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SUMMARY:peace\, love\, happiness & understanding  4/7/22
DESCRIPTION:  \nTHE OPEN ROAD \npeace\, love\, happiness & understanding \n  \nApril 7\, 2022 \n  \nMy dad loved the poems of Carl Sandburg. Sometimes I take the heavy tome The Complete Poems of CARL SANDBURG off the shelf\, in search of treasures. When I  open the book\, I always feel that my dad is by my side. \n  \n  \nTENTATIVE (FIRST MODEL) \nDEFINITIONS OF POETRY \n  \n1 Poetry is a projection across silence of cadences arranged to break that silence with definite intentions of echoes\, syllables\, wave lengths. \n  \n2   Poetry is an art practised with the terribly plastic material of human language. \n  \n3 Poetry is the report of a nuance between two moments\, when people say\, ‘Listen!’ and ‘Did you see it?’ ‘Did you hear it? What was it?’ \n  \n4 Poetry is the tracing of the trajectories of a finite sound to the infinite points of its echoes. \n  \n5 Poetry is a sequence of dots and dashes\, spelling depths\, crypts\, crosslights\, and moon wisps. \n  \n6 Poetry is a puppet-show\, where riders of skyrockets and divers of sea fathoms gossip about the sixth sense and the fourth dimension. \n  \n7   Poetry is a plan for a slit in the face of a bronze fountain goat and the path of fresh drinking water. \n  \n8 Poetry is a slipknot tightened around a time-beat of one thought\, two thoughts\, and a last interweaving thought there is not a number for. \n  \n9 Poetry is an echo asking a shadow dancer to be a partner. \n  \n10 Poetry is the journal of a sea animal living on land\, wanting to fly in the air. \n  \n11 Poetry is a series of explanations of life\, fading off into horizons too swift for explanations. \n  \n12 Poetry is a fossil rock-print of a fin and a wing\, with an illegible oath between. \n  \n13 Poetry is an exhibit of one pendulum connecting with other and unseen pendulums inside and outside the one seen. \n  \n14 Poetry is a sky dark with wild-duck migration. \n  \n15 Poetry is a search for syllables to shoot at the barriers of the unknown and unknowable. \n  \n16 Poetry is any page from a sketchbook of outlines or a doorknob with thumb- prints of dust\, blood\, dreams. \n  \n17 Poetry is a type-font design for an alphabet of fun\, hate\, love\, death. \n  \n18 Poetry is the cipher key to the five mystic wishes packed in a hollow silver bullet fed to a flying fish. \n  \n19 Poetry is a theorem of a yellow-silk handkerchief knotted with riddles\, sealed in a balloon tied to the tail of a kite flying in a white wind against a blue sky in spring. \n  \n20 Poetry is a dance music measuring buck-and-wing follies along with the gravest and stateliest dead-marches. \n  \n21 Poetry is a sliver of the moon lost in the belly of a golden frog. \n  \n22 Poetry is a mock of a cry at finding a million dollars and a mock of a laugh at losing it. \n  \n23 Poetry is the silence and speech between a wet struggling root of a flower and a sunlit blossom of that flower. \n  \n24 Poetry is the harnessing of the paradox of earth cradling life and then entombing it. \n  \n25 Poetry is the opening and closing of a door\, leaving those who look through to guess about what is seen during a moment. \n  \n26 Poetry is a fresh morning spider-web telling a story of moonlit hours of weaving and waiting during a night. \n  \n27 Poetry is a statement of a series of equations\, with numbers and symbols changing like the changes of mirrors\, pools\, skies\, the only never- changing sign being the sign of infinity. \n  \n28 Poetry is a packsack of invisible keepsakes. \n  \n29 Poetry is a section of river-fog and moving boat-lights\, delivered between bridges and whistles\, so one says\, ‘Oh!’ and another\, ‘How?’ \n  \n30 Poetry is a kinetic arrangement of static syllables. \n  \n31 Poetry is the arithmetic of the easiest way and the primrose path\, matched up with foam-flanked horses\, bloody knuckles\, and bones\, on the hard ways to the stars. \n  \n32 Poetry is a shuffling of boxes of illusions buckled with a strap of facts. \n  \n33 Poetry is an enumeration of birds\, bees\, babies\, butterflies\, bugs\, bambinos\, babayagas\, and bipeds\, beating their way up bewildering bastions. \n  \n34 Poetry is a phantom script telling how rainbows are made and why they go away. \n  \n35 Poetry is the establishment of a metaphorical link between white butterfly- wings and the scraps of torn love-letters. \n  \n36 Poetry is the achievement of the synthesis of hyacinths and biscuits. \n  \n37 Poetry is a mystic\, sensuous mathematics of fire\, smoke-stacks\, waffles\, pansies\, people\, and purple sunsets. \n  \n38 Poetry is the capture of a picture\, a song\, or a flair\, in a deliberate prism of words. \n  \n—Carl Sandburg\, from Good Morning\, America (The Complete Poems of Carl Sandburg\, pp. 317-319) \n  \n  \nCarl Sandburg wrote Rootabaga Stories for his daughters. Here are a couple of them—(reading aloud recommended): \n  \n  \nThe Potato Face Blind Man  \nWho Lost the Diamond Rabbit on  \nHis Gold Accordion \n  \nThere was a Potato Face Blind Man used to play an accordion on the Main Street corner nearest the postoffice in the Village of Liver-and-Onions. \n  \nAny Ice Today came along and said\, “It looks like it used to be an 18 carat gold accordion with rich pawnshop diamonds in it; it looks like it used to be a grand accordion once and not so grand now.” \n  \n“Oh\, yes\, oh\, yes\, it was gold all over on the outside\,” said the Potato Face Blind Man\, “and there was a diamond rabbit next to the handles on each side\, two diamond rabbits.” \n  \n“How do you mean diamond rabbits?” Any Ice Today asked. \n  \n“Ears\, legs\, head\, feet\, ribs\, tail\, all fixed out in diamonds to make a nice rabbit with his diamond chin on his diamond toenails. When I play good pieces so people cry hearing my accordion music\, then I put my fingers over and feel of the rabbit’s diamond chin on his diamond toenails\, ‘Attaboy\, li’l bunny\, attaboy\, li’l bunny.’” \n  \n“Yes I hear you talking but it is like dream talking. I wonder why your accordion looks like somebody stole it and took it to a pawnshop and took it out and somebody stole it again and took it to a pawnshop and took it out and somebody stole it again. And they kept on stealing it and taking it out of the pawnshop and stealing it again till the gold wore off so it looks like a used-to-be-yesterday.” \n  \n“Oh\, yes\, o-h\, y-e-s\, you are right. It is not like the accordion it used to be. It knows more knowledge than it used to know just the same as this Potato Face Blind Man knows more knowledge than he used to know.” \n  \n“Tell me about it\,” said Any Ice Today. \n  \n“It is simple. If a blind man plays an accordion on the street to make people cry it makes them sad and when they are sad the gold goes away off the accordion. And if a blind man goes to sleep because his music is full of sleepy songs like the long wind in a sleepy valley\, then while the blind man is sleeping the diamonds in the diamond rabbit all go away. I play a sleepy song and go to sleep and I wake up and the diamond ear of the diamond rabbit is gone. I play another sleepy song and go to sleep and wake up and the diamond tail of the diamond rabbit is gone. After a while all the diamond rabbits are gone\, even the diamond chin sitting on the diamond toenails of the rabbits next to the handles of the accordion\, even those are gone.” \n  \n“Is there anything I can do?” asked Any Ice Today. \n  \n“I do it myself\,” said the Potato Face Blind Man. “If I am too sorry I just play the sleepy song of the long wind going up the sleepy valleys. And that carries me away where I have time and money to dream about the new wonderful accordions and postoffices where everybody that gets a letter and everybody that don’t get a letter stops and remembers the Potato Face Blind Man.” \n  \n  \n  \nHow the Potato Face Blind Man Enjoyed \nHimself on a Fine Spring Morning \n  \nOn a Friday morning when the flummywisters were yodeling yisters high in the elm trees\, the Potato Face Blind Man came down to his work sitting at the corner nearest the postoffice in the Village of Liver-and-Onions and playing his gold-that-used-to-be accordion for the pleasure of the ears of the people going into the postoffice to see if they got any letters for themselves or their families. \n  \n“It is a good day\, a lucky day\,” said the Potato Face Blind Man\, “because for a beginning I have heard high in the elm trees the flummywisters yodeling their yisters in the long branches of the lingering leaves. So—so—I am going to listen to myself playing on my accordion the same yisters\, the same yodels\, drawing them like long glad breathings out of my glad accordion\, long breathings of the branches of the lingering leaves.” \n  \nAnd he sat down in his chair. On the sleeve of his coat he tied a sign\, “I Am Blind Too.” On the top button of his coat he hung a little thimble. On the bottom button of his coat he hung a tin copper cup. On the middle button he hung a wooden mug. By the side of him on the left side on the sidewalk he put a galvanized iron washtub\, and on the right side an aluminum dishpan. \n  \n“It is a good day\, a lucky day\, and I am sure many people will stop and remember the Potato Face Blind Man\,” he sang to himself like a little song as he began running his fingers up and down the keys of the accordion like the yisters of the lingering leaves in the elm trees. \n  \nThen came Pick Ups. Always it happened Pick Ups asked questions and wished to know. And so this is how the questions and answers ran when the Potato Face filled the ears of Pick Ups with explanations. \n  \n“What is the piece you are playing on the keys of your accordion so fast sometimes\, so slow sometimes\, so sad some of the moments\, so glad some of the moments?” \n  \n“It is the song the mama flummywisters sing when they button loose the winter underwear of the baby flummywisters and sing: \n  \n‘Fly\, you little flummies\, \nSing\, you little wisters.’” \n  \n“And why do you have a little thimble on the top button of your coat?” \n  \n“That is for the dimes to be put in. Some people see it and say\, ‘Oh\, I must put in a whole thimbleful of dimes.’” \n  \n“And the tin copper cup?” \n  \n“That is for the base ball players to stand off ten feet and throw in nickels and pennies. The one who throws the most into the cup will be the most lucky.” \n  \n“And the wooden mug?” \n  \n“There is a hole in the bottom of it. The hole is as big as the bottom. The nickel goes in and comes out again. It is for the very poor people who wish to give me a nickel and yet get the nickel back.” \n  \n“The aluminum dishpan and the galvanized iron washtub—what are they doing by the side of you on both sides on the sidewalk?” \n  \n“Sometime maybe it will happen everybody who goes into the postoffice and comes out will stop and pour out all their money\, because they might get afraid their money is no good any more. If such a happening ever happens then it will be nice for the people to have some place to pour their money. Such is the explanation why you see the aluminum dishpan and galvanized iron tub.” \n  \n“Explain your sign—why is it\, ‘I Am Blind Too.’” \n  \n“Oh\, I am sorry to explain to you\, Pick Ups\, why this is so which. Some of the people who pass by here going into the postoffice and coming out\, they have eyes—but they see nothing with their eyes. They look where they are going and they get where they wish to get\, but they forget why they came and they do not know how to come away. They are my blind brothers. It is for them I have the sign that reads\, ‘I Am Blind Too.’” \n  \n“I have my ears full of explanations and I thank you\,” said Pick Ups. \n  \n“Good-by\,” said the Potato Face Blind Man as he began drawing long breathings like lingering leaves out of the accordion—along with the song the mama flummywisters sing when they button loose the winter underwear of the baby flummywisters. \n  \n  \nHere are a couple of my dad’s and my favorite Carl Sandburg poems: \n  \n  \nTHE RIGHT TO GRIEF \nTo Certain Poets About to Die \n  \nTAKE your fill of intimate remorse\, perfumed sorrow\, \nOver the dead child of a millionaire\, \nAnd the pity of Death refusing any check on the bank \nWhich the millionaire might order his secretary to scratch off \nAnd get cashed. \n  \n  Very well\, \nYou for your grief and I for mine. \nLet me have a sorrow my own if I want to. \n  \nI shall cry over the dead child of a stockyards hunky. \nHis job is sweeping blood off the floor. \nHe gets a dollar seventy cents a day when he works \nAnd it’s many tubs of blood he shoves out with a broom day by day. \n  \nNow his three year old daughter \nIs in a white coffin that cost him a week’s wages. \nEvery Saturday night he will pay the undertaker fifty cents till the debt is wiped out.  \n  \nThe hunky and his wife and the kids \nCry over the pinched face almost at peace in the white box. \n  \nThey remember it was scrawny and ran up high doctor bills. \nThey are glad it is gone for the rest of the family now will have more to eat and wear. \n  \nYet before the majesty of Death they cry around the coffin \nAnd wipe their eyes with red bandanas and sob when the priest says\, “God have mercy on us all.” \n  \nI have a right to feel my throat choke about this. \nYou take your grief and I mine—see? \nTo-morrow there is no funeral and the hunky goes back to his job sweeping blood off the floor at a dollar seventy cents a day. \nAll he does all day long is keep on shoving hog blood ahead of him with a broom. \n  \n  \n  \nHAPPINESS \n  \n  \nI ASKED the professors who teach the meaning of life to tell me what is happiness. \n  \nAnd I went to famous executives who boss the work of thousands of men. \n  \nThey all shook their heads and gave me a smile as though I was trying to fool with them. \n  \nAnd then one Sunday afternoon I wandered out along the Desplaines river \n  \nAnd I saw a crowd of Hungarians under the trees with their women and children and a keg of beer and an accordion. \n  \n—Carl Sandburg (1878-1967) \n  \n  \nSince the Potato Face Blind Man plays the accordian\, and the Hungarians on the banks of the Desplaines River do likewise\, perhaps it would be good to include links to some rockin’ accordian music: \n  \nThose Darn Accordians play Jimi Hendrix: \nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzP-G9cVc7k \n  \nFlaco Jimenez\, Mingo Saldivar\, Pete Ybarra\, David Farias & David Lee Garza: \nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zc1ZXm-rFLA \n  \nClifton Chenier & the Louisiana Ramblers play “Tighten Up”: \nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zc1ZXm-rFLA
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-4-7-22/
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DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20220415
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20220515
DTSTAMP:20260427T030818
CREATED:20220417T173612Z
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SUMMARY:Meditation & Mindfulness  4/15/22
DESCRIPTION:  \n  \nOpen Road Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue \n  \n April 15\, 2022 \n  \nAs the crickets’ soft autumn hum \n        is to us \n     so are we to the trees \n        as are they \n  to the rocks and the hills \n  \n—Gary Snyder \n* \n  \nMeditation for Ukraine \n  \nWhen the war in Ukraine began\, we couldn’t believe it. Then we had to\, as an avalanche of headlines\, numbers\, and film clips came at us from all directions. The old ritual of violence had begun again so soon\, so fierce\, so inexplicable. All I could do\, every morning\, was to walk before dawn\, then sit alone\, ponder\, and write. The poems in this book arose in the first 30 days for the fighting\, as I tried to look at the obscene events in Russia and Ukraine from oblique angles—big picture\, close encounter\, root cause\, and imagined outcome.  \n  \nWe have been helped in this time by a Zoom group sponsored by Shambhala Online\, which each day of the war has convened a hundred or so from around the world for the practice of tonglen meditation. Our custom has included Buddhists in the U.S.\, Canada\, Britain\, Holland\, Poland\, India\, Japan\, Ukraine\, and beyond. We sit in silence for many long breaths\, working to inhale suffering and grief\, then exhale\, as we can\, compassion from the heart open wide. Following this practice\, we ask Iryna and Sasha in Kyiv\, Oleg in Odessa\, Andriy in Lviv\, and others inside the war how it is for them—days\, nights\, times of spring sun\, and of darkness. “Now I have no fear\, or no hope. I have only this time\, today.” “I don’t watch the news\, instead I go to the subway and see how little families each make a nest of their belongings.” “Humility comes to the front of your life. You see how artificial was life before.”  \n  \n—from the preface to Sunflower Seeds: Poems for Ukraine (www.lulu.com) \n  \nI have explored the “tonglen” practice of meditation in a poem: \n  \n      Trees Send Oxygen to Weary Citizens \n  \nSome Buddhists sit in silence to inhale sorrow\, \ngrief\, fear\, and all the cloudy darkness of strife \ninto the infinite open heart\, and there transform it \nto an exhalation of light\, of compassion\, a new \nchance for all sentient beings to be at peace. In \npractice\, in fact\, how can this miracle be understood? \nThe last breath of every soldier flies on the wind  \nover the rooftops of generals and their commanders \nfaster\, more direct than roads or other human tricks \nto far Siberia where in ravines and all along ridges \nhorizon by horizon\, valley by valley\, peak by peak \nthe waiting arms of pine\, spruce\, larch\, and fir sip deep  \ninto their green needle tangle a feast of human exhalation  \nto seethe\, turn\, and return pure oxygen for wind to freight  \naround the world\, passing all others\, to the battlefield \nwhere a girl wears her father’s coat\, a boy says his  \nmother’s name with breath made sacred by this war. \n  \n—Kim Stafford \n* \n  \nIf you would like to participate in daily meditations with people in Ukraine at 8 a.m. (PDT)\, here’s the link: \n  \nhttps://us06web.zoom.us/j/83817903514 \n  \n* \n  \nJude responds to meditation #11 from Your True Home by Thich Nhat Hanh: \n  \n#11  Aimlessness  \n  \nBuddhist teaching of aimlessness instructs us not to set an object or goal in front of us and run after it\, believing that happiness is impossible unless and until we get it. We must do as the flower does: we must stop reaching for something.  The flower knows it contains everything within it and doesn’t try to become something else.  \n  \nThis is another instance of word nuances: ‘goal’ and ‘objective’ have negative connotations in this case. They imply reaching for something\, usually a material something\, not being satisfied with life as is. \n  \nBut what about the desire\, the deep and intense desire\, and need\, to know and understand others not like you? The deeply felt purpose imbedded in that desire. The belief that knowing and understanding—connection— erases fear and mistrust and must lead to love. What if you call that a goal? Does that make it wrong? In my intense and life changing moment (still ongoing) of illumination in the mid 90s\, I knew I must seek understanding of those not like me: I found a deep and long friendship with Skosh who had AIDS; I sat with him when he died. I taught at Jefferson High School with its 80-90% Black student body (and took kids to prom and planted gardens with parents); went on five Habitat for Humanity builds to Mississippi\, South Carolina\, West Virginia\, Oklahoma\, etc; mentored rough and tough teenagers for\, now decades (and went to three Metallica concerts!). I befriended an Indian woman and her chaotic family (and sat with her daughter while she went through drug withdrawal) for sixteen years; worked in a family homeless shelter for three years; tutored and ‘adopted’ Hispanic adults (and made 200 tortillas with Maria)\, and up to current times\, volunteered in our precious OHOM prison program. Among other things. Everything I have done has been with a part of my world that I had little or no knowledge or understanding of.  \n  \nI hesitate to mention all of this for fear of sounding as if I’m tooting my own horn; it is not that. It is that I have felt propelled to do this. It is the deep need to know and understand others not like me. It all comes from that experience of ‘illumination’ (at 2:05 pm on March 25\, 1994) (more on that later). \n  \nAre these “goals?” Is this running after something and not being satisfied or happy until I’ve achieved it? I am happy—no\, I am filled with joy when I am living with this desire\, this ‘goal.’ It doesn’t feel wrong\, but oh so right. \n  \n—Jude Russell \n* \n  \nHere are some excerpts from Michel’s March meditation journal. The numbers refer to meditations from Thich Nhat Hanh’s book Your True Home: \n  \nMarch 3\, 2022  –  #250  Touched By Her Light \n  \nThis is a beautiful image. Just imagine it; living in a state of constant mindfulness\, leading others\, through contact\, to grow in cultivation of his/her own mindfulness…to become ripples in the pond of human consciousness\, spreading mindfulness to ever more people—like an anti-dis-ease\, or wellspring of happiness\, compassion and contentment with each one. Not only would that be something to behold\, but it would be amazing to become part of as well. \n  \nDo we not already have this opportunity\, and yet how many are touched by the “light” of my life? (Or\, yours?) What does it take for any one of us to step up and embrace mindfulness fully\, developing our light—let alone touching others’ lives with that light? I find it peculiar that all it takes for me (and you\, too) is to sit down regularly and practice mindfulness—to sit and breathe deliberately. That’s it! I only need to want to take the time to sit for a while. Doing this alone can be extra challenging\, lonely even. It’s funny how yesterday was about space\, leading me to embrace aloneness\, and here I am struggling to overcome loneliness in solitary practice—which is fundamentally still a solitary practice\, even in a hall with 1\,000 meditators at one sangha (fellowship/community). The union of conscious intent\, even practicing in “solitude” within a sangha of any size\, is the strength to overcome a sense of aloneness or loneliness. \n  \nI definitely am more consistent with a group—dedication to other until for self kicks in; and even more so with a personal plan as well. What do you do to get you to the cushion alone\, or in sangha regularly? \n  \nMarch 10\, 2022  –  #251  Many Wonders \n  \nThis is so apropos for my last few days. I find it curious; when I don’t take even the time to exercise and/or contemplate/write here\, it’s as if my experience of life becomes overwhelming to cope with. With the overwhelm comes a flood/flurry of other intensive emotional experiences\, which mount challenge after challenge as the day grinds on…to…a halt. I can go no further… \n  \nOr\, so I thought. Apparently\, enough training\, experience\, or divine intervention reminded me to “just breathe!” As I continued to breathe\, not giving in just yet\, still plodding forward\, one foot in front of the other\, perpetually pressing on and striving to keep going—slowly\, with help and kind words from others\, things started turning back around…unexpectedly. \n  \nThat is the point I believe Thây makes here: No matter how intense the experience of the self-induced suffering (it all is!) we can fall back on our past practice/training to carry us through. We can also reap benefit from just being open (through practice and training the mind) that we see and experience myriad wonders present in every moment—right there before our very eyes\, we only need to be aware enough to look (to go looking for these “wonders.”) \n  \nIt’s a matter of focal points—positive versus negative; wonders abounding everywhere\, or suffering\, pain and misery in each and every moment. I know where I wish I would focus and where I want to focus—I even do succeed occasionally as I desire\, just not as often as I wish I did. But that’s just it. This is all about our personal power of choice. Each of us makes this choice—often unconsciously or passively. \n  \nResults are obvious. You achieve what you focus on and strive for\, not what you aren’t paying attention to. So why don’t we choose better? Why don’t parents teach children that there is this option\, and that choice is our great inheritance of life power? Why don’t we own what they didn’t know then\, and teach/learn for ourselves (and others) now? All I have to do (and you can too!) is make my choice\, then act on it. That’s it. There’s no magic pill\, formula\, incantation\, or grotto. I need only grit to stick with the choice and do the “hard” work—(which isn’t actually hard at all\, it’s just more illusions I created for myself). What’s your choice? \n  \nMarch 24\, 2022  –  #256  Mind Creates Everything \n  \nExcitement rolled through the dorm building\, to a crescendo\, as each man anticipated the call to go down to get our feed. Dark clouds collecting at the edge of the valley\, rolling out over the plains\, building to a full frenzy thunder and lightning display. Just as quickly as the energy built\, each was in his seat\, eating a giant hero. Some chicken clubs—most\, actually—and a few for pastrami. The rains fell\, calming all sound with the coolness settling all around. One by one\, each finished his meal\, moving on to another area. Rains lifted\, skies cleared\, and all was quiet once again. Each man moaned in soft contentment of satisfaction\, having eaten his fill. \n  \nOur minds got bored—all people. The mind craves the new\, exciting\, colorful\, flashy\, brilliant distractions\, not silence within. Practicing mindfulness calms the mind’s desires for innovative and new stimuli. Through training\, a mind learns calmness and peace. \n  \nTV commercials\, live feeds\, Twitter\, Snapchat\, instant access to…every thing. This feeds the chaos drive of the mind. It’s little wonder most people are starving psychically for stillness\, calm and quiet. Few know this secret: It all starts with the mind—both the peace and the noise. \n  \nThrough the mind’s power we can create stories about many things; about peace and harmony\, beauty or chaos and disturbances\, war and violence\, etc. We have power\, which many of us don’t know to use\, but it’s there. All we need to do is practice mindfulness. With time\, practicing leads to consistent behavior\, leading to consistent peace within. What are you creating today? \n  \nMichel Deforge \n* \n  \nAlex Tretbar wrote to me that he has begun meditating every morning. I like to encourage people who want to meditate\, so I wrote some of my thoughts about meditation to him. I’m lazy. Instead of writing something new for this issue\, I’m just going to copy and paste what I wrote to Alex: \n  \nDear Alex \n  \nThanks for your letter and poem. I’m happy to learn that you are meditating every morning. I’ve had a serious meditation practice for more than 50 years\, so I’d like to share a few thoughts on the subject that I hope might be helpful to you. \n  \nThe word “meditation” can mean a lot of different things. For many years\, people considered it a kind of oddball thing that Buddhists were into. Many people tried meditating once or twice\, found it difficult or frustrating and concluded that it was not for them. In more recent years\, meditation & mindfulness—along with yoga—have become much more mainstream and normal. There are meditation apps that people have on their phones. Lots and lots of books about meditation and mindfulness. Health and mental health professionals now routinely recommend meditation and mindfulness for reducing stress and helping with various physical\, mental and emotional problems. \n  \nClassical Japanese Zen is rigorous and practiced in monasteries by monks. The poet Gary Snyder lived in Japan for eight years. He practiced Zen at a monastery and did zazen (sitting meditation) a minimum of five hours a day. \n  \nThere are kinder and gentler ways to practice meditation. Thich Nhat Hanh\, for example\, has a friendlier approach. He says you should enjoy it. If you’re not enjoying it\, you’re doing it wrong. \n  \nA brief word on sitting meditation. The two essential things are: eyes open and back straight. When your eyes close or your posture slumps you tend to daydream and then fall asleep. This is not a bad thing. Like taking a nap\, it’s restful. \n  \nMeditation is wakefulness. Attention. A mind quiet and alert. \n  \nRather than thinking of it as a difficult activity\, it might be good to think of meditation as “quiet time.” Peaceful time. A time set aside\, when you don’t have to accomplish anything. In our culture achievement is at a premium and people who don’t meditate tend to think of it as wasting time. Walt Whitman said: \n  \n“I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.” \n  \nThat’s the idea. \n  \nIf you spend some quiet time every morning\, over time your brain and mind and nervous system will gradually quiet down. \n  \nOne of the things that you learn from meditation is that instead of seeing and feeling and experiencing the world directly\, we learned early in life to see and experience and feel the world through a filter of thought and language. It’s like the difference between reading about Multnomah Falls\, or looking at a postcard of Multnomah Falls\, and actually standing if front of it and feeling the spray. \n  \nMeditation & mindfulness—that immediate kind of perception—can inspire poetic expression. All you have to do is find the right words to convey this experience to others. Simple. \n  \nIn one of our earlier exchanges\, you said that the problem for you with meditating\, is that you would be sitting there and you’d have an idea\, and you would want to write it down before it disappeared—and thus you would have to interrupt your meditation. This made me smile. The thing is: of course you can stop “meditating” in order to write. Writing is a form of meditation. Maybe silent sitting is one of the ways to invite poetic inspiration. Like opening a window\, so that you can feel the breeze. \n  \nThis problem\, like most problems\, is an imaginary one. First you imagined it\, then you imagined that it was a “real” problem. A toothache is a real problem. The Buddhist view is that 99% of suffering is self-inflicted. (“Imaginary” problems are not necessarily less painful than “real” ones.) Meditation is the art of not making yourself miserable. \n  \nOne of the paradoxes of meditation is that there is no goal. You sit in order to sit. Trying to get something—like peace\, or enlightenment\, or whatever—is just another way of making yourself miserable. It introduces time and a hypothetical future. There is no future\, only this present moment. \n  \nWell\, that’s enough for now about all that. \n  \npeace & love\, \nJohnny \n* \n  \n“Whenever you meet a situation that awakens your compassion… \nyou can stop for a moment\, breathe in any suffering you see\, \nand breathe out a sense of relief.” \n  \n—Pema Chödrön – Tonglen\, the Path of Transformation \n  \nI have been attending a daily Buddhist meditation practice since the early days of the War against Ukraine. Hosted by a group in New York and a group in Ukraine\, we gather on Zoom\, to give support to those suffering from violence due to the  ongoing invasion. \n  \nThe practice of Tonglen\, an extension of Loving-Kindness meditation\, is new to me. We begin with a check-in from sangha members in Ukraine. Iryna gives a hello and a weather report if the sun is shining\, then a brief update about the latest destruction and pauses in bombing. She speaks in Ukrainian and her friend translates for us. Then others are asked to speak – Oleg in Odessa\, Sasha and Ella in Kyiv\, Andrei in Lviv\, give personal stories from their homes. Seeing them in their zoom boxes\, with their windows shaded\, is a moving and transporting experience. These check-ins have been both heartrending and inspiring. Also comforting to know that they are alive\, these brave humble people who we have come to care for and LOVE over these weeks of war. Sometimes these new friends are away on meditation retreat\, or called to army duty\, or helping to take care of the wounded or homeless. In Kyiv they are involved with reconstructing a building for those who have lost their homes or have been sheltering in the subways.    \n  \nTaking a moment to sit with awareness of our feelings\, gathering stability and compassion\, we go directly into a practice of transforming suffering into compassion.  Tonglen – in English called Sending and Taking\, is new to me. The essence of it is to breathe in heaviness\, sorrow\, whatever images may be disturbing us\, then breathe out peace\, tenderness\, lightness\, liveliness.  Our minds may be overwhelmed by news\, or anxiety\, but our hearts have a bottomless well of love and compassion.  \n  \nThe Practice closes with a Dedication of Merit sent out to all beings that may be  suffering. Then we unmute for an open discussion\, questions\, poems\, or music. The chat box overflows with thanks and good wishes\, resources are sent for compassion in action.    \n  \nThirty minutes of raising compassion in a group dedicated to non-violence allows us to be supportive of one another in a volatile time. I’m sure the Ukrainians feel supportive\, but I am much more aware of the support for myself. It has been a gift; an antidote to the images in the morning newspaper\, to the enervating quality of nightly news commentary on the war that I have completely given up. \n  \nI had wondered if it would feel like a burden to begin my day up close in a war with strangers.  Rather it has been energizing\, spiritually creative\, and friendly. Here we are greeting one another each day\, getting to know our Eastern neighbors with names and faces and stories. I grieve for the children\, remembering our own war years and protests\, “Where have all the children gone\, long time ago?” I draw strength from my Polish ancestors\, when I hear stories of the millions taking refuge in Poland’s homes. In Western Ukraine too\, every person we heard from had people from Eastern towns staying in their apartment.  \n  \nHere at home\, I recognize a Ukrainian accent in line at Goodwill. Hannah starts weeping when I hug her\, so thankful to be listened to; her husband is Russian and supports Putin. Her parents meanwhile are terrified in Kyiv. Her own children are young.    \n  \nI feel grateful for our experience with you all through Open Hearts Open Minds dialogue and theater and Open Road discussions and readings and reflecting on Thich Nhat Hanh’s teachings. Being interactive\, communicating!\,  interbeing as Thay says\, practicing a common aspiration for peace and happiness\, has been helpful for not turning away from the suffering in war. \n  \nI muse over these words of Thich Nhat Hanh’s and think about how we might transform\, in prison or in a state of fear or in a difficult time of despair over how to help.   \n  \n The Buddha’s teaching is about viewing the world through the eyes of compassion. Thich Nhat Hanh taught deep listening and open communication with people on both sides of an issue. And taking action to relieve suffering\, everyone’s suffering. \n  \nHe said\, “When you have compassion in your heart\, you suffer much less\, and you are in a situation to be and to do something to help others to suffer less. This is true. So to practice in such a way that brings compassion into your heart is very important. A person without compassion cannot be a happy person. And compassion is something that is possible only when you have understanding. Understanding brings compassion. Understanding is compassion itself.”   \n  \nThank you\, dear friends\, for our ongoing communication\, and open hearts.  May we be at peace.     \n  \nLove\,     \nKatie
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/meditation-mindfulness-4-15-22/
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