Pathscrossing News

A Silent Thanksgiving

This year I decided to have a silent Thanksgiving, just me, by myself. It is kind of an experiment, of sorts. A few weeks ago, I revealed loneliness as a source of my joy – that through my loneliness, I found my deep, heart-felt appreciation of being with others, of being loved by others. So, I created a situation for myself, where I would spend Thanksgiving all by myself.

When friends asked, I tried to explain it. They understood the words, but probably not to the depth of exploration that I was undertaking. I politely excused myself from the traditional Shimada-Kross gathering, this year at my sister’s in Boise, Idaho. I explained that I was taking a personal retreat, a phrase they are getting more accustomed to as I devote more time to meditation. So, here I am, it’s 7:30 pm. How did it go? Two words: quietly and surprisingly.

The quiet aspect of it was through the time that I took for zazen, for practicing my Japanese calligraphy, and for reading. The surprising aspects were that I received a bouquet of flowers from my loving partner, Jan who is in the Czech Republic. It was on my porch, this little pumpkin filled with orange roses, fiery like a southwestern sunset. A moment of gratefulness for his love, his thoughtfulness, and his presence in my life.

The second surprise was a young woman named Summer who was standing in my doorway with a pie from her parents, Cynthia and Jeffrey.  Summer brought it from her parents who wanted to thank me for helping them push their car out of the road in front of our house a few days ago. I saw they needed help. It was the morning rush hour, and it was more important than making my smoothie. I was moved by their gratitude, and maybe more importantly, I also felt grateful for who I am, that I took the time to go out in the rain, in my pajamas.

Earlier in the morning, as I was meditating, a thought occurred to me. (Sidebar: even though in meditation we try to be empty, when a thought arises, we should just return to our breath. But, sometimes, one thought leads to another, then I return to my breath.) Building on what Koshin Cain, the Abbott of the Puget Sound Zen Center, said last night in meditation, about how we gather around the table, holding hands to stop and give thanks, here’s the thought: what if that gratitude that we formally acknowledge on one of the day would flow throughout the rest of our days, weeks and months? In fact, one of my most favorite youtube videos is by Brother David Stendl-Rast, called A Good Day.

On this silent Thanksgiving day, even though I was alone, I really wasn’t. You see, in my reflections and contemplations of loneliness, I realized that I’m never really alone. I am always surrounded by trees, birds, the wind, the moon, people walking by the house, and the countless thoughts of loved ones far away. By taking a silent Thanksgiving, I gave myself an opportunity to try and get in touch and be grateful for all of my relationships. I only needed to be still, to be quiet, to listen, and to feel it all around me, especially to to Jan and my neighbors, it was a really good day.

What I Found When My Heart Cracked Open

 “Sometimes there's so much beauty in the world I feel like I can't take it, like my heart's going to cave in.”

For years, I’ve always thought this clip from American Beauty was one of the most beautiful scenes in a movie. It captured me, because it was something I wished that I could feel, to be able to see life, to experience life with my heart overflowing. It’s not something that you can pursue, like deciding to see the Grand Canyon, or waiting for a sunset.

This last weekend, I had the good fortune of attending a retreat on Radical Joy at the Upaya Zen Center located in the beautiful mountains of Santa Fe. My interest in attending this retreat was to meet Joan Halifax Roshi, founder, abbott, teacher, and priest of Upaya and to experience the Center as part of my application process to their Buddhist Chaplaincy program.

The experience of the weekend was shaped by Roshi and Sharon Salzberg, providing a blend of Zen and Theravada Buddhism, respectively. Roshi commented about the common emphasis of Buddhism on suffering, and joy not as common. While I did not come away with a prescriptive notion of “radical joy,” I did feel that something happened, that my eyes, my mind, and my heart were opened.

Maybe it was the presence of Roshi and Suan. Maybe it was the beauty of the zendo. Maybe it was the presence of the other 100 or so individuals who were gathered. Maybe it was the combination of zazen and vipassana meditations.

All I know is that when I heard a movie clip by Brother David Stendl Rast’s, I felt my heart cracked open. All I know is that when Roshi was expressing her appreciation to a handful of residents and participants who were concluding their three week meditation sesshin, I felt my well of gratitude crack open.

All I know is that when the retreat ended, I sat with a woman to share with her my gratitude for the benefactors in my life, and I felt my heart break in to pieces as I felt that there has been so much love around me. I was experiencing that scene from American Beauty. I found the moment, or the moment found me. I felt it.

In that moment, when I felt so much love, I also in almost the same breadth felt it’s source in the final sentence I voiced to the woman I was sitting with. “It’s so overwhelming sometimes because I feel alone, I feel lonely.” I had realized what Roshi, I think, was speaking about, that the extent of our joy to some extent depends on our suffering.  My feelings of loneliness heightened my appreciation and gratitude for the moments that I have been loved. It was a beautiful moment, to experience joy in the retreat, and an equally powerful moment to recognize my own loneliness.

My heart was cracked open. I found joy. Radical? Not sure. But, inside my heart, I found loneliness, too. And, yes, everything else contributed as well, the presence of Roshi and Susan, the beauty of the zendo, the presence of 100 participants, and my experience of both zazen and vipassana meditation practices.

Roshi announced that she and Susan would be offering this retreat again in 2010. While I can’t make any promises about what you will experience, if you feel it pull you, then trust that.

The Practice of Being Enough

I just finished my volunteer training this last weekend for Shanti, a Multi-faith program.The program provides “free emotional support for people affected by HIV/AIDS, cancer, and other life-threatening illnesses.”

I originally submitted my application as a volunteer to deepen my spiritual practice, to someday be formally in a position of providing end-of-life care. Before attending the training, I knew from my orientation interview that being a volunteer meant learning how to be present to the individual’s grief, loss, and helplessness without trying to fix or solve anything for them. When I began the training, I carried that expectation with me, to learn how to not feel that I needed to have an answer. When I finished the training, I had opportunities to learn and practice those skills, but more importantly, I came face-to-face with my underlying beliefs.

Here’s the bottom line, for me: every time I say to myself, “I’m insecure” as a rationale for not doing something, what I’m really saying is that “I’m giving myself a reason, an excuse for being that way.” In my case, it expands to mean that it’s okay for me to not like myself, to feel less than adequate, to not be good enough, to not, to not, to not. Even though it’s what I honestly feel, here’s what happens: my judgment of myself means that it’s something I need to fix, and that means that I need to do something to fix it. If it gets fixed, then it reinforce the idea that I need to be fixed, but if it doesn’t then, it’s a failed effort, and I end up right back where I started.

As a volunteer, this has it’s downside. The more I try to find fixes for myself, the easier it has gotten to also provide fixes to everyone else, too. And, as I learned in volunteer training, that’s not what the individual is seeking, they only want support, no fixes. If you get on the fix-it side of the conversation, then in between the words what you end up saying is, “you’re not okay, you need to be fixed.” That’s not compassion, at least not the kind of compassion I want to demonstrate.

So, what’s the fix to the not fixing? For now, I’m going to try to just say “I am enough.” I’m hoping that it’ll short-circuit the thinking that something needs to be fixed. I’m hoping that it’ll be enough so that I can just accept what is, without any rationalization, without any notion of what should have happened or what could have happened. All that goes out the window! All of it!

As a result, here’s what I hope happens. I am enough gives me acceptance of myself and the situation. It derails the fix-it thought train. Instead, I am left with being understanding and I cripple the excuse for rationalizing and justifying my negative biases about why I act the way I do. Instead, I accept the situation, accept myself, and just move on.

I didn’t expect to realize this type of insight for myself in volunteer training. Now that I have, I realize that the opportunity that I have to spend with whomever I am matched will be a tremendous gift for me to practice being enough, and hopefully from that place, I will be able to have a supportive presence for the individual, and maybe, just maybe, they, too . . . (I almost wrote something that suggested that they needed to be fixed.) Ha! Got me! To practice being enough. That’s enough.