What Is That One Thing?

(Back from two and a half week retreat with Ruth Denison, at Dhamma Dena Desert Vipassana Center, I am devoting the next few weeks to sharing Ruth's wonderful teachings.)

Learning to Cultivate the Body with Ruth.

Ruth opened the retreat with a teaching about the body. 

"The body is like a jewelry box from which to give and receive."

Over and over, she had us return to the body, whether sitting, standing, dancing, walking, eating, smelling a flower, listening to music, breathing, chanting,  gardening . . . urging us to pay attention. "Then there is no room for the hindrances."

With Ruth, sitting meditation is not just sitting, but rather a whole dance with the body. First prepping the body, with movement and vocalizations. Then, sweeping the body from feet to head, head to feet.  Several times. Part by part, sensing into the body. Then focusing on the subtleties of the breath.  Sensing the air in front of the lips, and following each breath precisely as it enters the middle of the nostrils, then going up the nose into the trachea, into the lungs, belly rising . . . visualizing, to make up for our still gross awareness. Realizing that we are never alone that way:

"You are never deserting yourself. You are always in company - the kind that will never leave you."

Always with the breath as primary focus, and when that proves too elusive for our still tenuous attention, falling back on the body, sitting, as secondary focus.
       
Back from the retreat, sitting at home, I remember

Body sitting, quiet,
being breathed;
mind alert.

and that is usually enough to bring me back whenever the mind wanders.

Ruth is known for her skillfulness with the body. I went to her wondering what to do about familiar experience of irritation and tightness in the throat and the stomach. In the past, I had followed other teachers' instructions to linger on the unpleasantness, and it had not worked. Ruth had a different take. "Don't focus on it. The energy is blocked there. Turn your attention to your hands instead, and feel them. Slowly move them up and down. Do you notice any change? What do you feel?  Now open and close them. Feeling anything? Then now, rest your hands on your lap, and feel." So simple. 

Actually, not so simple. I could hardly feel my hands. I felt like a child needing to learn my way through the world of body and sensations. Thinking thoughts, feeling emotions, that I could do. But being in my body, that was another matter. 

A few days, it took me before I could feel that I was coming to my senses, literally. I wrote, 'Feeling that I am only now starting to inhabit my body, all of it. Body as a place of refuge.  Unlike before, when I used to reluctantly dwell in body. Finding joy in walking, sitting, standing . . .'

Ruth ended the retreat the same way she started. With the body:

There is one thing that when cultivated and regularly practiced leads to deep spiritual intention, to peace, to mindfulness and clear comprehension, to vision and knowledge, to a happy life here and now, and to the culmination of wisdom and awakening. And what is that one thing? Mindfulness centered on the body. ~ Anguttara Nikaya I, 21 ~

If the body is not cultivated, the mind cannot be cultivated. If the body is cultivated then the mind can be cultivated. ~ Majjhima Nikaya 36 ~

Holding strong to this simple method, and always going back to the body.

Empty Houses in the Desert

(Back from two and a half week retreat with Ruth Denison, at Dhamma Dena Desert Vipassana Center, I am devoting the next few weeks to sharing Ruth's wonderful teachings.)

Every day, walking through the Mojave desert, I became fascinated with the empty houses strewn throughout the arid landscape. 

Pink house, 

all boarded up.

Boarded pink house in Mojave Desert.

Old house, looted,
nothing left to be had.

Looted house in Mojave Desert.

House of brick,
structure still intact.

Empty house of bricks in Mojave Desert.

Soulful wooden house,
begging to be visited.

Wooden empty house in Mojave Desert.

Dilapidated house,
and a brand new fence.

Fenced up empty house in Mojave Desert.

Houses, empty,
many of them.

And I thought of my  body, and the way I used to not be there.
I thought of most people's bodies, and the way they fail to inhabit
these most precious structures of theirs.
Empty, no life any more.
Empty, no life yet.

(impressions from retreat with Ruth, about learning to inhabit my body - following Ruth's lead - coming to my senses)

The Will to Love

The Dalai Lama makes a big deal of kindness:

"My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness."

I agree with him, kindness, love, whatever you call it, is the supreme human quality, that which makes live worth living. 

Next comes the question, of how to be kind? Before I knew better, I used to think of love as a random occurence. Sometimes I felt moved to love, sometimes the opposite happened. In it stead, came hate, or indifference. Some people I found easy to love, others I called a pain, or downright nasty. The conditions had to be right . . . 

Now, I have changed my view, and I have come to the conclusion that love is an act of will, to be exercised moment to moment. Paying attention to the mind's constant stirrings, I catch myself often with a thought that could take me down an unwanted path, if I let it. Just one thought in the privacy of my mind, that's baiting me to move away, divide, judge, react, distrust . . . Just one thought begging to be said out loud, and do permanent damage, to myself and others . . . Just one thought with the potential to be acted out, down the line . . . Just one thought . . .

From having gone down the unwanted path, many times before, and watching others do the same, I have learned a big lesson. Left unchecked, a single unloving thought can create havoc in its wake. Words, said hastily, and leaving permanent wounds or grudges. Wrong actions, whose karmic effects can be felt for years, and sometimes one's entire life. So much unnecessary suffering, starting with just one little thought!

Of course, even with the best of intentions, there are moments still, when a careless word slips out too fast, or a wrongful deed takes place, and I am left with remorse, and the humbling reflections of my very imperfect human nature. A dangerous space where self-loathing lurks . . . A time to practice patience, and self-acceptance. An opportunity to open the heart, and apologize. A necessary step along the way of understanding and love. The more I feel the sting of my misdeeds, the more vigilant and willing I become to guard against the untamed mind.

On the receiving end also, lie plenty of opportunities to practice. Forgiving others for their own imperfections, particularly those without a vantage point from which to assess their thoughts. They are letting their unruly mind rule their lives. There is much compassion to be had there.

Playing with Sounds

(Back from two and a half week retreat with Ruth Denison, at Dhamma Dena Desert Vipassana Center, I am devoting the next few weeks to sharing Ruth's wonderful teachings.)

A Concentration Technique for Sitting Meditation.

A few minutes into our early morning sitting,  I heard the familiar sound of Ruth's cane  outside, door opening, shoes taken off, and soon the surprise of Ruth clearing her voice, very loudly, unapologetically, as she was making her way to the front of the zendo. "ok, now you do it." Ruth was inviting us to join her. Clearing our throat . . .  then coughing . . . then swallowing three times, mindfully, then playing around with making sounds with each out breath,

a................

o................

ou..............

ou..............

o................

a................

ay..............

i.................

u................

u................

i.................

e...............

out loud, then silently, on our own, settling back into sitting meditation. 

Using the sounds to support concentration, and continuing until concentration is established. "This is very fine work" says Ruth. 

Indeed . . .

The Catches Are Plentiful

(Back from two and a half week retreat with Ruth Denison, at Dhamma Dena Desert Vipassana Center, I am devoting the next few weeks to sharing Ruth's wonderful teachings.)
 
Bringing Feminine Wisdom Into the Field of Contemplative Neuroscience.

One afternoon, Venerable Madika, one of the two nuns in residence at Dhamma-Dena entertained us with stories of  her participation in Richard Davidson's neuroplasticity experiments at University of Wisconsin, part of his ongoing research to test the positive effects of meditation on the brain. A discussion ensued about the merits and potential pitfalls of viewing mindfulness practice under the lens of neuroscience. I found Ruth's take particularly refreshing:

May all neuroscientists heed Ruth's gentle  call for wisdom, as they carry out their work:

"Stay low to the ground

Live close to the Earth

Don't go too far away from your heart . . . "

May they beware of intellectualizing the practice, and of greed, and righteousness, and other wrongful strivings from the ego that may spoil their efforts.

A Very Old Woman

I made a wonderful new friend today. Lotus is 96 and a long time student of Sogan Rinpoche. The occasion was a Tsok celebration at Rinpoche's home. When I told Lotus about our  Mindfulness-Based Dementia Care Project, she lit up. It turns out Lotus knows a lot about dementia care and mindfulness. Her husband died of Alzheimer's and so did her mother-in-law.  She too came to the realization of the importance of adopting a different way of being with the 'forgetful' ones.  And she has been taking action at the assisted living where she lives. Lotus told me about the aide that comes to her for advice, almost daily, whenever she can no longer 'handle' one of the residents there. "I talk to her, and then she goes back and is fine for a few days, and then she forgets. She tries to change the other person's reality, when it should be the other way around. But I keep at it with her . . ."

Today, I am grateful for Lotus's inspiration. 

A Change of Heart

(Back from two and a half week retreat with Ruth Denison, at Dhamma Dena Desert Vipassana Center, I am devoting the next few weeks to sharing Ruth's wonderful teachings.)

Bringing the Shadow to Light, with Ruth.

Often with Ruth, we would chant:

I am opening up in deep surrender to the Buddha Dharma in my life.
I am opening up in deep surrender, to the numinous darkness of my shadow.
I am opening up in deep surrender, to the powerful wholeness within myself.

And opening up, to the numinous darkness of my shadow, I certainly did.

I came in angry and complaining about people, and circumstances in my life. The first evening, after I told my story, Ruth set me straight, and asked me to look within myself first. "Awaken to that which is hindering you, and is imprisoning you from your most inner self." And she shared about her own life, and the choices she had made. She talked about her sometimes difficult husband, and how she would respond to him from a place of love. She told us how surprised she had been by the amount of anger often present in women, here in America, particularly toward men. I went to bed, and was met by shadowy figures in the night. 

Woman's Shadow in the Mojave Desert

I dreamt of a woman in her bathrobe, opening the door to a kind man who had come to meet her. She embraced him reluctantly, apologizing for not being properly dressed to receive him. She offered to feed him breakfast but could not find enough food in the fridge to fix him a good breakfast . . . The first in a series of dreams, all on the same theme. Women not ready to meet friendly men willing to love them.     During the ensuing days, I watched as the hindrances came and went, relentlessly. Hindrances, shadow. Same thing. Only, the shadows in my dreams were telling a story that tied together the bursts of anger, and anxiety, and the episodes of  diffuse wanting. Being with myself for a long retreat made it obvious. I needed a change of attitude. 

In my journal, I wrote, 'Inner transformation needs to take place before I can truly honor and nurture masculine part within myself, and also outside. Dhamma Dena is a great place to do that. Coming home to myself.'  As time went on, I could feel the purification taking place inside, physically, emotionally. The anger, the fear, being burnt away by sustained attention, the wise understanding of their irrelevance, and the willingness to slowly open my heart to love. There was nothing to do but endure the unpleasantness with great patience and acceptance of the process, of myself.  Ruth was showing me the way. I knew she had been there and in her I could trust. 

I left the retreat a changed person. Anger, resentments, complaints, projections, helplessness, defensiveness, distrust, fear . . . all gone, burnt away. In their place, love, trust, and openness have taken permanent residence. It's been two weeks now since I came back, and the joy is still there. Some rather wondrous events have taken place in my outer life as well, and I am still in awe of the gift that was bestowed upon me. 

Do you have similar stories to tell of inner transformation? How has your mindfulness practice changed you? I would love to hear.