Enlightenment

Stella Doro lily doesn't know it's too late to bloom.  Note the sheltered ladybug.

Salvation, if we can talk about it at all, is the end of ambition, which is when you become completely one with your experience. Knowledge becomes one with wisdom, which is called buddhahood or the awakened state of mind. You realize that you never needed to make the journey at all . . .
Chogyam Trungpa, “The Human Realm,” in Transcending Madness: The Experience of the Six Bardos, page 258.

My main practice is Zen, but with an interest in other streams.  A year or so ago I bought "The Practice of Contemplative Photography," which includes some photographs by Trungpa Rinpoche, and that stimulated my interest in his work.  Like Shunryu Suzuki, he is more difficult to understand than his American followers, but worth the effort.

What these words remind me of is that I am perfectly what I am, what I was made to be by long and wide streams of karma, national, genetic, historical, environmental, and so on.  In Zen we talk about "the self," or "the conditioned self."  At one time I believed my task was to get rid of it.  I did, I believed that, because it was becoming clear to me that my histrionic hypersensitive over-responsible and bipolar self was the source of my suffering.  I remember Daniel Terragno asking me reasonably, "How could you do that?"  I thought we weren't communicating very well.

You cannot not be who you are. Your brain and your butt are the shape they are.  And you are okay.  But (as many teachers have added), you still need to work a little harder.  You may be OCD, but you can learn how to throw away a cereal box. You may be hypersensitive to criticism, but you can learn whose criticism to avoid or how to deflect it. It's bit by bit, inch by inch. There's always work to do

When I started a regular meditation practice, it was in a frenzy of fear that the cancer in my breast would kill me.  This was irrational; it had been discovered on a mammogram at stage one.  Nevertheless, I began doing a white light healing meditation you can find taught all over the world.  From there I somehow moved into just sitting following my breath, then a lot of other practices.  At this point in my life, I was also in torment with my alcoholic family, and they weren't the only people in my life driving me crazy.  That was how I saw life then: they drove me crazy.

There was some truth to that.  Some people are hard to take, and you should have a really good reason to spend time with them.  Over the next couple of years I was going to leave behind several people who just weren't good for me.  It was hard every single time.  Now I am amazed that I ever tolerated them.  But I didn't see the reality then.  My reality was governed by an idea that I should like everyone, tolerate rudeness, cultivate patience, and enjoy pool parties.  I mean, of course. 

You know what?  I like a genuine beach and a nice big body of water, as well as a creek and a waterfall.  I hate swimming pools, chlorine, cold water. It's a matter of personal preferences.  But I had to take swimming lessons and push push push myself to try and try harder - in the face of fibromyalgia pain - because, well, everyone said swimming was good for you.  And I thought I should learn to like it.  And certainly I had to go to my brother's pool parties because, well, he invited me.  Though another thing I really don't like is being around people who are devoting themselves to drinking all day.

One of the things Zen says is that when you are enlightened, you will taste a cup of tea and know for yourself whether the water is hot or cold.  It's a metaphor.  You learn you don't like Carol, and you're cold when you're cold, and hungry when you're hungry.  Other children of alcoholics may recognize the denial of ordinary needs that was enforced in my childhood.

I thought practice would teach me how to handle all the problems in my life back then. It has, including that some things can't be solved.  Also, I often see more clearly now where the problem lies, and how it can be handled.  This is hard for me to say, but there's actually nothing wrong with Carol, and I bet some people like her.  She is what she is.  I just - sorry, I just didn't like her.  And don't miss her.

In short, what I am gradually approaching with practice is not universal joy but being aware.  That includes, though it is not limited to, what you like and don't like, moment by moment.  It applies to many mundane things that can add up to STRESS.  It's very interesting how the little raft takes you far, but not where you thought it was going. 

[In looking up the hot and cold thing, I was led to a dharma talk I think must be by Shinge Roshi, for those who want to think more about this.]

Boredom Ointment

Self-portrait in orange shoelaces

The Vermont Country Catalog came today, and I was leafing through, looking at the supplements they offer us old people - this company is all about nostalgia, and easing old age.  There is a supplement for vertigo, for instance, that you smell to relax your anxiety and help you focus.  It contains lavender and some other essential oils; I approve.  It's fun to think of really old people (older than me) learning to use these hippy-dippy things that came out of the seventies.

I like aromatherapy, which is a science built on the oral tradition. I have a collection of scents I can use to bring me down a little or cheer me up or just relax me.

On the same page in the catalog I came across what I thought was Boredom Ointment.  What?  No, it's Boreoleum Ointment.  Which looks a lot like Vicks Vaporub for your nose.  But I already have a classy Ayurvedic nasal oil from Banyan Botanicals.  Ayurveda is basically another folk-wisdom tradition.

But, Boredom ointment!  If only there were a cream you could dab on and immediately feel interested in yourself and your surroundings.  I googled images for Bored student and got well over 2 million hits.  This seems like a lot, and accurately reflects what my own public schooling was like, but it's only 1% of the number of  hits for Britney.  Why Britney?  I don't know.  I didn't even know  she was the Queen of Pop until I looked her up. 

Anyway, this morning something led me to see that her Facebook page has over 2 million "likes".    Why is that number taunting me?  Because mine has 1,999,62 less, unless it's taken a huge growth spurt since this morning.  I asked why on my personal Facebook page, and haven't had any helpful answers, except that maybe I have too much time on my hands.  I think this difference is a comment on human nature, in fact. I'm a fun person (see photo above), but not as much fun as Britney, I guess.

Actually, these subjects - boredom and Britney- have found themselves side-by-side in my sprawling brain, and pulling weird, anomalous things together is what we artists do.  Britney is not an artist and Buddhist blogger, but an entertainer.  Entertainment is excitement, and seems to fill that big space of being bored or discontented with life or downright unhappy.  It pays much better than art.

Is discontentment the same as boredom?  I think it is, in a way.  There are some writings on boredom in the massive body of work left behind by Chogyam Trungpa, whose page is surprisingly small, with some 21,000 hits, though he was quite entertaining in his lifetime. 

To my surprise, there is no page for Ocean of Dharma, which sends me quotes like the one below from him.  Britney may be the Queen of Pop, but his honorific is Rinpoche, a Tibetan term for a Buddhist teacher which means "precious jewel". 

“Boredom is part of the discipline of meditation practice. This type of boredom is cool boredom, refreshing boredom. Boredom is necessary and you have to work with it. It is constantly very sane and solid, and very boring at the same time. But it’s refreshing boredom. The discipline then becomes part of one’s daily expression of life. Such boredom seems to be absolutely necessary. Cool boredom.” Chogyam Trungpa