Satya Robyn leads a Buddhist practice session with guided meditation, chanting, and bowing. The group explores shelter versus shadow, examining how spiritual dependence and independence shape practice.
Chapters
Good morning, everybody. Welcome. A little bit quieter today. No one on Zoom so far. Maybe somebody will join as we go along. Anyway, we're all here. That's good. There's lots of other things you could be doing on a sunny day. You've chosen to be here, so that's very good karmic— karmically, take my word for it. So, um, Maria's going to read a Dharma glimpse for us to begin practice.
This morning.
So this was written a month ago, so just ignore the reference to today and this week. This week I've started my new job. My head has been bursting with all the information on the company and my project. In that respect, I have pretty much been dropped in the deep from the get-go. But even more importantly, I am now working with the same people I used to work with about 2 years ago. So there has been a lot of catching up and emotional trips down the memory lane. Today was my first day at the client site, which is located in Coventry. I haven't really been around Coventry much since my MBA graduation 6 years ago, and I pretty much expected to see the same tired grey city centre. What a surprise when I stepped off the train to see a brand new train station building, new shops, refurbished square, and a few new office buildings nearby. I realised that I expected Coventry to not have changed at all in 6 years, and maybe Coventry also had not expected me to change. Isn't it strange how we tend to analyse and acknowledge all our progress and achievements, but then we pretty much expect the rest of the world and people to just stay as they are, as we remember them. How many times have I formed a negative opinion of someone and not given them a chance again later? Do I always assume it's just me who is evolving and everyone else is stagnating? How prejudiced if so. Indeed, so much has changed in my life in 6 years. My colleagues probably made the same mistake about me and my life and were surprised to see how much my priorities have changed. I need to give them the courtesy and assume nothing. I've never been one for nostalgia and looking back. When I was younger, I just thought it was black and white. If you miss someone, go ahead and give them a call. Now I know it's not as plain as that, and yet still I'm weary of looking back. Maybe deep down I know the world is impermanent, and there's a part of me that resists the reaffirmation of that knowledge. There is no going back into the same waters. Even the most solid rock eventually crumbles down into the sea. I think we should learn to find joy in the discovery of how much the familiar is changing every day.
Namamidipu.
Namamidipu. Thank you.
So move into a period of meditation for somewhere between 10 and 15 minutes. An invitation to sit quietly, and you might want to anchor your awareness on your breath, noticing cooler air entering at the tip of the nose, warmer air Leaving. And inevitably that focus will be interrupted by thoughts, feelings, sensations. When that happens, not trying to push anything away, which usually means it comes back more strongly, but just noticing, oh, here's a thought about what I'm doing later. Here's a feeling about this. Noticing and then returning awareness to the breath.
Kamita, Kamita, Kamita. Amita. Amita. Amita. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amita, Amita, Amita. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabha. Amitabha. Amitabha. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh. Amitabh.
We'll now read the refuges and precepts together and say the Bodhisattva vows, which are on the A5 liturgy sheet. We've slightly changed these this week, and we've slightly, very, very slightly changed them since Wednesday, partly just to break up the longer sentences and partly to add in a suggestion which Ajahn Sujjatin made. Which isn't on your piece of paper but is on mine, so you'll just repeat after me. These, um, they're all very traditional, but they're all our own gloss, which you'll find in Buddhist centers around the world, that they're this mix of being anchored back to what the Buddha taught 2,500 years and this mix of freshness and revision and liveliness. Kōyō Kobōshi said all Buddhism is reformist because we kind of take as a springboard what went before into something that is appropriate for us in this age, in our situation, both collectively as a group in the tradition that we're creating together and individually in our own lives. Enlightenment is something that lives in each of us and changes and is responsive to the conditions we find ourselves in. So these are both very traditional and also very particular to this tradition. So please repeat after me: For refuge I go to the Buddha.
For refuge I go to the Buddha.
The one who is awake and full of love.
The one who is awake and full of love.
Namo Buddha. For refuge I go to the Dharma. All that guides us to wisdom and compassion. Namo Dhammaya. For refuge I go to the Sangha. Those who live in the Buddha's light. Namo Sangha.
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo.
With faith in the Three Jewels, with faith in the Three Jewels, and in light of my human tendencies, and in the light of my human tendencies, I pray that I may become aware, I pray that I may become aware of when I take life, of when I take life. I pray that I may become aware, I pray that I may become aware of when I take what is not freely given—
of one who takes that which's really giving me?
Pray may become aware—I pray you tell them they come away—when fall into sexual misconduct—falling to do such misbehavior—or prayer at time it becomes wary or prayers on their behalf—they're all there—and then falls into wrong-speech falling through our own speed-I pray this might make him more well-versed—in how we can deal properly I pray that I may become aware of when I become intoxicated.
Of when I become intoxicated.
No blame. No blame. Be kind. Be kind.
Love everything. Love everything. Innumerable are sentient beings.
We vow to save them all.
Inexhaustible are deluded passions.
We vow to transform them all.
Immeasurable are the Dharma teachings.
We vow to master them all. Infinite is the Buddha's way. We vow to follow it completely. Namaste. In some ways, what I want to talk about this morning is, uh, sort of echoes what I was saying about tradition and freshness. Read something. So there's a newsletter I read by Freya Rhone, who— well, I read it this morning, I think it was sent a few days ago— is quoting an Irish poet, Pádraig Ó Tuama, who's writing from a book called In the Shelter about an Irish proverb, which is written here in Gaelic, and I'm not going to try and pronounce the Gaelic, but he says about it, It translates in one way as, 'It is in the shelter of each other that the people live.' Another way to translate it is, 'It is in the shadow of each other that the people live.' The word 'scath' can mean both shelter and shadow. The poet Michael O'Sadail, also a linguist, wrote to me once that skaf, which I'm not sure I'm saying properly, apologies, is related to a Norwegian word for mist. He wrote, 'I wonder if the wisdom in this proverb demands a kind of discernment appearing through the blur of ordinary living to decide when closeness overshadows and when it protects.' And I think that's lovely. I also really love that this, the proverb, the proverb contains both the meaning of this, like that it's in a close relationship with other living beings, with people, that we find shelter and refuge. And it's entirely appropriate at times to make other people our home. And the Buddha would say particularly to make enlightened people— the original meaning of the word Sangha from the Buddha's time was those who are enlightened. Now we don't really know what the bar for that enlightenment was, which is why here we simply say those who live in the Buddha's light. Part of the Pure Land tradition, of course, that we all are and will remain foolish beings of wayward passion. And yet, even as foolish beings of wayward passion The more that we come into relationship with the light of Amida, the, the more that light reflects off us, and we are able to provide shelter and refuge to others. And the other side of this proverb, we live in the shadow of others. Suggests that there are times when it's appropriate to step out of community and find ourselves, to step away from other people and to find our own feet. There's this movement in life between closeness and distance. So one way of looking at that in the Buddhist tradition is the movement from being a disciple to becoming a teacher. And, and we stay both of those things, and we move between all of those things, like, continually through our own life. And also across the course of a whole life, there is a general movement in that direction. Or the life of a human being, or any mammal really, I suppose, the period that we spend close to our caregivers before we can walk on our own two feet. And then the times when we have to learn to walk on our own two feet, literally that moment as a toddler where we have to step on our own two feet. And there's a moment where the caregiver goes, oh, I don't know if they're going to make it to the chair where they can be, you know, the other side of the room where they can hold on. But I have, I can't this time, I have to be slightly further away because This is how it is to grow. And then the same when we move from childhood into becoming teenagers, and teenagers into adulthood. There's a, a wisdom in both of these movements, in the movements into closeness and relationship and refuge and being taken care of and taking care of others, and in the movement away into resilience and independence and discovering what it means to be ourselves outside of those relationships. This morning I was talking to Satya Robyn, um, You know, in Pure Land Buddhism, one of the analogies that Nagarjuna uses is that you, rather than swimming yourself to the other shore— the other shore is an analogy that's often used to describe enlightenment. So there's this, if you think of the River Ganges, it's like it's immensely wide, and it's like, oh, the spiritual path is moving from this side to that side. Nāgajjuna says, one way across is to swim, but the other way is to get on the boat that Amida Buddha provides and let the Buddha carry you across. And I was just playing around with that analogy this morning because I think actually we do— both of those things are appropriate at different times. For me anyway, it isn't either the swimming or the boat. It's both of those things. I thought, well, what, what's an image, a helpful image that suggests that? So, oh, I've got my boat, sailboat, and Amida is the wind. So I have to do something to get from here to there.. And I'm not a sailor, so I can't tell you what those things are, but I think it involves turning a wheel and tying some ropes. But without the wind, I'm not going anywhere. So this is like the spiritual life. We need to show up and we need to reflect on the precepts and listen to teachings and take care of ourselves. But we also, as ordinary, flawed, limited beings, need the energy of the Buddha that we can both rest in, and that can kind of allow us to move forward if we step into its current— that's mixing my metaphors— if we allow our wind at sails to be full of the Buddha's wind. So in the shelter of others, stepping forth to find our independence, steering our own ship but needing the wind of the Buddha. The spiritual life is, uh, is all of these things.
Namami to Purnima.
Satya Robyn, you prostrate, bang the ground 3 times.
Which can represent both the Three Refuges, the Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, and also represent body, speech, and mind. And really, we discover the meaning of all of these practices by doing that.
Namoh Amida Butsu. Namoh Amida Butsu.
Namoh Amida Butsu. Namoha vida.
Namoha vida. Namoha vida.
Namoha. In gratitude, we offer this incense to all Buddhas and Bodhisattvas throughout space and time. Let it be fragrant as Earth herself, reflecting our careful efforts, our wholehearted awareness, and the fruits of understanding slowly ripening. May we and all beings be companions of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. May we awaken from forgetfulness and realize our true home.
So we'll return standing in our faces. We'll finish by bowing to each other. To the main shrine, touching our faces and bowing to our seats. In a moment we'll finish with the closing verse, but before then, an invitation to stay for a cup of tea. Invitation to stay and help with some jobs around the garden or the temple, which Satya and I will be doing this morning.
Unless nobody stays, in which case—
well, I'm going to. A reminder that the donation bowl is in the hallway, or you can donate online, or if you come regularly, you can arrange for a regular donation through the websites, which we really appreciate. I think that's all the announcements, so we'll finish with the closing verse, which is on the top of the liturgy sheet. Blessed by untarnished light, may we care for all living things.
Namomi to be. I think there's a couple of friends that might be available.
Maybe it's quite early in the morning.
Yeah, see how you feel. So, Philippa? Yep. Namomi to be. Namomi to be.
