Tonight I am grateful for the wonderful Buddhist teachings I’ve been receiving lately at the East Bay Meditation Center in Oakland. I’ve experienced many wonderful things at EBMC since I first started going to the Thursday night People of Color Sangha last July. This evening I participated in the fourth of a four-part series on “The Four Noble Truths,” taught by a wise, funny, and compassionate teacher. The class was titled, “Compassionate Liberation from Suffering: the Buddha’s Teachings on the Four Noble Truths,” and so much of what was shared over the past four weeks really resonated with me at many levels. The foundational truth (actually the first of the four Noble Truths) is that there is suffering in the world–in our own personal lives and in the lives of people and beings all around us. I’ve experienced my share of “suffering” over the course of my life and particularly acutely over the past several months. But as I’ve pointed out many times over the time I’ve been writing this gratitude blog, suffering is relative. Yes, I experienced a series of unfortunate events in the first few months of 2011, then spent the next eight or nine months in various stages of recovering from them. A large part of the recovery process has been the intentional practice of focusing each day on what I am grateful for in my life, and another has been intentional practice of cultivating the qualities of compassion, lovingkindness, equanimity, and joy through mindfulness meditation.
Mind you, I have a long way to go in developing a systematic mindfulness practice–I am still inconsistent and undisciplined to have developed a daily mediation practice, but every day I get a little closer. I have managed to maintain daily gratitude and daily writing practices; I’m determined to work my way up to daily meditation practice. Of course it’s probably as simple as starting. Just start it one day and then do it the next day and the day after that. It’s kind of how I started writing this blog. I didn’t set out to write every day for several months; I really just started writing because I wanted to express gratitude for something every day. And so I did. So I hope I can do the same with meditation. I’ll let you know how it goes.
Of course there’s nothing necessarily magical or mystical about this. One doesn’t have to sit on the ground and twist oneself into a pretzel to meditate; and it’s not necessarily about achieving some altered state of consciousness, although that can happen. If I really stopped to think about it, meditation and mindfulness is for me a bit like gratitude has been: I do it every day, several times per day. Every time I slow down (or stop) and focus on my breath and bring myself into this moment–the one that is happening right now–I am in meditation. Mind you, what I am talking about wanting to cultivate is an intentional, I’m-setting-aside-time-for-this kind of practice. The spend 30 minutes in silent focus kind of practice, and yes my hope is to sit on the floor and a semi-pretzel-like posture (though I still need to buy or create for myself a comfortable enough cushion and appropriate knee support.) But it’s not about getting too hung up on form and fashion, but more so on the essence of cultivating awareness and, importantly for me, cultivating compassion and lovingkindness (and joy and equanimity.)
One of the letter writers of the Bible said, “I reckon the suffering of this present time is nothing compared to the good stuff that’s going to be revealed in us later.” And paraphrasing another writer, “No chastening (suffering) feels good while it’s happening, in fact it’s quite painful. But afterwards it yields (and I love this phrase) the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who are exercised by it.” In other words, when one feels like they are getting their behind kicked, it’s painful and difficult to experience. But if I can learn to hold on, breathe through it, knowing that it will pass, I can experience moments of peace and gratitude. And I believe that the more I cultivate those moments of compassion for myself and others, the greater my ability to handle suffering when it does arise. Eventually one can get to the point of experiencing true liberation from suffering. Like I said before, I’ve a ways to go before I reach liberation and the cessation from suffering, but I’m getting hold of the concept and am on my way. I am exceedingly grateful for the things I am learning–formally through spiritual teachings, and informally through my own experiences and insights. As the old folks say, “I wouldn’t take nothing for my journey.” Thanks for coming along with me.
