Reflections for Meditations
Sometimes I go about in
Pity for myself
And all the while
A great wind blows me across the sky.
This could easily have been a text from a Tibetan Dzochen meditation or from a poem be Hafiz or Rumi. If I said it was from an Advaita Vedanta or Hindu teaching I’m sure it would also fit, But it’s from the Ojibwa tribe in North America, this most powerful tribe east of the Mississippi.
So it can be our theme for today’s sitting. That no matter what our mind is making of this present moment … “all the while a great wind is blowing us across the sky”
2. Ajahn Sumedho an American Buddhist Monk has called sitting practice a “Holiday for the heart”. It was interesting that he said Holiday for the heart and not holiday for the mind. I suppose there is no holiday for the mind. But rather when the heart takes a holiday the mind has to come along whether it wants to or not. This Sufi Poem takes up where Sumedho left off. The poem describes how our heart takes a holiday. We embody this when we simply sit and be in the present moment:
This is a Sufi poem by Ibn Arabi (Ibn Arabi was born in Murcia on July 28, 1165 CE (560 in the Islamic calendar), and his family moved to Seville when he was seven years old. In 1200 CE, at the age of thirty-five, he left Iberia for good, intending to make the hajj to Mecca. He lived in Mecca for some three years, where he began writing his Al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya (The Meccan Illuminations). In 1204, he left Mecca for Anatolia with Majd al-Dīn Isḥāq, whose son Ṣadr al-Dīn al-Qunawī (1210–1274) would be his most influential disciple.[2]
In 1223, he settled in Damascus, where he lived the last seventeen years of his life. He died at the age of 76 on 22 Rabi’ II 638 AH/November 10, 1240CE, and his tomb in Damascus is still an important place of pilgrimage.[3]
“How wonderful! A garden in the fire.
A meadow for the gazelles,
a monastery for Christian monks
A temple for pagan idols,
(A lotus blossom for Buddhists),
The Ka’aba for Muslim Pilgrims,
Tablets for the Jewish law,
And pages for the Qur’an.
I proclaim the religion of Love,
And wherever it carries me,
This is my creed and my faith.
3. Sufi Teaching Story
“ A man knocked on a door. “Who is there?” asked God
“Me” replied the man. “Go away then” said God.
The man went away and wandered in the desert until he realized his error and returned to the door.
He knocked again. “Who is there?” asked God
“You” answered the man. “Then come in” replied god “
“There is no room in here for two”
4. If you take pride in your attainments or become discouraged because of your idealized efforts, your practice will be confined by a brick wall. Suzuki Roshi from Zen Mind Beginners Mind
Transcend all the labels, especially those that have been given to you by others in the past. You are not what you have done. You are not your accomplishments. You are not what others have done to you. All those are only on your mind. They are only thoughts. There are no justified resentments!
5. Death Poem Goku Kyonen died Oct 8th 1271 age 56
The truth embodied in the Buddhas
Of the past, present and future;
The teaching we received from the
Fathers of our faith
Can be found at the tip of my stick.
When Goku felt his death was near, he ordered all his monks/disciples to gather around him. He sat at the pulpit and raised his stick, gave the floor a single tap with it, and said the poem above. When he finished he raised the stick again, tapped the floor once more, and cried “See! See! Then sitting upright, he died. (Comment: When he hit the floor with the stick he was pointing to the present moment- the instant the stick hit the floor and made the instantaneous noise. All the teachings of all the Buddhas are contained there, in the present moment)
6. Death poem . Kozan Ichikyo died Feb 12, 1360 age 77
Empty handed I entered the world
Barefoot I leave it.
My coming and going-
Two simple happenings
That got entangled
He wrote this poem on the morning of his death. A few days previously he called his pupils together and ordered them to bury him without ceremony, and forbade them to hold any services in his memory.
7. “What if these moments were your last moments on this earth….How would you sit?” Katagiri Roshi
8. Everyone knows that there are some things that are good and cause us to be glad or happy. And everyone knows that there are bad things that cause us to be sad and angry. But…what if what everyone knows isn’t true at all. What if things are just as they are- in all their rawness and nakedness? What if funerals aren’t supposed to be sad and weddings aren’t supposed to be happy. They are just what they are. When we are coerced into believing the conventional beliefs about situations we miss the opportunity to experience them as they really are. We miss the opportunity to open to them in our own sacred way- to meet the nakedness of a situation with our own nakedness. To see that whatever is happening is sufficient in its own right. That nothing needs to be added or removed from the moment to make it more complete. From and essay on ”the Great Way Is Not Difficult “ by John Tarrant.
And this applies to our sitting meditations as well. If we have expectations about how our meditation “should be” we may miss the chance to experience it as it is. If we fight with the experience we miss the opportunity to experience the present moment. It’s like fighting with a pig as the saying goes… You’re getting all muddy and the pigs having all the fun.
In the last watch of the night when the Buddha realized enlightenment, he remembered a time from his childhood when he was watching a spring planting festival officiated by his father. He remembered that he sat under a rose apple tree and just watched the festival unfold. He noticed that there was a sense of happiness that arose as a result of just watching the unfolding events. Nothing needed to be added to the situation to make it more complete, and nothing needed to be removed to make it any better. It was sufficient just as it was. The happiness arose from to wanting things to be any different or judging them in any way. And he wondered whether exploring this avenue was a way to freedom. We can do this as we sit today.
Thoughts, feelings, sensations and emotions are as much a part of the present moment as your sitting cushion. We can sit and watch things unfold without attaching t them or fighting with them. All things arise, manifest and fall away. Watching this unfold without judging, pushing away the unpleasant or attaching to the pleasant was what the Buddha did on this last watch before his enlightenment. This moment’s experience doesn’t need to fit any expectations. It is sufficient the way it is. Let’s try this today!
9. Do you remember a time as a child when you were completely happy. Maybe a family picnic, or a prom date or some holiday or event with your friends? I have had a few of these in my childhood. But one I distinctly remember was a neighborhood gathering that surrounded picking of grapes. We lived in an Italian, Irish and Polish neighborhood very near the steel mills in the city of Cleveland. Toward the end of summer there would be a gathering of all the people who had grape arbors in their yard (about 40 % of the neighborhood). And in the afternoon the men would pick the grapes and in the evening there would be a cookout, with Bocce ball games (first the adults and then the kids. It would go on well after dark. As the sun would go down my friends and I would climb on top of the garage and sit and watch the Bocce games then watch the stars. These were the most carefree days of my life. And the happiness and contentment was purely related to nothing being added or taken away from the moment.
If you’ve had a time like this you have experienced what the Buddha experienced when he gave up striving and sought the middle way. He remembered a time in his childhood when perfect peace was present in the simple moment of experiencing the present moment.
I will propose to you that each time we sit in meditation we have the opportunity to experience this kind of happiness. IF we don’t push anything away and don’t grasp at anything, If we fight the present by not being satisfied with our sitting, or wishing our monkey mind was different than the way it is, then we are denying ourselves this simple pleasure of letting go into the present.
So let’s sit here for a while and be content with whatever the world brings to us. Let’s watch it, appreciated its presence and let it go. The practice is to KNOW AND LET GO.
10. Three week practice consecutive. Meant to experience the three parts of meditation : Breath, Body, and Mind.
Week One. Mindfulness of Breath.
This week we will practice Applied Concentration (effort) and Sustained Concentration. We will be using the bell to help us. We’ll do the meditation for the first 15 minutes of the sitting. I’ll strike the bell and this is where we will enter the meditation. When I strike the bell pay attention to the sound of the bell. This is Applied Concentration. As the sound lingers keep paying attention to the diminishing sound of the bell. This is our sustained concentration. I’ll ring the bell again and we apply our concentration, the sound will linger and we use our sustained concentration. We are building our concentration practice with this exercise. If the mind moves away from the sound of the bell or the following silence, just notice the mind has wandered and return to your applied and sustained concentration. At the end of the time you may return to your regular concentration or Insight practice.
Week Two. Mindfulness of Body.
This week we will pay attention to the body. When we sit in meditation we try to sit still. But if we have sat for any length of time we will notice that it’s almost impossible to sit completely still. Our bodies feel discomfort and we often will move- even if its ever so slightly. We have a deeply rooted and habitual reaction to move away from discomfort. It’s not that there is anything wrong with this, it’s just important to see what’s happening here. If our lives are lived habitually moving away from discomfort we miss the opportunity to see what is happening in each moment and sometimes responding with courage and strength. The practice is to be mindful of discomfort and not to struggle with it. When we struggle with the pain it is just more aversion. Often it is the fear of anticipating future pain that causes us to move and continually move in order to prevent future pain.
So the practice this week is to sit and notice when we move, even if its ever so slightly; a slight movement of head, fingers shoulders. We aren’t judging anything we’re just noticing what is happening. We also don’t involve ourselves in commentary about what is happening- it’s just about noticing each and every movement that we make- all to get more comfortable.
Week Three. Mindfulness of Mind.
The last two sessions we noticed the breath and body manifesting as movement. We just sat and noticed our applied concentration with noticing the sound of the bell and last session we noticed the bodies deeply habitual and conditioned response to discomfort by body movement.
This week we will begin with a review of the first two weeks for the first 20 minutes then we will move on to notice the movements of the mind. This won’t be hard to do! The mind is conditioned to think and it is not only biologically conditioned to think but is habitually conditioned to think. We’re just going to pay attention to this. BUT with one caveat. We aren’t going to engage in the thought. We are merely going to notice that a thought has arisen and not attach to it. When a thought arises we just notice it with open awareness and let it go- our mind returning to open awareness. This may occur hundreds of times during the sit. We’re not going to judge this we’re just here noticing. It’s not important what the thought is- No matter how beautiful, loving, and tempting we are just going to drop the attachment to it and return to our open awareness. You may also return to mindfulness of the breath of body if you like.
So first we’ll practice mindfulness of breath using the bell for Applied and Sustained Concentration. Then we’ll move to the body and notice the movements of the body.
And finally we’ll just relax into open awareness and watch thoughts arise manifest and fall away without attaching to them. If you get caught in a thought just notice the moment of awareness of this and return to open awareness or the breath or body.
11. Breath, Body and Mind
Our meditation practice consists of initially watching breath, body and mind. Buddha was asked what kind of meditation he practiced now that he was an awakened Boddhisattva. He said he did the same meditation after awakening as he did before. And that meditation was Anapanasati- mindfulness of the in breath and outrbreath.
WHY? Because it involves mindfulness and concentration (access concentration where the hindrances are subdued). When we practice concentration, develop concentration, and become consummate in concentration (even incrementally) we enjoy the fruits of concentration which is the ability to see things as they really are.
AND HOW ARE THEY? From our own direct experience we see all things as impermanent and constantly changing. We directly experience and understand the teaching of impermanence.
Impermanence Sutta about the list of many skillful behaviors culminating in understanding and practicing the teaching of Metta (loving kindness) even if it’s only for the length of time it takes to pull a cows udder (or maybe for us it would be the time it takes to speed dial on our smart phones). And even better than that is to truly understand the teaching of impermanence even if it’s only for the length of time it takes to snap your fingers.
So that when we sit and practice Anapanasati (mindfulness of the breath) we directly experience
Impermanence of Breath (in breath-beginning-middle-end, smooth breath, coarse breath, short breath, long breath, and a clamed breath).
Impermanence of Body (all bodily changes, movements, sensations of body, etc)
Impermanence of Mind (we watch mind move form thought to thought until it settles of its own accord.
All of this naturally leads us to Vipassana (Insight)
SO during tonight’s meditation let’s sit and directly experience breath, body and mind and the joy and peaceful abiding this can bring.
