Relationships Based on Trust and Respect

 

Relationships Based on

Trust and Respect

Buddhists talk about samaya which means a relationship based on trust and respect. We need to treat all aspects of our lives with respect and kindness, so that things won't turn against us and cause us problems.

Samaya is important in all kinds of relationships, between friends, companions, parents and children, people and their pets, people and their surroundings and people and nature. If we don't treat our friends respectfully, friendship will come to an end. If we behave hatefully towards our companions, distrust is created and that will inevitably pull the couple apart. Children who have been treated badly by their parents, don't want to hear of their parents because there is no trust. Dogs that have been yelled at or kicked, are nervous and bite their owners. Mother Earth, that together with the Sun, provides everything we need to live, but when treated with disrespect, it creates mass fires, earthquakes, tsunamis, floods and hurricanes to indicate that such disrespectful treatment will not be tolerated. Respectful treatment is crucial even between our minds and bodies. If we treat our bodies badly, it creates illness. If we behave selfishly, everything that is good turns against us. We turn our Pure Land, our paradise, into a living hell. This is the consequence of self-based ignorance.

 

All life is good. All humans are basically good. All life is basically good. All life is imbued with immense kindness and radiates happiness. We are nurtured, protected and taken care of from the beginning. We have the power to change things for the good. We have the power to heal ourselves and others. We have the power to stop things from getting worse. We have the power to heal. We can re-establish trust and respect because all beings have the nature of perfect enlightenment.

Kim, 15.10.2020

Pemako Buddhism,

www.pemakobuddhism.com

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Why Do Buddhists Turn to Shamanism?

Why Do Buddhists

Turn to Shamanism?

Last year, I found out that noted American buddhist teachers, Shinzen Young and Jack Kornfield are also practitioners of shamanism. Today I found out that another secular buddhist, Mr. Stephen Batchelor, also uses shamanic substances, together with buddhist meditation practices.

Stephen Batchelor, once a Tibetan buddhist monk and a tantric practitioner, has for about 20 years now written about his (apparently mostly) negative experiences with tantric buddhism and has been one of the torchbearers of the so called "secular buddhist movement". I commented on his interview a couple of years ago with the title Why I Didn't Quit Guru Yoga?, see here:

http://openheartopenheart.blogspot.com/2017/12/why-i-didnt-quit-guru-yoga.html

Today I learned from the insightla.org-website,

"When Stephen turned sixty, he took a sabbatical from his teaching and turned his attention to solitude, a practice integral to the meditative traditions he has long studied and taught. He aimed to venture more deeply into solitude, discovering its full extent and depth.

The Art of Solitude documents Stephen’s experiences appreciating and making art, drinking peyote and ayahuasca, practicing meditation and participating in retreats, and training himself to keep an open, questioning mind have all contributed to Batchelor’s ability to be simultaneously alone and at ease."

Like Brad's, my attention was caught by Batchelor's use of peyote and ayahuasca. I have no problem with shamanism as tantric buddhism pretty much is a mixture of shamanism and buddhist philosophy (without psychedelics though), and I neither have a problem with shamanic substances such as peyote and ayahuasca. In fact, I took peyote myself last August in Finland, in the presence of Native American medicine man called Rupert Encinas, though it had no effect on me whatsoever. Long story short, I thought the whole event was really light weight compared to buddhist tantric practice. Anyway.

Mr. Encinas also happens to be a long time teacher of Shinzen Young, another noted buddhist teacher from the secular/mindfulness/science influenced meditation scene. Mr. Encinas told me that Shinzen Young had recently done a 4-day Sun Dance ceremony with him. Those who complete Sun Dance practice can become shamans or medicine men themselves within the tradition. Apparently Young's familiarisation with the tradition is quite extensive.

Together with Batchelor and Young, also Jack Kornfield, who is one of the founders of Insight Meditation Society, has made a public testimony about shamanism, see here: http://openheartopenheart.blogspot.com/2019/08/jack-kornfield-and-shinzen-young-on.html

Seeing how one secular- or theravada-buddhist after the other turn to shamanic practices, I can't help wondering why. And in fact, there is another sutrayana buddhist, Culadasa John Yates, who in the Summer of 2019 suggested that perhaps combination of shamanism and buddhism would tap what his practices have left untapped. See full text and sources here: http://openheartopenheart.blogspot.com/2019/08/culadasa-john-yates-sutrayana-doesnt-go.html

Edit: Adding to the list...

• Vanja Palmers (soto zen buddhist) says that after decades of zen-meditation he wanted to repeat impressive experience he had as a teenager on LSD: https://youtu.be/gsJ7Z_t5H_o?t=347
• Vincent Horn, How Psychedelics Improve Your Meditation (And Much More…). "...He found that psychedelics could be used in a similar way to meditation, in order to explore the mind and existence. By setting an intention, and creating an environment similar to meditation, he found he learned some things through psychedelics that his meditative practice hadn’t.Vince says that the visual experience of psychedelics was very different to that of meditation. Psychedelics allowed him to feel connected to his human ancestry, and gave him an ego death experience that shook him more fundamentally than any ego death he’d experienced with meditation. He warns, however, about the power of psychedelics – one experience made him “go crazy” for several days. He would slap a warning label on both psychedelics and meditation, describing them both as trial by fire...: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGA7L1TH1Gc
• Brad Warner critisizes psychedelic buddhism and Vincent Horn based on buddhist precepts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZysiPbe8ErY
  

Is it just because of the lack of merit or lack of inner readiness, why these noted teachers do not turn to mahayana and vajrayana buddhism? Shamanism and buddhism were joined a long time ago so we already have tantric buddhism that has a vast array of lineages, teachings and teachers. Apparently they realise that their chosen paths of buddhism lack something to seek a boost or extra gear from outside buddhism but then, is it because they do not have fortunate karmic connections with lineages and gurus of higher vehicles of buddhism, why they turn to shamanism? Native shamanism seems like a lesser path in comparison to mahayana, not to mention varayana. Or is it simple because of the rigid aspects of Vajrayana buddhism, which is almost all Tibetan, and also mentioned in a critical light by Culadasa because of theocratic features, why these teachers don't feel interested in Tibetan vajrayana? I couldn't blame them if they felt this way because I do too on top of a bunch of other turn offs, but still this trend seems strange.

I am a practitioner and teacher of pragmatic vajrayana buddhism, with a history in zen buddhism, so I know well what kind fo extra gear tantra has to offer to even those who have trained in sutrayana extensively. However, if tantra seems like a turn off and one doesn't want to get involved with empowerments or lamas, I'd recommend looking into Pure Land Buddhism and Buddha Amitabha. In Pure Land Buddhism there are no empowerments, to my knowledge at least, but I'd actually define Amitabha practice a tantric practice and because one turns to Buddha Amitabha for spiritual liberation and knowledge, his presence has the power to tap what in the words of Culadasa, sutrayana leaves "untapped". If I was not a tantric practitioner, with the knowledge and experience I have now, I'd choose Pure Land Buddhism as my path, though with the features of pragmatic dharma.

Thanks for reading. May True Dharma flourish!

Kim,

Pemako Buddhism,

www.pemakobuddhism.com

Culadasa John Yates: Sutrayana ”doesn't go far enough”

Culadasa John Yates:

Sutrayana ”doesn't go far enough”

See this video from July 2019: https://youtu.be/X7brJ8qrLBo?t=3404

In the video Culadasa John Yates, a veteran of 50 years of practice and one of the most respected teachers of buddhist meditation in the West, discusses The Mind Illuminated, his own version of buddhist sutrayana meditations, and states that it "doesn't go far enough", despite of some insight and awakening that the method produces. This lecture was given about a month before he was fired or himself left his own Dharma Treasure organisation due to allegations of misconduct in the forms of lying and extramarital sexual affairs.

Although Culadasa's bio says that together with his hinayana lineage, he also has vajrayana lineage, I have never seen or found a reference that would state that he is a tantric practitioner or that he would teach tantra. If you know that my information lacks in this regard, please correct me. I have sought this bit of information for few years but never found it. In some webcasts he has mentioned vajrayana in general but I have never seen him talk about tantric practices in the sense that it was something that he and his students were actively involved with.

In the video he says that he has gone through buddhist meditation training and that, despite of some illumination, "buddhist meditation traditions" (in plural) have severe deficiencies. He goes on to say that combination of shamanism and buddhism would tap what his practices have left untapped. In this connection, he also mentions Tibetan buddhism and Bon-tradition. That he doesn't mention his own vajrayana teachings or practices, adds to my belief that he is not a vajrayana practitioner.

Culadasa John Yates

As a practitioner of sutrayana, his statement about the deficiency of all buddhist traditions needs to be viewed with critical thought. I am aware that buddhism in general and Tibetan vajrayana in particular has all kinds of problems but in general based on my own observations vajrayana practitioners go farther in their practice than practitioners of sutrayana. I leave scholars, academics and doctors of buddhism entirely out of this. In terms of bhumi analysis (OHBM) it can be clearly seen that tantrics have more bhumis open and perfected, or in common terms have more clarity and purity than sutrayana practitioners do. By saying this I do not deny the benefits of sutrayana, because I know from my own experience that sutra practice reaps benefits, though they are lesser. In my own experience as well as apparently Culadasa's, sutrayana leaves a lot of the psyche into the shadow. It just "doesn't go far enough". For this reason I have discussed the benefits of joining sutra and tantra together.

The problem is that sutric meditation practice is built on one's own effort, energy and ability of attention which in the present samsaric condition are very limited. On the other hand , tantric deities that are archetypes of the enlightened mind cannot but reveal all the nooks and corners of the mind or psyche, leaving nothing hidden. This is the unique gift and potential of tantric practice, that non-tantric methods do not have. 

Culadasa, "As you progress on the paths of awakening, the changes of you recognising them (parts of our pscyhe) as something that needs to be purified, diminishes."

It is such a strange thing to say... but this precisely is Culadasa's testimony of the insufficiency of sutric practice.



May All Beings Be Free,



-Kim Katami, 23.8.2019
Pemako Sangha
www.pemakobuddhism.com

 

Have All Beings Been Our Mothers?

Have All Beings Been Our Mothers?

When a practitioner, who personally knows and practices on behalf of ill, dying or dead person, it has the power to move mountains of karma and health issues. Things can really change through personal connection. Can you think of a bigger favour to someone you know?

In Tibet it is customary to think that all sentient beings have at some point been our mothers. Lately I've been thinking about my human ancestors from both of mine parental lineages and last week did some calculations.

I, like everyone else, have two parents. My parents both have two parents, so including their parents, I have 4 grandparents. My 4 grandparents have altogether 8 parents of their own, which means that consequentially, I am genetically and karmically connected to these 8 ancestors. If I go further back in history up to 10 generations, it adds up to 1024 ancestors. I am genetically and karmically an heir to all these 1024 people, most of who I have no idea who they have been, what they did or where they lived. According to the definition of familial generation, which according to Wikipedia is 25-30 years, people 10 generations before me lived about 250-300 years ago. In 20 generations, the number of ancestors increases up o over a million, 1 048 576 to be exact. They lived roughly about 500-600 years back, in 1400-1500's. With 30 generations, the number of ancestors goes over a billion, to 1 073 741 824 and they lived roughly 800 years ago. That's a staggering number. In less than thousand years, which is a really short time in greater time frame, we've had over 1 billion ancestors, whose genes we have and to whose karma we are connected to. In three more generations (33), the number goes up to 8 billion which is the number of current popuation on Earth. The further back we go in time, the bigger the number of ancestors gets. Already one million ancestors is difficult if not impossible to comprehend. 

 

By Yayoi Kusama

To me the idea that my body and to some extent also my mind is directly related to countless people that I never met and do not know anything about, is a bewildering idea. My body, its constitution and health, is a cause of endless amount of ancestors, even beyond the scope of homo sapiens sapiens, which is our current species. It goes directly, without a gap, all the way back to apes and more primitive animals. Our ancestors are numberless, just like all sentient beings are numberless, as often recited in bodhisattva prayers.

All of our ancestors, beyond one, two or three generations, are of course long gone. They have left the bodies they used to pass on our genes and according to the buddhist theory of transmigration, as samsaric beings went on to take rebirth in all possible forms according to their karma. Maybe some of them were practitioners and attained something meaningful. Maybe one or two of them even attained buddhahood but by looking at the condition of the present spiritual state of human kind, it is safe to assume that the vast majority of them did not attain liberation. Anyhow, through this simple logic we can realise our connection to numberless beings and in this light, the Tibetan idea that all beings have been our mothers at some point, no longer sounds so abstract or silly anymore. I have been your mother, you have been my mother, your neighbour has been your mother, as well as mine, and so on. Our connection to everyone else does not come only through being citizens of Planet Earth at present time but through all these ancestors and the continuous engine of transmigration. It is a massive system... It is both funny and tragical to think that most of us from beginningless time, have had and keep having the same problems. We just keep going round and round, some as bodhisattvas and buddhas, some as samsaric beings.

Prayers said by practitioners who have personal connection to someone or a group of people, weigh more in the scale than prayers said by strangers. It is so because of stronger karmic, energetic or emotional connection between the two parties. What if we started praying and practicing on behalf of all those ancestors to whom we are actually connected to through our bloodline? Each of us has the capability to tune in and feel the presence of all those people and pray for them, for example, chanting Guru Rinpoche's name or the Refuge for them. In my experience this is an immensely touching and fulfilling practice of wisdom and compassion that really changes destinies by removing immense mountains of karma.

-Kim Katami, 19.8.2019

Open Heart Sangha,

www.en.openheart.fi

Jack Kornfield and Shinzen Young on Shamanism

Jack Kornfield and Shinzen Young on Shamanism

"Shamanism has been misunderstood in the modern times because it is associated with antiquated ways of thinking and superstition but the reality is that it was shut down primarily by colonialism and by organised religion. One of the great Catholic mystics of our time who I talked to said that the Catholic Church for example had hidden all their mystical practices after Martin Luther and the reformation because they didn't people to talk directly to God. They needed people to go through the intermediaries of the priests and the church. So the church was the one that could intermediate between the higher world and lower world and sell indulgences but nobody else could. The truth is that shamans and shamanism has always existed in cultures. They are the healers, the sages, the ones who live in between the two worlds and can open them to you and it's scaring people but now we need them more than ever". - Jack Kornfield, buddhist teacher and author, https://vimeo.com/220889134

It blew my mind to learn that shamanism has been the original religion or way of life since ancient times, literally for tens of thousands of years. World religions such as buddhism, christianity and islam are lightweight compared to shamanism, in terms of history. Shamans have existed in all native cultures, everywhere in the world.

I haven't studied shamanism per se but through healing practices and tantra, I instantly see many similarities with shamanism. Of course many practices and rituals of tantric yoga have shamanic origins, or perhaps I should say presence? It was also news to me that, according to Shinzen Young, another pioneering buddhist teacher, in shamanism there are two branches: 1. the style that is concerned with powers and 2. the style that is concerned with knowing oneself. Apparently Mr. Young has been a practicing shamanist for 40 years. See video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33u14OjeHpE

I do not subscribe to the secular, nonmystical worldview and I think that while rationalisation and common senseness needs to be a solid foundation of any type of path, the nonmystical and secular worldview is insufficient to people because it removes wonder and fascination. By wonder and fascination, I refer to a way of seeing human beings in a greater way than just as a sack of muscles and bones, brain and nervous system which is the view of modern science. To see human being purely as a physical-material organism is precisely what prevents understanding our humanness in a profound way, with all its nonmaterial depth and potential for self-healing and self-empowerment in psychological and spiritual ways.

-Kim, 3.8.2019