Endless Knots

And of course HHDL is following me

Further to my post of Sunday...

Welcome to the official Twitter page of His Holiness the Dalai Lama

A new person has joined the Web 2.0 revolution. A man who knows a thing or two about change. The Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama (OHHDL to us tweeps) is on Twitter. After less than a day, OHHDL has 13,241 followers and has put up 30 updates. Here's the latest post, which gives a look at what life in the viral world is like when the world's most famous Buddhist joins Twitter:

Our office is currently overwhelmed by responses from our first day on Twitter. We will make every effort to answer your questions in time.

The few of the updates are worth posting too:

Welcome to the official Twitter page of His Holiness the Dalai Lama - administered by The Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

The OHHDL would like to graciously thank our Twitter mediator, Deven Hk, for providing insight and logistical information.

His Holiness thought it was prudent to make his office open and assessible to a more youth and technologically advancing audience.

I agree. And as I've said here, there, and elsewhere, if you have the chance to see HHDL in person, do it. Repeating: there will never be another mature Dalai Lama in our lifetimes and any Dalai Lama who twitters is worth listening to in real.

Roland's on the 2009 Dublin Int'l Literary Award long list

Great news: Roland Merullo's Breakfast with Buddha has put him among the nominees for the 2009 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, announced on Nov 10 by Eibhlin Byrne, Lord Mayor of Dublin. With its 100,000 euro prize, it's "the world's most valuable annual literary prize for a single work of fiction published in English and is a Dublin City Council initiative, in partnership with IMPAC." (IMPAC, an international productivity implementation firm sponsors a number of literary awards - go, IMPAC!):

...Dublin City Council will announce the shortlist on 2nd April 2009 and the winning novel will be revealed by the Lord Mayor on 11th June 2009.

Also on the list are Doris Lessing for The Cleft; Junot Diaz for The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao; and Mario Vargars Llosa for The Bad Girl.

The 156 authors hail from 41 countries.  The books span 18 languages, 29 of which are translated from languages such as Arabic, Japanese, Russian, Slovenian and Hebrew. 19 of them are first novels. "These are books that might not otherwise come to the attention of Irish readers”, says Deirdre Ellis-King, Dublin City Librarian.  “The spread of languages and the number of books in translation continues to grow”. 

It's lovely to learn that nominations come from "157 libraries in 117 cities," in Roland's case, one situated in South Carolina. What an honor! And what a book. It's wonderful. And extremely funny. And deep. Roland-ish. Great gift, by the way. I couldn't resist snipping the portion of the nominee list where Roland's name appears along with these great literary lights:

Detailing for the soul

If you're in the vicinity of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, then you know that the Dalai Lama was hanging around recently. Wrapped up, earlier this week, a six-day "teaching" at Lehigh University, plus a public lecture (see Brandie Kessler's article, "Dalai Lama gives heart-y speech at Lehigh" in The Pottstown Mercury, the paper where I got my start, which ran this nice editorial, "Message of unity needed in the world."

When I mention that I've been to such a teaching (see "Transparency and the Dalai Lama," for example), I usually hear an impassioned, "WHAT was it LIKE?" Over the years (have been to four such extended events beginning in 1981 plus a couple of public lectures), I turn to metaphor because it's not really "like" anything else. As I've said before, I'm not a Buddhist; I'm not a "follower" of the Dalai Lama; I'm not even very knowledgeable about Buddhism or Tibet; and I've never been to Dharamsala, India, where he settled after fleeing his home in Lhasa in 1959. But I continue to choose to sit in venues with thousands of others time and again in order to do some deep internal housecleaning, i.e. detailing for the soul.

The Dalai Lama, the 14th person to hold this title, is a rigorously trained Buddhist scholar and, if I've got this right, there is endless scholarship to learn. Monks, geshes, lamas, rinpoches and, more recently acknowledged, nuns have been interpreting the writings of Buddhist thinkers ever since the Indian prince, Siddartha Gautama, left the reservation in search of deeper understanding of the world, abandoning a wife and child (for which I, and likely a few of my sisters, have never forgiven him).

But, if you get beyond this confusing choice in the life of the person who eventually sat under a tree and attained enlightenment, it's really hard to argue with Buddhism, regardless of your religion, even if the one you're born into (Judaism here) frowns upon "craven images," i.e., having a bunch of stone, wooden, wax, or even lucite Buddhas sitting around your house (ahem).

Honestly, I can't follow a lot of it when the Dalai Lama goes deep into the interpretation. Example: this teaching was about "emptiness," which, just to keep the mind nimble, apparently doesn't mean emptiness as in there's nothing there but rather that everything is connected to everything else, thus interdependent, which means there is never just a thing but rather everything that came before it and all that will come after and everything that it connects to in the now, if you can "catch" the now because as soon as you do, it's the before during which time you were probably day-dreaming about the future. The kind of brain teaser that comes up after a statement like that is this: What came before the Big Bang? Ponder that for the rest of the day and post a comment, please, when you've got it sorted.

That's just a slight toe into the ontology waters - and I'm not even sure the "study of reality" is the way to put it. What always keeps my attention in these lectures is the material around the self - why we behave as we do, why we put ourselves above others, and what to do about it. In a word, compassion. Put others first and you'll be one heck of a lot happier.

One other note to those who are wondering how these sorts of lectures work. In this case, the event took place at the Stabler Arena at Lehigh, a sports facility. The stage was at one end of the space, we were seated at the opposite end, on the side, up a relatively large number of rows. Fortunately, there were two jumbotrons - and, as usual, an extraordinary translator who speaks fluent, idiomatic English. The entire arena, with 6000 people, falls still as the dawn when the Dalai Lama enters, monks, believers, and those who respect the man bringing their palms together and bowing slightly as he does his prostrations and ascends to his throne. Then everyone else sits down, a sea of crimson and saffron-robed monks rippling around him on the stage floor. Chanting ensues in Tibetan for a few moments, though on the last day, a group of nuns chanted an incredible, breathless recitation that captured the essence of Buddhist thought. The Dalai Lama usually then speaks for a few moments in his broken English, without many adjectives or adverbs, without much attention to tense, then reverts to Tibetan, which he speaks for perhaps ten minutes straight, the translator following in astonishing detail, which the Dalai Lama occasionally corrects, evidenced by the translator saying something akin to, "Sorry, not analogy, I mean metaphor."

I have pages and pages of notes from these lectures. Here are a few nuggets from this one:

* It's better to keep one's own tradition than to adopt another's. Different traditions suit different people.

* We're all on the same planet with the same difficulties.

* On a practical level, it's all the same, regardless of tradition: love, kindness, forgiveness, tolerance, contentment, faith.

You get the idea. As I said, I've got pages and pages.

Some thanks:

The Tibetan Buddhist Learning Center sponsored this event, organized the volunteers, and provided a mainly hassle-free experience, given the numbers, the heat, the protestors (yes, there are those who don't like the Dalai Lama, including one rather large national government). Many thanks to Josh and Diana Cutler and friends. Hardly the word. The folks at the Stabler Center also deserve our gratitude. Imagine hosting the Pope for six consecutive days and having him on the stage for two sets - morning and afternoon - or, perhaps more analogously, Mick Jagger. With one exception, a very unhappy ticket-checker, who literally threw a curtain across a doorway in front of me so that I couldn't see the Dalai Lama from a hallway (the curtain was always partially open) and told me to "get out," the staff, including security, were extremely kind and helpful. That angry man needs a lot more time with the Dalai Lama.

And, I can't forget the typical close to these events: someone with an accounting background stands up and reads the financials "as of 2:15 today" (July 15, 2008): Total revenues = $1,138,798; total expenses = $1,110,000, expected to rise by the end, with any surplus being donated to "charities approved by His Holiness in New York City."

Last of the last: if you're interested in understanding the Dalai Lama, read Pico Iyer's brilliant and gorgeous memoir/biography, The Open Road. Iyer's father was a friend of the Dalai Lama and for thirty years, Iyer-the-son has had more than a passing acquaintance with the man. Superb.

And special thanks to the little sangha that came together in our remote arena seats: Julie the choral director, Jeanne the PhD chemist, Chris the anesthesiologist, and Jeff the systems thinker. And to our lunch group: Askold the writer extraordinaire and Richard the professor. And to Anne of the Kindle.

An Easter prayer for Tibet by Jeff Stamps

My husband, Jeff Stamps, a long-time student of world affairs, politics, and Buddhism, wrote this piece, which I hope you will read.

An Easter prayer for the Tibetan people
and their spiritual leader
By Jeff Stamps

This Easter, my prayer is for the Tibetan people everywhere and for their spiritual and temporal leader, His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama.

This global spiritual force, with his inclusive religious mantra, is an intensely-trained monk from the distant nomadic steppes of Shangri-La, the “roof of the world.” He also runs a government-in-exile from a generously-provided sanctuary in India.

The Nobel Peace Prize apostle of non-violence, the Dalai Lama is the Gandhi of our time, albeit with more spiritual depth but fewer political skills. Since his exile, he has held the same “middle way” view: cultural autonomy for Tibet, but not political independence. Today, he struggles with both the oppression of his people by the Chinese and with the now-unconstrained frustration of Tibetan youth demanding independence. Among all of us who love Tibet for whatever reasons, we share a deep sense that time for the Dalai Lama’s “middle way” and Tibet’s very survival is running out.

By “Tibet” surviving, I mean Tibetans as an ethnic group with roots deep into pre-history, a people treated as racially inferior (“barbarians”), as a coherent religious group of Tibetan Buddhists, and as a national group of several millennia standing. For the Dalai Lama’s strategy of non-violence to work, the world must find ways to help Tibet and China find a path that provides Tibetans the cultural and local autonomy they require within the Chinese federal system of governance.

There are four reasons the world should care about the Tibetan uprising at this time: (1) the preservation of an ancient and abiding culture; (2) respect for a very old spiritual tradition; (3) the act of genocide; and (4) concern for the environment.

Tibet, March, 2008

The terrible events in Tibet of the past few days have me thinking about our Tibetan friends and reflecting on the times we've spent at lectures with the Dalai Lama (HHDL, to his people). I think I've said before here (and certainly in my writing and to my friends) that when it comes to matters of spiritual practice, I tend, like my eating habits, toward omnivorism. If a body of belief espouses peace and justice and taking care of others, I'm in. And, if it is sound psychology, I'm not only in but climbing the stairs. Having spent two weeks in sessions with the Dalai Lama over the past 25 years, I feel confident saying that he is a profound psychologist. His attention to empathy and his call to work toward the happiness of "all sentient beings" resonates.

Like many others who've been concerned about the future of Tibet, my heart is breaking: two friends have received first-hand reports, which are excruciating to read, and the news this morning that the Dalai Lama, an unwavering believer in nonviolence, is willing to step down as the political leader of Tibet if that would contribute to the violence coming to an end, make me want to...you know, I don't know what it makes me want to do but it's a lot more than sit here and post to my blog.

Some years ago, my husband and I noticed a banner outside an art gallery in Meredith, New Hampshire: "Tibetan Children's Art Exhibit." There we found the most amazing collection of paintings by children who had fled Tibet without their parents (they send them out in hopes of a better life) and resettled in the north of India at Tibetan Children's Village. We looked at the many paintings on the walls and in the many drawers and listened to the story of how these paintings came about. To deal with the trauma they experience during their dangerous journeys across the Himalayas, these kids are offered art lessons once they arrive in India. Art as therapy. We decided almost without discussion to purchase two pieces, this one, "Life is a Dream," and the one at the end of this post.

We chose "Life is a Dream" because we liked it and because it was painted by a young boy, T. Lobsang, who is completely deaf. My hubby was born on this very date 64 years ago with a 60% hearing loss in both ears. Enough said. Beneath the painting, which hangs in our living room, is the small plaque that was on the gallery wall, explaining more about this talented young man.

 

We also chose a second painting, White Tara, the female Buddha associated with compassion and long life, because it was painted by the children's art teacher, Sonam Choephel. The original, which this photo can't possibly reflect due to my limited photographic skill, is exquisite and hangs in our dining room. It's especially meaningful because some years ago, Sonam Tsering, the father of our friend Phuni Meston, came to our house for dinner and said prayers in front of it. Sonam, a Tibetan nomad who fled his country after the Chinese occupation and lived for many years in India before joining his daughter and son-in-law here in Boston, passed on in 2005. I think of him every time I walk through the dining room.

White Tara by Sonam Choephel

The Majesty of Your Loving

Many years ago, we had the chance to become friends with Olivia and Hob Hoblitzelle, beacons of clear thinking in the fields of psychotherapy and spiritual development. I liked them immediately when we met - Olivia's calm presence even when everyone around us seemed to be going nuts, Hob's sense of humor.

To my young eyes, their home was everything an abode should be - simple, beautiful, and with a Japanese garden, this before everyone had a couple of bonzai in the kitchen and a Buddha or two in the backyard. Their children were close to adolescence; ours weren't even born. I truly admired them. Then, as is the case with so many who influence us, our lives drifted off into our futures.

About five or so years ago, I was in a yoga class at Kripalu, the yoga center in Western Massachusetts, and noticed a beautiful woman, intent on her practice, a few mats from me. It was Olivia. We spoke briefly, long enough for her to tell me that Hob was quite ill, that he had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's, and that she had come to the yoga center for rest and retreat. Some months after that, I read in the paper that Hob had died.

Now the news that Olivia has captured their seven-year journey in a book whose title promises many gifts: The Majesty of Your Loving: A Couple's Journey through Alzheimer's. And there's a website that summarizes their story, gives information on how to arrange a reading or workshop with Olivia, and, of course, provides additional resources.

Buddha, tonight, in Cambridge

It's no secret to my readers that I admire the writing of Roland Merullo (a dozen posts here, scan for his name) and so tonight I will be among those listening to his reading from Breakfast with Buddha, which I first blogged here: Porter Square Books, 25 White Street, Cambridge, Mass, 7 PM.

Finished it last night.

Few writers have the range with language that Roland does. Or with emotion. Or with the contemplative life. This book is funny, one of the acceptable ways, so far as this reader is concerned, to grapple with matters of deep spiritual consequence. If you're one of the hundreds of millions (possibly billions as we're up to, what, 6.7 billion hum beans at this point) who has meditated, done yoga, thought about the meaning of life, hungered for something deeper, read a book about how to be happy, or gone to a lecture about Buddhism/Christianity/Judaism/Jainism or whateverism, you want to read this book. Cheerfully, laugh-out-loud funnily, and poignantly, Roland takes his main character, Otto Ringling, from loving family-man and NY publisher to the edge of enlightenment with a cross-country journey that stops for sausage, bowling, and slot machines.

Otto's love for his wife and family are enough to make this book worth the read--few fathers in literature are so bold in their pronouncements--but when you include his very light but profound understanding of human nature and the meaning of existence, you have a treasure. And, oh, his uninvited passenger is a spiritual master, a Rinpoche in robes.

Write on, Roland. I can't wait for the next one.

Transparency and the Dalai Lama

Here's a riddle for you:

Q: What do Radio City Music Hall and organizational transparency have in common?

A: The Dalai Lama.

Tenzin Gyatso, His Holiness, the 14th Dalai Lama, was in New York again this past weekend for a three-day teaching, the third such protracted event like this that my hubby and I have attended. In 1981, we were two of 150 people who spent a week in a small lecture hall at Harvard University on the Dalai Lama's first visit there. Last year, we spent three days with our daughter and 3000 others at his lecture sponsored by Tibet House (co-founded by Professor Robert Thurman, the first American ordained as a Tibetan Buddhist monk, and, famously, father of Uma). Tonight, we're fresh from his latest New York appearance with our daughter again and at least 5000 others, another three-day event, this time sponsored by Healing the Divide (the non-profit started by Richard Gere, a long-time follower of Tibetan Buddhism) and The Tibet Center.

It would not be accurate to say we are Tibetan Buddhists. In truth, which is largely what the Dalai Lama's teachings are about, my hubby might pass, as he has read scadzillions of books on the subject, but, as is my wont, I'm a perpetual neophyte, interested primarily in the Dalai Lama's profound (too shallow a word, really) insight into human nature.

The Dalai Lama's psychology (the principal focus of last year's teaching) causes us to hold up a mirror to our most naked selves; his spirituality so inclusive that he encourages everyone to practice their own beliefs; and, in this teaching, his dissertation on Tibetan Buddhist logic is as close to quantum physics as "religion" could possibly be.

I'll say again here what I've said to many friends: If you haven't had the chance to hear him, make the time. Unless you're a baby, in which case you aren't reading this--at least not now--there will never be another mature Dalai Lama in your lifetime. This man is 72 and, with any luck, he'll be around for many more years. There will be no 15th Dalai Lama until this one passes away. And, then it will be some time before his successor is identified; many years will turn before that person is teaching.

Trained for his position from the time he was a tiny boy, the Dalai Lama probably never imagined back in the Potola, his residence in Lhasa, Tibet, that he would someday end up sitting on the stage that the Rockettes made famous, surrounded by 100 monks and nuns, wearing a crimson visor to block the klieg lights, with a headset hooked behind his ear, and talking for hours to thousands of Americans about non-duality and emptiness.

Without taking on a very serious piece of writing, I cannot summarize the past three days.

But I do want to share this, relevant to the themes of this blog. At the very end, after the Dalai Lama had made some very poignant suggestions about how to be a better human being, how to be more compassionate, more selfless, Richard Gere, who'd spent three days sitting in lotus position with the monks and nuns, took the microphone and said the usual wonderful things one would expect--how inspiring, meaningful, and touching the teaching was. And then he said something unexpected: that the Dalai Lama believes in transparency and in that spirit, a monk came forward to share the financials of the event.

According to Buddhism, no one should be paid for teaching. Thus, the monk read the line item expenses, totaling $1.396 million (it's not cheap to rent Radio City, i.e. $650,000); income was $1.394 million. "We are pleased to report," the monk said, "a loss of $3800."

May all sentient organizations be so transparent.