Made Things

There is something of the utmost importance about made things. Every thing is made and in symbiotic relationship with its maker. This is life; the unknowable ground of being folds upon its self giving rise to forms which seem separate and in interaction. There is the longing to make which is the void's fecundity and the longing to return which is form's remembering its true nature.

Twice in recent days I've been near the sea and her song. Once in the darkness of a moonless night with a storm way off out to sea so that although it is calm on land the waves roll heavy onto the shore, roaring in from the horizon. And once in the day when less dramatic, the waves seem moody and hint at the feminine; the sea full of subdued emotion and pointing at the sublime. At the shore we sense the amphibian and this stirs our own longing; form and emptiness, separate yet one, longing to make yet longing to return home to merge back in; on in. Shall we approach this longing as in internal journey or an external one; foolish to draw distinction, naive not to know the difference. Beware the siren's call and yet... But the song on that moonlit night was less of the siren and more of the sea; both the sea I could see and the sea I could feel...

A while back I took these pictures (click to enlarge):

Is it a person; blue hat, red coat, stick aloft?

Sculpture - arm raised, red sleeve stick in hand

Less like a person viewed from the side

Then more recently:

a Viking in cashmere  sitting next to its maker

The photos reveal the need to make (and especially in representation of our own form). I see humour and warmth in these made things too. And while the waves of our made-ness pass by there is the faint sound of the sea; the sound of one hand clapping.

Embarrassment

I looked up embarrassment on the (in)famous Wikipedia. Here's what I found:


Embarrassment is an emotional state of intense discomfort with oneself, experienced upon having a socially unacceptable act or condition witnessed by or revealed to others. Usually some amount of loss of honor or dignity is involved, but how much and the type depends on the embarrassing situation. It is similar to shame, except that shame may be experienced for an act known only to oneself. Also, embarrassment usually carries the connotation of being caused by an act that is merely socially unacceptable, rather than morally wrong.

The unquestioned part in this might be said to to be the notion of self and the beliefs leading to notions of 'right and wrong'. To put this another way, embarrassment is the feeling which arises to fill the gap between what I want my sense (or storey) of self to be and what the moment is demonstrating it to be. Or to be more accurate what it might be. Might, because when all is said and done I don't have the full picture in any moment. And that seeing only part of the picture is at the root of embarrassment. There is judging in all this. If I can see the illusory nature of a small separate self and / or illusory nature of the solidity of those beliefs giving rise to notions of 'right and wrong' then where is the embarrassment? But that can require a lot of spaciousness and simply being with what is arising. So embarrassment can be a gift because it's pointing to notions that might have been previously unseen; notions of separateness and unworthiness. And there is more here too. This 'what I want my sense (or storey) of self to be' needs some consideration. I believe it points up. Surrendering into any emotion has this gift and ultimately the koan unfolding. The koan or paradox of separation and unity; my own experience of a sense of separate self doing its best to survive and the bigger picture of interconnection in which this sense of separation is formed. At the level of that picture there is only acceptance and the part that is feeling embarrassed (or anything else) is held in compassion. If I am judging myself or others then where is the compassion? If my embarrassment is rooted in the belief that others will judge me then I am judging them and accusing them of judging me. And if they do, again where is the compassion? If I am not held in compassion why feel any less (than those judging)? Expanding and softening into any situation, drawing back but without creating a further separation the stillness holding the drama is revealed. The small (embarrassed) self has afforded this revelation and there is gratitude. This is personal growth as a small self grows and looks up and the sense of self diminishes.
If embarrassment arises when I feel I am not what I want or should be, from where then do these wants or shoulds come? And who is it that is feeling them? These questions are answered in the spaciousness if I can be with the feelings and let them soften. But this all takes time and as ever insight alone is not enough; I still need to give each emotion time to unfold. And in there will be found someone trying their best, looking up. A one reaching out to see. It's not a separate one seeing but One seeing. And when we smile at our foolishness in good humour we can come together, we cease judging our self and each other, see our humanity and in that seeing experience our divinity. We come out of Oneness to see, seeing takes us back.

The merit of this post is offered to Sue who is sitting with her dying mother.

Fireworks

DC and I attended an impressive fireworks display on Saturday then had dinner with friends. The display is paid for each year from the previous year's donations. I recalled contributing last year as I dropped my money in to the collection bucket. This for me generates a great sense of community; here we are, this crowd of people collectively contributing and collectively enjoying the fruits. Great stuff.  As the winter starts to set in bonfire night is as a much a festival of light in the short dark days as it is a reminder of gunpowder, treason and plot and DC noted that Diwali would start on Sunday. I enjoyed the fireworks yet noticed too some sadness; a similar feeling to the one generated by new year's eve. It's the empty celebration. This is not the pregnant emptiness of our true nature but the hollow emptiness of jaded form. Yes it's fun to see the display and be in a crowd of cheerful people yet somehow the very scale of the display and impersonal nature of the crowd left me feeling remote. The streamers, starbursts and showers of lights formed by the fireworks seemed to distance me from the excitement they are supposed to create. It's a trait in me to slip easily in to this sort of melancholy and I observed the slip and shifted my attention but not before I recalled that feeling in childhood. I turned to DC so as to feel our closeness and not focus on the fact of aloneness; the eternal paradox of interconnection and separation. More rockets flew upwards some with whistles. Great explosions of stars formed a carapace of smoke which gave greater dramatic effect to subsequent multi coloured explosions by reflecting their light; a slowly shifting and fading backdrop glowing with the shifting play of light and dark. The huge bonfire a conflagration of leaping flames lay off to the side sending sparks off into the night sky. 'Heretics be warned' said DC. 'Mm' I said. The noise of the blasts grew and could be felt as a shock wave in the torso. I looked at the smoke and thought of those who have suffered in war. Beyond the smoke and any cloud the firmament remained.


The display over the crowd dispersed filling the streets. A queue had formed at the chip shop and others made their way through the supermarket. DC and I hurried back to our friend's house to get dinner going and meet up with others who would have been in the crowd watching the display. There was a sense of people moving towards their food.

It's taken me a couple of days to get round to writing this post and the ideas I had on Saturday for it have faded. Today I visited someone in hospital. His company has done some work for me and we have got on well in the short time we've spent together. I knew what this visit could be about before I arrived at his bed side to hear him tell me that he had been given twelve months to live. He only received the news a few days ago and it is still 'sinking in'. Our lives are a strange mixture and very fragile. Yet as the fireworks end and the embers of the fire cool beyond the clouds of our delusion the firmament remains; not as a solid carapace above us but as the unborn.

The merit of this post is for Bill and those who love him.

What is it that wants to happen?

There has been a lot of toing and froing between Scotland and Newcastle for me of late and various job interviews. One such led to an offer of employment. But the offer was to go back into a design office with a very unhealthy set up. No thankyou. The process has confirmed for me my desire to stay related to the industry but not under crazy conditions. Truly looking at what one wants and facing the consequences can be both painfully difficult and liberating. The thing with desire is not I believe, so much that it is a 'bad' thing so much as truly looking into the desire to see what it is about at a deeper level is scary. This is not clinging to the surface features of desire but listening to its depths. Yet this deeper calling is what gives life its meaning and purpose. It may or may not bring happiness but it will if given sufficient time and energy bring an honest expression to life. This expression is I believe the very reason for our coming out of unity, out of the void. And, it is by looking into the depths of desire not just the surface that we might find our way back to unity and to a peace within the midst of the storm. Such looking and listening, sitting with what is emerging and acting from the deepest gut is in my experience often clouded by a whole range of thoughts and emotions. Which of the panoply of these stories and sensations is the deep gut, the heart mind? That is the question I ask in challenging conditions. Or put another way, what is it that needs to happen? It was tricky sitting with the panoply arising in the job chase of late but I am now sure I made the right decisions.

Recently a friend sent me a link to the revolverheld unzertrennlich music video. There can't be a gay man (particularly of my generation) who isn't touched by this video. The beauty of the video is I would suggest, in the acknowledgment of the (deeper) desire for unity, in the response of the heart mind. As ever, our humanity is in form's expression of emptiness. This is desire's true meaning and purpose. It will not always bring the surface fun, joy and excitement shown in the video but it gives body to the life we lead and life to the body we live it with. It is not so much work to live verses live to work as living the work of one's life.

Altar

Occasionally I consider setting up a more formal altar. I sit zazen each day and do have a Buddha figure in the location(s) I sit but I have not set up the usual altar arrangement. Why not? Because despite the help that 'props' of one kind or another can be, at bottom I am not given to formalistic ritual; I am more given to the aspiration to be in meditation not just 'on the cushion' but off it too, to see the world as the altar of my life, my life as the unfolding of a deeper movement of which I might glimpse. I don't want to set up 'out there' or other spiritual places and I find formal altars allegorical. And yet, I notice that I do have in each of the places I regularly sit some setting which represents the divine, a divine here and now, immanent and transcendent. The arrangement and location of altar and the place to sit zazen for me immediately bring to awareness the form of meditation and ask the question 'what is meditation?'; to just sit, to take aim for no target without trying, to notice as much of what is unfolding without becoming, not to reject and not to cling, an open, alert awareness including inside and outside the notion of self and other. Where in this is the altar? Where does the heart mind sit? And if this is a koan on the cushion how much more so in daily life!

We each have our way of being in the world; life's expression of itself in each other. I recall:

‘Peace is the state of distinctness without domination, with the distinct participating in each other.’

(Adorno, ‘Subject and object’, in The Essential Frankfurt School Reader, ed. Andrew Arato and Eike Gebhardt (Oxford: Blackwell, 1978), 497–511 (p. 500).)

A quote DC finds 'always brings a lump' to his throat.

Can we find the altar of our lives in our interactions and treat each unfolding moment be it a joy or a challenge as a sacred theatre? Even if I fail in this aspiration is the holding of and returning to it not an altar? Without the failing there would be no challenge and no meaning in the aspiration. Can I remember to keep returning to the precepts? I can given time. I can't all the time. Each time drama unfolds it takes me time to work it through, to gain insight into what has been brewing. I need to stay with it yet not become it. The place holding this is the altar and the drama is the offering. When at last I see it, there is the heart mind.

Small 'altars' integrated into (physical) items of daily living:

Music is a great pointer to spirit

Nature inside and out

Unfolding in time; growing and flowering before passing

Confetti angels with trumpets - my dear friend always puts them in his cards to me 

Demon to tea

A couple of weeks ago with a little too much time on my hands one of my demons came to see me. I decided to really invite him in, to deliberately put myself in the place where we face each other; the place the button gets pressed. The result was a complex mixture of emotions resulting in a fairly deep depression. Fortunately I retained objectivity and knew that this was 'the black dog' and not some sustaining truth. The 'black dog' moved off on Friday. Depression it is said is anger spread thin. There certainly seemed to be truth in that this time; the emotional mix was grief, sadness, shame, anger, and confusion. And there is self loathing lurking in the roots of it. I believe in looking at my demons because I think they have something valuable to tell me. I know I have to 'invite them to tea'. The trouble is that they have such poor table manners and I don't always remember that the tea party can take longer than perhaps I'd reckoned on! The depression was just part of the party. This demon is a big one. It's complex and I can't see it all in one go. I also have a feeling that my relationship with it is at the level of my life force; the desire to have experience, to live, to be in the world. All demons are about our wanting our experience to be a certain way; the nature of samsara. But beyond little and/or unwholesome desires there is the very will to live. I believe we come out of unity in order that the very unity of which we are might see itself. This is my understanding of nirvana in samsara; that the two are one and the same. So, I notice I experience desires which seem to run very deep and although they may not be clear I feel they point to my reason for being in the world. It is as if some part of me is saying 'look closely; this is what you came here (into human form) for'. Now a demon tied up with this is guarding a treasure. Not a trinket or a toy but, I believe, a dharma gate and the path back to the market place. Could it be that the gift of this demon is to see the nature of the very will to live; the nature of birth and death? I've got shame around this demon; the shame is part of him. This is because I feel I've wasted time in my life through fear and perhaps (for me) worse, ignorance. I find it difficult to accept not knowing, being ignorant. This too is about fear. When triggers in everyday life get mixed up with feeling that I have in the past and/or still am in the present wasting my life I am looking at this demon. There are complex issues of feelings from the past which I believe were not fully felt at the time together with feelings about the present. This makes it difficult to know how much is historic and how much is contemporary. As ever with such things all one can do is to invite softening, keep breathing and gently hold the question 'what is it that wants to emerge?'.  Not pushing away/repressing, not getting too caught up. But I have to say I don't find it easy to keep the master at home when big demons come to tea, even if they do get invited! Perhaps an interesting question is 'just who is it that invites them?'

Desire; not so simple methinks

A few times recently I've recalled this post about Blue. There is intended in the post a pointing to my sense of a sort of coming home to myself. I find this post on Jade Mountain Buddha Hall interesting in that there is a picture of a blue moon lit sky starting a post about desire.