Interviews

David:

David is a current student at Boston University. He got into meditating after taking a class with Dr. Brenda Phillips. David focuses on the meditative aspect of Buddhism much more so than the religious or philosophical aspect of Buddhism.

Q&A with David

Why did you start meditating?

A big part of it was Dr. Phillips. I was at a point in my life where I just needed to calm down and step back, especially during the pandemic.

Can you describe your process of meditating?

Meditating improves when I have a strict schedule. I wake up at 7am go into the backyard and use the Headspace app to meditate. Guided meditation is my go to.

Have you noticed a change since before and after meditating?

Starting the day with meditation got me into the right headspace. Definitely less anxiety regarding the pandemic and all the baggage that comes with it.

Did meditation help with school?

I really struggled with school last semester. For me, I’m a very in person learner. I started meditating near the end, but it didn’t help me much.

How do you use meditation in your everyday life?

I am using meditation to impact my day-to-day life much more so than using meditation to reach Enlightenment or achieve a particular goal.

Meditation is different for everyone, so stick with it. Guided meditation is a wonderful way to start off. I have tried multiple times to do meditation without a guide and couldn’t do it. Meditation is a way to find yourself. Forcing yourself to keep a strict schedule also helps.

How has it been to just focus and clear your mind?

I find myself being able to focus on my breath. I find myself able to focus better if I don’t go on social media in the morning. Avoiding my phone helps prevent racing thoughts. I realized after talking to people and responding in the morning made those conversations pop up during meditation.

Linda:

I was introduced to Linda by Dr. Brenda Phillips. Linda lives in the Massachusetts area and I got an opportunity to attend her sangha (the Peaceful Songbird Sangha). I loved learning about Linda’s experience with Buddhism to overcome hardship as well as how she came from a non-Buddhist background yet incorporates Buddhism into her life.

Q& A with Linda:

I grew up Catholic. I think I was on a spiritual path, you made reference to this. I had a book of readings everyday. I read a Christian daily meditation. I went through a really hard time. Someone said to me “oh you should meditate, it’s really good for stress”. I felt strong that I was a Christian. I noticed a class that was being given on Christian meditation. All of the barriers are so artificial. I thought that would be okay because “Christian is in front of it”. I went to the class and it had nothing to with Christianity. It was all about Thich Nhat Hahn. The place where I went had a bookstore, the teacher said you may want to buy “Peace is Every Step”. I bought that book and finished the class and I just began reading and listening to the teachings of Thich Nhat Hahn. It has really been a life-changing event for me because Thich Nhat Hahn used to come to Boston every two years. I was able to go on retreats with him. I got there super super early and tried to get the best seat possible so I could be close to him. He transformed my life with his teachings. Following his teachings and following him, I have a deep love for him. I don’t see it as an individual practice. I have my morning meditation and I do do some contemplative reading, usually Buddhist. Sometimes I will read things that are Christian. I have my morning practice and then I consider this part of my practice—I walk for at least one hour a day and say the rosary while I’m walking. I always walk outdoors, walking indoors does not cut it for me. I am part of a sangha. I have made the most wonderful friends. I have met many great people, including Dr. Phillips. The meditation groups and friendships that I have made are very important. These friendships are on a spiritual level. You can talk about what’s happening to you and how it’s affecting you deep down and spiritually. The whole sangha experience is one that is very important and to share the teachings and share your own journey. I have been on some lengthy retreats. I have been on a couple that are “silent retreats” where you don’t speak for a whole week. You get a lot out of it, but it is tough while you are there.

I have a sangha and we have been together for seven or eight years. We used to meet in person in a beautiful temple. I truly, truly love these people. I try to go to a different sangha. It wasn’t the same. It was hard for me to see how I could develop the relationship. It is really hard not in person. It is definitely possible to develop the relationship without being in person.

The Sanghas with Thich Nhat Hahn allow people to share from the heart. You share what is in your heart and what the reading brought you from a personal point of view. It is not intellectual sharing. The way you share is to speak very personally from the heart. We have a system where you bow in and once you bow in the floor is yours. You speak until you are finished. Everybody else is practicing deep listening. Instead of thinking what they are going to say next. Thich Nhat Hahn teaches giving that person your full attention. When that person is finished that person bows out. You never give advice unless somebody asks. Usually people do not want advice. You also don’t comment on what the other person says. You don’t start talking about it. You don’t even approach that person. The only thing you could say is “would you be interested in talking about that”. It is so respectful. The last thing we do is meta practice. You spend meta by speaking their name, or send meta in your heart during that time period. It is not super strict Zen, but it does have a format and structure, and there is a particular emphasis on not only meditating but speaking from the heart and deep listening.

I do not see Buddhism as a religion. I see Buddhism as a psychology. Anybody from any religion could benefit. I consider myself a follower of Thich Nhat Hahn and I love him. Thich Nhat Hahn suffered greatly in Vietnam. Everybody has suffering but he knows what it is to suffer deeply and transcend that, or transform that. I think he is a good person to learn from.

There is a lot of tradition in Buddhism. The path to teaching is kind of a lineage thing. There are teachers that have studied under Thich Nhat Hahn. You can find a teacher that you resonate with.

There is the mindfulness piece and all kinds of research and a mental health strategy. It is a very important skill and it can be taught to school children. It can be somewhat divorced from Buddhism and it is. I would always remind my colleague who taught mindfulness at Emmanuel College that this all came from the Buddha. I think people have to decide if this is a secular thing, or is this a spiritual path that has to do with finding out how I should live my life and ethics.

Gina:

Once again, I was introduced to the lovely Gina by Dr. Brenda Phillips. Gina works as a Executive Coach wherein she works with members of Corporate America and seeks to incorporate Buddhist concepts into the corporate world.

Q&A with Gina:

How do you view Buddhism?

I do not think I have ever looked at it as a religion. She described Buddhism as a dharma—the combination of religion, way of life, philosophy, spirituality, etc. Tibetan Buddhists’ study of the nature of consciousness is unrivaled. Buddhism is about looking at yourself and your function into the world. Buddhism is a way of being in the world, according to Gina. Gina describes the different branches of Buddhism as reaching the top of the mountain but by different paths—reaching the top of the mountain and achieving Nirvana—self is a construct.

Gina is a Zen Buddhist.

Can you describe Zen Buddhism vs. Tibetan Buddhism?

Zen is a Mahayana practice. Vashayana or Tibetan Buddhism is described as the Diamond Vehicle. Indian Buddhism came to Tibet and integrated Tibetan spiritual practices of shamanism, bon, with Indian Buddhism. The iconography of Tibetan Buddhism is similar to Hinduism. The Deities in Tibetan Buddhism are not the same as the monotheistic God. Yidam, or deity practice is important in Tibetan Buddhism-we visualize ourselves as a particular deity with all of the deity’s characteristics. Each deity has different archetypal symbolism. We visualize ourselves as that deity to remind ourselves that we are pure and perfect. In Buddhism you are born with purity. Profound ways for ourselves to reveal our original purity and inherent compassion and wisdom. Mahayana practice of cultivating love and compassion through yidam. Zotiem aspect? Four main lineages-she practiced Nygma, the oldest school of Tibetan Buddhism. All four schools cultivate a non-dual practice. You are able to drop the notion of a self. You drop the notion of a self and other. There is no longer an idea of “me and you”, we are able to understand that in awareness there is no you, me it. Awareness is outside of mind, yet we all can taste and stabilize through practice. Known from brocades, incense, and ritual implements. Doing deity practice is the visualization of energy and light coming from the deity through our bodies and spreading through the universe. Our ability to manifest and be the conduits for love and compassion is limitless. What Western science can see, touch, and feel is very small. Gina explains that our consciousness is vast, what we think of as ourselves is the tiniest sliver of what it really is.

In Zen Buddhism, Gina described that we just sit. Zen culminates in a recognition of non-duality. Zen does not have the same ritualistic components. The mark of a practitioner is your seat. Zen teaches that we learn to observe ourselves and our reality. It is a practice of ultimate acceptance of what is here and right now. Completely open to what it means to be a human being in this moment. Zen is the practice of not silencing the mind but allowing thoughts, emotions and our bodies to just be. The ultimate goal is to realize that self is a construct. Zen relies on koan—a Zen teacher will say something that will cause your mind to tilt. Conceptual thought is no longer relevant. We confuse consciousness and awareness with the mind that we know. Gina has a friend who says we think that we can think anything and everything through. Meditation shows us that there is a much greater part of consciousness that is beyond conceptual thinking. Practice of meditation allows us to go beyond our nervous system. Gina describes Enlightenment as more of a liberation—liberation from the idea that there is a self and other. Liberation is the realization that we are inseparable from each other. Liberation is all about understanding that there is no self to defend. By our very nature we are love and compassion. What we do with our concept of selfs is damning up our ability to spread love and compassion. Ultimately, liberation is about being able to release that damning up and be a manifestation of love and compassion. Love and compassion are the full manifestation of full awareness. When we don’t have anything to defend against, all we are left with is the recognition of all the world’s suffering and all we have left is to manifest love and compassion that will heal suffering. When we have the notion that there is an I to defend we are hampered in our ability to manifest love and compassion. Tenants of Zen Buddhism are not knowing, bearing witness, and compassionate action from a place of not knowing and bearing witness. Not knowing is what we are doing when we are meditating. Coming back to a place where we are not trying to know. We are coming back to a place of attuning to who and what we are, without the hampering of knowing. The knowing that Western life is “in love with” is knowing with a small “k” as she says. “Big Knowing” is experience with 360 degree living because you have lost everything. She describes Big Knowing as if someone turned a light and you had no idea you have been sitting in the dark all this time. Big Knowing is a kind that you can only get to when we drop “little knowing”. What we don’t realize is how small we make the world when we categorize and organize our world.

She describes her work with engineers. The older professionals cannot think of themselves as anything but engineers. Gina describes the world as pushing us towards one specialization and thus our lens is developed in that way only.

Buddhism is a way of going on our conditioning and fixation. Buddhism is much more asectisim. She describes a Buddhist practice that is just tasting food. It is about being fully open to experience without experiencing pleasure. We either pounce onto an experience or we try to kick it out of our lives as hard as we can. We can’t do grief, sorrow, pain and can’t be with our anger. What is intolerable is the sensation of anger in our body. Buddhism is about holding our experience, we are having it without embracing or denying that experience. Buddhism is about fully being in ourselves as humans without having to control, change, alter, hold on to, etc.

Meditation is experiencing experience. We often mess with or numb our experience. She offers the example of drinking to numb our experiences.

Vadriyana is about transforming our experiences into wisdom. Mirror-like wisdom is turning our anger into wisdom. Being fully in an experience and allowing it to transform itself and ourselves. Vadriyana does not reject anything.

How did your journey with Buddhism begin? Were you born into a Buddhist household? Did you discover the practice?

Mid 80s Gina’s friend started talking about meditation. began practicing on the subway in NYC. In 1990 she began studying Zen to become a Shiatsu practitioner. in 1991 she went to see the Dhali Llama. The Dhali Lama gave the Bodhisattva Bow—the bow of compassion. At the time she was a street activist—activism for AIDs research, women’s rights, labor issues. She did not want to take on a paternalistic, mysoginist religion. She grew up Catholic and gave it up at 12. She grew up wanting to be a Saint, but this would not easily be done as a practicing Catholic.  In every activist group she was in there was polarity she faced. Whatever space she was in she thought if we cannot agree there is no way they can eradicate oppression in the world. From 1994 until 2008 she practiced Tibetan Buddhism. She moved to a Tibetan retreat center until 2008. She thought she wanted to serve the dharma. She edited the highest teachings of the English translation for Tibetan Buddhism. Around 2008, the Tibetan Buddhist community disbanded and she went back into the “conventional world”. She then rejected Tibetan Buddhism due to the politics and disfunction of her community. Nevertheless, her spiritual path would continue to guide her. She ended up training as an Executive Coach. Her training brought her with trainees of many kinds of Buddhism. Her teacher said that “we are here to alleviate suffering”, keeping with the message of the Bodhisattva. She wanted to find a chaplaincy program, her aspiration was to work with folks at the end of their lives. Her goal is to bring the principles of dharma into the corporate world. Spiritual communities often are composed of ex-hippies, and doulas/midwives, or people who never fit in the conventional world. Her focus was to serve people while they suffer. She also wanted to develop corporate chaplaincy—currently the only chaplains are Christian. She volunteered in a Hospice center and the concerns of folks in Hospice are similar to those that she serves as an Executive Coach for.

How do you incorporate Buddhism into your life without living a monastic lifestyle? Philosophical, religious, etc.

She explains when we sit and we are just sitting, experiencing, noticing everything that is around us is the point of meditation. Buddhism explores what it means to truly be human with heart mind and body. She recommends just sitting for a few minutes and sensing into yourself. Gina offers the proposition for meditation of noticing consciousness in the smallest parts of your body—even your little toe. She explains this practice brings awareness, the awareness that we all  inherently posses, into ever part of your body. We consistently forget out entire being—even forgetting a meal. Meditation is a practice of remembering what it is to be alive in this body and noticing all our perceptions, perceptions that we often forget.

Gina recommends being wary of apps that reward one for meditating, or apps in general. She says to be wary of apps as they impede one’s true awareness of themselves and their bodies.

My first experience with a Sangha:

I changed my mind and decided to join a Sangha and not just look for a teacher. The lovely Linda invited me to join her sangha. I was so surprised by how welcoming everyone was! They seemed so excited to meet me and get to know me. It was an absolutely enriching experience. I highly recommend participating with a Sangha. The first twenty minutes consisted of a silent meditation. The we moved into introductions and check-ins. It was shocking to me that the sangha also used the ‘popcorn’ method. The folks were a relatively older group and they used Zoom with such grace and capability. Afterwards, we moved to explaining how our practices were going. I was so surprised that people who are much older than me still struggle with images of self-doubt and inner critique. To quote Olaf from Frozen 2, I thought everything gets easier when you are older. Luckily, for me, it does not…Henceforth we moved into a Dharma reading by Thich Nhat Hahn. Everyone went around and read a paragraph or two. Finally, we finished the meeting by sending Meta, or loving kindness to someone we felt needed it. We could do this silently or out loud. I sent Meta to my mother who has house showings this week and is very nervous. It did not feel like a traditional religious service; instead it just felt like a discussion amongst friends. I really enjoyed that aspect. I did not feel that I was preached at; instead it was up to me however involved and contemplative I decided to be.