Service

I was asked to give the talk last week (yipes!) -- the occasion was the transition of Sangha members from service positions they may have held for six months or longer into a new or different service position. An occasion of gratitude. The topic: Service.

There are so many people who actually create the container of practice. In my bumbling initial months as Shusso, I was struck by how the whole thing runs by itself. Like those spinning playground contraptions, which take some real effort to get going, but once they're going, just need a push every so often. The momentum of the energy and efforts of past Shussos, past service position holders, all the behind-the-scenes work, and the teachers' unflagging dedication was all present, is all present. So much life-energy channeled and poured into this practice community. It is humbling to think about.


So who is doing this serving? Who and what is being served? Our meal chant encourages: "May we realize the emptiness of the three wheels -- giver, receiver, and gift."

In the field of social work and in many "helping" fields, we get trapped in "helping prison." This concept is from a wonderful little book called How Can I Help, by Ram Dass and Paul Gorman. In it, there are many reflections and helpers' accounts of many facets of service, and particularly professional service.

If I am a helper, and am clinging to that identity, then I need you to be the helpee. There is a clinging to a particular outcome in order for me to strengthen my identity as a competent, successful, knows-what-she's-doing helper, and this causes our interaction to have quite possibly many layers of walls between us, and to become less-dimensional. We are all set up for disappointment.

So how do we let these walls fall away, and blur the distinction of helper and helpee -- that is, without breaching certain standards of ethics and professionalism?

To study the Buddha Way is to study the self
To study the self is to forget the self
To forget the self is to be enlightened by the 10,000 dharmas
To be enlightened by the 10,000 dharmas is to free one's body and mind
and the body and mind of others
No trace of enlightenment remains
and this traceless enlightenment continues forever.

~from the Genjokoan

In service, something much larger is happening. And our small self cannot possibly contain all that is.

I am hoping for some comments on this post. What facets of service can you articulate?