update from Sunday 21 june

Well, today is Sunday June 21st, the summer solstice. Another time for transformation? I don't know. I think transformation is overrated. Or at least not something to get too excited about, because you just never know where life is headed in the end.

One week ago, Sunday the 14th, I had a miscarriage. It threatened for 3 days, so I had some time to adjust mentally and emotionally. I spent the whole day Saturday just sitting outside in our garden, reading and enjoying the sunshine. It was actually very peaceful and lovely. I was reading "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying" -- so much better than the silly novel I commented on in my last blog. I would set it down every few minutes in order to think about what the author was saying, and to share the thoughts with the baby. Very deep. So even though that weekend was one of the saddest in my life, it was also one of the happiest. I really felt like I was connected to what matters, that my perspective on life was expanded. The sea is still as rough and stormy as ever, but my lifeboat is larger and it doesn't toss and turn as much.

Since I took a few paragraphs to describe the silly novel in my last entry, I'm definitely going to take some space here to write about The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. This blog is ostensibly about our dream house in Bunnik, yes, but really this is the essence of it all. Living and dying. Living well and dying well. And moving to Bunnik and setting up a center there -- that is just a little potential adventure in this particular lifetime, and not really so important.

Sogyal Rinpoche is a Tibetan monk who left Tibet many years ago and now travels and lectures throughout the world. He wrote "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying" in 1993 and it has lived for at least ten years in my favorite bookcase of favorite books (next to books by the Dalai Lama, Thich Nhat Hanh, Deepak Chopra, Lao Tse, Joseph Campbell, Eckhart Tolle, etc.) But for some reason I had never read it.

On Friday June 5th, I went to the Hague to take part in a conference called "Leadership for a Sustainable World." The guest speakers included a member of the Dutch royal family, CEO's of Dutch banks and companies, a former Dutch prime minister, a famous Dutch TV celebrity, the Dalai Lama and Sogyal Rinpoche. It was quite impressive, seeing all those people together, everyone talking about how we need to take advantage of the current crisis, and see how our greed and short-sightedness is ruining our society and the planet.

But the presentation by Sogyal Rinpoche was the part that made the deepest impression on me. He didn't say anything particularly unusual or different (Spirituality is really "my thing" -- it would be quite amazing if a speaker could say something spiritual that I've never heard or read before.) Even the way he said it -- that was very good and very special, but also not different. But Who He Was as he spoke, and as he led the audience in a short meditation -- it was like a boulder fell out of the heavens and flattened me on the ground. What he said was True, and who he was himself did not contradict anything he said, at any level, energetically. Wow. I was shaking and tears were running down my face and it was all I could do to "hold myself together" until his presentation was over. Amazing.

So when I got home, I thought it must be time to read his book now. I was nervous though. It took me about a week before I got it off the shelf. I've had some trouble in the past with spiritual leaders and spiritual movements. What typically happens is that I connect with someone with whom I share a deep spiritual understanding (for example: attachment is the root of suffering) and we talk. The person says he studies and meditates with a certain group following a certain practice and wouldn't I like to join? I say to myself, cool, a community of like-minded individuals, that would be nice. Then I read some of their literature or their website or meet some others in the group and it gives me a knot in my stomach. The words are good, and some of the people feel good, but mostly the whole thing feels artificial. It is as if the disciples of the particular school have figured out that having a flashy expensive sports car which impresses all the neighbors will not get them to heaven -- so they've traded the car in for a signed photo of their spiritual leader and a certificate congratulating them for meditating 3 hours daily for the last 10 years. In order to impress all the neighbors with how rich... er, spiritual... they are.

Is it better to hang out with the owner of a fancy sports car who doesn't claim to be spiritual, or with man who has given all his wealth to charity, meditates hours every day, and claims to be spiritual even though I'm not sure I really believe it? Heh heh, I can answer that question already, thank you Rinpoche for reminding me....

Here is the essence of Rinpoche's teachings:
Everyone dies.
No one knows when they will die.
If you stay aware of those two facts all the time, you will appreciate every moment that you are alive. You will be present.
You will also have compassion for every person you meet -- that person, like you, could be dead tomorrow.

The answer to my rhetorical question above is very simple: Just "be" with the person you are with, whether he is a rich man who is learning about charity, or a spiritual man who is learning about authenticity. We are all mortals, learning about something. We are all going to die. We need to support each other.

Yes, eventually I found the courage to open Rinpoche's book and happily it hasn't given me any knots in my stomach. Happily it has also not turned me into a weak-kneed hero-worshipper. I haven't gotten any urges to shave my head, don orange robes, and study up on Buddhist folklore. I like what I'm reading. I feel like Sogyal Rinpoche and I were friends in past lives. I feel (through the energetic connection I make with him while reading his words) that we respect and understand each other, and that we both have the urge to laugh out loud... at the world and at ourselves, for how difficult we make things sometimes. Life is actually so simple.

But I am also inspired, because I see that I need to remind myself of the Truth rather often, and he seems to have continuous access to it. Here is an illustration: after his presentation, Rinpoche came to sit at a table in the audience. It happened to be the table next to the table where I was sitting (I listened very carefully to my Guides when I was choosing where to sit!) Our chairs were next to each other, so at a quiet moment I turned to him and thanked him for his presentation. We ended up chatting a while about nothing in particular -- that his main center is in France, but there are also groups in the Netherlands that he supports, and there are programs for regular folks like me as well as for serious followers. That sort of thing. At one point, another person from my table came over and asked very humbly if he could ask a question. First, he pointed out that young people these days are more and more selfish, and less concerned about the environment, and constantly busy with violent video games -- then he asked, how did Rinpoche think that we could work with these young people to make them more spiritually aware? Rinpoche gave the perfect answer: He smiled, he chuckled, he said he would sit with the youngsters, talk with them and play with them. Whatever the "answer" was, it should be even more fun/interesting than what is attractive to the children at the moment.

My response, in my head, was much longer and more troubling. I'm only coming to the Truth now, as I write about it three weeks after the fact.

In my head: why is this man being so obsequious? Boy, that would drive me crazy if I was some sort of spiritual leader, everyone treating me like a god. I hate it when some people are on pedestals or insist that other people get on pedestals. Why can't we all smile and say "namaste" to each other -- I greet the god-spirit within you. Humility isn't the same as groveling. And now listen to his question! Geez. He might as well ask, "how can we solve world hunger?" Does he expect Rinpoche to flip a switch and channel a perfect treatise directly from the Buddha? Any decent answer would require a half hour discussion, at a minimum.

But maybe he doesn't really want an answer... maybe he just wants to impress Rinpoche with a deep and meaningful question, because he is afraid of appearing frivolous. Or maybe he's like one of the people who questioned the Dalai Lama: why does he think the Chinese consider him a demon? You know the reason why someone would ask such a silly question -- because he wants to hear the Dalai Lama talk about how the Chinese are ignorant or misguided or materialistic, implicitly suggesting that the questioner is much more enlightened and open-hearted. But the Dalai Lama gave the perfect answer: he smiled, he chuckled, his raised his pointed index fingers next to his head and said, "maybe it's because of my horns?"

And look at the premise behind this new question: all young people today are selfish. I don't believe it. What a thing to say. We are aware and responsible, but they are not? That sounds very black & white, very judgmental to me. And now what? Now that we have judged them to be insufficient, we need a good way to punish them, and then a way to manipulate them into being the sort of people we want them to be? And of course, it shouldn't be fun or interesting... these youngsters are already too self-indulgent. We have to make life harder for them... ugh. What's wrong with this man? Is he bitter about how his own childhood was much harder than those of kids today? Does he have children of his own that he can't manipulate or control and he thinks the trouble is that he needs a stronger method for manipulation?

Ah. Rinpoche is giving a very soft and loving answer. He isn't buying into the premise that the kids are unreachable. He is answering with humor. His energy doesn't indicate that he was annoyed about being put on a pedestal, although it also doesn't indicate that he wants to be there. He doesn't have anything in his energy that seems to want to correct the man for his question, although his energy also doesn't indicate that he enjoys "life, the universe and everything" questions. His energy feels loving and kind.... but... but.... maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I can't really tell. Maybe he isn't aware of all these dynamics -- the false humility, the hero-worshipping, the negative judgments, the projection of one's own shortcomings onto others, the need for control. If he is actually aware of all that, how can he not show any annoyance?

So, as I'm writing this, I'm asking him (or his Soul, at some level, I'm not quite sure how this channeling stuff works) is he annoyed by these sorts of questions? Here is his answer:

"No, Emily, I am not annoyed. Yes, I see when people are asking serious questions in order not to seem frivolous. I see how they try to earn my attention and respect by insisting that I am a greater person than they are. I see how they long desperately for approval, for forgiveness, for protection. And I am a human being -- I can get angry or annoyed just like you. But when I feel it coming, or when I can foresee the possibility of these emotions arising in the near future, I focus on my boat (to borrow from your metaphor above.) If I remember -- I am a human being and this person is a human being and either one of us could be dead tomorrow -- then the inclination to get angry melts away. If I let myself get annoyed, and from that space I say something critical, the person will be hurt. If I let myself get annoyed, and yet through self-discipline say kind words, those words will ring false. If I recognize my annoyance and immediately let it melt away, then my kind words will ring with Truth, and that will help the "annoying" person much more than criticism."

So, I am thinking about this annoying man and his annoying question some more and trying to get un-annoyed about it now (realizing that ideally that process should take a second or two, not three weeks.) I'm concentrating on my lifeboat, my awareness of death, and imagining that this man is a patient of mine. We have an hour to let go of judgments, to look perhaps at his past lives and past deaths in a loving and non-judgmental way... and I'm asking him now, why did you ask Rinpoche that question?

"I know it was a dumb question. It was too complicated for anyone to answer in 2 minutes, even if they could channel Buddha. But I didn't ask him in order to impress him, or because I just wanted any excuse to talk to him. Can you see? There's this spear in my back. I'm in pain. I'm being driven forward by someone whose face I can't see." I see the spear, and I feel only love and sympathy for this man, who is about to die. He's been marching for days with no food or water, at the point of a spear. He's in a delirium. He is so exhausted, he wants to die, and yet he is afraid of death. I'm not annoyed any more. He needed to hear a kind word from a man who isn't afraid of death, in order to release the weight of this terrible past. It didn't matter what kind word it was, or what topic it was related to. Rinpoche probably didn't see these past life images, but it didn't matter because he is more continuously in touch with the Truth.

How can I be more continuously in touch with the Truth? This is something I want to figure out. And I know it doesn't require 3 hours of meditation a day. Rinpoche was very clear, in Chapter 5 of his book, that meditation is a technique for bringing the mind home, making the waters still, so the dirt settles out and you can see, think, and act clearly. There are techniques within the technique -- focusing on the breath or on a mantra, for example. But the goal is to be able to see, think and act clearly -- that's all that's important. If a person could reach that goal by pinching their left ear lobe instead of by sitting-down-on-his-cushion-and-meditating-for-an-hour, he should pinch his ear and throw away his cushion, for goodness sake. (and having pinched his ear, it would look to everyone else like he is in a watchful meditation, at peace, seeing clearly....)

For me, pinching my earlobe has no effect, but if I take a moment to "make a deep channeling connection" to "the flattened-by-a-boulder feeling I had in Den Haag" or to "a leaf in my garden", then I am already there. Shaking. Tears running down my face out of pure joy at being alive. If this experience isn't being in touch with the Truth, I don't know what is. I can't imagine anything more profound or amazing or joyful. But I can't stay there continuously. It is too overwhelming, for me and especially for other people, I would imagine. If I see a neighbor letting his dog poop in front of our house, right in front of the no-dog-pooping sign .... "you don't have to burst into tears and go hug the man and tell him how sorry you are that he was sold into prostitution at age 10 in ancient Greece!" Uh oh, Rinpoche is teasing me! "Don't panic, there are techniques for working with the energy you have contacted so that you can also live in the so-called real world. Keep reading in the book, and follow through on the Dutch contacts I gave you, and don't push yourself to contact that place if part of you is also saying, whoa, this is too much."

OK, I think that is good advice. Next week there is an open meditation evening at the Rigpa headquarters in Amsterdam and I'm planning to go....

Maybe I'll have something to write about it for the next entry? Or maybe something actually about the house in Bunnik?