Serpent Energy

In my 35+ years of practice I have found out, as I’ve matured, that others who I might have once thought were not practicing the dharma correctly, were just passing through one of the other 84,000 Dharma gates. And I have learned more by listening to them tell their story in their own way, instead of merely dismissing them out of hand. And, in that listening, my Dharma Gate has opened all the wider.

And so I would like to very politely ask us here to have free access to all the voices of the Buddhist community. Even those with whom they might have deep disagreements. I, for one, am here to share dialog with others, not to play watchdog over what is allowed to be shared, and what is not to be allowed.

I would have very uncomfortable feelings about telling a fellow Buddhist that they were not welcome. I would not feel comfortable about telling a fellow Buddhist that their views were not allowed. And I would not feel comfortable about making a fellow Buddhist feel that they were unwelcome. And I am afraid that if we single out one practitioner’s tradition to be banned, then this is what would be done: making them feel unwelcome.

It is relatively easy to exercise compassion towards those you know who have fallen upon difficult times. But the real thrust of compassion is wrought when you have compassion for those with whom you have sharp disagreements with, or who threaten you, or who have done you harm.

This does not mean that you have to agree with them, or that you must confront them with debate. It means that you exercise tolerance and forbearance of practice. Needless to say, if there were no dialog, but merely spamming, trolling, and flaming, then that would be a situation in which we are not able to carry on our practice in an unthreatening environment. And appropriate actions should be addressed at that time.

All I am asking of my respected fellow Buddhist community members is that they allow other traditions to be allowed the same rights and courtesies that they would want for themselves.

Flight at Midnight

While practicing mindfulness, it is also possible to use an aid. There are many kinds of aids that you can use; each branch of Buddhism seems to have their preferred kind. One of the easiest to use is awareness of breathing.

In this practice you do not try to edit the content of your thoughts (restricting them to only that which is happening in the present, and avoiding those about the future or past). Instead let whatever thoughts happen just arise and fall of their own accord. However, while you are letting this happen, keep a little of your attention upon your breathing.

Just watch/feel your breath go in and out. You don’t need to concentrate upon the breathing maniacally – to the exclusion of all else - just along with everything else. It’s a bit like learning to ride a bicycle.

As you practice this, your attention will continue to have awareness of the present. So while your thoughts may seem endlessly running on, you don’t completely lose your focus of reality.

And as you practice more and more, you will find that your thoughts sometimes take a break from their ceaseless chatter. You will be more aware of these breaks and able to appreciate the quiet that accompanies these. As you become able to appreciate this peacefulness more and more, you will lose some of your incentive to mentally chatter on and on.

Yet, even in continuous stillness of mind, you will be able to practice awareness of breathing. So, it is a practice that is a part of the way of right living.

Path Upward

True there may be many answers to a prayer, so which is the right one and how do you follow it?

It has been my experience that an answer to a prayer is one that is deeply significant to you. So significant and meaningful to you, in fact, that it engenders action. It galvanizes your attention to focus in the direction that it points.

These kind of answers are not wishy-washy responses like “maybe you could…,” these are answers that lead you onward. And oftentimes these answers are those that give you the courage to go on with the path that you are on. Or, to have a vision of what a possible different life might be like.

As you say, perhaps the follow up action does not take place on the part of the person who receives the advice. But this is really ok, because we can only grow at the rate that we are able to.

When it seems that person does not follow the advice that they receive in a prayer, it is not necessarily because they are lazy or just want to indulge in play. It may very well be that they have many problems that they are faced with. They may not be able to change very easily because they are locked into so many difficulties that it is very hard for them to change without the whole house of cards crashing down.

Such a person might have to change incrementally and may have so many difficult decisions to make that it would be a truly difficult task. As I say we grow when we are ready, and one day they will be ready for that task that they face.

Until then it is best, I think, to have compassion for those with difficulties, and encourage them to have faith in themselves, their abilities and their choices, knowing that they can work through them and grow beyond them.

Climbing the Stairs

I have memories of ancient Egypt. It seems that I was at that time a High Priestess of the Goddess Isis. And I remember some things about the culture in general – magic was a large part of everyday life (both protecting from, and giving, misfortune and for health, wealth, etc.). I also have memories of my death in that life. Meeting the boatman who rowed me across the river to the next world.

Apparently I spent a good deal of my lives in the Far East. I have brief memories of several short lives as a pretty wild swordsman (a bit like the old west), and then being an old man and then a “geisha” (a prostitute in the little town that I lived in, where I also remember that I was stabbed to death by one of my clients).

From there I have memories of being a monk in the French Alps. We were very poor at the monastery, but I was quite plump. The head Abbott considered me a troublemaker because I was so interested in spirituality. I remember blessing peasants on the road as I roamed through the countryside. I think that I also had a life in sophisticated Paris as a young woman trying to be an artist (I was pretty bad.) But I don’t have any strong memories of that time.

I also have some general feelings about some lives I had as a Native American before the invasion of the white man. And also a life in ancient Grecian times in some no-name small town where we suffered an “inferiority complex,” being so far out of the way as it were. No clear memories, but just a kind of knowledge that I was there. These types of memories are more like the kinds of memories that one has of ones childhood - you might not be able to picture an actual event but yet you know it happened and what the situation was.

I don’t consider it to be my job to make people believe me or in reincarnation in general. I have memories, so the reality of the situation is evident to me. But if anything, perhaps a few people who would have dismissed it out of hand might not be so ready to ditch the whole idea of reincarnation if some of us speak out occasionally.

Part of Life

My, what a comfortable life you must have. I somehow don’t think you would wax so abstractly were you in such circumstances that demanded you find meaning in life or lose it.

If the aches were gripping your belly, the homeboy’s bullet piercing your chest, the car slamming into your side, your home and work threatened; when going out would be that much easier. Then, you can bet, you’d know that you had a reason for staying – that something was important enough to make living the Way, one more day here, worthwhile.

And that would be what was meaningful to you.

The Evolving Truth

In my “deepest” meditation, what I have experienced of the truth, has led me to conclude that It is supportive – nurturing, accepting, joyous - supporting It’s own brilliance of which we find form and transcendence.

It’s grace, beauty and wisdom are so profound that they are far beyond our comprehension. And yet they are evident, manifest in the depth of infinite harmonies with which we share the impressions of our own ceaseless truth that shines through each one of us.

It is with the anthropocentric conceit of “time” that we theorize that we are evolving It, rather than that It is evolving us. For in It’s grace of revelation, it is we who find ourselves, not lost but revealed with the boundless eminence of It’s joyous and aware fruition of potential thusness. And it is in our revealed evolution that It’s wisdom and clarity is manifest.

Postcard from Home

From my own experiences I would say that the truth is that the vision that one has of one’s surroundings, at any one given moment, is made up of information (light, if you prefer to call it that) that is scattered and discontinuous, much more than we seem to notice. It is more like we are seeing a loosely structured framework that has the incipient information to be organized into a whole that we then can believe is the world of reality that we so think we are ensconced within.

Then, upon this loosely organized “framework” we use our imagination to fill in the details, completing the picture to give it that sense of reality. I have seen that this is done in a more concentrated area in the center of the field of vision, and then progressively further away from this concentration the details are filled in less and less.

I have observed, in fact, that there is a point in front of the eyes, a couple of feet away from the head where this concentration of focus seems to be most clearly sharp, where the imagination is providing the most concentration of detail. As one shifts ones head or gaze, this “point” then shifts to wherever one is looking, so that there is always that center of focus around which we fill in our view of the world that we see.

Because we are so spellbound by our concentration upon our world, we don’t really notice, or take the time to notice, how disparate our vision is at its fringes.

What you might be seeing in Meditation., I would not venture to guess. It could be visual anomalies, energies, or who knows. But, I would suggest than instead of labeling them as chi or life energy, etc, you might let these effects reveal themselves for what they are in their own good time, if they should do so. It might be much more rewarding for you in the long run to let the understanding of these phenomena develop on their own, through your personal experience. This will give you a far more insightful view of them than if you just try to conveniently explain them away. After all, what is life energy? Only your personal experience will be able to tell you that.

Nevertheless, don’t try to concentrate on these effects any more than what you are normally aware of. Things reveal themselves of their own accord, I have found.

Reckoning with the Great Monkey

You might also care to consider moving to another planet. People here are a lot more relaxed about other people with unusual features.

For example, just yesterday a young man came into the store where I work. He was obviously in a severe fire as a youngster. His arms appeared to have all the hair permanently burned off of them, and his face was a maze of once melted flesh. I can’t explain to you why, but he was still a very cute young guy. He came in with his girl friend to just look around.

No surprise that he would be snatched up by some nice gal. Frequently in this town, an interesting or different appearance makes you seem like a more interesting or different person. Someone new to know and learn about.

I think a big part of it is the “vibes” that you put out. The young man, for instance didn’t put out an attitude of shame, fear, or a wish for pity. He was just the self he was. And in being himself, he was beautiful.

I understand from my own first hand experiences what some mean when they talk about the humiliation and taunting that they have endured. And I know that it’s not easy to live in that kind of environment. Nor am I not trying to imply that they have not accepted or come to terms with their challenges.

I guess that for me it becomes a part of the Way of Buddha to live within the framework of our lives (whether they are filled with challenges or joys). And at once to know the breath of truth that permeates experience in its unfolding. As it is this eminently greater reality that resounds throughout the many twists and turns of our lives, but from which our “spirits” soar.

At times it’s challenging to have compassion and understanding for those who inflict pain upon us, I know. But these people, you probably have already realized, are in just as much, or more, pain than you are. (And, they think, more able to refrain from facing their inadequacies, failures, lost hopes and self-hatred, because they look more “normal”.) Really, in their pain, they need all of the compassion that we can give them. And in recognizing our own struggle in them, we do not seem so all alone.

Faith Shaken

I would like to add another side to this discussion:

America is at a crossroads. Historically there has always been a strand of “spiritualism” (direct experience of truth) that has run through the fabric of American life – the Thoreau and Blativatski crowd for example. Whilst mainstream religions have been there for the masses (who have historically participated in their support); those people who did not have the kind of lives that sought direct experience of truth. Buddhism, at least up till now, has played the role of the minority religion which emphasized direct experience (through for many ancestral Japanese Americans, their tradition of Buddhist practice may have been more like the western version of church. So I shall try to exempt them from the point I am trying to make).

Now however, it seems that the great masses of the middle class have lost faith in their churches and their practices. Economic development has replaced spiritual reference. (I am being very general here.) Will economy replace spiritually in the heart of Americans? I guess we will have to wait to see if it is successful at that, but it does not seem like it would be the kind of place that I would feel much at home in.

Perhaps I should say at this point that it is probably certain people in leadership roles who would like to see the masses of people concentrating on buying things (that their businesses produce), rather that concentrating on their spiritual development (which they can’t profit much from anyway). But, I suppose that until people are put in the position of looking at what is truly in their hearts, they will continue to back the social organization that promises to make them fulfilled through products.

Whether society shifts one way or the other is one question. The next question then is will Buddhism go from being the religion of the minority that seeks direct experience of the truth to the religion of the masses who need something deeper to believe in than they have had before? I somehow don’t think it is realistic to imagine the vast majority of middle class Americans turning off their televisions at night and sitting cross legged on their living room floors trying to attain a glimpse of emptiness. But, I could see them turning off the TV and being with their families, because here in the present is the essence of what is important in their lives.

To be frank, I think that there are currently several strains of Buddhism that work well for the direct knowing minority. But for the majority of Americans, there seems to be few candidates that would fill their needs at this time. Pure Land is probably the most likely candidate currently. Or would Americans adopt the model of the community supporting the deeply experienced practitioner, who then advises community members on religious matters? It’s a scenario that works in parts of Asia, but relies upon decades of traditional society behind it. There isn’t that kind of framework in Buddhism here in America as yet.

Nevertheless, if Americans were suddenly to veer to a new direction of increased awareness of spirituality, then it would be an open question as to which faith they would turn to – I would not automatically assume that it would be Christianity, it could just as well be some morph of Buddhism for all we now.

Auspicious Movement

Since the Buddha Gotama is not here for us to ask anymore, I guess we shall have to find out for ourselves. What has your experience of physical reality been, illusion, revealed truth, or ?

It is the Way of Buddha not to confirm what is truth or is not truth by consulting with others or by reading books. The Way of Buddha is to know truth through direct experience of the truth. With the knowledge of the truth garnered through direct experience then we can truly know what is incorrect or correct.

Until then we are just moving the chess pieces around the board.

Leaving the Last of the Day

Buddhism does not say that you are nothing, nor does it say that the self is nothing, nor does it say that the self is a conglomerate of nothing. What it is saying is that there is no thing that can be identified as the self, no eternally unchanging core, no permanent object that makes up the self.

To extrapolate from that philosophy to the conclusion that you are nothing, I realize, is an easy step to take. However, it is going one step too far. The first hand realization of what the self is (if it is not a thing, nor nothing) is one of the points of Buddhist practice.

And it is the realization of this truth about the self that enables us to have the clarity to see the choices we are making, tempers our wishes and longings with wisdom, and reminds us that the illusions of the self that we identify with, and which entrances our attention so, is in reality, not the self that we truly are.

A Drink of Honey

As a long time recluse, I can understand in a very real way what you are going through.

Rather than the word surrender, however, I think more appropriate words would be compassion and respect. Compassion and respect for yourself, to be accurate.

Although I don’t know you, I would bet that one of the reasons that you’re as successful as you are in your business is because you are able to soberly and accurately gauge a situation and develop a response using the tools and people/talents available to you. When it comes to business you don’t fool yourself with fanciful dreams about having ideal business associates or employers. You just get the job done given the material you have to work with.

I would ask you to at least try to have respect for your self, for the person that you are. Look at you as the person that you have become. Look at your talents, your skills, your strengths, and the things that you spend your time involved with. Try to look at this person using a bit of objectivity – the same skills you use in your daily business life – and you will meet a person whom you have probably lived with for a very long time, perhaps without really knowing. Meet “You”, the real “You”. And for a few moments at least, respect her, her accomplishments and her predilections – she is living a life that is very important to her. And only she, as a whole person, can say why this life, the life that she is actually living, is so important to her, so fulfilling and meaningful to her.

Sure we can criticize her if we compare her to some idealized version that we might fancifully dream up. But this would not be fair to the real you. It would not show very much respect, or compassion, to the real person that she is, with all her particular interests and proclivities, with her wealth of skills. It would be like trying to put a star shaped peg into a square hole.

And when we realize that the real you is fulfilling a life that is very deeply important to her whole self, expressing her self truly and honestly as she is, then we honor her for her courage and determination and for the gifts of beauty and life that she contributes to reality.

Sure, each of us can spend our time with dreams of meeting Mr. Right and having a wonderful relationship. But let’s be honest, if that were really the most important thing to you then you would have quit that job at 25 y.o. and gone on the dating circuit in earnest.

As it is, in another few years many of your H.S. and College girlfriends will be going through divorces, and their families will be breaking up (not a pleasant experience to dream about). They will be entering a job market as single moms, with little experience in business and few developed talents to put on their resumes. Whereas you, with your wealth of experience in dealing with so many parts of your business, will be an honorable, established, and valued woman in your field.

Please don’t lose your dreams of love and family, because having those dreams is also what makes up you. Its one of the qualities that makes you all the more human and sensitive to life.

But one day, if we suddenly discover that we have become something other than what we hoped for and dreamed about becoming all our lives, we have to wake up and see that person that we are and try to cherish them for what they are. Realizing the road that we have traveled is the one that’s important to us, the one that’s the most meaningful for us to discover.

Eagle's Approach

The illusions of conclusions and relationships are not only dependent upon the entities involved, but also upon the manifestation of the existence of the elemental truths, which have illusory existence as well. When these illusory elemental truths are revealed to be their own manifestations, then awakening to the highest truth can occur. Until then, the chess pieces are merely being moved around the board.

In focusing on relationships and conclusions alone, one is just manipulating some of the chess pieces. The highest truth is, whether or not chess pieces are being manipulated, because it does not need to play the game of illusion.

When the highest truth reveals itself through an awakening, then the relationships and conclusions are not merely the chess pieces, but the revelation of highest truth “embodied” in actuality.

If you are going to see “behind” the game, then in the course of becoming the realization of truth there is an acknowledgment of that which was once seen as illusion, now revealing itself as truth.

One Degree Further

Perhaps there is too much silliness going on here to warrant a serious discussion of the topic. But, if anyone’s interested, I will try to explain a little bit more what I am trying to say.

As the illusion of food nourishes the illusory body, so the illusory ego facilitates our journey through what appears to be our lives.

Irrelevant? No.

I rarely take notice of the blood coursing through my veins. It too is silent and, hopefully, well behaved in its operation. But it is certainly not irrelevant.

In the dynamics of personality, the ego weaves its way through experience, helping to organize the moments of experience into a reality that makes sense to us. Not only affirming what makes sense to our particular personality – our likes and dislikes for example, but also more general information about out environment - such as a knowledge that the carpet on the floor is soft and warm to walk on.

In this way all the scattered information that we meet with takes shape into an apparently whole form. The personality that we have through life seems whole and, at least to us, reasonable. The ego is more like “where the rubber meets the road”. The interface that helps give things a sense of reality. It is more than just the word game that repeats in your thinking-mind telling you what it is that you want.

However, if the ego is left to run rampant, and that word game in the mind leads us willy-nilly through life, if we have no sense of greater self to balance off this relentless jabbering, then the role of the ego has been shifted.

Sometimes when a person is able to eliminate the incessant internal dialog of the mind, they have a shift in awareness that is so startling different that they are open, at least temporarily, to realize some degree of awareness of the true dimensions of the self – which are limitless. Thus the loud jabbering of the ego in the mind gets blamed for standing in the way of deeper knowing.

However, whether it is the ego standing in your way of realizing the full dimensions of the true self, or it is some fear, concern, or other suddenly arising notion that grips your attention, there will always be some excuse for limiting one’s self realization. Nevertheless, as we plod our way into the depths of truth, we need to be able to reconcile those suddenly arising ideas that grasp our attention so. Learning to go on, when we are entranced, is what it is about, I believe. Rather than blaming this or that pop-scapegoat concept.

Therefore, living with all of the various mental enticements that we come upon, we learn to recognize that our personality is far more than just the jabbering that once may have ruled our life. And in realizing the greater dimensions of the true self, one does not rely upon the ego as the identity of the personality, seeing instead that it is part of the greater identity that it exists within.

The ego then goes through a catharsis where it returns to a more quiescent role, not to irrelevancy, but to be the servant of our greater purpose. Then, we are not hung up on it, but using it as the tool of living that it functions so well as.