Via Daily Dharma: A New Definition of Consciousness

Consciousness is an action, a capacity for meeting whatever its object is.

—Beth Jacobs, “Mapping Your Mind: The Original Buddhist Psychology”

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Via justabahai blog : Letter from a gay former Baha’i

Letter from a gay former Baha’i

August 12, 2017

Lord, why do you pile all these troubles upon us? It is because of the gays, isn’t it?

In 1963 I joined the Faith at 15 in a European country. After 20 years of serving on committees, assemblies, pioneering to goal districts, holding firesides, praying, fasting, teaching and all the rest, I realised that to be forbidden to grow in love with another man was intolerable. 

The idea of growing old emotionally alone felt positively dangerous to my mental health. Having accepted my being gay since early adolescence I decided I had to be with other men like myself. I thought then that I could possibly continue to serve and also find mutual love with another guy—just being discrete about it. Love not sex, please note, because Bahai’s always, always, confuse the two. 

I met some great guys and quickly realised that these guys were just as normal as me. In fact, they were really attuned to human differences and the complexity of being the “other” in an intolerant society. It was a paradox that, in many ways, they showed more open and honest Bahai characteristics than many in my own local community. Time spent in their company became far more enriching and emotionally rewarding than sitting on an Assembly reading ever more jargon-ridden letters from the Institutions. I had shared the pain with dear friends who were marginalized for their academic research and writing, and who suffered vile abuse from some Bahais, still happening today. I felt the cruelty of the absence of a warm, fulfilling community life with other Baha’is.

Then a truly decent gay Baha’i acquaintance, on one of his sexuality guilt trips, outed me to an ABM as gay. [Note: ABM is a Bahai appointed to counsel Bahai communities at a regional level. 

Their role is advisory but local communities often accord them greater authority.] This ABM, a doctor working in a hospital which had done ECT on gays, wrote offering me a weekend of therapy which would cure me of these unhealthy and unacceptable urges. I declined, rather impolitely. I regret not being more diplomatic. Now outed, I decided to come out to close friends in the community. My closest friend of many years told me of his shock and how he never wanted to speak with me again and could not bear to even shake my hand. I haven’t seen him since, and still miss him. Another told me he would never leave his son in a room alone with me. Another dear friend could not bear to meet or hear about the man with whom I had fallen in love. On and on it went. I wondered how I could continue to serve on Institutions with these people. It simply was impossible. I chose to become inactive. Assembly members then called my home to tell me I was sick in the head.

I decided to leave the Faith one evening in a restaurant. I was having dinner with a gay friend—a dear, kind, sweet, lovely guy battling cancer, who would have been a credit to any community, may he rest in peace. Into the cafe came a party of Baha’is, including some who had served on an Assembly with me. They sat two tables away, in full view of me, and pointedly ignored me. I sat chatting to my friend and thought, who do I prefer to share my life with? Did I want a life with these Bahai’s, supposedly modelling themselves on the Master, or with truly decent people like my friend? It was a no-brainer. I withdrew. That was 1983. 

I have now shared my life for over 34 years with one man, the love of my life. We are married. We created a home, a life and a business together, and I have never much regretted leaving the Bahai community. Whatever excuses people make, however they quote scripture, or the Guardian’s letters, it will never change. The community itself is homophobic from top to bottom. It is beyond change. I saw so many closeted gays in the Baha’i community twisting themselves into knots over their sexuality, living lonely single lives, or in sterile marriages, having kids to prove they are devout and casual sex with strangers as a release. One guy got married and on his honeymoon confessed he was gay. That revelation was followed by a speedy divorce. So much unhappiness dealt out along with heaps of intolerance to gays who could truly show many Baha’is the depth of real human compassion and love. 

The Faith, devoid and deprived of this segment of humanity, seems so utterly sterile. It hardly deserves a future. 

The Baha’i community here is no bigger now than in 1983—it just has more committees and institutional bodies, it is still largely unknown to the public. It has apparently had no impact of any kind of depth on this wider society. It has many fine people trying their best, but on this issue don’t waste your emotional or spiritual energy. It is not worth it. Move on honourably and decently and leave them to their understanding of a prejudice-free world order. 

Keep your love for aspects of it and its Founders, by all means. I have no bitterness and wish my former friends no ill will at alI. Time will tell if I am wrong. Perhaps after all they will in fact create their frightening new world order, but be assured: gays will never be a fully-accepted people within it. That bet I think I will win.

In more recent years I wondered sometimes how things stood with my former Baha’i community. The internet is a great channel to look at this, and I quickly realised little had changed over the years. 

Reading your blog and others, I feel a great sense of hope reading so many expressions of positivity by so many people, but also of sadness and exasperation on two broad levels. The first is for those young people who have still have to hide their sexuality within the community and cope with all the negativity about them being somehow deformed human beings. The slightly softer line recently from the UHJ seems so obviously to be a concern for avoiding legal conflicts with civil societies who have accepted equal rights, same sex marriage, etc., rather than any ditching of institutional homophobia. They are in no way unique; this is all too common. Shunning those who have withdrawn now seems accepted practice in this part of the world.

Not far from here is a small, pretty lake with a lovely, tree-covered island. Years ago, a teacher who had been outed to his workmates, family, church and friends as gay rowed himself across the lake, past the swans, to the island where he took a rope and hanged himself from a tree. He had done no wrong, but his future had been taken from him by intolerance and hate. Going past the lake I think of how lonely and awful that he had no one to turn to, and that he may have found hanging less awful than drowning. The kind of prejudice which drove him to act as he did is what I saw and heard in the Baha’i community. Times have changed, thankfully, so that people are more prepared to say “No, I won’t be treated as inferior, mentally or spiritually deformed.” I left without too much regret, though I saw a big chunk of my social world suddenly vanish away. Others may decide to stay and brave it out, and good luck to them. I worry about their long-term mental/spiritual health, but wish them well.

My second source of sadness is to see the Baha’i community continue to deprive itself of all the really positive aspects of so much of gay sensibility. It may be cliched, but the creativity at so many levels, the humour, the empathy and understanding of otherness—of being discriminated against within a larger group—the deep honesty about society, and the genuine tolerance of differences: these are all attributes that the Baha’i community could use. Instead, it deprives itself of so much talent. This year I found myself in that city on the day of the Gay Pride march. It was a very positive and uplifting experience, particularly to see how many young straight couples had brought their toddlers and children to wave rainbow flags and cheer on the marchers. For them it was a fun, carnival-like family day out and they were supporting people they knew. Gays were not shadowy, sad, tortured weirdos, as in Shoghi Effendi’s day. They had names, life stories, families, workmates, a three-dimensional reality—in other words: ordinary people. I wondered what it would be like for Bahai’s to go in there delivering the message to these straight families about how sick these gays were, how this was wrong to God?

Recently the Republic of Ireland, despite opposition from the usual religious groups, had a referendum to allow constitutional change allowing same sex marriage. It passed by a huge majority and was implemented, and lo and behold the sky has not fallen. People have taken it in their stride, though older people like me still find it odd to describe my partner of 34 years as my husband. Where I live we have yet to introduce same-sex marriage. Bahai’s show themselves to be out of step with the wider society which seems sad to me, for all parties. But I comfort myself with Julian of Norwich’s great declaration, “All shall be well, all shall be well, all manner of things shall be well.”

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Via Ram Dass / Words of Wisdom - August 13, 2017

  

The way we regard death is critical to the way we experience life. When your fear of death changes, the way you live your life changes. 

-- Ram Dass --

Via Daily Dharma: The Price of Multitasking

Awareness itself is the primary currency of the human condition, and as such it deserves to be spent carefully.

—Andrew Olendzki, “Busy Signal”

Via Daily Dharma: Connecting with Awareness

As meditative awareness deepens, we may begin to experience what we call pure awareness. This isn’t some extraordinary state of consciousness. . . . It’s completely ordinary. It’s simply the natural extension of the first glimpse of awareness that comes when we start to meditate.

—Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, “The Good Shepherd”

Via Daily Dharma: Activists with Heart

With our practice, we can turn our gaze and our heart toward the very dilemmas of our time and enter as activists who cool and soothe the situation.

—Jack Kornfield, “A Change of Heart”

No More War!

Via His Holiness the Dalai Lama

I believe that to meet the challenges of our times, human beings will have to develop a greater sense of universal responsibility. Each of us must learn to work not just for oneself, one's own family or nation, but for the benefit of all humankind. Universal responsibility is the key to human survival. It is the best foundation for world peace.

- His Holiness the Dalai Lama

Via Daily Dharma: How to Experience the Freshness of Life

Watching impartially opens the mind to realize that there is no way that we can stop this flux even for a fraction of a second. We experience the freshness of life. Every moment is a new moment. Every breath is a fresh breath.

—Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, “Five Practices to Change Your Mind”

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Via Ram Dass / Words of Wisdom - August 9, 2017

Suffering is a lesson the Soul needs in order to get to its Beloved. Joy is too. 

- Ram Dass -

Via Daily Dharma: There's No Race to Enlightenment

We breathe in and out, and we just watch that. Nothing else. It doesn’t matter if we get enlightenment or not. It doesn’t matter if our friends get enlightened faster. Who cares? We are just breathing.

—Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche, “Do Nothing”

Via Daily Dharma: One-breath Meditation

In this world of onrushing events the act of meditation—even just a “one-breath” meditation—straightening the back, clearing the mind for a moment—is a refreshing island in the stream.

—Gary Snyder, “Just One Breath”

Via Daily Dharma: Connecting with Our Best Selves

Appreciative joy is a natural expression of our best humanity.

—Judith Simmer-Brown, “Transforming the Green-Ey'd Monster”

Via Ram Dass: Words of Wisdom - August 6, 2017

If you keep examining your mind, you'll come to see that thoughts of who you are and how it all is are creating the reality you're experiencing. 

- Ram Dass -

Via Daily Dharma: Transform Yourself

Meditation aims not so much to solve a person’s particular problems as to solve the person altogether.

—David Rome, “Focusing”

Via Daily Dharma: Why We Shouldn't Be Afraid of Suffering

Handling our suffering is an art. If we know how to suffer, we suffer much less, and we’re no longer afraid of being overwhelmed by the suffering inside.

—Thich Nhat Hanh, “Why We Shouldn't Be Afraid of Suffering”

Via Daily Dharma: Working with Difficult Feelings

A feeling-tone is a feeling-tone, and that’s all. Just like anything else, the invitation is to be with it, not to listen to it, not to ignore it, not to push it away, not to repress it, not to act on it.

—Dr. Jay Michaelson, “Working Through the Strong Emotions of Sexual Identity”

Via Daily Dharma: Respect Is All We Need

Love for others and respect for their rights and dignity, no matter who or what they are: ultimately these are all we need.

—Dalai Lama, “Consider Yourself a Tourist”

Via Daily Dharma: Changing Your Approach to Life

In Buddhism, the point is not simply to be accomplished meditators but to change our whole approach to life.

—Judy Lief, “Meditation Alone is Not Enough”

Via Daily Dharma: Find Freedom in Stillness

Stillness in the midst of motion and commotion is free of will, direction, and time. It is a complete letting be of what is from moment to moment.

—Toni Packer, “Unmasking the Self”

Via Daily Dharma: Your Whole Life Is Here and Now

To practice the way of Buddha means to completely live out this present moment—which is our whole life—here and now.

—Kodo Sawaki Roshi, “To You”

Via Ram Dass: Words of Wisdom - July 30, 2017

Bearing the unbearable is the deepest root of compassion in the world. When you bear what you think you cannot bear, who you think you are dies. You become compassion. You don't have compassion - you are compassion. True compassion goes beyond empathy to being with the experience of another. You become an instrument of compassion. 

- Ram Dass -
  

Via Daily Dharma: A Teacher Points the Way

A teacher, out of compassion and love, seeing that somebody is suffering, gives a path. But each individual has to walk on the path.

—S. N. Goenka, “Superscience”

Via Ram Dass: Words of Wisdom - July 26, 2017

As we each listen to the intuitive message of our hearts, the society of which we are a part listens too.

- Ram Dass -

Via Daily Dharma: Planting the Seed of an Awakened Mind

In Buddhism, we often talk about the seed of bodhicitta, the potential for an awakened mind that resides in all sentient beings. This seed is the basis of Buddhist practice—the generation of wisdom and compassion toward all sentient beings.

—Ogyen Trinley Dorje, “No Easy Answers”

Via Daily Dharma: Appreciation Is Key

I think for every human being, appreciation in daily life is key. Through having appreciation for everything, you're able to expand so much as a human being, with your heart and your spirit and your mind.

—Ifé Sanchez Mora, “Interview with Nichiren Buddhist Singer Ifé Sanchez Mora”

Via Daily Dharma: Defining a Hero

A hero, a person who is courageous, has the courage to admit one’s mistakes, one’s faults.

—Sayadaw U Pandita, “The Best Remedy”

Via Daily Dharma: The Art of Listening

To know what a person says, we must hear what remains unsaid. If we cannot hear silence, we do not know how to listen.

—Mark C. Taylor, “Hearing Silence”

Via Daily Dharma: Stepping into the Unknown

We’re always stepping into the unknown. And to trust that and be present with the moment without going into the stories is a lifesaver.

—Carol Wilson, “If We Watch, Wisdom Comes”

Via Daily Dharma: Buddhist Exercise

Right intention is like muscle—you develop it over time by exercising it. When you lose it, you just start over again. There’s no need to judge yourself or quit when you fail to live by your intentions.

—Phillip Moffitt, “Brief Teachings”

Via Ram Dass / Words of Wisdom - July 23, 2017

Compassionate action gives us an opportunity to wake up to some of our motives and to act with more freedom. It gives us the chance to put ourselves out on the edge, and if we are willing to take a clean look at what we see there, we can come to know ourselves better. We can’t, of course, change what is arising in us at any moment, because we can’t change our pasts and our childhoods. But when we listen to our own minds and stop being strangers to ourselves, we increase the number of ways we can respond to what arises. 

- Ram Dass -

Via Daily Dharma: Happiness Within Doubt

We can be quite happy with a question mark. It’s not a problem at all, actually, as long as we don’t solidify it or base our whole life on feeling threatened by it.

—Ani Palmo, “Necessary Doubt”

Via Daily Dharma: The Way to Happiness

Pay attention. Stay open. Note discomfort and go back to your breathing. Use your curiosity. Be patient.

—Pamela Gayle White, “The Pursuit of Happiness”

Via More 4 of 12 Daily Dharma: Every Moment is Useful

To me, then, the way to not waste time is to find something useful in every moment, no matter what is happening.

—Brad Warner, “How to Not Waste Time”

Via Daily Dharma: Do You Know What You’re Doing?

If we don’t know what we are doing, how can we be our self? If our mind is somewhere else, it means we are trying to be someone else, not who we are in the present moment.

—Les Kaye, “The Time Is Now”

‘Ancient porn’ sheds new light on Bible verses

Gay sex is a sin.  The New Testament makes that abundantly clear.
Or does it?

According to one of the UK’s most prominent evangelicals, if Christian scholarship engages with archaeological evidence from the rediscovered ancient city of Pompeii, much of St Paul’s teaching on sexuality must be radically reinterpreted.

In a new online video for the Open Church Network, Revd. Canon Steve Chalke argues that by studying the remains of Pompeii, and understanding the ancient Roman world’s highly sexualised culture, we can find new meaning in chapters such as Romans 1, which have traditionally been misinterpreted to condemn same-sex relations.



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Via Ram Dass: Words of Wisdom - July 19, 2017

It's very hard to grow, because it's difficult to let go of the models of ourselves in which we've invested so heavily.  

- Ram Dass -

Via Daily Dharma: Allowing Space Into Your Practice

When we allow space into our practice we begin to see the impermanent nature of the thoughts and feelings that arise within our experience—as well as of the conditions, over many of which we have no control.

—Tsoknyi Rinpoche, “Allow for Space”

Via Daily Dharma: Investigating Within

To know the real situation within yourself, you have to know your own territory, including the elements within you that are at war with each other.

—Thich Nhat Hanh, “Cultivating Compassion”

Via Daily Dharma: What Love Is and Is Not

Love is not about getting what we want. Love is about how we live with what we are given.

—C. W. Huntington Jr., “Seeing Things As They Are”

Via Ram Dass / Words of Wisdom - July 16, 2017

In mystical traditions, it is one's own readiness that makes experiences exoteric or esoteric. The secret isn't that you're not being told. The secret is that you're not able to hear.  

- Ram Dass -

Via Daily Dharma: Freedom in One Breath

Each day presents a new confrontation with reality. I want to run; instead, I breathe. One breath—the freedom to choose my response in that moment.

—Marilyn Buck, “The Freedom to Breathe”

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Via Daily Dharma: The Importance of Surrender

In order to practice, we have to surrender, we have to take a risk. Otherwise what we’re doing is standing back in order to judge, in order to feel superior.

—Sharon Salzberg, “Sitting on the Fence”

Via Lionsroar: Turn Your Thinking Upside Down

We base our lives on seeking happiness and avoiding suffering, but the best thing we can do for ourselves—and for the planet—is to turn this whole way of thinking upside down. Pema Chödrön shows us Buddhism’s radical side.

Photo by Tachina Lee.

On a very basic level all beings think that they should be happy. When life becomes difficult or painful, we feel that something has gone wrong. This wouldn’t be a big problem except for the fact that when we feel something’s gone wrong, we’re willing to do anything to feel OK again. Even start a fight.

According to the Buddhist teachings, difficulty is inevitable in human life. For one thing, we cannot escape the reality of death. But there are also the realities of aging, of illness, of not getting what we want, and of getting what we don’t want. These kinds of difficulties are facts of life. Even if you were the Buddha himself, if you were a fully enlightened person, you would experience death, illness, aging, and sorrow at losing what you love. All of these things would happen to you. If you got burned or cut, it would hurt.

But the Buddhist teachings also say that this is not really what causes us misery in our lives. What causes misery is always trying to get away from the facts of life, always trying to avoid pain and seek happiness—this sense of ours that there could be lasting security and happiness available to us if we could only do the right thing.

Suffering can humble us. Even the most arrogant among us can be softened by the loss of someone dear.

In this very lifetime we can do ourselves and this planet a great favor and turn this very old way of thinking upside down. As Shantideva, author of Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life, points out, suffering has a great deal to teach us. If we use the opportunity when it arises, suffering will motivate us to look for answers. Many people, including myself, came to the spiritual path because of deep unhappiness. Suffering can also teach us empathy for others who are in the same boat. Furthermore, suffering can humble us. Even the most arrogant among us can be softened by the loss of someone dear.

Yet it is so basic in us to feel that things should go well for us, and that if we start to feel depressed, lonely, or inadequate, there’s been some kind of mistake or we’ve lost it. In reality, when you feel depressed, lonely, betrayed, or any unwanted feelings, this is an important moment on the spiritual path. This is where real transformation can take place.

As long as we’re caught up in always looking for certainty and happiness, rather than honoring the taste and smell and quality of exactly what is happening, as long as we’re always running away from discomfort, we’re going to be caught in a cycle of unhappiness and disappointment, and we will feel weaker and weaker. This way of seeing helps us to develop inner strength.

And what’s especially encouraging is the view that inner strength is available to us at just the moment when we think we’ve hit the bottom, when things are at their worst. Instead of asking ourselves, “How can I find security and happiness?” we could ask ourselves, “Can I touch the center of my pain? Can I sit with suffering, both yours and mine, without trying to make it go away? Can I stay present to the ache of loss or disgrace—disappointment in all its many forms—and let it open me?” This is the trick.

There are various ways to view what happens when we feel threatened. In times of distress—of rage, of frustration, of failure—we can look at how we get hooked and how shenpa escalates. The usual translation of shenpa is “attachment,” but this doesn’t adequately express the full meaning. I think of shenpa as “getting hooked.” Another definition, used by Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, is the “charge”—the charge behind our thoughts and words and actions, the charge behind “like” and “don’t like.”

It can also be helpful to shift our focus and look at how we put up barriers. In these moments we can observe how we withdraw and become self-absorbed. We become dry, sour, afraid; we crumble, or harden out of fear that more pain is coming. In some old familiar way, we automatically erect a protective shield and our self-centeredness intensifies.

We can become intimate with just how we hide out, doze off, freeze up. And that intimacy, coming to know these barriers so well, is what begins to dismantle them.

But this is the very same moment when we could do something different. Right on the spot, through practice, we can get very familiar with the barriers that we put up around our hearts and around our whole being. We can become intimate with just how we hide out, doze off, freeze up. And that intimacy, coming to know these barriers so well, is what begins to dismantle them. Amazingly, when we give them our full attention they start to fall apart.

Ultimately all the practices I have mentioned are simply ways we can go about dissolving these barriers. Whether it’s learning to be present through sitting meditation, acknowledging shenpa, or practicing patience, these are methods for dissolving the protective walls that we automatically put up.

When we’re putting up the barriers and the sense of “me” as separate from “you” gets stronger, right there in the midst of difficulty and pain, the whole thing could turn around simply by not erecting barriers; simply by staying open to the difficulty, to the feelings that you’re going through; simply by not talking to ourselves about what’s happening. That is a revolutionary step. Becoming intimate with pain is the key to changing at the core of our being—staying open to everything we experience, letting the sharpness of difficult times pierce us to the heart, letting these times open us, humble us, and make us wiser and more brave.

Let difficulty transform you. And it will. In my experience, we just need help in learning how not to run away.

If we’re ready to try staying present with our pain, one of the greatest supports we could ever find is to cultivate the warmth and simplicity of bodhichitta. The word bodhichitta has many translations, but probably the most common one is “awakened heart.” The word refers to a longing to wake up from ignorance and delusion in order to help others do the same. Putting our personal awakening in a larger—even planetary—framework makes a significant difference. It gives us a vaster perspective on why we would do this often difficult work.

There are two kinds of bodhichitta: relative and absolute. Relative bodhichitta includes compassion and maitri. Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche translated maitri as “unconditional friendliness with oneself.” This unconditional friendliness means having an unbiased relationship with all the parts of your being. So, in the context of working with pain, this means making an intimate, compassionate heart-relationship with all those parts of ourselves we generally don’t want to touch.

Some people find the teachings I offer helpful because I encourage them to be kind to themselves, but this does not mean pampering our neurosis. The kindness that I learned from my teachers, and that I wish so much to convey to other people, is kindness toward all qualities of our being. The qualities that are the toughest to be kind to are the painful parts, where we feel ashamed, as if we don’t belong, as if we’ve just blown it, when things are falling apart for us. Maitri means sticking with ourselves when we don’t have anything, when we feel like a loser. And it becomes the basis for extending the same unconditional friendliness to others.

If there are whole parts of yourself that you are always running from, that you even feel justified in running from, then you’re going to run from anything that brings you into contact with your feelings of insecurity.

I’m here to tell you that the path to peace is right there, when you want to get away.

And have you noticed how often these parts of ourselves get touched? The closer you get to a situation or a person, the more these feelings arise. Often when you’re in a relationship it starts off great, but when it gets intimate and begins to bring out your neurosis, you just want to get out of there.

So I’m here to tell you that the path to peace is right there, when you want to get away. You can cruise through life not letting anything touch you, but if you really want to live fully, if you want to enter into life, enter into genuine relationships with other people, with animals, with the world situation, you’re definitely going to have the experience of feeling provoked, of getting hooked, of shenpa. You’re not just going to feel bliss. The message is that when those feelings emerge, this is not a failure. This is the chance to cultivate maitri, unconditional friendliness toward your perfect and imperfect self.

Relative bodhichitta also includes awakening compassion. One of the meanings of compassion is “suffering with,” being willing to suffer with other people. This means that to the degree you can work with the wholeness of your being—your prejudices, your feelings of failure, your self-pity, your depression, your rage, your addictions—the more you will connect with other people out of that wholeness. And it will be a relationship between equals. You’ll be able to feel the pain of other people as your own pain. And you’ll be able to feel your own pain and know that it’s shared by millions.

Absolute bodhichitta, also known as shunyata, is the open dimension of our being, the completely wide-open heart and mind. Without labels of “you” and “me,” “enemy” and “friend,” absolute bodhichitta is always here. Cultivating absolute bodhichitta means having a relationship with the world that is nonconceptual, that is unprejudiced, having a direct, unedited relationship with reality.
That’s the value of sitting meditation practice. You train in coming back to the unadorned present moment again and again. Whatever thoughts arise in your mind, you regard them with equanimity and you learn to let them dissolve. There is no rejection of the thoughts and emotions that come up; rather, we begin to realize that thoughts and emotions are not as solid as we always take them to be.

It takes bravery to train in unconditional friendliness, it takes bravery to train in “suffering with,” it takes bravery to stay with pain when it arises and not run or erect barriers. It takes bravery to not bite the hook and get swept away. But as we do, the absolute bodhichitta realization, the experience of how open and unfettered our minds really are, begins to dawn on us. As a result of becoming more comfortable with the ups and the downs of our ordinary human life, this realization grows stronger.

We may still get betrayed, may still be hated. We may still feel confused and sad. What we won’t do is bite the hook.

We start with taking a close look at our predictable tendency to get hooked, to separate ourselves, to withdraw into ourselves and put up walls. As we become intimate with these tendencies, they gradually become more transparent, and we see that there’s actually space, there is unlimited, accommodating space. This does not mean that then you live in lasting happiness and comfort. That spaciousness includes pain.

We may still get betrayed, may still be hated. We may still feel confused and sad. What we won’t do is bite the hook. Pleasant happens. Unpleasant happens. Neutral happens. What we gradually learn is to not move away from being fully present. We need to train at this very basic level because of the widespread suffering in the world. If we aren’t training inch by inch, one moment at a time, in overcoming our fear of pain, then we’ll be very limited in how much we can help. We’ll be limited in helping ourselves, and limited in helping anybody else. So let’s start with ourselves, just as we are, here and now.

Excerpted from “Practicing Peace in Times of War,” by Pema Chödrön. © 2006 Pema Chödrön. Reprinted with permission of Shambhala Publications. 

About Pema Chödrön

With her powerful teachings, bestselling books, and retreats attended by thousands, Pema Chödrön is today’s most popular American-born teacher of Buddhism. In The Wisdom of No Escape, The Places that Scare You, and other important books, she has helped us discover how difficulty and uncertainty can be opportunities for awakening. She serves as resident teacher at Gampo Abbey Monastery in Nova Scotia and is a student of Dzigar Kongtrul, Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche, and the late Chögyam Trungpa. For more, visit pemachodronfoundation.org.

Topics: Bodhichitta, Pema Chödrön, Shambhala Sun - May '07, Shantideva, Suffering

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Allow things to unfold and you will find your Purpose in Life. | Peggy Oki | TEDxQueenstown

Walk with Me

Jack Kornfield – Ep. 21 – What Changes Us