When I became a Mitra (friend) of the Triratna Buddhist Community earlier this year, I was surprised by the surprise of my non-Buddhist friends. They seemed aggrieved.
This was the general message:
‘We know you’ve benefited from meditation, and going on silent retreats. Although that’s not our idea of a holiday, we’re pleased for you. But why spoil everything by espousing a weird Eastern religion? Can’t you keep it secular? And if you have to be religious (though God knows why) can’t you stick to your own? OK, maybe not the Church. But what’s wrong with the Quakers? They sit in silence and meditate, don’t they?’
Fair enough questions. And I tried to answer them. I talked about the value of meditation, the common sense of the precepts. I talked about enjoying chanting, and finding ritual moving.
This was all true. But my explanation, even as I gave it, struck me as just so much hot air. After a lot of apologetic shrugs at dinner tables and in cafes, I realised that my decision to become a Mitra hadn’t been ‘thought through’ at all.
The commitments involved in becoming a Mitra – coming out as a Buddhist, promising to live by the precepts and choosing the Triratna Buddhist community as my spiritual home – didn’t feel like things I had ‘decided’ on.
Rather, all my experiences within the Triratna Buddhist Community had added up and reached a tipping point. I suddenly felt ‘at home’ with it all.
By experiences, I mean acts of kindness I’ve felt and witnessed. I mean the teachings of Order Members and the warmth or sometimes lacerating sharpness with which those teachings are delivered. I mean stuff I read in Buddhist books that speaks directly to personal problems I didn’t realise anyone else had. I mean the intimacy of joined voices reciting the seven-fold puja (one of the core rituals in the Triratna Buddhist Community) and the hypnotic beauty of the Heart Sutra, the poem at its core. I mean the pregnant sense of strangeness and mystery that often suffuses me when I sit in silence with myself or with others, at home, at Leeds Buddhist Centre, or on early morning meditations on retreat where you enter the shrine room in the dark, meditate while dawn gathers, and step out utterly and completely in the day.
I can no more justify or quantify this than I can tell you why somebody falls in love with one person – perhaps a person from a different background – and not another. My Mitra ceremony felt like a kind of marriage. Most marriages go through rocky patches, I know. I’m going through one even as I write this, not having meditated for a fortnight. But Buddhist practice gives me a home to come back to, a structure to see my struggles in the context of. That’s why I was happy to say ‘I do.’
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I am a Buddhist too! I "came out" about it because of people's problem with it. To be a thorn in Christian society's side. It's amazing that I have the "weird" religion. Clearly they have not looked at thier own in any depth. Also, it's just easier to say when meeting new people or if it comes up.
Congratulations, Ed! I think you're right that being a Buddhist in a broadly Christian society does in some way 'throw down the gauntlet' whether we want it to or not.
I’m not quite sure any longer what I would call myself if someone were to ask me what religion I follow, and in the recent filling-in of the census form my husband joked that I should put ‘well, this week I’m a Buddhist’. The thing is, I didn’t go looking for Buddhism, it felt much more as if it found me, (an experience I’m not unfamiliar with actually) and when I stumbled upon Wildmind not so very long ago, I had the same sensation you describe of feeling in a strange way that I was coming home.
I have a really eerie feeling of connection with a whole host of people who are mostly nameless and unknown to me and yet share the same inner perplexities and wonderings. Time and time again I open the Wildmind blog page and find something that speaks so clearly to my condition that I just have to sit and smile in a state of pure wonder.
This is more than just a thank you for this article, though saying ‘thanks’ to you for this is the simplest way I can think of in trying to say thank you in a much wider and deeper sense and to a far greater number of people. Thanks to all of you.
Thank you very much for the comment, Deborah. It's good to know that our blog posts resonate with you. And it's fascinating isn't it, that sense that something (or sometimes someone) finds you, rather than the other way round. Seems like a minor miracle when it happens.
I also feel that I didn't "decide" to become a Buddhist more like I discovered I was one. The decision to become a mitra came about while on retreat a few years ago when I realised that I was a mitra, so to speak, so had better come out in public. No big deal I thought, but then during the actual ceremony the implications of the commitment I was making emerged. Not worrying, felt like coming home to somewhere I hadn't known I'd left.
Hi Kevin, thanks for your comment; it's really good to hear about your experience too.
Hi Mandy
Nice article.
I have for over 20 years considered myself a Buddhist but never become a Mitra and am not sure why not. I meditate daily, i try to live mindfully and follow the precepts, i attend classes and teachings. As a Yoga and Meditation teacher Buddhism and its teaching resonate with me. I wonder if becoming a Mitra would change anything for me?
My parents have never understood my need to be involved in the Buddhist teachings as they are Jehovahs Witnesses and BUddhism is so far from their fear based faith.
But everyday i count my blessings for the love and understanding of the Buddha and my teachers.
Peace and Light.
dawn
Hi Mandy
I have just made the decision to become a Mitra, Following the last few months of seriously studying Buddhism. Your article has really encouraged me to the the next step.
Hi Mandy, I've literally just stumbled upon your blog and have only read a few lines so far, but wondered if you could offer some advice?
I'm 42 and have been interested in Buddhism from the age of 15 or so when I discovered Kelsang Gyatso's 'Buddhism in the Tibetan Tradition'. Now dogeared but still on the shelf, it has been joined by many other books over the years. I have drifted in and out of Buddhist practice, each time returning to it with a renewed vigour and pledge to 'commit this time'. In 2008, just before the birth of my first and so far only child, I decided to take refuge at Samye Ling Tibetan Monastery. Since then however I have moved to an area with no Buddhist community that I know of and with the rigours of parenthood, I no longer practice as such.
Recently I have been unwell and thoughts of my own fragility prompted me look at the Path again; but I became dazzled by neo-advaita teachers and was left feeling utterly hopeless (which is OK apparently!). My worry is that I have in some way violated my refuge vows and that by returning to practice it is from a self-serving motivation rather than anything else.
This doesn't seem that clear really and I do apologise.
I wanted to speak to Lama Zangmo at Samye Dzong London but I gave up going about 2 years ago as I found it all too impersonal.
I know the Buddha said " It's not how long you forget but how soon you remember (the Dharma) that counts"
Perhaps that's it. Just get on with it. What is done is done. Negative Karma generated, nothing I can do except try not to generate more. Is it worth retaking the refuge vows?
I don't expect answers to all this...just rambling now!
Graeme
Dawn, I'm interested in your question about whether becoming a Mitra would change anything for you. We are all different so maybe the answer might be found through looking at other commitments in your life and asking whether making them changed anything for you and if so how.
For me, the visual, aural and emotional memory of my Mitra ceremony forms a powerful reminder of the value of practice. I need that reminder because my practice goes through such lows. I also feel that becoming a Mitra supports my sangha. And might encourage me to bring more of myself to the sangha (whether this is of benefit remains to be seen!)
Russell, that's great. Congratulations and I hope you really enjoy your ceremony.
Dear Graeme, thanks for sharing your thoughts so honestly.
I'd say you aren't alone in drifting in and out of Buddhist practice, or indeed any other practice. Isn't that just our human nature talking? Not to mention the demands of parenthood! I'm not a parent myself but from what I see it has a habit of pushing all other considerations aside. I haven't come across 'neo-advaita', but like you I struggle at times with feelings of alienation and impersonality.
I'm probably too inexperienced to offer an opinion about your vows. But from my admittedly limited viewpoint it seems that awareness of one's own fragility is what brings many people to the Dharma, and also to each other. That may be self-serving in one sense but perhaps it's partly through awareness of our own suffering - and making an effort not to forget about it when/if it passes - that we develop compassion?
I do wish you all the very best in your quest.