How Things Unwind
According to Buddhist teachings on the mind, there are different ways that thoughts are resolved into Awareness or pure consciousness. One is described as similar to the coils of a snake naturally unwinding themselves. If one simply sits with an apparent dilemma or with any mental phenomena, it unwinds itself naturally. This is called resolving and is an ongoing process.
After one becomes firmly established in Awareness, the resolution process is described as being like a thief entering an empty house. The thief is faced with nothing to steal, nothing to do. The dilemma no longer exists.
I realized that I still had a dilemma, since I was reacting with negative emotions. When I first visited the ashram, Swamiji told me that I would be the one to teach him Buddhism. It had all looked very positive. But once there, I found that when I tried to present my ideas to Swamiji, he immediately and viscerally reacted against them. We sparred in our usual way. My sister’s visit, two months after my surgery, brought this into focus.
She agreed with my assessment of the situation, which was in itself very healing for me. She tried to convince Swamiji that the gonpa had been good for me and that it was a good place which she herself had visited and benefited from. She got nowhere and saw his resistant attitudes. But she also saw my intransigence. She told me I had to stop being confrontive. As always, it was the Mars. I was so combative, argumentative, and competitive that no matter how I masked it or swallowed it, the energy of it came through and set off Swamiji. How perfect!
I decided that I had to give up combat and find a way to express myself independently. I was supported by a new astrological interpretation. The whole house system put my north node in the first house, the house of independence. So I declared my independence - in an inner way, of course.
I just gave up wanting the means of expression to be given to me. I decided that this was up to me and so I prepared to take the reins and to leap into the abyss once again. Upon coming to this decision, a great calm descended. I began to pray to the universe to provide a way for me to move forward without any negativity. Upon making this decision, I no longer felt trapped and my great love for Devi and Swamiji was unblocked.
It felt so good and so right. There were numerous positive signs - invitations, possibilities, openings. I began a meditation group in a suburb of Melbourne where I used any terminology I wished. It wasn’t that much different from the meditation groups I led at the ashram, but the participants were not Swami Shankarananda’s disciples, which made a subtle difference.
Teaching independently and writing this piece provided me with an outer resolving, and my meditation practice continues to provide me with inner resolving. Again and again and again, there is letting go of the sense of dilemma, of the sense of negativity, of the sense of being tied up in a knot. The resolving goes on and on.
Give Up All Negativity
One of the most powerful and life transforming teachings I received from Lama Drimed was in an advanced dzogchen retreat. It was a very simple teaching, which was, “Give up all negativity.” It was explained that this was the key to success in practice. I was profoundly stirred by this simple teaching and have made efforts to put it into practice in my life. It was quite easy while living at the gonpa, since by the end, there were no difficult relationships for me there.
During my time at the gonpa, however, there was one relationship to which I knew I had to apply this teaching and that was my relationship with Gurumayi. When I decided to leave her, I was too afraid to be honest about it and instead crept away under the pretense of going to New York City to study NLP. My fear, dishonesty and negative feelings had festered as an inner wound for years.
Because I had left the ashram in such a cowardly and defeated way, I was very happy that I had been able to leave the gonpa so positively. When I left the gonpa to move to Australia, I was open and honest about what I was doing and Lama Drimed was extremely loving and supportive. Little by little I was bringing light to dark places in my psyche.
I had blamed Gurumayi for many things for a long time. That had melted away during my stay at the gonpa, when I really began to see that my own karma and stuckness was the cause of my suffering in every situation. There was a period during which I had very frequent dreams of her, which came to an end along with a positive feeling.
Once at the gonpa, one of my housemates came to my room and told me that there was a woman who was a disciple of Gurumayi’s attending a program there and that she had been told she should see me. I said OK and she soon arrived. When she saw my pictures of Baba and Bhagawan Nityananda and Ananda Mayi Ma sitting side by side with pictures of Dudjom Rinpoche, Chagdud Rinpoche, Lama Drimed and others, she burst into tears.
She had felt a split between her love and loyalty to Gurumayi and her new relationship with Lama Tsering, an American woman lama who was a disciple of Chagdud Rinpoche. We spoke for a while and I tried to reassure her that she could have both connections in her heart.
This also helped me subtly because I found myself in the position of supporting someone who loved Gurumayi. I visited this woman’s center where she invited me to lead the Tara puja at a satsang program. She also held a Siddha Yoga program on a different night. She was a loving devotee and this to me trumped any notions of correct or incorrect which I would have previously held. I saw that with Gurumayi’s retirement from public life, the universe had handed her on to another beautiful woman guru.
When I got to Australia and unpacked, I put up the pictures of Gurumayi which had been packed away since I had left South Fallsburg in 1992. It felt liberating. I took the idea of unpacking completely as a metaphor for the inner process of resolving. It is another way of bringing light to dark places, in this case the darkness of old suitcases. Writing has also had this effect.
One night about 9 months after I moved to Australia, I had a very vivid dream of Gurumayi and decided to write her a loving letter. Shortly thereafter I received a facebook invitation from an old friend who was close to Gurumayi. I assumed that because she was contacting me she had left the ashram, but when I wrote back and asked where she was and what she was doing, she said she was still in South Fallsburg.
I intuitively knew it was a mystical response to the letter I had written to Gurumayi but hadn’t mailed. What I mean by “mystical” is that I don’t think it was in anyone’s conscious mind that this communication was happening. It was a message for me only. At least I chose to interpret it in this way.
I sent a message to this old friend conveying my love to Gurumayi and never heard from her again. I discovered that I had only love in my heart for her, as well as the conviction that she was doing well and in a very good space. This was a kind of miraculous culmination to a slow recovery.
One thing I got from the Buddhists was a meditation practice in which the thoughts in the mind, when left alone, will resolve themselves. It is a way of holding the mind without interfering in any way, whether by indulging, rejecting, antidoting, or reacting to the various thoughts which play in the mind.
This training in meditation is now applied to the living of life in which karmic events arise both inside and outside. The challenge is to hold a place of oneness and openness and at the same time participate in the dance of life without a sense of separation. This is the essence of what I have received from the spiritual path.
Yoga Means To Join
At the end of November, I was invited to a reunion of all the people Baba had given sannyas to. It would take place in Santa Fe in June, 2010. Swami Chetanananda very generously offered to buy me an airline ticket so that I could attend this event. I sensed that things were in motion for me.
As time went by and with the inner decision made to move forward with my own work, I began to see that the model I had had about coming to Australia for the benefit of Swamiji and Devi had been egoic. I was ridden with agendas for other people. A true bodhisattva does not aim to correct errors, to mold others or to fix anyone. The real way to be a bodhisattva is to embody the motivation. It is about loving everyone just as they are, without an agenda to change them. As always, life is the true guru.
I have always loved Sharada Devi, the wife of Ramakrishna Paramahansa. She is known for her teaching on not seeing faults in others. On her deathbed, she uttered the following words, “My child, if you want peace, then do not look into anybody’s faults. Look into your own faults. Learn to make the whole world your own. No one is a stranger, my child; the whole world is your own.” These were words I had long cherished as an aspiration.
It has been a challenge to tame my obstreperous mind. Once in the 80’s, I was hanging out with a group of Baba’s swamis and one of them presented us with a zen riddle or koan. There is a goose in a bottle. The goose is large and the neck of the bottle is very small. There is no way the goose can get out through the neck of the bottle. The question is how to get the goose out of the bottle without breaking the bottle or hurting the goose.
My answer, of which I was quite proud, was “Break the bottle.” I was immediately told by the disapproving group, “You can’t break the bottle. It is against the rules.” My reply was, “Just break the rules.” It seemed like a wonderful solution to me but the group didn’t like it at all, saying it was just like me.
The correct answer was, “The goose is out of the bottle.” The solution was a matter of just changing one’s mind to another reality. Here the mind is changed, not the bottle. It is seeing that there is no problem, rather than fighting to alter the physical reality. I didn’t appreciate it very much at the time.
Now I seem to have mellowed and I like the solution very much. I find that as I write this, the desire to break bottles and to accomplish things is fading. I see that instead of changing the world and people to match my idealistic model, I want to love it all just as it is.
Although I will always have an interest in schemes of regeneration, transmutation, and spiritual growth, there is less urgency and less ego in the expression of them. The great saint Jnaneshwar in his Amrit Anubhav, said that although there is no real need to express the teachings, still there is the pleasure of expounding. It is like that.
I had wanted to share what I had received and as I do this, I find that there is more peace and the sense of having little left to say or do. The old joke about Confucius, the Buddha and Frank Sinatra comes to mind. Confucius said, “Do”. The Buddha said, “Be.” And Frank Sinatra said, “Dobe, Dobe, Do.”
Swami Shankarananda extols the power and virtue of laughter. It is one of the powerful ways in which he transmits his gifts to others. His humor and his love brightened my life during my sojourn in Australia. And so it continues to unfold. All I have to do is to keep going.
ADEENDUM:
Once More Into the River
On May 14 an angry encounter over a trivial matter sent me to my room to sit and ponder my situation. My initial response was my usual one when faced with difficulty, which is to withdraw or retreat - some version of “I’m out of here!”
As I sat in this mood, suddenly everything shifted. There was a massive downpouring of peace and light and love and the certain knowledge that it was time to move on. I didn’t see a man dressed in green, as in the story of the man with the inexplicable life with which I began this blog, but I received a clear and powerful message in a sublime manner that it was time to go.
There was no trace of negativity in this “download” – only a vast and vibrant field of love and light. I saw that I had accomplished what I was meant to accomplish in coming to Australia. On the one hand, I had arrived at a place of acceptance of Swami Shankarananda, which was without negativity and pain, and on the other hand, I had also arrived at a place where I knew that I was to begin my own work, whatever that might be.
I shared my experience with Devi and Swamiji from this field of love as we sat in my room. There was some resistance and concern, but over the ensuing weeks, it began to resolve. By the time I left, the feeling was smooth, loving and peaceful. During this time I had intuitions of spiritual work being accomplished on a very subtle inner level.
From time to time, fear would arise. Where would I go? How would I support myself? I knew that I had to hold to the higher vision and not go down the road of investigating these questions. It would be revealed. I disciplined myself to deal with the issues at hand, namely packing all my stuff and arranging for it to be shipped to my brother’s.
As I began to share with friends in the U.S., several invitations were received. At least I would not be homeless at the outset. My mind played over an imaginary map. It would hover over places in which I had friends and connections and over places with a warm climate. I tried to keep this inquiry free from fears and mundane agendas. Arcata? Florida? Southern California? Marin County? Hawaii? Ashland? Atlanta? I played around with some astrocartography, the branch of astrology which deals with relocation.
Meanwhile, the resolving of the relationships continued in a very subtle way. I was determined to hold to a positive state of mind, a state of love, acceptance and peace. Although the parting was very emotional, I managed to move through the various airports and arrive at the swami reunion in a positive and happy mood. It felt and still feels like a bardo or intermediate place – between one thing and another. Of course, even this ordinary life is considered to be a bardo. There is only transition and change.
The original plan for this blog was to tell what I got from the Buddhists, but that plan arose in a relatively stable situation. Now that my situation is in flux, it seems appropriate to share a little of what is going on presently, which is why I have added this addendum.
The swami reunion was wonderful and reawakened old feelings and connections in a most positive way. Then, on Gurumayi’s birthday – of which I was reminded later in the day – my morning meditation included the idea or inspiration that once I finish my story of what I got from the Buddhists, I should move on to what I got from Baba, which was a totally new idea for me.
On a purely factual level, I can share that I have been checking things off on the list of things to do, which I made mentally in Australia when I first knew that I was moving on. These included buying a car, picking up and storing my 29 boxes from Australia, and finding a place to stay.
I visited the gonpa and then went on to check out the Arcata area. On my first day of house hunting, I got an email from an old friend with an offer to rent their house from August to March while they visited Asia. So I will be living in Trinidad, eleven miles north of Arcata, for the winter, as my new life unfolds. During this almost effortless outer unfolding, there has been a significant inner process unfolding in my daily meditations.
The swami reunion powerfully awakened the connection to Baba’s mandala or energetic circle and many inspirations are flooding in. I feel that my job now is to stay open. At this point I have no idea where any of this leads, but am happily floating down the river waiting to see how it goes on from here.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Chapter 10: Embodiment
Bringing Light to Dark Places
Adyashanti, a major influence, speaks of the process of embodiment. After spiritual awakening to the truth of one’s being, one goes back into the personality and brings the light of Awareness to all the dark and unconscious parts of one’s being. This is difficult work and there are numerous temptations to flee into the light, but it is a kind of bodhisattva activity to bring light to any place there is darkness, not only to the dark places of your own psyche, but to the dark places in the outer world as well.
This teaching made perfect sense to me and provided me with a more positive way to regard the negative experiences in my life. I could see them as part of a task rather than something to be repressed, conquered or overcome. There was work to be done - to reclaim dark territory for the light - an approach which appealed to my warrior nature.
Because it is the unraveling of karma, the embodiment process is unique to each traveler on the path. My personal sharing in this chapter is offered as an example of how the process can proceed. Although others are involved in my story, it really is not about them but only about myself and my own karma, doubtlessly accrued over many lifetimes.
T-Square as Koan
In the early days of my sadhana, or spiritual practice, one of my favorite models was astrological. These days in my astrological work, I pay particular attention to the nodes of the moon, the ascendant and Saturn. These features point to the direction of growth, the lessons to be learned and the obstacles to be overcome.
I have north node and ascendant in Scorpio, the sign of transformation. My south node, representing past karma, is conjunct Saturn, which is in a T square with Mars and Pluto, the rulers of Scorpio. The “villain” in the chart is Mars, which opposes Pluto. Over the years, I have found that when things are most difficult, there is always a difficult Mars transit or aspect.
Mars represents self will, while Pluto, its higher octave, represents divine will. The T square with both of these planets squaring Saturn appears to represent all of my heavy issues. I think of this T square as the koan or dilemma of my life and sadhana.
Baba had Mars and Pluto joined in conjunction. One way to interpret this is to say that his personal will and divine will were one, or that he manifested the divine through his personal will. My task is to somehow join Mars to Pluto and end the war between them.
I was unable to appreciate the way Baba acted because my Mars is opposite Pluto, divorced from divine will, separate and unregenerate. When I saw his Mars manifesting without constraint, it felt wrong and bad, because it always has been for me. I think this projection is at the root of my difficulties with Baba. As always, it comes back to me.
For many years, my solution was to deny the reality of the ego – Mars - and to focus on God’s will - Pluto. When Mars made a transit of my natal Pluto, I began this piece. When I saw that this transit occurred at the time I began to write this, something fell into place. I saw then how I could use my Mars energy to express – to share with others about my process. That Mars certainly does want to express. After all, it is in an air house (according to Placidus and Koch) and the air sign of Aquarius.
Denying my Mars energy was not the solution, although I spent plenty of time using repression as a tactic. But it never really solved the problem, for Mars does not just go away. Bringing some light or awareness to this dark piece is the answer. I had to withdraw from the old patterns of self will, and at the same time proceed more positively by moving to gather up all the discarded pieces and fit them into the puzzle of my life in an integrated or holistic way. Moving into the gonpa gave me the immediate opportunity to withdraw from the old patterns of willfulness and ambition.
The Yoga of Seeking Challenge
There were situations I struggled with in my early days at the gonpa, but there came a time when my life seemed to be fairly challenge-free. I didn’t have any relationships which were difficult or stressful. Life was easy. It was about this time that I began to consider the one old relationship which was still stressful and that was the one with my ex-husband.
They say that yogis at a certain point find delight and happiness in difficulties because it provides an opportunity to practice. Difficulties and challenges are the fuel which can make the flame of Awareness burn brighter. I can’t say that I was quite at the point of taking delight in the stress, but I saw it as an undigested part of my psyche and was eager to deal with it in a more proactive way.
In the whole sign system, which is coming increasingly into vogue, my Saturn is in the 7th house, the house of marriage. As I pointed out, it is conjunct the south node in a T-square with Mars and Pluto, which oppose each other. Sitting in the house of marriage and conjunct to Saturn, the south node seems to describe the difficult aspects of my marriage. I had often felt oppressed, stuck, bound.
This was not the only aspect of my marriage. I also have Uranus in my 7th house and it makes a very close sextile to my Sun and a very close trine to Neptune. This minor grand trine of Sun, Neptune and Uranus, also describes my marriage perfectly. It was a wonderful spiritual union and to a man with Sun in Pisces (ruled by Neptune) and Moon in Aquarius (ruled by Uranus). This fit perfectly with the two planets exactly sextiling my Sun.
In the decades before I decided that I wanted to deal with this part of my past, my tactic had been to distance myself from the situation as much as I could. After years of not corresponding with him, Swami Shankarananda pointed out that he was not going to go away.
By then I had been at the gonpa a number of years and felt that as a bodhisattva wannabe, it was not right to reject anyone. So I began to correspond, setting off the great Hindu/Buddhist debates. I sent reams of material from the texts I was studying in the hopes of showing him the light.
Then one day in 2007, in retreat, I had a profound realization that I had only hated my ex-husband because I loved him. That realization was hard to bear. I rejected it for a while but it stayed in the back of my mind. The realization that I loved him made me feel disempowered, weak, sad, even pathetic. It was a very vulnerable feeling and I did not want to go there - at all.
After mulling it over and seeing that I could not avoid this, I wrote to him saying I would finally like to visit. He was overjoyed and welcomed me with great love. He and Devi invited me to move to Australia and live in the Shiva Ashram. I could feel all my rational defenses warning me, but I had decided to go with the flow of the irrational and follow what was apparently being directed by some higher or greater force.
It could have been grace, karma or delusion. Whatever it was, I knew I had to follow and make the move. Again, it was like the Sufi story of the man with the inexplicable life. The universe was conspiring to have me move to Australia and live in his ashram. How bizarre!
In my mind, he embodied a lot of the qualities I had had difficulty with in my relationship with Baba. And yet I loved him. Of course I saw his good qualities too – his love, humor, spiritual awareness, charm, and brilliance - but my focus during my first 11 years at the gonpa was more on what I perceived as flaws. Even though I was aware that it was all my projection, still the projection caused suffering. Clearly this was a piece that had to be reclaimed, transmuted. It had to be the outer manifestation of my T square.
This was not clear to me when I decided to move to Australia. Then, I had been moved to bring what had been for me the life-transforming teachings of the way of the bodhisattva to benefit him and Devi.. I went to Australia with the motive to share what I had gained. In some part of my mind there was the agenda to impart something great which would enable him to rise to greater heights. I was aware that he too had an agenda to transform me. I felt that if I could embody the principles of the bodhisattva path fully enough, I could prevail, but not in a competitive way. This was my idealistic way of thinking, which I did share with them.
The Stage of Failure
They too, however, had their agendas. After some months, I became overwhelmed by the situation. With Devi’s support, the two of them seemed bent on making me surrender to their vision and path. All my old feelings of being trapped, bullied, and suffocated arose. I struggled but got nowhere, so I just did what I had always done in the past which was to just eat my feelings.
I had had lumpy or cystic breasts for most of my adult life so I was on intimate terms with the lump that began to grow larger in late March, 2009. I figured it might be too much caffeine, a factor which had exacerbated the cysts in the past. I cut down, but it did not reduce. By May, it was much larger and the nipple had begun to invert. I went to the doctor who immediately sent me to a breast surgeon. After tests, it was diagnosed as breast cancer which had metastasized to the lymph nodes, and I had surgery on my birthday in July.
As with any illness, there are many causes and conditions that combine to bring it about. There was the factor of emotional stress and there were other factors as well. I had been taking estrogen replacement therapy for about 20 years, way longer than most doctors consider safe.
I was aware that it was auspicious to get ill when I was in a situation in which I was very well taken care of. The ashram had been paying for a health insurance policy for me and Swamiji paid for what was not covered. The cancer could not have been timed more perfectly.
As with so many who get a cancer diagnosis, it was a huge wake up call and brought a totally different consciousness. I was plunged into a meditative state which went on for weeks. I saw that it was very likely that I could die soon. It was time to get real and deal with emotional stress in a proactive way. I was well aware of the connection between cancer and emotional stress. I had also read numerous magazine articles, sitting in waiting rooms, of women whose cancer had been a boon and a blessing. This was the way I felt from the moment of diagnosis.
The entire ashram rallied to care for me in the most supportive and kind way. Swamiji and Devi responded with great love and concern and the pressures lessened considerably. I thought that perhaps my purpose was to show them the greatness of the path which had transformed me by my conscious death. Maybe my dying well would convey something which my personality could not. I surrendered to it. I have always wanted my life to be of some value and while with the Buddhists, I had embraced the teachings of pure motivation and sincerely aspired to be of benefit to beings in whatever way I could.
I was not afraid of death, and had never been, though I do have fears of physical suffering. The greatest fear of all is that I would not be able to fulfill my spiritual destiny. If it were to enter a deep retreat, meditate profoundly and leave my body without much fuss, then I was willing to surrender to this scenario.
I did not want, however, to be weakened by chemotherapy. I was dead set against it. I had seen so many people become ghost-like with no immune systems and with permanent damage. At the age of 70 I did not have the vitality of my youth and felt strongly that I could not endure the “slash, poison, burn” protocol of the medical profession. I was content to have surgery, but no more.
I read up on chemotherapy and the more I read, the more convinced I became that I could not and would not do it. Devi and Swamiji wanted me to be healed and believed that chemotherapy would help me. I just didn’t agree. Thus began a fight for what seemed to me to be even more important than my life. It was my potential to be of benefit to others. I printed out scads of research showing the ill effects of chemo and the negligible benefits. The doctors helped by presenting me with statistics showing that there was only a 4% benefit with chemotherapy for someone my age and with my type of cancer.
Finally they agreed with me. Then we went through it again over radiation and hormone therapy, but it was easier. I began a regimen of alternative techniques, therapies and remedies which Swamiji graciously and with great love offered to support. Both the ashram and he personally spent thousands of dollars on my health.
As I began to gain strength, it occurred to me that perhaps dying was not my great purpose or great teaching after all. It was not going to be that easy. I had to smile at how exquisitely the universe arranged everything. I was going to have to deal with the T-square after all.
I used to weep to Lama Drimed saying that I didn’t understand how I could live my chart in a positive way. It seemed so negative. To say that I don’t like conflict and upsetting people is an understatement. It so goes against my grain that my habitual mode of operating was to just go along and eat my feelings.
As an enneagram type Two, I want to express and embody love and love only. I want to accept everyone as they are. Before taking sannyas, Baba had given me the title “Mother Girija” and I felt that he saw, beneath my willful exterior, that divine motherly quality that I have always worshipped and wanted to express. For me, the divine mother is the one who accepts me totally - as I am at every moment. She is the ultimate refuge, beyond all concepts and beyond all situations in the world. She is comforting, accepting, compassion personified.
And yet here I was, clearly not yet dead, feeling resistant and despairing. It did not match my cherished persona. I was not yet able to be that compassionate being I so aspired to be. Clearly I had found a situation in which the need for transformation was crucial. Well, wasn’t that what I had wanted when I embraced the teachings on embodiment? Exactly.
Adyashanti, a major influence, speaks of the process of embodiment. After spiritual awakening to the truth of one’s being, one goes back into the personality and brings the light of Awareness to all the dark and unconscious parts of one’s being. This is difficult work and there are numerous temptations to flee into the light, but it is a kind of bodhisattva activity to bring light to any place there is darkness, not only to the dark places of your own psyche, but to the dark places in the outer world as well.
This teaching made perfect sense to me and provided me with a more positive way to regard the negative experiences in my life. I could see them as part of a task rather than something to be repressed, conquered or overcome. There was work to be done - to reclaim dark territory for the light - an approach which appealed to my warrior nature.
Because it is the unraveling of karma, the embodiment process is unique to each traveler on the path. My personal sharing in this chapter is offered as an example of how the process can proceed. Although others are involved in my story, it really is not about them but only about myself and my own karma, doubtlessly accrued over many lifetimes.
T-Square as Koan
In the early days of my sadhana, or spiritual practice, one of my favorite models was astrological. These days in my astrological work, I pay particular attention to the nodes of the moon, the ascendant and Saturn. These features point to the direction of growth, the lessons to be learned and the obstacles to be overcome.
I have north node and ascendant in Scorpio, the sign of transformation. My south node, representing past karma, is conjunct Saturn, which is in a T square with Mars and Pluto, the rulers of Scorpio. The “villain” in the chart is Mars, which opposes Pluto. Over the years, I have found that when things are most difficult, there is always a difficult Mars transit or aspect.
Mars represents self will, while Pluto, its higher octave, represents divine will. The T square with both of these planets squaring Saturn appears to represent all of my heavy issues. I think of this T square as the koan or dilemma of my life and sadhana.
Baba had Mars and Pluto joined in conjunction. One way to interpret this is to say that his personal will and divine will were one, or that he manifested the divine through his personal will. My task is to somehow join Mars to Pluto and end the war between them.
I was unable to appreciate the way Baba acted because my Mars is opposite Pluto, divorced from divine will, separate and unregenerate. When I saw his Mars manifesting without constraint, it felt wrong and bad, because it always has been for me. I think this projection is at the root of my difficulties with Baba. As always, it comes back to me.
For many years, my solution was to deny the reality of the ego – Mars - and to focus on God’s will - Pluto. When Mars made a transit of my natal Pluto, I began this piece. When I saw that this transit occurred at the time I began to write this, something fell into place. I saw then how I could use my Mars energy to express – to share with others about my process. That Mars certainly does want to express. After all, it is in an air house (according to Placidus and Koch) and the air sign of Aquarius.
Denying my Mars energy was not the solution, although I spent plenty of time using repression as a tactic. But it never really solved the problem, for Mars does not just go away. Bringing some light or awareness to this dark piece is the answer. I had to withdraw from the old patterns of self will, and at the same time proceed more positively by moving to gather up all the discarded pieces and fit them into the puzzle of my life in an integrated or holistic way. Moving into the gonpa gave me the immediate opportunity to withdraw from the old patterns of willfulness and ambition.
The Yoga of Seeking Challenge
There were situations I struggled with in my early days at the gonpa, but there came a time when my life seemed to be fairly challenge-free. I didn’t have any relationships which were difficult or stressful. Life was easy. It was about this time that I began to consider the one old relationship which was still stressful and that was the one with my ex-husband.
They say that yogis at a certain point find delight and happiness in difficulties because it provides an opportunity to practice. Difficulties and challenges are the fuel which can make the flame of Awareness burn brighter. I can’t say that I was quite at the point of taking delight in the stress, but I saw it as an undigested part of my psyche and was eager to deal with it in a more proactive way.
In the whole sign system, which is coming increasingly into vogue, my Saturn is in the 7th house, the house of marriage. As I pointed out, it is conjunct the south node in a T-square with Mars and Pluto, which oppose each other. Sitting in the house of marriage and conjunct to Saturn, the south node seems to describe the difficult aspects of my marriage. I had often felt oppressed, stuck, bound.
This was not the only aspect of my marriage. I also have Uranus in my 7th house and it makes a very close sextile to my Sun and a very close trine to Neptune. This minor grand trine of Sun, Neptune and Uranus, also describes my marriage perfectly. It was a wonderful spiritual union and to a man with Sun in Pisces (ruled by Neptune) and Moon in Aquarius (ruled by Uranus). This fit perfectly with the two planets exactly sextiling my Sun.
In the decades before I decided that I wanted to deal with this part of my past, my tactic had been to distance myself from the situation as much as I could. After years of not corresponding with him, Swami Shankarananda pointed out that he was not going to go away.
By then I had been at the gonpa a number of years and felt that as a bodhisattva wannabe, it was not right to reject anyone. So I began to correspond, setting off the great Hindu/Buddhist debates. I sent reams of material from the texts I was studying in the hopes of showing him the light.
Then one day in 2007, in retreat, I had a profound realization that I had only hated my ex-husband because I loved him. That realization was hard to bear. I rejected it for a while but it stayed in the back of my mind. The realization that I loved him made me feel disempowered, weak, sad, even pathetic. It was a very vulnerable feeling and I did not want to go there - at all.
After mulling it over and seeing that I could not avoid this, I wrote to him saying I would finally like to visit. He was overjoyed and welcomed me with great love. He and Devi invited me to move to Australia and live in the Shiva Ashram. I could feel all my rational defenses warning me, but I had decided to go with the flow of the irrational and follow what was apparently being directed by some higher or greater force.
It could have been grace, karma or delusion. Whatever it was, I knew I had to follow and make the move. Again, it was like the Sufi story of the man with the inexplicable life. The universe was conspiring to have me move to Australia and live in his ashram. How bizarre!
In my mind, he embodied a lot of the qualities I had had difficulty with in my relationship with Baba. And yet I loved him. Of course I saw his good qualities too – his love, humor, spiritual awareness, charm, and brilliance - but my focus during my first 11 years at the gonpa was more on what I perceived as flaws. Even though I was aware that it was all my projection, still the projection caused suffering. Clearly this was a piece that had to be reclaimed, transmuted. It had to be the outer manifestation of my T square.
This was not clear to me when I decided to move to Australia. Then, I had been moved to bring what had been for me the life-transforming teachings of the way of the bodhisattva to benefit him and Devi.. I went to Australia with the motive to share what I had gained. In some part of my mind there was the agenda to impart something great which would enable him to rise to greater heights. I was aware that he too had an agenda to transform me. I felt that if I could embody the principles of the bodhisattva path fully enough, I could prevail, but not in a competitive way. This was my idealistic way of thinking, which I did share with them.
The Stage of Failure
They too, however, had their agendas. After some months, I became overwhelmed by the situation. With Devi’s support, the two of them seemed bent on making me surrender to their vision and path. All my old feelings of being trapped, bullied, and suffocated arose. I struggled but got nowhere, so I just did what I had always done in the past which was to just eat my feelings.
I had had lumpy or cystic breasts for most of my adult life so I was on intimate terms with the lump that began to grow larger in late March, 2009. I figured it might be too much caffeine, a factor which had exacerbated the cysts in the past. I cut down, but it did not reduce. By May, it was much larger and the nipple had begun to invert. I went to the doctor who immediately sent me to a breast surgeon. After tests, it was diagnosed as breast cancer which had metastasized to the lymph nodes, and I had surgery on my birthday in July.
As with any illness, there are many causes and conditions that combine to bring it about. There was the factor of emotional stress and there were other factors as well. I had been taking estrogen replacement therapy for about 20 years, way longer than most doctors consider safe.
I was aware that it was auspicious to get ill when I was in a situation in which I was very well taken care of. The ashram had been paying for a health insurance policy for me and Swamiji paid for what was not covered. The cancer could not have been timed more perfectly.
As with so many who get a cancer diagnosis, it was a huge wake up call and brought a totally different consciousness. I was plunged into a meditative state which went on for weeks. I saw that it was very likely that I could die soon. It was time to get real and deal with emotional stress in a proactive way. I was well aware of the connection between cancer and emotional stress. I had also read numerous magazine articles, sitting in waiting rooms, of women whose cancer had been a boon and a blessing. This was the way I felt from the moment of diagnosis.
The entire ashram rallied to care for me in the most supportive and kind way. Swamiji and Devi responded with great love and concern and the pressures lessened considerably. I thought that perhaps my purpose was to show them the greatness of the path which had transformed me by my conscious death. Maybe my dying well would convey something which my personality could not. I surrendered to it. I have always wanted my life to be of some value and while with the Buddhists, I had embraced the teachings of pure motivation and sincerely aspired to be of benefit to beings in whatever way I could.
I was not afraid of death, and had never been, though I do have fears of physical suffering. The greatest fear of all is that I would not be able to fulfill my spiritual destiny. If it were to enter a deep retreat, meditate profoundly and leave my body without much fuss, then I was willing to surrender to this scenario.
I did not want, however, to be weakened by chemotherapy. I was dead set against it. I had seen so many people become ghost-like with no immune systems and with permanent damage. At the age of 70 I did not have the vitality of my youth and felt strongly that I could not endure the “slash, poison, burn” protocol of the medical profession. I was content to have surgery, but no more.
I read up on chemotherapy and the more I read, the more convinced I became that I could not and would not do it. Devi and Swamiji wanted me to be healed and believed that chemotherapy would help me. I just didn’t agree. Thus began a fight for what seemed to me to be even more important than my life. It was my potential to be of benefit to others. I printed out scads of research showing the ill effects of chemo and the negligible benefits. The doctors helped by presenting me with statistics showing that there was only a 4% benefit with chemotherapy for someone my age and with my type of cancer.
Finally they agreed with me. Then we went through it again over radiation and hormone therapy, but it was easier. I began a regimen of alternative techniques, therapies and remedies which Swamiji graciously and with great love offered to support. Both the ashram and he personally spent thousands of dollars on my health.
As I began to gain strength, it occurred to me that perhaps dying was not my great purpose or great teaching after all. It was not going to be that easy. I had to smile at how exquisitely the universe arranged everything. I was going to have to deal with the T-square after all.
I used to weep to Lama Drimed saying that I didn’t understand how I could live my chart in a positive way. It seemed so negative. To say that I don’t like conflict and upsetting people is an understatement. It so goes against my grain that my habitual mode of operating was to just go along and eat my feelings.
As an enneagram type Two, I want to express and embody love and love only. I want to accept everyone as they are. Before taking sannyas, Baba had given me the title “Mother Girija” and I felt that he saw, beneath my willful exterior, that divine motherly quality that I have always worshipped and wanted to express. For me, the divine mother is the one who accepts me totally - as I am at every moment. She is the ultimate refuge, beyond all concepts and beyond all situations in the world. She is comforting, accepting, compassion personified.
And yet here I was, clearly not yet dead, feeling resistant and despairing. It did not match my cherished persona. I was not yet able to be that compassionate being I so aspired to be. Clearly I had found a situation in which the need for transformation was crucial. Well, wasn’t that what I had wanted when I embraced the teachings on embodiment? Exactly.
Saturday, July 3, 2010
Chapter 9: Practice
Walking the Walk
When I first met Chagdud Rinpoche at the gonpa, I told him about my life in Siddha Yoga. Although I didn’t criticize Baba, I did say that there were some political difficulties. It turned out that he had several old Baba devotees among his followers and had heard a lot about him. He made a point of looking me in the eye and instructing me, “You must always honor all your teachers and hold them in high regard and esteem. You can’t make any progress without this.” At that very moment I vowed to try to accomplish this and never to lose sight of this key piece of advice.
As I went along, consciously trying to regard all my teachers with love, honor and respect, I began to see that this did not hold true just for those who were my teachers in an outer or formal way, but for all those with whom I had any connection, positive or negative. This perception raised the bar considerably.
I could talk the talk, but I knew that I could not really walk the walk. I felt I had a long way to go in so many areas. I was filled with judgments and opinions. I knew that I was far from embodying the teachings of non-duality in my life. I could understand them intellectually but did not live from them at every moment. I could expound the philosophical ideas. For example, I could assert that all is one, or that all is perfect, but all of my actions did not arise out of this place.
I could explain to others, and often did, that Baba’s apparent anger, desire, jealousy and pride were not real, but were just an outer show or play. My own anger, desire, jealousy and pride. however, did not feel perfect. Just saying that everything is perfect did not, I felt, relieve me of the responsibility of actually transforming my negative emotions. I know that verbally affirming non-duality is a path of understanding for some, but to me it did not feel completely honest or sufficient. I really wanted to transform, so I needed a practice which provided that possibility.
Baba used to tell the story of the student who one day received a new teaching from his guru. It was, “Speak the truth and don’t get angry.” The next day in the guru’s class of students, he was asked to recite this teaching from the day before. He could only say, “Speak the truth…” and could go no further. On each successive day, he was called on to recite, but still could only repeat, “Speak the truth….” Days went by and he was unable to complete the teaching.
Finally one day as the student again recited, “Speak the truth,” and then paused, the guru lost patience with this apparently dull-witted disciple and beat him with his stick. At that point the student smiled and finished the sentence, “and don’t get angry.” He then explained that it wasn’t until that moment – when he felt no anger while being beaten - that he had truly imbibed the teaching. This is what I wanted for myself.
The Poisons of the Ordinary Mind
While at the gonpa, I heard that rigpa, or Awareness, does not coexist with the poisons of the mind. There can be the display or appearance, but not any identification with them. At least this was my understanding of the teachings. This, then, provides a test. It is one way to determine whether or not you are making or have made any progress on the path. If your anger, jealousy, pride, etc have lessened, then there is progress. If they still exist, then there is more inner work to be done.
It is said that while there may be appearances of anger, pride or greed in a highly realized being, the seeds of these neurotic tendencies have been eradicated. They are said to be burnt seeds which cannot sprout and create karma. This teaching is nearly the same for Hindus and Buddhists, although the Buddhists might say there is no suffering for enlightened beings.
How to tell whether or not the seeds are burnt is a good question. I think it is something you feel in yourself. It may be similar to the distinction in meditation between having thoughts pass through the mind without pursuing or identifying with them and being engrossed and lost in them.
I studied Jin Shin Jyutsu while I stayed at the gonpa and in that study there is a focus on harmonizing the “attitudes,” which in that system are listed as worry, fear, anger, sadness, and “trying to” or pretension. There I learned that anger separates the soul from the body and is therefore highly detrimental to a spiritual experience.
The Buddhist teaching on anger is similar. Of all the poisons of the mind, it is said to be the worst one. It is said to destroy all accumulated virtue and can lead to rebirth in a hell realm. There is no need to posit a hell realm in the future, for to live with an angry mind is truly a present hell.
In the mahayana, one works on the poisons of the mind by cultivating the corresponding virtues, the paramitas, which include humility, generosity, patience, etc. When I came to the gonpa, I wanted to work on my vehicle, my personality. That is still my focus, these days not so much because I am suffering from the personality, but more so that I can really help others.
I used to spend time analyzing and internally debating philosophical issues, but learned to simplify my mind by staying away from these tedious contemplations - such as whether or not there was or was not karma or even whether or not there were enlightened beings - and just focusing on my own situation and steadily moving toward less and less suffering.
At this point, I am looking for integration, and not for higher and higher states of consciousness. The Buddhists describe many levels of attainment in great and amazing detail. The highest state of buddhahood is said to be characterized by many divine qualities such as complete omniscience of past, present and future.
My take on all this is that these descriptions of buddhahood are beyond “regular” enlightenment, whatever that is. These distinctions, and even the question of what enlightenment is, are not particularly important to me at my level. I do not envision, nor long for, omniscience and the full array of siddhis which are said to accompany perfect buddhahood. At the moment, I am happy just to keep lessening the poisons of the mind.
Levels
One can easily get the impression that the traditional unfolding of the spiritual path is in a kind of sequence, beginning with the introductory levels or yanas and moving along as one accomplishes each step. That is not how it appears to be happening today and I wonder if it ever really happened that way. Most westerners don’t want to start at the “beginning” but want the higher teachings immediately.
Since seekers are at different levels and have differing capabilities when they begin to work with a teacher, the practice of the path is always an individual process. At the same time that one is cultivating wisdom through the path of dzogchen, the cultivation of the paramitas can also be also going on. When a teacher sees that some remedial work is needed, he can assign the appropriate practices or teachings.
It often happens that a student is sent to another teacher for some important piece of work. I found it very refreshing to see that the lamas did not jealously try to hold on to their students and prevent them from studying with other teachers. Lama Drimed often expressed the feeling that he was very happy for his students to find something they could really learn and grow from, whatever it was.
There was a similar opportunity for people around Baba, who taught all levels of the path simultaneously. He presented teachings on the physical level (hatha yoga), on the emotional level (bhakti yoga), and on the intellectual level (jnana yoga). He also said that Siddha Yoga, the path that unfolds spontaneously in the presence of a siddha guru, is the ultimate yoga. People just gravitated to the practices that suited their temperaments and the unfolding proceeded individually on an inner level.
With the Buddhists, I learned in a more systematic way, but the end result was the same. Again, people gravitated to the aspects of the various systems that suited their temperaments and were appropriate to where they were in their journeys. It was satisfying, however, to have the clarification and the big picture. Even more importantly, it was comforting to have personal guidance based on one’s own history and development.
Ethical Discipline
During the World Parliament of Religion in Melbourne in 2009, I attended a private dinner with Swami Shankarananda at which there was a lively discussion between Andrew Cohen and two of the swamis who run the “Hinduism Today” magazine.
The discussion turned to the practices on the spiritual path. Palaniswami said at one point that he teaches the yamas and niyamas since people need a base on which to build. These are the very first or preliminary teachings of yoga and have to do with the cultivation of qualities helpful on the path, such as self discipline, and various types of purity.
I resonated with this approach. Although I had read a lot about the yamas and niyamas – basically the dos and don’ts of yoga – I never heard Baba teach on them. They cover such things as rules against lying and stealing. I also noticed that they were not particularly observed around him.
Just as I believed Rinpoche when he told me that I couldn’t make any progress on the path without honoring all my teachers, I believe that one cannot make real progress on the path, as I understand it, without some training in what is called ethical discipline.
This is more a practical concern than an ethical concern for me. As a teacher, I have a great interest in discovering what it is that will help a student learn and grow. I spend a lot of energy analyzing and contemplating what is helpful and useful - what actually produces harmony, integration and happiness - as students move along a spiritual path. One of my conclusions is that training in the moral qualities and virtues is extremely useful.
There is a debate among the Tibetans on the topic of whether to allow students to bypass the preliminary practices of the ngondro and jump to the highest teachings, or to require the completion of the traditional ngondro practices before being initiated into the path of dzogchen. Traditionally each candidate must complete the ngondro as a prerequisite for receiving dzogchen initiation. The ngondro is a time-consuming set of 5 practices – 111,000 of each – which includes full prostrations.
Some Tibetan and western teachers permit students to forego this requirement, wholly or in part, for various reasons. Chagdud Rinpoche did not. In many ways he was “old school,” in that he felt it was important for students to have completed their ngondro before they could study dzogchen.
When I moved into the gonpa, the ngondro was required and I just accepted this. I knew I had to do it in order to be initiated into dzogchen. That was what I wanted, so I just plunged in. I don’t know if it did me any good in the way it was intended. Although I made efforts to get into the essence of it and really do it properly, there was, I have to admit, a lot of focus on the counting and just getting it done. The goal-oriented aspect of my personality was certainly intact at the completion of the ngondro.
Tests on the Path
The ngondro is designed to purify the candidate and render him or her fit for the highest teachings. Although there are esoteric explanations of what and how each practice purifies, on a purely psychological level it was evident to me that it was also a test of will power, diligence, commitment, and other mental qualities necessary for a true spiritual path to enlightenment.
If a person can’t finish the requirement after many years, what is the reason? It is usually some psychological block – perhaps including resentment of the requirement itself. Whatever the block, it must be overcome to proceed along the path, so it is a useful test.
Baba used to tell a Sufi story about a seeker who went to a guru for teachings and enlightenment. The guru sized him up and prescribed a task. He gave him a box and told him to take it to another guru who lived some distance away. Under no circumstances should he open the box. Along the way, the seeker was overcome with curiosity and temptation and decided to sneak a tiny peak at the contents of the box.
As he lifted one corner just a tiny bit, a little mouse darted out and scurried away. The seeker had no recourse but to continue on to the other guru. On receiving the empty box, the second guru, lectured him, “How can you hold the sacred teachings, when you can’t even hold on to a small mouse??!!” This story makes the point that there are qualities of character that are necessary for embarking on the ultimate path of one’s life.
The ngondro is certainly much more than a test. It includes the profound practices of taking refuge and the vow not to harm beings, the generation of the attitude or motivation of a bodhisattva, confession and purification of non-virtue, symbolic offerings to increase generosity, and prayers and practices to merge one’s mind with the guru.
Some very high and well-intentioned lamas feel that it is more compassionate and generous to offer the precious higher teachings to westerners who may not be inclined to take on the requirement of the ngondro, than to withhold the teachings in adherence to tradition. Some require the ngondro to be done at some point but not necessarily before receiving any teachings.
Had I the choice to make, I probably would fall out on the side of the less traditional lamas and err on the side of compassion and generosity, but I do appreciate Chagdud Rinpoche’s point of view and know that it came from compassion and generosity far greater than mine. He believed that it was, in the long run and with all things considered, the most beneficial path for a student to take.
Sadhana Practice
One feature which I embraced at the beginning of my stay with the Buddhists, but which later fell away was sadhana practice. The word sadhana was used around Baba to refer to all practice on the path and even the path itself. With the Buddhists, it referred to specific liturgies centered on a particular deity. The texts were referred to as sadhanas. So there was a Red Tara sadhana, a Throma sadhana and a Vajrakilaya sadhana, in addition to many others.
These sadhanas were chanted in Tibetan, although all the mantras were in Sanskrit, the sacred language of India. There were many components, some much more elaborate than others. These included preliminary invocations, meditation on emptiness, visualization of the seed syllable, visualization of the deity, mantra repetition, offerings, praises, dissolution of the visualization, meditation on the formless, dedication and aspiration prayers. The practice could take hours and the language was beautiful and inspiring.
I imagined that there had once been or perhaps even still were similar practices in Hinduism. I had done chants to various deities, such as Shiva, Vishnu, and Lakshmi, but these were generally hymns of praise. There were neither visualizations nor all the other components.
The idea behind these elaborate sadhanas was to create in one’s mind a sacred reality, to participate in it, and then to dissolve it into emptiness. This mirrored the human experience of living in an elaborate outer reality. It used our human nature and experience to uplift us into a higher or sacred reality. There were accompanying mudras or gestures of the hands and fingers and the use of ritual implements such as the bell and dorje. In the Throma (or Kali) sadhana, we used a special two sided drum and a horn made from a human thigh bone, which was thrillingly dramatic.
As inspiring and evocative these ritual practices were, they were not, however, to be a sustained part of my practice. I wanted to do them when I was inspired or in the mood but not to be held to a daily commitment that was binding irrespective of one’s psychological state. I wanted a core practice that was on a more inner or psychological level.
I had always admired zen for its stripped-down-to-essence quality. For this reason, it was dzogchen in combination with the psychological aspects of the bodhisattva path which ultimately became my practice. I liked the fact that these practices were invisible and totally portable.
Some of the prayers, visualizations and mantras, however, have remained with me. When I sit I sometimes see Guru Rinpoche and recite the 7 line prayer which evokes his presence and blessings. At other times I see Bhagawan Nityananda and repeat the mantra of his lineage, Om Namah Shivaya. I often pray to the Divine Mother in Her various guises. The connection to the blessings of the great mahasiddhas and the divine shakti is the greatest treasure that I possess.
When I first met Chagdud Rinpoche at the gonpa, I told him about my life in Siddha Yoga. Although I didn’t criticize Baba, I did say that there were some political difficulties. It turned out that he had several old Baba devotees among his followers and had heard a lot about him. He made a point of looking me in the eye and instructing me, “You must always honor all your teachers and hold them in high regard and esteem. You can’t make any progress without this.” At that very moment I vowed to try to accomplish this and never to lose sight of this key piece of advice.
As I went along, consciously trying to regard all my teachers with love, honor and respect, I began to see that this did not hold true just for those who were my teachers in an outer or formal way, but for all those with whom I had any connection, positive or negative. This perception raised the bar considerably.
I could talk the talk, but I knew that I could not really walk the walk. I felt I had a long way to go in so many areas. I was filled with judgments and opinions. I knew that I was far from embodying the teachings of non-duality in my life. I could understand them intellectually but did not live from them at every moment. I could expound the philosophical ideas. For example, I could assert that all is one, or that all is perfect, but all of my actions did not arise out of this place.
I could explain to others, and often did, that Baba’s apparent anger, desire, jealousy and pride were not real, but were just an outer show or play. My own anger, desire, jealousy and pride. however, did not feel perfect. Just saying that everything is perfect did not, I felt, relieve me of the responsibility of actually transforming my negative emotions. I know that verbally affirming non-duality is a path of understanding for some, but to me it did not feel completely honest or sufficient. I really wanted to transform, so I needed a practice which provided that possibility.
Baba used to tell the story of the student who one day received a new teaching from his guru. It was, “Speak the truth and don’t get angry.” The next day in the guru’s class of students, he was asked to recite this teaching from the day before. He could only say, “Speak the truth…” and could go no further. On each successive day, he was called on to recite, but still could only repeat, “Speak the truth….” Days went by and he was unable to complete the teaching.
Finally one day as the student again recited, “Speak the truth,” and then paused, the guru lost patience with this apparently dull-witted disciple and beat him with his stick. At that point the student smiled and finished the sentence, “and don’t get angry.” He then explained that it wasn’t until that moment – when he felt no anger while being beaten - that he had truly imbibed the teaching. This is what I wanted for myself.
The Poisons of the Ordinary Mind
While at the gonpa, I heard that rigpa, or Awareness, does not coexist with the poisons of the mind. There can be the display or appearance, but not any identification with them. At least this was my understanding of the teachings. This, then, provides a test. It is one way to determine whether or not you are making or have made any progress on the path. If your anger, jealousy, pride, etc have lessened, then there is progress. If they still exist, then there is more inner work to be done.
It is said that while there may be appearances of anger, pride or greed in a highly realized being, the seeds of these neurotic tendencies have been eradicated. They are said to be burnt seeds which cannot sprout and create karma. This teaching is nearly the same for Hindus and Buddhists, although the Buddhists might say there is no suffering for enlightened beings.
How to tell whether or not the seeds are burnt is a good question. I think it is something you feel in yourself. It may be similar to the distinction in meditation between having thoughts pass through the mind without pursuing or identifying with them and being engrossed and lost in them.
I studied Jin Shin Jyutsu while I stayed at the gonpa and in that study there is a focus on harmonizing the “attitudes,” which in that system are listed as worry, fear, anger, sadness, and “trying to” or pretension. There I learned that anger separates the soul from the body and is therefore highly detrimental to a spiritual experience.
The Buddhist teaching on anger is similar. Of all the poisons of the mind, it is said to be the worst one. It is said to destroy all accumulated virtue and can lead to rebirth in a hell realm. There is no need to posit a hell realm in the future, for to live with an angry mind is truly a present hell.
In the mahayana, one works on the poisons of the mind by cultivating the corresponding virtues, the paramitas, which include humility, generosity, patience, etc. When I came to the gonpa, I wanted to work on my vehicle, my personality. That is still my focus, these days not so much because I am suffering from the personality, but more so that I can really help others.
I used to spend time analyzing and internally debating philosophical issues, but learned to simplify my mind by staying away from these tedious contemplations - such as whether or not there was or was not karma or even whether or not there were enlightened beings - and just focusing on my own situation and steadily moving toward less and less suffering.
At this point, I am looking for integration, and not for higher and higher states of consciousness. The Buddhists describe many levels of attainment in great and amazing detail. The highest state of buddhahood is said to be characterized by many divine qualities such as complete omniscience of past, present and future.
My take on all this is that these descriptions of buddhahood are beyond “regular” enlightenment, whatever that is. These distinctions, and even the question of what enlightenment is, are not particularly important to me at my level. I do not envision, nor long for, omniscience and the full array of siddhis which are said to accompany perfect buddhahood. At the moment, I am happy just to keep lessening the poisons of the mind.
Levels
One can easily get the impression that the traditional unfolding of the spiritual path is in a kind of sequence, beginning with the introductory levels or yanas and moving along as one accomplishes each step. That is not how it appears to be happening today and I wonder if it ever really happened that way. Most westerners don’t want to start at the “beginning” but want the higher teachings immediately.
Since seekers are at different levels and have differing capabilities when they begin to work with a teacher, the practice of the path is always an individual process. At the same time that one is cultivating wisdom through the path of dzogchen, the cultivation of the paramitas can also be also going on. When a teacher sees that some remedial work is needed, he can assign the appropriate practices or teachings.
It often happens that a student is sent to another teacher for some important piece of work. I found it very refreshing to see that the lamas did not jealously try to hold on to their students and prevent them from studying with other teachers. Lama Drimed often expressed the feeling that he was very happy for his students to find something they could really learn and grow from, whatever it was.
There was a similar opportunity for people around Baba, who taught all levels of the path simultaneously. He presented teachings on the physical level (hatha yoga), on the emotional level (bhakti yoga), and on the intellectual level (jnana yoga). He also said that Siddha Yoga, the path that unfolds spontaneously in the presence of a siddha guru, is the ultimate yoga. People just gravitated to the practices that suited their temperaments and the unfolding proceeded individually on an inner level.
With the Buddhists, I learned in a more systematic way, but the end result was the same. Again, people gravitated to the aspects of the various systems that suited their temperaments and were appropriate to where they were in their journeys. It was satisfying, however, to have the clarification and the big picture. Even more importantly, it was comforting to have personal guidance based on one’s own history and development.
Ethical Discipline
During the World Parliament of Religion in Melbourne in 2009, I attended a private dinner with Swami Shankarananda at which there was a lively discussion between Andrew Cohen and two of the swamis who run the “Hinduism Today” magazine.
The discussion turned to the practices on the spiritual path. Palaniswami said at one point that he teaches the yamas and niyamas since people need a base on which to build. These are the very first or preliminary teachings of yoga and have to do with the cultivation of qualities helpful on the path, such as self discipline, and various types of purity.
I resonated with this approach. Although I had read a lot about the yamas and niyamas – basically the dos and don’ts of yoga – I never heard Baba teach on them. They cover such things as rules against lying and stealing. I also noticed that they were not particularly observed around him.
Just as I believed Rinpoche when he told me that I couldn’t make any progress on the path without honoring all my teachers, I believe that one cannot make real progress on the path, as I understand it, without some training in what is called ethical discipline.
This is more a practical concern than an ethical concern for me. As a teacher, I have a great interest in discovering what it is that will help a student learn and grow. I spend a lot of energy analyzing and contemplating what is helpful and useful - what actually produces harmony, integration and happiness - as students move along a spiritual path. One of my conclusions is that training in the moral qualities and virtues is extremely useful.
There is a debate among the Tibetans on the topic of whether to allow students to bypass the preliminary practices of the ngondro and jump to the highest teachings, or to require the completion of the traditional ngondro practices before being initiated into the path of dzogchen. Traditionally each candidate must complete the ngondro as a prerequisite for receiving dzogchen initiation. The ngondro is a time-consuming set of 5 practices – 111,000 of each – which includes full prostrations.
Some Tibetan and western teachers permit students to forego this requirement, wholly or in part, for various reasons. Chagdud Rinpoche did not. In many ways he was “old school,” in that he felt it was important for students to have completed their ngondro before they could study dzogchen.
When I moved into the gonpa, the ngondro was required and I just accepted this. I knew I had to do it in order to be initiated into dzogchen. That was what I wanted, so I just plunged in. I don’t know if it did me any good in the way it was intended. Although I made efforts to get into the essence of it and really do it properly, there was, I have to admit, a lot of focus on the counting and just getting it done. The goal-oriented aspect of my personality was certainly intact at the completion of the ngondro.
Tests on the Path
The ngondro is designed to purify the candidate and render him or her fit for the highest teachings. Although there are esoteric explanations of what and how each practice purifies, on a purely psychological level it was evident to me that it was also a test of will power, diligence, commitment, and other mental qualities necessary for a true spiritual path to enlightenment.
If a person can’t finish the requirement after many years, what is the reason? It is usually some psychological block – perhaps including resentment of the requirement itself. Whatever the block, it must be overcome to proceed along the path, so it is a useful test.
Baba used to tell a Sufi story about a seeker who went to a guru for teachings and enlightenment. The guru sized him up and prescribed a task. He gave him a box and told him to take it to another guru who lived some distance away. Under no circumstances should he open the box. Along the way, the seeker was overcome with curiosity and temptation and decided to sneak a tiny peak at the contents of the box.
As he lifted one corner just a tiny bit, a little mouse darted out and scurried away. The seeker had no recourse but to continue on to the other guru. On receiving the empty box, the second guru, lectured him, “How can you hold the sacred teachings, when you can’t even hold on to a small mouse??!!” This story makes the point that there are qualities of character that are necessary for embarking on the ultimate path of one’s life.
The ngondro is certainly much more than a test. It includes the profound practices of taking refuge and the vow not to harm beings, the generation of the attitude or motivation of a bodhisattva, confession and purification of non-virtue, symbolic offerings to increase generosity, and prayers and practices to merge one’s mind with the guru.
Some very high and well-intentioned lamas feel that it is more compassionate and generous to offer the precious higher teachings to westerners who may not be inclined to take on the requirement of the ngondro, than to withhold the teachings in adherence to tradition. Some require the ngondro to be done at some point but not necessarily before receiving any teachings.
Had I the choice to make, I probably would fall out on the side of the less traditional lamas and err on the side of compassion and generosity, but I do appreciate Chagdud Rinpoche’s point of view and know that it came from compassion and generosity far greater than mine. He believed that it was, in the long run and with all things considered, the most beneficial path for a student to take.
Sadhana Practice
One feature which I embraced at the beginning of my stay with the Buddhists, but which later fell away was sadhana practice. The word sadhana was used around Baba to refer to all practice on the path and even the path itself. With the Buddhists, it referred to specific liturgies centered on a particular deity. The texts were referred to as sadhanas. So there was a Red Tara sadhana, a Throma sadhana and a Vajrakilaya sadhana, in addition to many others.
These sadhanas were chanted in Tibetan, although all the mantras were in Sanskrit, the sacred language of India. There were many components, some much more elaborate than others. These included preliminary invocations, meditation on emptiness, visualization of the seed syllable, visualization of the deity, mantra repetition, offerings, praises, dissolution of the visualization, meditation on the formless, dedication and aspiration prayers. The practice could take hours and the language was beautiful and inspiring.
I imagined that there had once been or perhaps even still were similar practices in Hinduism. I had done chants to various deities, such as Shiva, Vishnu, and Lakshmi, but these were generally hymns of praise. There were neither visualizations nor all the other components.
The idea behind these elaborate sadhanas was to create in one’s mind a sacred reality, to participate in it, and then to dissolve it into emptiness. This mirrored the human experience of living in an elaborate outer reality. It used our human nature and experience to uplift us into a higher or sacred reality. There were accompanying mudras or gestures of the hands and fingers and the use of ritual implements such as the bell and dorje. In the Throma (or Kali) sadhana, we used a special two sided drum and a horn made from a human thigh bone, which was thrillingly dramatic.
As inspiring and evocative these ritual practices were, they were not, however, to be a sustained part of my practice. I wanted to do them when I was inspired or in the mood but not to be held to a daily commitment that was binding irrespective of one’s psychological state. I wanted a core practice that was on a more inner or psychological level.
I had always admired zen for its stripped-down-to-essence quality. For this reason, it was dzogchen in combination with the psychological aspects of the bodhisattva path which ultimately became my practice. I liked the fact that these practices were invisible and totally portable.
Some of the prayers, visualizations and mantras, however, have remained with me. When I sit I sometimes see Guru Rinpoche and recite the 7 line prayer which evokes his presence and blessings. At other times I see Bhagawan Nityananda and repeat the mantra of his lineage, Om Namah Shivaya. I often pray to the Divine Mother in Her various guises. The connection to the blessings of the great mahasiddhas and the divine shakti is the greatest treasure that I possess.
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