Zenmom

We awaken together

2006-07-22T19:53:00.000-04:00

Whew! Just in from a week long retreat given by the monastics from the Green Mountain Dharma Center and Maple Forest Monastery in Vermont who practice in the tradition of Thich Nhat Hanh. The retreat took place on a beautiful college campus in Massachusetts and neither the near scorching heat nor the non-airconditioned dorms could dampen our enthusiasm or group spirit. The numbers were small, a few dozen adults and nearly as many children it seemed, so it was possible to really connect in dharma discussion groups and in the abundant leisure time as well.

One day of the retreat was called "Lazy Day", a day set aside for our choice of spiritual pursuit such as sitting meditation, spiritual reading, walking meditation, volleyball, frisbee, capture the flag, or just hanging out on the lawn! Zenkid, my 13 year old daughter and roommate, and I decided to stay pretty much in the rhythm of the other days. I got up at the usual time for early sitting then planned to spend most of the day reflecting and writing. ZK arose early as well and headed to the pond where the teens had been meditating. I asked her to just let me know when she changed locations.

Some of the adults later reported feeling a little lost with free time on their hands and apparently ZK had the same issue...I had just sunken into some lovely silence when I heard the brrrr, brrrr of my cell phone vibrating. Text message: "At pond. Ground is wet. Mosquitoes. Going to med hall." I answer, "Ground will be dry later. Ok". I take a deep breathe and start to settle in. Thirty minutes later, brrrr brrrr. "At med hall. No one is here. Where is everyone?"
I peck back, "It's early. Meditate anyway." And so it continued even as each of us changed locations. "In chapel. Bad smell", "Don't like soccer", "What should I wear to rose ceremony", "Where are my sweats"... No joke, I counted. Twelve messages.

So it felt like I spent my lazy day in little segments reminding myself that she was doing what I had asked her to do and acknowledging that children can just be plain inconvenient. We met up for silent dinner and on our walk back to the dorm she told me, "I've been thinking about this all day and I've decided to take the Five Mindfulness Trainings (the 5 Precepts)." I tried to feign nonchalance and commented brightly, "Oh really?" but I had to turn my head slightly to the side to hide the tears welling up in my eyes. All I could think of was the pink bookmark I'd purchased the day before. It quotes Thich Nhat Hanh:

I walk for you.
You smile for me.
We awaken together.

ZK has a dharma name now: Loving Compassion of the Heart, chosen for her by her long adored Brother Phap B. I stood off to the side as the young monk who is only perhaps twice her age and possibly twice her height explained that he chose her name to be like his which also includes Compassion of the Heart, because she is his "continuation".
More looking out windows, holding back tears. I'm so grateful we awaken together.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Illusion

2006-07-12T08:42:00.000-04:00

It all started in 1960, the year I was born. That's when my troubles began....

LOL! It's good to be back to my little blog after a self-imposed foray into less enjoyable writing as I smashed all the written requirements for a graduate course into 3 months. I wonder just how amused the prof was to receive my last paper emailed at 3:01 am on June 29 for a June 30 deadline. Apparently I have no shame.

My gleeful 13 you was even more delighted when my husband made the observation that my academic style hadn't changed much in 20 years. Oh, I retorted, but now I really am too busy for words. Twenty years ago I just thought I was. My voice trailed off as a tiny idea about habit energy arose in my mind. Indeed it had occurred to me that this was indeed a case of "Different decade, same behavior" along with the realization that there are just some kinds of discomfort with which I am quite comfortable. In fact it turns out that many other parts of my life are marked by thriving on a bit of adrenaline - having to pare down priorities, think quick, work fast. It's not so admirable but I noticed that when I received my grade in the mail, I had a distinct feeling, not of accomplishment or pride so much as of winning. This kind of stuff insinuates itself into my life and even starts to become part of who I think I am. Don Quixote tilting at windmills-at best. Suffering, causes of suffering, clinging to suffering. Groan.

Cut to Buddhanet Audio. I am listening to Pasada, from the Edinburgh Buddhist Centre, reading a translation of the Heart Sutra that is new to me. I am struck by how tiny differences in the translation open the door to new understanding. For instance, this translation talks about Avalokita being indifferent to any kind of personal attainment rather than "there is no attainment". It refers to the bodhisattvas "dwelling without thought covering" which seems to me to be a great image of what my usual translation calls "obstacles of mind". It goes on to say that because of this reliance on perfect understanding the bodhisattvas "overcome what can upset" ie. illusion and says that one should know prajnaparamita as the great mantra, the "allayer of suffering, in truth. For what could go wrong?" All this to contemplate and I've only gotten to the second of 14 mp3 files. You can hear it at http://www.buddhanet.net/audio-talks.htm Warning- You will fall in love with Pasada's voice.

So I am taking another time out...actually going on family retreat for a week with the monks and nuns from the Green Mountain Dharma Center and Maple Grove Monastery in Vermont. I'd like to take some time to see how "what can upset" is in fact, illusion and consider how I can loosen my grasp a little without feeling like I'm losing, or I'm not me anymore, or that there is a solid me to hang on to. I'm up for a little less suffering and know that with a bit of courage, and support from the sangha, it is entirely possible. I know this thanks to all of you who keep practicing and sharing your practice, even when I'm "on leave".

Thanks for your faithfulness.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

More lessons

2006-05-08T11:32:00.000-04:00

At our sangha yesterday we were discussing the 11th of the Fourteen Mindfulness Trainings as interpreted by Thich Nhat Hanh. It is about right livelihood and responsibility as a consumer and as a citizen.

It spurred me to revisit an issue that arose from our recent trip to Manhattan. Zenchild had her huge mane of hair cut at a fancy salon's training school. She flounced into the waiting room and announced "We HAVE to go to Canal Street to buy pocketbooks...all the stylists say so!" So off we went the next morning to this incredible row of stores some only three sided entities, laden with bags, watches, jewelry,and sunglasses. Zenchild was buzzing gaily from vendor to vendor and before long we were being ushered into secret back rooms and even a basement labyrinth of yet more "designer replicas" or "knockoffs". Even I, a Birkenstock wearing, sensible bag toting mom, fell victim and purchased a fake Vuitton. Ok, a fake Prada too. Almost all the vendors were Asian and I'd guess English was a second language for the vast majority.

When we arrived home, my Dad, a retired city cop, reprimanded me
for buying good which are illegal to sell, by illegal immigrants, and which possibly fund other illegal activities, maybe even involving children.(He knows how to get my attention.) Oh jeepers, I thought...all that just buying a pocketbook! How could I be so naive? I'm not usually on the wrong side of the law!

Then a friend of mine offered her idea that the knockoff business is allowed to continue because it is a tourist attraction. She contends that if I can get into the back rooms so can any police officer and the whole thing could be shut down in a minute. I'm not sure if that was a argument for or against or just a comment on my non-threatening looks!

Then zenchild offered her observation. She noted that each little store appeared to be operated by a mom and a dad and as it was school vacation week, there were a lot of children around too. She said "Since these people are 'illegal' they probably can't get a job in a regular business and they have children they need to buy food for.." And it made me think about what kind of risks I'd be willing to take if it meant a better life for my children. Maybe a lot.

So what does this have to do with the 11th mindfulness training...quite a lot I guess. Things are just never as black and white as I think they are, or as I'd hope they could be. But the mindfulness trainings are just that, trainings in being mindful. I may not have any answers but I am sure thinking about it.

Breathing in for all the people who are struggling to create a better life for their families. Breathing out, food, shelter, and safety for all.
All in the shadow of the Statue of Liberty.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Being in NY

2006-05-08T08:53:00.000-04:00

Wow, I've missed the opportunity this blog gives me to sort through my thoughts and experiences and make sense of them. Life just gets going and I've found myself torn between my meditation time and wanting to get to this blog- not to mention the regular time consumers...kids, writing papers, work. I've been meditating long enough to know that it needs to rate up there with eating and brushing my teeth as one of the necessities for health and happiness. It's interesting to me that getting centered and connecting with "the ultimate" in the morning makes it some much more likely that I will stay connected through the day. For someone who's not a "morning person", I've yet to make sense of that.

I took zenchild on a trip to NYC over the April vacation to celebrate her 13th birthday. I grew up in Boston but had never visited NYC amazingly. She and I met up with a friend who lives in the village that I'd met on a message board about 10 years ago and we had a grand girl-y time....admiring art and architecture, seeing a play, and doing some birthday shopping.

One thing that really struck me was the immense beauty of the city. Granted we arrived as a veritable heat wave struck and had the heady pleasure of strolling the city bathed in sun and warm breezes. So that was a lovely gift. I had expected a big, grey, frantically paced city in which it would be difficult to be mindful and what I found was so different.

I couldn't have been more thrilled by the bright lights and colors if I'd been taking in a field of poppies. Gazing out the window of the M6 bus we took down to the Staten Island Ferry felt like being dropped into the window of a kaleidoscope, swirling and turning in bright lively patterns. The sense of being a tiny little speck in a huge sea of bustling humanity didn't feel overwhelming as I might have guessed, I just felt a "part of" in a very comforting way. I practiced tonglen and did a lot of musing about interbeing. While trying on lipstick at Sephora, of course...don't want to give anyone the wrong impression here!

So the trip that started out as a gift to zenchild turned out to be a wonderful respite for me as well. It wasn't exactly a retreat but it was nonetheless a time free from regular responsibilities in which I could see and appreciate the beauty around me with new eyes...the gift of freshness I suppose. I marvel at the understanding that everything is a lesson, it's all opportunity for practice, and the means for waking up is all around us no matter where we are.

I love NY.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Eyes of wisdom

2006-04-09T20:04:00.000-04:00

It's been a very strange week. I've been propped up in my bed, distorting my mind with cold remedies and codeine cough syrup, the sound of my own wheezing morphing into the sound of children crying for help in my dreams. My subconscious. Best to leave it alone.

I take care of patients who have life threatening hematologic malignancies. The treatment is lethal if not for the rescue, the infusion of immune-system-growing stem cells. Usually the transplant itself is a success. It's the complications, infections and damage to other organ systems, that can cause the big problems. Still I love this work. I've left it many times to work in other hospitals, other specialties, but I always have stayed connected to this particular unit and currently work there full-time. I love the fight. I love being able to feel that I make a difference for people who are having some of the worst moments of their lives. I love it when people get better and go home to their parents and children. Even when it doesn't work out that way, I love it that we really really tried. All that love aside, I've brought enough bodies to the morgue over my twenty year career to sink a small ship and it's always sobering, never fun. The benefit is truly understanding that bodies are not what we are though sometimes it's hard to remember, and not always comforting.

This week, a young physician from our hospital was involved in a freak accident. A piece of scaffolding blew off the side of a building onto the roof of his car. When all was said and done, he and two constuctions workers were no longer alive. Then the nursing supervisor came by with sad news of a young man unable to be resuscitated in the emergency room, a stones throw away from away the new building under construction across the street: a state-of-the-art cardiac center.

I think that's when I started to catch my cold. Some symbolic contracture of my 4th chakra, encompassing my heart and lungs hollering, "Enough!" The cruel twist is that my most effective means of being with and transforming difficult feelings is unavailable to me when I can't meditate in my usual way! I mean liberation cannot be dependent on being able to breath through your nose, I tell my pitiful self. So it's been a matter of observe, observe, name, name....just be here, just be with.

Lying with my head on three pillows, I review what my teacher says about no birth, no death, continuation, sufficient conditions. I recall my teacher Thay's dharma talk from the last day of retreat last summer. Actually he's given a similar talk the last day of the three retreats I've been lucky enough to attend. I think he has said that it is the most important of the Buddha's teachings. In it he lights a match asking the children before him, "Where did the little flame come from?" and blowing it out, "Where did our friend flame go?" and in a short time, kids who are years away from having a drivers license are considering interdependent origination: no birth, no death, no fear. And all of us are being reminded to look deeply into the nature of our fear of non-being, so that we can transform suffering and increase our capacity to be solid, calm, and peaceful, bringing happiness to ourselves and others.

The most touching part of the talk is when he says, and I paraphrase, "If you should hear in the future that Thay has died, don't you believe it. Don't believe email, fax, telephone. My nature is the nature of no birth, no death. I will be here in you and all around you, if you have the eyes of wisdom to see." You can see it in his eyes. They are shining. He really means it. He believes it.

I decide to try to believe too. Staying, staying with my feelings, fears, with my inability to breathe at the present moment, I am grateful for my body's wisdom. I am grateful for the unplanned break from my usual tasks, time to lie in my bed and ponder. And I pray for the eyes of wisdom.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Some things require a second try!

2006-03-31T14:37:00.000-05:00

I am free

2006-03-31T14:22:00.000-05:00

I have absolutely no idea what I am doing here -or what will show up where-but felt inspired by Rev. Mugo's audioblog. I loved hearing her voice. I am inspired also by the brilliant sunshine and warm winds bathing New England today. I feel like spinning circles on the lawn.

Not having any material of my own, I borrowed I Am Free, which is this years favorite of mine. I learned it from the children who attended the retreat at Stonehill College last year. I believe the store at the Deer Park Monastery sells the CD if you want to hear it in it's entirety and in better tune!

May all beings be free!

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Avalokiteshvara

2006-03-26T10:49:00.000-05:00

Winter is dragging on in New England and Zenchild spent the entire week battling fevers to 103, just to name one of her many symptoms. It's a humbling realization that in life, in general, sometimes all our grand efforts to help are reduced to simply patting a back, sitting on the bed, fetching water. Even in the ICU, with all the wonders of technology at our command, it can be the most difficult task just to be fully present for a patient for whom the technology will not be enough. And it feels like I am not enough either until I shake off my pompous delusion of being able to make everything right and do what I can do -set my intention and be present.

This week I've been feeling tired, sun-deprived, and uninspired so I felt a tiny bit of anxiety when I was given a small assignment by my sangha leader: to speak for a few minutes on the first mindfulness training at our sangha today. This will be part of a panel discussion in preparation for a transmission ceremony to take place at the day of mindfulness we are planning for the end of April. Here's Thay's version:

"Aware of the suffering caused by the destruction of life, I am committed to cultivating compassion and learning ways to protect the lives of people, animals, plants and minerals. I am determined not to kill, not to let others kill, and not to support any act of killing in the world, in my thinking, and in my way of life."

(Sigh.) Doesn't it just make you appreciate the Ten Commandments where you could march right by "Thou shall not kill" with a quick "check" and be on the way to heaven? I notice even with this training I want to commit fully to vegetarianism and call it accomplished... my ego, it's relentless! But this training has ramifications that reach into every area of my life, with the goal of cultivating compassion and weeding out the seeds of violence even in my thoughts. It's easy it is to recognize the benefit of good intentions and wishes, as I've been noticing at home and at work this week. How is it that I can think I've got a free pass on violent thoughts and bad attitudes devoid of compassion? I realize I am called to pay attention to the effect my actions and thoughts are having out there in the world which also cause suffering for myself. It requires vigilance though as it seems I purposefully set good intentions but the less benevolent thoughts take a more insidious route into my consciousness.

So I circle back to the first words as a place to begin: "Aware of the suffering caused..." because it seems clear that the first step in eliminating causes of suffering is to become aware of them, to look deeply at my own part in perpetuating violence as I make choices everyday. Everything's on this table: what I eat, what I say, the clothes I wear, the car I drive, even the actions I don't take that support the status quo and institutionalized violence: war, poverty, prejudice. Phew! Thank goodness we are asked only make a concerted effort to head in the direction, knowing we will never reach the ideal.

In one dharma talk, Thay refers to the depiction of Avalokiteshvara, the bodhisattva of compassion, who has one thousand arms and one thousand hands. In the middle of each hand is an eye. The image is so stunning. When we have eyes in our hands, when we can see what our actions are doing, then we can have compassion. Maybe I can bring a photo to the sangha today so I don't lose my train of thought and crumple into a heap of mono-syllables when a mere 40 or so eyes turn to me...LOL.

More importantly, this morning we are baking brownies for a soup kitchen being put on by sangha members. Another example of "too little" thinks my cynical mind. Then again, who doesn't enjoy a brownie now and again and today it's what we can do. I'm going to think about those thousand arms. Those eyes. And into each brownie we will breathe the intention, "May we be aware of suffering. May we be free from suffering".

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Taking refuge

2006-03-16T16:03:00.000-05:00

This blogging experience hasn't been what I expected. That's usual for me actually, LOL. I thought that my blog would be a personal journal, one that might encourage or help others. When I decided to become an aspirant in the Order of Interbeing I found the Woodmoor Zendo blog and was thrilled to read a bit about Nacho's experience, his description of the lineage, and his account of ordination. I came upon a few sites here and there where aspirants had written small pieces in newsletters about their working with a certain precept, all fascinating and encouraging to me.

So when I started up this Zenmom blog, I didn't think I'd be including other bloggers in my metta meditation, offering good wishes for lab results, doing tonglen for those like myself in challenging relationships, wondering how the mothers of these gutsy young monastics in foreign lands feel about their children, so noble but so far away, and wondering if they miss their families too.

Nacho's post entitled "Taking refuge in the blangha" gave me a chance to think about this a little further. In my adult "real" life I haven't had a community of practice, or even a community of like-thinkers. I started working with a spiritual director about ten years ago when I was yearning for some human feedback and conversation about Spirit and my spiritual path. Since my SD lives in the middle of Puget Sound and I live smack on the edge of the Atlantic Ocean, even this relationship exists over phone wires as does my more recently formed relationship with my dharmacharya, who is, at least, only one state away!

Over the years, as I've journeyed through interests in creation spirituality, far-to-the-left Christianity, contemplative prayer, meditation, and Buddhism, almost all of my fellowship has been of the online variety. Only in the last few years, through attending a few Thich Nhat Hahn retreats and having a local sangha become available to me, have I been able to practice on a regular basis with other folks. It's ironic that although I ban my daughter from My Space and lecture her incessantly about the dangers of online predators saying, "you never know if people are really who they present themselves to be", some of my most important heart warming "real" relationships have been formed online. (I once threw my entire family into a panic when I met and went camping with an online friend, a lovely woman from Manhattan, with whom Zenchild is allowed to correspond since we have now even had her to visit in our home. Pity the poor child that has to live with my inconsistencies, but I digress.)

This virtual world has a way of eliminating the distraction of physical presence and my inherent prejudice about how people look and what I'm expecting them to say. While it's true that the lack of input from body language, facial expressions, and tone of voice requires a more careful and precise use of words, in another sense, online we may cut right to the essence of who we are: thoughts, ideas, feeelings. Sometimes these are more easily expressed when I can take my time and make sure that I am saying exactly what I mean. My real-life sangha is a little formal, low-key, without much interaction save some polite conversation in hushed tones around the shoe changing area and a lot of bowing. My sangha may become more of a refuge for me in time, especially with increased commitment to making it so. But for now I have to say, the online community, including this blangha, feels very nurturing.

I'm grateful for that and I do take refuge. Thanks everyone!

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Vrushali

2006-03-16T12:46:00.000-05:00

I've been preoccupied this last week trying to pull a rabbit out of my hat which is what writing a paper for a course feels like after 20 or so years of non-paper-writing! To my delight I've found all kinds of on-line help....programs that auto-format your paper with instructions like "click here and begin typing", even a service where I could submit my paper on a Saturday at midnight and have "Vrushali" zip it on back to me marked up with comments and suggestions by Sunday dinnertime. Wow, where were these people in the 1980's when I really had better things to be doing!

I had to pause, smile wanly, and read again when I came to this comment:
"For a large part of the essay, you simply go on giving quotes from people about the topic in concern here. You should give the readers your analysis, Susan, not the critics’. You are supposed to use the source information only to support your statements and opinions, not the other way round."

How do you suppose this guy got to know me so well just by reading a 6 page paper on nursing theory? I want to wail back "Well, I don't have any opinions of my own! Whadya think, that I've been a nurse for 20 years with my eyes OPEN?" Heck, I've been alive for 45 years half asleep too.

I was raised practicing a religion in which I was told what "we" believe. There is one prayer that is memorized by every child called the Nicene Creed that is a long series of "We believe" statements which, as far as I know, have not been revised in a very long time. It's not that I find fault with this or any statement of beliefs but I am awared that in all my 12 years of religious education, I was never encouraged to evaluate them, to question why these particular beliefs were deemed the most important ones, or to consider making them my own in an authentic way.

Scrambling along on this Buddhist path is a lesson for me in trying to stop quoting the critics, to stop trying to figuring out what "we" Buddhists believe so I can just sign on the line and relax about it. I have to admit that even with my dharma teacher and my spiritual director, I have the tendency to look for validation for my own experience even though, I assure you, they are both on to me. I want it easy, but that's not their job.

So on to my life, where mindfulness allows me to be present for what's happening without the overlay of everyone else's commentary, just my own experience. And on to my cushion where I can observe what comes up for me over and over, where the thoughts go, which ones return, what the feelings are, what my body does with these energies and just letting it all be ok. Looking deeply at my own experience, learning how to identify the thoughts that give rise to my particular suffering, beginning to find ways to transform suffering through understanding and compassion... In the end, this deep looking and working with my own stuff, leads to clarity, even insight. I know because I've experienced it, just a bit, just a glimmer but enough to make me "believe". It's really pretty amazing.

My creed may be short but it's my own and at that, subject to change.
Now to remember not to hold too tightly. Tomorrow's another day and everything can be different. I must thank that Vrushali.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Bead lady

2006-03-07T20:03:00.000-05:00

Lately I've been having a harder time than usual getting to my meditation time as early as I like. When I meditate for the first time mid-day or even later, it feels like coming in halfway through a movie or a party, as if I've missed out on half the fun I could have had. Which is true in a sense because that first connection with my breathing, making myself present for the day, makes mindfulness that much easier for the 24 hours ahead.

Ideally my morning sitting fits nice and snug between my shower and breakfast, while the coffee brews. Lately it's been so cold in the morning, zenchild has been beset by a spell of disorganization running around noisily looking for crucial items such as her favorite barrette or worse, her school shoes, and I've been desperately trying to see if I can pass in one assignment for a nursing theory class that will allow me to apply for an extension (what WAS I thinking?). At any rate, I have a litany of excuses as usual.

So since I am so adept at finding and describing all the things that make it hard for me to get to my cushion, I wanted to give equal time to considering the things that make it easier for me to stop stumbling so much with my practice, walk a little straighter, make a greater effort. I came up with a list of conditions that make my sitting more likely...getting to bed on time, sunshine drawing me down the stairs, zenchild's items gathered and ready to go. And then the things that make it easier for me to be mindful during the day...among them some habits I've acquired of returning to my breathe as I start the car and open doors or remembering my teacher Thay whenever I see a cloud (He told the kids once that he is "mmm, perhaps 70% cloud", something that zenchild has not forgotten.) As a child myself my classmates and I were instructed by the nuns to say a prayer whenever we heard church bells and it'd been a habit of mine to connect with the ultimate when I hear bells ringing , even before I'd heard of the bell of mindfulness.

This morning I was reminded of another "bell of mindfulness" and thought to mention her here. She is a very small older asian woman who crosses my path many mornings when I drive my daughter to school. She is walking a route that we've only partially figured out...we don't know her starting point and wonder though we may, we don't know her destination either. In the winter she looks like a small eskimo with her furry hood tightly drawn around her face. No matter what the weather she walks with small, slow steps, smiling a little smile and in her hands, always, rosary beads swinging to and fro with each of her steps. Zenchild reports..."They aren't mala beads. There's definitely a cross on the end" or "Oh look, the beads are green today, almost fluorescent!" For a while she had a theory going that the beads matched her day's outfit but that was disproved. If we don't see her for a while, we worry about her and think to throw in a Hail Mary of our own for her, since she obviously likes them so much.

One particular morning after drop-off, I was having a very tense conversation on my cellphone with Zendad and I pulled into a side street to talk because I was so distracted. As my conversation continued I could see the woman, whom Zenchild calls "bead lady", turn down the street and advance toward my car getting bigger and bigger in my side view mirror. Despite the conversation, I couldn't take my eyes off her. It was sheer admiration for her- the personification of sheer equanimity, faithfulness, dependability. As she came to where I was pulled over she passed by on the other side of the street and as she did, she looked over. I don't know if it was my tear stained face that inspired her or if it was just a whim but she took her beads, turned slightly without stopping, and blessed me with them, making a small cross in the air, deepening her smile for a second and continuing on. It was truly a moment of loving-kindness, of grace.

So she came to my mind this morning with the acknowledgement that she belongs on the list of things and people who help me remain on the path. Thank goodness for people like her. Her good example, the very energy she exudes, makes me want to rush home to my meditation room and hit the cushion running. What would she ever think if I told her this? Some day I'm going to find out.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Singing Poplar

2006-02-28T10:04:00.000-05:00

I have a confession to make. Zenmom sends her child to a Catholic School.

It's the best decision her Dad and I ever made, for a lot of reasons. First, uniforms are the best thing that could ever happen to the mother of a girl in terms of quality of life, (shallow of me, I know.) And yes, the academics are rigorous: National Honor Society is a good thing I guess. Still, what value most about my daughter's school is the way kindness is expected and pretty consistently modeled by the teachers and staff. The kids really seem to get it. From all appearances and despite endless grumbling about homework, they seem pretty happy for anguished young teens. Recently I questioned my daughter about leaving her ipod on the bus during a field trip. She said "Mom, no one would ever steal my ipod. Things don't get stolen at my school." Ahhh... I didn't know that.

Today she is off on another field trip, this one a religious retreat. She responded to my enthusiasm with a shrug and "Boring." "Really, how?" "I don't like to have to talk about God or pray according to a schedule." (How shocking. She doesn't like to clean her room or practice piano on any kind of regular basis never mind schedule either, but I didn't say that.)

Funny because I remember taking her to Thich Nhat Hanh's retreat at Stonehill College in 2002. She didn't have much initial enthusiasm for that either but by the last day she was hiking her little 9 year old self across the campus at 530 am to take the children's equivalent of the 5 Mindfulness Tranings, the 2 Promises, bowing to the floor to the great big bell and receiving the dharma name, Singing Poplar of the Heart.

As she approaches 13, she is a little more private about her spiritual practices and the conversations tend to be short. She doesn't join me in my evening meditation time as she used to and inviting the bell to ring, well, I guess that's passe. So I was secretly delighted when she had to write an essay for english class that illustrated a lesson that had been learned. She wrote about that first retreat and how she had dreaded going, prejudging the whole thing based on photographs of solemn monks and nuns she had seen. But she concluded:

"They were the most amazing people....completely devoted to their self-chosen spiritual path. I would've thought that someone with no checkbook, no cell phone, no fax, and no hair, would be the most miserable person in the world, but in fact they are the most joyous people i have ever been able to spend time with. I learned many lessons from them, how to stay peaceful in the present moment, that a lot of money and things aren't necessary to be happy, that there are many paths to God, and that you shouldn't judge a book by its cover or a nun by her robes"

Ahhh....more I didn't know.

84,000 dharma doors....what a relief! I'm sure she'll find a couple without my having to know a thing.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Flowers

2006-02-22T11:04:00.000-05:00

My dharma teacher (hereafter known as DT) admonishes "Read a little, practice a lot". I recognize the wisdom of that advice as I am someone who can easily think that the more books I read the better prepared I am. For what I'm not sure but I think it has to do with my ever present wish to get a firm hold on the essentially slippery nature of life. Sort of brings to mind the image of Don Quixote tilting at windmills, doesn't it? Get a grip indeed...

I spent a few years being treated for infertility and by the time I was actually pregnant I knew I needed to avoid information overload and resisted buying an entire shelf of pregnancy books. I decided not to even read too far ahead. Cosmic joke....my daughter was 6 weeks premature and I wasn't "ready", hadn't even finished childbirth classes! As a result, my husband and I dealt with the labor and delivery as it came and to this day, I cannot remember a more mindful, present event...the best ever. I can recall telling one of my friends that, even though I was a few years into meditation, until then I hadn't had the experience of single-mindedness, of concentration. What a gift. Sometimes life gives you one, not to mention a beautiful baby.

Right now though I'm wandering in the realm of difficult relationships and want to travel in a way I haven't before, a path that doesn't increase suffering for myself or anyone else. I am grateful for my DT's advice and her teaching regarding transforming suffering and healing ourselves. Kim talked so clearly in her blog the other day about her awareness of the ball of stress she feels in her stomach and it reminded me of my teachers advice to be mindful of what it is we are carrying around. She quotes Thay as saying, "What we don't heal, we transmit", a truth which, I imagine every parent has experienced.

Her teaching for me on our very first session described a practice called healing the past in the present moment, but I think it could be subtitled "healing the present too". The idea is to invite difficult feelings in rather than pushing them away, holding them like a mother holds her crying baby. With mindful breathing and attention the feeling is calmed and released. I practiced for many years stopping at this point, taking my unwanted feelings to meditation and sitting with them until eventually they just dissipated. But it seems there is more we can do which is called deep listening: sitting with the feeling, looking at its nature, paying attention to the memories that surface, and sending compassion to oneself at that time or place. Sometimes the causes of suffering will come clearly into view and we can see the beliefs that are at the root of these feelings. In this way our relationship with the feeling can be understood and transformed, the way I have heard Thay say that garbage becomes compost in which flowers grow.

If it's any consolation my DT concedes that it's rigorous practice because our habit energy is so ingrained but my experience has been that the gentleness of the practice, the way it is approached with complete acceptance and compassion for oneself makes it a whole lot easier to begin.

So I guess that my blog can become what I had intended...a chronicle of the path, my path at least, aspiring to be Zenmom, aspiring to the Order of Interbeing, aspiring to transform suffering in myself and being able to share the practice with others. I am grateful for this particular dharma door and I am off to practice now.

If I use my imagination I can almost smell the flowers.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

My dear little heart

2006-02-17T11:04:00.000-05:00

I'd meant this blog to be a chronicle of the journey of aspiration to Thich Nhat Hanh's Order of Interbeing, a nice little description of the Fourteen Mindfulness Trainings, the teachings of my dharma teacher, and my attempts at integrating all this into my life. Turns out this blog's edges aren't so neatly defined and it's definitely not nearly as esoteric as my ego would like.

Well, I can't make it up, can I?

So charging on with all the inelegance that my life and the inner workings of my mind entail...today I am pondering right action. Yesterday I subjected myself to a barrage of cardiac tests designed to determine just how much stress my heart could take in light of my recent ER visit for an arrythmia. With some kind of metal electro-shock-like device on my head with an arm hanging down in front of my nose to hold a snorkel-like mouthpiece in my mouth, a clothespin pinching my nostrils shut, all kinds of wires on my chest and a blood pressure cuff taped to my arm, I was expected to ride a bike! If only I had thought to bring a friend with a video camera I'm sure we could be millionaires right now or at least stars of "Americas Funniest Home Videos".

The good news is that there was nothing that could be found wrong with my heart. The other good news is that in addition to taking medication, I need to look at stress, diet, and exercise in my life which could be categorized as high, fair to poor, and none. (Did you get that feigned cheerfulness though?)

These three things and the inconsistencies between my beliefs and my behavior around them have been presenting themselves to me for consideration at pretty regular intevals over the last several years and with increasing urgency. I perked up my ears yesterday when the cardiologist casually referred to my heart as "irritable". Irritable! Enter the image of a cranky heart shouting out it's complaints like Archie Bunker chewing out Meathead....how un-zenlike.

So I guess it's my time to make friends with all this dissonance, thank my heart for all it's done and been for me, and vow to make amends. The middle path, here we go again.

I have no answers right now only a lot of vague thoughts and ideas about.....the quality of my relationships and what I want in my life, my crazy all night work schedule, how to make a commitment to go completely vegetarian while still cooking for a child allergic to beans and soy, how to eat in moderation and to promote health, and how to fit in the right kind and amount of exercise not just for short term but as a lifestyle change. It's been more my style to jump into a crash diet and join a gym class in which I have no hope of keeping up... but we know where that leads.

So today, I am sitting with my heart, inviting it to sit and have a cup of tea with me. I will ask "My dear little heart, I am here for you as you have been here for me. Tell me what it is you need now." I'm guessing that I will get some answers.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

No time to lose

2006-02-15T04:50:00.000-05:00

I recently purchased Pema Chodron's book "No Time to Lose". The very sight of it on my kitchen counter is making me nervous. During my affirmation phase, one of my favorite affirmations was "I have all the time I need." The problem with affirmations was that I always felt as though I was trying to fool myself, something along the lines of setting the clock ten minutes ahead, so it had an almost opposite effect. I just may have missed the point of the whole affirmation thing, but I digress.

Of course, I haven't actually opened the book to see what Pema has to offer by way of explanation for the title but I have the idea that it will be similar to the comments made in the Eternal Peace blog the other day in which the author ponders the instructions to practice with the single-mindedness and urgency "like your head was on fire". Now that's an image. Similarly, I have a framed copy of the Great Mountain Zen Center's evening gatha hanging in my kitchen which admonishes:

Let me respectfully remind you,
Life and death are of supreme importance.
Time swiftly passes by and opportunity is lost.
Each of us should strive to awaken.
Awaken! Take heed! Do not squander your lives....

So I am left to consider what it will mean for me to be diligent, faithful to my practice, but not anxiously overconcerned with lost opportunity or sqandering my life! The middle path, it's really a challenge. Especially when I think too much.

When I don't think so much but present myself for whatever is before me with an open heart it becomes a lot easier. Space opens up where there didn't seem to be any before. I listen to my daughter. I refrain from judging my husband's every comment. I am patient in traffic. I appreciate snow falling on my hatless head. I stop walking by the plant that's needed watering for a week and water it. My two block walk from the parking garage to the hospital is an opportunity for walking meditation. As I enter my workplace I dedicate the merit, the power any positive actions might generate, toward relieving the suffering of all beings. Using the practice of tonglen, any strong feeling or painful situation I encounter in my day can be the basis for connecting with the suffering of others and the whole situation can begin to feel completely different.

This practice, it's just so good for me. Thanks to the Eternal Peace blogger for giving me the opportunity to check my head for flames!

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Just today

2006-02-09T12:16:00.000-05:00

Today is just a day. How odd that I should find it comforting to note! There's no drama to report and no big challenges so far....I thought I had nothing to write about but then I thought again.

I am going about my daily activities, driving to school, stopping by my parents house for coffee, talking to my sister on the phone, organizing bills, contemplating laundry. There's no charge, no excitement. Interestingly, my recent experience with my rapid heart rhythm has made me much more aware of what gets my heart beating more rapidly. The other night at work during a stressful exchange with a physician I could feel a little adrenaline surge. Immediately I thought, "This isn't good for me" and I paid attention to my breathing, lowered and softened my voice, and unclenched my fist. The most amazing thing was that the result of making a conscious effort to relax my physical body, the irritation I was feeling seemed to lessen quite a bit. I guess I have a new way to understand the concept of "letting go" and another lesson about taking care of myself.

Anyway, these are the kinds of days I love.

These are the kinds of days I feel like I really might make it as a Buddhist! Driving slowly, enjoying the banter from the back seat of the car, appreciating a cup of tea, sitting in meditation in a sunny room, walking to the mailbox and waving the mail person, sorting through clothes to be washed, catching up on emails...Pretty much being present for all these mundane things feels like a small miracle. In these moments I feel connected to Spirit, the Ultimate, that ineffable creative energy that runs through my life just waiting for me to be able to change my posture, to turn towards it, always there.

I can't say how lucky I feel to have found a practice that teaches me how to find peace in stressful times but also in everyday moments. I recall Blake's poem that talks about finding the world in a grain of sand and heaven in a wildflower. I thought I'd understood the meaning of the poem but not until practicing mindfulness did I really feel that experience for myself. So I am grateful for these times when conditions are sufficient and I am tuned in enough to appreciate the lovliness all around me.

Sorting laudry? Who'd have thunk it? I'm not telling anyone else but if you haven't tried it, you just have to. It's a wonderful alchemy... finding the divine in the mundane, like turning coal to diamonds or lead to gold. And it doesn't take much to start. Just the intention to be present for whatever you experience and the ability to come back when you've drifted off, usually by paying attention to the breath. You'll see.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Bodhisattvas

2006-02-03T17:29:00.000-05:00

"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." These are the opening lines of the song of Thich Nhat Hanh's poem "Call Me By My True Names". Today it seems to speak directly to me.

In the midst of so much that is just plain hard there is so much beauty and kindness to be found too. I close my eyes in meditation and am beset with an onslaught of panic at all the "could happens" in my life, fear of future discomfort and pain for myself and those I love, and shame that I am just not living up to my ideals of practicing loving kindness and compassion, not even close. Keep breathing...

I am aware, as my dharma teacher reminds, that it is impossible to practice compassion for others until we can hold the same for ourselves. Why is that such a challenge? Habit energy of many years would be the obvious answer. So I sit with that and breathe in for all beings who are experiencing the same sense of failure and breath out the sense that we are nonetheless worthy and good-enough.

I subscribe to a daily email lojong teaching. In today's lesson Alan Wallace says "When we start to belittle ourselves for our own faults, recognize that they are simply afflictions obscuring our own essential purity and our capacity for full awakening. These temporary distortions are not who we are, and we do have the means for overcoming them. This is what Buddhadharma is all about: the dispelling of distortions and obscurations." Back to the 4 Noble Truths....there is suffering and there is a way out of suffering and I can get there. Ok, I'm in...

And besides the relief that there is hope for transformation, I feel deeply grateful that the scales upon which samsara is seated seems to be just about perfectly counterbalanced by what I might once have called grace but now call the energy of the many bodhisattvas.....the people who show up to love me. One definition of bodhisattvas attributed to Longchempa is "active servants of peace..." I am blessed, and humbled, by the presence of so many in my life.

Among my bodhisattvas, most wouldn't relate to the name....my daughter wrapping her arm around my waist whispering sweet words, her best friend and his mom who raced to the hospital emergency room to make sure we were all alright, my mom calling to offer to pick up a tea kettle because I'd mentioned I need one, extended phone time with my spiritual director and dharma teacher, the headmaster of my daughters school phoning to say he was available to help in any way he could, flowers from the school staff and faculty, flowers from my co-workers, a check in the mail from a friend whose husband is not working saying "Chinese are not subtle in the ways they show love...they send cash!", a gift card to Trader Joes from a co-worker with the message "Dinner's on me", and the many many phone calls and emails of concern and encouragement and just listening, allowing me to tell the stories until they are really told. I take refuge...

Indeed, servants of peace.

See you out there.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

May all beings be at peace

2006-02-02T01:13:00.000-05:00

Well, I have taken to meditating directly in front of the Peace is Every Step calligraphy. It reminds me of when I was in the midst of my difficult pregnancy and I needed to use a simple guided meditation to get any sense of quieting the monkey mind. Lately I need to have my teacher Thay's energy out in front, to help me get centered, to keep my balance. I have to say, it feels a little precarious. But this is my practice, my path, the way that makes sense to me.

At the risk of having this turn into some kind of blog-o-drama, I will relate the sparse details of my day last Sunday after awakening with a migraine headache and ending with a trip to the emergency room complete with cardioversion of a dangerously fast heart rthythm. Now along with medicine comes the scheduling of a battery of tests and appointments and all the attendant thoughts and feelings. I am no stranger to high tech medical care: I work in an ICU but I am strangely unfamiliar with feeling personally vulnerable to illness.

It's amazing, isn't it, that faced with a reminder of my own ultimate impermanence, what I feel is surprised, even when I take care of young patients facing life-threatening illness every day. So it's interesting to see what proceeds from this little mind-stopping event, to observe what thoughts, what feelings float in and out of my awareness. Another teacher Pema Chodron quotes, "Don't even think for a moment that you're not going to die" but apparently it's a challenge for me to consider it seriously for even a moment. So I am thinking deeply about how to open my heart (no pun intended) to this experience that seems to have been strangely timed in a series of difficult events.

So begin again, begin again. Sit and breathe. Notice, notice, feel, name, observe, and breathe, breathe, breathe. Flash on impermanence, spaciousness, ultimate goodness and be aware that countless sentient beings are thinking the same thoughts, are trying to make sense of similar experiences, are feeling the same feelings. Hold a sense of connection for a moment and breathe out a sense of safety, of gentleness, of the sacredness of life.

"May all beings be at peace...."

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Peace is every step

2006-01-25T11:07:00.000-05:00

Today is one of those days where I feel like an enormous effort is required to just keep breathing and the waters are rising fast. All around are pieces needing to be picked up and the task looks large, large, large. Appointments, insurance papers, strong emotions, pain...amid the everyday "stuff" of life. What is it that Thich Nhat Hahn says when someone really blunders? That their practice is "not so skillful"...I think that could be it. He seems to say it with a big grin and a little shrug as if to add "That's how it is sometimes". That's how it is for me today.

It's really a very kind compassionate way to look at what we might normally call "failure" because the sense is that compassion and understanding are skills and if we don't have them so much now there is a possibility that we can learn them. We can increase our capacity, our skill level, by practicing the teachings. Great teachers rarely waste time blaming or shaming. I'm trying to learn that too.

It's one of the beautiful features of Buddhist teaching as I understand it...that we learn to love others by first accepting and loving ourselves, that we achieve liberation and then look to the goal of liberation for others too, that suffering can be understood and transformed into peace and joy.

At a retreat last summer, I decided to purchase a special gift for myself, a calligraphy by Thay. I took my time, mindfully considering each of the black inked phrases available that day. "I am home", "I have arrived", "Interbeing", "Drink your tea", "Peace in myself, Peace in the World" but the one that spoke to me most deeply was "Peace is every step" because it reminds me that all the places we go, we get there one step at a time (this is good for my rushing problem) but also that each step is a new chance to choose peace (good for my "I blew it" mind) and that I have always before me the opportunity to begin again, right here, right now.

I think I'm going to take a few moments to sit quietly before the framed calligraphy and immerse myself in the lovely truth of that message, reminding myself that I can take refuge in the dharma anytime. I can feel the smile of the teacher, I can see the little shoulder shrug, and I feel very grateful that a renegade monk from a war-torn land opened his heart to share his love and wisdom with us. Very skillfully. It inspires me to keep on practicing.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Shifting Ground

2006-01-22T12:06:00.000-05:00

Wow! Remind me to always qualify any announcements of what I'll be doing at any point with some tentative disclaimer such as "I'm planning" or "I hope to" or as my grandmother was apt to say "God willing".

My keychains went to the aspirant dinner without me.

My husband's Dad had died a couple of days ago and due to a cemetery scheduling issue (!) was not to be waked until today and buried tomorrow. My husband decided to keep a doctors appointment on Friday for which he had waited a long time. He left the house at 930 am but hardly 10 minutes later I was listening to the adrenaline-charged voice of a bodhisattva who had witnessed his car careening off the side of the highway and bothered to stop and get my cell phone number. He gave me the location and added that I should "get up there" because "he's in bad shape".

No problem. My specialty...rushing.

My car ride was a study in observing my mind. Breathe, breathe, breathe, I chanted...then breathe slower, breathe slower as my face began to tingle. Clutching my cell phone, "Who can I call?", and the awful thought..."No one." It would seem too cruel to ask anyone to merely accompany me in my terror. It seems that there are these moments in life when we are just alone and the ground is sliding around below our feet, or worse, sinking. Pema Chodron says that it's an illusion that we think we can ever stand on solid ground. We can't.

The good news is that as I approached the scene of flashing lights and neon striped emergency workers I could see my husband through the eerie picture frame of twisted metal created by the sunroof of the car on its side, holding his hand to his head, moving therefore breathing. It took nearly an hour to extricate him as I stood breathing my gratitude for the entire scene, especially the very capable, very young people who are willing to do this for a living. My husband's Dad had been a firefighter and it was a curious thing that at one point when I asked to approach the car to let him know I was there, my husband's bloody hand wobbled out a pile of papers and folders to me, mong them his Dad's funeral and insurance papers. On top, covered with glass but in perfect condition was his father's plaque commemorating his many decades of service in the fire department. I couldn't help but think it represented some kind of very good karma as I held it like a shield across my heart.

The rest of the 2 day hospital tale is a mix of kindness and caring alongside frustration and waiting and things being lost and misunderstood: more opportunities for patience and compassion than should be allowed. The diagnoses at the end of the trail of scans and exams include a concussion, contusions, a stable vertebral fracture, and a Herman Munster-like gash in the forehead. The hard part is that though home now, my husband is badly injured, barely able to walk, and will miss his Dad's services today and likely tomorrow. My heart aches for the nearly 50 year old man who so badly wants to see his Dad one last time. I think about how I coaxed him from his father's bedside the night he stayed with his Dad as he died, with the words, "You'll get to say good-bye again". I didn't add, "God willing."

I know it's just more shifting ground and turn to my teacher Thay's instructions for answers to the question "What can I do?" And I find some. In between the dressing changes, and pill dispensing, and efforts to prop pillows I sit and breathe. As best I can be, I am present.

More opportunities to practice. God willing, I will.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Keychain links

2006-01-19T21:00:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow night I am having dinner with my Buddhist mentor and 2 others who are interested in studying and practicing in the tradition of Thich Nhat Hanh. We'd all previously made a commitment to 5 mindfulness trainings, or precepts as they are more commonly called, but in the last several months each of us decided to seek lay ordination in the order called Tiep Hien or Interbeing. It feels like a vast undertaking to me and one for which, at any moment, I am afraid I will find out that I am completely unsuited.

However, I've felt this way before. I recognize it. Here are the things for which I've heretofore felt completely fraudulent about even attempting: being a grown-up, being married, becoming a mom, being a nurse, tackling the ICU, stopping drinking, passing the graduate school entrance exam, and really loving someone.... I am heartened when I consider that since the end is not in sight the only thing to do is: take a step, take a step, take a step, smile. I may never wear the brown coat that signifies ordination, some embodiment of "when the fruit is ripe, you know it" that somehow exemplifies readiness. Still, I will get wherever I get step, step, stepping and smiling all the while.

As usual, I am grateful when there is company on the path. I've always been the type to like to share notes with others, benefit from a different perspective, marvel at differences and beam with the lovely comfort of understanding. So today while I was waiting to pick up my daughter at school, an idea floated to me and I popped into a local bead store with an idea, a vague image having to do with hearts, our hearts, and a shared path. When each of us accepted the 5 mindfulness trainings we received a "dharma name" which was meant to reflect our intentions. Mine is Authentic Kindness of the Heart and the other aspirants' dharma names also end with "of the Heart". So for my dinner partners, I chose 3 hearts of cloisonne, bone, and brass, some little sparkling crystal spacers and took them home. Paying attention to remaining mindful I breathed gratitude into my little assembly of colors and wire and carefully crafted matching key chains.

Dinner was late but it seemed that seemed ok.

Oddly enough, my 12 year old just flounced by on her way to get ready for bed and announced "I heart you Mom"....just computer talk I know, but still. She's calling now and I'm going. Smiling.

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart

Aspiring to be zenmom

2006-01-18T17:24:00.000-05:00

I want to give voice to the part of me who aspires to be zenmom. I used to work with a woman who, whenever the conversation turned to the crazy antics of pre-teens, would close her eyes, adopt a semi-lotus position even if standing and chant "We will be zenmom, we can be zenmom". Indeed we are living with honest-to-God zenmasters. (We learned that in Whole Child Whole Parent while we were still pregnant, didn't we?) Still, it's turned out to be rigorous training. Who needs obscure koans when the questions like "If you hadn't been my mother, would I ever have been born?" come fast and furious from the back of the mini-van. Who needs to be startled with the rap of a zenmaster's stick when confronted with the jolt of finding out that your darling offspring has indeed done something that you'd have bet your life savings could never happen! Beginner's mind? Is there any other name for the mind of parents who aspire to practicing understanding with a first child and get to feel smug for exactly a nano-second with the second. Then comes the jaw-dropping realization that with a different child, it's all different.

So all this tongue-in-cheek is not to make light of the road to spiritual liberation on the Buddhist path Only to say, that I am a mom and I want to be on the path of liberation too. Thank goodness for our little zenmasters who give us an endless amount of raw material with which to work, and instant feedback on where we are spiritually in any given moment. That said, some adult help from those further along the path seems necessary too. Ah, spiritual directors, dharma teachers, sangha sisters and brothers...Instruction, correction, encouragement....Precepts to study and practice.

So lucky....time to make dinner...

Zenmom
Authentic Kindness of the Heart