POC Practice Opportunities Still Relevant

This week I read an article about a recent Level One Shambhala Training for People of Color in the Shambhala Times, an online community news magazine of the Shambhala global community.

In response to the question Why Separate? the article begins:

The reality for people of color is that they do not always feel welcome. This perception comes in ways that may be subtle and unseen by others. Our intention was to create an environment in which diversity as well as difference could be appreciated and encouraged, in which it would feel safe to explore goodness in our experience, and in which we could uncover who we are genuinely, undiluted, unconfused, and, in particular, uncluttered by our habitual patterns of relating to the majority culture.

Even today as barriers continue to shatter that many never expected to witness (specifically the election of President Obama), the levels of comfort and acceptance (both perceived and experienced) by Blacks seeking Buddhism continue to be varied yet tend towards the same theme. Many simply don't know what to expect but believe they will be entering a community where they are an obvious and felt minority.

The Shambhala community gets it and is making conscious strides towards diversity. While I long for a day when these programs aren't necessary, I applaud Shambhala for the steps they are taking to acknowledge and meet the need.

 

Daily Dharma

The object of vipassana practice is to learn to see the truths of impermanence, unsatisfactoriness, and selflessness of phenomena. We think we are doing this already, but that is an illusion. It comes from the fact that we are paying so litte attention to the ongoing surge of our own life experiences that we might just as well be asleep. We are simply not paying enough attention to notice that we are not paying attention. It is another Catch-22.

Through the process of mindfulness, we slowly become aware of what we really are, down below the ego image. We wake up to what life really is. It is not just a parade of ups and downs, lollipops and smacks on the wrist. That is an illusion. Life has a much deeper texture than that if we bother to look, and if we look in the right way.

Vipassana is a form of mental training that will teacy you to experience the world in an entirely new way. You will learn for the first time what is truly happening to you, around you, and within you. It is a process of self-discovery, a participatory investigation in which you observe your own experiences while participating in them.

[...from Mindfulness in Plain English by Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, pg. 31-32]

Mindfulness: Not a Pink Practice

This morning I read an op-ed piece from the New York Times by Judith Warner called Being and Mindfulness. I heard about the article yesterday while acquainting myself with Twitter. I'm a very late adopter of the service and only found a reason to use it a week ago when I launched cycle one of the 108 days [the Remix] blog. So I was searching for recent tweets on meditation, mindfulness, buddhist blogs and the like and I took note of the following:

robertahill: NYT Judith Warner: Being and Mindfulness http://twurl.nl/jn1tvw Must read.

A glowing endorsement. A news source I often find engaging. Okay... I'll bite.

As I read, I wondered if Ms. Warner really understands what mindfulness is all about. She seemed to be talking more about a New Age spirituality than anything else. She complained of her mindfulness-leaning friends appearing to be replaced by pod people. She championed the importance of the edge... a personality that understands the art and science of sarcasm, is skilled in flippant remarks and dark humor and is not afraid to yell. She expressed concern about the loneliness and disenfranchisement she has felt being on the receiving end of a friend's foray into mindfulness, and she wondered if mindfulness (while it is supposed to bring people together) only loosens the bonds between people and pushes them further apart which she summed up in the following statement:

I have no doubt that this meta-connectedness feels real, and indeed is real, in the abstract at least. But in real-life encounters, I’ve come lately to wonder whether meaningful bonds are well forged by the extreme solipsism that mindfulness practice often turns out to be.

Really? Solipsism?

Solipsism is a term that is common in circles of academic philosophy but arguably lesser known outside those circles. While the NYT's dictionary pop-up feature does provide a brief definition of the term:

sol·ip·sism (sŏl'ĭp-sĭz'əm, sō'lĭp-)
n. Philosophy.

1. The theory that the self is the only thing that can be known and verified.
2. The theory or view that the self is the only reality.

[Latin sōlus, alone + Latin ipse, self + –ISM.]

A dictionary of philosophy will provide definitions with more context and breadth:

solipsism, epistemological (from Latin, solus, alone, single, sole + ipse, self)
1. the theory that one's consciousness (self, mind) cannot know anything other than its own content, see egocentric predicament. 2. one's consciousness alone is the underlying justification for, and cause of, any knowledge of the existence or nonexistence of anything at all. Contrasted with OBJECTIVISM (EPISTEMOLOGY).

soliphsism, metaphysical literally, "I myself only exist"; the theory that no reality exists other than one's self. The self (mind, consciousness) constitutes the totality of existence. All things are creations of one's consciousness at the moment one is conscious of them. Other things do not have any independent existence, they are states of, and are reducible to, one's consciousness.

[...from The Harper Collins Dictionary of Philosophy, 2nd Edition]

I would've preferred the use of another term, like say self-centeredness or egocentricity in place of soliphsism in this article. I think the inherent error that the premise of this article expounds can be summed up by the use of the word as much as by the content of the article itself. Just because one can use the word solphisism in a sentence does not mean they are stating a well thought or reasonable premise. That is just the type of egocentricity that Warner appears to be trying to warn us against.

Mindfulness is not a pink practice. There are too many Buddhist teachers in the world who are skilled in mindfulness to point to who are edgy and funny and sharp and biting... whose personalities are still intact while their teachings are sincere and true to life. MIndfulness practice doesn't lead us away from who we are, it turns us in on who we are... not because we need to be the sugary embodiment of a new age affirmation, but because we can't touch connectedness or concern for the world if we are out of touch with what is truly going on right now in the moment in our own lives.

Daily Dharma

When you really concentrate, it involves the entire body-mind. The power you generate with strong concentration can keep you warm, even in the coldest winter weather. So when you sit, please be attentive.

Once you have regulated your posture, take a breath and exhale fully. Swing to the left and right. Sitting fixedly, think of not thinking. How do you think of not thinking? Nonthinking. This is the essential art of zazen.

[...from On Zen Practice - Body, Breath and Mind by Taizan Maezumi & Bernie Glassman, page 34 from the section On Form}

Sitting Again

This is week one of 108 days and I'm sitting again. I can't recall the last time I sat every day for five days in a row. While my breath always seems to settle back in easily after some time away from my practice, my body protests like a beginner.

Daily Dharma

Just as a person

who has been gone for a long time

is welcomed on his safe return home with joy

by his relatives,

friends,

and well-wishers,

so will you be welcomed,

when you move beyond this life,

by the good deeds you have done

in this lifetime.

 

[...from the Still Point Dhammapada, the final verse in the Chapter on Transient Pleasures)

Turbulent Reentry

I started blogging back in 2004 out of a sense of spiritual loneliness more than for any other reason. I'd returned home with a child in tow in '97 and had been living with my parents, working and going to school.

I had gone through a bit of an identity crisis though I didn't know it or recognize it as such at the time. When I graduated from high school in '91, everyone thought I was off to Howard University to become some sort of big shot in whatever field I chose. It was expected that I'd meet a nice guy, come home and have my Dad walk me down the aisle as I entered the next natural evolution for a middle class girl raised with traditional and conservative values--marriage and motherhood. Nobody really understood that I was really just running away from home.

I read my first books on Buddhism while I was away at school during that first college career. With those, I read myriad other things. I introduced myself to yogis and gurus, travelled to Peru and "got" the insights with the main character in the Celestine Prophecy, bought a blue book with gold lettering and all of the available supplements I could find so I could make sense of it, surrounded myself with rose quartz and bloodstone, and started doing sun salutations and picking up Yoga Journal at the Barnes & Noble before it was en vogue.

I thought spirituality was important, but I didn't really know how to go about living a spiritual life. I felt my teachers had failed me. I grew up in "the church" where blind faith and presumption were prerequisite to practice, where song and sermon were inspirational and motivational but didn't feel instructional, where Sunday services were as much about proving who you were better than as they were about receiving the word. So, in search of spirit, I tried everything but drugs. I kept thinking that there was some group, some book, some thing out there that held the answers and if I just kept reading, kept hanging out at new age book stores, and kept acquiring and casting runes and chinese coins something would happen.

I was going through the (spiritual) motions.

One of the things I kept waiting for was a final realization that would explain to me who I was and where I fit. I carried around this drama around being adopted and had all kinds of stories in my head about what that meant. I mostly felt like an alien in my family. I wanted connection but I didn't really feel deeply connected to anyone. And though I thought it should, having sex didn't change that.

So there I was, a wanderer, a seeker, trying to figure out how to fix myself and the world around me... trying to learn "the truth."

It was with this truth-seeking mind that I first stumbled into Still Point, a Zen Buddhist temple in Detroit. It was the place I needed to be. I stopped reading books that made lists of the things I needed to fix about myself, and I stopped being concerned about my chakras. For two years I threw myself into this new practice, then my world fell apart. People close to me were sick and dying, work was more taxing than usual, my daughter was growing up and each new year required new attention. I felt myself pulled in a thousand directions and because I couldn't figure out how to make my practice fit in the middle of the chaos, I just held on. This statement made by Buddhist Philosopher in a comment on Tom's new blog describes the past few years of my life so clearly I won't bother to say it another way:

Most of us just live by momentum, asleep to the reality of duhkha, thirst, and the potential for awakening.

So it is 2009. I can't say that life is less hectic with the state of the economy, especially where I live and work, but I've been gradually making my way back to my practice and the virtual sangha that I felt very much a part of when the term buddhoblogosphere was coined. And I feel a little lost in this space. It's a little like moving back to your home town to find that everyone you know has moved away.

A few weeks ago I went looking for Blogmandu. I've relied on Tom in the past to keep me abreast of what's hot, fresh and new in the buddhoblogosphere and I couldn't find him anywhere. My first stop was as it always was... to his online magazine Zen Unbound. Initially, my first thought upon my visit was that he'd given the place a face lift. But the Tom I know would never feature prominently (or anywhere else) on his site links about elderly bathing aids, herniated discs or mesothelioma. Someone was toying with reality as I knew it. Well, I finally found Tom and read about what happened to zenunbound.com. And I'm embarrassed that I haven't known about what's been going on with my old friend for so long. That's just what happens when you check out... connections sever... and reentry can be painful.

Yes, it's 2009... and I truly feel that my practice must begin now or never. I'm watching the blocks I'd put up in the past (walls that prevented me from fully engaging my practice life) fall away... and I'm energized about beginning 108 days. I'm looking forward to returning to the temple, and I'm hoping to reconnect with old friends and make some new ones along the way.

Daily Dharma

Meditation begins now, right here. It can't begin someplace else or at some other time. To paraphrase the great Zen master Dogen, "If you want to practice awareness, then practice awareness without delay." If you wish to know a mind that is tranquil and clear, sane and peaceful, you must take it up now. If you wish to free yourself from the frantic television mind that runs our lives, begin with the intention to be present now.

[...from Meditation: Now or Never by Steve Hagen, pg. 3]

108 days [the Remix]

I’m a blogger who has been absent from the blogosphere for a while… I’ve stopped by for quick visits over the past year or so, but because I didn’t hang out for longer periods, I missed a lot. One of the things I missed that I wish I hadn’t was an online experiment/support group/community of ordinary people who want to start a daily meditation practice. It was called 108 days, and it was held between January 1 and April 18 in 2007. It was inspired by a similar venture called 100 days.

I am thinking very seriously about giving this a shot. I’m willing to host it on my own blog for all those who might want to participate. I haven’t decided upon a set start date yet… I’m mainly just putting the idea out there to see if anyone wants to give it a try. If interested, post a comment to this entry or send an e-mail to chalipblogs [at] gmail [dot] com with the subject 108 Days [the Remix].

The only objective is to meditate every day for 108 days, to post experiences/questions/reflections to the blog each day you are led to, to read what others are posting for inspiration/insight, and to make a commitment to just sit 108 days in a row to the best of your ability.

Sound like a plan? If you're interested, let me know how to contact you and I’ll make sure you get an invitation.

Daily Dharma

What drives the Wheel of Life? Traditional depictions of the Wheel show three animals at the hub—a cock, a snake and a pig—each biting the tail of the one in front. These three animals represent craving, aversion and delusion, and their chasing one another around and around drives the Wheel. Craving, aversion and delusion make the world go round—they are the root cause of our un-Enlightenment and, according o the Buddha, the source of all suffering.

Craving is the desire to possess things that you like, and to include them in your ego-identity in the hope of getting a sense of security from having them as part of you. Aversion is the fearful, angered wish to get rid of things which you dislike and to exclude them from your ego-identity in the hope of attaining a sense of security from not having them as part of you. And delusion is the refusal to learn anything that you feel might threaten your ego-identity and upset the sense of security you try to get from it.

Enlightenment, according to the Buddha, consists in the complete eradication of these three unwholesome roots. This is a demanding task. Fortunately, the unwholesome roots are not the whole of our experience. We are also motivated by the three wholesome roots: generosity, kindness and wisdom

[...from Mindfulness and Money: The Buddhist Path of Abundance by Kulananda and Dominic Houlder, pg. 39-40]