Perhaps my musical ear is why, when meditation comes to mind, what often arises is not the practice itself but the sound of the bell that begins and ends meditation.  I find a quality of peace and spaciousness in that sound. When I listen for it and hear it, I feel at home because of its musicality and beauty. I often feel encouraged by the contemplative setting created by the resonance of the bell. It puts me at ease and I use it as a way to anchor the beginning and end of my meditation sessions.

One day when I was taking a walk with a friend from the sangha I unexpectedly heard the sound of the bell.  Being nowhere near a shrine room, I looked around, wondering where the harmonious sound was coming from. My friend looked at me with an amused smile, reached into his pocket and pulled out his iphone, explaining that that sound was his mindfulness bell.  He went on to say that our teacher, Ponlop Rinpoche, had made this suggestion to his students at one point, to support the development of awareness of the present moment.

That was months ago, but the other day, when I was especially suffering under the weight of my own thoughts and feelings, I finally decided to try the mindfulness bell myself and I set the alarm on my phone to alert me on the hour.  The first few times the bell sounded I dutifully reset the alarm and I noticed my internal dialogue. It was an interesting practice and immediately caused me to think about the difficulty of staying mindful even when relying upon an external source.  Even though I was setting this alarm, I found that my mind was still straying into habitual thought patterns about the past and future and I felt somewhat discouraged. I could not stop thinking.

But then, after the third or fourth time resetting the alarm, something happened; it occurred to me that even the best, most wonderful mindfulness bell in the world would not be able to stop my tumbling thoughts. Instantly this provided me with some relief, because I recognized it as just a bare naked fact: no matter how many dharma texts I would read, hours I would meditate, beautiful bells I heard or teachings I would listen to, nothing would disappear the thundering waterfall of thoughts as I had hoped. Nothing outside of me was going to save me.  I had myself to rely upon on this journey and myself alone to make a good relationship to the goings on in my own mind.

And that is when it hit me; if there is nothing and no one else that can rescue me, then why rely on an outer bell when I have all the bells in my head, (so to speak), that I would ever need? I began to laugh and continued my line of thinking; In other words, I said to myself, what if I heard these persistent thoughts and feelings themselves as the bell? Suddenly I could see a whole new world of possibility opening up for me and the potential of infinite power to be awake to the present moment.

With new found anticipation and curiosity, I put this to the test and was amazed; I discovered that I had never before listened to my own thoughts, not the way I had listened to music, or to others, or to a sound in nature; not with my body. This meant that I was actually hearing something for the first time. I found that previously, I really had had no idea what I was saying to myself, what kind of energy the thoughts carried, their quality, their aural texture, their tone. I discovered that many of these thoughts and feelings resonated in my body, and that I could actually sit with them more easily simply by feeling them in a more neutral way, the way I feel the vibration of sound.

But even more salient than having a different visceral experience of my own thoughts and feelings, was that, when I practiced this way, my attitude went through a profound and easy shift. As I began listening to my thoughts and feelings with my whole self, a softness emerged.  In the same way I have listened to others talk about their worries, pains, and fears without any agenda except to be there for the experience completely, the same feelings of tenderness and empathy welled up in me towards myself. It was effortless and a miracle of relief from the typical heat of self-doubt and shame. For a rare moment, I experienced myself as a natural phenomenon, very innocent, very fresh.  Very acceptable.

Although this experience was just a taste of the ease that mindfulness promises, I am guessing that this result is, in part, what our teacher had in mind when he suggested we use the sound of the bell to practice! And it has given me an increased sense of confidence that resonating with a loving heart is no further away than a listening ear.

Since it was a weeklong sesshin — all day sitting, every day – you might imagine there was a serene atmosphere about the place.

Well, there was serenity, except in the kitchen. The kitchen is a crucible of action in the monastery — it gets ‘hot’ both physically and psychologically.

You have the demanding requirements of cooking a meal for 40-60 people. You want to make sure the different dishes are all ready to be served at the same time, and that the meals are prepared with grateful attention to the value of the food, the gift of the food. Reverence with speed and accuracy is required!

The kitchen becomes psychologically hot when you have to deal with public opinion. Tassajara is located deep in the forest valley and in this fairly primitive and austere setting, thinking about food becomes the main entertainment and distraction. The main focus of desire, craving, and projection for the monastic population, is food. And the kitchen staff often is blamed for any discontent that arises.

In the midst of this austere simple life, people often transform into hungry ghosts. So the head of the kitchen needs diplomatic skill as well as culinary and management skill. It requires courage and a thick skin to deal with the heat from the stoves, and to deal with the added heat when you are surrounded by hotheads.

During this particular sesshin, I found myself completely relaxed in a joyful, clear state of mind. I knew that this good state was not simply a result of my own effort — I sensed I was benefiting from the energy being generated in the meditation hall by my sangha brothers and sisters who were practicing so intently.

Even so, mealtime in a monastery is not a leisurely affair. And even though I was very active in the midst of cooking and managing the staff, and despite the fact that the food had to be served quickly, promptly, and efficiently so that everyone would be able to eat within a fairly brief recess, I was having a great time!

When it came time to assemble the food in various containers and to hand these off to the servers, a mad but silent rush ensued as people simultaneously moved in and out of the kitchen through its narrow doorway — some to pick up food, others leaving with food. I was standing by the door very intently directing people. One mischievous server, David Chadwick (author of Crooked Cucumber) came up to me and whined, “Jack, would you pull my thumb . . . .” This was a ridiculous request designed to get my goat! But I didn’t have a goat in that moment, so I happily pulled his thumb with a genuine smile, “There you go!” He just laughed and we both moved on.

As I said, I believed that my mental lightness, quickness, and good humor, were a gift of the group meditative effort. But whether or not I had “earned” it, this experience left a vivid impression about the state of mind to aspire to when at work. Here are some tips:

1) Clarity of purpose: to serve with love and to dedicate the merit of your actions to all.

2) Attentive to detail, but relaxed and grounded: Reset your inner and outer posture often, remembering to breathe deeply and with ease.

3) Kind and respectful speech: Work demands are not an excuse to stress out and unload on others.

4) Diligent, unattached effort: Sincerely do your best, but do not concern yourself with the outcome.

5) A sense of humor: If something unexpected comes up, relax and relate to it with interest and friendliness. Unexpected events are mirrors in which you can catch your own sense of attachment and stress.

6) Centered, at ease, and upright: Practicing this makes it easier not to take the opinions of others personally.

Oh yeah – and if someone should ask you to pull their thumb, stop everything and pull with a smile!

Contemplative photography, Miksang photography, provides us a way to see the world with fresh eyes. (Miksang, Tibetan for “good eye,” was introduced to the West by the Tibetan Buddhist meditation and dharma art master Chogyam Trungpa.) It brings together eye, mind and heart to make images that can expand our vision and appreciation of the world.

Miksang has nothing to do with technique or trying to make great art. Practicing Miksang photography develops our ability not just to look but to see with direct, unmediated perception.

I have been taking photographs on and off for many years, but thanks to my participating in a Miksang photography workshop at Seattle’s Shambhala Center two years ago I started seeing and shooting things in new ways. I learned to pay close attention to pure colors, light and shadows, abstract patterns and interesting details everywhere.

In considering how I had up to then approached taking pictures, the first thing I realized was that I was always thinking about what was beautiful or stunning and then trying to capture in a photograph that beautiful or stunning image. I was looking at everything through filters, so many mental filters that I couldn’t perceive anything directly, clearly and freshly. These filters were made up of all that I know and were shaped by judgments, opinions, fears and old memories.

But how in hell was I ever going to see without looking through all those hard-won filters? The answer came by means of the practice part of contemplative photography. To see what is actually there and not what our mental fabrications make apparent turned out to be a mindfulness awareness practice, full of joy, that can open our minds to the infinite beauty that is all around us all the time.

Most people think that “to contemplate” simply means to think about things. However, the first dictionary definition is “to look at attentively”—that is, to observe carefully. (When asked to define Zen in three words, Suzuki Roshi said “attention, attention, attention.”)

When I first started trying to take Miksang images, I found myself lost in my thought-streams—in concepts of what was beautiful—and still wanting to take great abstract art photographs. I struggled to incorporate these thought-streams and aesthetics with what I had learned about clear seeing.

Then I captured one or two images that surprised me in that they did not seem to come from my usual conceptual pursuits. A small crack opened in my overfortified mind and I remembered how Leonard Cohen sang, in “Anthem,”

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.

Space came in as well as light, and I began to open myself to being present with the world in a new way. Although I still mentally filtered almost all my images, I started seeing such things as a certain sharp edge, an arresting pattern, a delightful texture, an intense color in ways I had never seen before.

Now I am starting to fall in love with the world. My heart takes over from Central Headquarters for brief periods andallowing itself, eye and mind to simply see our world. Then Central Headquarters lets me know that if I would just change this or alter that, this would be a better photograph. I habitually want to manipulate, fix and improve everything.

This is where discipline of the practice got hard for me. It wasn’t easy just to see clearly what’s there and depress the shutter before second and subsequent thoughts could intervene, could take over.

When I reminded myself of the basic Miksang premise and injunction—No manipulating of the image!—I said to myself, “You have to be kidding. Can’t I just crop or lighten these?” An unequivocal no was the answer.

Miksang photography is like meditation – observing your thoughts and letting them be as they are without making short stories or manipulating them in any way.

Miksang photography is also similar to other Buddhist contemplative art forms Trungpa gave us: ikebana, calligraphy, stroke practice, Mudra space awareness. But with Miksang photography you can be fast, loose and out of control. It’s a hell of a lot of fun, and occasionally results in an interesting photograph.

For more images and info about contemplative photography, check out:
www.miksang.com

www.miksang.org

www.seeingfresh.com This is the website for the new book, The Practice of Contemplative Photography: Seeing the World with Fresh Eyes by Andy Karr and Michael Wood, from Shambhala Publications.

www.danmorris.zenfolio.com is a photo-sharing website where I’ve posted 70 or so Miksang-inspired and a few Wabi-Sabi–inspired images.

fabric artist in featured photo: Joan Wortis

Unresolved trauma — whether from abuse, witnessing or being a victim of violence, grieving a sudden or painful death, being in a car accident, or a myriad of other difficult events — can affect every aspect of a person’s life: physically, socially, emotionally, cognitively and spiritually. For example, intrusive thoughts and images can impact a person’s sleep, eating and overall health. The body’s flight, fight or freeze response to unresolved trauma can impact a person’s social and emotional life. Trauma is usually accompanied by negative beliefs such as “I am not safe”, I do not deserve love”, “The world is a terrifying place”, “God cannot help me”, “I deserved to be hurt,” which affect the traumatized person’s sense of self, world view and spirituality.

Mindfulness meditation and mindfulness-based psychotherapy can be powerful tools in healing trauma. Mindfulness meditation helps free people from the seeming power and “truth” of their thoughts, helping them stay in the present, rather than dwelling on the past or worrying about the future. In addition, many people dealing with depression, anxiety or trauma are not connected to their bodies. They literally live in their heads. This is a coping mechanism to escape the pain of their feelings — it may have served them in the past, but is no longer serving them. Mindfulness meditation helps a person focus on the present moment and notice where thoughts and emotions are felt in the body. This experience can help the traumatized person feel grounded. The simple act of feeling one’s feet on the floor, feeling the support of the floor and Mother Earth, is especially effective in letting go of racing thoughts about the past and future and being grounded in the present. This grounding helps clients feel safe in the present.

Mindfulness practices keep us in contact with things as they really are, helping us let go of the seeming power and solidity of our thoughts. Dealing with the past in the present moment creates spaciousness and workability around swirling and claustrophobic thoughts and feelings. In this way, mindfulness based psychotherapy allows traumatized clients to re-experience the traumas of the past while staying in touch with their present thoughts, feelings and body sensations. The experience of the present moment actually provides a sense of safety and distance from past horrors. We are able to experience as a witness  the thoughts, feelings and emotions associated with the past without being stuck in them, simply letting the experiences come and go. This witnessing ability is extremely powerful, allowing us to see that we are not our thoughts or our past experiences.

Physiologically speaking, working with the present body sensations, emotions and feelings associated with the past actually releases traumatic material that is literally stuck in the amygdala, or “reptile brain.” This stuckness affects our adrenal system and other body systems as well as our brains, resulting in the automatic flight, fight or freeze response Mindfulness practices facilitate the release of traumatic images from the brain, making them less intrusive. In turn, it becomes easier to choose more healthy responses than fight, flight or freeze, let go of negative thoughts about oneself, and actually replace those thoughts with positive thoughts.

As one client grieving the traumatic death of her husband said, “I still miss him, and still have images of him being in the ICU on life support, but those images are no longer intrusive and disturbing. They are now just memories, and the negative beliefs about myself and the world are gone. I know that my husband’s death was not my fault and I am OK.”

Sometimes I marvel at how precisely and thoroughly some people can talk to others about their suffering, and how quick they are called to help. I often feel lacking in this type of compassion because in my heart I am not sure of the best way to relieve another person’s suffering. I don’t necessarily feel this lack when relating to my closest friends, or with those who share the same beliefs and practices, or to those who consider themselves Buddhist. But what about the rest of the suffering people out there? How do we as Buddhists express our compassion and relieve suffering among those who don’t speak our language?

This question arises most when I visit my family of origin. Over the past two weeks I have been contemplating this while spending time with my parents, siblings, aunt, cousins, niece, nephew, and daughter. Needless to say, like in any family, there are deeply ingrained patterns and ways of relating, old wounds and misunderstandings. One by one I listen to the stories of each family member’s current life experiences; their joys and sorrows. Or I notice how other family members are disengaged, unable to reach out, or stuck in their own ideas. Sometimes judgment fills the air, but no one in the room seems to know how to see beyond their personal point of view to find common ground. And even more saddening still is to see those family members who feel they have failed in some way; that nothing they do is good enough to take away the pain of those they “love” the most. I often wonder what my place is in such situations and what my responsibility is to these relationships? This is especially poignant since I feel so fortunate to have met the dharma.

Love in the truest sense of the word is unconditional. And even though we feel bound to those in our family of origin, and there’s no question that we “love” them, want them to be happy and free from suffering, there usually remains an ego-based, conditional type of love. Most of us have a hard time stepping outside the established parameters of these types of relationships and most often the same types of interactions perpetually take place. This kind of suffering touches the core of my being as I watch my family members struggle with the solidity of ego and its hold on them.

I am not exempt from ego clinging by any means, but I do have the practice of meditation, which helps me find clarity about how I participate in certain relationship dynamics, and I do my best to utilize the support that comes from developing a dharmic view. I have the ability to be present; to listen and observe their suffering without the same kind of solidity and emotionality I once had, and I am more able and willing to experience their suffering as an inevitable part of samsara. I have developed the aspiration that my presence be beneficial, and most importantly, I now know that the strength I derive from being a practitioner is the only thing I have to fall back on. I don’t know if that helps my family or not, but in my heart I pray that the openness I am cultivating through meditation will eventually have an effect on those closest to me, and penetrate and soften the hearts of those who have been with me the longest.

As a mom with young children there were times that life seemed to stand still and I wished it would get moving. I remember thinking that the day my kids would be toilet trained would never come, but it did. I remember worrying that my children would never learn to fall asleep alone in their own beds, but they did. I remember thinking life waiting in car pool lines was endless, but it ended.

My children aren’t children anymore. My daughter is a junior in college and my son a senior in high school. He has a rock band, she lives in New York and this summer we’re together in Los Angeles. The joy of parenting older children is equal to the joy of parenting younger children but one thing is very different. As an older parent I am acutely aware that this summer of 2011, when the whole family is living under the same roof, will quickly pass because everything does. Nothing lasts forever.

My son took a couple of music classes at UCLA this summer and Friday was his last day. There was a vocal recital and, unlike all the recitals that have come before, parents weren’t included. It made sense that we weren’t included, after all this was a college course, not a child’s piano recital, elementary school gathering, or holiday concert. But I still wanted to hear the song that he sang so, sitting at the kitchen table after dinner, I asked him to sing it. He refused at first but my husband offered to back him up on the guitar and, before I knew it, they were playing and singing. It was a blissful moment and my awareness of the fact that it would not last forever made it feel like joy on steroids.

That night, I read an email from Arianna about her new parenting section in which she wrote “say whatever’s on your mind.” What immediately came to mind was a similar moment 14 years ago when her daughter and my daughter, who were classmates at the time, were making Christmas wreaths for their babysitters in the same kitchen and at the same table. It felt like déjà vu. The same flash of joy I felt at the table listening to the guitars this weekend was the same flash of joy I felt 14 years ago watching our daughters decorate their wreaths. Even as a young mom, somewhere deep down, I knew that it wouldn’t last forever.

If I had to identify one thing I’d like to say to younger parents right now, this would be it: Knowing that nothing lasts forever doesn’t have to be sad and depressing. Knowing that nothing lasts forever is a source of great joy. When parenting gets rough, remind yourself that this too shall pass. When parenting is joyful, remind yourself that this too shall pass. Nothing lasts forever can be the slogan you use to justify putting aside the work, chores, planning, organizing and other heavy-lifting of parenting to be there for the guitar playing, wreath making, recitals, ball games, birthdays, bath times, bed times, laughter and tears.

Remembering that nothing lasts forever can be the extra push that makes being fully present with your family, for whom you’re doing all that heavy-lifting in the first place, your first priority.

The foundations of our family life and spiritual path are the same. Both build on an intention to change our lives for the better, to live in community, and to challenge our self-importance. In the beginning we are full of inspiration and the work of relationship is not burdensome; the sharp edges become more apparent over time, “When the honeymoon is over.”  These sharp edges can function as the fulcrum on which we shift from a habitual relationship to a mindful one. To accomplish this transformation, first we must recognize that the root of our discomfort or disagreement is within our own assumptions about the nature of relationship itself.

Generally speaking these assumptions arise out of the deep seated tendency to seek lasting happiness. We believe that our relationships can make us permanently happy, even though intellectually we know better. When this dream of permanence is challenged by death, separation or significant changes in values, we feel excruciating pain. In these challenging moments, we have to make the path completely personal, joining our romantic inspiration with the clunky demands of living in an imperfect world.  We have to refresh our aspirations and look closely at our expectations. It takes a lot of bravery, curiosity and kindness.

The Practice of Mindful Gap

I find particular encouragement in a simple teaching by Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche which he calls the practice of Mindful Gap.  This practice is a way of engaging skillfully with difficult situations. Mindful Gap practice slows down the momentum of our strong emotions and cultivates helpful insight. There are three stages to the practice: distancing, patience, and right view.

This is how the practice works: 1) Distancing. When an intense feeling arises, first we acknowledge it. It’s helpful to name it, “I’m angry, in love, etc.”  Then we create a helpful distance from the momentum of the feeling by separating the direct sensation of the feeling from the story about it. Instead of following our impulse to blame, “I’m angry because you…,” we pause and experience the sensation of the emotion directly, with curiosity. It’s like listening to unfamiliar music – Ah, anger. At the same time we invite our friend, our anxious “I”, to take a seat nearby. We’re not asking our friend to leave, just to take a little break so we can spend a little quality time with our feelings! This is similar to the way we work with our children when they become overly demanding.

2) Patience. When we allow for distance our reactive impulse is still very near, so the next step is patience.  If we feel the impulse to respond, we acknowledge that and continue watching closely, with curiosity, while at the same time staying with the sensation. Within this simple openness we don’t need to label the experience as either bad or good.  With patience we begin to see the movement and change that are intrinsic to our feelings.

3) Right View. When we connect to the experience of patience an interesting thing can happen.  We may feel the loosening of the tight grip we had on our emotion – we notice that there is some spaciousness or ventilation where we initially experienced claustrophobia.  This change in our perspective is what Buddhists call “right view,” and it brings us a taste of freedom.  It is “right” in the sense that it is helpful and it is “view” in that we’re seeing the nature of our feelings more accurately – as impermanent and continuously changing, in contrast to our underlying assumption of permanence.

An effective way of bringing this practice to our relationships is through the simple act of listening. When we listen as our partner / child / parent shares their feelings and problems with us we often feel compelled to step in with answers, or to offer an opinion.  In this case, when the impulse arises to interject, rather than following this impulse, we pause and gently introduce a gap by welcoming the sensation of impulse; at the same time we invite our anxious “I” (who has such a need to be heard) to take a back seat; we then rest with the sensations and remain open to the conversation. Be patient with the fluctuating feelings and impulses, noting them with curiosity, and relax.  There is no need to jump, fix, or correct.

Mindfulness is the basis of all Buddhist practice.  I find this approach to mindfulness particularly useful in relationship because the three steps of the exploration give me a handle for exploring whatever emotion arises. It also allow me to start over as often as necessary. The curious, non-judgmental awareness invites a new way of relating to our old friends, our emotions. I encourage you to try it the next time your loving family member finds that hot button!

My four children were born into Buddhism while I was a student of Chogyam Trungpa. He gave them Tibetan names. They were blessed by Rinpoche and many other teachers including the 16th Karmapa. Can you blame me for assuming their Buddhist destiny was marvelously sealed?

As it turns out, not one of my four children is a Buddhist, and none of them practice meditation! One may even have Christian leanings (I had a wondrous experience of devotion as a young Christian boy, and I didn’t leave “the faith” because I rejected Christ, but because, as a young man, I found the most Christ-like beings seemed to be Buddhist teachers). In spite of their not being official Buddhists, my children are great-hearted kind people, so I can’t complain – they got the spirit of the teachings if not the letter.

Some Buddhist parents get very distressed about the rejecting attitudes of their non-Buddhist offspring. So far I’ve avoided this by remembering some of the teachings I received from Suzuki Roshi, my first Buddhist teacher, and later on, from Trungpa Rinpoche.

The heart of Suzuki Roshi’s Buddhist teaching was expressed in the concept of “Beginner’s Mind.” In order to have Beginner’s Mind you had to constantly let go of clinging to fixed ideas of how things are or “should” be. This attitude was especially important while raising four children. Of course, I still had to teach them such essentials as “don’t bite your neighbor.” But for those times when they were doing something that challenged my own social conditioning – like dying their hair red or wearing their pants around their knees — Beginner’s Mind came in very handy.

Roshi put a lot of energy into teaching that we should respect and trust the Buddha nature of our children. He said we should take great care not to spoil their nature by relating to them as if they lacked something or needed improvement – like indoctrinating them about how to be “good” Buddhists. Our parenting needed to be based in perceiving, respecting, and fostering our children’s natural, spontaneous intelligence and curiosity about the world, not on getting them to behave in ways that would make us more comfortable. Roshi taught we must let go of our hopes and fears for our kids – at times a tall order for me. He taught us to make a great effort not to spoil their natural, flexible, open Beginner’s Mind.

Roshi also repeatedly reminded us that there was a difference between being a Buddhist and calling yourself a Buddhist. He really didn’t care about establishing Buddhism as an institution. He wanted to create a tradition of practitioners who lived and cultivated Beginner’s Mind regardless of their religion or lack thereof. He constantly reminded us that many of the best Buddhists were not Buddhists at all. Real Buddhism, he taught, is contained and expressed in every moment of loving kindness, generosity, patience, and joy that arises in every, and any, human heart/action.

Just like our parents before us, we must set our children free. Being Buddhist doesn’t give us special permission to indoctrinate them because Buddhism is the “best” spiritual tradition! Trungpa Rinpoche commented once to a group of young new parents that we should relax and not be so concerned about creating “good” children. He said they bring 80% of their karma with them. Our interactions with them are only 20% of the equation.

It helps to remember the vastness of being and time that flows through “our precious little ones” – it helps to ease any anxieties we have about our parenting. We can release our tendency to regard our kids as inadequate simply because we perceive them in a temporary state of diminished capacity prior to the blooming of the 80% package they brought with them. Anxious concern for our children also causes us to more tightly contract into the identity of being “good” or “bad” parents, forgetting the vastness of being and time that we ourselves carry within us.

What is the most important issue for a western Buddhist with regard to family relationships? My advice is built on that of my teachers: don’t insist that your children accept Buddhism unquestioningly, and try to let go of any “us vs. them” ideas about the world as you can.

Be genuine, be kind, share your knowledge and mistakes, model Beginner’s Mind, and show them the best that Buddhism has to offer – an open, joyful heart and an open, inquisitive mind!

I am labeled a community artist, for lack of a better term. I came to SF in 1974, after graduating from Pratt Institute in NYC, and have worked with different groups in the Bay Area to give voice to their hopes and dreams, to express their plight and their resilience, and to build community across cultures and generations. You might say the work I do is really about helping to create the conditions where positive action can manifest, whether it is creating images for worthy causes, or reading poetry, or dancing, or helping organizations become stronger so that they can do the work I can’t do as one person, or inspiring others as a mentor. The practical aspects of Buddhism – patience, diligence, exertion, loving-kindness, etc. – are the tools I use do my work in the community.

My artistic method to get out of my own way. Letting go of ego-clinging is my creative process, and the means by which the Buddhist view is infused into my work. The lessons are constant, like in the movie, “Groundhog Day.” I always think I will be wiser and approach my work differently this time; yet every new project has me starting out the same way – with big intentions and preconceived notions of what I am going to do and how, and an expectation of what the outcome will be. I go through an arduous journey, paralyzed to begin for fear of doing something wrong, then furiously trying idea after idea, using different techniques, a whole kitchen sink of approaches, worrying about what people might think of the end piece. The process ends with me in total panic, when all familiar signposts are no longer applicable. Just at the point of despair, when I have no more ideas left and my brain is exhausted, I give up and ask the art or the poem what it wants to be. There is a faltering moment of doubt and anxiety, but if I stay open and still, then images or words inevitably begin to manifest. The result is usually so simple and so fitting that I can’t believe it took so long to come up with it. I am usually in awe, not just at the result but also at the process by which I got there.

How does this relate to the establishment of Western Buddhism? Buddhism in the West is no different from Buddhism anywhere else. At its core, the truth of suffering is the same. And the way out of suffering is the same. To me, it’s pretty much the same practice – getting out of the way. We go about a similar journey as the artistic process I just described – the intention to do something and to do it well, the furious applications of what we think are the best methods, the pondering over definitions and cultural differences, etc. Much will be written and thought about and discussed, and it is a necessary part of this growth. Then, just as in art and in the Buddhist path, we come to the place where we must stop and get out of the way and trust our innate intelligence and wisdom. Then the music and the colors of Western Buddhism will arise, unique in its mixture of sounds and shades but rooted in a deep and rich tradition.