The Dharma of Everyday Life--

Part of a public panel, "Buddhism Through Local Eyes," hosted by Friends of the Village Library Cooperstown, NY.  March 9, 2014

I encountered Buddhism for the first time in college, 35 years ago, and frankly, at first, I thought it was depressing and nihilistic: Everything is suffering? The self isn’t real? It’s all illusion? It appeared to me then that the Buddha’s teaching was to leave the world, as he left his wife and child, become a wandering ascetic, give up sex, food, all pleasure, and stop thinking . . . to basically check out. I thought at the time that the teaching was simply to deny the world and its claims on you so that you could pretend to be above all that. I was wrong, of course, or I wouldn’t be here now on this panel speaking as a self-identified "Buddhist."  At that time, though, I misunderstood the tradition's main teachings, and the last thing I wanted to do was check out and abandon my life and my self and this beautiful world. At 19, I was just figuring out what life was, and who I might be; and I was trying to gather the courage to go out and discover answers to these questions.

I don’t think my misunderstanding is unusual. From the outside, Buddhists can either look like they are worshiping the Buddha (or worse, their teachers) as gods, or they can look like they're trying to wreck everybody else’s party!

Still, it wasn't long before I realized that the central concerns of Buddhism dealt directly with the fundamental problems of living (and dying) with which I was increasingly concerned:

• At the heart of our lives is the intractable problem of suffering--of discontent and disappointment--and it seemed to me we are very often the cause of that suffering, both for ourselves and for others.  Buddhism promised an end to suffering.

• There is a human hunger to know how the world works, to know one’s place in the fabric of things, to know who one REALLY is (or at least I had that hunger). Buddhism seemed to have tools for examining these questions and finding answers.

• I was sure that we aren’t born as sinners; we are simply born with misconceptions--and we can change our conceptions. Buddhism offered a tradition and philosophy which supported that perspective. 

• Further, I was quite sure our “salvation,” if you will, is something we ultimately have to work out for ourselves. The Buddha said, “Be a lamp unto yourself." In other words, don’t just take my word for it; check it out! I liked the autonomy, and the objective, scientific approach. Buddhism didn’t require a set of beliefs. You just had to be willing to look at yourself. Essentially, Buddhism promised a toolkit for self examination rather than a set of beliefs that one must adopt. 

• And finally, and maybe most importantly to me, Buddhism had the figure of the Bodhisattva:  a human being who vows to postpone his or her own escape from all this pain and suffering--postpone his or her full and complete enlightenment--until everyone, every last sentient being everywhere, has come to full realization and an end to their suffering as well. To me this meant, that at its heart, Buddhism recognized we are all in this together: all equal, all worth saving, all of us with Buddha Nature, and all of us essential to untying the knot of human suffering.

So, I began to study Buddhism--alongside other religious traditions (I was a Religious Studies major in College)--and to practice simple forms of one-pointed attention and mindfulness meditation (Shamata and Vipassana). After that, I participated in several 3-10 day retreats in the Zen and Burmese traditions which deepened both my meditation practice and my commitment to Buddhist philosophy--mostly because I could see, first hand, substantive, concrete changes in my own thinking and behavior (It wasn't pleasant, but it was instructive, and in my personal world, growth trumps "pleasant experiences" every time . . . which is sort of annoying, but it makes for good "compost" I guess).

Then I met my husband, Sandy, who is a Buddhist scholar, and given his training, interests, and personal sitting practice, my own relationship with Buddhism continued, unsurprisingly, to deepen further yet. We spent a lot of time talking about this spiritual tradition, especially its philosophy, a conversation we've been having now for over 30 years!

However, perhaps the most important event in my own journey toward claiming Buddhism as my path occurred when we'd been married only a short time: we traveled to India where we would live for two years. There, Sandy taught on Antioch’s College Semester in India Program, and through this program, I met and took teachings with many Buddhist teachers--in the first year alone, Manindra and Thich Nhat Hanh, in the Burmese tradition; and Kalu Rinpoche and Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche in the Tibetan Tradition. This last teacher, Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche, is the uncle of Gomde Cooperstown’s main teacher Phakchok Rinpoche, and is also the brother of Chokling Rinpoche, Phackok Rinpoche’s father, who has taught at the center as well. Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche would become my main teacher, but this didn’t happen easily or all at once.

I was raised Unitarian by a father who said, “I never had a need for religion” and a mother who, when I asked her when I was nine years old, "What happens when we die?," replied, “You’re born; you live; you die; you rot.” End of story. (One might ask why these people even went to the UU Church! But that’s a different panel, I think . . . )

The point is, I wasn’t like my parents--I seemed to be obsessed with religions questions, and I thought there was more to the story than the biological facts of our birth, life, and death. And yet I was like them too: I had a healthy skepticism; I distrusted the dogma of organized religions; I did not believe in an eternal heaven and an endless hell; nor in a man-in-the-sky-with-a-long-white-beard creator god, and I absolutely knew in my bones that I had to figure out my relationship to the Divine for myself.

So when I met Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche in India, one of my first thoughts was, “Why are all these people following him around? Don’t they have lives? If this tradition requires one to leave their homes, lives, and families--if it’s not for being IN the the world and solving the problems of daily living--I want no part of it!” One of the central reasons for this strong assertion was that, just as I had somehow always known I had to figure out the answers to life’s big questions on my own, I also somehow knew in my bones that I was meant to be a wife and a mother.

Still, in India--

• I went to the teachings.
• I learned.
• I gained respect for the many Buddhist traditions that I encountered.
• And I had experiences which proved to me that there was something to these philosophies and practices: I was changing in positive ways.
• Slowly, I was beginning to be drawn to the Buddhist perspectives and practices of the Tibetan Vajrayana tradition, especially the simplicity and power of Dzogchen, with its striped-down heart.
• And finally, I felt a trust in, and affinity for, this particular teacher of the Dharma: Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche. And I could see that others whom I respected felt the same--his students were sincere and dedicated, many of them with busy lives back home who had saved money and taken time off from work to be with him and learn from him in India.

Still, I wanted to hear (from the horse’s mouth, so to speak) whether or not this was a path that a householder could walk with full confidence.

So I asked for an audience with Rinpoche. It was a casual meeting on the guest-house roof of the Burmese Vihar in Bodhgaya, India where he was staying during a portion of our program. We sat drinking tea in the open air. I told him of my dedication to a householder’s life and asked whether or not one could follow the Vajrayana and still be in the world, so to speak.  His reply was this: “It’s a harder path, and you’re going to cry a lot.” I don’t think we spoke of anything else. I remember bowing to him, saying thank you, and leaving. And then asking myself, for years, “What did he really mean?”

I still don’t know from personal experience if what he said is true or not; I can’t. I’m not a mendicant with a begging bowl, nor a solitary yogi in a cave, not a nun waking before dawn to sit with my sisters in silence. I am a wife and a mother and a teacher and tutor  . . . and also a student and practitioner of Vajrayana Buddhism. I’ve come to call this “The Dharma of Everyday Life.”

What I DO know about this path I have chosen (or has it chosen me?) is that there are ample opportunities for practice and that it’s hard to lie to yourself about being equanimous and compassionate and having overcome your shit. There are people around every corner telling you how mistaken you are. You have friends and neighbors and parents and a spouse telling you that you are NOT the Dalai Lama, but actually a complete Ass Hole!!!

And you have children . . .  Yes, children. My children have been my biggest teachers in this Dharma of Everyday Life. And I’d like to tell you about the day I learned one of my most important lessons from them: to show up and say yes; to be brave and choose love.

There was a period when our kids were little that was particularly challenging:  I had just finished doing my graduate degree in Marriage and Family Counseling (while pregnant and nursing), and I had just found out I couldn’t use my brand new degree after all. I was faced with the prospect of going back to school again or taking a job as a teacher and tutor at SUNY Oneonta. I chose the latter, but so far in that work I was feeling inauthentic and overwhelmed, and my lovely, sweet, intelligent, and intense children were intensely being just that--children: they were in the terrible twos and threes and fours, and I found myself saying every day, like a mantra, “I can’t. I can’t. I can’t do this!” And then one day I saw what I was actually doing.

It was the middle of the night. I woke up hearing Katie calling for me, “Mamaaaa.” She’d been sick and was recovering now, but I hadn’t slept in days.  Sandy was snoring lightly beside me. I lay there listening, holding on to edge of a dream, praying she wouldn’t really wake up:

“Maamaaaa.” she called

And I thought,  “I can’t.”

            “Maamaaaaaaa!” she called again.

And again I thought, “No. I just can’t.”  

But I saw myself swing my legs out of bed anyway.  I heard myself feeling, “I can’t. This is too hard,” but saying anyway, “I’m coming.” I watched myself cross the hall, and go to my daughter, and gather up her crying body in my arms--all the while thinking “I can’t”--until I heard myself saying, “Shhhh. Mama’s here.”

And that was it. I was. I was there. All this time I’d been saying I can’t, but I was doing it anyway. And in that moment I realized that all I really needed to do was to show up in my life, to raise my hand and say, “Here,” to be present, and then to work on being fully present to each moment.

So I stopped saying, “I can’t.” and started saying, “I can.” I found I didn’t resist my life as much. I began to lean into the suffering, to be present to it and for it, and in doing so, I found I was more present for and to everything: others, myself, the whole world. I began to experience more joy! I could see that I might live more fully this way: by not resisting, by saying yes to what is, by not judging the moment out of fear but embracing it--whatever it was--with curiosity, patience, kindness, and unconditional love. That’s what all the child psychologists say kids need; that’s what all the great religious traditions say the world needs; that’s what the Buddhist tradition says we need in order to end the suffering: diligence, and patience, and kindness, and unconditional compassion.

When we ride the waves of a strong emotion during an argument--watching it start and build and crest and fall away--instead of being pulled under by its force to a place where we can drown or be crushed against the rocks, we are practicing. When we begin to see the weather of our lives--the stars and sunshine; the clouds and storms--coming and going, we can also see the aware, awake witness to all of this that is our true home and nature: our Buddha Nature. When we make friends with our failings and fears and strong emotions, they become like tantruming children who dissolve into soft, hiccupping sobs in our arms when we embrace them, finally letting go of whatever it was that caused all the trouble. Whereas, If we ignore these things, or fight these things, or run away from them, they rage and eat up all of our attention and energy.

In the end, I found out for myself that authentic Buddhist practice doesn't happen only on a cushion through formal meditation and mantra and prayer and visualization, doesn't happen only in the peace of solitude and of retreat; the householder’s life offers so many opportunities for authentic, diligent practice: traffic jams and changing diapers; crying children and doing dishes; paying bills and committing to others--each morning and each night and each morning again,--as we find ourselves still there, doing the hard work of loving, saying the daily mantra of Yes: "I can, I do, I will, I am."

Indeed, it is a hard path. And I've cried a lot. But this, my training ground and home--this householder's life--teaches me daily how to be with and for the world: to not deny its claims on me but to work with them as tools to ripen my understanding and soften my heart; to not turn from the pain of living, but to lean in toward it and be curious about its causes; to say to myself when I feel doubt, "You are able, here and now, to be present to whatever arrises, good or bad. You are doing it anyway, so let go! You can be brave and choose to love whatever life brings to your begging bowl."