A raindrop

Each morning at Plum Village I would take my cup of hot water and go and sit by the lotus pond, listening to the frogs making a racket! You could see their cheeks bulging as they croaked and chorused to one another. And so this poem came about from looking at the lotus pond and from hearing Thay reminding us again and again about our interbeing nature, which is not the separate individual we think we are most of the time, but a cosmos body linked to the rest of the cosmos in a beautiful intertwining dance.

At Plum Village we are each put into Family groups (we were Sunbeams) and each Family has a particular job to do. Ours was keeping the tea table supplied, as well as getting rid of the recycling and garbage (rubbish to those of us in the UK) each evening. On the days when everyone from the other hamlets came to us for Thay's Dharma talk we had to provide extra tea tables for all the extra people (there were 800 of us all together on the retreat). For the last visit my lovely friend suggested I wrote out some of my poems and she illustrated them to adorn the tea table. So in this post not only do you get the poem, but also the calligraphy that came from it onto the tea table.

A raindrop

In appearance
we are each a raindrop
resting on our own lotus leaf.
Beautiful, unique, solid,
glistening in intensity and luminescence,
reflecting sunlight.
Yet one strong gust of wind
sends the unique raindrop
sliding into the pond below
dipping and diving and merging
with the water
that was always our true nature.
© 4 June 2014

Plum Village 21 day retreat

Well I'm back! And what an amazing 3 weeks it has been. Different to what I expected but beautiful and challenging and wonderful. Thay was on superb form and delivered many stunning and powerful Dharma talks on "What happens when we die?" His energy and enthusiasm alone were amazing to experience, as well as the collective energy of 800 people practising mindfulness together.
For me, one of the most surprising and enjoyable elements of the retreat was the amount of time we spent outdoors. I realised I live such an indoors life at home, unconnected from the beautiful nature which is right there in the garden, and sanitised from other living beings. It has been such a joy to reconnect with the lessons from nature and I have written many poems because of this, which will eventually be shared on this blog. Even the mosquitos that bit me at night and the mouse that woke us up as it tried to eat my chocolate bar were accepted and welcomed as part of the cosmos being we all partake in, interbeing with each other in a wonderful dance.

 Not the clearest of pictures but so lovely to have one of Thay smiling and just being so happy to share his wisdom and teaching with us.

 And here's a close up of him inviting the bell, a true teaching in concentration and being in the here and now.

An Autobiography in Five Chapters by Portia Nelson

I don't often post other people's poems on here but I found this poem again recently and I just love it as a description of the growing discernment that comes through mindfulness.

An Autobiography in Five Chapters
by Portia Nelson

Chapter 1
I walk down the street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I fall in. I am lost….I am helpless.
It isn’t my fault.
It takes forever to find a way out.

Chapter 2
I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the side walk.
I pretend I don’t see it. I fall in again.
I can’t believe I am in the same place.
But it isn’t my fault.
It still takes a long time to get out.

Chapter 3
I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I see it is there.
I fall in….it’s a habit…but my eyes are open.
I know where I am. It is my fault.
I get out immediately.

Chapter 4
I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I walk around it.

Chapter 5
I walk down a different street.

3 week retreat at Plum Village

From this Sunday, 1st June I will be on a 3-week retreat at Plum Village in France. There won't be any internet access there so I won't be able to post anything while I'm there but I'm sure there will be lots to add once I'm back home again (after 22nd June).
The retreat is called 'What happens when we die?' and here is the link to it
http://plumvillage.org/retreats/info/21-day-retreat-what-happens-when-we-die/
It sounds as if it will be amazingly interesting, 3 weeks to sink into the reality of no birth and no death. This will be the longest retreat I have ever done so I'm really looking forward to it.
And while I'm there I'm hoping to take part in a ceremony to receive the 14 Mindfulness Trainings and become an Order member. I've been working towards this as an aspirant for about 3 years and it has been an interesting and challenging time of considering what each of the 14MTs means to me personally.
Here's a link to the 14 Mindfulness Trainings http://plumvillage.org/mindfulness-practice/the-14-mindfulness-trainings/
I feel that this has helped me deepen my practice and embody more fully teachings of Buddhism, practising compassion to all, nonviolence and kindness, as well as reviewing what I am thinking and feeling through that all important question 'are you sure?'

Free the Mind

On Monday I went with a group of people into York for the UK's premier showing of a film called Free the Mind, featuring the work of Professor Richard Davidson on how we can change the way we think. It's a powerful film, working with soldiers suffering with PTSD and a child suffering from ADHD (you can watch the trailer here https://distrify.com/films/2487).
I took members of my family with me and it helped them understand what I'm doing as a Mindfulness teacher. When my niece (who has exams coming up) said she wanted to learn some of the breathing exercises I was delighted!
If you get a chance, see the film, it's amazing.

On the apothecary’s shelf

I am become an apothecary
I am become an alchemist.
The jars lining my shelves
are full of strange and wondrous objects
moving and ethereal, like light
rather than tangible shapes.
I take down this one and
hold it in my two warm hands.
This jar is filled with my sadness.
I hold it close to my heart
like a fretful baby,
only soothed by the closeness of
its mother’s heartbeat.
I embrace this jar of sadnesses
to soothe and calm them
letting each emotion rise and
overflow and dissipate from the
attention of loving care.

On the apothecary’s shelf
this jar holds disappointment,
this one anger, this one meanness and
this one selfishness.
In the middle of the shelf
stands a jar of water,
shining and bright as if filled
with silver moonlight.
A jar of mindfulness.
Each water droplet
a moment of mindfulness,
imperceptibly filling, flooding the jar,
spilling out, overflowing
into the other jars,
washing away the sadness, anger and meanness,
like marbles of light
dancing atop a surging wave of mindfulness,
turning the seeds of despair,
hopelessness and frustration into
happiness, compassion and joy,
filling the jars of darkness with smiles,
transforming each sadness into a
tiny flower of resilience.

With this jar of mindfulness
I am become an alchemist,
watering each seed to nurture and
transform it into a
golden flower of mindfulness.
© 22 May 14

Twenty-one days to create a new neural pathway - giving up computer games

Day 1,2,3 (3rd - 5th May) - This has been an easy start to giving up the addictive computer games as I was on a retreat and whilst I had my computer with me for work purposes I wasn't tempted to go on the games. It also helped that the wifi connection was a bit rubbish (being up on the moors in Lancashire) and took ages to load so unless I wanted something really important I didn't bother.
Day 4 - this will be the test, back home and working on the computer but trying to resist. It's lunchtime and I haven't been on them yet but I don't want to congratulate myself too early as I know the pull of them is strong at times.
I must say the games I play are very mild and inoffensive, there are only two I play, Spider Solitaire and Taipei (I know they are lame) but nonetheless they are addictive.
This will be helped again by another retreat on days 6-9.
Day 5 - I am on the computer but finished checking emails and Facebook and the blogs and anything else I need to do, and that this the time I would normally play a few games. So my hands feel twitchy and I have to walk away from the computer and find something else to do. Pleased that I didn't succumb to playing the games today. Each day is a fresh start.
Day 6 - Not going to be on the computer much today or the next few days as I'm off on a retreat this afternoon so that makes it much easier to resist the temptation.
Day 7-9 (Barmoor retreat) No internet signal and no computer anyway so not a problem on these days. It's when I'm on the computer that it will be more difficult.
Day 10 - It's good to acknowledge that I have already reached ten days without playing the games, I hadn't realised it had been as long as that.
Day 11 & 12 - mostly it has been fairly easy but there are times when I'm on the computer and I start to get twitchy and want to play. It's those times when I would have turned to the games before, so recognising that habit energy and knowing I don't have to choice that path this time. It's a step-by-step, moment-by-moment approach. This time I chose to put the laptop down and do something else. So it also relates to the time I'm spending on the computer. Haven't played a game yet but there were times over these two days when the mind would say, 'oh go on, why not. It's harmless' but I have managed to resist.
Day 13-16 - I have managed not to play a game yet but as above there are times when the habit energy would kick in. At those times I've had to put the laptop down and walk away. Not a bad thing of course. Perhaps the worst part of the habit is doing something else on the computer instead of walking away from it.
Day 17 - still haven't played a game but tempted a couple of times when the Ph.D work gets hard and I need a break from thinking.
Day 18 - not feeling so good today, really tired and not much energy. Today it would be easy to just have a couple of 'harmless' games. But I'm writing this instead to remind me of what I have resolved to do and hoping it will help. Nearly there as well so it would be a shame to break it now!
Day 19-21 - Well I've got to the last day without playing any games, and I'm really pleased to have managed it. The last few days have been the hardest, especially when I'm using the computer for other things, I have to make a conscious decision each time to put the computer down and do something else. I'm not saying I'll never play a computer game again as I think it's still a moment-by-moment, day-by-day decision, but I do feel as if I've broken the stickiness of the habit energy that meant I automatically played a few games as part of the checking emails etc. routine.
I'm celebrating 21 days without playing computer games! :)