Monthly Archives: May 2008

Daily Life, Out and About, Teachings

Pain Remembered

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Pain. So many thoughts on pain. So many stories about personal pain. Killing pain, pain that kills. Numbing pain, pain that numbs. Tolerating pain, accepting pain. Having the confidence to be in pain. Pain as a gift and a teacher. Pain that never goes away. So very many stories about pain while I’ve been in Edmonton. Not because Edmonton is any more pain filled than anywhere else, it just happens to be where I am right now. There’s always going to be pain where people are, where there is sentience.

Last evening there was a phone call from a congregation member. We’d said good by two years ago not expecting to meet again. I’m on a four hour leave from the emergency department. I need to get my bank business sorted and call relatives to let them know where I am. I’m due back at 8.00, he said. Err, is this really REALLY serious? Nah should be sorted in a couple of days, or so. Hopefully. We met again briefly, perhaps for the last time. One never knows. Here’s a man who does pain with great dignity. Others carry their pain with a smile. With tears. With silence.

Today I saw a cause of pain, a cause from my early life. Minds remember and bodies remember. Body and mind are not separate, thus it’s body/mind remembering. Places carry memories and photographers record those places so they, and the pain they carry, are remembered. That’s what I intended to do as an aspiring young photographer, in the early 1960. Thankfully there are photographers in this world who do that, are doing that. Right now. In Cambodia.

There is a difference though. Between being in pain and being in suffering.

Thanks to Michael for the link.

Teachings

As We Are

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As_our_young_friends_see_us.jpg
As seen and drawn by an eight year old friend.

Admiring the drawing I remarked that my young friend had drawn me with no hair. Her mother replied, Of course, she draws things as she sees them.

Films/Books, Teachings

The Perfect Slime Trail

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In_Flight.jpg

On the ‘plane I watched The Bucket List in which Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman play the lead roles.

A billionaire and a mechanic who meet in a hospital ward for terminally ill patients decide to make an escape and set out on one last trip to fulfill all of their dying wishes.

While the two men wait for news of their flight to Everest, climbing Everest was on their Bucket List, they are shown visiting a Buddhist monastery. It was all gloom, flickering lights and incense smoke. The Jack Nicholson character, ever the skeptic, ponders on the concept of karma and rebirth. I just don’t get it, he says. I mean, what does a slug have to do to get a good rebirth, leave a perfect slime trail? This is fairly typical of the popular view of karma and rebirth. (And of Buddhist monasteries too!) Which runs fairly much along the lines of, be good and you will be reborn into better circumstances. Lead a bad life and you’ll end up a short lived, squashed, fly. Truth is bigger, and more compassionate, than this.

I liked this film. It brought the subject of action (and that’s what karma translates as) into the realm of action, and out of the world of speculation and popular interpretations. There was reflection on past actions and the seeing into the unwisdom’s of those actions. There were scenes depicting the struggle to see those actions for what they were and then scenes which looked at what that means, right now. In short the two men were brought to look at the consequences of their actions and come to an understanding and acceptance of their lives. Find joy in your life, were the dying mans words to the Jack Nicholson character. He could have said, Live life, forget the ideal of perfection, of leaving a perfect trail of slime behind you!

Written for Kevin. This, in part, is my answer to your question. I hope you get the gist of what I’m pointing out. Other teachers in our Order might well see this film and interpret it differently. So be it, there’s no argument.

Out and About

On My Way, Going Properly

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A number of nuns from the Forest Tradition came to visit yesterday afternoon.

After a morning roped to my computer I’d climbed up the hill to sit in the sun and drink in the valley readying myself for tomorrows adventures in the sky. Seeing a monk waving me down, a small figure in the landscape at that distance, I extracted myself from my perch and made my way to meet the nuns. They were already tucking into tea, chocolate and conversation in the common room.

Valley.jpg
This is a picture of our side of the valley where I was sitting. The monastery is in the center of the picture, more or less.

….I would just like to wish you ‘rruga e mbare’ for your journey; loosely this is Albanian for bon voyage but better translated as ‘may your way go properly’ (rruga = way, mbare = properly), an expression I like and that is my wish for your travels.

From Tim. Thanks for keeping in touch. Keep on writing your blog.

Out and About, Teachings

Lamp Unto Oneself

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Our phone conversation was coming to a close. She asked, ‘Is there anything you can suggest I do to help myself during the day’? I asked, ‘Well, is there anything that you can think of? There was a long pause and then the answer came. ‘This might sound strange, given all that I’ve spoken about, however everything is well’.

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Light House, South Shields Northumberland.

“Those who, either now or after I am dead, shall be lamps unto themselves, relying upon themselves only and not relying upon any external help, but holding fast to the truth as their lamp, and seeking their salvation in the truth alone, and shall not look for assistance to any one besides themselves,…”
The Buddha’s Farewell.

Seeking help is not a problem, overly ‘relying’ on or depending upon external help is.

Be a lamp unto yourself…because you are that lamp.