Huge Steps on the Path

I attended a weekend retreat at our Buddhist Center with Khentrul Rinpoche. First of all, let me just say what an amazing man he is. I had a chance to meet him on Wednesday night first when he sat with our group. I was immediately struck by his innocent yet powerful and strong demeanor.

He is from Tibet and is the abbot of a monastery of 400 monks and 100 children that he also takes care of. Just an amazing man.

The retreat was mainly a two day teaching on the two main types of meditation. I got so much out of it.

The best part of the weekend was after the retreat was over and I, along with a dozen other people, took the Buddhist Vows of Refuge, which is basically a committment to the Buddhist path. It was a very moving ceremony for me. We were each given a new name as well by Rinpoche. Mine is amazing and beautiful to me but I feel like keeping it to myself for know.

After the Vows of Refuge, I was also honored to be given the Red Tara Empowerment in another even longer ceremony; again with the same people. I really have no words to describe that at all. I just know that I came away knowing that I was directly connected to a long and powerful lineage of blessing and knowledge.

After both were over, I took my khata up to Rinpoche to as an offering. He blessed it and then put it over my head and around my neck. When he was finished with that, he cupped my face in both of his hands and just gave me the biggest smile that I will never forget. It was like I was looking into eyes that had known me forever and that were telling me that everything was going to be good and that he was giving me unconditional love to take with me.

Just such a beautiful weekend.

I have added links to explain the Refuge and Empowerment Ceremonies.

 

The Quiet Before Sunrise

While I meditate in the quiet before sunrise.
I hear the click of my prayers beads.
The heater moves the air and the candle flames like the breath of Tara.
The candles cast moving shadows on my shrine making the Buddhas dance.

While I meditate in the quiet before sunrise.
The slow inhale and exhale of my sleeping dog quiets my mind.
The creaks of the house tell me to return to my breath.
The rooster crowing and the first bird songs are the voice of Tara reminding me to let go of my attachment to unfocused thought.

While I meditate in the quiet before sunrise.
I dedicate my practice as the sun comes over the trees.
The first rays of sunlight touching my face are the rainbow light of the Buddhas.
They reflect off of me and back to them and out to the world.

While I meditate in the quiet before sunrise.
May all beings benefit.

dedicated to my teacher

 

Sitting by Candlelight and my Buddhist Boxer

I actually got up in time this morning to be able to sit without feeling like I should be upstairs working. It was nice to be up before sunrise. I thought it would be a good idea to not turn on the light and just meditate by candle light.

All in all wasn’t a bad idea, I have gone through the Red Tara practice enough to have at least everything up to the prayer and mantra, both needing 108 repetitions, down without having the text open in front of me. By the time I got through that, the sun was working it’s way up.

I think I will have the light on most of the time though. I was taught to meditate with my eyes open specifically to get used to the light when we are working with my mind. It is supposed to prepare me for what I will see at death so I won’t be afraid of it and therefore miss out on doing the right thing.

I’m learning that is why we used visualization so much in Vajrayana Buddhism so we get used to seeing the Buddhas, or at least Red Tara in the lineage I am learning, guiding us through death to our next life or if all goes right not to rebirth but to the enlightened mind that we are all a part of.

Lately is has been harder to quiet my mind when I actually get to the meditation part of my practice. It’s a lot of work! Some thoughts are stickier than others (thanks to Pema Chodron for that term), and I get caught up in the storyline for what seems like forever. Then it’s back to the breath to snap me out of it so I can move on to what I may be working on at the time.

Rocky is always with me for the 90 minutes or so I spend sitting. I think he likes the peacefulness of it all. He watches every move I make until I actually start meditating and then he goes to sleep. I keep saying that he is my little Buddhist Boxer. Tibetan Buddhists believe that a well-loved and taken care of dog will be reborn as human and I can totally believe that. My teacher thinks it’s really good from him to hear Red Tara mantra; she believes I am helping him develop good karma since he can’t really do much for himself.

The funny thing is if he doesn’t come in when I first go into my meditation room, he comes running in when he hears me ring the tingsha (small cymbals on a leather cord) to start my practice.

He’s just cool that way.

I am working on learning a meditation for loving kindness and rejoicing. It seems like my mind goes off on its own even more with this one. I’ll have to keep checking into that.

 

Buddhist Beginnings – How I Found Tara or How She Found Me.

I was asked by a couple of my blog buddies to post some stuff about my Buddhist Practice. My only caveat with doing that is that I am by no means an expert or a teacher so therefore don’t take anything I say as the absolute correct way to do things. I wouldn’t want to mislead someone at all. I will just be posting about what my experiences are and what I do in my daily practice.  I am really just finding my way along with the help of a great group of friends that are a little further along than I am and also with the guidance of my amazing teacher who I love.

OK – So now I can feel better about talking about it.

Let’s talk about how I got here. Back in my Christian days, this would have been called my “testimony”. <cue music, speaking in tongues, raising of hands…etc>

My first intro to Buddhism was through my friend Tonya. I met her about 10 years or so ago. She worked at Sam Goody when I was a Suncoast manager and since we were run by the same company, we had quite a bit of interaction. I immediately felt a connection to her and thought she was way cool. She and I became good friends quickly. I found out she was Buddhist and thought it was the coolest thing. I knew nothing about it other than the surface stuff that most people know.

She went to India for a couple months on retreat and I was like, “Wow that’s quite the commitment.” She brought back some gifts for me. A statue of Green Tara and a Katha.  At that point they didn’t mean much to me other than awesome gifts that meant a lot to me since Tonya was letting me into a special part of her life.

I was intrigued so I went out to the bookstore and started looking for books on the subject. I found the “Tibetan Book of Living and Dying” by Sogyal Rinpoche.  I bought it based only on the important sounding title.  Brought it home and immediately started reading.

UMMMM yeah. I couldn’t wrap my brain around a single word of it. Made no sense to me whatsoever. I tried a few more times over the years but still nothing. So I gave up.

Fast forward to last summer and my hospitalization. While I was in the mental health ward, I was basically a stripped down human being. I felt like I had been brought down to a bare soul, nothing left to hide me, nothing left to cover me. Just me, out for all the world to see.

After I was discharged, I was put into a partial hospitalization program, which meant that for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week I was in therapy; group, individual, etc.  One of the group of therapists was conducting a group session and she decided to do a group meditation. It was one of those guided meditations on CD.

I sat on the floor, got myself comfortable and settled in. It was amazing! Not so much the guy on the CD but for a split second, I got it. And by it I mean I felt like my mind opened up as infinitely as possible. Of course the second it happened I literally thought, “I got it!” and then it was gone. LOL

But that split second made me want more and I needed to find out what was going on. The therapist assigned to me had suggested reading “The Power of Now” by Ekhart Tolle so I borrowed it from a friend and dove in.

And just like the book by Sogyal Rinpoche…nothing.

So I thought for the heck of it I would go back to his book. And when I started reading it started to make all kinds of sense. I didn’t quite understand all of it, but the parts I did were awesome. It was like I had known all of this before and I was rediscovering it. I can’t put into words how it felt to me.

I tried to continue meditating like I had done in therapy and also tried adding some of the things that were in the book as well. After a couple of weeks, I wanted to know more. Tonya and I had lost touch with each other (long story) so I didn’t really have her to rely on, so I went to the Internet.

I found a site for the Philadelphia Buddhist Association and started looking for a center or temple near me. I was prepared to only find places in the city so I wasn’t expecting to find much out in Amish country where I am. As I scrolled quickly down not seeing anything close, I suddenly thought I saw Honey Brook.

No way, seriously? Out here? In a conservative town of 7000 people mostly Amish and farmers? SHUTUP!

Yup, there is was. And get this…it was within walking distance of our old house. It had been there the whole time. I was blown away. I had lived less than a mile from the place for 12 years and never knew it was there.

I clicked on the link to their site and discovered that they were on vacation for the next two weeks….ugh. But I emailed the woman that ran the center anyway and waited for her reply. As I looked around the site, I came up to the picture of the shrine room and was blown away again.

There was a life size statue of  Tara, the same Tara that Tonya had given me all those years before.(She gave me a statue of Green Tara and this was Red Tara, but still the same deity, just a different aspect. Think of it like a different personality or like a different side of her.) Unbelievable.  I knew I was in the right place.

A couple of weeks later, Sandra emailed me back and said that I was more than welcome to attend a Wednesday night meditation and that she looked forward to meeting me. We chatted on the phone a few times before I went and she sounded so cool, so I felt comfortable going.

When I showed up the first time, there was only one other person there other than myself and Sandra and that made it even more comfortable.

I can’t say this enough but I sat down and immediately felt at home. I was in a place of safety, down the road from where I used to live and only 6 miles from where I currently lived. With a life size representation of Tara who I at least was familiar with by sight, and just had this amazing energy. I have always felt more comfortable with women and so with Tara being the female Buddha, the feminine aspect of enlightened mind, and the Divine Mother, I was good…totally good.

There are so many more details that made it obvious that I was in the right place at the right time, but it would take even longer to write. Tonya and I are back together as friends as well by the way, which is a great byproduct of the entire experience.

That’s how I took my first steps on the Buddhist path and I haven’t turned back since.

 

Catching Up

Wow I need to blog more. If for no other reason than to get the depressing entry to move down.

Things are actually good here. I am working through a med change which is annoying. I feel like I’m in a fog for the first couple hours of the day, but it’s only been a week and I know it will settle out soon.

Therapy is…well…therapy. I am in the third week of an ongoing series called, “Why I don’t like my Mom”. You really should catch it sometime. I think it’s on On Demand.

We have been painting some of the rooms in the house finally. And by “we” I mean “Mike”. I’m just not good at it and we both agree for our own sanity to leave me out of it. I’m just happy to be looking at something other than builders white. Mike is really good at picking out the right colors and getting them up on the wall.

My moods have been OK actually lately. Little peeks of anxiety here and there, but I’m either getting good at shoving them down or maybe I’m actually learning how to deal with them. (shocker!)

Rockstar is good too. He’s not happy with the snow at all. I told him it will melt soon , but I don’t think he believes me at all.

I came to the conclusion the other day that I like it better when the TV isn’t on. That’s a huge thing for me because it is always on. I am still watching Heroes, Lost, and the Amazing Race, but that’s kind of it. They get DVR’d too so I watch them whenever, not necessarily when they’re on.

We have also really gotten to be aware of  how much power we use. Mike and I have gotten in the habit of not keeping lights on when we really don’t need them, and unplugging things like the coffee maker, toaster and the computer when we aren’t using them. The TV’s are on power strips which get unplugged every night too. It will be interesting to see if our bill goes down.

I’m really looking forward to warm weather coming. I’m over the cold. I just want the windows open.

Meditation and my Buddhist studies are going well too. I talk with my teacher by phone twice a month for an hour or so and by email 2 or 3 times a week. One of the other Lamas that I talk with regularly will be coming out of her 6 months of silence soon so I will be in contact with her again soon too.

So that’s kind of where my little family and I are now. Not too bad I guess.

I will work a little harder on getting more posts up, I promise.

OH – By the way, why does spellcheck on WordPress always tell me thatnot only is the word “blog” spelled wrong, but it has no listing of the word at all in its suggestion list.  HMM

 

Memories of Eight Months Ago

Last Friday, was eight months to the day that I put myself in the hospital.

I still think about that day a lot.

The one thing that I can’t seem to believe is the total disconnect of how I felt that day. As I was swallowing all 200+ of the pills I took, I felt nothing. When I woke up that day, I felt nothing. I went out to get the mail, saw my neighbor, talked to him about getting together for beers later in the day, and still felt nothing. Two of my friends called that morning too, and nothing.

Rocky would not leave me alone, he jumped up in my lap and watched every handful go down and still nothing. I went up the third floor when I couldn’t stay awake anymore and thought, this is it. I laid down on the couch and immediately passed out.

I woke up about 2 hours later pissed off that it wasn’t working so I took more. But them my body started to turn against me and I started vomiting up handfuls of pills. Mike was home at that point and when he asked me what was going on, I broke down and told him.

He was pissed off beyond belief, he yelled at me while I cried uncontrollably. It was like I finally came back to reality after being somewhere else all day.

I only sat in the emergency room for about 10 minutes before they took me back and started running tests. I don’t think they heard me when I told them how many pills I had taken because they didn’t seem to be all that concerned. After a couple hours in the ER, I was taken to a regular room and given something to eat. Mike sat with me for a little bit but he had to go home.

I couldn’t tell if he hated me, loved me, whatever.

I fell asleep and then about an hour later all hell broke loose. My body started to shut down. I woke up vomiting and within a few minutes I had stuff coming out of both ends. It wasn’t until the nurse saw how many pills I was throwing up that she realized things were much worse.

I was also having problems hearing due to the loud ringing in my ears which is one of the symptoms of an aspirin overdose. I truly could barely hear anything over the sound.

I was immediately given doses of charcoal to drink which was the most horrible thing that I have ever had to swallow. It was either swallow on my own or it was going to be forced down with a tube.

The next thing I remember is being rushed to the ICU at about 3am and being set up in a room with machines everywhere and needles coming at me from seemingly every direction.

I was so sick and in so much pain that I was given drugs to start to settle things down and put me to sleep.

I woke up to a kidney specialist examining my chart and telling me that if things didn’t get better, I would have to be put on dialysis. I was still so out of it that I didn’t quite understand the severity of the situation.

Mike had been called by the hospital at about 4am and he came in immediately. I could tell he was somewhere between furious and petrified. He sat with me all day while I was in and out of consciousness and eventually Mark and Bill showed up as well.

I also had someone sitting in my room from security. Apparently that’s normal for all suicide attempts. I was never alone from that time until 5 days later when I released from ICU and transferred to the mental health ward.

The ringing in my ears didn’t start to abate until almost 10 days later and I actually still have it to this day and it may never go away due the damage that was caused.

I am thankful that other than that, I have no lasting side effects and my kidneys were not damaged at all.

I am still working on a lot of the other side effects though. Mike and I will never be able to forget the events of that weekend which turned into almost a month of hospitalization. In some respects though we have gotten closer and more honest with each other.

I still can remember everything like it happened yesterday and frankly I hope that never goes away. It may be the best preventative ever.

 

Meditative Thought

I came across an awesome line in the book I am currently reading, “Change of Heart”. which also happens to be edited by one of my teachers.

“Compassion is the only good thing to come out of any situation.”

I used it for meditation this morning. Really not much more to say about it, just thought it was good food for thought.

 

Has it really been a month?

OK, I’ll admit, I have gotten a little obsessed with Facebook. Which means I have let my blog go for a month. This is actually my favorite place to go on the web, so I need to get here more often. Facebook is good for a quick sentence on my life, cool wordgames, and I have reconnected with so many people. But here is where I can let it all out and get more than a sentence in.

I’ve had an OK month, some good, some bad. I wish I could say it was wonderful, but I can’t do that yet. I still don’t feel even close to being where I should be. But it will be alright eventually; well it actually is now to be honest. I am learning to just be happy with wherever I am at that paricular moment, even though it may suck.

Work is as good as it can be with the economy being the way it is. I feel like it’s so much effort to close things these days.  But hey, I have a job, and I should be thankful for that.

Spiritually, I’m getting to know myself again. I have found a lot of peace in the Buddhist path, and I am learning more and more every day. In the long run, if I wouldn’t have gone through the past year, I wouldn’t be where I am now. There was clearly a reason that I survived.

That’s kind of it for now, but I just wanted to let whatever readers I still have know that I’m still around.

 

2009 Will Be a Good Year…Dammit.

No resolutions for 2009. I have never been a big resolution person. I just think it has to be better than last year.

We had a great New Year’s Eve. We spent it wil Mark and Bill and some of Bill’s family that were in town. We went to Mark’s bowling center and I bowled my usual crappy games, but I had fun so who cares. 

When we came back, Bill and I opened our hoilday brew, it is freakin’ awesome! We truly outdid ourselves with this one.  After toasting in the New Year, Mike and I headed home.

Yesterday was a totally lazy, do nothing day. The best part is that it’s Friday already!! 

Oh, I had a good sales month in December and I think it may have saved me from any layoffs. PHEW!

I do want to write about some cool spiritual stuff going on but I will wait till later. I can’t be serious all the time.

 

Goodbye 2008

Wow, what a year this has been. That’s really all I have to say about it.

I had no idea on January 1 that it was going to be so tumultuous.

I had no idea on June 13 that I was still going to be alive.

I have rediscovered how wonderful my partner and my friends are. I have rediscovered my footing on the spiritual path.

I have discovered how amazingly healing that my relationship with an amazing boxer named Rocky is.

All I can wish anyone for 2009 are words from the Buddhist Metta Prayer.

“…May all beings be at ease. Whatever living beings there may be; Whether they are weak or strong, omitting none, The great or the mighty, medium, short or small, The seen and the unseen, Those living near and far away, Those born and to-be-born, May all beings be at ease!…”