All photos: @waylonlewis on Instagram, taken
at Shambhala Mountain Center. I’m up here at Taking the Leap into 2014, a
New Year’s Retreat led by Jon Barbieri. Meditation, hikes to the Stupa,
banquet, waltzing, movie, meditation, meditation, lectures, meditation,
aspirations and good-riddances. It’s been fun and fulfilling, both.
I’ll be back next year, join me!
The Buddha’s Four New Year’s Resolutions.
Okay, traditionally they’re referred to as the Four Limitless Qualities, or Prayers.
Society says we’re not good enough, rich enough, thin
enough. But what if we reversed the usual New Year’s Resolution trap,
and did something that worked?
Most New Year’s resolutions are predicated on not being happy
enough, or not having what we want, or needing to be prettier, or
thinner, or more organized. But what if we began with accepting
ourselves with maitri, or loving-kindness, and extended that genuine happiness outward?
The Buddha offered four limitless qualities worth cultivating. The first contemplation:
May all sentient beings enjoy happiness and the root of happiness
Recite these to yourself, each for a few minutes. Then
discuss with a friend or friends or colleagues, if you’ve done this
contemplation in a group setting.
First, recite “May I enjoy happiness and the root of happiness…”
Then, recite “May my loved one [name, could be your mom or dad] enjoy happiness and the root of happiness…”
Then, recite ” May my best friends [can be many names] enjoy happiness and the root of happiness…”
Then, recite “May [those you feel indifferent toward] enjoy happiness and the root of happiness…”
Then, recite “May [my 'enemy', name] enjoy happiness and the root of happiness”
Then, recite “May all sentient beings enjoy happiness and the root of happiness.”
That all sounds nice, right? But just you wait: this is hard stuff.
Reciting these four contemplations is like exercising a new muscle,
usually—wishing ourselves happiness? Some of us have a hard time with
that. We don’t deserve it, we aren’t worthy, we shouldn’t go first, we
should hide our light under a bushel. That one’s easy for me: it helps
me refine and define what I mean by happiness and the root of happiness.
For
happiness is something, in the West at least, that’s sold to us, pushed
on us, hyped at us…and it rarely results in happiness. We can’t
make
ourselves happy via external products, weight loss, love. Happiness is
more fundamental that that. Chogyam Trungpa, the Buddhist meditation
master, urged us not to wish one another
Happy Birthday, but rather Cheerful Birthday—for
happiness is a conditional state of mind, as opposed to the fundamental
state of being that contentment or cheerfulness or being at ease
implies. And conditional states of mind—happy, sad, good, bad, in love,
broken-hearted—are suffering, the cyclical state of pushing away and
clinging to that is called “samsara.”
So, we don’t wish conditional happiness on ourselves or others. We wish fundamental happiness, the roots of happiness.
And we wish it not only to ourselves, our loved ones, our best
friends…but to those we take for granted, or feel indifferent or neutral
toward. The baristas or waiters or mailwomen or those who we don’t know
well, or feel strongly about.
And we wish it to our “enemies”—to those who challenge us, who upset
us, who mistreat us. We wish them fundamental happiness, and as the
saying goes, only love can make our enemies into friends. And even if
that’s not our goal—some challenging people don’t belong in our lives—we
can change our own attitude from confusion to kindness.
And we wish it, finally, to all sentient beings—tigers, blades of
grass, mice, dogs, cats, birds, all humans everywhere—those who make
those products that capitalism is hyping at us…everyone.
And in so doing, this prayer doesn’t change anything—except
ourselves. And in changing ourselves, en masse, we change our society,
and world.
~
And now, for the words of wisdom of Pema Chodron, on all four limitless qualities, from her The Places That Scare You: www.shambhala.com Source.
It’s up to us.
We can spend our lives cultivating our resentments and
cravings, or we can explore the path of the warrior — nurturing
open-mindedness and courage. Most of us keep strengthening our negative
habits and therefore sow the seeds of our own suffering. The bodhichitta
practices, however, are ways for us to sow the seeds of well being.
Particularly powerful are the aspiration practices of the four limitless
qualities — loving-kindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity.
In these practices we start close to home: we express
the wish that we and our loved ones enjoy happiness and be free of
suffering. Then we gradually extend that aspiration to a widening circle
of relationships. We start just where we are, where the aspirations
feel genuine. We begin by acknowledging where we already feel love,
compassion, joy, and equanimity. We locate our current experience of
these four boundless qualities, however limited they may he: in our love
of music, in our empathy with children, in the joy we feel on hearing
good news, or in the equanimity we experience when we are with good
friends. Even though we may think that what we already experience is too
meager, nevertheless we start with that and nurture it. It doesn’t have
to be grand.
Cultivating these four qualities gives us insight into
our current experience. It gives us understanding of the state of our
mind and heart right now. We get to know the experience of love and
compassion, of joy and equanimity, and also of their opposites. We learn
how it feels when one of the four qualities is stuck and how it feels
when it is flowing freely. We never pretend that we feel anything we
don’t. The practice depends on embracing our whole experience. By
becoming intimate with how we close down and how we open up, we awaken
our unlimited potential.
Even though we start this practice with the aspiration
for ourselves or our loved ones to be free of suffering, it may feel as
if we’re just mouthing words. Even this compassionate wish for those
nearest to us may feel phony. But as long as we’re not deceiving
ourselves, this pretending has the power to uncover bodhichitta. Even
though we know exactly what we feel, we make the aspirations in order to
move beyond what now seems possible. After we practice for ourselves
and those near us, we stretch even further: we send goodwill toward the
neutral people in our lives and also to the people we don’t like.
It might feel like stretching into make-believe to
say, “May this person who is driving me crazy enjoy happiness and be
free of suffering.” Probably what we genuinely feel is anger. This
practice is like a workout that stretches the heart beyond its current
capabilities. We can expect to encounter resistance. We discover that we
have our limits: we can stay open to some people, but we remain closed
to others. We see both our clarity and our confusion. We are learning
firsthand what everyone who has ever set out on this path has learned:
we are all a paradoxical bundle of rich potential that consists of both
neurosis and wisdom.
Aspiration practice is different from making
affirmations. Affirmations are like telling yourself that you are
compassionate and brave in order to hide the fact that secretly you feel
like a loser. In practicing the four limitless qualities, we aren’t
trying to convince ourselves of anything, nor are we trying to hide our
true feelings. We are expressing our willingness to open our hearts and
move closer to our fears. Aspiration practice helps us to do this in
increasingly difficult relationships.
If we acknowledge the love, compassion, joy, and
equanimity that we feel now and nurture it through these practices, the
expansion of those qualities will happen by itself. Awakening the four
qualities provides the necessary warmth for an unlimited strength to
emerge. They have the power to loosen up useless habits and to melt the
ice-hardness of our fixations and defenses. We are not forcing ourselves
to be good.
When we see how cold or aggressive we can be, we
aren’t asking ourselves to repent. Rather, these aspiration practices
develop our ability to remain steadfast with our experience, whatever it
may be. In this way we come to know the difference between a closed and
an open mind, gradually developing the self-awareness and kindness we
need to benefit others. These practices unblock our love and compassion,
joy and equanimity, tapping into their boundless potential to expand…
