prevalence of ritual

Posted on October 11, 2014 by tiramit

POSTCARD#96: A village near Hat Yai: I’m at the wedding of my nephew in the South of Thailand, the only foreigner in the family… nothing for me to do in an event that’s complex and requires all kinds of engagement… mindfulness. I just watch the proceedings, pleased with this sense of generosity in everybody just being here. I have M, my Thai niece with me and she corrects me if I get it wrong. We set off from the groom’s house in a long convoy of cars, a 20 minute drive, then stop on the highway and walk the last 200 yards along the path to the brides house. Musicians up front with Glong Yao drum, cymbals and reed pipe; an eerie, almost discordant kind of wailing song. I wonder how it must feel like for the bride, waiting in her childhood home, and here comes this haunting, archetypal sound of her future husband’s clan calling to her – getting nearer and nearer and louder and louder until it fills the small room she’s in. I’m thinking of tribal things, fertility rituals and magic that changes the course of karmic events. For me, there’s only this; the sense that the ceremony is heavy with meaning; perhaps too, something about belief I used to think was real a long time ago.

The sad truth is that in the West, divorce is about as common as marriage – religion got deconstructed; the story we believed in came to pieces. No myth to feel connected with, except perhaps the myth of no-myth. In a sense, we’re all married to the economy, worship the consumer god, seek refuge, gratification, fulfillment and consolation in the purchase of goods and services. What’s left over after that, in terms of ‘belief, we have to figure out any way we can.

It’s different here, divorce is rare, maybe it’s the prevalence of ritual that – come what may – locks the marriage into this unbreakable bond. The marriage date is selected by an astrologer, taking into account all of the every-day catastrophes and natural disasters, about which most Western folk are happily unaware. Any begrudged spirits are appeased so that a date can be selected which is completely surrounded by joyful blessings and good fortune – the belief that the spiritual world is real is what causes it to be so. I feel like I’m watching a different movie, maybe more meaningful than the cultural movie we watch in the West, maybe I’m drawn towards this version more, now that 30 years have gone by – or maybe it’s too restricting for me and I’m on the outside looking in. Maybe that’s okay too.

Lengthy ceremonies for many hours, Buddhist monks chanting, holy markings made by an elder’s fingertips dipped in special paste and pressed lightly on their forehead, and a sacred cord sai monkonor is placed on their heads [see below]. They kneel with their arms on a decorative pillow, palms together in the ‘wai’ position, and family members take turns to pour water over their hands.

It was a long day for me sitting outside the house under this huge pink canopy. My niece M came to join me later, and I was facing away from the main group so I make a face of bored weariness for her and she laughs. Do the face again Toong Ting and I try to do it again, but can’t get it right. Do same face you do before Toong Ting! She insists. So I try all kinds of grotesque weird faces, a whole anthology of faces that go on and on until I’m thinking I’m going slightly mad, and she laughs a lot, but obviously tired. Somebody had to take her home. It was a long day for the couple too, when I saw them eventually, they looked exhausted, although the bride was strangely wide-eyed and alert – I was astonished, something about a kind of awareness that takes place at the end of something endless….

‘The fact that we can never “fully know” reality is not a sign of the limitation of our knowledge, but the sign that reality itself is “incomplete,” open, an actualization of the underlying virtual process of Becoming.’ [Slavoj Zizek]

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The title of this post is taken from an anthogy of Romare Bearden collage artworks

interconnectedness

Posted on September 28, 2014 by tiramit

POSTCARD#94: Chiang Mai: I’ve been without my computer for about two weeks now. When I tell people this they’re shocked; but how are you able to… I mean, survive without the internet? This is it exactly, no words to describe it; grief, loss, mourning. It’s like somebody died and the world just moves on regardless. The empty space in the middle of the desk where the computer used to be is gradually becoming a convenient place to put things; a cup of coffee, a book, odds and ends – it’s returning to the original ‘desktop’ state (no metaphor intended). I write with a pen on lined paper in an actual ‘notebook’. Back to the basics… oil lamps and candles, I want to live in a cottage in the forest, grow vegetables, chop wood. But instead of that I’m in Chiang Mai City and have convinced myself that walking two miles every day (there and back) to a nice Internet cafe is good exercise.

Heavy urban traffic, often no pavement at all and obstructions like a temporary structure, fried chicken vendor/street food cooking place set up in the pedestrian area – getting the customers’ attention – I have to negotiate with the environment to get through. Cooking smells and traffic hazards, locked-in loving-kindness in conscious mind is necessary. Mindfulness is necessary in order to not be flattened by a passing cement truck. This is the developing world, Asian cultural behaviour just allows it to happen, everything in close proximity to everything else. Take a photo of the hundreds of cables slung between poles I think are phone lines. Connectedness, the true meaning of the term, extended family; people have to have contact with each other all the time. There’s no such thing as overcrowding, it has always, always been like this.

In pre-modern times perception was more associated with the narrative, the story by-word-of-mouth about how it all came to be like this. Now it’s a different kind of reality, a reality without a myth – or a myth that evolved over time to include the social order mechanism, television, and now it disincludes the Godman, the DIY awakening factor – don’t be too concerned about that folks, the Centre of Worship is doing it on your behalf. Not so, here in Asia, that uneasy feeling in the core of my being cannot be filled with some kind of truly invasive commercial product. It’s not a ‘hunger’ aroused by created opportunities we are encouraged to keep seeking. It’s a received knowing that extends through all and everything, a kind of interconnectedness that’s always there, an awareness of the uncountable cells in an organism and multiple organisms within organisms – all of it.

Out of the street and into the cool interior of the Internet cafe. Nice people say hello as I find my place. Log in and download the text file I sent from my phone earlier in the day. Having no computer at home means I have to write my posts using the phone keyboard one-fingeredly and awkward, but learning how to develop skills in defeating the spellchecker that goes around changing all the words unasked-for. Something interesting arises in the engagement with it; having to invent solutions to problems I’m not immediately familiar with. Intuitive reaching must be something I have learned through living with local people in Asian countries for more than thirty years; trying to understand the world as seen through their eyes.

An aloneness, maybe… it motivates this reaching out. ‘The internet is an extended sense organ’, all known bloggers in the world scattered around in their geographical locations, but really all contained in conscious awareness – we couldn’t be anywhere else! I can’t see you, or hear you. I can’t touch you and will never ‘meet’ you in the normal sense of the word, I just know you’re there, or here inside me, or where we all are… curious how it’s the awareness of loving-kindness that activates it.

‘… Not a single particle out “there” exists with real properties until it’s observed… reality is a process that involves consciousness.’ [Robert Lanza]

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The internet is an extended sense organ,’ from a comment by Michael in the post titled ‘grounded‘ Excerpts from other comments included here.

– G R A T I T U D E –

loving-kindness for the unloved

Posted on September 22, 2014 by tiramit

POSTCARD#93: Chiang Mai: Nine-o’clock-in-the-morning rush downtown in a tuktuk, traffic is okay, no hold-up at the lights, one large swerve to the right and it’s a long straight run to the mall building where I’m headed – have to pay a phone bill, overdue for four months and they disconnected me. Sorry about that… ah well, they probably figured I was out of the country, no problem, I’d be back eventually. Foreigners (farangs) mix with the population here like benign extraterrestrials, disappear sometimes then reappear later.

Tuktuk takes me right into the mall car park, jump out, pay the driver and there are steps straight down into the basement arcade. Ask the lady there at Information for directions to the phone place and set off in the direction she indicates… can’t find it, searching and searching, it’s not there. So I go into this other phone place and ask them if they know where the place I’m looking for is. Oh, they say, this is the place, you’re in it – yes, we changed the name, you see… laughter. Fine, okay, and I’m not sure if I’m happy, or a bit upset about it – what’s going on here? Have a quick look around; everybody wearing turquoise and lime green costumes to match the same colour-coordinated interior and huge logo above our heads. A total makeover, new look with pale pigmented, cosmetic faces of little women who smile all the time.

So this seems to be very welcoming, I give my number over at the desk and it takes a moment to realise I’m not talking to a woman but it’s a small man, not overtly feminized, but wearing orange lipstick and disconcerting dental brace — smiles open-mouthed and giggles… going for the orthodontic barbed-wire look. Some caution required here, these effeminate guys can be a bit bitchy, but he (she) is okay, self-effacing, small gestures, acting the part, making a thing out of not being able to speak English, and doesn’t hear when I reply in Thai. The upset feeling I was having is gone when I contemplate this example of the human condition. Compassion for what that must be like. The gist of it, though, is that they need to have my passport, and I didn’t bring it. There’s no way they can do this without a passport, sollee na kha (uses feminine gender honorific).

What to do? No point in getting upset, this is Thailand, nobody gets upset, if there’s any difficulty, it just goes into slo-mo and everybody is really, really careful… the tension in the air like a wine glass about to shatter when the violinist plays exactly the right high-pitched note in resonant frequency. And structural integrity gives way, POP!… but it doesn’t usually get that far – just prolonged holding. I can feel an accumulation of negativity – something unloved beginning to appear at the edge of my vision, gives me a poke in the ribs, Hey! Yeh, been here before; the aversion is about ‘me’ struggling to accept the reality of it being there. Accept it, allow it in to conscious awareness, let it be there… but I’m still struggling with it. It’s the thought I have to go back for my passport – but it’s about registration, that’s all, it’s normal, should be easy enough.

It’s somewhere around here that I realise I’m concocting this whole scenario based on an attached memory of things that aren’t very lovable – I can’t love that thing; unlovable, unloved. Kinda hopeless and childish, but I can have loving-kindness mettā for the feeling that I can’t do it; loving-kindness for my resistance to loving the unloved. Walk back along the corridor, up the steps and out across the car park, there’s a tuktuk. Tell the driver where to go and we’re speeding back up the way I came, slow down at the lights wide turn left and soon back at the apartment. Jump out, ask the driver to wait, into the building, up in the lift, in. Get the passport, down again and we’re off back downtown again, wide turn right after the lights, and a straight run back to the mall.

Back to the turquoise and lime green renovated place and by this time things have woken up a bit, more people, more staff than customers. The ‘person’ with the dental work and orange lipstick greets me like an old friend. We get the paperwork done in about a minute and I’m out. Texting everybody to say hello: Hi, yes I’m here in Chiang Mai and it’s good to be back.

‘By reminding ourselves to have metta for the feelings we experience – not thinking about them or analysing them but going to the place in the body itself, to the mental quality, really embracing that – really being willing to feel those particular emotions, they become bearable. By changing our attitude to one of acceptance rather than of rejection, to interest, rather than just wanting to get rid of them, we find that they are things we can tolerate. Then they cease on their own, for all conditions are impermanent.’ [‘Universal Loving Kindness‘ by Ajahn Sumedho, Forest Sangha Newsletter, October 1997, Number 42]

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loving-kindness for the critical mind

Posted on September 19, 2014 by tiramit

POSTCARD#92: Chiang Mai: Writing this on the iPhone keyboard, shadowy index finger blocks out the whole letter. The letters ‘O’ and ‘P’ are difficult, I try to type ‘M’ and hit the backspace instead. Requires a certain kind of patience… it’s amazing what you can do if you have to. My computer is with the technician — went there immediately after arriving in Chiang Mai Tuesday morning. A red-eye flight from Delhi, only three and a half hours, no time to sleep – watching videos all night. Arrive in Bangkok at 5.30 am, a huge commercial project, the bright lights and glitz of 24/7 enhanced shopping experience. Passengers from all parts of the world gather at the domestic terminal lounge — we all wear a yellow transit sticker on the lapel — everybody having spent the night in an aircraft, bleary-eyed and hypnotised by inflight videos.

Then dispersed on different domestic flights North, South, East, West, and I arrive in Chiang Mai at 9.15am, a bit bewildered in the daylight of the arrival hall. Waiting for my bag… waiting, and waiting, but it doesn’t come. All the other bags have gone and now there’s just the belt itself moving round. Where’s my bag? My small volume of clothes folded flat, papers, books, computer cables zipped up tight, X-rayed and pushed into its space in the aircraft baggage. WHERE is it? My bag is ‘me’ an assembled ID, a costumed and shoed, hair-combed identikit. This is who ‘I’ am!

Man in uniform comes along, competent, in-charge attitude; looks at me over his glasses and asks to see my luggage tag number. He takes it to his desk, studies his document for a moment and makes a call (I’m watching him at his desk), comes back and informs me my bag was not loaded on the plane and it’s still in transfer at Bangkok… pause, he looks me in the eye, assessing my capacity for patience. Please write your address here and we will deliver it later today. His demeanour tells me he knows about this problem; he also knows how to handle worn-out passengers living in a video world. There’s an empathy and ease about his movements. Maybe he used to be a monk, a Maha Thera, all men in Thailand become monks for a short time. Some for a long time.

Meanwhile, I’m standing there like a satellite dish antenna pointed at the sky, receiving the signal, interpreting data – how should I respond to this devastating news? Make a huge scene? No, let’s not do that, long inhalation of in-breath, relaxed release of the out-breath. Man in uniform still waiting for a reply… there’s something quiet and easy about him. Just looking at me… calm eyes, one eyebrow lifted slightly, as if to say, is that going to be okay with you sir? Inner well-being, and there’s a feeling that, yes, it could be okay. Even if I did get upset, it still means my bag is not here, and having to wait for it anyway.

He walks me over to his desk and holds the form in the centre of my vision, finger pointing at a space where I’m supposed to sign my name. Is this the no-responsibility waiver? Am I signing away all my rights? Everything written in Thai, do I have to get my dictionary out? Oh no, it’s in the bag. Sign it, sign it! Thank you very much, bye-bye, nice man. Walk away to the taxi area with no bag, no trolley, hands free, hands in pockets, hands swinging by my side as I walk. Get to the apartment, shower and dress up in a bizarre arrangement of light cotton beach-wear. Fall asleep on the sofa for two hours, then the doorbell goes ping-pong, it’s my bag delivered and rolling in on its wheels, just like the man said.

‘… have loving-kindness for your dislike of the way it is, so you are not even criticizing yourself for being critical… Even if you are sitting here hating yourself, thinking of yourself as selfish and critical and not a very nice person, you can have metta for that; you can have loving-kindness for the critical mind.” [Ajahn Sumedho, ‘ Liberating Emotions‘]

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9/11/2014 “the big lie”

Posted on September 6, 2014 by tiramit

A Buddhist Reflection: I’m trying to find a way to write this post to fit with how I’ve been writing it these last two years [2013 and 2012] and not get caught up in the greater catastrophe that 9/11 has become in the 13 years since it happened. It’s impossible to think about the event and not include the possibility that there’s more to this than meets the eye. The realization weighs heavily on us. The sadness and grieving now is that the big lie is here, situated amongst the ordinary things in our world; lives being lived, sleeping, eating, busy with work, women bearing children, raising families, birth and death.

‘… in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation more readily fall victim to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying.’ [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, vol. I, ch. X]

The big lie needs to be brought into the light where it can be seen clearly because the tendency is for things that look like they should be hidden to stay hidden. So many things hidden and nothing revealed in the official 9/11 investigation in 13 years, except that it’s been proved there were no Weapons of Mass Destruction, Osama bin Laden was captured, killed and body thrown in the sea. The parallel ‘Truth’ investigation, however, continues to come up with more and more scientific evidence revealing the big lie. It’s this that has convinced me I need to know more about what really happened, painful though it may be. Yesterday I spent 5 hours looking at the video: September 11 – the new Pearl Harbour. It’s in three parts (link below) and if you watch it, you’ll come out the other end a different person.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DOnAn_PX6M

Whether the truth comes out or not, or to what extent, is not as important as dealing with the strong possibility of it being true. What effect does that have on me, how do I feel about it? The following is an excerpt from, ‘A Buddhist Reflection on the Tragedy of September 11’ by Ajahn Jayasaro, published in 2001:

“As Buddhists, we devote ourselves to learning how to maintain clarity of mind, fundamental compassion and intelligence, as a constant inner refuge. It is not so difficult to be clear about issues which don’t personally affect us, or those which provoke no strong feelings. The real challenge is to be awake even in the midst of a hurricane of emotions — when we are hurt and betrayed, angry and afraid. Clarity of mind means that when things get rough we can still receive the blessings of the principles we uphold. Inner clarity is thus the ground in which the dignity and meaning of life can grow.

An inner refuge does not come easily. It can only be brought about by a thoroughgoing commitment to this life education, a training of the way we live internally and externally. Buddhist teachings are seen then, in summary, not as dogmas to be believed in (or rejected), but tools to be made use of. We use the teachings to understand ourselves and our experiences in life, to understand other people and the world we live in. Then basing ourselves on that understanding, we seek to create as much authentic happiness and benefit for ourselves and others as we can.”

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Source for header image: Rob Clark/Institute – From my roof on 9-11

enigma

Posted on August 26, 2014 by tiramit

POSTCARD #89: Delhi: Why is it that the back of somebody’s head is so much like a closed door? I’m standing in a line of people in the food store waiting with my purchases for my turn to pay at the check-out. It’s taking a long time and I’m wondering if I’m feeling a bit miffed about that, yes or no – anyway there’s this quiet awareness, curious and interesting. When I see the back of somebody’s head I immediately want to turn that person around with a hand on the shoulder and see who it is…. Hi there! How’re you getting on? But, can’t do that in the food store check-out line, of course, we’re all strangers and each of us isolated in this slightly tetchy discontent about having to wait… what’s happening down there? This is our predicament, looking at the backs of people’s heads in front of us, all the way down to the front. I’m moving my head from side to side, trying to see past all the other heads. But all the way down the line, other heads are doing the same thing and my line of vision is blocked by somebody else’s head moving from side to side because the head in front of them is in the way too. Funny to see all these sideways wobbling heads. I have a quick look behind me and everybody is having to do the same thing to see past me… no laughing matter, there’s a grumbling in the air.

Stand quietly, feet apart, evenly balanced and look at the back of the head of man in front. There’s a kind of frontality about the head. The face is on the front, of course, eyes look forwards, incoming data is received mostly from the front – ears are on the sides, but sideways functioning is limited. No sensory receptors on the back that have the function of sensing what’s going on in the world. Any backwards movement is blind, no rear-view mirror… trucks reversing out with that automatic beep-beep, beep-beep, beep-beep sound.

The human body is like a picture painted on a flat cardboard cutout. The whole back of my head and body is one large blind spot; a not-seeing that I know is there. Turn away, and suddenly the thing I was looking at is gone! Ignorance is a kind of ignoring – it has intelligence. I have the ability to overlook things, watch TV every day, and have ‘preferences’. I choose to be unconcerned about wars created by politicians. Prefer to be mesmerized by the reflected screen-glow of the digital device...searching for an object and never finding it. Move on, click something else, the appearance of reality holds my attention for a moment, then click on the next one. Am I really the ‘me’ I think I am? I can see that the ‘self’ is a construct, but the truth is hidden from me because there is no solid enduring self that sees it like this.

Idiosyncratic humanness caught in an unexpected circumstance. Waiting, but not that suspended state of waiting for the thing I’m waiting for; more like just waiting with the waiting. Being with the gentle in-breath/out-breath, the temperature of the air, the feel of the body standing there, and an easy observation of everything that’s happening. Balance, openness – poised between things in a place of emptiness. It’s all just moving along. There’s a gentle questioning of events as they arise… what’s this now? The moment transforms itself, observing the curiosity of it, mindfully placing one foot after the other, slowly and carefully, on stepping-stones that lead out into the river and over to the other side.

Let the water settle and you will see moon and stars mirrored in your being. [Rumi]

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Upper image, ‘Not to be Reproduced’ (La reproduction interdite), a painting by Magritte 1937. excerpts from an earlier post: a sea of people. For the insight into ‘waiting’, special thanks to Zen Doe and The Path of Waiting – G R A T I T U D E –

surfing on the edge of dawn

Posted on August 12, 2014 by tiramit

POSTCARD #86: Delhi 05:00 hours: When I open the glass doors to the garden, the temperature outside is the same as it is inside. This is such a novelty for me, having recently arrived from Northern Europe where there’s always that early morning chill separating outer from inner. Over here, it’s all of a oneness. I want to drag my mattress and bedclothes through, spread them out on the paving stones here and lie down with my pillow. Then I could gaze up at the tall trees in the early morning sky and listen to the birds. A birdsong extravaganza, surfing on the edge of dawn… why this wild party and glorious singing? What’s going on? Such an accumulation of voice – is this what we call God? …somehow, it doesn’t cover it, ‘god’ is just a word, man-made. The actuality of it is as far as the eye can see, daylight spreading over the curvature of the planet and an immeasurable sense of sky.

Impossible to understand the totality of it, of course, the mind is a filter, selecting the data to suit the software, and this may be a sound-realm on a scale only birds are aware of. In the darkness they can hear the sound of the other birds over there on the other side of dawn, where it’s already light, and that’s the signal to engage in this shared event. It’s like a football stadium crowd performing “the wave.” A movement in time that’s always present in the here-and-now – same at every location. Light-colour-sound, daybreak and birdsong are inseparable. It fills the air for about 20 minutes then disappears. At the next place in time and space, the birds respond to it there; the Mother Ship – applause, celebration, rejoice, and it moves on. Incredible mystery… it’s the movement of the planet, I need to remind myself, the rotation of the Earth at more than 1000 miles per hour, and always happening like this, of course. The dawn chorus is always being experienced in some part of the world. Continuous birdsong since whenever birds first populated the planet…

From this location in North India, it’s shifting away Westerly, in the direction of the Middle East and on to the Mediterranean countries. The birdsong of Palestine, of Israel, Greece, then Florence, Portugal. Over the Atlantic Ocean, isolated flocks of gulls rise up from the water’s surface, calling and mewing in the golden sky. On from there to the Eastern Seaboard of the US, across the forests, rivers and mountains of the continent and out over the Pacific.

It does not appear or disappear.
It is not born and does not die.
It is neither constructed nor raised up,
Neither made nor produced.
It is neither sitting nor lying,
Neither walking nor standing still,
Neither moving nor turning over,
Neither at rest nor idle.
It does not advance or retreat,
Knows not safety or danger,
Neither right nor wrong.
It is neither virtuous nor improper.
It is neither this nor that,
Neither going nor coming.

From the Lotus Sutra

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Photo: Birds in sunrise sky/ID 7756984 Xdrew/ Dreamstime.com

over the horizon

Posted on July 29, 2014 by tiramit

‘Through our eyes, the Universe is perceiving itself. Through our ears, the Universe is listening to its harmonies. We are the witnesses through which the Universe becomes conscious of itself.’ [Alan Watts]

POSTCARD #83: London – Delhi flight: Clouds cover the landscape, with openings here and there where I can see the ground below. England is a patchwork quilt of very small fenced enclosures, little houses built with brick and stone that last for hundreds of years. Concrete bulwarks along the coastline, the idea of the sea engulfing the land is psychological. A united Kingdom huddled together on land space so small it’s almost not there at all. Travel across from East to West and in a few hours you come to the sea again. Geographical aloneness, an island mentality, the idea of ‘self’, marooned, I am contained, separate from everything, surrounded by water, the world is out ‘there’. Not much room, just enough space for everything, a smallness, memories are close by and everything is near at hand. The buildings and the land were all here before I was born and will be here after I’m gone. Children learn about the everlasting ‘soul’ living in an objective world; belief in a ‘self’ yet… seeing only the lack of it, a lifetime spent looking for an answer to this puzzle – it must be… over the horizon somewhere.

Somewhere far away from not ‘being’ but being busy doing things. Somewhere distant from the default settings the world of money and power depends on. The system hijacked the Jesus Teachings and now there’s no place in society for a contemplative spiritual life. Nothing to encourage children to look beyond sensory gratification and see through perception because it works better to have an unknowing population addicted to television and consumer goods. Living with an intensity fueled by greed, hatred and delusion, instead of generosity, loving-kindness and insight. The worship of self rather than selflessness.

In a discussion with one of the monks at Aruna Ratanagiri Monastery in UK the question came up, what does the word ‘contemplation’ actually mean? Contemplating contemplation… the state of mind where everything is seen as an awareness of present experience, circumstances which can’t be explained in any terms other than what they are. Thinking stops and the mind opens up to experience as it is – not as it’s verbalised. Sometimes language just gets in the way. Like waking up after a good night’s sleep and there’s the solution to the puzzle I was thinking about before I went to sleep. No words, no memory, no markers in the mind for thought to attach to and somehow everything falls into place.

We call it a grain of sand,
but it calls itself neither grain nor sand.
It does just fine, without a name,
whether general, particular,
permanent, passing,
incorrect, or apt.

The window has a wonderful view of a lake,
but the view doesn’t view itself.
It exists in this world
colorless, shapeless,
soundless, odorless, and painless.

The lake’s floor exists floorlessly,
and its shore exists shorelessly.
The water feels itself neither wet nor dry
and its waves to themselves are neither singular nor plural.
They splash deaf to their own noise
on pebbles neither large nor small.

And all this beneath a sky by nature skyless
in which the sun sets without setting at all
and hides without hiding behind an unminding cloud.
The wind ruffles it, its only reason being
that it blows. [Wislawa Szymborska]

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The header image source: Aruna Ratanagiri Monastery.

Poem source: superaalifragilistic, View With A Grain Of Sand.

The Alan Watts quote source: Zen Flash, Through our eyes the Universe is perceiving itself

– G R A T I T U D E –

the silence of objects

Posted on June 16, 2014 by tiramit

POSTCARD#73: Delhi: The rain stops around 5am. It’s been going most of the night, rattling down on the atelier roof window. Pleasantly deafening… the novelty of it. Rain! So long since we’ve had rain – the hot season is coming to an end! It’s enough to just lie in bed and listen to it falling in great patterns of syncopated rhythm I feel must have had a beginning somewhere… drifting in and out of sleep until it stops. Stillness, the sense of a sailing ship becalmed. The feeling of the in-breath in the nasal cavities, allowing the universe to enter and pass through this sensory organism. The deep knowledge of it – awareness of these surroundings, these circumstances and this quiet state of at-ease alertness.

Daylight. Time to get up, bare feet on cool stone slabs: pita, pata, pit, pat, pata, pit, pit… stop and look out the window; everything is totally wet out there. Aware, suddenly, of cold feet, consciousness of a physical object, contact with the world. Aware of thought and aware of no-thought. Awareness of the cognitive function and waking up to this pastel coloured pinkish, grey-blue dawn light spreading through the rooms, along the corridor leading to the front and out through glass doors to the tiled patio, shiny with wetness… and up there, a silver sky. In the darkness of the room things slowly begin to be seen, and the memory of the night before returns; objects, a pen, a cup, papers scattered around, left in the position they were in, unmoved. Cup handle sticks out, waiting for fingers to come and hold it… a quiet presence. The silence of inanimate things, neutrality, accepting it all as it is, awareness of objects and non-objects, the motionless space where everything is situated, context and content, awareness of that which normally passes unseen.

Tall buildings all around us, standing there like huge objects placed in a vast landscape… the clouds above, layer upon layer up into the vaulted sky. Their shadows cast over our small house, single storied, old wood-frame windows, thatched structure on top, roof garden and trees at the door… as if we were in a mountain valley surrounded by tall cliffs and the sun reaches us for only a few hours a day. Our perception of the universe is as tiny as it is for micro-organisms that live at the bottom of the ocean, remotely aware that far above them the sun is shining. The slightest change in light conditions in that underwater glimmer, the smallest increase in light calibration enters consciousness and brings with it a great brilliance of illumination. They can contemplate being present to their cold darkness, knowing that this is not the only experience in the world because the sun is shining inside their heart.

“If you want to awaken all of humanity, then awaken all of yourself, if you want to eliminated the suffering in the world, then eliminate all that is dark and negative in yourself. Truly the greatest gift you have to give is that of your own self-transformation.” [Lao Tzu]

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Note: this post contains excerpts from an earlier post titled Spaciousness of Being.

Image: Francisco de Zurbarán, Bodegón or Still Life with Pottery Jars, 1636

Thanks to: Living Success 3D for the Lao Tzu quote, which appears in the post titled: The Greatest Gift to Give.

flying away

Posted on May 26, 2014 by tiramit

POSTCARD#68: Phuket: We’re leaving today. Packing the bags takes up most of the early morning and M doesn’t say anything. Very soon we’ll check out, say goodbye to our rooms and never be back. The enigma of the hotel room, a location in time and space inhabited for a short time then it’s gone. Furniture is used; marble floor walked on – years and years of housekeeping staff have swept, swabbed and polished this floor. Such a beautiful thing ignored, M sits with me. Internet connection not good, no iPad – flying away in her mind already. Jumps up and goes over to the thin lace curtain at the window, pulls it around her narrow body, extends a leg and points her toe – looks along and down at how the folds of fabric fall like an exotic gown to the floor, then spins around in a twirl and skips away to somewhere else in the room.

The others are busy packing away bathroom things; nothing remains for me to do here. Sitting in the upholstered chair, see how that feels…. breath enters like a wind gusting in, withdraws. It comes back, blows through then it’s not there again. A great emptiness opens up, I might easily fall into a joyful state and believe that this is “it” but everything changes, anicca, everything changes. It’s about the on-going experiential response – what else could it be about? Skin, muscle, flesh, and these mysterious organs held by ligaments bonded into a skeletal structure. I am the context for the outer content. The whole investigation is one that is open to following where the mind leads, see where it goes, how it reacts. Conscious awareness of how the mind is able to concentrate and to what extent – passageways of insight open in an instant and are gone.

Then later in the breakfast room, M selecting food items from silver dishes, everything done in a dream, eyes glazed over; watching a movie in her head, a story about what’s going on around her. Holding her big white plate so it’s level, places it with mindfulness on the table, descending like a UFO landing. Sits next to me – I feel her presence/absence. She likes the hotel silverware flashing like swords. Takes the large fork and stabs a sausage as if it were trying to escape – that wriggling sausage can’t get away. Begins a vigorous sawing motion with knife held in the right hand, breakfast table moves with the vibration, coffee nearly spills from the cup. Cuts off less than 1/4 inch, lays down knife, fork transferred to the right hand like a weapon in battle… stabs the tiny portion of sausage and the trapped morsel travels up to the mouth. I count more than 20 chewing movements, up/down up/down, masticated beyond belief. She’s lost interest, forgotten about it. A few other nibbles and the rest of it is left untouched.

Wait in the hotel lobby, look at people we don’t know, will never see again, then into the van and away to the airport. Through the crowds, check-in, departure gate, boarding and we’re in our seats. The takeoff sends me to sleep, I have a short dream: gentle voices of friends talking, I hear my name mentioned with loving-kindness… it occurs to me that I’m dead. Wake up suddenly and ask M, beside me, did she say something? No answer, playing with her prince and princess dolls on the fold-down table. Silence, one held in each hand – relationships, a dialogue, events taking place in the mind…

‘The world outside is our consciousness…. It is not something separate and distinct. The object and the subject of perception inter-are. Without subject, there is no object; without object, there is no subject. They manifest at the same time. To see means to see something. The seer does not exist separately from the seen; they manifest at the same time. If you imagine that the seer is independent and goes out in order to see the seen, that is a mistaken perception.’ [Thich Nhat Hanh, “The Buddhist Understanding of Reality”]

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