Letting Go of the Outcome and the End of the Movie – Judith R.

What we just did together, to start. We have some motorcycles today. The season is changing. But that cardinal didn't stop for 20 minutes. What? That sound almost helps me to meditate. I found out there was one cold day when the windows were shut here. and there was relatively little noise, and I realized that I had become rather dependent on a background from noise. Listening to the silence is hard and spacious also. So it's a different kind of a meditation, listening to space. some people find it scary do you know what I mean? just really not holding on to anything I find that sometimes if I'm really not thinking about anything sometimes my mind will just try and grab on to the old thing Well, I know this year, I've been working on listening to silence and not depending on anything. And I go on these long retreats, seven-day retreats. The fourth or fifth day, you're very quiet finally, you know, and I'm so quiet my mind isn't doing anything but way way way in the back is like my favorite song running over and over and over and it's like my psyche is still holding on it now i can't hold on to the words or the storyline but it finds something way way way in the back uh and who uh what's her name uh india ari was who was way way away in the background so you just for me then i just have to relax and and trust that pretty soon I'll let it go. The need to, you know, kind of hold on to something. Anybody else? I think it's getting quieter in here though as we sit together. I think that we're starting to build Sangha here, and people are sitting more. Anybody like to read out of the big book? I'm kind of going back to where I left off. I know that's not where you guys left off, but I leftoff, we were somewhere around Step 6 and 7. so step 6 and 7 are we're entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character and 7 humbly asked him, or God to remove our shortcomings and I thought we could just read it's about 4 paragraphs on 6 and7 in the big book so anybody, would anyone enjoy to read out loud? okay uh let's see do i have it marked yeah it starts there and you go till there's a big line all right we pocket our pride and go to it eliminating every twist of character every dark cranny of the past once we have taken the step to holding nothing we are delighted We can look the world in the eye. We can be alone at perfect peace and ease. Our fears fall from us. We begin to feel the nearness of our creator. We may have had certain spiritual beliefs, but now we begin to have a spiritual experience. The feeling that the drink problem has disappeared will often come strongly. We feel we are on the broad highway, walking hand-in-hand with the spirit of the universe. returning home we find a place where we can be quiet for an hour carefully reviewing what we have done we thank God from the bottom of our hearts that we know him better taking this book down from our shelf we turn to the page which contains the 12 steps carefully reading the first 5 proposals we ask if we have omitted anything but we are building an arch through which we shall walk a free man at last. Is our work solid so far? Are the stones properly in place? Have we skimmed on the cement put into the foundation? Have we tried to make mortar without sand? If we can answer to our satisfaction, we then look at step six. We have emphasized willingness as being indispensable. Are we now ready to let go, let God remove from us all the things which we have admitted are objectionable? Can he now take them all, every one? If we still cling to something we will not let go. We ask God to help us be willing. When ready, we say something like this. My creator, I am now willing that you should have all of me, good and bad. I pray that you now remove from me every single defect of character which stands in the way of my usefulness to you and my fellows. Grant me strength as I go out from here to do your bidding. Amen. We have then completed step seven. Is that it? Yeah. Is that where there's a line? Yeah. Yeah. Isn't it great to hear the big book? I wish I remembered that more well I was struck with we can look the world in the eye that's a mindful awareness statement isn't it it's like I'm very interested in Buddhism's idea of no preference this is a big idea in Zen and really in all of them because step two, not step two the second noble truth is about grasping what you like hating or averting what you don't like and being in denial I'll use the 12 step lingo for the third one so non-preference means whatever is in front of your nose is okay can you make that leap from non- preference to I don't I'm not judging the world through I like it and I don' t like it I'm being what is actually happening and that's non-preference in Buddhism and I think it has to do with looking the world straight in the eye and what I'm thinking about is the world is the moment as it is naked it. Some moments I like, some moments I don't like, but whether I like it or don't like it it doesn't faze the moment at all the moment is the moment because I don' t like a moment doesn' t mean it goes away however in an addictive personality if we don't like the moment we change it fast through some tool so for me learning how to embrace the moment as it is without overlaying my judgment on the moment which is very hard to do which is mindfulness practice or awareness practice receiving the moment as it is we can look the world in the eye we can be alone at perfect peace and ease this is not at all what I planned to talk about but I was so struck by it we can being alone at a perfect peace and ease first of all, we can't be alone that makes me cry I guess I must be emotional tonight I never wanted to be alone I always thought there was something wrong with being alone and then Buddha said at his birth i think it was at his birth he walked in all i mean this is it's kind of like jesus's story too it's hard to believe okay so this is a religious mythology so he comes out of his mother's side not out of her down there part he comes out of his mother's side and he's about two years old because he can walk and he walks seven steps in each direction in the four directions and then he said I alone am the world honored one and so I always thought I alone and the world honored one what does that mean and I think it's a very existential point of view right that we go along with community and with other people but actually we live our life through our own eyes and no matter how close you are with a person like with my husband he does not live my life nor do my children, nor to anyone no one lives my life and I think that's very important in terms of codependency is because in codependancy I wanted everyone to live my wife or at least understand it not object to it and do the right for me do by me right you know and I think too, you know this sense of aloneness existential aloneliness is also that you go to your grave alone you don't take anybody with you and you don'y take any possessions with you it's stark naked I alone and I think there's some kind of strength you get from meditation that helps you accept your own existence and the difficulties and happinesses of your own life and you can't get rid of envy and jealousy until you have this kind of anchor in your own life you know rather than always looking at someone else's life so i meditate quite a bit on what did the buddha mean when i alone and the world honored one it also has something to do with um understanding and recognizing our well for my religion our own Buddhahood that we are Buddha and but from the Christian point of view they say what do they say you're the child of God or that Christ lives within those kind of words so that's what he said when he was born and what he said when He was enlightened under the Bodhi tree it's slightly a different different, what did he say under the Bodhi tree, he said something like the whole world and I are enlightened together so that's kind of the opposite but it's not the opposite it's the recognition that inside and outside are completely one but there is not even an I that separates you so when you say I am the child of God that's true but so is everything else and from that point of view the world is peaceful and at ease our fears fall from us and we begin to feel the nearness of our Creator. We may have had certain spiritual beliefs, but now we begin to have a spiritual experience. I've been working on really trying to be at ease with what's happening. And often it's in the category of I don't want, right? In that, I don' t want, I like. Learning how to very radically, I think the word radical is important, how to radically accept what is occurring, whether you like it or you don' T like it. And this gives you a tremendous amount of strength because you' re not what Katagiri Roshi would say, you're not blown away by the winds of the world and the winds in Buddhism are the eight worldly winds there's a lot of different translations but pain and pleasure success and failure praise and blame and winning and losing those are winds if you get tossed away by those winds you lose your sense that everything is at peace and that you are you are an expression of the universe or God or however you want to say it you are the mystery and the other thing I'm interested in and what I wanted to talk about is the tremendous importance of willingness. And in program, when you're not willing, they always tell you to pray to be willing. So let's just talk a little bit about willingness. and we left this is where we left off in terms of my lectures is how how do we become more willing to be open or how do We become more Willing to accept what's right in front of our nose I don't know if any had maybe some of you have been in program as long as me but there's a little there was a little blue book that was out in the 70s about acceptance written by a Christian priest, I think. And I got it on tape and I played it every day in the car. It was like a half an hour tape and I must have done it for a year. And the line that I remember 30 years later is, if it's in front of your nose, it's what's happening. if it's in front of your nose that's the thing you have to accept that's radical acceptance that's looking the world in the eye no bullshit, straight what is happening right now and can I accept that that is what's happening this makes a lot of difference in terms of your peace and serenity because you're not fighting what's actually happening. As soon as you start fighting what's really going on, what's not actually happening, you have lost your serenity. And I find that I can watch it in the daily life, in my daily life when I start to say this is unacceptable to me what's in front of my nose. and then I get all agitated and I start controlling I gear up start to use the phone and start to arrange the world what's that great line I'm the puppeteer and I'm arranging everyone according to what I want and it happens very fast that jump it's as fast a jump god I'm really going around in my head in the book remember it said the thought went through my mind that if I put a little bourbon in this milk because I'm drinking it with milk it wouldn't happen that's on the physical level and I haven't had that with liquor thank god but I have had it a lot with food oh doesn't matter just a little bit of that but that's similar to control and letting go the thought goes through your mind you know that you can control it if you can fix it if you only did this and that and that and then off we go so trying to stay on the topic which is willingness so in awareness in Buddhism in mindfulness practice you try and be aware of what's going on as your awareness starts to strengthen you will start to see your patterns and I'm repeating myself but I think this is so important that I'm going to repeat it you start to be more aware of your patterns particularly if you've done your fourth and fifth step then you really have brought up your awareness of what's going on in your life that's causing you difficulty now at this point you're still maybe not able to do anything about it you're just aware that it's there i find that one of the hardest stages it's painful stage you keep seeing it and seeing it and you can't change. You're not willing or you don't even know how. It's very painful, that stage. Do you get what I mean at that point? Now, I think the pain of that stage is very important. It is very import that you see the pain of the repeating of the pattern. How does Pema Chodron say, you see the pattern and you know how the movie ends. You play the movie out and you're so aware of it that you know what the end of the movie is. And again if I just say, if you take one bite of that chocolate chip cookie you can play out the movie and you see the end. This is awareness practice strengthening in you. And the pain and again I would say in terms of process you usually can't stop in the beginning. You see the movie and you play out that movie. this is called the habituated pattern okay so um i'm working with tit not ham tit not hans work on this so the first thing is really becoming aware of the pattern even if you can't stop it so what do you do with that pain a the pain of not being able to stop it for me If I allow myself to get in touch with the pain, that is the energy that stimulates my willingness. If I think about pain just as energy, that's the energy that's going to help me want to change. How many times do I have to do this pattern and have the same ending and so forth? So, using that energy. The second thing is accepting, accepting it. I want to say for a long time in program, I wouldn't accept it and be gentle or loving. what i would do is not accept it be judgmental and then be so mean to myself and you know what then i never become willing because that meanness kind of um takes me back to my childhood or it takes me back actually to the root of why that pattern is there do you get what i mean it's like the meanness itself is why the why i'm not at peace and ease so i struggled with this and i still do to some extent but now i'm so much more committed to love loving myself even with my faults and imperfections what did it i'm not gonna do it that story i'm letting that story go uh you know it says my creator i use this prayer a lot i love this prayer my creator I'm now willing that you should have all of me, good and bad. That's really, really important that you're not saying, I now am willing that You take the good, successful parts of myself and use them for the benefit of others. That's great, but it ignores Your shadow, all the things You're not willing to do. so you have to be so loving about this this is gentle Pema Chodron calls it the big G gentleness if you can't apply this dab of gentleness towards the habituated patterns if you only apply harsh judgmental quality to it I have not find that it heals from that that's my experience that what I get into is maybe I can control it for a little while but it comes back maybe it's a little bit like white knuckling let's say I'm working on jealousy and I'm very harsh about it, I can keep it at bay. But it's not, it doesn't go away then. As they say, don't they say it goes away? Well, they use it in terms of drinking. The feeling that the drink problem has disappeared will often come strongly. But you can also have that in your character defects. And I've been saying, saying i think i said before that i'm having this feeling about my achievement drive all these years i've had this incredible achievement drive the last two or three years i have been doing a lot of step work on it and all of a sudden i'm feeling like it's not you know it comes up but not very strongly you know what i know that you know when i mean because I know you have experienced it in your own life, that something gets lifted. And I think that has to happen out of embracing it or loving it, not being terrible to yourself because of your downs. And you have to be patient right there. Like, you know, again, And some of these defects of character are just, well, some of them may never go away and you just learn how to be with your faults. But some of then take years. Some hatreds, right? Some of your big resentments for those of us who are a long time in program, those took years to get over. Like 10 years or 15 years of every day being willing to say it doesn't have to be that way. Do you know what I mean? It doesn't, I don't haveと hate that person. I do hate that persona, but I don' t have to, right? You know, just saying that over and over, day after day, after day. It says in the book, I'm supposed to say it, you know, so you do it. But the funny thing is, eventually you don't hate that person. I've experienced this. I want to give you the hope that you keep doing this. And what I'm trying to say is, but please do it with love. In Buddhism, there's this great mantra, hatred is never healed by hatred but by love alone is healed this is the noble truth the noble and ancient truth hatred never ceases by hatred but love alone is healed this is the noble and ancient truth and I wish for us all to apply that to ourselves I know that love is applied to ourselves it's often a very difficult concept to get close to and I was going to offer that it has helped me to use the word trust you know that's an easier way for me to get to the place where I understand that things are as they should be. And through that, I feel like I'm able to come a little bit closer to this gentleness that is often talked about, which is, of course, difficult for me and probably many others to get through. What that reminds me of, too, is the very big importance in my program to the slogan, Let Go and Let God. So that's a trusting. It's a trustee. And when you can do that, then the ease part comes. Then it's not this big project that I have to get rid of my hatred or I have TO GET RID OF MY ENVY. do you know all of a sudden that's a huge project and i've done huge projects you know i've been in therapy since you know i've gone million dollar project on changing myself and they're good in terms of awareness right i i think it's good to spend time becoming aware of your patterns but at a certain point and this is the point where we're at in the steps which is step seven which is a god step they say at step seven it's not your project anymore do you get what i'm saying it's a big difference it's about i'm going to become a perfect person and i'm gonna You know, tighten up and do everything I can do. You know? It's actually the opposite. It's saying, I know I have this problem and I'm actually going to let it go. I'm going to Let Go. And however long it takes for me to recover, that's how long it take. Be it 3 months, 2 years or 15 years. katagiri roshi had a great saying about zazen because everybody tries to control in your meditation you want your meditate don't you you want your meditation to go a certain way you want to be relaxed you want to be concentrated you don't want to be thinking about other things you don' t want your body to hurt you know you want it to be really great so we try and control or you have a memory Like for me, I've been doing it so long. Fifteen years ago, it felt like that. And I'm going to get that state of mind back. That's a big crack of shit. I'm trying not to swear these days, but it comes out. Because we can't control it. Isn't that what we're trying to learn? You cannot control it, and mindfulness and being in the present moment is letting go of the control. and when you do that you get this I'm willing to look life in the eye and be at peace and I'm not afraid that's what comes forth when you do that it's a magical moment but it's not really magic in a way because we know how we got there and everything but um and what i'm finding is i can do it every day every single day i can say i accept what's happening i can be gentle with what's happening i could i can just do one little baby step at a time. And then what comes gushing forth is ease, peace and not being afraid. It's so fabulous to say that right now because I see that my day has been very anxious. So maybe Maybe is that about humbly, isn't that where we're at, humbly ask the universe to unravel my habituated patterns. So that what's the goal? The goal is to live in the present moment without manipulating from my end and it's radical to do this. This is radical. very rarely meet people who can actually do it but when I'm able to do it peace and not being afraid is what arises this is having a spiritual experience rather than just an idea in your head you know I used to laugh I used to make fun and i hope nobody's um offended i don't like what i used to do this is a confession um i would hear fundamentalists christians say i met jesus in the parking lot and i was born again and i thought what are they talking about you know that sounds so bizarre but in a way i get what they're talking about it's this moment where you let go and then what comes up is this joy of living and just you're happy you're alive no one matter what the circumstances things will work their way out you know all the those kind of slogans or just the ability the other thing, now I'm thinking when I was in a great deal of pain let's say two years ago I had a period of very deep grief what felt wonderful it felt horrible it was a horrible time for me but because I had done program and Buddhism and this stuff I knew what to do which was to accept it and to go slow and to just be with the human feelings of the hardship. And it made me, even though it was a terrible year, I was kind of, I felt good about it. felt proud like deep deeply like oh I just did the year I just did it with the help of program and my friends and daily calls you know and I would say I'm very very sad you know do you get what I'm saying it's a different way of being, not fighting it. The next thing that Thich Nhat Hanh talks about is, so you recognize it, you accept it, embrace it with gentleness, you be it, this thing that you want to get rid of so badly. And then you have to look into it deeply. I think this is part of four and five like untangling it looking deeply into what is the cause of this what is because and as you look deeply what will arise isn't some kind of insight you can find a insight into you know sometimes i when i look in i say oh oh, this is the repeat of an old pattern or I'm pretending that that person's my mom. You get the insight of why you're feeling the way you are and that's very helpful in order to let it go that you don't have to do that and the willingness starts to come with the more insight you have about what's going on And one thing that I like about willingness is, going back to this sheet, I love Pema Chodron said, you know what? Willingness is just I'm willing to do anything differently. It doesn't even have to be a big change. I'm just willing to go through this moment and this pattern differently. For example, I'm working on how I react to my brothers. And I've been through the movie a hundred thousand times. And you know what? They're not changing. So finally, about a couple weeks ago, in fact, I might have said something about it before I went on vacation. We were in the same gosh darn movie. and i just said oh i know this movie and i know how it ends and i'm i'm going to be willing to drop my end of it i'm gonna let them be who they are i'm to expect them to be i'm expecting what what it's like to be with them and i the word for me that i love so much now is I'm going to be patient. Patient with myself, patient with them and I'm gonna let God do the trip here. Okay? And I don't have to react the way I've been. Now it's taken me many, many long, long time to even have a feeling of being willing that I'm not gonna do my part. And you know my part is to get real emotional and real scared i learned this through doing my inventory what i do with them it's become very clear i had an insight about last year about what i did with my brothers and it seems like i'm more willing not to do it and i have no idea what the outcome is going to be right because I'm not controlling like I used to anyway I would control and the outcome was never what I wanted anyway you know so I already play that script if I try that script, if I tried to control then they got mad da-da-da, da-dada-da so I just let go it was great and I didn't have two weeks of insanity really insanity so just try at the moment when you know you're crossing the bridge if you have the strength this is an awareness this is why we strengthen our awareness because you'll know when you're crossing the bridge and you'll say can I do an iota different can I do this a little bit different like when jealousy arises for me now i know it and i say could you be willing to do this moment a little differently so there's an interplay between um that kind of magical uh grace and my willingness very subtle interplay and it happens in the moment and if i don't do it right it's very important for me to be gentle and try again next time there will be a next time until the karma is unraveled this is speaking in buddhist language until the Karma is unravel there will be a nice time and but you can feel it unraveling and I think that's what they're saying too about um uh if you've illuminated everything if you really worked hard you can feel it starting to unravel and when it unravels you will be free and in buddhism they say you keep doing that and keep doingthat and keepdoing that and what at the then that's called enlightenment when the karma has been unraveled and you're able to live in the moment with non-reactivity, right? This is called enlightenment. Okay, anybody want to say anything or I think we can probably go on now. I always get stuck in six and seven but I also think they're very, very important steps. How do we actually we do transform ourselves articles on the will. Finally I realized, well, below it's speaking to you. We need to hear this again and again. But it was talking about how the will required all of these articles but something to do with the will requires practice. Like it's great to be aware and recognize and that's but then when you must start practicing and you had the word what was your word refraining refraigning that's the practice when you know it's up you find your strength and you refrain if you can and for me I'm very, well I used to only be emotional but I've matured now I know there's a mental thought that precedes the action so if you can catch the thought and you have enough energy in your attention you can refrain if you don't catch the thought you've already done it before you have the opportunity to refrain but again I think what I'd like to say is there's a paradox there's dance there between will and letting go and it's kind of like a little atom with the electrons going around I know this idea of letting go is often misunderstood and I'm often frustrated when someone has a choice to make but then they're just going to let it go well first you can let go of the outcome but there's a point where you need to be accountable well in the Buddhist in what we've been studying in these Tibetan numbered systems what you're talking about is the point of cutting with the practice that's it's a sword, it's a manjusri moment it's not avalokiteshvara, it is you have a sword and you say I'm going to cut through this pattern with a spiritual practice and you can be very strong right there now you can call it will but it doesn't feel like will to me it feels like um intentionality and it has to be predetermined like i already know what practice for me right now in order to actually do this i have to know what process i'm going to do at the moment i'm jealous what do I do? And if you know what you do, you can do it. And so in that sense, it's not a refrain. It's not an actual positive doing something else. It's actually they would call it in Buddhist language, turning the Dharma wheel. You actually turn it in the positive direction. and then what happens it comes back and turns you right this have you heard this in buddhist you turn the wheel and it turns you so it's a mutual mutual thing okay it's uh we've passed our time but we need to pass the basket it. So please give generously so that this MZMC can stay around. And that's our offering to the place for giving us the space. Oh, and I have another exciting thing. My friend who runs Common Grounds, you know the meditation center Common Ground? He has got Kevin Griffin coming to town kevin griffin just wrote a book on buddhism in the twelve steps one breath at a time so he's going to be in town uh... friday and saturday september tenth and eleventh talking about his book at common grounds so i made a hundred flyers thinking that this group could take flyers and put them around at different meetings So we can get people who are interested to come to this. And I thought for this group, Saturday afternoon, 1 to 5, you could have a little retreat with him. I've been wanting to start us having retreats, so this could be the start of that, and then maybe we could keep it up. And then I also thought we could ask them to announce our meeting so people who go there might want to come here. So please take some and, well, I'll pass it around. Take some, if you have a meeting that you can hang it up at, please take one or two or three or five, whatever you would like to do. you Thank you.