Consciousness conundrum

Row, row, row your boat
Gently down the stream
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily
Life is but a dream.

Life is but a dream. This is one of the core teachings in Buddhist thought. Life is as a dream, an illusion that imitates reality. The truth of things is that each millisecond is different from the one that came before. No matter how minutely we subdivide time, we will still never find a segment that is identical to that which came before or that which comes after. And the only moment (or fraction thereof) in which we are truly living is this one.

Yet we live slathered in the illusion of solidity, in the dream of our moments being contiguous and change happening gradually, in the delusion that we are essentially the same persons until a crisis comes along to change us. Much of unhappiness can be laid at the door of this mistaken perception—we recall (or believe we do) a time when all was serene and perfect and if we can only recapture that time.... Or perhaps we have not experienced such an event, but have seen it in others, or in the reality-bending delusion machines of literature, television, and movies, wherein people live simple lives (bad or good) and resolution occurs on schedule. We crave such certainty and grieve that we cannot achieve it. When, in fact, it is not achievable. The illusion of certainty is an inherently uncertain world means that the more certain we are of anything, the more deluded.

The irony here is that only that which makes us uniquely human stands in the way of our enlightenment, yet only that which makes us uniquely human makes enlightenment possible at all. And this uniquely human trait is that of consciousness, of having the self-awareness to realize that such a thing as enlightenment exists, is desirable, and a path exists to achieve it. Yet all of this self-aware thought is precisely what causes us to seek for fulfillment in all the wrong places. Nearly all of us spend our lives in this puzzling state and die ungratified and confused.

But there is good news. First of all, for most of us enlightenment occurs gradually. Yes, there are all those delightful stories of someone hearing the teachings, the light dawns, and suddenly an Arhat stands where a mere mortal was a moment ago. But these are meant to inspire us, not show us how it's done. Every day, in every moment, we can reach for either surrender or resistance. The choice is ours. The first leads to peace. The second leads to suffering. It is not more complicated than that unless we choose to make it so.

Norman Fischer (in "Training In Compassion") has this to say:

If you and everyone else you know are unfathomable, then why do you persist in imagining that you know who you and everyone else are and, based on these fixed ideas, that you can predict your behavior and that of others? Freshness and openness and a capacity for surprise are hallmarks of mind training, which is one reason why it is so much fun....We view with bemused curiosity our various responses and habits, even when it is clear that they are not too wholesome or even sane. [We must] cultivate beginner's mind in relation to ourselves and our own experiences. To stop being such an expert on ourselves.

In other words, lighten up. Life is but a dream. But few things are more wonderful than floating gently down the stream of life. There is joy there, even in the midst of sorrow. Oh, yes, there is.

Expectations

A confession: until recently I wasn't sitting in meditation very often. Since I was promoted, I have been spending much longer hours at work and what got sacrificed (for a while) was meditation. These things happen in the life of someone devoted to this practice, so it doesn't concern me much. At the beginning of this month I committed myself to sitting every day, went back to the habits I had until not that long ago.

Here's the thing, though: when I began sitting again, one of the reasons I did so was to seek a feeling of ease. This is what's known as a rookie mistake. I should know better. Why? Because one of the surest ways to make a mash of meditation is to place expectations on it. Meditation is only truly effective if I drop all hope for an outcome and relax into the experience of it. This was the central message the Buddha had to impart: it is not circumstances that cause us to suffer, but the idea that somehow things should be other than they are. I took up meditation again for all the right reasons and a couple of wrong ones.

And I found myself falling into the same trap that most beginning (and many experienced) meditators fall into: the belief that because I did not feel immediate relief, it was the meditation that was failing me and not my expectations that set me up for a false feeling of failure.

I have the great good fortune, though, to have studied enough of the Dharma and to have had wonderful teachers. So I know that this is irresponsible nonsense. It is true that meditation leads to a sense of freedom and greater happiness, but it is a process, not a recipe. And it only comes to pass when all hope of achieving freedom or happiness or pretty much anything else have been abandoned. Because it is the abandoning itself that yields these fruits.

Big assignment, I know. That's one of the reasons retreats are so valuable. The wonderful thing about retreat is that it accelerates this process. The outcome is not permanent peace and serenity (though at the very end of a retreat—before you re-enter the real world—it can feel like it might). The outcome is that you have touched peace and serenity, so you know it is possible to get there. Then you never want to give up seeking it (by not seeking it at all—see, it's tricky!)

It sounds contradictory, I know. There is a certain kind of magical thinking in the world that truly believes good can come to us by wishing for it rather than working for it. Does that sound curmudgeonly? It's not, really. It is, as I said, the core of what the Buddha taught. There is no fairy godmother to make your dreams come true. Knocking on wood will not protect you from calamity. And meditation will only bring you desirable things if you pursue it without expectation and with the willingness to continue putting butt to cushion day in and day out even if what arises is unpleasant.

Think of it this way: jumping out an airplane can be a wonderful experience, but only in very narrowly defined circumstances. Doing so with the expectation of soaring on your own without equipment or preparation is unlikely to end well. Being thrown out, no matter how well-equipped you might be, will also likely end in disaster. But armed with information, a good teacher, and the requisite stuff, it might just be one of the most wonderful things you can do.

Reflecting on expectation this past month also caused me to take a look at the world and see what evil can be brought upon us by this dangerous force. There is an expectation of comfort, of plenty, of being able to impose your beliefs on others, of untouchability when one is in power. There is the expectation that we can continue to do as we do while the world heats up. That we can solve the world's problems with bombs and guns (ain't worked yet).

It's not that I don't understand the world is a complicated place; I know it is. I live in the midst of contradiction and competing goods that can't all be fulfilled. I work in an environment where the challenges facing everyone (not just clients) are complex and where there is not sufficient time, ever, to fufill the many demands placed upon us.

All the more reason to break down the corrosive concept of expectation. All the more reason to sit down at least once a day and let go of all that. All the more reason to surrender to the void, open our hearts, let ourselves soar. The world is not a hopeless place and we are not inherently destructive beings. But seeking to be always satisfied makes us into that. Let's not.