Ra Samye and Me!
I guess I'll be down at the Samye Ling by Friday this week. I had quite a sociable weekend so you've got to get back what you've lost on Monday and I was left with some feelings of trepidation about going for a week in a tent to a place where there's really nothing much to do!
I first went to the Samye Ling on a May bank holiday in 1988. I was the first day I was in sole charge of my daughter who was six months old then, my partner having gone back to work that day. The kid's never been back, but it was a very auspicious day for me.
Soon after me and Shiva spent a weekend there. I went with Shiva a couple of times after that, but then he dropped out and I started going on my own.
Going to a place where they don't allow smoking, if you're addicted to cigarettes, isn't easy. You have all the hassle with occupying your time without a tv, drugs, drink or anything, as well as climbing the walls with the nicotine withdrawal. These weekend breaks were sometimes hard work.
Then I went a couple of times over Christmas and was put in Purelands, which is a ten minute walk from the centre. In the countryside it gets very dark after four and I hadn't a torch, so I had to be in Purelands at four in the afternoon. I had a cassette player for cosmic tapes and cosmic books, and that was that. But at Purelands there is a shrine room and you could go in there to do hatha yoga and Tai Chi. Sometimes you might look out of the window of your wee room and you could see the moon and realise you could sit there watching it for maybe seven hours before you could go to sleep. This might have been ten year ago. The nicotine addiction wasn't so bad then, thank God, but I still had that anxiety before starting retreats like this.
I was in Purelands for a week at least twice, I think.
The only good thing about getting a full time job around seven years ago was that I could afford to visit the Samye Ling a lot oftener.
I was going three or four times a year for three or four days at a time.
Took refuge right at the start of 2003. First inner heat experience in April 2003.
Spent a week in Room 11 and I was happier then than at any time of my life. Joyousness beaming out of me at times. Had another wonderful week there.
Stopped drinking in 2003. Started again in 2004. Stopped and started again in 2005.
Joined the breath with ra bliss in the Spring of 2004.
Fantastic developments in 2005. Obstacles continue to disappear and I can raise inner heat sometimes. Finding amazing amounts of bliss and having some very peak experiences. But discipline getting shaky again.
I've been three times in a tent to the Samye since October and spent a week in a room. The last time I was there about two months ago I remember being in my tent reading the Gopi Krishna book and thanking my lucky stars that I had connections with people at the Samye which meant I wouldn't have the horrible time Gopi Krishna had!
I have no idea what is going to happen at the place where there's nothing much to do when I go there at the end of the week. There will be bliss and heat. I expect there will be astonishing amounts of bliss and heat. But things have been developing so fast recently ... if it's hard and challenging, that's okay. Maybe it needs to be like that. The last time I found it quite hard I ended up at the gate ready to go away and feeling so wonderfully calm. You can always dip back into that when you need it.
There is ra bliss. If you do not meditate a lot, you will never reach ra bliss.
This is what bugs me. My maw has an old friend who is sitting in a new bungalow among a lot of folk she doesn't know. She had a breast off and she has a colostomey (?) bag. She'd in her mid eighties and cannot get out hardly at all. She is not happy. She is more than not happy.
I ask myself if this woman would be happier if she had any understanding of emptiness and could maybe close her eyes sometimes and sink into profound bliss. I think she would be, but she is from a generation which didn't get the chance to find bliss because nobody knew anything about it and nobody told them it was there for the asking.
I heard once there was a code among pilots during the war. If you were getting shot down, you switched off the radio, so no one had to listen to the screams.
Young people are allowed to be foolish. My deep dear friends have no excuses. If I could end up in a monastic situation by the time I'm old, I won't have to listen to the stupid basturns moaning and groaning!
I first went to the Samye Ling on a May bank holiday in 1988. I was the first day I was in sole charge of my daughter who was six months old then, my partner having gone back to work that day. The kid's never been back, but it was a very auspicious day for me.
Soon after me and Shiva spent a weekend there. I went with Shiva a couple of times after that, but then he dropped out and I started going on my own.
Going to a place where they don't allow smoking, if you're addicted to cigarettes, isn't easy. You have all the hassle with occupying your time without a tv, drugs, drink or anything, as well as climbing the walls with the nicotine withdrawal. These weekend breaks were sometimes hard work.
Then I went a couple of times over Christmas and was put in Purelands, which is a ten minute walk from the centre. In the countryside it gets very dark after four and I hadn't a torch, so I had to be in Purelands at four in the afternoon. I had a cassette player for cosmic tapes and cosmic books, and that was that. But at Purelands there is a shrine room and you could go in there to do hatha yoga and Tai Chi. Sometimes you might look out of the window of your wee room and you could see the moon and realise you could sit there watching it for maybe seven hours before you could go to sleep. This might have been ten year ago. The nicotine addiction wasn't so bad then, thank God, but I still had that anxiety before starting retreats like this.
I was in Purelands for a week at least twice, I think.
The only good thing about getting a full time job around seven years ago was that I could afford to visit the Samye Ling a lot oftener.
I was going three or four times a year for three or four days at a time.
Took refuge right at the start of 2003. First inner heat experience in April 2003.
Spent a week in Room 11 and I was happier then than at any time of my life. Joyousness beaming out of me at times. Had another wonderful week there.
Stopped drinking in 2003. Started again in 2004. Stopped and started again in 2005.
Joined the breath with ra bliss in the Spring of 2004.
Fantastic developments in 2005. Obstacles continue to disappear and I can raise inner heat sometimes. Finding amazing amounts of bliss and having some very peak experiences. But discipline getting shaky again.
I've been three times in a tent to the Samye since October and spent a week in a room. The last time I was there about two months ago I remember being in my tent reading the Gopi Krishna book and thanking my lucky stars that I had connections with people at the Samye which meant I wouldn't have the horrible time Gopi Krishna had!
I have no idea what is going to happen at the place where there's nothing much to do when I go there at the end of the week. There will be bliss and heat. I expect there will be astonishing amounts of bliss and heat. But things have been developing so fast recently ... if it's hard and challenging, that's okay. Maybe it needs to be like that. The last time I found it quite hard I ended up at the gate ready to go away and feeling so wonderfully calm. You can always dip back into that when you need it.
There is ra bliss. If you do not meditate a lot, you will never reach ra bliss.
This is what bugs me. My maw has an old friend who is sitting in a new bungalow among a lot of folk she doesn't know. She had a breast off and she has a colostomey (?) bag. She'd in her mid eighties and cannot get out hardly at all. She is not happy. She is more than not happy.
I ask myself if this woman would be happier if she had any understanding of emptiness and could maybe close her eyes sometimes and sink into profound bliss. I think she would be, but she is from a generation which didn't get the chance to find bliss because nobody knew anything about it and nobody told them it was there for the asking.
I heard once there was a code among pilots during the war. If you were getting shot down, you switched off the radio, so no one had to listen to the screams.
Young people are allowed to be foolish. My deep dear friends have no excuses. If I could end up in a monastic situation by the time I'm old, I won't have to listen to the stupid basturns moaning and groaning!
posted by Hotboy at 1:34 PM
1 Comments:
I think you're right, that woman would benefit from bliss, and I suppose we should all cultivate the bliss skill as insurance for the day we find ourselves in hospital/jail/wheelchair. But is it too late for her to start?
If she smokes, she would have to give up first, as indeed should you. Quite apart from the cancer that I got from smoking, there's the humilation of being trapped into lining the wallets of shareholders in tobacco companies. If you are tempted to light up while at Samye Ling, may you find unlightenment (get it?).
PS Your empathy with your fellow-humans is an inspiration to us all.
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