Alana's Dharma Blog

It was one of my early retreats, 2012 perhaps, and Mae Yo started playing a game some of you ‘old timers’ might know: How are those birds related? The set-up is simple; imagine you look up and see 2 birds flying in the sky. Explain how they are related.

I heard this and I thought, “this is sorta idiotic”. I mean who cares how the birds are related? Sure, sure I know the punch-line before we even start the game (because if you hangout with KPYers for a bit you’ll catch-on that it’s always about impermanence and/or suffering); the relationship between the birds is impermanent, which in this case means it is not just what we initially think, but some huge number of possibilities. But this isn’t a real-life situation. No one would play a game this simple. What’s the point? Isn’t there some ‘real Dharma’ we can be learning? Still, like a good student, I played:

Folks start calling-out how  the birds might be related and a list goes up on the board:

• The birds can be lovers/spouses
• The birds can be a parent and child
• The birds can be friends
• The birds can be enemies
• The birds can be travel companions
• One bird could be teaching the other bird
• One bird could be hunting the other bird
• The birds could be leader/follower
• The birds could be siblings
• The birds could be be strangers going in the same direction
• The birds may have no relationship at all, we just see them for a single moment flying in one space

The list went on…The conclusion was just what I thought it was at the start of the game. Our assumptions about this world are based on one view, one belief, one perspective –ours. Reality is there are many possibilities, many perspectives. I get it already…moving on to the next big idea…

But once I went home from that retreat, I noticed that I had started playing games like this in my head  when I had a few minutes to myself. I would look out at situations in the world, the way two people interacted, the meaning of words in a language I couldn’t understand, the possible outcomes for a game or an interaction and I would start listing –what could it be? I watched, I gathered evidence, I noted when I guessed correctly and when incorrectly (when that information was available). I played. I let my mind imagine and I checked myself.

One day I get a letter in the mail slot of my house, flip-it over and see it was addressed to someone else. In that instant I  realized something had changed in my heart  because I noticed I wasn’t surprised* to be getting a letter for a stranger. Sure, sometimes I get letters for other folks, its a normal everyday event, but it always surprised me a little bit. After all, I expected that the letters in my mailbox were for me, when they weren’t it was surprising — an exception to the rule. The rule is permanent, the exception is a corner case, not something I need to worry about, not proof that my basic assumption about letters in boxes is wrong…But all that practice, all that play, it had helped me start seeing possibilities. I had begun, in small everyday ways, to train my mind to see the impermanence that is always there, to not just write-off the corner cases, to not ignore the evidence. This was the first time I really recognized that my Dharma practice wasn’t just solving my big problems, it was reshaping my habits of thinking, my expectations about how everyday stuff happens in the world.

This story may seem small, may seem trivial. After all,  where is the suffering of thinking 2 birds always relate in one way? What’s the suffering of thinking letters in my mailbox are for me?  But imagine a similar situation — I see my husband at a cafe with another woman  (2 birds) and I believe it can only mean one thing (lovers), what’s the suffering in that? If I believe that an invitation to a friends’ outing should be coming to me only to find it addressed to someone else, where is the suffering in that? If I believe every mole is cancer? Every dentist appointment will hurt? Every fat person will die young, where is the suffering there?

The thing about impermanence is we all already know it’s real; we know the conclusion before we even start the game. I sure thought I did — Yah, yah, old  punchline, yipee, moving on… But, knowing abstractly and really believing in my heart are two different things. Believing only comes from my gathering the evidence, training to look for it, making note of when I am right and wrong. If I really already knew impermanence ruled this world, it would be game over, I would have no fear, no surprise, no disappointment, I would be enlightened already.

I offer you, Dear Reader, this story so you know my practice isn’t all heavy doomy and gloomy all the time. Sometime I just play, I let my natural curiosity guide me, I re-explore the world I think I know so well, I note when things are not the way I thought. I use the technique I will call “Gathering Evidence” — making mental (and sometimes written) note of  the many possibilities that exist in the world, the huge number of possible futures, possible meanings, possible perspectives —  so I can learn to believe in impermanence, not just ‘yah yah’ it and move on. And when I have a real problem, when life gets heavy, I can  turn back to the technique of gathering evidence, which I have been practicing all along, to show myself how so many times this world isn’t really how I imagine it to be/ will be at all. 

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*  A note about being surprised: Just like anger or fear or annoyance, surprise is one of those warning lights we have a wrong view of permanence. We are surprised because we believe we already know what will happen, what is normal, what the rule is. When something else happens, something other than our expectation we are surprised. If we deeply understood anything can happen, that the world operates by its own laws (karma and impermanence) not by our expectations, we would not have any surprise in our hearts. 

Another Prelude to Introduce A Super Duper Important Buddhist Concept — Two-Sidedness:

This next 2 section will have lots of entries on two sidedness so this seems as good a time as any to offer an introduction to one of the most fundamental ideas in Buddhism — Everything, everything, EVERYTHING, has 2 sides. 2 sidedness is a feature of impermanence. What exactly does that mean? Actually, it means lost of things. A few simple ones:

• The things that we enjoy come with suffering and the things we hate also have good parts. Example: I love buying fresh flowers, until a few days later when I feel sad to throw them away…

• Everything that benefits us also has a cost. Example: I buy that dress, it looks great on, but I’m afraid I’ll stain it every time I put it on. The dress costs me money and worry.

• Opposites come together,  they define each other.  If everyone were the same height would there be short and tall?

There are even more ways to think about 2-sidedness and there will be future blogs on the topic. Here though I want to talk about using 2-sidedness to combat a super sneaky and troublesome wrong view — seeing things only from one side, our own. So today’s aspect of  2-sidedness:  

• Any time I have a conflict (i.e. suffering), either in my heart or out in the real world,  there are 2 sides to the story. I however am only seeing the one I am used to, that I already believe, that benefits me, that belongs to me –I have a permanent view that  my side is right, in fact, I often can’t even see an alternative (I call that super permanent).  That whole other side out there is a blind spot.

I like to think of blind spots as bright, flashing danger lights on my dashboard. And how do I fix danger lights? With a tool of course!! Enter:

The Matrix

The Story: I had a coworker, we’ll call her Barb, who I was just beginning to become friends with; we had started having lunch together, riding the bus together and hanging-out after work sometimes. I really liked Barb, I wanted to be her friend and I though she felt the same way too, until…

It was after a huge work event, Barb and I had spent months planning the thing and it was a success. A few of the folks from the office were helping to clean-up and Barb, who had been talking to another co-worked, Rina, while cleaning, asked Rina if she wanted to go hang-out after the cleanup was done. I was standing right there but no one invited me. I was crushed. My heart hurt so bad as Rina and Barb walked away.

I went home sulking thinking Barb wasn’t really my friend, I had misread all the signs…after all, if it had been me who had invited-out Rina, I would have invited Barb to come along.  Real friends just don’t leave their friends out like that (this is my side, the belief I already have, what I am used to). Then as I lay awake in bed, too upset to sleep, I thought, “wait”, “is it really true that Barb not inviting me means she isn’t my friend?  Is it true that real friends invite each other to every single gathering? Is it possible there are factors besides our friendship at play here?”

The Matrix: So the matrix is really just a series of 4 squares that cover all the logical conclusions of a problem statement: If X then Y, If X then not Y, If not X then Y, If not X then not Y. Then, it uses examples, evidence from real life to show us that really, any one of the possibilities can be true. Us clinging to the squares we believe, just because we haven’t stacked sufficient evidence in the other squares isn’t reasonable — it is a wrong view. Let’s work it for the Barb Story:

Problem Statement: On some level, I think Barb not inviting me out means she isn’t a real friend…  So let’s use the statement — Real friends always invite their friends out.

Real Friends Invite Their Friends Out: I already believed this one was the truth.I based this off my experiences, my gut reaction that it’s what I always do. When around multiple friends, I include everyone in my plans. I wouldn’t just leave people out. No more evidence needs to be stacked here since it’s my starting belief.

Real Friends Don’t Invite Friends Out —  When I think a friend is sick,  tired, broke, has other plans, etc. I don’t always invite them out; I don’t want to put them on the spot. In this case, I had to admit, Barb knew how late I had stayed-up the night before the event. —  I don’t always invite Eric, my husband and best friend out when I want to have girl-time, or talk privately.  Again, thinking a little more… Barb had mentioned she wanted to talk to Rina about a project that didn’t involve me. — Sometimes as much as I love my friend Sandy, I need a break. Barb and I had been together non stop planning the event Already, it was clear I don’t even follow my own rule of “always inviting out friends”

‘Fake’ Friends Invite Their Friends Out — I had a ‘friend’ back in college who invited me out only when they needed me to drive or pay the bill. —  I have invited ‘friends’ out just so I didn’t need to go out alone when I wanted to go dancing. –I have had ‘friends’ that would invite me out just to make fun of me, or make themselves look good next to me since I was less attractive, popular, stylish. Clearly, it doesn’t require someone to be my friend in order for them to invite me out.

‘Fake’ Friends Don’t  Invite Friends Out Again, I believed this one and didn’t need evidence, it’s just the opposite of what I already believed: friendship = invite so no friendship also = no invite.

 

When I really thought it through, I was upset for nothing. I was upset because I believed one possibility, one side, was true and didn’t leave room for the other side in my heart. I didn’t even see it. But evidence from my own life tells me that there are many possible situations in which Barb may not invite me out and it does not necessarily mean she doesn’t think of me as a friend.

If I had just stayed upset I would have been sad myself and may well have put my relationship with Barb, as well as my other co-worker, in danger. Barb and I actually became  very close friends over the years.  Since this incident there have been many times she has invited me out and many when she has not. She has mostly behaved like a good friend and sometimes like a bad one too. We have both grown and learned a great deal from each other though and I am so so happy I did not let this early-on incident stand in the way of our friendship.

As for the Matrix, it’s a simple tool that can help focus my mind on the ‘other side’. I will admit, that for complex problems, it may not be my starting place as it can be a bit too simple. But it does, ultimately represent the TRUTH —  the matrix is the logical conclusion of a correct view (check-out Killing the Crazy to see how I got to a “matrix model”  on the relationship between what I fear and what actually happens using the evidence). So why not try drawing one out every once in awhile…