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Sunday night, I lay in the grass by the lake watching the sun set behind a line of thick trees on the horizon.  The air was fresh and warm, enveloping my skin like a silk sheet.  The water looked like gleaming liquid metal with a pastel sheen.  Sail boats coasted slowly between the pane of silver water and the lines of dusty lavendar clouds cutting across the flaming fucsia and apricot sky.

Overwhelming contentment entered my blood stream, calming and elating every cell, until I settled into a natural inner silence, an ever present listening.

Two days later, I developed pain in my back that reached a crescendo the following day.  I went into the emergency room in agony.  What a different moment!  Every cell in my body was flooded with pain.  The only thing entering my blood stream was the IV drip.  Instead of lying in soft green grass, I was being threaded through a CT scanner.  Instead of watching the sun paint the sky, I watched flourescent lights glare on bare walls as nurses and doctors came and went.

“How would you rate your pain on a scale of 1 to 10?” the doctor asked.  I answered the question many times that day.  In some moments, I was a 10 and in others, only a 2, the merciful consequence of pain medication.

This seems to be the question we are always asking ourselves as a way of judging the quality of the present moment.  Is this moment happy or sad?  How good do I feel right now?  When the answer is positive, we relax.  When the answer is very positive, we naturally sink into the present moment, and the mind settles.  On the other hand, when the pain crosses a certain threshold, perhaps at 4 or 5, we reject the moment and yearn for something else.

Deep contentment grows from being present with things as they are.  But I think there’s something even more important than this.  In loving the moment as it is, one practices unconditional love.  This unconditional love for now, for nature and reality, then arises in your relationships.  When you can be fully present when times are good, and when times are bad, you can be fully present for those you love.  When you can see beyond transient circumstances into the fundamental okayness that permeates life, you can see beyond someone’s transient characteristics into their fundamental okayness.

Even in the midst of terrible pain, there was beauty in the present moment.  There were friends and family expressing immense kindness, doctors and nurses fulfilling their altruistic professions, and medicines working.

“Love the moment. Flowers grow out of dark moments. Therefore, each moment is vital. It affects the whole. Life is a succession of such moments and to live each, is to succeed.”
~ Corita Kent

Today, I focus on being in the moment through listening.  Listening as if everything around me was about to share the most profound secret.

If I were going to tell someone the secret of this reality (as if I knew), I would put it this way:

Okay, now, I’m going to tell you the secret of reality!

Listen very carefully, because I’m only going to say it once.

You must listen with a completely open mind.

You have no idea what I’m about to say.

Listen as though you’ve never heard the spoken word before.

Listen without having any preconceptions about what the secret will be.

Okay, are you listening?

Are you completely listening with your whole being?

You’re about to hear it.

Are you hanging on my every word?

Then I would pause for a very long time, still, as though the words were on the tip of my tongue, as though the words were carried upon my every breath.  If they were really listening, they would know the secret, because the listening is it.  What it feels like to be in that listening, the kind of listening that is dripping with confident expectation yet completely clear and open and without demand, that is the thing we are listening for and wanting to hear.  In that listening, we are perfectly aligned with what is, and we enter the current.

Eventually I would start a new conversation about something like the good movies, dancing, or the ocean, and the listener would know that every word, every syllable, was giving away the secret.

You are War and Peace, Pride and Prejudice, and yet most people assume you are only three pages long.  They say, “Don’t judge a book by its cover,” but equally useful is the warning, “Don’t assume that the Preface captures the essence and nuances of who someone is.”

Once, people would sit down with a good book, relish each word, turning the pages slowly, and digest the story along with a nice cup of tea.  These days, we get the Cliff Notes version, sift through the basic facts, and move on with our busy day.  We think we know each other; we think we’ve enjoyed the story to its fullest, after only a few pages.

The author, David Foster Wallace, was known for his extensive use of footnotes and endnotes.  His book, Infinite Jest, contained a hundred pages of footnotes, and those who read the book soon learned that the footnotes were an integral part of the story.  Wallace said that the notes reflected his perception of reality (see the interview clip on Charlie Rose).  How many people, getting to know Wallace, skipped the footnote section of his personality?  They would have missed an integral part of who he was.

In contrast, Pablo Coehlo, who wrote The Alchemist, is known for his bare bones style, his tendency to tell a story straight up without embellishment, and yet his stories are rich with meaning and inspiration.  How many people, getting to know Coehlo, dismissed the meaning of who he was on account of the simple delivery?

Then there is you.  You’re not a sound bite.  You’re not a headline or a two sentence summary.  You deserve to be savored from cover to cover.

Once, I was invited to a dinner, and I mistakenly thought it was a date.  Sitting near the kitchen, I was conversing with the cook when the cook asked me a question.  He thought I was the host’s significant other.  My “date,” who overheard the question, shouted across the room, correcting the cook’s misconception, something about not having a significant other.  In that moment, my heart sank, and I felt terribly out of place.  “I shouldn’t be here,” I thought.  I wanted to leave, to shirk away and curl up in some corner by myself, maybe cry a little.

However, at that time, my mantra was “keep your heart open no matter what.”  “I have a choice,” I thought.  “I can walk away, cradling my bruised ego and feeling sorry for myself, or I can stay and offer my company to someone who cares about me and did in fact invite me over.”

I decided, with much conscious effort, to keep my heart open.  I stood up and walked over to the bookshelf.  I grabbed the first book that caught my eye, closed my eyes, opened to a random page, and planted my finger on a random spot.  When I opened my eyes, I saw that my finger was pointing at the phrase “open heart.”  Yes!  Validation.  The book was Emptiness Dancing, by Adyashanti.  It happened to be my copy on loan.  I continued reading:

“Open mind, open heart.  Realize that there isn’t somebody in there to protect.  There is no need for an emotional barrier or the feelings of separation and isolation that come from that barrier.  The only reason you ever thought that you needed protection was because of a very innocent misunderstanding.  This happened because when you were given a concept of yourself in very early childhood, you also received a kit with which to build walls that would protect this concept.  You learned to add to the kit as circumstances arose.  If a good dose of anger seemed useful, you would add that to the kit, or perhaps you added resentment, shame, blame, or victimization.  Whether you cling to a self-image as a good person or an inadequate person, the kit of identity is used to protect that image.

This is very innocent.  It happens without your knowing that it’s happening.  It continues until you realize that inherent in this holding of ‘me’ as a self-image in the mind and body is the belief that you need protection.  You can’t have one without the other.  They come in the same box.

When you drop your protection, the truth comes in and takes away the self-image.  That’s why the self-image came with a wall, because without the wall, the remembrance of your true nature is going to jump in fast and take away the self-image, whether good or bad… When the emotional wall opens up, you become open-hearted.”

Adyashanti went on to describe the love that arises spontaneously when we stop seeing everything in relation to this self-image and instead drop the walls and open up to the world as it is.

I returned the book to the shelf and joined the wonderful dinner and focused my mind on enjoying what was, as it was, and appreciating the gift of friendship.  I felt happy and connected, and my unrequited affections melted once more into a more mature and genuine tenderness.  I think the choice to keep my heart open helped me become a more loving person.  Often, closing the heart inadvertently leads to self-absorbtion and makes it difficult to see the needs of others.  Opening, in contrast, despite all the fear, is a gift of love.

In a recent conversation about relationships, a fellow Zen Buddhist compared people’s tendency to expect changes in their romantic partner to shopping for a dog and bringing home a cat then expressing continual frustration to the cat that it doesn’t do what dogs can do.  People go out in search of something specific and, when they end up with less than what they wanted, make efforts to change the person.

We do this to ourselves, too.  We want to be a dog, but if we are a cat, we spend our lives pointing out to ourselves all the ways in which we are not a dog.  You might think, “Well, yes, but we have the power to change ourselves, whereas our power to change others is limited.”  However, this distinction between self and other breaks down at a certain point, because what you do within is reflected without, and what happens externally is really internal.  That is the essential Buddhist experience.

In some sense, the whole world is just one big cat, and samsara (or suffering) is the whole world wishing to be a dog, and love is to simply see what is and accept what is.

When we truly and deeply accept everything as it is, we find that this total acceptance is just like a dog.  We were both all along.

From Adyashanti in Emptiness Dancing:

“Everybody transmits his or her own realization, like a radio broadcast signal, twenty-four hours a day.  And everybody receives it.  When you realize that your true nature is already free, that it is inherently empty of image, and that it is pure spirit and presence, you will see that it is what everybody else is.  Without even thinking about it, you will transmit this.  If you think everybody is separate, you will send out that signal, no matter what you do.

With this freedom you start to realize there is no inner and outer, because it is all one, and the vision of this is more powerful than anything that I will ever say.  I guarantee you that one being who sees the Buddha in you is worth more than reading ten thousand books about the Buddha.  One being who actually knows that there is only the Buddha and that nothing else is going on has a more powerful effect than anything else.

The deepest feeling of a compassion that does not seek to alter anything, paradoxically, alters everything.  When you touch inside yourself that which is not seeking to alter anything, you’ve touched upon absolute nonresistance, and this alters your perception of everything.  When your conditioning touches that inside, which is unconditioned, it alters your conditioning irrevocably.  That is the sacred alchemy, and that is compassion.”

Attempting to meditate during a retreat in town, I had the following train of thoughts:

Hmm, I need to find the space between thoughts and experience mental silence.  How to do that.  Must start by recognizing what is a thought.  What are my thoughts right now?  Hmm, this is a thought.  I should stop thinking this thought.  Funny, I’m having trouble finding mental silence, because I’m thinking about finding mental silence.  Ah, it seems the kind of thought that most obstructs my search for silence is the verbal narration of my search for silence.  The key then is to stop thinking thoughts about trying to stop thinking.  Wait, I’m doing that right now.  I should stop.  Hmm, interesting how my mind…  D’oh!

Yesterday morning, I was on my way to spend time with a close friend who was offering companionship during a time of need, and I heard the song “Lean On Me” on the radio.  A thousand questions entered my mind.  When can I lean on someone?  For how long?  What if my troubles are too heavy?  How much weight can they carry?

The words of another song came to mind: “He ain’t heavy.  He’s my brother.”

When harsh circumstances deepen our need for support, there’s a chance we won’t find it.  Trust erodes, and love is overshadowed by fear when we need someone, and they aren’t emotionally present.  This happens to everyone, because our capacity to be present with those who need us is limited, and as social beings, our needs are deep and real.  The challenge: Our needs often exceed our social capital.  Without becoming Vulcans, we can’t stop having needs, and although we may increase our social capital, the bonds we form may or may not bring fulfillment, especially if personal fulfillment is the focus.  How you meet this challenge, the strategies you choose, influences your well being and shapes who you are deep down.

The prospect of placing one ounce over the alloted weight limit and tipping the scales from love to repulsion terrifies me.  I think people get nervous when they’re needed, because they believe the weight will only increase, and eventually they will be required to push the person away or let them down.

Breaking the Silence

In a research study I encountered while working at a health organization in Washington, DC, doctors were limiting the amount of time a patient could ramble on about their symptoms.  They were asked to estimate how long the patient would talk if given the opportunity, and most doctors predicted patients were fill a good hour.  A group of doctors were asked to simply let the patients talk for as long as they needed and see what happens.  While a few patients did indeed ramble on, the vast majority of patients did not speak for more than a few minutes.  A few minutes!  For the most part, the doctor’s fears were unwarranted, and after the study, many changed how they interact with patients.

Were I in the study, I would probably speak for about 3 seconds, and the doctor would need to coax more information out of me.  I am exquisitely perceptive of the expressions and body language of someone who believes that the demand on their attention has exceeded their preference.

Yet I find inspiration in a touching scene in the movie The Secret Life of Words.  A nurse, Hanna, survived torture in Bosnia.  She takes a job on an oil rig caring for a burn victim named Josef.  Initially quite silent, gradually Josef coaxes Hanna into speaking about her past.

She eventually leaves the rig, but after Josef recovers, he finds her and offers his love:

Josef: I thought um, you and I, maybe we could go away somewhere. Together. One of these days. Today. Right now. Come with me.
Hanna: No, I don’t think that’s going to be possible.
Josef: Why not?
Hanna: Um, because I think that if we go away to someplace together, I’m afraid that, ah, one day, maybe not today, maybe, maybe not tomorrow either, but one day suddenly, I may begin to cry and cry so very much that nothing or nobody can stop me and the tears will fill the room and I won’t be able to breath and I will pull you down with me and we’ll both drown.
Josef: I’ll learn how to swim, Hanna. I swear, I’ll learn how to swim.

Unconditional Trust

When I turn to someone for support, my needs enter into statistical formulas and probability distributions.  I calculate the ratio of positive to negative interactions over time and consult the imaginary table of numbers that will indicate whether the ratio has reached the cut off point.

Finally I realize I am being totally Vulcan about it, and my needs are still there, unphased.

When I abandon the calculations and trust in the universe, I become lighter.  Many needs arise directly from distrust and fear, and when you cultivate trust and faith, your needs naturally lighten.  As your needs lighten, it becomes easier to receive the love that is there, to see that you do matter, and to feel cared for, and what little trust you cultivated grows stronger.  It also becomes easier to shift your focus to the needs of others, which often become obscured by our worries.

Rather than putting trust in particular circumstances, you can trust the intrinsic loving nature of others.  Or more importantly, you can trust yourself to remain open to the support of others.  It becomes less important how well a person can be physically present at a given time, and what matters is what’s in their heart, which is the eternal.  I stumbled across a greeting card with a picture of flowers that said, “No matter how carefully you pick your friends, eventually they will all die.”  The attempt at morbid humor fell flat with me.  Instead, I found it insightful.  Every relationship, if what you call a relationship is some particular social arrangement for a certain ongoing interaction, is ultimately temporary, but love survives.

Opening to Needing

Last night, a friend suggested we watch the movie What Dreams May Come.  The movie is about two people, Chris and Annie, who fall in love and marry, but tragedy strikes, and Annie plunges into severe depression.  All the while, Chris encourages her to be strong and overcome her pain with courage.  “Don’t give up,” he recites.  He keeps his distance from her pain.  He considers leaving her.  However, their connection is strong, and love triumphs.  Eventually, Chris joins Annie in her experience of the pain.  The moment he gives up and enters the pain with her, Annie awakens from the darkness.

We put a lot of time and energy into building social capital, but when the amount we give is designed to maximize profit and minimize the cost, our social economy is unsustainable.  We aren’t as separate as we assume.  The math breaks down.  The more we surrender, the more we open our hearts and make ourselves vulnerable, the more we give up, the more we win.  “Sometimes when you lose, you win,” Annie says.

The funny thing about all this is that the one thing that I’m most afraid of, what prods my heart to close and shut down, is not being needed.  When I was very young, a boyfriend constantly encouraged me to avoid needing him.  Ironic, because he did a lot to help me out over the course of several years.  Ultimately, what drove me crazy is that at no point did he ever express a need for me.  I remember talking to him on the phone once, crying, and asking, “Do you need me?”  He couldn’t reply, because the answer was “no.”  I only cried harder.  Yet, what a reflection of me he was.  He had merely succeeded at what I was trying to engender in myself.

The truth is that our needs for one another are not always in our control, and perhaps that is just how it should be.  I give up.  I wave my white flag.  I will let myself need.

To those who would call upon me, I would say have trust in me and let go of fears that arise when I don’t come through.  You ain’t heavy.  You’re my brother.

(For a beautiful Zen Buddhist perspective on need, see this entry in Luminous Emptiness: Meeting Needs.)

Recently, I was leaving a parking lot and pulled out onto the sidewalk that crossed over the exit.  I thought I would catch an opening in traffic, but it quickly closed, and another car had pulled up right behind me.  I was blocking the sidewalk.  In the midst of the heat wave, a young man was pushing a very elderly man in a wheelchair down the sidewalk.  Their different ethnicities suggested they were not related, and I guessed the young man was doing volunteer work.  He glared at me, stopped, and sat down, waiting for me to get out of the way.  I tried to say that I was sorry for being in the way, but he was too far away to hear me.  I wished there was some hand gesture for expressing an apology.

When I finally pulled out and drove away, I was surprised at how awful I felt.  I just blocked the sidewalk for an elderly man in the middle of a heat wave.  He hadn’t waited long, but I was still down on myself.

The desire to be a loving person can make it hard when you hurt someone, even inadvertantly.  As a teaching assistant, I recently graded homework assignments, and several students were crestfallen and upset when they discovered they had lost many points for not showing their work on a math problem.  I lost sleep wondering if I’d subtracted too many points.  Again, I was surprised at how awful I felt.

Then I received a card in the mail from the bank.  It was a thank you note from a bank teller.  At the last farmer’s market, I found someone’s wallet lying in the grass, and I couldn’t find any contact information among the cards and photos, but I did find a bank card.  The local branch was right there on the capital square, so I walked over and gave the wallet to a teller, who called the owner of the wallet.  According to the thank you note, he was still walking around the farmer’s market that morning, and he was very happy to see his wallet again.  It was a small thing, but I felt wonderful.

All of this demonstrates how deeply we each need not just to be loved but to feel that our love is received.

During meditation, sometimes I ask my intuition how I can best love someone.  I imagine being in their presence, and I ask them, “How can I love you right now?  What do you need from me?”

Today, I began a new meditation.  Instead of imagining love going from my heart to other people, I imagined being open to receive it.  Instead of asking, “How can I love you,” I asked, “How can I receive your love?”

The fear is that we’re not loved, and we’ll be left out or left behind.  A bible verse says “Perfect love casts out fear.”  One way of loving is to face that fear, face the fear out of love, and then oddly it disappears, because if you’re seeing things that way, it becomes obvious that people just want to be appreciated.

Receive by knowing how much joy people get when they’re able to give and love.  I have a habit of saying “It’s not all about me,” but now I’m learning that it can be a very loving thing to say, “It is all about me,” because it gives people joy.  Knowing that you matter is something that matters to the people who care about you, and surely there are many who do.

“Facing My Fears With Love”
pastel drawing