where love developing happiness meets wisdom and wisdom … · kamalashila love roughly sums up the...

vajrabellSUMMER 2016

keeping sangha connectedspreading the dharma

Also in this issue:Pilgrimage to Kyoto, page 12

New Series : Sangha Connections, page 19

The Path of Practice :Developing Happiness and Wisdom by Dh. Amalapage 9

Where Love Meets Wisdom

by Dh. Kamalashila page 6

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vajrabell

Dh. Amala (Chair) Dh. Vidhuma (Vice Chair)

Dh. Arjava Dh. Dayalocana

Dh. KhemavassikaDh. Surakshita

SPIRITUAL VITALITY COUNCIL

CO-EDITOR: Mary Schaefer [email protected]

CO-EDITOR: David Watt [email protected]

COPY EDITOR: Dh. Vihanasari [email protected]

ARTS EDITOR: Deb Howard [email protected]

WRITER: Bettye [email protected]

DESIGN: Callista [email protected]

VAJRA BELL KULA

Dh. Arjava (Chair) Barry Timmerman (Secretary) Elizabeth Hellard (Treasurer)

Dh. AmalaDh. RijupathaDh. ShrijnanaJean CorsonTom Gaillard

Daniel KenneyAlisha Roberts

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Gary Baker, New York [email protected]

Paramita Banerjee, Vancouver Buddhist [email protected]

Susan DiPietro, Khanti [email protected]

Peter Ingraham, Aryaloka Buddhist [email protected]

Sabrina Metivier, Nagaloka Buddhist [email protected]

Mary Salome, San Francisco Buddhist [email protected]

Samatara, Rocky Mountain Buddhist [email protected]

Mike Mappes, Khante [email protected]

SANGHA NOTES CONTRIBUTORS

© 2016 Aryaloka Buddhist Center

Aryaloka Buddhist Retreat Center14 Heartwood Circle

Newmarket, NH 03857603-659-5456

[email protected] · Aryaloka.org

Dh. Shrijnana, Executive DirectorVanessa Ruiz, Office Manager

Dh. Bodhana, Kitchen ManagerDh. Lilasiddhi, Cleaning Coordinator

Dh. Rijupatha, Web Master and Publicity DesignerDh. Shantikirika, Buddhaworks Manager

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table of contentssummer 2016

Arts at Aryaloka04

Developing Happiness and Wisdom, by Dh. Amala

09

COVER IMAGE: Neil Harvey neillharvey.com

06

05 Path of Practice Introduction

Where Love Meets Wisdom, by Dh. Kamalashila

06

Pilgrimage to Kyoto,by Neil Harvey

12

Sangha Notes,by Sangha Note Contributors

14

Sangha Connections, Interveiw with Dh. Narottamaby Bettye Pruitt

19

From the Editors22

Spiritual Vitality Council24

Board Notes

Poetry Corner25

Upcoming Retreats26

Upcoming Day Events and Classes

27

19

26

12

09

Upcoming & Ongoing Events28

http://www.neillharvey.com

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arts at aryaloka

In her new book of poetry, Becom-ing a Buddhist, Aryaloka’s resident poet Kavyadrishti says “poems have become a record of my becoming a Buddhist. So I offer this book of poems to express my gratitude to my teachers and friends who have helped me to grow, and to encourage others to listen to what comes in the silence.”

Kavyadrishti first attended a Friends of the Western Buddhist Order class in the Portland area in 1989. She moved to New Hampshire shortly af-ter that to be closer to Aryaloka, and soon found pleasure in sharing her poetry with people in the sangha.

“I’ve been writing since an assign-ment in third grade,” Kavyadrishti says, “when I shared something with the class, and everyone laughed. It was supposed to be a ‘what I did this summer’ thing, but was all fiction. I began taking writing classes and workshops after raising four children, and then found a way to share my work.” Since then she has published poems and has read at workshops and open readings in Portland and at Portsmouth Poet Laureate events.

The poems span more than 20 years starting before Kavyadrishti knew much about Buddhism and ending with where she is now. In

between – in chapters titled “Acorns,” “With Folded Hands” and “The Evo-lution of Silence,” she explores the many aspects of her path in becoming a Buddhist. The poems range from the two-line “Credo” to a complete sevenfold puja inspired by Sangharak-shita and Shantideva.

Each chapter starts with a short ex-planation of the origin of the poems included, when they were written and what inspired them, giving readers insight into the creative process as well as the spiritual backdrop for the poems. With simple lines calling forth clear visual images, she captures feel-ings and insights that are difficult to express in words. The poems express the joyful, painful, exhausting, inspir-ing, confusing, demanding, rewarding and ever-changing path of Buddhist practice.

Kavyadrishti’s delight in the Dharma is evident and becomes contagious through her writing. This is a collec-tion of poems that can speak to and inspire anyone at any stage on the path of “becoming a Buddhist.”

Becoming a Buddhist is available in the Buddhaworks bookstore at Aryaloka now, and proceeds from the sale of the book will go to the center.

— Deb Howard

The Voice in the Silence

You have heard it,that silence that speaks of knowing.And you have found peacein doing, going, being where it led.Were you still listeninglast month, last night between the tears?Have you feared the answer,or forgotten once the meditation ended,then turned to the confusion, the book,the mistaken memory instead? You have heard itin the silence.

—Kavyadrishti, Becoming a Buddhist, 2016Becoming a Buddhist, a book of poetry published by Dh. Kavyadrishti

Arts Study Group: Zen and Creativity “The creative process, like a

spiritual journey, is intuitive, non-linear and experiential. It points us toward our essential nature, which is a reflection of the boundless creativity of the universe.”

—Daido John Loori

Some members of the Aryaloka arts kula and sangha are joining together to study creativity, medita-tion and their interconnectedness. The group meets every other week on Friday morning from 10:30 a.m.-12 noon in Exeter to discuss a chapter from Daido Loori Roshi’s book, The Zen of Creativity: Cultivat-ing Your Artistic Life. With 14 chapters we have a standing schedule that will take us through November. All are welcome to join us on a regular or drop-in basis. We ask that you just commit to reading the current chapter and come with comments and questions to discuss. Contact Kiranada: [email protected] Deb Howard: [email protected] for dates, location and more infor-mation.

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The Triratna Path of PracticeA Comprehensive Approach to Spiritual Development

IntegrationDeveloping Peace:

getting to know oneself, bring-ing all one’s energies together behind spiritual purpose

Samatha, mindfulness meditations

Positive EmotionDeveloping Happiness:

positive connection with oneself and others; skillful or postive emotion

Metta and Brahma Viharas meditations

Spiritual DeathDeveloping Understanding and Wisdom:

direct knowing, transformation through insight, letting go

Insight practices

Spiritual RebirthExperiencing Freedom:

of heart and mind:a new way of being;

Sadhana meditations,Buddhannussati

Spiritual ReceptivityNo More Effort:

spontaneous compassionate actionJust sitting meditation

The Triratna Path of Practice is a comprehensive view of the whole of the spiritual life from a Buddhist perspective and represents the crystallization of a lifetime of teachings by Urgyen Sangharakshita. The Path of Practice describes the crucial elements that, taken together, compose a life of hap-piness, purpose, freedom, equanimity and inner peace.

The Aryaloka Spiritual Vitality Council (SVC) has endorsed making the Path of Practice and Spiritual Development the general theme for the center's 2016 programming. As part of that effort, the Vajra Bell continues its explora-tion of the Path of Practice with a deeper look at Positive Emotion/Develop-ing Happiness, and Spiritual Death/Developing Wisdom and Understanding with articles by Dh. Kamalashila and Dh. Amala.

— Editors

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by Dh. Kamalashila

Love roughly sums up the second aspect of the Triratna Path of Practice. It’s the human need to be empathic, kind and

generous, which in Buddhism is a key quality to cultivate. To live alongside others, we need to find ways to cut away the envy and fear that sepa-rate us. Just to live with ourselves, for the sake of our mental health, it’s essential we have access to positive emotions. Emotions are passionate hopes and fears, the desires that motivate us in helpful and unhelpful ways. Our behavior, our inner life and view of things get driven by what we want, what we like, what we love and what we don't. Through engaging in the Buddhist path, all this love-hate energy gets worked on, channeled and refined.

So Buddhism is a path of love, we can say, but it’s also one of wisdom. There’s always going to come a crisis on the path where, in order to

continue and not fall back, we need to be convinced we don’t have to identify with some negative emotion. This is tough. Identification seems out of our control. That’s because it concerns what we believe. Powerful views sit in our head, shoring up likes, dislikes and opinions. They feel so right. Indeed to us our opinions and preferences seem, deep down, to be actually who we are.

Delusion runs deep, but the Dharma is deeper. Insight methods show us how fleeting are those things we identify with and how incoherent is our identification with them. Seeing this cuts away at our attachments. Yet such methods are subtle and they don’t immediately work for everyone. Positive emotions can sometimes work better, undermining ego clinging in their own way – partly through be-ing naturally selfless and freed from self-identity.

From different directions, the

methods of love and wisdom draw us into the same state of being. Wisdom works through mindfulness. We look carefully at our experience and see that the "me" we appease with an array of likes and dislikes is really a construct. It’s not anything solid and real. Once this is seen, the whole busi-ness of building ourselves up starts looking quixotic and irrelevant.

With love, the approach is develop-mental. We cultivate and deepen a heartfelt empathy and care for others. Eventually, in the light of compassion and kindness, concerns for ourselves don’t feel as urgent. They fade in the light of our desire to help and be-friend the world.

Delusion is woven into our social lives. It is part of how we are and live with others and in the state of the world. For example, consider the glob-

Where Love Meets Wisdom

Delusion runs deep, but the Dharma is deeper.

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al tendency toward individualism. The quality and quantity of written and spoken Dharma available on our com-puters and phones are phenomenal, and so is the ease with which we can communicate about it. Yet, often the very convenience seems to degrade our sense of community. It doesn’t have to, but it often seems to end up as a purely solitary experience. Since on our own we can explore in depth the Dharma interests that appeal to us – and build up our own personal practices – why do we need to bother to keep up connections with a Bud-dhist movement which has a very particular history and teaching style?

The value is in having something to grow in relation to. A movement like Triratna builds naturally over the years of constant exchange around the Dharma, a tradition which has integrity and a particular spirit that’s noticeable everywhere you look within it. This is valuable, but it does not come easily. The spirit of our tradition has evolved over years of communi-cation and collective practice. Working with others is immeasurably more demanding than putting together a personal Dharma world. That, in some ways, is the appeal of opting out of collective practice, because it takes effort. Yet, it’s immeasurably more satisfying to co-create a culture based on the ethical principles of Buddhism that will help enormous numbers dis-cover themselves and develop their humanity for others’ benefit.

This brings us back nicely to the positive mind-states known as the four Brahma Viharas (named after the Brahma gods of mythology who dwell with their minds entirely per-vading their world): good will (metta), compassion (karuna), appreciative joy (mudita) and equanimity (upekkha).

Good will is like the sun shining equally on all without distinction or preference. Even if there were no one to receive its light, the sun would continue to shine as warmly and gen-erously as before.

Compassion is like the sun at night-fall, at the horizon when it is about to descend into the darkness and

becomes a beautiful display of many astonishing colors like peach, purple, gold, gray and crimson.

Appreciative joy is like the sun newly-risen in the early morning as-cending into the sky accompanied by ecstatic birdsong, its bright white light sparkling and creating rainbows in a thousand dew drops.

Equanimity is like the sun’s light mysteriously reflected in the full moon, silvery white and coursing – isolated and magnificent – through the night sky.

Of these, the original quality is good will or metta, a quality that’s expressed by the five ethical precepts of kindness, generosity, contentment, truth and mindfulness, which are cultivated through the Metta Bhavana meditation. In each of the meditation exercises that cultivate the boundless qualities, we most easily connect to our goodwill by previously practicing the ethical precepts and removing the conditions for the five hindrances.

Here, one of the classic sources describes the process:

A learned noble disciple leaves behind unwholesome bodily deeds and develops wholesome bodily deeds, leaves behind unwholesome verbal and mental deeds and devel-ops wholesome verbal and mental deeds.

Being … free from ill will and contention, discarding sloth-and-torpor, being without restlessness or conceit, removing doubt and overcoming arrogance, with right mindfulness and right comprehen-sion, being without bewilderment, the learned noble disciple dwells having pervaded one direction with a mind imbued with compassion, and in the same way the second, third, and fourth directions, the four intermediate directions, above and

below, completely and everywhere. Being without mental shackles…[the learned noble disciple] dwells having pervaded the entire world.

Then [the learned noble disciple] reflects like this: “Formerly my mind was narrow and not well-developed; now my mind has become bound-less and well-developed.”

— From the Madhayama Agama, a Chinese version of a Pali sut-ta from the Majjhima Nikaya as quoted by Analayo in his book Compassion and Emptiness

It is interesting that according to the Pali Canon the practices are de-scribed as simply connecting with the positive quality and then radiating it out in all directions. In Triratna, we’re familiar with the method of stages, as when the quality is developed toward a friend, neutral person, etc. Full instructions for the Brahma Vihara meditations according to Buddhagho-sa's commentarial instruction can be found in my book, Buddhist Meditation: Imagination, Tranquillity and Insight.

This approach comes from a 5th century commentary by Buddhagho-sa on the teaching that was written down from the oral tradition. Today we still find it a useful one. It’s like-ly that the method of stages came about through a need for a more de-tailed, comparative approach. Sakya-muni’s original method of radiation is similar to the ancient meditations, where a simple object of concen-tration like earth, or the color red, is spread out infinitely to encompass the totality of experience. Compas-sion comes to embrace everything, the sum total of all there is.

As we know from the Metta Bhava-na, this is what happens in the final

The spirit of our tradition (Triratna) has evolved over years of communica-tion and collective practice.

- Love/Wisdom continued on page 8

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radiation stage of all the Brahma Vihara meditations. There’s an infinite, non-specific radiation (anodhiso-pha-rana) of the relevant quality. In this there is no preference. The wish is for universal inclusion and impartiality, as illustrated in the Karaniya Metta Sutta as informally translated by Sangharak-shita:

Let his thoughts of boundless love pervade the whole world, above, below and across, without any obstructions, without any enemy.This non-preferentiality is brought

about by breaking down barriers, a sub-stage preparatory to the radia-tion, in which we look back on how the practice went and compare the responses evoked in relation to the friend, neutral person and opposed

person. We then equalize them: the memory of our more generous responses draw us up out of less gen-erous ones of which we let go, with the result that in the final radiation the feeling is purer and more certain without any obstructions, without any enemy.

Where the early texts describe ra-diation, there’s no mention of others receiving the quality. Love simply fills space. It is freely available to all who are contained within space, but it ra-diates quite independent of anyone’s interest or even their presence. Met-ta, karuna, etc., express disinterested love, like the sun whose warmth is dis-pensed impartially, without privileging some favored area over another.

Meditators know how this becomes a kind of meditative absorption. Once you get into it you can stay there hap-pily a long time. In that way, radiation absorption is akin to the jhana that comes through one-pointed attention to a single object. There is similarly a satisfying immersion in the object, but in this case the object is everything. In the first case there’s a progression from the multiplicity of the sense world down to a single point of expe-rience; in the second, the progress is from a single point – the positive quality – out into universal radiation.

The texts describe a third kind of absorption that is, again, outward- facing: the four arupas or formless jhanas. These spread out to bound-less infinity like the Brahma Viharas, but their sense of boundlessness unites with insight into universal

realities and the experiential spheres of infinite space, of infinite awareness, of no things being per-ceptible, and wherein neither perception nor non-perception can be said to arise.

Compassion meets wisdom as it moves from a single point to infinity, in an intima-tion of insight into the insubstantial nature

of the self. We naturally identify with the self as the central point of our world. But in the Brahma Vihara medi-tations we progressively dis-identify from that center until there is no center.

We tend to think of ourselves as being situated here in space (even here in our heart or head), which is clearly no more than a habitual idea. So to extend out from that single point of identification to the limit of our imagination of space attenuates our natural self-sense to the point of transparency, even invisibility. It’s an experiential, non-analytical and very pleasant way to undermine the illusion of a solid self.

The inner absorptions and the

outer radiation absorptions are worth cultivating, not only because they sup-port insight, but because they’re so good for our mental health. Benefits that come from cultivating universal empathy include mental ease, pa-tience and curiosity. Tradition says radiating metta confers an ability to sleep deeply. And as was pointed out at the beginning, the Brahma Viharas are in themselves states of decreased self-clinging.

So if we practice the Brahma Viha-ras in relation to wisdom practices, empathy increases and self-identi-fication decreases. Eventually they merge, so that love and wisdom become one awakened heart: Bodhicitta.

The inner absorptions and the outer radiation absorptions are worth cultivating, not only because they support insight, but because they’re so good for our mental health.

Kamalashila has been active for 40 years teaching meditation, establishing communities, writing and leading Dharma study. Among his writings is his book, Buddhist Meditation: Tranquility, Imagi-nation and Insight. He founded the West London Buddhist Centre in 1976 and was a founder of the Vajraloka Meditation Centre and Vajrakuta in Wales. He was ordained into the Triratna Buddhist Order by Sangharaskhita in 1974. His website with his teachings and writings is DharmaDoor.org.

- Love/Wisdom continued from page 7

http://www.DharmaDoor.org

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by Dh. Amala

In this article I aim to outline two of five great stages of the spiritual path. They can be called “Developing Happiness”

and “Developing Understanding and Wisdom.” The same aspects are termed “Positive (or Skillful) Emotion” and “Spiritual Death,” respectively, in the Triratna Path of Practice as de-scribed by Dharma teacher extraordi-naire, Urgyen Sangharakshita.

Happiness and wisdom sound good! I’m ready to experience and to develop both of those qualities. Where do I start?

You’ve got to accentuate the positiveEliminate the negativeAnd latch on to the affirmative Don’t mess with Mister-In-BetweenYou’ve got to spread joy up to the maximumBring gloom down to the minimum Have faith or pandemonium’s Liable to walk upon the scene

—Lyrics of the song “Accentuate the Positive;” music by Harold Arlen and

lyrics by Johnny Mercer, 1944

Many of you may know this up-beat song, made popular by the likes of Johnny Mercer and Bing Crosby decades ago. While the words don’t exactly express the Dharma teachings on cultivating positive emotions, they

make a good start for a discussion. For our purposes, let’s say that Mis-ter-In-Between is apathy or indecision and lack of mindfulness, and that pandemonium is the ever-present wheel of samsara bringing confusion, unsatisfactoriness and disappoint-ment into our lives. To either side of these are the poles of the positive and negative, joy and the blues, faith and pandemonium.

What is the positive in a Buddhist context? That which conduces to greater love and care, greater con-tentment and generous exchange, greater clarity and understanding both within us and among those around us, and that which leads to enlightenment.

Positive emotion does not mean being always smiley-happy and feeling good. It does not refer to passing moods or sentiments. It refers to emotion as motivation, as the deeper undercurrents in our mind and heart that flow toward clarity and real ap-preciation of what is actually happen-ing in life.

The positive is not some thing, an object to be acquired or adopted into our psyche and our life. We can’t go out and get it somewhere, nor can we manufacture a potion of the positive. It is attitude and approach. It is appli-cation of attentiveness to unfolding moments, thoughts and actions every day. It is a sifting or selecting among sometimes confusing choices and motives for ways to greet and engage

with the world with respect and kind-ness through acts of body, speech and mind.

It takes practice to prioritize the skillful-leaning (positive) tendencies within our minds that are so jumbled and full of conflicting impulses. Some of us, who tend to wear a negative bias like glasses that tinge everything with a cloud of gloom, need to find ways to recognize love and care when we see it. We need to learn how to accept kindness and feel its soothing effects while looking for ways to be kind to others. We need to put aside the gloomy glasses and learn how to feel joy. We need to allow ourselves to feel connection and to feel touched in the heart.

Others of us, who tend to wear a generally happy bias like cool sun-shades, also need to open to the truth of things. We need to let our-selves feel the cool gray of an im-pending storm or a sad and awkward moment between friends. We need to sit with sadness and not jolly it away, to discover that difficulty walks side by side with happy. Then we will feel greater depth of connection and let ourselves be touched deep in the heart.

A foundational skill for learning how to embody the positive is curios-ity, which can be described as open observation of things without jumping too quickly to assessment, judgment or conclusion. With curiosity we ask

Developing Happiness and Wisdom: No More Pandemonium!

- Happiness continued on page 10

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simply, “What is this?” and wait to hear the answer before speaking.

On the way to positivity we proceed with our eyes open, honestly look-ing within ourselves and all around, at just what there is in front of us with a minimum of embellishment or embroidery. We learn to suspend the habitual running commentary, interpretation and editorializing that

accompany experience. If the path is stony and rough, the landscape is dry and the plants all around have thorns, we note just that. If the path is soft underfoot, covered deep in pine needles, and the trees around are tall and lush, protecting us from bright sun, we note just that. Trees, thorns, soft, stony – we aim to approach all landscapes with appreciation and respect.

To be open and attentive – to a friend, to our own feelings and thoughts, to aches and pains, to a situation at work – is already positive. Mindful attention is already kind. Awareness without haste or cut-off is already generous. Our attitude or approach of open curiosity paves the way for skillful and positive tendencies to proceed.

What is the negative in a Buddhist context? That which conduces to ill-will, greed or unawareness and spiritual ignorance; that which per-petuates stress, unsatisfactoriness (dukkha), and leaves us none the wiser as to how to attain happiness or wisdom.

The negative is not a thing. It, too, is an approach, a way of being, thinking and acting, a habit, even. The negative is rooted in views that hold us to be separate beings in some definitive, enduring way. If I am me and this me has some ultimate significance, then you are other and all things are other

and significant in relation to me. With this set of blinders on, we act

and think and speak with continual self-reference. We all do this. It is called spiritual ignorance, and from it comes all manner of unsatisfying experience (dukkha). We suffer as we grasp greedily after things and experiences that we think will make us happy. We suffer as we separate the world into people and things we

like and don’t like. We suffer when our hopes and expectations are dashed time and again. If this is the negative, then yes, please – as the song says – let us eliminate it!

The negative is not just what we don’t like, find difficult or do not enjoy – like a bad mood. It is what-ever keeps us entangled in samsara, whatever keeps us unaware of how things really are, whatever does not enlighten.

To lean away from the negative, openness and curiosity again are important. Open, unflinching ob-servation of what is happening in a moment and over time shows us that grasping behavior and hateful thoughts contribute to our unhap-piness. We begin to see that if we connive to get our own way, believing we must protect our self-importance, we are likely to damage relationships along the way. The deep-down satis-fying sense of connection with others may be lost to the extent we are locked in self-reference. It requires steady resolve to develop the kind of fearless open attention that shows up our own unskillfulness.

The Four Right Efforts, guided by the Five Precepts, are essential for this stage of developing happiness and eliminating the negative. The efforts are undertaken in meditation and at all times off the cushion. They are:

(1) to prevent the arising of unaris-en unwholesome states;

(2) to abandon unwholesome states that have already arisen;

(3) to arouse wholesome states that have not yet arisen;

(4) to maintain and perfect whole-some states already arisen.

What does this mean? 1) To make sure that hateful, jealous

or complaining thoughts do not rise in my mind, I remain actively mind-ful, aware of the tiny beginnings of thoughts, ready to turn away from anything unhelpful. This requires vigi-lance and training myself to recognize mental hindrances.

2) If hateful, jealous or other un-helpful thoughts arise in my mind, I find a way to stop them. Just stop. Why dwell on a train of thought that makes me feel bad about myself, puts someone else down or seeks to take advantage?

3) To encourage mental states that bring ease, contentment and focus, I actively set out to cultivate mindful-ness, metta, energy, concentration, tranquility and more; again through meditation and in activity.

4) Once positive states of mind are present, I recognize and support them and allow them to expand. This requires letting myself have new kinds of experiences, going beyond habitual thought patterns and understandings of myself.

The Five Precepts are recited in the Triratna Buddhist Community in both their negative and positive forms – things to abstain from and things to cultivate. The positive qualities can be thought of as a description of the natural states of enlightened mind. As we get to know ourselves, drop some of our self-limiting views and learn to pay attention to things around us, we naturally become more kind, gener-ous, content, truthful and mindful. The precepts are a framework for our efforts.

In the process of strengthening pos-itive tendencies, weakening negative habits and creating conditions for happiness to arise, faith is a helpful partner. Faith can mean many things,

The negative is not just what we don’t like, find difficult or do not enjoy like a bad mood. It is whatever keeps us entangled in samsara...

- Happiness continued from page 9

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and appear to us in different ways. To some, faith will center on the example of the historical Buddha, a man who, through determination and focus, broke through spiritual ignorance to find the roots of enduring happiness, wisdom and equanimity. If he can do it, we can, too.

Faith also means confidence: con-fidence in the path and the Buddha’s teachings, in the practices we are doing, in ourselves. Faith can be a coming together of our heart and mind with our experience. We start to believe what we see; that being truth-ful makes communication more satis-fying, for example. Faith can be a trust in ourselves. We are able to change unhelpful habits, experience joy and withstand sadness, and survive when these states change.

The work – or practice – of the stage of developing happiness and positive emotion involves being more mind-ful; knowing ourselves deeply; paying attention to the thoughts, motivations and patterns behind our behavior.

In this stage we make a real connec-tion among our inner mental states, our actions, what happens and how we feel. For example, if I make the effort to practice Metta Bhavana med-itation and to listen to others with metta during the day, I experience greater clarity and fulfillment. I also may experience strong shifts in how I understand myself. I may have some

rude awakenings. I may realize – in the difficult person stage of a metta meditation or in a meeting – that the other person is just being who they are. I am the one who is perceiving and perpetuating the difficulty. My mental framework and attempt to make myself look good often sour an otherwise perfectly friendly situation.

Repeated awakenings of this nature can shake us deeply. We find we are not any more or less important than the other person. We all act in a dance of inconceivable complexity, responding to situations and con-ditions, and, in turn, contributing to situations and conditions. Boundar-ies of me and other blur. Perhaps we begin to see there is no need to look through the lens of me all the time. We realize that the way we’ve thought of situations has been colored and distorted by self-reference. It can be scary to remain open and curious as we recognize our own delusion, and a new way of looking emerges.

This kind of experience is called “Developing Understanding and Wis-dom” or “Spiritual Death.” This phase of spiritual life is indeed both of these. Wisdom is seeing reality more clearly as well as a profound letting go of former or limited views, particularly regarding the sense of selfhood.

Wisdom, or clear seeing, goes hand in hand with mindful attention, active abandonment of the negative and

cultivation of the positive. It is natural that we start to recognize our own agency in the life we experience, and we begin to change. As the main reference point moves away from me, it becomes not a point at all, without periphery and center, vast like all of space.

At this stage we need a strong base of positive emotion, skillful habits and faith behind us. While we may be elated and relieved to experience the release of a limited self-view, we also may be disoriented.

It is more important than ever to stand firmly in the ethical practices of kindness, generosity, contentment, truthfulness and mindfulness. It is vital to develop our confidence in the depths and universal reach of loving kindness and compassion, joy and equanimity. It is helpful to look to the Buddha for the way to live after wisdom strikes. Glimmers of a radi-ant, confident and clear way of being will emerge for us, mingled with the processes of cultivating what is skillful and positive, letting go and even breaking down.

Stages of the spiritual life unfold in sequence as our practice deep-ens, but are not discrete. Peace and integration will deepen as the next stages develop. Happiness and posi-tive emotion contribute to the arising of both wisdom and spiritual death, and are refreshed and deepened by the new perspectives that come from deep letting go. A continual overlap-ping process moves us forward along the path.

While every phase and every effort is integral to the journey, for many of us, the stage of developing happi-ness and positive emotion is one that deserves dedicated attention. The emerging wisdom and understanding, infused with love and compassion, will flower readily into radiant freedom.

Amala began her journey with

Buddhism in the 1970s and with the Triratna Buddhist Community in 1991. She was ordained into the Triratna Buddhist Order in 2000 and is active at Aryaloka Buddhist Center, where she is currently chair of the Spiritual Vitality Council.

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by Neil Harvey

A man sails to Chi-na to find out more about what the monk Bodhidharma brought from India: the teach-

ings of Gautama, the teachings of an enlightened one. He sits at the feet of masters for some years and wakes up. He hurls a three-pronged dorje in the direction of his island home. He sails back to see where the dorje has landed, and there begins teaching what he learned.

The man was Kūkai, a Japanese monk born in the 8th century, and we are meditating on the mountain (Mt. Koya in Japan) where the dorje he threw was found; where sincere people have meditated, studied and prayed since 819 AD; where it is said Kukai side-stepped death and still sits in perfect samadhi under the ancient trees which shade monasteries and 120 temples.

We are Triratna Order members, mitras, meditators, artists, photogra-phers and poets – 12 pilgrims who were guided by our leader Kiranada, fresh from a year-long solitary retreat, on a 14-day pilgrimage in April 2016 to backstage Kyoto, Japan. We are Brits, Americans, a Swede, a Finn, and a New Zealander, and we are a long way from home. We journeyed to Mt. Koyasan and Kyoto, the heart-mind cultural treasury of Japan.

Massive pillars of cedar and pine

support tons of decorative roof tiles at temple after temple, as if they were light as feathers. At each gate we turn around to pop off our street shoes, back up onto the clean wooden step, slip on temple slippers and scuff our way onto polished broad-planked floors – creaking by design – and then abandon the slippers and rise again, in stocking feet, to tatami grass mats.

The thresholds we enter, from soto to ushi – outside to inside – mirror our pilgrims’ path. We pass through great guardian pillars to gliding paper walls, to the shadowy world of the interior alcove. There we discover a poem upon which calligraphy silently dances on a scroll and an earthen vase holds a spare stem/leaf/flower arrangement. It is a shrine to beau-ty, impermanence and wisdom that seems to whisper, “Be welcome to leave your armor out at the gate, and please join us within this precious moment.”

Two of Kiranada’s life-long col-leagues opened their home art studios to us. These kimono artists of the highest tradition presented their silks – bright color fields shaped by wax resist – conducted a formal tea ceremony, and offered sweet treats and so much laughter!

At the Pure Land Honen-in Temple, devoted to Amida Buddha, the screen to the Abbot’s private quarters and moss blanketed garden was pulled back for us. We had an exclusive audience – a great privilege – at a low

table on cushions just down the hall from the emperor’s personal rooms.

Our schedule was full but perfectly punctuated with free time to explore museums, meet pottery artisans, watch traditional dance, try calligraphy and flower arranging or shop for gifts. This pilgrim returned to 17th century Haiku master Basho’s preserved hut to meditate, write Heart Sutra man-tras on native paper and sit alone for hours watching the soft Kyoto rain.

How could one not write poetry? At the Daisen-In temple I encoun-

tered these words of Zen Master Soen Ozeki:

A Song of Gratitude

The whole family, harmonious and devoutAware of debts to our parents and ancestors.Revering Nature, grateful for society.Always humble, learning from others.Able to give, demonstrating kindness.Making one’s motto: “A bright life.”Overlooking others’ faults, correcting one’s own.Moderate in speech, not getting angry.Gentle, kind, honest.Let’s appreciate the joy of life…Where kindness is the natural by-product of being alive.

Pilgrimage to Kyoto: Where Kindness is the Natural By-product of Being Alive

photo: Neil Harvey

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Here is a Kyoto pilgrim’s recipe for awakening:

At 7 a.m. sit in a circle of Order members and mature meditators.

Enjoy a slow breakfast of exotic vegetarian tastes and textures.

Be led to sacred shrines and deli-cate gardens where, for generations, aspirants before you have prayed for your enlightenment.

Purify your hands and mouth at ancient stone basins where shining water flows.

Offer incense and candles for those to come.

Breathe. Wander carefree among foreign but

friendly faces who bow and laugh with you at the slightest invitation.

Step mindfully, honoring the social restraints of politeness and commu-nity. All are designed to support the truth that your individuality is a playful illusion, and harmonious unity with everyone equally is where you will find home. And “everyone” includes the frogs calling down in the bamboo forest creek; the purple iris briefly blooming; the startling Buddha statue that penetrates your being, bringing tears; the evening bath that loosens your bones; the yukata (sleeping ki-mono) cotton on your shoulders; the fired clay cup that holds your tea; the thin rice membrane walls that wash away the impulse to trivial speech; and the new bamboo brush in your hand. To all these, you softly offer thanks as to dear relatives.

As my airliner taxied away from the gate for the return flight home, out the window I noticed two impecca-bly-uniformed ground crewmen wear-ing white helmets. As our jumbo jet passed them, in unison they deeply bowed to the plane and waved us on our journey. This moment rang with so many other moments in Kyoto: the enthusiastic “Arigato Gozaimasu!” to every passenger from the white gloved bus driver, chanting quietly together beneath the Okaeri Ami-

Kiranada (second from left) led a pilgrimage to Kyoto, Japan, with 12 pilgrims from around the world including (left from bottom) Dayadharani, Kiranada, Taramani, Alexandra Suffolk Maitriprabha and Victoria Fahey; and (right from top) Warren Moeller, Robbin Smith, Neil Harvey, Lisa Kelly, Visshudhimati, Susan Carragher and Sanghadevi. Photo: Ito-san

tabha rupa looking over his shoulder, receiving the precise kyosaku, awak-ening stick, blow from the Zen master in zazen, the all-universe-this-moment look from the begging monk as we drop small change into his bowl, the Koyasan priest’s invitation to focus on the seed syllable “ah.”

Some 1200 years after Kūkai’s hero-ic journey, this contemporary woman flies far away to find out more about what is pulling at her heart. She learns about the teachings of Gautama, an enlightened one. She sits at the feet of masters for some years and wakes up. Lucky us. She throws fabric art, paintings and calligraphy in the direction of her home. She receives the name Kiranada which means “she who gives or radiates moonlight.” She organizes the trip of a lifetime, and more make the journey with her.

This is our small song of gratitude.May all benefit.

Pilgrimage to Kyoto: Where Kindness is the Natural By-product of Being Alive

photo: Neil Harvey

Neil Harvey is an award-win-ning artist, photographer and writer. A student of the Nyingma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, he has been practicing meditation at the Aryaloka, Portsmouth and New York sanghas since 2011.

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ARYALOKA SANGHA(NEWMARKET, NH)

sangha notes

Aryaloka offered and hosted a range of retreats, celebrations, prac-tice days and classes this past spring. Highlights of recent activities and ongoing events follow.

Ongoing eventsBodhana continues to lead open

meditation sessions for all levels of experience Monday, Tuesday and Thursday mornings.

Rijupatha leads a monthly Young Sangha Hangout for friends in their 20s or 30s (or thereabouts). These gatherings offer young folks with an interest in Buddhist practice to meet and practice together.

Alisha Roberts leads monthly Chil-dren’s Sangha classes for children up to age nine. In each class there is a short talk, gentle meditation and an arts and crafts activity related to a Buddhist theme.

Special eventsSatyada and Amala hosted Aryalo-

ka’s Buddha Day Celebration with readings, talks and quiet contempla-tion to help deepen our relationship with the Buddha and enlightenment.

To celebrate the founding of our community, Khemavassika led medi-tations and a puja as part of Triratna Day.

Order members from the northeast gathered for a practice day, “The Big Picture,” with Kamalashila, an Order member from the UK. They studied and meditated upon the relationship between compassion and emptiness. This was Kamalashila’s third retreat at Aryaloka in three years, and dis-cussions have already begun for an Order retreat with him in 2017.

Aryaloka’s Fundraising Dinner and Silent Auction in May raised more than $1,800 of much-needed funds. Many thanks to those who contribut-ed artwork, crafts, gift certificates and other items to the auction, and to the crew who prepared a delicious Thai dinner.

More than 30 Order members, mi-tras and friends attended this year’s Spring Work Days in May. One group cleared a spot for a memorial garden while another group cleaned out the barn in preparation for some upcom-ing renovations to Akashaloka.

RetreatsIn April, Sunada and Viriyalila led

“Living With Mindfulness,” an opportu-nity for folks to try a gentle introduc-tion to weekend retreats.

Megrette Fletcher led “After the First Bite,” a retreat on mindful eat-ing that took a deep look at habits around food to transform mind, health and life.

Friends’ NightAs part of the late winter Friends’

Night series, members of the teach-ing team led a session called “What is the Buddha?” – our introductory session on the Buddha, his history and enlightenment. A second session, “Ego and the Idea of a Fixed Self,” was facilitated by Arjava and Akashavanda. It explored the fiction of self and how we cling to it. The discussion looked at how ego grasping affects mindfulness, compassion and awakening in daily life.

During the spring series, Satyada is leading an introductory session on the The Noble Eightfold Path. Arjava is leading “No Self, No Problem,” a follow-on to the winter series session. Tom Gaillard and Khemavassika’s group are studying stories from the Jataka Tales. These fables are some of the oldest texts describing the Bud-dha’s remembrances of his past lives and express Buddhist values, such as kindness, generosity and truthfulness.

— Pete Ingraham

Keeping Sangha Connected

Sangha members Elizabeth Hellard (below) and Tom Gaillard (left) joined more than 30 others in May for work days at Aryaloka.

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Kay Jones, now Samatara, was sent off to be ordained in March by her newly formed women’s chapter: (left to right front) Tejavani, Samatara, Varada and (standing left to right) Shuddhabha and Vara-suri.

Karunadevi (back right) from San Francisco led a women’s practice day with (left to right front) Varasuri, Kelley Willett, Kathleen Sta-chowski, Amy Engkjer, Ashly Roberts, and (left to right back row) Annette Puttkammer, LeAnne McDonald, Cynthia Stary, Varada, Tejavani and Carol Matthews.

ROCKY MOUNTAIN SANGHA(MISSOULA, MT)

We are pleased that two new Order member chapters have been established in Missoula. Beginning in December 2015, a mixed chap-ter began meeting weekly and has continued with steady attendance and enthusiasm. Members are Abhayanaga, Karunakara, Saramati, Sarananda, Sthiradasa and Varasuri. A newly-formed women’s chapter be-gan meeting in January this year. We have met every other week by Skype because of the distances between us. Montana isn’t called big sky country

for nothing! The chapter has man-aged also a few in-person meetings on some weekends. It’s been great that all four Dharmacharinis in west-ern Montana can attend this chapter: Shuddhabha, Tejavani, Varada and Varasuri. We look forward to having our newest Dharmacharini Samatara, ex-Kay Jones, join us this summer. We gave Kay a send-off to Akashavana, the women’s ordination retreat center in the mountains above Valderro-bres, Spain at the end of March, and are holding a place for her when she returns!

During the second week of May, the Rocky Mountain Buddhist Center

hosted a visit by Karunadevi and Tara-prabha. Karunadevi led the Wednes-day Sangha night with a discussion of the Brahma Viharas. She also led a women’s practice day with 12 women in attendance on the theme of spiri-tual friendship – a lovely, lively event. Karunadevi and Taraprabha then joined the other Dharmacharinis for a women’s Order meeting. Everyone ap-preciated having these two wonderful women visit our Sangha!

— Dh. Varasuri

sangha notes

aryaloka.org

The annual spring Triratna retreat was held in early May at Samish Island Camp in Washington. Organized by the Vancouver Sangha with some help from the Seattle Sangha, the retreat was attended by people from Seattle, Vancouver Island, San Fran-cisco and Tacoma. More than half of the 40 attendees were from Vancou-ver. The location was picked for its beauty, centrality and affordability. The retreat ― “Four Reminders: A Tiny Splash of a Raindrop” ― was led by Order member Nagapriya.

The following are reflections from Seattle Sangha member Gary Derry who attended the retreat.

Our human birth is preciousI wasted time; now time wastes

me. Cultivate a sense of blessedness as you use your three conditions of opportunity, capacity and motiva-tion. How can I make the most of my favorable conditions? How can I bring more gratitude into my life?

As our small group met outside to discuss these questions, several owls carried on their own conversations in the nearby trees. After a refreshing day of sits, small group discussions, and delicious food, we went into silence after our evening meal. We walked along the bay draped in the pink orange of sunset in twilight. I reflected on living in gratitude rather than moaning over my struggles.

Death and impermanenceNever be too overjoyed when

someone arrives, nor too distressed when someone leaves. It is challeng-ing to let go of our attachments to the future. If this is our last time together, all I want is to be present. Rejoice in personal merits. Hold them lightly. Embrace death as part of the karmic rebirth process.

While rediscovering the labyrinth, I noticed swallows squeakily vie for a place to rest in three nests at the apex of the roof outside the shrine building. I love you, and one day you

and I will die.Karma and consequences

I have the significant responsibility of always being between inheriting the consequences from my past ac-tions and creating my future. Be care-ful about the stories I reinforce. Own my part. In the middle of the night, an owl announced my comings and goings with one hoot for each time I went outdoors. Can I see how my past actions have created my current life? What kind of legacy do I want to leave behind in this lifetime?

The limitations of samsaraSamsara is the opportunity. Suffer-

ing is the beginning of the real path. We live in samsara – the wheel of the wholeness of life. Recognize and accept the stories I create. Create a space between an event and the sto-ries I create about the event. Watch how I tend to find fault with others and myself. How do I create my own suffering? I have a choice.

As I rowed a canoe on the brackish lake, blue herons flew overhead on their way to their rookery. I smelled the fresh air and felt the breeze on my cheeks. On shore, people swam and others sunbathed. Radiate love and place your heart on the Dharma, remembering that others suffer just as I do. In my heart I wished, “May we be happy, may we be well and may we be free of suffering.”

— Gary Derry, Paramita Banerjee with edits by Reg Johanson

TRIRATNA VANCOUVER(VANCOUVER, BC)

SAN FRANCISCO SANGHA(SAN FRANCISCO, CA)

Spring brought more sunny after-noons to San Francisco, a pattern that lasted until the summer fog started rolling in. The construction on Bartlett Street – where the San Francisco Bud-dhist Centre is located – is complete, and the street is open to traffic again.

Down the street from the center is the San Francisco Police Depart-ment’s Mission Station, where activists camped out and fasted for 17 days in April and May to bring attention to patterns of police brutality in San Francisco’s communities of color. This peaceful protest raised awareness of institutionalized racism, already on many minds due to police/community dynamics around the country, and the climate of intolerance fostered on a national level by the rhetoric used in the presidential race.

The center hosted a Sangha night series in May on “Transforming Intolerance and Racism: Training our Hearts and Minds.” The series was intended for anyone interested in us-ing Dharma training tools to respond creatively to the persistent problem of racism, including rising Islamophobia, in our world.

- SF Sangha continued on page 18

sangha notes

The annual spring Triratna retreat was held in May on Samish Island, in Washington State.

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The Triratna New York Sangha has been my spiritual home for more than eight years, and I am happy to provide an update from us for the Vajra Bell.

In late March, the New York Sangha took a major step forward: its council decided to sponsor and hold a spring retreat. More than two dozen of us gathered at The Grail, a Jesuit wom-en’s retreat center in the Hudson Valley, just an hour north of New York City, for an inspiring weekend of med-itation, study and fellowship.

This was the first time we have organized a retreat of our own at a retreat center and enlisted the other Northeast Triratna sanghas for sup-port. The weekend brought together Triratna members from New York, New Jersey, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont, includ-ing several members who do not have the benefit of a local sangha and were particularly happy for the opportunity to participate in our community.

The theme was “Love meets Wis-dom: Compassion, Impermanence and Insight.” The retreat was led by Kamalashila, an Order member from the UK and one of our movement’s most experienced meditation teach-

ers, along with Order member Amala from Aryaloka in New Hampshire, another experienced meditation teacher.

One highlight was some amaz-ing chanting led by Amala who also taught several sessions. Many of us enjoyed a trip across the Hudson by ferry as one leg of our journey to the retreat. What a great way to get things started. The Grail itself is a fantastic place for a retreat, a classic Victorian estate house with plenty of bedrooms and bathrooms, an expansive proper-ty and a stone labyrinth, whose spiral path is designed to foster contempla-tion and insight.

Having made the long trek to Ary-aloka many times in the past, it was our pleasure to be able to reciprocate and offer hospitality to our many friends. Special thanks to Savanna Jo Luraschi for organizing the retreat. Of course, it took a village, so thanks also to: Padmadharini and Singhatara for all the wonderful food, Josh Heath for serving as shrine keeper, Gary Baker for coordinating transportation, Vajra-mati for handling publicity, and Alyssa Fradenberg and Liesl Glover for helping with preorganization support along with many others, including Jon Aaron and Elaine Smith.

In other NY news, we are continuing

NEW YORK SANGHA(NEW YORK CITY, NY)

to slowly build our sangha’s founda-tion of leadership. Padmadharini, an Order member originally from the UK who has been with us for about two years, has provided a wonderful supplement to Vajramati’s long-time leadership. Samayasri joined us earlier this year and has led some insightful Sangha night teachings. In September, New Zealander Tejopala will be joining us.

We started a weekly drop-in med-itation class for beginners, and are launching a training program to en-able mitras and other sangha mem-bers to lead the group. At the main Sangha night, we have enjoyed many inspired teachings from our leaders and visiting Order members, as well as programs developed by other sangha members, including Savanna and Alyssa. Josh always brings amaz-ing creativity and spirituality to our shrines, which he sometimes pulls together beautifully in just a few short minutes.

If you are in New York City on a Tuesday night, come visit us, or if you have friends in the Big Apple that could benefit from our spiritual com-munity, send them our way. We are online at triratna-nyc.org.

— Gary Baker

PORTSMOUTH BUDDHIST CENTER(PORTSMOUTH, NH)

Recently Candradasa became co-chair of the Portsmouth Buddhist Center, supporting Suddhayu who has taken on a demanding new job. These two Dharmacharis are long-time friends and will be a dynamic duo at our council helm.

New program offerings will build both our Sangha and our connec-tion to the Portsmouth community. The Sunday morning meditation has expanded into a more substantial community gathering and is our main event of the week. Join us from 10 a.m. till noon any Sunday.

A weekly level two Buddhism class led by Narottama and Khemavassika has gelled into a lively group in recent

Order members Suddhayu (left) and Candradasa recently became co-chairs of the Portsmouth Buddhist Center.

weeks, offering a bridge for newcom-ers to get more involved with the Sangha. We also will launch a series of occasional Buddhism and the Arts events this summer. These will take place in a studio at Portsmouth’s But-ton Factory, giving people a chance to bring their creative side into their Dharma practice. Details of the pro-gram can be found online at TheBud-dhistCentre.com/Portsmouth.

Candradasa and Rijupatha are leading weekly meditation classes at the Portsmouth Public Library as part of a collaboration with other local meditation and mindfulness teach-ers. Sessions are on Mondays from 6 – 6.45 p.m., and Wednesday lunch-times, 12:15 – 1 p.m.

Join the Portsmouth Sangha as part of Triratna on the Seacoast. We look forward to seeing new faces and bonding with old friends as the sum-mer progresses.

— Bettye Pruitt

sangha notes

http://www.triratna-nyc.orghttp://www.TheBuddhistCentre.com/Portsmouthhttp://www.TheBuddhistCentre.com/Portsmouth

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share. We started Saturday with a guid-

ed Metta Bhavana meditation. We followed that practice with further analysis of the Five Spiritual Faculties. We discussed vigor, the energy that motivates our practice. Although we chose many different words to describe it, the theme was the same: vigor fuels our practice.

We then changed gears and gave Susan DiPietro the floor. The men were eager to hear about her recent trip to Nepal. She shared pictures and highlights of her journey. The men were moved when she told them she made a dedication to the Concord Sangha at Everest Base Camp as an expression of her devotion to the Sangha and a tribute to the men who share her spiritual journey.

After lunch we picked up the dis-cussion of the remaining faculties. Concentration was introduced as the counterpart to vigor. With meditation we quiet the mind by reducing dis-tractions and narrow the focus of our

The Khanti Outreach Sangha Re-treat at the Concord State Prison for Men in New Hampshire was held in late April. The theme was “The Five Spiritual Faculties.”

The retreat opened Friday night with the refuges and precepts. We reflected on our intentions for the retreat and meditated. The Dharma study started with discussion about the faith we establish in ourselves and our practice. We discussed the belief that this path is the right one, and that our investment in it will lead to the elimination of suffering, and ultimately, enlightenment.

We discussed wisdom as the coun-terbalance to faith. The pursuit of wisdom opens a window into seeing reality and allows us to increase our understanding of life, its purpose and how our conduct shapes that reality. It was a rich dialogue, and, as always, the men embraced the opportunity to

CONCORD SANGHA(CONCORD, NH)

attention, typically to the breath. We work to hold this state for increasing amounts of time. Concentration al-lows us to focus the boundless energy of the mind.

We then put our knowledge of concentration and mindfulness into practice. One of the men taught the basics of Origami as a way to exer-cise mindfulness. He led us through the creation of a swan and a frog. Watching this group work together to fold paper into a sculpture was a testament to the richness contained in each moment.

We concluded the retreat with a round of reflection and gratitude and the recitation of the refuges and precepts.

If you are interested in attending a retreat, please contact Khema-vassika or Satyada. There are two more retreats scheduled for this year ― July 22–23 and October 20–21. Friday sessions begin at 6:30 p.m. and Saturdays at 8:30 a.m.

— Mike Mappes

sangha notes

The series was well attended and brought newcomers to the center. Order member Viveka led medita-tions each evening that were followed by impressive teachings from guest speakers on breaking down and clarifying what is meant by racism, the different ways it expresses itself, and how we all find ourselves in places of privilege and disadvantage.

In June, a series of activites were of-fered for Buddhist Action Month, the Triratna-wide invitation to get involved in practical actions to express our care and concern for the planet, its people and other beings that inhabit it. Activities include an evening on the ethics of housing, and talks by Sangha members engaged in various forms of activism. Among other things, we will look at the psychological dilemma of feeling disempowered by the mass scale of suffering in the world, and managing our internal dynamics as part of a process of engaging.

The center’s land in Lake County is once again available for retreats and individual rentals. A “Beginner’s Mind” weekend retreat in early June was scheduled along with a week-long summer immersion retreat led by Parmananda on the “Alchemical Heart” in mid-July.

— Mary Salome

The Start of a Young Sangha In the summer of 2014, a bit over-

whelmed by from the San Francisco hustle and bustle, a few young mitra friends met at a bar. Sharing un-certainty about careers, we all were pondering a similar question: “How can I align my livelihood with my true and deeper intentions?”

From those initial get-togethers, we saw the potential for group discus-sion and support among millennials facing similar questions and with lives marked by transitions. Right livelihood was only one facet of living in our modern culture. All the choices we make in society have an impact on

us and the wider world. What about consumerism, awareness of the envi-ronment, our fears, discovering paths that lead to more freedom and even online dating?

This was the start of our Young Sangha group. We opened it up to the larger Sangha by formally creating a half-day retreat on the first Saturday of every month. Each retreat day has a friendly and inclusive space with a mix of group discussion, meditation and sharing of personal experiences. The gatherings have been a way to check in on personal intentions and have been a heartfelt ongoing sup-port for all the organizers.

For future events we are excited to get involved with Buddhist Action Month, try outdoor practice and expand to other creative and playful events. We look forward to more mitras taking a lead role as our core group expands.

— Brad Schwagler

- SF Sangha continued from page 16

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by Bettye Pruitt

The Button Factory is a big red brick industrial building in Portsmouth, NH, that houses artists’ studios. Narottama

welcomed me into Studio 321, a cluttered space on the third floor where he lives and creates a couple of days a week. In December last year, I came to the holiday open studios at The Button Factory and had admired the beautiful whale and other figures

Narottama had carved out of drift-wood. At a more recent meeting in his studio, he had a painting-in-progress on an easel – a landscape with dark blue mountains in the background – and a well-used copy of In the Bud-dha’s Words on the table nearby.

Connecting with Triratna

Triratna came to Bill Horton at a time of crisis. In 1991, while working on a construction site, he fell from a ladder and broke his leg in two places. “At that time I had six children and a farm with 30 cows, and we were raising 30 acres of organic vegetables . . . I found myself going from 150 miles per hour every day to a dead stop, in a recliner with a cast on my leg.”

At the time, there were only 600 Triratna Order Members in the world (today there are more than 2,000) and one of them lived a mile and a half from Bill’s house in Maine. “I knew this person, but I didn’t know anything about the Order or anything. He came over and visited and said, ‘I’m starting a meditation class in Belfast, would you like to come?’ I said, ‘Yes, as soon as I can walk!’”

The Order member was Dayarat-na. “I still feel a very strong sense of appreciation and gratitude for that connection on many different levels; one being that he taught me the Mindfulness of Breathing and showed me that, yes, you can slow your mind down.” Narottama recalled his state of mind at that time: “You reach a sort of a crisis in your life and say, ‘Is this all there is? There must be something more.’”

The quest for more led him deep-er into meditation, the Dharma and

Triratna. He became a mitra in 1994 and in a few years began teaching classes in the Belfast sangha after Dayaratna returned to Cambridge, U.K. At times, he drove well over two hours each way from Maine to New Hampshire to attend mitra classes at Aryaloka.

“I didn’t do that very often, but there was a very strong desire to experi-ence community, approach the truth, wake up, whatever you want to call it. Along the way there were a lot of people who were very helpful, and I’m here today because of those connec-tions.”

Experience of ordinationBill Horton became Narottama at

Guhyaloka in southeastern Spain in 2007. “So I was a mitra for 12 years. Whoever was in charge probably figured I was going to be too old if they didn’t ordain me and just said, ‘We’d better get this guy done.’” In fact, at one point he had become

sangha connectionsConversations with Triratna Order Members

Dh. Narottama: Supporting Others in a Helpful, Mindful Way With No Expectations

Narottama lives and creates a few days a week in Studio 321 in The Button Factory in Portsmouth, NH.

Writer’s Note: I proposed writing a series of profiles of Triratna Order members for the Vajra Bell, because it allows me to do two things in my work that I most enjoy: interviewing people about their lives and careers and supporting – in my professional jargon – a “global learning commu-nity.” The glue holding together a network as far-flung as Triratna is stronger when people have a sense of who’s out there and can imagine them as they go about their lives. Moreover, as a mitra who has asked for ordination, I naturally am curi-ous about the group I am joining and the experiences of those who have gone before me. This is the first in a series of interviews with Order members on three broad topics: their first encounter with Triratna, the changes they experienced with ordination and their practice now. My first subject, Narottama, is someone I see frequently around the Portsmouth Buddhist Center and am able to speak to in person. I found our conversation inspiring. I hope you will, too.

- Connections continued on page 20

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frustrated with the ordination pro-cess and even considered dropping out. Someone suggested he think more about helping other people get ordained and less about his own process. That proved to be helpful advice, which he has carried forward as an Order member. His Sanskrit name, Narottama, means "a man who is upright, capable and dependable in the Dharma."

Narottama was in Spain for more than four months – a significant go-ing-forth in itself. He had three teen-aged children still at home, a business to run and no extra money. “So how do you leave for four months? The rational, logical side said, ‘You don’t.’ And when I talked to people in my family, they said, ‘You don’t!’”

Reflecting on that experience, he realized that it “sort of touches on the Dharma niyama. I don’t want to reify anything or make the abstract con-crete,” he said. “But when I commit-ted, when I made the decision that I was going to go to Spain and stopped the internal conflict, it just opened up. It was like the doors opened and there were helping hands – these invisible helping hands. I don’t want to be mysterious and strange about it, but it was almost as if someone said, ‘Let go, and just go with it.’ Oh, what a powerful experience that was.”

The friendships that developed over the four months were “incredibly powerful. I’m still in contact with a lot of those men and in different ways. It’s not just a text, a phone call and an email. You can connect with people internally and wish them well, and I think that’s also a meaningful form of contact.”

In a way, Narottama said, “It’s a question of what’s really pulling you along? And when you allow that ex-pression to come out, it starts moving into the realm of spiritual energy, which is in everything all the time. We kind of screw it up, because we put labels on this pull or energy and try to

understand it. The intellect gets in the way.” But in the case of the synchro-nicity surrounding his ordination, he said, “I think it was a very strong reminder that there are things going on that we don’t necessarily need to know about from the intellect.”

How did ordination change him? “What changed for me in ordination is still happening,” he said. “It’s not so much an event as a process. I think ordination has just given me recogni-tion that what I’m doing is meaningful, has merit and is worthy. And to be recognized as such gives it validity, permission almost. That’s both an in-ternal and an external component in that. At some point, what’s happening inside manifests itself outside. Things are just flowing in a certain way.”

The work of an Order member, Narottama said, is to “continually lessen your ego clinging. That’s going to take place internally, as well as in classes and everywhere else. And there sure as heck is a lot of opportu-nity to lessen the ego. It comes up all the time.”

Current practice: mindfulness and metta

Narottama’s practices these days focus on basic mindfulness and metta. “I’ve realized recently that a lot of us talk about compassion, and compas-sion is conditional,” he said. “There are certain things that have to be in place for compassion to arise. If I’m

not feeling a sense of metta when I run into someone who’s suffering, there’s no room for compassion to arise. So I have to keep it mindful, keep it positive, and be open and curious about what’s next.”

Being open to what’s next is a practice in itself. “I’m moving towards zero,” he said. “I don’t want to know. I don’t need to know. I don’t need to figure everything out. It’s just what’s the next step, the next thing to do, while trying as much as possible to experience as clearly as possible what’s going on, paying more atten-tion to the raw data and not the in-terpretation, the narrative that we tell ourselves. That’s what we’re caught up in. It can be useful, but it can also be a wicked hindrance.”

More than anything, Narottama fo-cuses on “just participating in life” and supporting others in doing the same. About a year ago, his son died of cancer. Now he takes his three-year-old grandson to the library one day a week, finding pleasure in helping the boy get over his shyness and fear of new situations.

“If you can help another human being navigate this challenging world that we’re in, help them build con-fidence in themselves and listen to their own heart, not what other peo-ple are telling them – within reason – I think that’s one of the best gifts you can pass on to people. We all need it

- Connections continued from page 19

If I start to worry about a finished product, I’m going to ruin it. It’s like the spiritual life in general: you have a direction and here’s the canvas. What are you going to do with it, and where’s it going to go?

sangha connections

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in some way.”Narottama is a mainstay of the class

offerings at the Portsmouth Bud-dhist Center. He also teaches at the Nagaloka Buddhist Center in Portland, ME, and participates in the men’s ordination trainings at Aryaloka. He doesn’t think of himself as a teacher, though, and prefers to be thought of as “hosting.”

Recently, he signed up to cook at the men’s ordination training retreat next summer, still following that advice about helping others get or-dained. “To me the richest experience in life is being involved in other peo-ple’s worlds – my 98-year-old mother, my three-year-old grandson, intro classes, whatever it is – just being engaged in a helpful, mindful way. Not expecting anything back. It sounds all altruistic and warm and fuzzy but I get a hell of a lot out of it.” For Narottama, these connections are what keep it all together.

Down the rabbit hole of artSince attending a retreat at

Adhisthana in England, “Beauty, Eros and the Spiritual Life,” led by Subhuti in May 2014, Narottama’s quest to lessen ego clinging “moved into the realm of seeing beauty everywhere.” For him, beauty has become “another avenue into seeing reality. If you can step away and stop judging and com-paring and all of that,” he said, “you can enter into the realm of seeing conditioned existence, and by seeing that you are participating in beauty, with a capital B. Then that opens up into creativity, and where can you express that – in a conversation, in a class, in a painting, in a poem and everywhere!”

Part of being in the Order, Narotta-ma says, is being encouraged to be oneself. “Often when we’re ordained, we think, ‘Oh, I’m doing it for these reasons.’ But there’s always some deeper level to be explored. And this way of creativity and seeing beauty is really a path to waking up.”

Buddhaworksthe aryaloka bookstore

Your support brightens Aryaloka’s future.Buddhaworks is located at the Aryaloka Buddhist Center

The bookstore is geared up for the summer!

You will find:A nice selection of cotton medita-

tion shawls and cotton Om scarves in lovely colors.

A silver and turquoise pendant with matching earrings in the jew-elry section that can be purchased as a set or separately. The jewelry section also has both neck and adjustable wrist skull malas, adjust-able copper Om Mani Padme Hum rings and one spinning Om Mani Padme Hum ring.

A supply of Nag Champa incense and several sweet Jizos for your home or garden.

A fresh selection of cards with photography by Bodhana and art-

work by Eric Ebbeson.Several additional book titles in

the used book section! If you plan to weed out your collection of Dhar-ma or poetry books, please keep us in mind for donations.

A display of the long awaited book of poetry by Kavyadhristi titled Be-coming A Buddhist. This is a collec-tion of poems by Kavyadhristi that touch the heart and warm the soul.When logging in your purchases, please indicate the part number for each item you are buying (if avail-able) as this helps us to track what items are selling and what items need to be reordered.

– by Dh Shantikirika

Bettye Pruitt joined the Triratna community through the Portsmouth Buddhist Center in 2011. She became a mitra in 2012 and asked for ordination in 2013.

For example, he suggested one can approach each day creatively, whatev-er it entails: “You can paint it with dark moody colors, or bright shiny colors, or boring colors – however it is, it’s up to you. And that’s a way of living that really adds a lot more richness.”

I asked if his carving and painting began after the 2014 retreat or had he always done them. “It’s like coming back to something,” he said. "Recently I’ve fallen into the rabbit hole of art. It’s everywhere. I was up way too late last night dabbling, and I realize it’s all just a practice. If I start to worry about a finished product, I’m going to ruin it. It’s like the spiritual life in general: you have a direction and here’s the canvas. What are you going to do with it, and where’s it going to go? So you’re opening yourself up to a higher form of guidance in some way. And

your self falls away, and you become more open to what there is and let it happen – the painting or the conver-sation or whatever.”

“It’s nice if you were encouraged as a child," Narottama said, "but some-times when you’re not encouraged as a child you do it anyway – carve your initials in trees and whatnot. But it’s in everyone, and I’d like to turn the Button Factory 321 into a space for art. What can we do in here?”

aryaloka.org

by Mary SchaeferCo-editor, Vajra Bell

In early June I attended a retreat led by Yasho-bodhi, an Order member from London. I landed at

Aryaloka Friday evening coming off an intense and stressful few weeks. As I settled in for the opening dedication in the shrine room, my body vibrated while my mind still actively picked through details of the week and work not yet done.

In those opening moments, Yasho-bodhi invited us to take the weekend to “rest your brain” and “give your lit-eral mind a holiday.” At that invitation, my shoulders dropped slightly and I wanted to ask, “can I give my body a rest, too?” But my mind just wanted the details on what steps I needed to take to achieve this brain rest.

The retreat theme was “Opening to the Heart’s Wisdom,” described as an “intensive meditation weekend invit-ing the heart to be open and listening deeply to what it is trying to tell us …allowing the mysterious process of the bodhichitta to manifest in our experience.”

“How ambitious,” Yashobodhi said, warning us that there are no short cuts to wisdom.

Try as I might, particularly in our western, mind-centric world, I can’t think or study my way to wisdom. I instead – as Yashobodhi suggested – need to create the conditions for wisdom to arise. It requires space and spaciousness in my life so that I can open my heart for listening deeply and allowing wisdom to show itself.

As I started to rest my brain, my body followed suit. I then started to become keenly aware of how tired my body and brain were with all the effort they were putting forth in the world. Not the conditions of space and spaciousness. If wisdom was there, no way was I going to hear it with all that clutter and clatter.

from the editors

Opening to the heart’s wisdom does not require effort, Yashobodhi said. Our minds are always so busy. She likened our careening thoughts to a bull in a china shop, and we often bring that busyness and effort to the cushion.

Keep a light touch in your medi-tation, she encouraged. Open the space. Breathe in the world – whatev-er you are experiencing – and breathe out your influence on the world. And may that influence be light, easy and kind. Play, don’t plow, your way through meditation, she said.

As I breathed in and breathed out, listening to her quiet thoughtful guid-ance, my mind and body eased. Make the space. No effort. How simple (how hard!) is that?! I felt lighter, more cre-ative and playful.

The retreat was an important reminder with a large dose of per-mission to take time to just sit and breathe and give the mind a holiday. Go light on the effort. Meditation is not something on my to-do list to be worked at under the heading “things to do to be a better Buddhist.” It is an invitation to breathe in and breathe out, watch, listen deeply and wait. Only then can I open to my heart’s wisdom.

Deepening FriendshipIn 2010, I asked for ordination into

the Triratna Buddhist Order. These past few years I have been on a path of deepening commitment to the Buddha, deepening practice of the Dharma, and deepening friendships within the Sangha. In May, surround-ed by my fellow mitra sisters in the Dharma, I took another step to deepen my friendships. In a sweet and affirming ceremony with Amala, Khemavassika and Lilasiddhi became my Kalyana Mitras (KM) – a term that means beautiful friend.

Spiritual friendship, said the Bud-dha, is the whole of the spiritual life, and that is particularly true in the Triratna Buddhist Community with the emphasis on Sangha and friendship.

Amala, as a private preceptor, led the kalyana mitra (KM) ceremony at Nagoloka in Portland, ME, where Khemavassika and Lilasiddhi became Mary Schaefer’s spiritual friends.

Making Space: You Can’t Think Your Way to Wisdomfrom the editors

aryaloka.org

from the editors

by David WattCo-editor, Vajra Bell

Four times a year, we have the privilege of publishing the Vajra Bell, and I have the opportu-

nity to write in this space. I generally reflect on the quality of the writing we receive and the joy and comfort I ex-perience at Aryaloka. While this issue is filled with wonderful essays, articles and poetry (please read them), world events have drawn my attention to why I practice in the first place.

Several years ago after the Sandy Hook massacre, Shrijnana led a sim-ple memorial ceremony in the shrine room. She placed the large gong in the center of the dome and rang it 27 times – once for each of those killed. We then meditated. As I meditated on compassion, I was engulfed by sor-row. Soon I was choking back sobs. I stayed until everyone left so that I could weep openly. In the wake of the recent tragedy in Orlando, I had a similar experience while meditating.

The idea that one man, acting out of his own anger and despair, could destroy so many beautiful lives is disturbing enough, but the reality of it again opened up a well of sorrow.

Trying to develop wisdom in the face of these tragedies that strike so close to home – not to mention the countless other daily tragedies in the world – I can feel like I’m living in denial. How is it possible to reconcile the anger I feel with the desire to be compassionate to all beings? How is it possible to believe that my practice and what little acts of generosity I and my fellow practitioners do can some-how blunt the momentum of the evil that exists?

If I have learned anything from the Dharma, it is to take a long, expansive view. The suffering of the victims and their families and those who grieve with them will diminish and transform over time. Acting with compassion, we can help with that process. Those who were killed did not live in vain. Our world and our lives are richer because they were here. If we act

skillfully, we can help the world learn to celebrate the gay community and, by extension, ourselves. We can celebrate their courage and vitality and realize that maybe we have those qualities, too.

One realization I had during these experiences of sorrow is that I tend to use anger to avoid sadness, because sadness is so much more painful. Just as aversion is a hindrance in medita-tion, it is also a hindrance in life. Using anger to avoid sadness means that I also avoid the skillful states that can arise as it passes – appreciation for the good things in life, opportunities for reconciliation, and acceptance of the path forward.

The Dharma teaches me to value, if not love, these moments of sorrow. These are moments for transfor-mation, not despair. Sorrow is not permanent. It is a gateway to action, compassion and joy.

Sorrow: Gateway to Action, Compassion, Joy

aryaloka.org

board notesby Barry Timmerman

In May, the Aryaloka Board of Directors and the Spiritual Vitality Council held their annual joint meeting, an oppor-

tunity to review our progress and our shared mission. Each entity reported on initiatives, progress, challenges and a shared vision for the future of Aryaloka.

The board shared specifics on a variety of projects:

The Stupa Landscaping PlanWe will need to raise funds for

major landscaping around the stupa, but in the meantime, we will continue to groom the stupa area and begin to plant flowers in strategic areas.

The Memorial GardenDuring the work weekend much

progress was made on designating and clearing an area for a memorial garden, a lovely area just off the trail

to the right of the stupa. There is a grove of trees and in the center, a large glacial boulder serves as the focal point of the garden. Venera Gattonini, a skilled craftsperson, is working on designs to hold Ayake-ma’s ashes. There will eventually be benches in the area for meditation and reflection.

The July to December Programming

The Aryaloka events calendar for the second half of 2016 is nearly finalized. We have a full schedule of workshops and retreats of varying lengths, as well as days scheduled to celebrate Buddhist events that are acknowledged all over the world.

The Friends of AryalokaThis program is intended to create

more connections in the community and for people to learn more about us. We have a registration form in the works.

Sangha CareThe development of this kula is

moving along nicely. Rack cards and flyers are ready to be printed and the process of interviewing and selecting volunteers is under way. We also will be providing training for volunteers.

PledgingWe are reaching out to current

pledgers to ask for an increase in their commitments and to encourage those who have not yet pledged to do so. A generous Sangha member will match any and all pledge increases.

All board minutes are available for review on the bulletin board down-stairs at Aryaloka. Feel free to speak with any board member about ideas or concerns. It is a gift to have the opportunity to be exposed to the Dharma and to have such an empha-sis on Sangha.

by Dh. Khemavassika

Aryaloka’s Spiritual Vitality Council (SVC) meets monthly to review all aspects of the cen-ter's efforts to provide

for the spiritual needs of our commu-nity. Members are Amala (co-chair), Vidhuma (co-chair), Dayalocana, Surakshita, Khemavassika, Arjava and Shrijnana, who recently joined our group.

Our crowning achievement over the past few months was the updating of "A Vision for Aryaloka" that was drafted several years ago to guide the work of the board and the SVC. This document describes what Aryaloka will look like in five years, and the goals the center hopes to achieve by the end of that time. The vision looks

spirituality vitality councilat all aspects of our operation, from facilities to the ideal composition of our Sangha. Aryaloka’s Board of Directors will review and add to the document.

The council reviewed ways in which it can promote cooperation with other Triratna centers in the area, partic-ularly Boston, Portland and Ports-mouth. Coordinating programs with other centers will prevent scheduling conflicts and allow for greater sharing of teaching resources. We also re-viewed the possibility of working with other centers to share in the celebra-tion of festival days.

The council created procedures to address concerns about teachers that may come from sangha members. We reviewed the program for the second half of the year to ensure that we have a balanced program for mem-bers at all levels.

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Thoughts on Nowby Leslie Myers Strong

We all have a limited number of trips around the sun. At the end of our last trip, we become a body in a box under six feet of earth,or a bag of ash for loved ones to scatter.

I will be no different.This I cannot change.No one has survived this realm we call life.

But now? Now as I sit in solitude by the window,bathed in midwinter light,my cat by my side – I hear a dove coo,a neighbor slicing my quiet with his gun.I see the snow sparkle in the light.Now is infinite in possibility!

Now is peace.Now is pain free.Now is the chickadee practicing his spring song

where love developing happiness meets wisdom and wisdom … · kamalashila love roughly sums up the...

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