Taking Refuge in the Sangha Part I

My intention has been to be motivated by love and not fear.

I don't know for sure, but I suspect that Zen practice is slowly dissolving the anxiety that has been the glue holding my life together. I have called upon the Sacred Fool archetype to help me relax into this life, take things a bit less seriously. To open to play and love and this moment. I am trying to juggle, and naturally 'dropping the ball' quite a lot lately.

Now, even though I was the one who invited the Sacred Fool into my life to help me cultivate this fearlessness, he/she has plopped down and decided to stay a while. I guess I am not sure what I thought it would be like, but I have forgotten, or missed, or rescheduled quite a few events and responsibilities of late. I have been feeling... "spacey". And that's not a common experience for me. Me, who likes to have as much of her shit together as possible, Miss Five-Minutes-Early-for Everything... well, it's not so fun sometimes.

Slight tangent:

I especially felt spacey after I went to an intensive hip-opening yoga workshop a few weeks ago. Which was weird. I have in the past felt angry the day after some hip-opening poses. At least that made sense to me; that it is likely where anger goes when it gets stuffed down. So I had to check the papers that the teacher gave us to take home after the workshop. One was a list of emotional reactions we might have during or after the workshop. And sure enough, spacey was the last one. Weird. I can't figure that one out. It's just so not how my ego cares to define itself. Hip-openers are supposed to be all grounding, right? First Chakra energy and all that. Did I happen to mention I've had chronic tailbone pain for about a year? First Chakra indeed. More on that in a future post.
Anyway, the spaciness hadn't reached the point of a discernible pattern, though. Or at least nothing major had been dropped until right before Sesshin, I got a call from a very dear Dharma-sister, who wondered why my letter of recommendation for her scholarship application had not been submitted in time for the deadline, and therefore her entire application for the scholarship would be thrown out.

It was like a sharp and aching pain, a heaviness and a burning that I could only just hold and accept responsibility for and write the letter and submit it anyway pleading with the people for leniency in their policy, which I knew they could not change, and continue to hold the feelings even though it made my body want to writhe around on the floor.

Then a few hours later, I went to her birthday party.

I think this qualifies as exposure therapy. I did not want to go. I did not feel worthy of going. But the relationship is very important to me, so I went (we talked about it on the phone prior, and she did say I still should come), and it was ok. Then we drove up to Sesshin together. We talked about it a little on the way, I was able to talk about how I truly thought the deadline was Wednesday not Saturday, the truth of my intentions, and how mistakes can have small or large consequences. We agreed it was just hard, that we both really care about each other, and there were still some feelings of disappointment, anger, regret, etc, along with the love and everything else. And then we were seated right next to each other in the Zendo for the whole retreat. And we also dormed together. In silence. All week.
Zen is not about avoidance.

Every morning the day begins with the 3:50 am wake up bell, and then we are in the Zendo by 4:30 am joining each other in brisk walking meditation. Then, from the Korean Zen tradition, we do 36 bows -- full body prostrations -- to the Bodhisattva of Compassion, very loudly saying "Kwanzeon Bo Sa!" at each bow.
This very physical act works up heat enough to keep me warm in a chilly Zendo for about two sitting periods before I need a blanket or anything. It is invigorating and enlivening, and I treasure this practice, having experienced previous Sesshin without it, in which I would totter into the Zendo and immediately begin to sit melting into the cushion, still in the night's dreams and certain there's been a big mistake: We were all really supposed to be back in bed.

On the first morning, Chozen suggested we use the bows as an opportunity to express atonement for things we may have done to inadvertently harm someone. I felt like just turning myself 90 degrees to do my bows, because there she was, that someone. I was very grateful for the opportunity to at least be able to do something. And so I made an offering of 108 bows. That felt right. Because I knew it would be overkill to dwell on it for the whole retreat.
The Sesshin was about Metta, or LovingKindness.
And the first days we spent focusing Metta only on ourselves.

May I be free from fear and anxiety.
May I be at ease.
May I be happy.

Perfect. Because my Inner Critic would have loved to take this error and bludgeon me with it for the rest of my life. In the container of retreat, and an intense field of Metta, I was able to examine that sacred middle ground between shaming and deflecting. Even on the drive to Sesshin, we talked about how humbling this has been, and how it opens up such compassion for all who make mistakes -- something I would tend not to like to look at in myself, and so how could I have much room for it in others?

It's one thing to talk about it, and yet another to really just sit with it.

My dear friend Rebecca wisely pointed out to me on the phone after retreat that mistakes allow us to experience love and connection and relationship with others that is not predicated on what we do, but just who we are. That we can forget people's birthday, and yep, they still love us anyway.

Mistakes plunge us into the pool with the rest of humanity.

Mistakes allow us to let others help us and offer compassion to us.

The Sacred Fool loves mistakes.