​Sandbridge, Virginia Beach, United States by Jae Bano

The lipid (cholesterol) and Hbaic (3 month blood sugar average) results are released online by my primary care physician. After a few months of changing the exercise routine due to a chronic piriformis injury, and celebrating Diwali, Thanksgiving, and Christmas with so much food, I know the numbers won’t be good.

Taking a few deep breathes, I click on the lab links. The numbers confirm my apprehension. Shoulders slump, the heart sinks in disappointment.

Judgmental thoughts abound. How could you possibly think hiking and walking would be enough? Can’t you control your food choices and intake? Isn’t it a bit hypocritical to offer advice to patients you can’t even follow yourself? The thoughts threaten to submerge the heart even more in the brewing anger, fear, and sadness conjured by them.

Mindfully aware of the thoughts, feelings, and effects they have on the body, I recognize an old pattern based on past causes and conditions. The lab values feel like health grades, a kind of report card defining my wellbeing. If the numbers are outside of a certain range, then I have failed.

Ouch! This hurts. It’s unpleasant. Does it have to be, or am I adding on extra arrows of suffering that don’t need to prick so sharply?

I don’t like the numbers, but like final semester grades, they don’t define what I’ve learned about physical, emotional, and spiritual wellbeing. I wonder what a wise teacher, loved one, or good friend might say to me in this moment to help me remember kindness.

Sweetheart, this is an invitation to the biggest wellbeing party of your life! How does your body want to move, to dance? What do you want to eat at this party that is not only sweet or savory when swallowed, but will last to support deep loving connections with self and others?

Radiant, the heart emerges with more care, communicating with a curious mind to expand a narrowly focused lens on experience. With a panoramic view, I think of my colleagues and other physicians who balance the wellbeing of patients with their own wellbeing every day, sometimes to their own detriment. Ahh, others experience this, too.

Though I work part-time, have so much support at home, and cannot attribute a change in health status to work alone, I know other physicians suffer from exquisite burnout. Burdened by the overwhelming weight of patient care, demanding electronic medical records that threaten the physician-patient relationship, and never-ending administrative duties that seem to proliferate at an alarming rate, mindlessness can feel like the only easy way out.

According to Diana Winston, Director of Mindful Education at the UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center (MARC), mindfulness is “paying attention to your present moment experience with openness, curiosity, and a willingness to be with what is.” For years, I worked with definitions like this in meditation, movement practices, silent retreats, and meetings with a mentor. The “paying attention to present moment experience with openness and curiosity” piece was starting to make sense. The mind got it, but the heart still wasn’t convinced.

When I learned about Kristen Neff and Chris Germer’s research and teachings on self-compassion, and began to integrate them into mindful practices, the heart began to trust the combined capacity of heart-mind to communicate with the body, to be in tune with each other and sense when there was an imbalance of thoughts, feelings, and sensations leading to dis-ease. The capacity to stay with these experiences led to internal freedom and joy independent of external circumstances.

To this day, mindful self-compassion gives me the strength to stay with difficult patients and circumstances, to touch intimacy and vulnerability without overwhelm, to celebrate healing with patients in a larger context than ones limited by disease states and problem lists.
 
Clearing
by Martha Postlewaite

Do not try to save
the whole world
or do anything grandiose.
Instead, create
a clearing
in the dense forest
of your life
and wait there
patiently,
until the song
that is your life
falls into your own cupped hands
and you recognize and greet it.
Only then will you know
how to give yourself
to this world
so worth of rescue.
 
May we all create a clearing in the dense forest of our lives. May mindful self-compassion bring back the meaning in medicine.

Dear Piriformis Muscles,
 
I hear the burning call of anger
The quivering fear with each step
Disappointment and impatience asking
Where do we go from here?
 
I’m sorry I mistrusted you
Left you all alone
When you needed me most
Needed someone to understand
 
I’m here for you
For as long as the healing takes
Here to hold you, support you
Grateful for your special part
 
In keeping this body whole
 
For the last month, I’ve heard the burning call of anger, the quivering fear with each step, disappointment and impatience asking, “Where do we go from here?”.

Eleven years of mindfulness and compassion practices weren’t enough. I needed help. “Help me understand what I’ve forgotten, what I need to know now!”

Who was I calling out to, and why wasn’t self-compassion working?

As the piriformis muscles continued to burn and ache with each step, I turned to supportive family, wise friends, and healers who might help me remember. This is what I discovered.

Honesty. I can’t heal what I can’t feel. I’m so used to having a plan, knowing the answer, using spiritual practice to bypass what’s asking for direct attention here and now. Why feel if I know what will heal? The problem with this logic is that I can’t possibly know what will heal, until I’m honest about the anger, fear, disappointment, and impatience present. Until I’m really willing to listen to them, let them be as they are, and show me what is standing behind them. They are not roadblocks to compassion, but doorways.

This is what I’m feeling right now. It’s OK. It’s not bad or wrong. There’s space for these feelings.
 
Compassion. Compassion is the softest thing I know that cushions the hard edges of reality. It’s what I often use to shield my heart against the extra arrows of self-judgement. It’s easier to practice compassion for someone else who is suffering, and feels selfish, self-indulgence to include myself in the circle of compassion. Over the years, self-compassion became the parent, partner, best friend I was seeking, the ally who never let me down.

 I care about this pain. Others have bodies that break down and disappoint them, too. It’s not my fault.
 
Patience. I’m still surprised by how often I use self-compassion to bargain with life. Look, I’m being gentle and kind. Why is the burning, aching sensation still here? Why do I still feel stiff like the Tin Man? Isn’t self-compassion the oil needed to lubricate this stiffness so I can move pain free? Patience asks me to wait, to let the answers come in geological time. Sometimes, I’m not sure I can wait that long, but am always surprised and humbled by the outcome when I surrender to the elements that shape each and every experience.

This won’t last forever. Everything changes. May I be patient with the impatience.
 
Gratitude. When physical, emotional pain strike, it’s like a large, dark stain on a beautiful dress, a hole in a perfect picture, the uninvited guest to a party. Help! Bring my old life back! The negativity bias deletes all memories of these piriformis muscles supporting the birth of a beautiful child almost thirteen years ago, meditation and yoga postures that have offered profound joy and peace, hikes that have brought me closer to the womb of the Divine Mother than ever before.
​
Thank you for carrying this body, for supporting each brave step as best as you can into the future unknown.
 
Trust. If old age, sickness and death are inevitable who or what can I trust? Why even try to celebrate the 10,000 joys if sorrow is just around the corner, waiting to shadow the light? I’m not sure there is a simple answer to these questions. For me, it’s a partner who wonders what I am trying to prove, recommending I take Advil and rest the body that is being pushed to continue the elliptical and yoga stretches despite obvious signals of discomfort. It’s a teenage daughter who offers glimpses of care and concern by gently patting my behind despite raging hormones and peer conditioning. It’s a mother who cooks and offers to do the dishes when she sees me wincing in pain. It’s a friend who recommends a gentle chiropractor because she knows what I want in a healer. It’s other friends who offer up compassionate listening presence like the sweetest dessert when I have forgotten how to offer it to myself. It’s a chiropractor who alleviates my fears by reminding me of the body’s intuitive capacity to heal itself. It’s Qigong helping to move stagnant energy and encourage flow. It’s wild turkeys on a hike reminding me that life still goes on, a dim sun with so much potential to burn through the fog with love, the Great Mother promising to always be there no matter how this body ages or whether I have direct access to Her.
 
The people, places in my life will come and go, but there will always be someone, something to remind me of what matters most.
 
May this reflection inspire all beings everywhere without exception. May we learn to stay with our own experience, so we can support others on their healing journey.

What she said, what she did really pissed me off. The precept, ‘knowing that our lives intertwine, I vow to speak only what it true, useful and kind‘ felt like a distant memory. Years of painful conditioning begged for release. I wanted to hurt her.

What I really wanted was for her to be conscious, for intimacy in this relationship to be built on something stronger than the ego.

*****

In The Yoga of Relationship, Phillip Moffitt describes three types of relationships: ego at the center, love and ego at the center, and love at the center. Though the model describes romantic relationships, I see how it applies to all relationships – family, friends, coworkers, neighbors, challenging folks, EVERYONE.

I immediately recognize the first type of relationship with this being. For years, the heart has diligently practiced metta for her. I know she is overwhelmed by insecurity, her actions inspired by the promise of ego belonging. It’s why we collide like asteroids so many times, instead of orbiting each other’s celestial being in awe.

May you feel a sense of belonging without the need to criticize others.

I yearn for the second type of relationship where love is also brought into the center with ego. For years, the heart has also practiced metta for this writer. I want to move beyond sense doors that trigger past hurt – sights and sounds that constrict the heart to hurt more and love less.

May I speak my truth with kindness.

“When love and ego are at the center, you are not abandoning or martyring yourself. Instead, you are giving up certain expectations, which means that your relationship to the energy of love is not dependent on your partner (or other being).”

Can I appreciate this being’s cycle of dependent origination causing her to connect mainly through comparison over compassion? Can I renounce certain expectations, so that my relationship to love is not dependent on her? Can this relationship be built on Metta (lovingkindness), Karuna (compassion), Mudita (joy), Upekkha (equanimity), where the heart is not just a welcome doormat easily stepped on, but a heavenly abode that opens to love’s possibility when feeling resourced and safe?

*****

What she said, what she did still pisses me off. The hurt is less. Wanting her to be more conscious, I turn inward, asking citta (heart-mind) for intimacy in this relationship to be built on something stronger than the ego, for the Brahmaviharas to hold us both.
​
(May the benefits of this practice be shared by all beings who struggle in relationship, all beings yearning for conscious connection.)

​It’s our first full day in Paris. I’m feeling joy after viewing Monet’s Le Bassin Aux Nymphéas at Musee d'Orsay​, marveling at how water lilies must have inspired him the way they inspire me. I’m also feeling gratitude after lighting a candle, chanting metta for all beings everywhere, and appreciating the diverse currency inside a glass box at Notre-Dame.

It’s not until we are walking to our hotel room, bellies content with Häagen-Dazs, that my husband stops abruptly.

“Hey, do you know what this charge is on our credit card?”

I open my purse and quickly realize my wallet is missing. Flower! (My substitution for the F word.) I must have left it at the Orsay gift shop after buying some post cards.

We rush to our hotel room and start to call the credit card companies. While my husband and daughter comment on the unfortunate turn of events, I’m doing my best not to add extra arrows of self-judgment.

“Breathe, Kaveri. Breathe. Let your compassionate breath flow, Sweetheart. You know how to do this.”

I check the information desk at the entrance inside Notre-Dame. The lady behind the counter shows me three black wallets, none of which are mine. I also revisit the donation box. Still, no black wallet. Feeling tired and defeated, I rejoin my family to figure out dinner plans. We decide to try a falafel place my cousin suggested. It’s about a twenty-minute walk from here.

Once we sit down with our falafel wraps, I feel like there is still something missing. I practiced self-compassion and forgiveness for the one who found the wallet. What about the others who lost their wallets? The woman at Notre-Dame showed me three other black wallets. I’m not alone. Others experienced this, too. I take the opportunity to widen the circle of compassion.

May other travelers who lose something major feel safe.
May they find solace and support.
May compassion be an antidote to self-judgment.
May they know peace.
​
I take my first bite into crispy falafel balls dressed in tangy tahini sauce, cabbage, cucumber, and eggplant tucked inside a pita bread. Yum! Dear Universe, thank you for the blessing of these experiences. I lost my driver’s license and major credit cards. I lost an identity, worldly wealth, and gained the currency of compassion.

The sunny side of the heart
is where we all want to live,
avoiding the shadow at any cost,
the chill of loss and loneliness
that lingers like thick fog.

What if true wealth
is not in the address
or the ratio of good to bad,
but the coin in your pocket,
with heads for joy
and tails for compassion?

May compassion transform pain
into the possibility of freedom,
understanding that a moment’s
richness was never dependent
on an external sun.
 
It’s the 7th straight day of waking up with a headache and some heartburn. What the hell is going on? Am I sleeping enough? Am I eating too much? Maybe it’s something on the taboo list. Too much chocolate? Am I worried about something? I thought the homeopathic remedy was working. Maybe I need another dose. What’s wrong with me???

As a physician, it’s easy for me to quickly analyze symptoms, form hypotheses for possible causes, and rule out conditions that don’t fit the diagnosis of what I am experiencing. It’s how I was trained. Western medicine is great for this kind of flawless, clear cut analysis. But is it so flawless and clear cut? And does this help a human like me with real fear and personal judgements about what’s going on?

In working with patients, I’m finding that astute clinical acumen is not as important as the ability to listen and appreciate their stories. A patient naturally wants an accurate diagnosis and therapy that will help them feel better. But the fears they share, the self-judgements that add layers to their suffering, aren’t easily alleviated with a quick prescription.

As humans, we desire security, satiety, sanity (and so much more). We want to live on the sunny side of the heart, avoiding illness, aging, loss, all dissatisfaction at any cost. I am no exception. I’d rather wake up with a clear head and belly ready to digest anything that comes my way with ease.

The thinking mind is helpful if it’s willing to ask wise discerning questions with curiosity and kindness, patient for the answers that come. It’s not helpful when the mind acts like a merciless lawyer interrogating me on the witness stand for a crime I didn’t commit.
 
What if the true wealth of this world, this life is not in the address of where you’d like to live, who you should be, or the ratio of good to bad moments? What if the coin in your pocket has joy on one side and compassion on the other side? Joy typically isn’t a problem for most of us. It’s the shadow side, the challenges in our lives that ask for compassionate attention.

We crave for things to be a certain way, cling to certain ideals. When we get what we don’t want, or push away things as they are, the heart space is filled with struggle. Only compassion can transform this pain into freedom. We don’t have to like what is happening. We do need to love the life that is being affected by the struggle. When we understand that a moment’s richness is never dependent on an external promise of happiness, we begin to trust our internal capacity to simply bear witness.

*****

It’s the 7th straight day of waking up with a headache and some heartburn. What the hell is going on? Before I pop an Advil or Zantac to prematurely block the inquiry, I sit still. Question marks and exclamation points float like balloons through this sky mind. Placing a hand on my heart, I breathe till the breath is not so constricted by fear and the judgments that follow. I feel compassionate presence growing stronger.

Though I’d rather celebrate a moment of pure joy, the realization slowly comes like a good friend tapping my shoulder to point out something I’ve missed. Among the question marks and exclamation points, images of Padmapani and lotus hearts begin to emerge.

*****

When our thoughts are stuck on the spin cycle of Samsara, we can press the pause button and use a different washer to purify these thoughts. Before we place the laundry coin in, we can notice how compassion and joy are two sides of the same coin, this vast heart that has space for it all. Welcome or not, each moment has the potential for full engagement, because of the coin in your pocket.

(Note: This reflection is not meant to minimize or gloss over the intense suffering that comes with chronic illness, loss, social unrest, environmental degradation, etc. It’s an invitation to explore the smaller inconveniences in life, to cultivate a compassionate presence that stays when the larger waves hit, to appreciate the flip of compassion to joy, and back to compassion, depending on what each moment requires. May the benefits of this inquiry be shared by all beings everywhere without exception.

​If this reflection is not helpful, let it pass in the sky mind till images that are useful to you appear. May your spiritual thirst for freedom lead you to your own fountain of meaning.)
​

I thought we would be friends forever. I thought we could overcome any obstacle of hurt. Maybe I was wrong.

A dear friend and I recently exchanged words that left us both feeling angry, stunned, and upset. I tried to bridge the gap of misunderstanding with acknowledgment of my contribution to the confusion. I also tried to respect her perspective without compromising my own. It was my idea of a peace offering. For her, it was a bomb that had sadly backfired. I was dangerous, and she didn’t want the enemy anywhere near her.

My thoughts would not stop trying to console me. They ranged from extremes of self-righteous positions blaming my friend, and inferior positions blaming myself for my heartlessness. Judging us both was painful, so painful, that I longed to think my way out if this tangle. What Buddhist practice could help me unravel this confusion? Was it the three characteristics of existence, the Four Noble Truths, the Eightfold Path, understanding of the Middle Way, or something else?

The harder I tried to understand, the tenser I got. During a weary morning sit, a voice reminded me to let go, surrender, and relax the resistance. That is the moment I began to heal with an embodied presence as opposed to a spiritual bypass. Over the next few days, I reached out to Sangha to help me process what happened. The above Buddhist concepts were no longer mental gymnastics that weakened understanding, but strengthened it through R.A.I.N.

I know in my heart that seeds of understanding are being watered, nurtured, and sprouting in silence. I don’t know what will happen to the friendship. Emotions of anger, fear, and sadness still rise like tidal waves threatening to drown and submerge my clarity in cold darkness. But I will no longer say no to them. I’ve been here before – past lives, previous relationships, praying for freedom. The heart must be irritated to form pearls of wisdom.
 
Reconciliation Prayer

I’m tired of trying to change you,
rattling the bars around this heart prison
expecting you to have the key.
Where’s the sunlight, connection, and joy in that?
What if i am an open door allowing
you to come and go as you please,
not trying to cage you with small thoughts,
but spacious awareness that sees everything?
What if i get to know you, understand you?
Would i choose to stay?
Dear Universe, help us find each other,
eyes meeting in peaceful resolve
till the first words spoken are kind.
 
May I be patient with this process of learning. May I be kind and gentle with myself, not taking these exchanges so personally. May I remember my sincere wish to wake up and attract relationships of wise, mutual understanding.

May the Universe support your need to be heard and understood. May you be happy, well, safe, peaceful, and at ease. May our eyes meet in peaceful resolve till the first words spoken are kind.

May all relationships (family, friendships, acquaintances, strangers, perceived enemies, animals, plants) be held in  wise reflection, wise exchange, wise effort, till the first words spoken are kind.

After the first Dedicated Practitioner’s retreat, I’m deeply humbled by my opinions, especially in the context of ethnic, economic, educational, sexually eclectic, gender, age-related, and able-bodied diversity.

I watched how comparing mind categorized my views as inferior, ignorant, in need of something more than what I had.  I felt like an outsider standing in a cold blizzard watching others through a window gathered around a warm fire in intimate conversation.  At other times, I labeled my views as superior, so sure of where I stood on solid ground.  I wanted to stay with people who promised comfort and connection through common perspectives based on shared experiences.

Post retreat, I realize how my experiences in small and large groups there echo my experiences in everyday life.  I tend to size where I stand compared with others.  Compassion naturally arises for this comparing mind because I know I am not alone.  Others experience this, too.

According to Shakil Choudhury, author of Deep Diversity, “We tend to tilt towards those most like ourselves and away from those we perceive to be different.  When we feel included, we tend to soar.  When excluded, we tend to underperform, second-guess ourselves, and in extreme cases, get sick.” (pg.25)

I remember when my mindful parenting and yoga mentor, Jackie Long was pregnant with her son.  Fumbling with my daughter’s care for the first few years of her life, I desperately wished I could push the rewind button for a second chance at parenting.  I yearned to embody Jackie’s maternal wellspring of wisdom and grounded loving presence.  Jackie’s words at that time were clear and kind.  “You admire me because you are looking in the mirror at yourself, a part you don’t recognize.”

Now, having a better understanding of Right View, I realize that no being is isolated in their magnificence or modesty.  We all carry the potential for each extreme.  Perhaps the Middle Path begins with awareness of our intentions and how they inform and inspire our actions.  I don’t need to emphasize expertise or deny knowledge/intuitive wisdom that can help heal myself and others.  When my ego is inflated, I can invite the person with a pin willing to pop me gently.  When I’m feeling stupid, I can remember my potential to learn.
 
We weave stories through one another,
dancing patterns of dread and delight.
No single colored strand is responsible
for holding the whole tapestry together.
Still, when one end of fabric frays
surrounding threads unite to stitch
the frazzled edges with kindness,
till each fiber is strengthened
by the eclectic, elegant design.
 
We weave stories of expertise and ignorance through one another.  Know single being knows it all or can possibly hold the whole tapestry together.  But when one person dominates or feels deficient, others surrounding him/her/them can unite to meet this being with kindness, curiosity, and peaceful engagement till all members of the group are strengthened by the eclectic, elegant design.

The tapestry is only as strong as each individual thread.  It is also quite fragile, blood-stained with ancestral stories, bright with the healing faith of our collective potential.  May we recognize the divinity inside one another.  May we honor the sacred within.

(Note: For questions to spark personal reflection regarding racial differences and enhance self-awareness, see Deep Diversity, pg. 44.)