Words from the Heart, To the Heart

Today I would like to speak of something of great interest to so many of us, and it has to do with how profoundly intimate communication can take place. We so much want to connect with one another in a meaningful way, but the commonplace give-and-take of daily life usually leaves us lacking. We attend to an onrush of words from so many sources, yet we get very little sustaining nourishment from these words, which are typically given and received without passion or conviction. There is no fault-finding intended by saying this, only to point out that we do not often find ourselves in situations where the deepest aspect of another is touching the deepest part of us.

Somehow, through an extraordinary good fortune in my privileged life, I have come to know of something different from this. When I was a young lad of twenty-seven I first came to India, a place I found to be very exotic and mysterious—filled with myriad contradictions and incongruities. One evening I ended up almost by accident at a large gathering where a very highly respected spiritual teacher would be speaking. I had no real interest in such things, but I was sufficiently curious that I went nonetheless.

What happened next was beyond anything I had ever experienced before. This woman was speaking in Hindi, a language I did not understand at all, about ideas completely unfamiliar to me, in a context that I had never been in before, but yet when I got up from my seat at the end of her talk, I knew that everything she had said had gone right into my heart. Something had been communicated which would totally change my way of seeing the world, and yet I had not understood a single word. What is this?

I speak as a person who does not at all tend towards the spectacular or the fantastic, but this was my direct experience. A person spoke, and something remarkable was communicated that did not come from the words that were spoken. It was a direct transmission that allowed an essential intercommunication to be imparted directly and immediately through non-verbal means. Having had this experience, it made me wonder what it implies about the nature of all communication.

But the example I just gave may be so unfamiliar and unlikely for most people as to be unhelpful, so let us look instead at more viable instances in life where such communication can take place. Can one envision a bond between two people, totally relaxed with each other, easefully coming together in unconditional love and respect, where the words that were spoken came directly from the heart and are received devotedly in the heart?

Not demanding anything from one another, perfectly present in the here-and-now, speaking and listening from a place of not-knowing, completely freed from the cage of narrow notions of who one is or who the other is. Hearing everything as if for the first time, without goal or obstruction, open in a way that merges the space between the two.

For this to be so, what would be required? Well, nothing additional is required. There is no effort to make, no habits to be corrected, no attentiveness to be created or obligation to be fulfilled. It is simply a matter of allowing our moment-by-moment attention to be undistracted. We may have been trained in life to follow after all our thoughts and emotions and all our judgments and assessments, but instead, for short moments many times, over and over again we keep returning to our own natural intelligence that is open and vast.

We discover this place again and again and grow more and more confident that it is not distant from us. We sense to our delight that no one is a stranger and that every sound calls us back to that place. When the heart is at rest in this place of peace, then it is not distant from other hearts that are at rest. From this place of non-separation, the most intimate of heartfelt communication takes place.

The Marriage of Total Grief and Total Joy

We are told throughout our lives to believe that our emotions have power over us. We learn that if we are, for instance, sad or depressed or grief-stricken, then this emotion is solid and real and it has the capacity to rule us for as long as we are wrapped in it. We are also led to believe that two opposing emotions cannot coexist at the same time. So, say for instance, one could not possibly feel great sadness and great happiness at the same time, as those two solid and substantial states would necessarily crowd one another out.

I now know from my own direct experience that all of this is completely untrue.

Recently I was waiting to go up to speak to about seventy lovely friends, and five minutes before that talk was to begin, I was given the unexpected news that a dear friend, a lovely young person full of kindness and compassion, had died suddenly. For a moment I simply stood there in shock with my hands clasped over my face. The grief came pouring in and I was totally absorbed by it. I felt all the deepest feelings welling up, and I was about to break into tears. But I also recognized that I would need to be at rest with this flood of emotion, because I would be momentarily addressing people who had not yet heard the news and that this was not the proper time to inform them.

I recollected myself, stood quietly for a minute and let everything be as it is. I then went up front to the stage, trembling with emotion as I sat down in the chair in front of a sea of wondering faces. When it was my turn to speak, I had no idea what I would say. However, all of a sudden a vivid image came into my head: the lovely lupine flowers that we have beside the roadside in summer. I spoke of how when the lupines are picked and placed in a vase, they still have the life and intelligence to move towards to sun, separating themselves from one another to give each stem enough space to grow. I described how these flowers, like all the seasonal flowers, had a time of life and then they died. The metaphorical relationship between the flowers and what had happened with our young friend was very present for me, and I was engulfed by intense grief.

But then, as I just sat there and let the emotions wash over me, I could see that grief was not the only thing present, even if it was overwhelmingly present. Simultaneous to the grief and equally at hand was an awe-inspiring joy and gratitude. I could not say that the joy and gratitude was for anything in particular, but there it was in equal measure to the crushing grief.

How could this be? I was not in a position just then to figure it out, and thank goodness for that. Instead, I was in a very auspicious instant of total clarity, watching something quite extraordinary happen: two tremendous feelings that I had never experienced at one time together were totally and completed wedded to one another in that precious moment.

We completed the talk, and I think that it is fair to say that I came off that stage a different person from the one who went up to it. I had seen, in my own direct experience, that the names for emotions don’t matter. Whatever description we give to things, it is all one incredibly beneficial energy flowing in a marvelous and miraculous way. Once this is seen, then it is also seen that there is nothing to be avoided and nothing to be afraid of. Life in all its glory is ever-present in the here and now, and it is only our descriptions that distract us from that gift.

I am reminded of an ancient teaching which I will paraphrase here: Wisdom is not difficult for those who have no preferences. When love and hate are both absent, everything becomes clear and undisguised. Make the smallest distinction, however, and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart. If we wish to see the truth, then hold no opinions for or against anything. To set up what you like against what you dislike is merely the play of the mind. When the deep meaning of things is not understood, the mind’s essential peace is disturbed to no avail. Be serene in the oneness of things, and such erroneous views will disappear by themselves. With a single stroke we are freed from bondage.

The Teacher, Sometimes Appearing in the Form of a Person

There are those rare occasions in our lives when we are simply overwhelmed by something—an inspiring personality, a captivating phrase, song or speech, an insight that catapults us into another level of understanding—and we are lifted out of the merely familiar into an unanticipated realm of great joy, passion and vision.

This summer, in a retreat in which I was a participant, I was transported beyond my usual way of understanding things by a short quotation in a text that went something like this: “The teacher, sometimes appearing in the form of a person, is pure beneficial energy bestowing empowerment. There is a great treasury of inexhaustible benefit brought to life in the visible form of a teacher. The teacher is completely devoted to the student; the teacher is the ultimate friend, a guide to a realm of treasure which is available to all beings.”

There are many, many things to be said about this short quote, but I want to focus my attention on this one phrase: “the teacher, sometimes appearing as a person.” There are multitudes of teachings in those seven words. The first thing I can see is that EVERYTHING is a teacher. Every thought, emotion, sensation, experience, every sound, image, touch, taste, sense, every pleasure and every pain is a teacher.

I just have to repeat this, not just for those of you who are reading this but for me who is writing this: EVERYTHING is a teacher. That one recognition completely and totally changes our relationship to our experience. All of existence is summoning us in each moment. We are entirely flooded with the whole of universal experience in each here-and-now. So, what need is there to “be in the moment” or “be mindful” or “come back to our true self”?

“The teacher, sometimes appearing as a person” also points us to our own power. We do not need to give up the autonomy of our own experience to some authority figure; there is no powerful person who is going to make things all right for us; there is no guru sitting there who holds the knowledge and power we will never possess. Being as we are an integral part of this “everything,” we are ourselves the teacher sometimes appearing as a person.

Yet, at the same time, I do not want to forget the great gift of a visible teacher who appears, one who is the ultimate guide and friend, a person whose sole interest is our greatest benefit. The devotion that comes from such a relationship is unimaginably beautiful. There is only the purest of motivation for both teacher and student, and from that purity the greatest benevolence flows. How glorious it is to contemplate the possibility of “a treasury of inexhaustible benefit brought to life.” Wow, count me in! A friendship filled with devotion and care and service to all—where do I sign up!

And finally, what a joy to consider the boon that is this moment, right now. All the instruction that is needed is being provided, right now. This one recognition is life-transforming. The universal intelligence that fills every bit of space is ever available and accessible. We just open our eyes.

What Does "Reading" Really Mean?

The name of this blog is "Read, Relax, Recognize," and as I begin the series of posts that will follow, it will be helpful to look at each of those three terms to see what they really mean.
For instance, what does the word "read" actually mean? The first and most obvious assumption is that it is what we do with the printed word. Most of us read every day, whether it is email, web articles, books, instructions on food packaging, advertising and countless other things. It seems so fundamental and natural for us to be able to look at a page and know what is being communicated.
A key element that might not be so obvious is the fact that the words are actually a sort of code which we have the ability to discern. We did not have that coding ability when we were small children, and if the words are in an unfamiliar foreign language, we won't be able to get the meaning. One could say that the key element in the interaction with words is not merely seeing them or hearing them, but being able to truly decode them.
A lack of understanding might come not only from not being able to decode and understand the language, but from not WANTING to understand. A racist who reads information that contradicts his prejudices will certainly understand the words, but he simply will not be able to process and assimilate the meaning because of his resistance to what the words point to.
Lack of understanding can also occur because of lack of attention. If we are not alert or are disinterested in what is being communicated, then communication and understanding will not take place.
Reading is not limited to man-made language. A person who is very familiar with the natural surroundings can read the natural signs: how will the weather change, when is it the right time to plant a crop, is this a place animals would come to feed, is this a plant that can be used as a medicine, and so on. It is an art that has almost totally disappeared in the modern world, but it is nonetheless a form of reading.

Now I come to the most significant interpretation of the word "reading." We are living a life filled with a profusion of experiences that are difficult to understand. A loved one dies, we get a severe illness, nations go to war, children starve....One day we are hopeful that we can find a solution, but the next day we fully despair. We seem to be under assault by things we cannot understand and for which we have no solution. We may end up just blocking it out in boredom, apathy, distraction and medication, but the flow of life is unrelenting.
Am I now going to give you a gimmicky solution to this age-old dilemma? No, thankfully not! But what I will say is that the response to this challenge has a lot to do with reading. Can we understand what the flow of life is bringing us if we are totally distracted by our thoughts and emotions about the experiences? Can we be discerning and clear if our minds are totally unclear? That is, can we "read" our experience fully if we are confused about the language?
Well, okay, fine, but how do we have a clear view; how do we find peace when our minds are constantly raging? In a very simple way, we take a stand, we make a choice....we refuse to be distracted. We do that in each moment of our experience, and we keep coming back to that place of non-distraction and rest over and over and over again, rather than being carried along by the distraction. We remain clear, unmoved, alert and aware in each moment, regardless of what storms swirl around us.
We can do this for short moments, over and over again, and like a baby taking little steps, falling and getting up to take more baby steps, we become confident in our capacity to remain alert and clear in each moment.
So, dear friends, the reading that we are doing in this case is the utmost reading we can do: skillfully discerning what is important and what is not....reading the signs, as it were. When we see that our thoughts and emotions don't need to control us, we can read without distraction. And it begins with short moments, many times, until it becomes spontaneous.