Get a Lifetime!

(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be beneficial!)

I love Vermont.

To me, it’s always been a magical place since I first went there in January 1974 to hear Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche speak on Zen and Tantra at what was then known as Tail of the Tiger land centre (now part of beautiful Karme Choling).

I travelled there again on September 02, 2011 for six days to participate in a retreat around Tibetan King Gesar of Ling lead by His Eminence Namkha Drimed Rabjam Rinpoche. On Tuesday, September 06, His Eminence gave about eight of us an interview — arranged for us by his student Gary Mass — that lasted for one hour!

We were invited to ask one question each. In this situation most of us ask questions around the dharma teachings.

This webpost is around the simple yet profound personal question asked by Shambhala Buddhist student Leslie Witt from Vermont: how do you see the world? This is what I remembered the next day of His Eminence’s answer — PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS IS NOT NECESSARILY WHAT HE ACTUALLY SAID.

Highly realized persons have thoughts and emotions like everyone else. The difference is that they do not follow those thoughts. And because they don’t follow the thoughts, they do not engage in liking or aversion. So they they do not perpetuate negative karma of the three poisons.

As my weblog is around an in-depth exploration of karma, I appreciated this simple yet very profound description.

As I sat writing this post at the computer in the dining room at Karme-Choling, one of the programme participants suggested I speak to the translator, Vanessa Turner from Los Angeles, to get her recall. (Vanessa tells me that she has been speaking and translating for a number of years for her Tibetan teachers, one of whom is His Eminence, since she was 16.)

I hit the jackpot! This wonderful translator remembered what His Eminence said almost verbatim. [Please note that words in {   } are mine.] Here it is, unedited so that the reader can get the full flavour of His Eminence’s answer:

I’m really just the same as you.  I too have thoughts and emotions just like you do. But the difference between you guys and myself is that I have thoughts but I recognize the thoughts {as thoughts} and I don’t follow after the thoughts. Actually this is the fundamental difference bewteen ordinary people and lamas. Both of them have thoughts and emotions. The process of thoughts and emotions arising is the same for ordinary people as it is for lamas. The difference is that ordinary people follow after the thoughts and get caught up in them whereas lamas recognize the arising of the thoughts and do not follow after them. (He thinks for a moment.)

When I was young, I remember finding this uncontrived, spontaneous deep level of compassion that was like this feeling of compassion for all sentient beings that was not constructed or forced. It was like something that is always innately there.

I know all sentient beings. I know the way in which they are confused and lost in samsara {the world of confusion created by ego, our manufactured self} and when I see sentient beings lost in their confusion and out of that confusion engaging in creating more negative karma because of their attachment and aversion and ignorance, I genuinely feel just a sense of loving care for all of them. I really feel for them. It’s like they can’t help it. They’re confused. I see it. I see how they create suffering for themselves. I feel so much love and caring for them. So there is this feeling, this compassion, where it’s like I can see that the sentient beings and the nature of their confusion but I myself do not follow after that confusion. But I can see it!

And also some lamas who have really high level of realization they actually don’t see impurity anywhere at all. They don’t see impure sentient beings. They see only deities {wisdom beings}. They see only the display of the deity mandala. Everything that appears to them appears as the expression of wisdom as a display of the deity. Everything they hear (all sounds) arise to them as the sound of mantra. But to have that kind of view one would have to be really high level of realization.

However, I will say that when we are all gathered together in puja and sometime I just look out at all of you and I only see your goodness. It’s like I look at you all and I don’t see any faults in anyone. When we are in the puja together, all of you are wholly good. So maybe that is some reflection of a pure view because really don’t actually see any flaws in you when we are together in the puja. For lamas of really high realization everyone appears as the deity {wisdom being} and anyway I too have thoughts but I recognize the thought.  Recognizing the thought I do not follow after it. Or become entrenched in it.

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Location:    Roy Thomson Hall, Toronto, Canada

Event:       State funeral for the Honourable Jack Layton,
             leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition

Date:        Saturday, August 27, 2011

Jack  was always an innovator, a creator, often ahead of his time, as the expression goes. Click here for summary of career.

But he outdoes himself on August 27, 2011 when he uses his own funeral as the setting for his last political campaign!

Let’s go back a bit.

May 02, 2011 Canadian Federal Election: Jack, 61 year-old leader of the federal New Democratic Party, had just brought his party to its highest political status in its history on the federal level: he won enough seats to become Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition.

August 22, 2011 – 04h45: Jack dies from cancer. Prime Minister Stephen Harper, understanding the great affection Canadians have for Jack,  regardless of their political affiliations, announces that Jack will be given a state funeral — most unusual because state funerals are given if a former prime minister or cabinet minister dies. Jack has been neither.

August 22 – 26, 2011: Tributes to Jack come from some of the many people he worked with and knew over his lifetime. The one I like is given by Robin Sears who makes a point that no one else I am hearing has made:  how Jack evolved as a politician. The concepts of evolution and transformation appeal to me. And that was my experience of Jack. When I first met him in the 1980s he seemed defensive and somewhat aggressive. Now he has the stature of a bodhisattva, those who serve others out of compassion without thought of what one can get for oneself.

August 27, 2011: The day of the funeral. Only 600 members of the public were allowed into Roy Thomson Hall for this event. There are 1,700 invited guests including the Prime Minister, other elected officials including mayors and cabinet ministers etc. etc. etc. I managed to be one of the 600.

Here are a few of my off-the-cuff notes from this past week of mourning and grief:

• The media reports describe Jack as “lying in repose” in his casket — I think to myself that it probably is the only time that Jack lay in repose in this lifetime!  He was constantly working on behalf of others.

• Jack was a wonderful example of a great Shambhala (Tibetan) Buddhist warrior — warrior in the sense of courage, not aggression and hatred. His compassion fueled his courage. The Tibetan name for Great Warrior is Pamo Chenmo.
• We cannot become a genuine warrior until out heart is broken. Jack’s heart was broken by the suffering in the world.  He truly manifested the genuine heart of sadness of the warrior. Juxtaposed with this sadness was his boundless uplifted spirit of optimism and hope.
  

• Jack for me embodied some of the qualities of the Great Eastern Sun — the sun shines on everyone. It does not distinguish between old, young, fat, thin, rich, poor, beautiful, ugly, etc. etc. etc. Jack helped everyone who came to him.

• Jack often spoken of as “passionate” about his beliefs, described as social democratic. Yes, he was passionate, but not fanatically fixated or obsessed.

• Jack as a loving warrior – I like this phrase because of the juxtaposition of two apparently opposite ideas: “loving” and “warrior.”

• Jack-in-the-box  —his body is in his coffin now, but Jack was someone who could think outside the box.

• I hear people says it’s “unfair” that he died at this time. I don’t think Jack lived his life in terms of these kinds of dichotomies, e.g. fair\unfair.  To me, Jack lived in the gap between all the dualistic, polar opposites by which we conventionally live and judge others. Again, some examples are stupid\intelligent; nobody\somebody; and the biggest one being the us-and-them dichotomy; etc. etc.

• Jack’s “political” message transcended politics and spoke to basic goodness  (Quebecers call Jack “Le Bon Jacques”)

• Great teachers — whether they manifest as politicians, doctors, whatever — sometimes leave this life relatively early….we now have to stand on our own.

• I hear people say “I never met Jack but….”  I think to myself “Yes you did. You meet Jack anytime you see someone taking time to help someone in a practical way. He did not tell people that it wasn’t “convenient” for him and maybe if he had time he’d get back to them. No. He just helped them. On the spot.

• Jack, despite his personal and political stature, provided the courtesies of everyday life to everyone he met. To me, these simple courtesies create peace.

• There’s a phrase in one of our Shambhala Buddhist chants that talks about becoming “gentle and tough” (page 3 of 4). To me, that was Jack.

Dear Jack,

Just a few last thoughts…….

I’ll bet you are making your journey through the after-death  bardo on your bicycle! That is fitting,  as you promoted the option of riding our bikes rather than riding the transit rails or driving our cars in the city of Toronto long before anyone else.

You’ll always be on my ballot whenever there’s an election.

Well done, our good and faithful servant.

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This past Thursday, my sister Stephanie Andersen came to visit Mum and I from Florida. We went out for Father’s Day brunch today at the Bloor Diner in Toronto — albeit without my late father who died on November 06, 2004.

Around 1969 Dad sold the family business that his grandfather had started several decades earlier. And at the age of 50 Dad began to sell commercial real estate.

He won numerous awards year after year as top salesman in his company. How? He told me his “secret” — he sold without selling.

The young salespeople in the company always tried to make a quick sale. I didn’t. I spent a lot of time with the clients to assess what their needs were.

It sounded very Shambhalian to me.

Mum and my sister and I clincked glasses in a toast of gratitude to Dad.

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It’s March 05th, the Tibetan New Year, a time for celebration within the worldwide sangha (group of practitioners).

Every year the students of the Sakyong [Earth Protector] Mipham Rinpoche gather in their respective shrinerooms to hear his address through an onlinehook-up, which includes centres and groups from six continents and over thirty countries around the world .

But this year is even more special because Rinpoche [the Precious One] has just completed a year-long retreat.

As the Sakyong enters the shrineroom in Boulder, Colorado, 8,000 students stand up in their respective shrinerooms from Argentina to the United Kingdom. The bagpipes are played. Rose petals are tossed into the air.

The Sakyong takes his seat.

He looks well. As sangha member Madeline Conacher said in an e-mail message to me “Did the Sakyong not look radiant and peaceful!”

He begins his address:

Read the rest of this entry »

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We live in interesting times. Tunisia, and now Egypt, have overthrown their respective dictators. Natural disasters seem to occur with frightening regularity. No less than the karmic streams of these countries have been changed.

We are encouraged not to resist change by living in our cocoons and clinging to our own little lives caught in the vice of self-cherishing.

Join with others! Form communities so that we can be alone together and work for healthy changes. Just as we cannot find happiness in some external circumstance outside of ourselves, we cannot depend on others to “lead” us. We are our own leader!

Create your community.
Be good to each other.
And do not look outside yourself for the leader.
…….
…….

At this time in history,
we are to take nothing personally,
least of all ourselves,
for the moment that we do,
our spiritual growth and journey come to a halt.
The time of the lone wolf is over.
Gather yourselves.
Banish the word struggle from your attitude and vocabulary.
All that we do now must be done
in a sacred manner and in celebration.
We are the ones we have been waiting for.”

<source: paragraph of a speech given by a Hopi elder in Oraibi, Arizona to the Hopi Nation circa October 28, 2001>

Here are two more calls to action from The Sakyong (Earth Protector) Mipham Rinpoche:

Especially recently, we have seen a series of natural and manmade disasters. It is as if the earth is asking us to be kind to each other and to itself. Now, more than any other time in history, the fate of our own planet is in our hands. (Sakyong Mipham, Rinpoche, letter to sangha, June 28, 2010)

……….

“If we expect somebody else to create peace in the world, we’re going to be waiting for a long time. We’ll become even more angry or anxious, because our unmet expectations will bring frustration, disappointment, and inevitably, more instability. But if we can stabilize our motivation and learn to cultivate peace and compassion, our willingness to take responsibility for changing the environment will inspire many others.”

© 2005 by Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche, from his address to the Sit for Change Meditation Marathon 2005. This excerpt first appeared in The Shambhala Sun.

We are the one’s we’ve been waiting for. We can change the karmic stream of our planet. Indeed, we will have to. Why? Because we are beyond the proverbial Eleventh Hour.

You have been telling the people that this is the Eleventh Hour, now you must go back and tell the people that this is The Hour. <source: section of a speech given by a Hopi elder in Oraibi, Arizona to the Hopi Nation circa October 28, 2001>

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What do sneezing and unexpectedly slipping while walking on ice have in common? We’re in the NOW. No discursive thought whatsoever. No concepts. Just the NOW.

Friends who’ve been in bad car accidents tell me that “everything stopped” while the car rolled over and over. They experienced NOW, a kind of stunned constancy (term from the Ocean of Definitive Meaning).

Another term for NOW is “the fourth moment,” the other three being past, present and future.

The past is all of the things that have already happened and no longer exist.  The future is all of the things that have not yet happened and don’t yet exist.  The NOW is like the edge of a razor blade: so short and so sharp that there is no time for anything to exist in a substantial way.  We see that there is no time, and no substance, only clarity-emptiness, the nature of mind. <source: e-mail from Shambhala Buddhist student sent March 18, 2008>

My New Year’s Resolution is to be in the NOW as much as possible. My question is:  how can I do that without nearly being killed?

Here’s what happened exactly three years ago today.

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It’s Spring, 1976. I am the sole support mother of a beautiful four-year-old son.

The doctor says my son has to have his tonsils out.

Every night for one month I read a book to him that takes a child step-by-step through the process of what happens when the child enters the hospital for the operation. I hope that this information will calm his fears.

When my son is rolled through the hall on a gurney towards the operating room, he says to me “I not only love you. I like you.”

Even 36 years later, I am struck by the wisdom in this remark.

But what does it mean?

We talk about love a lot. But this remark suggests that somehow you might love someone, but not necessarily like them!

In order to gain some clarity, I did a contemplation exercise on loving and liking.  (Instructions for how to contemplate are provided in Appendix C,  Turning the Mind Into An Ally by Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche)>

Here’s what arose for me: Read the rest of this entry »

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be beneficial!)

Even if you do not believe in reincarnation, live as if you do!

Why?

Your perspective gets much larger. More spacious. Less crowded. It’s easier to sort out what is important and what can wait.

On a light note, there’s also what I call the “just-in-case” principle: live as if you believe, just in case you find out that it is true when you die…..

My son pointed out some specifics of the benefits of acting as if we believe in reincarnation:

1. We have a larger perspective. We realize we don’t need to dwell so much on things have are happening or have happened in our lives. We’re working on a much larger scale.
2. There’s a long-term meaning to our lives, rather than the “It-doesn’t-matter-what-I-do-in-my-life-because-nothing-matters-anyway” attitude.
   
3. If we’re very materialistic, acting as if we believe in reincarnation helps us to shift our focus to the spiritual dimension of life.
4. The belief in past lives helps us to make sense of what happens in this lifetime in a much deeper way.

Post Script: you might find a transcript of Suzuki Roshi’s comments interesting – please click here and scroll about half-way down the page.

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We live in the mundane world, the relative world, the world of phenomena.
We do not live on the ultimate plane.

Nonetheless, we can make use of the ultimate plane in problem-solving.

How? Read the rest of this entry »

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be beneficial!)

Whenever I write about kindness, generosity, compassion etc., someone will ask me “Before we help someone, shouldn’t we be asking ourselves if the person deserves\is worthy of our help, generosity and kindness”?

Here’s what the Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche (SMR) tells his students in response to the view — (that our help should be conditional) that underlies that question:

Especially I think these days it is a sense very much of materialistic culture where everything is appealing to our sense of satisfaction and us wanting. And often when we need to give we become uncomfortable. We might actually feel like whoever we’re giving to is not worthy….. Being kind to another person doesn’t necessarily mean, or be determined by, the action of the other person. It’s just that kindness is appropriate. In fact, the more the other person is suffering or irritating, in a sense, the more kind and compassionate we should be. <source: from Seminary at Shambhala Mountain Centre, Colorado, July 17, 2010>

In short, while we usually practice conditional (“what-can-I-get-out-of-this”) kindness, we can now practice unconditional kindness. And while we might feel uncomfortable at first, we get to like it!

The benefits of practicing unconditional generosity:

• the mind becomes happier, less claustrophic, enoyable for everyone; and
• we create “tremendous merit and benefit personally for our own personal lives, as well as for the community…and the world as a whole” (SMR) because our intention is pure, not bound by ego.
• we are open to receive; if we are open to receive, then we grow.

There is no better reality than the one we live in – where a good heart can be realized. – Khyentse Yangsi Rinpoche

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On June 28, 2010,  Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche addressed the Shambhala Buddhist Community on the disasters that the world has been recently experiencing. Here is part of the address. The highlighting and images are mine. The terms “warriors” or “warriorship” refer to courage, not aggression.

bird covered in oil from BP oil spill 2010

…….This has been a powerful and meaningful time. More than ever, I feel
how fortunate we are to have these teachings. Especially recently, we have seen a series of natural and manmade disasters. It is as if the earth is asking us to be kind to each other and to itself. Now, more than any other time in history, the fate of our own planet is in our hands. Read the rest of this entry »

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The men I love always seem to die at 19h00.

The common cold had turned into pnuemonia and my beloved grandfather lay dying. I was in university at the time. But my time was devoted to my grandfather. Not my classes. I was getting ready to go to the hospital. It was 19h00. The telephone rings. My grandfather has just died. And I hadn’t gone to visit him that day….

Today is Sunday, April 04, 2010. But I am remembering when it was April 04, 1987,

It’s 19h00. We are meditating in the shrine room.

The telephone rings. We have been dreading this call from Halifax, Nova Scotia. It means that our beloved spiritual guide Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, crazy wisdom master, has died.

I was inconsolable. I could not stop crying.

It didn’t take long for the rest of the world to pay tribute to this great mahasidda (teacher who has great spiritual abilities.)

Here’s an example from one of Canada’s major newspapers, The Globe and Mail, April 06, 1987: Read the rest of this entry »

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be of benefit!)

For me, it’s a delicious juxtaposition when Valentine’s Day + the Tibetan New Year fall on the same day as they have this year on February 14, 2010.

What follows are my notes of Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche’s address to his international Shambhala Buddhist sangha at 13h00 EST today.

Let me stress that this is merely what I heard — not necessarily an absolutely precise transcription of what was said. But I believe it’s close enough to share its inspiring message.

The words in {   } are my interpretation only. Words in (  ) are from Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, the Sakyong’s father.

• Courage and effort are part of our {Shambhala Buddhist} tradition;
• {By contrast} It’s easy to fall asleep {not being awake;  just sleepwalking through life by being caught up in habitual patterns etc.} and hope that it all gets better;
• {It takes courage to} take responsibility for our own thoughts and projections;
• Don’t need to give into hate. Must have the power and maturity to express our love. Kindness will save our mind and planet;
• Love is the natural outpouring {on the relative or conventional plane} of our basic goodness {on the ultimate or absolute plane}. It’s a feeling of offering.
  • (“The closest analogy I can think of at this point is the general basic goodness of drinking a glass of ice water.” Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche; paras 4 + 10, please click here);
• (Love) liberates us from a mind that is stuck in just wanting;
• Ability to love brings peace and soothes others;
• Sometimes we are foolish and overwhelmed and possessed by wanting more. We become unhappy and wanting creates pain for others.
• Kindness = not struggling with our selves. Kindness is not a ceremony but a simple human exchange;
• Love is powerful emotion. Kindness is the daily [SMR actually said "more common and practical] expression of love. This is a viable path. When we decide that love is our path, it’s a very powerful moment;
• As Shambhala warriors, we are being challenged by wanting to hate; this is where we have to remember our tradition of courage; if we have something {good} to offer, we must demonstrate that;
  • (“The whole Shambhala training process is connected with how to manifest, so that people can do things without deception.” Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche; para 2)
• Not continously driven and wanting;
• Meditation has shown us that through kindness we can stop torturing ourselves by thinking that there just one more thing that we need to be happy;
• So take charge of your attitude {rather than just being driven by negative thoughts that are generated by your mind}. If we decide we want to be awake, we can. Otherwise we’ll sleepwalk throughout our life.
• Awake = the attitude that any part of our life is an opportunity to be awake and good;
• When things become difficult, see this as part of {what is being generated by our} mind;
• Look at our life as the possibility of enlightenment itself;
• If we have positive and strong attitude, then our home life can be our path to enlightenment;
  • (“As they say, charity begins at home.” Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche; para 2)
• Home is neutral. It’s up to us to decide whether it will be positive or negative. This is the notion of the householder living an awakened life rather than hiding in our life. On the premise that home can be the basis of goodness, then we can move into the world with this attitude.

The complete address can be found here.

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be of benefit!)

The telephone rang at 06h00 on February 5, 2010! I’m an early bird. But not that early!

Ferhan, a former workplace colleague, apologized for calling so early. And then got down to business:

“I feel extremely negative lately,” she said. “I don’t understand what’s happening. There seems to be a lot of discord around, my mind seems even more discursive than usual. I feel dragged down by heavy emotions. Like they’re almost taking me over.”

“Donovan’s Season of the Witch is upon us,” I replied.”

“What? What witch?” she said.

“Oh yes I forgot. You would have been in diapers when that song was popular. Well, the ‘witch’ in this case is called Mamo.”

“Specifically,” I continued, “it’s the Dön [pronounced "dun"] Season. From February third to the twelfth. A lot of negativity built up over the past year gathers together now. Maybe you’re picking up on that.”

She asked if I could send her an e-mail with more explanation.

Dear Ferhan,

The Dön (obstacles) Season comes at the end of the Tibetan year, which changes every year, unlike the Western New Year, which always takes place on January 01.

Here’s a sort of “nutshell” quotation from Harald Dienes, Blue Lapis Clinic:

Accumulated negative karma tends to ripen towards the end of the lunar year. It is a time when we are more susceptible to seemingly external influences such as distractions, illness and collective upheavals. According to tradition this is a time when we allow for closure of the expiring year and do not embark on any new projects…..

The Tibetan New Year is  sometimes in January, sometimes in February or March. This year it is February 14, 2010. Valentines Day!  So, before this date, negativity is heightened for about two weeks.

Because of our lack of paying attention to the conditions of our life, obstacles sneak in, says Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche.

Here’s an analogy: You’re a knitter. If you drop a stitch and don’t notice it, just keep knitting, then drop another stitch and on and on in this way, when you have the finished product, you’ll notice the holes. So you have to pay attention. A line in Donovan’s song Season of the Witch puts it this way:

You’ve got to pick up every stitch.

Now for the good news!

…..what is it we can do as antidote for obstacles?….engaging in practice …… restarting and rekindling our ….. mind of enlightenment. Loving kindness and compassion………

• We can work with obstacles, understand them. Then they can help us to become more aware of what is happening moment-to-moment as much as we can every day of the year; become appreciative of the life force.
• We can slow down right now, reflect on what’s happening; a time to amend relationships and friendships, quarrels.
• This is the time to “hold your seat” and just be aware of the negativity that arises, rather than indulge in it. If we indulge then we have to be aware of that also. Awareness is the antidote.
  <Source: Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche: The Dön Season; my unedited transcription of an  online talk in real time; January 27, 2008; Halifax, Canada>

FYI…Buddhists, besides practicing mindfulness and awareness of situations, also practice something called The Mamo Chants to pacify the turmoil of the Mamos.

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be of benefit!)

Humtpy Dumpty sat on a wall
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall
All the king’s horses, and all the king’s men
Couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty back together again.

I’ve had lots of experiencing falling off the wall.

In the context of this post, Humpty Dumpty refers to our manufactured self (ego). It’s not a stable structure because none of the “parts” exist in any solid, permanent way independent from the causes and conditions — that we call “our life” — which themselves are constantly changing and shifting.

I spent a lot of time in a never-ending cycle that looks like this:

1. sat relatively comfortably on my wall; and then
   
2. something would come along to challenge this comfort and I would fall off the wall and then try to “get my life back together again.”

Then the two stages of this cycle would start again.

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be of benefit!)

On Friday November 06 Iras and I drive to the St. Lawrence Market in Toronto to participate in the Light Exchange. Bring in old Christmas tree lights and get the new, energy-saving led ones.

About six months ago, Iras has a change for-the-better in her financial situation. So as we drive back home, I asked her how that affects her life. She makes an interesting statement:

I can’t change my life. So I just made it better. Not in any big way though. I just paid off my debts.

The big question we all have is: How can I change my life (karmic stream\patterning)?

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be of benefit!)

A few years ago I noticed that certain music evoked a kind of bittersweet longing, a particularly difficult emotion for me. It was causing me suffering.

I discovered that this particular music — a kind of Top Ten on my own personal hit parade — turned out to actually trigger deep-seated habitual desires, cravings….and it was mainly the negative ones that were triggered. So everytime I listened to these songs, it strengthened negative habitual tendencies.

• Roy Orbison: You Got it
• Bonny Raitt: Something to Talk About
  Huey Lewis and the News: Power Of Love
• Elton John: I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues
• Climax: Prescious (sic) and Few
• Melissa Manchester: You Should Hear How She Talks About You
• G. Rafferty: Right Down the Line
• Glass Tiger: Don’t Forget Me
• Sister Sledge: We Are Family
• Barry Manilow: Read ‘Em and Weep

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be of benefit!)

I don’t know why I can’t listen to the whole book-on-tape from beginning to end. Jeffrey Archer is one of my favourite authors. And his book A Prisoner of Birth — given my interest in the nature of karma and “mistaken identity” — is certainly right up my alley. But I can’t get beyond the first CD. I’m a prisoner of my habitual pattern of fear.

Seems I’ve downloaded a habitual pattern that is so imprinted on my consciousness that, even knowing the ending, my fear prevented my moving beyond the beginning and the end! I am frightened of the details of the plot.

The beginning of the story — an innocent person convicted of a serious crime he didn’t committ — triggers my own anger, fear and a sense of  powerlessness. I become frightened for the main character. So frightened that I cannot listen to the rest of the CDs in order to learn the whole story.

So I go to the last CD to hear the end of the story. Am reassured by the “happy ending.” But I find I still cannot listen to the rest of the CDs.  So I get a hard copy of the book. I reason that maybe if I play the disks and simultaneously read-along, I’ll be able to cut through the fear and get the “meat” of the story.

Didn’t work. Can’t get beyond my fear. I want to ignore the details of the story, the plot, in other words, I try to ignore the “middle” part – between the beginning and the end – of the story. But I’m not prepared to give up. I listen to the CDs in reverse order: number 13 (the end) first, then number 12 and so on. But I give up on that. I still do not know all the details of the story.

What’s going on here? All I know is that the story triggers a very solid pattern of mine, a pattern I seem unable to cut through. Contact with this story is downloading my habitual fear.

The only thing I understand is that my ego has solidified itself vis-a-vis the story. Ego has made a sharp distinction between self and other: Ttere’s me. And there’s the characters in the story. I can’t seem to bridge the gap, the duality, I’ve created.

Let’s deconstruct this pattern of fear.

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be of benefit!)

I wish I knew how it would feel to be free.
I wish I could break all the chains holding me.
I wish I could say all the things that I should say.
Say them loud, say them clear
For the whole damn world to hear.
by Nina Simone.

As long as we are in the grip of the consequences of the karma that we have produced in the past, the only freedom we have is how we choose to relate to these consequences. We cannot change the consequences at this point. the seeds from past volitional actions have ripened.

The question of Free Will has occupied an important place in Western thought and philosophy. …But…If the whole of existence is relative, conditioned and interdependent, how can will alone be free? Will, or anything for that matter, …. is within the law of cause and effect. (Rahula, Walpola: What the Buddha Taught, 1974 ed; page 54)

While caught in a life based on what I call “mistaken identity” (i.e. ego), the most we can attain is relative freedom. Your next move is up to you.

ChogyamTrungpa: Karma is like a game of chess. Your particular position at any point is determined by where you were, what your moves were; but after that point, it is up to you.

Student: Then is there a continuation of karma or the effects of karma?

Chogyam Trungpa: It’s up to you.

<source: Karma and the Twelve Nidanas: A Sourcebook for The Shambhala School of Buddhist Studies, page 13>

We think we have control over our lives. But in terms of karma (actions) that we have already created, we have no choice about the consequences — except the attitude that we manifest when that karma ripens in our future.

When is free will really free? Ultimately only when we go beyond creating karma (cause and effect) can we be truly free. That would mean that we have a thorough understanding  that there is no independent or permanent self, and therefore no permanent, independent “other.”We and others exist only as a product (outcome) of the coming together of certain causes and conditions in our lives.

But the point we want to stress is that in the conventional (relative) world in which we live

……we are creating future actions. We can change the course. We are not stuck in our karma. (Class Four, page 86 of the Sutrayana Transcripts

…..to be continued in Part 2 on Sep 13’09

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uccess (in conventional society) = inner happiness?

Fools don’t know the source of happiness. Because they are mystified as to how happiness comes about, they’re always just chasing after happiness with the idea that it depends on other people or things like food and clothing. A wise individual knows the source of happiness: the mind. Thus a wise person knows that the mind needs to be
developed. <source: Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche: The Legacy of Shambhala>

Many of us have been trained to think that financial success and high social and occupational standing leads to happiness. Success (material) = happiness. We are dismayed to discover that it doesn’t.

I think it’s the other way around: happiness = success. If you are happy, then you are living a successful life.

There is no way to happiness, happiness is the way. ~~ Buddha

Many of us have been trained to think that happiness is “candy floss.” Not realistic. I don’t. I believe that it is our “birthright.”

So what does lead to happiness?

We hear that it has to come from inside ourselves, not from the outside, not from being led around by the nose by our society’s definition of “success.”

But, again, what does this mean, exactly?

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be of benefit!)

It doesn’t really matter what causes us to reach our limit. The point is that sooner or later it happens to all of us. <When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron>

If I am Susan Boyle, I reach my limit when I go from being a “regular” person, unknown except to my family, pet, neighbours, shop keepers and friends, and doctors and other service-providers to having every one of my actions scrutinized. I thought I was just providing entertainment for a talent show. Instead, I become the entertainment! I become anxious, fearful, nervous.

Our habitual assumptions, all our ideas about how things are, keep us from seeing things in a fresh open way…[But] There’s no certainty about anything. This basic truth hurts and we want to run away from it. …things like disapppointment and anxiety are messengers telling us that we are about to go into unknown territory.<When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron>

Habits are comprised of two aspects: an emotional aspect, and our habitual ways of reacting (karma). Ego, our manufactured self, uses habits as one of the items in its arsenal of weapons in its battle to maintain its (illusory) solidity, to bolster its mistaken belief that it exists unconditionally, that is, beyond relative causes and conditions. But when ego is “unsuccessful,” and the ground under our habitual patterns shifts, we feel like the rug has been pulled out from under us. We feel like things have fallen apart.

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be of benefit!)

We shall fight on the beaches – <source: Sir Winston Churchill>

When we talk about the fear of death, I believe that it is really ego’s fear of its own destruction.

Ego struggles to maintain its solidity. But it is a battle that it can never win because it fights to maintain a solidity that is illusory.

Whenever there is any threat that might expose the shifting sands that underly ego, this ego tries to secure a “beach-head” — like the beach-heads at beaches code-named Juno, Omaha, Sword and Gold, in Normandy, France on D-Day, June 06, 1944.

We might habitually drink alcohol, take drugs, eat, stop eating, call friends, ignore friends, sleep, play sports, have sex, manifest self- righteous anger etc. etc. — anything to restore a feeling of comfort with who we think we are.

These habitual patterns contribute to both creating and maintaining our karma. Sometimes this produces negative effects, as described in previous posts, namely, Deconstructing The Karma of Alleged Killer….; and I’m-just-a-link-in-your-chain.

On “D-Day” — which stands for The unnamed day on which an operation or offensive is to be launched  — the terrified teenage warriors provided target practice for Nazi guns perched on the cliffs high above the beaches on which the soldiers landed.

We shall never surrender <source: Sir Winston Churchill>

I noted above that ego tries to secure a beach-head like those beach-heads on D-Day.

But that’s where the similarity ends. For on June 06, 1944, these warriors, with invincible courage, set aside ego and surrendered to big mind. They sacrificed small, self-centred, “me first” mind on the altar of basic goodness.

I cannot think of a greater tribute to those of you, “dead” or “alive,” who fought there, to say, with heartfelt gratitude that, despite being on what amounted to a suicide mission, you established a beach-head — both literally and spiritually — from which to conquer hatred in all its forms.

Wherever you are now, I thank you.

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be of benefit!)

With the publication of his book My Remarkable Journey, Larry King loosens his suspenders and dips his toe in his own karmic stream.

During his book tour, I heard Jian Ghomeshi interviewing him on May 26, 2009 on CBC Radio One

Among other things, Larry said that throughout most of  his life he hasn’t engaged in “introspective thinking” because he “lives in the moment.” (I myself don’t think of the two as being mutually exclusive.) Larry never asked himself “why?” or checked the connection between cause and effect in his own life – i.e. he didn’t interview himself! He didn’t explore his own karma.

Larry’s famous suspenders kept him together — kept his manufactured self (ego) in place —until now. The man whom many consider the king of all interviewers is finally interviewing himself.

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(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be of benefit!)

On Sunday, May 03, 2009 I watched a television programme on the world’s oldest living conjoined twins on The Learning Channel. On Mother’s Day, May 10, I want to pay tribute to their step-mother Mary. Their biological mother rejected them.

With their bodies fused at the lower chest, doctors didn’t think that conjoined twins Ronnie and Donnie would survive through the night. But the twins have confounded everyone by living to the ripe old age of 57. <source – The Learning Channel)

I was so moved by Ronnie and Donnie’s story. Besides feeling great appreciation for their step-mother Mary, I want to honour the twins for demonstrating in a physical way that we are all spiritually, emotionally and psychologically interdependent in this world. That we are not separate or independent from others.

They illustrate in such a heartfelt way the notion of skillful means and compassion.

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As our technology becomes more sophisticated, we perhaps think that our emotional responses need to be more sophisticated as well. But what seems best is simple, direct feeling that is not padded with logic or twisted concepts, such as, “Maybe they deserved it,” or, “I’m glad it’s not me,” or, “They should have known better,” or even, “That’s their karma.” These contorted responses reflect poorly on our own state of mind. If compassion feels unnatural, it’s probably because we’re still thinking of ourselves. We want the suffering to go away because it scares us or it causes us personal pain. (Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche)

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