Sunday, June 1, 2014

Finding Peace



Everyone wants to be happy, or so it seems, but the world isn’t a very happy place.  Buddhism isn’t a path that leads to happiness so if that is what you are looking for, look somewhere else.  Siddhartha wasn’t looking for happiness, he was looking for peace, and peace is what he eventually found.  His path, and that path that I follow, leads to freedom from suffering, freedom from delusion, freedom from confusion and ultimately to peace.

So you ask, how do find freedom from suffering, from delusion, and from confusion?  While there are many facets on the diamond fashioned by Siddhartha the two that have most helped me find peace are impermanence and nonattachment.  The principle of impermanence teaches us that everything that is made in impermanent.  For example, the house that I live in what build in 1958 and the roof, which needs to be replaced, reminds that the house is impermanent.  I look at my face in the mirror and I don’t see my father, the last time that I lived with him he was in his mid-forties, an age that I have long since seen come and go.  No, when I look in the mirror I see the face of my aging grandfather, the face that I remember from my college days.  Yes, I too am impermanent.

Impermanence gives rise to the second principle, that of nonattachment.  Attachment leads to clinging and clinging eventually leads to sadness.  Were I attached to the body that I had when I was 21 and had I tried to cling to it tenaciously for the past 40 years I would be very sad today because it is gone.  Nonattachment lets us accept change with grace.  Some of my dearest friends have died and I remember them frequently with fondness, however I’m not attached their physical forms or their voices on the telephone and so with grace I have given them the freedom to pass on.

Nonattachment has also helped me learn to live in the moment.  The Buddha was once asked by the leader of another sect what it was that made Buddhism so special.  The speaker said something like, “We eat, wash dishes, walk and shit just like you do.” to which the Buddha responded, “True, but when we eat we eat, when we wash the dishes we wash the dishes, when we walk we walk, and when we shit we shit.” 

How often do you see some walk out for a “walk” being walked by the dog while they carry on a very one sided conversation on their cell phone.  I often wonder if the person on the other end of the conversation is also engaged in a monolog and that both people are talking while no one is listening.  The point is that the person is not taking the dog for a walk, walking or engaged in a conversation.  Multitasking, no matter how much you argue to the contrary is impossible.  Our brains are not wired to multitask, to do many things at the same time.  When we try to do it our attention must jump from one activity to another in rapid succession and as a result our performance in all the areas is sub-optimal.

So my challenge for you today is to recognize (Not “wreckanize” . . . the “cog” part in that word has to do with cognition so please don’t leave it out.) the impermanence of all things and then to practice nonattachment by being present in the moment with whatever you do.  I would love to hear from you if you would like to share your experience.

Peace,

Keisho Ananda, Bhikkhu