Slogan Nine

In all activities, train with the slogans.

From the Lojong for the Layperson booklet:

            If we were to cross a field every day, we would tramp down the weeds and eventually create a well-worn path. The slogans help us create a new path by thinking differently. When we study and memorize the slogans, they steer our minds in a new direction.  We will find that no matter what situation arises, the memory of an appropriate slogan will come to mind. Their purpose is not to help us escape from life’s hassles or make all our troubles disappear, but to aid us in working with the challenges we face. The slogans increase our capacity for loving-kindness and decrease our self-absorption. We learn to break out of our habitual pattern of reacting in self-centered ways.

Photo: Fifty-nine different types of tumbled stones.

            What we do, see or hear frequently becomes familiar. As an example, check out these advertising taglines and see if you can connect each one to the product or company it represents:

• ·         Just do it.
• ·         Melts in your mouth, not in your hands.
• ·         Can you hear me now?!
• ·         Don’t leave home without it.
• ·         It keeps going, and going and going…
• ·         Good to the last drop.
• ·         Plop plop, fizz fizz, oh what a relief it is.
• ·         Nothin’ says lovin’ like something from the oven.
• ·         Where do you want to go today?
• ·         Live in your world, play in ours.
• ·         Once you pop, you can’t stop.
• ·         Snap, crackle, pop.

My apologies to readers who aren’t in the States as some of these catchphrases may not be recognizable to you (but I bet you could easily come up with your own list). When I make the slogans a part of my daily spiritual practice, they have a way of popping in my head just when I need them.

(Answers: Nike, M&Ms, Verizon, American Express, Energizer Batteries, Maxwell House Coffee, Alka Seltzer, Pillsbury, Microsoft, Sony Playstation, Pringles Potato Chips, Rice Krispies Cereal) 

Slogan Eight

Three objects, three poisons, three seeds of virtue.

From the Lojong for the Layperson booklet:

            Humans naturally categorize things as a method of survival, labeling some objects as beneficial and others as dangerous. But this slogan cautions us that labels may take on a life of their own. Judy Lief elucidates: “They change from being simple observations of a current situation or interaction to become unchanging definitions of the way things are. They become the world according to us.”  If we crave something, it becomes an object of attachment. If it is something we want to avoid, it becomes an object of aversion. If we could care less either way, it becomes an object of indifference. Each of these objects produces a reaction (poison) – desire, revulsion or ignorance – which leaves us feeling unhappy or desperate. But instead of blaming the object, we can take responsibility for our emotional reactions and see them as our own creation. We can realize they make our world very small instead of spacious. We breathe in and transform the “poisons.” As we breathe out, they are reformed as the seeds of virtue.

Photo: Three types of nuts, leaves and blooms on a sycamore leaf.

            I love gardenia bushes, and I've tried on multiple occasions to grow them in my yard. Unfortunately, they like moist, well-drained soil, and I live in an area where drought occurs and the soil is compacted clay. It’s similar to trying to grow something from a brick. On the other hand, I have poison ivy galore. Weed killers and pulling plants by hand are useless; the birds love the berries and just plant more. I would be quite an unhappy gardener if this was where all my energy was focused. In addition, my yard has nondescript plants like the tea olive with an unimpressive, scraggly appearance. Yet if I attend to its nearly imperceptible flowers in the fall and spring, I’ll be rewarded with a fragrance even more delightful than the gardenia’s bloom. Recently it dawned on me that indifference is quite different from detachment. It involves labeling something as so insignificant and useless, that I don’t consider it worth my attention. That kind of poison is worse than Roundup. It will keep the seeds of compassion from ever sprouting.   

Slogan Seven

Sending and taking should be practiced alternately. These two should ride the breath.

From the Lojong for the Layperson booklet:            
       “Sending and taking” refers to tonglen, a meditation that instills compassion. Norman Fischer defines compassion as “the willingness to feel pain with another, to feel another’s pain as one’s own.” Tonglen trains us to move toward rather than away from suffering; it teaches us that our pain is the same as that of other people. To practice, we visualize taking another’s suffering into ourselves as we inhale, perhaps feeling the air as hot and heavy or seeing it as dark and smoky. We pause, picturing the pain being converted into peace, healing and happiness. We breathe these wishes out to the person who suffers, imagining this breath as feeling light and cooling or appearing clear and radiant. Tonglen is also practiced with our own anguish; as we realize others feel this same pain, we extend our practice to include them. We are not harmed by the suffering we breathe in, but are transformed by it. It softens our hearts, making us more loving and kind.

Photo: Bare firethorn branch and azalea branch between two stones and bounded by Boston fern fronds.

                Are you familiar with the TARDIS on the British television show Doctor Who? From the outside its size appears deceptively small, much like our hearts. The first time I read about tonglen practice, my response was “Ugh, how awful!” I wish I could blame my reaction on being brainwashed by the Law of Attraction movement, but the reason went much deeper than that. I felt as if my emotional knapsack was full to bursting. I was barely managing my own pain and had no room for another person’s suffering. Buddhist wisdom nevertheless assures us that our hearts are much more expansive than we may think. As I breathe in with the longing to remove suffering and breathe out with the wish to send comfort and relief, my self-absorption loosens and my compassionate side unlocks. I begin to recognize my kinship and connection with all beings: everyone suffers. Like Seuss’s grumpy Grinch, I may suddenly discover my heart has grown by three sizes. 

Because suffering is impermanent, that is why we can transform it.

Because happiness is impermanent, that is why we have to nourish it.

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

Slogan Six

In post-meditation, be a child of illusion.

From the Lojong for the Layperson booklet:

            Shortly after our meditation, we can easily slide back into habitual patterns. But this slogan encourages us to continue to look at the world with fresh eyes rather than fixed ideas. A young child has little experience in the world, and so he sees with eyes of wonder. Our perceptions are based on our presumptions – “this” is like “that,” therefore I should like/dislike it. We become tangled in hope or fear based on a notion from a past incident instead of being present in the here and now. Yet nothing is solid and fixed; everything is continually changing. If we find ourselves waiting in a long line at the bank, we might think “this frustration is going to last forever.” But what happens if we de-familiarize ourselves from the scene? We might take notice of a nearby toddler who is grinning shyly at us. We may hear an unfamiliar noise coming from outside. As we pay attention to each moment that unfolds and shifts around us, we’ll stop worrying about the long line. We will have become a child of illusion.

Photo: Bubble floating above nandina (heavenly bamboo) shrubs.

       As a kid I loved optical illusions, those images that trick our mind into believing something that may not be real. I recently ran across one I hadn't seen before called the Checker Shadow Illusion.  I was so sure what I saw was truth (that the squares weren't the same color), I copied the image into Paint, cut out a section from each square, and then pasted them into a Word document for comparison. Lo and behold, they were the same shade of gray! Of course I wondered if maybe there was something off with my computer monitor. Yet the exercise turned out to be a good example of my preference as an adult for something solid and predictable rather than something indefinite and changeable. Nevertheless, if I can relax and observe - without being in strategy mode, without trying to quantify and label everything - my mind will open to a fresh view of life. And my inner kid would tell me there's a lot more joy in seeing from this perspective.

Slogan Five

Rest in the nature of alaya, the essence.

From the Lojong for the Layperson booklet:

            Certain Buddhist traditions describe eight types of consciousness. The first five are connected to the senses (sight, hearing, taste, smell, touch) and the sixth is mental awareness (reflexive perception). Egoistic awareness is formed by our memories and experiences and becomes the repository that shapes our identity. The last type is alaya, pure awareness untainted by life experiences, judgments or preconceptions. This unbiased expanse of the mind is a place of refuge, a place that can prepare the ground for compassionate action. When we rest in this openness, we notice what is there but don’t cling to it – we gently let it go.

Photo: Hawk feather in Mondo grass.

            I was reading a book last night before bed, and one of the story’s characters had gotten his fingers caught in a Chinese handcuffs toy. This cylinder of woven bamboo allows for a finger to be placed in each end. The action of pulling the fingers back out makes the shape lengthen and shrink in diameter. The harder a person struggles to get loose, the tighter the toy squeezes. The not-so-obvious solution for releasing trapped fingers is to relax. We may struggle in the same manner with our thoughts. To borrow a line from Otis Redding, we don’t often sit on the dock of the bay and watch our thoughts roll away. We’re way too busy struggling; we throw rocks at the boats we don’t want tied at our dock or swim out to the boats we want to secure. But if we take Redding’s advice and observe our thoughts and emotions without judgment, without pulling or pushing, we’ll find a peaceful place to rest.

Slogan Four

Self-liberate even the antidote.

From the Lojong for the Layperson booklet:

            As we contemplate the last two slogans, we may believe we are beginning to figure things out. Our insight into emptiness – a mistaken view of a solid, stable sense of the world and ourselves – can become our answer and remedy for everything. But the fourth slogan cautions us not to turn our discoveries into a dogma; we should hold the slogans in an open palm not a closed fist. Otherwise we’ll attempt to use every insight to construct a solid conclusion, thus continuing our deception that we have something secure to which to cling. It also advises us to avoid replacing the experience of emptiness with a conceptual idea of emptiness. Pema Chodron clarifies, “We have to pull the rug from under our belief systems altogether. We can do that by letting go of our belief, and also our sense of right and wrong, by just going back to the simplicity and the immediacy of our present experience…”

Photo: Blue sky above cumulus clouds.

       I remember as a young adult learning about the patriarchal society, a community in which males hold positions of power in government, religion, the workplace and the family. “Aha,” I thought, “the oppression and inequality of women are why our society today is such a mess!” For several years, I painted every evil and every wrong in the world with this wide brush. I felt empowered by this information because I believed I had the answer for everything. Living in my head kept me smug and snug in my intellectual easy chair. Yet as I grew older, I began to notice all of my experiences didn’t perfectly align with my dogma. Yes, there were injustices against women, but not all of the men I encountered held such repressive beliefs. I began to see that a lack of communication, ignorance and fear were just as likely to cause such wrongs in society. My “absolute answer” that gave me a feeling of control and security was not so sturdy after all. The antidote of concepts is not a cure-all.

Slogan Three

Examine the nature of unborn awareness.

From the Lojong for the Layperson booklet:

                The third slogan looks within at the transparency of our identity. Though it appears connected to the brain, our awareness is not identical to it. Since we tend to view our mind as the place where identity resides, quietly observe (but don’t analyze) the thinking process. Pursue awareness to a deep level. Notice how perceptions of self are tied to things. The mind depends on the object perceived and the senses that perceive it – it coexists with everything. If these “things” are taken away, is there a perceiver separate from what is perceived? Is there a concrete “you” inside? We may discover our identities are only created by the thoughts we churn out. Yet beyond the ideas of “me” and “other,” we find a peaceful spaciousness.

Photo: Moon snail shell (“shark eye”) nestled among white clover.

       Our minds are constantly bombarded by stimuli - a knee scraped, soothing music, a stack of bills to be paid, the aroma of cinnamon rolls baking. The mind compares this information to our memory files of past information then creates emotion and thought that motivates us to act. This is "born" awareness, generated by things outside us. But there is another type of awareness that observes without judging or labeling; it does not separate everything into categories but sees all as a whole. How do you find it? Watch your mind and how it works. At first it may seem like an endless loop of thoughts and sensations, but be patient and keep watching. Eventually the unbiased observer will appear.