Tag Archives: Spirituality

Hand Dryers

Sometimes objects out there in the world have a lot to say to me.  When I go into a washroom, I make sure that I use soap.  I also want to have my hands dry when I walk out the door.

Years ago, my office was at Catholic Central High School in London.  I’d do my phone calls and paperwork there, and then zoom off to all sorts of schools to see low vision kids.  The stress of the job often overwhelmed me.  I was just going so fast.  A washroom was right next door, and I’d sometimes fly out of there with hands dripping.  It took me maybe two years to figure out that my bathroom behaviour was a symbol of what was “off” in my life.

One day, I decided to wait until my hands were completely dry.  That was a trick, since the CCH hand dryers were definitely underpowered.  But I was determined.  I rubbed and waited and then rubbed some more, turned the dryer back on a few times, and felt the tension growing in my chest.  What an education.  Having a natural completion of the task seemed wise, but it was so hard to not lean forward into the next moment.

Then what about companions?  I’m in a restaurant washroom rubbing away but another fellow is washing his hands at the sink.  He’ll need the dryer in seconds!  And my hands are still wet.  What discipline it takes to finish the job while feeling him standing behind me.  But that’s what I do.  It’s good to feel the pressure, and to hold it gently, realizing that I will still be alive when my friend and I exit.

But some dryers are painfully loud.  Such an assault on my whole being.  I’ve decided that if there are no paper towels, I’ll drip dry.  This seems to defeat my commitment to dry off completely, but really it doesn’t.   What I’m committed to is my well-being, whether that means not subjecting myself to noxious noise or seeing a task to its natural end.  If my heart and soul remain balanced and happy, then they’re available to the next person I meet.

So … thanks, all you manufacturers of hand dryers.  Little do you realize that you’re contributing to my spiritual development.

Pathless

Buddhism asserts that the spiritual journey is unique to each individual.  Therefore, of course, it cannot be held, circumscribed, limited, or even ultimately judged by any institution, tradition or external authority.  The unique journey that lies before us does not exist in any text, external person, or religion.  In fact, it does not exist at all, but only lies ahead of us, to be discovered literally as we go.  Thus it is that the spiritual journey cannot in any way be preconceived or predetermined; it is not humanly constructed or fabricated.  The journey to ourselves is truly a journey into the unknown, a setting forth onto a sea that has never before been sailed and never before been fathomed or mapped.

Reginald Ray

So what is spiritual life?  You don’t get to say for me, and I guess I don’t even get to say for me.  It’s unfolding as we speak.  But this doesn’t mean a rejection of the wise teachers who came before, such as Jesus and the Buddha.  No, I can absorb what they say about living a good life, and see to what extent I make it my own.

Take “The Sermon on the Mount” and “The Metta Sutta”, for instance.  Who am I to argue with the Beatitudes, which honour the “merciful”, the “pure in heart”, and “those who hunger and thirst for righteousness”?  Or with the Buddha’s assertion that “Even as a mother protects with her life her child, her only child, so with a boundless heart should one cherish all living beings, radiating kindness over the entire world.”

My conception of Spirit has been nurtured by decades of spiritual practice.  More and more, I breathe life into what I’ve drawn from my fellow travellers, from books, from meditation retreats.  I’m happy about that.

But Reggie Ray is pointing to a mysterious sea.  I don’t know where my voyage is taking me, and you don’t know where yours is taking you.  We’ve thanked the guideposts along the way, but now … there aren’t any.  We point the bow of our ship to the horizon, and wait.  Will we fall off the end of the world?  No.  Will we fly?  Yes, I think so.

I await my future.  I will write a new song and sing it out loud.  And may your melody be sweet.

Words from Jody’s Mouth

Dear kindhearted ones,

In four hours, I’m driving to London, then getting on a bus to Toronto, and then a plane to Cuba.  I’m so excited!  And Jody’s going with me.

I remember my dear wife in many ways.  One of my favorites is reading what she has written.  The human being, in all her glory and pain, shines from the page.  Here are some snippets that I hope you’ll enjoy:

***

On June 25, 2014, we celebrated our 26th anniversary:

Dear Bruce:

I love you completely, without reservation, and my heart sings with happiness when you are with me.

***

And to a dear friend in April, 2014:

I hope you enjoy this pouch that was made to help you carry both jewelry, money and important papers when you are travelling … I hope you find it extremely useful.

We love you dearly,

Jody and Bruce

 ***

In the midst of great sickness:

I don’t want to be alone.

(To Bruce)   Fuzz top

Oh, Bruce. I’m so glad you’re here.

 ***

Bruce: May I go outside and get the paper first?

Jody:  No.  You have to sit here and smile … Of course you can get the paper.

 ***

A letter to herself at the end of a meditation course:

I need to pay attention to ME!  Everything else will naturally get better … I am naturally a happy person … I don’t have to get sucked into the situation or stay that way for long.  I do have the ability to create distance from the issues.

***

Bruce: Hello, loved wife.

Jody: Hello, loved husband.  I love you so dearly.

 ***

Bruce: I wish we’d had kids.

Jody: I’m sorry that we didn’t.

Bruce: You would have been a good mother.

Jody: You would have been a fantastic father.

 ***

And as Jody got weaker:

Jody: I need to have somebody help blow my nose.

Bruce: Pick me.

 ***

A letter to her grandmother on October 31, 2014 shows the soul beyond the limitations of time:

It’s been a long time.  I realize that it’s been a long time since we’ve said hello so saying goodbye seems like a funny thing to do.

***

 A couple of weeks before Jody died:

I’m more than happy to comply with your wishes, kind sir.

***

 Two days after Jody died:

I am with you, husband, in a way you can’t comprehend from your side.

 ***

Lovely phrases all.  I’m so glad that I get to hold onto many of Jody’s words.  And I’m sure we’ll talk lots in Cuba.

On Saturday, December 6, 2014, there’ll be an announcement about Jody’s Celebration of Life in the London Free Press and in the St. Thomas Times-Journal.  It will be held at 11:00 am on Saturday, January 31, 2015 at Bellamere Winery in London.  I thought long and hard about whether to include in the ad something funny Jody said to me.  Well, heck, it’s a celebration isn’t it?  So the funny stuff now sits there, waiting for your laughter on Saturday morning.  I’ll be on the beach at the time, reading The Book Thief.  I dearly hope that I’ll see you in January.  Jody deserves a big crowd.

I love you all,

Bruce

Hearts Opening All Around Me

Jody was having trouble breathing last night.  I called 911 and the paramedics arrived quickly.  Once she had the oxygen mask on for a few minutes, Jody felt better.  She decided not to go to Emergency.

What a moment in time for me, to stay silent in response to Jody’s decision, while yearning to have her fully checked out in the hospital.  In the words of Shantideva, an ancient Buddhist sage, “It’s then that like a log you should remain.”  Jody gets to choose.

This morning, she once again was struggling for air.  And Jody chose ambulance.  I wondered as we headed down the road for the St. Thomas-Elgin Hospital if she would ever come home again.

It turned out that Jody has a lung infection with some fluid buildup.  Not the re-emergence of blood clots nor the spectre of imminent death.  Now she’s sleeping soundly beside me at home, with an antibiotic coursing through her, and nasal prongs delivering oxygen.  (Sigh)  Perhaps Jody’s time on Earth is short but this is not the day of leaving.

I am so blessed to have people stroll into my life, happy to be in my world. Today’s angels included:

1.  Two young paramedics, a man and a woman, both with big smiles, kind words, and funny words.  “The unbearable lightness of being”, as one movie was aptly titled.

2.  The resident doctor who smiled so fully at Jody and me.  She sparkled. And her words were wise, coming from a place far beyond her years.

3.  The emergency doc who first saw Jody a year ago, and both compassionately and assertively suggested that she may have cancer.  He was “with her” both then and today, showing me how the contact of the moment outstrips the content.

4.  The pharmacy technician who saw that I needed the antibiotic in a hurry, who saw in my fear the deep love I have for my wife, and who pulled strings to get me what I needed quickly.  Our eyes truly met when I said thank you.

5.  The respiratory therapist who saw Jody briefly in hospital and then came to our place tonight to comfort her with air and love, and who patiently showed me how to operate the equipment, returning to a task when she saw I was confused.  She realized that I was “gone”, and allowed her caring to flow.

***

Out of the woodwork they come
Out of their phone booths
Out of their skin

Somewhere Between One and Zero

Another unknown human being out there in the world, in the present or in the past, has this to say:

We can think of ourselves spiritually as being somewhere on a continuum between one and zero.  One is the full embodiment of the “I” separate from all things, and zero is emptiness and the unconditioned.  Spiritual practice is supposed to move us from one to zero, but it often moves us in precisely the opposite direction, back toward one.  We cannot use the strategies of one to get to zero.  The movement toward either zero or one is within every thought and action of body, speech and mind.  We are continually solidifying the hold that “I” has on reality, or we are loosening it.

Perhaps the most difficult transition is to abide within zero and leave the world and ourselves alone.  We have practiced for so long that with lightning reflexes we intervene on our behalf, observing, examining and understanding whatever resistance arises.  The energy behind this intervention suggests that something is wrong when these states of mind, thoughts or attitudes occur.  The final understanding is that there is nothing wrong with anything because it all holds the same essence.

 As we move toward zero, we will never know what the next step will look like, except that it will be quieter than the previous one.

I wonder what zero would feel like.  I guess all of the things that happen to me, the “conditions”, would not be important any more.  That sounds like a pale life from one vantage point but possibly great freedom from another. Perhaps there would be nothing or no one I’d feel separate from.  Perhaps I’d be just as engaged with life as ever but without the need to have any particular result show up.  I could do what I do, as an expression of my essence, without worrying.

It’s 11:54 am.  Linda, one of Jody’s personal support workers, shows up at noon for her 8-hour shift.  No PSW comes in for the other sixteen hours. Thirty minutes ago, I looked at the kitchen and the laundry area and thought “not good enough”.  Dishes in the sink, clean dishes sitting in the dishwasher, food stains on the counter, drier full of stuff to be folded or hung.  So I’ve scurried around, quite mindlessly, to get the jobs done.  And now they are.  But what was that all about?  Not very quiet.  Definitely holding on to something being wrong.

Strange.  The PSW’s job is to clean and cook and generally support Jody.  But I wanted the house to look good for her.  And, in line with our mystery author, there’s nothing wrong with that.  And there’s nothing wrong with me being so uptight about it.  In the spirit of quietness, though, I could just do the cleaning within a context of Being, with no strings attached.  That would be nice.  Think I’ll give it a go.

Linda’s arrived.  House looks good.

It could be that I’m at 0.8, or maybe 0.3.  But really … how silly to be even thinking numbers.  Still, I wouldn’t mind being .007.  Kerr’s the name – Bruce Kerr.

Beyond Which Not

I’ve been reading a book by Lex Hixon called Coming Home.  In it he points to the possibility of enlightenment as uncovered through various spiritual traditions.

I don’t know what to say.  Perhaps being at a loss for words is appropriate when glimpsing … Spirit.  I know I want to say something as I grope through an unknown territory.  I don’t think it’s about achieving anything, such as a rarefied state of being.  Or about starting at A and then experiencing what I need to experience to get to B, and then C, D, …  Here’s how Lex expresses the inexpressible:

From our perspective as seekers, we may imagine that we will someday turn a certain spiritual corner, finally to experience the vast new vision of what is truly ultimate.  But this is to misunderstand the Ultimate.  Turiya is not any particular experience but is what constitutes all experiences.

He refers to the “biggest” consciousness as turiya.  It seems to me like the essence of all people and things and moments.  All of this is aglow from within.  Maybe a simple white candle burns always in my chest and yours, an eternal flame.  Maybe your favourite tree holds the same candle … your bed, your coffee, your coat.  A building, a street, a field, a mountain, a lake.

Perhaps it’s all perfect – this moment and every other one.  Today I couldn’t find my vehicle permit for Hugo.  I need to have all the paperwork in place by Sunday.  I looked everywhere, watching my frustration grow.  Perfect?  Even the part about frustration and fear?  Could be.  (Never did find the permit, but the Government of Ontario will replace it for $10.00.  Whew.)

Sometimes my responses to life’s travails are mellow.  That feels right – spiritual.  And I’ve defined the absence of such a mature (?) response as bad, as less than.  But what if I could easily get in touch with the adequacy of everything I receive and everything I send out, “positive” or “negative”?

Right now, Jody needs my help, and so I’m leaving our conversation.  In this instant, within this spaciousness, allowing myself to be shifted away from the task I’ve chosen is perfectly fine.  So I’ll see you later.

***

I gave Jody her daily injection of Fragmin, to treat her blood clots.  I get scared when I’m about to push the needle into her stomach, worried that I’ll hurt her.  Today, I did the deed while surrounded by space.  Within the fear was complete sufficiency.

I thought tonight about how to access this turiya.  If only I could think of one word that would trigger an opening.  It sure wouldn’t be turiya.  Apart from the writings of Lex and another fellow named Ken Wilber, I’ve never heard of the term.  It doesn’t shine inside me.  I’ve often thought of the word Spirit, with a capital T, but that’s not it either.  Okay.  I decided to wait for it to be revealed.

I didn’t have to wait for long.  Jody was angry with me for an hour or so. During that time together, I let a vast consciousness be there.  And a word naturally came to the surface … “candle”.  Yes.  That feels right.

Jody has now fallen asleep.  Even though the residue of her anger is still with me, so is a little white candle, and the moment is illuminated.  Plus I just thought of a song by Peter, Paul and Mary:

Don’t let the light go out
It’s lasted for so many years
Don’t let the light go out
Let it shine through our love and our tears

Works for me

Laughing with Kabir

Kabir was a mystic poet in India during the 1400s.  He rejected the rigidities of Hinduism and Islam, and wrote ecstatic poetry about experiencing union with God.  He also chuckled a lot, sometimes enjoying the presence of others, and sometimes gently mocking the world’s foibles.  Here are a few choice quotes:

The caller calls in a loud voice to the Holy One at dusk
Why?  Surely the Holy One is not deaf
He hears the delicate anklets that ring on the feet of an insect as it walks

Why should I flail about with words
When love has made the space inside me full of light?

I laugh when I hear that the fish in the water is thirsty
You don’t grasp the fact that what is most alive of all is inside your own house
And so you walk from one holy city to the next with a confused look!

Do you have a body?  Don’t sit on the porch!  Go out and walk in the rain!

It is time to put up a love-swing!
Tie the body and tie the mind
So that they swing between the arms of the Secret One you love

The Sacred Books of the East are nothing but words
I looked through their covers one day sideways
What Kabir talks of is only what he has lived through
If you have not lived through something, it is not true

Don’t go outside your house to see flowers
My friend, don’t bother with that excursion
Inside your body there are flowers
One flower has a thousand petals
That will do for a place to sit

Suppose you scrub your ethical skin until it shines but inside there is no music
Then what?
Mohammed’s son pores over words and points out this and that
But if his chest is not soaked dark with love
Then what?

Then what, indeed.  Not what this life is intended to be.  I have so many spiritual books but they only touch me if I in turn breathe life into them. Along with Kabir, “if you have not lived through something, it is not true.” Each day, then, I listen inside for the sweet ring of “yes”.  If the package I hold in my hands sings to me, then I place it gently on my shelf so that I may enjoy it another day as well.

And as for the lightness of life, where do I find people who laugh and laugh and then laugh some more?  Who open and open and open some more?  I bet Kabir would say …

Oh, we ain’t got a barrel of money
Maybe we’re ragged and funny
But we travel along
Singing a song, side by side

Oh, we don’t know what’s coming tomorrow
Maybe it’s trouble and sorrow
But we’ll travel the road
Sharing our load, side by side

The Bodhisattva

Bodhisattva: a being (sattva) committed to liberation (bodhi)

So simple.  And yet not at all simple to do

***

The Bodhisattva Vows

Suffering beings are numberless.  I vow to liberate them all
Attachment is inexhaustible.  I vow to release it all
The gates to truth are numberless.  I vow to master them all
The way of awakening is supreme.  I vow to realize it fully

How illogical to think that you could free every single human being from suffering.  And yet … ?   Then how about being attached to nothing and no one, letting them all come into your life and later leave?  Plus staying open to all the sources of wisdom that are embraced across the world, rather than accepting only one

***

Each bodhisattva has delayed her or his departure from the world of samsara until beings everywhere are free of suffering

Samsara means a circular, repetitive existence on this planet, being reborn lifetime after lifetime, making mistakes and suffering each time, learning oh so slowly what we need to.  Am I willing to come back again and again to assist others, rather than accepting a freedom that is well earned?

***

In simple acts of kindness and gestures of cheerfulness, bodhisattvas are functioning everywhere, not as special saintly beings, but in helpful ways we may barely recognize

That woman smiling at you
That man letting you take the parking space
That child doing their best to bake you a cake

***

Bodhisattvas usually are unknown and anonymous rather than celebrities, and function humbly and invisibly all around us, expressing kindness and generosity in simple, quiet gestures

If they’re all around us, I wonder how many of them I see every day

***

Bodhisattvas are extraordinary wondrous beings, bestowing blessings on all wretched, confused, petty creatures.  Bodhisattvas are living in your neighborhood, waiting to say “Good morning” to you

I’m going to see every person who says “Good morning” to me as a bodhisattva.  Perhaps they are.  Perhaps they aren’t.  It doesn’t matter

***

A Course in Miracles

This work was published in 1976. An “inner voice” dictated the content to a psychologist named Helen Schucman.  Although it’s Christian in tone, many have said that the Course points toward universal wisdom.  I’ll let you be the judge of that.

Here are some quotes:

I am responsible for what I see
I choose the feelings I experience
And I decide upon the goal I would achieve
And everything that seems to happen to me
I ask for and receive as I have asked

Nothing real can be threatened
Nothing unreal exists
Herein lies the peace of God

I rule my mind, which I alone must rule
At times, it does not seem I am its king at all
It seems to triumph over me
And tell me what to think
And what to do and feel
And yet it has been given me to serve
Whatever purpose I perceive in it
My mind can only serve
Today I give its service to the Holy Spirit
To employ as He sees fit
I thus direct my mind
Which I alone can rule
And thus I set it free
To do the will of God

There is no more self-contradictory concept
Than that of “idle thoughts”
What gives rise to the perception of a whole world
Can hardly be called idle
Every thought you have
Contributes to truth or to illusion
Either it extends the truth
Or it multiplies illusions

What would you see?
The choice is given you
But learn and do not let your mind
Forget this law of seeing
You will look upon that which you feel within
If hatred finds a place within your heart
You will perceive a fearful world
Held cruelly in death’s sharp-pointed bony fingers
If you feel the Love of God within you
You will look out on a world of mercy and of love

Reality brings only perfect peace
When I am upset
It is always because I have replaced reality
With illusions I made up

The world that seems to hold you prisoner
Can be escaped by anyone
Who does not hold it dear

When you have learned to look on everyone
With no reference at all to the past
Either his or yours as you perceive it
You will be able to learn from what you see now

Seek not outside yourself
The search implies you are not whole within

It is your thoughts alone
That cause you pain
Nothing external to your mind
Can hurt or injure you in any way
There is no cause beyond yourself
That can reach down and bring oppression
No one but yourself affects you
There is nothing in the world
That has the power to make you ill or sad
Or weak or frail
But it is you who have the power
To dominate all things you see
By merely recognizing what you are

Only your mind can produce fear

You will fear what you attack

No one who loves can judge
And what he sees is free of condemnation

The real world is attained simply
By the complete forgiveness of the old

Teach only love
For that is what you are

When you meet anyone
Remember it is a holy encounter
As you see him you will see yourself
As you treat him you will treat yourself
As you think of him you will think of yourself

Is it an evil to be punished or a mistake to be corrected?

You heal a brother by recognizing his worth

You cannot know your own perfection
Until you have honored
All those who were created like you

There is no journey
But only an awakening

Your task is not to seek for love
But merely to seek and find
All of the barriers within yourself
That you have built against it

With love in you
You have no need except to extend it

Remember that you came
To bring the peace of God into the world

Why wait for Heaven?
Those who seek the light
Are merely covering their eyes
The light is in them now
Enlightenment is but a recognition
Not a change at all

Simply do this:
Be still, and lay aside all thoughts
Of what you are and what God is
All concepts you have learned about the world
All images you hold about yourself
Empty your mind of everything
It thinks is either true or false
Or good or bad
Of every thought it judges worthy
And all the ideas of which it is ashamed
Hold onto nothing
Do not bring with you one thought
The past has taught, nor one belief
You ever learned before from anything
Forget this world
Forget this course
And come with wholly empty hands unto your God

Content Analysis

When I was in teacher training, one of our profs asked us to look at scholarly articles and see if there were certain words that showed up a lot, and whether examining all those words which were frequently used created a context for the writing.  Was the atmosphere of the writing suffused with love, deficiency, joy, comparison, openness, division or any other ways of being?

Take this paragraph, for instance:

Daily training in aikido allows your inner divinity to shine brighter and brighter.  Keep the mind bright and clear as the endless sky, the deepest ocean, and the highest mountain.  Do not be calculating or act unnaturally.  Keep your mind set on the way of harmony, and do not criticize other teachers or traditions.   Aikido never restrains, restricts or shackles anything.  It embraces all and purifies everything.

I want to live with these verbs inside me: allow, shine, keep, embrace, purify

And not these: criticize, restrain, restrict, shackle

These adjectives: inner, bright, clear, endless, deep, high

Not these: calculating, unnatural

These nouns: divinity, sky, ocean, mountain, harmony, all, everything

Not these: (Actually, I couldn’t find any)

***

Maybe I should do a content analysis of my heart.  How about strapping a recorder to me as I wander in the world or sit in meditation?  I wonder what would come up?  Well, I have a good idea of the top sellers:

Love, kindness, compassion, empathy, peace, integrity, generosity, humour, acceptance, spontaneity

As for the formerly strong but now middle of the road:

Fear, sadness for me, frustration, laziness, pride, competition, greed

And the ones that have faded away:

Antagonism, anger, guilt, depression, boredom, criticism, jealousy, pity, repression

Just me.  Nothing special