Month: July 2024

On being a friend to the world . . .
by

On being a friend to the world . . .

Now, while there is freedom to act, I should always present a smiling face and cease to frown and grimace. The first to extend my hand in kindness, I shall be a friend to the whole world.

Shantideva, Bodhisattvacaryavatara

i. What does this mean to me?

When I first read this, I thought to myself, “cease to frown and grimace”, isn’t it unhealthy to go around pretending everything’s okay? But on further reading, I don’t think that’s what Shantideva meant. He doesn’t say “always present a smiling face” without first saying, “Now, while there is freedom to act…”.

For me, that gives a sense of urgency to what the writer is saying. Why would there not be freedom to act? Is the world ending? Is this some sort of apocalyptic hint of things to come? I don’t think so.

We live in samsara, a place where we are in constant fear and constant uncertainty. The sands are always shifting beneath our feet in samsara. I think Shantideva is saying do this now while you can because, whatever your situation in samsara, it’s going to change, and not for the better.

ii. How would I explain this to someone else?

What does Shantideva mean when he says he’ll “be a friend to the whole world”? Our local friendly AI tells us that ‘friend’ means “someone you know well and like, and who you regard with affection, trust and loyalty.” Shantideva is telling us he will be, “the first to extend my hand in kindness, I shall be a friend to the world.”

Here Shantideva is letting us know that he intends to regard the world with affection, trust and loyalty. How can he say that about the entire world? I think this goes back to two ways of thinking about samsara and our place in it. The first way of thinking is that, like putting a drop into an ocean, one single act changes the whole world. There is also the thought of interdependence. It’s impossible to do anything to anyone in samsara without adding to the whole, because we are interdependent upon one another.

Looked at this way, Shantideva is saying that while there are circumstances of life allowing us to do so, we should take advantage of that “freedom” to act by always presenting a smiling face. Does this mean we should pretend? No. But it does mean that when we are in a position to do so, we should always shift our focus to what is pleasant and share that with others. If we share a smile with just one person, we are putting a drop of kindness into the ocean of samsara.

iii. How do I bring this into my life?

This is an interesting one for me because in my mind it feels a little like a PollyAnna approach to life. But when I really pause to think about it, this is something we do all the time.

Don’t believe me? If a random person bumps into us while we’re on the street walking, what do we do? Do we slap their faces and pause to berate them for ruining our day? No. Of course not. The most likely thing to happen is that you’ll both say “excuse me” with a smile and then go on about your day.

Isnt’ this a small example of being a friend to the world? We say “excuse me” because we assume there was no maliciousness in what happened. Is this regarding those we encounter with affection, trust and loyalty? Not exactly, but if we stop and think about it, it comes pretty close.

When we literally bump into each other, there is no thought on our part of maliciously doing harm to the other person, and we assume the same about others. Is this the same as being a friend to the world? As I said earlier, it comes close. But this way of thinking is definitely extending a hand in kindness merely because we assume the other person meant no harm.

I bring this into my day to day life mostly at work. At work I talk with people whose loved ones’ medical diagnoses often includes “end of life” or “terminal” or “hospice care”. When I talk to these people, I approach them as a friend. Although I have to do business with them at an unpleasant, sad time in their lives, I inject as much humanity and compassion into the transaction as I can. Does this mean that I regard these people with affection, trust and loyalty? To a certain degree, within the limits of the interaction, yes it does.

We all have the capacity to do this if you’re reading this. If we have time to read (or do anything) for pleasure, then we have the capacity, like Shantideva, to be a friend to the world. We are at a place in our lives where we can extend a hand of friendship in kindness. Shouldn’t we seek out these opportunities and put as many drops as we can into the ocean of samsara?

On reality…
by

On reality…

“Such ones do not take anything seen, heard, or thought to be ultimately true or false. But others get attached, thinking it is the truth, limited by their preconceptions.” Buddha Shakyamuni, Angutarra Nikaya

i. What does this mean to me?

This is a direct quote from the historical Buddha. What did he mean by “such ones”? The Buddha is referring to those who, like him, are enlightened. We call these enlightened ones ‘Buddhas’, which simply means those who are awake.

If we look carefully at the scripture, it’s saying that enlightened ones or ‘Buddhas’ don’t take anything they see, hear, or even think “to be ultimately true or false.” Why not? All that we see, hear or think are internal mental representations. We can understand this by considering how we interact with the known world. There’s no question that we can’t physically fit a dining room table into our head. Even if it’s from a dollhouse, it still won’t fit.

But yet, we know what a dining room table is. How do we know that? Because we’ve seen countless dining room tables. This being the case, we’ve created a mental image and labeled it ‘dining room table’. The same is true of any phenomenon. If you think about windchimes in a mild breeze, you’d hear the sound of windchimes, right?

But is the sound really there at that moment? No. The sound itself is an internal mental representation. With thoughts, it’s a lot easier to understand this. The only interactions we ever have with our thoughts are as internal mental representations. After all, we can’t take a thought out of our head and hold it in the palm of our hand, can we?

If we look back at the verse, this is what the Buddha is saying. Buddhas (those who are awake) understand that all their experience is internal mental representations. This is why Buddhas don’t take anything in their experience to be “ultimately true or false.”

Buddhists are not nihilists. We know there is an external ultimate truth. But due to the limitations of our mind and bodies, we can’t know what it is. Those who are enlightened understand that the internal mental representations we experience are nothing but ideas about what ultimate reality might be. Based on our everyday experience, we can’t say whether or not our internal mental representations reflect some truth about ultimate reality.

The Buddha goes on to say that “others” (those who have not yet realized their own enlightenment) “get attached, thinking it is the truth, limited by their preconceptions.” All that stops us from realizing our enlightenment are our preconceptions, namely wrong views and afflicted emotions. If, the Buddha is saying, we can resolve just these two things, we will realize the truth of our own enlightenment.

ii. How would I explain this to someone else?

I’d start by asking them to describe a dining room table. If they describe a rectangular table, I’d ask if a dining room table could be round. Of course, the answer is yes. Now there’s a dilemma. Which table is the ‘real’ dining room table? Is it the round one or the rectangular one? This is kind of a trick question. The answer is that neither is the ‘real’ table. We know there is an ultimate truth that ‘dining room table’ refers to, but we don’t know what that ultimate truth is.

The Buddha says that “…others get attached thinking it is the truth, limited by their preconceptions.” In the world as we experience it, there is entropy. Things fall apart. Even people fall apart. The Buddha taught that there are four signs of ultimately reality: true purity, true bliss, true permanence, and true being. I like to add a fifth one to help me understand, “no retrogression”. Ultimate reality is not subject to entropy.

Because entropy is our only experience with ‘reality’, we become attached to this point of view and take it to be the truth of how things are. But ultimate reality is not subject to anything in samsara. In fact we could argue whether or not ultimate reality is part of samsara. It’s not. Samsara is a realm of illusion. Ultimate reality is . . . well . . . real.

iii. How do I bring this into my life?

Samsara gets so much airtime in the mind. It surrounds, inundates and penetrates the mind until through sheer repetition, we believe it to be true.

This is why it’s so important to recite prayer or mantra whenever we can, wherever we can. I have a wonderful new practice (new to me) that helps a great deal. It’s called Ten by Ten. It means ten times a day pause to take ten slow deep breaths. For me, I recite “Ohm” with each in-breath.

I find this helpful because it ‘pokes holes’ in the false reality of samsara. For a few moments at a time, I can focus on just my breath, just rest in the empty luminosity of the mind. And in those fleeting moments I see through the illusion of samsara, a few seconds at a time.

And really, that’s all it takes. Enlightenment is easy. If we can, for any length of time escape the illusion of solidity that samsara imposes, we can see through the illusory quality of samsara. And with this clear seeing, we can experience our true enlightened selves, our own Buddha Nature, if only for a few moments.

On focus…
by

On focus…

I will abandon laziness for which life has no time,

enter, undistracted, the path of listening and hearing,

reflection and contemplation, and meditation,

making perceptions and mind the path,

and realize the “three kayas”: the enlightened mind.

Now that l have once attained a human body,

there is no time on the path for the mind to wander.

Guru Rinpoche Padmasambhava

i. What does this mean to me?

I’m on a mission this year. My goal is to knit 75 hats and scarves by winter time to be donated. Before this my knitting was different. I’d have two or three projects going at the same time. I guess you could say I wasn’t focused. I would just knit whatever I felt like working on whenever I sat down to knit. But it’s different now. Somewhere out there are seventy-five people that I could make the winter more comfortable for. With this in mind, I only have one project going at a time – the hats and scarves. Even though it’s only July, I feel a sense of urgency about this project. You could say I’m more focused.

In these last two lines the writer lets us know that “. . . there is no time on the path for the mind to wander”. Why is that? Because the writer has “…attained a human body.” What does this mean? Is the writer a werewolf who turns into a wolf at full moons? I think it’s far simpler than that. We have this expression in our daily speech, “In my former life, I was . . .”. For me it would be “In my former life I lived in South Florida, land of hurricanes and tropical depressions.”

For better or worse, we are always changing. Was I more human when I lived in Florida? I would say I was a different human because that was a kind of Hell realm for me. The suffering was so intense that all I could think about was self-preservation.

Whether or not you believe that your karmic stream continues after the death of the physical body, we can understand what the writer is saying here. He is at a point in his life where simply surviving is not his whole concern. Now he can turn to the concerns of being human. What is our responsibility as human beings in samsara? It is nothing less than the liberation and enlightenment of every sentient being in samsara. Is this possible in the span of one’s lifetime? Probably not. But it is a sufficient goal to bring our minds into focus. As the writer tells us, “There is no time on the path for the mind to wander.” Not when liberation and enlightenment of every being is the whole of the path.

ii. How would I explain this to someone else?

I’d start by saying that the mind is very easy to distract when there is nothing to focus on. What if you wanted to become a race car driver? You’d be all over the internet researching. Google would be your best friend. You’d visit racetracks just to see what goes on there. You would have no end of questions.

In these lines the writer reminds us that the mind works best when focused. For most of us, we go through life focused on things that are mere distractions to the mind. Having encountered the Dharma in this life, and having had the chance to study the Dharma, there is no time to waste.

Once we realize this, our best option is to walk the path without distraction. Wherever we encounter a being suffering in samsara, this is our chance to put the Dharma to work. When we have this kind of focus in our lives, the path becomes our life, and our life becomes the path. The path is a process that proceeds gradually, with our every act a step on the way to liberation and enlightenment.

iii. How do I bring this into my life?

No matter what we believe about our lifetime, we are always beginning anew in every brand new moment. These moments taken together make what we call a ‘life’. In my former life, I had absolutely no time to study anything or even think of anything except my own survival from moment to moment. The uncertainty and fear in my life crowded out all other concerns.

But now, I have had the amazing good fortune of studying the Dharma. I’d like to say that in this new life I take every possible moment to learn and study the Dharma. This isn’t the case. Like most, my mind is distracted by samsara. But as I move through this life and live the path, I make a deliberate effort to remember that we are all suffering in samsara.

I bring this into my life by deliberately bringing to mind that there is no time to waste now that I have the Dharma in my life. I follow this strong intention by making the most of each encounter with a sentient being. I treat them with empathy and respect and most importantly I remind myself over and over that there is no time to waste. Even in the smallest quickest encounter with a sentient being we have a chance to make a difference.