death

A path to live life to the fullest

Saddhamala
on practice
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Path through golden woodland

In Buddhism there are four reminders, things we should consider to make the most of our lives and to prepare us for death.

The four reminders are:

  • our lives are precious
  • we are not immortal
  • our actions have consequences and
  • we can learn to transcend pain.

These reminders can make a difference in how we live our lives, if we keep them in mind and reflect on them each day.

1. The preciousness of life – our lives are precious and our physical and mental health, energy, freedom, food, and money give us opportunities to make the most of each and every day. So each day, we might ask ourselves, “Am I making the most of my life?” “Am I using my time wisely?” “Am I aware of my thoughts, speech and actions?” “Do I react by habit or respond creatively to situations and people?” “Am I working at a job that is ethical and helpful to people?” “Am I spending as much time with my family as I want to?” “Am I spending as much time with my friends as I want to?” “Do I take time for leisure activities?” “Am I getting enough rest and sleep?” There may be other questions you would add to this list.

2. We are not immortal, although, in our culture we do not think about death until a loved one is very ill or we hear of someone dear to us who is dying. One thing is for certain — we will all die. We cannot avoid death. We all age, day by day we get older. We may think we are immune, but we are not. And there are other causes of death: illness, accidents, natural disasters and violence. We may die after an illness or we may die suddenly without being able to say good-bye to friends and family. Facing death takes courage and a clear conscience. We become more alive when we contemplate death.

3. Actions have consequences. We are the sum of many influences: family, religion, culture, education, relationships, friendships, diet, exercise and more. We are also the sum total of all the many choices and decisions we have made; our actions and our emotional lives. There may be some things we cannot change and we must accept that we cannot change them. We can, however, change the way we think (rather than letting the mind think in a random, unrestrained way). We can become more positive and loving by practicing meditation and yoga. When our actions are honest; when our speech is kind, helpful and harmonious; when we are positive, generous, loving and wise — all this will affect how we feel. We can commit to acting in a way that is beneficial to ourselves, to those around us, and to the world.

4. Learning to transcend pain and suffering.  Each day there is stress and striving. We are always searching for something: a faster, newer car; an updated computer; the latest technological toy; something different in our marriage; a new relationship; more fashionable clothing; a different job; an understanding boss; people to act differently; a bigger house; or greener grass. The list is endless — take a few moments and consider what you strive for, what you would like to be different or new in your life. Along with striving and stress — there is illness, injury, depression, fear, mental anguish — all of which contribute to feeling that we do not have enough, we are intrinsically not enough, we wish things/people/situations were different. Our bodies continue to grow older, our thoughts never end and keep us awake at night and distracted during the day. This is life, what the Buddha called samsara. We search for happiness and fulfillment in what we do not have, rather than finding contentment and joy in what we do have.

This dissatisfaction often brings us to question the meaning of life, or to a spiritual quest. We often need a wake up call to be jolted out of our complacency. We need to wake up to the truth – that we will not live forever, our actions have consequences for ourselves, others and the world, we can find happiness and joy, and we need to be aware enough to make the most of this precious life.

There are different ways of reflecting on these four reminders: meditation, silent reflection, writing and discussions with others.

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Steve Jobs on death

Bodhipaksa
on practice
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Steve Jobs

I’m sad that Steve Jobs has died. No one has had as much effect on the computer industry as he has. His company, Apple, has transformed the way we relate to computers.

I only recently learned that Jobs was a Buddhist. According to his Wikipedia biography, he went to India in the 1970s and came back a Buddhist. In 1991 his wedding ceremony was performed by a Zen priest. He was a very private man, and I don’t think he talked much about his religion.

I thought a fitting tribute would be Jobs own words, from his 2005 commencement address at Stanford University, in which he eloquently discusses how an awareness of death and impermanence inspired him to live life to the fullest.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.” It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn’t even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor’s code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you’d have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I’m fine now.

This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

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“Ten Thousand Joys and Ten Thousand Sorrows,” by Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle

Vidhuma
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Ten Thousand Joys and Ten Thousand Sorrows

To be clear from the start, this book is worthy of the rich praise it has received. The inner jacket liner contains three pages crammed with accolades from what could be easily construed as the Who’s Who of leading contemporary spiritual leaders and health professionals. The book is a moving and loving story of this extraordinary couple’s experience.

It is a love story. It is a love story written from the deeply touching and personal perspective of a remarkable woman living through her equally remarkable husband’s dementia and death. The book covers the six years from his first symptoms to his death as she emotionally lived the various pieces of their life together as it changed profoundly. The book is drawn from her journals, giving the reader the direct expression of her emotions as they went through her.

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The theme and tone of the book are both poignantly captured in a phrase that is the Postlude to the narrative, “Dance me to the End of Love,” a line drawn from a Leonard Cohen poem. The book is a dance in its delicate movement, its cadence and its intimate flowing emotion. The reader is watching lovers dance, from inside one of the dancers. It is sweeping love story between two extraordinary people who, as we learn from the book, and feel from its author, have each lived extraordinary lives.

Title: Ten Thousand Joys and Ten Thousand Sorrows: A Couple’s Journey Through Alzheimer’s
Author: Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle
Publisher: Tartcher/Penguin
ISBN: 978-1-58542-827-4
Available from: Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.co.uk Kindle Store, and Amazon.com or Amazon.com Kindle Store.

The extraordinary qualities of the writer, of her husband and of their lives together are stamped throughout the book, from the jacket liner to the back cover. This entices the reader; gives a sense of wonder and awe to the experience of the close connection with their lives, their struggles and their needs, each of them, to come to so ordinary a thing as death. It is a strength of the book; two sparkling, talented people who lives have soared above us in a glorious flight of remarkable accomplishments, experiences, encounters, facing together an ignoble debilitating illness and the commonness of death. This also is a puzzle for the reader.

What is so very extraordinary about the lives of the writer and her husband removes them from what is all too ordinary, the plight of most people and families who face the same challenge. When we bring to mind the estimated 5.4 million Americans who suffer from Alzheimer’s Disorder, and their 14.9 million unpaid caretakers we are carried to a different and less exalted reaction than the one we are left with at the end of this beautiful and extraordinary experience. Every family’s story, of course, is different and singular.

What is incongruent is that we cannot conceive of most of these millions (millions that will swell in a few decades to tens of millions in what has been described as an epidemic) as extraordinary. We cannot conceive of these millions having the resources financially for the care that is described in “Ten Thousand Joys and Ten Thousand Sorrows”. We cannot imagine millions having the homes in Vermont and in Cambridge, Massachusetts. We cannot imagine millions with the support of a large network of loving and distinguished friends, and of renowned spiritual leaders. We cannot imagine millions dying peacefully in their homes surrounded by loving caregivers.

In this way the ordinary and the extraordinary are juxtaposed too nearly. We suspect the wreckage of dementia on the many millions and their families is something quite different than what this book has told of. We suspect that so many die alone. We suspect that so many are broken by the financial impossibilities of good care. We suspect the isolation and loneliness of those families who cannot afford care, who chose to leave their jobs to care for their stricken relatives, whose world then becomes a small one of long and weary days and sleepless nights. We know of the number caretakers who die early, earlier than their loved one with Alzheimer’s. We know of those who live with Alzheimer’s much longer than the six years described so movingly by Olivia Hoblitzelle, many of whom, unlike her husband, dwell in silence or are unable for years to remember who is in the room with them or what they did or said two minutes ago.

So we remind ourselves that “Ten Thousand Joys and Ten Thousand Sorrows” is a particular story about particular people. It is a tender and touching love story that can give us comfort and inspiration. It is not about us. But may still be a help to us. The “Suggestions” at each Chapter’s end may be practical reminders for some of us. The “Seed Thoughts” also at the conclusion of each Chapter will be consistently useful to us (“May I cultivate compassion toward myself and others”, May I find new ways of handling my negative emotions.” “May I accept the challenge of this situation”, “Let me be calm”).

“Ten Thousand Joys and Ten Thousand Sorrows” is uplifting for us in the way that all stories of courageous struggle are. And it brings that us that sweet and painful poignancy of all powerful love stories.

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This precious human birth

Sunada Takagi
on practice
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When one of Sunada’s best friends from college lost her brother recently, it served as a wake up call for her. It was a reminder that life is short, and there really is no time to lose.

My friend Cecily recently lost her brother to illness. He had just turned 50 the week before he died. She is devastated.

Cecily is one of my best friends from college. We’ve known each other for 32 years. It’s that rare kind of friendship where even if months pass without connecting, we still pick right up where we left off. We’ve never lived anywhere near each other since graduation, but we’ve stayed in touch through all our ups and downs. It’s a friendship I treasure.

When she came to visit after her loss, there was something very poignant about it. It turned into something of a wake up call for me.

I’ve written here many times about my busy-holic tendencies. It turns out I’m in one of my legitimately busiest periods in years. I recently took on a new part-time job, on top of working to build my coaching practice, and teach meditation and dharma. This week, I start attending a training program one day a week. My husband wants to start some home renovations to prepare our townhouse for sale. And I’m keeping up with my singing engagements and voice lessons. I’ve said this many times and I’ll say it again. Everything I’m doing is very important to me. I have a hard time seeing what to cut.

But sometimes I take things too seriously. I get so driven and sucked into my vision of where I want to go that I forget to live my life right now. And Cecily’s visit reminded me of that.

At my sangha group this week, it was timely that we discussed the traditional Buddhist teaching on the Four Reminders. Here’s one presentation of them, in verse form:

This human birth is precious,
our opportunity to awaken.
The body is impermanent,
and time of death is uncertain.
The cause and effect of karma
shapes the course of our lives.
Life has inevitable difficulties,
no one can control it all.

This life we must know
As the tiny splash of a raindrop.
A thing of beauty that disappears
Even as it comes into being.

Therefore I recall
My inspiration and aspiration
And resolve to make use
Of every day and night to realize it.

– Compiled by Viveka Chen, based on verses by Tsongkhapa (14th century Tibetan master)

What this teaching says to me is this. Of all the millions of different circumstances that I might have been born into, I was given this fortunate human birth. I have everything I need, and the freedom to choose how to live. How foolish it is to spend my life like a hungry ghost — constantly grasping after some elusive future.

Right Now is a good time to appreciate what precious gifts I’ve been given. And make the best use of them, both for my own benefit and for everyone else’s. When else could I do that? Besides, I don’t know how long my good fortune will last. Things could change tomorrow. I don’t know. And the opportunity might not come again.

For now, I’m not in a position to change my overloaded schedule. But I can change my mindset. For one, I realize how precious Cecily’s friendship is to me. Even though we’ve been friends for 32 years, there have been big chunks of time when we weren’t connecting. Now that we’re both in our 50s, I’m seeing more clearly how the time ahead of us is finite.

Seeing her and reflecting on the Four Reminders have given me my wake up call. There really is no time to lose.

The image above is the Holstee Manifesto Poster, available for sale here.

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“Lessons For The Living,” by Stan Goldberg

Josh Nute
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lessons for the living

Given the fact that we’re all going to die, it’s remarkable how little thought most of us give to the actual process of dying. In Lessons For The Living Stan Goldberg seeks to illuminate this most universal of experiences by sharing the lessons he learned during his time as a hospice volunteer.

Title: Lessons For The Living
Author: Stan Goldberg
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 978-1-59030-676-5
Available from: Random House, Amazon.co.uk, and Amazon.com.

What drew Goldberg into volunteering was the discovery that he himself was living with an incurable cancer. Part memoir and part practical guide, this book should be of interest to us all, and in particular to those of us wondering how to best help our loved ones as they approach the end of life.

By learning how to help others in the last days and hours of their lives, Goldberg discovered a blueprint for living which applies equally well to our entire lifespan, not just the end-point. Under such headings as “Forgiveness”, “Letting Go,” and “The Dilemma of Hope,” Goldberg describes the lessons he learned and applied, not only in helping others, but also while coming to grips with his own mortality: “I no longer invest energy in hoping that the cancer will remain under control — I’m too busy living.”

As Goldberg delves deeper into his own fears and uncertainties surrounding his own future he comes to understand the often illusive nature of hope: “The absence of hope isn’t a negative state. The disappearance of hope put me squarely into the present, since I know I can die at any time.” By being present and aware, both hope and fear tend to fade away, replaced by a clear and open mind. It is just such a mind which is best suited, Goldberg discovers, to attending not only to the actively dying, but to our own daily tasks.

During the course of more than six years as a hospice volunteer, Goldberg came to know hundreds of individuals facing their own deaths. When asked by one man dying of AIDS what possible motivation he could have for doing this, Goldberg cleared up the myth of selfless service with a touch of humor: “I do it because a day doesn’t go by when after I leave you I don’t learn something about myself. I’m with you every week, not because I like you, but because I’m a selfish son of a bitch.”

The tendency to view the sick, the dying, the elderly, as somehow “other”, as “exceptions”, obscures the fact that we are all subject to falling apart in one way or another. By being of service to others we can learn to dissolve this view and to accept our common bond. “Service is the rent we pay for living. It is the very purpose of life and not something you do in your spare time … As I think about what I’ve gained by serving the dying, and how it gave purpose to my life and changed me, I realize I’m not paying enough rent.”

In closing, Goldberg describes a startling realization he has while guiding his family through the death of his brother-in-law, Tom: “We stood around him and reminisced about his life. It was only then that I realized I was wrong in thinking the goal of my journey was to prepare Tom and my family for Tom’s death. That was an offshoot. The purpose of the journey had always been to prepare my family for my own death.”

For Goldberg, the service rendered during his hospice career allowed a gradual softening of the heart, which in turn brought him closer to accepting his own eventual death. This, Goldberg realized, was truly a priceless gift, one which he generously passes on, not only to his loved ones, but to anyone willing to put aside their discomfort with death long enough to read his book . Whether your primary concern is for your own family, or for yourself in facing the eventual loss of a loved one, this book will provide a useful and poignant guide for traversing this final terrain.

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Dharma in Hell: The Prison Writings of Fleet Maull

Priyamitra
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Dharma in Hell, Fleet Maull

In a sense we all live in a prison, but a life of literal confinement can force us to confront our existential situation — and our need for change — with unflinching honesty.

As the subtitle indicates, this is a collection of writings; of the nine chapters comprising the body of this text five appear to be written while the author was still in prison. A sixth chapter appears to have been composed within two weeks of his release. The remaining three chapters recount the nature and experience of the author in relation to practicing the Buddha’s path.

Title: Dharma in Hell: The Prison Writings of Fleet Maull
Author: Fleet Maull
Publisher: Prison Dharma Network
ISBN: 0-9718143-1-7
Available from: Amazon.co.uk, and Amazon.com.

Chapter one carries the book’s title and also expands on the theme with the subheading “Practicing in Prisons and Charnel Grounds”. Here, the author compares the experience of living and practicing in prison with doctrinal reasons for and benefits of practicing in charnel grounds, a main point being that both prisons and charnel grounds thrust one directly into experience of mental poisons, that is, into direct contact with greed, anger, and ignorance. The chapter begins by explaining just what is a charnel ground, and by extension what charnel grounds represent. This makes it possible to explain, in Buddhist terms, what is a charnel ground practice, both traditionally and in contemporary terms. Lastly, the reader is given a glimpse inside Fleet Maull’s prison experience, showing just how the prison conditions, both external/physical and internal/psychological, provided him with the opportunity for charnel ground practice.

Chapter two looks at Buddhist practice in prison as a form of monasticism, particularly the author’s experience of taking and applying monastic vows in prison. First we get to see that Buddhist practice in prison is very different from its counterpart in a monastery. “Noise and chaos are a prison’s most pervasive qualities” (p.41). Eventually it becomes evident that while formal practice is very difficult the practice of mindfulness throughout daily life is crucial in prison.

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Chapter three, like the previous chapter, is an edited excerpt of previously published material. It addresses “Money and Livelihood Behind Bars.” There is an economy in prison. Wages can be earned and trade does occur, and there is inevitably a black market where goods and services can be bought. While it is possible to live on very little, everything about prison life and western society at large tends to ensnare us in economic gain. With his pre-incarceration livelihood coming from drug smuggling, the author realized upon entering prison that it would be necessary for him to practice Right Livelihood, with its attendant honesty.

In chapter four the author considers “Death Without Dogma”. In this chapter Maull recounts his interaction with dying inmates while performing hospice work. The stories are very personal and give a real flavor of how he brought practice into his interactions with inmates of other faiths.

Chapter five speaks of the widespread phenomenon of depression. Although this problem is not specific to prison or charnel grounds, in this case prison is the framework for examining and understanding depression. And, although this is the shortest chapter of the book, the author makes quick work of explaining just how potent a steady meditation practice can be at dissolving the life-sapping darkness of depression and hopelessness.

In chapter six, “Rumblings from Inside,” we get a look at the psychology of the incarcerated. Emphasis is placed on considering the effects of penal methods (punishment vs. rehabilitation) for the inmate in terms of taking responsibility for his or her life. Negative mental states abound, and are structurally encouraged, in prison life. The author suggests that real change can come about when inmates learn to be of service to others. He also speaks of the value meditation offers in seeing inmates’ responsibility for their current conditions.

Chapter seven, “A Taste of Freedom” looks at the experience of stepping outside the role of prisoner for a three day unescorted furlough. The author has been in prison for thirteen years by the time we get to this chapter. The sudden shift to experiencing freedom outside of prison prompts the author to reflect on his years of prison conditioning, conditioning that he realizes can be met with mindfulness and emotional receptivity.

Chapter eight sees the author finally released from prison and embarking on life afterward, speaking to a Buddhist audience about “Transforming Obstacles into Path”, and explaining how he came to see that whatever difficulties encountered can be met without reactivity and used as fuel for practice. By this point in the book much of the material has been stated in prior chapters.

And lastly, chapter nine discusses the “Path of Service”. Here Fleet Maull explains how service to others in prison benefited him, allowing him to get beyond his own personal drama. He also explains how he thinks that service to others is offers healing to those still in prison. Getting out of the endless loops of our mind by helping others makes it possible to let go of our own self-perpetuated suffering. As is stated in the opening verse of the Dhammapada:

“Mind precedes all mental states. Mind is their chief; they are all mind-wrought. If with an impure mind a person speaks or acts suffering follows him like the wheel that follows the foot of the ox.”

Life in prison can easily be seen as life in hell, but as Fleet Maull illustrates it need not be so.

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Joliet hospice to break ground on labyrinth

Wildmind Meditation News
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The Joliet Area Community Hospice Home will hold a groundbreaking ceremony for a labyrinth and meditation garden at 9:30 a.m. Tuesday on the hospice property, 250 Water Stone Circle, off of McDonough Street.

The public is invited.

Funded by a $25,000 grant from Harrah’s Joliet Casino & Hotel, the labyrinth and surrounding garden design were developed by Joliet Junior College Professor Greg Pierceall and his horticulture students. The event will begin with refreshments, followed by a short program at 10 a.m.

“Hospice provides a professional, caring service at a most difficult time of life, while allowing for comfort and support for numerous families,” said Darren VanDover, senior vice president and general manager of Harrah’s Joliet Casino & Hotel. “Harrah’s is honored to be able to contribute to their amenities with the hope that the meditation garden will provide solace and peace to families in crisis.”

A labyrinth is a single path that leads walkers to a center. The labyrinth planned for the hospice is off of an existing pathway, and hospice officials hope it will be a place for meditation and reflection for patients and their families.

“We would like this space to offer those dealing with loss and end of life either a relaxing or energizing experience,” said Ava Shapard, hospice director of development.

“This labyrinth is one of the many amenities provided to patients and families coping with loss and end of life at the hospice home, all designed to provide peace and tranquility in their hours of need.”

For more information or to RSVP, contact Jill Madison at jmadison@harrahs.com or 815-740-7829; Ava Shapard at ashapard@joliethospice.org or 815-460-3250; or Kelly Rohder at 815-280-2915 or krohder@jjc.edu.

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“The Heart of the Buddha,” by Chogyam Trungpa

Suriyavamsa
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heart of the buddha trungpa

Trungpa Rinpoche was a deeply flawed man, but an inspiring teacher. A new book gives Suriyavamsa a chance to reflect on Trungpa’s genius, and on the visceral and striking teaching it gave rise to.

I remember studying with my teacher Sangharakshita in a group of Triratna Buddhist centre teachers a couple of years ago. He expressed his admiration for Chogyam Trungpa and, using Gurdjieff’s distinction between the narrow saint and the broad genius, considered Trungpa to be a flawed genius of intelligence, flair and imagination. Sangharakshita went on to encourage us all to become ‘geniuses’ – to be broad and other regarding, and to develop the many diverse talents necessary to spread the Buddha’s teachings.

Title: The Heart of the Buddha
Author: Chogyam Trungpa
Publisher: Shambhala
ISBN: 978-0-87773-592-2
Available from: Shambhala and Amazon.com.

This memory returns to me on reading The Heart of the Buddha, a recently re-released collection of Chogyam Trungpa’s articles. Trungpa was certainly broad. He had the genius, the flair and talent necessary to inspire many people to take up the Buddha’s teachings and he has had an enormous impact on Buddhism in the modern world. Many of the famous Buddhists teaching today such as Pema Chodron, Sherab Chodzin Kohn, Judith Zimmer Brown and Reginald Ray owe their foundation in the Dharma to Trungpa Rinpoche.

Trungpa has had an enormous impact on Buddhism in the modern world.

It pays to watch some of the YouTube videos of his lectures and get a sense of the author before reading this book. On these we see him sitting calmly, holding court before hundreds of people. He is immaculately dressed in a suit and tie and is carefully emphasizing each sentence with an impeccable elocution acquired during his stay at Oxford University in England. This is not a traditional Tibetan teacher fresh out of the Himalayas with trumpets and robes but someone deeply immersing himself in Western expressions. Someone out alone in a foreign culture determined to communicate the heart of the Buddhas teachings in a language accessible to the people before him. Trungpa’s presentations combined a thorough training in traditional Tibetan Buddhism with a radical re-visioning of what it means to practice the Dharma today. He tapped into a broad range of sources from Erich Fromm and psychology to Zen flower arranging and military discipline, and was keen to avoid the distracting allure of exotic Tibetan cultural trappings.

The articles in The Heart of the Buddha were chosen to represent “as complete a range of Rinpoche’s teachings as possible,” according to the introduction. There are edited introductory talks with questions and answers as well as more scholarly essays. In the first section we have a more experiential evocation of what is involved in meditation practice, in devotion and in the integration of intellect and intuition. Here is a taster from the article on mindfulness:

‘It (mindfulness) is a worldwide approach that relates to all experience, it is tuning into life. We do not tune in as part of trying to live further […] Rather we just see the sense of survival as it is taking place in us already. You are here, you are living: let it be that way – that is mindfulness. Your heart pulsates and you breathe. Let mindfulness work with that, let that be mindfulness, let every beat of your heart, every breath, be mindfulness itself. You do not have to breathe specially; your breath is an expression of mindfulness. If you approach meditation in this way, it becomes very personal and very direct.’

I’ve never found a clear overview in a Chogyam Trungpa book. He never wrote a 101 of Buddhism. I have thoroughly enjoyed my wanderings through these articles, but have been glad of my studies in my own tradition for an underlying framework to help hang it all together. For this reason I wouldn’t recommend even this broad compendium as an introduction to Buddhism. What you do get with Trungpa Rinpoche is something at least as important – vivid evocations of spiritual experience and a living sense of the scale and detail of the Buddhist perspective. He uses unexpected and surprising imagery which is often visceral and always striking. Reading his books is like making out the Buddha’s Dharma by flashes of lightning – you are left with memorable impressions and a stack of vivid quotes. Here are a few:

‘People have difficulty beginning a spiritual practice because they put a lot of energy into finding the best and easiest way to get into it. We might have to change our attitude and give up looking for the best and easiest way. Actually, there is no choice. Whatever approach we take, we will have to deal with what we are already.’

‘True admiration has clarity and bite. It is like breathing mountain air in winter which is so cold and clear that we are afraid that it may freeze our lungs. Between breaths we may want to run into the cabin and throw a blanket over our heads lest we catch cold – but in true admiration we do not do that.’

‘Spiritual shoppers are looking for entertainment from spiritual teachings. In such a project devotion is nonexistent. Of course if such shoppers visit a store where the salesman has a tremendous personality and his merchandise is also fantastically good, they might momentarily feel overwhelming trust of some kind. But their basic attitude is not desperate enough. Their desperation has been concealed or patched over, so they make no real connection with the teaching.’

The second section of the book contains three articles chosen to represent the three phases of the Tibetan Buddhist path –  taking refuge, the self transcendence of compassion, and the tantric path of ‘Sacred Outlook’.

The chapter on “Sacred Outlook” is the longest article at just under forty pages. Originally written for the catalog of an exhibition of ancient Buddhist Silk Route art, it is one of the best introductions to Tantric Buddhist practice I have come across, both in the thoroughness of its description and in its simplicity.

I found reading these articles induced an experience not unlike that of digging out old rock music and being struck by its fresh energy and imagination…

The final section is a bit of a mixture with articles on relationships, death, poetry, money, Buddhist/Christian dialogue and a piece on drinking alcohol. This is where Trungpa’s dangerous side comes out. He writes on the limitations of a moralistic attitude to pleasure and on the difference between alcohol being poison or medicine lying in the level of one’s awareness. A meditator undertakes ‘conscious drinking’ as a means to keep connected to others. It is difficult to read this as anything but naive in the light of his early demise at forty seven from cirrhosis of the liver and the chaos of his community after his death.

Nevertheless, I found reading these articles induced an experience not unlike that of digging out old rock music and being struck by its fresh energy and imagination in contrast to the formulaic, safe and commercial nature of so much of today’s music. These articles come from a time when Buddhism in America was more radically alive. Their vitality, originality and indeed danger, as well as their deep rootedness in the Buddhist tradition contrast strongly with so much of what passes for Dharma today. Amidst the mountain of secular Buddhism, domestic Buddhism for couples, therapeutic Buddhism for stress management and a strange fixation on our everyday, commonplace laundry, this book stands out for its ability to inspire and stir us from our complacency. Cold, clear mountain air indeed.

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Yoga, meditation helps heal grief

Wildmind Meditation News
news
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People cope with the death of a loved one in different ways.

A local woman is using mind-body therapies such as yoga, meditation and journaling to help grieving folks cope with the loss.

Heather K. Whittington holds a master’s degree in thantology, the study of death and dying, from Hood College. She is also a Certified Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy practitioner.

She combined her professional training in both to launch Mindful Grief at Mind-Body Therapies, 5 N. Bentz St., Frederick . Services include Yoga for Grief classes, group relaxation workshops and private Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy sessions.

“Grief is a physical reaction to loss that causes emotional, physical and behavioral responses that creates more stress,” Whittington said.

Frederick News Post: “Losing a loved one is hard on the heart and hard on the body, but there is some good news in that there are easy-to-learn techniques that can at least relive some of the physical complaints, and even calm the mind.”

Whittington began planning for the new business while completing her coursework at Hood College, where she earned the master’s degree in January. She presented a poster of the business at the Association of Death Educators and Counselors annual meeting last year. She wrote “Living in the Body: Using Awareness of Physical Sensation to Cope With Loss” in the organization’s October edition of its quarterly publication, The Forum. The response was positive from the death education and counseling community, she said, and decided to move forward with her plans for the business.

Whittington has managed Maryland Yoga Therapy at the Center for Mind-Body Therapies since 2003 and was honored for her entrepreneurship for a former business, Gecko Media Group, in 2002.

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The Blue Poppy and the Mustard Seed, by Kathleen Willis Morton

Siddhisambhava
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Blue Poppy and the Mustard SeedThere can be few things more painful than the death of a child. Can Buddhist practice help us cope even with this level of suffering? Siddhisambhava reviews a new book chronicling loss and letting go.

The Blue Poppy and the Mustard Seed is the tragic story of Kathleen Willis Morton and her husband, Chris having a longed for baby boy who dies seven weeks later. The story is extraordinarily difficult to read sometimes because it’s so painful. It’s also a very tender book, so you don’t want to rush it.

It’s hard to write about grief well. In writing The Blue Poppy, Morton joins a canon of grief and bereavement literature that has some real heavyweights in it — and she can hold her head up. In the 1960’s Simone de Beauvoir wrote about her mother’s death (A Very Easy Death) and CS Lewis penned a Christian classic, A Grief Observed, following the death of his wife. Another spiritual classic, Grace and Grit, written by Ken Wilber in 1991, courses his five year journey with his wife, who was diagnosed with breast cancer within weeks of their marriage. More recently Joan Didion’s The Year of Magical Thinking won critical acclaim and became a one woman show on Broadway and in London’s West End. Her husband dropped dead at the dinner table. “Life changes fast. Life changes in the instant.”

Title: The Blue Poppy and the Mustard Seed
Author: Kathleen Willis Morton
Publisher: Wisdom Publications
ISBN: 0-86171-565-9
Available from: Amazon.com and Wisdom.

Just occasionally Morton overdoes the description. And occasionally she tells, rather than shows –- which must be very tempting with a book like this. But mostly she’s PDG (pretty damn good). If you want to know, or remember, how raw grief is, or can be, or if you need to have your current terrifying/chaotic/deadening/etc experience of grief articulated, read this.

It’s such a new life and tiny body dying. It’s so poignant. We grieve in relation to how we’ve loved. And they say the death of a child is the worst. “I had books on my shelf that were heavier than he was in the end.” When Liam dies they quit their jobs and book a trip around the world. “I wanted to walk away forever going nowhere, and lie down and die at the same time.” The travel stuff is interesting, but the basic material is the same. Like Jon Kabat-Zinn says, “Wherever you go, there you are.”

Anyway, she pulls through, of course. It takes her nine years to feel kind of OK at his death anniversary, and to wake up one morning feeling happy. Morton began practicing Tibetan Buddhism when she was 17 and had Liam when she was 27. She had ten years of practice under her belt by the time of his death, then. Practice helps, it definitely helps. “In the darkness I had the stars to look up to.” But it’s not a magic wand: “wave this and avoid suffering.”

I would have liked more about the “end” of her process. It’s too short and “wrapped-up” a bit too soon for me. Maybe she hasn’t had enough distance from the end yet? I dunno. There’s a sense of a publicist wanting to write on the back-cover that this is an “uplifting memoir about enduring world-shattering pain and coming out whole.” That is part of the story, of course, and I’m glad Morton feels like that.

But sentences like “I had to die in my mind to wake up to my life. In letting go, samsara is nirvana” don’t do her justice somehow. I wish she’d done a little more work there, but maybe that way of expression is not her forte. It doesn’t feel like her voice. The very last sentence of the book is more her voice, and is much more interesting. “Sometimes powerful reasons to hold on are not yet known to us.” Given the age old ping pong in Buddhism between attachment and renunciation, and the manifold ways we rationalize, opine and actually behave, I wish she had explored this apparent contradiction more. In a sense, she’s writing about that all the time, not knowing how to go on living without Liam, yet somehow keeping going, fumbling. It’s a paradox and a koan this bereavement business. What do we hold on to and what do we let go of? There’s the whole of the Dharma in that question. And what exactly is it we are doing when we do hold on and/or let go? I look forward to seeing other Buddhist writers keep Kathleen Willis Morton company in this genre. She’s made a fabulous contribution, from the experience of a practicing Buddhist as well as a mother – and there’s still plenty left to say.

Kathleen Willis Morton can be found online at www.TheBluePoppyAndTheMustardSeed.com. She encourages readers to visit and share their experiences on the online forum.

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