Day 3 - A Carnival Ride through the Freak Show in My Mind

Sitting in the meditation hall, about 5:45 a.m.  I'm over an hour early for the daily dharma talk by Thich Nhat Hanh (affectionately known as "Thay").  Spent the last 10 minutes maneuvering for position.  Maybe even jockeying.   

Should I be in a chair or a cushion?  A cushion would be closer to Thay, since the cushions are arrayed in front.  But I just finished a half hour of seated meditation on a cushion, so a chair would be easier on the knees.  I decide to find a cushion.  But one of the higher ones, to ease the pain.  I find one, 15 feet from where Thay will speak.  I eagerly sit on it.  But Thay tends to speak quietly.  What if I can't hear?  Unfortunately, there are no high cushions in the very front.  Maybe I should move closer to one of the loudspeakers, even if I'm further back.  I look at my watch.  Nearly an hour before the dharma talk.  What if he talks for 2 hours?  I don't want to be on a cushion for a total of three and a half hours!  I find a chair, in the first row of chairs.  I sit down again.  Uh-Oh.  Now I'm near the German translator.  I don't want to spend the whole time listening to someone muttering in German.  People are starting to fill up the place.  I'd better move again.  Okay, there's one high cushion left.  I take it.  Then, another bright idea.  Instead of waiting for an hour on the cushion, I'll put my notebook on it, to reserve the space, so I can do walking meditation outside, until the talk begins.  Oops.  Too cold outside.  So I come back in.  I pace back and forth along the back of the hall.  No talking allowed.  The place is nearly full.  Wait.  There's a small row of three chairs in front.  They're way off to the side, but right next to a loudspeaker.  I sit in one, to test the view.  Looks like it'll be a great side view of Thay.  Hard to see the writing board, but he'll say what he writes on it anyway.  Too bad I have nothing to use to reserve the seat.  Even if I did, I'd be reserving two seats at once.  It's obnoxious enough to be reserving even one.  So I go back to my second cushion, pretending not to hurry.  I take my notebook off it, and make a beeline to my second chair.  Will I get there in time?  People are moving in that direction.  Shit. I guess I deserve this impending fiasco.  But then I get lucky.  The people moving that way are looking for cushions, not chairs.  I take the chair.  Whew!  Then I notice another one.  It has a view of the writing board.  So I take that one instead.  But the glare from the film camera lights makes the board unreadable.  Besides, now I'm further from the loudspeaker.  So I quickly move to one of the very few seats left, a chair right in front of the loudspeaker.  It is the chair that is in the extreme right front corner of the room.  This is my fifth chair, and my seventh seat.  The dharma talk is still 20 minutes away.  Still time to move again, like a jumping frog.

THE DHARMA TALK

The following are my notes.  These are not even close to a transcript of the talk!

Breathing is the royal entrance to the body.

During the first two seconds of following the breath, your mind touches your body.
Following your breath allows you to touch the miracle of being alive.  You are resurrected.

Mental discourse is the source of suffering, sorrow, and anxiety.  You are like a tree caught in a storm.  Your emotions and thoughts are like the upper branches, swaying in the wind.  Take your concentration downwards, to the steady trunk.   

Your sorrow and anxiety can be healed.  The basic condition for healing is rest.  We humans have forgotten that.   Animals still remember.  That is why a wounded animal always seeks a quiet spot to rest, and even to fast, until healed.  Learning how to rest is a crucial part of our practice.

Your meditation on the breath should not be work.  It should be enjoyment.  No need to worry about whether each breath is long or short.  Simple recognition is enough.  Make your practice a joy.  Life already has enough suffering.  Why create more of it?

While enjoying, we smile.  Smiling is a practice, but it is not forced.  Smiling is the yoga of the mouth.  Smiling is like kneeling, or putting one's hands in prayer -- it is allowing the body to take the initiative. Breathing in, be aware of your half-smile.  Breathing out, you can smile to that smile.  You can have a double smile!

We've been mistreating our bodies.  We should be reconciling with them instead.  If the CEOs of corporations were wise, they would offer deep relaxation sessions for their employees.

The collective energy of multiple people mindfully breathing is very powerful.  It can penetrate us.  I can heal us.  That is the sangha.  (sanskrit for spiritual community)

You also need to learn how to release your cows.    One day the Buddha was sitting in the woods with thirty or forty monks. They had an excellent lunch, and they were enjoying the company of each other. There was a farmer passing by, and the farmer was very unhappy. He asked the Buddha and the monks whether they had seen his cows passing by.  The Buddha said they had not seen any cows passing by.  The farmer said, "Monks, I'm so unhappy. I have twelve cows and I don't know why they all ran away.  I'm suffering so much, I think I'm going to kill myself."  The Buddha said, "My friend, we have not seen any cows passing by here. You might like to look for them in the other direction."  So the farmer thanked him and ran away.  The Buddha turned to his monks and said, "My dear friends, you are the happiest people in the world.  You don't have any cows to lose.  If you have too many cows to take care of, you will be very busy."

That is why, in order to be happy, you have to learn the art of cow releasing.  You release the cows one by one.   You once thought that those cows were essential to your happiness, and you tried to get more and more cows.  But now you realize that cows are not really conditions for your happiness; they constitute an obstacle to your happiness.

Take a piece of paper, and call your cows by their true name.  List, as "cows," all of the things you think you need for well-being and happiness.  You don't need them.  Let them go.

A TURN FOR THE WORSE

I thought the dharma talk was excellent.  As they say, Thich Nhat Hanh's words were falling on me like dharma rain. 

But now I'm feeling very down.  I'm not sure why.  I know the feeling will pass.  I hope the feeling will pass.  Here are a few of my mental symptoms ("formations"), none of which are worth being depressed about, but here they are:

1.   I'm angry at the rushing required to get to breakfast in time to avoid arriving after all the porridge has run out.  I'm annoyed that there was no soy milk today, only cow's milk.

2.  I'm pissed off that once again, even on retreat, I'm becoming attracted to guys, and to the kind of guys who will barely say hello.  Everybody seems to be making friends except me.  I know this is false, but it feels true.

3.  I took a picture of Thay and the group at the start of walking meditation.  It made me feel like a selfish, anti-spiritual tourist.  Imagine if everyone did what I did?  The retreat would descend into chaos, before totally self-destructing.  It did not help that all of the people clustered around Thay during the walk this morning seemed like angry, men-hating women, glaring at me for ruining their special moment.  Another untruth, and one that is inherently contradictory, since as a technical matter, Thich Nhat Hanh is a "man," but there it is.

4.  Hay fever is acting up again.  I don't like being around snivelling, dribbling, sneezing, wheezing people.  I imagine no one wants to be around me either.  Besides, during an allergy attack, I am just miserable.

5. I cannot seem to find a good place, or a good time, to do my ashtanga yoga practice.

6. I am tired.

God or whatever, please allow me to feel better.  A lot better.

I'm off to lunch now, perchance to eat.  I'll probably eat a lot. 

A TURN FOR THE BETTER

At lunch, I decide to accept my depression.  I decide to sit down by myself, and wait it out.  Most people are happily (and silently) eating in the beautiful outdoors.  This means I have a long table in the dining room, all for me and my bad mood.  Then a handsome guy, who looks like Rufus Wainwright (the singer/songwriter/musician), comes over to me.  He stands in front of me.  He sits down right across from me.  As he does these things, he smiles at me, and gazes determinedly into my eyes.  I gaze right back.  We eat in silence, following the rules.  When he finishes his plate, he stands, staring and smiling at me again.  We look smilingly into each other's eyes for a long time.  He has lifted my spirits.  He's like an angel sent to do just that.

Then of course come the stupid, negative thoughts.  "He's helping me the same way he probably volunteers to hold hands with people dying of AIDS."  At this, I laugh out loud. 

First, because it actually could be true that people mean what they say when they say they like me, or even that I am wonderful.  Second, even if "Rufus" sees me as a charity case, good for him!  Why can't I just learn from that, and be like that?  Or maybe he's stark, raving, barking mad.  If so, why can't I be insane like that?  If I could learn to be charitable or insane like Rufus, maybe I'd be happy.

By the way, the sexes are segregated into different "hamlets" here, to avoid precisely the kind of sexually oriented distraction that I'm facing nearly all the time.  How ironic.  So the Order of Interbeing has arranged it so I'm living in "Upper Hamlet," in close proximity to all of the handsome, sexy guys at the retreat.  Ha!   But what else could they do?  They obviously can't put all of us gays and lesbians in one hamlet together.  That would be even worse.  Conundrums like these remind me of that old saying.  "God must have a sick sense of humor."

DHARMA DISCUSSION

I have a great dharma discussion family.  (The "Snow Cherries.")  So many wise people.  So many open people, all seeking truth.   We were asked by the monks to identify our cows.  I said that most of mine were too embarrassing.  Then I blurted out that I'm an alcoholic, even though I am not fully convinced that this is true.

It felt somewhat good, but mostly bad.  Like putting my head out on chopping block.  It was at once like saying, "hey, look at me -- my problem is more dramatic than all of yours," while also saying "hey everybody, I'm damaged goods, so don't waste your time on me."

Which leads to the question.  What do I want?  Clearly, I think I want to be popular with the kind of people I like.  I think I want to be impressive.  I think I want attention.  I think I want to IMPROVE physically, mentally, spiritually, financially, and socially.  But why?  For what?  All of these supposed wants are mistaken.

Can this retreat of 21 days ignite a transformation of my diseased mind?  I actually like the word, "brainwashing."  My brain needs to go through the Super Wash cycle.

Day Three is over.  Evening meditation was good.  Feeling calm, peaceful, and hopeful.

[For you web surfers and other readers who have no idea what I'm blogging about, these are my notes from the 21-day "Breath of the Buddha" retreat last June, with the Vietnamese Buddhist monk, Thich Nhat Hanh, at his monastery in Plum Village, France.]

Comments

[Ursula]

You write so well. It is so exciting to read what you have written even though you were only looking for a place to sit. Thank you for sharing your days at this monestry.

[Padma]

Dear Russell:

A long time ago I dropped you a line, to tell you that we all think that we suffer alone, but we don't.

Anyway, the dharma talk sounded wonderful. I am, as I type, thinking and numbering my cows. Dear Russell, do you feel that the desire for love and acceptance is one of your cows?

Please, let it go. You are perfect, you already are.

Padma

[susan]

This has to be one of the funniest blog entries ever.
I can only imagine my same thoughts at a retreat such as this.
The search for the perfect seat, my cow being the absolute taboo of cows, sexual attraction,
everyone else's assumed happiness and my obsessive negative thoughts.
But hey, you are aware, awake to these patterns. Probably more than most can say (see, my negativity showing through again).
You have to acknowledge them first before you can move past, right?
And anyway, I think you could be a happy, obsessive, gay, popular, yoga practitioner.
It's all the desiring to be something your not that gets in the way...
God really does have a sick sense of humor!
Good Luck,
Susan

[Lauren]

Russell,

I am so glad you have been blogging again. Your blog is one of the most honest and real I have ever seen, and it is incredibly heartbreaking and joyous at the same time. I am a big "fan" (is that even the right word?) of TNH (you call him "Thay"?). So much of what he writes resonates with me. I look forward to more of your notes.

Lauren

[Alan Little]

Regarding the hayfever: I found neti with a neti pot and slatwater helped considerably. The thing that really transformed my life though, and has given me three almost hayfever-free summers after forty years of red eyes, sneezing and streaming, is a kind of high-tech turbo-neti device: http://www.hydromedonline.com/hp.html

... won't help you much while you're sitting in a field in Frnace, but I recommend it whoelheartedly as something to think about later, maybe for next summer

regards
Alan

[Tony]

I was reading your blog regularly a while back, then you stopped writing for a while, and I stopped reading for an even longer time. Quick history of me: I abused substances, in a mostly social context, regularly, frequently and excessively for about 18 years. Establishment of a fairly regular yoga practice helped wean me off this lifestyle addiction. This summer, I read some Krishnamurti, in which he writes at length about all the things that are NOT reality. Among those things is discipline, being something that is usually called upon when there is a goal or aspiration. I.e. discipline is usually called upon when one is trying to become something other than what one is. To shorten the story, I gave up all forms of discipline, including yoga practice, for a period of about two months. End result: ate worse, drank more alcohol (avoided most other drugs, thankfully), became generally lazier and more sedentary, experienced diminished awareness of my feelings, gained 12 pounds, lost self-esteem. My feeling about the experience at this point: pursuits of discipline & the desire to improve may be just another way to avoid confronting who we really are, but I think I'd rather be healthy, happy and endowed with a sense of moving forward in a direction that feels good.