mirror neurons.”  Their research showed that through our mirror neurons we actually feel the emotions, movements, and intentions of others. It is part of our social brain, “a neural circuitry that connects us.” These finding illustrate that to a certain degree at least, we are “genetically predisposed” to be compassionate.

But we often get confused about the limits of what that means.  We can mistakenly think that to be really compassionate, we have to help every homeless person we see, fix our friend’s latest crisis or family’s members ongoing difficulties, or even volunteer for one more thing.  These are our own personal guilt trips.  There is a one-sided nature to this kind of care, that can ignore our inner sense of integrity.  It can be co-dependency.

Here is where the fierce sword of compassion is necessary.  The fierce sword is the “no” of compassion.  We can listen and serve others, but must include ourselves for love and kindness.

Jack Kornfield, in his book The Wise Heart, gifts us this wider view:

“Compassion is a circle that encompasses all beings, including ourselves. Compassion blossoms only when we remember ourself and others, when the two sides are in harmony. Compassion is not foolish. It doesn’t just go along with what others want so they don’t feel bad.  There is a yes in compassion, and there is also a no, said with the same courage of heart.  No to abuse, no to violence, both personal and worldwide.  The no is said not out of hate but out of unwavering care.  Buddhists call this the fierce sword of compassion.  It is the powerful no of leaving a destructive family, the agonizing no of allowing an addict to experience the consequences of his acts.”

It is the learning to finding the harmony between holding on and letting go…in love.  May you find courage and renewal in both the yes and the no of your compassion.