The grief & bliss of interconnection

Welcome everybody in joining us in the shrine room and joining us online. If you haven't muted yourself online, please do so. So we're going to start today by reading The Life of No Regrets, which should be where you're sitting now, but there weren't quite enough copies for every seat to have one, so if you don't have a copy, have a little look around. So it should say The Life of No Regrets at the top.

Life of Mary Magdalene.

Your radiant face, like a mountain peak catching the first burst of morning light, has awesome and unequalled majesty, like black ink by comparison. Are the sun, moon, or the Marni treasure. Tathagata, such is your incomparable face. The melody of your enlightenment fills the world. Rare and precious are your precepts, learning, energy, meditation, wisdom, and amazing virtue. The oceanic Dharma of the Buddhas which fathoms to its deepest depths, dispels the three poisons from the heart. You are like a lion, valiant and divinely pure. Great power, deep wisdom, awesome light, reverberation. A prayer I make, a Buddha to become equal to you, my Dharma King. To lead all beings to the other shore, leaving none behind. The six paramitas to perfect, with Prajna at their head. Should I become Buddha, I will fulfill this prayer completely. To everyone, I'll bring great peace. To Buddhas, Kaulas, Asambras, my offerings I make. And do not flinch from the trials of the incomparable way, powerful, straight, and true. Though Buddha lands and worldly realms be numberless like sand, by sheer power of aspiration I'll fill them all with light. Let me become a Buddha, and the multitude of beings will all enjoy my primordial nirvana world. By indiscriminate compassion, I will enlighten all. Reborn here from no matter where, in my country their hearts will lighten and be joyful, happy and at ease. Oh, you Buddha, witness my vow, my true aspiration. Establishing my vow on you gives me the strength to fulfill it. Buddhas throughout space and time of unimpeded wisdom always witness my heart's practice. No matter the obstacles, the hardships, my practice will endure through all without regret.

So we're moving now into a short period of meditation. So just seeing if the body can get even a little bit more comfortable. Finding that contact with the ground, with the air, with the breath. And perhaps just inviting the awareness to settle into the heart space, into the chest. For a little while. We're going to move into some chanting, and we're going to chant to Kuan Yin, the Bodhisattva of compassion. Who is sometimes known as the mother of all Buddhas. And if you need to see it written down, then it's on this small little A5 little chichi sheet underneath the chair or beside you. And the mantra is Namo Kwan Shin Bosat.

Namokwanji in Bosat. Namokwanji in Bosat. Namokwanji in Bosat. Namokwanji in Bursa. Namokwanji in Bursa. Namokwanji in Bursa. Namokwanji in Bosats. Namokwanji in Bosats. Namokwanji in Bosats. Namokwanji in Bosat. Namokwanji in Bosat. Namokwanji in Bosat. Namokwanji in Bosat. Namokwanji in Bosat. Namokwanji in Bosat. Namo Kwan Chi Invo Sat. Namo Kwan Chi Invo Sat. Namo Kwan Chi Invo Sat. Namokwanshi N'bo Satya Robyn. Namokwanshi N'bo Satya Robyn. Namokwanshi N'bo Satya Robyn. Namoh Kwanji Indosat. Namoh Kwanji Indosat. Namoh Kwanji Indosat. Namokwanji in Bosat. Namokwanji in Bosat. Namokwanji in Bosat. Namoh Quan Chi Inbosa. Namoh Quan Chi Inbosa. Namoh Quan Chi Inbosa. Namoh Quan Chi Invo Sat. Namoh Quan Chi Invo Sat. Namoh Quan Chi Invo Sat. Namoh Kwan Chi in Bosat. Namoh Kwan Chi in Bosat. Namoh Kwan Chi in Bosat. Namoh Kwanji in Bosat. Namoh Kwanji in Bosat. Namoh Kwanji in Bosat.

We're going to chant the refuges and the precepts. Refuges are reliable anchors and things that we can experience shelter and inspiration Fon. And the precepts are guidelines given by the Buddha a long time ago, and that are thought to help us live in more harmony within ourselves and within each other, and also to be just natural, natural kind of expressions of an awakened state. So mostly you repeat after me. 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 Buddhae. For refuge I go to the Dharma.

For refuge I go to the Dharma.

All that guides us to wisdom and compassion.

All that guides us to wisdom and compassion.

Namo Dhamma.

Namo Dhamma.

For refuge I go to the Sangha.

For refuge I go to the Sangha.

Those who live in the Buddha's light.

Those who live in the Buddha's light.

Namo Sangha. For refuge I go to the Earth, the holy ground of awakening.

Namobunyay.

With faith in the Four Refuges, and in light of my human tendencies, I pray that I may become aware— of when I take life. I pray that I may become aware— of when I take what is not freely given. I pray that I may become aware— of when I fall into sexual misconduct. I pray that I may become aware.

I pray that I may become aware of when I fall into wrong speech.

I pray that I may become aware.

I pray that I may become aware of when I become intoxicated.

No blame.

Be kind. 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 bow to Master Dharma.

Infinite is the Buddha's way.

We vow to fulfill it completely.

Namomi Dabu. So last weekend I went to the Beltane Bhakti gathering, which I go to every year, which is It's a gathering. It's quite big this year, bigger than normal. There's like 300 and probably over 350 people, which was a lot, which is more than normal. And it's a bhakti yoga gathering. And bhakti yoga is the devotional path of yoga. And there are a lot of crossovers with Pure Land Buddhism because Chanting is— there's two real central practices, chanting being one of them, and chanting really to remember, to remember, to remember, to remember our connection to the Divine, um, and to love and to awareness. And also chanting as an offering, as an expression of that connection, as well as a remembering of it. And the other central practice is karma yoga, which is like work, basically. It's like selfless service. It's like, don't just feel all like this love, you know, go out and do something with it. Like take action, allow that to permeate through your interactions, through your day-to-day life. Um, yeah. And keep that in, in flow. And, um, it's so the, the event involves a lot, many, many, many, many hours every day of chanting and singing and ritual and, um, that kind of thing. And also really good food and great people. Um, so Yeah, it, it was quite a journey. So when I arrived, I got into my little tent and I was like, oh my God, I just, I get to be by myself. And I was like, oh, that's, I am, I am at an event with hundreds of people and we are gonna be packed into a marquee. Um, and clearly what I need right now is really to be by myself. So I was like, okay, let's really see how we can honor that, how, how we can really, how I can really, really be here and also engage with these practices. Um, and so for until the next day, until like probably halfway through the next day, I didn't really talk to many people, even though I have good friends there that I see every year. Um, and I was just, and I was just really able to kind of, um, balance between being involved and also coming back to myself and taking myself off when needed. And then what happened when I started to come into conversation with people is that the, the grief that I knew that I was feeling about the state of the world but I didn't quite know how much I was feeling it. Just completely tore me apart. Like, I was just— like, my heart was absolutely breaking in response to the suffering in the world, to an extent that I hadn't realized. Until I started to, until I was there, until I was practicing, until I was talking about these things with people. And so I found myself carrying this into the chanting. And so for just like hours and hours, I was just there with all this grief and like with all this weight. This like really kind of crushing weight. And I knew that the grief was an expression of interconnectedness, of my experience of interconnectedness. So like I was never in any doubt about that. And so I just kept, kept bringing it into the practice, like just again and again and again and again and again. And I started to experience very frequent, like quite in quite deep, uh, states like of absorption and other kind of meditative states, kind of moving in and out of them as I was just really just giving up, just giving, just giving up, giving myself up. Into the chant, into the, um, connection with the Divine, with the Infinite. And slowly other things started to happen as— and as well, and as— and, and, and something started to happen to that grief. Like physically I felt like layers of skin was ripping off my chest. It was very— it was like really quite uncomfortable. Um, and other things were happening, and I was having intense dreams and, and all this kind of thing. There was a lot of releasing happening, a lot of releasing. And in the— in, in a space that was almost imperceptibly being freed up as the grief kind of moved through, moved through with the trust of my connection, that it was an expression of interconnectedness, that in the space, like, a lot of bliss started to come through, and I was experiencing a lot of bliss states. And it really reminded me again that that is also an experience that can come out of being— of interconnectedness, that, that disconnection is obviously isolating and painful or numbing or, or these kind of things. So coming into connection more and more and more can bring about both grief for all the suffering and bliss at being connected to everything. So I was like, grief, bliss, grief, bliss, grief, bliss, moving with all this flow. And then I got back, and as I was unpacking, I found out that an old friend of mine had died. And then I was like, oh, and it's a new grief. This is a This is a human, a personal, a bit more of a personal, um, grief. And I'm being with that, or different flavor alongside kind of all of the big experiences that were and are slowly integrating. Um, yeah, so those were my experiences over the last few days. Um, yeah, and just deep reminders that interconnectedness can bring grief and bliss and all sorts of other experiences as well. And a lot of gratitude at the opportunity of having a period of such intense practice. Um, and a reminder of how important it is to do that, like to go off and to dedicate periods of time, like longer periods of time, to practice, and how powerful that can be. And now, Mami Dabu.

Moving into some frustrations. Namu Amida. In gratitude, we make this offering to all Buddhas and Bodhisattvas throughout space and time. May it be as fragrant as Earth herself, reflecting our careful efforts, our wholehearted mindfulness, and the fruit 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.

And we're gonna bow one way, the other way. We bow to our seats, we tidy our seats. And transfer merit for, um, The pure land of peace. Sending some love to his little girl. Uh, announcements. We have well Dressing blessing happening on Sunday.

Yeah, Sunday, 3 o'clock in the afternoon at the clock tower. We're going to be blessing the waters of the well as part of the May Day celebrations. According to my diary, work, uh, volunteer work day in Carlos after that. We'll sort some details about that later in our meeting.

Whole day?

Is it whole day?

Sorry, Marlowe. Yeah, or your hour. Or work day. Satya Robyn.

Yes, and on Sunday night we have Kirtan and curry.

Woo! On Saturday the 16th, online at 5:00, there's a Dharma hour. We'll be exploring the three minds. Do we need to cultivate specific mind states while chanting or meditating? Details on the website. Great, thank you.

Bless us, Satya Robyn, the sovereign of lights.

May we care for all living things.

Om Namah Shivaya.