So,
Last week,
Lily talked about the relationship to gain and loss.
And gain and loss,
It's viewed as two sides of the same coin.
They're inseparable and inherently subject to change.
And the Sutta teachings on this are commonly known as the Eight Worldly Winds.
And these describe four different pairs of conditions that change throughout our life.
And these winds,
They blow all of our life.
And they include praise and blame,
Pleasure and pain,
Fame and disgrace.
And then the first pair that we're focusing on,
Gain and loss.
So,
As we have been opening to the field of loss,
It has been really beautiful to witness the authentic vulnerability that many of you have expressed.
This container of community has been coined by one friend as the sacred space of us.
The sacred space of us.
And it is truly beautiful to experience this.
Expressing loss is what the psychotherapist Francis Weller calls our soul work,
Our soul work.
In his book,
The Wild Edge of Sorrow,
He talks about how sharing our losses actually transforms our private pain into a source of community connection.
And I really think that we're seeing this in our community.
You know,
He normalizes grief by first off,
Not seeing it as a problem,
But as an apprenticeship.
So,
Grief as an apprenticeship that kind of ripens our human spirit.
So,
We are following grief in a way.
And by doing so,
Learning skills to metabolize loss.
Weller calls this wild alchemy.
So,
When we make room for our losses as just another human experience,
It transmutes the suffering of loss into wisdom and is kind of the ground for genuine love and compassion.
So,
In this way,
Loss is a gateway towards gain.
And what we gain is vitality and truth and wisdom.
What we gain is the Dharma,
Which is understood in this path of practice as one of the three jewels that we do.
So,
The jewels of the Buddha or this awakened part of ourselves that can normalize grief,
That can apprentice loss,
Follow loss.
The jewel of the truth of suffering or the truth of experience,
The freedom of that,
The Dharma.
And the jewel of community,
Which we are a part of and we are growing in and we're witnessed.
Lily shared a story last week about the broken cup.
And my understanding is that this story was told by the Thai forest teacher Ajahn Chah.
And Jack Kornfield,
My first teacher in the insight scene,
Used to tell this story back when Spirit Rock was still a small meditation community,
Not unlike this.
And Ajahn,
Ajahn simply means teacher or mentor.
So,
Ajahn Chah would hold up this cup.
And he would,
Like the cup that he was describing was said to be from an ancient like dynasty,
Which could very well be creative license,
Okay.
But he would hold up the cup and he would say,
You see this cup?
For me,
This cup is already broken.
And because I know it's fate,
I can enjoy it fully here and now.
And when it's gone,
It's gone.
So whatever you cherish will someday be gone.
And perhaps it's an item you simply lost.
Or it breaks like a cup.
Or it's a beloved pet.
Or a friend.
Or a partner.
Or a child.
Or parent.
The teaching is the same as what Ajahn Chah said.
Because I know it's fate,
I can enjoy it fully here and now.
And when it's gone,
It's gone.
The deepest bow to loss is presence here and now.
And we regularly forget this.
We forget that these worldly winds are constantly blowing.
Gain and loss,
Pleasure and pain,
Praise and blame,
Fame and shame.
Always happening and always disappearing.
We forget and then we come together and we remember and our hearts soften and we go out into the world with our soft hearts.
And hopefully we keep opening.
But sometimes we don't.
Sometimes we close down as soon as we turn off the screen.
We listen and we watch and we continually and deliberately soften.
And then maybe blame comes to us.
Or pleasure.
And we stay open and we remember.
We remember because I know it's fate,
I can enjoy it fully here and now.
And when it's gone,
It's gone.
My friend and teacher Dee pointed to this.
What is freedom like right now?
Dropping that question in has been such a great practice for me.
I've been practicing it since she shared it with us.
What is freedom like right now?
Which way is the wind blowing?
Is it loss?
Is it gain?
When my mother took her life almost six years ago now,
I remember so distinctly how her death,
The greatest loss of my life,
Was also a gift.
How is that possible?
Loss and gain,
Right?
Her death broke my heart.
It broke it open and it had to open to be able to deeply and authentically teach to all of you.
I understand suffering in the way the Buddha teaches it.
Suffering,
Its causes of clinging,
Its end and the path.
And I know the other side of suffering is this deep abiding compassion.
Love for the girl that can pick up the pieces of a broken life and hold them up and say,
Holy,
This is holy,
This belongs and you belong.
And the story that I don't belong is a story and it can't hold water like the broken cup can't hold water.
When I drop the story or the cup,
It shatters,
It's gone.
And just like Ajahn Chah,
Of course,
Of course,
Gain and loss.
Trusting the winds of change,
You know.
Trusting.
We can trust it.
In the Dhammapada,
The Buddha said something like another,
It almost sounds like another worldly wind.
But it's not part of the eight pair of opposites.
He said,
Hatred never ceases through hatred,
But by love alone is healed.
This is the ancient and eternal law.
Hatred never ceases through hatred,
But by love alone is healed.
This is the ancient and eternal law.
Love and hate,
Opposite sides of the same coin,
Right?
So I offer this for your consideration.
Gain and loss,
Just the opposite side of the same coin.
Thank you.
