Chapter 11: Resolving

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.

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.

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.

Chapter 8: Interdependence

No Man is an Island

One of the key concepts emphasized by the Buddhists is interdependence – the idea that all things are mutually dependent on each other and that everything is connected to everything else. I remember embracing a version of this idea in high school when we read Tennyson’s poem “Flower in the Crannied Wall.” I was transported to a vaster awareness as I read, “Flower in the crannied wall, I pluck you out of the crannies, I hold you here, root and all, in my hand, little flower – but if I could understand what you are, root and all, and all in all, I should know what God and man is.” Again when I first heard of holograms and the idea that the part contains the whole, my mind was uplifted and expanded.

Although the concept is somewhat tangential, I got the same feeling on encountering the work of Byron Katie and her definition of God as simply all that is. The title of her book Loving What Is sums it up very elegantly. It combines the compassion aspect – Loving – with the wisdom aspect – What Is. In holding all that is with love, one can never fixate on a part of the whole and leave anything out of one’s loving embrace. Using the three little words as a kind of motto, I am always led to consider all phenomena as connected to the whole.

A Philosophy of Interdependence

Once a year at the gonpa, Khentrul Rinpoche would lead a month long shedra, or philosophical school. We spent all day listening to teachings on ancient scriptures. It was often difficult because it was dry, academic, and full of polemical points, but I enjoyed Rinpoche’s presence and also being exposed to the philosophy. I was particularly impressed with the month long shedra on Nagarjuna’s Introduction to the Middle Way, an exposition on the philosophy of madhyamika prasangika.

Although it was very complex and detailed, the essence I gleaned was that reality is the union of absolute and relative reality - the union of wisdom and appearance - or in the language of Kashmir Shaivism, the union of Shiva and Shakti.

The vast majority of the text is devoted to proving that all manifest things have no absolute reality. This is done by disproving all the other positions and the then-current philosophical approaches. The many arguments are very difficult to follow and they really gave my intellect a workout. I often became impatient when they seemed dated and political. It was a stretch to find relevance to a western 21st century outlook.

The outstanding point came at the end, when the text described absolute and relative reality, saying that there is nothing to be said about relative reality, other than that it is characterized by impermanence and by interdependence. This philosophy has no argument with relative reality. It is just accepted as it is. It is real as appearance. It is as it is. As I tried this on, it felt very peaceful and full of loving acceptance.

Then, at the very end, the text quietly states that there is no separation between the two. Relative reality is a manifestation of the absolute and is thus one with it. Aha!! It seemed to me that there was a lot of argument to arrive finally at the conclusion that there is no problem. Although the process and arguments were tedious, I loved the conclusion.

In relative reality, everything is interconnected. There is no beginning or end - just changes in form and appearance. That is the nature of the phenomenal world. Things are born, are sustained and then die. There is constant change of form. It applies to humans, animals, cultures, ideas, planets, suns, solar systems, and universes. All exist in Awareness and as Awareness. From this perspective, there is no creation, no creator, no emergence of consciousness out of materiality.

While in graduate school as a teaching fellow in anthropology, I had secretly begun to harbor doubts about Darwinism as it was taught. I had begun to believe a tiny bit along the lines of creationism. As an anthropologist, this would have been considered the most outrageous heresy, so I kept it to myself. While studying Buddhist philosophy, I discovered that their ideas solved the problem.

I took the position of the middle way that things are as they are. The timelessness aspect is the absolute reality and the time-oriented or evolutionary aspect is the relative reality. My doubts about Darwinian evolution were really a yearning for a description of absolute reality, or timelessness which I had found hints of in some of the creationist ideas.

The Western Mind

As I began to focus on my own mind and attempt to hold fleeting moments of Awareness, it was much easier if I let go of the hold that concepts of history, time, culture, and science had on me. Of course, I am a westerner and have been conditioned as such. My father was a nuclear physicist and an agnostic. That conditioning is there. But it is just conditioning and is trumped by a spiritual point of view of oneness, timelessness, mystery and grace. Without denying their relative reality, I no longer feel wedded to or bound by science and materialism.

As a westerner and one who likes ideas and systems, I want to use this tendency to benefit others. This is the motivation behind this writing. I find that I am torn between the impulses to go on expounding various ideas which bubble up and the desire to speak simply and autobiographically with stories, in a more interdependent or relational way.

Interdependence with the Guru

For the most part my relationship with Baba did not seem to have much interdependence. He seemed godlike and virtually omnipotent to me, while I was a mere novice on the path. I felt a great gulf between us in many ways. This seemed appropriate since he did have enormous spiritual power and I was a beginning seeker. There was one experience I had with him, however, that seemed to turn this dynamic around.

During the second world tour, Baba had a heart attack and was hospitalized. After some time the doctors allowed him to receive visitors and some of us were taken to the hospital to visit him. On one such occasion my husband and I were ushered into Baba’s darkened hospital room. He was lying on his side, without his teeth, looking like an old grandfather.

We sat on the floor very close to him and he began saying, “Baba has no shakti now.” He went on in this vein and reached out and took my hand. As he held my hand, I had the most amazing experience. I became very large and the top of my head opened up. Into my head from above streamed a vast flow of energy. It was very bright, both white and golden. As it flowed into my head, it filled my body which became enormous in order to contain this vast energy. It flowed down my arm and through my hand out to Baba’s hand.

I was transfixed and marveled that I was helping Baba. Although I had nothing to do with it, I felt that I was a channel of grace for him. It amazed me that it could work like this. I saw that anyone could be a channel for God’s grace. Baba usually fulfilled this function, but when he felt depleted, the universe would provide him with energy to be able to fulfill his function. In addition to the radiant bliss of the energy, I also felt incredibly honored to somehow be able to be part of this amazing process.

On another occasion, Dick Mann, a devotee from the Ann Arbor ashram, shared a similar experience. It was wonderful to contemplate that Baba lived in this universe of interdependence. Lama Drimed acknowledged this interdependence when he began prostrating to his sangha after his three year retreat. He acknowledged the oneness of guru and disciple in this moving gesture.

Karmic Connection

Another aspect of interdependence that fascinated me was karmic connection. Although everything is interconnected, the way that it is interconnected is mysterious. We all have affinities and connections from the past that deeply influence our lives. For example, I knew that I had karma with the Tibetans. I had read all the books by and about Chogyam Trungpa that I could get my hands on during the 70’s and had loved them. I didn’t really understand a lot of it, but it was compelling. And then there was my connection with the Karmapa. At the first glimpse of him, I had burst into tears.

Once, just after leaving Siddha Yoga, I consulted a much touted psychic, who was a housewife in Kansas. I spoke about Baba, Gurumayi, Nityananda, and all the dramas I had been involved in. She gave me very interesting advice, and at one point in our conversation she said that Baba was doing this and that. I pointed out that Baba was dead. She said, “He’s dead?” When I assured her that he was, she responded, “Well, he’s still running everything.” This had rung true at the time.

At the end of our session, she told me that I had a lot of protection. She saw hosts of Buddhists above me. I told her they were not Buddhists, but Hindus, because I didn’t know any Buddhists. She insisted that they were Buddhists. I calmly assured her that they must be Hindus, assuming that she couldn’t tell the difference. She was most adamant that these beings above me, protecting me, were Buddhists. I completely forgot all about this until one day long after I had moved into the gonpa. She was apparently right after all.

There were many small experiences that helped me integrate my two paths. For one thing, some of the westerners had heard that the highly revered Chatral Rinpoche has once said about Baba, “He is an emanation of Tilopa.” Tilopa was an Indian siddha, the founder of the Kagyu lineage, and the guru of Naropa - who in turn was followed by Marpa, Milarepa, Gampopa and the first Karmapa.

When Rinpoche died in 2001, I had a powerful meditation dream in which he and Baba met. From a distance, Rinpoche shouted out, “I’ve heard a lot about you!” They were both beaming at each other and ended up in a big bear hug and a lot of laughter. This experience made me exceedingly happy.

I had always felt that there was a connection between Baba and the Tibetans and that I was part of it in some way. It struck me during the Karmapa’s visit to Ganeshpuri during which he performed the Black Hat ceremony in Baba’s ashram. For some reason Swamiji and I were present at a private meeting between the two great gurus. It was held at Turiya Mandir in the upper garden.

An English woman who was a Tibetan nun, Ma Bedi, translated for the Karmapa and either Professor Jain or Amma translated for Baba. I remember that Baba was very intent on asking the Karmapa about the blue pearl, a significant experience that Baba frequently spoke about. It seemed to me at the time that Baba wanted some confirmation of the importance or meaning of this mysterious phenomenon.

The other thing that struck me was the gift the Karmapa gave Baba. It was a Tibetan bell and dorje, traditional ritual implements used in sadhana practice and all rituals. Baba leaned forward with great delight and took them, in the appropriate hands, and held them. Then the two of them fell out into samadhi. There are photos of this event in which Baba is meditating still holding the bell and dorje in his lap. This was long before I heard the story of Baba being an emanation of Tilopa, but it gave me a strong intuitive feeling that there was a connection between the two of them that went way back into the past.

I could see no reason why I was present at this private meeting – except that I too was part of this tradition. Later when I moved into the gonpa, I felt somewhat uncomfortable about my Hindu roots, especially since there is a prejudice against Hinduism that I detected. Historically there had been many famous debates between adherents of the two religions. I had always heard of the Hindus besting all comers, but here I heard the opposite – how the Buddhists always won in debate.

I knew this was just politics but it made me feel that my credentials were somewhat suspect. So, I was very happy when I met Sogyal Rinpoche, author of the best-selling The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, and he gave me a lovely affirmation. He visited the gonpa and gave a public talk at the local elementary school in Weaverville. Marilyn, an old friend of his, introduced me to him, saying, “She used to be a swami.” He looked lovingly at me and said, “She still is.”

It is All a Play

I developed great love for the Karmapa during his visit to Ganeshpuri. Later when he visited the Ann Arbor ashram, and I was his hostess, I had my first argument with Baba - over which chair the Karmapa was to be given.

There were two identical love seats which I felt would be perfect for the two of them to use during a public program outside the ashram. One was Baba’s seat in the hall and the other was in his quarters upstairs. I felt it was the right solution and so with great confidence, I went into his room and asked him if I could take the love seat for the program. He didn’t like it and told me to use another chair. I stood my ground, a novelty for me, and finally Baba grudgingly gave in.

I had heard many stories of others arguing with Baba and prevailing, so I knew it was possible, but it had never been a possibility for me before. I didn’t even feel badly about it because I felt divinely inspired. I felt that it was a kind of joke between Baba and me, a play in which he pretended to want to keep the chair in his room and then let me get it away from him. I felt that he too knew that it was the right solution.

This idea of play or lila is also part of the doctrine of interdependence. Everything and everyone plays out their karma according to their conditioning and according to circumstances. Each act, however insignificant, has an effect on the whole. At the same time that one is irrevocably intertwined with everything else, there is also free will to act and make your own mark on the whole. Such is the dynamic energy of Awareness, the Shakti of Shiva.

Chapter 7: Compassion/The Path of the Bodhisattva

Kindness

The reverence with which Tibetan Buddhists regard compassion is supreme. Great importance is placed on it. I was told that without bodhicitta (the word used for compassion), enlightenment was impossible, whereas with bodhicitta, it was inevitable. This made a deep impression on me. I was fortunate to be with Chagdud Rinpoche who was famous for being the “motivation lama.” The motivation of benefiting all sentient beings, of offering compassion to them, was his trademark. Lama Drimed follows in his footsteps.

In the teachings I received on the path of the bodhisattva, it was pointed out at great length and in great detail that kindness to others was supremely important. It was also put into practice at the gonpa. I had never met a group of people as genuinely kind as the various Tibetans who spent time there.

Rinpoche, for example, had an open door and seemed to have infinite patience. He was capable of being fierce and upholding discipline, but the underlying feeling tone was great compassion. Lama Drimed put up with my demanding personality with patience, kindness and love. I knew that he truly wanted the very highest for me. I am enormously grateful to have such a being on my side, not only in this life but beyond.

I knew that Baba loved me and had evidence for it over and over. He was, however, not the slightest bit tolerant of my delusions. I literally spent years weeping daily for his love and attention, to no avail. This kind of personal desire and attachment was still present when I moved into the gonpa and it became focused on Lama Drimed. Again, I was a gopi, yearning for his love and attention.

At the beginning of my time there, he would meet with people once a week and I took hours and hours of his time going over my emotional baggage and my numerous insights and ideas. Instead of relaxing, I persisted in trying to get something from him to make the suffering go away for good.

He never once showed annoyance or asked me to go. Nor did he do it with any one of us. He never yelled or showed anger or displeasure with me. His presence, however, made me acutely aware of my shortcomings. They stood out in bold relief. During these long meetings I would finally realize that I had used up too much time and drag myself away. Each time after I left his presence, I felt healed, calmed, relieved of the inner burden – for a while. Over time, his kindness and compassion really had a transforming effect.

The Bodhisattva’s Vow

The ideal of the path of compassion is the bodhisattva, a being who lives only to benefit others. Once I heard the bodhisattva described as someone with a permanently broken heart. The heart is wide open to the suffering of the world. From the point of view of the ego, this sounds terrible, but the pain of the bodhisattva’s broken heart is incredibly sweet and poignant with love.

It is wonderful to imagine and evoke the buddhas and bodhisattvas of the ten directions, as described in so many of the liturgies used at the gonpa. It is said that space is filled with these compassionate beings who are ever listening, caring, and relieving suffering and to whom one can pray.

Hearing the teachings on the path of the bodhisattva brought to mind a long-forgotten experience. When I first arrived in India with my husband in 1970, before meeting Baba, we took a 10 day vipassana course with Sri Goenka in Bombay. Early one morning in one of the optional sessions, he performed a ceremony in which we took the bodhisattva vow. I remember being moved to tears by the ceremony, which brought up a feeling of deja vu and tremendous nostalgia in me. This seemed to be another mark of the karmic connection I had with this path.

Tonglen

I loved the fact that there were practices one could do to instill this attitude. Instead of spending countless hours in a kind of neurotic inner dialog, as I did in the early days of my sadhana, trying to figure out how I could get what I wanted – personal love and attention from Baba, a good position, recognition, relief from pain, liberation, etc. – the training in tonglen shifted this focus away from the incessant focus on “me.”

This practice of breathing in suffering and breathing out compassion is totally counterintuitive. Because it so profoundly goes against the purpose and energy of the ego, it is a powerful tool in undermining the ego’s sway. I found the practice of breathing in the dark and breathing out the light to be very soothing and peaceful. The ego’s practice of keeping darkness and suffering away and trying to attract all that is pleasurable does not produce a feeling of peace.

Another compassion practice, called exchanging self for others, was, however, too difficult for me at the beginning. I was resistant to the notion that one should put others above oneself. For some reason, taking in the suffering of others still allowed me to feel some self worth - that I was being good - whereas exchanging myself for others left me no ego gratification at all. It felt unattractive, wrong and even dangerous. Here I bumped up against what they call ego clinging.

So I proceeded to pray for others, to breathe in the suffering of others, but could not go the whole way of exchanging self for others as taught by Shantideva, the saint who was the acknowledged expert on the subject of bodhicitta, or compassion. However, over time and in that environment, it slowly dawned on me that I could renounce my little self, at least on the level of belief. It felt good and was in fact a relief. This was a sea change for me.

Kindness as a Path

I watched Chagdud Rinpoche and Lama Drimed intently and saw the results of their kindness and softness. They were not wimps at all, but they lacked the dynamic, energetic and very self confident quality I had not fully appreciated in Baba. There was, however, a lot to appreciate about Baba. I loved him deeply and marveled at his dynamism. The energy of his presence was intoxicating and dramatic and took one out of oneself. He was like a force of nature, a whirlwind, but as with forces of nature, there are certain contexts in which there is unease and fear. I felt more at ease and more trusting with the path of the bodhisattva.

I know that there are Tibetans who are self-centered, powerful and charismatic in the way Baba was. I am also certain that there Hindus who are as kind and “selfless” as my Buddhist teachers. I do not mean to compare the paths or the cultures, but rather to tell my own story. This is a personal story of my own development and not meant to be an indictment of anyone or anything. It is just my story. I want to be honest and tell it like it was – or more correctly, as I perceived it at the time. I did arrive at a place where I no longer had any residue of the criticisms I had felt of Baba, but I lived for a long time with rancor and resentment eating away at my heart. I do not wish this kind of suffering for anyone.

My original focus at the gonpa was dzogchen, and the teachings on the way of the bodhisattva came later. Perhaps the reason that the teaching on the bodhisattva path resonated so deeply was because I heard it in the context of studying dzogchen, the great perfection teachings of supreme wisdom.

The teaching on compassion can be approached from a non philosophical or secular point of view, as Rinpoche did in his Bodhisattva Peace Training course. It was a course designed for people in the helping professions to provide teachings and practices to help them avoid burnout. This work was inspired by Lama Shenpen, an American woman lama ordained by Rinpoche, who had been an activist and feminist but who had gotten burnt out doing this work.

When she turned to the spiritual path, she met Rinpoche and found what she needed in his teachings on motivation and compassion. She asked him to create a training for those who wanted to work with people’s suffering without getting stressed by their work. She wrote a book called Change of Heart which is a compilation of Rinpoche’s words during many Bodhisattva Peace Trainings and which was the text used in a study group which I facilitated for several years while at the gonpa. It was the experience of facilitating the study group that led me to recognize the importance of this perspective for myself.

As I immersed myself in Rinpoche’s teachings on compassion, I saw that it solved the problem of how to become good. One piece of the solution had been provided in the teachings on no self. If there were no individual self, then I didn’t have to spend any energy building it up or worrying about its concerns. But how to get away from it? The answer to this question was pointed to in the practices of motivation and compassion. There was a way to actually move beyond the morass of ego fixation.

Wisdom and Compassion

When I first moved into the gonpa, I was drawn to the dzogchen path, with its allure of "the highest secret teachings," and I came to the teachings on the bodhisattva path later. They provided the final piece of the puzzle. Each alone was not enough for me. It was the marriage of wisdom and compassion – the combining of these two aspects of the path which made it feel complete.

I loved dzogchen with its lofty view, its untrammeled non-duality, its freedom from all cultural trappings and its simplicity, and at the same time I revered the mahayana’s teachings on the bodhisattva’s compassion.

Wisdom without compassion can be dry and fruitless. Compassion without wisdom can be misguided, self-serving and also lacking in lasting benefit. The two together, which are called view and conduct, provide a complete path.

Padmasambhava, the great siddha who brought Buddhism to Tibet, famously said that one’s view should be as high as the sky while one’s conduct should be as fine as barley flour. It is not that any particular conduct is enjoined, but rather the motivation behind it. With the correct motivation - to be of benefit to beings - any activity undertaken is of benefit.

Integrating Head and Heart

The other day I heard some meditation instructions, from an Anglican priest, which said in part, “Put your mind into your heart.” It was a beautiful expression of this path of wisdom/compassion, the integration of head and heart.

When I arrived at the gonpa, I already had the essence of the dzogchen piece from Kashmir Shaivism, but I didn’t really have the compassion piece. I believed that Baba operated from compassion, that he lived to serve beings. He did not, however, formally teach a path of compassion as did the Tibetans. Receiving these teachings was like nectar, balm, much longed-for grace.

Because of my experience, I find that I like to teach meditation from both perspectives, alternating between a focus on Awareness meditation and the practice of tonglen. I also have begun teaching a variation of tonglen for one’s own suffering. This does not involve breathing in someone else’s suffering and is therefore a good way to begin. One does breathe in one’s own suffering, but then it is already there, so it is less problematic. I find that this technique is excellent for alleviating current upsets, as well as long standing traumas.

In this application, on the inbreath one allows the present suffering or contraction to be fully present in one’s being. During this part, one gives enormous space to the feeling of suffering. The attitude may be one of curiosity or hospitality. It is like inviting in a dear friend with a problem. You invite your friend to sit comfortably, offer a cup of tea and then listen to her problems with an open heart.

In the practice of tonglen for oneself, the contraction or suffering is allowed to expand, without judgment, fear or revulsion. Then on the outbreath, love and compassion are sent to this suffering in whatever form is needed - understanding, acceptance, relief, forgiveness - whatever form love takes in the situation.

This practice can lead directly into the more traditional tonglen practice in which one imagines a being or beings before you and allows their darkness and suffering to flow in on the inbreath and allows love and compassion to flow out on the outbreath.

The practice of offering compassion to others in one’s own body is very powerful. It provides one with the experience of being the source of, or channel for, divine grace. Depending on one’s perspective, it can be looked at as accessing the higher emotional center of the heart, or accessing the heart of the chosen deity - whether it be Tara, the Divine Mother, or Avalokiteshwara.

Offering One’s Virtue to Others

One often hears criticism of those who do long retreat or who spend their lives in caves, meditating. It is felt that such a life is selfish, useless and indulgent, but if the retreatants and cave dwellers are praying for humanity and dedicating the merit of their practice to the upliftment of all sentient beings, then this is beneficial work for the planet and indeed, the universe.

This brings up the idea of dedication of merit, an aspect I particularly love about the Buddhist path. At the gonpa, at the end of every practice session in the shrine room, we would all recite Chagdud Rinpoche’s prayer of dedication and aspiration in which we offered the fruits of our practice for the welfare of all sentient beings.

I was taught that unless one’s merit is sealed by offering in this way, it can be destroyed by non-virtuous activity, such as anger. Although I can’t say that I fully subscribe to the fear-inducing aspect of this teaching, I really like the idea offering one’s merit.

Chagdud Rinpoche’s dedication and aspiration prayer says, “Throughout my many lives and until this moment, whatever virtue I have accomplished, including the merit generated by this practice and all that I will ever attain, this I offer for the welfare of sentient beings.

“May sickness, war, famine and suffering be decreased for every being, while their wisdom and compassion increase in this and every future life.

“May I clearly perceive all experiences to be as insubstantial as the dream fabric of the night and instantly awaken to perceive the pure wisdom display in the arising of every phenomenon.

“May I quickly attain enlightenment in order to work ceaselessly for the liberation of all sentient beings.”

Insert After Chapter 6: Once Again Into the River

Greetings from Santa Fe

Although I had planned to post 11 chapters, one each week, something has come up which necessitates a change in the schedule. Once again I have jumped into the river and there is a new chapter in my life unfolding. I have rather suddenly decided to move back to the US, so I am inserting a piece here about that. Next week, I plan to continue posting chapters of my “what I got from the Buddhists” piece.

A few months ago, I was invited to a swami reunion to be held June 11-13 in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Swami Chetanananda graciously and generously offered to buy me a ticket and I have been planning that trip. I was to spend a few extra days in Santa Fe, then go the Bay Area to visit family and friends, finally to the gonpa for 5 days and then back to Australia. Now it seems that I will stay in the US and not return to Australia.

This change in my life course has come about, directly and indirectly, because of this blog. Although I sensed that it might bring up some shifts and surprises, I was not aware of what would arise and how it would play out. As reactions arose and things played out, the desire to have my own spiritual work came strongly to the fore. It had, of course, been in the back of my mind ever since meeting Baba and has undergone numerous permutations.

Inner Revelation

My credo has always been that one needs an outer sign. I have had inner intuitions over the decades, but never a clear cut outer sign. The recent change came, however, from an inner revelation and I knew it was time to give up looking for something outside myself to validate, confirm, or command. It was time to take full responsibility for my life and just do what I felt I had to do. It suddenly became clear that it was independent work and furthermore, that it was time to just do it.

The revelation was not the result of a thought process, but more like a whole picture descending in a flash of light. The feeling was both ecstatic and peaceful at the same time. There was a vast field of love surrounding it all and I was certain that this was a true revelation. It was clear that I would leave the Shiva Ashram and go out on my own to begin my own work. At some future point I may write more about this revelation.

I had come to Australia, as I have told many, to deal with the one relationship in my life which felt unresolved, - the relationship with Swami Shankarananda, my ex husband. This has happened. I feel at peace with this profoundly karmic relationship. There is great love between us and he is continuing to offer help for which I am very grateful. I am grateful for my time here, for his Ashram, for all the beautiful people who are members of his sangha, for Devi Ma’s motherly care, for the opportunities to begin teaching meditation and discovering my authentic voice.

There are many people in this community who have given me great love and I know that this is due in large part to Swamiji’s grace. Because he loves me, they are inclined to join in and give their love to me. I am also grateful for the various pressures he and Devi Ma applied, whether consciously or unconsciously, which have brought the issue of my place in the universe into clarity.

It has become clear that their work, which I applaud, is not my work. It is time for me to move into my own work. I envision that it will incorporate the many strands of my inexplicable spiritual path – Baba’s work, what I got from the Buddhists, Jin Shin Jyutsu, counseling, astrology, the enneagram, and maybe even NLP and hypnotherapy. Above all is the motivation to be of benefit to others on the spiritual journey.

Impermanence

I keep trying to settle down, unpack all my stuff and have a permanent home. I cringe when I write the word “permanent.” If there was one word I heard the most frequently while at the gonpa it would have to be the word “impermanence.” While I know that everything is impermanent, there is also a desire to settle and to rest. The conclusion I have come to is that every moment contains rest and peace and at the same time the dynamism of change and becoming. Every moment is the whole of life, the union of Shiva and Shakti, Wisdom and Compassion.

Part of my recent revelation is that it is time to let go of stuff. I did the practice of imagining myself leaving everything behind and being more of a wandering sadhu. As I tried this on, I saw that it is not the stuff itself I have to let go of but the attachment to it and the worry over dealing with it. It really is simple. Whatever might be useful or beneficial can stay and whatever is superfluous must go. So packing becomes a meditation.

Once again it is time to jump into the river. Although there is much in me that resonates with the mode of renunciation, there is also a strong Cancerian part that wants to feather a nest and a very cosy one at that. This reclusive crab carries a big house on her back, wherever she moves.

I have lost count of the many many moves I have made in this life. After my revelation to leave, I consulted the I Ching and got The Wanderer. Interestingly, the very first time I ever consulted the I Ching, which was on the eve of my first arrival at Baba’s Ganeshpuri ashram in March, 1971, I got the Wanderer and the Creative. It seemed auspicious at the time. And now when I got it again, almost 40 years later, it also seems auspicious.

This time I am really going into the unknown. My mind keeps moving all over a map in my head. It goes to all the places I have lived and the places where I have friends. It hovers here and there spinning possible scenarios. But it doesn’t land anywhere. Not yet. It is not the place, however, which is important, nor the convenience or inconvenience. It is not about the possibilities that may be offered. This time it is really about what I want to offer, rather than about what I might receive.

The Awakener

The decision or revelation arrived on May 14. A week and a week later at the May 22 satsang program in Australia, I was sitting in the hall and began to look at the large “shaktipat photo” of Baba which was right in my line of vision. I usually just take it for granted and don’t look at it closely. But for some reason my gaze fell on it and it began to move and come alive - just like it had the first time I saw a large photo of Baba in New Delhi in 1970 at Mohini Amma’s place.

This happened before we met Baba. My husband and I were helping Bhagawan Das get his visa renewed and had come down to Delhi from Neem Karoli Baba’s place in the mountains to ask Mohini Amma’s husband, a government official, for help. My husband, Danny Goleman and Bhagawan Das went off to the government office and I stayed back at the house. I asked her if there were someplace in her house where I could sit and read and she took me up to the roof to her satsang room. It was lovely and had a beautiful and highly charged atmosphere. I sat down on a cushion facing a large photo of Baba.

As I looked at it, it came alive and smiled at me. I was astonished. It was like the psychedelic experiences I had had before our quest in India. I knew I hadn’t had any psychedelic drugs of any kind for months, and so I was surprised at the aliveness and movement in the photograph before me. I wondered if perhaps he were my guru. It turned out that he was.

Now again, in Australia, Baba was twinkling and smiling at me. I knew he was pleased with my decision. The thought entered my mind, “He is the Awakener.” His power to awaken, to enliven the spiritual energy, was undiminished. As I continued to gaze, there was the sense of union, the certainty that he and I were one energy, one purpose though with different outer forms. I knew this had always informed my life and would continue to inform my spiritual work, however it would unfold.

I have faith in the Mother of the Universe, who in all her manifestations is my chosen deity - my ishta devata or yidam. She has always held me closely, and is always available, leading me to the next perfect place. Around Baba, and also at the Shiva Ashram, we daily chant the ancient formula “Om purnamidam purnamadah purnat, purnamudacyate purnasya purnamadaya purnameva vashishyate.” Roughly translated it affirms, “This is perfect; that is perfect. If from the perfect the perfect is taken, the perfect remains.” And it ends with peace - Om shantih, shantih, shantih – which is the fruit of the awareness of perfection.

Chapter 6: Motivation

Benefiting Beings

This topic probably should have gone first, since it is the first thing every Tibetan teacher begins with when giving a teaching. The students are asked to set their motivation for receiving teachings, i.e., to listen to the teachings with the aspiration to use them for the welfare and upliftment of all beings.

Chagdud Rinpoche was known as the “motivation” lama. No matter what he was asked to speak about, he spoke on motivation. No matter what the announced topic of his talk, people also got teachings on motivation. I heard that students had begged him to talk about something else, but he confessed that he seemed to always want to give this message to people.

The teaching is simple: the correct motivation, the highest motivation, is to be of benefit to sentient beings. This is the motivation of the bodhisattva, the ideal of the mahayana path. Although he was a great dzogchen master, established in the highest view at all times, Chagdud Rinpoche radiated kindness and compassion. He had the same quality that the Dalai Lama has.

In my estimation, this quality speaks to the human heart more powerfully than any other. The greatest spiritual teachers and saints all have this quality. They are filled with the effulgence of divine love and have eradicated the traces of the tyranny of the small self.

Motivation and Trust

The practice of developing the motivation of compassion has far-reaching effects. In my experience those who practice this are capable of evincing a high degree of trust. I found that I was able to trust my Buddhist teachers more deeply than I had been able to trust any other people in my life – because of their total dedication to benefiting others.

My parents were very loving and were good parents in almost all ways - and they were alcoholics. Even though I was confident of my parents’ love, there was a part of their psychology which was in the sway of their addiction. I could see and feel that this was a constant motivating factor in their lives and as a result, there was some insecurity and lack of full trust.

In a similar way, I sometimes harbored suspicions about Baba’s motivations. I had doubts fostered by his personality. It seemed to me at the time that Baba had personal interests and motivations in addition to the motivation behind his spiritual work. For example, I saw that he was very interested in the numbers of people that attended his programs and also in the numbers of famous people he attracted. Was this just the motivation to serve humanity on a vast scale? I can see now that this was no doubt the case. But at the time, I had issues with it, because it didn’t match my ideals.

One story will give an example of my ideals and my concern with ordinary human feelings. For a time, Baba would give a present every day to a young boy who was the son of the president of Baba’s foundation. He was an adorable child and Baba loved him a lot. But it was painful to see all the other children watch him getting a gift day after day while none of the other kids ever seemed to get anything. I was told that this was mentioned to Baba, but it did not change.

I wondered why Baba did not know or care that others were suffering. On a personal level it was obvious that there were favorites. It is true that this outer play served the purpose of the purification of ego that always goes on around a guru. After all, it was just desire and attachment that caused their suffering, and Baba never pandered to desire and attachment. I understood this and yet at the same time I was pained at the suffering which I saw no need for. I doubted that Baba was consciously providing spiritual lessons to small children.

The Divine Mother

I used to think that my judgments of Baba reflected real flaws in his character. I no longer see it that way. He had a particular personality through which the divine manifested powerfully. In the years I lived with him and the years after this, I overcame my attachment to many aspects of my spiritual idealism. This was positive, but at the same time, there was still some demoralization and cynicism which kept my heart contracted.

In retrospect I see that I was looking for a way to manifest my divinity. I was looking for a model of how I could be and was blinded and side tracked by Baba’s powerful display, which I knew could never be my way. The problem wasn’t my divinity, but how I could manifest it.

Baba gave me a clue when he gave me the name Mother Girija, and told the swamis to call me Mother. I had had inner revelations of my deep connection with the Divine Mother. I think that I was looking for a model for this aspect of the divine. The Indian concept of ishta devata, or chosen deity (yidam in Tibetan) is a key concept in Indian spirituality. I had learned about it from stories of Sharada Devi, Ramakrishna’s wife.

She was said to be able to discern easily and quickly what the ishta devata was for any aspirant who came to her for initiation. Others had to meditate for a longer time to arrive at the correct aspect of the divine into which the aspirant should be initiated. The tradition was that the guru would initiate the aspirant into the worship of a particular deity, or aspect of the divine. This practice would eventually ripen into full identification with the divine, by using the natural propensities or qualities of the aspirant. So the form (the ishta devata) led to the formless (union with the divine) which then manifested in form (enlightened activity or conduct).

I was looking to Baba for a model of the humble and compassionate mother aspect and when I didn’t find it, I felt alienated and found fault. It was a relief to find that I didn’t have this issue at the gonpa for the most part. It appeared to me that my Buddhist teachers were very sensitive to people’s hurt feelings and would always behave in a kind and inclusive way. Although this may just have been a matter of personality, I attributed it to the discipline of holding the benefit of others as the paramount motivation. This resonated deeply with my being.

It was very interesting to watch how the lamas handled difficult people. Generally there was great acceptance and compassion but on occasion, if the negative behavior reached a level where it impacted the stability and harmony of the gonpa, steps were taken to remedy the situation. It seemed to me that the psychological states of the people involved and impacted was the main consideration.

This suited my temperament and provided a model of behavior for me. Most importantly, it allowed me to trust more deeply than I had in my life. This trust was a key to the healing that took place for me while at the gonpa. Here at the Shiva Ashram, I see that Swamiji’s emphasis on people’s emotional states and issues is very beneficial to the ashramites and community members.

How to Be Good

When I was a child, I was fascinated by the stories of saints’ lives. I babysat for a Catholic family and found books containing stories of Catholic martyrs and saints. Some of the stories were quite extreme and even gory, but I was nonetheless captivated. I remember having the despairing thought that I could never be a saint because I could never sacrifice myself in the way that they did and basically, because I could not just be good all the time.

I knew that I had a selfish heart in spite of the aspiration for it not to be that way. Later, when I read the prayer of Saint Augustine: “God grant me chastity, but not yet,” I knew how he felt. The “not yet” demonstrated the unwillingness to really be transformed. I was aware that I didn’t really want to give up my selfishness, my small self - not really and not completely.

All of the despair and praying for self improvement was still only coming from the ego. In prayers like, “I want to be good. Please make me good,” the emphasis is still on the small self, on “me.” The teachings on motivation take one out of this realm and provide a solution by shifting the emphasis onto others.

Non Virtuous Speech

I received formal teachings on motivation during the ngondro retreat I took with Lama Drimed in 1996, before moving into the gonpa. I was in an open frame of mind and the teachings on motivation sunk in very deeply. I felt happy and encouraged. It seemed as though the very next thing I heard, right on the heels of this life-altering teaching, also made a deep impression on me, but it was more like horror than joy.

It was part of the teaching on the ten negative actions to be abandoned. In addition to killing, stealing and sexual misconduct, there were four categories of speech which were deemed unworthy of a sincere seeker. They were said to create non-virtue and to be the cause of a lower rebirth, to say nothing of hampering spiritual progress.

As these were described, I recognized every single one of them as prominent features of my speech. The four were lying, sowing discord, harsh speech and worthless chatter or gossip. I was horrified when contemplating what it would mean to give these up. Was it possible? Would there be anything left?

I had always been given to exaggeration, or as I liked to think of it, poetic license. I knew that I also tried to speak in a way that would present myself in a good light. In studying our text, which was Patrul Rinpoche’s Words of My Perfect Teacher, it seemed pretty clear that this constituted lying.

Sowing discord, the next category, was not so frightening. It didn’t seem to apply to me quite so much, but I suspected that if I searched deeply, I could find that it too was a habit of my speech. I certainly remembered complaining to others about those who upset me, in the hopes that they would be on my side and think less highly of the ones who made me feel badly in any way. This was certainly a form of sowing discord rather than harmony.

Harsh speech was definitely going to be a problem to overcome. I have always been quite undiplomatic, preferring to “tell it like it is.” My judgmental nature manifested in my speech. This category included not only overtly harsh speech, but also included words that made others unhappy or uncomfortable. I saw that giving this up would take quite an effort. But still, it seemed easier than the last category of non-virtuous speech.

This category was worthless chatter and included gossip and irrelevant talk. Wow! That pretty much summed up most of what passed my lips! I had always been pretty good at small talk and social chit-chat. I loved to talk about people. I didn’t feel that it was malicious, but more a love of analyzing people and digging into what makes them tick. I also wanted to facilitate greater understanding between people. Although I was trying to move beyond judgment, I knew that my analyses were still tinged with judgment. Furthermore, I could not pretend that I didn’t know that sharing stories that people would not like told about them was hurtful.

I decided to contemplate this teaching and to move in the direction of more virtuous speech. I was helped by the fact that the residents of the gonpa and the members of the sangha who visited were all trying to do the same thing. Of course, talking about people did go on, but it was done in a slightly more conscious way. Practically speaking, this meant that it was often done with various subterfuges. One would hear such things as, “I know I shouldn’t be gossiping, but ……” or, “I really love so and so, but……”

The traditional teachings on motivation emphasize the attitude of compassion for beings, the attitude of wishing for and acting for the benefit of others. I was inspired by this general teaching, but even more inspired by the motivation to really put all of the teachings into practice. I found that I was in the midst of people who were trying to diminish their negative emotional habits and it was very moving to me.

Harmlessness

An example of how this worked for me involved the teaching on not killing. I was surprised to discover that the Buddhists did not even kill mosquitoes. I had grown up routinely killing insects. I didn’t enjoy it or do it gratuitously, but I had no qualms about slapping mosquitoes, swatting flies, or mopping up infestations of ants on the kitchen counter. This was not done at the gonpa.

We used bug wands, little vacuum devices, to capture and transport spiders and other bugs from our rooms to the outdoors. Infestations of ants were dealt with by creating “pure lands,” boxes containing grass, twigs and sugar. When the ants migrated to this, it was simply carried outside. There were also mouse traps that captured the mice alive so they could be taken out to a field and released. There was a crew who captured rattlesnakes and took them across the river to be released.

At the beginning, I felt that this was perhaps too much political correctness and began to inquire as to why it was wrong to kill small things that were dangerous or very inconvenient. I heard a lot of explanations, but the one that moved me was the idea that by making a decision not to kill or harm any being, one becomes a “harmless” rather than “harmful” being. This reduces the amount of fear in the universe. It makes you someone that others can look to for protection and refuge, rather than someone who is to be feared. On a subtle level, this is a very big energetic shift.

Taming the Mind

I decided to sign on and began to work at breaking old habits. I even let mosquitoes bite me, rejoicing in the fact that I was providing a meal for them. I discovered that if I did not scratch a mosquito bite, the itching would totally disappear in a few hours. In actual fact, it was not that difficult. The difficulty lay in my emotional habits and reactions.

Practicing not harming in this very physical way was an exercise in watching my mind, watching the fear and aversion that automatically arose when I heard a mosquito buzzing. It felt like an important victory to be able to control my mind in this very limited situation. By learning to do this small thing, I could then extend it to the larger issues of my willfulness.

To actually be of benefit to sentient beings, one must have control over one’s mind. It is a project that involves more than good intentions. As a child, reading about the Catholic saints and martyrs, I saw that it was impossible to be good just by wanting to. I couldn’t even begin to accomplish it nor could I see how it even could be done by anyone. It seemed to be impossible.

Now I was on a path that promised to show me how it could be done. I trusted this path, primarily because of its first tenet, which was motivation. Just setting my compass in the direction of bodhicitta, the attitude of compassion, gave me the feeling that all things were now possible. As a young person, dealing with my impulses had seemed an overwhelming and impossible task. Here I was learning to take baby steps. Even if I didn’t get very far in this life, at least I was moving in the right direction.

Bhakti and Compassion

I found it very interesting that the Buddhists use the word compassion instead of the word love to describe the form side. So instead of jnana (wisdom) and bhakti (devotion), they have wisdom and compassion. At the highest level, I think that love and compassion are the same thing, but at the bottom of the mountain, they manifest differently.

Around Baba, I was immersed in the world of bhakti, of intense devotion. Baba’s devotees wept, danced, bowed, reached out to touch him and sat gazing in adoration from morning to night. We also saw displays of Baba’s devotion to his guru, Bhagawan Nityananda. Baba had installed a beautiful lifelike statue (murti) of his guru and had formal worship of it done throughout the day. He would do full pranams or prostrations to this murti and also circumambulate it every day.

This was all very moving and uplifting and we were raised up out of our ordinary worldly focus. This is how the path of bhakti works. The ordinary capacity for love, admiration and adoration is focused on the divine and intensified. The goal is selfless love of and union with God.

Both the path of devotion and the path of compassion are about development of the heart, but whereas bhakti yoga is associated with emotional yearning and weeping for god, the path of compassion has practices such as tonglen, with its focus on developing compassion for others, and also the practice of exchanging self for other. Always, the focus is on others and not on oneself.

The gonpa was much less juicy than the love-drenched atmosphere of Baba’s ashram, but it also seemed to have fewer of the adverse aspects of that atmosphere. Around Baba I had experienced god-intoxicated bhaktas – passionate devotees - who would think nothing of pushing and shoving their fellow seekers out of the way to get closer to the object of their devotion.

In all fairness I also found this at the gonpa, but usually the Buddhists were much “nicer.” They had been instructed from day one in the six paramitas or virtues and were committed, to some extent at least, to forswear anger, desire, jealousy, greed, and pride.

I did miss the chanting and other aspects of the path of bhakti or devotion which are rich and full of joy. Chanting is one of the things I love about the Shiva Ashram. Still, in spite of the bliss of chanting, it hadn’t led me to a transcendental level. It had not taken me beyond the little me, screaming inside for satisfaction. I was still brought down by my ego, like the gopi who, when she finally had Lord Krishna in her arms, began to pride herself on her accomplishment. In that instant the Lord fled from her embrace.

I was uplifted by the emphasis on the other, which seemed to me to offer a way beyond the selfish concerns of ordinary love, which had always been connected, in my case, with wanting, desiring, and striving. The focus on motivation seemed to diminish this pitfall.

Although the tantric maelstrom of Baba’s ashram served me well, it also went against my grain from time to time. I wanted a model that felt like one I could reasonably and easily aspire to, one that displayed itself in a kinder, more humble and apparently caring fashion.

The Tibetan Connection

This desire came up for the first time when the Karmapa visited Baba in Ganeshpuri in the early 70’s. When I first laid eyes on him as he stepped through the front gate, without knowing who he was, I burst into tears. This was so unexpected and embarrassing that I fled to the bookstore and closed the door.

I felt enormously guilty when, during his visit, I had the thought, “I wish he were my guru.” I hoped Baba would not hear this thought as I gazed at the Karmapa with a kind of longing. I admired his humility, his apparent lack of ego, his lack of bluster, his kindness and calm demeanor. I certainly loved Baba enormously, but somehow there was an attraction to this Tibetan.

Baba spoke highly of the Karmapa in Ganeshpuri, and in fact paid him a rare compliment. He was usually very strict about spiritual promiscuity. He did not approve of guru-hopping and encouraged his disciples to focus on one guru. Because of this atmosphere, one of the young boys who was serving the Karmapa was alarmed when the Karmapa gave him a mantra.

He ran to Baba in a panic and told him that the Karmapa had given him a mantra. Baba reassured the boy saying, “That is his nature. It is OK. It is just who he is.” It was clear that Baba had high regard for this smiling Tibetan.

Later in Ann Arbor, when he visited for the opening of the Ann Arbor ashram, Baba pointed out to a few of us gathered in his room that the Karmapa was fat and could not keep up with him on their walk. There was no malice in it, but still I did not like it. It seemed like bragging and there was a hint of competitiveness which rubbed me the wrong way.

I now chalk this up to nothing more than a quirk of personality. I no longer feel critical of Baba as I once had. None of the judgment that I burned with seems to remain. I also don’t believe that the way of humility is superior. I just like it better. It is a quality which allowed me to develop trust, which I needed to develop my own being.

I was delighted to meet Chagdud Rinpoche and many other Tibetans. As a culture they are - for the most part - humble, kind, and calm. One would not expect to see them bragging or showing off, which would be considered bad form. During my first meeting with Rinpoche at his gonpa, I told him that I would like him to be my teacher. His response was, “I very bad teacher.” I was so shocked that I blurted out, “Oh don’t say that!” It was so antithetical to my concept of the guru.

I was also charmed by the fact that the Tibetans all claim to be without attainment. The Dalai Lama, for example, refers to himself as a simple monk. This is not to say that all the Tibetans I met were enlightened and had no egos. I met some who displayed the poisons of the mind, who appeared arrogant or competitive, but overall the culture was more to my liking. I attribute this in large part to the teachings on motivation with its focus on compassion.

In the early day at the gonpa, when confronted with what I deemed to be arrogance and pride in a highly placed person, I would share my views with others and would be frustrated by their calm reactions. They would express compassion for the person instead of outrage, which is what I felt. It wasn’t that they disagreed with my analysis of the situation, but they had a totally different attitude. I wondered if I could ever feel as they did.

Even before going to India and meeting Baba, I had felt that my task as a seeker was to somehow become egoless. Except for the few short-lived experiences in which it was lifted away, I could not get away from the sense of “me” which looked for its own gratification. There were no specific practices that promised to lead to the eradication of this troubling samsaric being which seemed to be inseparable from myself. I eventually found help in this endeavor in the teachings on motivation and compassion, which focus on others and not on the personal self.

Refuge and Bodhicitta

The practices of taking refuge and generating bodhicitta are the first two practices of the ngondro, which I began the day after visiting the gonpa and having a meeting with Rinpoche. One takes refuge in the buddha, the dharma and the sangha. Although this was explained quite beautifully, it did not really impact me greatly. With Baba, I had already taken refuge in the guru, in the spiritual path, in the spiritual teachings and in the divine. For these reasons, taking refuge didn’t seem like something essentially different or new to me.

However, the generation of bodhicitta, the mind or attitude of compassion, was quite different. I had never heard of generating this motivation consciously as a practice. It made sense. Why not wish for ordinary and ultimate happiness for all sentient beings? It was obvious to me that one wanted the very best for all of those one loved and felt connected to. It was also obvious to me that this “very best” had to be enlightenment, or at the very least, access to divine grace.

I recently read the last Harry Potter book and was struck by the fact that, at the end, it was the quality of Harry’s motivation – specifically the motivation to help and support those he loved – that made all the difference. It is a beautiful and modern story of the bodhisattva.