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Different Minds
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Category Archives: Spirit
Simply Pay Attention
Existence is hard; it is literal suffering. It has wonders and joys, amazements and fascinations, yes. And it has love. All of this along with suffering, which happens to us and which we inflict on others and our own selves. Bean once asked me, if life is suffering, what is the point of being alive? In the end it seems simple enough: we are Life experiencing itself. We are Consciousness holding everything. We are the Mystery. It doesn’t bear too much thinking about, because thinking is a distraction. Better to simply pay attention to what is happening right now, what is right in front of me, and to meet it as fully and with as much attention as I can.
Taking my own advice, I happened to notice the sunlight on freshly washed grapes when I made my lunch. After visually appreciating them for a time, before relishing them in my mouth, I snapped a photo to share.
Colors
In All Eternity
“Under your breath, just loud enough to be heard, tell the Earth that you can hear the sound of its turning, and it’s making you giddy. Say, too, how much you love the fact that in all eternity, this moment will never be repeated. Though you may drink in the delicious atmosphere with a trillion trillion more breaths, this special dispensation of air molecules will never fill your lungs again.”
–Rob Breszny
A Reminder
“Have you ever been loved? I bet you have been loved so much and so deeply that you have become blasé about how much grace it confers.
So let me remind you: To be loved is a privilege and prize equivalent to being born. If you’re smart, you pause regularly to bask in the astonishing knowledge that there are many people out there who care for you and want you to thrive and hold you in their thoughts with fondness.
Animals, too: You have been the recipient of their boundless affection. The spirits of allies who’ve left this world continue to send their tender regards, as well.
Do you “believe” in angels and other divine beings? Whether or not you do, there are hordes of them beaming their uncanny consecrations your way. You are awash in torrents of love.”
-Rob Breszny
Middle School
Listening to my daughter talk about her feelings and the dynamics of kid interaction at school, I realize the following:
- Middle school is “Lord of the Flies” harsh even when it’s a good school;
- People can be really judgmental, including my kid;
- A middle schooler wants more than anything to be accepted; the hardest thing to do is to befriend someone who is an “outcast,” because you risk your own social safety;
- I suck at listening, despite being a psychotherapist (psycho therapist?);
- All my childhood wounds are activated;
- I have to WORK REALLY HARD to keep my mouth shut, my heart open, and to accept I do not have control over this.
BEING PRESENT with someone else’s suffering, especially when that someone is the most precious treasure of my life, is the hardest soul task I’ve encountered.
Wolves
Wolves
When I die let the wolves enjoy my bones
When I die let me go
When I die let the wolves enjoy my bones
When I die let me go
When I die you can push me out to sea
When I die set me free
When I die let the sharks come ’round to feed
When I die set me free
Oh, the world is dark
And I’ve looked as far as I can see
When the years have torn me apart
Let me be
When I die let the flames devour me
When I die set me free
When I die throw my ashes to the breeze
When I die scuttle me
Oh, the world is dark
And I’ve looked as far as I can see
When the years have torn me apart
Let me be
Let me be
Let me be
Let me be
Daylight is waiting for you
Daylight is waiting for you
Daylight is waiting for you
Daylight is waiting for you
Daylight is waiting for you
Daylight is waiting for you
Daylight is waiting for you
Daylight is waiting for you
Just Breathe
No one can find the rewind button, child. So, just breathe.
Just Breathe
Two AM and she calls me ’cause I’m still awake,
Can you help me unravel my latest mistake,
I don’t love him, winter just wasn’t my season
Yeah we walk through the doors, so accusing their eyes
Like they have any right at all to criticize, hypocrites,
You’re all here for the very same reason
‘Cause you can’t jump the track, we’re like cars on a cable
And life’s like an hourglass, glued to the table
No one can find the rewind button girl,
So cradle your head in you hands
And breathe, just breathe,
Whoa breathe, just breathe
May he turn twenty one on the base at Fort Bliss
Just today he sat down to the flask in his fist,
Ain’t been sober, since maybe October of last year.
Here in town you can tell he’s been down for a while,
But my God it’s so beautiful when the boy smiles,
Wanna hold him, maybe I’ll just sing about it.
‘Cause you can’t jump the track, we’re like cars on a cable,
And life’s like an hourglass, glued to the table.
No one can find the rewind button boys,
So cradle your head in your hands,
And breathe, just breathe,
Whoa breathe, just breathe
There’s a light at each end of this tunnel, you shout
But you’re just as far in as you’ll ever be out
These mistakes you’ve made, you’ll just make them again
If you only try turning around.
Two AM and I’m still awake, writing a song
If I get it all down on paper, its no longer
Inside of me, threatening the life it belongs to
And I feel like I’m naked in front of the crowd
‘Cause these words are my diary, screaming out loud
And I know that you’ll use them, however you want to
‘Cause you can’t jump the track, we’re like cars on a cable,
And life’s like an hourglass, glued to the table
No one can find the rewind button now
Sing it if you understand.
And breathe, just breathe
Whoa breathe, just breathe…
The Blue Hour
Leaving Target tonight, I was entranced by the evening sky. It was a rich Indigo blue, almost verging on navy. It was the shade of the not quite ripe night sky. Usually I see light blue skies, gray skies, or vivid optimistic blue skies. And when I looked later night had fallen. Usually when I think to look, the sky has transformed into black velvet. What I saw was the in between color. Funny how I’d never noticed it before. Or maybe I just don’t remember noticing it quite as vividly in an ordinary location. I know that I am often aware of beauty when I’m camping, but I miss the beauty of my mundane life.
In Relationship With the Truth
“The dharma — understanding, peering into the nature of reality — is not specific to Buddhism. The dharma is truth. And the only choice we really have is whether to try to be in relationship with the truth or to live in ignorance. There are no other choices. You have to actively engage. How did I come to be? How do I think of myself? How did I get what I have? (I don’t mean your degrees.) Where did I come from? What land are we on?If it sounds like a lot of work, it is. All of us, in some way, have profited from our wrong knowing.”
— angel Kyodo williams, Your Liberation is on the Line
Taking Stock
“Dharma practice is founded on resolve. This is not an emotional conversion, a devastating realization of the error of our ways, a desperate urge to be good, but an ongoing, heartfelt reflection on priorities, values, and purpose. We need to keep taking stock of our life in an unsentimental, uncompromising way.”
— Stephen Batchelor, Buddhism without Beliefs
Look
I was driving to an appointment just now, carefully navigating rush hour chaos. I happened to look at the sky and saw big puffy clouds, the sun brilliantly reflecting light and shadow. It was so sharp, so detailed, to SEE this gift of beauty in the middle of an ordinary moment. I felt small and elated, and it brought tears to my eyes. Go and look at your world. It’s incredible.
Beauty
“Butterflies are self propelled flowers.”
–Robert A. Heinlein
A Living Continuation
“The day my mother died I wrote in my journal, “A serious misfortune of my life has arrived.” I suffered for more than one year after the passing away of my mother. But one night, in the highlands of Vietnam, I was sleeping in the hut in my hermitage.
I dreamed of my mother. I saw myself sitting with her, and we were having a wonderful talk. She looked young and beautiful, her hair flowing down. It was so pleasant to sit there and talk to her as if she had never died.
When I woke up it was about two in the morning, and I felt very strongly that I had never lost my mother. The impression that my mother was still with me was very clear. I understood then that the idea of having lost my mother was just an idea. It was obvious in that moment that my mother is always alive in me.
I opened the door and went outside. The entire hillside was bathed in moonlight. It was a hill covered with tea plants, and my hut was set behind the temple halfway up. Walking slowly in the moonlight through the rows of tea plants, I noticed my mother was still with me. She was the moonlight caressing me as she had done so often, very tender, very sweet… wonderful! Each time my feet touched the earth I knew my mother was there with me.
I knew this body was not mine but a living continuation of my mother and my father and my grandparents and great-grandparents. Of all my ancestors. Those feet that I saw as “my” feet were actually “our” feet. Together my mother and I were leaving footprints in the damp soil.
From that moment on, the idea that I had lost my mother no longer existed. All I had to do was look at the palm of my hand, feel the breeze on my face or the earth under my feet to remember that my mother is always with me, available at any time.”
–Thích Nhat Hanh, No Death, No Fear
We Are Not the Designers
“But we do neither: we never fail, and we never succeed. We are not the designers of our lives. Life is the designer of us. Life is vast and grand, intelligent, clever, and completely unknowable. It always has the last word. It is the last word. Life interrupts us when we are at our most self-assured. Life diverts us when we are hellbent on going elsewhere. Life arrives in a precise and yet unplanned sequence to deliver exactly what we need in order to realize our greatest potential. The delivery is not often what we would choose, and almost never how we intend to satisfy ourselves, because our potential is well beyond our limited, ego-bound choices and self serving intentions.”
–Karen Maezen Miller, Hand Wash Cold: Care Instructions for an Ordinary Life
Gratitude
Despite the fatigue and pain in my body, despite the washing machine and the dishwasher being broken, despite the state of our country and the earth, I felt flooded with gratitude this morning as I took Bean to art camp for the day. I’m grateful for:
- coffee, brewed strong and black
- friends with kids who are willing to help fetch each other’s kids and take them places (it takes a village)
- my husband’s reliability and humor
- my daughter, who works so hard to find her way these days
- the means to afford the repair bills, the art camp, the groceries
- the spirit of animals, a chance to connect with pure consciousness
- political resistance and the freedom to act
- a chance to cherish life and death, creation, destruction, and renewal
- all the mysteries of existence, the unanswered questions, and the chance to sit with not knowing
The Challenge of the Season
The challenge with this season is that our culture decides to focus on bright and shiny and joy, but reality does not change. There is still suffering. Christmas lights; people are sleeping outdoors in the cold. Baking cookies; 25% of the population in Silicon Valley is food insecure. Christmas carols; there are people sobbing and wailing in grief. Spending and spending on presents; foster kids have nothing. The differences are unsettling. My body is tired. My joints ache. My mind races with to-do lists.
So I do this: I sit in silence. I settle into my breathing and notice each breath. I take off my glasses and gently lay my hands on my face. I rest this way a few moments, feel the warmth and tenderness of my hands, feel my face relax. I move my hands to my head and neck, massaging them. If thoughts come, I decline the invitation to follow them. If I catch myself in a thought, I recognize and let it go. I do this until I feel real again, whole and connected. Then I feel into what comes alive in my core. What can I do in this moment, to help, to love, to heal part of the world? When an idea arises, I follow.
That idea might be to write a note to someone. Or pick up the phone and call. It might be to divert money that would be used for family gifts and spend it on gifts for children in foster care. Or to write a check to Second Harvest Food Bank. It’s as simple as really looking at the person who rings up my purchases and saying hello, how is your day going? And meaning it, receiving the response, making a connection.
Recognition
Last night, I stretched before bed, a routine which helps bring sleep when I make the effort. At the end I lay on my back in what is called “corpse pose” in yoga.
As I lay quietly, I imagined my heart stopping suddenly. My breath ceasing. My brain shutting down, and with that, all awareness evaporating. The “me” that existed just gone. No more Kathryn. No afterlife awareness as Kathryn.
What arose for me: we are expressions of the Life force. The creations Life makes are temporary. They change, disintegrate, and the constituent parts are reabsorbed. The matter and energy become the source again. There is no soul identified as Kathryn. There is no awareness of others. In this way we are eternal and infinite, because our parts merge again with Life. But the death of the body is the death of the personality.
And for whatever reason, for the first time, that felt all right. True. Not scary. Not sad.
Reflections on Sesshin
Almost six years ago I sat my first sesshin at Hazy Moon Zen Center. I did not return, for many reasons and rationalizations. But when my teacher put a winter weekend sesshin on the calendar, I committed to come. It was wonderful sitting with so many people and creating community. These are some small reflections on my experience. A huge rainstorm visited LA, unusual and impressive for California, and a gesture from nature that we might be worthy of deliverance from drought.
Practice has become a priority. Six years will not pass before I sit sesshin again.
———
Reflections on Sesshin
Rain strikes the city
like a kyosaku startling
dusty streets awake.
The rain converses
with the windows
while water gushing
through gutters holds
a debate with the sidewalk.
Nearly six whole years past
the rooster still crows at dawn
in downtown L.A.
I met my match
outwaited her impatience
wrestled her on the mat
until she cried
not my way, the Way
then bowed
and walked into the day.
–Kathryn Harper
Latest Work
For the last few weeks I have been working on a painting using a new type of canvas (to me) made of Belgian linen. It is incredibly smooth, and the paint glides on and blends beautifully. So I chose a palette and began to see what emerged. Two nights ago, I dreamt that I was pregnant. Most of the time I don’t recall dreams, so when I do, it has import. This dream felt so real. When I awoke, I was holding my stomach the way I did when I carried my daughter, feeling it taut and firm with life.
I finished the painting today. Sometimes when I paint I have an idea. Other times, as with this one, I start without an idea and work intuitively, without thinking and analyzing. Then I step back and see what I see.
This painting reflects a deep, intuitive exploration of the divine feminine within me and the earth. It makes me think of molten earth, the core of our existence. I also see a womb with an embryo, and an ovary, and the blood that makes the ground from which we arise.
I have gone through menopause in the past year, and now I am a crone. But while my physical body cannot create a human life anymore, I have graduated to creating life on a larger scale.
I want to thank my father for his recent gift that enabled me to purchase larger canvases!
