Deepening Practice

Caitríona Reed

I entrust myself to the Earth.
The Earth entrusts herself to me.
I entrust myself to the Buddha.
The Buddha entrusts herself to me.

Earlier in the retreat someone had said how intimidated he had been, before coming here, by the thought of “Buddhist practice.” He said he had felt that meditation was something distant, something beyond him. Now he realized that to be a meditation, to practice the Dharma, he needed only to be himself.

In order to plant the seedlings, the beds had to be prepared. Waste from the kitchen has already transformed itself into rich compost. We dig it into the soil. We plant to just the right depth, press down the soil around the seedlings, give them water, put up netting to protect them while they are still small. By February we will be eating fresh broccoli.

Sometimes the thought of learning to meditate may be intimidating. Perhaps it’s the same for those who have never planted a garden. At first they may feel a little uncertain of themselves. Just as with planting a garden for the first time they may think that meditation, “spiritual practice,” and the development of mindfulness and awareness are something that they may not know enough about yet or are not quite good enough for. They may think that they don’t have the time, discipline, motivation, or understanding. Or they may imagine that it is something irrelevant to their life, a commodity outside of themselves.

Do you ever think that you do not have time to eat? Or that you do not deserve to eat? Maybe you could get someone to eat for you, but it probably would not satisfy your hunger for long.

When you reflect on the food you eat you realize that it is not a commodity; rather it is a part of a process, involving soil, sunlight, the human care of seeds over thousands of years, and cultivation and preparation, as well as the subsequent nourishment and energy you derive from eating it. Mindfulness is just like this. It is not a commodity, but a part of the process of being alive. It is also the way you can embody and recognize that you are a part of that process. You can call it mind, becoming, God, or simply life.

There’s nothing so special about food, when we eat it every day. There’s nothing so special about meditation and mindfulness either. But unless we take time to nourish ourselves we suffer. Sometimes we get lost in the hectic pace of day-to-day survival. Unless we find a way to remember what we are, to relax, our whole life can pass by and we forget to notice anything. When we’re hungry, food is important. There’s another kind of hunger that drives us toward the fulfillment of our potential, toward happiness beyond the mere satisfaction of our appetites. Mindfulness shows us the way to satisfy that hunger.

Whether we come to practice for the first time, or after years of training and study, we come just as we are. We remain ourselves. If anything changes it is our acceptance, our deepening understanding of the process of the conditions that form our life. We open into natural ease, joy and compassion.

We are sustained by the confidence that allows us to know we can be ourselves, that we can find stability, joy and love right where we are. Thich Nhat Hanh has said that it need not take a long time to develop this kind of confidence, perhaps just a few minutes. He also says, time after time, that in order to sustain our mindfulness we need a context, a community. Even if it is the support of just one other person.

Just as a plant in the garden never stands alone but always with other plants, nourished by sun, rain, soil and care, our community becomes our garden, the ground from which we spring and within which we find the confidence to be with ourselves as we are, without pretense, skillfully, at ease.