November 7, 2011

TOSSING THE BASKETBALL OF MINDFULNESS
I’m noticing that mindfulness is a kind of catch-all word or fad.  There are mindfulness classes for everyone from dentists to psychotherapists. The results of numerous studies have shown that mindfulness practice, a secular form of Buddhism minus the Buddha and the sutras, is good for pain management, stress relief and healing from disease. And maybe the fad aspect is good, because more people may try mindfulness practice and benefit from it because it’s hot at the moment.

But what I observe is that some folks are leaving out the most important aspect of mindfulness. In a company training on customer service, a company

which shall remain unnamed, the trainer was trying to teach mindfulness with clients and those on the opposite end of the phone. I’m not sure what the word “mindful” evoked for the trainees, but the trainer never mentioned the one key to mindfulness, the door to mindful practice that brings us right into the present moment, which is our in-breath and our out-breath.  That is, noticing our in-breath and our out-breath. 

Of course we breathe in and out all the time, and hold our breath when we’re stressed or in a hurry, but we are not aware that we’re breathing, nor that we’re interrupting our breath when anxious.

We don’t know we’re breathing because our breath is a function of the autonomic nervous system.  We don’t have to think about it.  Our respiration just naturally performs its job, as do our digestive and vascular systems, to name two more.

As a former smoker, I have always had a tendency to hold my breath.  So in learning mindfulness, I have learned to notice my breath. I use certain sounds as cues to remind myself—like the ringing of my phone or stopping at a light in traffic or waiting in line at the grocery store or waiting for my computer to change functions. It’s simple. Two of my friends were making fun of me because I said I was trying to eat more mindfully. They took a strawberry and fawned over it, and said in a sing-song voice, “I’m eating my strawberry mindfully.”  But they were not noticing their breath.

Mindfulness without conscious breathing is like toast without butter. 

As a point of clarity for those who hear the word tossed around like a basketball, mindfulness is, first and foremost, awareness of our breath.  Next in mindfulness practice comes a soft belly and soft neck and shoulders, followed closely by relaxation of the facial muscles.  These seem to be the three areas where we hold the most tension.

One of my favorite mindfulness quotes is from our teacher Thich Nhat Hanh, “Breathing in, I know I am breathing in.  Breathing out, I know I am breathing out.”

Not exactly rocket science, but a great way to peace of mind.  A great way to be present in the moment. 



November 1, 2011

SOME KEEP THE SABBATH GOING TO CHURCH

       WHAT I BELIEVE

         My brother and I recently recollected our upbringing in Cleveland Heights, Ohio, during the Eisenhower era.  Our grandparents made sure we got to church every Sunday, to a vast gothic cathedral built by Cleveland steel barons, where my two younger brothers and I sang in the children’s choir.  On special occasions I got to sit beside my grandmother for one of Dr. Brown’s sermons. He never failed to tell at least one joke.  Always when he told the joke, his voice would crack.  So laughter was part of worship for me.  And song.   
         There was the feel of my grandmother’s flowered silk dress, the look of her veiled hat perched on piled-up gray hair, the faint smell of rose water.  Dr. Brown’s bald pate reflected in the stained-glass light of the pulpit.  The unsettling boom of the huge pipe organ, with Mrs. Carl, my piano teacher, on the organ keyboard bringing “Holy, Holy, Holy” to life, everyone singing at the top of their voices, never failing to give me chills. “Lord God Almighty...” Certain Biblical quotations still have that effect on me, too.
          “Wasn’t it great growing up in the church the way we did?” I said to my brother Doug.  
          “I hated every minute of it,” he replied.  “All I wanted to do was escape.  I wanted to wander around Shaker Lake, kicking stones, digging for worms, searching for minnows.  The outdoors is my church.”
           “Well, I replied, “the Dalai Lama says we don’t need religion.  We only need to be kind to each other.”
Doug knows that I’m a mindfulness teacher and Buddhist minister.  But that came out of a tragedy--only after three people in my first husband’s family were murdered.  They were my sister-in-law–my daughters’ favorite aunt–and her two teenaged boys, my nephews. I was desperate.  I turned to the Quakers with whom I’d been worshiping.  They introduced me to a dharma teacher, an American nun.  I took refuge with her.  She taught me that the source of our salvation lies in what we feel is damning us.  I believe that to be true. She also introduced me to Thich Nhat Hanh, who would become my teacher, the zen master and peace activist who founded an order out of the killing fields of Vietnam.            After five years of daily mindfulness practice, I was able to forgive the boy who murdered three of my family.  We sit a lot.  My brother would feel fenced in.  He’s living in Arizona now where he can stay outdoors and make frequent camping trips to the high country.  What do I believe?  I believe it is best for people to heed their spiritual and religious leadings.  If we take the time to listen, we all know what calls to us.  Doug and I are not all that different. While I sit zazen, my brother worships at the altar of the world.  --Judith


October 17, 2011
THIS FROM JERRY BRAZA, OUR BROTHER IN THE ORDER OF INTERBEING:
"Every blade of grass has its angel that bends over 

it and whispers, 'Grow, grow.'"   -The Talmud 


"If ancient wisdom tells us that even a blade of grass needs encouragement, how much more do the people in our lives need us to whisper words of inspiration into their lives? Imagine the face of a child hearing, "You are so precious. You can do it. I'm so glad you were born." Picture the look on your loved one's face when you say, "You are perfect as you are. You are such a joy. I am here for you. Thank you for being in my life." And if you received continual whispers of "You are enough, just as you are," how would your life be different? Would you be better able to whisper encouragement into the lives of those you love?"

(Excerpt from The Seeds of Love: Growing Mindful Relationships)We offer you this tender thought in the spirit of our book, Murder as a Call to Love. How can we live our lives like the angels?  How can we act gently and calmly as bodhisattvas of kindness in a world gone mad? Let's breathe together and contemplate this for a minute, okay?


October 14, 2011



“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions” Rainer Maria Rilke, (Austro-German lyric poet, author of Duino Elegies and Sonnets to Orpheus, 1875-1926)


We anticipated publication of Murder as a Call to Love in September, but alas, there have been a few printing setbacks for Cloud Cottage Editions. I can only believe that the book is not "supposed" to come out until it does. Our backers have been sometimes more patient than I.  

At the True Nature Country Fair last Saturday, I gave a reading. How could I have known how difficult it would continue to be, to share my story in detail again? Yet I still believe "the Call" is for a good reason--that others identify with me, come out of their own woundedness, and are able to find inspiration from what happened following the murders--mindfulness practice, Thich Nhat Hanh, relief. For that, any discomfort I endure is well worth it. Kathleen Osta was there on Saturday, and she said,

"Judith, your book is making its way into t he world exactly as it is supposed to...." I told her I would have that phrase tattoed on the palm of my hand and read it several times a day.

Judith



August 29

I come to you with empty hands to offer my gift:  Murder as a Call to Love, the book. To be published mid-to-late September, 2011, this is the culmination of a ten-year project. Great news! The Forgiveness Project in the UK  has posted my story on their website, www.theforgivenessproject.com/stories/. Check it out! We are hoping to bring their Forgiveness Exhibit to North Carolina in the next year.

June 25

Form versus Substance


There is a story told about the Buddha, who one day was approached by a disciple who brought gifts for the master. The woman stepped toward her teacher, holding out her right hand which held an intricately carved ivory  ornament. "Drop it," said the Buddha.

Then the woman held out her left hand, offering a precious gem. "Drop it," said the Buddha once more.

"Oh, I get it," she thought. Finally, the woman stepped forward with both of her palms empty and outstretched.  "Drop it," said the Buddha.

What do we value most:  our doubt? our creativity? our inner peace? our sense of self? our ability to forgive? our spouse? our children? integrity? humility? our signlessness?  our meditation practice?  We must lay them all aside. Our hands must be empty in order to receive. Empty in order to give. Empty even of emptiness.



June 23
It is our elder daughter Laura's birthday. Tomorrow we will marry her and her beloved Christian. And also today--the 16th wedding anniversary of our younger daughter Halle and her husband Neil. The ivy forest continues to green and the flowers bloom. In the midst of this good life, a poem:

My hut lies in the heart of the dense forest;
Every year the green ivy grows longer.
No news of the affairs of humankind,
Only the errant song of a woodcutter.
The sun shines and I mend my robe;
When the moon comes out I read poems.
I have nothing to report, my friends.
If you want to find the meaning, stop chasing after so many things.

                                                                   --Ryokan


May 25
The weekend at the YMCA Blue Ridge Assembly with Thu and Anh-Huong Nguyen was transformative. Lives were changed. Flowers bloomed. Songs were sung. Everyone was embraced and nourished. Some people requested the words to these two songs--"Breathing In, Breathing Out" and "I Have Arrived."  Here they are, with our blessings:

Breathing In, Breathing Out
Breathing in, breathing out, breathing in, breathing out,
I am blooming as a flower, I am fresh as the dew.
I am solid as a mountain, I am firm as the Earth, I am free.

Breathing in, breathing out, breathing in, breathing out,
I am water reflecting what is real, what is true
And I feel there is space deep inside of me:
I am free, I am free, I am free.

I Have Arrived
I have arrive, I am home in the here and in the now.
I am solid, I am free, I am solid, I am free.
In the ultimate I dwell, in the ultimate I dwell.

(And the ultimate, dear ones, is none other than the heaven we are standing in.)

March 19
We have begun work in the Community Garden. The pansies are blooming at Cloud Cottage, and the lilies are sprouting. 

Philip Toy and I are thrilled to share TV producer Cinnamon Kennedy’s beautiful video of our project, Murder as a Call to Love, the Zen of Forgiveness, the book.  And we’re gratified that Kickstarter.com saw fit to promote our idea. And we’re inviting everyone to join us to be a part of this project, to help us publish my story of how three murders in my family led me to Zen and the gentle teachings of our dear teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh, which will be our second book through Cloud Cottage Editions. And we’ve cooked up some nifty Rewards for people who pledge anything from $5 to $1000, so everyone can participate.

While the video focuses on the pivotal event of the murders, the book itself focuses on my deeply personal story of how I grew up, came to Zen and Thay's teachings, and finally came to forgive the murderer. It focuses on how a Western woman raised as a Methodist in the Eisenhower era experienced huge changes. And it tells the story of our years of working with prisoners, some of whom knew the boy who murdered my family.

Here’s the link:  https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/330205005/murder-as-a-call-to-love-the-zen-of-forgiveness-th

Thanks so much for your support!

Judith

March 8, 2011

Finally, the video is finished!  Larry & I did the best we could, but we needed a professional videographer. Lo and behold, along comes Cinnamon Kennedy, Cloud Cottage member, writer, editor and tv producer, (Purple States) to donate her time and talent for the kickstarter video.  The video, if you want to preview it, is up on youtube under http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1WMJ1sBeMg Judith Toy Murder as a Call to Love.  The beautiful Native American flute in the background is Larry Cammarata's original music.  Thank you so much, dear Sangha. Next we will ask you to go to www.kickstarter.com, and to pledge your financial backing of this project--the completion of the book manuscript and publication by Cloud Cottage Editions, for the sake of all beings.  We have cooked up some nifty Rewards for those who pledge their support.  This book is the personal and confessional story of my life and how three murders in my family changed everything. It is the story of how I took refuge in the practice of mindfulness as taught by Thich Nhat Hanh, and found a way to forgiveness and peace of mind.

December 4, 2010

Murder as a Call to Love:  The Zen of Forgiveness, the book

Here is the text of the video Larry Cammarata is shooting today of me requesting financial backing for this project.  Philip and I want to publish my book--which still needs some honing--via Cloud Cottage Editions, our own firm. And there is a list of rewards that will go to our backers. I first read about kickstarter in the NY Times. You pitch your project--a film, a book, an invention, a new business-- to a group of young people in Manhattan, and if they like it,  they put it on their website to create funding for you.  It's not about investing--it's about backing creative indie endeavors. And as backers, you get specific and very cool rewards from the people you underwrite.  But you don't anti up a cent unless the project is totally funded in a specific time period.  So the kickstarter staff does not allow projects they think are unworthy of backers. (Because they get 5%.) In order to back a project, you must have an account with Amazon, who take 2%.  Two million people are viewing the site. Isn't this exciting?

MY SCRIPT FOR A 3-MINUTE VIDEO

Three of my family—my sister-in-law, Connie, and my two teenage nephews, Allen and Bobby, were bludgeoned and stabbed to death in their beds by the 19-year-old boy across the street, in a quiet neighborhood in Eastern Pennsylvania. He raped Connie.

 

In my book, Murder as a Call to Love, the Zen of Forgiveness, I tell the story of what happened, and the media circus that ensued. After the killer was apprehended, he was almost literally lynched. The story is full of bizarre twists and turns.

 

All my life, I have been a nonfiction writer and editor but this project began in 2001, when I was invited to tell my story at Plum Village, France, to several hundred people at a Hiroshima Commemoration Day. 

 

I’m deeply grateful to the many folks who have helped, including Larry Cammarata, who’s shooting this video.  At one point, I had an editorial advisory board to sort of lean on while I wrote.  I would ply them with huge gourmet meals and read them the chapters. There was an awesome writing group that met at our home for about a year. Two good editor friends—Sara Jenkins and Cinnamon Kennedy--offered great advice.  The Cloud Cottage Community of Mindful Living is a huge support, as are my two daughters. Melvin McCloud, editor of Shambhala Press published an excerpt from my book in Best Buddhist Writing, 2006, and so did Tynette Deveaux of Buddhadharma Magazine, in their latest issue.  I’ve also had excerpts published in the Mindfulness Bell where I was associate editor, and in Right View Magazine, as well as the Asheville Citizen Times where I was a columnist.

 

The first relief I got from the trauma was six months after the murders, when I found my first Zen teacher who introduced me to Thich Nhat Hanh, the author and peace activist who was to become my Zen master.  So the book is not just about the murders.  It is my life, how I came to Zen, it’s about my amazing teachers, Genro Lee Milton, Yayoi Matsumoto Lyn Fine, Richard Brady, Dai-En Bennage and Thich Nhat Hanh. (I am actually now a senior member of his order). The beautifully simple practice of mindfulness helped me find enough peace and freedom within myself to eventually forgive the murderer.

 

In 2010, my husband Philip Toy and I launched our own publishing company with our first title, by Dharma teacher Roger Hawkins, and we want my book to be Cloud Cottage Editions second title.  With your help, we can do this. Thank you so much!

 

So stay tuned and we'll let you know when the project is launched on www.kickstarter.com.


 
_________________________________________________________________________


i carry your heart with me (i carry it in my heart) i am never without it (anywhere i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done by only me is your doing, my darling) i fear no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true) and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant and whatever a sun will always sing is you here is the deepest secret nobody knows (here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide) and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

e.e. cummings



October 13, 2010

Workshop for staff at Mission St. Joe's was a great success!  We're being asked to do more.

Found this poem, like finding a new volunteer flower in one's garden,  from Sr. Annabel Laity in Thay's book on the Anapatasati Sutra, so beautiful:

Breathe! You are Alive

Breathe and you know that you are alive.
Breathe and  you know that all is helping you.
Breathe and you know that you are the world.
Breathe and you know that the flower is breathing too.
Breathe for yourself and you breathe for the world.

Breathe and be one with the air that you breathe.
Breathe and be one with the river that flows.
Breathe and be one with the earth that you tread.
Breathe and be one with the fire that glows.
Breathe and you break the thought of birth and death.
Breathe and you see that impermanence is life.

Breathe for  your joy to be steady and calm.
Breathe for your sorrow to flow away.
Breathe to renew every cell in your blood.
Breathe to renew the depths of consciousness.
Breathe and you dwell in the here and now.
Breathe and all you touch is new and real.


And from yours truly, to describe the day Philip and I saw the migration of the butterflies:

Earth Migration

                  --like all my poems, for Philip

 

Oh the man in the orange and black shirt
by the monarch butterflies in the thousands
roosting in early Appalachia forest morning
making themselves into leaves on the goldenrod
and meadowsweet, making themselves leave
the mountains as salmon swim upstream
together, a holy multitude of sulphur & shadow
and the man holds up his arms, as hundreds
of them fly up like radiating sparks of the sunset.
This is earth migration, a man birthing butterflies.


 

JB Toy

Wild Mind, Earth Theme

Cloud Cottage

10-10-10

 

 





October 4, 2010

WALKING MEDITATION

                    --for Norma


Holding hands with two gorgeous young models of womanhood
step, breath, step—I the brown crone between them
step breath step/and they my youth in waiting/step breathe
waiting to enter the place in our own hearts that is broken
step/we see the grass spring back beneath the feet
of the sister who leads us/step breathe
we kiss earth shyly/she rocks our feet in return.
Babies, we weep for milk in the lap of her green cradle
step, breathe/rock each other back into mouth of earth
step breathe step/kiss her with our baby buddha feet/step, breathe.

We walk with the soles of the wise ones, each footfall a gatha
grows a sudden flower/and we be the lilies of this field.

JB Toy

September 24, 2010
Thundering Silence
Southern Dharma Retreat Center



September 21, 2010

Zen is Not Self Improvement 

          Contrary to popular opinion, Zen is not a self-improvement program.  In the West, we tend to customize Buddhist practice by taking our precepts--known in Thich Nhat Hanh's tradition as the Five Mindfulness Trainings--as law.  They are not law.  They are designed as a guide.  They are one way of being.  But the ultimate guide, as the Buddha repeatedly pointed out, is our inner self.  If the central illumination of Mahayana Buddhism is correctthat we are all Buddha, only masked by layers of forgetting--then how can Zen be self-improvement?  The root of the word Buddha means to wake up, to remember.             

          And when this happens, we realize we are neither self nor non-self.  That is, we have no separate existence apart from anything or anyone else, sentient or nonsentient.  Then comes the dawn, with rainbows.  We inter-are!  There is an electricity, an energy, known as prana, or chi or light, or God, or Buddha, or Christ energy, that runs through everything.  We cannot be separated from this universal dynamic.  It is our birthright.  It, and we, were never born and will never die.

           Take a simple cloud.  Does she need to improve herself?  Does she need to shop for a new outfit?  Does she worry over what her girlfriend said the night before?  Does she fret over how much rain she containsor where her rain will go, where it came from?  No.  A cloud floats.  Her beauty is completely un-self-conscious.  She does not enter beauty contests.  She doesn't stress over how she will look to the other clouds.  Yet she is Buddha, for in her innate wisdom she brings the stuff that life cannot live without: water and  the wondrous nutrients and healing powers it contains.

           We can cultivate our cloud nature.  Indeed, this sheet of paper, these words, have cloud nature.  It is truly possibleeven in the face of taxes and economics and politics and social injustice and warto float through our days in perfect joy.  And as we do so, as we become one with our original nature, we will emanate love.  We will give to the world the very nutrients it needs to stay alive.  As we become who we are, our true selves, we will shine light on everyone and everything.  There will be no question of who am I, where I have been, or where am I going.  We will know.  People will be drawn to us as they're drawn to the beauty and freedom of a passing cloud. 

           So when the cloud dies, does she really die?  No, she transforms herself into water and melts into the earth, the rivers and the sea.  She is pure power, electricity, manna.  Before she was a cloud, what?  She was the mist hanging over our valley, the serene lake, a baby's spit, the urine of an animal.  She was never born and thus can never die.  We are the same.  So what is there to improve upon?  Let us love our families, pay our taxes, work for peace in the world, play ball and die in joy, letting our true nature shine.

 --JT

 


September 17

Long time no blog!  To tell the truth, I've been Facebooking and Twittering about our new group here at Cloud Cottage in the tea-room on Tuesdays, Mindfully Trim.  I really needed to do something, so I did what I do--started a group.  There is so much suffering out there vis a vis excess body weight.  We have had an immediate and strong response to the idea of a spiritual weight loss program.  There is no program as of yet, because as I lose my excess 30 pounds, I am writing about our meetings and we are devising the program together.  Those who come are aware that I'm journaling about them, names changed.  We're part of a grand experiment.  I always felt something was missing from the diets and weight loss programs I've tried.  And this Mindfully Trim thing is working!  I'm melting slowly but surely. Prayer, meditation, mindful eating of smaller portions, journaling, exercise and group support.  Wow!

Here's the Statement of Purpose for Mindfully Trim: 

In decades of multiple weight loss programs and diets I tried, there was always something missing.  Like many others, I would take off the weight and put it back again, take it off, put it on, ad nauseum.  When we lost both our son and a close family friend in 2008 and 2009, both of them young adults in the prime of their lives, I literally ate my grief and sorrow.  Thirty pounds later, I woke up and said, “Enough. This extra weight is a threat to my health.” The only way I am going to lose it is through prayer, meditation, mindfulness and emotional support.  The only way I have ever solved a personal problem effectively has been through prayer, meditation, mindfulness and group support.  Don’t we all find joy and liberation in deep relationship to all that is inside and around us? But there was no such group.

 And so I realized the only way I could maintain mindfulness vis a vis eating less and enjoying it more, is to do as I did when I stopped smoking two packs of cigarettes daily 22 years ago—start a support group.

 I have Twitter to thank for the name Mindfully Trim.  I wanted to burn my bridges by going public with a spiritual weight loss support group, and the first few names I tried were already taken.  Mindfully Trim was available.

 You are not alone.  The strength we feel comes from the fact that we do this not just for ourselves, but for one another and all beings who suffer with excess weight.

 We encourage Mindfully Trim group members--and you are a member if you come to meetings--to use prayer, meditation, affirmations, journaling, healthy foods, smaller portions and appropriate exercise.  We offer the mutual support of weekly meetings to energize our personal weight loss journeys.  This is not the place for weighing in, advocating pills or supplements, or prescribing particular diets or food plans.  This does not mean we cannot share recipes and tips.  We enhance our personal weight loss program through a focus of a non-judgmental self love and spiritual love that allows us to release the extra weight and realize our true selves:  trim, fit and healthy, not to mention happy!

 Be forewarned that I plan to write and publish my experiences in Mindfully Trim--and yours. If I don’t lose the weight, my reports would not be encouraging.  But I believe we can reach our individual weight loss goals if we approach this thing spiritually and if we do so for the benefit not just of ourselves, but of one another. Here in the tea-room at Cloud Cottage, you are involved in a grand experiment that could likely become a movement.

 Judith Toy


Martha Magroski, a Dharma sister, sent me this story.  There were many ants in a salad bowl, and most of them were trying desperately to climb out.  Some succeeded and others did not. There was just one ant who sat at the bottom and said, "Nice Bowl."

JT

August 24, 2010

I should have kissed you
not taken a picture

August 23, 2010

Was I dreaming?

The Isle of Palms:  I had the most amazing swim yesterday morning, under a rainbow with dolphins!  I could not believe what was happening!  They were so close.  I jumped up with both of my arms in the air, to cheer, and two dolphins did the same thing with their flippers!  Was I dreaming?

Judith

August 14, 2010
the pure land

Shambala means Pure Land.  We are home here in Scotland.  When we drove up the stately drive with a palamino in the yard and saw the white-washed mansion where we would stay on the water, we gasped.  Then entering the retreat center, all the ceilings are about 15 feet high, the rooms very large, the icons so beautiful, both Philip and I had the feeling we'd been here before. Because of the success of our retreat last weekend in the garden of Findhorn, we were invited to continue the mindfulness practice this weekend at Shambala.  Twenty-three people joined us for our meditation to begin our day of mindfulness this morning.  For years now, I have seen this place in my dreams.   We want you to know that Philip's brother Delwin passed on Thursday, so we have his name on the altar here. Philip and I cannot leave for the funeral, so we are practicing and praying for Delwin's smooth transition.  Also yesterday, right after the phone call and our tour of this spectacular place, I fell in a great heap in the foyer and twisted my ankle. Later, with my foot raised and iced and bandaged, I thought to myself, "I just sprained my ankle.  We've had a death in the family. Why do I feel so happy?"  I believe it is the benevolent energy here!   The pain hasn't been bad, and I'm favoring the foot today.  Arnica, rescue remedy and arnica ointment were all on hand. Many hugs were on hand for Philip. Tonight I will have a gratis session with our host's roommate, an energy healer.  We are well cared for, and Sara is a delight to travel with.  Philip is doing okay.  We decided to go ahead with the mindfulness weekend anyhow, as it is always nurturing for us to practice. Everyone put a name on the altar in a moving ceremony this morning, as we chanted the name of Avalokita and evoked the energy of love and compassion before the most beautiful golden thousand-armed Chenrezig (Avalokitesvara). Tomorrow we will begin the day with Taize here, and then the first meditation of our second day of mindfulness.   We are smiling to you from a sunny!! day in Northern Scotland on the Moray Firth in paradise.
  Judith and Philip   "Paradise--if not now, when?"  --Thich Nhat Hanh

August 10, 2010
The Other Side of Sorrow

After yet another very stressful travel day from Pitlochery to Findhorn--not without its deep pleasures and incredible sights (including JK Rawlings estate and the castle of Hogswart from the Potter series)--Findhorn turns out to be a paradise. The original dream of Eileen and Peter Caddy in the 1960's is alive and well and breathing evenly.  During meditation on our day of mindfulness I could feel viscerally the energy and vitality of the nearby gardens and lotus pond. Our retreat at Findhorn was the most international we've ever led. There were folks from Scotland, Sweden, Finland, Germany, |Italy, Holland, the US (one only) and elsewhere. Our topic was cultivating joy. Our teacher describes joy as the emotion a thirsty person feels upon discovering water. One of the retreatants said she felt surprised to be on this retreat, and we eventually concluded that joy includes an element of surprise and perhaps wonder.  How do we keep this alive? There were about 20 people present. The day was completely nourishing, including the fresh Findhorn veggies used to prepare beautifully seasoned dishes.   Later in the evening Philip and I explored the gorse and heather-covered dunes. Not until after we returned did our host tell the story of the night she and a friend got lost on the winding trails of the dunes and had to spend the night out there!  I found myself wondering about the wildlife hidden in the underbrush.   The homes we've visited in Scotland are energy conscious with electric showers and few napkins, no top sheets on the beds--my style!  But Findhorn is the epitome of conservation. Their eco footprint is the lowest ever measured for any community in the industrialized world, and is just half the UK national average.  Our strawbale house was loaded with beautiful woodwork and white-washed walls. Each of rooms had lofts and the sleeping was peaceful. Findhorn is a grand experiment in spiritual, community and earth-honoring sustainability that has actually worked.  Four hundred residents swell to maybe a thousand who attend various conferences and programmes in the summer, plus those who volunteer to staff them.  Artistic endeavors are encouraged, as at Ballytobin Camphill Community.  Life at Findhorn is prayer, beginning with Taize in a round little stone building with a grass roof--the nature sanctuary--where we crowd in to sing hymns and chants in harmony--four parts! and an hour of meditation immediately following in one of their four sanctuaries in the eco-village.   We left on a prayer and drove West to Skye, the most spectacular drive of our lives as the heather just beginning to bloom and the majestic Cuillin Mountains rise up from their water firths pouring waterfalls down and sustaining all life.  These mountains seem to be the great protecting mothers of virtue, happiness and peace, expressing the realm of nirvana.   A divinely guided journey from the start, ours continued to the heavenly |sle of Skye and we see why they call it Skye.  Perched here at the croft of Inveralavaig on Penifiler Lane at #1, we cannot believe the blessings poured upon us here as we relax in our private sitting room overlooking the sea loch to Portree.  This is a working croft where two neighbors share the care of many hundred head of sheep.  There are wild hares galore, a rich bird life, yummy flower and veggie gardens, an island out the window and a path I've already wandered to the sea.   Our host's comment last night--We keep a low profile; if you find us, you're meant to be here.f"  Thank you, God.   Beyond the locks of the blood of the children of men, beyond the frailty of the plain and the labour of the mountain, beyond poverty, consumption, fever, agony, beyond hardship, wrong, tyranny, distress, beyond misery, despair, hatred, treachery, beyond guilt and defilement; watchful, heroic, the Cuillin is seen rising on the other side of sorrow.   --Sorley MacLean   What was I thinking|? Walked out on the burns wearing socks with Crocs (with holes in my shoes). Got soaked, and found out why they call them bogs!   Celtic music, sumptuous breakfast and water, water, water. We are soaked in Scotland among thistle and gorse, heather and meadow sweet, sheep dung and grasses and sage.   For the sake of all beings,   Judith
August 6, 2010

Samye Ling means "Place Beyond the Imagination," and is named after the very first Buddhist monastery built in Tibet in the 800's.  Indeed.  How can I describe the morning Green Tara prayers except to say that beings of light sing out light.  To begin the day this way is to enter heaven.  We were gladly aware that every step, every mouthful of deliciously prepared veggie food, every sweet smile and welcoming hello, each heartbeat, each in breath, each out breath comes from the heart of the Buddha at the seat of the cosmos. 

The stupa at Samye Ling is made to the exact mathematical proportions as those in Tibet herself.  Within the spire of the stupa is a tree which is suspended on ropes in the exact direction it grew in the earth.  The tree serves as an organic conductor of the energies of compassion embodied by the building and the many people who lie in state there or whose ashes are contained there.  All are welcome there. And beneath the seat of the Buddha are buried weapons confiscated by the local police force--guns, knives and razors meant for violence but now become the Buddha's holy seat. 

What we seemed to find there I could call ordinary holiness.  Not one bit of pretension.  Just happiness based on a deep peace and caring for all the peoples of the world.  The gardens and the buildings and the temples and the university taking shape there are done precisely in the Tibetan style, to carefully preserve the culture of Tibet in the rolling sheep-dotted and forested hills of Scotland.

The shrine rooms made us feel as though we were in Tibet.  But strangely enough, when I asked for butter tea in the Tibetan Tea Room, I was told they don't serve it because nobody likes it.

One of our last experiences there was with a standup comic monk with very few teeth who called himself the Vulnerable Daily Lama!

We are now in Harry Potter territory, staying at the B&B after whose owner the author named the baby dragon Norbert.  The railway station from the movie is here, too.  The author herself lives nearby.  And good lord, castles galore.  Just to walk down any street in these villages is a visual feast.  This whole experience has been a visual feast.  No way to put it in words.  But I'll keep trying.

Deep peace of the flowing waves to you.
Deep peace of the moving breeze to you.
Deep peace of the silent earth to you.
Deep peace of the shining stars to you.
Deep peace of the child of peace to  you.

Judith


August 4, 2010

We had one day from hell on our pilgrimage; I guess that's required, and certainly it was worth it.  Missed our plane from Dublin to Edinburgh, walked for miles to the wrong boarding gate, walked miles again, found ourselves trapped outside of customs in a kind of bad nightmare with poor Sara and her cane, had to wait nine hours for another plane and they charged us all over again.  Philip began driving on the left, sitting on the right with a gear box to his left, as we arrived in the major city of  Edinburgh.  Hair raising!  We drove directly onto the cobblestone streets into the Royal Mile, an honest-to-goodness medieval city with modern shops and hoards of people.  We were stunned, our jaws on our chest.  There are spires and turrets and leaded glass windows and enormous ancient stone structures and churches that date from the middle ages.  There we experienced the carnival of August's festival on the streets, heard absolutely mind-bending folk music on original stringed instruments in St. Giles Cathedral, and then next day drove into the country into the mountains to Samye Ling.  Thanks to Joan from Joyful Mountain Sangha, we had a personal tour from her friend Vin of the Monastery grounds.  We cannot describe this, a bit of Tibet in Scotland.  One thousand carved, gold leafed buddhas flank the huge golden Shakyamuni on the altar.  All Tibetan artwork, including thankas and unbelievably intricate carvings, created here over the last thirty years.  Although Trungpa founded this place, his name or image nowhere to be found. ?? 

Here we are participating in the monastic schedule of Tara prayers, long periods of meditation and wonderful veggie meals.  We are truly blessed.  The bodhisattvas of wandering have blessed us.

Missing you, dear Sangha, and our family and our doggies.  Next we go to a country house, and then to Findhorn for our day of mindfulness there.

Thursday July 28

Goat cheese salad for lunch en plein air in the beer garden in Lahinch overlooking the sea.  Headache disappears as I eat my salad to the sea sounds under a deeply clouded sky, clearing to the West, where we will sail to the amazing Cliffs of Mohr. Philip and Sara got fast food, but I wanted a salad and some alone time, so we parted temporarily until we will get to the boat.  Lovely weather all week! Sea breeze today and in the sixties.  Time to myself~  first time in a week except when I went on a long dune walk and found shells for Sara.  Martin on his own today.  Loving this seaside town.

We crossed the River Shannon estuary on a ferry yesterday, listening to Enya sing her own music which stems from a self-imposed solitude.  Our guide Martin Doyle comes not only as an Irish gentleman and ambassador, but as a music lover with built in Irish music in his ipod which he broadcasts in the car.  Made traveling quite pleasant.  He was formally light and sound technician (he’s a techie!) with the Mushrooms, a Celtic Rock band who had a number one hit in the seventies.

Also yesterday the four of us enjoyed lunch in a fine hotel in the town of Listowel, served by an Irish lass who has lived in Manhatten, after an AA meeting for Philip and me in Tralee, which they asked me to chair.  There I met a man with the name of Carroll, most likely a relative, and heard from a guy named Patrick the secret of the universe—live in the moment.

Felicity is our hostess at the Victorian era stone home of Willow Lodge b&b with deep windowsills throughout.  How is this small land so grand?

Everyone seems glad to meet us!  Sara is a vision with her white head, layered patterns brightly chosen—and her carved walking cane, often topped by a homemade hat.  So among us—Philip and I in our browns—Sara in her multicolors, we do draw the looks.  Bought Lorin a gift of an Irish word for blessing in the early cuneiform-type script of Ireland called Ancient Ogham, on handmade paper, hand calligraphed and framed, and mailed it to New Jersey.  There are beautiful woolens here and unique yarns and weaves.

Driving through Limerick I could not resist writing one:

 

There once were several Buddhists from the States

Who wanted to put on an Irish face

But they all wore brown

And in that county’s town

They were terribly out of place.

 

Bah boom.



July 28

Dingle was a hot potato.  We did not have a good night at the Green Street Town House.  Long story which included a leak in the ceiling dripping into Martin's room, a toilet with no seat and a lot of tourist and street noise throughout the night.  Morning found us unexpectedly on the road again.  But not before I had a chance to kneel and pray in St. Mary's Church in Dingle, a gorgeous sanctuary. I took some of the baptismal water and patted it behind my ears.  Tears.  A letting go.  And the words that came to me have to do with AA's tenth step, taking personal inventory:  "Judith, cultivate gratitude for each moment of your abundant life."  Meaning don't let leaky ceilings and missing toilet seats stop the beautiful flow of your appreciations.  Then I found St. Patrick's Prayer, reminding me of the Navajo Peace Prayer, one I shall keep forever, with only one word changed:

Buddha with me,
Buddha before me,
Buddha behind me,
Buddha in me,
Buddha beneath me,
Buddha above me,
Buddha on my right,
Buddha on my left,
Buddha when I lie down,
Buddha when I sit down,
Buddha when I arise,
Buddha in the heart of everyone who thinks of me,
Buddha in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me,
Buddha in every eye that sees me,
Buddha in every ear that hears me.

 An AA meeting in Tralee placed us square in the lap of the Irish.  Cead mile failte, pronounced caide meela fortchay:  one hundred thousand welcomes. It was Martin who went online and found us the meeting and squired us there, Martin who speaks Irish as needed, Martin our bodhisattva who is currently candling Philip's ears.  What a treasure he has been!

Lunch in a very good hotel in Listowel, then off through the gorgeous Irish countryside of stone walls, ancient hedgerows, green castle ruins and, now, the sea itself.  In the distance as we approach the cheerful seaside town of Lahinch, the purple Cliffs of Mohr form a ring of protection somehow.  This town is charmed.  Found the Willow Place B&B and a hotel for Sara, and we watched the sunset by the sea.  Tomorrow--a day of nothing!  Friday, back to Dublin to the Crowne Plaza Hotel and a couple of days there before flying to Scotland.

July 27

Breakfasted with Norma and Jim at the Ballaughtobin Country House's baronial diningroom, a true Irish breakfast.  Then goodbye to Norma and Jim and hello to Martin Doyle, our driver and guide, who picked us up this morning.

The ride toward Dingle with Martin a dream drive. Martin, too, a dreamy healer and world traveler and  Irish adventurer who lives part-time in Asheville.  First thing he said to me?  Welcome home.  And I was home. And he's a great driver on the left, having come originally from an island off the northern coast.  Philip, Sara and I feel we are in a kind of Pure Land here, drinking in the Irish landscape, the brogue, their little expressions like "Off you go, then," and their lilting songs.  Strangers pose for our camera and strike up random conversations on the street. Martin came complete not only with directions, but with his own built-in WIFI (I'm a techie, he said) and the music of Ireland on CD in the car.  At one point, hearing a slow blissful love song to Ireland, a song about the letting go before one dies, Philip and I both broke down and cried.  The retreat, the scenery and Martin's profound company, combined with the wistful music, conspired to bring us to tears. We found this cheery little b&b on the coast of Bantry bay, with the stone-strewn hills of green on one side and the ocean on the other, a mirrored sea of small fishing craft and sea-birds.  When you set the intention to go on pilgrimage, every moment is sacred. And our conversations deep and funny and cheerful and multi-layered.  Two new taste sensations today--Hake, a marvelously prepared fish, and a type of pie whose name I can't remember, made from whole wheat biscuits (cookies), caramel, bananas and cream. 

Tomorrow we visit Sogyal Rinpoche's Buddhist center where a hospice has been built. This is a country that has known much deprivation and suffering. They are in the throes of an economic depression now.  In Dharma interviews, Philip and I listened deeply to the personal struggles and happiness of retreatants over the weekend. But when you hear their music--it is like the original blues in the American South-- you know that the Irish harness their suffering as a wing and their joy as a wing...and with those two wings, they fly.

July 26
FROM THE MOUTHS OF BABES


Anam Cara, the name of our host Sangha, means in Irish:  Soul Friends.  And hasn't our teacher the Buddha said that good friends are the w hole of our spiritual lives?  Philip gave a Dharma talk this afternoon in which he listed the weight of our dear Jesse's heart and his brain, from the coroner's official report.  How those we love move on too soon...how everything changes...even our sharp griefs and sorrows morph to something deeper, softer.  And I told the Sangha of how the killer of Louise, Dougie and Danny was unable to murder my wonder and awe. The dove songs at his Camphill Village where everything is a work of heart--they ake me back to the tiny Romanian village of Paclisa o the orphans and peasants here. Here, there are lowing cattle, countless hedgerowed pastures and fields, old, old tree beings.  Life seems defined by greenery. 

I played with the children on Saturday and Sunday:  we sang Breathing in Breathing out, collected pebbles for pebble meditation and swung on the swings.  On Friday night at the close of partial silence at dinner, six-year-old Andrew piped up after the bell:  "Thank God! I thought I was dead!"

I'm siting in a stone amphitheater alone with my journal, carrying out my own assignment.  What is my transformation?  I can only be the experience of Ireland, cannot capture it. The people are warm and funny and brilliant at living. And they are so giving to us, so much that I want to drink them.  They blithely resist our retreat schedule which is way too full anyhow...and they make their transitions leisurely, in a way that we can learn from them.  Our American-ness is sticking out.

One retreatant brought her happy Shepherd mix, who does walking meditation with us. It is good to have Norma and Jim here.  Norma ended up doing what she does so well, arranging the flowers for our retreat, and helping a dear, overburdened Leonie, our host bodhisattva and mama of the retreat, in the kitchen.  Last night we had dinner with them in Kilkenny, charming, but touristy.  The food's fabulous, all the food.

In what ways do I change?  Am I changing? What piece of nature tells it?  (I asked retreatants to find a twig or an object of nature to symbolize their own transformation.  Something round, for roundness?  For smoothing out my sharp edges?  For turning around a heavy hand to one of lightness and good humor?  Here it is--a lightweight heart in the shape of a stone. (I've lately been obsessed with stones in the shape of a heart.  Philip's Dharma talk tells me why.  I said I was collecting them for Susan--but did I?  The copper-colored wound on this heartstone is part of me.  This one is lighter in weight than Jesse's or mine.  And neither of us consists of our heart or our brain or our body. We are life eternal, Thay tells us, disguised in this temporary body.  My own breath went out with Louise's, with Dougie's, with Danny's, with Jesse's, and we have all been tranformed to light.  Philip and I, Mindfulness Ireland and I, the heartstone and I.

One last anecdote.  I took on the task of explaining the Two Promises to the children.  Spoke of the three gems as well, and discovered the interbeing of the three gems, by using a flower as metaphor.  Then our conversation went on to weightier things--to ecology and interbing.  Once again, Andrew, six years old, provided us his wisdom.  "Without the bees, he said, there would be no flowers and no worms," and then he stopped to think..."and no Buddha."

So then,, off to the West and parts unknown.
July 23, 2010

Easy flights, great connections and interconnections.  Leonie Baldwin is an incredibly thoughtful host for Mindfulness Ireland. Retreatants from all regions of Ireland are setting up camp and beginning the retreat tonight while we try to catch up on misplaced sleep.  We left at 6:30 Thursday morning and arrived at our beautiful country house accommodations at about 2:30 Friday afternoon, a longish journey, with lots of mindful walking in airports and surprisingly wonderful foods like miso soup in Jet Blue Terminal, JFK.  The JFK air train was a remarkable experience with cloud strewn skies as backdrop. Tomorrow we leave early and join the retreatants for early morning meditation.  Our main impression of Ireland is that the plant life is incredibly lush and green and huge.  Today we saw the leaves of the gunnera, about six to seven feet in diameter!  Gardens, castles, medieval ruins, quaint country towns, lovely hotel for breakfast and Camphill Community-run restaurant with magical gardens for lunch.  We are indeed in paradise.  More to come.

--JT

June 19, 2010

There is Nothing Personal

We did not have a chance to attend the death of our son. It was sudden and completely unexpected.  But in the past year I’ve had the opportunity to attend two dying friends, with contrasting experiences, both of which shimmered.  Alexis was 37 years old and dying of cancer that, when discovered, had already metastasized to her brain from her lungs.  Trouble in the heart chakra.  She had many troubles there.  Lost and fleeting relationships.  But that one bond with her four-year-old son—and with her parents as well--was deep and solid.  She did not want to die.  Alexis lingered.  And my own daughter left her husband and two children for weeks, to be the midwife of Alexis’ death and caregiver to her son.

I rushed to Alexis’ bedside, where everything was still.  I had known her since before she was born. Her breathing was labored.  My daughter was in the room, so everything was intensified.  I got close to Alexis’ face and kissed her hands and told her I loved her.  She was radiant in her dying, her eyes huge in a face that had grown thin. “You’re beautiful,” she told me.  There was a mirror, a light that connected us.  She saw straight through my grandmother’s face. We were not one, not two, but our spirits intertwined in that moment.  She was generous in her dying:  everyone who entered the room felt he or she was The One.  “Are you ready to go?” I asked her. She tightened her lips and punched out the word “No.”  It was almost as if she had stomped her foot.  Alexis’ death was long and gruesome.

Gretchen is 75 years old and dying now of lung cancer. She is my longtime beloved friend, political activist, socialist, painter, poetry lover and daughter of a well-known artist.  Gretchen has lived a refusee life, preferring her own company to almost anyone’s else’s, and insisting she see only one friend at a time. She pounded a sign into the front lawn of her miniscule cottage:  CAPITALISM OR PERISH?  Last year, her retrospective one-woman show of paintings sold out. Her artwork is all over my house. Not long after the show, she was diagnosed with cancer (perhaps metasticized, but she never told me) she called and asked me to look up information on the internet on how she might end her life.  That’s how I knew she was dying. She handed me a moral dilemma, as I truly do not believe in messing with life and death, yet I understood completely that this woman would have no medical intervention—no chemo, no oxygen, no radiation, no hospitalization, no heroic measures--and that she deserved the liberty to end it as she saw fit.  We do as much for our dogs.

Gretchen ultimately decided to let her body take its own course.  Neither she nor medical science would intervene.

In her art-drenched livingroom, I sat on the floor at her feet and rubbed them, gazing into her face.  I had no agenda for this visit, perhaps our last, but I wanted at that moment to laugh for the joy of our 37-year friendship!  We giggled together. Her hair is pure white and straight, and that day, was strikingly cut and clean. Gretchen had confided to me, not long before, that in her old age she had come to prefer aprons to brassieres. I brought her a bright apron painted by a child, with a CD tucked in the pocket.  When she unfolded the apron, she almost screamed with delight, saying it was the most spectacular apron she’d ever seen!  She tried it on, moving an object to better see her full-length reflection in the mirror.  So small.  Then she told me to sit in the chair where she had been sitting. And I realized at that moment there was no difference between host and guest.

Later, Gretchen called me to say how much the visit meant to her.  She sketched me and sent the sketch.  I was all tooth and smile and roundness!  She commented happily, “We only spoke of the big things, nothing personal.”

“There is nothing personal,” I answered.  And indeed, at the nitty-gritty time of death, there are no personal matters.  Why can’t we live as if we’re dying? The dying come into their bodies of light. In their presence, we are more:  we become only light reflecting light.  Alexis knew this, Gretchen knew it, and we were all comforted by seeing straight through our dense human bodies to something clear and mysterious.  What was all that beauty we beheld?




May 25, 2010

Out of the Mud

At a meditation meeting, I sat on a couch next to a dark-haired young man named Sean whom I had never met.  We entered into the silence of meditation, and in about five minutes when my mind settled, I felt a great pain emanating from him.  His pain was dark and struck with lightning in the nature of a trauma-- a childhood trauma that he carried in his body.  And as I meditated, compassion filled my cup, and up came the phrase, “Poor child!  Poor child!  Poor child!”  While I sat still as a stone, I imagined myself rocking and holding my heart and uttering this phrase on his behalf. And then I began to send healing pink light waves for his heart that I knew was broken. For the remainder of the meditation, I was able to abide in seeing how his pain was my pain. We were not one nor were we two, but we inter-existed in perfect harmony in both darkness and light as part of the vast natural world.

And we still do.  Just because I am not in the hyperaware state of meditation does not mean I cannot realize that Sean and I inter-exist.  I wonder, though, if he felt my dead son, or my deep grief. 

During the discussion segment of the meeting, Sean began to talk, haltingly, reaching for his tea to stave off the tears so he could say what he needed to say. “I grew up in Ireland, and our family was a huge Catholic family.  I had many brothers. In the mornings, I would go to the church to pray. And there, when I was eleven years old, I was raped by the priest,” he said, choking back the tears.  “That was 20 years ago, and I am just now starting to deal with it.”  He began to sob.  I put the palm of my hand on his back.  It was a long time before he could speak again.

How does this knowing happen?  How, in meditation, are we able to leap beyond the boundaries of space and time and know the unknowable? 

In the meditative state, unburdened by cognition and cares, we inhabit the enormous being that is our true self.  Unbound by the muddiness of thought, we experience the crystal clarity of non-doing in the here and the now.  From the mud, our buddha self arises.  There are no boundaries of width or height, nothing to stop us from tuning in to the energy that surrounds us but eludes us in purely human affairs. 

Each of us is a human broadcasting network. The energy and information we transmit cannot be made proprietary or private. It cannot be owned.  It is out there, in the ether, and does not belong to us. Sean’s pain is not his alone.  It is our corporate pain.  So for a few minutes I was able to share it—as well as the priest’s blind delusion--as my pain, too.  We have no real way of separating ourselves from any being, sentient or insentient. That we are all in this together is an understatement. Nothing separates us.   

Afterwards, I tried giving Sean a hug.  His body is still bound.  He could not receive it fully. Yet I knew that somewhere in paradise, we had made a connection more potent than touch, and that was good enough for me. 

--JT






May 21, 2010

Mantra For a Nightmare

My world is divine and pure.
Starving children die by the minute.
Every hour bodies blown to bits.
While the half-moon flying
With the high winds
Drags the stars to nowhere
Anybody knows.

Mantra For Going Back To Sleep

Given peace--true
Lasting love may bloom.
This bloom brings light--is light
And in this light once seen, employ
All things and dance with them in joy.

Philip
29 years writing poems together!

May 20, 2010

I try to contain my joy but it is uncontainable! This afternoon we hiked old 70 down the mountain, now a bike trail, as far as the Boy Scout lookout, walking between the raindrops with Angel and Marshall. And the mist arising like huge angels winging from the greenery to crown the mountains with clouds. At our feet, stars of bethlehem and buttercups, asters and berry blossoms, fresh kudzu and jewel weed beaded with raindrops. I swear you can see the kudzu growing. A train comes up the mountain through the tunnel, and we watch with glee, a couple of five-year-olds, as each car, maybe a hundred of them, rumbles and screeches beneath us.  Then the vast stillness.  Then an eastern bluebird so blue against the sea of green, perched at the very top of a dead tree vined in kudzu, the bird making the smallest clicking sounds that echo like our joy through god's green valleys. Sunday we'll be married 29 years. It's good. 

May 19, 2010

Imagine, if you will, a universe in which all things have a mutual identity. They all have an interdependent origination:  when one thing arises, all things arise simultaneously. And everything has a mutual causality: what happens to one thing happens to the entire universe. Imagine a universe that is a self-creating, self-maintaining, and self-defining organism--a universe in which all the parts and totality are a single entity; all of the pieces and the whole thing are, at once, one thing

This description of reality is not a holistic hypothesis or an idealistic dream. It is your life and my life, the life of the mountain and the life of the river, the life of a blade of grass, a spiderweb, the Brooklyn Bridge. These things are not related to each other. They're not part of the same thing. They're not similar. Rather, they are identical to each other in every respect.

But the way we live our lives is as if that were not so. We live in a way that separates the pieces, alienates and hurts.  ...Buddhist teachings...point to how we can live our lives in harmony with the facts described above. These teachings refer to us and the whole universe, and we need to see them and practice them from that perspective. If we are to benefit from what they have to offer, and begin healing the rift between ourselves and the universe.

To practice Zen is to be in harmony with your life and the universe. To practice Zen means to study the self exhaustively--not just on the surface but on many levels, plumbing its depths. It means being deeply honest with yourself. It means taking responsibility for your life. If you don't practice taking responsibility for your life, you are not practicing Zen. It is as simple as that.

To take responsibility empowers you to do something about whatever it is that's hindering you. As long as we blame, as long as we avoid or deny, we are removed from the realm of possibility and power to do something about our lives. We become totally dependent upon the ups and downs that we create around us. There is no reason that we should be subjected to anything when we have the power to see that we create and we destroy all things. To acknowledge that simple fact is to take possession of your life. It is to make these teachings your own. It is to give life to the Buddha, to this great earth, and to the universe itself.

                                                         --John Daido Loori, from t he preface of Teachings of the Earth

Found this wonderful quotation from bell hooks this morning, May 13:

Dominator thinking and practice relies for its maintenance on the constant production of a feeling of lack, the need to grasp. Giving love offers us a way to end this suffering--loving ourselves--extending that love to everything beyond the self, we experience wholeness, we are healed.

--JT


May 11, 2010


 Rain and the copy machine

saturated ferns on the porch

a rose for your pocket

a penny for your oughts.

 

A new day spins into spring

this way, no getting or gots

just this!  Ordinary millisecond

with you and the dogs in the dark.




--JT




April 23, 2010

"The mountains are walking," says Dogen. "They are traveling on water."

Singing to the Trees

Earth Day, 2010

 

Susan Hale started it, a way of getting people all over the planet to sing to the trees at Noon on Earth Day, Thursday, April 23, 2010. So Philip and I walked down the mountain in Ridgecrest on old 70 into the Pisgah Forest to a formidable lookout where you can see thousands and thousands of trees for hundreds of miles, a sea of green. "Green mountains turn to clouds and slip slow by," said Gary Snyder. At our special place cloistered in Kudzu, there are two sturdy park benches erected by boy scouts, and two flags on a pole with a solar flag-raiser.

On the downward path, even before we got to the lookout, I started to sing as Paulownias threw flowers at our feet:

Amazing Grace; It Isn’t Easy Being Green; Life is Like a Mountain Railroad; Breathing in, Breathing out; The Island Within Myself (“There are beautiful trees within the island…”), God Bless the Child, and Imagine (“Imagine no countries, and no religion too…”).  And as I sang I thought, “I feel you,” --  your accumulated green  energy, your rootedness. And I could feel the offered songs of earth lovers all over the planet.

Then I prayed a prayer of thank you. I thanked the trees for their blossoms like snow in the spring wind. I recalled my friend Karen Vizzina asking me about our trees in the yard: “Who is this? And Who is this?” she would ask. Her question stirred something deep in me. Lord, all the trees I’ve taken for granted!

Looking out on our green mountains, I whispered to the sea of trees, “Thank you for my life, thank you for my breath and the breath of my children and my children’s children.” When I stopped to listen to the oaks and maples and paulownias and pines, tears came.

As a K-2 teacher at The Learning Community on the 600 acres near Lake Eden, I invited each of my students to adopt a tree and sit beneath it from time to time. Later, when we were learning native flute, they would go to their chosen tree and offer their sweet music to their trees. A grandmother locust lived across a meadow from the school. Every morning before class, I would check in with her, listen to anything she had to tell me. The children learned to hear her, too.

I mentioned the bones of my Earth Day experience on the mountain to one of our families at Strengthening Families Program last night. I asked the kids if they did anything for Earth Day at school. “No,” their mother replied. “Teachers find it too controversial.”

For the sake of all beings, what can we do about this? Mother Earth desperately needs us now --  to sing to her and pray to her in thanks, to walk gently upon her, to honor her, to feed her, to give back. May we keep our appointment with the locust or the beech or the pin oak, our old acquaintances. May the Susan Hales of the planet proliferate! May we make friends with the new beings in our yards. May we listen.

--JT


April 21, 2010

Thay's classic poem, "Please Call Me by My True Names," -- truly reminiscent of Walt Whitman's phrase, "I contain multitudes," has been coming into my mind so often these past two days, that I am charged to copy it here for you.

Please Call Me by My True Names
                             --by Thich Nhat Hanh
                      

Don't say that I will depart tomorrow--
even today I am still arriving.

Look deeply; every second I am arriving
to be a bud on a Spring branch,
to be a tiny bird, with still-fragile wings,
learning to sing in my new nest,
to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower,
to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry,
to fear and to hope.
The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death
of all that is alive.

I am a mayfly metamorphosing
on the surface of the river.
And I am the bird
that swoops down to swallow the mayfly.

I am a frog swimming happily
in the clear water of a pond.
And I am the grass-snake
that silently feeds on the frog.

I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones,
my legs as thin as bamboo sticks.
And I am the arms merchant,
selling deadly weapons to Uganda.

I am the twelve-year-old girl,
refugee on a small boat,
who throws herself into the ocean
after being raped by a sea pirate.
And I am the pirate,
my heart not yet capable
of seeing and loving.

I am a member of the politburo,
with plenty of power in my hands.
And I am the man who has to pay
his "debt of blood" to my people
dying slowly in a forced-labor camp.

My joy is like Spring, so warm
it makes flowers bloom, all over the Earth.
My pain is like a river of tears,
so vast it fills the four oceans.

Please call me by my true names,
so I can hear all my cries and laughter at once,
so I can see that my joy and pain are one.

Please call me by my true names,
so I can wake up
and the door of my heart
could be left open,
the door of compassion.

by Thich Nhat Hanh



April 21, 2010

Forgiveness is a Fire

a prose poem

Forgiveness is a fire in the belly, like that of the g num-mo monks who melt snow around their bodies with nothing but breath, sweat and body heat. This fire begins with the stuff of sorrow, the energy of anger that consumes. Suffering. We would ignore sadness and anger at our peril, for they are the kindling of fire.

We place sadness and anger on the hearth of the heart. If we fail to allow the fire to breathe, to feed it its due, it will burn us alive.

Next, with care, we pour on the fuel of pausing, stilling. We still ourselves long enough to wake up and see that we are burning. An in-breath. We look into the kindling of grief and rage, feel the heat on our faces. An out-breath. We see into the eyes of the other -- the one we claim is the cause of our pain. Now we are face to face with our nemesis.

We continue to still ourselves, see deep into the face of our enemy. Our eyes lock. We see the enemy and she is us. Breathing in, we see not only the reasons for our enemy's misdeeds, we see their kindnesses. Breathing out, we recognize ourselves in the eyes of the other -- all our cries of discontent, all our joys, unto generations of our ancestors, all the gardens planted, all the beings killed. Compassion fans the flames, ignites our sorrows.

This is the moment of opportunity. We strike a match to our grief the instant we see our self in the mirror of other -- in the other, the mirror of self. Here comes the ball of fire, like the first flame, spit by a spark from Grandfather Fire who made earth and sky from the cradle of cosmos.

Creator/destroyer of universe, our fire sets love in motion, a soaring meteo9r blazes, transforms! Not to destroy, but to make life. Red, yellow and orange flames rise to harness power. Birth flies out on blue sparks. We fully forgive! We dissolve into love, are made new by the fire. We become light. The idea of forgiveness burns, too, melting in the light of love. And after the fire, there is rain.

--JT


April 16, 2010

A deep bow to Dharma teacher Peggy Rowe for transmitting her love and wisdom to our ordinees this week in a seamless Cloud Cottage ceremony for the transmission of the Five Mindfulness Trainings (See tab at left). Peggy's special touch with ceremony added immensely to the experience for all of us. A sample of Peggy-wisdom: whenever in the ceremony she ran across the phrase "The Enlightened One," she expressed it as "The Enlightened Ones."

And congratulations to our recipients:  Suzanne Thierry, Mollie Milner, George LeRoy and Vivian Gold. To paraphrase Mahatma Ghandi, the great Indian pacifist and human rights activist:

We offer you peace.
We offer you love.
We offer you friendship.
We see your beauty.
We hear your need.
We feel your feelings.
Our wisdom flows from the highest source.
We salute that source in you.
Let us work together for unity and love.

Judith


April 12, 2010

One summer day some years ago, Philip and I took a walk on our farm while he read me a poem by Anne Sexton in which she employs a four-leaf clover as a metaphor. Just then, gazing downward, I sighted a four-leaf clover at my feet! This is how I feel about our fund raising event at Jubilee! yesterday. It was a four-leaf clover. After expenses we raised over $800, precisely the amount we needed to write a generous check to Hospice and pay our tea-room bill.

This is first to thank Barbara Bates Smith for her performance that brought so much laughter -- and tears -- to an audience that was visibly moved, even more so by the original hammered dulcimer music of Jeff Sebens.

And this is to thank Maggie Schlubach for mothering the event, Susan Hales and Laurie Serfas for inventing and gathering for and carrying out the elegant silent auction (I bought/won the high bid for Kimberly Child's gorgeous art necklace of rainbow glass beads with a hummingbird stitched into it, as a gift for my daughter's birthday); to Mollie Milner and Ted for setting up, breaking down and doing the lighting and sound; to Karen Vizzina for making a jacket for the auction and working hard to set up and break down; to Susan's friend, Alyssa, owner of Flora in West Asheville, for the stunning flower arrangements; to Mollie Milner, Lauren DiMaio, Eric Kuehn and Wanda Eichenholtz, for appearing as our deeply articulate panel of experts. Thanks to Howard Hangar and the Jubilee! Community for providing a beautiful space. And a deep bow to all those who donated, bid on and paid for the auction items.

Anne Sexton's poem,  "Evil Eye," is about the suffering that comes with luck, or the luck that comes with suffering. Yesterday, Barbara's amazing performance and the ensuing discussion of cancer seemed to me to epitomize Sexton's message. How can we hold both our luck and suffering? Can we see that they are one and the same?

I cradle a four-leaf clover in my palm, green wonder, and note how easily torn these leaves...

Judith

When we first conceive of an event such as this, we can not imagine what energies and people will be brought together for good. I heard last evening that yesterday a group of cancer survivors connected and are talking about forming a support group focused on alternative therapies.

April 7, 2010

Today is the birthday of our second grandchild, Hanah Rae Riley, who is 15. On her birth, I wrote:

here there is only life

will they stay here

father on the precipice of peace

mother on the precipice of peace

your fingertips write oh birth yes!

you are awake!




And for today, this spring day:


out of humble strangers

silently

bring us whispers

hug grasses lie down

there they press old dahlias

there fresh dogwood blossoms tumble out

yes joy yes gladness

everyone sing medleys! everyone forget the government!

grasses hymns

they become each other

loves

they cannot come homely

grasses!

they cannot come homely

loves!



March 29

I sat down on my cushion Saturday for our day of mindfulness and realized to my horror that I was not wearing makeup. I only wear a bit, but this bit has taken on some importance in my sixties. Okay, I had to deal with this on my cushion. Then outdoors, I realized to my further horror as we walked in meditation over the lawn, the proliferation of all the sticks and debris of winter which had not been raked away. Then suddenly, Big Mind kicked in. Every leaf shard, every bit of thatch and detritus, each broken stick shined! Everything was beautiful, and I let go into the moment. This! And I became the detritus and the shining. And I realized there is no makeup necessary. No raking necessary.

Every shining pine needle, every sandy shore, every mist in the dark woods, every meadow, every humming insect. All are holy in the memory and experience of my people. --Chief Seattle

Judith


March  23

in not yet spring, leaned

down to sniff yellow pansy

and I lost my heart

JT

March 21

The lesson this week is what Rumi said, "Be melting snow." And when I am grateful, my gratitude produces heat. This heat melts the edges between myself and everything else. I begin to evaporate, and as I do so, I help seed the clouds.

We were given an exercise by a spiritual teacher: Take all of your attachments, everything you cling to. In your mind, gather them together. Now dissolve them.

So at first, I felt myself reaching out to a friend -- because my husband, my children and grandchildren, my dogs, my house, my spiritual practice, had all been dissolved. But no, she was dissolved also, because clearly I am attached to her! Well what about that prayer that I used to heal from so many difficulties and diseases? Nope, not available. Because I'm also attached to that prayer.

Suddenly I felt the borders between me and the chair I was sitting on vanish! Gone were all the borders. I was sitting in heaven, connected to all beings and all things!


March 16

This morning's meditation:

"Everything is Necessary, Nothing is Sufficient."

As with the particle and the wave of quantum physics, we seek to know our place in the universe(s). We want to know ourselves, just what we are made of. Particle, wave, particle.
To have some notion of our location, we must sacrifice some self-knowledge, let go our grasp of ourselves. To keep a grasp of ourselves, we must give up hope of ever knowing precisely where we are in the universe(s). But could this be because we are under the influence of space/time?
And perhaps where and when there is spacelessness & timelessness, we may have a hope of both precisely and simultaneously locating ourselves and knowing ourselves. H. H. the Dalai Lama has been responsible for instituting science and physics studies into monastic learning. He is convinced that science and physics also has much to learn from consciousness and the contemplative and investigative pursuits of meditation and prayer. I think it is his belief that while science recognizes consciousness (sentience), it doesn't know when it began nor where it's going. Further, he holds that consciousness can effect a "reverse causation", which is to say that diligent meditative practice can send back waves of influence to alter otherwise "normal" causes and conditions, in effect, changing the course of evolution and history. I champion him for this heroic and bold Tibetan warrior stance ( although, I'm sure he would not see it that way at all, humble monk that he is). Everything, in and of itself, is Necessary. Nothing, in and of itself, is Sufficient.

Praise be to particle and wave and humble monks!

Love to you from Philip in the gloaming.
  

March 5
My granddaughter turned 21 today. Ohmygosh I'm old. I smile to the feelings of wonder that accompany this rite of passage, as Philip and I prepare to lead a day of mindfulness in Charlotte tomorrow. I am struck that each of these days of mindfulness has its own way of manifesting and flowing like a river to the sea. This day will be strictly secular yet deeply spiritual, because this day brings us the action of the eleventh step of all 12-step programs:

"Sought through prayer and meditation to increase our conscious contact with God, praying only for knowledge of his will for us and power to carry that out."

While the Eleventh Step is spelled out in books such as Alcoholics Anonymous' Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, the 12 and 12 does not contain an instruction manual for meditation. Many people in recovery cast about -- I certainly did for years -- looking for a way to meditate. How to hold my hands, what to do with my back, my tongue, my chin, my wandering mind? So tomorrow we humbly offer an instruction manual for meditation. One way, not the only way.

We feel so grateful to Suzanne for organizing this retreat day! Thank you!

                                                                                                    --Judith


March 4

I have never felt especially mindful in my everyday life.I always paired it with concentration and twisted it into an idea of something to gain, while attaching myself to the goal of total mindfulness all the time.  In hindsight, I am not surprised that I felt like I was not good enough at mindfulness practice. Mindfulness is central to Thich Nhat Hahn’s teachings. In his book Going Home: Jesus and Buddha as Brothers, he states,“Mindfulness is the energy we can generate within ourselves. During walking meditation, we can be mindful of every step we take. So mindful walking is what you and your child can do. You know that mindfulness is something real, and not just an idea. If you do well, you can cultivate the energy of mindfulness every day, and make it into a powerful source of energy within yourself.”  

Self conscious effort is not in line with the spirit of mindfulness as taught by the Buddha.  Most of us are so accustomed to self conscious effort that we do not really know how to do anything else. We think of ourselves as separate beings, taking whatever action we take. And we judge ourselves based on our attachment to results. We judge our sitting meditation as well as our activity in daily life. In some of the instructions on how to do zazen, we teach students to follow their breathing. When they become aware of their mind getting lost in thought, we tell them, “Simply bring your attention back to the present moment.” 

This language is fine for beginners. Most likely they need to struggle for a while with how well they can perform the task. Struggle is inevitable in the early stages of practice. However, when we give the instruction to bring our attention back to the present moment, we subtly imply that while our mind is wandering, our attention is on something other than the present moment.  Actually, our attention is always saturated with this moment -- sometimes in the form of entertaining thoughts about last night, and sometimes in the form of watching our breathing. There is no need to say bring your attention back to the here and now. Your attention never left, just as your breathing continued without your awareness of it.  Mindfulness of language is important. We normally gloss over countless instances where the words we use reflect a dualistic view.

Mindfulness of our attitude toward entertaining thoughts, in or out of zazen, is of the utmost importance for meditation practice. Judging them or calling them a hindrance to our progress is equally as harmful as indulging them.  Both are based on craving and feed our attachment to them. As we feed our attachments, they grow. The true spirit of mindfulness in Buddhist practice is to cultivate an attitude of abiding with whatever manifests. Suzuki Roshi had a beautiful way of putting it in Zen Mind Beginners Mind, “When your mind is concentrated on some activity, the quality of your state of mind is the activity itself.” 

So in Zen we say when you are washing the dishes, just wash the dishes.  This does not mean to repress thoughts that come up while we are washing. Just washing the dishes means when we become aware of other thoughts, we merely notice them. Notice the feelings and continue washing.  The more we practice this way, the more we begin to realize that we never stopped washing the dishes, even while our mind was wandering. Now we see the state of just washing as one with our wandering thoughts. While we continue to wash the dishes, thought goes on.  Perhaps we think of a good movie we plan to see that night. Maybe we think the dish water is a little too hot for comfort.

We need not villify thinking. When Suzuki Roshi says the quality of our state of mind is the activity itself, this does not exclude thinking. Washing the dishes is one activity. Thought is another activity. They arise together. If we are present to both, the two activities become one. Thinking is not inherently bad, and just washing the dishes is not inherently good.  The quality of our state of mind can embrace both activities.  If we are mindful in this way, we no longer waste energy in the struggle to manipulate our state of consciousness, to morph it into something other than what it is. If we leave the object of our awareness alone, if we just wash and just think, we allow our self-consciousness to dissolve. This sort of laissez-faire action helps us function more as a whole, as the whole being we are, which actually is the entire universe. Mindfulness means becoming mindful of the whole, the whole of creation which embodies us all the time. The fact that creation always embodies us means the universe pervades our total being. The universe is our true body. When we are mindful in this way, the energy of the creator, our true being, is allowed to penetrate us, and we are free to express divine energy.  This is what Thich Nhat Hanh refers to when he speaks of cultivating the powerful energy of mindfulness.

--Roger Hawkins, excerpted from Great Doubt, the Spirit of Self Inquiry                                  





March 1

Ordered a week's worth of food from Veg-In-Out in Asheville, and we are impressed. At a price that we who live simply can afford, they offer a gift to the planet. The food is varied, mostly organic, vegan and extremely tasty. For lunch yesterday, we had the nut loaf and mushroom gravy with a fresh salad I made. For dinner, the penne pesto with my own cole slaw. Wow. And with the time I save at the stove, I can blog.

We're feeling the effects of the financial downturn along with mammoth electric bills for our two heat pumps during this unusually frigid winter. Yet we trust as always that we need not make a killing -- only a living. As we deepen our mindfulness practice, partly through being snowed in so often, we realize again that what is important has nothing to do with monetary income. Love prevails.

This Saturday we go to Charlotte to lead a day of mindfulness for folks in recovery. While the Big Book and the 12 and 12 recommend meditation, they constitute a philosophy, not an instruction manual. So every chance I get I like to show people in recovery a method or two they can use to quiet the body/mind. For so many years, my meditation practice was dicey and sporadic until I sat down with Dai-En Bennage, a Zen monk who showed me exactly how to hold my body, what to do with my eyes, my hands, my tongue and most of all what to do with the wild horse of my mind. The horse still escapes, though. That's just how it is.

                                                                               --Judith

February 26

Postponed two morning appointments first thing because I woke up overwhelmed and not feeling particularly well. Today I need simply to be, not to do. Morning sun pours through our office window. Thich Nhat Hanh tells me to receive this day in a joyful, relaxed way, achieving a lot without aiming for anything. From Nothing to Do, Nowhere to Go,  Thay writes:

There's a Vietnamese poet who said, 'If you're born as a human being, you must create some fame among these mountains and rivers.' This is the more traditional view, that we have to strive to distinguish ourselves in some way. Master Linji was saying the opposite. [Linji, or Rinzai, is our Zen ancestor.] If we cultivate the spirit of aimlessness, we will be fresh and free, like the rose. But if the rose wishes to become a lotus, she will no longer be happy. A rose doesn't need to become a lotus. A rose should just be a rose, and deeply manifest all her beauty and fragrance in the present moment.

How can I simply be an old fashioned rose today, perfuming the air, with no thought of doing? How can I quietly grow, without needing to know? Dropping the self, breathing in and breathing out, rejoicing in the mystery of changes?

                                                                      --Judith

February 24

Tonight is the fourth Wednesday, thus the Learn to Meditate Night at Cloud Cottage, and Philip is leading. Maggie will greet tonight, and I believe Laurie is bellmaster. This is always a joyous night because we get to practice Beginners Mind.

I have prepared a "Sweetheart Bag" of treats for our silent auction, which I will give to Laurie and Susan, our silent auction chair people, tonight:  2 teddy bears, a huge chocolate puzzle heart, two pairs of love socks, some silly jewelry and two glow-in-the-dark necklaces, as well as a CD of love songs. Value, $25.

I am just home from a weekend women's retreat with one of my daughters in Myrtle Beach, topped off by my other daughter and two granddaughters arriving from Charleston to join us for lunch and adopt a nine-week-old yellow lab puppy -- the essence of dog -- right in the neighborhood of our retreat on the sea!

                                                                                             --Judith