On the Cushion

The Buddha called the faculty of wisdom, the fifth and final Spiritual Faculty, the crowning virtue among all the requisites of enlightenment, as it illuminates the meaning of karma (the weaving of causes and effects in our interdependent world) and the characteristics of phenomena—naggingly incomplete, impermanent and without self. Wisdom also includes establishing intentions of good will and harmlessness in all actions of body, speech and mind.

There was a question at our recent Town Hall meeting that we didn’t have time to answer but I thought it would be worth addressing now. The question was: Is New York Insight a Buddhist Center, a Meditation Center or a Mindfulness Center? To which my answer would be “yes”.

On Wednesday evening September 7th we held an "All Sangha Gathering" here at New York Insight. The administration shared some general information in a powerpoint presentation about the day-to-day business workings of our sangha. (See it here). This was followed by a robust brainstorming session.

My birthday is August 15th, and when I was young it always came with mixed emotions...the joy of a birthday came as a signpost that summer was coming to an end. The deep days of August hang heavy with humidity. My mind gets slow, the fan blades seem tired from turning all summer and the drone of it's motor clouds my thinking. The late August lifeguard watches over the pool with indifference. The watchman hasn't quite the energy for enforcement.

In Buddhism there is no shortage of lists of all the nasty states that one needs to see and overcome—the taints, the fetters, the cankers, the hindrances, the defilements. One can really feel quite burdened with the heaviness of it all. If we aren’t careful this kind of teaching can play right into the hands of what is already a highly developed capacity for self-loathing in Westerners. We hear about all these things that we need to overcome and this just precipitates new ways to beat up on ourselves. You get the feeling that you have to squash and pounce and beat things down.

Mature practitioners often report surprise at the tenacity of their quarrelsome tendencies. Even after years of practice the mind seems determined to find fault with self and others, to take exception to what is, and we can feel helpless in the face of it. One might say, “Well just stop thinking those thoughts,” but it’s not that easy, is it? The unawakened mind seems habituated to quarreling.

Many of you know that I am focused on a Buddhist response to climate crisis. I believe Dharma practice has a lot to offer because it brings us into alignment with a different kind of power than—well, basically money, and the privilege of being able to manipulate the natural world to secure our comfortable lives. This ‘other power’ emerges from directly knowing the indestructible, diamond-like mind-heart as awareness knowing consciousness, which is the same deep subjectivity within all sentient life.

One of the last things my father said to me before he died was, "Don't waste your energy rehashing what has been or imagining a brighter future. Be content with what you have and who you are." He was seventy-four at the time and, although he didn't know it, he was not long for this world. He had always been a practical man, apparently more interested in teaching my sisters and I how to get along in the world—how to lay tile or mow the lawn or conduct ourselves in the board room—than in encouraging us to contemplate the meaning of life.