Best of 2009: New Person and Best Book

This one is a hard one for me. I've met a lot of new people - I do every year as a teacher. I like a lot of them; in fact, I like a lot of them a lot. Lots of people from Dharma Zephyr have made an impact on me, but none of them are new. I've also gotten to know some people better who then kind of became new people to me because of the new impressions they made on me:

• Ben, a special ed teacher, and his wife. They're both incredibly dedicated to their professions, their politics, and their son.
• Corina, the person who will be our new SP Coordinator. She's uber organized and professional.
• Our superintendent. Underneath that stoic persona is a man who cares a lot.
• Kenley, the daughter of a couple friends of mine. She was born early in 2009. She's so adorable, unique, and cute that you can't help but adore her. She's a special needs baby who is the happiest baby I have EVER met.
• Jenny, Kenley's mom. I always saw her as a super business woman. After Kenley's birth, a new Jenny was revealed to me, one who is loving and adoring and yet a fierce advocate for her daughter. She has inspired me.

All of these people and more have made an impression on me, but I think the one person who most impacted me is someone I never got to really know personally: Shaila Chatherine, who wrote the book Focused and Fearless (the book that I have chosen as best book of 2009) and who taught one of the day-long retreats I attended.

I went into this book dragging my feet. I knew it was about the jhanas (euphoric states that arise from deep concentration), and so I expected that I would get little out of it. I may never in my life time reach a jhanic state and will certainly not do so any time in the near future. So when the sangha chose this book to read together, I thought it would likely not mean much to me.

But I was wrong. First of all, much of the book deals with elements that apply to all Buddhists and that must be well-developed in order to begin jhanic practice. Things like equanimity and concentration. In fact, Catherine's chapter on equanimity is the best I have ever read on the subject. I must have read it three times. So as it turns out, the book had quite a bit of application for me.

Plus, a new focus of meditation was opened to me. Before I had just tried to quiet my mind or I would sometimes do metta (loving kindness meditation). But after doing concentration practice, I learned how powerful concentration practice can be. With concentration comes quiet; with quiet comes peace; with peace comes happiness. I grew a lot in my practice as a result of Shaila Catherine's book and retreat.

So thank you to DZIMC for choosing this book and introducing me to this amazing person and thank you to Shaila Catherine for being such a knowledgeable person and for sharing that knowledge with us.

2009: Practice

The year 2009 was a year of practice for me for many different reasons. Last spring, I was tested and had to do my best to apply the Buddhist teachings in a somewhat confrontational setting. It was a challenge to apply compassion and right speech when I really just wanted to scream, cry, and . . . well, you know, throw a temper tantrum. I wasn't perfect, that's for sure. But I did handle some things more maturely than I normally would have, and I think I did have compassion for someone whom at the time I didn't want to feel anything by anger toward. It was an excellent couple months of the more practical form of "practice."

I did two low-impact months of no shopping, which is always an excellent form of awareness practice.

This summer, I followed through on a 90-day focus on practice during which I meditated every day, attended a day-long concentration retreat, read articles, listened to podcast dharma talks, read a dharma book, and tried to live by the ten grave precepts. I didn't feel like I was accomplishing much at the time, but in retrospect, my practice grew tremendously.

I also felt that in the summer, largely a result of my daily meditations, I was able to reach new levels of concentration. It was good because it spurred my interest more in the meditation or "practice" side of Buddhism, not just the daily life stuff. My meditations at two of the day-longs I attended were the quietest and most concentrated I have ever been.

I feel I am applying my practice more to daily life now; I'm seeing the fruits of my efforts. I am more equanimous in general - not getting as ruffled as quickly. Sure, I still have a long journey ahead of me, but the past year has been a year of flourishing practice for me.

In 2010 I hope to attend a residential retreat and to engage in another 90 days of a focus on practice. I also plan on doing two more low-impact months and attending as many day-long retreats as possible.

So here's to a great year of practice and hopefully a full 2010.

This weekend . . .

. . . was a blast. I got to attend one of the two single-day retreats by Donald Rothberg. He is one of my favorite teachers because he incorporates interactive activities to the day. While I felt that the second day's topic - Keeping Cool In The Fire: Becoming More Skillful With Inner Or Outer Conflict - was more personally relevant, I was only able to attend the Saturday retreat on Emptiness and Compassion. As it turns out, it was a happy accident, as I found the day enlightening and relevant.

I had previously decided the Buddhist concept of emptiness was beyond me, that okay - if I ever have the opportunity to go deep into practice, that I might get the chance to understand this topic somewhat vaguely.

But alas, Donald made the topic very clear. And this abstract concept is paradoxically kind of simple. He defines emptiness as no self without interdependence, meaning that we as individuals and our experiences do not exist without the myriad of other elements that play into/build upon the "self" and its experiences.

I try to come up with examples, but they fall flat, so let's just leave it at that. I feel very grateful to have had the opportunity to spend the day with such loving, compassionate people and to learn so much in so short a time. Plus, I meditated today for forty minutes, which I never do at home. It was a breeze. The day-longs definitely further my practice.

Meanwhile, DH and I attended a party sans kids, which we haven't done in YEARS. It was a blast hanging out with friends where none of us had to change a diaper, settle a dispute, leave at 7 p.m. for bedtime, or wipe a nose.

Today was productive. The kids spent the night at my MIL's house, which meant I was able to work on Rosalind's costume, clean my car, do laundry, go to lunch DH and meditate all without interruption.

I feel very lucky to have the life I have.

Happiness, Meditation and the Brain

Disclaimer: In this blog post I cover some very complicated issues presented at a retreat. I hope that I come close to the target as I try to explain them. I am not a neural scientist and do not fully understand the concepts I relay, but I have done my best is formulating my understanding of them.

When I went shopping for a faith a couple years back, the NPR Science Friday episode that covered the Dalai Lama and scientists studying happiness caught my attention. The show documented a connection between Buddhist practice and happiness. I couldn't have been more intrigued, so I started looking into Buddhism and eventually decided to dive in and start my practice.

Part of my practice is attending our sangha's day-long retreats. The recent Rick Hanson retreat covered meditation and the brain. Part of that talk included a discussion on happiness.

Hanson talked about synaptic patterns and how they form. He explained that "those that fire together wire together," meaning that when a person has repeated thought patterns, synapses fire; those firings form a connection, thereby forming a neural pattern. For example, a person who is ruminating about an argument she had with her partner is solidifying that negative pattern through her rumination. Then she sees her partner, and those negative synapses are triggered, and a negative attitude toward her partner is stimulated.

One of the more intriguing elements of this is that negative thought processes "wire together" much more quickly than do positive thought processes. Hanson pointed out to us that this serves a biological, evolutionary purpose. A primate living in the wild must pay more attention to those things that could kill her than those things that bring her pleasure. It's a matter of survival.

Hanson's point in discussing this is that we need to consciously focus more on the positive thoughts to encourage our brains to think positively. Because negative patterns formulate more quickly and more easily than do positive, we must work harder at developing the positive. Meditation, specifically metta meditation, does this. When a meditator sits and focuses on loving, kind feelings associated with others, even toward a person with whom she has difficulties, she is solidifying that positive synaptic association. The result is a happier and kinder person.

As part of our practice that day, Hanson lead us through a guided meditation using the following steps:

1. Setting intention
2. Relaxing the body
3. Focusing on feelings of safety
4. Evoking positive emotions
5. Absorbing the benefits

Step four had a profound effect on me - during this step I felt euphoric. The process is to focus on all the things in your life that make you happy. Doing so after having done steps one through three - for me - resulted in intense happiness and a very quiet mind. While going through my list of things that make me happy (my children, my marriage, my job, my sangha, my dogs, my friends, etc.), I started listing things that I would normally consider a negative. I was moved by this connection - that I could learn to deeply love the problems and the people that bring me strife.

One of the things I so dearly love is science, particularly medical science. I love to read about new discoveries in science. At this retreat Hanson illustrated just how far the field of neural science has come when he said that in the last twenty years we have doubled our understanding of the brain and that scientists expect that to double again in the next twenty years.

The biggest discovery has been our understanding of the relationship between the brain and the mind: no longer do scientists believe that the brain only affects the mind, but they now also believe that the mind affects the brain, as illustrated in the "those that fire together wire together" concept I mentioned above.

That is huge. Everyone should know this.

Yes, hormonal imbalances can affect mood, but we also now know that thought patterns can affect biological functions that happen in the brain, thereby either encouraging or discouraging happiness.

This is good news: We have some control over happiness.

Happy New Year

It's January 1, the first day of 2009. Here's a little bubbly for you all to enjoy.

I know I should be reflective and thinking about goals and whatnot for the upcoming year, but I'm not. I usually totally dig that kind of thing. Just not feeling it this year for some reason.

For the following year, I know I want to continue my practice, to meditate more and work on being more mindful on a daily basis.

I joined a 365 Flikr group, so I'm hoping to do a pic a day for the year. I found that when I've done this in the past for a month, I have improved my photography skills and gotten some killer photos. Let's face it, some of the best photos don't come from holidays and birthdays.

And of course, I want to lose weight and get healthier. Yada, yada, yada.

Happy New Year to you and yours. :)

Update

Wow! I haven't hardly posted at all in months. Things have been busy, but normal around here. Kids have been sick. Almost took daughter to the ER this weekend just before her asthma took a sudden turn for the better. We narrowly escaped a very large medical bill. Meanwhile, DS and I both got sick, too. I have been coughing a lot.

Went to Teach 4 Success training, which was actually pretty good. I got some good engagement strategies and did some strategizing with our principal and fellow department heads. It energized me, even though I coughed through the whole day.

I'm back to meditating six out of seven days a week.

LOVING that Obama is leading in the polls, but I'm not going to relax until he's president. Tomorrow I work the phones.

DH has a play going right now that he directed for the school. His Complete Works of Shakespeare finally closed.

Went to the doctor today and almost fainted when I got on the scale. YIKES! I need to work out and eat less. I'm definitely into the "overweight" category.

John Travis retreat

I went to a day-long retreat yesterday that was taught by John Travis from Mountain Stream. I loved the retreat and really enjoyed John's teachings. His approach to meditation teaching is a lot less prescriptive. Instead of telling us to use this technique or that technique, he simply said to try to stay present and relax. (He expanded on this, of course.) As a result, even though we meditated for a large part of the day, I never once felt that good-God!-when-will-the-bell-chime? panic I sometimes feel when a meditation has gone beyond what I am accustomed to.

The topic for the day was The Liberation Teachings. The day was mostly meditation, not as much verbal instruction. He'd give us some small tidbits and then have us meditate. Then at the end of the day, he talked for about an hour. By the end of the day, I felt a lot more at peace, a lot happier, and definitely ready to meditate some more.

If you get a chance to attend a John Travis retreat, I highly recommend it. He is a gentle spirit.

Why I Meditate

The other day, I was telling someone about the day-long retreat I had been to for meditation. This person said to me, "I have a good form of meditation that's easier than yours."

"Oh? What is it," I asked, biting into his baited statement.

"It's real easy. I get up in the morning, walk into the bathroom and take a Prozac. That's it. All done."

I was confused.

Then it occurred to me that this person thinks I meditate as a form of psychotherapy, or in his case psychotropic therapy. However, that's not why I meditate.

About a year and a half ago, I started exploring different faiths, reading a little about Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Christianity, Judaism, and Unitarianism. It didn't take long for me to fall in love with the teachings of Buddhism. So I started reading more.

I discovered that meditation is pretty much an essential element of Buddhism. I hesitated to learn to meditate, not really understanding what meditation is or why people do it and how it realted to the Dharma. But I gave it a try. I'm not a great meditator now, but a year ago, I could only meditate for five minutes. I now meditate for anywhere between 20 and 40 minutes.

After I started meditating regularly, I discovered that meditation does, in fact, have some psychotherapeutic benefits in that it makes me calmer and happier. But really, that's a pleasant side effect, not the real reason I meditate. I learned that meditating is a form of training the mind so that I can be more mindful during life. It's analogous to an athlete who lifts weights to increase his performance on the track, the cheer leading squad or the football field. The muscle is developed and therefore allows for better performance. I train my mind so that throughout the day I can be more in control of my mind and therefore my actions. I perform better.

Sure, meditation might equate to Prozac for me, but I never intended it to.

A friend of mine meditates, too, but her meditative practice is quite different than mind. Not lesser or better, just different. She developed her practice called Hemi-sync with this place called The Monroe Institute. According to The Monroe Institute's web page, "Hemi-Sync® is a patented audio guidance technology that works quite simply by sending different sounds (tones) to each ear through stereo headphones. The two hemispheres of the brain then act in unison to 'hear' a third signal – the difference between the two tones." The two tones, as I understand it, put the brain into the same wavelengths that scientist say people in deep meditation experience.

The experiences that follow, from what I understand, are dreamlike or mystical, often resulting in out of body experiences (OBE).

This would explain why my husband asks me every Monday night when I return from my meditation group, "How was levitation?" When I meditate, I don't have mystical experiences, and I'm not seeking that. I don't want to levitate, speak to God, or have an OBE.

I just want to be a better person.

Meditation

At last week's retreat, the instructor, Donald Rothberg, gave instructions to the newbies on walking meditation. He suggested that we should split our meditations up 50/50 - half sitting and half walking. I really like the walking meditation - somehow I am able to focus better on my foot than my breath. And since I mostly meditate in the evening (when I'm tired), it's helpful because it keeps me from falling asleep. Now the trick for me is to not fall back too much on walking meditation and to still doing sitting meditations.

I think I'm ready for some meditation supplies. I've been meditating for almost a year now and have resisted buying anything for it. But now I feel it's time to try a zafu, the meditation cushion, (or maybe a bench) and maybe even a Buddha statue. Somehow it didn't seem right to run out and buy things for this practice. Now it seems appropriate.