Barry Garden Path

I’m never sure when I am ready to be opened up. I face disappointment, failure, loss. They all have the potential to open me. They all can have an effect more beneficial and lasting than success, but only when I am ready. Only when I yield to being opened up.

It seems I am hardly ever truly ready to be opened up by a friend’s growing distance and inattention. I often miss the opportunity to be opened and miss the chance to turn another blank page of unrealized expectations. I think I was ready to be opened up by the death of a close friend, and that allowed soothing grief to flood in, accompanied by a deep sense of my friend’s continued presence. I doubt that would have occurred had I not been ready to be opened up by the loss.

I wonder if I can be ready to be opened up by poor health or by failures that quietly stalk me uninvited. My failures as a gardener are sometimes on my mind, and I wonder if I can be ready to be opened by failures in my garden. Can I be opened up to something that success never seems to provide?

I wonder if I will be ready to be opened by the failures that every aging parent must experience. As an older parent, I become aware of my past opportunities lost, my failure to support, my unhelpful words. Am I ever ready to be opened by these growing awarenesses of my old actions as I watch my children grow older?

Success has seldom transformed me in a positive manner, except perhaps to strengthen the husk of my self-awareness. Mostly the breaking open times, the splitting of that self-supporting husk have served to allow me to grow. The breaking open times have allowed the mystery inside to unfold, the wonders of the world to come rushing in.

As I look across my bedroom at the tall bookcase that extends floor to ceiling, I stare into my stored past. So many books, some standing two deep on shelves, all remind me of my stored experience. Those pages tell part of the tale of all that has been stored in me.

A couple of books of chant are vestiges of the many songs I sang in those books. There are so many adventures and explorations. There are some fantasies, but mostly discoveries made by my heart and mind. Beginnings and endings are all there, as they remain in me. False starts that were never ended are there. So are also the repeated reads, and notes, and plunges into unfamiliar waters. All are reminders of what I carry stored in me.

Today I am aware of so many stored experiences, and the books only bring a reflection on a small part stored in me. Like the ancient maple in my garden, I have many rings that store experience of what seems the past, but is actually still present and part of me. So much has been stored in my roots and nourish me every day.

Even as I reach out to friends that surround me, I realize I do so with many stored experience within me of others and they are still present. I hold inside of me all those I have experienced and known. I have stored all those who have shaped me and still are part of my breath and my sighs. I hold a storehouse of encounters and intimacies on my yellowed pages and in my anchoring roots.

I have albums of photos that remind me of some days of my past, especially the stored memories of experiences with my two kids and Brenda. There are also other photos and written thoughts that remind me of the many people who have had intimate impacts on me and are stored within me. Their presence is more intense and intimate than the books standing vigil on the shelves in my room.

So much is stored inside of me, some easily accessible by memory and some not. Still, it is all there. What appears to be past experience is part of every everything that unfolds. What is stored has not ended. It seems to go on, day by day, moment by moment.

If I know that everything is instantly changing, always in motion, why does nearly everything seem to stay the same? Is it enough to realize that my mind provides the illusion of unchanging stability? Is my mind grasping for a stability that doesn’t exist. Is there, perhaps, some intervening plane that maintains the illusion of stability?

I wonder if things really are changing, or do they somewhat stay the same? Where lies the stability? And what difference does it make after all?

I suspect that stability is a creation of my mind and some notion of stability is maintained in spite of my unstable sense perceptions. Sometimes I just want life to be a stable path down which I travel with planning and deliberateness.

Perhaps all perceived existence, including my own, is more a river that will carry me along if I allow it. It is better if I simply relax, pay attention, and not focus on putting one foot carefully in front of another. I need not follow a stable path which, after all, may only exist in my mind.

Each morning, I tend to fashion a path that I plan to follow that day. One of my guides is my mental clock that marks how my day will be anchored. The danger is not that I might wander off this time-measured path, but that I might miss the thrill of a sweeping current that invites me into a world not at all stable.

If I truly relax, I never know what I might see of this changing world.

Being on a path seems to imply some kind of movement. The presumption is that the movement is mine and is in a forward direction, towards an outcome. That outcome is somehow better than where I stand.

I think I am starting to prefer to stand in place, to feel undirected toward some kind of goal. I think I like the feeling of embracing unintended outcomes and I am a little suspicious of things turning out just the way I planned.

If anything moves, it is not me but the path itself. It carries me along, intent though I might be of not falling off the edges. I am thinking less of outcomes and more about yielding to where I am. I like to sometimes just sit on the path.

I sense that I have no place to go, no where else to be. The path will carry me if I do not resist or stray onto its sides. The flow of the path knows how to carry me. I need not move but only look around and be aware of where I am. It is enough to become part of where I am.

For months, I have been sitting with groups of people as we explore the impact of trauma on all of us. We have been guided by Resmaa’s book on trauma as we have attempted to come to grips with the unfortunate impacts of the trauma experienced by our ancestors or ourselves.

In talking so intently with others about this inherited trauma, I have forgotten about something equally important. I have not remembered equally well that I am the beneficiary of countless acts of kindness, not just acts of trauma.

So many acts of kindness have shaped me. These are not just the acts of kindness I have directly experienced, but also the vast number of acts of kindness that have preceded me and had such a great effect on me. I may have a dark side to my inheritance, but I also have a bright side as well.

I think of the thousands of gestures that have both saved and enriched lives, and I received that bounteous inheritance from the first moment of my existence. I am remembering the countless acts of kindness that have created a high functioning species like me. Every morning, I immerse myself in the memory of the acts of love that have shaped the kind of person I am today.

I know that I carry the burden of past trauma, my own and my ancestors. I also carry all the acts of kindness of those who have come before me. I carry in me all the warmth and support of the sea of kindness of those who surround me with an abundance of compassionate love.

The raw hostility of the world is softened by the generous kindness that I see as the prevailing face of a universe that is essentially benevolent and kind. I have been marked by countless acts of kindness of humans just like me.

I aspire to play my own role in shaping with kindness what is yet to come. My every act of kindness reaches out beyond the time I still have to be alive.

It seems almost like an unreal dream that Kip and I practiced this time so often. I know I have been here before, but the reality is taking its time to settle in.

It has been only a week since I suspected that Kip was back in the hospital. He had not answered my Sunday email suggesting how we might schedule our routine Monday morning chat on FaceTime. There was his ominous silence. It was a silence we had laughed away numerous times before when I quipped that when he didn’t answer my email or my phone messages, I could assume he was in the ER or the hospital. Again.

This time it would be a day before I got the email from Ellen announcing that this was a serious return to hospital. Kip was very seriously sick. He was put on a ventilator on Sunday. Then came the dreaded but expected news that his close family would be gathering to say goodbyes on Wednesday morning.

Kip and I had witnessed this chain of events before. Practiced it. Examined it. Turned it over and over. Imagined what it would be like. He from one perspective. Me from another. His was about letting go of life. Mine was about letting go of a friend.

Cancer may take life, but it gives time. We had years to prepare for the bend in the road we both knew was inevitable. Though we could only see vaguely through the fog of medical uncertainty, we new there was a sharp curve somewhere ahead. We moved along as though we had all the time in the world, for today.

It has been a week since the practicing ended and reality set its uncertain course. Kip died on Wednesday. Even though it has been only a week since I was certain he was about to die, it seems like a much longer time. Even though the reality that was emerging slowly was strangely familiar and practiced, it became a slow and difficult process. The peeling away revealed a pain and sadness I had not seen before. Practice is one thing. The real performance is quite another.

It has been a week of raw newness blended with studied familiarity.

I guess that I thought I was being prepared and practiced for the inevitable. But in the arriving of the letting go Kip and I both had to do this past week, I found it unfamiliar. The more I have allowed myself to settle into the reality of Kip’s death, the more I am finding the experience deeply sad and difficult. I have been down this path before. We had practiced, after all.

I now realize that the practice mostly made it easier for me to slide down a familiar route. Letting go was a practiced experience. I felt little resistance to the reality I slowly settled into. The practiced ease, however, has also allowed the sadness to enter in so effortlessly and deeply. Practice was no shield from sadness.

I wonder what it was like for Kip. When I knew he was dying, I wished him acceptance and an ease in letting go. I never thought to wish him the joy of realizing that he had experienced a wonderful life. Perhaps it is not too late to remind myself to think of what a gift it has been to have Kip as a friend, to have shared all those moments of supporting friendship.

As I delete all those future 9:00 FaceTime visits with Kip from my calendar, I also remember all those past scheduled times that are still there. We may have spent a little time practicing for what was to come, but we spent a lot more time living shared moments of life together. A good blend.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted things to stay as they are. I’ve wanted things to be permanent, stable, and above all predictable. I certainly had flashes of excitement when some things changed, but I actually liked to have my feet solidly on the ground, a ground I was familiar with.

I’ve been chipping away at that solid foundation that seemed so permanent. I’m not so sure any more whether anything can be permanent, no matter how much I want it to be. I’m not so sure anything can remain the same, no matter how much I might find that appealing or comforting.

I eventually came to grips with the idea that life is not permanent. Getting older gives me the choice to try to hang on to staying alive or to yield to the inevitable and accept that I am going to die someday, perhaps soon. The idea that this will all pass away has something of a futuristic sound to it. It will happen some day, but not right now. I’m not so sure. That may be just a small part of the reality.

I’m noticing that there is nothing permanent about today, this hour or even this moment. For me to embrace impermanence goes way beyond accepting that “some day” I am going to die and my body will lose its animation. I am actually being carried along on a current of moments that has no characteristic at all resembling permanent. I and everything around me is constantly disappearing, vanishing, eroding away.

I once sat on the south ridge of the Grand Canyon and watched the sun gradually disappear below the ridge across that vast abyss. The sun was there one moment and then slowly it sank below the horizon. What had been there moments ago with amazing brilliance was no longer present or perceptible. In an instant it seemed, the whole world around me changed. I was enveloped in the approaching clutches of darkness.

So it is every day, throughout the day. Each moment, each instant that seems so firm and permanent is suddenly gone. There is nothing permanent that offers me stability and comfort. What was here a moment ago, is totally gone. There is nothing I can hold on to, nothing I can reclaim. The wisp of smoke in which I live is constantly changing, constantly evolving. I am constantly changing along with it.

It is becoming apparent that what was there at the beginning of this sentence is no longer there when I strike the “period” key. I live in a world where the concept of permanent has no place. The more I live in harmony with that lack of anything permanent, the more I will be awake in a real world. There actually is comfort in that.

I have long been attracted to the sensual quality of words in poetry and enjoyed their ability to allow me to share in the hidden experiences of the writer. This has mostly been in some context and the emerging magic has been in the weaving of words together. Some words are taking on an ability to stir deep feelings in me without the context of syntax, or rhythm or woven imagery.

All words have some cognitive resonance and recognition, as long as I understand the language. Some words, all on their own, can stir sensations beyond the enjoyment of recognition. I find that even without context, words like “emptiness” bring on sensations that ripple through my body. “possibilities” is a word that conjures up a murmur that relaxes all of me. “Inbetween” instantly takes me to a deep sensation of recognition and being centered.

I know it is my past experience with these words and my deep immersion in them that causes this sensation in me. It is like they are a small opening into a space that is wide and wonderful. Just by thinking them, they instantly remind me of where I have visited before.

There is one theory that language has the effect of rewiring the brain. We think in patterns conditioned and even formed by the assemblage of words in our language. I think that the rewiring of my brain might also be associated with individual words. The words individually concur up whole wide experiences that would normally take many paragraphs to describe

I think that I normally have rich experiences that I associate with individual words. When speaking with others, I use those words, realizing that there is no way that they can understand the full meaning that those words have for me.

I am aware that some words not only have that rich depth of meaning for me, but they also cause sensations. The ones I am thinking of conjure the feeling of unmistakable peace and calm. It is nice to have my brain wired to them. It is nice to have them so accessible.

I sometimes reach out for a hand, and none is there.

I wonder if this is just part of being human in the midst of others like me, or is it an invitation for me to relax into a realm of no formations. There is a rich joy in the experience of being connected with another person, a plant, a rock or any other entity. This is mirrored in the rich joy of being connected with nothing at all. The beckoning lure of nothingness extends a powerful invitation to enjoy the sphere where there is no recognition, but all things abide.

I am caught in between the poles of this duality in my life. The invitation of each is so strong, and sometimes very distracting. Perhaps there is an in between where both abide.

I’m never quite sure what people mean when they talk about “being present.” I am even rather vague about what I mean when I say that I am present. However, I am noticing that there are a group of characteristics that show up when I experience what I consider being present. Actually, focusing on those characteristics of experience sometimes help me have an experience of being present.

There are traditionally five aspects of experience, and paying attention to them makes my life much richer. I have more experiential contact with what being present is about. Although they can be looked at individually, they are like the panels of a five-sided ball. While they can be understood when examined individually, they are best experienced when observed all at the same time. Experience is the bundle.

One obvious aspect of experience involves material form. This is the sensory aspect of experiences and includes all matter and the related physical sense impressions. A tea cup sitting next to my keyboard and my seeing it is an aspect of experience. My feeling the warm cup in my hands and pressing my lips against its hard rim all are aspects of my tea cup experience.

Whether this is a pleasant or unpleasant experience is a wholly mental activity and a second aspect of experience. Every experience is pleasant, unpleasant or neither-pleasant-or-unpleasant. Sometimes this is called feeling tone, and it is a basis for developing likes or dislikes, which is another aspect of experience. If I recognize the experience as neither-pleasant-or-unpleasant, it typically means I am tuned out, not paying attention. I am in a moment of delusion. To experience being present, I have to know if the experience is pleasant or unpleasant.

Recognition of the tea cup is another aspect of experience and a second mental activity. In my constant stream of sense activity, I am constantly singling out objects that I recognize. I relate this current experience of seeing and holding a tea cup to a mental storehouse of previous experience. There is great vulnerability and chance of error in this aspect of experience. Recognition or perception is not always accurate. It is important that I suspend beliefs, desires and fears in experiencing a tea cup. It is a challenge to recognize things as they are and not as I imagine them.

A fourth aspect of experience is my attitude to what I perceive. This aspect is also a mental activity and includes all the things that express my will and motivation. This aspect of experience includes a vast range of mental experience: likes, dislikes, confusion, joy, tranquility. My experience of the tea cup can include a great assortment of moods and emotions. My attitude to perception is a major part of the moment of experiencing the tea cup. I often experience my tea cup as comforting, soothing, tasteful, delightful.

The fifth aspect of experience is the knowing quality of my mind or consciousness. It is like a cloak thrown over the rest of the experience. It is the most complex concept of experience, and is the most basic knowing of my tea cup. Consciousness is like the hand passing in front of my face. It is simply there.

There are times that I examine my experience from the perspective of each and all these aspects. Like a pilot going through a check-list before take-off, I check each of the five. Then I hold them all together in my attention, like the pilot who is aware of all the green lights at once.

It is one experience after all, and it is necessary for me to hold all five aspects in mind in order to understand it. I hold them together in one moment, one experience, while still being aware of all five aspects. It is that collective understanding that forms my sense of being present.

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