Letting Go Of How This Moment Should Be and Letting Others Be Who They Are
11 December 2019
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What a amazing retreat. It is hard to know where to begin. I had so many amazing insights, reflections, thoughts and ideas. Tonight I want to talk about the idea of letting go and letting be. The Buddha is quoted as having said, “I teach about two things: Suffering and the end of suffering.” In the Pali Cannon, the first recorded teachings of the Buddha, suffering is often defined as getting what we don’t want, not getting what we do want, having to spend time with people we don’t want to be with and not being able to spend time with people we do want to be with.
I would like to invite you to take a moment now and reflect on your experience of not getting what you want, getting what you don’t want, having to be with those you don’t prefer, and not being able to be with those you do want to be with.
It isn’t very pleasant, is it? Seems like a reasonable definition of suffering.
And please not reflect on how it feels in your body in your heart in your mind when you are resisting things that they are when you’re fighting reality when you have a thought it should not be this way. This moment should not be like this. He should not be doing that. She should not have said that. It creates suffering right?
In the four Noble Truths we’re offered the first Noble Truth – Dukkha – there is suffering in life. The the second Noble Truth the cause of suffering, Tanha literally thirst, but typically translated as craving. The third Noble Truth, the cessation of suffering – Nirodha. And the fourth Noble Truth – Magga, path, the path leading to the cessation of suffering, the Noble Eight Fold Path of:
right understanding or view (4 noble truths)
right intention
right speech
right action
right livelihood
right effort
right mindfulness
right samadhi
Suffering is just a normal part of life. And it comes, I have found from resisting things as they are. From trying to be in battle with reality or I spoken out in Buddhist terms things as they are. Because reality is kind of tricky, we don’t have a full picture, I don’t believe. We never have all the information, that’s for sure. That is why Thich Nhat Hanh speaks of the absolute dimension and the historical dimension, or ultimate reality and objective reality. Which in other traditions is sometimes spoken of two truths. So while reality can be used as a shorthand I think, “things as they are” is much more accurate and can be helpful for us. We can see how we get caught wanting things to be different than they are and the sufferings that creates for us.
On this retreat the yogi job I did, or what we sometimes call working meditation, was chopping vegetables. There was a group of six of us and we worked in silence for about 45 minutes to an hour day each day, every day for six weeks. There was a team of five cooks who were giving us instruction. Then one day someone else came in and gave us instruction, and he did it differently. From my experience he was loud and boisterous giving us too much information I didn’t like it. (knives)
We were quite settled and peaceful and had cultivated a lot of ease. And perhaps I was attached to the style with which the other five cooks had delivered the instructions and which work they’d given us. So this other cook comes in and it’s very different and I didn’t like it and I found myself being very aversive, and as a result suffering.
And the gift of the practice is that I was able to see it. It isn’t as if just because I’ve been meditating for three weeks straight I am not going to get caught in delusion or have aversive thoughts. But the gift of practice is that I can see and recognize that I’m caught and in the seeing it there is freedom.
It’s just like it if you’re in formal meditation and you are following the breath, you’ve chosen the breath as your object, and you notice that attention has wandered from the breath. You kindly, gently bring attention back to the breath. It’s not as if a skillful meditator just keeps attention on the breath every second. That’s not how works. It’s about noticing, recognizing and then choosing what we want to do in that moment.
When we are following the breath and a pain in the knee gets our attention, we notice and then we might choose to rest into the sensation in the knee just feeling and allowing it to arise and pass, we might send the knee love and tenderness, embracing the sensation; we might try to bring attention back to the breath, or we might look for another part of the body where there is an absence of unpleasant sensation, neutral sensation, or maybe even pleasant sensation and perhaps allow attention to rest there. There is no right way to do it. We just explore avenues that create less suffering. The gift is in noticing that there is and choosing our next action.
In the case of the kitchen and the new cook I had the thought, “allow Marlon to be Marlon.” And this relieved all of my suffering. I tell you it was not instantaneous. But it didn’t come, and for that I am quite grateful.
Later on, at about week 5 or the beginning of week 6, another Cook gave us instruction and I found that they were micromanaging us which is very challenging for me. He put a stack of bell peppers in one corner of the large table, where we were working, and a stack of cucumbers in another corner and then depending on the speed at which we were working he was moving the cucumbers and moving the peppers around. It was so distracting and so challenging for me. Can you imagine you’ve settled really deeply after five weeks of cultivating presence and then someone is moving things around in front of your face? While you are are trying to focus on chopping a cucumber or bell pepper. I don’t know if you could imagine how challenging that might be. It might sound pretty mundane but at the time it was very powerful.
He was training someone and they’d been talking while we were finishing breakfast just before we came in to the kitchen and I was so annoyed. It is a silent container!
So with him too, after some time, I was able to recognize that his behavior had nothing to do with me and if I could allow him – this one whose company I didn’t enjoy, but whose company I was in – to just be who he was I was no longer suffering.
So this is why I think of the second Noble Truth, the cause of suffering, as being resisting things as they are. I find there is much freedom to be found there, in the non-struggle the non-striving, non-resistance. The joy of allowing people to be who they are, allowing this moment to be as it is. The truth is we can’t change this moment. Sure, we might be able to change the next moment. (we can move our attention away from the ache in the knee to something neutral or pleasant. That is skillful, that is not fighting reality, trying to make the knee be different, to be mad or annoyed that the knee hurts) My experience is when I’m trying to control any thing, any one, I am miserable, I am creating a lot of suffering. When I step into a allowing, that is where I find freedom.
It isn’t about accepting unacceptable behavior. It isn’t about condoning sexism, racism and homophobia, ableism or any other of the atrocities that plague our societies today. It is about embracing this moment just as it is, not being at odds with this very moment in front of us, letting this moment be as it is!
Letting go of the idea that this moment should be different than it is and letting others be who they are. This is where I am currently finding freedom is found. And I know that the knowledge I currently possess is not absolute truth and the truth is found in life. So I know that my perspective on this will continue to evolve. And this allowing things to be as they are (letting go of my notions that this moment should be different than it is and letting everyone be who they are) is a strong aspiration for my practice right now. I know it has brought me great peace when it has been accessible and I hope that for you it can bring you some peace and ease too.
Since there is time I want to talk about a formal practice that can support us in developing our capacity for this letting go and letting be that I spoke of that we might be able to employ in our daily lives. This formal practice comes from the 10th century Indian master, Tilopa. Naropa was his students and Milrapa was Naropa’s student or actually Naropa’s student’s student. And a whole lineage of Buddhism has been born from them.
Tilopa offered these six words of advice. I’m sure when I say them it’s not just going to be six words but in the original language in which they were offered whatever the language of India was in the 10th-century in the community were Tilopa live it was summed up in six words. Just like the four Noble truths. It’s really just four words Dukkha, Tanha, Niroda and Magga, it just takes more words to offer those truths in English.
Let go of thinking about the past
Let go of thinking about the future
Let go of thinking about the present
Let go of planning
Let go of figuring
Let go of letting go and simply rest, relax
This is a new practice for me. They’re not new ideas or new notions but on this retreat was the first time I assumed my meditative posture and consciously practiced letting go of the past, letting go of the future, letting go of the present, letting go of planning, letting go of figuring and just resting. And that’s why I offered the instructions I did at the beginning of the night: resting. This idea of allowing resting, the experience of resting to be our object of meditation.
I offer that exploration for you tonight. So good to be back with you.
May you know ease!
