What's discipline got to do with it?

I hate Dallas. I hate Dallas with a fiery hate equal to the temperature on this August afternoon outside the terminal at Love Field where I'm waiting for an airport-to-hotel shuttle.

I hate Dallas. That's a broad statement, but it's the kind of thing I tend to say, consigning an entire city or category of things to the trash bin of "unpleasant experience." Tofu. Humidity. Feta cheese.

And I don't mean it. It's what Tsoknyi Rinpoche calls "real, but not true." If I look closely at the causes and conditions that give rise to the thought "I hate Dallas," what is there is not a concrete lump of hate for a whole city but discomfort with being hot, hungry, unsure of what will happen next.

Waiting.

Transitioning,

The groundlessness of being in a space that's neither here nor there.

I want to be back at the retreat center I left a few hours earlier. I want to be home with my spouse. I just don't want to be in a 16-hour layover at Dallas-Forth Worth airport, waiting for a shuttle.

I'd been reading Tsoknyi Rinpoche's "Open Heart Open Mind" on the plane that brought me to Dallas, and I'd just read a section on how to work with difficult people. Rinpoche's one-word prescription: Discipline.

It takes discipline, one of the paramitas -- or perfections of the heart -- to stay with the difficult feelings, to accept that they are your feelings, and to see them as the impermanent, ephemeral things they are instead of treating them like a slab of marble, carving a statue, and writing a story that's engraved on a plaque to justify the whole thing.

I don't hate Dallas. I dislike how I feel at the moment, when I happen to be in Dallas.

When I see that, I see space around my feelings, space in which I know everything will be OK. The shuttle will come or I'll walk upstairs and get a cab. The hotel will be air-conditioned. I'll find food.

It's a similar process in working with a difficult person in metta meditation. When you tease out your feelings about this person, about their behavior, from the human being, you can see that they are just  getting through the day. It becomes easier to send lovingkindness -- the wish that they will be safe, happy, healthy, and live with ease -- when you see them as human rather than a monument to their irritating qualities. You don't have to like them or what they do, just see their humanity. Address yourself to their humanity, not their irritating qualities. You may find those qualities become less important and less irritating.

And then you can rest in that space, finding comfort wherever you are.

My Terrible, Horrible, Wonderful Night

I had plans last night to go into the city and meet a dear friend to see a very special performance. So many things went wrong that I could easily have had an terrible time. Instead -- thanks to practice -- it full of extraordinary lessons and beauty.

I left work early so we could meet before the show. Ten minutes later, I realized my phone was still charging in my office, and I knew I would need it. So I went back. "You're such an idiot," I said as I pulled back into the driveway. "And I love you." (That's a lesson taken directly from Sharon Salzberg's book on Lovingkindness.)

 The 20 minutes that took meant I'd miss the early train, but that was OK. The later train, though, was slow and got in 20 minutes late. I hadn't noticed because I was concentrated on a good book, avoiding the swirl of anxious thoughts.

Still time to get there before the show. I hopped onto a crowded subway train, standing in the aisle. I felt my bag bump the people sitting behind me and felt bad, but it was a crowded train and I couldn't move. A few minutes later, things emptied out and a seat opened up. The girl sitting in the seat near where I was standing smiled at me and went back to snuggling with her friend. A few minutes later, I noticed that the zippered compartment where I keep my Metrocard was open and the card was gone -- likely taken by the snuggling, smiling women.

Of all of the things that I carried, the Metrocard was the least important -- easily replaced and not needed until after the show. So I let it go.

When I got off, I still had 20 minutes to get to the show. But I got the address wrong and walked a half-mile past the venue, with encouragement from my phone map, before calling my friend to ask where I should be. I walked back and got there just after the show started. I picked up my ticket, stopped at the bathroom, got to the door and had no ticket. It was nowhere in my purse, where I'd put it; I retraced my steps and found it on the bathroom floor.

The performance had started.The usher offered to find me a seat; I showed her my friend's text that she'd saved me a seat in the fourth row. I expected the usher to tell me that there was no way I could take that seat and disrupt everyone -- instead she led me to it. I galumphed over people who weren't happy to let me through, but got to my seat. My friend squeezed my hand. I joined the audience and performers on a magical trip through the bardos.

So many things "went wrong" that night. Before I meditated, any one of them would have ruined my night. Since all of them were due to my own inattention -- forgetting my phone, not paying attention to where my bag was, not checking the address, walking in late -- I could have and would have beaten myself up, sending myself into a state where I could not have enjoyed a personal performance by Prince.

On this night, I didn't do that. On this night, I let it go and got beautiful and precious dharma teachings with clarity and grace. I let my friend love me even though I messed up. Being my dharma sister, she did.

The Buddha's Guide to Having a Good Time at a Party

The Buddha said that if you practice lovingkindness, or metta, meditation, you will experience scores of benefits (well, 11 specific ones). His list did not mention that you will have a better time at parties. Add that.

In the version of the Four Immeasurables practices that I do, you work with three people for each one: Someone you love, someone who irritates you, someone you don't really notice and have to cast around to bring into your meditation. Chances are these are the three types of people you will meet at a party (or really anywhere).

I like to get a head start. In the days before a social event, I bring people who are likely to be there into my meditation. Who will make my heart light up when I see them? That's the person I love. Who will make me sidle away from a group when they join? That's the irritating one. And who else was at last year's version of his party, standing next to someone who stands out in my memory? Oh, yeah. What's-his-name.

One by one, I offer them the aspirations of lovingkindness: May you be happy. May you be safe. May you be healthy. May you live with ease.

And a warmth develops -- toward all of them. The irritating person just wants to be happy. In fact, they are not irritating. I am irritated.That background person is also a human, with things that make her happy or sad. I wonder what they are? Maybe I will ask.

Extend that feeling of warmth and kind attentiveness to everyone in the room. Feel the judgments about their outfits or how much weight they've gained or the food they brought fall away. Here we are, just humans, just dancing each other home once again. How fortunate to have each other.

And extending the wish to everyone in the city, on the continent, on the planet. May we all be free from fear and know the happiness that brings.

When you get to the actual event, you will feel warm-hearted and curious, open and attentive. You will have a pleasant expression on your face, and people will be happy to see you. You will be happy to see them. Heck, devas will love you.

And if there are moments where that's not the case, you can stealthily emanate lovingkindness, silently making the wishes as you gaze around the room. Or extend it to yourself and leave, if it's that bad. Kindly, attentively, gently.

May you be happy. And may your days be merry and bright.

I can't make you happy

The happiness or suffering of others is the result of their actions and not my wishes for them.

This was my mantra, and it was an important part of my path.  I grew up believing that my role was to make people happy, and my value was tied to whether I was successful at that. So Buddhism was a revelation in that it proposed that I have my own intrinsic value and that everyone is responsible for their own happiness.  I can't make you happy -- you have to make that choice. I can try to act ethically, with kindness and compassion, but I can't control whether that makes you happy.

So why metta, why wish for another's happiness, safety, health, and ease?

It's about training your mind, opening up to the common experience of sentient beings, loosening your grip on the solid people you project the wishes onto, letting go of your own definitions of what that means.

Metta is about letting go.

May you be happy -- however that manifests for you. You don't have to meet my definition of happiness. YOU DON'T HAVE TO SMILE. I wish that you have happiness that's not tied to a new iPhone or a text from your crush, that you find a deeper source of contentment that lasts, that you see that happiness is not tied to external circumstances. May you find that, in your time and your way, which may not be mine.

May you be safe -- I have adult children; I learned a long time ago that I can't control whether someone else is safe. With kids, ultimately, all you can do is hope that you've passed on enough information so that they avoid those dangers that are avoidable. Then trust. May you avoid the risks you can and not be so frightened of the ones you can't that you get paralyzed.

May you be healthy -- and may you have ease with whatever level of health you have. (See safety.)

May you live with ease -- I hope that you can find a way to accept what you cannot change and to change the things that you can. And the courageous wisdom to figure out which is which.

I can't make you happy or keep you safe or give you health or put you at ease. But I hope that you find it. May I create the conditions that will enable you to uncover that in yourself.

Kindness in the news

We crave stories of kindness. How else can you explain why a photo of a grocery store worker tying an elderly man's shoelace goes viral?

There are scary things happening all around the world today, from Ferguson, Missouri, to Iran and Syria and, seemingly, everywhere.

But there are also good things happening. Often those things are small actions performed by an individual -- like the grocery clerk -- while the scary things are big, like thousands of people trapped on a mountain or an angry crowd facing police cloaked in padded gear.

If you look only at the big things, it's easy to be overwhelmed by anger and despair.

If you look only at the small things, you can become a delusional Pollyanna, radically accepting the status quo when wisdom sees that the situation needs to change.

To me, Buddhist teachings often come back to balance -- finding the pivot point that holds the awareness that people and the situations they create are both kind and mean, avoiding the traps of despair and elation, seeing the good and how to mobilize it to work with the bad.


Anger is a contagion. It spreads in a flash. When met with anger, it roils and builds.

When met with kindness, it dissipates. The situation in Ferguson changed dramatically when the militarized police were taken out of the equation. Hugs replaced hate when highway patrol officers with visible faces and no body armor took over from the padded, helmeted local police.

Of course, the situation is more complicated than that in Ferguson and there are many things to be looked at and addressed. It's impossible to do that in the confusion of anger, which locks everyone into their own view.

Robin Williams' death also stirred up lots of emotions this week, not just grief but anger and hurt over the comments around suicide, addiction, and depression. And it brought stories of his great kindness behind the scenes, like this tribute from Norm Macdonald.

Kindness is all around. When you practice metta, you train your mind to notice it. And you train yourself to respond kindly. Practice in meditation is all about training your reflexes to respond in the post-meditation world.

Kindness is contagious. Here is a story, a true poem, by Naomi Shahib Nye, of what kindness can do. It's describes what happens at an airport gate during a flight delay when passengers and crew became a community rather than adversaries:

And I looked around that gate of late and weary ones and I thought, This 
is the world I want to live in. The shared world. Not a single person in that 
gate--once the crying of confusion stopped--seemed apprehensive about 
any other person. They took the cookies. I wanted to hug all those other
women, too.

This can still happen anywhere. Not everything is lost.

Release your heart

Today is a full moon. I could tell even before I checked the calendar, based on the phone calls that came in to the newspaper where I work. That's not unusual -- the callers range from those with tomatoes that resemble Richard Nixon to ones who tell you they're wearing tinfoil on their heads while they talk on the phone about conspiracies.

Friday's calls had a different quality than the usual lunacy, though. The callers wanted to tell me about kindnesses they'd experienced. And they simply wanted to share their gratitude and joy -- they didn't even launch into the usual rant about how we only report bad news and how about writing something good for a change.

One was a big deal: A woman was lying on a downtown sidewalk in May, and another woman stopped to check on her, then called 9-1-1, saving her life. The woman didn't remember any details but wanted to thank her unknown helper. She couldn't write a letter to the editor because, she said, she had a stroke and "all I can do is talk."

Another caller praised a newspaper customer service worker, who had driven to her disabled brother's home to hand him a newspaper after a delivery snafu. Getting the newspaper is the highlight of his day, she said (giving me a highlight for my day), and getting a special delivery gave him great joy.

The calls reminded me of the importance of developing an attitude of kindness, seeing the small ways that the world supports us rather than focusing on the insults.

The magic of metta practice is not that it makes us more loving toward the person we love or tolerant of the annoying person. It is that it turns our mind. We begin to see everything with the wide eyes of compassion rather than the narrowed eyes of judgment.

The Buddha identified 11 benefits of lovingkindness (speaking to monks, so Buddha says "he"):

1. "He sleeps in comfort. 2. He awakes in comfort. 3. He sees no evil dreams. 4. He is dear to human beings. 5. He is dear to non-human beings. 6. Devas (gods) protect him. 7. Fire, poison, and sword cannot touch him. 8. His mind can concentrate quickly. 9. His countenance is serene. 10. He dies without being confused in mind. 11. If he fails to attain arahantship (the highest sanctity) here and now, he will be reborn in the brahma-world.

These advantages "are to be expected from the release of heart." What a beautiful phrase. If you released your heart from its constrictions, from its limits, from its cages, where would it go?

What if you looked for the kindness in the world instead of the meanness? What if you realized the ground-floor gratitude of being able to take in breath? How would that change your life?

Beginner's heart, loving heart

In his classic book, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind,  Suzuki Roshi succinctly pointed to our original nature as our true nature -- unfabricated, unfiltered, disentangled from preconceptions that color our view.

"In the beginner's mind, there are many possibilities, but in the expert's there are few," the book begins.

What if we extended that to our hearts -- if we cultivated beginner's heart? What would that be like?

If you could go back to the the firsts in your life -- the first time you drew a breath or recognized a caregiver's face, held hands, received a kindness, received a heartfelt thank you -- how would that feel? What would it be like to experience affection without all of the concepts and questions we layer onto it: What does this person really want from met? Is this The One? Will it last? Will they expect something in return?

What if we could simply see the world with an open heart, without anticipating arrows headed toward it?

I saw the phrase "beginner's heart" this week, and it stuck with me as I was thinking about the Interdependence Project's month of metta meditation in August. Metta is a practice of cultivating beginner's heart, of recognizing that underneath the labels we stick on ourselves and others is a common, untrained, open, and accepting space.

We all start out with open loving hearts, but as we gain experience we build walls. Noah Levine describes as building a papier mache shell layer by layer; each disappointment or heartache adds a piece of paper, maybe tissue paper, maybe corrugated cardboard, until the heart is well-protected. Nothing gets in or goes out. But the heart is constricted; it can't expand beyond the space the shell allows.

Beginner's heart, though, is as big as the sky.

When I do metta practice, I try to remember that each person -- the neutral one, the loved one, the irritating one -- has this heart inside them, covered over by their own layers of hurt and fear. And if I can touch my own beginner's heart and let go of whatever concepts I have about them that land them in those categories, I can reach out for that. And when my heart feels that shared space, there is an openness where love flows.

If all else fails, I think, "Well, their mother loves them." And knowing how I feel about my kids, it's possible to see them with the eye of lovingkindness rather than judgment.

In Buddhism, the heart and the mind are seen as one thing, the heart-mind, not the two distinct aspects of ourselves that Westerners generally see. We think the heart wants what it wants, and the mind knows what's good for it. The heart handles emotion, the mind does analysis. We can use that for this contemplation.

What if you could let down the defenses around your heart? Maybe for a 15-minute metta practice? Would that change the world? Or just your view of it?  


 

Mothers and metta

It's said, in traditional Buddhism, that over the course of our many lifetimes every being has been our mother. In traditional Asian societies, this was meant to help us see with the eyes of love and compassion.

From the poems of Shabkar Tsokdruk Rangdrol ~

All living beings have been your kind mothers . . .
Just as you feel love for your mother of this life,
Generate love for all beings, your mothers from the past . . .


In contemporary society, after more decades of blaming deficient mothering for all of our psychological ills, the idea of looking at every being as your mother may not generate feelings of deep,appreciative love. For some, it's more like a feeling of horror. And then there's that moment when you speak and hear your mother's voice come out of your mouth saying something that you always hated hearing ...

But here's the thing -- every parent wants the best for their children. Their ideas of what's best may not coincide with what the child needs, but they're likely unaware of that. Every parent I know would gladly take all of their children's suffering on themselves, but you can't do that. As a parent, you can only try to help them learn how to reduce their own suffering. And you don't always do that skillfully. For one thing, you can't pass on skills you don't have.

The Buddha, who was skilled at presenting his message in ways that people could hear it, also offers the inverse of seeing every being as a kind parent from a previous life:

Even as a mother protects with her life
her child, her only child,
so with a boundless heart
should one cherish all living beings:

Radiating kindness over the entire world
spreading upwards to the skies
and downward to the depths,
outwards and unbounded,
freed from hatred and ill will.

See all beings, even your parents, as your children. Happy Mother's Day.

Applying kindness

You can get smartphone apps to share photos with friends, tell your friends where you are, find out where they are, let them know when you're about to meditate so they can sit down too.

Now you can get an app to send them random compliments.

Kindr is an iPhone app that "users can send pre-crafted or original compliments to their friends and earn points along the way. Ready-to-use compliments include things like: 'Who always sees the glass half full?' 'Who do you admire for their dedication to their fitness?' and our favorite, 'Who's so smart that if they were turned into a zombie, they'd just seem like a normal person?" the Huffington Post reports.

The story doesn't explain why the compliments are worded as questions, which seems oddly impersonal. Or say what good the points are. Is it a competition -- the nicest person is the one with the most points? Can you redeem them for a whining binge? (It does say HuffPo will be providing content. It also provides the image at right)

The Kindr website includes a link to studies the document the benefits of kindness.

Of course, the Buddha listed them 2,500 years ago.The most ancient extant Buddhist collection of texts, the Pali Canon, identifies a number of benefits from the practicing of metta meditation, including:

One sleeps easily, wakes easily, dreams no evil dreams. One is dear to human beings, dear to non-human beings. The devas protect one. Neither fire, poison, nor weapons can touch one. One's mind gains concentration quickly. One's complexion is bright. One dies unconfused and – if penetrating no higher – is headed for the Brahma worlds.


If you're interested in practicing kindness, you could do metta, or lovingkindness, meditation. It's described here.

And if you want to get digital with it, you could just set an intention to text one compliment every day -- maybe after your metta meditation session. Make it one that you write yourself, from your heart. You'll feel good. The recipient will feel good. (Although I once, in a metta haze, texted my son, who wrote back, "Is this a generic text?") And if enough people feel good ... it'll be a movement.

Training in Metta

Metta -- lovingkindness meditation -- is a stealth practice that you can do anywhere, without anyone else knowing, and it can transform your experience. I like to do it in groups where I can observe people quietly -- like on the train.

This week I took Metro North into NYC and decided to use the time for my daily metta practice, which I'm doing for IDP's metta month in August. The method I've been using is slightly different from the usual one. It involves visualizing three people: on your left is someone you love, on your right is a difficult person, and in front of you is a neutral person. It works with the three poisons of attraction, aversion, and indifference.
In this case, I chose people on the train. The person I felt affection toward was the man in the seat behind me, who offered to help put my bag in the overhead rack. The difficult person was actually a group of loud giggly young women a few seats away. And the neutral person was the man next to me, a business type in a navy pinstripe suit checking email on his phone.
The idea is to feel the person's presence and your own reaction. The inclination is to lean toward the person you love and away from the difficult person. By touching in with your own bodhicitta, you even out. Is there something in the irritating person you can connect with? In this case, I touched in with the young women's excitement. Clearly, they had plans-- they all wore pretty dresses and had their hair arranged. They had a Big Day in the City ahead of them, and their giddy excitement spilled out. May you be safe and happy in your adventure.
The neutral person was someone I would not have thought much about. But the conductor noted that he had a peak-hour ticket, and this was off-peak, so he was late for work. His jaw was tight. I've been there. May you live with ease, young master of the universe.
It's easy to wish good thinga for the person you like. I caught the cadence of an Irish accent as he talked on the phone, quietly. He was helpful. Be safe, happy, healthy, and at ease, sir.
And then, extend the feeling to everyone in the train. With the walls of your heart down for these three, send metta to everyone. And everyone in the towns we pass through, the city, and the world.
It makes for a pleasant trip. Even the process of getting off and and making my way through

Grand Central didn't annoy me. And that is a transformation.

What's kindness got to do with it?

Metta, the first of the Buddha's Four Immeasurable Qualities, is a Pali word generally translated as lovingkindness (or loving-kindness). Why isn't it just love? What's kindness got to do with it?

We tend to use the word "love" a lot. We love coffee, kittens, summer days, dry white wine, walks on the beach at sunset, and "The Daily Show." In the old but still relevant "Annie Hall," Woody Allen tells Diane Keaton that he doesn't just love her, he "lurves" her to distinguish his feelings from the generic "love" we express toward those things we like.

Adding the suffix "kindness" changes things in a fundamental way. Kindness is not a word that we throw around lightly. We might use "nice" in its place -- when someone brings us coffee or chocolate, you might say, "Oh, that's so nice of you." And it is nice. But it's also kind. And because kindness is a word that's not in our everyday vocabulary, throwing it in stops our minds, which gives them time to undo the auto reply and think about what we're saying. 

My first experience with metta was at a weekend retreat. In the traditional teachings, you practice metta by starting with yourself and going through a succession of people ending with everyone in the whole wide world (and beyond, if you think that way).

But we started with someone dear to us, someone we love, someone it's easy to send the wishes that they be happy, safe, healthy, and live with ease. Then, we were told, to let our sense or image of that person dissolve -- while keeping that loving feeling -- and put ourselves in that place.

For me, and many others in the room, the engine fell out of the metta machine at that point and came to a dead stop. That lovin' feeling? Now it's gone gone gone. Like many people, I was not raised with the idea that I should love myself or be kind to myself. Much was expected of me, and I expected even more. Kindness was not on the rubric.

For me, one of the radical ideas of Buddhism is that I should love myself as I love my (metaphorical) neighbor, that I was as deserving of kindness as anyone else. That, in fact, if I cannot treat myself with love and kindness, what I offer to others may appear to be metta-phorical but, in fact, is meant to appease or win favor and is based in fear or pity.

What we call "love" is often attachment -- maybe, if you're close enough to adolescence or adolescents, you've heard the phrase, "If you love chocolate so much you should marry it." "I love coffee" means "I want coffee" and the more of it the better.

Real love, the kind meant by metta, isn't grasping; it's generous. Think of a being you really love -- you want them to have the best, you give them the corner piece of the cake with all the frosting, and you take a center piece. You care for them.

Once I was on retreat, and I was so tired that I couldn't handle the slow, circular walking meditation; I felt like I would crash into a wall or fall over. I left the room (which is how in it's done in this tradition) and met the teacher coming down the hall. I told him how I felt and said I was going to lie down on the couch in the common room and I was really sorry, I knew I should be walking, but ... He cut me off. "That would be the kind thing to do," he said.

And the kind thing is always the loving thing. We just need to be reminded of that.