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Mountain Medicine

IMG_0069_2Strong as a boulder, small as a pebble, that’s how I feel after returning from a twenty-day backpacking expedition on the John Muir Trail (JMT) in California.  My three trail companions and I hiked over 200 miles from Tuolumne meadows to Mt. Whitney, crossed seven mountain passes over 11,000 feet, and earned a total elevation gain of 46,000 feet during the course of this magnificent, everything-worked-according-to-our-plan trip.

Even though there are enormous health benefits to daily load-bearing exercise, drinking 2-3 liters of water and massive bowel elimination, it was being in the mountains that felt most therapeutic. Most of our days were spent in dry sunny high alpine zones where we walked by pristine lakes and rivers, through boulder fields, talus slopes and scattered granite outcroppings while mountains, dramatic rock cathedrals, either surrounded or beckoned us forward on our southward route.

IMG_0059_2Of course, it was physically rigorous, and consumed all my attention, to climb and then descend the switchbacks on every mountain pass.  Each step up the mountain, the rarified air, brought me closer to the dizzying cerulean blue sky and dazzling panoramic views.  It’s the kind of high one can’t get from smoking or imbibing; elevation elation comes from hard-core effort.  However, the subjective significance of all my efforts shrunk to pebble size compared to the import of the geologic forces that both built and eroded the Sierra Nevada mountain range.  It was obvious: me, my time on earth is puny; I too will erode. My insignificance in the scheme of things wasn’t a negation of my existence, just a perfectly calibrated dose of reality, and that is exactly the kind of medicine the mountains delivers.

IMG_0116_2Being in this vast sparse rocky land, I found the spaciousness and silence in myself to safely make my way without much self-commentary given how the wilderness wholly absorbed me. I spent entire days observing the shifts in light, the pecular and wonderful rock formations, the coursing of water through streams, the emerald and turquoise lakes populated by trout, and the ever changing vantage points which convinced me that I was beholding the most beautiful sight in my entire life, only to cancel that thought ten switchbacks later when I would again be forced by sheer awe to make that proclamation all over again.

Now as I re-enter my life in Seattle, I am not just noticing natural beauty in my surroundings, I am stopping more regularly, and opening up space and time in myself to really experience it. This morning as I stood in my kitchen washing dishes, I looked out to the backyard and observed water evaporating and swirling into an ethereal mist off our canvas chairs from the previous night’s rain; pausing, I engaged in this very quiet transitory moment. Allowing myself more time to concentrate on each moment as it arises requires an internal stillness. My mentors, the mountains, modeled how to hold steady and poised while in the flow of changing life conditions.

Having had the good fortune to traverse the John Muir Trail, I feel inspired to stay on the trail, continuing to take one step after the next.

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Ritual Grief Shopping

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May 30th was the 49th day after my mother’s death.   I, who still had the urge to do for my mother, followed the Buddhist grief ritual of reciting the Heart Sutra for 49 days after her death. It is believed that by reciting the Heart Sutra, one can help the mind/spirit of the departed by encouraging them to let go of their earthly attachments and move toward their own enlightenment.  Basically, the sutra speaks to the fundamental emptiness of all phenomena.  Because in my grief my days have felt empty and vague, almost vaporous, I could relate to the contemplation.

But when day 49 came along, I wanted to not just recite the Heart Sutra, I wanted to give my mother one more taste of earthly life before sending her off to the next rebirth or whatever.   So, to lighten things up a bit, I invited my mother’s spirit to join me on a four store food-shopping extravaganza.  She, or my mental hologram of her anyways, came along as I bought specialty foods for our upcoming month long hiking expedition on the John Muir Trail.

When she was alive, she had a true hunter-gatherer’s love and fortitude for shopping so I had no doubt she would be up for this adventure.  In my mind’s eye, I could still clearly see her in each store browsing the aisles, studying the deli selections and searching for bargains.  We ended the day at Costco. It was probably not the best choice to end there because my mother might have been tempted to haunt the food sample carts for the rest of her spiritual life.   How can one really let go when there is so much free food being handed to you?

When our domestic duty was completed, and the contents of the grocery bags were put away in the refrigerator or cabinets, I sat down on the couch, and wept while reciting the Heart Sutra.  Letting her go one more time tore open the temporary sutures that were holding together my own broken heart. I realized there was nothing more I could do for my mother.  The doing was over, but just being with her as a spiritual mother was just beginning. How we move through space and time will never be the same; now we move together as free spirits, whirling through each other’s empty heart space, unencumbered.

I can hear her saying, “Enlightenment…..the Buddhist enlightenment is very nice, but you really should try the Jewish version.”

Video by Claudia Groom, Costco parking lot, Tukwila, WA.

 

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A Hole in the Fabric

IMG_0507With my mother’s recent passing in April, I am aware of an empty feeling, a hole in the fabric of my being.  Yet, that hollow spot doesn’t feel empty as in lonely or depressing, it feels hallowed.  When I return to the moment during and after my mother left her body, a profound sense of peace fills me.  Witnessing her let go was a blessing and a necessary learning. In that moment, my mother showed me how to let go of suffering, of struggle, of life itself. Like a reverse birth, instead of a womb becoming vacated to give birth to life, her physical body became vacated to give birth to spirit.  The space in my consciousness, which she previously occupied, I now experience as a deep calm. Not too many thoughts or feelings, not many remembrances – just vast space.

After a death, life insists on moving on and yet I find myself not too eager to stitch up that hole because in its emptiness, I am in touch with the undeniable fact of impermanence.  Before, this sense of transience seemed threatening, but now it just feels real. Buddha really had a handle on this, and I can see the worth in dwelling on the matter for a spell.

As I slowly move back into the current of my life, I am more drawn to emptying than filling it.  Weeding, clearing, sweeping and cleaning are the activities that sooth me because they burnish that quiet, loving, internal space that is lit up in remembrance of my mother, Evelyn Greenberg.  This high gloss, continuously polished, kind of grief is a way for me to stay in reflection, and also a way for my mother’s light to continue shining through me.

 

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Minding Myself, Minding Others

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Besides the Zen meditation retreat I attended last weekend, I also had two mindfulness experiences last week that reinforced the value of my training.

In Janurary, I took a 6 session online webinar for facilitator training from the Prison Mindfulness Institute called, Path of Freedom, a mindfulness and emotional intelligence training for incarcerated youth and adults. As part of the curriculum, we, the facilitators-in-training, were taught about the concept of holding your seat, taken from the horse training sport of dressage.  Basically, the idea is to not let your mind or emotions drag you around like an out-of-control horse; instead, keep your center (hold your seat) as you ride through all your mental and emotional fluctuations.  For homework, we were asked to write about situations where we had to hold our seat within ourselves or with others.

Well, that week, I didn’t particularly have any triggers so I was worried I wouldn’t have anything to write about, but after going on a series of errands, I found I had plenty of material.  My first stop was to my local natural food store (PCC).  Even though I am ordinarily triggered by their high prices, on that day, I put items in my basket with relative equanimity.  It wasn’t until I was waiting in line to check out that I was challenged to hold my seat.  You see, the woman in front of me had some indecipherable issue with her debit card.  It was the kind of issue where back and forth communication between her and the cashier seemed to go on and on.  All customers have an intuitive sense of the amount of time that simple questions like, “Do you want cash back?” or “Did you bring your own bag?” should take, and this interaction was definitely taking too long by my clock. At the same moment my internal sensor was alerting me that I was in the wrong check out line, I decided to try the hold your seat exercise. Instead of focusing on the cashier, I focused on my breath and stilling my mind.  It’s not that I didn’t notice her inefficient use of time, or her poor spatial organization when she bagged her customer’s groceries; it was that I was relaxed and easy with it.  Just as I was settling into taking whatever time it was going to take, I noticed at the edge of my periphery vision, a cashier at the next register opening her drawer. I made a beeline to that register, beating out other customers to be the first in line.  Holding my seat didn’t mean I needed to stay frozen in an unwanted situation. Instead, by centering myself, I was able to relax and keep my awareness open and alert so I could fluidly move out of stasis.

My next stop was to get gas at the Safeway gas station on Rainier Avenue S. When I opened the door to the cashier’s kiosk, I had an instant flash of irritation, an inner harrumph, as I was once again at the back of a long line of customers waiting to pay while a man at the front of the line was raising his voice with the cashier.  “Not this again,” I thought to myself.  This time, the tension wasn’t all within me, although I did have my own fair share given that the Safeway on Rainier Avenue is the epicenter of gang-related violence in South Seattle. I was all too aware that an angry man could turn into a dangerous man in this setting, but I decided to focus on holding my seat, rather than entertaining random fear.  Ordinarily, in this kind of situation, I would be primarily focused on listening to my own internal annoyance, but as I stilled my mind, I started listening, really listening, to the biracial man at the head of the line.  Apparently, he did his own calculations and the amount printed on his debit receipt was inaccurate.  After the cashier asked the man to step aside for a few minutes so he could take care of the other customers waiting in line before attending to his issue, I made eye contact from my place in the line and said, “You did the math, eh?”

“Yep, and this receipt says I saved 70 cents but actually I only saved 45 cents.   It’s wrong.”

“They (meaning The Man) count on us not doing the math, on us being stupid.”

“You got that straight,” he agreed.  Two African Americans in line in front of me also turned toward me, and nodded, adding to the consensus.

“Thanks for speaking up,” I said.

“You GOT TO!”

“Yep, I learned something real important today.”

After I paid for my gas and started walking towards the door, the formerly angry man, now the acknowledged man, said, “You have a real nice day, Miss.”

Being mindful doesn’t mean just being exclusively focused on yourself, and your own internal experience.  No, being mindful means opening up your whole sensory body to really experience what’s happening, both inside and around you.  If we practice mindfulness every day, and have the discipline to hold our seat, we might become enlightened in every ordinary situation.

 

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Working For The Cookie

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I’ve done some arduous things in my life; like memorizing all the points and meridians when I was in acupuncture school; like being a caregiver for my paralyzed mother for two years; like walking through the wilderness with a heavy backpack on, in all kinds of weather, on all kinds of terrains.  All these experiences taught me the same thing:  I can tough it out.

So when my best friend Anna and I sat for a three-day Zen meditation retreat last September, I expected I could handle the long twelve-hour days of sitting, walking and eating in silence.  And, in fact, during the first day of sitting, in between all the thoughts and emotions circulating through my head, there were moments, maybe just seconds, when I experienced an exquisite sense of stillness, a deep emptiness, an unexpected peace.   And there were other moments when I felt a profound sense of widening, as if my own molecules were pushing outward and disappearing into the collective molecular mix of the room.  That’s all really great, really profound, but that’s not all I experienced.

You see, by the end of the first day, when the the twelve hour day was two hours away from being over, I couldn’t get my mind off the tea and cookie that would be served at the closing of the sit.  More specifically, my mind wrapped itself around the cookie as if it was the fortune I had been seeking my whole life.  I just really, really wanted a cookie.  Can you relate?

Indeed, the end of the day did arrive at nine o’clock and I got my cookie, and yes, I enjoyed it immensely. As soon as Anna and I were in the privacy of my car as we began our drive home, I said with total clarity, “Anna, all this work, it’s all about the cookie.  I’m working for the cookie.”   Understanding my irony, she laughed because she also spent the day watching her mind spin out on her own wild preoccupations.

The next morning as we drove to the retreat together, Anna confessed, “I don’t know if I can keep it together today thinking about you working for the cookie. That’s so funny to me.”

The day unfolded precisely as the day before; we cycled through chanting, dharma talks, silent sitting, silent walking, and silent eating.  At dinnertime, Anna and I silently walked by each other with eyes cast down, and both at the same time glanced at the box of cookies on the table. Knowingly, we smiled at each other.  Unbeknownst to me, however; the tea server for the evening had asked Anna to help him serve the cookies at the end of the day.  A few hours later, when it was time for the tea service, which is enacted with a graceful series of bows, teacups raised and lowered, and cookies offered one at a time, I was surprised to see Anna following the tea server with a plate of cookies in her hand. I couldn’t help but smile inwardly, so proud was I of her as she bowed at all the appropriate times with total sincerity and accuracy. You see, Anna was raised in an orthodox Jewish household, but as an adult, she was no observer of any disciplines or traditions, which made her sincerity all the sweeter.

After the tea server bowed to me, I raised my teacup to be filled; afterwards, both the tea server and I bowed to each other once again.  Anna followed right behind and bent down, offering me a cookie with all the ritual correctness she could muster, and even though she said not a word, I could hear her saying to me telepathically, “Here’s your cookie, Joycie!” In the next moment, we both burst out laughing, not in light chuckles or even suppressed giggles; no, we lost all control. Tears streamed down our faces, our noses dripped, and when we tried to hold it back, we erupted all over again into spasms of laughter.

Through all the years of our friendship, we have had many gut busting crackups, but always in our own company, and never in the middle of a collectively maintained shrine of stillness. While we were in the middle of our own Lucille Ball skit, the others in the room sat silent as stones patiently waiting for us to calm down.  Eventually we did quiet down, but not without spurting out a series of last laughs. It was the ultimate inside joke.

The next day, I asked the teacher, “So, what is the cookie?  What am I really working for?”  He answered, “To know your true nature.”  Oh, right.

Tomorrow I’ll begin four-day sit.  I’m really looking forward to the cookies!