So,
Last week we wrapped up the foundational teachings of the Buddha that we've been exploring since the beginning of the year.
The Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path and I ended the series of these talks pointing to what the Buddha termed the Three Characteristics of Existence.
Those,
Again,
Are impermanence,
Also known as anicca in the Pali,
Dukkha,
Which translates to the unsatisfactoriness or suffering in this life,
And anatta.
These characteristics are not self,
They're not personal.
What we call me is also changing,
Roles,
Identities,
Capacities,
Changing.
And these characteristics are not abstract doctrines.
They are descriptions of our lived experience.
There is change,
It is constant,
There is stress,
It is pervasive,
And the I,
The me,
It's more like we.
It's all of us.
These characteristics of existence are all of us,
They're happening,
And we're all part of it.
So we're entering into a new practice territory together.
They are Buddhist teachings and life teachings.
The inquiry for this time ahead is exploring loss,
Uncertainty,
Aging,
Sickness,
Death,
And sorrow.
And the relationship these all have to the heart qualities of love and compassion,
Joy and balance,
Equanimity,
Because they are in relationship.
But when we're experiencing loss,
For example,
We're not always attuned to love or to balance.
So we're going to really explore that and support remembering that connection.
You know,
We live in a society that puts a timeline on grief,
That denies death through a myriad of procedures and supplements.
And these areas that we will explore together have been relegated to what the psychologist Carl Jung called the shadow.
What we put in the shadow are the parts of ourselves that we deem unacceptable,
The parts of ourselves that we repress,
That somehow we've disowned or denied and said that they're not welcome.
And what I find so fascinating about Jung's work and observation is that whatever we put in the shadow,
It doesn't sit there passively waiting to be redeemed.
It regresses and becomes primitive.
It's fascinating,
Like in my own area of practice in this,
In this work,
This was kind of an aha moment for me.
Going into the shadow,
I go in humming.
Because the inhabitants in the shadow,
They don't understand language as much as emotion.
And humming is soothing and my shadow needs to feel safe.
So there are two books that I will bring along on this journey together.
One is The Wild Edge of Sorrow by Francis Weller.
And the other is The Five Invitations by Frank Ostasewski.
And just to say,
You don't have to get the books,
But if you already have them,
Pull them off your bookshelf and take a second look.
In The Wild Edge of Sorrow,
Weller invites us to kind of widen our understanding of grief.
Our orientation is around grief is that it comes,
Grief comes when someone or some being we love dies.
And that's real and it's holy.
But there is also grief that accompanies aging and the loss of capacity,
The loss of watching the body change,
The grief with the turmoil in the world,
The loss of opportunities not taken,
Relationships that have shifted,
Identities that no longer fit,
The grief of dying species and extracted resources.
These two.
And so Weller's book is really an invitation to restore sorrow from its position as an interruption to our life,
To kind of a foundational element of being alive.
Grief is not a problem to solve.
It's a companion to love and to embody.
It's woven into the fabric of this being,
This life.
And Frank's book,
The Five Invitations,
It looks more at death.
What death can teach us about living.
But we're not looking at death only from the standpoint of end of life.
We're looking at it from the end of certain capacities,
The end of youth,
The end of identity,
The launching of children and the caring for aging parents,
The changing roles.
When the time ahead of us is clearly shorter than the time behind us.
That can teach us something.
That we are alive and we are still learning.
So as we step into this inquiry together.
I would like to place this exploration within the frame of the Buddha's teaching.
On the three characteristics of existence.
Impermanence,
Unsatisfactoriness and not self.
If we take these characteristics seriously.
Grief isn't an anomaly.
It's the.
It's like the fragrance of awakening to think how things are.
How things are.
Everything changes.
The body ages.
Relationships shift.
The weather turns.
Our roles evolve and disappear and we can't hold on to any moment.
No matter how beautiful.
And when we resist this truth.
Grief becomes sharp and bitter.
But when we allow for impermanence to be what it is.
Then grief is like this tender acknowledgement.
Of the.
It all matters and it's all sacred and it's all bleeding.
And Dukkha,
You know.
Dukkha is like a sort of.
It's just the inherent vulnerability of being alive.
Even in moments of joy.
There is kind of a subtle ache.
Because we know.
It can't last.
We experience disappointment.
We experience illness and uncertainty.
And you know,
The mind wants continuity and certainty and security.
And what does life offer us?
It offers us flux,
You know,
Change.
So grief in relationship to Dukkha.
It's not a failure.
It's actually an honest response to it.
It's an honest response to Dukkha.
And then the third characteristic,
Anatta,
Not self.
You know,
What we call me.
Is always changing.
How many roles have.
Appeared and disappeared in your life.
Identities and capacities.
Many of our sorrows arise,
Not from losing other people.
But from losing versions of ourselves.
The strong body,
For example.
The certainty of a career path.
The identity that we carry of a parent or a partner of a teacher or a child.
When these shift or fall away.
Something in us.
Trembles.
Who am I now?
So as we explore this,
You know.
I don't want us to approach grief as something to fix or to transcend.
And nor do I want to turn it into some private psychological process or project.
You know,
I hope we can explore.
These.
Happenings,
These human experiences as that as shared human conditions.
Ones that connect us and humble us.
And maybe even initiate a deeper sense of belonging.
Like what if aging.
Is not just decline.
But an initiation.
What if uncertainty.
Is not just anxiety.
But an invitation to trust.
What if sickness and death are not only.
Tragedies.
But teachers.
The Buddha didn't turn away from sickness.
Old age and death.
In fact.
It was encountering these realities that actually was the catalyst for his own awakening.
He saw clearly that there was no.
No way of escaping them and that no one.
Escapes them.
And then rather than collapsing in despair.
He began to inquire.
And that's what I'm inviting us to do.
Not and not coming to a conclusion.
But an inquiry.
But today.
Today we begin gently.
Perhaps the first step is to simply acknowledge that sorrow is not a mistake.
Perhaps you can locate where in the where in the body.
Grief lives.
And notice that you have.
An idea about.
About grief and perhaps there is a bracing a bracing against it in your own way.
Maybe it's just sensing how much energy goes into.
Pretending that we're not vulnerable.
Notice that.
The Dharma.
Doesn't promise immunity from loss.
It offers intimacy with it.
And my interest is in the place.
Where sorrow.
And love.
Meet.
The place where our hearts break open.
Rather than break apart.
So I hope that you will.
Continue to travel on this journey with me.
And your companions.
On this path.
And I'll close.
Again with this beautiful short poem by Wendell Berry.
To know the dark.
To go into the dark with a light is to know the light.
To know the dark.
Go dark.
Go without sight.
And find that the dark to blooms and sings.
And is traveled by dark feet.
And dark wings.
