It Takes A Long Time To Grow Young: Nurturing Contentment

So,

A few weeks ago now,

A dear friend of mine and I were spending some time together over at her house one night,

And one of the topics of conversation that inevitably arose was a favorite of ours,

Which is the topic of aging.

And all that that entails,

Including everything we're kind of still hoping for,

Everything we're afraid of,

And of course everything we wish had maybe been a bit different during the past six decades that we've both lived through.

And as we were discussing all of these things,

We both kind of recognized and agreed that if we could just shift all of our wanting and our not wanting down to one single theme,

It would essentially come down to the desire for one thing,

Which is a sense of contentment.

Or maybe more precisely,

We recognize that underneath all of it,

Our deepest intention is to become more and more free of our seemingly never-ending wanting and not wanting,

Our fears and regrets,

And be able instead to live with more of a sense of acceptance or ease with what actually is,

Right now,

Right here,

In the present moment,

What actually is.

And of course,

This is also exactly the type of letting go that the Buddhist teachings are trying to point us to,

Right,

Or are asking us to practice.

Because the truth is that the more we're able to rest with the basic uncertainty of this life and let go of needing ourselves,

Other people,

And in fact the world itself,

To conform to our version of how it should be,

The more content we're going to be with the lives we're actually living,

Again,

Right now,

Right here in this moment.

And because,

As we all know,

This is not at all easy and can in fact sometimes be maybe excruciatingly difficult,

Right,

To let go,

This is truly our work,

Right here,

To learn how we can do this more and more often with less and less effort.

And so,

During that long conversation we were having,

My friend brought up a short quote that she learned about recently from the artist Pablo Picasso,

I just absolutely loved it because it really points to this.

Apparently he said,

It takes a long time to grow young.

Takes a long time to grow young.

I just love that.

It actually reminded me of a story about the time of the Buddha's enlightenment,

Which as the story goes,

Happened very soon after he remembered what contentment had felt like to him as a young child.

In fact,

It was that memory that apparently made all the difference.

And so,

Because this story is so important for our understanding of this quality of contentment or serenity,

Which I want to talk about,

Which in the Pali language is called Pasadi,

I thought I would share the story.

So,

As many of you may recall,

The Buddha was born a prince,

Prince Siddhartha,

And until the sort of late age of 29,

He was just completely showered with luxury and mostly sheltered until finally and radically he made the decision to leave his home and his family and everything he loved to go out into the forest as a homeless ascetic in search of enlightenment.

And so,

For the next six years,

This is exactly what he did.

He dove very intensely into this search and he studied with many,

Many different teachers.

And near the end of those six years of study and practice,

He believed very strongly,

As many spiritual seekers of his day did,

That punishing and depriving his body is what would ultimately lead him to freedom and nirvana.

In fact,

He was such a devoted student that he nearly killed himself with this practice.

And you might have seen statues of the prince in this emaciated state.

This was before his enlightenment.

So,

In the Buddha Sutras,

He explains how ill and painful his body had become.

The Buddha tells us,

Quote,

My limbs became like the jointed segments of vine stems or bamboo stems.

My ribs jutted out as gaunt as the crazy rafters of an old roofless barn.

The gleam of my eyes sunk far down in their sockets looked like the gleam of water sunk far down in a deep well.

If I made water or evacuated my bowels,

I fell over on my face.

If I tried to ease my body by rubbing my limbs with my hands,

The hair rotted at its roots fell away from my body as I rubbed because of eating so little.

A pretty vivid description.

And so as he was lying in the state under a tree,

In a state of great pain and suffering,

This young woman from a nearby village passed him and could clearly see that this monk was dying.

And so she offered him some milk rice.

And finally,

Finally,

Siddhartha agreed to eat.

And so essentially,

This young woman,

Sujata,

Saved his life.

And then for many months afterwards,

Continued to nurse him back to health.

So during this time,

As Siddhartha was recovering and meditating under a tree at the river's edge,

A memory from his childhood came to him.

And in this memory,

He was eight years old.

And here you might just imagine the scene.

This is a memory of he and his family attending a big annual ceremony,

Where the entire town had gathered for the first plowing in the fields.

And so people were all dressed up in their best clothes,

And the trees were all decorated with colorful flags and things.

And there were tables and altars filled with food and drinks,

And lots of holy men were leading prayers and chants and asking for healthy and vibrant crops,

Et cetera.

So it was very festive,

But as you might imagine,

After a while,

Many of the children started getting a bit antsy.

And so they started venturing out into the fields,

And Siddhartha followed them and did this as well.

But because he was a very curious child,

Siddhartha ended up walking as close to the fields as he could,

So that he could watch the men who were plowing the earth with the buffalo.

And Siddhartha apparently watched the man who was the closest to him.

He noticed how tired he looked and how hot he looked.

The man's back was bare,

And he could see the sun shining off his sweat.

He also noticed how tired the buffalo looked.

He also seemed hot and seemed to be really laboring to pull that heavy plow into the earth,

All while being whipped by the man to go faster and faster.

He also noticed that in the soil that was being dug up,

There were hundreds of worms.

And to his great horror,

He saw how they were kind of wriggling in distress to get away and writhing in pain as they were chopped in half by the blades.

And there was also a flock of small birds who were busy eating those helpless,

Defenseless worms.

And then there was a hawk who flew down and scooped one of the birds up in its talons.

So in that moment of seeing all of this together,

The young Siddhartha just suddenly became completely overwhelmed and felt fully all of this fear and pain and struggle,

Things that he had again mostly been sheltered from,

Which we all may recognize is just life itself,

The truth of it,

Again,

The first noble truth,

Their suffering.

The little prince was just really upset about this and the afternoon sun was blaring and he was feeling hot and sweaty and upset.

And so he made his way over to the nearest tree,

Which happened to be a rose apple tree.

He wanted to get away from all the commotion and the noise of all the other children.

And right away underneath this rose apple tree,

It felt like a relief to be in the quiet and in the cool shade of that tree.

There was also a large cool slab of rock there where he could sit and this felt like a great relief to him too.

So as he sat down,

He kind of curled his legs up beneath him and closed his eyes and he rested his hands in his lap and he just kind of sat that way,

Breathing and reflecting on what he just witnessed.

And as he continued,

He gradually felt himself becoming saturated by this great feeling of compassion for all the beings that he'd seen suffering.

And very importantly,

This compassion also included himself for having been witness to such suffering.

As the story goes,

Siddhartha sat like this for hours and hours in what is often referred to as the first meditation.

So during this time of that first meditation,

Siddhartha focused on his compassion and his breath and his innate connection to all these beings who were also suffering.

What he noticed was that his mind had become very still.

In fact,

His thoughts had quieted down so much that he experienced a very deep tranquility and calm that allowed him suddenly to see things even more clearly and to actually have profound realizations about life itself.

Suddenly he was so absorbed that at the end of the day when his family finally found him still sitting,

They noticed that while all the other shadows had shifted with the sun,

The shadow underneath that rose apple tree had never moved.

Throughout the day,

It had just continued to shield the young prince.

That's the story anyway.

So as an older man recalling this memory of his childhood,

What Prince Siddhartha realized was that in order for us to discover freedom on this path,

We not only need joy and compassion,

We also need the quality of tranquility and calm.

And that striving and punishment is not the way to freedom.

So essentially when he discovered what's often been called the middle way,

What he realized was that we don't need to beat up on ourselves or push ourselves in order to find freedom.

Instead,

What we need to do is to actually soften.

Soften.

And what we're softening is the mind and the body and the heart.

So even back then,

This idea was considered radical.

And of course,

It often still is today because if we're really honest with ourselves,

It's still really the opposite of what we think we need to do in order to gain freedom,

Isn't it?

To soften.

There's actually a short poem from the poet Narayan Waheed that I love that really reminds me of this teaching.

She writes,

You do not have to be a fire for every mountain blocking you.

You could be a water and soft river your way to freedom,

Too.

You could be a water and soft river your way to freedom,

Too.

I also like to sometimes think of all the great spiritual leaders and how they all exemplified this quality of calm in order to create great changes in our world.

They were calm.

The great monk Piyadasi Mahatera says this about the importance of cultivating the quality of calm or contentment.

By the way,

I took the liberty here to change his original quote,

Which used the word man.

We can listen to it a little differently.

He said that the Tathagata,

The tamed,

The Buddha,

Teaches the Dharma for the purpose of taming the human heart.

A disorderly mind is a liability both to the owner of it and for others.

All the havoc wrought in the world is wrought by those who have not learned the way of mental calm,

Balance,

And poise.

Calmness is not weakness.

The calm attitude at all times shows a person of culture.

It is not too hard a task for a person to be calm when things all around them are favorable.

But to be composed in mind in the midst of unfavorable circumstances is hard indeed,

And it is this difficult quality that is worth achieving,

For by such control one builds up strength of character.

The most deceptive thing in the world is to imagine that they alone are strong,

Who are noisy,

Or that they alone possess power,

Who are fussily busy.

The person who cultivates calm of the mind does not get upset,

Confused,

Or excited when confronted with the eight vicissitudes of this world.

They endeavor to see the rise and fall of all things conditioned,

How things come into being and pass away.

Free from anxiety and restlessness,

They will see the fragility of the fragile.

They will see the fragility of the fragile.

So whenever I read that passage,

I like to think of the words that are often used to describe the opposite of calm,

Composed,

Content.

Words like discontent,

Hot-headed,

Or hot-tempered.

I also like to imagine someone with maybe smoke literally coming out of their ears,

Or someone maybe trying to tear their hair out like it's on fire somehow,

Right?

And of course,

We've all been here at some point or another,

And we've all experienced being frustrated,

Angry,

Upset,

Or we felt like our heads might be truly on fire.

And if we think about it,

Whenever we're caught up in a story of wanting or not wanting of some sort,

Doesn't it feel like both the mind and body are hot?

Like there's some kind of fire in the mind,

Fire in the body,

Or just burning up with it?

I find that image really helpful,

Especially since the quality of passati has been described as the cooling factor.

It's something that cools the heat or the fire of both the mind and the body.

And it has a quality of actually refreshing us.

And so here we might recall the Buddhist childhood memory of sitting on that cool rock under the cool shade of that rose apple tree.

And so passati essentially is what helps us to chill out,

If you will,

You know,

Keep our cool,

Cool down.

And it's a kind of relief,

Again,

A kind of letting go.

One of my teachers,

The great Joseph Goldstein,

Describes passati this way.

He says,

It's what a tired worker feels upon sitting down in the cool shade of a tree on a sweltering day,

Or what a child feels when her mother lays a cool,

Soothing hand on her feverish forehead.

And actually,

In some versions of the story about the rose apple tree,

The tree itself is believed to be a goddess in disguise who offers the Buddha the compassionate shelter of her arms,

If you will,

And that same kind of soothing care like that of a mother,

Not allowing the heat of the sun to burn him.

And you may know that traditionally,

Kuan Yin,

The bodhisattva of compassion,

Is shown holding a vase,

And inside that vase is the cooling water of passati.

So many years ago,

I bought a big statue of Kuan Yin,

Which I almost always bring along with me whenever I lead a retreat.

And I really like to look at the vase in her hands and be reminded of how precious and vital that quality of passati is.

As if Kuan Yin is cradling this rare,

Precious,

Magical,

Cooling nectar,

And all we need to do to receive some of it is just to first remember that it's available right there,

And then to actually open our hands to receive it.

Because if we think about it,

We can't really be open to receiving much of anything if we are clinging or holding on so tightly.

We're not going to receive that nectar.

And if we want to receive even more of that kind of calm or contentment more often,

What we need to do is to consciously train ourselves to relax so that we can again allow ourselves to also let go.

The good news for us is that there are actually innumerable ways that we can cultivate this quality of passati.

And for this short talk,

I thought I'd offer us the three main qualities that can help us the most.

And traditionally,

These are the qualities of calmness,

Groundedness,

And spaciousness.

Calmness,

Groundedness,

And spaciousness.

And so here we can return to the Buddha's memory of sitting under that rose apple tree and just recall the steps that he took.

So first,

You might notice that he went somewhere quiet to get away from all the hustle and bustle so that he could cool the fire of both his mind and body,

If you will,

And maybe just not add any more flames to it.

And the idea here is that we ourselves can do the exact same thing.

Whenever we find ourselves upset about something or feeling anxious or angry,

Frustrated,

Discontent,

Maybe hotheaded,

We might very consciously,

Consciously take a time out,

Find somewhere quiet so that we can start to cool that fire in the mind and the body.

Just as a for instance,

Sometimes when I feel myself getting a bit anxious in a conversation I'm having with my husband,

I will very gently kind of raise my hand and then patiently tell him that I need a little quiet time in order to kind of cool down or calm down.

Then I'll just get up and go to my room,

My office,

And I'll practice for a bit and work on getting my footing back,

If you will.

And I have to say whenever I'm doing this,

It always,

Always helps me to remember that by taking a time out,

I am not somehow being weak or fragile or unable to handle stress.

And I'm not simply avoiding what's happening.

I'm actually following what the Buddha himself did at age eight.

He was fully aware that he was experiencing stress,

He was hot,

And he instinctively went away to find some quiet and calm along with some comfort and compassion and insight.

So when he discovered that cool tree and that rock,

The very first thing that he did was to curl his little legs up beneath him,

Sit up straight and gently place his hands together because this was just the most comfortable way for him to sit.

And it was also a posture that he thought he could hold for a long time.

And so again,

We too can follow this example and try to make ourselves as comfortable as possible even if this just means sitting in a cozy chair somewhere and maybe staring out the window,

Letting ourselves just be.

If we're sitting more formally in meditation,

We also want to make ourselves comfortable by trying to find the best posture,

Not too tight,

Not too loose as the Buddha advised.

And we also want to very consciously try to relax the body,

Which of course is going to help us relax the mind because the two are really not separate.

In the famous Satipatthana Sutta,

Which is essentially the Buddha's main instructions for how we're being asked to practice,

He gives us some very specific instructions for how we can do this,

Which you might notice sound very similar to that very first meditation when he was eight.

And here,

I'm going to read you the translation of the Sutta from the late great Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh,

Which I really liked because he made the pronoun feminine.

So the instructions are as follows.

She goes to the forest,

To the foot of a tree,

Or to an empty room,

Sits down cross-legged in the lotus position,

Holds her body straight,

And establishes mindfulness in front of her.

I'll read that again.

She goes to the forest,

To the foot of a tree,

Or to an empty room,

Sits down cross-legged in the lotus position,

Holds her body straight,

And establishes mindfulness in front of her.

So just to say the lotus position was at the time just the most comfortable way for the little Buddha to sit,

And this isn't necessarily for us,

Really.

We truly just want to find a posture that is stable,

Comfortable,

And also sustainable,

And to find a really quiet place to practice.

Also when the Sutta says in front,

It's not saying to be mindful of something that's literally right in front of us.

It's asking us to stay here in the present moment right now by paying attention to what's right here in front of us,

Not in the future or the past,

But right here,

Right here,

Moment by moment.

And so we can do this by paying close attention to whatever's happening both inside and out.

So for instance,

We pay attention to what's happening all around us,

And we pay attention to our bodies and our minds,

And maybe most especially our hearts,

Because all of those things are right here in this moment.

That's what's in front of us.

Then we might just let ourselves be relaxed,

Open,

And curious,

As children are so good at doing.

We might even imagine a little eight-year-old child here and how they might really relax into this practice,

Like they're being held in the arms of a loved one.

Whenever we're practicing,

We can allow ourselves to really do the same by allowing ourselves to feel held by our common great mother,

The earth,

Which is actually always holding us and always will,

And trust that.

Now this doesn't mean that we kind of collapse in some way and just let everything go.

We do want to find a good balance between effort and relaxing,

Which means we really do want to find an upright posture,

But then we want to balance that by maybe relaxing the body,

Maybe dropping the shoulders,

Unclenching our jaw,

Loosening our hands.

We want to be able to relax the eyes and the forehead and our tummy,

Let that be soft.

Then we might even consider how might a child's face look when it's being held in this way.

Very often there's a kind of slight contented smile,

Isn't there,

When a child is being held?

Very literally when we're practicing,

We're being invited to do exactly the same by placing a very slight smile at the corner of the eyes and the lips.

When we're doing this,

We're inviting not only a sense of calm,

But a sense of unconditional friendliness or metta to our practice.

Metta is considered the soil,

The foundation of our entire practice.

We invite that in.

Of course,

This is never,

Ever as a way of placing a smiley face over something or covering anything over.

It's a way of bringing kind of allowing,

Kind allowing to whatever's happening in the heart,

In the body,

In the mind.

We're curious and allowing with kindness.

Actually,

Even though the Buddha suggested this practice of literally placing a slight smile on the face thousands of years ago,

Science has shown us today,

Modern science,

That it really does help calm the mind and the body by bringing on the flow of those good feel-good neurotransmitters,

Which can not only relax the body,

But can also lower our heart rate and our blood pressure.

It's another kind of cooling.

You may even try it on right now as you're listening.

Not a big smile,

Just a small smile.

See how that feels in the body,

The mind,

And the heart.

So to continue,

Once we've found some sense of calm and grounding,

We can then follow the Buddha's example again and do what he did next at age eight,

Which was to focus on his breathing,

Which also helped him to slow and cool both his mind and the body.

And here,

What I find so helpful to remember is that,

Again,

It doesn't just need to apply to our formal practice,

You know,

That's where we train.

We can put a very conscious attention on our breath right in the moment,

Right in the middle,

Say,

Of a difficult situation or a conversation,

Et cetera.

Right in the moment,

We can take a couple of slow,

Conscious breaths and remind ourselves that we're consciously using them as a way to help us cool down.

And here,

We might recall the teachings on how we're being asked to do this,

Again,

From the Sādhāpatthana.

And I'd like to read directly from the Sutta,

And again,

It's Thich Nhat Hanh's version.

He writes,

She breathes in,

Aware that she's breathing in.

She breathes out,

Aware that she's breathing out.

When she breathes in a long breath,

She knows,

I'm breathing in a long breath.

When she breathes out a long breath,

She knows,

I'm breathing out a long breath.

She breathes in a short breath,

She knows,

I'm breathing in a short breath.

When she breathes out a short breath,

She knows,

I'm breathing out a short breath.

She uses the following practice.

Breathing in,

I am aware of my whole body.

Breathing out,

I am aware of my whole body.

Breathing in,

I calm my body.

Breathing out,

I calm my body.

So we could use that practice just over and over and over again,

Being aware of the breath.

The reason this type of close,

Curious attention on the breath can help us to cool the mind is because what it does is help us to let go of all those thoughts that are keeping us from being present.

It helps us to let go.

And in the Satta Patana,

We are asked to practice doing this,

Quote,

Diligently,

Clearly knowing and mindful,

Free from desire and discontent in regard to the world.

And again,

This means that we're being asked to let go of all those,

Quote,

Desires and discontents in regard to our lives.

Or all those thoughts that are adding fuel to the fire of our stories,

Or to our negative emotions,

Our fears,

Our worries,

Our planning,

Our doubts,

All that fuel.

Again,

The breath can be kind of like that cool hand settling on our feverish forehead.

So we can soften,

In a way,

Our tight,

Clenched thinking mind and simply feel that kind touch in the form of the calmness and sweetness of our own breathing.

And so at the same time,

Just as the little Buddha did sitting under that rose apple tree,

We are also asked to practice the third thing that he did,

Which is to pay very close attention to the heart.

So when we're practicing,

We're being asked to pay close attention to our own fear and suffering,

And really be with it,

And to nurture our compassion for both ourselves and others.

And so a lot of time,

What this really means is just remembering that we are not alone,

That we all experience pain and suffering,

And that it's okay to be feeling these very natural human emotions.

They are not wrong.

They're just a natural part of living in this world.

They're not wrong.

And so this is where the sense of spaciousness comes in.

When we can start to,

Again,

Let go,

But what we're letting go of is our limited sense of self,

With all our wanting and not wanting,

All of our shoulds,

And getting in touch with our innate connection to all beings,

To all things.

Or in other words,

It's when we can stop taking everything so personally.

That's what we're letting go of.

And the interesting part of this is that the more we begin to do this,

Instead of this letting go being really scary,

It actually ends up bringing us much more calm,

Much more ease and freedom,

Because we become so much less fearful and defensive,

And we feel like we are not alone.

And so maybe as a practice this week,

You might see if you can use your mindfulness practice to recall the word defensive,

Defensive,

And then notice what happens when it arises.

Maybe notice how hot you become in the mind,

Or the body,

Or the heart,

Or all three,

And then see if you can use your practice of calmness,

Groundedness,

And spaciousness to pour some of those cooling waters of passati onto the heat of things,

And allow yourself to let go of your strong grip,

And then to actually soften,

To soften.

And so to end,

If it's available for you,

I'd like to offer you a brief meditation on this practice of passati.

And so if you're home,

Or somewhere where you can sit comfortably,

You might again find that comfortable seat.

Make yourself comfortable,

Comfortable posture,

Not too tight,

Not too loose.

If you're walking,

You might also relax the body a bit,

Loosen the hands.

Feel your feet walking on the earth,

Feel that connection to the earth,

Movement of the body,

Sensing the breath.

If you're driving,

You might sense your hands on the wheel,

Your seat in the car cushion,

Sensing the breath.

And then,

For all of us,

Really beginning by enacting to the breath,

You might take a nice,

Deep,

Long inhale,

Filling the lungs,

And a slow exhale,

Letting go.

Maybe right away noticing the cooling aspect of the breath,

And then feel cooler on the way in,

And then sense that calming aspect of the breath on the way out.

Really allow yourself to sense the sweetness,

The cooling aspect of your breath,

Especially on the exhale,

Letting the body and mind soften.

You might let the shoulders drop,

Might allow the whole face to soften,

And here you might add that slight smile to the corner of the mouth and the lips,

Not covering over,

Just bringing a sense of allowing,

Curiosity,

Friendliness,

Metta,

Sense of calming.

You might feel your sit bones connected to the earth or your feet,

And again,

Sense your connection to mama earth.

Allow yourself to feel held.

You can sink into or trust the support of the earth,

Just allow yourself to be held.

Still breathing,

Softening.

You might also notice the hands,

See if you can open them a little more in a gesture of both letting go and receiving,

Letting go and receiving,

Imagining that you're receiving that cooling nectar of vasari,

Softening,

And then let that sense of letting go and receiving flow through the whole body if possible.

See if what you're sensing in your hands can be reflected in the whole body.

Still breathing,

Aware of the breath,

And then you might see if you can find a sense of spaciousness by remembering you are not alone.

You are not alone.

We all suffer and we're all seeking happiness,

All beings.

You are not alone.

Just like the Buddha,

We can place our focus also on compassion,

Compassion for ourselves,

Others,

Everyone and everything living on this earth,

Including the earth itself.

Recalling the instructions from the Satta Patthana,

You might hear these words,

I breathe in,

Aware that I'm breathing in.

Breathe out,

Aware that I'm breathing out.

Breathing in,

I'm aware of my whole body.

Breathing out,

I'm aware of my whole body.

Breathing in,

I calm my body.

Breathing out,

I calm my body.

You might even just focus on those last lines.

Breathing in,

I calm my body.

Breathing out,

I calm my body.

And finally,

With the eyes still closed,

Just listening to these words from Sharon Marsh who tells us,

Give me the soft things.

Give me the soft things.

The sound of a wind chime clinking in the breeze.

The warmth of sun on my face.

Fluffy blankets and stacks of books.

The sound of the river.

Kind eyes and stranger smiles.

Give me feather pillows and the smell of soap.

Country roads or the gravel crunches under my car's tires.

Apple pie and ice cream on a Sunday night.

Listening to the sound of the rain on a tin roof.

Give me the soft things.

Give me the soft things.

Namaste and blessings.