Sunday evening was the 100th Chan group meditation session since I started this meetup in 2006! It was a cold, wet night, but even so four people drove all the way from Stockton to attend and were so appreciative. I feel that as long as there is even one person interested in practicing Chan or Buddhist meditation, I'm willing to help them as best I can and can introduce them to others more capable if they can use more than I can offer. This is the advantage of being part of a larger international Sangha, founded by my Shifu, Ven. Master Sheng Yen. His Dharma Heirs in the U.S. continue his tradition of giving the direct experience of Chan.
The focus of this group is to teach Buddhism from the inside out. In this group, we begin by experiencing the fruits of the teaching and use the teaching to understand and reenforce what we are experiencing. This is really the only way to learn what the Buddha taught. Our Shifu was highly skilled in teaching in this way, by giving the direct experience of the truth of the teaching.
With the New Year we began to discuss the Four Noble Truths, the first discourse of the Buddha after his enlightenment. The Four Noble Truths are that:
1. In life there is dukkha.
2. There is the possibility of the cessation of dukkha.
3. For this to occur, we need to understand the cause of dukkha.
4. Having understood the cause, we need to follow the path that leads to the cessation of dukkha.
So, what is dukkha? Dukkha is commonly translated from the Pali and Sanskrit as "suffering". But, dukkha has a broader meaning than that in Buddhism. Dukkha ranges from mild dissatisfaction to intense misery in life covering the entire spectrum of human existence, even including happiness. Even when we are happy, there is dukkha, an underlying apprehension that happiness won't last. And experience bears this out, that happiness is impermanent, fleeting.
In the spirit of learning Buddhism from the inside out, our assignment last week was to be aware of this dukkha arising in our life. Chan meets life head on. Chan is not for people that want to gloss over the unpleasant or escape from what is actually there, but to face whatever comes our way with clarity and determination. From what I heard tonight, this was certainly an undertaking worthy of the way of Chan. Just this awareness that there is dissatisfaction arising helps us look to the cause, the Third Noble Truth. And with the understanding of the cause, we gain insight into the Second Truth, that there is a possibility of the ending of dukkha. We gain insight into the Fourth Noble Truth, the way out of suffering in life.
A participant tonight commented that dukkha was arising due to conflicting desires and aversions. On the one hand, he wanted to eat alone at work but on the other wanted to hang with coworkers. There was a mixture of feelings that created this overall feeling of dissatisfaction. He also related arriving home to a messy kitchen and feeling vexed that he had to clean up after his daughter and how after becoming aware of this vexation, he was able to turn washing the dishes into an opportunity to be fully present. His wife commented how it is the things that are out of our control that cause us to become upset and on realizing this "dukkha" arising, she saw that it was a waste for her to be upset over things she could do nothing about.
The Buddha highlighted the cause of suffering as aversion and craving. During our sitting and moving meditation sessions, we set up the conditions to experience what it is like to be without aversion and craving for longer and longer periods of time. At first, this experience is just like a gap in the continuum of experience. As we learn to settle into meditation and become more focused on our method, we settle further and further into bright, clear, pure awareness. What was a silent gap becomes illumined and in this serenity, we see thoughts arising just as vapor arises from a lake or from a horse's back after a long run on a cool day. The thoughts no longer grip the mind. The mind no longer attaches to them only to be carried away by them. These thoughts are just vaporous phantoms, just a release of some stress incurred long ago. The mind is no longer bound by them but merely reflects their arising and passing away. This gives insight into the possibility of the cessation of suffering and the path leading to liberation from suffering. As we learn to let go of even the notion of self, what remains is a deep, abiding sense of contentment, equanimity.
Of course, this does us no good if we can only experience it on the cushion.
We alternate between sitting meditation and forms of moving meditation so that we can learn to stretch that equanimity into the phenomenal world and retain deep contentment even in a dentist's chair!
We look deep into motion. With bright, clear, settled awareness we track every increment of movement to penetrate to the core of motion. And there, though we are moving as slowly as possible in our walking and moving meditation, we find unceasing change, interrelated causes and conditions happening at an incredible speed. As we look deeper, we peer into the silence that permeates this unending change, that renders change itself into a play of silence. We peer into a universe where change and silence are fused into a oneness that is inseparable from the bright, clear, serene awareness that experiences this silence-infused change. Once we peer into motion at this level, whenever we get up out of a chair at work and begin to walk it will be there. When we brush our teeth it will be there. When we chew our food we are nourished not only by the food but by the act of chewing itself. We become fully present to life, dukkha subsides as it is displaced with an unshakeable sense of contentment and well being. We are free of the aversions and craving that drove us to live life without being present, without having the time and space to really choose. We were slaves of our impulses that drove us through our day while giving us the illusion of being in control. When we have this experience of being fully present, we suddenly realize that we were never in control, we were mere puppets of our tyrannical egos that caused us nothing but problems in life. When pure awareness with no sense of self acts, everything that needs to get done gets done with efficiency and clarity, yet without the oppression of the petty self driving the process while numbing the mind into submission.
This self that has pinched itself off from the rest of the universe creating the illusory duality of "me vs.everything else", this illusory self is the only thing blocking liberation from this pervasive dukkha in life. As people gain deeper experience in meditation, they begin to intuit and later to clearly see that abandoning this petty notion of a separate self is the only way to see things as they truly are. This seeing is liberation.
The assignment for this week is to look at what is causing the dukkha that is arising. Also, each day, pick something new for mindfulness practice. Be fully aware, fully present as you add this activity to your repertoire.
Next week we will focus on the Fourth Noble Truth, path that leads to the cessation of dukkha. Hope you can make it to our 101st Chan session!
Happy Chinese New Year!
With Metta,
Barry
http://www.chancenter-sacramento.org
http://www.meetup.com/bodhisattvapath
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