Don't get lost in the details

For 2 years in a row, the date March 9 has brought me face-to-face with the frailty of the human body.

This normally inconspicuous date has also held for me interesting coincidences.

On March 9, 2012, I awoke shortly after midnight with a splitting headache. It was the worst headache I ever had in my life. It was as though a large Bowie knife had been shoved through my skull. My vision was distorted by shimmering lights, like an aura. Because I had lived with migraines most of my life, I deduced it was just an exceptionally bad migraine. I took some Excedrin and went back to sleep.

Later that morning the headache persisted. I stayed at home and worked, but the throbbing pain in my skull was getting to me. I took a handful of aspirin later in the afternoon. The pain diminished slightly. I was beginning to notice that I had lost vision in my left peripheral field. It was the normal blind spot I get when having a migraine, so I thought.

The next day, the headache and the blind spot were still there. Perhaps this was not a migraine. I called one of those "phone a nurse" lines and described my symptoms. It was suggested that I get to an emergency room. I drove myself there. They did a CT scan. They told me I had a stroke.

On March 9, 2013, I woke up feeling fine. I went to make the coffee. I returned to my room and started my laptop, started to look through my email. When I heard the coffee had stopped brewing, I went and got a cup. I poured the soy creamer into the mug and then added the coffee like I always do every morning. I took the mug of coffee back to my room, took a sip, set the mug on the side table, then sat in the chair to resume web surfing.

Suddenly there was an intense pain in my chest. It was as if a giant hand wearing one of those metal medieval jousting gloves had gripped my chest all about the left breast and was squeezing with the pressure of an hydraulic vice. The pain radiated to my left arm, went under through the arm pit, then down my arm to my fingers. This intense pain went up the left side of my neck as well to my jaw. My breathing became shallow, I felt clammy.

I knew what was happening. I stood up, went to my medicine cabinet, grabbed an adult aspirin and chewed it. I returned to my chair and focused my mind on the pain, on my heart, on the blood vessel that was shutting down. I waited a few moments, but the pain was not subsiding. It was steady; a black knight had me in his grip and he was not letting go. Mara be damned. I was going to have to go to the emergency room. Again.

I told my roommate what I thought was happening and he and his boyfriend drove me to the emergency room. I never felt like I was going to die. But I was thinking about the irony.

Two hugely significant medical emergencies in my life, both occurring on March 9. In both incidents, I had Phô for dinner the night before. In both situations I had recently picked up my friend Curt at the airport upon his return from Malaysia where he had spent three months. And on both occasions, Curt returned from Malaysia with some type of lung infection.

Coincidences. Silly facts to mess with your mind.

At the emergency room, it had been at least an hour since the symptoms first showed and my chest was still gripped with pain. This is not a hackneyed metaphor. It literally felt as though my chest was caught in some giant vice. My blood pressure upon arrival was 188/107. They gave me a nitro. A swelling headache developed, but the chest pain had only slightly subsided. Morphine was next. At last, the pain was receding.

They drew blood to see if the tell-tale enzymes would show up indicating a heart attack. It could be severe angina or some other less serious event. These enzymes show up when there is heart tissue damage, and the only thing that causes that type of damage is a heart attack. The first draw was necessarily zero, but it would be the second draw that would reveal all.

Nammo tassa bhagavato arahato samma sambuddhasa. Say it three times. Say it six times. Say it a hundred times. I wasn't afraid. I knew I wasn't going to die. But I was embarrassed. And I was confused. I don't follow the best diet, but I eat reasonably well and I exercise a lot. My cholesterol numbers are fabulous. My EKGs have been normal. I have never felt chest pain while exercising or exerting myself. All I did was sit down after getting my coffee. Now I was annoyed. They told me I would be spending the night for observation in a regular room. Dennis and Stephen went home to get me some things.

Then the first enzyme test came back. They were canceling my room. They were sending me to ICU. The enzymes were there. I was 54 years old and I had a heart attack. My father was 58 when he had his first one. My brother was 62 I think when he had his, one that required a quad-bypass. But this couldn't be. I knew I didn't have blocked arteries. I just knew it! But what was happening?

An angiogram done two days later confirmed my belief; there was no arterial blockage. They started talking about a spasm, like a cramp in the artery that caused it to pinch shut, blocking the blood flow just as effectively if it had been blocked with plaque. But there was a problem with this diagnosis. Had it been plaque in the artery, they would cite a source, whether it was my diet or something else leading to the plaque buildup. There were procedures for this, whether surgery or angioplasty, doesn't matter - there was a protocol with that scenario.

Without the plaque, well now, they couldn't tell me what caused the spasm. And without knowing what caused the spasm, they couldn't very well tell me what to do or not do to prevent it from happening again.

It was like the stroke all over again. The stroke was caused by a blood clot - at least that's what they tell me - but they could never identify the source of the clot.

My roommate Stephen said it best: "You are a medical mystery."

Fuck that.

But now, when I chant the Five Remembrances, the significance is hard to ignore. I got things to do. And not silly things. Now the Bhaddekaratta Sutta has meaning unlike anything its held before. And yet I am still the same person. I'm not quite acting differently, not yet. But I am looking at others much differently. And I'm looking for opportunities. Opportunities to help. Opportunities to be kind. Opportunities to smile. And most important of all, opportunities to be present.

Expect some more of the same, but a little bit different.

Selfishness disguised as compassion, or kamma can suck

For the past several days I’ve been struggling over what to do with my cat, Symba. He’s been sniffling and sneezing and losing weight, which I largely attributed to some type of severe allergy or sinus infection. However, there was a key symptom I wasn’t paying attention to: Symba’s breath was awful smelling, like rot. Everything else was beguilingly normal; all his other body functions were operating, shall we say, unimpeded. And he was especially perky whenever I fed him and Tazz, my other cat, soft food.

When I finally took Symba in to see the vet, the news was dire. It wasn’t merely nasal congestion or some allergy going on. It was an infection, but it was in his mouth. He had already lost several teeth, his breath smelled rotten because of all the pus building in his gums and even the roof of his mouth, which was starting to look like maggot-ridden hamburger. The swelling from the pus on his right cheek was so intense it was ready to burst through the outside of his cheek; the vet showed me the spot where hair was starting to disappear. That’s why he was constantly rubbing and grooming that side of his head with a paw. And that’s why he showed excitement when I brought out the soft food, because his mouth hurt so much to eat dry food.

I was overwhelmed with sadness, but it wasn’t for Symba – it was all about me. I hadn’t recognized it fully, however, at that moment. Oh, I knew I felt guilt for not paying closer attention to Symba’s symptoms. And I felt guilt over not listening to a vet 8 years ago who told me that Symba was developing gum disease that ought to be taken care of. But when he told me that it would cost $150 to clean his teeth when I hadn’t gone to a dentist in years to take care of my own teeth, I said no. Now I was looking at major surgery for Symba to the tune of at least $900, potentially more.

There was the possibility, the vet told me, that Symba’s problems were entirely restricted to this awful – and I mean AWFUL – mouth infection. She said there was a possibility he may have bone cancer in the jaw as well. If that were the case, she recommended putting him down. But there was a catch. She would need to begin the surgery on his mouth before she could see and determine if cancer were present. And even then, it may not be immediately obvious, which would then necessitate a biopsy. Biopsy results could take a couple days, meaning the mouth surgery would be completed and a few days after his return home, the biopsy result would be available.

This all meant that I could end up spending more than $900 only to learn later that Symba’s days were over. That bugged me. Really bugged me. But a voice inside reminded me had I listened to that vet 8 years ago and paid the $150 then, I wouldn’t be faced with $900 now.

This was all on Thursday. The vet told me she couldn’t do the surgery until Monday. If all went well, Symba could be home that evening. If it were just the mouth infection, she said his prognosis was actually excellent. Symba wouldn’t have any teeth, but should fully recover. They had a plan, also, that would allow me to pay for the surgery over time, interest free. I qualified, so I agreed to schedule the surgery for Monday with the knowledge that I still had the weekend to think things over.

That evening I had dinner over at a friend’s house. He gave me very practical feedback. I don’t have $900, this would add to my debt load, even if only temporarily, he told me. Symba was 15 years old, he’s lived a good life. I gave him an excellent home, took care of him and loved him. I shouldn’t feel guilty over not addressing the gum disease issue in the past. I also had my own life situation to consider. My cat food costs would like go up after this because I would need to buy soft food more frequently, so long term my expenses would rise. I needed to think about myself in this situation as well.

It was all very persuasive. My friend made excellent and valid points. I didn’t have any money, no savings at all, and Symba was 15 years old, at the high end of a cat’s normal life span. Even if the surgery was successful and there was no cancer, how many more years would I be giving to Symba?

Friday I worked at home, although frankly, I was not very productive. I struggled with my decision. I couldn’t ignore the cost and the impact that would have on me.

Symba seemed to sense something was troubling me. He came out of his corner where he’s been spending his days, the lower shelf on a small case where I keep grocery bags, and came into my home office. He looked at me, meowed loudly (I think he’s deaf now, and that may be the result of the infection as well), then jumped into my lap. I reclined back into my chair and he laid his frail body against me and began to purr. I understood now why his fur was so ratty looking; he wasn’t grooming himself because of the mouth infection. I knew why he had lost weight; because it hurt his mouth to eat the dry food. I was overwhelmed with sadness and guilt. I apologized to him. I did this to him. I had failed. And the decision to have him put down was beginning to take shape.

But it was still all about me.

I was ready to take him to the animal hospital that moment and have it done. But there was somebody else I wanted to talk to first. Benny. So I left a message for Benny to give me a call. While waiting for Benny’s call, I drove to Whole Foods to pick up some items with the idea that I would park my car on the street when I got back, making it easier to bring Symba down to the car to take him to the vet. But when I returned from Whole Foods, there were no street parking spaces, so I drove back to the alley to my garage.

Back inside, I tried to do a little work, responded to some emails, and then Benny called. We chatted for a bit and he said something that surprised me. Benny’s known about my Buddhist practice, I even tried to teach him meditation but he didn’t stick with it. He said that my dilemma sounded like something I should meditate on.

Duh. When was the last time I meditated? My practice had really gone to shit. It must have been weeks, perhaps months, since I last mediated. What was up with that? After my call with Benny, that’s exactly what I did, I went to the cushion.

It was a struggle. My mind was all over the place. Rather than attempt to “think” about anything, my decision or whatever, I just brought my mind back to my breath. Over and over it would run wild into this or that thought, and I would each time bring it back to the breath. By then end of the session, I had achieved some semblance of mental calm. I then began my normal routine of chanting some Pali verses after the silent sit. Needless to say I got a bit choked up when I said out loud, “May all beings be free from suffering.” But what really got to me was reciting the Five Recollections.

“I am of the nature to grow old, I have not got beyond aging.
“I am of the nature to be sick, I have not got beyond disease.
“I am of the nature to die, I have not got beyond death.
“All that is mine, beloved, and pleasing, changes and vanishes.
“I am the owner of my kamma, the creator of my kamma, born of my kamma, related to my kamma, abide supported in my kamma; whatever kamma I create – skillful or unskillful, light or dark – to that I fall heir.”

My voice trembled as I recited this, but something was coming up. Something was rising.

I went back to my computer and began a search with the terms “euthanizing pets Buddhism.” The discussion was all over the place, but I began to see a common thread. And in particular, it was discussion on how our sense of compassion may not really be compassion at all, but a mask to cover up selfish intentions. We tell ourselves that our beloved pet is suffering and so we seek to end that suffering. At the other extreme is the notion we should never euthanize our pets because they have their own kamma to work through and by euthanizing them we’re interfering with that. I found that argument to be bullshit, largely because it presumes that we “know” what kamma the animal has and must deal with. Now that is ego to the extreme. Plus, such a position logically leads us never to intervene when anyone is sick because we might be interfering with their kamma. That’s just crazy.

But the notion that the option of euthanizing an animal was merely a smoke-screen covering up our own discomfort with disease and death was resonating with me. The more I began to re-evaluate Symba’s symptoms, the more I began to see that the likelihood he also had cancer was extremely low. I’ve had pets that were on death’s door because of either feline leukemia or another terminal illness. It was clear that they were close to death because they weren’t eating, some couldn’t even lift up their head and they could barely respond to any type of affection.

Beyond the fact that he had a horrible mouth, Symba was still Symba. He remained affectionate and even playful, particularly if he knew I was preparing soft food for him.

We all get sick. Sometimes really, really sick. But we don’t die from every illness. Not every illness is fatal. In fact, we recover from really major illnesses all the time.

And so do animals.

I do have responsibility for Symba’s illness. After all, I cannot ignore the fact that I did not heed the advice of that vet 8 years ago. Symba’s and my kamma are connected. And this got me thinking of the simile of the salt crystal. I can’t erase my negligence and selfishness entirely all in one sweep, but I do have an opportunity to remedy this and eliminate not just my kamma but Symba’s as well. And when I came to that realization, this burden I had been feeling was completely lifted. I felt light and at ease, like a shadow that never leaves.

So I will be bringing Symba in on Monday morning, but it will be for the surgery. Certainly there is the possibility that he has cancer and in that case, we’ll put him down. But I truly believe that is a slim chance. Despite that, I am comfortable with my decision. Symba doesn’t want to die and he doesn’t need to now. For me to think I would be doing him a favor by euthanizing him was delusion.

This time the decision was about Symba.

Why couldn’t I help you Lance?

I would not normally write about and identify any of the children I used to work with, but in Lance’s case I’m going to make an exception, because, you see, Lance is dead.

The details are hazy as it happened many years ago, but as I recall, Lance took a pistol and shot himself in the head. I think he was 15 at the time. The specifics are immaterial, and when one doesn’t know all the facts, the facts become mixed with rumor until truth can no longer be separated from fiction.

All that matters for now is Lance is dead. And while it remains speculation, I have a pretty good idea as to why.

Lance was a handsome, energetic, athletic and mischievous boy from Texas. His smile was infectious. He honestly tried to please others, but like many boys his age diagnosed with ADD, his mouth and actions often got ahead of his brain, leading him to say and do things he quickly regretted.

He was a student at the private boarding school where I worked as a cabin counselor. The school, up in the mountains of Northern New Mexico, was for teens diagnosed with learning disabilities. It was a beautiful natural setting that offered tremendous opportunities for outdoor activities in the surrounding national forest. I took students on many hikes and backpack trips into the mountains there and not just for recreation. I’ve always believed that the wilderness is an effective teacher of many things; it will humble the most arrogant teen and in the flash of a moment, will show you death for what it really is.

I liked Lance. I remember on a hike one day up the steep slope of a ridge by the school, we encountered a rock outcropping that was about 12 feet high. You could walk around it, but it was an excellent opportunity to do a little free climbing without any serious risk. I was amazed at Lance’s agility as he easily climbed up the rock face, finding the right handholds and swinging his body up to another tiny ledge where he paused briefly horizontal to the ground before using his wiry strength to pull himself to the top of the outcropping.

It really was a beautiful and awe-inspiring site.

Later in the year there was hushed talk about an incident between Lance and another boy in his cabin. Lance’s normally bright demeanor was subdued and gloomy. The once loquacious boy had become taciturn and morose. I was just 24 years old at the time, struggling with my own sexuality. Intuitively, I sensed a similar struggle within Lance. So I took a risk.

Lance’s cabin counselor agreed to let Lance come over to my cabin after lights out to chat. Talk about an uncomfortable meeting. I let Lance know I knew what occurred between him and the other boy. I also let him know I wasn’t going to tell him that there was something wrong with him. Rather, I wanted to find out what he thought about the situation. How was he going to deal with it? What happened, I said, didn’t mean he was gay. But the incident wasn’t going to go away.

There was one other time I approached another boy, also from another cabin and at the request of his counselor. (Was it that obvious to others? “Send the kid to Rich, he knows how to deal with that kind of thing.”) In that situation, I made an obvious mistake. The boy’s reaction to my inquiries, despite how oblique they were, clearly let me know I was making a mistake.

With Lance, however, I believed I was right. He gave me the non-denial denial, never clearly denying what others were saying had happened, nor clearly denying that he had sexual feelings for other boys. But he remained closed up. Never had I seen someone suppress their tears so effectively. He wanted to tell me something, but he couldn’t bring himself to say it. I told him that anytime he needed to talk about anything, I would be there.

That was late in the school year. Lance brightened up a bit and finished the year on a good note. He opted to return to public school the following fall, so he did not come back to our school.

About six weeks into the next school year, I was doing something in the office when someone grabbed me and said, “Hey, Lance is on the phone, he just called and asked if you were there.” At the time, I thought it was odd for Lance to call like that. But I shrugged it off. I took the phone and asked Lance how things were going at his new school. Not so well, he said. He was calling from home, he had just been suspended. His parents weren’t home yet. He was worried how they might react.

I think I asked Lance what had happened at school to get him suspended, but I can’t remember whether he again evaded my question or gave me an answer. I remember telling him he would get through this. And I remember telling him thanks for calling and asking for me. I told him I liked him, he was a good kid.

A week later I heard the news. Lance had shot himself dead. He did it on the same day that he called the school. He must have shot himself shortly after the phone call.

Long pause because I’m crying right now.

I don’t blame myself for what happened to Lance. But goddamnit, what a fucked up situation that was. It was the 1980s when everything said about gays had AIDS connected to it. I was in my 20s, confused about my own sexuality trying to talk to a 14-year-old who was just as confused. I was deathly afraid of anyone finding out. My position at the school would be ruined. Even though I had never done anything in the least inappropriate with any of the boys at that school – and while I worked there I had personal knowledge of at least three other counselors who had sex with students, two involving male counselors with female students and the third a male counselor with a male student (and there are a couple other instances that while I didn’t have personal knowledge, I have strong evidence, a lot can happen in five years) – I knew that if someone were even suspicious of me being gay my life would be ruined. Or at least, that’s how I thought.

Lance must have been thinking the same way.

So much suffering, and what the fuck for?

Much of this came to me during my morning meditation today. Normally when I finish meditating, I always recite the Loving Kindness chant. But today, I just couldn’t get through it. Not only couldn’t I remember the verses in the right order, I was weeping as I tried to say them. And when I went through the Five Remembrances, I was struck by the last line.

“I am the owner of my Kamma, made of my Kamma, born of my Kamma, related to my Kamma, abide supported in my Kamma. Whatever Kamma I create, wholesome or unwholesome, light or dark, skillful or unskillful, to that I fall heir.”

It’s the part “… related to my Kamma, abide supported in my Kamma …” I asked my original teacher long ago what that meant. He said that being related to your Kamma literally means my relatives are manifestations of my Kamma, and the last part had to do with all my personal relationships. My friends, the jobs I had and the co-workers I have, that also is my Kamma. And as we continue to create more Kamma with our present actions, we constantly create for ourselves situations and relationships that allow us opportunity to undo past Kamma.

When you look at Kamma this way, you see how we are all in our own personal version of Bill Murray’s “Groundhog Day.” This endless cycle of rebirth plays on and on until we get it right, until we stop making Kamma and find release.

There are a lot of us in this world who behave like oxen, dragging a wagon full of woes behind us. And instead of unhitching ourselves from these carts, we spend our time throwing more shit onto someone else’s wagon. We protect our own wagons, having become fond of our woes, rather than abandoning them. I do the same thing. I want to stop. I want to help others stop.

I don’t know how to finish this post, so I’m just going to stop.

Teach your children well

A former colleague recently asked me to come up with an outline of how to teach the Four Noble Truths to children ages 4 to 14. It was going to be part of a presentation at his Unitarian Universalist congregation. I did a quick search for some online material, but was surprised at how scant the resources were when it came to teaching kids about Buddhism.

A monk once told me that in many Thai families, for example, the first thing parents teach their children is how to hold their hands when bowing. Then the parents move on to teaching the correct way to do the three bows before a Buddha image. Do they teach these prostrations and gestures because they are part of the rites and rituals of Buddhism?

Not really. While that does play a part, doing the bows and holding your hands correctly takes concentration. It requires that you pay attention to what you are doing. And rather than teach a very young child something as esoteric as cause and effect, Thai parents teach their children how to concentrate so they can do something correctly. Concentration is, after all, one of the three legs of Buddhism: Concentration, morality, wisdom.

I know there are others who despite their own Buddhist practice refuse to “indoctrinate” their children. Frankly, I find this attitude a bit self-serving. For most of us Buddhist converts, we came to Buddhism because we rejected our (most likely) Christian upbringing. The reason goes, I suppose, is that our children can “find” their own way just as we had. But this, to me, is a very flawed way of thinking.

For example, let’s consider all the people who accepted their Christian upbringing and continue practicing a Christian faith. Likely they did so because as children, their parents made sure they attended church, probably attended religion classes also because to truly know one’s faith, one ought to study its texts. And these children participated in many Christian rituals, no doubt – everything from saying grace at the dinner table to participating in activities at the church where the family attended.

The children accepted this and continued to hold on to their “religion” into adulthood.

We converts were undoubtedly raised this way as well, but along the way we began to question the doctrines and the practices. Supplied with unsatisfactory answers, we sought something else. For many of us, it was Buddhism. Now, ask yourself this: would you have found Buddhism if initially you hadn’t felt satisfied with your Christian upbringing? If you hadn’t been exposed to Christian practices within your family, would you have likely searched for something else? Maybe, maybe not.

The point I’m trying to make is that your childhood exposure to one religion prompted you to search for something else. However, let us not forget that a much larger group of people raised in similar circumstances found comfort and peace in the same religious practice as their parents and never developed a need to search elsewhere.

Yet, for some Buddhist converts, there is this odd desire to deny their children this same opportunity. Why not teach your child about Buddhism? Why not “indoctrinate” them? Teach and let go. If they accept your guidance, then they will be happy. And if they are unsatisfied, they will search for something else, just as you had. And maybe they will join an evangelical Christian church and be happy. Isn’t that what we want for our children, for them to be happy?

Some of you refuse to “force” your children to learn Buddhism and develop a practice because you don’t want to be like your parents who “forced” you to practice Christianity. But teaching your children Dhamma doesn’t need to be a “forced” activity.

The Buddha used the very common image of a mirror to teach his son Rahula when the boy was just 8 how important reflecting on our actions is to our welfare. Paying attention to what we do is critical to our Buddhist practice. And there are many ways to teach that to our children without “forcing” a doctrine on them. If you teach your children the cause and effect relationship between their actions and the outcomes those actions create, then you’re teaching them Buddhism.

One of the Five Recollections is: I am the owner of my kamma, born of my kamma, made of my kamma, related to my kamma, abide supported in my kamma…” Being related to your kamma is literally just that: your children are representations of the fruits of your kamma. They’re your children for a reason. Contemplate that during your next meditation session and see what bubbles up in your mind.

Anyway, below is what I came up with after finding this site. It’s very basic, but it’s a start. Feedback is welcomed.

Four Noble Truths for children

1. We aren’t happy all the time; there are times when we are sad, angry, frightened, or lonely.
2. We feel sad, angry, frightened or lonely mostly because we can’t get what we want, or we’re told to do something we don’t want to.
3. It’s our fault that we feel this way, and we can stop it when we learn how to want the right things.
4. The Buddha gave us Eight things to remember to help us learn how to want the right things and accept that life doesn’t always go the way we want it to.

The Buddha’s Noble Eightfold Path essentially tells us there are right ways to do things and wrong ways. Doing the right thing is much more than being moral. Doing the right thing brings us a happiness that causes us to feel at ease, unworried and unafraid of what may happen next. It’s a happiness that doesn’t go away. The Buddha compared this type of happiness to a person’s shadow: it’s always following you but you can’t tell it’s there unless you look at it.

Doing things the wrong way is what brings us those feelings we don’t like. If we say mean things, we’re going to make someone else angry, and what do most people do to someone who has made them angry? They get even, they do something to harm the other person. So it starts with us. We create our unhappiness, and this can cause us to feel hopeless, like we’re stuck dragging a heavy weight all the time. The Buddha described how our wrong actions create burdens by using a simile of an ox dragging a cart. The cart is heavy and burdensome. It’s as if with each wrong action we take, we are tossing another heavy rock into a wagon we are tugging along behind us. If we’d just stop putting heavy rocks in the wagon, it would be easier to pull.

I am related to my kamma

This week in the world of news we had two extraordinary events that are connected in what appear to be an abstruse manner. But with both Tiger Woods and Joseph Stack, we have two examples of decidedly different ways to handle personal responsibility, and an opportunity to examine the element of kamma in each.

Today, Tiger Woods spoke publicly, and in my opinion, eloquently about his extramarital affairs, and in doing so, gave us a pretty clear picture of how he was going to deal with the consequences of his actions.

Just the day before, we had quite a different event with a desperate and deluded man opting to destroy his own life while attempting to destroy the lives of others. Joseph Stack felt trapped; but did he set his own trap and walk willingly into it?

After every sitting meditation session, I recite two things: the Loving Kindness chant and the Five Recollections. Within the Five Recollections is this line: I am the owner of my kamma, born of my kamma, related to my kamma, abide support in my kamma – whatever kamma I do, skillful or unskillful, to that I fall heir.

The key element to this particular verse for the purpose of this post is the phrase, “I am … related to my kamma …”

When I first heard this, I asked my teacher what it meant. He said it literally means that the people you are related to are part of your kamma. The parents I had was not an accident, nor was it “fate” or random that I have the siblings that I do. And all the people I’ve had other types of relations with – friendly, professional, intimate, antagonistic – are connected to my kamma. These people are in my life because of past actions, either in this present life or from a previous life. And how I manage these relationships determines whether I am abandoning kamma or creating more.

Holy shit, I thought. That is some heavy duty stuff. I was stunned with the concept. Because if these people are in my life because of past kammic action, then how I deal with them right now determines my future kamma and my future life!

Hold on to that thought for a moment.

Joseph Stack was a troubled man; that is not too difficult for anyone to see. His despair must have been profound. Yet, when you read his manifesto, it becomes very clear that he accepted no personal responsibility for his actions. He quite plainly took significant time to justify in his mind what he intended to do (remember, kamma is based on intent): “I would only hope that by striking a nerve that stimulates the inevitable double standard, knee-jerk government reaction that results in more stupid draconian restrictions people wake up and begin to see the pompous political thugs and their mindless minions for what they are. Sadly, though I spent my entire life trying to believe it wasn’t so, but violence not only is the answer, it is the only answer.”

What a desperate and deluded mind to reach such an ominous conclusion. And we learned that it wasn’t just the people in that building in Austin who were being targeted by his delusion. Prior to his fateful flight, the night before, he had a terrible argument with his wife, who fled with their daughter to spend the night elsewhere. Thank goodness for that. For the next day, Stack set fire to his home before he fled to attempt mass murder.

Now think about that phrase, “I am … related to my kamma …” Think of all the people Stack has pulled into his kammic universe. They will be back, whether he is reborn human or animal, these people will be back.

Now let us consider Tiger Woods. Did you watch his statement? I did, and while listening to him speak, even before he began talking about his Buddhist faith, I recalled the Buddha’s teaching to his son Rahula.

“Rahula, it’s like a royal elephant: immense, pedigreed, accustomed to battles, its tusks like chariot poles. Having gone into battle, it uses its forefeet & hindfeet, its forequarters & hindquarters, its head & ears & tusks & tail, but keeps protecting its trunk. The elephant trainer notices that and thinks, ‘This royal elephant has not given up its life to the king.’ But when the royal elephant... having gone into battle, uses its forefeet & hindfeet, its forequarters & hindquarters, its head & ears & tusks & tail & his trunk, the trainer notices that and thinks, ‘This royal elephant has given up its life to the king. There is nothing it will not do.’

“In the same way, Rahula, when anyone feels no shame in telling a deliberate lie, there is no evil, I tell you, he will not do. Thus, Rahula, you should train yourself, ‘I will not tell a deliberate lie even in jest.’”

While I listened to Woods speak, I saw a royal elephant. Granted, he completely messed things up with his wife and children, but you could tell he recognized that. He took complete and unequivocal responsibility for his own actions. He owned them. And he admitted that simply saying he was sorry wouldn’t change anything. He had to change. And by recognizing this, he has the opportunity in this life to diminish the kamma he has created.

Appamadavagga: Heedfulness

Things were pretty simple and straight-forward in the verses found within “The Pairs,” the first chapter of the Dhammapada. The idea that we own our outcomes is laid out pretty clearly, and with language that allows lay people to immediately grasp the lesson.

But chapter 2 of the Dhammapada – Appamadavagga: Heedfulness – comes off as a bit more esoteric. The message appears to be more directed toward the monastic community, with less overt applicability for lay people. And it’s structured around a pair of terms that may appear easy enough to understand, but which nonetheless retain some ambiguity: heedfulness and heedlessness.

The Buddha made a big deal out of “heedfulness.” In fact, I think it is safe for me to presume that no one, lay person or monastic, can progress along the path without being heedful. In the Anguttara Nikaya Book of Tens, there is the Appamada Sutta where the Buddha outlines ten examples of the importance of heedfulness. Each of these examples concludes with: “In the same way, all skillful qualities are rooted in heedfulness, converge in heedfulness, and heedfulness is reckoned the foremost among them.”

What’s nice about the Appamada Sutta is that the examples the Buddha outlines to emphasize the supremacy of heedfulness come from facets of everyday life; it is a lesson for lay people using real life language lay people can understand.

But if that isn’t clear enough for you, take a look at the Upajjhatthana Sutta, which starts off with this: “There are these five facts that one should reflect on often, whether one is a woman or a man, lay or ordained. Which five?” The five facts the Buddha outlines are the Five Recollections, also known as the Five Remembrances. These five facts the Buddha presents are central to anyone’s practice – lay person, monastic, rich or poor. And through contemplation of these five facts, we develop a keener awareness of the results of our actions through a deeper understanding of these five basic facts of our existence. Out of this practice, out of this contemplation, arises this quality the Buddha called heedfulness. Hence, being heedful of something is more than just paying attention to it, more than just noticing it or acknowledging it: Heedfulness means you are aware of it, and upon awareness you pay attention to it, and from paying attention to it, you allow it to motivate you into skillful action.

I can be aware of all the traffic in the street, but I am only heedful of that traffic when I use that awareness to wait for a pause in traffic that will allow me to cross the street without being struck by a car.

There is something very powerful in the first verse of the Appamadavagga, and that is the notion that people who pay no heed to what is occurring around them, let alone what they do, are like the walking dead.

“Heedfulness: the path to the Deathless.
Heedlessness: the path to death.
The heedful do not die.
The heedless are as if
already dead.”

That verse alone is worth repeating to yourself everyday before and after you meditate. And not inside your head; say it out loud.

Verse 25 acknowledges that this takes effort, but the effort is rewarded.

“Through initiative, heedfulness,
restraint, & self-control,
the wise would make
an island
no flood
can submerge.”

Through initiative and being heedful, we can develop the skills to keep ourselves from being distracted and distraught by all the crap that goes on around us. We are, then, like an island that will not be flooded over by this wave of chaos called the world around us. But some may read into verse 28 a sense of condescension, and perhaps even indifference:

“When the wise person drives out
heedlessness
with heedfulness,
having climbed the high tower
of discernment,
sorrow-free,
he observes the sorrowing crowd —
as the enlightened man,
having scaled
a summit,
the fools on the ground below.”

There are people may read this to exemplify what some already think about those of us who follow the Theravada vehicle, and that is we are selfish and self-centered, that we would prefer to retreat from the world rather than engage within it. But this notion, to me, is another example of, as the rock band Aerosmith put it, “talk with yourself and you'll hear what you wanna know.” Let’s not forget that the next line in the song is, “gotta rise above cause below it’s only getting’ worse.”

The metaphor of the lotus flower rising out of the pits of a cesspool or swamp is instructive here, because the beauty of the lotus flower contrasted against the filth around it is what brings our attention to it. And when I encounter someone who seems to be unflustered by the world around them, someone who can move with ease within it, he or she will attract my attention. And who knows? Perhaps it will embolden me to ask, “How are you able to do that?”

The Five Recollections

As I mentioned in my previous post, I had read an item by Jack Daw at his blog Sweep the Dust Push the Dirt that reminded me of something that had been missing from my daily practice: reciting the Five Remembrances.

The Five Remembrances are:

1. I am of the nature to decay; I have not got beyond decay.
2. I am of the nature to be diseased; I have not got beyond disease.
3. I am of the nature to die; I have not got beyond death.
4. All that is mine, beloved and pleasing, will change and vanish.
5. I am the owner of my kamma, heir to my kamma, born of my kamma, related to my kamma, abide supported by my kamma; whatever kamma I shall do, whether good or evil, of that I shall be the heir.

To assist me in making these Five Remembrances concrete for my simple mind, I have arranged a few items on the shelf that I face while I meditate. My practice includes reciting these Five Remembrances aloud so that they penetrate my thick head to remind me that all of the things I don’t like or want to think about are going to happen to me regardless. Ergo, if I recognize these five items as being real and happening to me right now in this moment, it can energize my mental focus and bring Right Effort into my daily activities.

I am of the nature to decay: I have not got beyond decay.

At the heart of this is the fact that I grow old. I am growing old. I am not staying the same. That’s why I have the photo on the right, which is a picture of me from the second grade. It’s to remind me I’m not that person any more. And moment by moment, I am constantly becoming a new individual. It also reminds me that my body is always changing. I can’t eat and drink like I did when I was 35 and still stay a dashingly slim 185 pounds. I can’t climb mountains like I used to, as I have arthritis in my right ankle. Oh wait, that’s number two.

I am of the nature to be diseased; I have not got beyond disease.

Because I live in this bag of bones, I am subject to tiny little creatures called viruses and bacteria that make me feel like hell from time to time. And in general, time takes its toll as well. So yes, my shoulder aches, my ankle gets puffy, I can swim two-thirds of a mile in about 30 minutes, but that’s the best I can get this old heap to do nowadays.

I am of the nature to die; I have not got beyond death.

Lots of folk say so-and-so died of cancer, or died of old age, or died from a heart attack, or died from a broken heart. Doesn’t matter, we are all going to die. And it’s birth that kills us. It just might take a while. Now, this may sound really depressing. Maudlin even. But that’s just an excuse for not paying attention to it. And as a result, we end up living carelessly. Death waits for no one. It is what unites all life. Don Juan used to tell this to Carlos Casteneda – death makes all forms of life equal.

All that is mine, beloved and pleasing, will change and vanish.

Oh, how true, how true. This is the toughest. Whether it’s your spouse, a partner, a parent, a brother, a sister, a son, a daughter, a mother, a father, a friend … everyone changes, everyone dies, or things change. A young parent might delight in their new child, laugh and play with them, but then becomes shocked when that child becomes a teenager and no longer has the same interests or desire to be with a parent. And the parent becomes hurt. Why? Because this inevitable change was not anticipated. Key word there: anticipate. It’s different from expecting something to happen. To anticipate means that you not only expect the event, but are prepared for it. It can also mean you took steps to avoid that uncomfortable future.

I am the owner of my kamma, heir to my kamma, born of my kamma, related to my kamma, abide supported by my kamma; whatever kamma I shall do, whether good or evil, of that I shall be the heir.

It all belongs to me. The parents I had was kamma; the fact I am gay is kamma; the fact that I am male is kamma. That doesn’t mean it’s bad or good kamma, it’s just kamma. And as long as I am clear on this, I can recognize that what is done is done. What counts now is the moment, because out of this very moment arises my future. If I screw up now, I am screwing with my future. Which is why I really like the last line on side 2 of “Abbey Road.”

“And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.”

Death as a teacher

Jack Daw over at Sweep the Dust, Push the Dirt, always has great posts, but lately he’s written a couple that have really sparked my thoughts, prompting me to share my own experiences on these topics. His post regarding death really struck a chord with me. In particular, his mention of the Five Remembrances, which I know as the Five Recollections, prompted me to resume something that had been missing from my meditative practice for quite some time.

Contemplating death ought to be an important part of anyone’s Buddhist practice, but as Jack points out, it’s a subject often treated superficially, if it gets any attention at all. Yet our serious contemplation on this subject can be transformative, as indicated by this passage, taken from Ten Dhamma Talks by Sister Ayya Khema:

“If we really believe in our impending death, not just use the words, our attitude towards people and situations changes completely. We are no longer the same person then. The one we have been until now hasn’t brought us complete satisfaction, contentment and peacefulness … If we were to remember each morning that death is certain, but now have another day to live, gratitude and determination can arise to do something useful with that day.”

Let me take the risk of boring all of you with my personal journey with death. Fair warning, I’m afraid this is going to be a long post. But death has been one of my teachers for a long time, despite the fact I was, for the most part, completely oblivious to its lessons.

It was either Flag Day or Independence Day in 1968 when I awoke at home completely alone. It unnerved me a bit, as I was only 9 years old, that I could wake to an empty house like that. I don’t have a clear memory of how the news was eventually delivered to me, but I learned later that day that my father had a heart attack while he was putting the flag up on our front porch. He was in the hospital in something called intensive care. That was it, that’s all anyone told me. And for years I had no idea what a heart attack was, or that my father had a very close brush with death.

Fast forward to 1972 when I was 14. I was out riding my motorcycle around a lake where my parents were building their retirement home when I came upon a scene of people watching a rescue crew pull a body from the water. I watched and listened, gathering enough information to learn that a man was water skiing in an area of the lake that he shouldn’t have been, because when he fell, he struck his head on a stump in the water. It was the first dead body I had ever seen, yet my reaction to seeing the corpse was barely discernable. I didn’t know who this man was; but there it was – death.

I’m pretty sure it was that same summer when I begrudgingly helped my father and a brother-in-law dig trenches around what was to be our new home near the lake to bury Styrofoam around the foundation to increase the house’s energy efficiency. I hated doing this laborious work and wanted to be doing anything but that. My utter uselessness led to my father’s frustration and he angrily told me to get the hell out of there and do whatever I damn pleased. I did and went off riding my motorcycle. When I returned later in the afternoon, dad was lying in bed. Mom told me that he had angina; again, no real explanation of what that meant. But I remember quietly walking down the hall to peak into their bedroom to see him lying on the bed, resting. At that moment, I finally understood what a heart attack was.

An interesting aside: My father was born in 1910 when Halley’s Comet passed by the Earth. He died in 1986 when Halley’s Comet last passed by the Earth. It was a heart attack that killed him.
My father, I slowly learned, was a very compassionate man. We had Siamese cats, two of them. They both caught feline leukemia. When the first was so sick it was beyond help, he placed it into a large hat box, which he took out to the edge of the woods by our house where he would shoot it with my .22 rifle. But he couldn’t bear to see the animal as he shot it, so he left the lid on the box. Of course, he missed making a fatal shot. Up in the house as I watched out the window, I could hear the cat’s shrieking and reflexive thumping against the side of the hat box as my father fumbled with the rifle, a single-shot bolt action weapon, as he tried as quickly as possible to insert another bullet. When he successfully managed that, he pushed the lid off the box and fired point-blank.

When the next cat became so ill that death was inevitable, he and I together did things differently. He was a biology teacher. We went to his classroom and picked up a plastic funnel, a large wad of cotton, and a bottle of ether. We soaked the cotton with the ether, put the cotton into the funnel then placed the funnel over the cat’s head. It was so weak it just lied there. Slowly, quietly, it died.

I didn’t “come out” to my family until I was 35 years old, and the first person I told was my mother. I was quite fearful of her reaction as the Catholic Church was her life and we all know how accommodating the Catholic doctrine is of homosexuality. I had been away from home for a very long time and did not know that the priest in her parish at that time had brought a very positive message to the congregation about gays and, most importantly, AIDS. She showed me an article about the priest that mentioned another man named Mark who was living with AIDS. The writer quoted Mark as saying that he lived in a remote area and sometimes needed help with simple things like housekeeping or getting to the doctor. I decided to give Mark a call and offer my help.

I could tell Mark was suspicious of my intentions when I called him, but he agreed to meet me at his uncle’s house, as he did not want me to know where he lived yet. When we met, he revealed that he knew who I was, that he remembered me because we went to high school together. He was a year ahead of me, and we had never associated with each other, so I had no recollection of him. We became friends and I would visit him from time to time to watch movies and call him more frequently to chat.

One night I gave him a call to see how he was doing. When he answered, I could hear he was weak, his voice distant and faint. He told me he was having a bout of fever. I asked if he needed anything, but he didn’t reply. All I could hear was his wheezy, raspy breathing. I told him I was on my way over. It was about a 20 mile drive. When I arrived he appeared to feel better than he sounded on the phone. As long as I was there, he suggested, why don’t we watch a movie? During the movie the fever returned; I could hear his raspy and labored breathing. I moved from my chair to the couch where he lay, sat so he could lay against me and I put my arms around his chest. We sat like that and watched the rest of the movie.

It was very late when I left. He later told me that the following day he drove himself four hours to the V.A. hospital in Ann Arbor (he was ex-Navy, honorable discharge) where he was treated for PCP, a rare form of pneumonia that was a common killer among AIDS patients. A year later, he drove by himself from Michigan to San Francisco where he died a few months later.

At that time, I think every gay man thought about how he may die. We all, I think, wondered what we would do, how we would behave, when we received that information that many of us believed to be inevitable – that we have AIDS and were going to die. Getting the results for every HIV test I had was always a time when I had to face my mortality. And every time I wondered what I would do, how I would feel, should I learn I was positive. I’ve been fortunate when so many others have not.

And so when I came to Buddhism, my teacher impressed upon me how important recognizing the inevitability of death was, its utter certainty. And I realized how much I had already encountered death, and how I was continuing to encounter it. I just hadn’t always been paying attention.

My teacher talked about how monks would go to cemeteries in the middle of the night to meditate and contemplate death. I couldn’t do that, but interestingly, I had a book about homicide reporting – I was a police reporter for a newspaper at the time – that had all kinds of grisly photos of corpses in various states of decay. I didn’t like looking at those photos because my monkey mind always set an emotional trap for me, leading me to think about that “poor dead person,” how they “must have suffered at the hands of their killer.” But the point of meditating on death, my teacher emphasized, it to realize that our body is not who we are, it’s just a body. And the photos of decaying corpses and dismembered homicide victims in my book were not images of people – they’re just bodies.

I have a different attitude about death now than I did in the past. But there is still something very important for me to do that I haven’t done, and that is use death as an appropriate motivator. Death can be a useful tool to prompt us into action, to take the steps we know we ought to, but just haven’t gotten around to taking.

The notion that death waits for no one is a worthy one for contemplation.