Immediately after I wrote the blog post Sand Drawings I wrote the following journal entry which I will share in full (with a few modifications for clarity) here: After I wrote the sand drawing blog I started thinking — how am I changing, decaying, just bits of matter, aggregated together, subject to decay like other bits of aggregated mater that exist in the world? Don’t my teeth wear away like kitchen knives? Doesn’t my skin dry and crack and sag like the…
I already had rupa on the brain, so it wasn’t surprising that I found myself on a bit of a rupa roll. Sitting in my apartment one day, I started looking around at my stuff and I asked myself, “Do you really understand these items? Do you know what they are and what they do?” My eyes fell on my favorite stuffed animal — Grux — a real fur bunny toy that Eric had bought me, for a small fortune,…
In all my contemplations about my ‘shield of special’ and my little bubble world — fabrications of my mind that let me imagine an Alana who is safe and comfortable and exempt from the suffering of the world — it was hard to ignore the obvious: My bubble world is full of stuff. I pin my ideas of what is ‘safe’ in my environment, on my belongings like houses and money and a husband that will shield my from unwanted…
I was at the hot springs and there was this woman there who was so obese. I tried to internalize what it would be like to be so fat, but my heart refused to accept it. The contemplation was shallow, going through the motions, but feeling nothing. I realized the reason why: I don’t believe I can ever be that fat — I am different, I work-out and mind my diet, that won’t happen to me. But the truth is,…
One of the key themes the exercises on uncovering hidden benefits and beliefs kept coming back to was that I continually quest for/seek to build a ‘bubble world*‘ — the kind of place where everyone lives in harmony, according to the rules and standards I think are ideal. In my bubble world, people are respectful and considerate, they are laid-back and peaceful, they are community-oriented and friendly. After living in Cali, fairly happy, for so long, my bubble world had…
Dear Reader, today’s blog is a direct continuation of last week’s, LP Nut’s Alana-fied Technique to Uncover Hidden Benefits and Beliefs Part 1, so please do read that one before continuing on here. In the last blog, we began an exploration of an Alana-fied version of a technique LP Nut taught at the 2017 retreat to uncover hidden benefits and beliefs. The premise behind the technique is a simple one — if we do stuff that we know hurts us, there…
At the 2017 retreat, Phra Nut taught a method of contemplation aimed at uncovering the hidden benefits and beliefs that lay at the foundation of our charged responses to situations we find upsetting. Now, I have to admit that from the get-go that I modified LP’s technique a bit to fit my understanding and thinking style, so, in the interest of transparency, what you are going to get here is an Alana-fied version/explanation of all this. From my understanding, the…
It was the 2017 KPY Retreat, I was on a nature hike out in the woods with a small group of attendees and I started talking to L.P. Nut: “I can’t stand New York”, I said, “I hate it so much. The people are so rude, they make so much noise, especially the hoking, it is unbearable and the the filth, the way people litter and trash stuff, it is overwhelming…I don’t know what to do, being there makes me…
I took a friend to lunch, trying to console her on the recent loss of her brother. She talked about how relatively young he was when he died and about how she didn’t feel like she got enough time with him in this life, especially at the end. Naturally, I started thinking back to when my own dad died. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer when he was just 64 and I was 28. I remember so clearly thinking that…
A good friend of mine had a brother who had become seriously ill. The truth is, it was a long standing disease — slow progression at first, but suddenly much more severe. It looked increasingly like his death was imminent. All my friend wanted to do was to help, to find some cure, to put forth effort, to do something, anything, to make her brother better. Her efforts however were fruitless and my friend was inconsolable. Still, I tried to console…
I was sitting on the bathroom floor of my Manhattan loft, engaging in a-now-typical-ritual — crying my eyes out. I was miserable. I was so depressed. Above all else, I felt lost and trapped. The circumstances were this: Eric and I were in debt for a house we hated. He had a 2 year contract at work that, if broken, would require a significant sum to pay back our relocation expenses. Besides, Eric worried about his career, his resume, and…
I was out for a walk and I saw a swirl of leaves blowing around in the wind. I decided to try to use it as an Ubai, a metaphor for my own confused and upended life. I closed my eyes and began to imagine my own objects, details of places and people, from my Cali and NY life, swirling around me. All out of my control, moved by forces beyond myself. Suddenly, I opened my eyes and realized I…
And … because sometimes suffering and delusion just don’t end overnight … a second pestering email, written several weeks after the first, to Neecha, and her skillful response. Alana’s Second Email to Neecha Hey Neecha — I hope you and Mae Yo are both well. I’m writing to whine again… sorry. The problem is, at least, slightly different this time (no actually I’m kidding, its totally the same, but I’ll get there)… I have been waiting and watching change. And, sure enough,…
After about 2 month down in the dumps I finally decided to reach out to Neecha for some advice on how to deal with the extreme stress and sorrow of my new New York life. When I think back on it, I realize that her advice was some of the best anyone has ever given me. SPOILER ALERT –Impermanence, impermanence, impermanence, death, death, death. Its funny because now, almost 3 years later, I see my hatred of New York fading…
I went to a family reunion in upstate New York and my aunt pulled-out her old photo albums. She handed me a pic of three teenage boys standing in a row and asked, “do you know who that one in the middle is?” I took a few wild guesses before she told me it was my dad. Shocked, I grabbed the picture for a closer look; I was so close to my dad, I loved him so much, I thought I would…
I was sitting on an airplane, and for 2 hours, the woman sitting next to me only interrupted her near-continuous coughing fits to take the occasional sneeze break –the woman was clearly sick as a dog. Everyone gets sick, I get it, but this woman refused to cover her mouth/nose when she coughed and sneezed, she was spewing her disease all over me and everyone else around. I was friggin furious. Doesn’t she know you are supposed to cover your mouth…
…Interruption in our regulatory scheduled program: I know, I know, Dear Reader, you have gottta be thinking I am the worst, most scatter-brained narrator ever. I just got back to the program, and here I am with yet anoooottthhhheeeer interruption. Ugh, I know, but I promise its just a short reflection. One and Done… The other day, a friend (who incidentally is Buddhist-curious, but not a practicing Buddhist), asked me what my musings were during these crazy Covid times. When…
With the boxes all put away and the final design elements being put on our new home I remembered an old plant that I used to have that would have looked nice in the house, it was an orchid. An orchid that had thrived so well in a sunny spot on my desk and then died, quite quickly, when it had shifted just a few inches to the left, out of the direct sun. Suddenly it hit me, one of…
This a continuation of the last blog. If you haven’t read previously then please go back and read ‘Interruption Part 16’. My Dear Reader, I thank you for bearing with me on this looooonnnggg interruption in our regularly scheduled program (an orderlyish, linearish blog tracing my meandering dhamma path), this will be the last posting in our Post-Retreat Interruption Series. It is simply a brief reflection of what I have come to understand my path to be. A long time…
