Burlington Buddhist Sangha

Continuing a particular thread of our exploration from last week, Sam guided our reflections this Sunday on Intimacy and Vulnerability, drawing on the teachings of Ajahn Sucitto, Christina Feldman, and Pamela Weiss. As we open to experience our lives more fully, we become both more intimate and more vulnerable, and can use a path of wisdom that helps us negotiate this terrain.

Here are links to the three talks:

Dhamma Stream Online Puja:  The Gift of Vulnerability, 5-3-20,  Ajahn Sucitto https://dharmaseed.org/teacher/9/talk/61685/

Dukkha and Vulnerability,   9-24-17,   Christina Feldman https://dharmaseed.org/teacher/44/talk/47553/

Listening With Love, 3-23-19,  Pamela Weiss https://dharmaseed.org/teacher/231/talk/55409/

Although Investigation is known as the Second Factor of Awakening (after Mindfulness), it is often overlooked in practice as our meditative lives unfold.  Drawing on Early Buddhism, Zen, Advaita, and related traditions, Michael guided our reflections and experiments in Meditative Inquiry this Sunday,  as we explored ways to investigate our sense of what counts most for us in appreciating and shaping our lives.

Specifically, we took part in a small group exercise where we repeatedly asked one another some variation of the question, “what do you want from your practice?”. After some exploration in which we determined that much of what we want seems to be rooted in the present moment, we then asked, “what is getting in the way of having that right now?”.

At a time of the year when many take stock and reassess, it helps to have some reliable principles to base our thinking on. An end-of-retreat talk by Akincino offers a thought-provoking context for looking at one’s life afresh. Don guided our reflections this Sunday, drawing on Akincino and our own insights to see what values are guiding us, and why.

The talk is available here: https://dharmaseed.org/teacher/360/talk/33191/

Bobby guided our reflections this week, exploring how compassion and wisdom need one another for balance in an awakened life. Aided by excerpts from a talk by Jill Shepherd which investigates not only compassion, but all four Brahma Viharas, we can locate the sought-for balance as an expression of the middle way.

You can listen to the talk here:

https://dharmaseed.org/teacher/637/talk/62442/

This Sunday, Jeffrey J presented a talk by Thanissaro Bhikkhu on “The Present Moment is not the goal”. 

Karma shapes the present moment, provides the raw material for choices of how to be in the present moment, what to do. What you do in Present Moment influences your experience of it, and future action, says Thanissaro Bhikkhu. Present actions make the difference between if past bad actions lead to a lot of suffering right now, or a little. We have freedom in the present to act. We act in the present moment, it is not a static goal, but an active one.

Meditation is to learn to observe the mind in the present moment. So as to let go of unskillful elements like panic, and to develop skillful ones, liking assessing what is available and thinking clearly. 

Jeffrey revised and extended the Buddha’s Parable of the Raft to illustrate Thanissaro Bhikkhu’s interpretation.

A person is passing thru dangerous territory, there are bandits about. She gets to a river t she cannot swim across and there are no boats. She first panics, then calms herself. She looks around and decides there are enough logs, branches, grass, whatever, for her to build a raft. It is leaky and weak, but it works. She paddles across, and leaves the raft, walks away from the river. Shortly, she finds another river. Stronger. From what she learned the first time, she can build a stronger raft. Off she goes. Same process. River after river. But she gets better and better at building rafts and getting across. The rivers may slow the bandits behind her, but they are still coming.  The land is the Present Moment, it holds the raw materials from past actions, from which she fabricates, constructs a new raft to get across to the next Present Moment. It never ends. The Present Moment is just a construction site to build the next more skillful actions. The bandits are her motivation, that is, her continuous contemplation of death.  That is what Buddha said is necessary to continue to recognize and reduce suffering.

We discussed what the river stood for and there were many ideas: Ignorance, the Hindrances, doubt, and more. 

The dharma talk: The Karma of Now

Readings:

The Karma of Now: Why the present moment isn’t the goal by Thanissaro Bhikkhu

More on Karma: The Buddha’s Baggage: Everything you wanted to know about karma but were afraid to ask– Thanissaro Bhikkhu

Youtube video on same topic by Thanissaro Bhikkhu

We seem to have become a species lost in thought and fueled by unskillful exterior influence.  We may have little control over the events of our lives… but we do have some capacity to be at peace – depending on our relationship with what we experience.  

This Sunday we explored “Freedom of Awareness” with Mark Coleman, who describes how ‘being the knowing’ allows us to be at ease with what is happening around us.  This style of relating to our experience allows us to see our patterns of reactivity and delusion.  The more we take refuge in awareness, the more likely we are to be at peace.

Evelien facilitated a discussion aimed to turn the lens from the object of our thoughts to the awareness of being aware, the knowing of seeing.  

“Awareness is the foundation of kindness; kindness is the expression of awareness.  When we’re really present to something, we often find we’re in connection with it, we appreciate it.”    

6th Zen Patriarch

You can listen to the talk here: https://dharmaseed.org/teacher/115/talk/62080/

Having conquered all temptations, Siddhartha touched the ground with one hand and asked the Earth to be witness to his awakening. ~ The Buddha was born under a tree, first meditated under a tree, became enlightened under a tree, and died under a tree. His relationship with nature was profound and intimate, and guided him on his journey toward enlightenment. Yet vipassana’s teachings contain precious little instruction on how we, like Siddhartha, might derive true insight through deep attention to the plants, animals and streams in nature.

There is an urgent need today to highlight aspects of Buddhist teachings that guide our actions in support of planetary wholeness, and to develop practices that deepen our own connection to that wholeness.   

For Thanksgiving Sunday’s session, Lorilee featured teachings by Micah Mortali from Kripalu Center, leading into a nature meditation. Lorilee also read aloud ecologist Matthew Zylstra’s comments on “What Vipassana Forgot”, regarding some potential missing pieces regarding teachings about nature. Finally, we heard a teaching on Sila, or right conduct by Ajahn Succito (linked below), which highlights the need for a great focus on nature from a Buddhist perspective.

You can watch Ajahn Succito’s talk here:

We often undermine our own possibility of happiness because we are living in future planning for it. This Sunday Wendy guided us as we reflected in depth on this question, drawing insights from a talk by John Peacock addressing our obsession with planning.

The talk by John Peacock is “The present alone is our happiness”, and can be found here: https://dharmaseed.org/teacher/91/talk/35006/

In the talk, the speaker read “Beyond the Bend in the Road”, a short poem by Fernando Pessoa, which you can read here: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/8189250-beyond-the-bend-in-the-road-there-may-be-a

Also mentioned in the talk was the book “Rowing Without Oars” by Ulla-Carin Lindquist, which you can find more about here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/452313.Rowing_Without_Oars

Finally, during our discussion, Michael quoted from the Hsin Hsin Ming or Xinxin Ming, specifically the Richard B. Clarke translation, which you can find here: https://terebess.hu/english/hsin.html#3

Today Jeff H. led the Sangha as we listened to Brian Lesage from Election Day 2020 in a talk entitled “Facing Uncertainty: Allowing Love to to Return in a Different Way”. You can listen to the talk here:
https://dharmaseed.org/teacher/484/talk/62918/

Jeff’s thoughts on this topic are written below.

Some people say we are living in unprecedented times: a global pandemic, an intensely divisive American presidential election, fallout from the American system of racial oppression, global climate change and more. Uncertainty seems to be lurking everywhere.

Other people might instead offer that there is nothing new under the sun. World Wars I and II, the violence and unrest of the 1960’s, plagues throughout history, the world has always been filled with uncertainty. Everybody gets an uncertainty medal.

The Buddha proposed that everything is uncertain, subject to causes and conditions beyond our control. When we choose to believe the illusions of certainty we are setting ourselves up for disappointment. Better to study the transient, imperfect and impersonal nature of all things,  release our attachment to particular outcomes and reduce our disappointment. Sounds easy.

Our brains are hardwired to seek certainty in an uncertain world. Brian Lesage recognizes that this tendency is futile, but it appears to offer short-term comfort as we plan for the future. What can be a useful tool, the “what if” mind can become a prison. Let’s listen to the talk that Brian gave this election day, a peak in national uncertainty.
I admit to spending a lot of time before, during and after the election stuck in my “what if” mind. I deliberately ramped up my vipassana practice to improve my resiliency, but occasionally fall back into anxiety and fear. We can even bring others into our “what if” scenarios, which is not a way to dispel the misery of the world.

Brian advocates using media to inform, but not allowing media to rule our lives. I have limited the amount of election news I view. The stories are designed to catch our attention and push us onto the next story. This is a recipe for anxiety and fear. As Brian says, anything can happen tomorrow which is always the case. Letting the media fill our hearts with sensationalized stories is not a kindness to ourselves.

I appreciate Brian’s suggestion to use the “what if” mind as a tool and use the media to inform. This seems to be in harmony with “the middle way”.

News of great anger, tragedy, and destruction of life and environment comes into our awareness from all directions in our modern world. Although this immediacy of information is incredibly useful, a lot of it is triggering to our sensitive hearts, and our heart wants us to react.

Sometimes a piece of news can merit a quick reaction. If we learn that our house is on fire, we need to do something! But most of the news does not need an immediate reaction. It may require a powerful response, but we need time and care to choose a response that does not cause further harm. This may be obvious in the case of dramatic physical responses (punching someone in the face), but it’s equally true for responses in our mind (thinking about how much we want to punch someone in the face).

To do this, we need to be able to handle our own restlessness and reactivity, bringing calm to an agitated mind. This is not easy to do. The space between the triggering thought, image, or word and the immediate chain of thoughts that follow is very small. Meditation practice is a way of widening that space.

In this week’s Sangha, Payton investigated our reactivity and ways in which we can bring a wise view into our daily life.

We first heard a talk by Christina Feldman, entitled “Embodiment”, which you can listen to here: https://www.dharmaseed.org/teacher/44/talk/17402/

Christina references the Arrow Sutta, which you can read a version of here: https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn36/sn36.006.than.html

Next, we listened to a talk including an exercise by Jill Shepherd, which you can find here: https://www.dharmaseed.org/teacher/637/talk/56769/

Finally, there were some quotes from a book by Sayādaw U Tejaniya, entitled “Dhamma Everywhere”, which is actually free and you can find copies of it online here: https://ashintejaniya.org/books-dhamma-everywhere (there are also free physical copies but I don’t seem to be able to find those right now; they may be out of print at the moment).