Practice kindness

I awoke from my nap this afternoon feeling so weak it took a good 10 minutes before I could push myself up and swing my feet to the floor.

Frankly I found that depressing.

As I lay in bed feeling sorry for myself and feeling that there is almost no point to my life – since owing to increasing illness and infirmity there is little I can actually do – I suddenly thought: “ah, but I can still practice kindness.”

To a culture addicted to materialism I think that kindness may seem at best irrelevant or at worst a form of weakness.

But we all need kindness. To some extent we are actually starved for it, which is one reason there’s so much aggression in our culture. Our environment is certainly starved for a little kindness.

Generating the capacity for kindness – giving rise to an increasing capacity for kindness – and extending kindness to ourselves and to all beings may be one of the most important and significant things we can possibly do.

At this critical time our very survival may depend upon our capacity for kindness.

So lets be kind to each other. It’s one of the first things we all learned as kids. And it actually feels good.

It feels good because kindness flows naturally from a kind heart.

Perhaps we cannot be kind all of the time. I certainly don’t feel kind all of the time. But we can practice. And that’s worth getting out of bed for.

If you'd care to indulge an immediate expression of kindness please consider signing the Sandy Hook Promise: http://www.sandyhookpromise.org/

Note: If you’d like a little gentle encouragement and guidance or perhaps feel the need to reconnect with your own kind heart I recommend listening to the audio recording of a talk given by the western Buddhist nun Pema Chödrön entitled: From Fear to Fearlessness. I found the talk at my local library and was able to borrow and download it onto my computer for absolutely free and from the comfort of home. Now that’s kindness! Yes. Our public library system is an expression of kindness that we all share in because we all support it. J

Cultivating peace and happiness within the experience of loss

Chronic illness is among other things an experience of profound loss. The loss of one’s health necessarily means a host of other losses that can include one’s friends, family, job, home, security, independence, mobility, strength, and stamina – the list can be almost endless. But it doesn't have to include happiness and peace of mind.

In fact we can use the opportunity of illness and suffering to generate something that Buddhists refer to as boundless joy - sometimes called sympathetic joy.

How do we develop such a quality of joy? By rejoicing whenever we see or hear of someone else’s good fortune. We have lots of opportunities to practice sympathetic joy because when we’re sick we often see or hear about other people enjoying life in ways we no longer can.

Of course it isn't always easy to feel joyful especially if we have habits of jealousy or resentment, which most of us do to some degree. This is our chance to become familiar with some of our negative habits and develop positive ones instead. At first it takes practice. In the beginning we have to make some effort but eventually feeling genuinely happy for other people becomes a new habit.

If we notice we’re feeling resentful or jealous that can be a reminder: “oh, yeah, instead of feeling resentment I can use this chance to practice feeling joyful.” Then we flip the negative habit – we drop it – and give rise to  happiness for the person towards whom we were feeling jealous. We smile and feel genuine happiness in our heart that the other person is happy and that good things are happening for them.

Notice that the happiness is in our own mind and heart. It actually feels good! With a little practice we start to automatically feel happy for other people when good things happen for them. We start to develop a happier and more peaceful mind.

This is part of a Buddhist practice called the Four Immeasurables: boundless equanimity, boundless compassion, boundless loving-kindness and boundless joy. They are called “immeasurable” or “boundless” because we cultivate these qualities towards all sentient beings. Since the number of sentient beings is considered to be infinite these qualities are also infinite as we develop the ability to extend them to all beings.

In brief, equanimity is considering all beings including friends and enemies as equal and having no partiality towards those we think of as friends or enmity towards those we consider enemies. Compassion is the desire to free all sentient beings from suffering and loving-kindness is the wish that all sentient beings have happiness.

We can use the opportunity of chronic illness to develop all of these qualities. When we suffer we can think that we don’t want anyone, not even someone we might think of as an enemy, to have such pain. Then we can extend our compassion and think how we would like all beings to be free from suffering. We think how wonderful it would be if all sentient beings were happy; we make the wish that everyone would have everything they need in order to be happy. Then we can practice sympathetic joy by rejoicing when we actually see that other people are happy.

When doing these kinds of practices it’s best to start with those we care about and have some feeling of affection for, otherwise it’s too difficult. Gradually we can extend these practices towards those for whom we have neutral feelings. Eventually we can include people we have difficult relationships with or whom we think of as enemies or have some feelings of revulsion or aggression towards.

In the Buddhist tradition when we do such practices at the end we always dedicate the merit so that all sentient beings have happiness and are free from suffering. These profound practices enable us to generate vast loving-kindness and compassion as well as a happy and peaceful mind.

Equanimity

In response to my first two posts a friend, who also has Lyme disease, sent me an email: “Nice, Cara. Not sure that I'll find the degree of equanimity that you've found, however. Love the snowdrops!!” To which I replied: “Equanimity! Hahaha! Equanimity is something I keep having to come back to hence the title of the blog: ‘Coming back to peace.’ I have to practice it – over and over and over again.”

With a quick google search I found the following definition of equanimity on miriam-webster.com: “evenness of mind especially under stress.” It describes nicely the point of meditation practice, which is to become familiar with our minds so that we can ride the roller coaster of thoughts and emotions without freaking out. Contrary to what some might think meditation is not about getting rid of thoughts – good luck with that! The point of meditation is to develop mindfulness and awareness so that we aren’t jerked this way and that by our habitual emotional tendencies, concepts, and endless internal dialogue.

Equanimity takes practice, it’s the ability to be with whatever’s happening and not lose our cool. When we do lose our cool – which is certain to happen at some point – then equanimity is the ability to notice that we just lost it and climb back on the surfboard, skateboard, horse – you choose – and finish the ride. Then we use that as inspiration for next time so that when another big wave comes our way we have a chance to catch it before we’re slammed. 

Being sick is a lot like being slammed again and again by a huge wave. I never seem to get any ground beneath my feet. Some days I think to myself: “I am so fucked!” Sometimes I shout it out loud and that’s when I’m being most honest with myself because there’s nothing I can do. My situation can’t be fixed, changed, or solved. I’ve hit bottom. There’s no ground beneath my feet, there never has been any ground, the ground is only an illusion and all I can do is watch and be with whatever is happening in the moment – that’s equanimity in practice.

There’s tremendous wisdom in hitting bottom. In some ways it’s similar to what Zen practitioners refer to as “beginner’s mind.”[i] Beginner’s mind is fresh, open and without any concepts or preconceived ideas. Realizing that we’ve hit bottom is when we finally know that none of our concepts work. It’s when we know that no amount of effort on our part can change what we’re going through. Suddenly we can’t hold on any longer. We have no choice but to let go and when we do we discover that there is actually tremendous space in our situation. Like an eagle we might, for a brief moment, catch an updraft and realize that we can actually soar and then it all changes again. 

When we let go of our concepts and at the same time continue to hold our seat, not moving from that spot but continuing to look and stay with it, there’s an opportunity to see the basic sanity in our situation, the basic health that’s always there no matter how sick we are. Working with illness and pain in a productive way is, among other things, a practice of patience and equanimity. We come back to peace each time we let go of our concepts, internal dialogue and destructive emotional habits long enough to relax and enjoy the space that’s always there.

Note: From the Buddhist view sickness is sometimes considered a powerful path for practice. Why? First, there is no greater motivation for meditation practice than our own suffering and awareness of mortality. Second, touching our own pain at a deep level enables us to develop compassion and the motivation and aspiration to free other beings from suffering. Such an aspiration has tremendous benefit for oneself and others. It changes our whole intention and mindset toward other sentient beings and our world.

Learning basic mindfulness practice: There’s been a lot written lately about the benefits of mindfulness meditation for people living with pain and chronic or terminal illness. Scientific studies of the brain using imaging techniques such as MRI scans show that meditation alters the brain in significant and positive ways. Changes to the brain’s structure can happen relatively quickly even for beginning meditators who practice only a few minutes a day – consistency, however, is an important part of the practice. Anyone can learn to meditate. Simple, guided mindful meditation instructions are offered on line by the UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center: http://marc.ucla.edu/body.cfm?id=22

For more information about mindfulness meditation, its benefits and positive effects on the human brain:

Washington Post – Monday, February 14, 2011

Meditation and mindfulness may give your brain a boost

Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Program

http://www.mindfullivingprograms.com/whatMBSR.php

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[i] “In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, in the expert's mind there are few.”

- Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind