​ 
Holding on, letting go
The beauty of this tree
Is not in its fullness
But its duty to the season
Infinite echoing and mirroring
Of this body, these tissues
Holding on, letting go
​
​

​Twoness with Awareness
 
There is a darkness within
that seeks light from the outside,
an eternal love that will not shrink
in response to dukkha of the ages.
What is this duty to Soulmaking
I feel called to entertain?
An image of a heart nebula arises in meditation,
the divinity of loving and being loved
shining from above, shining from within-
trusting the meaning of this awareness
to unfathomable beyonds.

Tired of blaming myself
Or others
I lay down the weapons
The lancinating judgments
The crooked perceptions
The claw-like control
Of the way things should be

Breathing in meditation
I feel this body
As a clump of matter
More porous than expected
A sky full of stars
Open to any and all
Possibilities

Sometimes I believe I have more agency over others or myself than I actually do. This leads to subtle aggression. What the f@c! is wrong with you? What’s wrong with me? The energy spent to shape and manipulate things to my satisfaction is EXHAUSTING!

Many of us want more peace in our lives. What do we say or do to align our lives with this intentional and heartfelt purpose?

I’m beginning to understand that equanimity is not just some fancy practice you read about, some place you hope to get to if you close your eyes tight enough and practice diligently for hours on end.

For me, it begins with the breath like a surveillance camera, sweeping through all parts of the body that feel tight and congested. It’s the wisdom of a benevolent ancestor (Yasodhara Ma) whispering words of forgiveness, “It’s not your fault. You are doing the best that you can.” It’s sensing how each moment forms from a painful and precious past, and dissolves into a sky full of stars, open to any and all possibilities.

Peace is possible when there is a gentle letting go of what was, a tender curiosity for what is, and trusting the unfolding mystery.​

breathing into the heart
a door opens
like a gentle breeze
Love enters
whispering
while the mind
is silent

this is who you are
beyond boundaries
beyond words
remember
this thread
of divinity
in all

(Inspired by William Stafford’s “The Way It Is”)

There is a breath that you follow.
Sometimes the breath is heavy,
oppressed by circumstance.
Sometimes you sing,
inspired by a courage 
beyond words and music.
People die.
You grow old.
You never stop breathing
till it’s time for your last one. 

*****

Disheveled and depressed, his spirit is struggling to stay embodied. After 11 days in the hospital, the white stubble and glazed look in his eyes make me yearn for the man who introduced me to elements of the natural world as if they were my relatives, who sheltered me as his own daughter.
 
He’s still in there somewhere…
 
Sensing that he may respond to touch beyond the squeeze of a blood pressure cuff, the prick of needles drawing blood, even a cold stethoscope meant to hear the breath and beating of life, I ask the nurse for assistance in bathing him.
 
Our hands work gently, methodically, dipping white washcloths into warm soapy water, stroking dry wrinkled skin tenderly, as if we are bathing someone sacred. I hear whispers of encouragement. He is still here. Find him!
 
As if on cue, Papa responds. “Pass me a washcloth to help.”
 
Once the bathing ritual is finished, the nurse proceeds to dress this skeleton of a man in a new patient gown. I reach for the Eucerin cream and began to moisturize dry skin thirsty for better days. A single tear trickles down his cheek. It’s all that he can contribute despite the heavy diuretics he is on. We make eye contact. Something is different. The clouds still linger. There is also a clearing. 
 
Today, I am not here as a doctor, Papa. The cardiologist and medicine team have that covered. Today, I am here as your daughter, someone who wants to bathe you in love. What good is modern medicine if loving connection is lost?

​On a walk at Calaveras Big Trees National Park, the park ranger paused to pay homage to two giant sequoias that shared the same trunk. The trunks were originally separate, and fused together after a fire for mutual benefit and survival.

I thought of my mother and daughter, how the umbilical connection was severed between us at birth, how the sacral, sacred burning in my body was a sign.

I reflected on all the beings I have pushed away on this camping trip and beyond, the yearning to share the same base, something tender beyond ideas of a separate self.

In meditation, the image of the conjoined sequoias arose, inspiring metta for my teachers, for me, for my mother and daughter, for all the beings at camp, and beyond. It wasn’t my body-heart-mind responsible for such vivid and vast imagination, but tapping into a larger, loving life force inherent in all things.

Listening to the bell resound at the end of the sit, I was clinging- to the bell, the sequoias, the feeling, fearful that I would walk back into a black and white world where beings scurried frantically around like mice to make meaning.

I will continue to disagree with others and feel the pain of separation. I will also persevere in tenderness, beauty, and Soulmaking.

It’s what I was born to ‘do’, and who i already am.

During spring break, I had the opportunity to visit a butterfly sanctuary in Maui. The fact that it is called The Maui Butterfly Farm (not caterpillar or chrysalis farm) speaks volumes about the value given to the butterfly in its life cycle.

The butterfly is beautiful, light, and free – an exquisite symbol of pleasurable moments or stages of life. In contrast, the caterpillar is ugly, heavy, sluggish, always hungry for more. It represents challenges along the way, the wish to transform and be transported elsewhere. For me, the hardest stage to be in sometimes is the chrysalis, the neutral moments of perceived inactivity when questions are marinating in dark space. If I force answers prematurely, wings are torn before possibilities can even take flight.

What does it mean to honor each stage, to understand that I am moving through symbolic caterpillar-chrysalis-butterfly stages multiple times, not just once in a lifetime? How would my life change if I wasn’t just chasing butterflies, but embodying the whole picture?

*****

In Matty Weingast’s, The First Free Women, original poems inspired by the early Buddhist nuns, Theri Punna (Full)  writes:

 
Fill yourself
with
the Dharma.
 
When you
are as
full
as the
full
moon--
burst open.
 
Make
the dark night
shine.
 
 
Hearing Punna’s whispers inside this body-heart-mind, I wrote the following:
 
All this time--
waiting
for the big moment,
the Earth to quake
like His awakening.
 
All this time--
the heart knew
that reflecting
wholeness
in all beings,
 
like a still lake
mirrors
the full moon,
 
was Her awakening.


For years, I’ve been waiting for my life to begin. Chasing butterflies, waiting for the Earth to quake, to awake with ultimate understanding, I missed the smaller moments of stress and struggle, of forgiveness and redemption, of joy and fullness all around me.

In medicine, meditation, and other aspects of life experience, there is deeper presence, less restlessness, more contentment in the simplicity (and profound healing) of reflecting wholeness in others by sensing the fullness within.

*****

In Yasodhara* and the Buddha, Vanessa Sasson does a fine job of setting a vivid stage for their story. She honors ancient Indian culture with humor and reverence. Because of her background in Asian studies and notes at the end of the book referencing other Buddhist and Hindu texts, I trust the story. I also respect her creative additions.

There are so many themes to contemplate in the book: opulence vs. simplicity, loving a precious few vs. all beings equally, the life of a monastic vs. the life of a householder, confusion vs. clarity. They remind me of the three poisons in Buddhism – greed, hatred, and delusion, and the healing power of generosity, metta, and clear-seeing.

Though the Buddha’s story gets all the attention, Yasodhara’s story is equally important. As a householder myself, I feel her loss when she agrees to marry and is confined to the palace walls and Siddhatta’s heart. She renounces her previous life and the freedom it offered. I feel her labor pains, her devotion to Rahula*, her grief and the doubt it conjures when Siddhatta leaves and again when the Buddha takes Rahula for training. I resonate with the need to embody Durga Mata*-like fierce presence, the need for strong maternal guidance and support from someone like Mahapajapati* to face sexual assault.

In the end, I understand that awakening is possible for a householder as much as it is for a renunciate, not because she left, but because she stayed. She stayed with the whirlwind of emotions, changes in her body, changes in her identity.  She saw Kisa Gotami* holding on to a dead child in a deliriously painful way, and began to contemplate the power of letting go.

May all women sense their full moon potential, and reflect this in others.

Notes:  
*Yasodhara is Siddhatta’s wife. Siddhatta later becomes the Buddha.
*Rahula is the son of Yasodhara and Siddhatta.
*Durga Mata is the Hindu goddess of protection, strength, motherhood, destruction and wars.
*Mahapajapati is Siddhata’s maternal aunt who raises him when his own mother, Maya dies after childbirth.
*Kisa Gotami is so stricken by the death of her child that she loses her mind. She is freed by a wise teaching from the Buddha.

*****
​
Butterflies, full moons, epic stories inspire this journey of late. I’m so grateful for some time to slow down and reflect on them. May something offered here be of use, of inspiration.

Everything is The Dharma, the truth, the transformational path of waking up. I used to believe this wholeheartedly when I liked what was happening.

If there was a thorn in my heart, I would “flop around like a fish in shallow water.” (Attadanda Sutta). My faith would waiver, waiting for an ocean of pleasant experiences to arrive, so I could swim comfortably again.

What if I already have EVERYTHING I need to wake up? What if you do, too? Would you embrace all experience - pleasant, unpleasant and neutral as gifts toward your awakening?

What does it mean to lean into the unfolding mystery of life - anger, fear, sadness, joy…the full spectrum of our human experience?

There are so many ways to process this inquiry. Today, I will leave you with a short haiku reflection.

Hiking Meditation 

footsteps cradled by soft earth
prana exchange with the forest
the sound of joy

I need to slow down, make space in the schedule and fullness of my life to hear what is screaming for attention from within. I need to meet it with some aspect of love (kindness, compassion, joy, equanimity). 

Maybe you do, too. Here is one way to do so.

However you are meeting the life you have been given, may you find exactly what you need to wake up.