Metta Day

Or, Valentine's wishes for Buddhists. May all beings be happy and peaceful, may they be liberated from the bonds of craving and aversion, may they be free.

Iti 27: The Development of Loving-kindness. Translation by Thanissaro Bhikkhu 

"This was said by the Blessed One, said by the Arahant, so I have heard: "All the grounds for making merit leading to spontaneously arising (in heaven) do not equal one-sixteenth of the awareness-release through good will. Good will — surpassing them — shines, blazes, & dazzles.

"Just as the radiance of all the stars does not equal one-sixteenth of the radiance of the moon, as the moon — surpassing them — shines, blazes, & dazzles, even so, all the grounds for making merit leading to spontaneously arising in heaven do not equal one-sixteenth of the awareness-released through good will. Good will — surpassing them — shines, blazes, & dazzles.
"Just as in the last month of the rains, in autumn, when the sky is clear & cloudless, the sun, on ascending the sky, overpowers the space immersed in darkness, shines, blazes, & dazzles, even so, all the grounds for making merit leading to spontaneously arising in heaven do not equal one-sixteenth of the awareness-release through good will. Good will — surpassing them — shines, blazes, & dazzles.

"Just as in the pre-dawn darkness the morning star shines, blazes, & dazzles, even so, all the grounds for making merit leading to spontaneously arising in heaven do not equal one-sixteenth of the awareness-release through good will. Good will — surpassing them — shines, blazes, & dazzles."

When one develops — mindful — good will without limit, fetters are worn through, on seeing the ending of acquisitions. If with un-corrupted mind you feel good will for even one being, you become skilled from that. But a Noble One produces a mind of sympathy for all beings, an abundance of merit. Kingly seers, who conquered the earth swarming with beings, went about making sacrifices: the horse sacrifice, human sacrifice, water rites, soma rites, & the "Unobstructed," but these don't equal one sixteenth of a well-developed mind of good will — as all the constellations don't, one sixteenth of the radiance of the moon. One who neither kills nor gets others to kill, neither conquers, nor gets others to conquer, with good will for all beings, has no hostility with anyone at all."

 

 

 

Believe nothing

Many westerners seem to lump Buddhism in with other 'religions' and then reject it out of hand because of presumed dogma. I find frustration with this approach, because in conversations I find these people to be unwilling or unable to look at the subject in any way other than what they already believe. I'm hardly a spokesperson to say what Buddhism is, but one thing I can say unequivocally is that whatever it is, it's not dogma, or blind belief.

One of the first things I learned, in my first ever meditation retreat where I heard my first Buddhist teachings (a 10-day Goenka retreat many years ago), was that we should not accept the teachings blindly, that they were intended to be used experientially. They only asked that we try it with an open mind and see for ourselves whether or not the teachings and practice were beneficial to us.

Many years later when I lived in Georgia and attended a monthly half-day retreat at someone's home for about 3 years, the host always ended the retreat with the above words (from the book Beginning to See, by Sujata), which always stuck with me because of their beauty as much as because of their message. But the message is the basis of what I follow and what we are asked to follow, and the explanation far better than any words I could put together.

For most of us who approach our Buddhist practice with this philosophy, we find that the path indeed leads to good and happiness for all creatures, including ourselves first and foremost. There is no 'idol worship' involved. I've been accused of that, among other things, from a preconceived bias of another person. For most of us westerners who practice Buddhism, the draw is Buddhist psychology, which simply teaches us how to train our own mind for our own benefit, which ripples out to benefit others we encounter. It's not a religious practice.

For me, this simple bit of philosophy from the renowned Thai monk Ajahn Chah, says it all:

 The heart of the path is so simple. No need for long explanations. Give up clinging to love and hate, just rest with things as they are.

We learn to let go of unwholesome mental states such as anger, hatred, greed, attachment and judgment. We replace these with more wholesome mental states such as metta (loving-kindness), compassion, generosity, acceptance and goodwill. None of it happens overnight -- you can't simply decide to never be angry again, for example, and have that come to fruition. For most of us, it's a continual process, based in mindfulness and awareness (a relaxed, open state in which we can observe our thoughts, feelings, and behavior as they arise, without being overtaken by them), that releases the anger or other unwholesome state bit by bit until one day one becomes aware that yes, anger is gone! It comes from deep inside, not from a surface thought, and it's permanent. And it certainly does not come from believing that if we accept the principle as a dogma, the Buddha will then grant our wishes, or that some rite or ritual will be our salvation. WE are our salvation. The Buddha only taught the steps that lead us there. WE have to do the actual work to arrive at the destination, the goal, which is simply a state called true happiness.

You have to do your own work;

Enlightened Ones will only show the way.

Those who practice meditation

will free themselves from the chains of death.

Dhammapada 20.276

 
As opposed to situational happiness, which comes from circumstances in our life that bring joy for a short while, true happiness comes from releasing unwholesome states, from replacing them with wholesome states. And until you try it for yourself, you'll just have to take my word (and the word of thousands of others who've tried it) that true happiness is far, far better than any situational happiness could ever be because it's steady and lasting and always with us. We don't need outside influences to bring happiness, we only need what's inside ourselves.

As to the subject of whether or not Buddhism is a religion, I leave that to more learned folks than I. From my experience and observation, and from my earliest teaching (at the above-referenced Goenka retreat), it was impressed upon me that the teachings were non-denominational and were appropriate and non-conflicting for people from any or no religious background. It's not at all unusual to see a Catholic nun, for example, at these retreats. There was one at my first retreat. The Church does not see the teachings as conflicting with their own teachings.

A few years ago at a retreat at the Bhavana Society in West Virginia, Bhante Gunaratana was speaking in the meditation hall and brought up the question of whether Buddhism is or is not a religion. He (a Sri Lankan by birth) said that it is indeed a religion, an old and respected religion, but he also acknowledged that most westerners don't practice it as such. A friend of mine, Bhante Cintita Dinsmore of the Sitagu monastery in Austin, TX is a western monk who has written extensively on the subject from a western viewpoint. He wrote of what he called 'folk Buddhism', which came about as the Buddha's basic teachings traveled slowly from India into the various countries and cultures of southeast Asia. Here, he said, the teachings were blended with the already-existing religious cultures and became part of those religious cultures. If you are interested in his writings, visit his blog Through the Looking Glass.

A student of Buddhism will readily see that there are still differences between Burmese Buddhism, Thai Buddhism, the Buddhism of Laos and Vietnam and Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Indonesia and others, all home to Theravada Buddhism practices.  Most of southeast Asia practices Theravada Buddhism, as I do. Zen and Tibetan Buddhism have evolved into quite different and thus separate divisions of Buddhism, no longer under the Theravada umbrella. But as different as they may be, all of these follow the same core psychology and teachings of the Buddha. It's only the expression of these teachings that may vary from place to place. The Buddha himself said that he was not a god and that he was not to be worshiped. All he asked was that people follow the path to true happiness that he learned in his years of meditation and finally, his enlightenment. Meditation and a search for these things had been long-practiced in India even 2500 years ago, but he brought something new and profound to the picture and that's what made him The Buddha, as opposed to other buddha's or wise men who had come before him.

But, don't believe me, either. Try it for yourself, with an open mind and a willingness to trust that 2500 years and thousands of people who have benefited can't be all wrong. This much is required initially. A closed mind with immovable pre-conceived ideas will never budge. Give it time. Learn from people who know (don't make it up for yourself). If indeed you find that the path works, then and only then should you follow it, like the moon in the path of the stars.

Noel -- Metta wishes for the season

Here I am sharing the words of our wonderful Venerable Ayya Tathaaloka and the wishes of all the bhikkhunis of Aranya Bodhi and Dhammadharini Vihara in California.

May we give rise to all that is wholesome, healthy, helpful, beneficial, peaceful, benign, sublime and liberating. 

May all else fall away and arise no more.

As we move into the season of increasing light, may we know the increase of good qualities in our lives, in our hearts.

May our applied and directed thoughts, internal and externally directed be beneficial, healthy, helpful, wholesome, peaceful and sublime.

May we care well for whatever lies before us,

and for where we are right now.

In each step.

In moments of immanence,

in present moment awareness,

clearly perceptive,

knowing the amazing gift 

and the amazing opportunity 

in what we are meeting here and now.

And may we be a support for one another in this Way,

to all as for ourselves.

May we rejoice, with joy and gladness in our hearts

knowing the good this is, 

for ourselves

and for one another.

Rejoicing,

on this peaceful and silent night,

all calm, hearts bright,

with much metta ~

Ayya Tathaaloka

with Ayya Sobhana, Ayya Suvijjana and Ayya Nimmala

at Dhammadharini Vihara

Silence

That's what these last nine days have been about, and it was beautiful.

This was nothing like a group retreat, where there is always talking of some kind, where there are always sounds of people moving about, and where there are always people around, period. I had none of that. I had total silence, total stillness -- and that total outer silence and outer stillness led to total inner silence and inner stillness that was a thing of beauty to experience. The only sounds -- outside of the background sounds of the refrigerator or dehumidifier humming, or a fan spinning, or cars and neighbors -- came from the soothing voice and exquisite wisdom of Bhante Gunaratana, three times each and every day.

I made a last-minute decision to use his jhana CD, which I've had for a couple of years, instead of online retreat talks from Sister Susila, and that was a good decision indeed. Essentially, while the discussion and training was for jhana, it was a metta (loving friendliness, or loving kindness) retreat, as he teaches a method of attaining jhana through metta. This -- the metta -- was what influenced me the most. Jhana became secondary. One entire guided meditation was centered on relaxing the body and mind -- so peaceful that after the 30 minutes were over I continued to sit and continue relaxing both body and mind for the rest of the two hours.

All that metta, and all that inner silence eventually pointed to a place inside me where a great big knot of resentment lived. And friends, that resentment was all aimed at myself! Once I saw it, I also clearly saw the source: 70 years accumulation of blame, guilt, remorse, regret for everything I've ever done or said -- and there have been thousands of them -- that I later regretted in one way or another. Once again, I clearly saw the suffering this has caused me over a lifetime. 

The antidote is metta -- to myself and to others, along with compassion for myself and others. If we hold others in metta and compassion, we cannot say or do things we will regret.

And, as Bhante G said in one of his dhamma talks, the way we treat ourselves is most likely the way we will treat others. I've felt a lot of resentment towards other people from time to time. In fact, it's been really easy for some otherwise innocent person to pull that resentment out of me. Now that I'm aware of it, I can stop that. I managed to let go of a lot of that resident self-resentment and replace it with resident self-love and compassion. It will be an ongoing effort to rid myself of all of it.

This was an extraordinary experience for me, and I plan to do one of these each month (although without an electronic teacher, to keep the temptations of the internet away). Clearly, I would make a good hermit! That cave in the Himalayas is sounding better all the time. Too bad it's too cold and too far away. The 'cave' I'm in works just fine.

I realize this is something that many people could not do -- jobs, family and such do not offer the time and silent place for such things in the home. But if you ever have the chance to do it at home or in a remote cabin or even a tent -- do it! You won't be sorry.

What is compassion, and how do we get it

What is compassion? I think we probably all have an intellectual understanding of the word, a dictionary definition along the lines of 'Deep awareness of the suffering of another coupled with the wish to relieve it,' or words to that effect.  Some of us seem to have it, others not so much. I've been one of the latter, and that in itself has been the subject of much meditation, much effort to correct, much concern, much questioning. A good Buddhist is compassionate, after all. Why was this so lacking in me? I had a major breakthrough on this subject this morning in meditation. But before I get into that, I want to explore the subject a little more.

First of all, I've learned over the years that you can't just decide to be compassionate, or beg and plead for compassion to arise. For most of us, it's inherently either there or not there. Some people seem born with great amounts of compassion. Many of these seem to gravitate to helping professions of one kind or another. Others use their innate compassion within their families or friends. I know many people who have great compassion. The rest of us struggle with it (even if we don't know we are doing so).

In my case, I've always had great compassion for animals of all kinds, and have had moments and times of great compassion for the suffering of those humans that I loved. I'm capable of generalized compassion for people around the world suffering from one weather phenomenon or another, or starving because of corrupt governments. But most of the time, I've learned that I was so wrapped up in my own struggles and sufferings that I simply didn't see the struggles and sufferings of others for what they were.

One thing that seems to be consistently taught in Buddhism and other spiritual practices concerns love: without love for oneself, how can one love another? Some teachers that I respect say that compassion springs from love -- including the idea that compassion for oneself springs from love for oneself. That's something else I lack, although I've had some cracks in that armor in recent months. And that probably explains the dearth of compassion for others that I've come to see so clearly. It's also said that compassion ripens over the course of our practice, as wisdom grows and we see things more clearly.

In A Path With Heart, Jack Kornfield talks about an exercise he often uses with groups. First, he asks them to reflect upon death, to imagine themselves at the end of their lives. Then, he asks them to look back over their lives and bring to mind two good deeds that they have done. Most people, he says, come up with small things. He says 'the things that matter most in our lives are not fantastic or grand. They are the moments when we touch one another, when we are there in the most attentive or caring way'.  Some people, he says, find this exercise very difficult. No good deeds come to mind, or if something does arise, it's immediately rejected. We judge ourselves too harshly.  I fall into that category -- although deep in my heart I know I've done many good deeds, I've never had any arise when I try that exercise. I am my worst enemy, my harshest judge, my strongest critic.

A couple of years ago I was listening to Sayalay Susila in an online recording where she talked about how shocked she was when she first began teaching in the West to see how few of us actually love ourselves. She said that in Malaysia, where she's from, and other Asian countries, everybody loves themselves.  In my mind, there must be some crucial sense of self or nurturing that children in those countries receive, compared to the way children are raised in the West.  To help us learn to love ourselves, she offered some metta phrases that I've used often over the last couple of years, although I'm not really sure how much they've helped. Part of the problem has been that I've simply been unable to wish these kind thoughts upon myself. I could mouth the words, or think the words, but there wasn't much sincerity behind them. Still, I keep them taped to my computer monitor and I use them lots in meditation:

May I love myself just as I am,

May I sense my worthiness and well-being,

May I trust this world,

May I hold myself in compassion,

May I meet the suffering and ignorance of others with compassion.

Note how that pesky word 'compassion' sneaks in there. I guess you really can't have one without the other. But how do you get them?

Many years ago I remember reading in one of Jack Kornfield's books a method of doing this. He suggested that you close your eyes and imagine that your adult self is holding your child self in a deep, loving embrace. I could do that -- envision an old photograph of myself as a child and hold that child closely cuddled in my lap, see her suffering, and offer her love and compassion, but it was pretty limited and certainly not lasting. It's much easier to find compassion for a suffering child than it is to have compassion for -- or even see -- the suffering of the adult who 'ought to be able to handle such things'. The sad truth is that most of us can't handle our suffering on our own, other than by ignoring, covering up, self-medicating or perhaps going off into the darkness of depression. And make no mistake, we are all suffering in one way or another. Back to Jack Kornfield's method, I tried it for awhile but eventually stopped because it didn't seem to be making any difference.

Fast forward a lot of years. Since listening to Sayalay's talk I've used  her metta phrases countless times, in and out of meditation. I've used other metta phrases in the same way. Trying hard to find even small glimpses of love for myself, compassion for myself. Last March I attended a metta retreat at Southern Dharma taught by Ayya Sobhana, of Aranya Bodhi in California. I've studied and used metta for years, but this was my first actual metta retreat. Following the usual format she had us choose various people in our lives as examples of the various categories of people we wished to send metta to during the week. A respected teacher or mentor, a good friend, a loved one, a neutral person, and an enemy -- and oneself. What I learned the most during that week -- and it brought great sorrow to me at the time -- was that I could not find love for myself at all, nor could I even choose one person in my life who stood out as a 'loved one'.  It was a sobering week for me and frankly, not a great deal has changed.

There have, however, been small steps. I have great compassion for the nuns at Aranya Bodhi, for example. I see and feel the struggles of their daily lives in rather primitive surroundings (they don't see it as such -- in fact they are thriving and happy), and I have a strong wish to alleviate and ease some of their struggles and suffering (as seen through my eyes). Last fall, driving home after 3 weeks at the Southeast Vipassana Center in south Georgia, my mind and body were suddenly overwhelmed with a glowing sense of well-being, happiness and something new that was unmistakably love for myself. That deep realization, the glow, the wonderment of it all, stayed with me most of the way home. So this is what it feels like!

Eventually the glow wore off, as these moments inevitably do, but there was a crack in the wall. A big one. In recent weeks of meditation I've begun each morning meditation with lots of metta -- aimed mostly at myself in an effort to widen the crack. I began speaking the words aloud, softly, in an effort to better sense their meaning, and to keep my mind from wandering. There have been days when I've felt the walls go down -- but in time they always go back up, although I do believe they become weaker with each incident and will eventually be swept away completely. Part of these recent meditations included something else I recently learned somewhere -- probably from Jack Kornfield again, perhaps others -- which is to envision myself wrapped in love and compassion as I spoke these metta phrases. Not surprisingly, I had some difficulties with that, but there were enough small successes to keep me trying.

This morning I went back to Jack's original advice -- the adult me and the child me. After the years of study and effort, I was indeed able to see and feel the suffering of this small child I was holding. I remembered how she suffered, how unhappy she was, and I was filled with compassion for her suffering, could wrap myself in that compassion, deeply. I stayed with that for awhile, then one of those magical moments/insights we look for in our practice arose and I suddenly saw very clearly the connection that exists between that young, suffering 'me' and all others. I saw that all children suffer in one way or another, just as all children take that suffering with them into their adult lives in one way or another. The deep compassion I was feeling for the child 'me' spread instantly and naturally outward to all others around the world and my mind and body were filled with a wonderful, indeed physical, glow that encompassed peace, equanimity, love, compassion and all sorts of other feelings. I literally felt this glow moving outward to others, wrapping them just as it wrapped myself. It was such an extraordinary moment that I just stayed with it for the balance of the hour, knowing its value and importance, wanting to absorb as much of it as I could.

It wasn't the most important insight/experience I've had in my practice, but it ranks right up there -- especially if it actually makes a noticeable, lasting change. I can only hope that this was powerful enough to shatter barriers forever. Only time will tell, but today feels really, really good.

Lullaby for Buddhists

Now, I know that our practice does not generally include music, but a few days ago someone on the Huffington Post mentioned this in a comment -- can't remember the article, probably something to do with relaxation or maybe sleep. Since I have issues with sleep, and also needed a little push to make me begin meditating before bedtime again, I took a listen and liked what I heard.

It's simply metta blessings with gently vocal music background -- from Malaysia, I believe. I've been using it at the beginning of my pre-bedtime meditation, and find that it is perfect for unwinding and relaxing at the end of the day. As an added benefit, the silent meditation that follows is more rewarding because after the 10 minutes of music and metta, my mind is clear and relaxed and happy to sit quietly for the rest of the hour. Sometimes I continue to relax the body, but since I'm now going to bed relaxed and free of tension and anxiety, I find that the level of tension and anxiety held within my body has lessened greatly. With a mind and body this relaxed, it's easy to use the rest of the hour for quiet contemplation, or slip into concentration.

It's so peaceful that sometimes I listen during the day, outside meditation. Try it!

Chant of Metta by Imee Ooi.