Net of Indra

Water and Light

2010-04-25T00:28:00.001-07:00

I've had a long break from my blog, it was really good to simply write on paper for a while. Many of my poems were simply written by hand instead of being typed in and it was a good feeling. Now, I'm moving in a direction with my poems, but also with my "exploration" of the contemplative and mystic in many aspects. So, I'd like to share here what I find. That is why I have taken these words "Water and Light", for me that is the feeling of being or feeling the presence of the Eternal. Both water and light fill up, but leave one being free....

New Year's Eve

2008-12-31T04:43:00.000-08:00

"Every exit is an entry somewhere else."

-Tom Stoppard-
"This time, like all times, is a very good one, if we but know what to do with it."
-Ralph Waldo Emerson-

These are two quotes that I like very much to start the new year. The door of 2009 is about to open, but the time now is the time that we can 'do good with'!

Light begins again to grow at the start of Winter

2008-12-22T00:50:00.001-08:00

Oh Winter, ruler of th'inverted year,

I crown thee king of intimate delights,

Fire-side enjoyments, home-born happiness,

And all the comforts that the lowly roof

Of undisturbed retirement, and the hours

Of long uniterrupted ev'ning know.

-William Cowper-

The movement of light and change

2008-12-16T05:38:00.001-08:00

On a grey day in December, with just a bit of muted light coming through the sky without any hint of blue, I've been thinking of the movement of light and darkness, how my whole existence plays between these two. Above you can see a paper snowflake my friend Steffi gave me last week. It hangs in the window of our dining room and every day since I received it, light has played and transformed itself in its shape. From early morning to night, some kind of light...sun, moon, stars, reflected city lamps and also some kind of shadow from our home, from the buildings across the way from a bird flying by...all of these have danced in it, have lit it up, have darkened it and yet there in its geometric form it has stayed the same as everything else has changed. It is a good reminder of how to stay still in this darkening season of turning inward. For soon, the inward motion will reach its deepest point and then the outward, gaining of light begins again. Shapes and shadows will still change, only among more light. Until light falls away once again to lengthening shadows...

The last photo is of an eclipse of the moon we had about two months ago. My prayer for the day: May I stay still in the shadows and flickerings of all that passes...for it only passes, What Is Is and Remains...

Things hidden underneath

2008-12-09T05:15:00.000-08:00

I took these pictures in the "wee" hours of the morning. There are four of these trees right next to our house and they are doing so suprisingly well here in the middle of the city. As their leaves have fallen away and their berries have begun to really shine, I saw that each tree has a nest. Throughout the whole spring, summer and autumn we had very noisy mornings with all the birds. Now we know why! It reminded me of how sometimes in my meditation and training I have an underlying feeling of something that is not right, some bit of past karma that seems to be rising to the surface and I have not been able to recognize and let go of. However, as I continue to practice, it seems as if some things begin to fall away, almost like the leaves of this tree, and then what is there can be seen clearer. A nest is revealed that needs to be cleaned out and through this falling away of things, my vision becomes a bit brighter, bright and beautiful like the berries on this tree this morning.

The world is large...

2008-12-07T10:58:00.000-08:00

"The world is large, but in us it is as deep as the sea."

-Rilke-

"Prayer and meditation open us to a joyous and more fulfilling life....

They are like a spaceship that carries us to the source of that which is profound....

When we enter inner space, we embark upon a great adventure of self-discovery."
-Adrian Milton-

All these pictures are from my visit to the aquarium in Barcelona, this summer in July. How far away July now seems in cold December...but the adventure of self-discovery goes on and on and on...what a lovely journey!

A world populated by thinking, conscious creatures

2008-12-04T02:59:00.000-08:00

I read a wonderful review of a new book that has come out. It's title is: "Alex and Me: How a Scientist and a Parrot Uncovered a Hidden World of Animal Intelligence---and Formed a Deep Bond in the Process http://www.amazon.de/s/ref=nb_ss_w?__mk_de_DE=%C5M%C5Z%D5%D1&url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Alex+and+Me&x=14&y=16 . Ms Pepperberg, the scientist, say, "Alex taught me that we live in a world populated by thinking, conscious creatures." I think most pet owners, or maybe a better word is pet friend, have always know this. Up above you can see our two friends, or better members of our family: Griffin and Lynx. Each one of them can communicate and show emotions of all kinds. Griffin even likes paw massages! I think this is so important for as many people as possible to know. It may make us think a bit deeper about our relationship with all beings, how we act and what we do and how it has wide effects on ALL beings.

The link to the review can be found here: http://www.amazon.de/s/ref=nb_ss_w?__mk_de_DE=%C5M%C5Z%D5%D1&url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Alex+and+Me&x=14&y=16 . It has a lot of good tidbits from the book. The last sentence really got to my heart, "Alex died on Sept. 6, 2007, apparently for a fatal arrythmia, heart attack or stroke. His last words to Pepperberg were: 'You be good. I love you.'"

I think that says a lot!

Pilgrimage 4

2008-11-26T23:14:00.001-08:00

As my walk continues up the hill toward the temple, it is a time to reflect and what I see along the way really are the things to think about in life. The first sign is a small marble "factory" that produces mostly grave markers. It is good to stop allowing the flowing river and think about that. There is no escaping it, death comes, and how will I face it, how do I face it, how have I faced it.

It is amazing to see how many of these pieces or marble there are, how many times have I been affected by the deaths of others? The first time death "appeared" for me was as a child of five when my uncle died in a hunting accident. At that time, I was mostly affected by how others had reacted to the situation. Then my first year of college my beloved grandpa died unexpectedly...it was the first poem I ever wrote with the memories of him working in the garden and I remember the last line: "And you now in a row instead of planting..." My creative writing professor and the whole class were speechless when I had finished reading it. A very powerful experience. And then my dear grandma died. The day before she had seen a rose frosted and a bit wilted in early October and had told me, "Isn't it beautiful, still there, frosted, alive..." These are often the thoughts that go through my mind. All the friends, who were so young, who I lost to AIDS in the '80's and early '90's...and so on....

Then I often come to this point and almost every time light has shone through these trees. It reminds me to look up to the Buddha with all of these questions, to keep turning and looking in the right direction....

Coming around a curve, I see this bench that faces away from the street, looking into the forest and I realize, getting closer to the temple, it is time to turn deeply inwards, to what is there, to what the Still Small Voice may be saying...

And then, just before reaching the temple is a sewage treatment plant. A very small one, but it has become a reminder for me that I am here to "clean" up the karma that has obscured and disturbed the pure clear water of the spirit that is always there. This is a most important point before I reach the point to go up to the temple....

Thangkan Interlude

2008-11-25T03:52:00.001-08:00

Over the weekend I had a wonderful experience of taking a "Thangka Course" offered by the "Tibethaus" http://www.tibethaus.com/ here in Frankfurt. The course was led by Marian van de Horst http://www.thangka-marianvdhorst.com/!english/index.html. From Friday to Sunday we started with meditation and then moved on to work on the building blocks of a Thangka. The first step is to do the head of Shakyamuni Buddha and then the body. This is done with specific measurements based on sors, a certain measurement. There is really so much to learn about the iconograpy and symbols. They themselves become "scriptures" with all of their information. One thing that I didn't know is that when coloring the eyes, there is always a little bit of red in the edges of both sides. This is for all Buddhas and Bodhisattvas and it stands for the compassion that they have for all beings and that their eyes are watered with tears for our suffering. A very nice image.

Anyway...the first drawing was my first head and then I had to learn how to reduce it in size and then one more time and add color. I'm looking forward to continuing with the seminars in February! It is also nice to learn about another tradition in Buddhism.

Pilgrimage 3

2008-11-12T05:54:00.001-08:00

As soon as I make the turn in the direction of Bad Teinach, I follow this path up towards the temple. It's nice to have the feeling of going "up" to the temple. As soon as I come upon this path, I try to calm down all the chatter in my head and to relax any tension that I might feel. It's amazing to just take a moment and hear all the turmoil and tumult inside...and let it go. To step on the path, to step into the silence...which is not empty, but FULL and waiting...

"At such moments we don't choose silence but fall silent. Silence, like love, is not something we reason our way into. And once we are in it, we recognize that it has been there all along. It's there like the background noise of the universe, that uniform hiss astronmomers find when they point their radio telescopes at the space between the stars, the remnant of the big bang, the residual wind of our origin."

-Philip Simmons-

"The seeker's silence is the loudest form of prayer."

-Swami Vivekananda-

"Silence of the heart is necessary so you can hear God everywhere---in the closing of the door, in the person who needs you, in the birds that sing, in the flowers, in the animals."
-Mother Theresa-

"Nothing is so like God as silence."

-Meister Eckhart-

Pilgrimage 2

2008-11-11T04:25:00.000-08:00

"The greatest assassin of life is haste, the desire to reach things before the right time which means overreaching them."

-Juan Ramon Jimenez-

The next step on my way of the pilgrimage is not to get into a hurry. To settle down and not worry about the train connections and pushing my way onto the train in front of others. Just to simply let what happens, happen. It is difficult to come to this after a week of work and being often caught up in the swirl of haste. By practicing this on my pilgrimage, I hope I can bring it into my every day. This has also been an inner quality of mine, to try to hurry on, to get something with my training. To want more now than what is given. And, of course, I have been constantly taught that this does not help. In fact, it hinders me from being with That Which Is Greater than myself. At these times I try to remember what Reverend Master Jiyu Kennet http://obcon.org/saf.html said:

"Just let it be enough to know the Unborn, and to feel It coursing through your veins. Don't try to do more. And when it is time to act, trust the Buddha Nature to guide you instead of trying to figure everything out with your mind."

So, underway, it is good to learn that it is enough to be underway. Not to be trying to arrive before my feet have carried me there. There is so much to learn, so much to practice on the way. A constant journey. Being open to what is there will also prepare me to act in accordance with the circumstances instead of acting with how I see or want the circumstances to be. There are things that will show me which way, like the little bridge that I walk across after getting off the train or the sign that points to the way in the right direction. And sometimes, just looking up in the sky I can see whether it is good that I walk or better to call for a ride. This is all practice of how to live my everyday life. This is also the practice of my small pilgrimage to the temple. No haste when none is needed. Be there with what is. Feet firmly planted, eyes open and heart looking for direction.

Pilgrimage

2008-10-28T06:01:00.000-07:00

The view from the bench I usually sit on at Frankfurt am Main Central Station

My backpack and boots and other articles

"The day on which one starts out is not the time to start one's preparations."
-Nigerian Proverb-

Every month for the past while, I've been going to a Buddhist Temple: http://www.dharmazuflucht.info/ . Since it is about two hours from our home, I see each time as I go as a small "Pilgrimage". This has really helped me to arrive at the temple with my heart and mind in the right "position", as long as I treat the whole journey as a pilgrimage. The first very important point is explained so well by the quote above. I've learned to really start planning at the beginning of the week for the journey on Friday. In this way, I slowly bring my heart in line with the rhythm of the temple. As I thoughtfully put together the things that I'll need or the things that are needed at the temple, I can already begin the inner preparation. The few times I've not done this are the times that I've forgotten some bedding or my watch or alarm clock and I noticed that as I arrived at the temple, my heart and mind were not at all settled. In fact the ego was still bouncing about, either complaining about something on the journey or justifying itself for being grumpy or whatever else let it wander about. So, there is something to this preparation. This preparation is to point the Way. In a pilgrimage there is a definite point to come to, whereas, often in simply journeying about there is no endpoint to come to and I think this in itself causes the self to also wander aimlessly.

However, it's not that on a "pilgrimage" one does not take notice of things around, only looking towards the destination. Not at all! This is such an important part! In fact Alan Watts said this wonderfully:

"We usually don't look. We overlook."

That's the most wopnderful part of my "pilgrimage"...there is so much to see and reflect about on the way/ Way!

More tomorrow....

Endeavor

2008-10-15T02:14:00.000-07:00

In the 16th Canto of Ashvaghosha's Handsome Nanda, we are brought into an Explanation of the Noble Truths and what I found so important is the encouragement that goes along with endeavor. Keeping the Buddha's Dharma right there before our eyes:

"Set dharma before your eyes, which is peaceful and benign, with no passion for desire, a resting place, a cessation, an eternal, irremovable, and noble protection, in which there is no birth, no old age, no death, no sickness, no association with anything unpleasant, no failure of wishes and no separation from anything pleasant; it is an ultimate, unfallen state of ease." 16.26

"Just as a substance may be pungent in flavor yet when eaten ripe may proved to be sweet, so an endeavor may be hard in its execution, but when it ripens through the accomplishment of its aims, prove to be sweet. Endeavor is paramount, for it is the foundation of doing what needs to be done, and without endeavor there would be no accomplishment at all. All success in the world arises from endeavor, and if there were no endeavor evil would be complete." 16.93-4

The past week has really shown me how important it is to carry through with this endeavor to train every day. Just going slack a little bit, can lead one off the path very quickly and I noticed how fast I could become lost. But looking up, the Buddha is always there, in this past week this was very much before my eyes in the love and support I received from so many around me.

Abandoning Notions

2008-10-06T08:22:00.000-07:00

This is the 15th Canto and there are some really wonderful expressions in it:

"If your mind offends you with feverish ideas of passion, do not dwell on them but brush them off, like dust that has collected on your clothing." 15.2

"When the passions are hunted there is suffering, but no peace in their conversion. Losing them brings great grief, but acquiring them no satisfaction." 15.9

"Whatever it is that a man continually thinks about, his mind, through habit, will develop a leaning towards it. Therefore you must give up what is unwholesome and concentrate on the wholesome, since this will work both for your best interest in this world and for your attainment of the ultimate goal." 15.19

"To obtain gold, a dirt-washer discards first the large bits of grit, and then, to refine it further, he discards also the tiny bits of grit. After this cleansing, he retains particles of gold. To obtain liberation, a man of focused mind will likewise abandon first gross faults, and then, to further refine his mind, he abandons also subtle faults. After this cleansing, he retains the constiuents of dharma." 15.66

Food!

2008-09-23T06:15:00.000-07:00

"Next having closed off the dam of the senses with the gate of mindfulness, be measured in your food intake, for the sake of meditation as well as good health."

Handsome Nanda 14.1, Ashvaghosha

This next canto deals with food and sleep. The food aspect is very important to me because at heart I'm a "hobbit" and really enjoy food and drink. But just as with everything, this can get out of balance, into the too much or too little, into the clinging to or pushing away category. As always, it is to find the Middle Way and this is what Ashvaghosha says:

"Just as the scaled go down with a heavy weight and up with a light one, but stay level with the correct weight, so does this body with its food. Therefore you should take food with due consideration for your own capacity. Don't apportion yourself too much or too little even if you have strong opinion on this subject, for when it is weighed down with heavy food, the fire of the body dies down like a small fire all at once covered with a lot of fuel.

Total avoidance of food is not recommended, for a person who doesn't eat is extinguished like a fire without fuel." 14.5-8

These words sound so simple but it is not so easy in our culture where the possiblities of getting food and the choices are so great. It must have even been so at the time that Ashvaghosha was writing as he says:

"The world likes alternatives and is distracted to the core by sensual experience. If a man lives in it in seclusion, indifferent to choice, virtuous and with his heart at peace, then he has sipped the taste of wisdom as if it were the cup of deathlessness and is content at heart. A man of discernment, he grieves for the clinging world as it hoards sensual experience."

14.51-52

So, now I try to take a "sip of wisdom" when I'm at the supermarket, before I cook or when I look for choices for my lunch or an evening out. To not be so distracted by sensual experiences and alternatives and definitely not to hoard those experiences. Not so easy, when you have the heart, and stomach, and tongue, and eyes of a hobbit!

Garden of the Senses

2008-09-19T04:05:00.000-07:00

In Frankfurt we have so many "hidden" gardens in the city. They are in some out of the way places where people pass by without noticing them. As I was going by one of my favorite ones this morning, it is actually sunken down from street level, so many walk by without even noticing, I thought once again about what I've been reading in Handsome Nanda. The 13th Canto is "The Conquest of the Senses By Moral Self-Restraint", and it is full of wonderful words.

Ashvaghosha writes:

"In order to reach deathlessness, my friend, you, with the faculty of faith as your forerunner, should from now onwards increase the guard on your conduct. So that your physical and verbal acts become pure, they should be upright, open, regulated and without blemish---upright because of the working of your true character, open because nothing is hidden, regulated because the focus on self-government, and without blemish because they are irreproachable." 13.10-11

At the park today the "gate" reminded me of the "gateway of the senses" and the fountain with the face reminds me of how we can lose ourselves in the flooding of the senses and cannot see clearly. We follow and become completely attached to what is pleasant or push away what is unpleasant. This can be such a difficult part of training. Ashvaghosha continues with:

"Next, establishing mindfulness, hold back those naturally restless senses from sensory experience, for one's own senses, ever injurious, are more to be feared than an enemy, a fire, a snake or a thunderbolt." 13.30

These things in themselves are not inherently good or bad, it is what we do with them. He continues:

"Here in the world the senses must necessarily operate, each in its particular sphere, but htere should be no grasping at either the major attributes or the minor details of an object." 13.41

And:

"the village of the senses never has enough of sensory experience, just as the ocean, though rivers perpetually fill it, never has enough water." 13.40

Then comes the hard stuff to work on:

"Nothing should be taken away, nothing should be added; whatever the kind of object, it should be seen as it really is. If in the realm of the senses, you continuously observe what is real, then neither attraction nor aversion will leave the footprint in your mind." 13.44-45

"Just as a a fire burns when it has both fuel and air, so too does the fire of defilement arise when both sense objects and imaginings about them are present. For a man is imprisoned by unreal imaginings about a sense object, but when he sees that very sense bject as it really is, then he is freed." 13.50-51

How often do I coat what is before me with my own imaginations, my own paint of desire or aversion. It is very often throughout the day. To see things as they really are...a hard one!

"It follows sense objects are not the cause of bondage or liberation; whether attachment arises or not is due to specific imaginings. For this reason you should control your senses with the maximum of effort, for ungoverned senses make for sorrow and rebirth. (...) In every situation, therefore, be careful to place restrictions on those enemies---sight, smell, hearing, taste and touch---which produce unwholesome state. Don't be negligent about his for an instant!" 13.53-55

Good (and difficult) advice to follow!

Comprehension

2008-09-07T01:57:00.000-07:00

(from a statue at the Louvre)

A few entries ago I had mentioned reading Handsome Nanda by Ashvaghosha. It has really been a delight and I'm not through with it yet, I still have a few cantos to go. However, the cantos I've read in between have some lovely language and quotes. We see Nanda passing slowly from a state of ignorance and reaching out for Faith. In the 11th canto he is caught between the Life of Training and the life of the senses. Ashvaghosha writes wonderfully:

"He was soothed by calming restraint and drained by violent passion, just as one is calmed and dried from a combination of water and fire." 11.5

I know exactly that feeling! Knowing the feeling how training is changing my heart, but still feeling the pull of the senses. This "water and fire" really creates "steam" for me somtimes and it is difficult to "see" the right way to go. What is missing at those times is a FULL commitment!

"For just as a bird bound by a string flies back again although it has flown far, so do people bound by the string of ignorance return again though they have traveled far." 11.59

the 12th canto is entitled "Comprehension" and it is where Ashvaghosha presents the importance of Steadfastness and Faith, Faith being such an important element in his writings .

"Steadfastness is in every respect hard to accomplish when the mind is given to unfettered passion, just as it is hard for a thirsty traveler to maintain slef-control when he sees dirty water." 11.27

And now comes such a lovely description of Faith:

"That is why I refer to faith particularly as 'the hand', since it reaches out to the true dharma like an unimpaired had reaches out for a gift. It is described as 'the sense organ' because of its prevelance, and as 'strong' because of its persistence, and as 'wealth' because it allays the impoverishment of virtue. It is declared to be the 'arrow' by reason of its protection of the dharma, and it is named 'jewel' because it is so hard to find in this world. What is more, it is said to be 'the seed', since it causes the arising of Excellence; again, it is called 'the river' because it cleanses wickedness.

As faith is the primary factor in the arising of dharma, I have called it different names on various occasions due to its effects. Therefore you should nurture this shoot of faith; when it grows, dharma grows, just as a tree grows when its roots grow. When a man's vision is blurred and he is weak in resolved, his faith wavers, for it is not operating towards its proper outcome.

As long as reality is not seen or heard, faith is not firm or strongly fixed. But when a man's senses are governed by the rules of restraint and he sees reality, then the tree of faith is fruitful and supportive." 12.36-43

(from Handsome Nanda, Ashvaghosha. Trans. Linda Covill. New York University Press, 2007)

Surounded by kindness

2008-09-03T02:32:00.000-07:00

We were in Paris this weekend for my birthday and something really struck us: how friendly and helpful the Parisians are! We had both heard how "arrogant" and "unfriendly" Parisians were and that was never the case. From the evening when we arrived and went to eat and they were about to close as the last table had just finished. Instead of turning us away, they opened their arms and told us what was good on the menu and were happy and smiled through our whole meal. It was the same way everywhere we went.

Then I was reminded about an article I read last Thursday about how they have found out that birds and especially those of the Crow-Raven family have such a strong memory...especially about who has been kind or unkind to them. As we were sitting in the park with the Eifel tower to the back of us we were joined in our lunch by a crow sitting across from us on the other bench. It was really fun how he was there the whole time, taking us in and maybe sensing that we were kind. I hope so!

Here's the article:http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/08/28/healthscience/sncrows.php

Sensuality, Intimacy and Training

2008-08-28T03:20:00.000-07:00

In Sanskrit literature the Chakraváka bird, the ruddy shelldrakehttp://orientalbirdimages.org/search.php?action=searchresult&Bird_ID=159, a species of waterbird signifies conjugal love. Here in the West, Swans would have the same symbolism. Swans on the River Main this morning

I have just started reading a book entitled: Handsome Nanda (Saundaranandakavya)http://www.claysanskritlibrary.org/Handsome-Nanda-v-43.html written by Ashvaghosha http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asvaghosa. Nanda is blessed with youth, money, being attractive and a voluptuous wife and is able to satisfy all of his sexual and emotional needs. He also has the Buddha as an older brother. The Buddha forces him to confront his enslavement to sensuality and physical intimacy. It is a story that I can understand very much and something that I deal with in my life everyday. How do I find the healthy Middle Path?

The long poem is split up into 18 cantos and I have read through the first six and have some things to share. I really liked this line from the 3 Canto which is "A Description of the Realized One":

"For just as the risen sun dispels darkness, so Gáutama with his sun-like appearance dispelled the dark ignorance of sensual people who followed a number of different paths." 3.16

In the 4th canto, the Buddha arrives at Nanda's house, but he and his wife are so enthralled in what they are doing and cause the servants to be busied with the preparation of everything needed for their pleasures that they do not even know the Buddha is there:

"While Nanda was thus enjoying himself in his palace, which was like a celestial palace, the Tathágata, the realized one, entered his home for his alms, since was the time for his alms-round. Looking downwardsand without asking for anything, he stood hin his brolther's house as he would in the house of any other person. But he went away without obtaining any alms because of the household's preoccupation." 4.24-26

How often am I so concerned with my own "pleasures" that I forget to turn towards the Eternal that is there and offering Itself?

Nanda is totally upset when he finds out that his older brother was there and then decides to hurry and find him. His wife does not want to let him go, being so attached to him:

"So she let him go from her arms which were scented with sandal from her breast, but she did not let him go in her mind." 4.37

How often do we think that we have let go and we haven't?

And then at the very end of the canto, you can feel the confusion within Nanda...I know the same confusion!:

"Kept back by his passion for love, and drawn forward by his attachment to dharma, he proceeded with difficulty, being turned about like a boat going upstream on a river."

In the 5th canto, the Buddha ordains Nanda and interestingly enough it is a bit against his will, but his older brother knows this is the only way to give him the medicine he needs.

"The greatly compassionate one saw his distress in an instant and pitied him. He laid his hand with its wheelmarked palm on Nanda's head and said:

'Dear friend, Death is present in every situation and strikes in many ways. Before that dread time arrives, make sure your mind is composed. Hold back your restless mind from the sense-pleasures common to all, which dreamlike and insubstantial. For sensual pleasures are no more satisfying for people than oblations are for a wind-blown fire.'" 5.22-23

It's not so much that these things are "bad", it is just are holding on to them that makes them consume us rather than seeking the Unborn, Undying. Stated again in another way:

"I see no feature of pleasure which would not change into something else and so bring sorrow. Therefore under no circumstances should you tolerate attachment, unless the grief at its passing is bearable." 5.44

The 5th canto ends movingly and beautifully and I wish I could read Sanskrt better, but the English translation is also good:

"And later, wearing a faded garment of ochre tree-bark and depressed as a newly-captured elephant, Nanda resembled the full moon moving into the dark half of the month, at the end of night,daubed with the light of the early morning sun." 5.53

The 6th canto, "The Wife's Lament" is very moving as we see how her "attached" thoughts roam about fearing that he has another woman or that he has stopped loving her since he did not return like he said. This is another side of sensuality and intimacy---jealousy and anger. But that's enough for today!

!Vive Despacio!

2008-08-25T04:16:00.001-07:00

Taking it slow on the steps!
The Cathederal is scheduled to be done in the 2020's!
This is a pillar right at the entryway to the cathederal, what better symbol to slow down before entering a "temple" than a turtle!

When we were in Barcelona a few weeks ago, I bought a new candle holder for our altar in our home. It is really a lovely lotus shaped holder. But, what caught my attention even more was the sack that it came in. On the sack was printed: "Slow es posible". This was such a good reminder for me, since I'm someone that can get pulled so quickly into a hurry, into moving fast and not being aware of the waves that I'm making. So, I know have this piece of the sack in my journal and a copy of it above my desk! In Barcelona, when we visited the Cathederal, Sagrada Familia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagrada_Fam%C3%ADlia planned and started by Gaudí http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antoni_Gaud%C3%AD, I saw once again the importance of slow progress. Let me remember to move slowly and be aware! Vive despacio! Slow es posible!

gently, gently

2008-08-13T05:08:00.000-07:00

Frankfurt the modern skyline

Yesterday was a stormy day...not only in the sky but also in the clouds in my head. The day started off with heavy rain, but not a cool refreshing rain---rather it was oprressive and humid---only 21° C, but still it made sweat pool on my forehead. My thoughts were heavy and oppressive, too. I began to feel the inner critic chastising me and it was hard to keep going. But then, the Still, Small Voice reminded me:

Gently, gently...

That's can be a hard lesson to learn and even though in the evening as my thoughts were raging and the storm with its wind had begun to howl, I tried to keep that as my mantra:

Gently, gently...

Not only gentleness for myself but also gentleness for others. Suddenly, in the late evenig the clouds began to break and the sunset was stunning, you can see the pictures above taken from differnt windows of our house. Finally, a gentleness began to settle on the night and in my heart. I still woke up a few times in the night, but in the morning I could still hear the whisper:

Gently into the day...

And I went gently into the morning with the sun rising and spreading its light over the river and there in the light were swans swimming. One was in the front and one in the back, in between were three small ones, protected and safe upon calm waters. I being reminded of beauty and love and gentleness.

Tread gently today...

Cat Interlude

2008-08-10T23:13:00.000-07:00

Bergen
Vardoe

Barcelona

I thought I'd take an interlude today and show the pictures of the cats from our vacations so far this summer. We've been in Norway and Barcelona so far and somehow we always find furry friends. It's a nice "ersatz" when we are away from our two furry friends at home. I liked these pictures.

Hurtigruten Day 11

2008-08-10T00:00:00.000-07:00

"Endings and beginnings---everything moving on, in

flow...

Only a few more hours on the ship---a little bit of a sad feeling and yet the joy of having experienced so much. Last night especially looking at the sea and the many shapes and movements the water and light made---a better understanding of :

Ocean

Water

Wind

and

Wave

Remembering a something from William Blake, how to not hold on but to let the joy be:

He who binds to himself a joy

Doth the winged life destroy

But he who kisses the joy as it flies

Lives in Eternity's sunrise.

Coming into port in Bergen, I kiss the JOY and let it go..."

***

"So don't accept the idea that there is a certain unchangeable life pattern controlled by something or someone...watch your life carefully. In daily living your past life comes up like a jack-in-the-box. Pop! You don't feel good, but this is okay. You still have the freedom to make a choise of how to maifest your life now. Then your actions in the present create causes and conditions for your life in the future....Freedom means that in the next moment you can manifest your life in a new way."

-Katagiri, p 199-

***

"If you take the best care of one moment, offering yourself to your activity, letting your life touch the ground of existence and handling the phenomenal worl with wisdom and compassion, you turn a new leaf---360 degrees. In the next moment a completely new life appears, and that life helps others."

-Katagiri, 201-

***

"So stand up in your life, accepting the whole situation. That means total acceptance of your life."

-Katagiri, p 205-

***

"Don't attach to thoughts and emotions; just let them return to emptiness. Just be present there and swim in buddha-nature. This is living the bodhisattva vow to help all beings. Then the great energy of the universe supports you and you take one step toward the future with all beings."

-Katagiri, p 216-

Hurtigruten Day 10

2008-08-08T23:58:00.000-07:00

"We visited the Nidaros Cathederal early this morning---almost nobody was there which gave it a completely different feeling from when we were first here. I realized how much "religious" art has a draw for me---it would be interesting to work with this "medieval" style and bring it into Buddhist styles of art."

***

"Whether you realize it or not, whatever you do, your action leaves behind a kind of smell in the depth of human life. we have to take responsibility for our behavior, whatever it is, good or bad, right or wrong, because even though our actions disappear from the surface of life, the smell of what we have done is still there as unmanifested karma."

-Katagiri, p. 187-

Hurtigruten Day 9

2008-08-08T00:29:00.001-07:00

"Yesterday we sailed back through the Trollfjord area---really unbelievably beautiful. And then in the evening we were on the Lofoten Islands http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lofoten, starting in Svolvaer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svolvaer and travelling through to Stramsund . As has been said, the light play on the island is enchanting, especially with the midnight sun, and that's why so many artists have lived and been creative there. This morning we passed south of the Arctic Circle amd so the sun will now have a short rest during the night."

***

"When you act wholeheartedly, your activity becomes very clear, calm, flexible, and magnanimous. It is boundless, and simultaneously it is you. So studying the boundlessness of activity is studying the self. This is called intimacy."

-Katagiri, p. 142

***

"When you have a strong, stable confidence every day, it is called spiritual life."

-Katagiri, p, 146

***

"You must be fresh every single moment."

-Katagiri, p. 153

***

"So you have to just walk, step-by-step. If you do this, very naturally you become humble and majestic. From generation to generation, buddhas and ancestors have walked like this."

-Katagiri, p. 153-

***

"Buddhist practice is to constantly create beauty. Beauty is the functioning of wisdom."

-Katagiri, p. 158

***

"In order to make the surface of your life mature, you have to make the depth of your life mature."

-Katagiri, p. 162

***

"Instead of expecting to get something from our effort, we give quality to our effort."

-Katagirir, p. 171-

Hurtigruten Day 8

2008-08-07T07:16:00.000-07:00

"Our one longer stop was in Hammerfest http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hammerfest ---the northernmost city in the world and as we walked up the hill to the lookout tower, there was a reindeer in the backyard of an ampartment complex chomping away on the delicacies in the garden---soft flowers and other ornamentals. Back on the ship we passed unbelievably beautful scenery again---mountain and water and cloud and light and now and green..."

***

"Doing meditation, or any spiritual practice, because we want to be something special in the future is not the point of Zen practice. The point is to be free where we are now. Where we are is also the beauty of existence."

-Katagiri, p. 126-

Huritgruten Day 7 Part B: Flowers and lichen and moss and rocks!

2008-07-31T09:07:00.000-07:00

"When you are eternal time, you are not the ordinary you that you usually belived yorself to be, you are the big you that exists in the entire world. You have to depend on the big you. If you do that, you have spiritual security. If you ignore this, you are always depending on something else." Katagiri, p. 106

"Only humans become great laughter through suffering." Katagiri, p. 111

"Eternity is leaping and alive, constantly changing. We cannot pin down exactly what it is, but we are alive because something supports our life and helps us live---something that exists always. This is called eternity of the absolute." Katagiri, p. 114

"To 'just be there' means to completely open your heart. Then, in a moment, you can see something. Everyting turnsover and the whole situation becomes beautiful." Katagiri, p. 120

Hurtigruten Day 7 Part A

2008-07-31T00:04:00.000-07:00

Getting ready to get on the ship
An Icon of Mary and the Baby Jesus in the front of the ship!

Yellow post: Norway; Red post: Russia

"Yesterday we took a river boat along the Pasvik River which at one point has the border between Norway and Russia. A very beautifuol landscape with stunning birch forests along with some of the best and strongest pine in the world because of its slow growth. Culturally very, very interesting: Saami, Russian, Norwegian. Orthodox Christianity has a heavy role with Holy Trifon's Cave and the Boris Gleb chapel off in the distance. http://www.pasvikelva.no/index.php?page_id=4&article_id=64&lang_id=2 OH! And what wonderful wildflowers, everywhere! Some even surviviing under the river's water---bright yellow daisy like flowers. Lichen and moss covered rocks---and then suddenly reindeer grazing and galloping along the river!"

Hurtigruten Day 6

2008-07-30T05:14:00.000-07:00

"Yesterday we stopped at Nordkapp (English: North Cape) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Cape%2C_Norway and took a tour---lovely arctic land with summer grazing grounds for reindeer---even a few young calves, very cute. The landscape was filled with beautifully formed rockds and covered with many hued lichens and mosses. I also saw a spectacular crowd of poppies---in all shades of yellow from light butter to deep mustard. There were also very dainty pink flowers. Fagile but strong! Wonderful! Right now we just entered the Varangerfjord and have HUGE waves! " http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varangerfjord

***

"...your life must be swimming on the surface, and simultaneously it must be rooted, walking on the bottom of the ocean. That is living whole heartedly."

-Katagiri, p. 81-

***

"If we swim just on the surface, we are tiny. But if we touch the bottom, we are huge---we are Buddha."

-Katagiri, p. 88-

***

"You just sit, blooming your life."

-Katagiri, p. 96-

Hurtigruten Day 5

2008-07-29T08:10:00.000-07:00

"The idea of vastness---and how it can be felt on this ship---water and sky going on in every direction---filled with islands and clouds---but only momentarily and then they drift and disappear from view---and new ones appear and again disappear...rising and falling...fading...coming into view...time...being...

...flow...

We are not separate, we are full of All and Other...the fullness of Nothing, the emptiness of Everything...BRIGHT AND SHINING!

***

"...so your human consciousness creates an idea of time that connects the past, present and future. Then you believe that time is passing quickly and is characterized by the continuous existence of separate beings. But that is narrow understanding of time which creates lots of suffering, because when you think about time that way, you become egoistice, you believe that another person's time is separate from yours and that you only have to take care of your own time. Then you feel isolated and cold. You don't feel a warm relationship with other people or beings and you can easily hurt them."

-Katagiri, p. 70-

***

"The source of time is the place where you can see your human life from a broad view."

-Katagiri, p. 76

***

"There is no gap where you feel separate from time, because your life is the whole dynamic world of time, and all sentient beings are the contents of your life. This is called egolessness."

-Katagiri, p. 78-

Huritgruten Day 4 part 2

2008-07-22T08:55:00.000-07:00

"...in the evening we entered the majestically splendid and beautiful Trollfjord---just to be there and floating on the water was so wonderful and it was still light out at 11.30 p.m.! Then as we slowly sailed out of the fjord we entered the midnight sun---how can this be described? The colors in the sky and on land were nothing I had seen before and to have the sun floating effortlessly above the horizon at 12.45 a.m.! We will have this sun for the next few days...in summer never night, only light and water, ever floating and floating on...."

***

"Mokurai, 'moku' means 'silence' amd 'rai' means 'thunder'. So silence is quiet, but there is an enormous voice like thunder there."

-Katagiri, p. 63-

***

"Silence is a great space where you can accept everything."

-Katagiri, p. 64

***

"Silence is full devotion---your self-centered life is thrown away to wholeness. A whole life is characterized by commitment in love, wisdom and prayer."

-Katagiri, p. 65-

***

"Vastness is a character of Buddhism. It's vast and it's deep---there's nothing to pin down."

-Katagiri, p. 66-

Hurtigruten Day 4 Part One

2008-07-22T08:36:00.000-07:00

"Yesterday at BodÖ, it was wonderful to go out in the small boat and see the Maelstrom---Saltstraumen---one of the world's most powerful currents: 'where 372 million cubic meters (13 billion cubic feet) of water is forced in and out through a 150 m (500f) wide and 31m (100 foot) deep passage four times a day.' It was really amazing and we also saw sea eagles---one was even sitting in its nest...

***

"Demonstrate full commitment to life, and just be there."

-Kitagiri, p. 52-

***

"To experience this refreshing emptiness, accept your life and then face it. Make your body and mind be fully present, and practice living with full devotion. Instead of trying to get something for yourself, totally offer, your whole body and mind to whatever you are doing; surrender your life. To surrender means to let go of the idea that you have a completely separate existence and accept that your life is going on beyond your usual understanding. Then demonstrate full commitment from moment to moment and just be there. That's it! That's all you have to do. At that time you are right on the flow of impermanence."

-Katagiri, p. 53-54-

Hurtigruten Day 3

2008-07-18T00:00:00.000-07:00

Monument showing where the Arctic Circle begins
Just having crossed the Arctic Circle

Svartisen Glacier in the background

"This morning at 7:27 we passed the Arctic Circle---bright blue sunny morning with a temperature of 16°C---the water was sparkling and then as we went further along, the land-and-seascape was so majestically beautiful---a sigh of incredible. In the background of water and tiny islands and larger islands with forests and then rocky land rising up and then the glaciers then the blue then the sun...one layer after another and another. We were close to Svartisen http://www.gonorway.com/norway/sidevisning.php?id=87&tekst=87

*****magical*****"

***

"Touch the moment and bounce! Keep moving!"

-Katagiri, p. 50-

****

The Flow is what keeps thing from falling apart, stay togehter, carries on...

***

Hurtigruten Day Two

2008-07-16T23:34:00.000-07:00

Geirangerfjord

Seven Sisters Waterfall

Geirangerfjord

Trondheim Bryggene

Nidaros Cathederal

"Today we made landfall in Trondheim---we separated ourselves from the masses and walked up to the old fortress---beautiful and calm view of everything below. There was even a very short walk through the woods. Then we went to the cathederal, Nidaros, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nidaros_Cathedral---masses and masses of people---pushing and trying to get ahead of others to buy tickets and souvenirs. I felt a bit of sadness for a place that should be sacred. Instead of going in, we walked away. We knew that on our return down the coast we could visit early in the morning. Hopefully before the tidal wave of tourists."

***

Water bright

with light

reflecting each to

each

Not two---

Not one---

each to

each

Light bright

with water

Reflecting

***

"...accept every moment as an opportunity presented to you to practice facing reality as it really is. When a moment arises, you don't know the reason why it exists, but you have to accept it and face it, whatever happens."

-Katagiri, p. 24-

"Do it like a turtle: clamly walking, step-by-step, moment after moment, without expecting anything."

-Katagiri, p. 25-

"To live in peace and harmony, become yourself as you really are in the present moment as it really is. This is very beautiful."

-Katagiri, p. 26-

Hurtigruten Day One

2008-07-16T04:57:00.001-07:00

"From wind and water to rising and falling waves---it was the first night of my life spent on a ship, such a big piece of welded together metal, held ever so lightly on the water and ever so lightly tilting to and fro and up and down. As if I had been placed in a giant cradle for sleep, being rocked to sleep, ever so lightly. At first, though, there was a moment of uneasiness as the stability of the Earth seemed to be lost. However, I let go to the waves and suddenly I found the holding power of Water, fluid but strong. Then in the morning, on opening the portal window---shining water holding and giving back the light from itself.

Sitting on deck with a cup of tea, memories rising---falling up---a boat long, long ago on a reservoir, a place much drier than here. My grandpa, fisherman; I, beloved grandson. A bright sumemr day to fish, to be held together on top of the water by sun and sky. I remember after catching my first few fish, how I hated to watch how they gulped for air, their sparkling beauty brought out of their element, gasping---both of us---for air. He always knew after that that I never put bait on my hook. He was just happy that I was by his side, and I that he was by mine. On the water, supported, fluid and strong."

***

Ship's wake---

then---

water returning unto

itself.

***

Norway

Land forced down by ice,

Heaviness retreated,

Rising again above water,

Washing away again

In wind and waterfall.

***

"Then Dogen asked, 'What is practice?' The old monk said, 'Nothing is closed in the Universe."

-Katagiri, p. 9-

***

"One aspect of time is to separate; the other is to connect. The aspect of time that separates you from others is the human world. The aspect of time that connects you to others is universal truth. You are connected with all beings in time, which permeates into every inch of the cosmic universe, and space, where everyone and everything exist togethe in peace and harmony."

-Katagiri, p. 11

***

"Be still, and know that I am God."

The Bible

***

"Stare at reality face-to-face, without blinking, and become yourself with open eyes. This is Buddha practice."

-Katagiri, p.15

Hurtigruten Journey

2008-07-15T04:09:00.000-07:00

The oldest part of the city, a UNESCO heritage sight

A view from up above the city
An 11th century Stave church on the outskirts of the city

For the next week or so I thought I would post pictures from our journey along the Norwegian coast with excerpts from my daily journal as well as quotes from the books I was reading along the way. How wonderful to sit on deck, drinking tea and looking at such spectacular vistas. Spending a lot of time reading Dogen this year http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/D%C5%8Dgen, I brought along a book entitled "Each Moment is the Universe: Zen and the Way of Being Time" by Dainin Katagiri. I read a bit each morning and the thoughts there also 'colored' my sight.

We flew from Frankfurt to Bergen and were in the city for a day and a half before we boarded our Hurtigruten ship, the Polarlys, meaing "Polar Light" in Norwegian. Here were my thoughts on that day and a few pictures of Bergen and a link to info about the city: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bergen .

"How time moves---how thing change. Arriving in Bergen---flying above clouds---seeing expanses of water, all hues of blue, a blue reainbow, blue light prisimed into more blue and blue. Suddenly small swirls of islands and then a fjord opening up and out and then the city. Clouds rise and roll and give away of themselves with water and water and water---wind---and sun---an 11th century church---stones slowly washing away---wind blown, rain beaten. This church seven times burnt down to the ground and then raised again. Stone upon stone. Everything changing---falling apart---rising again and again...time:

flow..."

Manifestations of Avalokiteshwara

2008-04-03T09:23:00.001-07:00

This is a beautiful old Weeping Willow that I pass by on my bike a few times a week. All along the River Main in the 10 km I travel it is the only one and it has a lovely presence. Here in the pictures today, you can see how it is just starting to open itself up to Spring. I found these few wispy branches hanging over the river to be especially beautiful and fragile this morning.

Here are a lot of branches hanging, almost looking like a waterfall of leaves.

And in this last picture you can see the massiveness of the tree itself.

This all fits in very well with the first of the Thirty-three Transformation Forms of Guanyin. The first is called Willow Leaf Guanyin also known as Bhaisajya-raja Avalokitshwara. This form of the Bodhisattva hold a vase in the left hand a stalk of willow leaves in the right. Many say this refers to the the Bodhisattva's flexibility to adapt to the mind of sentient beings, like willow leaves in the wind. Or that the vase has an elixir that can cure all physical and spiritual illnesses. I think both are nice ideas!

Oh willow deeply rooted upon the shore

With branches as thin as a breeze of wind

Bending each way

While leaves reach down

To the waves beneath them

Teardrops not ready to fall

Some other artwork

2008-04-01T09:21:00.000-07:00

After looking in the sketches in my diary, I started to think about the artwork that I had done over the last year and how it relates to my Buddhist Training. The first here is part of the Teachin that no matter how dry and cracked the ground of our existence may be, the Unborn is always there...even when it may only feel like a small rivulet of water...IT is THERE for us. I know this very much from experience with this feeling...and from this small rivulet a flower may bloom and then it flows and begins to fill every crack of our being. How wonderful it/ It is!
This is the picture hanging next to the one above, sorry about the photo quality...our camera is seeing its last days once again! The golden circle represents the Unborn for me and the Knot of Eternity Its expression in the every day world. And somehow the vison of water mixed with light is how I sometimes perceive this, that's why I have the water cascading out of the circle and filled with light. The words may be hard to read from the picture, but here is what they are:

Eternal Source

Ever flowing

Ever falling

Never ceasing

Eternal Flow

This is a picture that I did which reflects one of Dogen's writings which I really treasure. I like combining Celtic Knotwork and Medieval Art as elements. This is from the scripture which says:

"If you become thus utterly free you will be as the water wherein the dragon dwells or as the mountain whereon the tiger roams."

My next project that I'm working on is block prints of the 33 forms of Kanzeon, but more about that tomorrow!

Back from Sesshin

2008-03-31T05:56:00.000-07:00

I was really good to have last week as a sesshin. To really have time to sit and meditate and look within. At this point in my life it was so important. Looking back over the week today and looking in my diary, I saw that I had sketched two pictures from the week. I had never thought of putting these on my blog, but somehow I think these can say better what Teaching there was. Another thing I'd like to share is a prayer that developed and I wrote down as well in my diary:

In this difficult moment

I will look up

and

turn to Buddha

to soften my heart,

to strengthen my will,

so that I may

cease from evil,

do only good

and

do good for others.

What's left behind

2008-02-20T02:38:00.000-08:00

This is a picture of the box that I keep my incense in for meditation. It was given to me by my grandma before her death and it was one of a few things that she gave to me. It was such an uncomfortable moment when I visited her and she had all of these things on her table. I told her at first that I didn't want to take them, it made me feel uncomfortable thinking about her death. However, she explained to me that it was a joy and a comfort to her to know where her prized possessions were going and to whom. For me it is a wonderful "heart connection" to her every time I meditate. You see I also really treasured the box because of the bird on it. My grandma and I used to love to watch the birds outside the large windows of their mountain house.

I think she had the right idea about giving things away when she did, it has kept a wonderful "physical" connection between us. I've learned how important it is to keep onself open to the wishes of the dying!

Changes other than death

2008-02-12T09:51:00.000-08:00

(this is a picture looking our form where I work. A large skyscraper had been torn down and a new one is slowly being put up. This is how it looked last year. In the background you can see the "Alte Oper" Old Opera House, and then in the far background St. Bartholomew's Cathederal where the Holy Roman Emperors were crowned as well as other buildings being constructed with cranes.)

I realized in the past few days how changes can be very uncomfortable and since death is one of the big changes, I sensed how even with some of the little things I can become so disturbed. The first change was to hear from our neighbors, who I really cherish, that they are looking for a new place because she is pregnant again and they need a bigger and better located place. I felt very sad as I had just really felt how wonderful it was to have really fantastic neighbors. Then after that I was at Yoga on Monday and my favorite teacher, who also has an interest in Buddhism and who I've know for almost three years now, told me that she is moving back to the States because her husband works for the diplomatic corps and has been called back to D.C.. Then at work, new classes start in March and some of the participants that I've had, and cherish, since I started in 2001 have been told by their boss that they cannot take English anymore. All of these really jOlTeD me emotionally. Change and loss. Very real even when it does not involve death. This has really pointed out to me how I must remain mindful in such situations and look at the core of the discomfort.

I wish all of these people well in their new endeavors and know that in heart there is always a connection.

By the way the building that has been started has come quite a long way, I'll try to post a picture of it this week. Funny, people at the bank are now sad because of the change of having a new building there. Their view is no longer so nice. Change and change and change and how do we deal with it?

2008-02-11T05:27:00.000-08:00

(taken in the desert outside of Dubai)

"Death is not our shadow, it is our guide."

-Gurumayi Chidvilasananda-

The passing of others

2008-02-10T01:50:00.000-08:00

These are two pictures of the wall of the foundation in the churchyard that has been turned into an AIDS memorial. The metal spikes are put into the wall as a memory for those they know who have died. Often there are fresh flowers put upon the spikes. In golden letters are the words in German "Verletzte Liebe"---"Injured Love". As you can see our dying camera didn't get such a good picture of this, but I still wanted to share it.

In my early and late twenties I lost so many friends and even my first partner to this disease. As I said in an earlier post my Grandpa was the first death of someone that I experienced and then just a year after I begin to see death all around me. The deaths of very close friends and many others not so close, but the numbers were staggering. So many died very painful deaths. One friend who was only twenty-five died from herpes covering his whole body. This was a time of great suffering for me as well, not physical but spiritually. Unfortunately, I didn't learn at this time how to keep my heart open. However, later with experience and from these experiences, I have slowly learned how to let the heart continue to open.

Lama Shenpen Hookham has some wonderful lines about this:

Connecting to the heart

"What we mean by heart is multifaceted and reich, and there is much about it that is relevant to how we approache death and thereafter. There seems to be meaning in talking about 'our heart of hearts', 'deep in our heart', 'holding someone in our heart', as if there were some kind of inner sanctum or place of innermost sensitivity. As well as being the seat of our deepest longing, the heart is often associated with warmth and genuineness of feeling, which mean so much at death. When one's whole world and all that it means to you is slipping away, it is only your own other people's hearts that can offer any sense of meaning at all."

Our hearts are connected to the One Heart, so there is no separation at all. A very consoling and joyful thought!

An endless end

2008-02-09T06:49:00.000-08:00

"Your end, which is endless, is as a snowflake dissolving in pure air."
-Bassui, addressing a dying disciple-

Away from home

2008-02-08T03:57:00.000-08:00

I was really touched by this tombstone in the churchyard here in Frankfurt. To see someone who was so far away from home and so young, who died. Was alone? Was he with his family here? Had he been visiting relatives? Was it an illness? An accident? A crime? Were his last wishes and thoughts to be at home with his family?

I guess this has an especially strong feeling for me since I'm also living in a foreign country, away form my original home. Although Frankfurt is my new home and I have my "new" family and friends here, the thought still remains, when I die, will I think of the Rocky Mountains where my life started? And who knows at the time of my death where I'll be...it could always happen away from home, on vacation for instance. But I guess that's what my Buddhist Faith is trying to teach, I'm already "home" when I rest within the Eternal. Easy to say, but not always easy to be there.

"Coming, all is clear,

no doubt about it.

Going, all is clear,

without a doubt.

What, then, is it all?

-Hosshin 13th cen Zen Monk-

"Empty handed I entered the world

Barefoot I leave it.

My coming, my going---

Two simple happenings

That got entangled.

-Kozan Ichigyo 14th cen Zen Monk-

First Encounter

2008-02-07T08:42:00.000-08:00

Today I thought about the first time that I really encountered death and I was surprised how really late in my life it was. All of my pets lived long lives until I was in my early twenties, in fact, our cat Musette lived to be 23 years old! The first encounter was completely unexpected, a total surprise. I was in my freshman year at university, in the spring semester and my parents showed up to take me home as my grandfather---a strong and healthy man---had died unexpectedly.

This was one of the most beloved people in my life up to that time. My grandfather who took my fishing and knew that I never put a worm on my hook because I felt terrilbe killing something. He smiled and told me that was an admirable quality. Or this wonderful man who could make anything grow and had a huge garden every year, even planint different kinds of lettuce outside of the fence for the deer to nibble on and have a treat. This wonderul man who had hugged me and made me feel so deeply loved---he was gone.

I remember arriving home and walking out to the garden. It had all been freshly planted and the sprouts were just rising up. And there I wrote a whole poem, a poem that I later read aloud in my first creative writing class and there was silence from everyone and tears from a few. The pain was almost overwhelming and sadly I cannot find the poem anymore, it was published in the universities quarterly literary magazine. Today as I thought about this day of unexpected and such painful loss, I could remember the last line...the two pictures I had in my head, the garden and the graveyard and this was :

and You in a row, instead of planting

I also happened upon a poem from 2005 in my little book that I carry around with me that I scribble all sorts of things in and it said:

In autumn

In falling rain

You don't see

The tears

Of the turning leaves

As they fall.

Funny how different memories of loss rise to greet us at different times in our lives. I also thought happily, how I have my grandfather's first name as my middle name and how wonderful that is.

Open heart

2008-02-06T09:44:00.001-08:00

After a bit of a long day, I'd just like to put some of the things I read in Lama Shenpen Hookham's book here. The importance of meditation that leads to an open heart is the most important thing to prepare us for our death, and of course, it is also the most important thing while we are alive. The quotes from today's reading:

"In other words, what is impermanent and illusory about us is not what we are. We are awareness, and awareness is no other than our heart."

"Genuine understanding of the true nature of reality comes from being deeply connected with our heart through meditation."

"To have a deep, ongoing confidence in our heart is the most important thing at death."

"What we sense as meaningful in our heart is really the living presence of the heart of the universe, right there in the heart of our being. That is a bold statement indeed!"

"What we all need to develop is a sense of an underlying trust in what is in our heart that can carry us through life and death. That is what takes the time adn requires commitment."

Seeing death

2008-02-05T04:33:00.000-08:00

I've been reading a book by Hape Kerkeling, a German comedian who took time out to take the pilgrims path to Santiago de Compostela. The book's title, "Ich bin dann mal weg", (I'll be gone for a bit) has some wonderful reflections about how one can see life and their own life along a pilgrimage route. I just read on Sunday the part where he reflects on a near death experience and what he felt:

"Man wird ganz friedlich und ordnet in aller Ruhe die eigenen Gedanken. Da geht es zum Teil um völlig banale Dinge, die aber im Sterbeprozess unglaubliche Wichtigkeit bekommen. Vor allem geht es aber um die Frage: Was tue ich anderen und was tun andere mir! Tiere übrigens eingeschlossen."

"You are completely peaceful and put in order your own thoughts. In part it deals with banal things, which, however, have become unbelievably important. Above all is the question: What have I done to others and what have they done to me! By the way, animals are also included."

And then he describes the moment:

"Ich kann es nur versuchen, es zu beschreiben. Es ist etwa so ein Gefühl, als würde man mit einem Plöpp-Geräusch eine Bierflasche öffnen und dazu die Berliner Symphoniker in doppelter Besetzung die 9. Sinfonie von Beethoven spielen lassen. Banal und feierlich zu gleich."

"I can only try to describe it. It is a feeling as if you hear the sound *Plop* sound of a beer bottle with the Berlin Philharmonic with double the musicians playing Beethoven's 9th Symphony. Banal and celebratory at the same time."

I think there is a lot of wisdom, and good humor, in these words!

And from my Calendar this week is a qoute from Hakuin:

"The monkey is reaching for the moon in the water.

Until death overtakes him he'll never give up.

If he'd let go the branch and disappear in the deep pool,

The whole world would shine with dazzling pureness."

(from The Zen Koan, by Isshu Miura and Ruth Fuller Sasaki, Harcourt, Brace and World, 1965)

Going over to the other shore

2008-02-03T07:01:00.000-08:00

(Bronze Age "Boat" Graves on Gotland)

After talking about the archeaological dig on Gotland, I thought of these wonderful graves from the Bronze Age. They were made in the shape of boats to symbolize the journey to the other side. At the same time, the Buddhist image of the boat taking us to the other shore from samsara to nirvana came to mind. So, even in Buddhism a boat helps us to leave the division of death and life behind. Once we know our True Nature, the death of the physical body no longer causes concern. The finla state is like a raindrop merging into the ocean, existence remains, but one's limitation and sense of separateness dissolve. It is something like this, anyway.

The first "death story" in Sushila Blackman's book is this one:

"When an elder Buddhist master asked a group of meditators, 'What survives when an enlightened being dies?' a man in the group replied, 'When an enlightened being dies, nothing remains.'

The master smiled and replied to the surprise of those assembled, 'No. The truth remains.'"

May I find the Truth, so that It may remain!

Not me!

2008-02-01T23:25:00.000-08:00

(Looking down onto our excavation field near Fröjel)

(Sarah, a Viking woman from the 9th century)

"Yudhisthira asked 'Of all things in life, what is most amazing?'

Yudhisthira answers: 'That a man, seeing others die all around him, never thinks that he will die.'"

-Mahabharata-

This is such a good point, but perhaps in our day and age we are not confronted with death as people were in the past. Above you can see a photo of an archeaological dig that I participated on the island of Gotland in the Baltic Sea. We were working in a Viking graveyard that had layers from the early 6th all the way to the 12th centuries. This grave is of a young woman, who probably died in childbirth. At that time, death permeated much of life.

Working on this site it became evident how gentle and reflective one becomes around death. With gentle bruch strokes, we slowly revealed the skeletal remains and among everyone was a sense of respect and wondering who this woman was. At the same time, even on those beautiful, long Swedish summer days, our thoughts were confronted with death, ours and that of others. As Lama Shenpen Hookham says:

"Although the best time to read and reflect on death is before we have to face it---preferably a long time beforehand---few people do so. It is symptomatic of the human condition that life's preoccupations sweep us relentlessly on, leaving us with no time to think about death, and little inclination to do so. This is one reason why the prospect of death tends to come as a shock, when we are suddenly faced, at the worst possible moment, with fundamental questions about what life is, or was, all about."

It is interesting to not that in early Buddhism and still to this day in Theravada tradtions, monks meditate in graveyards. Working on an archeaological site all one summer, on a beautiful island in the Baltic, brought me closer to thinking about what death is and how things really are impermanent.

Well, I guess I wandered away from the cemetery that is so close to our home here in Frankfurt, but the island had so many expressions of death and LIFE! It was one of the most enjoyable things I did in my life and friendships were formed that still go to this day! The island also has incredible graves from the Bronze Age, in many different forms, so I'll have to show those later. I have to dive into the days preoccupations as my parents-in-law are coming. And my father-in-law is having to deal with illness at the moment. In a week he'll start radiation therapy for the cancer cells which are gorwing in his prostate. Another reminder!

Reflections on the place we all have to come to...

2008-02-01T09:12:00.000-08:00

"Of all footprints

That of the elephant is supreme;

Of all mindfulness meditations

That on death is supreme."

-Mahaparinirvana Sutra-

I made the decision this month to reflect on death, not out of a morbid sense, but out of the sense that it is something I often forget to think about in my day to day life. This, even though there are signs all around. One of these signs is a graveyard in the churchyard that I walk through on my way to the gym many times a week. As an American who grew up in the West where the cemeteries are no more than 150 or so years old, it is amazing to see those that are much older. Today, on a rainy and dreary day, I really enjoyed taking a closer look at what the churchyard had to show. The picture at the top, I thought, was fitting for the start of a month of long reflection.

February is also the time that Buddhist celebrate the Paranirvana of the Buddha and so I thought I would also be doing some reading about death. The two that I'll be reading are:

Graceful Exits: How Great Beings Die

(Death stories of Hindu, Tibetan Buddhist, and Zen Masters)

Compiled and Edited by Suchila Blackman

and

there's more to dying than death: a buddhist perspective

by lama shenpen hookham

The later I've already read, but want to return to it because it had so many wonderful and intriguing things to say and present. I hope to also share the photos that I took of the graves...some are a bit blurry as our camera is also on its last legs. And some have things to say themselves without any words!

75 Years ago....

2008-01-30T02:28:00.000-08:00

Today marks the 75th anniversary of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party taking power in Germany. Avi Priomor, the former Israeli ambassador to Germany, said at an event commerating the Holocaust and the liberation of Auschwitz in Erfurt last Friday:

"Where in the world has one ever seen a nation that erects memorials to immortalize its own shame? Only the Germans had the bravery and the humility."

This is such an important statement, the ability to see what has been done wrong, to remember it, to seek forgivenens...to have the humility---humilitz in its positive sense---to do this and go on. The going on can be such a difficult aspect for some, it can be that we go on and forget OR that we go on and continue to drown in our unrelenting feelings of having done the worse. On a personal level, I understand the second feeling very well. The problem is that this can lead to a deep hardening of the heart on the personal level and on a much wider level. In an article from the IHT this moring, Susan Neiman, directior of the Einstein Forums in Potsdam, and international publich research organization said her own children are saturated with discussions of the Holocaust and no longer want to hear about it. She said:

"I worry terribly that it's going to backfire."

So, not so easy to find the balance between remembering so that we can help ourselves from falling into error again and the other side of beating ourselves down for what we've done, or feel we've done, and not coming to a sense of closure and moving on. A difficult sense to going on...

Here is a picture of the Old Opera House (Alter Oper) here in Frankfurt at Christmas this year. The Opera lay in ruins into the 1980's and it was decided to rebuild it. It reminded me that memories of past mistakes can also be a light to illumintate our present with memory and the hope of going on....

Back Again!

2008-01-29T08:41:00.000-08:00

Wow...amazing to think that it has almost been a year since I last wrote. Mostly this was due to other writing and creative projects, but now I'd like to get back to writing on my blog. As always the blog will be about my every day encounters with my spiritual life. And I thought no better way to start off than of the statue that I made which stands in front of our front door. That means, we see it when we leave home and when we return. It is a reminder for me to keep myself open to others and to practice Compassion in the world. And along with the statue is one of my favorite quotes from the Pali Suttas:

"...with a heart filled with loving-kindness...having pervaded one directions with such a heart, and likewise a second direction, a third directions and a fourth direction. Upward, downward, across, everywhere, and in every way, throughout the whole world, he lives with a loving-kindness that is widespread, great, boundless, free from hatred, and untroubled."

This is from the Kalama Sutta and it is from John J. Holder's book: Early Buddhist Discourses. It's a great book and you can even go to the publishers website to download study and discussion questions, which I found wonderful to think about myself.

Death of an old friend...

2007-02-08T04:28:00.000-08:00

(One of the first pictures taken)
(The last picture taken)

First, I should say: "Don't worry! It is not a living person who has died, but our camera!" But what a friend it has been. We bought it right before our trip to Australia and New Zealand which was also the time of our first anniversary. As you can see one of the very first pictures shows my partner and me...one of the pictures I love because it shows love! The last picture is the same. I was going up to our place this week and I saw our neighbor's shoes and her child's shoes lying next to each other. I see Franca and Giaccamo often in the week as they are going out for walks and playing and often when I pass by their door I can hear Franca singing Italian songs to Giaccamo. It is always heart warming and a nice point in the day. Somewhow, those small shoes almost seem to snuggle up to the big shoes. I thought it was a wonderful picture and moment. But then the "FEHLER" notice (German for "Malfunction") appeared and the camera made a strange noise and went dark, I realized a friend had died. Thousands and thousands and thousands of pictures during all our trips or with family and friends or on my bike aroudn the city, to and from work,...pictures that we wanted to share with each other and everyone we hold dear. It was clear, this camera was an object filled with love and I just wanted to take a moment to honor it in it's passing and say: "Thank you, friend, for sharing so much with so many!"

Goodness shining bright!

2007-02-04T00:48:00.000-08:00

Listening to the news this morning, I saw the devastation from the storms in Florida. One place, which was really hit hard, was a mobile home park with mostly senior citizens and many of them had lost everything. One gentleman told how his insurance had been cancelled a year before, not because of his not paying, but because the company decided the area was too high of a risk. I could feel the angry grumbling in my heart, but then they showed how other people in the area were opening their homes for these people to stay in. They had moved out to sleep on their couches and sofas and floor so that the elderly could sleep in their beds. It was really beautiful to see! They asked one young couple how long their new three guests could stay and the man looked as if it was a silly question and simply answered, "Why until they can stand on their own two feet again!" That is true goodness shining bright, without condition and completely open. Then, they talked to one of the elderly residents who had been offered a place to stay and she said as she stumbled through the rubble of her house, "You see, there is only really good, only good, deep down in all of us." It was so magnificent to see someone so utterly convinced of this...something I need to find deep in my heart myself that there is only really good, only good, deep down in all of us!

Dharmazuflucht Schwarzwald/ The Black Forest Dharma Refuge

2007-02-04T00:41:00.000-08:00

I just wanted to share a few pictures of the temple here. Friends have asked what it is like. The first photo shows the path that one walks down to get to the temple, the next is a picture of the temple itself from up on the hill and the last is the view one has when one steps out of the door from the kitchen. It is really a gift and a blessing to have a temple so close and to have a monk here who shares much wisdom, compassion and humor!

Absolutely, unexpected beauty!

2007-01-22T04:16:00.000-08:00

Whoever thought, on the first day this year that it has really become cold that we would have a visitor in our bedroom. I went in to use the computer and there on the windowsill was a: BUTTERFLY! And an incredibly beautiful one! What a gift! I'll have to look up just what kind it is. The only thought, should I put it back outside...it will go below freezing by the end of the day and the rest of the week!

Wind

2007-01-20T07:54:00.000-08:00

(These were the top wind speeds from the storm "Kyrill" as you can see Frankfurt is in a protected area between mountains, so we were relatively safe)

I read an article yesterday about the saddest time of the year and it reminded me as well of a conversation I had with a friend about ten years ago. My friend Kathleen suffered from depression and told me that the wind really made her angry and depressed. I was surprised, for me the wind energized me. Then, she found a scientific article that talked about the wind making our skins produce a chemical to protect it, in some people it causes a sense of happiness to euphoria and in others a terrible sense of depression. The wind in the storm this time did cause mostly sadness, there were many people injured and some killed throughout Germany and Europe. Back to the article, according to researchers the saddest day of the year is January 24th. This is due to the still continuing dark winter days, the "Post-Christmas-Blues", family tensions, credit card bills and the collapse of our New Year resolutions! I think the best advice there is, is to look up, it will lift our spirits. As Helen Keller said: "Keep your face to the sunshine and you can't see the shadow." Or one that even like better is an old Chinese proverb: "You can't stop the birds of sadness flying over you, but don't let them nest in your hair." Good advice!

In the middle of the storm!

2007-01-18T09:28:00.000-08:00

WOW! What a storm today. Here in Germany it is being called a monster-storm and they have given it the name "Kyrill"...sounds like some monster from a Sci-Fi movie. The wind is really howling and roaring outside right now! Nothing I've ever seen since I've lived here. During the whole day I was amazed and a bit frightened by the power of it. I couldn't ride my bike to work this morning and so I took the train, which wobbled back and forth on the tracks form the forcse of the gusts. I heard that the trains are being kept at lower speeds and the bullet trains are going at 100 kph less than usual. Then, coming home for lunch I saw the usual outdoor market with its trailers and stands and one of them had blown over and they closed the market many hours earlier than usual. And I saw as I walked along the pedestrian zone some large stores had put out signs that they were closing at three because of it. All afternoon there have been sirens and loud noises without stop. On Thursdays I only work in the morning, so this afternoon I had the opportunity to meditate two more times. It was interesting to be aware of the loud roar of the wind and all the other noises and feel the uncomfortable feeling of fear and worry rise up. Then, this late afternoon, in all that noise I could hear the usual ringing of the church bells around the city center. It was a lovely feeling...something familiar and usual in all that cacaphony of growling chaos. Now the wind is not so scary!

And also a nice memory from last week

2007-01-16T06:06:00.000-08:00

Getting ready to go snowshoeing
There I am up in the snow
and my partner Marc
And a Buddha statue in the little tiny town of Hirschegg in Kleinwalsertal in the Alps...this was a nice surprise to see in front of the health food store there...found some great local organic cheese and raspberry lassi!

Bubble Thoughts

2007-01-16T06:00:00.000-08:00

I was cleaning about my bike bag and took out the little black book I was given as a birthday present when I first moved here to Germany. It was fun to look through, as I had forgotten that whenever short little "poetic" ideas came I scribbled them in the book. Usually, I was underway on my bike and wrote them quickly at stoplights along the way or stopped along the river to jot them down. So, here are some of them...and I think I'll take this habit up again...I'm constantly having little bubble thoughts that pop up.

sigh---
relief
again
buds break from branches
Earth’s genorosity---
and the thanks?

21.III.2001

tomb and womb
only a difference of
one letter!

25.III.2001

monkish thoughts
then cool morning
spring breeze---
hyacinth---
flesh!

27.III.2001

a pear’s broken skin,
softer than an apple,
torn, an accident,
bled on this book.
how long will this sweetness
endure?

29.III.2001

the willows heavy with rain
and even proud oaks
bowed in supplication for
sun

IV.2001

joy is melancholy’s shadow
silent, unnoticed
following behind
faintly touching our heels.

IV.2001

have. have not.
mixed unevenly.
left to simmer,
slowly boil.
careful it doesn’t
rise to the rim.
Spill over.
Hate.
4.IV.2002

2007-01-14T09:54:00.000-08:00

Outside the window, the mountain is heavy with mist, only dark outlines and its peak keep it from disappearing, letting us know it is still there. It is as if the fog has taken the whole world away and me with it. I sit looking out, feeling the weight. Doubt is heavy. Doubt is dark. The question keeps rising, just as the mist from the valley, and it envelopes me: is the path that I'm following, really right for me? Was taking the Precepts the right choice in life? But within all that is heavy and dark, there is lightness. This is living in the opposites. This is where one finds The Way.
The wind rises and the laden white strands are whirled and whisked away to different sides and more of the mountain can be seen and it picks up light from the sun. Again an opening: It is right; it is ALL right. Bright faith rises for a moment, there is certainty, there is a lightness. The sky, the mountain and I open up. The air can be breathed again.
But again the fog may rise from the deep valley or clouds settle in from the sky. As it has the past few days. Everything will seem to be lost from view again. Eyes blind, doubts rising. a thought: remain like the mountain, for it never really disappears. Obscured but solid, I'll learn to sit. Again, it is only the mist and wind that move, not the mountain. Heavy, laden with doubt: pure meditation must be done.
The sun sets, unnoticed in deep grey winter evenings. Night falls. Heavy. Stars appear. Light. Light rises. I sit.
There is Truth in all this.
Pure meditation must be done.
Sit like the mountain, even when the doubts come!

The rest of the time in the Alps was filled with delight, feeling a deeper sense of my practice, feeling more open to That Which is. How wonderful, I have become a bit more like the mountain and less like the wind and mist.

Truth

2006-12-26T02:35:00.000-08:00

(our tree this year)

Growing up in the Rocky Mountains, where the air is very dry in the winter, we were never able to have a tree with real candles. Here in Germany it is possible and it is a splendid picture! My partner's parents brought the tree with them.

And a nice quote that I read this morning:

''The search for truth is more precious than its possession."

-Albert Einstein-

Chains and Scrooge

2006-12-16T00:18:00.000-08:00

Well, I must say I've been very busy the last few weeks with performances! However, last night was the last one for the season and now I can get back to a little more contemplation and writing. I've been trying to find something for my students next week that has something to do with Christmas since it will be the time for a "light lesson". Past years we've read "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas" or J.R.R. Tokein's letters that he wrote to his kids, etc...

This year I thought I'd take a look at "A Christmas Carol" again. Something that I've not done for a long, long time. I forgot how much fun it is to read Dickens and how much humanity and understanding of the human heart he has. In fact, I think everyone can remember when the ghost of Marley comes to visit Scrooge and what Dickens says is a pure teaching of Karma, which is good to remember at this time of year! Here it is:

"I wear the chain I forged in life," replied the Ghost. "I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to you?"
Scrooge trembled more and more.
"Or would you know," pursued the Ghost, "the weight and length of the strong coil you bear yourself? It was full as heavy and as long as this, seven Christmas Eves ago. You have laboured on it, since. It is a ponderous chain!"
Scrooge glance about him on the floor, in expectation of finding himself surrounded by some fifty or sixty fathoms of iron cable; but he could see nothing.

A good reminder to listen to the "Ghosts" who try to show us the way out of our chains!

The Leaf, the Madwoman and the Still Fountain

2006-12-06T04:39:00.000-08:00

It is dark. It is still. The time after the city fountains have been put to rest, in fear of frost, which has not yet come---but will. Early hours and I see a woman circling a trash can, filled with what was left of the rush of business lives from the day before. A moment of pondering---what is this woman doing dressed as if ready to work---circling and circling a trash can---mumbling and mumbling like a Shakespearaen witch.

But the greyness lifts ever so slightly. I see it is a suit that is smeared and tattered as is her hair. And her bag is full of nothing---old news and empty bottles.

A rush of wind comes, scattering her hair and spiraling long ago fallen leaves into the air---they circle, too. And crackle like a brood of witches taken to the sky. A morning of incantation, of madness, of loss---of sorrow.

Until suddenly the curse seems lifted for a moment---one leaf breaks free caught on some other unseen breeze---rises away from the others, from the madwoman, from me.

Perhaps finding blessing in the never ending air.

Perhaps never to be seen again.

I go on to work.

It is dark. It is still.

The Season

2006-12-01T04:30:00.000-08:00

(The altar in our meditation room decorated for the season)
(Our living room decorated as a "Buddha Land")
(The front side of the box for the Avatamsaka Sutra)

'Tis the season..., how often have I heard that in my life since I was a child? It is actually a nice thing to hear and I remember how much I loved Advent and Christmas time as a child. I grew up in the Episcopal church and that taught me to love ritual and see how it mirrors the changes in the outer and the inner world. In other words, this time of year has always meant a lot to me and this year coming from a Buddhist point of view, I decorated our living room to look like "Buddha Land" and made a wooden box with a picture of the Cosmic Buddha and Samanthabadhra on it to hold The Avatamsaka Sutra which is being read each day. Ritual is important to me and I guess it can be seen as a form of meditation. It brings my mind into a pointed awareness just as meditation does.

Along with all of this I have an Advent calendar that is filled with different kinds of semi-preicious stones...a nice link to the idea of the jewels in "Indra's Net" and each one comes with a word according to its symbolism. Today's stone was a Chinese carnelian...it is lovely! It is all sorts of opaque terracotta colors with a bit of milky white in it. It's symbolism, according to the box at least, is "vitality". A nice stone and idea to carry in my pocket today. Vitality at this time when everything seems to be losing its energy---dark mornings, evening light that begins at four in the afternoon, etc.

I guess the thought today is: "Be vital!" No matter how dark it seems, we are always in the bright Ocean of Meditation!

A party of two wanderers....

2006-11-26T02:17:00.000-08:00

(A picture of Milford Sound, New Zealand, 2002...one of my favorite pictures!)

A friend of ours learned of the death of a very close friend in Amsterdam on Wednesday. He had been very close to the man and his partner and had spent a lot of time with them, first as a student studying art in Amsterdam and then a long many years of visiting them for extended weekends. They shared many interests together and the friendship grew and grew.

Parting is never easy and this morning as I was flipping through Japanese poetry books, as I'll be visiting the country in February, I came upon an old copy of Basho's The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches. I love the lines of his starting the journey with a friend:

We celebrated our start by scribbling on our hats 'Nowhere in this wide universe have we a fixed abode----A party of two wanderers.'

And then at the end, very movingly written, when the time comes to part:

I felt deeply in my heart both the sorrow of one that goes and the grief of one that remains, just as a solitary bird separated from its flock in dark clouds, and wrote in answer:

From this day forth

The dew-drops shall wash away

The letters on my hat

Saying 'A party of two'.

Basho also mentions illness and our friend's friend, who we met a few times, suffered a very painful illness of liver cancer, but continued to stay "bright":

Sick, on a journey

Yet over withered fields

Dreams wander on.

Somehow the words at the end of the journey are very sad and one can feel what it is like to be the lost bird in dark clouds...but somehow there is a light shining through these words, there is a going on and a few poems later, comes:

As firmly cemented clam-shells

Fall apart in autumn,

So I must take to the road again,

Farewell, my friends.

So, we all must say goodbye and continue on...like the clouds taken by the wind, like the clam shells that have fallen apart.

The last book I flipped through was Zen Poems of China and Japan: The Crane's Bill. It's a very old, tattered paperback I've had since university and as I opened it there was a poem from Dogen:

Four and fifty years

I've hung the sky with stars.

Now I leap through---

What shattering!

May we all do the same as we live---hang the sky with stars and when the time comes:

LEAP!

May Walter have lept through his collection of stars!

"Nothing in life is to be feared. It is only to be understood"

2006-11-24T05:08:00.000-08:00

Those are wonderful lines from Marie Curie that I just read today. I have suffered from fear for a very long time in life. I grew up in a family where I never knew what emotion was going to explode or be used at any moment. I was also a victim of sexual abuse, so I remember as a child sometimes just cowering inside with fear...although on the outside I played the "tough guy"! I notice, still, that fear can have such a strong hand over how I think...what will happen in the future, what will happen with this action, did I do all I could, etc.... But what is so imporant here is that "it is only something that needs to be understood"---and then let go of. Though I'm talking about what happened to me in the past, just this year I was able to really let it go. My parnter and I visited my parents, and I was really able to stay open and loving. Everything was transformed...there was no fear, no anger...this was an example of "leaping beyond fear!" And as one of the scriptures says in the Soto Tradition: OM TO THE ONE WHO LEAPS BEYOND ALL FEAR! I'm not there yet, but I'm ready to leap...soon, someday WITHOUT FEAR!

No matter how big of a mess...

2006-11-20T02:28:00.000-08:00

Yesterday we had friends over for a Thanksgiving meal. Being from Germany, they had never experienced Thanksgiving food before and what an experience they had! We started making some of the dishes on Friday and finished Sunday evening at 6 p.m.. We hadsweet potatoes with walnuts stewed in honey, maple syrup and a sherry vinegar, mashed potatoes with goat cheese and sage, dressing, green beans with roasted shallots and fennel and of course cranberries homemade. It was a lovely evening and our friends stayed until late. Then when they had left, we were tired and left much of what needed to be cleaned for this morning. My partner loaded the dishwasher once and did tidying up before he left for work, but as I had my first cup of coffe this morning...all I could see was a "mess that would never be cleaned up"! That's how I felt anyway and then I reflected on how that seems to be with my karma...I've done so many things and continue to do them...how can I ever get it cleaned up?!

Then, a smile rose, I just have to do it bit by bit. So, this morning between meditation and writing, I simply worked on it bit by bit and it's almost cleaned up. Just a bit more this afternoon between writing and preparing lesson plans.

And what's nice is there are lots of leftovers...so no cooking perhaps for the next few days...and I guess leftovers can be seen like working on cleaning up karma...they are the good "things" left that nourish us and help us continue on our way!

Bodhi Tree Update:

2006-11-16T04:18:00.000-08:00

There in the center is the tiny, green sprout...enjoying a very sunny day in the window!

Wanting to help, but not being able to...

2006-11-16T04:03:00.000-08:00

This is a picture that I keep on the shelf under the altar in our meditation room. It was drawn by my grandmother for me and it has so much meaning, especially because of how much she meant to me. But it also has another meaning. You see, my grandmother suffered from emphysema, and although this was a struggle for her, she lived a very long life into her 90's. However, the last two years of her life she lived in assisted living and sometimes she felt very closed in. So, on those days, she'd give me a call at work and we'd go for a drive...usually to a park or the botanic gardens in Denver or sometimes just going to the supermarket was fun for her. And, of course, for me as well.

However, one day she called and I could tell by her voice that she was really feeling closed in and sad. Many of the people she had first made friends with had passed away and it was not a day you could go outside walking. It was so hard for me because I was not able to leave work that day because of a meeting that was very important. I knew she understood, but I could still tell she was disappointed. I know she could tell by my voice that I felt guilty for not being able to help and I really struggled the rest of the day and through the meeting to keep my thoughts at work and what needed to be done. She had not created the guilt, I had.

What was so wonderful was that the very next day, in the mail came the picture you can see above. With it was the following poem:

Feel not remorse

At things undone,

As yet, they are to do!

You aren't a pigeon,

No wings have you,

And I understand.

With love,

Grandma R.

This is there on my altar to remind me of my grandmother and to offer merit to her whenever I can, but also to remind myself: sometimes we cannot help even though we want to and even though this is so, the love is always still there.

Bodhi Tree

2006-11-13T04:53:00.000-08:00

Last September when I was at the Buddha House in Stuttgart, I saw they had a potted Bodhi Tree and I was really fascinated about how beautiful the leaves end in a long point. By chance, I happend to find an offering of Bodhi Tree (Ficus Religiosa) seeds and I sent away for them. You can see how tiny they are...amazing that they will grow to such large trees! I planted them carefully and placed them in a nice warm spot. Then I began to wait and wait and wait...each day checking to make sure it was warm and damp enough.

Today, on a very wet and grey November day, I looked into the pot and there was one tiny little sprout! How wonderful to see! It is too small for a picture, but as soon as the sprout grows so more, I'll be adding its picture and maybe someday a picture of a small planted tree. A Bodhi Tree...a relative of the tree under which the Buddha was enlightened!

Light, water, leaves...

2006-10-22T00:59:00.000-07:00

Where I grew up, which is far away now, both in time and distance---it has already snowed, like it usually does. The striking golden leaves of the aspen have fallen down, brown under the weight of frost and snow. But here, far away, where I am now, autumn is able to sigh many times before being taken away by the heavy frost or snow. Here I have a lightness, a feeling of floating...much like the leaves must have when they dangle and dance from the branches in the summer, and then in their glory are caught by a breeze and gently fall. Some even lucky enough to fall upon a pond or lake, to float there for many more days. Today light, water, leaves and light. And there as if two brightly hued leaves have been brought together and sail: a butterfly, and I think:

Is this the last

butterfly

I'll see

Before

Frost lames wing?

Before leaf

lies captured

on ice laced

pond?

The only answer there is, is perhaps, perhaps not. Now is only:

water

leaves

light

Herons

2006-10-14T08:04:00.000-07:00

Riding home from work on Thursday this bird caught my eye! A heron up in a weeping willow looking out over the pond. They are really stately birds that seem to contemplate everything around them. I don't think they are always looking for fish! I took a look about the symbolism for herons and it is interesting that in all the cultures that I looked at from Ancient Egypt to Native American the heron stands for wisdom and patience. I think that fits them quite well as they quietly sit, as if in meditation, and simply see the world as it is. May I learn to sit as a heron does!

Ocean of Compassion

2006-10-14T07:58:00.000-07:00

Our Kanzeon Altar in our hallway at home

After all that has happened the past few weeks and how much the meaning of the Ocean of Compassion has come to mean to me, I worked on making a cloth for our altar that shows water cascading down from Kanzeon and filling the world. I used plastic beads and embroidery to show how this limitless flow can be seen to sparkle everywhere. The altar is on the wall in the hallway that forms the center or our home and is a wonderful reminder everytime I passby. I wanted to make this as an offering for everyone and everything that has shown me this beautiful example over the past few weeks!

In gassho

When really bad things happen

2006-10-03T00:29:00.000-07:00

Last week was a very difficult week. Just as I was getting ready to call my sister in Colorado for her 49th birthday, I saw on CNN that something had happened at a school in Bailey, Colorado. I immediately got online and saw that a man had taken teenagers hostage in the high school there, methodically chose young blond girls, sent the others out of the classroom and then began to sexually assault the young women until the police raided the room and he shot a Emily in the back of the head and then he himself was killed by the police. He had had it all planned, including having sent suicide notes in the mail. My first reaction was complete sadness and compassion for the people of Bailey, my sister, my nephew who grew up with Emily as a neighbor and still had her as one of his closest friends. At the same instant I felt a sense of loathing rise up in me against the man who had done this---the loathing turned to hate and grew darker and deeper. Suddenly, in meditation, my heart caught this and a different feeling arose...I felt a sense of sadness and compassion for the man who had done this...how much suffering and delusion he must have been feeling and now carries with him even further. Tears started coming and rolling...after meditating I approached our home altar and offered incense and all the merit I could...Not only to the victims, but to the perpetrator as well.

Now it has happened once again in Pennsylvania...though I do not know the people there...I still feel the same water of compassion wanting to wash over me and the situation...for the victims and the perpetrator.

May Kanzeon's always continue to poor the waters of compassion upon the world and may we always be aware to see it. One last thing that is so important...Emily's last SMS to her parent's cell phone was: I love U all! The small town of Bailey has continued to show this love over the past week. The good is always growing! We must remember that!

Compassion for all beings

2006-09-26T04:01:00.000-07:00

I was in Hamburg over the weekend and while my partner was playing in his volleyball league, I was able to explore the city. It is a really wonderful and beautiful city and one of my first sights in the morning was seeing this woman feeding all of the waterfowl...and she had bags and bags of bread crumbs for them...you can see them behind her in the picture. I was amazed and the number of the birds and the loveliness of the scene as she sang and chatted to the birds as she fed them. Many other people were also enraptured and began to take pictures. It made the rest of the day seem really beautiful, to know that there is compassion around us at all time...we just need to look and SEE!

Things not being the way I want!

2006-09-08T03:56:00.000-07:00

Neither wanting nor not wanting---

The Morning Glory

Opens

To the Sun's

Touch

(These pictures are from the window of our guest room which also serves as our meditation room.)

The past few days I've been suffering from a cold. First the feeling of being extremely tired with the scratchy throat, then the full sinuses, runny nose and watery eyes and now the cough that is trying to clear my lungs---and also making me crazy and miserable. NO ONE CAN SUFFER LIKE I CAN! Or so I think!

Usually I'm a person who has more of a problem of "pulling things in", of wanting to have...but this week I've been feeling the opposite extreme of wanting to push things away. ESPECIALLY THIS COLD! And it is interesting to take a moment and see that in both grasping and clinging and pushing away, the self becomes harder, more uncompromising and blind to what is around itself and others. The OPENING is gone. There is no STILLNESS in grumbling.

Then, yesterday, I read a line from Pema Chödrön: "When we get sick, for example, we don't usually think of the sickness of others." In other words, I become so centered on my suffering, without thinking of coming out of it and being open that I forget the suffering of others. The self becomes harder and harder. The self says: NO ONE CAN/ IS SUFFERING LIKE I AM AT THIS MOMENT! I have let myself become blinded and disconnected. The grumbling goes on.

However, the last lines of the chapter state: "This is the aspiration of a young Bodhisattva, one in the process of letting go. Even if we don't genuinely feel it, we're able to say 'May this seemingly negative connection be our link to waking up'".

And after that I started to wake up and then this morning after meditation, looking out the window, I saw the morning glories and other flowers and realized: don't grab onto things, don't push away. Happiness or unhappiness, stay STILL, stay OPEN, stay AWARE!

WAKE UP!

Expectations!

2006-09-06T05:05:00.000-07:00

This morning my expectations were really high. For the past two weeks when I rode my bike to work there were always beautiful swans in the early morning on the river, floating among the mist with their long and graceful necks raised. I was completely ready and had my camera with me. However, this morning the swans decided to stay on the other shore and they were sleeping not looking graceful at all!

I felt very disappointed and being so focused on the swans, I had forgotten to be OPEN to what was around me. The thought came to me that I had closed myself off from the morning by only focusing on the swans. As I turned around with those thoughts, I saw a leaf hanging from a tree, being held by the small thread of a spider's web, in the first rays of the sun. It was an UNexpected beautiful sight!

Welcome each moment and be OPEN to what it brings!

hanging leaf,

held neither by branch or wind,

but by the broken woven thread of another,

golden

in morning light.

The building of "I"

2006-08-28T03:49:00.000-07:00

Three days a week I ride past this "empty" statue plinth. It was set up a summer ago and as a Buddhist it really has a lot to say. If you do not know German, "ich" means "I" and most the time when I pass by, people are taking their pictures standing on the plinth and as I look up at them I notice how separated they look from everything else around. So, this week I decided to climb up on the plinth and I found out it is a feeling of being separate from everything, above everything, really a strong "ich"! And, of course, when no one is up on the statue it is empty of "ich"! The first two lines in German on the sign read: "Each person is unique/ That is of course also true for all creatures"---and I think most of us would agree with that and that is why the Net of Indra is such a beautiful analogy. However, the last line reads: "Keep it always here"---and then they have a symbol of a camera to take a picture. In other words: "Try to make it permanent!" Just what we don't want to do!

Who won?

2006-08-16T02:16:00.000-07:00

As I sat with my coffe this morning the news was reporting about the cease fire between Israel and Hezbollah. Then suddenly they turned to the topic of who had won the conflict. Switching to the Isrealis they told how they had accomplished "exactly" what they wanted and they had won not only for themselves but all of the other innocent victims of terrorism. Then they switched to the leaders of Syria and Iran and they, too, said that they had taken the victory and Hezbollah had accomplished what it had set out to do. Their people could be proud, having brought down the "evil" West. On both sides you could see crowds of people shouting and singing in this happiness of "victory" and "success". The only people were the thousands who were severly wounded and the almost on thousand who had died.

I reflected how I, too, jude my successes by "winning" by "victory", forgetting that by having this attitude I may and most probably will cause suffering for others as well as my self. So much a part of being human. I aksed my studnets who they thought had won and of course some said "No one won". True, but I think it has to go deeper than that...it's not that no one won, it's that there is not a need for anyone to win or think they did. This just adds more delusion to an already difficult situation!

What more to say...it is difficult, it is sad, there is suffering caused by unwise actions.

***

And while riding to work today along the river:

Swans gone;

scattered purity,

the only evidence:

lost white feathers

flowing

down stream.

Letting go...

2006-06-24T00:40:00.000-07:00

Today as thoughts were arising, I began to try to work on them. To work to "let them go". When I suddenly realised that by trying to let them go, I was holding on to them or pushing them away. Just exactly what is not beneficial in serene reflection. Let that thought go! Let that thought go! Was a mantra that was running through my head and I felt how I was becoming more and more frustrated as I held onto or pushed the thoughts away, while in the meantime doing so seemed to open up a waterfall, a cascade of more thoughts! Frustration arose, judgmental thoughts arose that this was something I could never do!

Then ever so calmly, ever so compassionately the "Still, Small Voice" simply said: "They will pass..." It was a small moment of complete understanding: Letting go still has an Ego involved, I/ME/ MINE-thoughts...in letting them pass, there is no "doer" or "doing".

How wonderful it is to hear the "Still, Small Voice", even in the roaring of the cascade of trying to let go!

Bombs and Karma

2006-06-21T23:27:00.000-07:00

Every once in a while it happens here. Something from the past rises to the surface and has to be delicately taken care of. Here it is bombs that fell more than sixty years ago. And here in Frankfurt just yesterday, a bomb was finally pushed by the earth to the surface. It had been at rest for a very long time, but now there it was again---a danger, a piece of the past ready to explode or simply ready to be set to peace. And amazingly enough, no chaos ensued. Sure, they had to shut down trains from certain stations going in certain directions. However, there was no panic. It was simply handled with care and concern without any anxiety.

As I thought about it, I could see how often these "bits and pieces", these "karma bombs" rise up from time to time to the surface when I'm meditating. Can I learn, have I learned to deal with them the same way the bomb here in the city yesterday was handled? With care and concern, with serene reflection, without panic and anxiety, without triggering it to explode. That is the way for a bomb to be removed, disarmed and let go. Devoid of emotions about the past, how this bomb fell because of a fight or anger or ignorance. Removed, disarmed and let go.

A good lesson from the past, from the earth, from what is given, from what is let go of.

Feathered Friends, Webbed Friends

2006-06-15T00:30:00.000-07:00

Last night on the news, I was really struck with the incredible compassion there can be for our "feathered friends". In a German city yesterday a dog attacked a family of swans. Sadly, one of the little ones was killed and the father severly injured as he tried to protect his offspring. The mother and other young ones escaped without injury. I thought how wonderful this was of concern and on the news. They showed how the father was being taken care of to be brought back to health and then they instructed people about how to train their dogs and keep them from causing such suffering. It was a nice counterbalance to what I saw on Sunday as a father showed his son how he could chase the waterfowl on a lake with his battery operated toy-boat. The birds were completely under stress and after a few minutes they were all in a corner of the lake.

Then this morning I saw a picture of a seal who had been saved and returned to the wild. A great act of compassion, a lesson to learn, something to always be aware of---we are all connected. Here's the link to the picture:

http://cfapp2.rockymountainnews.com/slideshow/slideshow.cfm?type=WORLD&ID=061406world&NUM=2

NOBLE SILENCE

2006-06-14T02:48:00.000-07:00

''When you are gathered together, bhikkshus, there are two things to be done: discuss dhamma or maintain the noble silence.''
-Ariyapariyesana Sutta-

Silence, something that we all often seek, but all too often feel an itch within because we want to ask and be answered. Thoughts bubbling along the stream of the mind, often wish to reach the surface with a comment and rather than follow the ''silent teaching'' that is all around us, we lose sight of it by words. We want to ask, which breaks the silence, and then we want to hear a clear and loud answer, which also breaks the silence. Today, I learned what Noble Silence means, but not by uttering one word, nor hearing one word in answer.

On my walk this morning, through a park which was just being warmed by the first rays of summer, I came upon a small pond and as I escaped the sun over a bridge cooled by the roof of leaves, I looked down into the water to see a mother duck and just one, very tiny duckling. My first thoughts came along at how strange it was to see only one duckling with a mother, had there been others who had been trampled in their shells, or eaten soon after birth by scavenging dogs or cats? How could this little one survive, so tiny, so fragile? But those questions were not important, they were just distractions from what was really happening. Bubbling up, bubbling out, but I was lucky to be alone, so there was no one to ask or answer. How easy it is to slip into the past, to what could or might have been. Or fall into the future of what might be. You see, as an English teacher, I know these constructions are called ''conditional''. It was not at all important to that moment.

What was important was really seeing what was being taught. Yes, there was teaching here as there is everywhere.

When the mother duck went close to the shore and nibbled at what was growing there, so did the duckling, without a moments hesitation. No question asked. When a large labrador came close to the edge of the pond with his proding nose and outstretched tongue, she moved quickly away and the duckling followed in her wake. I watched for a long time as every move she made was mimicked by her offspring. No questions asked. Even when she dunked her head and wiggled her tail, in what seemed to be delight in the new, warm summer morning---so, too, did the little duckling, who had to shake his whole body just to get his tail to move. His head went under for a moment and came up sputtering a bit. But he was learning, in noble silence. Then, as the shade retreated from the pond, the mother duck pulled herself up onto the shore. The embankment was no small matter. And to my surprise, without any effort and without the slightest *cheep*, the duckling somehow was on the shore, next to his mother, having learned exactly what he needed. Both pressed themselves close to each other and fell into a short morning nap.

As I walked away, I thought about how often I haven't been silent and how I should just watch those around me, to learn the best I can by seeing, without confusing it with too many questions and answers, the *cheep* *cheep* *cheep* that can fill the air, making it more difficult to stay afloat or get back on shore. Sometimes it's good to be the lone duckling!

Swan

2006-06-13T03:51:00.000-07:00

This is no wild place that I have come upon. A park, in the city, with a crowded pond, both on and around: web-footed, pawed and shoed. On my own two feet, I carry a heavy load today, going back home. This is no wild place; no place where they are alone, but somehow they are. They have found a seclusion of their own, but not a separation. They are here with everything. Yet, solitary.
Two swans, somehow out of place here among the common things of a park in the city in the middle of spring. Standing on the edge of a pond which has a cement edge and no earthy bottom. Among abandoned bottles and wet and soggy newspapers filled with the past; among fallen petals of trees shedding the heavy weight of blossoms, only later to take the burden of fruit. Here in the litter and fragments of our lives, they raise their necks in a wide arch, ruffle a feather or two and preen themselves. Taking away what is not needed, old down or a split and tattered feather. They, like the trees, know that we cannot hold on. Hold on.
They let go again of this moment, stretch their necks high and spread their wings into an effortless elegance, here, with everything. Then a trumpet and they are off and up and away. After the echo of their call and flap of wings, I hear the snore of the drunk on the bench, the bark of a dog, the delight of a child splashing in water. Here with everything, yet solitary. I go home, my load left behind.

2006-06-12T09:44:00.000-07:00

A long time...

2006-06-12T09:19:00.000-07:00

Wow! How quickly time truyl passes! I was so busy getting students ready for their final tests and reading so many of their papers that I forgot to write! And how I've missed my blog here. Again, it is seeing what is important in the day...and somehow this was forgotten here. The past few weeks I have somehow been confronted with many images of water and wings. One of the students that I have for a one-to-one has been interested in reading literature and we just finished the book, Birds Without Wings by Louis Bernières. Of course, the book is full of images about birds, but the most important is a short line towards the beginning of the book: "Man is a bird without wings, ...and a bird is a man without sorrows."

At the same time I was reading a book by Charlotte Joko Beck where she compares us to "whirlpools" and this was a very helpful image for me. Here are a few quotes:

"What we can best do for ourselves and for life is to keep the water in our whirlpool rushing and clear so that it is just flowing in and flowing out. When it gets all clogged up, we create troubles---mental, physical, spiritual."

"A stagnant whirlpool with defended boundaries isn't close to anything."

So, for the next while, I'll be talking about Water and Wings!

Back from Jukai

2006-04-18T10:21:00.000-07:00

Well, I must say that Jukai has really been one of the most important events in my life. I don't want to go into to detail about the rituals because I think it is important that people do not know about them before they go...that makes their power and effect even that much greater.

One thing that was so powerful for me was the idea of "Pure Intent" that somewhere at sometime our karma started from it. That means there was not some dark and evil thing, just something very confused. During the Sange ceremony, I suddenly had the realization that as a child I only hoped for love/ compassion and harmony. From this, however, came confusion and I slowly made a knot of confusing love with sex and by trying to create harmony whereever I could, I began to lie constantly. Somewhere along the line, all of this just pulled tighter and tighter on the knot. And then during the ceremony I began to feel the loosening of it!

Wonderful!

Do not debase the Three Treasures

2006-04-05T22:53:00.000-07:00

Well, tomorrow the physical part of my journey to Jukai starts. This time tomorrow I'll be sitting on a plane on my way to London and then from London to Newcastle and from there bus, train and taxi to Throssel Hole. A long way...and a long way since I wanted to go to Jukai for the first time. As I looked at this Precept this morning I saw what Dogen wrote:

"To do something by ourselves, without copying others, is to become an example to the world and the merit of doing such a thing becomes the source of all wisdom: do not criticise: accept everything."

Those last words are probably the hardest I can imagine and yet they are surely what "opens the Gate", somehow I can feel the Wisdom in them.

Then I saw what Rev. Master MacPhillamy wrote about the Precept:

"Since these are my true refuge and the very Way, how could I turn from them myself, much less cause doubt about them to arise in others."

These are very powerful words for me, especially since there were already two times in my life where I turned away from Buddhism: first of all for many of my own selfish reasons, but also because of listening to others who said it was not possible for me to be "Buddhist" because of who I was. Rev. Master Morgan wrote about the Precept:

"Do not do that which denies the Buddha Nature in yourself or in others. Do not criticise but be willing to see the Buddha. We cannot see the hearts of others nor can we understand the true purpose of things whilst we set ourselves apart from them. Cynicism in the end leads to despair."

I am so grateful to everyone who has helped me to step out of this despair that I felt for a long time. The deepest wish of my heart has been to lead a spiritual life and how wonderful to be on that path now! How wonderful that the Still Small Voice never goes silent, but always continues to whisper!

I would also like to take the opportunity to offer the merit of this blog to Gary Bodin. He was my very first parnter when I was only 19 years old. He was 12 years older than I and taught me so much that helped me in life. I was also with him the first time I went to Shasta Abbey. Gary died from AIDS in 1992 and suffered a lot in his last days. Today, interestingly enough, would have been his 52 birthday.

I think the words to keep in my heart on my journey for the next ten days are:

"be willing to see the Buddha."

Do not be angry

2006-04-05T05:02:00.000-07:00

No, not even at the slightest thing...it is so easy to become angry...I feel this especially when I ride my bike and pedestrians are on the bike path or cars have parked there! ARGGGG! I want to scream, I want to tell whoever it is how %*§$&* I think they are. And why? Is it perhaps because Ego is there...my bike path, my right to be here, not your right, etc, etc, etc...Ego likes to get angry, doesn't it?

Do not be angry...

Do not be miserly in giving Dharma and wealth

2006-04-04T06:01:00.000-07:00

Remember one word can be just the right amount of Dharma for someone...or one blade of grass just enough wealth. And how easy it is to be miserly and forget even the smallest gift can work wonders...a miser does not realize this. Give with an open heart...I try to do this every day...

Do not be proud of oneself and devalue others

2006-04-02T23:23:00.000-07:00

Just walking down the street in the city, how many times do I let thoughts play in my mind about others...not those I know...I usually do not devalue them...but look at that homeless person, look at that beggar, look at that business person who can only think of the next deal, look at that woman all made up with makeup, look at those punks drinking and foul-mouthed...look at me, who thinks he is just right! Follow your mind down the street and see how proud it is of itself and how it devalues others...you might be surprised!

Do not be pround of oneself and devalue others!

Do not speak against others

2006-04-01T04:56:00.000-08:00

This is a very interesting Precept to follow throughout the day. How many times am I ready to say something about someone else? Many times! Sometimes without thinking, it just comes out---even just as a way to start conversation. Other times there is much more behind it, by speaking against others, sometimes I can make myself look better. Rather than speaking against others, remain silent. Or gain enough wisdom to speak without saying something against another, and just giving the information given.

This Precept has also taught me how often I waste time with empty chatter.

Let my words do no evil, let my words do good, let my words do good for others!

Do not sell the wine of delusion

2006-03-31T09:46:00.000-08:00

How do I delude myself...a thousand times a day. That is the reason to take refuge in the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. This helps me to see much more clearly, listen to the Voice of the Eternal. And I try not to delude others...so that means watching what I say and what I do---the other Precepts help me to not delude myself and others.

Do not say that which is untrue

2006-03-30T07:42:00.000-08:00

Oh Boy! This is the second big one for me after coveting. I learned so early on to protect myself with stories...from further hurt or abuse that I slowly lost the ability to speak the truth most of the time. It is just really recently that I've realized how freeing saying what is true is! I went through some time telling many people the things I had lied about. I was always careful not to hurt anyone or to go to quickly and hurt myself. Lots of compassion was involved there. As soon as I let go of many of these untruths and did not have to tell more untruths, I felt a great weight lift from me. It was amazing, although at times it is still so easy for me to begin to say that which is not true, to tell stories...which I'm very good at...so I have to be really vigilant about this Precept. It is not so easy, but the rewards are really worth it as well as the loss of stress. I remember a Bible verse that states it quite well, "The truth will set you free."

Do not covet

2006-03-29T04:00:00.000-08:00

As I said yesterday, this is one of the more difficult ones for me. Wanting, having, clinging, clutching and wanting more has been part of my existence for so long. It is also almost everywhere outside and all around. I really had a moment of "seeing" last year as I was riding my bike and new Pepsi poster advertisements were going up all over the city. As I rode my bike along the bike path, every few meters there it was, the pepsi motto: "Ask for more". Over and over and over again: "Ask for more!"

And suddenly a voice inside of me asked, "Is there ever enough?!"

Yes, most of the time there is more than enough, often too much. From that moment on, I began to think about what is needed rather than what I want...and somehow thinking that way, I seem more content and have more gratitude. By thinking about what is needed, I also realized I'm more able to think about not taking more than is needed...in every aspect of my life. By letting go of wanting, a liberation comes...

Do not covet!

Do not steal/ Do not take that which is not given

2006-03-28T03:14:00.000-08:00

At first I thought that this was too easy, just like killing. I mean I've never killed anyone and I most certainly haven't stolen. Since I was a child, I've been taught that stealing is wrong. Yet, when I really looked at this Precept, it was very clear...there are many times when I have taken that which was not being given or even taken more than was needed. There are the times, after teaching a seminar or someone in a one-to-one English course, where the whole teaching hour was not used...maybe just a few minutes, should I charge for that, is it stealing if I do? Those are the situations where careful thought must be given.

I have also seen that taking more than I need because of the "I want" coming into the picture that that is also a form of stealing. I tried to be careful now and really think, is this necessary and how much of "this"---whatever it is---do I really need. I tend to have my greatest problems with the next Precept, which I'll write a bit about tomorrow: Coveting, wanting, having, clinging, clutching, wanting more, not having enough of whatever. Stealing and coveting tend to have a very close connection for me.

I know as I worked through my addiction problems, I "stole" many people's peace of mind, especially those I love the most!

Do not take that which is not given!

On to Jukai...

2006-03-27T00:20:00.000-08:00

So, here it is less than two weeks to Jukai and I thought I might write a little each day about The Ten Precepts and how I have thought about them the past year. I knew last April that I would attend Jukai this year, so I took time every so many weeks to examine one of The Ten Precepts and really think about it. Of course, even a year is much too short to completely get a feel for each one...but it is always interesting to see how they are so interrelated to one another. Today I'll start with the first in the list:

Do not kill

This seems easy at first, but there are so many different facets. Of course, simply not killing another creature is right. Why would I willingly take the life of another? Since all things are interdependent, it makes absolutely no sense. And again, it is important to look at the positive side, which is: how can I help prevent killing or preserve life. Often it is easy to turn away and let killing continue.

Then one day during the year, I realized when I became angry with someone that I had "killed" the good mood they were feeling and had caused suffering for them and of course for myself in doing that. There are endless ways to kill, not just the body of another.

Breaking myself off from the Unity of all life, is killing. Breaking others off from the Unity of all life is killing. I will refrain from killing...

Not being still, not listening...

2006-03-25T23:20:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I saw "Brokeback Mountain". It takes a while for movies to get here to Germany, but I was really touched by the movie for so many different reasons. First of all, because of what I've written in my blog about feeling like being Gay makes it not possible to be accepted as Buddhist...though those feelings are now long gone.

The movie itself is so full of the sadness and suffering of many things. First of all, the pain of not being able to be who one is because of cultural conditions. Not being able to express love causes in many cases suffering and hate, even self hate. This was very sad to see.

However, what affected me most was how none of the characters was ever really able to be still and to listen to what was True around them. How simple it is to be full of what we are told by others and not hear the voice of the "Eternal", the voice of what is Right. The whole movie shows how this creates only more and more and more suffering and sadness. But even then, at the end when we see the character have a realization about what is good and right, we see that a heart can be changed in an instant...that being still and listening can happen at any time and radically change us.

Be still...listen...hear...