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And Now an Interruption in Our Regularly Scheduled Programming Part III — Boxes of Rupa

And Now an Interruption in Our Regularly Scheduled Programming Part III — Boxes of Rupa

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In my time of transition I continue to ‘broadcast live’ some of my thoughts on my recent move to NY. Sitting shadowed by a tower of boxes, stuffed with the things I ‘own’, its a bit hard not to have some thoughts on that favorite old topic:

Rupa

 I am surrounded by, swimming in, a sea of my stuff. I can look at each item and remember  how badly I wanted it back when I bought it. My heart believed that that table/rug/lamp would solve my problems, fit perfectly in my space, make my home beautiful. That by extension, these items would make me a sort of person — the sort of person that values beauty, surrounds myself with it, cares enough to have a lovely home filled with lovely things. An adult, a non-slob, someone tasteful but unique.  I wanted these things and I bought them. But the story isn’t over…

Now I have all this stuff, tables/rugs/lamps/clothes, in a new space where it doesn’t fit anymore. Where it is non-beauty, just clutter, part of the endless piles I need to sort through. In a town where even donating items involves work (I either need to get an Uber XL and carry it down, or I have to order a Salvation Army pick-up and wait all day for them to come). I saw all the benefit when I bought these things, but I ignored the  burden. But (and we will cover this topic much more in a later log) the burden was always there, just waiting for its moment to come to the fore, to rear its ugly head.
Most of the time, I think these items serve me —  after all, who buys something thinking,”I wanna pay good money to be this table/rug/lamp/dress/etc.’s bitch?” But here, amidst the stress and fall-out of a cross country move, it is very very clear, I am subject to these items (actually, to my desire for them)–finding ways to salvage some stuff for the new space, finding storage or haul-away for others. The stubbed toes, the aching back, the stress of inadequate closet space. And then there is the dependency; how can I live without all 4 feather pillow that I’m used to, even though my new “bedroom” is barely big enough to fit a bed.
And did these items even do what I believed they would do? Did they fulfill the ‘promise’ I imagined they made to me? Sure, for a bit there was convenience, beauty to my eye. But did it make me that tasteful, non-slob, adult? Did it make me fashionable, and pulled together, and worthy of love, and adoration, and even a bit of envy? How can I say these objects succeed in making me all that awesome stuff, when now they make me look like a hoarder with a cramped space, when the effort to just dispose of them is making me haggard and stressed. I promise my  situation is utterly unenviable.
At the end of the day, my desires changed. When I wanted that table/lamp/rug my desire felt so solid, so fixed, so permanent, so real. But now, I want it gone.  I always believed, I want, I get, I am satisfied, game over. But in truth, this is a game I can never ever win. Lasting fulfillment will always  evade me. How can I win when my wants are so capricious, when the desirable can become undesirable with even the most minor changes? When my once beloved furniture oppresses me.
Stop Being Such a Mooch

Stop Being Such a Mooch

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I had these friends, we’ll call them, Blake and Sandy, who were always mooching off my husband and I. When we went to dinner, the grocery, the farmers market, the movies, these two would just stand on the side while my hubs and I pulled-out our wallets. I figured, for sure, when they hung out with other friends, it couldn’t be like that. So why were we always expected to pick-up the tab?

The situation really tore me-up, I worried we couldn’t afford to pay for 4 all the time, we had to use our money to meet our own wants and needs, to save for retirement, a rainy day. I imagined-up a future scenario where we were just a few dollars shy of being able to pay for my life saving surgery…If only we hadn’t bought those ice creams for Blake and Sandy. On the other hand, I didn’t want to be greedy; my husband and I made more money than Blake and Sandy so shouldn’t we be the ones to pick-up the tab? Then again (so many voices in my head), I couldn’t help feeling taken advantage of, maybe they couldn’t pay for a fancy meal, but would an occasional cup of coffee be too much to ask for?  

But, of course, there are a ton of wrong views and pretty deep concepts here (you may have noticed already that that’s sort of the theme of all these posts ;)) so let’s take a closer look:

1) That friends are all supposed to behave in some fixed, predictable, formulaic way. When it comes time to picking-up the bill, either bills should be split equally or those with more should always pony-up more. The problem was, if things should always be split equally, I was violating my own rules. My husband is the big earner in our house — let’s just say my quaint low-stress non-profit job is not exactly bringing in the big bucks — but still, we share everything equally. 

And if those with more always bear the financial responsibility, there have been times at my  job that I have had more in the bank then my organization — should I be paying them my salary? And is it the case that whatever the rule is it applies to every relationship across time and space or was it ok that Blake and Sandy may be treating us different than their other friends?

2. If I spend on X it doesn’t mean I won’t be able to get the Y I want/need… Alright Dear Reader, here I am going to exercise my ‘later addition author’s prerogative’ and add a bit more details. This is because though I want these stories to reflect my natural progress, I also want this blog to be clear and helpful. So, originally, as far as I got on this topic was that money is not necessarily black and white, I could spend some on X and some on Y. Or I could spend on X and still have enough for Y later. I had a bunch of scratched-out diagrams in my notebook,  not terribly clear.

Fast forward to a meal I was having with a friend the other night. I order first and ask for french fries. My friend, who loves fires, orders after me and she does not order fries. In my head I’m already thinking, “Crap. Why didn’t she just get her own fries, now she is going to eat all of mine.” Food arrives and sure enough my friend and I both start hoovering down the fries. But then, we both get full, and in the end there are a few fries left in the basket.  I immediately  saw my wrong view — because a resource is finite it means I won’t have enough. But the truth is, I really can’t know my future wants/needs (even in the course of one meal). Moreover, I can’t know my future resources. I didn’t know how many fries would actually come in an order, just like I couldn’t have known how much cash I would have in the bank when it came time to pay for all the imaginary wants/needs that I perceived myself to be trading off in order to buy stuff for Blake and Sandy.

3. That money is equivalent to safety and security.  Clearly this is not true, rich folks die, get diseases, get into accidents, have pain and loss everyday. Money does not protect them. In fact, there may be times where money makes one more vulnerable, like being a target of theft. Additionally, friends are sometimes a source of safety and security — so can I know in any instance whether money or friends, neither or both are going to help me (too many variables for a magic 8 ball to help answer)?

4. That there is a single activity or behavior which will indicate someone is taking advantage. These friends, actually did a lot for Eric and I. Even though they didn’t split bills, they took care of our home when we were away, helped us run errands, taught us lots of new skills and fun tricks, they were emotionally supportive and could be a lot of fun to hang-out with.Can any one activity and behavior demonstrate if they really cared for us or were they just using us (are these even either/or things or could it be both/neither)? Can I know what’s in someone else’s heart driving them? If not, why did I zoom in on one thing–mooching–and use that to judge their intention rather than picking another activity like time spent with us as the indicator of what was in their hearts?

At around this time, I had been contemplating Rupa (without much clarity or success to be honest so the explanation here has been colored by some more recent contemplations). Rupa is a fancy word for the tangible form that exists out in the world (including our bodies), versus all the stuff going on in our heads. This form, Rupa, on its own, is neutral, something that is just composed of the elements that make-up the physical world. The problem however is when our wrong-view ridden minds sense it, it really gets our imagination running. This Rupa, which in this story is money (dolla dolla bills yo), acts like a trigger for the problems that arise. It’s sort of a base, a foundation for the whole drama –after all, if there were no money in this story there would be no story at all. 

Ultimately, the way I see Rupa, and the belief I can own it and control it is a major source of daily suffering. Starting to see this, and the mechanics of how the outside physical world interacts with my mind was a starting point for seeing the way this whole kit-and-kaboodle of myself and my beliefs arises. But those details are an entry for much much later… (shameless pitch to get you to keep on reading 😉 ) For now, lets just say..what a bunch of noise, for me, my husband, my friends, all based on the all mighty dollar.  

 

Get your Grimey Hands off my Teacup

Get your Grimey Hands off my Teacup

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The reason I chose this story to share is it uses one of my all-time favorite contemplation methods. The method comes directly from a teaching Luang Por Thoon gave to a man named Singh that quickly led to his enlightenment.  The method is essentially asking a series of questions about objects we ‘own’ in order to better understand the nature of the objects (impermanent) and our relationship with those objects (also impermanent) and, in the process, to  weaken  our attachment to them. Basically, we have a bunch of stuff that we use while we are in this world, but it doesn’t actually belong to us, it is not stuff we ultimately own or control, it’s not like we can take it with us when we die. We work so hard to get ‘our’ things, we work hard to keep them, we mourn when they are gone. Because we are deluded, we believe these things will serve us as we imagine they will,  permanently, and our misunderstanding drives us to continue accumulating, to come back for more lifetime after lifetime and with each life, with each scavenger hunt for things, we suffer the pains of being disappointed by the limitations of these objects, the pain of getting them, the pain of trying to preserve them and the pain of their loss. . . Without further ado, the questions*:  

  1. Where did the item come from
  2. Think about the item leaving you
  3. Think about leaving the item behind
  4. How do you control the item
  5. How does the item control you

The Story:

I get to the 2012 KPY retreat and on my first night I grab a cup from the kitchen. I wash it SUPER well and then I tape a note on the cup, “Alana’s Cup, do not clean, I will reuse teabag”. Sounds very eco of me right? Conserving and all, who can argue with what a great person I am being? The real reason —  I do not want to to share cups with other folks at the retreat, I don’t want their germs, their disease. So clearly, if I just take a cup and make it ‘mine’ with this simple sticky note, I will be safe from all those dirty grimey folks licking-up on my cup and making me sick. My cup is, by definition, cleaner and safer than ya’lls cups (even though I kept forgetting it outside and there is some possibility all manner of bug and vermin were crawling-up in it –wait how is the plague spread again?). Clearly, this is all very sane ;)…

So, let’s start with the idea that the cup is mine (I did label it after all) and get down to our questions:

  1. Where did the cup come from? The cup came from the KPY kitchen. Someone may have donated it, KPY may have bought it, some other person whose cup it was may have brought it on retreat and left it behind. Before that the cup came from some store, before that some factory. Someone labored to make the cup, manufacture it, the clay that made-up the cup was molded, shaped. Before that it came from the ground…  When exactly did the cup become mine? In fact, when exactly did the cup become a cup instead of a lump of clay? Why would I believe that a sticky note (which was written in my super illegible handwriting, in English, at a retreat where most folk’s first language is Thai) made it mine. Made it so others would know not to use ‘my cup’ and my cup would know not to run -off with some other thirsty person…
  • How can the cup leave me? The cup actually did leave me several times on retreat –I kept forgetting it outside. Sure I managed to recover it each time, but was the cup mine when it was lost? What if it broke? Would it still be mine..would each piece be mine? What if someone took the sticky note off of it –that sticky seemed to have the magical power to make the cup mine so did its removal return it to the status of KPY community cup?
  1. How can I leave the cup? Clearly I could leave the retreat center, so was I going to take the cup with me? Was I actually going to steal a KPY cup because I had convinced myself, with that all powerful note and a little effort of a good scrubbing, that the cup was mine? Or, I could be out in the woods, get attacked by a bear (that was attracted by the sweet smell of my delicious tea) and die — I guess I wouldn’t really need the cup then…
  • How do I control the cup? Thats easy, I can wash it, label it, carry it around, drink from it, play mini drums on it, I can do anything I want right? Because it’s just an object and an object that’s mine! Well, maybe I can’t do anything with it, I can’t make it sprout wings and fly after all, but of course I am the person and the cup is a cup, I must be in control. Right? Well, not so fast…
  • How does the cup control me? Once I make that cup ‘mine’ suddenly I have a responsibility, a burden. I have to carry it around (so no one takes it –clearly even I don’t believe my note is enough), I have to wash it, I have to make sure my sticky isn’t chipping off. When I lost the cup I had to retrace my steps, one time I had to walk halfway down the mountain, to retrieve it. I felt slightly self conscious about the cup, about labeling it, so I both wanted folks to see the label but I also wanted to hide it as best I could. I had to worry –should I take the cup back to the tent? I know food in the tent is a no-no because of bears…can they smell tea?

What are the risks of all this craziness? Someone could see the label and be offended by it, I could create disharmony in the community. Perhaps I lose the cup carrying it around, or someone who needs a cup to drink from can’t find one since I have raided the kitchen for ‘mine’.  

More dangerous still though is that I feed the control monster — I reinforce this idea that I am empowered, I can control risk by having my own cup (cup=control). I can avoid all the death and disease out there that is lurking behind every corner just ready to get me.  I create a false sense of safety , built on a false understanding of the nature of ‘my cup’, rather than dealing with the fact that diseases spread and I am subject to them with or without a cup.

Plus, what does ‘after me’ really mean? Is disease after me? Is impermanence a personal affront that with enough effort (and some teacups) I can control? LP Nut helped me immensely with this contemplation…he taught me  the method of  “Killing the Hope”. (Lucky luck, we have a twofer here –two methods, for the price of one story). As  he explained it,  I need to look at the world, look who out there is exempt from death and disease and loss. Gather the evidence and determine whether or not I can control or change these things, exempt myself, or whether they are realities that need to be accepted. I.e. I need to kill the hope that I can escape impermanence so that I can accept.  So here are a few highlights of my evidence:

  1. I, unlike my husband at the time, vigilantly watch what I eat and exercise  –my blood sugar is a little high and his is just fine, all my control is not yielding the results I desire.
  2. I was considering taking a yellow fever vaccine for some travel, my Dr. recommended against it. Why? Because a number of folks have gotten the vaccine and actually gotten yellow fever from it. Guess control wasn’t working for them either.
  3. As hard as I diet and exercise I still feel fat most of the time
  4. I wash my hands obsessively, but I still manage to get sick
  5. I hired financial advisors to help manage and control my money and then I still lost money the last time the markets dipped
  6. I went to Italy for an easy, risk free, vacation and ended up getting food poisoning
  7. I went on birth control to manage pregnancy and menstrual symptoms but it caused me weight gain
  8. Despite all my lotions and potions I am starting to get wrinkles and grey hair
  9. Once I graduated university I had to leave all my friends and my university life behind even though I did not want to
  10. My father died
  11. My cat died
  12. My friend Sue gained weight even though I tried to ‘help her’ avoid it
  13. I lost faith in my Vajrayana practice even though I worked so hard at it, chanted hundreds of thousands of mantras and meditated every day
  14. This actor I really liked, played Spartacus on TV. He was so talented and crazy fit/beautiful. He was diagnosed with a rare cancer just when his acting career began to take off. At first they said it was highly treatable and then, he died from complications
  15. I tried to control my teeth, prevent pain, by getting crowns and then the crowns ended up causing me pain

Gathering all this evidence (there was actually even more, but I won’t bore you)  was what helped the pieces started coming together, when I started seeing the limitations of my control and the fact that sometimes I can’t just fight, I need to accept.  My next few stories will take up this theme further.

I also want to say that, mostly, at the time of this contemplation my focus was on impermanence, on my wrong views regarding control and disease/unwanted outcomes. Contemplating on the cup, realizing my relationship with it and its abilities to fight disease were not fixed, were a backdoor into considering my control of death and disease more broadly. In other words, I used an analysis of my crazy view that I control the cup and use it like a talisman to ward off disease, in order to consider the broader questions of whether disease is something within my complete power to avoid . But now, reviewing and rewriting this story I see so much more fruit here sooo…. I am going to write this later addition synopsis concerning ownership, which is another potential aspect of the teacup contemplation. Though this does not follow my contemplation timeline,  I think it will help clarify and make this entry richer. So I am going to use that ‘blogger’s prerogative’ and fill-in the lines a bit more on the topic of owning (plus..this is how my practice works, back over the same stories, the same themes, getting deeper and richer over time):

We get so caught-up buying things, owning things, thinking they are ours –we don’t notice these items totally manipulate us, they bully us, they force our hands all the time. Like with the teacup, it’s easy at first to say I’m in control, the cup makes my life better, more convenient, safe from the disease I fear. Or that, with my extensive wardrobe, I can define who I am, shape my identity and make it real. But from the get-go the items are in charge. I seek them out, it’s not like the cup labeled itself or my clothes hop into the shopping cart on their own. I pay for them with money or elbow grease. I need to care for the items, to clean them, to interact with the items on their  terms if I have any desire to retain and preserve them  (if it’s breakable I have to handle with care, if it’s white fabric I have to be so careful about stains, when a part or a gear wears out I must replace it, when the car needs gas I have to stop what I am doing and feed it).

Trust this fashionista, once I have found that perfect purse I have to have it (it’s like it calls to me from across the store). I spend hard earned money on it  and then  I worry constantly about keeping it nice. When it finally does wear out, or goes out of fashion, I need one that’s just as good or better..it’s not like I’m going to go from carrying a Chanel purse to something from the Gap..I have standards after all.  And those standards, they came from the Chanel bag (my misunderstanding of it anyway), from the wardrobe I have built that matches that bag, so really, who is in charge?

Even more subtly still, these items, each one, we obtain to solve a problem. I need a cup to keep me disease free. I need a bag to carry all my other stuff, I need an accessory to match my clothes, I need a thing I wear to make other folks think I’m pretty and fashionable (that I am a person who is in control of my super buttoned-up image). And in return for a problem patch I get an item that creates a bunch more problems — gives me new responsibilities, sets new standards, makes me dependent,  plants the seed for the ‘need’ for more new items in the future. And does the item even solve the problem I think it solves? If so, for how long? Can a cup keep me disease free? Can a purse make you see me as beautiful or polished or in control?  So is an item we can’t control really ours? How much do we pay, how much do we suffer, for the privilege of fake owning it for some limited time?

* I have actually see multiple versions of the questions that go with this story. Here I have the ones I used for this contemplation.

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