Mindfulness and Intimacy on the Noble Eightfold Path
by Yin De
Text of a talk given on December 17, 2006 at Glendale, Arizona
There is a difference between mundane inattention - going through the motions, and mindful purpose - walking the noble path.
Mindfulness and intimacy can become a reality in most of our daily activities if we commit to learning and practicing the Noble Eightfold Path of Buddhism. The Noble Eightfold Path, along with the Four Noble Truths makes up the foundational teachings of Buddhism. These are the core and the primary teachings of Buddhism, but you don't have to be a Buddhist to learn and practice them.
We call it a path, but it's not linear. You can't start at step one and end at step eight. Each step is interconnected with each other step, and as we practice one element, we strengthen all the other seven. This path is the prescription given to us by the great healer, Shakyamuni Buddha and it is the method which is sure to liberate all beings from suffering. In working the steps of this path, we can develop both mindfulness and intimacy on levels we couldn't have imagined in the past. Within the context of our talk about mindfulness and intimacy, I'm going to give you a little more detail on each of the steps and share some personal experiences of my journey on the path so far. As you will hear, my journey on the Eightfold Path started long before I knew anything about Buddhism, and several of the lessons I learned on the path I was only able to relate to my practice after having developed a degree of mindfulness through meditation and through practicing the other steps. I think each of us has life experiences and lessons that we don't fully realize the value of until some time later, when their karma ripens.
The Noble Eightfold path consists of three divisions; Prajna or wisdom, Sila or morality, and Samadhi or mental development. The steps on the path belonging to the Wisdom division are Right View and Right Intention. The steps belonging to the Morality division are Right Speech, Right Action, and Right Livelihood. The steps belonging to the final division of Mental Development are Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, and Right Concentration.
Keep in mind that "Right" as in Right View doesn't mean right as in right versus wrong, but rather it means "complete" or "effective". The English word right is the chosen translation from the Pali, but like in so many other instances, it's not an exact match for the meaning.
The first step on the path is usually listed as Right View. Right View means to see things as they really are. It means to see reality without adding the imaginings and creations of the ego on top of it. It's like direct perception of the truth before the conditioned mind has a chance to bounce the information off of it's collection of experiences and prejudices. Right View also means seeing and understanding the Four Noble Truths; all beings suffer, suffering is caused by craving and desire born of ignorance, there is a way to end suffering, and the way is to follow this path. Right View is sometimes called Right Understanding. Our understanding creates our reality, so Right View leads to the other steps on the path.
One of my personal experiences with Right View came as I was working with the inmates at the Federal Prison where I volunteer some Saturdays. I had been meeting with a group of male inmates who wanted to learn and study Buddhism for about a year when I met a man who had served about half of a twenty year sentence stemming from a weapons and drugs conviction. Let's call him "Jeff".
Jeff was always studying the law and he had confided in me that his greatest desire had been to learn enough to be able to appeal his conviction all the way to the Supreme Court and one day win his release. I asked him what he would do once his dream became a reality. Jeff told me that he had wanted to get our so that he could kill his ex-wife. He had everything planned out; it would be the perfect crime. He had spent years thinking about and planning how he would murder the woman he once loved. He was obsessed and his whole life had revolved around this plan and this hate.
But then something happened. Jeff began to learn meditation and to study these teachings, and bit by bit he began to see that his own attachment to anger was causing his suffering. With this insight, he began to loosen his attachment to the delusions that motivated him to hate and anger, and he began to understand the Second Noble Truth - the one about the cause of suffering. Jeff eventually lost the desire to kill his ex-wife when he gets out, and he no longer spends his days obsessing about her. In fact, Jeff says he rarely thinks about her at all and when he does, he remains calm and has no feelings of anger. He lives each moment and watches his mind become clearer, more focused, and more compassionate day by day. He began to see things as they really are. Jeff began to experience Right View.
The second step on the path is given as Right Intention. Right Intention refers to volition; the energy that directs our actions. With Right View in place, we then have to develop the will or volition to act upon our Right Views. This will or volition is called Right Intention. We develop the intent to follow the Buddha's teachings and to share them with others. We develop the intent to do no harm to other living beings. Right Intention includes the intent to live in accordance with our precepts, morals, or convictions. One of my experiences with Right Intention came about through my ordination into the Zen Buddhist Order of Hsu Yun. I had been studying and practicing Chinese Ch'an Buddhism for a few years, when one of my teachers presented me with the opportunity to take it a step further and join an unbroken line of monks that could be traced back 99 generations right to the Buddha himself. I jumped at the chance because I was in love with Buddhism, and I felt that it made sense to become a member of the clergy if for no other reason than that I wanted it.
The ordination ceremony was a long and grueling ritual of bowing, kneeling, clanging of cymbals and bells, offering of incense, and Chinese chanting that none of the postulants, myself included, understood then or understands to this day. At the conclusion of the ceremony we enjoyed a special vegetarian feast, which had been prepared by the temple's head chef. The four other newly ordained priests and I sat down to eat with the Abbot, and he began to quiz each of us on what we intended to do in our new role as Ch'an priests.
One new priest planned on going to work as a hospital chaplain in his home town of Las Vegas. Another planned to work the rest of her life translating Buddhist scripture from Chinese into Spanish. Another third new priest was asked next and he indicated that he wanted to work with troubled youth in his home borough of The Bronx. I felt myself beginning to sweat a little as I thought to myself… uh oh, what am I going to tell him… what do I want to do with my new position… when he looked at me I said "I'm going to start a Sangha in Phoenix, Arizona so that I can teach others what I have learned about Zen. I want to share the Dharma with anyone who is interested". A moment of painful silence followed before the Master spoke up in his best broken English. He said "Arizona, Grand Canyon". Apparently he has been to Arizona to see the Grand Canyon.
The fact was, I did have a budding desire to start a Zen Sangha, but I had yet to develop the intention to move ahead with it. It wasn't until about two years later when I finally incorporated the Arizona Zen Buddhist Society and we began meeting in a Unitarian church on Tuesday nights. I had the Right View, and then the Right Intention - the complete and whole intention - developed from that.
The third step on the path is Right Speech. Right Speech is the first of the "Sila" or morality division of the path. It has to do with how we use speech to support the other elements of our practice. Right Speech includes concepts such as not lying, no harsh speech, and avoiding idle chatter. It also refers to not gossiping about others, not speaking words that may offend or hurt others, and only using speech to develop understanding and compassion.
One of my personal encounters with Right Speech is illustrated in the following short recollection: One day when I was visiting my parents in Salt Lake City, my mother had just bought a new pair of jeans and she asked me "Do these pants make me look fat?" Thinking quickly about Right Speech and about the Precept against speaking falsely, I replied "You had better ask Dad" and I got out of there as quickly as I could.
Sometimes Right Speech means no speaking. Many of us westerners can't stand the idea of silence. We find great painful discomfort in silently sitting with people we don't know well, and we usually destroy the silence with mindless idle chatter about the weather or some such nonsense. One of my favorite quotes about this step of the path comes from Shridi Sai Baba, who said: "Before you speak, ask yourself: is it kind, is it true, is it necessary, does it improve upon the silence?"
Right Action is the second part of the Precepts division, and it refers to the physical actions we take. This would include the Precept of not-killing, and of avoiding sexual misconduct. Also included in Right Action is getting enough exercise, enough sleep, and enough of the proper kinds of foods to eat. Actions we take and actions we don't take are equally important in our spiritual development. This step includes not taking that which is not given - no stealing.
I remember one of my early lessons with regard to Right Action. It was a dual lesson that I learned when I was six or seven years old and growing up in Massachusetts. I had just met my future best friend, another mischief loving boy named Nicky. A few days after we met, Nicky and I were over at the corner market visiting the shop keeper like I had done dozens of times before. The shop keeper looked just like that old man Mr. Whipple in the "Please don't squeeze the Charmin" commercials. He was really nice and fun to visit with.
While the old man was cashing out a customer, Nicky whispered to me "I dare you to steal a pack of gum". I was terrified but I wanted desperately to impress my new friend so I decided to do it. While Nicky was talking with the old man, I slipped a pack of Wrigley's up under the cuff of my long sleeved shirt and I walked quickly out the glass front door of the market to wait for my friend. When he didn't immediately follow me out, I looked back inside through the glass door and saw Nicky pointing at me as he was talking to the shop keeper. He had turned me in. It was a set up. The old man came out and said "Give me the gum". I did, then he said "It's not nice to do that" and he turned to Nicky and said "But it's even worse to tell on your friends. You should be ashamed of yourself". Mr. Whipple knew what was up the whole time. I got a lesson in both Right Action and Right Speech that day.
I didn't remember this event much less relate it to the Eightfold Path until just a few years ago. One of the side effects of Buddhist meditation is that long forgotten memories seem to find their way back into your consciousness - both good and not so good - they all come back. Once I remembered this episode, it allowed me to reflect on "Right Action" and look closely at what goes on in my mind that causes me to act - or not act - in a certain way.
The fifth step is Right Livelihood and it refers to the way in which we earn our living. We should be fully aware of all the implications of the work we choose to do. We should strive to maintain a job that fits in with our morals and values - the Buddha said specifically that we should not work in the trade of weapons, illegal drugs, animals for slaughter, or other types of work that create suffering. We should avoid any kind of occupation that could result in the violation of the precepts, or in the harming of other beings. Everyone has to make a living, but not at the expense of our vows, virtue, or morals.
I have worked in car dealerships for most of my working years since leaving school. I'm sure you can imagine all the internal conflict that is possible there. I have had the owner of a car dealership look me in the eye and tell me "You can't be completely honest with everyone, they'll never buy that way and besides, they can't make the right decision unless you embellish the truth to some extent". Needless to say, this kind of work became more and more difficult for me after taking my vows and beginning to develop mindfulness and intimacy as a result of my practice of meditation. As your practice deepens, you start to see your loved ones or even your self in every face you look into. A few years ago I left that world and went to work for an organization that was more concerned with service than with avarice. As with my last story, this episode also gave me the opportunity to investigate the nature of mind and to look into why I acted the way I did in certain situations, and that's exactly what we are supposed to be doing if we are Ch'an Buddhists - investigating mind.
The "Samadhi" or mental development part of the path begins with Right Effort. Right Effort is very closely related to the second step of Right Intention. Having developed the intention to follow the path, we must also make the effort. It's not good enough to want to live morally and to develop our mental capacities; we must make the effort as well. Once we have developed the intention, we have to put that intention into action with Right Effort. It takes effort to walk this path and it takes effort to allow mindfulness and intimacy into all areas of our lives. We have to make a committed effort to practice each step of the path and to live consciously in as many moments during each day as possible. This might sound simple, but then so does Zen meditation - and I know many people who would testify that Zen meditation is not as simple as it sounds - not even close.
Right Mindfulness is the next step and Right Mindfulness means being fully present in whatever activity we are engaged in at the time. It means doing whatever it is we are doing without allowing wandering thoughts to interfere with our attention to the task. Right Mindfulness is present when we are fully aware of our activity, whether it is washing the dishes, driving the car, sitting in Zazen, teaching our children, or even going to the bathroom. Whatever we do, we should try to do it with full intent and complete focus. That is right mindfulness. The practice of mindfulness is what develops our intimacy.
Let me illustrate with a quote from Nonin Chowaney of the Nebraska Zen Center, he says:
When I'm ready to begin a class in Buddhism I teach at Creighton University, I close the door to shut out the noise from the hallway. It's a heavy wooden door and there's no cushion where it meets the metal frame, so I'm usually careful to close it gently. Once, however, I was careless, and it slammed shut with a boom! It was so jarring that I grimaced, for I felt it deep in my heart. I automatically put my hands in gassho and apologized to the door for not treating it kindly. As I walked back to the desk, I thought of something I'd read in a book by Kosho Uchiyama years ago, when I was just starting to practice zazen. He said, "If you can't hear the pots crying out in pain when you bang them together in the kitchen, your zazen is not deep enough." I didn't know what he meant at the time and imagined "pot beings" in agony in some non-human purgatory, but the phrase stuck in my mind, and when I slammed the door the other day and felt its pain, I understood what Uchiyama-Roshi had meant. Fifteen years of zazen had opened my ears.
This kind of intimacy with all things, both living and non-living is a natural part of the mental development of Samadhi; it's what people mean when they say mindfulness.
The final step on the Eightfold Path is Right Concentration; sometimes translated as Right Meditation. Right Concentration refers to the development of mental clarity that comes through the practice of meditation. Concentration is a combination of mindfulness and focus, resulting in clarity. When we begin with meditation, we focus our awareness on a single object - usually the breath. This practice if done repeatedly and regularly serves to intensify and increase our ability to concentrate. If we practice Right Concentration regularly, every interaction throughout the day is easier, and stress and confusion become less frequent. Gradually, through this process, we are able to see reality as it is. We are able to perceive on a much more subtle level. All of this leads to being able to better understand each step of the path; it leads to mindfulness and intimacy with all beings and all things, and leads ultimately to liberation from suffering - also known as nirvana.
One of my memories of Right Concentration comes from my first intentional experience with meditation. I remember I had been practicing zazen for about two years, not really noticing any progress but it felt good and my wife said I seemed less angry and high strung so I kept doing it. Fewer people were giving me the finger on my morning commute. Anyway, one day I remember sitting in zazen, focusing on my breathing, when suddenly for no obvious reason, I no longer felt like I had a physical body. For one golden moment, my legs didn't hurt, my butt wasn't numb, and I didn't "feel" any physical sensations at all, but the breathing was still happening; only there was no "I" that was doing the breathing. Neither was there any "mind" that was causing the breathing, or even watching the breathing any longer, there was just breathing. There was breathing without a "breather". There were in-breaths and there were out breaths, but no person doing the breathing. The breath was part of all that existed for that one golden moment.
For that one moment in Samadhi, the "I" disappeared and the awareness that was left merged with everyone and everything that ever did or ever will exist. That was true intimacy born of mindfulness. It was Right Concentration, and it served as a reminder to me that this path should be walked. This practice should be continued. These eight skillful means should be developed and maintained.
This path can be walked by anyone, and one day, having mastered the three divisions of Prajna, Sila, and Samadhi, we may find that all things are indeed impermanent and interconnected, and with this realization all of our actions and interactions begin to take place on a new level of mindfulness and with a new degree of intimacy.
Amitofo.