The 13th Dharma Session of Middle Way Buddhist Association: Great Compassion

I tried a new approach to meditation in today's session, it being the 13th of the now monthly Dharma session organized by Middle Way Buddhist Association and held at its Pinellas Park venue. Previously, I have been using the Breath method, concentrating on the inhaling and exhaling to focus the mind, with some success. Then I read in Daniel Goleman's The Meditative Mind (Putnam Book, 1988, pg. 186) that “some of the most widely used concentrative meditations employ mantras as the objects of focus.” It cited “Om Mane Padme Hum”, a pithy Buddhist mantra, as an example. And that was what I did, today.

Effect-wise, it wasn't much different from the Breath method as random thoughts and pieces of sounds picked up by my hearing still wandered in and out of my mind, breaking up my silent chanting in the process. But I heeded the lessons that I have been taught: let the thoughts and the sounds make their way through, and gently bring the mind back to the mantra chanting.

I think I began to lose track of the time toward the later part of the meditation session, until I heard the chime signaling the end of the session. Reluctantly, I reentered the physical world to attend the Dharma talk by Bhante Dhammawansha that ensued. Calling it a discussion rather, Bhante said the time for Dharma discussion is auspicious, timely, fortunate, precious, and beneficial. So was the Dharma topic today: Great Compassion, or Mahakaruna. This is the Buddhist compassion that knows no limits. Also in Buddhism, wisdom and compassion go hand in hand.

Compassion can be defined simply as the heart warming, even melting, upon seeing suffering, which then precipitates a want to help. Unlike cruelty, it takes efforts to cultivate compassion. For example, most people would just smash a mosquito on one's arm with one's palm without giving it a second thought. A truly compassionate person would have to consciously let go of that killer instinct, and softly shoo the mosquito away. Most may also rationalize their “destructive” action on the “for the greater good” argument that mosquitoes are vectors of debilitating deceases such as Malaria and Dengue Fever. However, Bhante gently reminded us that while animals have single-point poisonous parts (for example, tails of scorpions and fangs of venomous snakes) in their bodies, ours is a whole-body arsenal of poisons. That's food for thought indeed.

So many times we seek and see happiness outside of and around us, but never feel the compassion inside. We must realize that what we see outside are tools to an end, including Dharma. An oft-cited Buddhist analogy is once we have crossed a river in a raft, we don't carry the raft with us but leave it behind for others.

When we practice compassion, there is no place in our mind for cruelty, for jealousy, and all the other negative human emotions. As His Holiness the Dalai Lama humbly proclaims, “My religion is my compassion.”

But as the cliché goes, it's easier said than done. How, then, can we cultivate and develop compassion? Bhante said we can start with doing the little things such as:

1) Do little things for others.

2) Speak kind words.

Then to expand the sphere of and elevate our level of compassion:

3) Realize that we will be helpless and hopeless one day. [Here the discussion shifted to cases of people committing suicide, say through a self-inflicted gun shot, just to escape the situation to which Bhante responded that the last thought that a person leaves this world with is important in determining his/her next life, perhaps one prone to wielding the same weapon to cause harm to others then. An attendee also posited that this very act would deny others the opportunity of giving. The proper thing to do is perhaps not to expect anything in return.]

4) Think everything as impermanent, thus laying a great seed to develop compassion.

5) Know yourself. We need to take care of ourselves first [not in the sense of serving our own needs first, but so that we are in a position to help others].

6) Listen to others' lamentations, hear the crying world.

7) Put ourselves in others' shoes [Brilliant scientists who develop and program mass weapons of destruction (chemical, biological) are likened as people with knowledge but without compassion.]

8) Have a calm, peaceful personality.

At this juncture, the sky started pouring, pelting the roof to a crescendo. It also afforded Bhante the chance to liken the rain to the shower of compassion, removing the desert in the heart just like the rain would make the plants rejoice and flourish.

Adding to the above list, an attendee suggested: think inter-connectedness, to which Bhante offered the term, one brotherhood.

To conclude, Bhante suggested that we keep a journal of good deeds that we have performed on a daily or weekly basis. One such entry could read: Today I smiled back to a person who got angry with me. At the end of the year, a reading of the journal would provide a glimpse into our compassionate journey and also spur us on to aspire to great compassion in the Buddhist sense.

In the midst of discussion, several attendees also touched on the issue of being vegetarians in consonance with the Buddhist precept of no killing, even though Buddha did not decree that one should not consume meat explicitly. As a matter of Buddhist Edict, Buddhism does prohibit eating meat prepared when one has witnessed the killing of the animal, one has heard the killing of he animal, and one has ordered the killing for the meat preparation, or that the animal was killed because of me. Then there are views that merely the act of consuming meat alone, even though it is not in violation of the Buddhist Edict, is tantamount to creating a demand for meat, and the same act is amounting to condoning the killing, or letting others kill for you. Another attendee also pointed to the moral high ground that some self-righteous activists position themselves to judge others. This is a complex, highly charged and emotion-laden human interaction that is surely beyond the ambit of this discussion to resolve. But Bhante's exhortations through the Buddha's words and his teaching are sobering:

“No harm to others because of me.” .... The Buddha

Do not have a differentiating mind.

As usual, the attendees feasted on a vegetarian lunch prepared by the various volunteers during which more exchanges of views, doubts, and explanations took place; but these would remain as private discourses among lay Buddhists since none of us have the “credentials”, as yet, to say one way or the other. But the contents did provide fodder for more self investigation through experiential learning.

A doubling of Wify with Arnold (left), and Sandra (right), two fellow attendees.

A Spiritual Dinner

This evening we participated in the International Dinner and FundRaiser for the benefit of Dhamma Wheel Meditation Society (DWMS) to realize its aim of expanding its meditation hall. The event was held at the Unity Church of Clearwater, located just next to the DWMS venue, which also serves as the residence of Bhante Dhammawansha, the resident monk of DWMS.

Wify prepared two dishes for the occasion, and we promptly brought them to the cafe area of Unity Church to be arranged along with numerous dishes from other volunteers. A brief ceremony was first held in the sanctuary, started off by the host, Rev. Leddy Hammock, the minister of Unity Church.

She first spoke of peace, succinctly contained in the following seven points:

1)War and violence do not work, and are counter-productive to the wellbeing of the human race.
2) Our worldview must change as treaties do not guarantee peace.
3) To do that, we have to change the human thought, our consciousness.
4) And we have to change our thoughts individually.
5) Love is the only thing that works.
6) One filled with love can overcome anger.
7) And when anger is released, we feel peaceful.

She then led the attendees through a peace prayer session. Bhante Dhammawansha next talked on self love, it being the remedy for everything. Self love comes from within, and its cultivation brings unity. He enumerated the following ways through which self love can be cultivated:

1) Cultivate the mind to avoid unwholesome thoughts and deeds.
2) Have a sense of humor, as it infuses one with self love.
3) Be humble and let go of your ego.
4) Appreciate your human life, one that's endowed with so many good qualities.
5) Cultivate non-violence.
6) Do others' duties.
7) See the suffering in the world.

In the words of the Buddha, “No harm to anybody because of me.”

He then invited his fellow Sangha members in attendance on to the stage to deliver a joint blessing in Pali. Thus blessed, all were invited to a spiritual dinner hosted at the cafe area.

The start of the vegetarian dinner. We were feted to music entertainment courtesy of the organist who was shielded from view by the waiting line to the right.

Bhante Dhammawansha (second from left) were seated at the library area just next to the cafe area with his fellow Sangha members, and they were having their own spiritual dinner indeed.

The dinner was a vegetarian fare, which we partook of mindfully. Thus ended a blessed evening, for a noble cause, spiritually fulfilled.

Oh yes, we each took a fortune cookie. And mine read: You will be pleasantly surprised soon. But I'm already.

A Great Buddhist Practitioner and Scholar

Garma CC Chang is a name that we first came across in an email from a Buddhist friend, inviting us to attend a two-hour special program delivered by his wife, Mrs. Helena Chang. We were intrigued by the brief biographical sketch of Prof. Chang given therein:

“He went to eastern Tibet to study Buddhism at age 16 and stayed there for 9 years. Master Chang was professor of Eastern Philosophy at Pennsylvania State University. He had made tremendous contributions in bringing Buddhism to the western world.”

Wishing to learn more about the remarkable journey that Prof. Chang had carved out for himself on his chosen Buddhist path, we did the most natural thing in the Internet Era: googling. Starting from his English name, we managed to locate his name in Chinese, after a few twists and turns in the virtual world. The first impression we got is that his Chinese name seems familiar. Then a whole slew of information unraveled when we googled his Chinese name.

We learned that he was born into a well-established family of military repute in China. His mother was a devout Buddhist, whose reverence for the Buddhist teachings had rubbed off on him in his formative years. He was proficient in Chinese, English, Tibetan, and Sanskrit, a very rare combination of linguistic fluency these days. This rare endowment, some no doubt acquired with tremendous perseverance, had placed him in good stead to help bridge the subtle differences among the original and various translated Buddhist scriptures to get to the common underlying themes. Equally important is his eminently ambassadorial role in helping to propagate the Buddhist philosophy to the West, which he had fulfilled exemplarily, by both delivering Dharma talks and writing English Buddhist texts. One of his early Chinese Buddhist texts, What is Dharma? (translated from Chinese), has become a very popular introductory text on Buddhism. He passed away in 1988, leaving a wealth of legacy to guide lay buddhists like us.

Because of our seeming familiarity with his name in Chinese, wify started looking through her collection of Chinese Buddhist texts, and located the above text published by the Buddhist Association of US, the provenance of which (as in from where) we are unable to trace.

Unlike other texts in the same genre that relies on historical development, this rather thin text (numbering less than 100 pages in the B5 format, about half the size of a foolscap paper) employed an effective three-pronged approach to elucidating the salient facets embodied in the Buddhist teachings.

Prof. Chang first resorted to comparative analyses involving other major faith systems to evoke the uniqueness and profundity of the Buddhist teachings. Next, the Mahayana tradition that posits everyone as imbued with the Buddha nature was employed to explain why we have yet to attain Buddhahood, and to illuminate why meditation is the foundation from which stillness, consequent upon taming the mind, will emerge, thereby laying a viable path, paved with wisdom, toward enlightenment. This “straight to the gut” approach provides a direct conduit deep into the essence of Buddhism.

The third variant then pinpointed our errant ways of living that delude us into embarking on the wrong path and identified several modes of Buddhist practice that, when incorporated into our daily routine, would help put us on the right track.. The last experiential approach is meant to make us realize the meaning of Dharma through self actualization.

I finished the entire book in less than an hour of continuous reading, the speed no doubt aided by my prior exposure to similar contents. I particularly like the presentation in this version (unfortunately it's undated, but see the cover, which is different from this electronic text) where concise statements culled from the gist of a particular section are laid out on top of every page for easy and quick reference. Some translated examples follow:

“A beginning is only relevant in the context of a particular event.”

“Buddhism is the belief of rationality; Dharma is the pursuit of wisdom.”

“The Buddha is not omnipotent. He is merely our teacher, and only our own efforts can truly liberate us.”

“The Buddha is the great emancipator through the elimination of greed, anger, and delusion. The Buddha will not be enraged into meting out disasters as punishment for our misdeeds.”

“If we descend into hell, it's because of our own karmic pull toward retribution. Such a cause leads to such an effect.”

“Equality, Tolerance, and All-inclusiveness lie in the core of the Buddhist Teachings.”

“Our experience through life is nothing but a journey of zero sum game of emotions and rationality where one can only grow at the expense of the other.”

“The co-arising of great compassion and great wisdom is the common goal of our learning efforts as lay Buddhists.”

“Our delusions are like torrents that escape our detection before we practice meditation.”

“The cause we plant in this life, may not reach fruition in this life. The effect in this life may also not be due to the cause we have planted in this life. “

I have also located his second Chinese Buddhist text on the Net: Buddhist Teachings in Four Communications (translated from Chinese), which will be my next reading assignment.

Prof. Chang also had several English books to his credit, one of which is entitled The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa, translated from the Tibetan text. According to Wikipedia, Jetsun Milarepa (c. 1052-c. 1135 CE) is “generally considered one of Tibet's most famous yogis and poets, a student of Marpa Lotsawa, and a major figure in the history of the Kagyu (Bka'-brgyud) school of Tibetan Buddhism. The essence of Milarepa lies in his writings rather than the legends that have grown up around him. The writings, often referred to as the Songs of Milarepa, are canonical Mahayana Buddhist texts and in particular emphasize the temporary nature of the physical body and the need for non-attachment.”

Then this morning I read this quote of him cited in Christina Feldman's The Buddhist Path to Simplicity (Thorsons, 2001, pg. 62):

“Long accustomed to contemplating compassion, I no longer see a difference between myself and other.”

And the barricade that we have placed around us, the so-called I/Ego, becomes emptiness. Instead, separate bodies and minds become connected and inter-dependent. This is the logical end that the noble path of compassion would take us, as was the case for Milarepa.

We are indeed fortunate and blessed that we have been invited to partake of the life of this great icon in the annals of Western Buddhism, through the words of his beloved wife, Mrs. Helena Chang. And we look forward to attending the occasion.

This image of the lotus flowers by wify is our tribute in memoriam of the late Prof. Chang.

An Afternoon of Compassion and Appreciation

We attended the 2007 Year End Appreciation and Blessing Dinner (well, perhaps a misnomer of sort since the event was held in the afternoon) organized by Buddhist Compassion Relief Tzu Chi Foundation U.S.A, Orlando Chapter held at USF today. This is our second time, the first being in 2005, a dinner held in the evening.

Themed Gratitude, Respect, and Love and Reverence to Heaven and Earth for Merit Accumulation, the event included dispensation of Words of Wisdom from Master Cheng Yen, the founder, the Review of 2007 Community Service and Tzu Chi Events, both as documentary films, and live performance of the sign language troupe, culminating in the Light Up Your Heart Ceremony.

The Themes in Chinese, with the bylines: Use the eyes of compassion to contemplate the various forms of all sentient beings; Use the ears of wisdom to discern the voices of all sentient beings.

Abiding by their motto “First to arrive, last to leave”, Tzu Chi volunteers have been over in 47 countries, rendering assistance, both medical, mental and physical, wherever and whenever calamities hit: earthquakes, fires, floods, droughts, hurricanes, tornadoes, as documented in the films. Their first priority is to provide personal assistance, through physical presence and demonstration of great love.

Seeing them in action, selfless and expecting nothing in return, the documentary nearly brought tears to my eyes. And here I am, lamenting about the inconveniences in life in relative affluence, mouthing compassion and yet staying within my comfort zone. One can pray and transfer merits as much as one so wishes, but nothing is more welcome to the victims of misfortunes than personal care and immediate relief. The Tzu Chi Foundation is deservedly a movement of compassionate relief, actualizing and propagating the Buddha's teachings in saving humanity from hardship, especially those who are least able to fend for themselves, transcending creed, ethnicity, and status.

It's patently clear that their relief efforts harbor no religious overtones nor overtures, with compassion as the sole driving force, as evidenced by their universal acceptance wherever their footprints cover. While its dedication to helping the aggrieved is beyond question, the Tzu Chi Foundation, led by its far-sighted leader, Master Cheng Yen, has also recognized the potential disasters that await the Earth in the not-so-distance future, a rather warm and wet one as projected by the International Panel on Climate Change, in the form of sea level rise and extreme meteorological events.

Mother Earth's inhabitants, the supposedly thinking ones, are spewing greenhouse gases, chief among which is carbon dioxide, in unprecedented amounts, thus setting off a chain of events that start from global warming, to ice sheet melting, to sea level rising, and to the loss of the coastal fringes, even entire islands. One of the messages in Master Cheng Yen's dispensation has to do with carbon reduction, and that it's everyone's responsibility. Everyone matters in this bid to save the world, and there is no better place to start than right from the very home of each and everyone.

Saving electricity by switching off unused lights, electrical appliances, and computers. And yes, those computers in sleep mode are still consuming electrical power as we speak, or I write to be specific about it. An attendee informed that merely by switching off the water heaters when not in use and having them turned on just half and hour before shower time saves his household electricity bill by $50 a month. And to think that the hot water in our home is always on demand, the electricity that is, I realize that I have played my part in contributing to the rise in energy consumption, and by extension, carbon loading.

Carpooling or even bicycling. Human energy is the most environmentally friendly, not to mention the health benefits accrued from pedaling. The majority of us are indeed pampered so much by technological advancement that we have to resort to indoor gyms to exercise, a classic case of using technological fixes to shed the extra pounds gained from eating gourmet food, again made possible by advances in amenities.

Using washable utensils. Tzu Chi volunteers always carry metal/porcelain chopsticks, spoons, and containers wherever they go. Even when they are not, they do not use disposal items.

Indeed as lamented by Master Cheng Yin, we have neglected the wellbeing of Mother Earth, abdicating our duties as responsible children of Mother Earth by sucking out every last ounce of her resources, and succumbing to greed, to grandeur that blinds us to the injuries inflicted on Mother Earth. Hence, the exhortations to cherish the treasure that we have, and to use the resources wisely.

Another message is that doing good and doing filial piety are two things in life that cannot wait. We must be grateful, respectful, and loving to our parents, our elders, and our teachers. We must curb our personal cravings, and reinstate/revive the filial way, observing decorum.

The performance by the sign language troupe was well executed, exuding warmth and softness of touch. This was followed by the lighting the candle and transmitting the light ceremony as a symbolic act of Lighting Up the Heart. The day's event ended with the making the vow ceremony and gift giving, after which the attendees adjourned to savor refreshments comprising various tidbits.

The sign language troup performing, transmitting the universal language of love and compassion.

The Song of Great Love: Thank you for the warm embrace, helping me to tide over the ebbs in my life. A heart filled with love to the brim, is not swayed by forceful wind. Learn to lend a shoulder for support. Smile with sincerity and understanding, and solve your worries by your side. Seeing the halt in your crying, even for a fleeting second, when you raise your head, envelops me in warm feeling through and through. I believe there is love in this world worth bidding. A heart long sealed is bound to open up. Understanding and forgiving will undo hurt. And loving kindness will remove suspicion. The most moving kind of love is trust.

The gift giving ceremony.

And these are our gifts: healthy non-meat powder food and packets and coins with inscriptions of wisdom gems, the former to ingest and the latter, to digest.

Drum roll ... the Tzu Chi volunteers, in the same resplendent and distinctive wear that is the hallmark of the Tzu Chi troupe.

Seeing is believing, we came home deeply moved by the experience, and at the same time thankful that there are such noble people amongst us who brave the elements, who traverse the uncharted territory far and wide, and who render assistance in far flung corners of the Earth just at a moment's notice. While wify and I have not committed ourselves to following their peerless paths, we do resolve to help out in their local assignments any way we can, both financially and in kind.

The 12th Dharma Session of Middle Way Buddhist Association: Karma & Causality

One of the three unthinkable subjects in Buddhism (an assertion that Bhante Dhammawansha has repeatedly told in his Dharma talks that I have attended) relates to the immutable notion of Cause and Effect. Variously known as the Principle (some have used the more forceful term, Doctrine) of Causality, Conditioned Arising, Dependent Origination, Dependent Co-Arising, and the related widely popular Karma, the original Sanskrit term that has been absorbed into the English lexicon, which is simply translated as Action, the notion encompasses the ramifications implied in many of our common sayings such as “you reap what you sow,” “crime does not pay,” and much more since its payback, in the present-day parlance, is not restricted to the present life, but over the so-called Three Life Interpretation (see Figure below).

A concomitant belief is Rebirth, which I personally prefer over another oft-used term, Reincarnation. Both beliefs predate Buddhism but have become two of the central tenets in Buddhism and are inseparable in the sense that denying one makes it that much harder to accept the other. Both constitute a huge mental block for lay believers as empirical evidence of their manifestation in our daily life within the lifespan as we know it is indeed far and between. Living counter proofs abound: rampant poverty and other social scourges, the bad guys got off scot-free while the good guys, victimized. Even those who have taken the Three Refuges may still harbor reservations as amply blogged here.

This apparent incongruence that may seem to require a leap of faith, a rather stupendous one at that, to bridge was explored in the 12th Dharma Session of the Middle Way Buddhist Association held yesterday (Jan 19, 2008) at its Pinellas Park venue, led by Bhante Dhammawansha.

As usual, the session started with sitting meditation, each attendee electing to sit cross-legged on a cushion or on a chair in accordance with personal preferences and perhaps the dictates of physical condition peculiar to each. I assumed my position on a chair and tried to lose myself in mental liberation from random thoughts.

Even though I have several such feats under my belt accumulated since day one (March, 2007) of the formation of MWBA, my mind was still drifting in and out of brief clarity (the tick-tocking of the wall clock was all I heard, and actually counted), and what seemed like an eternity of muddled state where different sounds/noises vied for my attention, from which I was awakened, thanks to gravity, by my body sensing an imminent forward lurching motion (or was it all in the mind?), a warning that the mind was heading toward stupor thus losing control over the body. Anway, I was relieved when Bhante's calm voice came into my consciousness, signifying the end of yet another tussle in the on-going saga of my journey on the path of meditation.

Bhante started the Dharma talk by observing that we don't like to take responsibility. We deem gifts from others as ours, even borrowed ones. But once they are broken, they are no longer ours. This refusal to take responsibility runs counter to the very fabric of causality that every action begets a reaction as embodied in the law of physics governing Nature, and has consequences in human interaction.

However, these consequences will only manifest when the conditions are conducive, or ripe. For example, our presence here in the morning was the convergence of many conditions: Tom organized, the venue was available, Bhante was committed to lead, and the attendees were informed and made the trip through the foggy weather. Thus, Buddhism denies that an action is the result of one condition alone being fulfilled. A simple illustration to understand the concept of dependent origination is the system of English alphabets where B comes after A, C comes after B and so on. If there is no B, then there is no A, and so on.

The Buddha rejected three reasons offered to explain why something happened:
a) previous karma;
b) external agencies/controller;
c) no reason.

In the Buddha's teaching, the Noble 8-Fold Paths, a mainstay of the Middle Way, serve to exemplify the working of the cause and effect:

First we must have the right view/understanding. Then we will have the right thought, the right speech, the right action, the right livelihood, the eight effort, the right mindfulness, and the right concentration in that order. To bring out the human wisdom, we need to search, experiment, and investigate, step by step. It's like reaching for the light from the dark, slowly seeing the light for ourselves as we journey as per the admonishment from the Buddha for self verification, i.e., do not believe because He said it, because of fear, and because of scriptures. Indeed, this rejection of blind faith has continued to be echoed by such scientific luminaries as Sir Issac Newton, “In the fight between truth and untruth, truth always prevails,” and Sir Julian Huxley, a 20th century English biologist and humanist, “No reason to believe anything without experimentation.”

Bhante then went ahead to put in words the causal relationships (the twelve links) that lead to our suffering, starting from our body to the ultimate source: ignorance. Rather than transcribing verbatim what Bhante had explained, I found a graphical representation here that could perhaps illustrate the linkages in the same way, but entailing the three life interpretation as an amplification. Thus, it is said that ignorance is the greatest rust, while wisdom is the greatest gem.

Conditioned Arising - The Standard Model as applied to the Second Ennobling Truth (Fig. 1 taken from here. There is also a disclaimer in the source that "the above diagram is not a strictly accurate depiction of the 3 lives view." Click on the figure for an enlarged view.

A notable feature of the above figure is the cyclical process. Thus, life in Buddhism is viewed as an endless cycle of birth and rebirth with no beginning and no end, the wheel of samsara. And the ultimate liberation lies in getting out of the samsara through enlightenment. We can experience such a cycle in our daily life as well, a prime example of which is the hydrological cycle that traces out the path of water, for example, in the mighty Mississippi River.

In karmic terms, some may view the 2004 South Asian tsunami catastrophe as a contradiction. Then there are quarters who attributed the carnage to the absence of faith in God. However, in the worldview of Buddhism, the event is a natural phenomenon spawned by an imbalance in the four elements that constitute the world: water, fire, earth, and air.

The confusion arises from our inability to separate culture and religion, often seeing the world through lenses that are colored by our prejudices and obfuscated by layers of ignorance. Therefore, the Buddha exhorted us to go deeper to understand reality and as such, He had devised many ways to help put ourselves on the path to enlightenment, as befitting his exemplary role as a great physician for mental diseases.

In the interaction that followed during the vegetarian lunch, I was given an idea for my next reading project in trying to better understand how Buddhism that professes no self would be able to reconcile with the notion of individuality that is so deeply ingrained in the western ethos: Buddhism without Beliefs by Stephen Batchelor. Thanks, Olivier.

A Bright Moon: The Buddhist Path of Venerable Hung-I

The extension in the title would have alerted readers to the fact that this is not a blog about the moon that is hung way up there in the nightscape, though its physical presence there has spawned many folklores and poems. Rather, it's about the legendary life of a man, a real one, who switched from living in one world to another world, albeit physically occupying the same space, seemingly just by flipping the mind. But as we shall see, the switch is driven by the same positive emotion that we all have, but a very much extended version: universal love.

I first heard of Venerable Hung-I from a Chinese Buddhist book that wify brought with her from Malaysia. It's a collection of Buddhist wisdom compiled by Venerable Hung-I from all the sutras that he had read but explained by Venerable Chin Kung.

Then I was told of the widely circulated account of his ordainment as a Buddhist monk at the rather mature age of 39. By then he already had a family and had earned rave reviews and established himself as a consummate artist and musician. In this respect, he much mirrored the way Shakyamuni Buddha had left his earthly wealth and beloved ones to seek the universal truth of our existence.

Then I found out that one of the songs in a Chinese Buddhist Song CD that we listen daily is by him, the lyrics that is. We listen to it so much so that we can even recite the verses of the song, Bidding Farewell, from memory. The elegance, the fluidity, and the profundity of the arrangement of the words conjure up the extreme gloom typically associated with saying goodbye, accentuating the impermanence of human interaction.

More recently, I chanced upon the news of a Chinese movie depicting his life, A Bright Moon, one that draws a sharp contrast between his earlier life of a wealthy prodigy of arts, covering nearly every major fields in artistic creativity: calligraphy, paintings, music, sculpture, and drama, and his later life as a highly venerated itinerant monk steeped in the school of precepts and morality. The transition from ebullience, fame, and accolades to solitude and serenity is phenomenal to say the least.

(Image taken from here.)

Since then I have been searching for the movie since it is a rarity indeed to find a movie made in the rarefied genre of Buddhism, especially a biography of a contemporary (we were born about sixty years apart) Chinese Buddhist monk that happened to share the same last name as me. And the prayer was answered today, when I watched the 99-minute movie with wify.

The movie started with a kid striking a spinning top with some kind of flexible stick (rattan?) ostensibly to keep it spinning (we have our own version of spinning top back home, one that's much more streamlined in shape released from a thin rope coiled round the top which is then left to spin on its own accord). That's Lee Shu-Tung, before he became Venerable Hung-I. And the next scene showed him reciting some verses from the Diamond Sutra, at the young tender age of four.

The top of the spinning top.

The first half of the movie is about his life in the mundane world, dabbling and excelling in various forms of arts, and his frequent clashes with the feudalistic way of his family (his biological mother was a concubine and he was fatherless at a young age). As an avant-garde in the realm of music and arts, he was credited with introducing music and the uninhibited art-form (using models in the nude) of the West into China, facing tremendous hurdles in the latter effort as one would image.

The transition occurred at the mid-point of the movie, when Lee related his wish to embrace monkhood to his best friend, Shia, who was understandably shell-shocked that a man of such good fortunes could just give them all up to escape into a world of pessimistic retreat as judged through the lens of one ensconced in the conventional world.

In the next scene, he relayed the same news to his wife, who was heart-broken. When she entreated him to go to Japan as Japanese monks could still have families, he proudly declared that he was a Chinese, that he had mastered his arts while in Japan notwithstanding. This patriotic leaning in him was weaved through the movie, especially toward the end when he admonished the sangha community that Buddhism was about loving and saving the country.

I must admit that I was waiting for some kind of life changing event that precipitated his transition to emerge, but to no avail. I guess the threshold was reached incrementally, that he was basically still an unhappy man despite all the niceties in life. There was a scene when he and his erstwhile wife met in the middle of a lake, in two different boats. She pleaded him, addressing him as Venerable Hung-I at his insistence, what love was. His reply: love is compassion.

I recalled an earlier scene when they were happily married and were boating in the same lake, on one boat. She had said then, “Paradise up there, and Su and Hang down here” (Su Chou and Hang Chou with their unparalleled scenic beauty were the two heavens on earth then). What a diametrically opposite contrast of life's mutability.

Apart from been a vegan, Venerable Hung-I actualized the edicts of precepts, of morality. One scene showed him removing a bug from under his head while planning to sleep and letting it go next to the bed. He had penned verses on pictures of releasing life (one of the scenes in the movie displayed juvenile fish being released into a lake), drawn and compiled by his students into a book collection.

The drawing entitled Sentient Beings and verses are from here. Chinese translation: All sentient beings share our body form, and we should be compassionte toward them because of their ignorance. Releasing life and refraining from killing are my advice to all, as to love them is to not consume their meat.

He spent his remaining years delivering Dharma lectures and composing Buddhist songs, educating the next generation of the Buddhist flag carriers to propagate the Buddhist teachings. The last scene showed him refusing his physician's prescription while seriously ill so that the needy could benefit from the medicine, accepting the inevitability of death totally.

From the halcyon days of artistic achievements, the pioneer in invigorating the arts scene in China, a beaming icon of unparalleled talents, to the stillness of a monastery, a full devotion to emptiness, and a complete abstinence from all worldly pleasures, that's the path that Venerable Hung-I had traversed, one that would forever illuminate the path for generations to come, like a bright moon.

A Preamble to the Bodhi Path, an Effort at Translation and Actualization

An Anthology on Middle Contemplation and Life, a Chinese Buddhist book by Mr. Huang Kuo Tat, printed by the Buddhist Association of the United States (2005) has been in wify's collection of Buddhist books for some time now. We could not recall how the book ended up there, but chances are we must have picked it up at an exchange service of free Buddhist books, which is an integral part of many Buddhist centers.


Anyway, when we started to participate in the activities of the Middle Way Buddhist Association (MBWA), I started to delve further into what Middle Way entails. One obvious reference is Wikipedia, which casts Madhyamaka (the Sanskrit term) as “the rejection of two extreme philosophies, and therefore represents the "middle way" between eternalism (the view that something is eternal and unchanging) and nihilism (the assertion that all things are intrinsically already destroyed or rendered nonexistent”. While this is precise enough as definition goes, I wanted to understand it better as a lay believer.

And the first paragraph in Sub-section A (The Wisdom of Middle Way) of Section 1 (On Middle Contemplation) in the First Chapter (The Chan Practice of Middle Contemplation) of the above-mentioned book, as available online here, but I first saw it here, definitely put me on the right frame of mind. An excerpt of the text, translated in English, follows:

“Buddhism speaks of the Middle Way as the avoidance of extreme views and behaviors. What then is the true meaning of the Middle Way? The Middle Way is defined as following the middle of the path as appropriate, without landing on either side. In this respect, Shakyamuni Buddha had cited the following illustration:

For a timber log to be transported smoothly from upstream via a river to a downstream destination, it has to follow the flow of the main stream so as not to be grounded in the shallows near the bank, nor sunk to the bottom. Middle Way is also akin to playing a harp, the sound is discordant when the strings are either too taut or too loose. Melodious sound will only ensue from strings that are neither taut nor loose.

In practice, Shakyamuni Buddha demonstrated the Middle Way as seeking neither suffering nor happiness. Neither the fruitless self-afflicting way of the ascetic, nor the indulgent, carnal way of the hedonistic can lead to liberation of the mind, which can be accomplished only through living the wisdom embodied in the Middle Way.”

I particularly like Section 3 of Chapter 3 (Integrated Discussion) entitled The Unperturbed Mind/The Bodhi Path with the tag-line, On Freedom and Responsibility. Both are deemed important human attributes in Buddhism but neither is absolute nor driven by a sense of mission borne of chauvinism. Both are relevant, if not integral, to the many personal struggles that we undergo on a daily basis, as well as to the intra- and inter-national and racial conflicts befalling the world today. Through dealing with life's challenges, the section expounds on how cultivating the Unperturbed Mind and actualizing the Bodhi Path can help bring the conflicts to some satisfactory resolution.

And that, meaning doing the English translation of Section 3, I will do in the next several blogs because of its length.

From Calm Abiding to Insight, Meditation-wise

We drove to St. Pete yesterday morning to attend the Meditation Retreat for a Dialog with our Minds conducted by Bhante Upananda organized by Samadhi Buddhist Meditation Center and held at the Southwest Florida Buddhist Vihara. But we were there only for part of the time, staying to listen to the Dharma talk on How to move to Vipassana from Samatha.

We have been to the Vihara several times before, recalling the majestic outdoor model scenes depicting the various momentous events in the life of Syakyamuni Buddha, all in sparkling white. We note that several mini wooden crossings have been added since then.

We first handed over several vegetarian dishes to the kitchen, and tiptoed into the main hall where Bhante Upananda had already began his Dharma talk.

Bhante likened our life to being on a psychological marathon, always on the move. And we are lost amidst the tremendous technological advances that we have forged, mechanically moving forward but perhaps spiritually deficient. To fill this void, we need dialog, and talk to ourselves. Hence the purpose of the retreat, which is to try to look at ourselves.

Bhante notes with concern the fixation of college students on cell phones. They are often seen fidgeting with the cell phone in hand, scrolling up and down for someone to call. The outlook is often one of seeking pleasure from without, rather than addressing the inner turbulence that is constantly brewing, bordering on bursting at the seam.

In this respect, the word meditation as is commonly understood fails to convey what it is meant for. In Pali, the word is Bhavana, which means to cultivate, to enhance, to increase, through reducing turbulence.

Samatha (an English translation is Calm Abiding Mediation) is then aimed at emptying our mind of negative feelings, akin to clearing out the garbage that is occupying space in the kitchen, as a tool for fulfillment.

All Buddhas profess to do no evils, do all good, and to purify the mind, achieved by removing moral garbage. We inherit 52 types of tendencies by birth, the majority of which is negative. And good tendencies feed on good feelings, and vice versa.

While meditation as a practice predates Buddhism, Vipassana (an English translation is Insight Meditation) is where true Buddhism/Dharma begins.

Bhante believes that the word "religion" fundamentally carries cultural connotations. A preferred alternative term, which is increasingly used in US, is spirituality, which is perceived to be culture-neutral.

He also believes that there is no religion other than emotions, which are the functional aspects of the mind. One particularly pernicious emotional display is a deep level of helplessness, sometimes manifest in our crying out for help.

Thus, Samatha deals with the inner turbulence engendered by our emotional upheavals so that in the process positive tendencies would pop up, leading to good results. What Buddha did was to change the Samatha meditation as practiced then by not surrendering to some unknown higher level/source. The Buddha taught us to seek internal divinity instead, by internalizing and humanizing the God within us.The Buddha then rediscovered Vipassana, the insight meditation that permits us to see things as they truly are through letting the dust settle such that the water is no longer troubled. Otherwise it's like trying to see through a pond of troubled water but we cannot see because there is no way to see.

He cited a personal example of a back pain sustained during a fall in Toronto in 2002. While the doctor can prescribe clinical relief, he had to deal with the pain by seeing the pain as it is, to transform the pain as is often cited by Dalai Lama.

The easiest avenue to Vipassana is through dealing with aches and pains. By believing in the ability to deal with the pain, we can realize our inner potential. Scan the body, identify the pain as one whose primary existence is in the mind, recognize that we are mortals, are in a state of perpetual change, and hence, impermanence, thereby educating our mind in the process.

Vipassana connotes discernment and wisdom, and entails diving into the mind to see its beauty. While he does not encourage everyone to do so, Bhante engages in seeing his own skull as a way to understand impermanence. As an analogy, a medical practitioner has an anatomical understanding of the body, but the Buddhists need to have a spiritual understanding of the same, peeling off the robe, the skin, the flesh, the bone, the marrow, and ultimately nothing, the ultimate emptiness.

At this point, Bhante concluded the session on the Dharma talk and the attendees then adjourned to a scrumptious vegetarian lunch prepared by volunteers. We left soon after lunch while the other attendees continued with the afternoon session on walking meditation, earning a well-timed respite from their busy schedule by engaging the mind in a dialog through meditation.

The 11th Dharma Session of Middle Way Buddhist Association: Love is in the air

“ ... Love is nature's way of giving; a reason to be living ...”

For those of us who belong to the so-called baby boomer generation, this is likely to be familiar lyrics; otherwise the tune itself, Love is a Many Splendored Thing, may also evoke a trip down the memory lane. Love can indeed move mountains. At the same time, love can be the source of untold misery too, when its twin brother, hate, comes to the fore. But it does not have to be that way, when we subscribe to the Buddhist notion of love, as expounded by Bhante Dhammawansha at the occasion of the 11th Dharma session of Middle Way Buddhist Association (MBWA) held on December, 15, 2007 at its Pinellas Park venue.

This was to be the first of the three topics that Bhante would speak on, immediately following the mutual introduction of fellow attendees, the other two being cause and effect, and compassion, two of the central tenets in Buddhism.

Broadly, love can be conditional or unconditional. The former lies within the purview of us mere mortals, it being the preoccupation of the mundane world, be it between married couples, among family members, friends, leaders and followers, etc. On the other hand, unconditional love is a particular rarity in this time when materialism reigns supreme but is professed by the Buddha and Bodhisattvas nonetheless.

Conditional love is characterized by the duality of love and hate, the line of division being often tenuous at best. It is selfish, driven by self benefits, and is loaded with expectations. It is carnal in nature and fixates on the ego. Since “I” is in the thick of action, negative emotions like anger, fear, worry, and doubt abound, thereby accentuating the negative feedback to the extent of destroying the lives of others. This proliferating trend has turned the world into a time bomb, a catastrophe in waiting.

The only way to defuse the dire situation is to propagate unconditional love, one that is fulfilling, healing, uplifting, and reinforcing. It nips hatred in the bud. Unconditional love starts from within, by changing our mind. It is said that the difference between a murderer and a saint is only one thought away.

Ever noticed that the poisons in animals are confined to certain parts of their bodies: the tail of a scorpion, the fangs of a venomous snake, the skin of some animals? But all five senses of a human body are poisonous, but they can be controlled, with the mind. Think no retaliation, practice forbearance. When in a group, do only one of two things: spiritual discussion or noble silence.

A pre-requisite to embracing unconditional love is self love, the ability and capacity to love ourselves. It may seem paradoxical, but is like having a bottle of water, you can't give it to others if you don't have one. Through self love, we will be able to give love to others. This is one way to develop the seed of unconditional love. One other way is to appreciate life, going above and beyond the oft-quoted raison detre: eat, drink and be merry.

Cultivate the right understanding, and hold the right view. Let go of clinging, avoid emotional roller coaster, talk to “anger”, without giving it plus or minus, be friendly with negative emotions, not hiding or rejecting, but accepting, observing. Be mindful, focusing in the moment.

How to be detached from the 5 senses? When seeing, just see. When touching, just touch. We need to control our senses, just like the turtle retracting its head and limbs into the shell when it encounters a tiger, leaving the tiger no choice but to walk away.

Satisfying our desires only brings temporary relief, after which they will continue to fester to become long-term afflictions.

Bhante concluded the meaningful session on love by passing on another gem of Buddhist teaching:

“Worldly things are always ready for our needs, but not for our greed.”

The Tenth Dharma Session of Middle Way Buddhist Association: Consciousness and Self

Venerable Jiang Hu made a return visit to Middle Way Buddhist Association's venue at Pinellas Park at the occasion of its Tenth Dharma session to deliver the Dharma Talk entitled Buddhist Analysis of the Mind: Consciousness and the Self. As was the case during his first visit in July, the session was preceded by meditation at 7.00pm, and concluded with a Taking the Three Refuges ceremony at 9.30pm.

We left home around 6.00pm and found the evening commute on I-275 to be bearable, enabling us to reach the venue before the scheduled time of start.

The attendees in place, seated variously on chairs and on the carpeted floor, with cushions, Venerable Jian Hu first gave a brief introduction to the essentials of meditation, it being a way to tame the mind, distracted as it is by our endless search for happiness, not realizing that our preoccupation is actually a delusional facade and is the very source of our unhappiness.

Through understanding the mind, which is by nature restless and constantly seeking, we can begin to understand ourselves, the truth of others, and the problems that surround us. This insight can come from within, uncovering our potential to realize the highest level of happiness and freedom.

Meditation is a fruitful practice that begins with the right posture, one that is upright, centered, and relaxed. While the full lotus position is deemed the most stable, beginners can opt for other less “difficult” position such as half lotus, or simply cross-legged, or even sitting on a chair, if physical limitations prevent one from assuming the preferred position. This is followed by paying attention to our breathing to follow a natural unhurried rhythm, and our mind to be fully aware of what's going on. The salient points in this regard are covered in Venerable Jian Hu's first visit and would not be repeated here.

Venerable Jian Hu then led us through a sitting meditation, followed by a walking meditation to experience mindfulness in motion.

Brother Tom introducing our Dharma teacher for the night, Venerable Jian Hu.

In the Dharma talk that followed, Venerable Jian Hu cited meditation as one approach to calming the mind, to render it non-seeking and not desiring. The focus is to clear ourselves of self, the mind in pure awareness, no thoughts arising.

Another approach is a contemplative one, by analyzing consciousness. He related a parable of a group of blind men trying to make sense of what an elephant looks like by feeling different parts of the animal: its tusks, its trunk (snout), its body, its tail, and its leg. As a result, each “sees” a partial and incomplete picture. This is analogous to our perceiving the world using our limited senses.

In Buddhist analysis, we have eight types of consciousness. The first five of sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch are similar to the five senses known in western psychology. The sixth consciousness is our thinking faculty, one that categorizes, and assigns names to objects the first five consciousnesses come into contact with and therefore co-arises with them. However, this is not sixth sense or extra-sensory perception (ESP) that people in the west are wont to invoke.

As a result of the co-arising, our perception of reality through the five sense consciousness is often colored and distorted by our sixth consciousness, with accompanying good and bad thoughts. These then lead to good or bad karma, and retributions. In this regard, it is the one most responsible for our fate. The principle of causality enshrined therein is a central canon in Buddhism, and is somewhat akin to the western refrain, what goes around, comes around.

A good example of our sense limitation is we can only see a tiny range of the entire electric-magnetic wave spectrum, the visible light. Outside this visible light range, a wide assortment of EM waves ranging from microwaves to X-rays that we are blind to have been tapped to maintain and advance our well-being. But when we do not understand the limitations of our senses, we become ignorant.

Venerable Jian Hu then related a personal story of talking a little girl out of consuming meat. The girl was holding a puppy and admitted to not wanting to hurt it when asked. But her eyes swelled with tears when she was asked whether a chicken would feel pain when its leg is cut off. So often we are so used to seeing a small part of reality, in this case, a golden yellow drumstick on our dinner plate, we become detached from it. But if we are able to see a bigger picture, through a larger window to the world if you will, we can generate compassion within us and behave compassionately toward others.

The 8th consciousness is the Alaya or storehouse consciousness. It is also a field, akin to one from which farmers can reap harvest. It always metamorphoses, changing our perspective. As a storehouse, it is a repository of “karma seeds” created by the first seven consciousness. As a field, it can preserve the karma seeds, and when the conditions are ripe, the seeds will grow and bear fruits (karmic retributions).

The 7th consciousness is the Manas or self consciousness. In everyday lingo, it's the ego, a rather irrational one, through clinging to the 8th consciousness. Unfortunately, it's not the real self.

On the other hand, awareness, that fundamental perception that lies at the base of consciousness, does not change. We are equal at the fundamental level, but diverge through alterations by cultural conditioning. To realize your true self is to empty yourself.

Venerable Jian Hu concluded the talk by offering the following advice:

Your can only convert your enemy through compassion.
Work as a way to serve humanity.
Life is impermanent. Accept it.
Do something for the departed by doing good deeds and dedicating the merits to them.

We left the session at the conclusion of the talk and did not stay to witness the Taking the Three Refuges, but I'm sure those who did have had a very blessed night.

Here I would like to conclude with one of the two poems on consciousness from the handout of Venerable Jian Hu:

There are eight brothers from one womb,
One is smart, one is dumb,
Five are out there doing business,
one stays home keeping the account book.

Can you name each of the eight consciousness as described?

Dharma in Multimedia Format

I have taken to viewing Dharma talks on DVDs with wify, a habit she has cultivated for some time now. Previously I did stop briefly about my business and sat down to watch with her. But it was never sustained. This time, though, is different, largely because the delivery goes beyond the pedantic, the speaker often weaving life happenings into the wisdom lessons.

So for the past few days we were watching several recordings of Dharma talks given by Venerable Master Huei Lu when he delivered a series of Dharma talks over three days in early December 2005 at the Singapore Dharma Convention 2005. The three themes that he covered are: Delving into the Karmic Forces; Transforming Knowledge into Wisdom; and Understanding the Mind and Discovering Buddha Self.

The scanned DVD cover.

Ven. Huei Lu, who is domiciled at the Kaohsiung Wen Shu School in Taiwan, is a witty and erudite Dharma teacher who has a knack for freely sprinkling humorous anecdotes just at the right moment to emphasize a point, effortlessly drawing quotes from various sutras at will. Perhaps he was speaking in Singapore where English is widely spoken, he resorted to the use of some everyday usage of English to illustrate the ways toward detachment, or at least lessening the craving for fame, status, and keeping up with the Joneses.

A screen shot of Ven. Huei Lu delivering the Dharma talk.

One instance is to“shut up” when you have nothing new to say. He cited the example of a couple engaging in frequent squabbles. Each time the wife would say, “If not for the three kids, I would have left you long ago”. The way to marital bliss is for each party is to say what needs to be said, once, and then just walk away, ostensibly to cool down.

The other is the ubiquitous “so what?” as a repartee to any comments, the more glorifying the more potent it becomes. He is so rich. She is so beautiful. He is so famous. And a retort like “so what?” would help diminish, if not eliminate, conceit for those put on the pedestals and envy for those around the pedestal. For fame, beauty, and wealth are all impermanent. And the earlier we realize these simple truths, the earlier we will be enlightened, and be in touch with the proverbial happiness that has been so elusive for many.

Languages: the Lifeline of our Communication

Reading an English Buddhist text can be a revealing exercise, in the sense that some of the Buddhist terms appear familiar. I'm referring to their similarity to romanized Malay words that we have learned since young, both in spelling and in meaning.

The teachings of Sakyamuni Buddha, who hailed from India, as embodied in the various sutras (scriptures) passed down through centuries, naturally would adopt the lingua franca of the day, Sanskrit. This only goes to show that some of the Malay terms have Sanskrit roots. Here is a sample, from the perspective of Buddhist terms, courtesy of this on-line Buddhist Glossary of Terms, and this Wikipedia source:

dana: Giving, liberality; offering, alms.
Dharmacakra: the wheel of Dharma (laws and doctrines), which means cakra is wheel or disc as in melontar cakra (discus throwing) as a field event in athletics.
dosa: Aversion; hatred; anger. One of three unwholesome roots in the mind. This generally means sin in Malay.
dukkha: Stress; suffering; pain; distress; discontent.
naga: A term commonly used to refer to strong, stately, and heroic animals, such as elephants and magical serpents.
rupa: Body; physical phenomenon; sense datum.
sukha: Pleasure; ease; satisfaction.

So in a way, we have learned some words from other languages that can be written in romanized forms. One exception that I know is Chinese, even when in the romanized form called Ping Yin as it is a system based on phonetics only. The Chinese characters are in block form made up of basic strokes, and they are mono-syllabic, one sound per character, which can be any of the four basic intonations.

Personally, I have not been very careful at enunciation when it comes to Chinese, often giving a word the wrong intonation, evoking earnest reprimand from wify, and perhaps silent demur from others. But I have tidied up somewhat. And having a chance to converse with Chinese from China and Taiwan in Mandarin since we moved here is a big help.

Not to say that my spoken English is flawless. I recall attending an internal seminar on presentation last year. Each attendee was asked to do several 5-minute oral presentations, once at the beginning, once mid-way, and once at the end, with critiques from both the course instructor and fellow colleagues. Guess what, I was told that the proper way to pronounce the first syllabus of the word “colleague”, or at least the American way, is like “call”, and not “curl” as I have been happily doing it before that day. Even CE, my youngest, is not averse to, in fact I think she is thrilled at, correcting her good old Dad's spoken English.

But that's OK since I'm not a native English speaker anyway. One thing I've learned though, is to speak slowly, making sure to enunciate each sound syllabus clearly, a far cry from my days of staccato machine gun-like delivery. I also find that speaking slowly helps to reduce my accent, an acquired trait that I just can't get rid of.

I marvel at the beauty of both the spoken and written word, and their inherent utility in communication. We should feel blessed that we are able to read, write, speak, and hear, and therefore be extra careful in wielding these tools of communication lest we be misconstrued. Similarly, we need to be extra attentive in listening lest we misconstrue others.

The Three Buddhas

I recently finished Buddha: A Story of Enlightenment by Deepak Chopra (HarperCollins, 2007), a feat stretching over several weeks of intermittent reading. The reading times occurred in relatively bigger chunks toward the end of the book, a reflection of perhaps my resolve to get to the author's conclusion as regards the epic journey of one of the greatest spiritual beacons there is.

At the outset, Mr. Chopra makes it very clear that this is a story, as evidenced both from the subsidiary title and his note right before the story unfolds when he writes “I wrote this book as a sacred journey, fictionalized in many of its externals but psychologically true ...”

In that respect, Mr. Chopra's Buddha is not unlike the unique manga work by Osamu Tezuka, entitled simply Buddha (English translation, Vertical, 2006) in which Mr. Tezuka took liberty with his own imagination manifested in graphic details.

I started with the first volume, Kapilavastu, which I bought from Barnes and Noble, but have yet to go beyond the first quarter. I used to like reading comic books, or graphic novels to be politically correct about it now. I think I made the switch, unconsciously though, to the written word, when I was in high school. I find that imagination is a very powerful ability, conjuring up myriads of scenarios, possibilities that a picture/drawing can hardly evoke. A mental movie would start to weave through my mind, in consonance with the flow of the author's concoction laid out in words.

Another namesake of the book is by Karen Armstrong (Penguins Group, 2004), which I checked out from a local public library a few months back. This book is much more matter-of-fact, and is a bit dry for my taste. That would explain why the book was returned hardly touched. However, I tend to have the same problem with most non-fiction works, or shall we say, books read for knowledge as they normally put a demand on your ability to understand. For fiction, one just hops along mirthfully, oblivious to the stumps/chasms that may cross the path.

Of the three Buddhas, I only finished Mr. Chopra's. Since I already have some familiarity with Sakyamuni Buddha, both the man himself and his teachings, gleaned from reading, usually only several sections, the buddhist texts that wify brought home after occasional visits to temples, Buddha did not leave a lasting impression in, or resonate, with me. I did enjoy some of the details that have eluded me in my intermittent reading of the subject, especially his interaction and characterization of his sometimes nemesis, Devadatta. Buddha's parting words (or rather Mr. Chopra's) on Devadatta is meant to be directed at the Devadatta in each of us:

“When you're obsessed with hatred for someone, it's inevitable that you will return one day as his disciple. He [Devadatta] will still be arrogant and proud. But it won't matter. The fire of passion burns out eventually. Then you dig through the ashes and discover a gem. You pick it up, you look at it with disbelief. The gem was inside you all the time. It is yours to keep forever. It is buddha.”

May we all find the gem that has always been within us.

In terms of my personal benefits though, it has to be the six pages of questions and answers at the end of the book. Entitled The Art of Non-Being, Mr. Chopra expounded, albeit concisely, on the three ways to live the wisdom of the Buddha: social (forming groups of disciples into a Sangha), ethical (centered on the value of compassion), and mystical (taking to heart the message of non-self, necessitating ego death).

Admittedly, despite Mr. Chopra's valiant attempts, some notions are still too nebulous to sink our teeth to, so to speak. Example are the negative phrases such as “non-doing” and “no desire”. The former, in Mr. Chopra's words, “isn't passivity but a state of openness to all possibilities". Similarly, the latter is to be understood “in a positive sense, as fulfillment” whence “desire is irrelevant”. Then there is non-self, which does not mean that you lose yourself at all. Rather, “it's who you are when there are no personal attachments.”

It seems fitting to end this blog with an excerpt from the last page of the book (pg. 278):

“Buddhism is a do-it-yourself project, and that's the secret of its appeal in the modern world. Don't we all ultimately concentrate on personal suffering and what our individual fate will be? Buddha asked for nothing else as a starting point, and yet he promised that the end point would be eternity.”

The 9th Dharma Session of Middle Way Buddhist Association: The Spiritual and Medical Benefits of Prostration, the Buddhist Nexus

We usually cover our car journey from our home to the usual venue of the monthly Dharma session of Middle Way Buddhist Association at Pinellas Park on the other side of the Tampa Bay in less than 35 minutes. Our usual route is by way of I-275, which can be notoriously jam-packed on weekdays, or on certain weekends when the Bucs, and lately the Bulls of USF, are playing their home games. Yesterday was not a game day, but then again we have not taken this route in the afternoon before as the Dharma sessions are held in the morning of a saturday.

But to accommodate the schedule of the speaker of the 9th Dharma session held yesterday, the time was changed to 2pm. We left home at 1.15pm, and were 15 minutes late. That was even after we had decided to take a detour through SR60 via Courtney Campbell Bridge to the north to cross the Bay and then turned south along US19 to Pinellas Park after we were caught in a snail crawl just coming into the Tampa downtown portion of I-275. We wasted some minutes in “just going along” with the optimistic frame of mind that perhaps the backup was from traffic going to the Veteran Expressway and not the I-275 bridge over the Bay. We knew our optimism was misplaced when the exit lane at the turnoff to Veteran Expressway was empty.

So we joined the session while the attendees were in the middle of meditation, most seated on the floor carpet while some on chairs. I took my seat at the back, my usual position, and plunged into deep concentration, or at least attempted to. The usual spectrum of noises came up, and waned, accompanied by the usual allotment of extraneous thoughts that the noises engender. But I remained motionless, save for some occasional shaking which I knowingly corrected, or arrested, my awareness at work. Soon I heard the familiar chime of a bell, a cue to awaken to another reality, complete with sight and sound. And that would be the talk on Traditional Chinese Medicine by Dr. Peter Chang, a National Certification Commission for Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine (NCCAOM)-certified diplomat in both Acupuncture and Chinese Herbology currently based in Orlando.

This may seem as a departure from the usual theme of the Dharma sessions that revolve around the wisdom of Buddhism, but as is soon obvious from the Dr. Chang's delivery, the link is unmistakable, even though Traditional Chinese Medicine can be embraced in its own right as “a safe and effective alternative for [our] health” as the introductory leaflet on Dr. Chang's credentials recommends.

Entitled “Harmony Chinese Medicine”, the leaflet states further that:

“Oriental medicine consists of acupuncture, Chinese Herbology, bodywork (tui na) [similar to body massage in broad terms], nutritional therapy, moaxabustion [the more usual spelling is moxibustion, which is “the burning of moxa or other substances on the skin to treat diseases or to produce analgesia], gua sha ["an immediate form of domestic "first-aid" intervention" and "involves repeated pressured strokes over lubricated skin with a smooth edge", "commonly a ceramic Chinese soup spoon was used, or a well worn coin, even honed animal bones, water buffalo horn, or jade"], cupping, and exercise based on the principles of Traditional Chinese Medicine. Established as an energetic [I can't help but speculate whether "energestics" could have been a more apt description from a similar usage I'm familiar with in describing the movement of sediment grains in water in terms of flow energy] model, Oriental Medicine recognizes a vital energy behind all life forms. This energy, Qi, was discovered to flow along specific channels throughout the body knows as meridians. Each channel is associated and interacts with a particular physiological system and internal organ. A deficiency or imbalance of energy in the meridians is considered to be the cause of disease.”

In the above, I have taken the liberty to look up some terms and reproduced the brief explanations from these cited sources. These are not alien topics to me, having come from Malaysia, a typical Far East locale where Chinese medicine was brought in together with the influx of Chinese immigrants into the country a century ago. While personally I have not undergone such medical treatment (however, I could only vouch for that as far back as my memory permits, which is my childhood days), but I have seen it applied to my own brother when we were young.

Dr. Chang started by citing some of the common physical afflictions resulting from car accidents, sports injuries and physical mishaps such as falling, and job-related ailments. Neck pain, whiplash, back pain readily come to mind while we are all too familiar with stiff neck (zero range motion), numb arms, pinched nerves from a sedentary job. So what better way to start the session than to look at our spinal structure and the uniqueness of each of its components in relation to its link to different internal organs through nerve connections.

Sister Lily handing out pencils for us to jot notes, back to the school days.

Dr. Chang then proceeded to enumerate the type of nerve connection to each vertebra of our vertebral column, aka spine, sub-divided into different sections as illustrated in the image below combined from the two handouts distributed during the session. Instead of putting these details in the handouts, Dr. Chang had opted for oral explanations, correctly rationalizing that active participation from the attendees, in this case listening, inquiring, and jotting down with understanding, would have served us better. And it did, as evident from my list here, complemented by the clarifications sought by fellow attendees and my own post-session Internet sleuthing:

Our vertebral column, front and sectional views (note that the Sacrum consists of five vertebrae fused into one, and the Coccyx is perhaps better known by its layman counterpart, the tail bone).

Cervical Section:
C1: development of eyes and ears
C2, C3: blood circulation to the brain
C4, C5: diaphragm, eyes, ears, nose
C5, C6: throat, thyroid, hand, heart
C7: heart and hand

Thoracic Section:
T1, T2: trachea [think asthma], heart, wrist
T3: lungs, heart [important for skeletal and muscles development in teens]
T4: lungs, liver
T5: lungs, eyes, stomach
T6: diaphragm, ribs, stomach
T7: kidney function, diaphragm
T8: diaphragm, pancreas, liver
T9: liver, pancreas, spleen
T10: kidney
T11: gastro-intestinal tract, uterus [women take heed]
T12: large intestine

Lumbar:
L1, L2: urinary bladder, intestine, liver
L3: lower legs, reproductive system
L4: lower extremities, lower legs, large intestine, bowel movement
L5: urinary bladder, lower extremities, prostate [men take heed]

Sacrum (five vertebrae fused into one):
S1: urinary bladder, lower extremities
S2: reproductive organs
S3: reproductive organs, anus
S4, S5: anus, urinary bladder.

There you have it. I'm sure there would be omissions and would appreciate any feedback.

Dr. Chang also touched briefly on the various points of the back as per a third handout (not shown, perhaps with anticipation for a thorough scrutiny in a follow-up session) with special mention of the Yamen (literally translated as the mute gate) point located just below C1, a point when correctly pricked can make a mute talk, but with the risk of bodily paralysis when incorrectly administered. Therefore, acupuncturists never take risks with this particular point for risk of losing certification.

Next to follow was the bending exercise, executed slowly from the head all the way to the lower back, working on each vertebra and its nerve connection from C1 to L5, and then backing up. This is done by visualizing each of the vertebra and reciting each one in turn as the bending proceeds and reversing the order while backing up. In this way, it's as if we are working on all our organs in one pass. The recommended number of repetitions is 5 – 10, any time, any place, the stretching exercise that promotes blood circulation imparting the benefits of “paying nothing and getting everything” as per the living motto of Dr. Chang.
Dr. Peter Chang demonstrating the traditional Buddhist hand gesture.

In Buddhism, the bending exercise forms part of the prostration ritual, one that is aimed at purifying the body, the mouth, and the mind. However, the prostration, just like the bending exercise, can be denomination-neutral in the sense that it could be done in paying homage to any spiritual guide that one is in tune to.

While the movement is best learned visually, I will attempt to verbalize the salient points here:

1) Joining palms, legs spread slightly, and head, spine and legs forming a vertical line.
2) Bending the neck, counting C1 – C7.
3) Bending the back, counting T1 – L5, loosening the whole arms, resting comfortably by the sides.
4) Bending the knees, hands reaching down to rest on the ground, palms faced down.
5) Flattening the feet, the hip sitting on the heels.
6) Lowering the head to touch the ground, palms slightly extended beyond the forehead and turning them face up.
7) Turning the palms face down, proceeding to back up by first letting the toes touching the ground.
8) Pulling the hands back just next to the forehead, raising the bent head/back and the knees.
9) Continuing to straighten the back, and then the neck, palms joined.
10) Repeat as needed.

A word of advice from Dr. Chang: back up with both knees together, not favoring the left or the right in the process. This would make the more difficult movement of backing up easier.

Now that we have learned the basic steps, it's up to us to practice at home, or at work, or anytime and anywhere where conditions permit, to master the movement such that it becomes second nature, and for those of us who are Buddhists at heart, a spontaneous manifestation of our awakening, conscious to the elevation of self introspection.

Back at home, wify showed me a Chinese Buddhist book, entitled Prostration and Medical Study in translation, that details the intimate link between prostration and medical benefits. Published by Kaoshiong Pure Land Buddhist Association (2002) and edited by Venerable Master Dao Zheng, the book details the underlying fundamentals of prostration as an avenue to conditioning our body and mind by infusing humility and to safeguarding our body and mind against stiffness and stress by imbibing compassion and forbearance.

The book cover, with English translation of the passage thereon.

The best feature of the book is undoubtedly the many pictorial illustrations of the Dos and Don'ts of the prostration, including an in-depth examination of the physiological merits of each sub-movement, and the Buddhist wisdom embodied in each.

A scanned page from the book, in black and white, of part of the prostration.

For example, both hands and knees in synchronized motion (another major sequence is adopted in India where the right side is considered the right way, hence right hand/knee first in that order, according to the book), both sides touching the ground at the same time, symbolize equal support for concentration (left) and wisdom (right), and equal application of kindness (left) and compassion (right).

Whichever noble spiritual underpinning that we subscribe to, let's practice the bending exercise and prostration as the fusion of Buddhist teachings and scientific principles of human anatomy, physiology, and physics.