Talk Notes:
Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva of compassion. Hannah showed us some images, the heads, the hands, the eyes. There are over 108 manifestations of Avalokiteśvara. All expressing the limitless nature and the range of bodhisattva compassion and they're all alive in you.
So the question I'm asking is how do we access and express this vast range of expressions of compassion.
We have some brilliant examples of of Avalokiteśvara compassion in famous figures such as Mother Teresa known for her lifetime selfless service serving the poorest of poor in India. She started soup kitchens, developed centers for the dying, for leprosy patients, also built orphanages. And then there's Ammachi, known as the hugging saint, who has offered darshan a blessing in the form of a hug to over 40 million people.
I know. And you know, I found that stat on the internet. I don't know how current it is.
I'm sure you can think of other brilliant examples. But actually, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. I'm looking at nine beautiful bodhisattvas of compassion right here in this room including the zoom room.
I know some of you because I see you even outside the Zendo. I know some of you volunteer at the interfaith coalition's project that serves meals to our homeless population. I know some of you work for the Coalition for Immigrant Support, packing food and supply boxes for families that are afraid to leave their homes. Some of you have volunteered at hospice and this is just what I know about. I'm quite certain that many of you volunteer and offer services to those in need in many other ways.
How do you respond to the cries of the world?
Can you hear me? Okay. Okay. Or bring the mic. How's How is that? I know I'm not always loud. This thing is also a little bit too big for my head, so it slides down. I think it's shaped here. Now it's a little more stable on my head. Can you hear me any better? Okay, I'll just focus on speaking up.
So I was asking in so many words, how do you feel the spirit of Avalokiteśvara expressed in your life?
Like many of you, I also do volunteer work. And aside from my volunteer work, when I see a homeless person outside the grocery store, I try to remember as I shop to buy them a sandwich.
But I also know that at times I feel paralyzed by the cries of the world. overwhelmed by the immense suffering in our world. So overwhelmed that I just don't know how to act, what to do. Sometimes I find myself turning away from the suffering because it hurts too much to take it in. And sometimes I just feel helpless like my actions are so insignificant in the vast sea of suffering that I see around me. And I wonder, can I really make a difference in the world? You sometimes feel paralyzed in these ways.
But Avalokiteśvara is alive in each of us. She is the most natural outpouring of compassion and compassionate action from our hearts. And yet at times this flow is blocked. So the question that arises for me is how do we cultivate the ground from which this compassionate action springs? How do we help? How do we create a feeling of connection where we feel more a part of the world and less separate or afraid? How do we move past the overwhelm of suffering, the paralysis connected to the overwhelm and the fear of the suffering itself?
These are the questions I've been turning as I read. I've been devouring Pema Chodron's books. When Things Fall Apart, The Places That Scare You, Start Where You Are. She has such a beautiful presentation of practices and teachings on compassion. So, have some of you Yeah. Yeah. This one is my favorite these days. I just have been going over and over through the chapters in this book When Things Fall Apart.
And I think the most important thing I or the the message that has stood out most strongly to me these days in her books is compassion begins with the practice of loving kindness for yourself. And that in turn becomes loving kindness for others
In Start Where You Are. This is a quote. Pema says the basic ground for compassionate action is working with rather than struggling against your own unwanted unacceptable stuff. So that when the unacceptable and unwanted stuff appears out there, you relate to it based on having worked with loving kindness for yourself.
So the basic ground it starts with working with your own unwanted and unacceptable stuff.
It makes so much sense. If you're able to stay with what feels unacceptable within yourself, then you're much less likely to turn away from it when you see it out there. And and I say it in in in air quotes because really inside outside there is no distinction.
But once you practice with what is unwanted, unpleasant, unacceptable in yourself, then when you meet it out there, you go, "Oh, I know how to meet this."
But
it's not an easy practice because I don't know about you, but I know for me, if it's unpleasant, I tend to push it away. If it's pleasant, that's what I'd rather hold on to, right? And I I think that's pretty, if I dare say without projecting, I think it's pretty universal. If it's unpleasant, we tend to push it away. If it's pleasant, we tend to hold tight or grasp. Huh? So to stay with what feels difficult or unpleasant or unacceptable requires a really deep shift in attitude, a really deep shift in our habit pattern of pushing away what we don't like. It means allowing ourselves to feel, to feel it without denying it, turning a blind's eye, sweeping it under the carpet, minimizing it, all the other things that we might do when we meet what we don't like in ourselves.
And we each have our own defense mechanisms against feeling what we don't like, what we don't want. For me, one of the strong defense mechanisms is blame. Blame and criticism. The ultimate exit door. I'm out of here, right?
So, I've really been turning this material in myself as I've been studying Pema Chodron's books and I'm dealing with my own challenges with my health right now bringing up a lot of feelings, reactions responses that are unpleasant, unwanted.
So, I've had a lot of ground for practice.
So, for those of you that don't know,
I found out just a few weeks ago that 70% of my left main artery was blocked. 70%. I was completely asymptomatic. So, thank God they found it. And two weeks ago, a stint was inserted holding the artery open.
So, not such good news for me, but good news that they found it. There's a strong history of heart disease in my family. So, in spite of my heart-healthy diet, my daily exercise regime, I have the genes. I have the genes. They're with me and they'll continue to be with me.
So, the unpleasant unwanted feelings I feel frustrated. I feel helpless because in spite of my good health care habits, I have this condition.
I feel afraid. My father died suddenly at age 68 of a heart attack. All three of my four grandparents died also young of a heart attack. I feel vulnerable not knowing what my future holds.
Will I continue to develop blockages in my arteries? Chances are yes. Will I be lucky again to find them before damage occurs.
I don't know.
Will I die like my father before my grandchildren are born?
I don't know.
Most days these days, I feel sad and sometimes weepy, sometimes angry.
On other days, the grief of my father's early death emerges tied to the grief that I feel around my own heart health.
And on a really good day, even if it's just for a moment,
I can touch the spaciousness within and embrace not knowing and the invitation to live right now as fully as possible.
But as I watch myself move through my process accepting my condition, I see my escape routes from feeling the unwanted, the difficult, the unpleasant feelings. I blame the medical system. Why don't doctors spend more time proactively with patients on prevention? taking time to educate them. It's easier to blame than to accept my helplessness in this situation. And I get angry. Recently the pharmacy made a mistake. They like lost my prescription. Didn't fill a prescription that I have to have. They dropped the ball.
And for me, it's easier to rant and blame and criticize than to feel my own vulnerability and fragility. That's that's one of the hardest things for me. Hana asked me this morning, "What's the hard part?" I said, "Feeling vulnerable and feeling fragile. I am used to feeling strong and capable.
On some days, I feel the impulse to curl up in a ball on my bed with my head hidden under my pillow. I don't indulge in this impulse because I recognize that this is another escape route to try to go to sleep to my feelings.
So the cultivation of compassion means accepting every aspect of ourselves even the parts we don't like.
This is another quote from Start Where You Are. Pema says the change in attitude and she's referring to this attitude needing to turn toward instead of turn away from what's unpleasant. She said the change in attitude doesn't happen overnight. It happens gradually at our own speed if we have the aspiration to stop resisting those parts of ourselves that we find unacceptable and instead begin to breathe them in. This gives us much more space. We come to know every part of ourselves with no more monsters in the closet, no more demons in the cave. We have some sense of turning the lights on and looking at ourselves honestly and with great compassion.
Turn the light inward. Dogen also gives us this guidance. It's quite famous for in Fukan zazengi take the backward step and turn and shine the light of awareness within.
Pema's kindness and compassion as well as her wisdom come through strongly in her writing. And I have felt through her teachings the support that I've needed in this difficult time I'm moving through to stay with the hard feelings to feel the frustration, the vulnerability, the fear, the not knowing. And with the support of her teachings, I notice more quickly when I turn to the exit door. And then I have the choice. I can choose to stay in the room with what's uncomfortable. And really, where else can we be but right here?
So starting with ourselves.
Yet as wise as her advice is the kind of geek in me. I looked up the dictionary definition of compassion. And you know what it says? It says compassion is a deep awareness of another person's suffering coupled with the desire and action to relieve it. So no mention in this dictionary definition of the self. This notion of compassion and I think this is what we've learned. I know this is what I've learned points to feeling for or responding to another person.
But if we go with that understanding of compassion, then we get to skip over our own pain and suffering. But really, that's a no-go. The teachings are clear. Having compassion for others starts and ends with having compassion for the unwanted parts of ourselves.
If we can't care for our own pain, how can we care for others?
If we have a sincere desire to be helpful, sooner or later, what's unresolved in us will come up. will meet the obstacles that block the flow of Avalokiteśvara from our hearts.
The Tibetan tradition Pema Chodron is of the Tibetan tradition of Buddhism offers a beautiful practice to cultivate the ground of compassion for ourselves as well as for others. In Tibet, the word tonglen literally means sending and taking. It refers to bodhisattva's vow to take in the pain or suffering of ourselves or others and to send out love and healing to all.
There are many ways to practice tonglen. But what's common, the common thread in all those variations is you breathe in what's painful or unwanted and send out the sincere wish for the end of suffering.
I remember when I was first introduced to this practice, it was many years ago. Norman Fischer at an everyday Zen sesshin introduced it to me and I was a little intimidated by it. I remember feeling resistant to breathing in not just my own but the suffering of others. I thought it would be overwhelming.
And again, you know, as Pema says, the capacity to work with what feels unacceptable grows over time. Each moment we can stay with a feeling that's unwanted, we gradually learn not to fear it.
So I'm gonna describe the four traditional phases of tonglen practice. We're going to and in in a few minutes we're going to work with tonglen. I'll guide you through it. But these four stages of tonglen practice while each of these stages reflects a different aspect of the traditional teaching. You don't have to practice it in this order and in this way. There are a lot of ways to express tonglen but I'll talk about that after I talk about the tradition. So traditionally the first stage take a moment take a breath and open your mind to what is right here.
The second stage is to visualize energy. And this may or may not work for you, but traditionally you breathe in a black, sticky, heavy energy. Maybe you visualize it like heavy smog. Breathing in what's unpleasant and unwanted as this heavy, sticky, smoggy energy. And breathe out qualities of spaciousness. Open, accepting, loving, kind.
This is how Norman explained it to me. Some people, and I would include myself in this, find it a little easier to connect directly with the feeling, the feeling in my body rather than visualizing an energy that uh is an expression of the feeling.
The third stage is using the practice for a specific person. Maybe your own self, maybe another person. And again, I suggest you start with yourself. Breathing in is opening and accepting what is unwanted.
Breathing out healing, the healing that naturally happens when we accept what's unwanted. Embracing it like a child, like a parent holding a child who's crying or hurt. So we breathe out love, acceptance, and care.
And when we practice the third stage, which is specifically for another person, we always include the fourth stage, which is to remember all the other people that experience the same type of suffering.
And this is powerful. Practicing with the fourth stage brings to light that it's not my suffering. It's not your suffering. It's human suffering and we all share it.
And while tonglen might be a practice that you do on your cushion and in a few minutes I'll guide you through this practice on our cushion.
It may feel less intimidating to use tonglen as a kind of on the spot momentary practice when you're engaged in daily life. Maybe you're washing your dishes and you're recalling a conversation with your boss at work that made you angry, right? And you notice the unwanted or unpleasant feeling arise and you take a moment right there to breathe in the pain, take in the suffering and then breathe out from your heart. What would be your wish for healing? Maybe it would be to let go. Maybe it would be to feel strong in yourself. what would feel healing to you.
And this same kind of momentary on the spot practice could arise in response to somebody else.
Maybe you see a homeless person on the street breathing in the suffering of this person that must, I imagine, feel so alone. desperate for survival
and breathe out your wishes for the end of their suffering. May they feel safe, protected, warm, fed.
May they be at home in themselves on this planet.
What are the meta prayers the wish the wishes that emerge in your heart.
So while I talked about the four traditional stages of Tonglen practice, how they're traditionally taught in in Tibetan practice, I think it's more important to find a way that you can in a very practical way apply the practice in your life to find a way to express the practice that's natural for you.
Pema calls the tonglen practice the path of the warrior bodhisattva.
Responding to the cries of the world.
So let's start together again closing your eyes or a soft gaze in front of you.
If you've lost connection with the breath, come back to the breath.
Breathing in,
breathing out.
Noticing after the exhale, this micro momentary pause before the inhale naturally fills you.
So exhaling completely, letting go and then receiving
the breath that comes. The next inhale that comes without a single effort.
And after settling
I'm going to invite you to think of an unpleasant situation or circumstance in your own life, your personal life.
Could be anything. Maybe you have an unresponsive landlord or a micromanaging boss at work.
Maybe you're unhappy with your partner or feel stuck stuck in a job that's not fulfilling. Maybe you're worried about someone you care about who's not doing well. Maybe you have your own health challenges.
Something
unpleasant, unwanted.
And once you settle on that circumstance, that unpleasant or unwanted circumstance, notice what feelings emerge for you. What kinds of feelings emerge in response to the situation?
Maybe there are one or two
most prominent unpleasant feelings
that you don't like
in response to the situation.
Breathing into your body. Where do you feel this feeling in your body?
Breathe in the feeling,
the suffering. accompanying that feeling. Breathe it in and embrace it like a parent embracing their crying child.
Then breathe out compassion, love, healing. Breathe out whatever healing
you're yearning for. What would be healing for you?
And continue to breathe in the unwanted feeling or the unacceptable part of yourself
and offer compassion. Compassion and healing with the out breath.
Sometimes for me the most compassionate thing is to fully embrace that feeling. So I breathe in
For me, I'm dealing with vulnerability.
I breathe out the love of a parent, embracing
that feeling.
I breathe in what I don't like emerging in myself. What I don't like to feel and I breathe out knowing that zen is zen when you are you
be yourself accepting what's right here.
Breathing in what's challenging and breathing out the spaciousness of not knowing.
And now imagine stage four, all the other people who shared this difficult feeling. Breathe in the pain of this shared human experience for everyone that knows it.
And send out healing wishes. Send out the wish for the end of this suffering to all those who share your pain.
And continue this for a few minutes.
And again, some people find it helpful to practice with the visualization of energy. So give it a try. See how it is for you. Breathe in the painful feeling that you're working with while visualizing dark black tar-like or brown smog-like energy. Breathing it in through every pore in your body. Then breathe out through every pore. Warm healing light.
Breathing in with the painful feeling, dark, heavy energy.
Breathing out warm, radiant, healing light.
And if visualizing the energy isn't helpful to you, you can let that go.
We'll close the meditation by putting down our tonglen practice and just coming back to sensations of the breath in the body.
sitting in open awareness.
Just notice how you're feeling after your
practice of tonglen with what's unwanted.
When you're ready, open your eyes.
coming back to awareness of our friends in the room practicing with us.
And again, I want to underscore a tonglen practice is a powerful practice, but find the expression of tonglen through you. Is it on your cushion? Is it a momentary
breathing in and breathing out when you're engaged in daily life? Is it visualizing energy? Is it more focused on sensation or both? And what kind of healing prayers I'll say meta comes forward from you as you practice as you meet yourself or another person that is suffering.
