Category Archives: Western Teachers

Teachers primarily of American and European cultures

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the insentient

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Last summer, Frank replaced the weathered and broken boards of the deck in the rose garden.  The boxes in the background are a version of Square-foot Gardening that has been a passion for a few years.  But last year was very wet and we never got around to weeding it or planting anything.  Then, while away at Upaya, I arranged for a neighbour to cut down the scrub maples around the east side of the rose garden so that there would be more sunlight on the roses and the vegetables.  The final result: a mess of timber and the accumulation of bad karma exposed!

But I’m grateful.  For many things: that this has been revealed, for neighbours with chainsaws, a husband with eternal patience, and friends with boundless love.  These teachings don’t shy away from messes just popping up when I need them.  It’s always been a deeply held truth that we would not have survived out here on this farm without the kindness and wisdom that flowed through all connections with the sentient and the insentient.

There is nowhere in the world that I feel more grounded and connected than on this vast acreage of land we co-inhabit with coyotes, moose, deer, hawks, finches, cardinals, evening grosbeaks, and a multitude of insects and reptiles.  It is decorated by the pines, spruces, birches, wild and contained flowers, and yes, even nasty scrub maples that tangle and strangle everything.  It is sewn together by three streams that carry down the effluents of other farms, rain, and golf balls from the club upstream.  On this patch of the world, I worry more about my decisions and actions than anywhere else.  The impact of ecologically unsound decisions seem so much more frightening, perhaps only because I know the faces of the animals, plants and minerals.  Yet for the three decades we been here, I’ve related to this land only tentatively, uncertain about my capacity for stewardship.

I find now a tiny book on my shelf that helps secure the relationship: Teachings of the Insentient by John Daido Loori.

In general, our ecology is based on separation.  The teachings (of the Buddhadharma) are about intimacy.

Often when we take on these endeavors, I feel desperate to save things.  Save the rose garden, the vegetable garden, the strawberries growing helter-skelter on the fringes of both.  Pull every weed, sweep every shaving and dessicated leaf.  Sometimes, I’m not sure if I’m saving the garden from damage or forcing a change so I don’t have to see or feel damage. I think in past years, this desperation has prevented intimacy and the reason is ridiculously obvious.  Saviours require victims (usually) – a relationship that precludes true intimacy because it is one of power over another.  Intimacy requires nothing other than a willingness to be with just what is.

On this day, something has shifted.  I am motivated by this early Spring, these unbelievable days of sunlight and blossoms.  There is a tiny blooming of a belief that I have survived a harsh winter, that I was able to walk through the storms and bone-deep chill because of many visible and invisible workings of the sentient and insentient around me.

Dew on the pine, the grasses, and trees are the real form of truth.  They are the limitless life of the endless spring.  ‘Endless spring’ is used in Buddhist texts to refer to enlightenment or realization.  The question is, Where do you find yourself?

In her retreat at Upaya on Work That Reconnects, Joanna Macy asked a question that could precede Loori’s.

What would happen if that was your task: not to save the world but to love it?

Then, where do I find myself?  Where do you find yourself?

Thank you for practicing,

Genju

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a mandala of precepts

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from my notes on the talk on precepts by Roshi Joan Halifax:

In the practice of Buddhism, the context of moral authority is  transmitted through a dharma mandala of Theravada, Mahayana, and Buddhayana.  The Theravada teachings provide a literal perspective that connects action to consequences, cause and effect.  The Mahayana lens enters the realm of interconnectedness.  Suffering is shared and therefore compassion is generated for the liberation of all beings.  The Buddhayana lens is the boundless mind, encompassing not just all beings but all concepts and visions of the path, lifting desire away from outcome.  Thus, moral authority resides in the integration of action, interconnection, and casting the net of compassion wide.

The guiding principles of such moral authority are manifested in three dimensions: inner, outer, and interactive.  The inner source of moral authority arises from a singular precept: regulation of one’s mental continuum.  This coolness and peacefulness prepares the ground to “pull aside the curtain that makes our ethos less visible to us.”  That is, a solid stance taken on stable ground increases the likelihood of seeing what is present, unclouded by preferences, conditioning and cultural bias.  By taking on the precepts, we clarify our intentions, direct our motivation and center our aspiration.  It makes conscious our intention and holds up to scrutiny the rationale for doing what we are doing.  These are also ego-taming precepts that regulate the psychological domain and mitigate the effects of anger, addictive behaviours, and preferential judgments.

The external source of moral authority is evident in the behavioural manifestation of what it means to be a good person within our social order and the congruence with cultural expectations of gender, age, and faith.  These behaviours do not and cannot exist in a vacuum, free of the changing expectations of women, men, and children of any generation.  It is within this crucible that the precepts of realization form and generate our awakening.

The practical source of our moral authority arises from the interaction with the world.  Like the external source of our development, they are consequentially-based and context-driven.  Actions congruent with one community may be incongruent or misperceived in another.  The demands of living this precept requires a relinquishing of fixed knowledge and entering a “not-knowing.”  Within this context, bearing witness provides that context-based way of engaging and compassionate action can be sensitive to the sacred language of the community.

The world as I experience it remains cold to the concept of practice that arises from precepts.  It is enamored of situational ethics and moral ambiguity.  As I reflect on the many scenarios of my personal and professional life, I am suddenly aware that we spend a lot of time negotiating around and from that place of outer and practical precepts but rarely spend time learning of the other’s inner precepts.  Yet, it is these inner precepts that allow us the flexibility and clarity to develop the other two and engage wisely with our community.

Thank you for practicing,

Genju