Blue Cliff Monastery – Day 6

This morning we “slept in” until 6am and then headed down to the hall for the transmission of the Five Mindfulness Trainings.  I thought for a while about whether or not I would receive all five, but after talking to one of the monks and one of my bunkmates who had already received the trainings, I felt more comfortable about taking a broader interpretation of some of the trainings.  The ceremony for receiving the trainings was beautifully done and I’m glad to have gone through the process as a way of really intentionally brining these practices into my life.

After the ceremony, we received our dharma name and practiced Hugging Meditation.  In hugging meditation, you fully embrace the person across from you and breathe in and out with them for three breaths.  It’s a really wonderful practice – one that my friend, Shirley, has fully mastered (she gives the best hugs).

And then it was time to go.  We cleaned up our room, packed our bags and I grabbed some lunch for the road.  The ride home was uneventful and even though I took the same four highways on the return route, it felt less chaotic, less overwhelming than the ride down.

Blue Cliff Monastery – Day 5

I don’t remember what today’s meditation was.  I think we were allowed just to sit with our breath, but I spent most of my time wondering if it was raining.  For some reason, it always sounds a little like it’s raining in the meditation hall, but today the rain sounded legit.  I was concerned because I wasn’t dressed for the rain and didn’t want to get soaked on the way back to my room.  When I caught myself thinking about all this, I had to laugh because it didn’t really matter at that moment if it was raining or not, and I was getting myself all worked over up of the possibility that it might be raining.  It was a little comical given the context of what I had been doing over the last week.

It was raining a little (though not as much as I thought) when we left the meditation hall. One of my roommates and I braved the weather to practice yoga on the porch together, which was just as nice as practicing in the sun.

Our dharma talk today was a question-answer session with the monks and nuns, which was enlightening, tender and hilarious all at the same time.  Later, we split up according to gender and had more concentrated, personal discussions specific to us as women or men.  To me, there always seems to be an inherent sexism in religious organizations and at first I wasn’t sure how I would feel about this dharma sharing with my fellow women and the nuns.  My concerns were quickly allayed as we touched on topics about femininity and womanhood, our bodies, our relationships with our mothers.  I didn’t have time to share, but these are topics I have spent a lot of time with over the last few years.  I grew up with the notion of women as strong, but it wasn’t until I spent some time in Japan, where they have very traditional gender roles, that I really began to experiment with the idea of women as soft.  I think it’s part of the appeal of birth – an act that requires a woman to fully claim her power in a moment of complete surrender.

This evening we celebrated our week together with the Be-In.  This was a compilation of skits and songs and stories performed by each of the groups that embodied what resonated with us over the retreat.  One group taught us how to find the North Star, which turned out to be one of the more tender presentations.  Other groups danced, sang and one group did Blue Cliff Retreat jeopardy, which was by far the most hilarious.  We also had a delightful MC – one of the brothers who shared witty remarks between presentations.  Afterwards, we all stood outside looking at the stars, pointing at the sky and finding our True North.

Blue Cliff Monastery – Day 4

Instead of sitting meditation, we walked The Loop this morning.  I’m not sure how long the walk was, but we walked it fast.  It was nice to walk fast – to walk at my own pace and have some space between me and the others.  For a moment I understood the monastic life – the joy of feeling free to be with yourself, but within the context of the group – the idea of being alone without being lonely.

Our dharma talk today was about aspiration.  A young nun shared the story of how she decided to become a monastic.  She described how, as a teenager, she was troubled and unhappy and how her parents invited a few monastics over to help her.  Eventually she started hanging out at the monastery and one day was asked if she thought she might like to stay.  She wanted to, but first she needed to ask her mother how her mother would feel if she became a nun.  It reminded me of the time, not-so-long-ago that I asked my own mother a similar question.  I had just returned from Japan and was slogging my way through pre-requisites for veterinary school.  Retrospectively, my suffering was probably some pretty severe reverse culture shock, but at the time all I knew was that I was miserable.  One night I had a dream – the symbolism wasn’t subtle and I knew I needed to do something radical to change my life.  I sat on it for a few days and then eventually told my mom about it.  The result of this conversation was the beginning of my current path:  I read Birthing From Within and decided to explore midwifery as a career option.  But before I leapt in, I paused for a moment at the edge with a question for my mom:  Is it okay if I never go back to school?  Is it okay if I’m never a doctor?  Is it okay if I abandon every expectation ever set for me?  Is it okay if I’m not the good kid, the academically oriented kid?  She responded in the same way that the mother of the young nun did – with a smile and a blessing.

During our dharma sharing today we asked the monks and nuns about their stories.  Some were born here to Vietnamese parents, others were Westerners, but many had come from Vietnam to escape persecution.  Some of those who had come from Vietnam had been beaten, or had their families harassed and bullied.  The majority of them had sought refuge in Thailand, and a handful at a time, some were brought to America or France for a few years until their visas ran out.  When we asked why they didn’t seek asylum so that they could stay in the West permanently, one brother responded very simply, “Because Vietnam is our home.”

Our evening activity was an introduction to the practice of Beginning Anew.  This practice is about non-violent communication to resolve conflicts and heal relationships.  There are four steps to the practice: 1) Watering the Flowers (telling the other person what you appreciate about them), 2) Sharing our own weaknesses/shortcomings, 3) Sharing how we have been hurt by the actions of the other person, 4) Seeking support from others.  While I haven’t used this practice specifically, more open, non-violent communication is something I have been working toward (unskillfully) for the last five years, and so I was interested in this slightly new and different framework.  After the introduction to the practice, a father and son courageously demonstrated the steps for the group.  I think everyone was sobbing except for me, but then, I’m always that person =P.

Blue Cliff Monastery – Day 3

This morning’s meditation was to imagine ourselves, and then our parents, as five year olds, exploring those five year old needs, what we might say to them and ultimately realizing that all those five year olds were a part of us.  It was both a very tender and very challenging experience.  After our morning meditation, I skipped the group exercise and set up my mat on the porch to practice.  Not to totally buy into a stereotype, but there’s really nothing more lovely than practicing yoga at sunrise outside.

Our dharma talk today was about relationships, but it ended up going in a different direction.  One of the monks told us a story of a man who was shot by an arrow.  His companion tried to help him and treat the wound, but the man wouldn’t allow it until he had asked several questions:  Where was the arrow?  What kind of arrow was it?  Where did it come from?  Who shot it?  Why did they shoot it?  By the time he had finished asking his questions and was ready for his companion to treat his wound, the man had lost so much blood that he died.  The monk told the story in a funny way, and it served as a wonderful parable for how our minds sometimes work.  It reminded me of Pam England’s “Love Warrior,” the one who acts according to what is needed in the moment and who does so with skill and integrity.  The more time I spend learning about the Warrior archetype, the more I am intrigued – I always thought of warriors as blood-thirsty, violent, crude and, to be perfectly honest, dirty.  I never wanted any part of that for myself.  Now, though, I’ve come to view the warrior as a person of action, someone who has mastered the art of Mindfulness, who acts with integrity, and has healthy boundaries.  These are things that I want for myself and I have gently been letting the Warrior into my life a little at a time.

I continue to be surprised by how different walking meditation is each day.  We walk the same path, and today I was wearing the same shoes as yesterday, but the socks were different and the ground was drier and so the walk was different.  I’ve been obsessing over my feet so much lately – Do they hurt?  How long before they start to hurt?  Where do they hurt?  Can I stop them from hurting?  How? – and it’s been nice to notice my feet in a new way.

In our dharma groups we spent some time discussing relationships.  Some of it was focused on family and friends, but of course, much of it was centered around romantic relationships.  Without going into too much detail, I struggled with this conversation because I didn’t feel I could relate to the sentiments being shared.  I understand the need to be self-reliant, but also believe in synergy – that sometimes being with another person really does make things better.  After all, studies have shown that people in relationships are happier and live longer.

Our evening activity was an introduction to the Five Mindfulness Trainings.  These are five practices for us to incorporate into our daily lives.  In a nutshell, they are 1) Non-harming, 2) True Happiness 3) True Love 4) Loving Speech and Deep-Listening and 5) Mindful Consumption.  We discussed whether or not we felt these were practical for young people and how we thought we might benefit from them.  We have the option of receiving these trainings on our last day here and so it was nice to be given an opportunity to think on and digest them a bit.

Blue Cliff Monastery – Day 2

This morning we had sitting meditation at 6 am, followed by a reading and then exercise. Our choices for exercise were qi gong and “stick exercise.”  Having no clue what stick exercise was, I chose qi gong, which was different and fun, except for the cold!  After exercise, we had breakfast, which is a completely silent meal – we can talk once we’ve washed up our dishes.  It’s not hard for me to eat breakfast in silence.  I’m still waking up and so even if I think of something to say (this morning it was a question about something I was eating), I’m not with it enough to care about saying it.  Perhaps the most shocking thing about breakfast this morning was how not-hungry I was.  Normally, I wake up starving, but today I didn’t feel like eating much.

After breakfast we listened to a dharma talk by one of the sisters.  The talk was about managing strong emotions and two things really stuck out to me: 1) 知己: Soulmate.  When Sister D wrote these characters up on the whiteboard, I recognized them and their meanings, but I did not realize that together they meant soulmate.  The first character, 知, means “to know,” and the second, “己,” means oneself.  It was a lovely revelation – that we are our own soulmates, that when we truly know ourselves, we are Home.  This, along with the song we learned today, I have arrived, I am Home, felt particularly relevant and poignant, given my feelings about SF and my recent trip home.  2) Original Fear.  She used this term to refer to the moment when we are born and we are no longer weightless and warm and suddenly have to take our first breath.  She pointed out the inherent risk in pregnancy and childbirth and how this innate fear is passed down from mother to child.  Naturally, I thought of the fear I’ve witnessed in all my clients, the fear I’ve felt myself at births.  I think it’s healthy – like never turning your back to the ocean – a reminder of the power and sacredness of birth.  Unfortunately, we live in a society that preys on this fear and has given rise to our present birth culture.

After the dharma talk, we went for a meditation walk, then had lunch.  The structure of lunch is similar to that of dinner – the main difference being that once we have our food, we wait for the reading of the Five Contemplations (which remind us to be mindful of where our food came from and how we eat).  From lunch, we headed back to the meditation hall for Deep Relaxation, which is similar to yoga nidra.  We jokingly call Deep Relaxation and yoga nidra “nap time,” but to me, both are more fulfilling than a nap.  I always wake up feeling rested and awake and satisfied.

In the afternoon, I studied a bit while others did chores.  My dharma group was exempt from afternoon chores since we were scheduled to wash dishes after dinner.  I was secretly glad to have scored the dish washing chore, not just because it got me out of cleaning toilets, but also because I actually really enjoy washing the dishes.  Since I don’t cook, I often find myself washing dishes – I find it’s a more tangible and concrete way of expressing gratitude for the food I’ve received.

Once we finished up with the dishes, we reconvened in the meditation hall for a second round of deep relaxation, followed by a practice called “Touching the Earth.”  Touching the Earth is five prostrations, each one with a different focus.  The first is showing gratitude toward your blood ancestors, your parents and grandparents and all others who came before you.  The second is gratitude for your spiritual ancestors and teachers.  The third is for our land ancestors, the people who lived on and cultivated the land we currently walk on.  The fourth is for those who love us and whom we have caused to suffer because of that love.  The fifth is for those who have wronged us and challenged us. It’s a beautiful and moving practice, one I’d like to incorporate into my daily life and yoga practice.

Blue Cliff Monastery – Day 1

After a week in SF, I popped back into New Haven to teach class and then popped back out again for a Mindfulness Retreat at Blue Cliff Monastery in Pine Bush, NY.  My day started normally enough – I got up, did my laundry, bought some snacks and finished my packing.  I looked forward to zoning out on the long car ride down, but instead found myself frantically checking directions as I wound my way through the highways of Connecticut and New York.  Driving is easier back home.  Freeways are straight shots; it’s comfortable to put the car on cruise control and one road will take you almost all the way to your destination.  If there’s one place my geography is good, it’s in my long, sock-shaped state, and so if I do need to switch freeways, I can do so with relative confidence.  Out here, however, the roads are winding and curving, the speed limits lower, but the drivers more aggressive.  During my 2.5h trip, I think I took four different highways which, with my complete ignorance about the location of towns, was a rather nerve-wracking experience.  At some point I got lost, but with a little luck and ingenuity, I found my way to Blue Cliff.

Shortly after we arrived, we gathered for our first Meditation Walk.  I like walking and I like walking in the woods and so immediately I was sold.    I would have preferred to have been wearing my boots, or at least some lace-up shoes, but it was a surprisingly pleasant experience to walk in my Crocs.  Due to the softness of the footbeds, I was able to better feel the earth beneath my feet.  My feet molded to the rocks or tree roots, toes able to curl and grip.  Toward the end of our walk, we performed 10 mindful movements, which were coordinated with the breath, like qi gong or tai chi.

After our walk, I met my roommates and then headed down to dinner.  Each meal has its own ritual.  At dinner we spend the first 20 minutes eating in silence.  Then, a bell is rung, at which point we can get up for seconds and begin to talk with those sitting around us.  The silence is meant to promote mindfulness – we are encouraged to eat only as much as we need to in order to be satisfied, and talking while eating often distracts from this awareness.  During dinner I met a lovely couple who had recently driven out from Oakland to start a retreat center in New Hampshire, as well as a physician practicing in New York.

After dinner, we had an orientation in the meditation hall and met our dharma groups (mine was the Dancing Daffodils, though I think my favorite was the Crispy Chrysanthemums.  We were all at a loss as to what exactly was meant by the adjective “crispy”).  I also met a surprising number of people who knew people I knew – one woman from DC, who knew my fellow midwife and yoga teacher, L, another woman from Boston, who knew my dear friend and classmate, F, and a guy from the school of music here at Yale, who knows the karmie who signs in my class on Sundays.  I was glad to meet them – it felt grounding, less intimidating to be there in a new environment.

After our orientation, we began the practice of Noble Silence – a quiet period that begins after our last activity of the day and ends after breakfast the following morning.  We returned to our rooms in silence and tucked ourselves into bed.

Wagons East! Day 5

After a very good night’s sleep, we woke up and had some chai and coffee, said our goodbyes and went to have breakfast with our friend Curtis, from JET.  It was good to see him and he seems to be doing well.  It’s always nice to see a much-loved friend after a long absence (it really does make the heart grow fonder).  We hit the road again and were soon into Pennsylvania.

I didn’t feel much like listening to our audiobook (even though David Sedaris’s When You Are Engulfed in Flames is hilarious.  Side note:  I actually own a signed copy of this book.  My sister and Juan gave it to me as a gift.  If I’d remembered this, I wouldn’t have spent $21 for the audiobook, and instead just taken turns with E reading it aloud), so we chatted about nothing in particular instead.  As we drove through a very cloudy Pennsylvania we noticed what looked like a body of water in the distance.  It looked massive.  We both swore it was a lake or bay, but we saw no signs and couldn’t find anything on the map.  Eventually we realized that it was low lying clouds in the valley below us and through the gray, it gave the illusion of being water.  At some point we stopped at Panera for “lunch” (it was around 4 pm).  I was a bit sleepy and so I ordered a green tea, only to find out that their version of green tea involved ice, pomegranate and a ton of sweetener.  It was foul.  I couldn’t even taste the green tea (which really should NEVER have sweetener in it) and I was pretty sure it contained no caffeine.  I should have taken it back and ordered something else, but I was eager to get back on the road.  E asked if I would be all right, or if I wanted some of his cappuccino (equally vile, in my opinion) to stave off the sleepiness, but I told him that sugar and rage would do the trick.

On Meg’s advice, we took HWY 209 to avoid driving through NYC on a Friday night.  209 is the Delaware Water Gap that runs through the Poconos and is a really pretty drive away from all the usual highway nonsense.  I fell asleep for a while and when I awoke, we were 20 miles or so out of Danbury, which was around where we needed to take another highway to New Haven.  I asked if we were in Connecticut yet and E said we weren’t.  After 10 more miles or so, I asked if he was sure, because I knew Danbury was in Connecticut and that that we were awfully close to Danbury. Again, he assured me that we were still in New York.  Another 5 miles and we still hadn’t seen the “Welcome to Connecticut” sign and I asked if he was absolutely sure.  He told me that I would get used to this – that New England states are small and that one day I would make a wrong turn and end up in Massachusetts, but that it would be okay, because it’s not that far away (I think Kim may have actually done this on her way to the airport once).  Finally, we arrived in Danbury (and consequently Connecticut.  I didn’t realize it was a border town).  After a few more miles on 84, we cut South and East (which I really want to keep calling West, because for me, “West” is synonymous with “toward the ocean”).  Some dark, winding roads here, some unclear signage there and eventually we pulled up to my new home.  We said hello to Kim, unpacked the car, found some food and crashed into bed.