What happens when you decide not to call yourself a Buddhist

What does Dhamma mean to me? It means truth, it means God, it means this: just this. It’s not some fixed thing. It’s also continually revealing itself as a result of my direct understanding in practice, in daily life, in relationship, in formal meditation. The Buddhadhamma? As far as I can tell, there are some things that sound pretty universal like those teachings about the stressful aspects of being human, of our very consciousness, and the ways in which we can manage it, not be a prisoner of it. Maybe even transform it altogether. I experience these truths every day, in every waking moment. And freedom too, it’s there embracing it all, available in each moment.

Not sure I ever shared this essay here. And since I haven’t published any of my own writing in a long time, I thought I’d revisit this one. While you’re over there, you might find some other submissions of interest too.

This is now an ongoing project with a monthly theme, and though I must admit the new tone does not resonate for me at all, perhaps you will feel inspired to submit something yourself. 

Did I ever tell you how I cried?

When I came back from a two-week stay at Abhayagiri Monastery and then went to an event to honor the decision of two long-term members of the Forest Sangha, Ajahns Anandabodhi and Santacitta, to ordain as bhikkhunis, I was overwhelmed with emotion. Specifically, it was when I heard Ajahn Santacitta lead us in the same chants I had been reciting the previous weeks. It struck to the bone in that moment, the wonder of hearing a woman’s voice, after hearing man’s after man’s after man’s. It struck me too how we live our lives with little appreciation for the small ways in which we maybe feel we cannot, or are not enough, simply because there is no one (or few) like us in that role—of teacher, of Nobel prize winner, of composer, or whatever it might be. The bitter-sweet aspect of these women, monastics for decades, having to leave the community they were trained in for lack of support, is telling.

I, with much trepidation, wrote the other day about the disparity in number between men and women teachers in the spiritual traditions. While, as my friend and dharma sister commented today, in absolute terms one could argue there being no gender—gender only being a concept, the reality is we live in and are conditioned by the relative world. 

Yesterday, I spoke with another friend, who is a new middle school teacher. In a moment of trust, one of her students whispered to her a desire to become a pilot…but admitted that no one (least of all her mother) had confidence in her ability to do so. She’s not smart enough, not good enough in math, she should be concerned with getting married. For many, this is still the world we live in.

It is difficult for me to share opinions, it is difficult for me to admit that I am struggling with something so much on the conceptual plane, but it is a reality. And I hope in bringing my own struggle to light that others will recognize how they may perpetuate these conditions, so often unknowingly, and how they may begin to free themselves of the same.

Early morning reflections by kantryla on Flickr ( web | blog | tweet ) If you don’t live the Tao, you fall into assertion or denial. Asserting that the world is real, you are blind to its deeper reality; denying that the world is real, you are blind to the selflessness of all things. The more you think about these matters, the farther you are from the truth. Step aside from all thinking, and there is nowhere you can’t go. Returning to the root, you find the meaning; chasing appearances, you lose their source. At the moment of profound insight, you transcend both appearance and emptiness. Don’t keep searching for the truth; just let go of your opinions. —Seng-ts’an, Hsin hsin ming (translation by Stephen Mitchell) from my latest ramble… Opinions
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Early morning reflections by kantryla on Flickr ( web | blog | tweet )

If you don’t live the Tao,
you fall into assertion or denial.
Asserting that the world is real,
you are blind to its deeper reality;
denying that the world is real,
you are blind to the selflessness of all things.
The more you think about these matters,
the farther you are from the truth.
Step aside from all thinking,
and there is nowhere you can’t go.
Returning to the root, you find the meaning;
chasing appearances, you lose their source.
At the moment of profound insight,
you transcend both appearance and emptiness.
Don’t keep searching for the truth;
just let go of your opinions.

—Seng-ts’an, Hsin hsin ming (translation by Stephen Mitchell)

from my latest ramble… Opinions

On atheism, the buddha, and the church

The Dalai Lama says we don’t need to (and perhaps shouldn’t) abandon the religious tradition we were born into, I can’t fully relate.

I don’t believe in anything except that which is proven through the laboratory of the mind, e.g., loneliness feels like this, anger about X comes because of believing this idea about Y, or, jealousy is a direct result of desire. And the means to do that are found in the mind training of the Buddhist tradition.

Although there is a contemplative practice in the Christian tradition as well, theism has never resonated for me so I haven’t remotely explored it. I could say “Lord Buddha” but I couldn’t as easily say “Jesus Christ is my savior”.

Some theologies may say God is within us and in the relationships between people, and if God is awareness or similar to buddha-nature, that could work for me but what about the divinity and the redemption of Jesus? What is emphasized so often is the birth, death and resurrection instead of the teachings.

I don’t know, but the idea of original purity is easier to swallow than original sin.

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Thanks for sharing my writing usgroovykids.

(via usgroovykids22-deactivated20130)