&quote;Sharing Dharma&quote; (eBook)

Self-Kindness
by Dharmasenna

Let’s not beat around the bush. Within the secular western context, putting it plainly, this means actually doing it. There’s a wonderful example of just talking the talk that happened in Britain soon after Buddhism began to become of interest in the mid 1960’s. The upper and middle class, unlike the rest of us, were free of the usual dictates and realities of working for a living. They were obviously proud of their newly acquired Buddhist tag or status, but were heard to exclaim, “Surely you don’t expect us to actually do this old boy” as they smoked their cigars and drank another glass of Port after a talk at a Buddhist Society gathering.

As we practice, it’s helpful for all of us to ask ourselves questions like; what is my highest potential? Why am I here? What is the actuality of my health and well-being, as against my perceptions of my health and well-being? Am I being authentically and helpfully engaged with my overall life’s journey? Do I actually understand that I could have all the wealth and comforts in the material world, but with out my well-being, it’s all for nothing?

For most of my life, I have never been far from seeing the many health promotional initiatives that are delivered to all Australians and it’s probably the same in other western societies. Like the more familiar Dharma, this material is also to be engaged with, tested, tried within our own direct experience and either refuted or realized as being either helpful or unhelpful to move the mind away from worrying towards being at peace with itself, others and the world around it.

My chosen journey would be devoid of credibility had I not passionately applied these gentle directives in my own life. We can all go forward being kinder, more aware, knowledgeable or truthful and be proactive in setting up the potential to minimise, alleviate or eradicate our worrying mind. As a Dharma practitioner, serious about learning the benefits of meditation, you have a really compelling reason to reduce, alleviate or eradicate the niggles, or demands of the body sensations that draw your attention away during a session, or even in awareness practice outside of a formal setting. It’s really about getting to know and being at ease in the body, so that it can focus on the mind within the awareness process, that inevitably means extending time spans and thus not making your meditation sit or walk more challenging than it need be.

For some years now, anyone attending Dharma classes or taking an interest in Buddhism in general, will have noticed an on-going reformation occurring. The old language and customs of classical religious Buddhism have been rendered more easily understood from within our own direct and practical experiences. If the historical Buddha were to commence a fly in - fly out engagement to where you are located, what would his experience be? What would be his twenty first century advice for us? Evolutionary change, cultural differences, affluence, lifestyle, rampant materialism, abundant food, packaged alcohol, labour saving technology, welfare, road rage, mental health statistics, and substance use, would necessitate the Buddha having another very long sit, not under a Bodhi tree perhaps, but here in Australia possibly a local gum tree. I suggest that what he would have to say to us today would be unhelpful if he just repeated the same information that was applicable to a different time, place and culture in history. The essence of what he had to say would not have changed, but the content and method would.

Aspects of our lives, even compared to the lives of our great grandparents bear comparison. My great grand parents had little schooling, travelled by horse, worked hard from dawn till dusk, had no access to unhealthy foods, had neither electricity, running water, or telephone, They were teetotal, non smokers and had no realistic way of accepting any religious beliefs or discipline other than Methodist doctrine. On our personal journey through life, the Buddhist middle way may serve us only to ensure that we neither atrophy with lassitude, by being in a state of physical, emotional or psychological weariness, or conversely we don’t become radicalised, narrow, result driven nutters, ever looking for the next retreat, teacher, therapy, gym routine or product. It points to the experience of contentment with the way things are, when life has become balanced between the extremes of nihilism and eternalism, between hedonism and asceticism, between pleasure and pain, between like and dislike, between want and not want.

So this chapter will celebrate human potentialities in this age. This age of on-going now-ness. In particular our own well-being, especially when we are looking more broadly than the middle way. For a start, we have been conditioned to believe there are only two states of well-being: illness and healthy, and we must fit into one or the other. The middle way approach would suggest staying somewhere between those states. I’m suggesting you investigate that to see if there are degrees of optimum health that can be realized or experienced, that are way beyond merely being well. Conversely, there are many degrees of illness, ranging from influenza, all the way to someone with terminal illness rattling along just outside of deaths door. In the current model of health, many of the various measurements used by medical science to determinate your health are often outdated, unhelpful or very general. For example, if your cholesterol levels were measured, they may be either high or normal. Guess what? Normal is in line with what is recorded and found normal across the entire population. High is self explanatory, and there is an additional cholesterol level or designation. You guessed it ‘desirable,’ that is in fact a level best for optimum health. Blood pressure is another example. Over night 29 million Americans have been reclassified as unhealthy, simply by the American Health Authority’s downward reclassification of high blood pressure. Australia hanging in tight to a favourite friend and ally is highly likely to follow suit.

So what do these quotes rightly or wrongly credited to the Buddha or others teach us? “A healthy body and mind empowers us for life.” “Every human being is the author of his own health or disease.” “Health is the greatest gift, contentment the greatest wealth, faithfulness the best relationship.” As engaged Dharma practitioners, how can we not only do the least amount of physical, emotional and psychological harm to our precious human bodies and minds, but be actively seeking to find and apply helpful ways to take care of ourselves, others and the world around us in our daily lives? Who amongst us, would not take an interest in our amazing bodies and encourage their functioning in an optimal manner? Why do we forget our bodies, yet pay proper attention to maintaining or looking after our motor vehicles, homes and even our pets, when our engagement with all of those things is dependent on a fully functioning and healthy body? In looking for answers, do we get into an auto pilot way of life, just reacting to the world around us on the basis of habitual patterns of thinking, speaking and acting? Maybe it’s a coping mechanism, or have we been conditioned to put others needs before our own? Maybe we think we are invincible? Why don’t we act on the health promotion material our taxes provide? Even knowing it’s updated regularly and has always been available for free. Is it the free bit that’s a problem? Do we think that there is only value in things we have to pay for?

Some of that wealth of health promotion material includes, sun damage prevention, or skin care, food and nutrition, weight related type 2 diabetes, cardiac failure, exercise and cancers. Diabetes related illnesses alone precipitated 4,443 amputations in Australia in 2011. Think also of the visible gut and toxic fat messages recently screening on T.V. Think exercise, mental health, sexual health, including transmission of sexual diseases. Consider substance abuses and addictiveness. Avoiding occupational trauma, or illness, includes everything unsafe you engage with day to day including seat belt use, hearing, sight and breathing protection, safe use of devices walking or driving.

It’s so weird in this current age that there is even now an app to let you see what’s up ahead so you can multi-task things like texting or gaming while walking. There is an increased interest in the likelihood of the chemicals added to our drinking water with the best of intentions, are seriously harming our health. The ‘quit campaign’ is clear about the helpfulness or otherwise of smoke inside the human body, the environment and people near by. One brilliant message reminds you that your time of death is unknown, but what is known is the final years of your life will be uncomfortable if you don’t look into your health care in now-ness

So remember, if you still can’t hear the messages, then you’re statistically speaking, going to spend some 12 percent of your allotted life span in preventable ill health. Whereas it’s possible, as my own mother exemplified, to spend no time with illness. Or like Singaporean’s continue to show, spending as little as one percent of their allotted lifespan suffering in illness.

This thing that we think of as us, is an inter-related mind/body complex. Just as if we focus...