New Beginnings

A Warm Day

By Louise Glück

 Today the sun was shining

so my neighbor washed her nightdresses in the river—

she comes home with everything folded in a basket,

beaming, as though her life had just been

lengthened a decade. Cleanliness makes her happy—

it says you can begin again,

the old mistakes needn’t hold you back …

Sometimes all you can think during you daily gratitude practice is “I’m grateful the day is over and tomorrow is another day…. I can begin again.”  Beginning again is filled with optimism. Clinging and aversion is where we suffer. Letting go of what we cling to or what we are angry at is hard. On the other side of letting go is beginning again, which is creative and life affirming.

Covid 19 forces us to find joy in the smallest things. The simplicity of cooking a lunch every day or the feeling of clean sheets against your body at night. Preparing for the change in seasons by moving your tee shirts out of your draws and replacing them with your winter sweaters. Doing things we naturally want to rush through slowly and appreciating them with a sense of spaciousness can give us room for new beginnings.

The Illusion of Time

 Thanks to Brendan for leading Dharma Punx last Sunday. He led with a 30 minute silent meditation and a reading titled the “Three Categories of Illusion” by T’ien-t’ai from the Zen tradition. 

 Our following discussion centered around the nature of time and space and whether time exists or if it is just something we experience, an illusion. Brendan shared his thoughts “Once you start taking time out of the equation the results look different. Most important are the “now” moments, what we do in this life time. But at the same time, it doesn’t matter. Time goes on forever but we are just this lifetime.” Marco commented “In physics one can know where a particle is OR where it is going, but you can’t know both at the same time.” And Rob replied “I love the fact that there is so much we’ll never understand.” Marco stated that religions historically have supplied basic answers and definitions to simplify life for people.

 The persona is only a constructed reality. All we really have is the self which is impermanent and in transition. The persona works in tandem with the self. Neither is true, but they are both true. It is a duality, and we learn to hold the two opposing thoughts in your mind at the same time. (In the Tibetan Buddhist lineage, it is known as the Conventional Self and the Ultimate Self, or the Two Truths.) Reality is perceived in layers. How you are perceiving it changes the outcome of how it unfolds. Questions arose in our group such as, when we die, how will we be perceived? They may be many things about us that no one knows, things we haven’t shared with anyone, that we carry with us, to our graves. What persona will we be remembered for? It may just be the little things like, being kind to one person, or helping another along the way. Or the things we made by hand, that may be found by another in a thrift store. Our gifts left behind.

 Brendan commented “Think of consciousness as just a field. It’s possible that we all experience the same field. But we channel it through our own mind. This is how we separate ourselves from others. Because we experience it directly, we feel that our experience is more important than others.”

 Melissa talked about ego stories being illusions we tell ourselves to try to make sense of things. Asking herself “What are the stories I tell myself that I would like to change?” and “what is the new story that I can replace it with?”. The story, “I am a busy person” is countered with “Nowhere to go. Nothing to do. No one to be”. And the story “I’m not good enough” is countered with dropping out of my identity. Letting go of thinking things are always related to me. Melissa concluded “I find that there is much more space when I am not guided by the constricted view of who I am.”

The Five Hindrances

Thanks to Brendan for leading DPX last Sunday with a meditation and talk. He played us a Ted Talk by about finding your individual path using the metaphor of climbing a mountain by Master Shi-Heng Yi. Shi-Heng Yi spoke of the 5 hindrances that get in the way of your individual path. 1.) Sensual desire. 2.) Ill will or aversion. 3.)  Sloth and torpor. 4.) Restlessness. 5.) Skeptical doubt. He stressed that in order to bring meaning and value into your life, one needs to master yourself and not let the hindrances stop you. Master Shi-Heng Yi reminded us that the hindrances are inherently part of our conditioning. He presented 4 ways to align and structure your life to prevent the hindrances. 1.) recognize the hindrance. 2.) Accept and acknowledge the situation or person and let it be. 3.) Investigate why? And what are the consequences? 4.)  Non- Identify. “I am not the body”, “I am not the mind”, “I am not the emotion”. “You can see these, but you are not these”. In our group discussion there were comments expressing an understanding that “whatever happens there is always an opportunity to have compassion for ourselves”. And “An opportunity to appreciate being a human being in progress”. And “The goal is simply an obstacle to overcome as quickly as possible. Pay attention to the journey and don’t be so focused on the end.”

Loneliness During Covid 19 Quarantine

Melissa led DPX on the theme of loneliness last week. Sighting that loneliness lies behind a host of problems—anxiety, violence, trauma, crime, suicide, depression, political apathy, and even political polarization. Lonely people can even feel homeless even though they had a roof over their heads. Loneliness can manifest when finding yourself among a group of people who do not know and understand you and can trigger a fight-or-flight response. We breathe fast, our heart races, our blood pressure rises, we don’t sleep. We act fearful, defensive, and self-involved, all of which drive away people who might actually want to help, and tend to stop lonely people from doing what would benefit them most: reaching out to others. Our group had a variety of responses ranging from feeling less alone knowing that everyone is going through this and that it lands in different ways for people. Having empathy for the frontline nurses and doctors seeing and experiencing collective grief. Noting that anger is a masking emotion for grief and sadness. Grief for the loss of a previous life. Feeling ostracized from friends and gratefully acknowledging how much our DPX group has helped. Feeling grateful for recovery, which helps to connect with emotions, identify them, be with them, and deal with them. Feeling waves of sadness but opening to the inquiring mind when there is space. 

Fear, Doubt and Covid 19

At our Sunday Zoom meeting led by Ray, we did a happiness inducing Metta meditation for everyone in the world who is suffering from the Coronavirus including its emotional and financial trickle down. Our discussion centered around emotions of desire, anxiety, fear and doubt, and how one emotion spirals into the next. Doubt arises from fear. We doubt the best way to control a potential negative future that we are afraid of. It causes us to hold back and we get stuck in ruminating thoughts. Too much thinking and not enough action. We are afraid we are going to pay the consequences and people are going to judge us for doing it wrong. We fear that we will be separated and unloved as a result. 

 Remedies for this downward spiral include, being present and focusing on your breath. Labeling the emotion, saying “This is a moment of suffering.” Meeting it with kindness and without blame, self-blame, or judgement of any kind. Saying “may I be at ease” and “I care about my suffering” Rather than … “I shouldn’t be feeling this way”. Finally, asking yourself “is this useful?” Committing to mindfully trying to understand the emotion and the situation and to face it with positivity, productivity and rewardingly. Don’t obsess over unattainable targets or expectations. Goals should be realistic and attainable. If the situation cannot change, accept it as it is and turn it to an advantage. 

      In our group discussion Bailey talked about the difficulties of living outside her daily routine and commented that in her situation, turning it to an advantage meant learning that is ok to ask for help. Sam talked of shifting from hypervigilance to mindfulness. Mike mentioned gaining resiliency as we go through difficult times. Beth talked about using time more wisely, because we don’t know how much time we have left. 

     Brendan commented that “In many ways, this is no different than normal life. In normal life we have no control, ….it’s just that we have more things to distract ourselves with so we don’t have to think about it. This virus situation takes away everything we have built up and leaves us with only ourselves to observe and be with.” 

      Mike said “It’s a time to question how we want to show up in the world because we are all grieving together. Everyone agreed how surprisingly comforting it was to be with our community and see everyone’s faces. Even if it was through Zoom.