Month: September 2023

Sometimes I feel like I am walking around in a bubble. This is an experience that mainly comes when I am focused on my legs and the pain that I feel.

I noticed this yesterday when I walked down Nicollet Avenue, slowly making my way along the 3 blocks from the bus stop to the light rail platform. Each step was a grumpy reminder that one or both my legs were not happy with what I was asking them to do. My focus on my legs and discomfort put my awareness squarely on my leg movement. I was only slightly aware of the activity around me. I walked in my own private bubble.

When I finally stood on the platform waiting for the light rail train, I noticed the family almost pressed up against me. All had brown skin and they spoke soft words of spanish. The young five year old boy and I exchanged looks occasionally. They otherwise were nestled in their own bubble. But my own bubble had somewhat dissolved.

I watched carefully as each new person came on to the platform. Almost all with skin tones darker than mine. Heads turned to see where the harsh and loud words were coming from, a loud and upset man walking behind us. I was more interested in watching the watchers.

On the train, a few students trickled in as we approached the university. I felt more and more immersed in a cultural and economic milieu I hardly ever experience in my limited corner of the world. The platform I stepped onto at the university east bank station was a mix of students, and I was aware that I had entered a whole different mix of humanity. Culturally and economically I had, in just a few steps, become aware of a new surrounding.

My legs still hurt, but my bubble had become less isolating. My bubble had begun to dissolve when I shuffled up the incline to the down town Minneapolis platform. I gradually became more attentive to people all around me. I may not yet be ready to fully embrace them, but I had become more aware of my people. Perhaps my bubble simply got a little larger.

This is a talk given at the Blooming Heart Sangha on Sept. 7, 2023

Like you, I live in an experience of time, …….or at least I think I do.

• I often wonder: What is it like to live in an experience of the timeless.
• My watch and my phone often remind me of the experience of time, or what I think is time.
• On the large scale, time is based on the observation of the rotation of the earth:  we break down the rotation into hours and minutes and seconds.  
• An atomic clock allows time to be based on the observation of very small particles.
• Time is annually based on the observation of the movement of the earth around the sun.
• Time is sometimes based on observation of the red shift in the movements of stars and we can conjecture the beginning of the cosmos……when did it happen?

Actually, I am not observing time, just the movement of large bodies, or small atoms.

• My mind creates time
• Time is an artifact of observation.    Time, unlike gravity, doesn’t really exist, except in our minds.
• So how big a step would it be to move from time to the timeless.  
• Actually, it seems quite large, but I think I do it routinely;   we all do.  We do it right here.
• I think we experience time routinely;  we experience the timeless in mindful practice;  in the mindful experience of the here and now, in the experience of the mindful present moment 
• I think that living in the historic realm is easier to imagine, but the ultimate realm is within reach

We have a clue to this transformative leap, this transformative experience in the five remembrances……you know about them.

• It was Bro Phap Hu who pointed out, for me, a new and deeper meaning in the 5 remembrances.    
• The first four rembrances all refer to the passage of time, things that exist in time:   We will die, get old, get sick, lose those we love.
• But the fifth remembrance speaks to what endures;  it exists out of time 
• Sister Chan Thuan Nghiem said: “I inherit the results of my actions of body, speech and mind. “  = 5^th remembrance.
• “My actions are my continuation.”   
• My actions endure.   They exist beyond my notion of time.   
• Embeded in the 5th remembrance is an invitation to step into and experience the timeless, an invitation to step into and experience the ultimate,

The 5^th remembrance reminds me how lasting transformation takes place, how transformation endures.

• Lasting transformation takes place right now, it takes place as we act in this moment.
• Linear time is a mental artifact.  Actions endure in the timeless.
• Here’s the big news for me: The historic and the ultimate are one and the same.
• I can see this when I break the mental constraints on the relationship between linear time and transformation.
• It’s not easy: Linear time is a slave driver, it presents an apparent ticking clock for transformation.  Hurry up!
• But lasting transformation happens now, in the timeless, in the ultimate.   Relax in the moment.

The first four remembrances point to the ticking clock.

• These things are going to happen in time, death, sickness, age, loss
• BUT. And ALSO, what endures is the transformation taking place right now
• What endues is taking place in the ultimate, and that is in the right now. = 5^thremembrance.

That is why, for me, what we are doing here right now is so important.   

• This is my place of transformation, of shaping the timeless.  
• What I do here is both in time and in the timeless, the historic and the ultimate.
• There is no difference, only a mental distinction.
• I am often thinking of how what I do now shapes the future of historic time, but there is much more to it. 
• There are consequences in the historic, and what I do now also shapes the ultimate, timeless.  
• My mind is fettered to the siren call of time, what will I do tonight when I leave, what will I have to do tomorrow, how soon will this talk be finished.  
• Mindfulness breaks that tie to time, allows the timeless, the ultimate to be experienced.

For me the practice is about learning how to experience the timeless, the ultimate.

• Anything that invites me to mindfulness also invites me to experience the timeless, the ultimate
• I touch the 2 billion year old stone around my neck; I can’t  imagine 2 billion years and the touching reminds me how I am right now straddling time and the timeless.  
• We will soon listen attentively to what one another says this evening, that listening allows experience of the timeless
• I Attentively feel the shape of the chair or cushion, an experience of the timeless.
• I attentively sense the air around me,  that action allows me to experience the timeless if done mindfully.
• It is what we sometimes call living in the moment…..actually it is also learning to live, to act in the moment-less.
• Living, acting in the moment is also living, acting in the ultimate, the timeless.  

Thay speaks of standing on the other shore as a future event, and then he also says we are already standing there.

• This is it; we are already in the ultimate.   In this room, in this moment, I am sitting in time and in the timeless, in the historic and the ultimate 
• What I do here shapes both, what I do here is transformative in time and in the timeless.  
• I will die, I will get sick, I will grow old, I will suffer loss.   And what I do here will endure. 

I invite you to listen to one another as we do dharma sharing with the experience of listening in time and the timeless.    

• And then remember what that feels like.

I think that autism is like a wild card in the homo sapiens genome. It is out of line with what humans expect in the ‘typical’ or ‘normal’ deck. It appears in place of other traits and allows the brain development to go in a slightly different direction. That means something is lost and something is gained.

What is lost is some trait that humans usually consider normal, even desirable. It may have something to do with sociability, and the person with the wild card often doesn’t seem to fit into what has been seen as an acceptable social norm. What is lost may be something that has over time come to seem to bind humans together and make them seem to exhibit similar behavior.

Because it is so acceptable and fits the common definition of ‘normal’, a person with the normal trait has an evolutionary advantage. They are more likely to pass on their genes to another generation. People prefer to stay normal. So a very static, non creative but stable situation develops when normal people select to mate with normals. Not much changes. The human situation based on normals neither gets better or worse.

Autism throws a wild card into the mix. In the human deck, the human genome, there is a chance for a wild card to emerge. Some humans experience brain development that does not follow the dominant, normal pattern. Some features may be reduced or left out. But new features develop instead, and it is all part of what occurs in the human genome.

Those new features can be frightfully undesirable, perhaps including cognitive impairment. The new features can also be amazingly wonderful and the individual might have an expanded understanding of reality, something ‘normals’ might never imagine.

Many individuals who have been dealt this human genome wild card have shown up in history. Most of them have been a little quirky in that they did not fit in the normal mold. Many have been considered nerdy. And many of them have, because of their untethered grasp of reality so common to normal humans, shown their fellow normal humans how inventive the human mind can be.

These have included the intellectual greats who show up in human history. These have included the artists and inventors who were able to share their unique and new grasp on reality. Because of them, humanity has largely prospered and benefited.

Some of the great receivers of the wild card have not benefited humanity. Rather than bring inspiration and a better life, some have had the genius to bring destruction and harm to their fellow humans.

The normals have many times had to decide whether to include these inspired visionaries into the mix of humanity’s future. It is happening today and applies both to those who are beneficial or those who are harmful.

That ability that humans have to decide whether to welcome the wild card is specific to homo sapiens. Humans can knowingly and deliberately step out of the laws of evolution and consciously decide the future of the species .

Wild cards are opportunities provided by the human genome. Fortunately, humans have chosen wisely so far, considering the general success of the species. Even in this period of peril and fear of the future, it is possible for some of those wild cards to inspire and guide humans to a thriving future. It is possible if those wild cards are valued and followed.

A thriving future is not likely to be exclusively in the hands of ‘normals’. We need humans with special vision and insight, and they are likely to be wild cards on the autism spectrum.