Alana's Dharma Blog

In the wake of my cake baking contemplation and seeing the extreme limits on my control/tendency to use rupa arrangements to define who I am, I had gone to get my nails done. About a week later, looking down at them, I caught myself feeling surprised that the polish had started chipping so soon. At lightning speed, I caught myself thinking, “I have been being so careful with them.” Then it hit me– it’s not about me. My actions are a single, small factor, in nail polish staying. It is chipping because that is what happens to polish left alone for a while.

My mind went immediately to Dharma Meltdown 2.0,  when I panicked that I got my light colored  pants dirty, that I could never keep white clean, that it was a sign I was a bad Buddhist. For the first time I clearly saw it — dirt on white is not an indictment of me, it isn’t about me, my ego is lying. White gets dirty, that is a natural, expected state of white cloth over a long enough life cycle. At most, I am a factor in temporarily keeping white clean. I am reading meaning into Rupa that simply isn’t there.  There is no innate meaning that lives inside of 4es that is just waiting to be penetrated by me, Alana the Great Rupa Whisperer.

I started collecting evidence to prove that I am the one who reads meaning into rupa. Because if the meaning of an arrangement doesn’t live in the arrangement itself, can the arrangement create meaning (i.e. identity) in the arranger?

1) The meaning I assign to things keeps changing thanks to new information or new beliefs. So my ex-boyfriend’s emails used to mean I was special, loved, that someone so smart must see that same intelligence in me. Now when he emails I feel little, he is my ex after all. My NY home was supposed to prove I had a nest from which to build my NY fabulousness, but then I decided I didn’t want to be NY anything and that same home became a burden I struggled to sell. My car used to make me feel so on top and clever and then, when I went to sell it, at a huge loss it made me feel foolish and duped (here is the car story).

2) I don’t even consistently apply meaning to like objects. I was thinking about a fancy car I rented for some vacay. I remember someone complemented me on it as we pulled out of the gas station. Out loud, I said “thanks,” but in my head I was thinking I don’t own this car, it is a rental, it’s nothing for me to be proud of…and yet, when someone complemented my Porsche, my heart swelled with pride. But wasn’t the Porsche on loan too? Something I used for a time and then parted ways with. Simply the act of believing something is mine changed my meaning of it. The reality however is the only difference between that rental can and ‘my Porsche’ was the duration of use. That, and my imagination.

3) Even if there is some characteristic ‘proven’ in an arrangement of Rupa I help create, it doesn’t adhere to me, it is literally over once the arrangement ends. That mandolin player played a concert virtousically, he created a sound that the people in the room found beautiful. But then as soon as it was done, it was done. He likely took it home – that ego puff – took it to mean something about him later, but how could some past arrangement say something about present him? It literally exists nowhere but memory, so how could meaning in the rupa carry forward?

4) There are times that ostensible meaning of rupa remains, even when the person it is supposed to point to, to define, is already gone. I had recently gone to a museum that has an extensive collection of Sol LeWit wall paintings and something struck me hard – a number of the paintings were dated after he had died. I wandered around till I found a plaque that explained, LeWit left intricate instructions for his paintings, but by design they were meant to be able to be replicated on walls by other artists on his team. He insisted the date written on paintings was not the day they were created by him, but rather the day they went up on the wall. The result is that  the date of his creation, the object that proves his skill and artistry, was posthumous. It is not like the painting happened and then he died, rather he died and then the painting happened, so how could the painting create an identity in him? The only answer possible is that it can’t, it never does.

When I started thinking about my husband, Eric, I started to see the mechanics inside the clock – the way that my own aggregates clobber onto form, assign it meaning, and then reflect that meaning back onto myself.

I take Eric’s sammuti (supposed form) and give it a meaning: special, discerning, generous, good, handsome, mine and then I use the object and the meaning I create to build and define me. Wife, beloved of someone so great, worthy of treatment so kind. This is the way my mind uses rupa; gives it meaning and then reflects the meaning back to reference me, to build me.

The other night I was watching a show and the Golden Gate Bridge flashed on the screen — immediately I thought “mine” and ‘home” and I wanted to be there. As I reflected on my feeling, I realized this moment sort of summed-up a place I have been stuck: I know a bridge is just rupa, there is nothing in it except for 4es, and yet it seems to say more. It seems to have meaning, where meaning is an abstract ideal like loved, or just, or home and/or to offer  some guaranteed future outcome — like crossing the Golden Gate, in my fancy car, with the top down, holding Eric’s hand, laughing at some joke, as we embark on happily ever after adventure.

Stay tuned…in the next blog we will look at how I started to un-stick this very stuck point.

After all of my contemplations I was beginning to see that there was nothing innately special in my objects or my body. Just varying, shifting arrangements of 4 elements. I knew I was not my arrangements, and yet, I couldn’t shake the belief that those arrangements, and my ability to bring them about, must prove something about ME. Alana the great arranger!  I knew I had a huge wrong view remaining – that because I am a partial cause for an outcome, that outcome must prove my identity. What follows is a synopsis of some of the discrete contemplations I used to attack this view.

Beaver dam:

I was out hiking and came across a beaver damn. The dams are quite common out here in Connecticut and after seeing the zillionth one, I was hardly impressed. But…shouldn’t I be? I mean here was Beaver the Great Arranger of Dams: the little animal worked hard to cause its dam, this one indeed did look a little bigger and more symmetrical than the rest I had run into. But, in my mind a dam is just what beavers do, there is nothing special – no identity that I assign a beaver – because of its dam.

So, why do I look at things I build/cause, the particular arrangements of my wardrobe, my home, my body, and feel they make me special? Isn’t all this shit just stuff humans do? That’s when it hit me – I am the one assigning value – identity bestowing meaning — to some results/arrangements while ignoring others. A beaver dam is just what beavers do, but my elaborate wardrobe makes me a fashionista. My greatness only exists (in my own mind) because I am self-selecting the qualities with which to build my identity.

What’s more is I have a tendency to get caught-up in details, to use small differences to further sell myself the identity lie. So humans have all figured out how to use bags/baskets/trays to carry stuff, but my LV bag versus your Gap bag is what makes me so special. But the thing is, some beavers have access to better wood, better location, they have more strength or less human encroachment and can build a better dam. So? That is normal. As is the fact that that very same beaver can lose their dam, a forest fire or a building project can make wood scarce, etc. That some humans, some times, can have LV bags and others can’t, that is normal too. Normal and subject to change. So how am I using it to prove something special, something meaningful, something ME, about me?

My friend the baker:

A friend of mine went to culinary school and I always think of him as ‘the baker’. Even when he hasn’t cooked for me in a while, even after he got a job doing something totally unrelated, he remained “a baker” in my mind. But how does an action, done at distinct points in time bestow an identity?

I suppose I could justify a fixed ‘baker identity’ if a  cake he made, even once, stayed steady-state forever… but, without fail, each and every baked item gets consumed, or goes stale, or ends up in the compost bin. I started thinking hard about why that is, why no cake ever just keeps its perfect, post oven, glory and I realized it is in the nature of the 4 elements itself.

Left uninterrupted things that are hot, like cakes out of the oven, tend to cool. Wet/moist things tend to dry. Solid things tend to disintegrate. Movement comes to a halt. In time, all arrangements tend to go back to the states indigenous to their elements. So how can the identity of the arranger stay the same when the arrangements themselves keep shifting, decaying, following the rules of rupa rather than the rules of the arranger. What baker wouldn’t bake the ever-perfect cake if they could?

A trip to the eye doctor:

I was on my way to the eye doctor the other day and got to thinking about the suffering in my day so far. I realized that since I had awoken, I had been at low level stress trying to get to the appt on time. I felt rushed, worried. I realized the suffering wasn’t just my desire to make the appointment, it was arising because of my belief that being on time to the appointment proves what kind of person I am: If I am on time, it proves I am a considerate person, someone good, someone who cares about the life and time of others. I want desperately to be that kind of a person and I can’t face an identity as an inconsiderate bad person, as a late patient, that would disprove who I believe I AM.

The problem is, I use Rupa world shit, stuff I seriously don’t ultimately control, to prove this great considerate identity. I am bound to ultimately fail sooner or later. Trains are late all the time, alarms don’t go off, emergencies happen. In truth I am regularly late, even when I take preparations and precautions, to be on time. When I am late I suffer a terrible pain, a hit to my identity.

But even when I manage to be on time I suffer too. I suffer stress, like I did getting to the appointment. I suffer the preparation time and worry. But when I am on time, I excuse it, gloss over the stress because I think it is worth it, I get to be the me I want to be!

But this is like winning small battles, at high cost, in a war I can never ever win.

Why can’t I win? Because I am trying to derive identity based-off of things that I can only arrange when all the stars align, partially to my liking but always with consequences I don’t like, some of the time, temporarily.

Another day, another cake:

All of this brought me back to the original problem:  Even though I know I am not my arrangements, I couldn’t shake the belief that those arrangements, and my ability to bring them about, proves  something about me. I.e. since I can cause a cake to be baked that cake defines Alana the Baker (baker pronounced ‘Alana the organizer and controller of all Rupa in the universe’).

But after considering beaver dams, my friend the real-life baker and a trip to the eye doc, I realized I can arrange a cake, if:

1. The circumstances and Rupa allow it. I.e. Eric didn’t use the last egg, the weevils didn’t eat the flour, the landlord fixed the oven, etc. In reality this isn’t some fine print asterisk of “conditions may apply”. In everyday life there are countless ways and circumstances that don’t allow for cake baking.

2. Some of the time, ie even if the circumstances allow me to bake a cake it still may go flat or turn out crappy

3. Partially, there are always 2 sides so even if I get a cake that I want, I get a huge stack of dishes I hate

4. Temporarily ie I can bake once, but not necessarily a second time

5. Plus once that cake comes about it is not subject to my rules but the rules of Rupa, so rot, decay, consumed, etc.

When I put it that way…it doesn’t exactly have the same ‘Alana, high and mighty, ruler of the universe ring to it.’ So much for Alana the Great Arranger.

This blog is a direct continuation on the previous blog, “Interruption Part 11: A Major Breakthrough Part 1”. If you have not read that blog yet please go ahead and read it first before you continue on with this one.

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4. Does rupa do what I think/ want/imagine in an absolute sense or in relation to myself? 

• Is a quality fixed/innate in myself — Again I started thinking about beauty. I realized that if my 20 year old self saw my 40 year old self in the mirror she would freak the hell out. The only reason my 40 year old self sometimes (good haircut, lost weight, botoxed) can look in the mirror and give myself the pretty thumbs-up is that my nama has change the standard. Rupa may nourish nama, but it is also a limit setter/backstop. When it tells an irrefutable tale, like that I am 40 not 20, then Nama is forced to adjust its standards to cope with the reality of the situation.

The problem is that my nama is a lot like a teacher who grades on a curve. If each year her class gets dumber and dumber, being in the most recent class and get an A doesn’t really prove I am some sort of genius. It doesn’t prove the quality of smart lives in me. Just so, my curve grading nama doesn’t mean that beauty lives in me.

Each object is just an arrangement of 4es. Over the course of its life its arrangement of the 4es change over time/situation. Every object will have a peak/pinnacle look, like all fruit will have a peak ripeness. It doesn’t require any nama observer for this to be the case. This body had a peak arrangement that I would call max beauty. But it was momentary, every other arrangement before and after was sub-peak. And in fact, even at peak, it was just peak for my body arrangement: Across all time and all like objects there will be arrangements that are prettier/thinner/richer. So what this means is that even my ripeness/pretty is retaliative. Its not absolute. I am constantly working so hard, suffering so much, choosing this world over and over for a quality in rupa that is not even absolute and is definitely not permanent no matter what my curve-grading-nama-liar is trying to say.

• Whose fault is it when I need to endure a 4e arrangement I hate (spoiler alert –it is mine)? I  was thinking about a few times when I knew stuff wasn’t really really mine, I was using it temporarily, but I got ticked as hell they were taken from me, to the point of hate/vengefulness and I started trying to figure out why. The examples were:  1) I was in Zumba one day and this chick just came, stood in front of me and took my dance spot.  2) A plane trip where I paid extra for premium seats in front of the bulkhead, but because of where the bathrooms were arrange people kept using it as an aisle and stepping on me; 3) My neighbors hogging the washer.

I realized when I was thinking about taking a body and entering the ‘rupa level’ that the reason I was so angry in these cases is they made me feel like a fool for not reading the fine print. I signed the contract, I get a rupa body yay! I can arrange rupa objects according to my liking as long as it is within the acceptable arrangements of the 4es in a particular circumstance at a particular time. Fine print, there are times the rupa can’t be arranged to your liking, rupa has its own rules, you have to deal with it. You get ears to hear pretty music, but you are also going to get honking Lady. No one wants to feel a fool, no one wants to feel a chump, so I got angry , I felt belittled. In reality I took home the wrong message: the right message is “you need to stop looking to rupa to prove your ability to be master of this world. You are not. You get the power to play within this world, you don’t have super worldly abilities. I am afraid that if the washing machine is being used, you can’t wash your clothes…

• Alana the special snowflake — In winter, I love standing out and catching snowflakes when it snows. Each one has its very own unique crystal structure. They are all special snowflakes. But, each and every snowflake is a 4e object subject to the rules of rupa. They are formed at a certain temp and melt at a certain temp, living a life cycle of vapor to solid to water and back to vapor again. Sure each one is unique, but not in the critical ways that govern their nature, life and death. I realize that I use my crap to try and make me a special little Alana. The body, the clothes, that car — all accessories of my uniqueness. But, really, I am just like those snowflakes..in all the ways that matter most, in the rules that govern my 4es, I am just like every other person, every other 4e object. I have to stop thinking I am some kind of special snowflake, they don’t exist.

5. My belongings don’t have the power to always create or sustain an arrangement of rupa I want, so I suffer.  My shit is like props in a play: 

• The 4es of the actual object (prop) are always changing: My body will go through states of health and states of illness. My bath will go through states of warm and states of cooling. Since I don’t like all the arrangements (not fan of sick Alana or cold bath) I suffer.

• The scene is always changing: I liked the porsche when I was driving the back roads of Napa, but wasn’t a huge fan when I had to stop for gas in Soma. I liked my fav ring on my 30 year old hand, on my 40 year old hand it draws attention to my wrinkles. I liked my wedding ring and then I developed an allergy to the metal and stopped liking it because it caused burning rash/pain. Same objects, but in a new scene, don’t create the arrangement of rupa I want. Since  the scene is always changing, the ability to create the exact arrangement of rupa I want can’t be in the objects .

Further example: In SF life money seemed to make me happy, to continually create an arrangement of rupa I found favorable. So, I dumbly believed that money would do the same thing in NY and, even though I clearly saw when visiting I didn’t like the sounds/smells/ density/etc I believed once I threw money at the problem I would be able to arrange the form to my liking. Duh, it didn’t work and actually money made it worse: we moved for more money, so acquiring this item I thought would guarantee me a favorable arrangement of rupa got me a more unfavorable one. The reason, at most money is a factor in getting an arrangement I want but if it is a factor in getting an arrangement I want than it must also be able to be a factor in getting an arrangement I don’t want as well (I’m going to look more at this point tomorrow).

• The audience changes: I loved that NY house when I first saw it. I bought it. But then my feelings as an audience member, my feelings about NY changed. So then I didn’t like the house any more. Same object, same scene, but my feelings changed. Then, I had to suffer having the object and having to get rid of it.

• I always seem to need new props: Based on how good the last production was, I need new props to make the new play as good as or better than the last. If I had a Porsche, I can’t have a BMW or I am a loser producer.  If I had Goyard, I can’t have gap or I am a loser producer. If I am judged (by myself and others) by the quality of my play, by the successive arrangements of rupa that create a story line of my life, then the next scene, the next play has to be better than the last. But the nature of the world is that things can go up or down (ahh the bubble dilemma). Its impossible to always have better props. It is impossible to keep the props I have pristine. So, I suffer.

Anyway, there is more, but this is the basics. I have had to hack at a few hydra heads along the way, wrong views that were really delaying progress. But otherwise, I am trying to stay on the program — self and self belonging and its many facets. I realize now how much missing the 4e piece was hurting my practice. Even worse though was not understanding the difference between cause and factor; this whole dharma thing is just the truth of cause and effect in this world. To be unclear on this topic, to constantly think I am a cause where I am merely a factor (of various strengths and durations) is like wrong view quicksand — so fucking hard to escape this world when stuck in it…After all, if I am a cause, I can just try harder, work more, do better to get the effect I want since a cause always brings about an effect. But, by definition, a factor is something that ‘works’ some of the time, under some circumstances. All it takes is to see that circumstances are constantly changing, bubbles always shifting and popping, to start easing my gripping heart….