Hi everyone,
It's Judy Cohen,
And this is Wake Up Call 434,
Hema Chodron's book The Places That Scare You.
The subtitle is A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times,
And even though the book was published in 2001,
Which seems like a whole universe ago,
Its message,
Its message is just as relevant.
Maybe it's even more relevant today.
Which is the point,
I guess,
Because when has the world not been a place where humans need fearlessness?
Or when has the world been a place where,
Not been a place where,
For some of us or many of us,
Fearlessness is needed because times are difficult?
I don't know about you,
But sometimes I get deluded into thinking that these times and everything that they portend are the worst of times,
You know,
The times when fearlessness is really,
Really needed.
And then I remember,
We don't have any corner on hard times.
And then I go back to,
Yeah,
But these are really,
Truly difficult times.
So anyway,
In the previous chapter of the book,
Pema,
Which is chapter 16,
Pema reminds us that it's easy to be lazy about our own well-being,
About cultivating our minds in these times.
And I'd add,
It's also easy to be lazy in our profession,
Cultivating well-being in these times.
And I got a lot of notes last week from people who agree.
And so then in 17,
Chapter 17,
Pema gives us a perspective that I feel like can help me at least to be not so lazy about my well-being,
Which is remembering that our own well-being isn't just about us.
And she says,
Few of us are satisfied with retreating from the world and just working on ourselves.
We want to train to manifest and to be of benefit.
So I see this in law students all the time.
They journal each week about their experiences with different elements of mindfulness as we work through the fundamentals throughout the semester.
And every week they point to ways that they themselves personally have greater ease and well-being.
And so even though we haven't even talked about it yet,
They start to point at how their own well-being supports their relationships with their friends and families and colleagues,
And not only their relationships,
But supports those friends and family members and colleagues themselves.
And they're saying that,
You know,
Their devotion to cultivating wholesome states of mind and heart pays off for them and benefits others.
So our well-being isn't just about us.
We're only taking care of ourselves so that we can take care of each other.
It's not a standalone proposition.
I mean,
It's not any kind of alone proposition.
Thich Nhat Hanh always said,
We enter our liberation,
Our freedom from fear,
Our freedom from suffering only can happen in community.
No one is free until everyone is free.
There are six trainings that Pema begins to point at in this chapter that help us to be kinder and more compassionate humans.
And they're called the Paramitas,
A word which Pema says means gone to the other shore,
Hence the image here of the raft.
And the trainings are trainings in generosity,
Training in ethical conduct,
Training in patience,
Training in joyful energy,
Or she calls it enthusiasm,
Which I love,
Training in meditation and training in wisdom.
And when she says the trainings take us to the other shore,
She's pointing to the ways they take us beyond our fear of letting go.
So one way of thinking about or practicing with the Paramitas,
And this is a classical one from the ancient texts,
Is that we get onto a raft on one side of the river and we try to understand and concretize and clarify everything we encounter.
And by the time we get to the other shore,
We know what's what.
And from that perspective,
We know how to let go.
And that way of thinking about it,
It reminds me of the way I used to do legal research,
Where I'd start wherever it seemed like was the beginning on one shore.
And I'd have 30 books open on the conference table before electronic research or 30 tabs open after.
And then slowly theories and ideas would come clear,
They'd connect,
I would string them together into a cohesive argument with these precise citations.
And then I'd go into a meeting or mediation or courtroom and explain why everyone else should understand what I was saying as the most obvious thing,
You know,
The only reasonable thing.
And Pema says she likes to think about it differently.
This is the picture I prefer,
She says.
In the middle of the river,
With the shoreline out of view,
The raft begins to disintegrate.
We find ourselves with absolutely nothing to hold on to.
From a conventional standpoint,
It's scary and dangerous.
However,
One small shift of perspective will tell us that having nothing to hold on to is liberating.
We can have faith that we won't drown.
Holding on to nothing means we can relax with this fluid,
Dynamic world.
So mindfulness is key here.
And this is the first piece,
It's,
You know,
This is what she's telling us is first,
Remember your mindfulness,
The ability to see what's happening in each moment,
Moment by moment.
And really,
It's this ability to be in an ongoing state of inquiry.
So what's happening now?
How can I help now?
What does this person need now?
What do I need now?
And what do I need in order to be my best self,
The best lawyer or teacher I can be,
The best friend or lover or partner or parent or child I can be?
And as with everything,
Mindfulness,
The invitation is to be present with courage and grace,
Right?
So those difficult moments.
And also without layering anything on top of our experience.
So you could think of it as a form of nonviolent communication,
Where the aspiration is to separate our observation of what is happening from our evaluation of what is happening.
Pema says we can think of it like this.
It's raining when we wake up.
Disappointment arises because we were planning on going out on a hike.
Or gladness arises because we haven't had much rain.
So a mindful observation of that moment without evaluation is just this invitation to remember that it's just raining and nothing additional is happening.
And it's from this place of just this,
And maybe that's how the Zen students would say it,
That we can begin to cultivate generosity,
Ethics,
Patience,
Enthusiasm,
Mindfulness and wisdom.
These six paramitas.
Or maybe just this is wisdom,
Is that last paramita,
And we start from there.
Wisdom,
Prajna in Sanskrit,
It's the place we begin and it's the place we land.
So it's both shores.
It's the shore we depart from in our raft and the shore we arrive upon after the raft has disintegrated.
These six paramitas,
I think,
Are worthy of some exploration.
I mean,
Generosity alone,
In my experience so far,
Is worthy of a lifetime of exploration.
So over the next few wake up calls,
Let's just explore the paramitas.
And by the way,
I also wanted to say that paramita translates as perfection.
And I want to ask all of us who agree to be gentle with that translation,
Because perfectionism in the law and also,
At least in my experience,
We're not so much about perfecting each of the six qualities,
Which doesn't really feel possible to me anyway,
But what we are about is perfecting our refusal to be lazy,
Right?
Perfecting our understanding that we aren't becoming any of these qualities,
So much as we're just remaining dedicated to looking for liberation in that sense,
In that reality,
I don't know,
Of truly having nothing to hold on to in our very fluid and very dynamic world.
So let's sit,
Let's sit with that.
Finding a comfortable posture,
Something that will support your practice for the next 10 minutes.
Upright,
But also relaxed.
Dignified,
Kind,
Curious.
Finding the breath in the body or the sound in your environment.
And bringing the attention to the breath or to the sound.
As a kind of home base,
As a kind of refuge.
Seeing if you can be generous with yourself when the mind wanders.
And there's a restlessness in the body.
But not grasping a fold of generosity.
As a construct or a part of identity or anything more than a moment-by-moment experience.
Same with love.
Frustration.
Patience.
Staying in a state of inquiry.
And noticing that that is also coming and going,
Just like the breath,
Just like the sound.
Emma's teacher,
Shogyam Trumpa,
We're all just falling through the air.
Nothing to hold on to.
Noticing when generosity is present.
When love is present.
When love is present.
When restlessness,
Frustration,
Agitation are present.
Each experience or each phenomenon just arising and passing away.
And then taking a few deeper breaths,
Wiggling the fingers and toes.
Fluttering the eyes open.
Thanks,
Everyone,
For being on the wake-up call today.
It's lovely to sit with you.
Have a good Thursday and a safe weekend.
And I'll see you next Thursday.
