Tag Archives: inspiration

Seeking Justice: Commitments

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This morning I was just sitting, or at least trying to just sit. You know, being quiet, relaxing the mind. All that kind of thing. And of course, an idea sprung into that not so cooperative mind, so I grabbed my notebook. Just as I went to put this latest brainwave on paper I noticed a very extraordinary note I must have made I don’t know when:

I’ve just looked it up: It’s a slight paraphrase of a verse from the Old Testament, from the prophet Micah. Where I read it, I can’t say (the note is at least several weeks old). But to quote another little note from some unknown source, I always like to:

Let the noble thoughts come to me from all corners of the universe.

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I’m just like everyone else, always wanting the easy solutions and you can tell that can’t you? ‘How to live the good life? Simple!’. I mean really; hardly humble in my approach in that note was I? Well, let’s talk about what Micah says, not my own lack of humility.

Seek justice; practise kindness; and walk humbly with [your] God.

There are numerous versions online of this verse (Micah, 6:8), so I will leave it to you to check those out for yourself. I’ve added the word your because all those versions do say ‘your God’. But even in this paraphrase it’s easy to see there is nothing at all simple about any of these injunctions.

I discovered that this verse is often invoked in times of grave injustice, or crisis. I think it goes without saying that we would be hard pressed to think of a time that was not a time of grave injustice or crisis. Certainly, we are living in one of those times of injustice and crisis.

There’s no need to or purpose served by getting into how ‘grave’ injustice is now compared to some other time; there’s no need or point to weighing up the relative severity of one crisis versus another. Injustice is injustice; a crisis is a crisis.

In other words, the present is always the time to heed the injunctions of this verse.

So, what do we do if we are to seek justice? Running the risk of sounding flippant, I would say that there are as many answers to this question as there are people to answer it. Now, you would think this would make the task impossible; too many cooks and all that. But actually it’s perfect. Why? Because it means that whoever you are, whatever your situation, you can actively seek justice.

Or, I am sorry: I should say I, me. Not you. I can actively seek justice. But, you say, you are a hermit; you live in a cave (not literally but I know what you mean); you hardly ever even talk to people in ‘real life’. Yes, all true. And I would say that the action I take is by no means at the level I know I want it to be. I’m doing nowhere enough.

Does that mean I’m leaving the cave? Going out into the world, onto the streets to join other brave souls seeking justice? Believe me, I ask myself such questions constantly. But to speak truth to you now, I will say that I know absolutely, in my heart, that my role is something different.

If anything, I need to go deeper into the cave; I need to go deeper into the inner world of my own Self. I know that in this way I will join with so many others in what I’ve come to call the Invisible Community of people all over the world living lives of contemplation and prayer. Or, speaking for me personally, trying to live a life of contemplation and prayer.

By so doing I am at least in a tiny way supporting those millions of others out there on the streets, in the aid groups, running campaigns, writing letters, helping the victims of injustice, in all kinds of miraculous, brave, and innovative ways.

So that’s my commitment to you. To deepen my prayer; to intensify my contemplation; to more fully realise my union with all living beings; and to really join with the invisible community in its efforts.

And, you ask, this blog? What’s it about then? Well, notes, musings, thoughts and reflections all aimed at reminding me of my responsibilities. And hopefully along the way, solidifying my union with you and the rest of creation, just a bit.

Peace and love

PS I haven’t forgotten ‘practise kindness’ or ‘walk humbly with your God’. Maybe another time.

Just Passing Through … or Seeking Noble Truths: A Poetical Sharing

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Greetings friends

In my last post I mentioned I would share a poem with you in this one. And here it is!

Just Passing Through … or Seeking Noble Truths, is, like the previous post, concerned with passing through, how as I go through life, I am always in some sort of passing through place. Before we get to the poem, just let me fill you in on a bit of the back story.

First, I wrote the poem as I walked home to our hermitage at the time in a town called Moama on the Murray River in Australia. Now, the Murray is the biggest river in the country and the then little town of Moama sits across the river from its bigger city sized sibling: Echuca, the biggest inland port in Australia.

Anyway, I’d just crossed the river bridge and the words just started coming to me. Not exactly as you read it here, but close. I am very lucky that I had only a few minutes walk left to get home, otherwise the whole lot could have been lost to memory.

The longer back back story? Well, as the poem suggests, I’d spent a lot of time hitchhiking, in Australia and a few other places too. It’s true what it says in the first lines: I’d done a lot of trudging through a rather large number of towns unknown to me then, and only some of which are better known to me now in much later years.

Okay, that’s enough back story to last a while, so let’s just present the star of the show. I share this, as I do all my efforts, with heart.

JUST PASSING THROUGH … OR SEEKING NOBLE TRUTHS


Many have been the nights 
I’ve trudged (and less often, strode) 
past illuminated windows framing. 
families sharing sit down meals. 
Or huddled worshipfully before 
flickering and silent (to my passing by ears) 
picture boxes in corners of cosy family rooms. 

I am just one more invisible (to most), anonymous 
drifter. Just passing through 
the empty nighttime streets of one more 
anonymous town. 
Longing to enter the illumined frame. 
Longing to share one of those sit down meals. 
Longing to worship at the alter of the flickering picture box. 
Longing is loss. 

The edge of town roadside summons 
this lonesome bodhisattva begging rides. 

It’s just one more quiet and cold 
semi desert night. A high moon in a clear sky 
casts ghostly shadows through Eucalypts: 
my only company as the waiting game begins. 
Waiting to see headlights coming and going my way. 
Waiting to be rescued from this lonely edge of town roadside. 
Waiting for another ride, to another anonymous town. 
Waiting is wasteful 

Better to be here, now, on this 
edge of town roadside. A place as good 
as any. Illumined by the moon, 
the ghostly gums create the frame 
in which this bodhisattva rests. 
And worships. 

Thank you for allowing me to share these words with you. The road, as many of you will know, can be a teacher, a guru. I don’t hitch-hike anymore, but the road is still teaching me. And I am grateful.

Sometimes Happy, Sometimes Blue

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Remember, this is just a passing through place

Many years ago now, a wise person I know used these words to remind me of a fact of life that, even now, I sometimes (to be honest, this should read very often) forget: we are – all of us – only passing through. For me, the words have extra resonance beyond what you might call that overarching reality of the temporary nature of our time in this world: I was, born and still am, a nomad.

Even though I very much see myself as being on a never-ending pilgrimage, I do often get anxious about should I move? should I do this? Should I do that? Existential and other kinds of angst are common to all of us I think. So, now and again it’s a good idea to hit the refresh button and click the reminder that I am always in a passing through place.

I often find myself singing (usually very quietly or in my mind) the chorus from Passing Through, a very special Leonard Cohen:

Passing through, passing through.
Sometimes happy, sometimes blue,
Glad that I ran into you.
Tell the people that you saw me passing through

Leonard Cohen – Passing Through

And that’s the refresh: It is literally true to say – both in terms of my internal life journey and where I might be geographically speaking at any given time – that I am only passing through.

Change is constant, that’s the message here. Being sometimes happy, sometimes blue are just facts of life Leonard’s song tells us. But putting the whole chorus together you can see it’s about presence. It’s about being in the ongoing present moment; the moment that just keeps on keeping on. It’s about living in and being conscious of that ongoingness, whether we’re happy or blue.

As I typed that last sentence, about states of happiness and blueness, I suddenly thought of a poem I wrote quite a while ago now. Just Passing Through. Or Seeking Noble Truths. It, too, is about presence, about the attachment to outcomes (like being happy, or not being blue) being the cause of our suffering. Of course this isn’t my idea: it’s one of the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths.

I think I would like to share that poem with you. But let’s do it next time shall we? Because, while there might be no time like the present, as we’ve just seen, the present is ongoing.

So, see you next time

Peace and love

What’s ‘Ordinary’ Got to do With It?

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Perhaps shameful is too strong a word, but that’s kind of how it feels. You see, I’ve been thinking of giving up on the book I’m reading at the moment. And you are thinking, this is a big deal? If you don’t like it, put it aside and try something else.

Yes, excellent advice, thank you. And usually that’s what I would do. In fact now I think about it there was a time when I would force myself to complete a book, even if I wasn’t enjoying it or was bored with it. But I learned a long time ago that this is a waste of time, waste of mind, waste of energy, and unfair to me.

Yet, on this occasion, I started to have some thoughts that took it a bit deeper. It’s true to say that I’m a bit bored with this book; it’s as if I’m not overly interested in the story the author is telling, and in the way she’s telling it. As well I had this feeling that the book was ‘ordinary’: meaning that it was a kind of day to day telling of a segment of a life with its mundane and routine elements included along with the ‘good bits’.

And it was that feeling of being not so interested that got me thinking. The author’s vocation, thinking, activities, and the subject of the book itself, is exactly in line with areas I am very interested in reading about, not only for entertainment but for my learning, for my own spiritual journey and way of life.

The way she’s telling it? Now, this one got to me even more. The book was put together after the author’s death and is made up of extracts from the author’s journals and from the many letters she wrote to family and friends during the period of her life the book covers.

That’s what I do isn’t it? Keep a journal? Write letters? These and the many many blog posts (which in a way are a lot like letters, and even journal entries do you think?) I’ve written over many years, and the journal I’ve been keeping for most of my life, are the core of at least the personal writing I have done over my lifetime. By rejecting this book I started to feel that I was rejecting my own, for want of a better word, genres.

Or, worse than that, I’m rejecting the invitation to share a life. And illogically I’m rejecting the life story and insights of a person whose own experience I actually value for my own quest and from whom I could learn a great deal.

And what about the feeling of boredom and that the book was too ‘ordinary’ and mundane? Well, to borrow a well-worn phrase, this really does take the cake. I mean if you were to look at much of my past writings and look at my photography blogs from times past, you would see that one of my main statements of belief was:

There are no ordinary moments, nor are there any ordinary people.

And I still believe this. Indeed, spiritual practice and study has only deepened my instincts that all there is is the moment; all there is is all the beings of the world experiencing that ongoing presence, that never-ending moment. There can be nothing in the least ordinary about that.

I’ve saved the best – or is it the worst? – for last: what the book is about. It tells the story of a three year period in the life of a person just out of university who looking for a deeper meaning to life and to finding a true course for her life, travels from her home to Japan and enters a Zen monastery to become a monk.

Her journals and letters give the reader an intimate and in-depth account of her experiences: what she learned; insights into the language, culture, and history of Japan and Zen itself; the people she met and knew, her own feelings and reactions to what was a huge shift in her life.

After three years the author left the monastery to travel slowly back to see family at home. Sadly she was killed in a bus crash along the way.

Pretty much everything that has to do with living a life. And here’s me rejecting it because it was ‘ordinary’ and some details were ‘boring’.

So, I’m going to stay with this book. It’s taught me a lot already, and I think there is more there for me. Perhaps, I can better put into practice by own so strongly held idea that there are no ordinary moments or ordinary people.

Peace and love from me to you

Talking About Sloth

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Sloth.  Its a good word isn’t it?  One of those words you don’t have to look up to know what it means.  But if you do look it up, you’ll find it has a couple of meanings.  One is: laziness, indolence and a reluctance to make an effort.

Is sloth a bad thing?  Certainly it gets a bad rap; I mean: lazy? Indolent? Not willing to make an effort? Hardly words of praise. On the other hand we value words like busy, productive, efficient, hard working, and the rest. In our culture, these are definitely words of praise.

Go out and play; Read a book; Go to school; Study hard; Get a good job (whatever that means); How much do you make a year? When are up for promotion?  Demands and questions like these are constants in all our lives, and they force us into defining ourselves by what we do whether we are a little kid at school, a teenager trying to sort life out, an adult trying to make our way in the world the best we can.

Yes, it’s true I think: it always seems to be a about defining ourselves by what we do, rather than who we are, or what we stand for.  Always we have to be doing something.  Ever heard that little identity joke, I’m a human being, not a human doing?  I wonder how many of us would feel lost if we shifted from that need to be a doer to another definition of our identity, one less reliant on what we do or on what we’ve done in the past, or will do in the future.

Well, I hear you saying, this is all fine and dandy, but my boss won’t pay me unless I show up, there are meals to cook for the kids, I’m running late for an appointment, the lawn needs mowing and after that I have to write a report for my night class.

All very true, valid, and all of them things that do need to be done. We all have a life don’t we? But perhaps sometimes, even just now and again, and perhaps just for a few minutes at a time, you can stop. Just stop. Thats all. Stop and just do nothing, or rather stop and simply be.

Have I mentioned a favourite little two word sentence I really really like? Just sit. Don’t read, don’t think, don’t try to stop thinking, don’t ‘meditate’. All that’s required is to do nothing. Do No Thing. Actually, I think I’ve found a new favourite.

On, remember I said there are a couple of definitions of sloth?  Well the other one tells us that a sloth is a slow moving nocturnal mammal noted for hanging upside down from tree branches.  It lives entirely in the trees and is capable of only very slow movement on the ground.

So, I guess you should be very careful when you tell someone else I’m a sloth. Mind you, putting aside the hanging upside down bit, and the nocturnal requirement, it’s probably not such a bad way of being to emulate, do you think?

Have a lazy (slothful) day.

Silence. Could I have some more please?

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Silence isn’t my strong suit. Or I should say, keeping quiet isn’t what I’m known for. One of the main reasons l live the life I do is because I am very sensitive to noise, but my problems start when I seem to forget that other people, and my own peace of mind, are affected by excessive noise created by me too.

And noise includes talking too much. Of course there are any number of reasons a person talks too much. Some people even believe they talk so much because it quietens the mind. No, afraid not. Been there. Not for me anyway.

Insecurity, nervousness, fear, low confidence, compulsive behaviours. The list could go on and on. When you think about it, the why isn’t always so important as the how to fix it question.

I spend a lot of time alone, in solitude, that gives other people and on rare occasions my mind, a break. I spend a lot of time listening to music to which I always listen intently. Of course that works on a number of levels, and is uplifting most of the time.

Speaking of listening to music, I usually use headphones like a lot of people. And I am blessed, absolutely and truly blessed, to have really good noise cancelling on my headphones. Anyone who uses ANC knows that it’s almost a miracle and makes the experiencing of music even better than it already is.

But I have discovered another use for the noise cancelling. I don’t always want to listen to anything: sometimes even I want some quiet, some silence. So, probably not the first person to do this, but I use ANC just by itself, just to shut out external noise.
But I’ve found it does more than this. Turning it on somehow creates another space. I actually feel like I’m enclosed in a space, or place. I hope that makes sense.

We tend to think of quiet and silence as meaning the same thing, and obviously they are similar and we use them interchangeably a lot of the time. But, sometimes they seem to be two distinct concepts. Quiet is an absence of noise. Whereas silence often seems to me to be a kind of solid state, an entity that comes into being for a short while (or longer hopefully) and encloses one in something like a cocoon or protected space.

Of course this state can be attained in different ways. For me lately I find with ANC on for itself alone, I can relax more quickly; I feel sort of ‘protected’ and safer somehow. Anyway, enough for this little tip from me. Perhaps headphone makers should change the label from Active Noise Cancelling, to Active Silence Creation

Peace and love

Look! I’m using two hands!

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Namaste my friends


In my last post I shared with you a poem. Just another note as I said then. Today I find myself thinking about sharing a drawing with you. Or it’s a design, a ‘symbolic’ illustration. I’m not sure what to call it. Actually illustration is a good word in this case: I’m not exactly sharing it for its own sake, but to illustrate the topic for today’s post. Anyway, moving right along.

For a lot of years I have every so often had an urge to create patterns and designs, and just to colour in things. Just to see colour on the page I think. Just to be making them. They are of many and varied shapes and some are paint, some markers, and some pencil. I picked this one more or less at random so you can see the kind of thing I’m spending way too many words telling you about.

I really enjoy making these things. It can be quite a meditative process; of course mind can wander as always, but I find that if I just focus on the exact mark I’m making or a particular detail, then it pulls me in. Into the zone as you might say. In that sense it can be an intense experience.

And therein lies the problem: Sometimes, particularly with pencils I can be be so focused and intent, that I end up hurting my hand. Holding the pencil too tight, pressing too hard trying to squeeze more colour onto the page (that’s what it feels like anyway), or just old fashioned and typical impatience pulling me to push harder.

Whatever the cause, nowadays if I even begin to use a pencil (writing with a pen is okay for some reason) my hand begins to ache. It’s not terrible pain, just a nagging thing. But certainly it is what you might call a disincentive.

While I was looking through a pile of old drawings a couple of days ago, I thought, I wander if I can use my other hand instead? Now I’m not one of those people who can switch between hands with ease; if there is an opposite to ambidextrous, then that’s me. But I thought, I’m going to try anyway.

So I took a coloured pencil and paper and with my non-dominent hand (that’s an understatement if I’ve ever made one) and tried to just pretend I was colouring in some shape. No lines as such, just colouring in strokes.

Alien alert! That’s what it felt like. Completely and utterly alien. Although my hand wasn’t totally out of control, it felt like it was. Still I persisted, and you know I won’t say I got to the point of it feeling natural or fluid or comfortable, but I could tell there was potential for that to happen.

In a funny way it wasn’t even my hand that was the problem; it was more a mind or brain thing where I just felt out of joint, not connected or something. Quite disorienting actually. But I think I’m going to try again. At least I thought I can use my other hand for the big areas, leaving my usual one for the finer work when necessary.

I suppose it’s like anything new isn’t it? Or rather in this instance it was about realising I’m not able to do a thing, an activity that is meaningful to me because the way I was doing it was making it too hard, or even impossible. And actually causing damage.

Who can say why it’s only just occured to me after so many years of struggling with the issue (on and off). I guess, there’s a right time for everything, or as I often think, there is never a wrong time. Life just is.

Never too late as they say, to do it differently. I guess we’ll have to see what happens. I might end up ambidextrous, who knows? Mind you, don’t be expecting fine art or lifelike portraits with my other hand anytime soon.

Homage to The Cockroach Man. With thanks and affection

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Notes from the Hermit’s Cave is what this blog is called. I promised to publish musings or notes of all sorts: your regular text blog; photos or other pictures; poems; and other assorted bit and pieces.

Well, I’ve rediscovered a poem that I think would be great to share with you.

Looking through some posts saved from old blogs no longer active, I came across theaforementioned poem. It’s about a guy I met in a cafe in India back in 2006. This person kept me and a crowd of other travellers spellbound for a couple of hours one monsoon afternoon. Not to mention the many conversations focused on him that followed in the next few days and the several pages in my Journal recounting the whole experience.

Anyway, as soon as I saw this poem again, I thought I just have to post it here. That trip was a big step for me in my own healing and spiritual journey. And meeting this guy has played a part in all that.

So, please join me in making this small offering of thanks to that guy, whose actual name I never learned, and who forever will be known to several very fortunate travellers as the Cockroach Man

THE COCKROACH MAN

This is what he said.
He’d lived many years in India,
and, in that time he’d done many things.
Even, he said, for a while he’d trained with a yogi, his guru.
This is what he said.

Yogic training is not easy, he said,
In fact, he said, one aspect made him sick
for a year.
This is what he said.

His Guru put beings in his head.
Beings like parasites he said.
Yes, yogic training, it made him sick.
This is what he said.

Parasites implanted in the head? A part of yogic training?
No. I don’t think so.
Actually, inserted was the word he used.
‘inserted beings in my head.’
This is what he said.

All gone now, save one, he said.
Only one remains—it’s like a cockroach.
And it’s still in him making him sick.
This is what he said.

At night, he said, there is sometimes relief.
The cockroach leaves and floats just below the ceiling.
Well, its astral body leaves his head and floats above his bed.
This is what he said

‘You’re a healer. You understand,’
is what he says as he turns to me.
Umm, no. Actually I don’t.
But this is not what I said.

Where is he now, the Cockroach Man?
‘It’s winter soon. I’m gonna give blankets
to the villagers.’
This is what he said.

He’s known suffering, he said.
And you could tell he was tired
from fighting the cockroach.
‘I’ll feed the poor.’
This is what he said.

Right Understanding:First Step on The Eightfold Path

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In my last post, I reflected upon a lovely Buddhist mantra, an invocation for peace and happiness for all beings (Lokah Samastah Sukhino). We discovered along the way, that it is no ordinary mantra: it actually amounts to a solemn promise to contribute to the peace and happiness of others (and Self obviously).

Then we thought about how to actually go about acting on this promise: Be kind. That’s what I came to. That’s all that is required. But, as you will recall, being kind sounds easy but quite often isn’t. The Buddha himself came to our rescue with  The Eightfold Path,

At the end of that last post, I declared I would devote this next one to looking at Right Understanding, the first of the principles in The Eightfold Path. I said I would just sit at the keyboard and see what emerges as I thought about what is Right Understanding.

Before we get started, let me make the point that The Eightfold Path is not a kind of ‘to do’ list where you tick off one item and move onto the next. The Path is more about integrating the principles into our lives, letting them overlap when they do and moving forward in one area, while (possibly) moving backwards in another as our lives unfold with all the usual twists and turns.

The Eightfold Path is a life-long (some would say lives-long) process; don’t think in terms of goals to be achieved.

Does this mean we will need to explore all eight principles on the Path? Well, we’ll have to see how this evolves over time. Although as I say it’s not a to-do list, I think it more than possible to at least think about the principles or steps on the Path one at a time.

The second thing to say by way of introduction is this: As I mentioned in my previous post, there are virtually unlimited places on the internet where one can source The Buddha’s Teachings, including many commentaries on The Eightfold Path.

I’ve made no use of any of these sources. I have sought only to put down some of my own ideas and learnings, as well as just letting my heart have its say.

If in that process I’ve made any errors of any kind, forgive me. I merely follow The Buddha’s own instruction: Don’t take my word for it; Ask questions; Do your own analysis; Think for yourself.

Now that’s all out of the way, let’s just describe briefly the Four Noble Truths. This is necessary because the injunction to follow The Eightfold Path, comes in the Fourth of those Noble Truths.

Putting them as succinctly as I can, The Four Noble Truths are as follows: The first truth tells us that life is suffering, the second that the cause of suffering is desire (or we can also say attachment), the third that there is a cure for suffering and the fourth tells us what that cure is.

That’s where The Eightfold Path comes in: it’s what you might call The Buddha’s prescription for the alleviation of suffering. At this point I would like to suggest that if you are not familiar with the Four Noble Truths, please take some time to check out the topic for yourself.

The Eightfold Path does, as I mentioned last time, in fact sound very easy when put it in list form like this:

  1. Right understanding
  2. Right thought
  3. Right speech
  4. Right action
  5. Right livelihood
  6. Right effort
  7. Right mindfulness
  8. Right concentration

Remember, though, as I said, it’s not a to-do list we can work through one item at a time. Or perhaps we can put it another way: It is possible to work on one item at a time, but it’s not about getting that one completed before one can move on to the next item on the list.

The first step on this Noble Path we have embarked upon is Right Understanding. Actually it’s not only the first, it is the ongoing one; and it is the final step also on this particular Path of Liberation. And it seems to me that I’m right in this: my life has been one continual search for undetstanding.

Not many people know this, but I spent some time working as a journalist. One of the fundamental principles (aside from telling the truth of course) that I followed was the, Who? What? When? Where? Why? and How? set of questions.

Now, I wouldn’t say that it was necessary to ask every one of these questions in every situation. But, as a general rule, they served as a useful guideline to getting as much information on all relevant aspects of an event, a person, or whatever the subject of a story was. And I have to say that I find myself quite often using this list or some varient of it when I’m trying to understand or figure out something.

Why those questions? Where do they lead? What am I trying to do by asking them? How do they help me? (See what I mean? I can’t help myself) If we sum it up, then we would say that asking the WWWWWandH questions have the potential to lead us closer to understanding.

Let’s say you are unhappy with the work you do on a daily basis. You don’t understand why; After all, it pays okay; the hours aren’t too onerous, the work itself is fairly easy as work goes. What’s the problem then? You just don’t understand. You know there’s something not quite right, but you just can’t put your finger on it.

Who is doing that job? I am, you say. But, really, who are you? Is it you doing the job or just a part of you that you kind of section off from the real you for the working day?

What are you doing that makes you unhappy? Is it being in that workplace? Is it the work itself? It might be ‘okay as far as work goes’, but is it really okay?

When are you at that job? I guess this question is about how many hours, what percentage of your life you spend doing that job. And, even more to the point of the when question: When are you really there? How much of your work day are you actually off somewhere else? (refer to the where question)

Where are you? Are you where you want to be? And, kind of getting back to the Who question, who is it that’s there? Is it the real you? Or is it that sectioned off bit of yourself you access during work hours while the real you is off somewhere else?

Why are you doing that job/work? Well most likely your answer will be something like: I have rent to pay, food to buy, bills to pay, family to support. Well, those answers have to do with what you do with the money you earn from doing that job. The question lingers: Why are doing that job? I mean, the real you; why?

How can you be happier at your work? By now you’ve got the hang of this. If you have answered all the W questions then you will already be getting some clues about the answer to the H question.

Asking variations of this set of W and H questions can help us in many aspects of life where we seek understanding. They don’t have to be put as formal questions, and they don’t have to all be asked in every situation. Also they don’t have to be thought based queries either, if you know what I mean.

The answers may well come by simply asking the question, and ‘sleeping on it’. By that I mean you don’t have to tirelessly mull over a question. Meditate on it, think about it, of course, but then forget it consciously and let the answer come to you. And, of course you can always literally sleep on it.

There’s a small art gallery in a desert mining down almost in the heart of Australia. On their window they used to have a quote by  Claude Monet:

I know we aren’t talking about art here (or maybe we are?), but I think this quote applies to many of us as we try to understand our lives and our place in the world. Especially when it comes to what makes us happy. All of us spend a lot of time, not so much pretending as in going through the motions. That’s because sometimes it’s just too hard to try and understand.

But, keep at it. Ask the questions but don’t worry about the answers: they will emerge when they’re ready. True understanding is close to love, as Monet says.

Peace to you from me

May All Beings be Happy & Free

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Lokah Samastah Sukhino

There is a little shrine at the foot of a huge and ancient tree, outside a Buddhist temple above the banks of the Mekong River in a little town called Chiang Khong in the far north of Thailand. As I looked at this obviously highly revered sacred site, through the viewfinder of my camera, I knew what I would call the photo:

Lokah Samastah Sukhino

Now, I already knew that this translates to: May all beings everywhere be happy and free. A friend of my son’s used to use this ancient Sanskrit mantra a lot and I’d long since discovered its meaning. Or so I thought.

Anyway, later as I readied this (what turned out to be quite a lovely image in my ever so humble opinion) I thought I would look up the mantra again. Just to make sure I had the right spelling and so on.

It was then I had a surprise. May all beings everywhere be happy and free is only the first part of this beautifully expressive mantra. I quickly discovered that this mantra is not simply some vague wish or prayer for universal peace and happiness; it is also a call to action. Here’s the complete translation as I found it:

May all beings everywhere be happy and free, and may the thoughts, words, and actions of my own life contribute in some way to that happiness and to that freedom for all.

But, wait. There’s more.

As I read more deeply into the meaning of all the words in the mantra, I discovered that it’s more than a call to action or a simple invocation. I learned that the mantra as I knew it was missing a final word: Bhavantu. So with this word missing, a vital element of the mantra was lost: the use of the suffix antu at the very end in the original Sanskrit turns the whole thing into a solemn promise. Antu means it must be so.

This all got me thinking: How? I mean, how do we transform our ‘thoughts, words, and actions’ so that they will contribute to the happiness of all beings? And how can we actually make it a promise?

Then it suddenly occurred to me: the action required was summarised very nicely by the Buddha in what he called The Eightfold Path. We are meant to start living according to the principles in that teaching.

Now, The Eightfold Path is, on the face of it, a fairly straightforward set of life principles that, when understood and integrated into one’s life and being, will lead to the cessation of suffering.

Now, this sounds all very well and good, but I’ve been wondering if there was a way I could sum it up in just a few words.

Something succinct, and to the point.

Then I found myself (again suddenly, right out of the blue) scribbling a note on my phone:

Be nice.

That’s really what it boils down to

Kindness in all our intereractions with all the forms that life has taken: other humans; other animals; plants; Earth herself; the rivers; the oceans; the forests. You name it. All forms that life has taken.

So, how do we be nice?

When I say it like that, it almost sounds silly; I mean, how hard can it be? Be nice? Easy.

Well, I guess I can say for myself that it’s true, sort of, sometimes. Yes it is often extremely easy for me to be nice. And, then, other times I have to try to be nice. And then there are those times when try as I might, nice just doesn’t happen.

Which means, I guess, that it might not be quite that simple after all.

There are so many wonderful explanations of the Buddha’s teachings, including The Eightfold Path, on the Internet. On the face of it, that might seem confusing. However Buddha himself advised that each person should question the teachings and come to their own conclusions. In other words, he said, don’t take my word for it, check it out for yourself.

The Eightfold Path. I might know that lovely list by name (Right Understanding, Right Thought, Right Speech, and so on), and I’ve read a little about them, but maybe it’s time to dig a bit deeper.

I’m going to make a start with Right Understanding simply because it’s the first on the list, and has always seemed to be a pretty important starting point.

So, next post (or perhaps a later one) that’s what I’m going to do. Just sit and see what comes out of my heart and onto the page (or screen). Please join me then and we’ll see what happens.
Peace and love from me to you