There is a fierceness in this practice that must have its due, what the Shambhala tradition calls the Lion's Roar. If we approach all this letting go and relaxing into the present with passivity, we may achieve a state of relaxation or a gentle questioning of the status quo, but never move one inch closer to true freedom.
When the Buddha sat under his famous bodhi tree and determined not to rise until he found the truth of his existence, he was in dire earnest. He meant to never rise again, to die and rot and blow away to dust rather than rise without an answer. This is our model. Granted, like Jesus dying on a cross, the courage of the Master is at the extreme end of commitment to the truth. We are not to expect ourselves to go quite that far. But the exemplar is one of extreme courage and dedication to the best of our individual ability.
Pema Chödrön says that if we knew what benefit could derive from our practice, we would do so "as if our hair were on fire". Yes, yes, there is plenty to be gained from a passive dedication to the cushion and a half-hearted study of the Buddha's words, but these practices reach an inevitable stopping point where they have borne all the fruit they can. Most of us stop there. We feel more serene. We are kinder. We think before we speak. We seek peace in the world around us. There is nothing wrong with this, of course, but it will eventually seem like too little benefit for so much work and we will drift away or else stay in this place and accept that this is all we can derive from the practice and the teachings of the Buddha. But this is not the truth.
We must begin by acknowledging that our perceptions are wrong by their very nature as perceptions. These deeply filtered impressions of the world bear the same relationship to reality as, say, Soviet art does to art, and for the same reason: they are filtered through an autocratic, paranoid, fabulist, overbearing maze of censorship, protectionism and power hunger, in this case the dictatorship of the ego. Reality, which is the only source of lasting joy, is the proletariat and our own fear the KGB. Is this rhetoric excessive? Far from it. What is required here is a fierceness, the same fierceness the Buddha demonstrated when he sat under that tree, a stripping away of all delusion and a dedication to seeing what is for what it is and neither more nor less than that.
In the light of our everyday lives this sounds impossible. If we are easily defeated by such thinking, we may throw up our hands and say that it can't be done or we are not worthy of the task. But the most important understanding we can have is that any effort we make in the direction of awakening is of value. We need not do this all at once; we need not do it at all. But the very realization that it is possible, that it is accessible to each of us at any time, is what matters most. It is not as if we have to scale a mountain all in one go. In fact, it's not much at all like scaling a mountain. This task is more akin to leveling a mountain; it is a great task that can be done as quickly or as slowly as we have the energy to take it on. Given many lifetimes, a mountain could be leveled with a soup spoon. But the Buddha has given us picks and shovels. If we dedicate ourselves to the practice and study of this discipline, he has even given us backhoes and earth movers. And he has promised us the dynamite of moments of enlightenment if we continue trudging the path.
So you can see where this fierceness comes in handy. It is a faith that says, "I will go out today with my soup spoon even if I might not see this mountain leveled in my lifetime. I will do so because I know that the closer I get to level ground, the closer I am to being free. I do not have to take it all down in a day to benefit from the increased freedom I achieve by being even a foot closer to sea level. At the same time I know that, through the practice of kindness, love, harmony, patience, compassion, friendliness, openness, peace, equanimity, sympathetic joy and grace I am making the mountains of others easier to bear." This is, if you will, a patient fierceness, that does not judge or reprove, but goes about the task with dedication and determination, that knows that herein lies the truth.
When the Buddha sat under his famous bodhi tree and determined not to rise until he found the truth of his existence, he was in dire earnest. He meant to never rise again, to die and rot and blow away to dust rather than rise without an answer. This is our model. Granted, like Jesus dying on a cross, the courage of the Master is at the extreme end of commitment to the truth. We are not to expect ourselves to go quite that far. But the exemplar is one of extreme courage and dedication to the best of our individual ability.
Pema Chödrön says that if we knew what benefit could derive from our practice, we would do so "as if our hair were on fire". Yes, yes, there is plenty to be gained from a passive dedication to the cushion and a half-hearted study of the Buddha's words, but these practices reach an inevitable stopping point where they have borne all the fruit they can. Most of us stop there. We feel more serene. We are kinder. We think before we speak. We seek peace in the world around us. There is nothing wrong with this, of course, but it will eventually seem like too little benefit for so much work and we will drift away or else stay in this place and accept that this is all we can derive from the practice and the teachings of the Buddha. But this is not the truth.
We must begin by acknowledging that our perceptions are wrong by their very nature as perceptions. These deeply filtered impressions of the world bear the same relationship to reality as, say, Soviet art does to art, and for the same reason: they are filtered through an autocratic, paranoid, fabulist, overbearing maze of censorship, protectionism and power hunger, in this case the dictatorship of the ego. Reality, which is the only source of lasting joy, is the proletariat and our own fear the KGB. Is this rhetoric excessive? Far from it. What is required here is a fierceness, the same fierceness the Buddha demonstrated when he sat under that tree, a stripping away of all delusion and a dedication to seeing what is for what it is and neither more nor less than that.
In the light of our everyday lives this sounds impossible. If we are easily defeated by such thinking, we may throw up our hands and say that it can't be done or we are not worthy of the task. But the most important understanding we can have is that any effort we make in the direction of awakening is of value. We need not do this all at once; we need not do it at all. But the very realization that it is possible, that it is accessible to each of us at any time, is what matters most. It is not as if we have to scale a mountain all in one go. In fact, it's not much at all like scaling a mountain. This task is more akin to leveling a mountain; it is a great task that can be done as quickly or as slowly as we have the energy to take it on. Given many lifetimes, a mountain could be leveled with a soup spoon. But the Buddha has given us picks and shovels. If we dedicate ourselves to the practice and study of this discipline, he has even given us backhoes and earth movers. And he has promised us the dynamite of moments of enlightenment if we continue trudging the path.
So you can see where this fierceness comes in handy. It is a faith that says, "I will go out today with my soup spoon even if I might not see this mountain leveled in my lifetime. I will do so because I know that the closer I get to level ground, the closer I am to being free. I do not have to take it all down in a day to benefit from the increased freedom I achieve by being even a foot closer to sea level. At the same time I know that, through the practice of kindness, love, harmony, patience, compassion, friendliness, openness, peace, equanimity, sympathetic joy and grace I am making the mountains of others easier to bear." This is, if you will, a patient fierceness, that does not judge or reprove, but goes about the task with dedication and determination, that knows that herein lies the truth.
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