Good morning! I really value the discussion here and that we can manage to share differing experiences and needs without their seeming like unpleasant disagreements. What it is starting to bring up for me - which is good, because it does need bringing up - is my inability to opt for one path and stick with it, for all I long so deeply for a sense of community and belonging. I feel attracted in different ways to at least three buddhist traditions, and some non-buddhist ones as well. To a great extent, I think it doesn't matter - just commit to something! But I don't seem able to. Towards the end of last year I cosied up to a group of British Tibetan buddhists, started reading their stuff on line, signed up for their distance learning course, booked to go on a retreat. Then other commitments stopped me going on the retreat, I never started the course, and, though they seem lovely people and I definitely like the teacher's approach a lot, I no longer have any impulse at all to join this group. So now I find myself attracted to a zen group I found through the teacher's blog (there aren't too many zennies in this country), but I'm really chary of repeating the process with them. It's just the same pattern I have with everything in life, remaining a good-natured but fickle, flakey loner, when I want (or think I want) nothing more than solid commitment and sharing with others. It's particularly depressing, though, to see the same pattern emerging here. At least I am seeing the pattern clearly - I suppose that's a start.
Hmm. As I left work at 7.30 last night, dead tired, in the lobby of my building was a fluttery old man asking in poor English for directions to a lecture theatre nowhere near here, while a student shrugged and looked vague. Felt a strong impulse to pretend I hadn't heard, than found myself thinking 'you practice loving kindness meditation and engage in long discussions about cultivating compassion and then you WALK PAST?'. So, well, I didn't walk past. So uncomfortable to catch such glimpses of oneself :-)
Good morning Jean and All. I love what you say here Jean - it feels so close to some of the things, patterns I struggle with without even realising. It seems to me of paramount importance and significance that what has started to change for you (by the sound of it) and for me is simply a noticing of patterns, and also soemthing about allowing those glimpses of self to be there ... and I feel it is a joyous thing that actually, in the end you didn't WALK PAST. A gestalt supervisor I used to work with once said to me that repeating mistakes (patterns) was merely an attempt to get it right this time, this is why we go round and round doing the same things, trying to do it better (or as Beckett said '...fail better' - I think?)...
Somebody quite clever (can't remember whom) once said, all we can hope for in life is to make new and better mistakes. Similar in spirit to the Beckett.
Hooray for not walking past, and hooray for self-knowledge. It is indeed the start of all change (sorry to pontificate, I'm commenting from work and the know-it-all atmosphere is contagious :-)
A blogfriend of mine, Richard - http://tinyurl.com/hqapq - has just self-published a selection from his blog. It begins where his blog did, with a hilarious piece about sitting meditation: http://tinyurl.com/gfzf8
Jean, it's one of those fascinating -- to me, anyway -- divergences of what we "officially want" and what we actually pursue. I remember when Paula of the House of Toast was searching for a spiritual community. It made me very uneasy, and I was glad when she stopped; it felt all wrong, somehow. Like the needs and desires just weren't lined up. I couldn't picture it succeeding.
I'm presently, for no good reason, completely fed up with my sangha. But at this point it's like a successful marriage -- I can be fed up without seriously thinking about leaving.
I used to be all gung-ho about urging people to find a teacher and join a community. Now I think that people who are holding back may be holding back for good reasons. I guess I think it's good to hold on to the question, but maybe not to force the answer.
The most valuable piece to me of belonging to a sangha -- besides getting to receive the teachings of someone I greatly respect -- is having duties there. I have to go and umze (I'm the sort of person for whom it's unthinkable to shirk a commitment like that), and that means that periodically I *have* to go and sit with the group and hear the teachings, whether I like it or not. Which has jump-started a battery-dead practice at least a dozen times, in the past ten years.
Yes, that's the way it was for me, singing in a choir for years and years. It made me show up!
Can I timidly point out that we all seem to be showing up here pretty regularly? Which might tell us something too about the sort of community we desire.
I suppose I'm ambivalent about having a teacher. I have difficulty with any relationship that's explicitly not egalitarian. Partly a thoroughly healthy commitment to social egalitarianism. But also because every unequal relationship recalls the relationship with one's parents... ouch...
Thank you, Janice, and those who're here who've been to my site. I think it's the first time I've been able to articulate what it is about this day that is so raw for me in about 22 years. It could be that loving-kindness meditation, moving through my life, opening wounds that never healed so they could begin to actually heal.
And, Jean, do I know well what you speak of. I love learning, am interested in so many things, love people, will join things until I hit a place that I can't go - somewhere where I am asked to lay aside all my beliefs and replace them with the beliefs of the system. It happened with depth psychology, it happened with Catholicism, it happened with the Sikh religion behind my yoga tradition, it's happened in so many ways and places that I no longer even wonder about it.
I know I can't. Not completely. It's the skeptic, perhaps. Or I just can't see how system "a" is any better than system "b," and if I give myself to system "a," then I will have to see system "b" as inferior.
Something like that. But I also have commitment issues in relationships. Though I have 2 children who I've never wavered from, so that's something. Jobs, ooh la, no, no commitment of any kind. Which you do have.
It's an interesting question and I often try to plummet its meaning.
Hi there, and many thanks to Jean and Janice for the link and the nice words about my post -- the first post I ever wrote for my blog, as a matter of fact. I'm not a Buddhist -- more a Taoist, but still more an individualist, I hope. I've meditated on and off for a generation and have renewed a regular practice just this past month. I'll stop by here again for more fellowship and inspiration.
Yeah, it's a really interesting problem, taking a guru.
For me there definitely came a time when I realized that what was in my way was precisely my attachment to keeping control of my practice -- that if it was going to take me into really new places, I was going to have to relinquish control over it. Which was scary as hell and even seemed immoral -- my associations with handing over control to a leader tend to run to "good Germans" at Belsen. But I just didn't see any way around it. Using my ego to undo my ego was like trying to jump over my own shadow.
Of course, my tradition makes a big deal of the guru-student relationship, exagerating everything scary about it. In the Vajrayana your "root lama" or "heart lama" is someone you're supposed to view as the Buddha. It makes the Catholic exaltation of the Pope look minor -- at least no one pretends he's Jesus. Lots of traditions aren't so nearly so extreme as mine.
The Dalai Lama, if I remember right, said that before choosing someone as your root lama you should study closely with them for at least five years, during which time you should view them skeptically, even cynically. The relationship is thought to be that important and that fraught; it's one you really can't afford to make a mistake about.
But that's just your relationship with that one teacher. There's no requirement to view anybody else as flawless. Just because someone's a lama doesn't mean you have to take their advice or believe what they say. I emphasize this because a lot of people take what we say about the relationship with the root lama and illegitimately extend it to all relationships with teachers. If you tried to treat every lama who came down the pike as an infallible Buddha, I'm pretty sure you'd give up on being a Buddhist pretty quick. If you had any sense, anyway.
Today was a typically busy Tuesday, which means I was beat when I got home from teaching. So today's meditation consisted of 10 minutes sitting in a tired heap on the sofa. I figure if I can't drag myself to the cushion like John did, at least I can sit wherever I land.
I'll add my 2 cents to this current discussion on teachers tomorrow, after a night's rest. (yawn) In the meantime, good night! :-)
18 Comments:
Good morning! I really value the discussion here and that we can manage to share differing experiences and needs without their seeming like unpleasant disagreements. What it is starting to bring up for me - which is good, because it does need bringing up - is my inability to opt for one path and stick with it, for all I long so deeply for a sense of community and belonging. I feel attracted in different ways to at least three buddhist traditions, and some non-buddhist ones as well. To a great extent, I think it doesn't matter - just commit to something! But I don't seem able to. Towards the end of last year I cosied up to a group of British Tibetan buddhists, started reading their stuff on line, signed up for their distance learning course, booked to go on a retreat. Then other commitments stopped me going on the retreat, I never started the course, and, though they seem lovely people and I definitely like the teacher's approach a lot, I no longer have any impulse at all to join this group. So now I find myself attracted to a zen group I found through the teacher's blog (there aren't too many zennies in this country), but I'm really chary of repeating the process with them. It's just the same pattern I have with everything in life, remaining a good-natured but fickle, flakey loner, when I want (or think I want) nothing more than solid commitment and sharing with others. It's particularly depressing, though, to see the same pattern emerging here. At least I am seeing the pattern clearly - I suppose that's a start.
Hmm. As I left work at 7.30 last night, dead tired, in the lobby of my building was a fluttery old man asking in poor English for directions to a lecture theatre nowhere near here, while a student shrugged and looked vague. Felt a strong impulse to pretend I hadn't heard, than found myself thinking 'you practice loving kindness meditation and engage in long discussions about cultivating compassion and then you WALK PAST?'. So, well, I didn't walk past. So uncomfortable to catch such glimpses of oneself :-)
Good morning Jean and All. I love what you say here Jean - it feels so close to some of the things, patterns I struggle with without even realising. It seems to me of paramount importance and significance that what has started to change for you (by the sound of it) and for me is simply a noticing of patterns, and also soemthing about allowing those glimpses of self to be there ... and I feel it is a joyous thing that actually, in the end you didn't WALK PAST. A gestalt supervisor I used to work with once said to me that repeating mistakes (patterns) was merely an attempt to get it right this time, this is why we go round and round doing the same things, trying to do it better (or as Beckett said '...fail better' - I think?)...
Somebody quite clever (can't remember whom) once said, all we can hope for in life is to make new and better mistakes. Similar in spirit to the Beckett.
Hooray for not walking past, and hooray for self-knowledge. It is indeed the start of all change (sorry to pontificate, I'm commenting from work and the know-it-all atmosphere is contagious :-)
A blogfriend of mine, Richard - http://tinyurl.com/hqapq - has just self-published a selection from his blog. It begins where his blog did, with a hilarious piece about sitting meditation: http://tinyurl.com/gfzf8
Richard's piece is very good. Jean I really appreciated several things you said... making me feel a little less alone, for what that's worth.
Oh, and, good morning all!
Jean, it's one of those fascinating -- to me, anyway -- divergences of what we "officially want" and what we actually pursue. I remember when Paula of the House of Toast was searching for a spiritual community. It made me very uneasy, and I was glad when she stopped; it felt all wrong, somehow. Like the needs and desires just weren't lined up. I couldn't picture it succeeding.
I'm presently, for no good reason, completely fed up with my sangha. But at this point it's like a successful marriage -- I can be fed up without seriously thinking about leaving.
I used to be all gung-ho about urging people to find a teacher and join a community. Now I think that people who are holding back may be holding back for good reasons. I guess I think it's good to hold on to the question, but maybe not to force the answer.
The most valuable piece to me of belonging to a sangha -- besides getting to receive the teachings of someone I greatly respect -- is having duties there. I have to go and umze (I'm the sort of person for whom it's unthinkable to shirk a commitment like that), and that means that periodically I *have* to go and sit with the group and hear the teachings, whether I like it or not. Which has jump-started a battery-dead practice at least a dozen times, in the past ten years.
Yes, that's the way it was for me, singing in a choir for years and years. It made me show up!
Can I timidly point out that we all seem to be showing up here pretty regularly? Which might tell us something too about the sort of community we desire.
I suppose I'm ambivalent about having a teacher. I have difficulty with any relationship that's explicitly not egalitarian. Partly a thoroughly healthy commitment to social egalitarianism. But also because every unequal relationship recalls the relationship with one's parents... ouch...
got home from work last night late. dead tired. dragged my self to the cushion anyway.
happy birthday, Brenda
happy day, happy year, happy life
I'll light a candle on my tofu lasagna for you tonight
thank you, Jean, for the link to Richard's new book
it's on my wish list now at Amazon
Thank you, Janice, and those who're here who've been to my site. I think it's the first time I've been able to articulate what it is about this day that is so raw for me in about 22 years. It could be that loving-kindness meditation, moving through my life, opening wounds that never healed so they could begin to actually heal.
And, Jean, do I know well what you speak of. I love learning, am interested in so many things, love people, will join things until I hit a place that I can't go - somewhere where I am asked to lay aside all my beliefs and replace them with the beliefs of the system. It happened with depth psychology, it happened with Catholicism, it happened with the Sikh religion behind my yoga tradition, it's happened in so many ways and places that I no longer even wonder about it.
I know I can't. Not completely. It's the skeptic, perhaps. Or I just can't see how system "a" is any better than system "b," and if I give myself to system "a," then I will have to see system "b" as inferior.
Something like that. But I also have commitment issues in relationships. Though I have 2 children who I've never wavered from, so that's something. Jobs, ooh la, no, no commitment of any kind. Which you do have.
It's an interesting question and I often try to plummet its meaning.
This inability to settle.
Hi there, and many thanks to Jean and Janice for the link and the nice words about my post -- the first post I ever wrote for my blog, as a matter of fact. I'm not a Buddhist -- more a Taoist, but still more an individualist, I hope. I've meditated on and off for a generation and have renewed a regular practice just this past month. I'll stop by here again for more fellowship and inspiration.
Welcome, Richard. We've got all kinds here. And non-kinds.
That made me laugh, mb!
Yeah, it's a really interesting problem, taking a guru.
For me there definitely came a time when I realized that what was in my way was precisely my attachment to keeping control of my practice -- that if it was going to take me into really new places, I was going to have to relinquish control over it. Which was scary as hell and even seemed immoral -- my associations with handing over control to a leader tend to run to "good Germans" at Belsen. But I just didn't see any way around it. Using my ego to undo my ego was like trying to jump over my own shadow.
Of course, my tradition makes a big deal of the guru-student relationship, exagerating everything scary about it. In the Vajrayana your "root lama" or "heart lama" is someone you're supposed to view as the Buddha. It makes the Catholic exaltation of the Pope look minor -- at least no one pretends he's Jesus. Lots of traditions aren't so nearly so extreme as mine.
The Dalai Lama, if I remember right, said that before choosing someone as your root lama you should study closely with them for at least five years, during which time you should view them skeptically, even cynically. The relationship is thought to be that important and that fraught; it's one you really can't afford to make a mistake about.
But that's just your relationship with that one teacher. There's no requirement to view anybody else as flawless. Just because someone's a lama doesn't mean you have to take their advice or believe what they say. I emphasize this because a lot of people take what we say about the relationship with the root lama and illegitimately extend it to all relationships with teachers. If you tried to treat every lama who came down the pike as an infallible Buddha, I'm pretty sure you'd give up on being a Buddhist pretty quick. If you had any sense, anyway.
Welcome, Richard! -- In fact I'm pretty sure the non-kinds outnumber the kinds, here :-)
Hey, everyone...and welcome & hello to Richard!
Today was a typically busy Tuesday, which means I was beat when I got home from teaching. So today's meditation consisted of 10 minutes sitting in a tired heap on the sofa. I figure if I can't drag myself to the cushion like John did, at least I can sit wherever I land.
I'll add my 2 cents to this current discussion on teachers tomorrow, after a night's rest. (yawn) In the meantime, good night! :-)
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