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Saturday, Feb 19th, is the 80th anniversary of the signing of Executive Order 9066, creating a sudden situation of distress and tragedy for our neighbors, friends and family. of Japanese ancestry.

Issued by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1942, this order authorized the evacuation of all persons deemed a threat to national security from the West Coast to relocation centers further inland. In the next 6 months, over 100,000 men, women, and children of Japanese ancestry were moved to assembly centers. They were then evacuated to and confined in isolated, fenced, and guarded relocation centers, known as internment camps—as prisoners without a crime. 

Grounded in the confusion, fear and sadness of war and and in the still on-going persecution and racism against Japanese American citizens in the US, this act disrupted life and liberty for so many. Even today, the impacts of EO 9066 are embedded in the thoughts, feelings and actions of the citizens of our country, and the world. 

Many of those interred were practitioners of Buddhism, and like many Tibetans who were and are persecuted today, they brought practice to their suffering. Their stories are important to our spiritual formation as contemporary American Buddhists. Please read more on this topic. Please use the suffering of these and all beings—including the perpetrators of these actions—as practice this weekend. As community, let’s keep these events in the light, and resolve to own our own role in the creation and resolution of suffering of all kinds. Suffering has no past, no future:  it is alive in hearts and minds right now, right here, and can be created and must be resolved in this and every moment. 

Learn more about Executive Order 9066 and its impacts on the lives of our Japanese American sisters and brothers here, and here and many other places online. May the Dekeling community ground itself on the fundamental equality of all, understanding that there is no ‘other.’

From the place where we are right
Flowers will never grow
In the spring.

The place where we are right
Is hard and trampled
Like a yard.

But doubts and loves
Dig up the world
Like a mole, a plow.

And a whisper will be heard in the place
Where the ruined
House once stood.

(from The Selected Poetry of Yehudi Amichai, translation by Chana Bloch and Stephen Mitchell, University of California Press, 1996,)

1. Practice gratitude. Today notice all the things in your experience that you can be grateful for. There are so many things we are not grateful for until we don’t have them. For example, can you breathe easily today? Appreciate that. Does your left elbow work? Notice it.

2. Offer experience. When you see, feel, hear, or taste something pleasurable today, offer it to the enlightened spiritual beings of all faiths. This allows us to experience pleasurable things while not becoming attached to the experience and it cultivates the habit of giving.

3. Be generous to yourself. Today, cut yourself some slack. Give yourself some space. Ease up on self-judgment. Take time and make effort to give yourself the same nurturing that you more easily give to others. This will result in a life with more ease, which is a support for well-being. It will also help cultivate the habit of generosity with others since you will feel how good it feels to be the recipient of kind, generous behavior.

4. When in conflict, escalate generosity. Today, when someone is irritating you, instead of escalating the conflict, try to see their conflicted behavior as a symptom of their suffering and escalate generosity. This is the practice of restraint and generosity. It develops your patience and will help others have the direct experience of kindness, which will gradually help them be less conflicted.

5. Celebrate the joys and virtues of others. The practice of empathetic joy is an antidote to jealousy and helps decrease the fear and suffering of a jealous mind. Others will feel pleased to be recognized and to share their successes and you will receive the experience of their joy. If you suffer from performance anxiety or a need to be recognized as right or ‘the best,’ this practice will help ease the suffering of these mind states.

6. Notice the strings attached to your generosity. Make offerings. Give things away, both material and imagined. Notice how you want something in return. In the moment of noticing, don’t judge, just see. In this way you begin to understand generosity and the lack of it. No need to be critical of yourself. If you see your actions without judgement, little by little they will change.

7. Accept what is offered. When people offer you something, whether it is a compliment or a new house, accept it graciously. Be present for the gift. Don’t worry about motivations other than your own. Fully formed generosity is also able to receive gifts and help from others.

8. Use mindfully. Today, remember all other beings and mind your consumption. Eat simply so others can eat. Recycle and reuse. Share. These small acts acknowledge that we are interconnected and that our actions have impact on others.

9. Accept the suffering of others with forbearance. There are many practices for this. If someone is angry, mean, or unkind, they are suffering. Accept this and do not return their unkindness with your own suffering. They have enough already. Offer your clarity if you can. Even if you simply make the wish that they be relieved of their suffering, you are helping them by not adding to their burden and you are helping train your own mind.

10. Offer forgiveness. The hope for a better past is always futile. When you forgive someone, you are not saying what they did was right or helpful, you are letting go of your own suffering around the issue and moving on. This benefits you and the other person, as well.

11. Stop stealing. When we kill, cheat, or lie, we are stealing. When we selfishly overuse shared resources, we are stealing, which is antithetical to generosity. Determine that today you will not steal. If you feel you were stealing, do your best to correct the matter as soon as possible and celebrate your new awareness. No need to feel guilty!

12. Help relieve the fears of others. Many people–even those who seem successful and proud–are filled with fear. Be generous with your attention, your approval, and your smiles.

13. Practice equanimity. It’s easy to be generous with people we like. Expand your generosity by extending it to those with whom you have difficult and indifferent relationships. All beings want to be happy. It’s the one thing we have in common. Let yourself have the luxury of extending generosity to strangers and to those who would call themselves your enemy. Feel yourself relax as you feel the barriers dissolve.

14. Water the seeds of the happiness of others. When people are unbalanced, they suffer. You can help by helping that person remember their inner resources, pleasant memories, and positive circumstances. Even their physiology will change as they dwell on the positive.

15. Support all faiths. Give time, money, and energy to support the practice of the authentic spiritual teachings in all traditions. If you cannot do intensive practice yourself, support those who do (monks, nuns and hermits or other committed lay folk). You and others will benefit from their presence in the world and the future will be more sane, safe, and happy as we all progress spiritually.

16. Offer your presence with no agenda. If someone is having difficulty or is sick or dying, offer to be present with their suffering. Let go of agendas. Just stay. Use your own mindfulness to see when your agendas arise and drop them. Even 5 minutes of genuine presence is a gift that can bring spacious relief.

17. Take care of yourself. Many people, some of whom you do not know about, depend on you. So, take good care of yourself. Show up. Give yourself a break. Accept support.

18. Remind yourself that things change. Everything is impermanent. Nothing lasts. The worst suffering and the greatest joys fade. Noticing this is the antidote to clinging.

19. Perform generous acts in secret. Do something generous and keep it a secret. This will help prevent pride and will help you develop the ability to give without wanting something in return.

20. Learn from yourself about generosity. As you practice generosity, you will see that sometimes, even when you want to be generous, you can’t. It’s hard work! The more you learn about this, the more you will be patient with others’ lack of generosity and the more you will appreciate their generosity

Right now there are Tibetan Buddhist monks in a temple in the Himalayas endlessly reciting mantras for the cessation of your suffering and for the flourishing of your happiness. Someone you haven’t met yet is already dreaming of adoring you. Someone is writing a book that you will read in the next two years that will change how you look at life. Nuns in the Alps are in endless vigil, praying for the Holy Spirit to alight the hearts of all of God’s children. A farmer is looking at his organic crops and whispering, “nourish them”. Someone wants to kiss you, to hold you, to make tea for you. Someone is willing to lend you money, wants to know what your favorite food is, and treat you to a movie. Someone in your orbit has something immensely valuable to give you — for free. Something is being invented this year that will change how your generation lives, communicates, heals and passes on. The next great song is being rehearsed. Thousands of people are in yoga classes right now intentionally sending light out from their heart chakras and wrapping it around the earth. Millions of children are assuming that everything is amazing and will always be that way. Someone is in profound pain, and a few months from now, they’ll be thriving like never before. From where they are, they just can’t see it . Someone has recently cracked open their joyous, genuine nature because they did the hard work of hauling years of oppression off of their psyche — this luminous juju is floating in the ether, and is accessible to you. Someone just this second wished for world peace, in earnest. Someone is dedicating their days to protecting your civil liberties and clean drinking water. Someone is regaining their sanity. Someone is coming back from the dead. Someone is genuinely forgiving the seemingly unforgivable. Someone is curing the incurable. You. Me. Some. One. Now.

Mary Standing Otter

Margaret had a question:  “Why do you meet one-on-one with students?”

First of all, it’s totally optional; to participate in these meetings is a matter of personal choice and preference. I am happy to say that there is no charge for one-on-one meetings. Sometimes we call these meetings ‘interviews’—not like job interviews, but because in talking, we mix perspectives/views. We talk at the intersection of our views.

I meet with students one-on-one because my teacher did that and I found it enormously helpful. In the same way Lama Michael did, as I get to know a practitioner, we can get at the core of their understanding, mis-understand, habits and life in general.

In one-on-one meetings, we have no particular agenda, though after the first meeting, I will always and continuously direct the conversation back to dharma practice. I am not a therapist. Not a doctor. Not a shaman or a person looking for a new friend. I am a dharma teacher, so I’ll assume if you come to me, you are looking to get answers to your dharma questions or to see how to apply your practice to life’s many challenges and opportunities. I’ll assume you want to wake up, even if you have no idea where to start.

In public sessions, like our Monday night mediation and dialogue, you can also ask dharma questions. If we’ve met, I’ll tailor the answer to both your question and your situation a little bit, if I know something about you. But I’ll still spend most of the response time on ‘the middle’—the average person in that night’s group who might share your question. Others will also contribute their thoughts and experience, which is wonderful; in part because in that process you’ll gradually develop meaningful relationships with others in the community.

In one-on-one sessions the advice can be more specific to you. We can discuss concrete examples, based on your life at the moment and can explore specific uses of practice that will help with your most common habits and obstacles, while developing your strengths.

In a one-on-one meeting it’s possible that the ‘container’ feels more intimate—and therefore, for some, more safe. I can be more direct with questions and you can speak freely without having to direct energy towards the others in the room. I can ask more clarifying questions to be sure I have understood what it is you really want to know and do.

In one-on-one meetings, we can have a months’ long on-going discussion about key themes of your dharma interests and about your main practices. As your experience grows and your understanding develops, we can talk about more nuanced understandings and application of the dharma views, methods and activities.

We can also discuss how to work with your relationships in the community, with volunteering, with your vision and hopes for the community. And of course, we can talk freely about any challenges you might experience. When your sense of all those is clear, you can raise them skillfully in a more public setting, like sangha (community) meetings or our Monday night sits.

Some practice questions are quite person-specific—and general answers point in the right direction, but might not actually show you a meaningful path of application of your practice. You might not feel like raising certain questions in public, especially if you have trauma, or are new to the community. We try to make Dekeling an inclusive and safe place for all, but trusting that takes time. We want you to take all the time you need, and one-on-one meetings can be a good place to test your growing trust.

One-on-one meetings are a resource-intensive use of both the teacher’s and student’s time. But I find that people who learn to use them wisely often become community members who support the community in many ways. I think it’s worth it to invest in these meetings.

We do one-on-one meetings by Zoom and in person, socially distanced. Board members and assistant teachers are given first priority, but often need the least support. Those two volunteer groups can get one-on-one meetings on short notice and often. This helps them be resourced well enough to continue to offer work to the community. Access to the Lama is our way of appreciating their contributions to the community, since their work may take many hours from their life. People in urgent situations, even if they are new to the community, can also usually get a meeting. Generally, we do meetings at a time and place convenient to my schedule, but if someone is dying or in the hospital, or suddenly home-bound, I can and will travel. But everyone—even people who don’t come to Dekeling—are welcome to sign up for a meeting. 

Meetings are scheduled for an hour, but we may finish early. No problem.

I always hope that students who participate in one-on-one meetings or any other of our free offerings will find a way to give back to the community. It takes a village to run even a small center like ours. There is always volunteering. Dana (offerings) are always useful to keep the lights on. Your meditation is always an offering to the whole world.

If you’d like a one-on-one meeting, this is the link to the calendar. If you set a meeting and can’t come for some reason, just let me know.

Happy practice. May beings benefit from your kind intentions.   

Peter had the question, “What should I do to get the most benefit from retreat?”

It depends on the retreat, and why you are there.

• If you sign up for a retreat to receive teachings on a practice like Chenrezig, there will likely be periods set aside for receiving teachings, asking questions and getting answers, and for practice together as a group and possibly for practicing alone in your room. There will also likely be meals and time for rest or exercise. On these retreats, I generally recommend only reading the readings assigned by the teacher. If you must read something else, read a book on the topic of the retreat—in this case, the best would be to read a book on the topic of the retreat that you have read previously. This way you are not enticed to expand your knowledge at the expense of spending more time in practice.
• If the purpose of your retreat is rest and relaxation, do whatever accomplishes that. Retreats for renewal and reflection are valuable from time to time. Keep careful watch on the habits of body, speech and mind that stir up patterns that sap energy and keep you locked in activities and mental loops that add to fatigue. Remember alternative modalities like movement practices and art.
• If the purpose of your retreat is to deepen your awakening, do one or more practices you already know, on a set schedule. Study and read only those practices, leaning in the direction of more practice than study.
• If you are engaging in a study retreat, split your time between disciplined study and some periods for contemplating the topic of the retreat. Many commentaries raise excellent questions for contemplation. Take time to rest the conceptual mind and do some Shamatha practice so the mind is undistracted and clear. If you are a beginner, pick only a few sources for study; a big pile of books is likely to be a distraction. Keep a list of questions so you can seek out answers when a mentor or book are available.

The most precious retreats are those in which you simply take a practice you know and do it session after session. This deepens your relationship to the practice and creates the conditions for learning beyond the conceptual. On these retreats, set aside a small amount of time for exercise and meals and during those activities, keep your mind on the practice as much as you can. Practice before sunrise and add sessions after dark, as well. Adhere to a schedule.

In most all retreats, these things may help

• Do something towards the accumulation of merit. Recite aspiration or lineage prayers, or do service (clean, cook, etc.), make offerings, or do extra related practice (mantra, etc.). You can also create accumulation of merit before the retreat doing those things, or by making it possible for others to practice.
• Limit talking. Talking on retreat can feel good, but it’s also often a source of distraction. The act of talking engages the mind differently than practice.
• Limit looking at others. Retreat is a deeply internal effort. Keeping your eyes to yourself helps protect each person’s sense of comfort, safety and ease, reserving social energy for inner work.
• Limit reading. The thinking mind and the mind of practice are different.
• Limit or exclude the use of phone and other technology. This kind of engagement takes the mind out of retreat.
• Limit journaling. Journaling can be an important tool for self-discovery, but it takes away from time spent in the mind of practice—a very different use of awareness.
• Maintain as much silence as possible. This reserves energy for practice and contributes to ease and single-pointedness.
• Watch your body, speech and thoughts. In the concentrated container of retreat, the way you use body, speech and even thoughts impacts your retreat.
• Rest enough to be able to practice with diligence.

How you balance your use of this advice depends on your level of practice experience and your habits and proclivities. It might be impacted by your physical needs and your general psychology, as well. Until you are familiar with your needs, and with all the ways you are prone to sabotaging a retreat, get help from your mentor on setting a schedule and choosing the format for your retreat activities.  

The general guideline I use is to limit your activities on retreat to those that best cultivate the thing to which you most aspire. If you want to awaken, set the conditions in place to do that. Remember that doing is much more important than reading about doing or talking or thinking about doing. Direct experience is the jet fuel of practice.

Think of this: If you went on a weekend retreat to learn to chop wood, you might read a page or two about how to do it, and you might think about it a little, but you’d learn most about chopping wood by spending the weekend chopping wood.

For teachers, customer service people, counselors, chaplains, barbers—all those of you who work with a stream of people each day. Something to recite between to keep your mind on dharma.

Through the kindness of my teachers,

may I recognize the true nature of myself

and everyone who passes through this door.

Like an alchemistic potion turning metal into gold,

in this meeting, delightful or difficult,

may I find bliss without contagion,

completely undefiled,

and through the virtue of the dharma

and the truth of interconnection,

may goodness pervade each moment we share.

May I visit every realm, without preference,

if it benefits beings.

May I serve them humbly

and receive without hesitation

their perfect gifts,

even when disguised as conflict and complaint.

Through the power of the truth of phenomena

may any ailment of body or mind,

any obstacle or veil,

in myself, this person and anyone I meet

be removed completely

if it benefits beings.

May our connection be fruitful

for this and every life,

and may we all be free.

Releasing obstacles,

attachments, and worry,

I am present now and meet this person–

—a beloved companion on the path

with gratitude, peace and joy.

 

Have you ever wondered how they make those beautiful thangkas (Tibetan Buddhist scroll paintings)? They start with a drawing. Each drawing is done to very precise proportions on a predetermined grid called a ‘thigse’.

Here you can see some examples of these marvelous grids and designs.

The dates below are days that are not good days to put up new prayer flags.

February (2021):

March: 17, 29

April: 9, 16, 28

May: 9, 12, 14, 26

June: 20

July: 1, 16, 27

August: 12, 23,

September: 4, 7, 18

October: 1, 15, 27

November: 14, 26,

December: 10, 23

January (2022): 6, 18, 30

February: 1, 14

These days in the year 2021 are not the best days to raise prayer flags, according to the Tibetan calendar.