Bhutan is well-known for its creation and value of the Gross National Happiness (GNH) index, a philosophy and series of nine measurable indicators for citizens’ wellbeing and happiness. The Mindfulness City is largely based on each of these nine indicators, including include psychological well-being, health, education, community vitality, and cultural diversity.

The proposed plans, designed by Danish sustainability architect Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) with Arup and Cistri, shape the proposed city around 35 rivers and streams, transitioning in density to work in tandem with the environmental landscape and protect from flooding in monsoon season. The city is connected by a series of “inhabitable bridges,” and will include the a new airport, hospital, and university. The plans also feature the Sankosh Temple-Dam, which houses a series of staircases for mindful walking trails, as well as stairs that lead to an elevated temple. 

In the announcement of these plans, King Khesar described the city as “one of a kind, anchored on the vision and values of GNH. It will be a Mindfulness City, encompassing conscious and sustainable businesses, inspired by Buddhist spiritual heritage, and distinguished by the uniqueness of the Bhutanese identity.” 

Buddhist teacher and founder of Mangala Shri Bhuti, Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, attended the unveiling of these plans, and described the inspiration and intersectional influences of the plans.

“With the Mindfulness City, His Majesty seeks to create a hybrid model of modernity, integrating the significant achievements in technology, science, and medicine from recent decades, yet at the same time, maintaining serenity, calmness, compassion, and an untouched vibrancy of an ancient culture, its art, and way of life,” he writes.

“The Mindfulness City will be a multi-racial, multi-cultural, and multi-ethnic enclave where all residents can live under common laws founded upon the Buddhist principles of compassion and wisdom,” Kongtrul Rinpoche writes.

There is currently no set timeline for the city, as it will depend on how “business developments progress,” but a ground-breaking ceremony for the city’s airport took place in December.

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En ningún otro lugar se ilustra esto tan claramente como en la leyenda del Buda y su discípulo Mahakasyapa y la flor. Se cuenta que un día el Buda estaba con sus discípulos y decidió exponerles una enseñanza sin palabras, para lo cual simplemente sostuvo una flor en la mano. Todos miraron extrañados, sin saber qué sucedía, excepto Mahakasyapa, quien sonrió. El Buda supo entonces que él había entendido y en consecuencia le otorgó la transmisión de la sabiduría. El zen remite su linaje a esta leyenda.

Aunque hay mucha discusión acerca de la autenticidad o el sentido histórico de esta narración, lo importante aquí es resaltar la gran relevancia para la tradición zen. Ya podemos atisbar por qué suele pensarse que el zen sospecha de la expresión verbal. De alguna manera esto es verdad, pero no significa que la expresión verbal sea rechazada o censurada. Más bien, lo que hace el zen es tomarse completamente en serio la idea de que las palabras no pueden ser contenedores de la sabiduría, pero sí medios hábiles conducentes a ella. O sea, más que contenedores son herramientas: así como mediante sus utensilios el carpintero puede crear excelentes muebles pero solamente si tiene el entrenamiento adecuado, el estudiante de zen puede servirse de los textos y las prédicas pero sobre la base de una práctica espiritual asidua y bien orientada.

Esa práctica es el zazen, lo que algunos llamarían la “meditación” zen, aunque la expresión no es la más precisa. El zazen, dicho en pocas palabras, no es nada más que la práctica de estar presentes a la totalidad de la vida tal como es aquí y ahora. Para estar así despiertos a la realidad presente, uno se sienta en posición estable y trata de mantener el cuerpo quieto, y la mente sin hacer ningún esfuerzo: el punto no es tratar de parar la actividad de la mente, sino simplemente soltar los pensamientos a medida que surgen y dejar que sigan su curso natural. En pocas palabras: estar plenamente presente. Entonces, lo que se hace transparente es el simple movimiento de la vida que fluye a través de uno y de todas las cosas.

El zen no consiste en guardar silencio en todos los instantes. No defiende una prohibición de la palabra. Más bien, de lo que se trata es de que la expresión verbal surja de ese lugar de plena presencia y no de las películas y telenovelas que vivimos haciéndonos en la cabeza cotidianamente. Es interesante que la actitud del zen nunca excluyó la elaboración conceptual y el debate, sino que de hecho los alimentó. 

Contrario a los estereotipos habituales que se hacen de él, en el zen se promueve la expresión de la sabiduría en palabras; pero debe tratarse de “palabras genuinas”, es decir, surgidas de la experiencia de comprensión de uno mismo, una comprensión de la vida que brote de la vida misma tal y como es aquí y ahora, y no de nociones o teorías preconcebidas sobre ella. Esa comprensión no puede darse si no es a través de un camino de asidua práctica.

De esta actitud hacia la palabra surgen muchas historias, como la de Kyogen Chikan (820-898) y su maestro Isan Reiyu (771-853). Kyogen era muy versado en las escrituras budistas: para cualquier asunto que se le preguntará, siempre podía citar algún sutra o algún tratado como respuesta. Un día, su maestro le examinó pidiéndole que, sin citar ningún texto o comentario, pronunciara alguna frase en el estado que tenía antes de que nacieran sus padres. Esta imagen del rostro que uno tenía antes de nacer los propios padres (el “rostro original”) es tradicional en el zen y se refiere a la propia naturaleza: a quién es realmente uno mismo dejando de lado las nociones que uno usualmente tiene de sí mismo.

En fin, Kyogen no fue capaz de responder la pregunta de su maestro. No se le ocurría nada. Así, decide dejar sus estudios, quema sus libros y resuelve dedicarse a servir las comidas en un monasterio. Posteriormente, construye una choza en los terrenos de un templo y planta bambús en las proximidades. Un día, mientras barría el camino, accidentalmente golpeó un trozo de teja con la escoba; el trozo salió disparado e impactó una de las cañas de bambú. Al escuchar el impacto, Kyogen despertó.

¿A qué despertó Kyogen? Despertó profundamente a la realidad presente tal como es. Pero no por eso se va a quedar en silencio. Kyogen de hecho expresa su realización en palabras, y su maestro lo escucha para verificar la profundidad de esa realización y comprensión. Los maestros zen han hecho esto toda la historia: esperan que sus discípulos expresen su comprensión mediante una palabra genuina. La tradición lo valora tanto que preserva muchas historias de estas interlocuciones entre maestro y discípulo, así como también preguntas de los alumnos y diálogos entre maestros. Esas son las historias zen preservadas en colecciones como la Crónica del acantilado azul (en japonés Hekiganroku) o La puerta sin puerta (Mumonkan). Es muy interesante notar que tanto estas crónicas como la diversidad de tratados y prédicas redactadas por los maestros (o compiladas por sus discípulos) dan cuenta de la diversidad de posturas que la tradición zen inspiró. No solamente eso: también encontramos estilos de debate y de argumentación, así como reflexiones muy relevantes para pensar el lenguaje, el conocimiento, la ética, la naturaleza humana o la tierra, entre otras cuestiones propias del pensar filosófico.

La tradición zen es un ejemplo muy notable de filosofía budista tradicional. No le han faltado diversidad de posturas, debates, creatividad para elaborar conceptos y un patrimonio textual que refleja todas esas facetas. Algunos podrían replicar que el zen no tiene filosofía porque rehuye la especulación y sospecha de las palabras. Aunque esto es así, no significa que el zen guarde completo silencio. En realidad no desprecia el lenguaje: lo que critica no es la expresión de la sabiduría en palabras, sino la obsesión con fantasías mentales que acabamos confundiendo con la realidad; y esto, a decir verdad, pasa tan a menudo que ni nos damos cuenta de que vivimos como en un sueño producto de nuestra especulación, en lugar de estar en contacto atento con las cosas tal como son aquí y ahora. 

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But the stone that the builder refuse
Shall be the head cornerstone,
And no matter what game they play,
Eh, we got something they could never take away;
We got something they could never take away

You already are what you want to become.

—Master Lin Chi

All of us go through times of transition, challenges, and difficulties. We may have faced or will face times of loss, confusion, or heartbreak, when we realize we cannot control the way our life is unfolding, whether in our personal lives or in the world around us. With mindfulness, we can learn to move through these intense, challenging times in ways that don’t add to the suffering and difficulty that are already there. We can even learn to open our hearts to the richness and wisdom these times of immense disruption can bring us.

When we touch this experience of coming home, it is like we have finally arrived home after a long journey.

A key step that can help us begin to settle ourselves when we are profoundly unsettled is to come home, to ourselves, in this moment, whatever is happening. This is one way of speaking about mindfulness, or being present: coming home to ourselves. When we bring our mind back to our body we come home. We could consider this state as our true home. This home inside of us is a home no one can take away from us, and it cannot be damaged or destroyed. No matter what happens around us, if we can find this home inside of us, we are always safe.

When we touch this experience of coming home, it is like we have finally arrived home after a long journey. We experience a sense of peace and even freedom, no matter how confining the outer circumstances. Coming home to ourselves feels like belonging; it is a state that holds us and enables us to hold others.

This is so important because we can live our whole lives estranged from this home within ourselves.

My mentor Thich Nhat Hanh, whom his students call Thay, or “teacher” in Vietnamese, sums up his whole lifetime of teachings with one sentence: “I have arrived, I am home.” For him, the principal aim of mindfulness practice is to experience that we have already arrived, here and now. There is nowhere we need to run to or be, other than right here in the present moment. And we experience ourselves at home, no longer looking for some refuge outside of us, in some other place or time, when we touch the truth that all that we long for and search after is here inside of us.

We can experience encountering this spacious and free place of our true home in unexpected moments as we spend more time tuning in to what is happening inside us and around us. One morning, when I was a novice nun, in slow walking after our early morning sitting meditation, I was very present and able to be aware of nearly every step. I began by being aware that as I was stepping with my left foot, I was at the same time stepping with my right, because my left foot could not be without my right. And vice versa. Then I saw that my arms were also contained in my feet, so I was also stepping with my arms. Then my hands, my stomach, brain, sense organs, heart, lungs. I was 100 percent with my body. So I was tasting the earth with my feet, listening to it, looking at it, feeling it, knowing it, smelling it with my feet. My heart was loving it, my lungs breathing it in and out.

Then I turned my attention more toward the Earth and knew I was also walking on cool streams of water flowing under me, and hot, fiery liquid deep below, in the center of the Earth. I imagined walking on the feet of those directly opposite us on the other side of the planet. The soles of my feet touched the soles of a little baby taking tentative steps, and a pregnant woman, and an old grandpa. My feet touched the feet of a lonely, isolated person, and someone carried away by hatred and anger. I was also walking on the feet of someone who was right then doing walking meditation and enjoying the present moment. I was one with those walking the Earth whose hearts were filled with love and peace.

We can’t find what we need to meet tomorrow or a month from now because we can’t control or exactly know the future, but we will find what we need for right now.

If we’re not aware of what is happening in the moment because we are caught up in our thoughts or reveries, or in the grip of worry or other strong emotions, it’s like we have left our house. If we stay away for a long time, dust accumulates and unwanted visitors may take up residence in our home. Things like stress and tension accumulate in our bodies and minds, and over time, if we don’t tend to them, they can lead to physical or psychological illness.

But the beauty of awareness is that we can always return home to ourselves. Our home is always there, waiting for us to come back. There are numerous ways we can go home to ourselves: by being aware of our breath, by being aware of body sensations or bodily movements, and by connecting with the reality around us, like the sounds in our environment. And when we come back home in these ways, we are able to take stock and survey the territory of our being, seeing clearly what parts of our inner landscape need more support, where we need to pay more attention.

It is especially tempting in times of transition and challenge to abandon our homes, to leave our territory, in search of answers, perhaps by worrying about what will happen in the future. This is precisely the moment when we need to return to the present moment, feel our bodies, and take good care of ourselves now. Because the future is made of this moment. If we take good care of this moment, even if it is very difficult, we are taking good care of the future.

It may also be hard to come home if we sense that unresolved pain has accumulated and we don’t want to face it. We may get into the habit of avoiding our home completely. We don’t want to be with those raw, unprocessed parts of our experience that are painful and may be quite scary.

If this is our situation, it is important to have compassion for ourselves for not wanting to return home to face these places inside of us. And yet the only way we can heal them, move through them, and make our home a more cozy place is to turn toward them. As the teaching goes: “The only way out is in.” Or through.

How do we do this? One of the ways is to stay with what is here and now, on the platform of the train station so to speak, watching the trains of our thoughts and plans come and go, rather than jumping on a thought-train that is heading into the future, or another thought-train that takes us into the past.

Those plans, worries, and anxieties will surely arise in our mind, but we can learn to notice them and take good care of them rather than feed them and get pulled away by them. Bringing our attention to our breath or to the sensations in our body helps us to stay on the platform of the now. The past and future are not the place where we can come home to ourselves and resource ourselves with the elements we need to move through our difficulties. We can only come home to ourselves in the present moment, in the here and now.

We can spend lots of our time and energy trying to predict or control what the future will bring. This doesn’t usually serve us. In truth, we don’t need to know what the future will bring. We just need to be right in this moment, and if we touch it deeply, mind and body united, we will find we have all that we need to meet the present. We can’t find what we need to meet tomorrow or a month from now because we can’t control or exactly know the future, but we will find what we need for right now.

Meditation: I Am Home

Let’s practice connecting with our present moment experience. Sit, lie, or stand in a comfortable position that supports you to be alert and also relaxed. You may like to set a timer with your phone or an alarm clock for ten minutes if you wish to be aware of time. Most of these meditations are short, and you can practice them throughout your day.

Begin by feeling the contact between your body and whatever surface is supporting you. Let yourself rest in this place, returning to this moment, here and now. Invite whatever parts of yourself that may still be dispersed to come back and settle.

Set the intention to come home to yourself, to be present for yourself. You deserve this care, you are precious and unique, in all the world there is no one else who brings the precise combination of gifts that you bring. Allow yourself to arrive here as fully as you can. And welcome the many parts of yourself home.

You may already begin to feel yourself settling into the home inside of you: the place of your strength, wisdom, and clarity. A place that is trustworthy and capable of providing you with refuge in the storm. But if not, continue to stay with awareness of your body sensations, sounds, or breathing. A sense of coming home will develop over time. It may not happen the first time you meditate, but as you become more attuned to yourself, you will find you have been at home all along.

If it’s helpful you can repeat inwardly, I have arrived. I am home.

If it supports you, you can connect the words with your breathing, arrived with the in-breath, home with the out-breath.

Arrived in the present moment, home in myself, just as I am.
Arrived, arrived,
at home, I am at home,
dwelling in the here and dwelling in the now.
Solid as a mountain, free as a white cloud,
the door to no birth and no death is open,
free and unshakeable.
—Plum Village song

This teaching is excerpted from her new book, We Were Made for These Times, which will be published by Parallax Press in October.

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Buddha is the great liberator, says Zenju Earthlyn Manuel. He taught that freedom comes from freeing your mind.

I first heard of Buddha at age eleven. My mother and oldest sister were on their second hour of shopping for our family of five, while I waited outside in my father’s shiny, green Buick. He and my younger sister were with me, and after they fell asleep, I escaped to indulge my favorite pastime of people watching. It was then that a Japanese couple walked up to me and introduced the Buddha. The strangers were members of the Soka Gakkai, a lay Buddhist organization steeped in the early teachings of a monk named Nichiren.

The couple had approached the right girl-child, as I was already focused on liberation. I considered myself an unofficial member of the Black Panther Party and an ambassador for the civil rights movement, but no one would have known this unless they’d listened to my simplified rhetoric about ending racism, especially the kind I endured daily in my desegregated middle school.

To smile and talk to Japanese strangers about Buddha, while my father wasn’t looking, was a personal act of rebellion. This was the early 1960s, and it was a world of free love, peace, and yes, Eastern religions arriving in the U.S., challenging Christianity. Since my family was Christian and protective, they would not have approved of a conversation, with strangers, about Buddha. Yet it was fate that the historical Buddha, Shakyamuni Buddha, would become a revered ancestor in my life.

As time passed, I learned Buddha was not God, just like Jesus Christ was not. But they both were of God. They believed in love and peace. Both wore the cloak of being saviors for those who suffered. They protested the evils of the world, such as war and hatred, and promoted peace and love.

My interest in Buddha grew when I discovered his teaching that liberation from suffering is possible. Buddha was like Christ in that he was not only a savior and protester, but also a liberator. While Christ’s liberation was steeped in love, Buddha’s was steeped in love and a freedom that comes from freeing our minds from what causes us to suffer. In the dharma, my perception of being black was expanded beyond the discrimination I endured. The internal pain was understood as a collective one, whether others thought so or not.

After decades of walking in Buddha’s footsteps, I began to see Shakyamuni Buddha not only as an ancestor, savior, protester, and liberator, but as a shaman. His quest in the woods, sitting on the roots of trees, led to a deep seeing and knowing about suffering. I see the Buddha as a shaman who taught not from his intellect but rather from the wisdom of his quest in nature, as would any shaman of the earth.

In the end, it isn’t Buddha or Buddhism that I am interested in. Often when I say this to people, they laugh because they see me stand before them in a Buddhist robe. But I am standing in liberation.

In His Image

In drawing the Buddha’s curved hands and gentle smile, Ira Sukrungruang finds peace.

I was born into a Buddhist family, with a statue of Buddha in nearly every room. Every Sunday we went to the Thai Buddhist temple of Chicago, Wat Dhammaram, which was once an elementary school, and we prayed to the gold Buddha residing in the former gymnasium. I wore a Buddha around my neck, my father wore several that clinked when he walked.

The image of Buddha was everywhere in my life. So much so that I became obsessed with his image. My aunty Sue encouraged my obsession. One day, she gave me a notebook.

“This is for drawing Buddha,” she said.

I had been doodling Buddha on scrap pieces of paper all over the house—his pointed head, curved hands, and long fingers. I also doodled boxes within boxes within boxes—endless geometric shapes. I was seven, and my head swirled with patterns and Buddha.

“Draw him when you feel anxious,” Aunty Sue said in Thai, “when you need to calm yourself.”

I was an anxious boy, whose legs bounced uncontrollably, who chewed the side of his cheek until it bled.

“Keep his image in your mind and remember to take deep breaths.”

I nodded because whenever my aunt spoke, she possessed a calm that stilled me.

“Remember to breathe,” she said, “like when you meditate. Breathe in, poot. Breathe out, toa.”

I told her okay.

“Draw the Buddha in the living room. Come show me when you’re done. Okay?”

I sat on the living room floor, the green carpet soft against my skin. Buddha sat above me. From the kitchen the sweet aroma of cooked jasmine rice fragranced the house. I opened the notebook on my lap and began drawing. First, his torso, the delicate V of it, then his face and the gentle curl of his lips, and then his eyes, about to wake from a pleasant dream.

Drawing Buddha was a form of meditation, and at the beginning it was difficult, just as stilling the mind is difficult when meditating for the first time. Too many thoughts invade. Negativity seeps through the barriers of your brain you thought you had fortified. When drawing, I wanted to draw a perfect Buddha, as pristine and golden as he is. This perfection frustrated me. Made me crumple up balls of paper. Made me erase over and over until the paper thinned and tore. But eventually, the act of drawing, the act of keeping him in my mind was more important than a crooked eye or a smile that looked vampiric. It was drawing that was important, not what was drawn. Wasn’t that how Buddha gained enlightenment? Sitting under the Bodhi Tree, letting the world whirl around him?

Over time, I let the pencil lead the way, let it follow the curve of his hands. Let it dimple the rivulets of his hair. Let it waterfall the creases of his robes. Let the image of him, in my steady hand, bring me peace.

The Buddha’s Greatest Teaching

You’d be amazed how much your spiritual journey parallels the Buddha’s, says Melvin McLeod. But he took the big step that woke him up. You can take it too.

The Buddha gave many teachings over the course of his long life, and they’ve been expanded on by great meditators in the 2,600 years since then. Yet the Buddha’s most important teaching is the story of his own journey to enlightenment. It’s the essential guide for our own spiritual journey.

So, let’s take a look at the Buddha’s path, stage by stage. I think you’ll be surprised how similar his spiritual journey initially was to ours. Then he took a big step, a surprising, counterintuitive step. It made him the Buddha, and we can take it too.

The Buddha was born into a royal family in what is now Nepal. This was the epitome of privilege at that time, the equivalent of being born into some tech billionaire’s family today. He had all the luxury and pleasures one could want.

Privilege is designed to shield people not only from suffering, but from the knowledge of suffering. But as we all know, no matter how good our life is, how insulated we are, eventually we have to acknowledge the reality of illness, old age, death, and all the world’s other sufferings.

That is what happened to the Buddha. He broke through the cocoon of luxury his family had built around him and woke up to the suffering of beings. His heart opened with compassion, and he saw that all the pleasure and wealth in the world does not protect us from old age, sickness, and death.

This realization ended the first stage of the Buddha’s journey: he’d enjoyed a life of material success and then he’d seen its ultimate futility.

I’m guessing that like the Buddha, you too have realized that material success doesn’t solve life’s most important problems. So, like the Buddha, you’ve embarked on a spiritual quest for the meaning and happiness that materialism can never give us.

This begins the second stage of the Buddha’s journey, and ours. We go from material struggle to spiritual struggle.

Seeking an answer to the problem of suffering, the Buddha left his family’s palace and went off into the forest, where he tried all the powerful spiritual methods of his day—yoga, concentration, tantra, asceticism. He was disciplined, dedicated, and courageous, and he became an outstanding practitioner.

But it wasn’t working. Try as he might to deny, purify, change, improve, or transcend himself, his practice did not deliver an end to suffering. It didn’t work to try to become someone different or better than he was.

That might be your experience too. It is certainly mine. Practicing with some self-improving goal in mind—whether it’s enlightenment, healing, becoming some great meditator, or just being a better person—we find that we’re still suffering. And try as we might, it’s extremely difficult to avoid tainting our practice with at least some goal orientation.

Up to this stage, our journey has been similar to the Buddha’s: we have seen the futility of material struggle and sought answers in spiritual practice. We’re working hard in our struggle to achieve something spiritually, and although it may not be working that well, we haven’t given up.

But here the Buddha did something we haven’t yet—he did give up. This was the third and final stage of his journey to enlightenment.

He stopped all struggling, both material and spiritual. He stopped the self-indulgence of material struggle and the self-abnegation of spiritual struggle. He took a middle path of just being who he really was.

Who he really was—who we all really are—was an awakened one, a buddha. He didn’t have to cultivate awakening; all he had to do was stop doing the things that obscured it, like trying to become something he wasn’t.

When he finally ceased all his struggle while seated under what became known as the Bodhi Tree, he saw himself and all reality as they really are—perfect, complete, and joyful. There was nothing that needed to be done because nothing needed improvement. He saw that we suffer because we don’t know this, mistakenly seeing ourselves as separate, solid, and imperfect.

The Buddha realized that because enlightenment is our natural state, we don’t need to seek, create, or achieve it. This struggle only obscures our true nature, and when we stop struggling we naturally awaken. This is the key to Buddhist meditation.

The Buddha is often portrayed reaching down to touch the ground after his enlightenment. But I think he’s doing more than gesturing toward the earth. I think he’s pointing us toward this whole reality, which is perfect and good. He’s telling us that this very reality is his true home, and it is ours. We don’t have to struggle to be anyone or anywhere else. The seat of enlightenment is right here where we are. We just have to realize that. This is the Buddha’s greatest teaching.

Siddhartha’s Son

Siddhartha gave up everything to seek enlightenment. That story, says John Tarrant, is a linear depiction of a nonlinear event.

Imagine yourself a prince named Siddhartha, raised in a world in which the concealed knowledge is of old age, sickness, death, and the path to know the nature of mind. Messengers come from the gods and demonstrate this secret knowledge to you. You take it in. Then, secretly, at midnight, with a single backward glance, you turn away from your wife and newborn child. The hooves of your great white horse are muffled, and—with your only friend—you steal away. Earth spirits cast a slumber on the guards, and soon you’re out of the palace and riding through the night. At dawn you arrive at a place where the deer are not afraid. You dismount and take a free breath. You swap your silk clothes for a passing hunter’s coarse, red linen. As he departs, your friend weeps and your horse, too. Then you enter spiritual training.

When I first met this compelling story, I took it as encouragement to sacrifice, to work hard at spiritual matters, turning the whole of myself toward a transformative change. The extremity of the departures and losses struck me, also their repetitions; Siddhartha lost his mother when he was a baby, and in turn he abandoned his son. The pain of such recurrences is profound, and led him to turn to the deepest matters.

I didn’t quite fit my own, Tasmanian, culture; I couldn’t find a ready-to-wear outfit. After a succession of improvisations—working in the mines, working a fishing boat, working for land rights—I realized my question was an inner one: Who was I?

So, without knowing anything about the dharma, I gave up most things in order to study Zen. When I went through the gates of departure, the pieces of the Buddha story became natural, archetypal, stops on the way. I wanted to see the world differently, but I had no clue how to do that.

In the final piece of his story, the Buddha, having sat all night under a great fig tree, was attacked by Mara, the Lord of Death, facing terrors I was personally familiar with. As the first birds called, Buddha looked up and saw the morning star and cried out: “Now I see that all beings have the nature of the Tathagata. Only their delusions and attachments prevent them from realizing this.”

Everybody in our temple worked hard to awaken, but the effort was full of, well, effort. I was trying to get freedom, yet even my quest was full of desire.

There was the matter, too, of the children. Siddhartha abandoning his son on the night of his birth touched me. The night my daughter was born, she rested on my chest, and the tenderness of her skin seemed to be a mystery beyond the stars. She and I were both included in that pattern, along with her mother, the doctors and nurses, and the scent of plum blossom through the widow.

As my daughter grew, I took her with me when I traveled to teach retreats. The idea was that we could have silence, peace, and awakening in the middle of life. Other children came to retreats too. They’d take lunches and hurtle off up the creeks, coming back in time for supper.

I found that my story was an odd rhyme with Buddha’s story. There was a child, though she was a girl, not a son or prince like Buddha. I carried her onto an airliner, and she wailed all the way across the Pacific. It’s as if when I left the palace, the spirits tried to help me steal away, but she made all the noise in the world. So that’s the way we left the palace—together. A steward, saying “It’s hard to have a nipper,” secretly passed me a bottle of champagne from first class. He was like the farmer Sujata who offered Buddha blessings and nourishment.

I found I could enter Buddha’s story anywhere, and the journey itself was a resting place. The light seemed not to play on the story, but to strike the shards. The intelligent thread of instructions—this is how to do it and what to sacrifice—was all reasonable and even respectable. But my mind wasn’t reasonable or respectable. For me the light was in the leaves and tips of the grass, in the feelings as well as the thoughts.

Anywhere, I could enter Buddha’s story anywhere. Here was always good. As Chan ancestor Mazu Daoyi said, “Your thoughts and feelings are Buddha.” We’re not living the wrong life. The life we have now is Buddha’s life.

An Enlightened Community

Laywomen and men, monks and nuns—all were held in equal regard. Wendy Garling on the Buddha’s fourfold sangha.

My journey as a Buddhist began when I was a hippie, traveling in Nepal and India. Serendipitously, I visited Tibetan communities where I experienced, for the first time in my life, the depths of human potential for kindness and generosity. In shrine rooms amidst a cacophony of color and sound, I encountered riveting teachings from brilliant lamas that changed my life. One day in 1979, at the Delhi train station, I met a kind lama who turned out to be my root teacher and a cherished constant in my life until his passing three decades later.

Looking back, I see how fortunate I was that my introduction to the dharma was not gendered. I never heard that as a woman I was a lesser candidate for buddhahood than a man, or felt marginalized within a sangha by a hierarchy of males, or felt pressured by a teacher for sex. It’s been gut-wrenching that so many dharma sisters across all lineages have had just these experiences, with horrific stories of abuse continuing to emerge. And then there is the heartbreaking finger pointing at the Buddha himself; some say that he set the precedent for misogyny and patriarchal hierarchy.

And so, I take a breath and dive into stories of the Buddha to find answers for myself. What was he really like? What was his regard for women? From years of this research, my faith in him has only deepened. For me, there are a couple of stories that eclipse millennia of Buddhism’s misogyny. They’ve become guideposts for me as a female Buddhist, beacons in my practice, writing, and teaching. Let me share them with you.

Shortly after his enlightenment, the Buddha declared the goal of creating a fourfold sangha of disciples comprising both lay and monastic women and men. With an eye on his legacy, he intended that representatives from all four groups would become accomplished practitioners and dharma teachers during his lifetime. We know he actualized this model because in canonical sources he goes on to laud two dozen “foremost” women as exemplars of his highest teachings. Khema, for example, was recognized as the role model for embodying wisdom; Samavati for loving-kindness; and Khujjuttara for superior learning.

The Buddha’s equal regard for women was also underscored when he was asked to settle a dharma dispute between quarrelsome monks. Rather than make a ruling himself, he turned to his most accomplished disciples and appointed one judge each from the fourfold community. Mahaprajapati, a female monastic, and Visakha, a laywoman, were selected as equal judges along with a monk and a layman to rule on the accuracy of the dharma discourse in dispute.

At the end of his life, the Buddha expressed satisfaction that his mission of creating a fourfold sangha had been accomplished. Imagine how different Buddhism would be today if his nonhierarchical, gender-balanced model for dharma community had endured!

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These ceaseless changes are the experiential basis of the Buddha’s quiet proclamation of the truth of “no solid self.” Let’s pause for a moment to consider this, as the Buddha’s primary teaching of selflessness might not seem to agree with our experience. “No self?” we may ask. “If that’s true, then who is reading (or writing) these words?”

The unexamined self feels like an isolated, self-sufficient, permanent individual, essentially separate from others and all that surrounds it.

Before we closely examine our experience, many of us assume we are essentially the same person throughout our lives. We are born, grow up, develop, and mature. All of that is my experience; all of that happens to me. We feel certain that there is a constant “I” somewhere near the center of all our experiences, though we are somewhat unclear about the precise nature of this assumed-to-be enduring essence.

So the great path of awakening begins with asking ourselves a tiny question: “What is the experience of being me?”

Even though I’ve heard the basic Buddhist teachings of impermanence and no self for many years, I often proceed through my day on automatic pilot, acting as though I’m an autonomous, sovereign self. I feel and act as though I’m a completely independent, permanent person. Right here in the midst of the swirling tempests of everyday events rapidly arising and falling away, I continue to act as though I have an infinite stretch of time before me. My actions and inaction suggest I feel I will live forever, even though, rationally, I understand the truth of impermanence. Yes, of course I can admit that things are always changing, but still I wonder: isn’t there a rock-solid unchanging “me” hidden somewhere underneath it all?

This unexamined self feels like an isolated, self-sufficient, permanent individual, essentially separate from others and all that surrounds it. Yet even a few moments of self-reflection suggests otherwise. My body is not the same as when I was eight or eighteen years old. If all humans are mortal, then my life will also end, exact time of departure unknown. Similarly, all my feelings of happiness and sadness come and go, arise and cease, changing gradually or suddenly, but always, inevitably, changing.

Looking closely, I also see that I’m not a self-contained, entirely independent individual. I need food, water, and air to survive. I speak and write a language generously passed on to me by others from long ago. I engage in everyday activities that were all part of my cultural training from childhood onward: brushing my teeth, exchanging greetings of “good morning” and saying “good night,” attending ceremonies, weddings, funerals.

Even at the most basic level of existence, I did not arise as a spontaneous, self-created human being. I was born and nurtured through the union and love of my parents, and they are also descendants of many ancestors before them. We are all “dependently related” beings, developing and aging in rapidly changing societies.

So what? Why does all this matter? Because when we ignore these basic truths, we suffer. When we conduct our lives as though, all evidence to the contrary, we are separate, permanent, unitary selves, we find ourselves constantly living in fear of the large, looming shadow of change. Actions based on a mistaken sense of self, or “ego,” as an unchanging, isolated essence are filled with anxious struggle. We fight many futile battles against the way things actually are. How are they really? They are changing, connected, fluid. It’s as though we are standing waist-deep in the middle of a rushing river, our arms outstretched wide, straining to stop the flow.

This mistaken sense of self arises as a solidified set of beliefs about who we are and how the world is. When we proceed on that basis, all our life experiences are filtered through a rigorous, simplistic, for-and-against screening process: “Will this person or event enhance my permanent sense of self? Will this encounter threaten the ideas I’ve already accumulated?” Believing the inner voice of deception, we grasp and defend and ignore in service to an illusion, causing suffering for ourselves and others.

Letting go of the false sense of self feels liberating, like being released from a claustrophobic prison of mistaken view. What a relief to discover that we don’t have to pretend to be something we’re not! The initially surprising and challenging news of “no solid self” turns out to be a gentle invitation into a more spacious approach to living and being with others. Releasing fixation on permanence goes hand in hand with taking brave steps toward more communication and harmony in our lives, our actions, our relationships, and our work.

We might call this fluid inter-being an “open self,” one that is more sensitive to other living beings and nature. This open sense of self allows us to proceed from empathy and compassion for ourselves and for those suffering around us and elsewhere. With the dissolving of the seemingly solid walls of ego’s fragile tower, our experience is porous and permeable, less cut off and isolated. As we gradually release the old commitment to conquering the unconquerable, to denying the undeniable, we explore the many genuine and fresh possibilities in our ever-changing situation.

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Jean Marie Robbins: I understand them as an intentional device to maintain an enslavement mentality, in order for the people on top and in power to do as little as they need to and reap the benefits of very inexpensive labor, if not free labor. That was intentional from the beginning, and it took time to take root. Now it’s so deeply rooted that it’s rooted in my own consciousness, and I have to work intentionally against the idea that I’m indebted and I have to always pay my way and pay twice as much, just to belong and to stand alongside people in white bodies.

Pamela Freeman: Jean, you said it very clearly, and I would echo what you said. We’re still living in a post-Confederacy. There is this whole thing of taking away of our rights and chipping away at everything we have in order to keep us controlled. Think about slavery. Our children were taken away from us; marriage was something that couldn’t happen for us. Now they’re trying to eliminate public schools, trying to eliminate everything that can empower us. I see what’s happening in this country. It seems to be getting worse, not better. 

Ramona Lisa Ortiz-Smith: I didn’t want to deal with race when I first started practicing. I just wanted to sit and meditate, but there is a force in meditation that brings up the truth. So, I’m rediscovering and peeling back the layers to figure out my understanding of blackness in America. It’s an oppressive system that was created to oppress Black people and other peoples who were not part of the dominant culture. And it still exists, it still persists.

I was writing something the other day about people wanting us to forget about slavery because it was a long time ago. But when I sat down and looked at it, I’m only maybe three generations out of slavery on my mother’s side, and maybe four generations out on my father’s side. Then I look at what’s happening today. 

What really gets me is the economic oppression—the hundreds of years that we worked as enslaved Africans, without any compensation, with barely any food, while the ways we had of supporting ourselves culturally were stripped from us. Given all the time we were building wealth for this country and for the world, to have it turned around—to say that it’s my fault that I’m in this economic situation—is crazy. If the economic system doesn’t change, the situation is not going to change. 

We’ve tried over the years to have our own this, that, or the other, then it gets destroyed, blown up, taken, stolen again. I’ve been thinking, “Where in the world can I live outside of the system?” because I’m tired. What countries have not been colonized? Where is there not racism against this Black woman’s being? We’ve got to change the economic system, destroy it completely—in some peaceful way.

Victoria Cary: We are a diverse people, so it’s difficult to generalize, but what comes to mind is our exhaustion at having to still fight for equality, equity, and for our lives. 

Given the particularities of the suffering of Black people in the United States, how can Buddhist practice help?

Ramona Lisa Ortiz-Smith: The dharma is a healing force. It’s medicine for the soul. That is why I do it. I practice because everything that is a part of life is in the dharma—the truth of the nature of things. It is a language that I understand, I think, from way back to all of my different indigenous roots. It is the language of what is present, what is real. 

Practicing the dharma allows me to contemplate, discover, and reflect on ways that I might be able to live this life with more ease and peace, love myself, forgive myself, love others, forgive others in a way that includes forgiving them for racism. The dharma is medicine; it provides me with a salve, which to me are the teachings that, when practiced and applied to my life, support the healing of my being. As a practitioner, I have to let go of my views, and I have to reflect on my conditioning and the conditioning of others. It’s deep when you really do that. The dharma says that this is what you need to find liberation and this is how you do it, so go see for yourself. I can bring the dharma to bear on racism or on anything else.

Pamela Freeman: I agree that the dharma is medicine—it’s healing. Before I practiced the dharma, I felt really disconnected. It has helped me to not be agitated, to listen to people better, to be kinder to myself and other people. It’s helped me to be quieter, and it’s given me a lot of hope. When I’m in meditation or walking or thinking or listening to a dharma talk, I feel so grateful that I’m alive. 

The dharma has helped me to be able to deal with some white people, because, before I practiced, I was just done. Now I can be with them and not feel so angry. It’s helped me to not be so reactive, and I think that’s why Black people need the dharma. We can be really mean and nasty to ourselves. This practice helps me give myself a break when I make mistakes.

Jean Marie Robbins: I live in Chicago and I belong to Shambhala Chicago. I came to Shambala about ten years ago in a very resistant mode, but the minute I heard the instructors say that meditation builds confidence in our basic goodness, I was hooked, because as a Black person, I’d never before heard that I was basically even acceptable, not to mention good.

Buddhism’s first noble truth is that there is suffering. Regarding the particularities of the suffering of Black people, I have coped much of my life by expecting to suffer racial harm and expecting white people to look at me in a negative way. Now, I’ve shifted my idea of suffering, and I ask myself, “What can I learn here?” One of the things I’m learning to do is to release what I imagine people are thinking about me—that’s just a thought. When I pause, I’m letting go of that flood of negative talk. Of course, it floods right back. It’s normal to have negative self-talk, so learning to let it go is a process—it doesn’t happen overnight.

I think the idea of no self is such a perplexing idea, but it’s one of the things that has helped me recognize this idea of identity as a trap. In a dharma setting, we can talk about that and really explore what it means to shackle ourselves with the idea that we’re limited to this identity, an identity that is defined by our society as something terrible, when really, it is our incredible resilience and resolve to survive that has made this country.

From Dr. Sheila Walker’s anthropological study of African descendants, especially in the Americas, I’ve learned that Afro-diasporans made the modern world by impacting music, science, business, food, agriculture, sports, and many other fields. Learning this has totally shifted my thinking about what we’ve contributed, what we’re capable of, and what I’m capable of.

Victoria Cary: Dharma is a path toward freedom. The dharma can be that for Black folks, too. It’s certainly been that for me.

If you could give one piece of advice on how to experience liberation, what would that be? 

Victoria Cary: Be curious and acknowledge reality with compassion. 

Ramona Lisa Ortiz-Smith: My advice would be to cultivate embodied stillness and empowered silence. When you choose to be silent—and not silenced by the oppressors—when you stay in the present moment with this breath, this body, there is an element of liberation.

Pamela Freeman: Liberation, to me, is believing in yourself. Trust in yourself, in your stillness, and even in your movement. Know that being yourself and believing in yourself is not something above you—it’s inside of you.

Jean Marie Robbins: In building on that, Pamela, I think that connecting with what we really are—with our basic goodness—and accepting all our stumbles and flaws softens us and enables us to connect with others. And that’s where liberation happens in our relationships, not just with others, but also in our relationship with ourselves.

Ramona Lisa Ortiz-Smith: Movement is such a big part of my Black experience. In moving, the mind gets to settle so that we can just be with our truth, connect to the earth, and see the ideas, views, and the conditioning that trap us, that shackle our minds. In embodied movement, there’s freedom.

Jean Marie mentioned the concept of no self. That word and concept has also been used in Buddhist dialogue to mean that race, ethnicity, the ways we identify socially don’t matter. My question to you is, does it matter to the people you serve in your dharma communities that you are Black? 

Ramona Lisa Ortiz-Smith: Yes, it matters. Before I can actually let go of my identity, I have to embrace all of who I am—all of my life, all of my experiences, all of my views. This way, I get to know all these different facets of my identity and understand where they came from, how they’ve shaped me, and how society persists with identifying me with some of them. 

But “no self” doesn’t mean that I don’t exist. Like Joy DeGruy [author of Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome: America’s Legacy of Enduring Injury and Healing] says, in this skin, it’s a different experience. So, it is true that I look like this—I am Black—and my experience in this world and in meditation and dharma communities is completely different because of it. I have to walk through this world in this skin; I can’t leave home without it. Therefore, I have tangible, visceral experiences as a dharma practitioner and teacher in this skin that are different than those who are not people of color and do not live in this skin. It causes challenging conditions in the practice and in practice communities because I and other people believe that I have a self that is “Black.” 

Jean Marie Robbins: Yes, it absolutely matters that I am Black! I feel like my showing up in my sangha is a practice that I impose on my white colleagues. It is a practice for them to manage their sense of anxiety or curiosity or resistance or whatever. 

My Black body does get a different reaction from others. On an absolute level, there’s no self, and I can see that. I can relinquish the habits that confine me to this sense of identity. I can be totally free, but I am in this body, so I probably am not going to relinquish all these habits until I leave my body. 

Victoria Cary: That statement—that race and other identities don’t matter—is just not true. Race matters, identities matter. It matters to me, and it matters deeply to those Black folks I serve. It matters because if you don’t acknowledge my race, my gender, my sexual identity, you don’t acknowledge me, my suffering, or my humanity. The dharma is about reality, and the reality is that race-based discrimination is still happening today in this country.

Pamela Freeman: Delaware Valley Insight is mixed—mostly white. People tell me it’s important that I’m there, and my experience is very different from the white members of my group. With the people of color group, my presence gives them hope. When I see Black dharma teachers and leaders, I want to cry. When I started this practice, there were two Black people, and now there are many of us. I think we give each other hope. 

As we talked, I felt myself falling in love with you all, and that has to do with feeling like I was receiving a transmission of deep loving-kindness, compassion, and care. You all have committed yourselves to take care of people like me, and I felt myself leaning in for that care. Thank you.

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El enfoque distintivo del Chan es señalar que no existe tal cosa como un yo fijo, pues ya somos libres. Es tan sólo gracias a nuestra fijación por las palabras y el lenguaje —y, por ende, por nuestras discriminaciones, puntos de vista discursivos, diálogos internos y emociones— que surge el yo. Este “yo” es perpetuado por el deseo, la aversión y la ilusión, que nos atan al sufrimiento.

El Chan reconoce que las formas rígidas de práctica espiritual también pueden convertirse en una fijación; por ello, el triple sendero de la virtud, la meditación y la sabiduría debe cultivarse en medio de la vida cotidiana, especialmente cuando percibimos los “ocho vientos” de la ganancia y la pérdida; la fama y la calumnia; la alabanza y el ridículo; y la alegría y la tristeza. Por lo general, estas percepciones polarizadoras nos golpean profundamente a diestra y siniestra, y las etiquetamos porque no sabemos cómo experimentar el mundo sin nombrarlo todo.

Aunque las palabras tienen su utilidad, la mayoría de la gente queda atrapada por ellas. Al etiquetar, adquirimos una sensación de control, y las etiquetas forman los contornos de nuestra realidad, pero, en realidad, las palabras que elegimos nos controlan. Cuanto más fijación tenemos en estas etiquetas, más atrapados estamos en esa realidad. Esto es engaño; es sufrimiento.

La clave de la práctica del Chan reside en ver más allá y desmantelar nuestra fijación en las palabras, que inevitablemente divide, reifica y trae sufrimiento. A lo largo de los siglos, el Chan ha desarrollado dos formas distintas de atacar explícitamente nuestra tendencia a reificar el mundo a través de las palabras y el lenguaje. El primer método es contemplar los gong’ans (o koans, en japonés), vocablo que literalmente significa “caso público”. El término procede de los documentos judiciales civiles de la dinastía Tang (618-907), referidos a casos legales. Los maestros Chan recurrían a esta metáfora judicial para referirse a “casos” o relatos de situaciones de la vida cotidiana que conducían al despertar. Del mismo modo que los magistrados revisan, examinan y dictan sentencia sobre los casos legales, los maestros Chan recopilaban y comentaban los encuentros de practicantes anteriores. Sus comentarios, como el veredicto de un magistrado, evaluaban el punto de inflexión o el catalizador más importante de aquellas experiencias de despertar para así ofrecer a los lectores pistas para su comprensión, inspirándoles a tomar estos casos como sus propios objetos de investigación contemplativa. Estas recopilaciones se llegaron a conocer como colecciones de gong’ans.

En la práctica del gong’an (en japonés: koan), se contempla una historia o diálogo paradójico con el fin de cortar con las formas de pensar ordinarias y dualistas. En un conocido gong’an, un estudiante preguntó: “¿Tiene un perro naturaleza búdica?”. Fotografía de Xan Griffin

Para muchos, los gong’ans parecen extraños rompecabezas, pero, en realidad, no hay nada que resolver. Su utilidad radica en utilizar veneno contra veneno. Dado que las palabras y el lenguaje son como un veneno en nuestra mente, que contamina todo lo que experimentamos, los gong’ans introducen un nuevo veneno que contrarresta el original. Presentan una imposibilidad, una encrucijada, y hacen que la mente se atasque. Nos quedamos con una gran sensación de desconocimiento, impenetrabilidad y asombro, que es la finalidad de este método. Los gong’ans no nos dan nada a lo que aferrarnos, así que todas las palabras, conceptos y todo lo que hemos conocido de nosotros mismos como “esto” y “aquello” se desvanece. Dan la vuelta a las palabras, al lenguaje y a los conceptos, destrozando así nuestro aferramiento a nosotros mismos para que despertemos a nuestra verdadera naturaleza. En pocas palabras, los practicantes del Chan utilizan los gong’ans para disolver la autorreferencialidad y las fijaciones. Así, pues, practicar el gong’an es utilizarlo como método para investigar nuestra vida y lo que significa vivir de acuerdo con nuestra libertad.

Hay muchas formas de relacionarse con los gong’ans. A menudo no es necesario reflexionar sobre toda la historia contada en un gong’an, ya que cada uno de éstos tiene un punto de inflexión crítico con el potencial de transformar el engaño en despertar. Este punto crítico, llamado huatou (o wato, en japonés), puede ser el centro de la meditación. Algunos ejemplos de huatou son: ¿quién soy?, ¿qué es esto?, ¿cuál era mi rostro original antes de que nacieran mi padre y mi madre?

Un huatou es, en muchos sentidos, una versión condensada de un gong’an. Huatou significa literalmente “lo que está antes de las palabras”. Si las palabras y los conceptos son las enredaderas espinosas que nos atan y engañan, el huatou es el hacha que las corta y nos libera. De nuevo, la clave es generar una sensación de asombro, no de saber. Con el tiempo, el asombro se hará añicos y uno despertará del sueño del engaño.

El segundo enfoque de la práctica del Chan se denomina mozhao o iluminación silenciosa, que se asemeja en cierto modo a la práctica simultánea de las meditaciones de shamata y vipassana. Este método requiere que abandonemos por completo el lenguaje. Permitimos que cualquier palabra o pensamiento que surja se disipe por sí mismo. Cuando abandonamos las etiquetas, la mente recupera su luminosidad natural. Llegará un momento en que la mente misma se desvanezca de repente y, junto con ella, el yo. Esto es el despertar.

Al extender esta práctica a la vida cotidiana, interactuamos con el mundo sin estar tan atados a palabras y conceptos. Ya sea al sentarse, caminar, trabajar o interactuar con los demás, tan sólo hay una experiencia despierta y clara de la frescura y la inmediatez de cada momento. El practicante está presente ante lo que existe y responde a lo que hay que hacer, a lo que se puede hacer, sin inyectar un yo donde no lo hay.

La práctica del Chan se extiende a la vida cotidiana. Ya sea al trabajar, sentarse, caminar o interactuar con los demás, el practicante está presente ante lo que existe y responde a lo que hay que hacer. Fotografía de iStock.com / RyanJLane

Tanto la iluminación silenciosa como el gong’an son métodos que se basan en la convicción de que el despertar ya está aquí, en este momento, y que no es algo que se produzca mediante una práctica artificial. Sin embargo, la práctica es absolutamente necesaria porque estamos condicionados por nuestras fijaciones, siempre divididos entre el yo y el otro, empujados y arrastrados por los ocho vientos.
Practicar la virtud, desde la perspectiva del Chan, es liberarse de los ocho vientos. Practicar la meditación es estar libre de las distracciones en medio de la vida cotidiana. Practicar la sabiduría es no obstruir la naturaleza de la mente, que ya existe libre del yo.

Incorporar a nuestras vidas la triple práctica de la virtud, la meditación y la sabiduría también significa establecer nuevas relaciones y observar nuevos comienzos. Esto es compasión en acción. Cuando nos encontramos con dificultades en la vida, no hay por qué tener una fijación en nuestro impulso de etiquetarlas como negativas. Lo que parece negativo puede convertirse en una experiencia de aprendizaje. Cuando la vida nos presenta retos —ya sea por parte de nuestro jefe, compañeros, familiares, amigos, maestros o alumnos—, si sabemos adaptarnos a las situaciones y reconocer que cada momento es un nuevo comienzo, no guardaremos rencor ni resentimientos. Las soluciones a nuestros retos siempre aparecen cuando dejamos de etiquetarlos, cuando dejamos de atraparnos en una realidad fija.

Desmantelar nuestro profundo hábito de reificar las experiencias a través de las palabras y el lenguaje es tan fácil como soltarlas ahora mismo o tan difícil como vivir toda una vida de práctica. En el proceso, nos volvemos más espaciosos, conectados y receptivos a las maravillas de la vida. Nos alineamos más con nuestra verdadera naturaleza, que ya es libre.

SOBRE GUO GU

Guo Gu es maestro Chan y profesor de budismo y religiones de Asia Oriental en la Universidad Estatal de Florida. Es fundador y maestro del Tallahassee Chan Center de Florida, y quien imparte la formación a todos los maestros occidentales de dharma en el linaje Dharma Drum del maestro Sheng Yen. En 2020, fundó la organización budista intraconfesional y socialmente comprometida, Dharma Relief. Entre sus libros figuran Essence of Chan y Silent Illumination (2021).

ESTEFANIA DUQUE (TRADUCTORA)

Estefania es licenciada en Lenguas Modernas e Interculturalidad por la Universidad De La Salle Bajío. Creció en la calidez de la comunidad budista de Casa Tibet México y actualmente cursa un Programa de Formación de Traductores de Tibetano en Dharma Sagar, con la aspiración de traducir el Dharma directamente del tibetano al español.

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Clarity about the difference between meditation and rumination is important for an optimal sleep routine. Meditation is intentional; the intention can be to let go of thoughts instead of following them, or a resolve to focus on the breath.

In contrast, rumination happens spontaneously. Studies show that we spend 30 to 50 percent of our mental activity in thoughts that are neither related to what we’re doing nor to our surroundings. This can be a problem at bedtime as the body has trouble telling thoughts from reality. Thus, if your thoughts are replaying an argument you had earlier in the day, then your heart rate, blood pressure, and level of stress hormones will match those feelings instead of feelings that will foster a peaceful drift into sleep. Meditation can help you go to sleep, whereas rumination can keep you awake.

Although I didn’t start meditating in order to sleep better, a good night’s sleep has been one of the unexpected gifts of meditation. I use the two essential practices of focusing on the breath and letting go of thoughts every night. My personal challenge has been going back to sleep after waking up at night—a problem that affects up to 35 percent of us. Now when I wake up, I sit on the edge of the bed and do a period of meditation. After a short time, my mind is peaceful, and I’m ready to fall back to sleep.

If you find meditation challenging, try the following steps. Do each step for three breaths.

1. Focus on Your Breath

Breathe slowly and deeply from the diaphragm, concentrating on the sensations of breathing.

Always breathe through your nose. The nose makes important contributions to your health. Glands in the sinuses produce nitric oxide, which helps dilate the blood vessels and improve circulation. The nose humidifies and filters the air.

Is one nostril blocked? Lie on the other side. This unblocks it within a few minutes. Are both nostrils blocked? Cup your hand at the faucet and fill your nose with cold water for a few seconds. A blocked nose isn’t necessarily due to mucus, so blowing your nose may not always fix it. Sometimes the cause is the erectile tissue inside the nose. Nasal blockage and mouth-breathing contribute to snoring, which in turn may interfere with sleep.

2. Do a Body Scan

A body scan is systematic. You start at one end, say the feet, and work your way up—focusing on different parts of the body, noticing any tension, and letting it go. Some yoga teachers offer a shortened version of a body scan at the end of a class. That was my first introduction to it, and I’d sometimes notice fellow yoga practitioners falling asleep in class while doing it.

Whether on the yoga mat or in bed, a body scan is effective as a relaxation technique.

When I lead a group through a body scan, I start by asking people to feel if one foot is colder than the other, and I ask them to notice the pressure they feel on the buttocks from sitting. (We are usually sitting in a meditation class.) Then we work our way up. When we come to the neck, I note that the head is ten pounds heavier for each inch it’s leaning forward. I notice a few people straightening up as I say that. Coming to the facial muscles, I usually quote Thich Nhat Hanh: “Sometimes I smile because I’m happy, and sometimes I’m happy because I smile.” I also remind people of the old adage: “The face is the mirror of the mind.”

A body scan is a good practice for body awareness and relaxation. Focusing on the body works as an antidote to being in our thoughts, for the body is always here now, whereas thoughts can be anywhere, anytime. We need that grounding at bedtime.

3. Conduct a Scan of Your Emotions

Notice with compassion what’s on your mind. The psychological term “negativity bias” refers to our tendency to think more about negative things and to accord them more importance. This creates anxiety rather than happiness, and discontent rather than contentment. Both can interfere with sleep.

The first step in overcoming the negativity bias is being aware of it. Then with a smile, urge your mind to notice that the glass it sees as half-empty is also half-full. We tend to take what we have for granted, and this gets in the way of contentment. Reach for contentment. Look at all the things you take for granted and appreciate life’s blessings.

4. Focus on What You Want

Thinking doesn’t stop when we go to bed. There’s no “off” button. Forceful directions, such as saying to yourself, “I will stop thinking,” don’t work.

Give yourself positive directions instead. An obvious example of this is what happens when you say, “I will not think of a pink elephant.” You think of a pink elephant! But think of a blue elephant instead, and the pink elephant disappears. Thus, “I will not think of that argument I had with my spouse,” is likely to be counterproductive. It’s better to say to yourself, “I will focus on my breath.”

5. Let Go

The goal of doing your best is more realistic than the goal of being perfect. Keep in mind that we control our intentions and our actions, but not the results of our actions. With hindsight, we may see what we should have done; however, that knowledge wasn’t available during the moment we acted.

“I’ve done my best today; may all people be happy and well” is a soothing evening prayer. It celebrates a compassionate heart while tacitly acknowledging its limits.

If your mind serves you self-bashing thoughts at night, turn them toward self-appreciation. Focus on your motives and your efforts—the things that you do control.

Our culture says, “If at first, you don’t succeed, try harder.” Such messages are valuable in certain areas. For example, if we try harder, we can run faster, at least to a certain extent. But in areas where we don’t have conscious control, trying harder doesn’t work at all; it’s often counterproductive. Instead of helping, the extra effort gets in the way. Sleep is one of those areas.

Striving or worrying about sleep only makes it more difficult to attain. Just focus on your breathing. Let go of everything else.

Once you’ve cycled through these five steps, extend the meditation period by continuing with conscious breathing, or try repeating the steps from the beginning.

If you don’t fall asleep after a reasonable time of meditating, get out of bed. Put yourself to work doing something that needs to be done. Do this with a positive mindset, considering the extra time as a gift. Use up your energy. You’ll check off an item or two from your to-do list, and you may feel more inclined to sleep afterward.

Finally, be aware that pairing meditation with certain lifestyle choices is particularly effective for nurturing healthy sleep patterns. Thich Nhat Hanh once said, “Everything relies on everything else in the cosmos in order to manifest—whether a star, a cloud, a flower, a tree, or you and me.” So, a sleep problem also has the nature of interbeing—it doesn’t exist alone. Our lifestyle, including our caffeine consumption and the amount of exercise we do, has a bearing on how well we sleep.

Caffeine doesn’t affect everyone the same way. For some people, it can stay in the blood for more than nine hours. It turns out that 40 percent of us are fast caffeine metabolizers; 15 percent of us are particularly slow at it; and the rest fall somewhere in between. If you know someone who drinks cup after cup and then sleeps peacefully, don’t try to imitate them. It may not work for you. A good way to find out how coffee affects your sleep is to go without it or only drink the decaffeinated stuff for a week.

Studies show that regular exercise correlates with better sleep. These days, over half of all work is done while sitting at a desk, so this makes intentionally finding ways to exercise all the more necessary. Bike to work if you can, find a gym close by, or run. Do what you need to do to get a daily dose of exercise. You’ll appreciate it at bedtime.

Sweet dreams, my friends!

The post What to Do When You Can’t Sleep appeared first on Lion’s Roar.

The next Saturday, I took my father to the ER for Covid, and I never held him again till I held his ashes. Throughout those days when grief and helplessness enveloped me, I leaned deep into my nature-meditation experiences. I remembered how trees survive storms. I remembered the groundedness of the earth holding me. I remembered the loving nature of the universe. When my family asked how I was holding up, I answered, thinking about trees, “Roots go deeper; feet stand firmer.”

Six months later, in the Hudson Valley, I picked a big tree that had fallen right next to the trail. I spent time sensing the tree and holding it, as if it were my dad’s body lying in the hospital. I sensed love from the tree and my love for it/him. I said my prayers in tears, feeling my dad’s spirit there with me.

What is tree meditation? It is a practice described by Mark Coleman in his book Awake in the Wild, of spending time with a tree with attention and reverence. This is my interpretation of how to do it, integrating others’ perspectives as well.

Be Called to a Tree

Notice where you are standing in your environment, tune in to the body first, and sense if there is a tree that you find interesting to connect with. Follow your curiosity.

As you first approach, take in the whole tree from a distance, noticing its height, shape, and how it fits in with its environment.

Sense the Tree Up Close

Slowly approach the tree and look at the tree from root to canopy. Shunryu Suzuki said, “As soon as you see something, you already start to intellectualize it. As soon as you intellectualize something, it is no longer what you saw.” Try to look at the tree as shape, texture, colors as you were seeing it for the first time.

Feel into the environment of the tree and its whole mini-ecosystem. What does this tree smell like? Can you smell the scents of bark and leaves? What do you hear standing in front of this tree? Birdsong? Leaves rustling? Insects?
Feel any moss or ferns or lichen that may be living on the tree. Be aware that you are visiting the home of animals. Be careful not to instill fear in them. Humans are perceived as predators.

Interact with the Tree

A tree is a living being. Just as you wouldn’t hug a stranger without permission, first introduce yourself to a tree and ask permission before you interact with it. Out loud or silently, state your name and purpose for visiting the tree. Get a felt sense if the tree is okay with you interacting with it. If yes, then go ahead. If not, say thanks, gently turning your attention to another tree.

Check in with your body and sense how you may want to interact with the tree, or how it may want you to be with it. Perhaps you want to ask for support from it. Perhaps you want to ask it a question. Perhaps you simply want to lean against the tree and rest. Listen to your body and let it guide you.

Interacting with a tree is an energetic exchange. You may want to hug the tree. You can sit at the roots, or you can lie down and rest your head on or between the roots and look up at the canopy. Feel if there’s a sense of exchange between you and the tree.

Touch different parts of the tree—roots, bark, leaves. Close your eyes and rub these different parts against your face and hands. Can you feel the roughness of the bark and sense what the tree has gone through to survive? The sense of touch is particularly helpful for connecting with the tree. The moment you touch the tree, does anything shift inside your body? What sensations arise?

Stay a Little Longer

You might be compelled to move on, but stay. See how the full connections develop. Notice the quality of impatience, resistance, or boredom. Feel whatever is arising, take a breath, and resume this meditation.

One helpful quality to bring to this practice is beginner’s mind, a sense of curiosity and openness. If you are a one-year-old child seeing a tree for the first time, what would you see? How would you interact and connect with it? There is no right or wrong experience. Just be with what arises.

At the end of spending time with the tree, express your gratitude by giving it some water or a bow or any kind of gesture (verbal or nonverbal) that allows you to show your thanks for its support.

May a tree bless you and sustain you.

The post Need to Heal? Find a Tree appeared first on Lion’s Roar.

While there are many variations of this practice, this simple version is common to many Buddhist traditions and is a mainstay of the secular mindfulness movement. It is a foundation of the path to enlightenment and offers immediate benefits to our health, happiness, and well-being.

Sit cross-legged on a meditation cushion or on a straight-backed chair. The important thing is to be upright, grounded, and relaxed. With your eyes open, let your gaze rest comfortably as you look slightly downward about six inches in front of you. Place your attention continuously on each in-breath and out-breath, while also remaining aware of the environment around you.

Gently note when you have been distracted by thoughts, without criticizing yourself, and return your attention to the breath. In this practice, thoughts are not judged as good or bad. You simply acknowledge them and return to the breath.

2. Mixing Mind and Space

This is mindfulness of breath with a Vajrayana flavor. It is attributed to Gampopa, a founder of the Kagyu lineage, and was the main meditation practice taught in the West by Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche. It combines mindfulness or concentration with the open awareness of such practices as Dzogchen and shikantaza.

Place your attention on the out-breath as in the previous practice. Let your attention go out with the breath and dissolve into the space around you. Rest your mind in that open space or gap without placing your attention on the in-breath.

Place your attention again on the next out-breath, following it out and mixing your mind with space as it dissolves. Rest in that open awareness. Continue meditating in this way.

3. Tonglen

Tonglen, which means “taking and sending,” is a visualization practice using the breath to expand our compassion. It reverses the way ego usually operates. When we put ourselves first, we try to take in what’s good for us and send away what causes suffering. When we put others first, we do the opposite—we take in their suffering and send out our happiness. This is the living action of bodhichitta—the enlightened heart–mind of the buddhas—that is cultivated in tonglen.

Taking our meditation posture, we begin the practice with the in-breath, visualizing that we are taking in the suffering of others as a thick, black, hot cloud. We may visualize this cloud striking our heart and destroying our selfishness. On the out-breath, we then visualize that we are sending out all that is good to others in the form of a white, cooling cloud that eases their fear and suffering.

As we continue this visualization, we expand our compassion from those close to us, to those we are indifferent to, to those we don’t like, and to all others. Pema Chödrön says this practice creates not only compassion for others, but compassion for ourselves and a deep connection with all beings based on our common experience of suffering.

4. Cleansing Breath

This nine-breath practice from the Tibetan tradition is designed to expel blocked or “stale” energy (prana, chi). As a yogic practice, this can include visualizing the expulsion of prana with each breath, but in this simplified form it can be done by any meditator. Because it relaxes the body and opens up the respiratory system, it is an excellent way to begin any meditation session.

Seated in your meditation posture, close the left nostril with your index finger and breathe slowly in and out through the right nostril three times. On the last exhalation, expel as much air as you can. Now close the right nostril and breath three times through the left nostril, again finishing with a forceful exhalation. Finally, breathe three times through both nostrils, doing a compete exhalation with each out-breath. Return to normal breathing, feeling open and relaxed.

5. The 4-7-8 Breath

Also known as the Weil Technique, for its advocate Dr. Andrew Weil, this simple yogic breath practice can be used to cultivate calm restfulness in any situation, but is especially prized as a way to help you fall to sleep.

In a restful position—this may be in bed, but doesn’t have to be—place the tip of your tongue just behind your front teeth. Inhale, then let out the breath with an audible, whooshing sound. Inhale again while internally counting to four. Next, hold the breath for a count to seven. Then, exhale again, using the same audible breath, for a count of eight. Repeat the cycle as you wish.

Weil notes that while the technique can be highly effective, one should be patient and consistent with it, as it may take up to two months to develop as a reliable sleep aid.

The post 5 Meditations on the Breath appeared first on Lion’s Roar.