When the cup is empty

In our ordinary life, we’re like dreamers believing that the dream we’re having is real.

We think we’re awake, but we’re not. We think that this busy mind of thoughts and emotions is who we truly are. But when we actually wake up, our misunderstanding about who we are – and the suffering that confusion brings – is gone.

come easily, yet it helps to recognize that our thoughts, behaviors, and perspective of who we think we are when we can accept that what is constant in the stream of our life is always changing even when we cannot see that change occurring.

most of us, and we become self-protective dedicating ourselves to noise and chaotic states of busyness.

However, as the late Lama Yeshe once said, “The truly rich person is the one who has a satisfied mind. The affluence of satisfaction comes from wisdom, not from external things … If you are truly free from the mind of attachment, you’ll see that nothing really belongs to you in the first place …” of us with sustained effort, experience can mature into realization, and those momentary gaps in our glimpses of emptiness eventually become a stabilized experience that supports us to “wake up and stay up!”

BY SAL BARBA, PH.D.

Dzogchen Ponlop (taken from “Dreams of Light: The Profound Daytime Practice of Lucid Dreaming” by Andrew Holecek).

When I was a young person, I was terrified of being by myself; especially by myself in the dark. I became addicted to looking outside of myself for security – as if that fully exists! My conventional forms that I had constructed around me had to go! And, in my late 20s when I experienced my first glimpse of emptiness for a short period of time all hell broke loose!

The work had to be done to reevaluate the way I viewed my inner life, as well as my outer life. However, change does not

Fundamental to acceptance of change –and dealing with it, is the recognition of emptiness. I am not referring to “emptiness” as an existential or nihilistic component of awareness. Emptiness is integral in the importance of waking up and recognizing that the cup is not just half full or empty, but it is already broken! This realization supported me in my journey to wake up and look at the cup of my life!

It is said that waking up means that one has discovered emptiness. Therefore, emptiness is the “end of form as we know it, the death of materialism, and for a fully formed and materialistic ego it is akin to death.”

When we become addicted to seeing only outside of ourselves, we miss an opportunity to access our inner being. The thought of meditation can freak us out! However, when we become dedicated to a world of distraction, the idea of silence and self-reflection can become terrifying. Looking inward is not a favored choice for

There is a marvelous story about a monk in a monastery. One day some delicious yogurt had been getting served at the long table the monks were sitting at. One monk was sitting down the line of the table and was hearing the loud slosh of yogurt put into the bowls of the monks ahead of him. He began to worry that the other monks were receiving too much, and there would not be enough for him.

Suddenly, he realized what was going on in his mind. He began to meditate upon how powerful attachment is, and how his mind began creating fantasies that had nothing to do with reality. He decided to turn his bowl down. When the server arrived at his place, the yogi said, “No thanks, I already had mine.”

To further mature our experience of emptiness, we must develop three sets of skillful tools: listening to the wise teachings of our elders – in this sense the wisdom of the Buddhist masters, (or contemplative mystics) contemplation, and meditation. These are the tools that will support a seeker to gradually mature in the ways of those teachings.

When we listen, we are studying the teachings, when we contemplate, we are engaged in reflection to deepen their meaning, and finally to embody the teachings we must meditate. We need to learn how to meditate in order to integrate our experiences of emptiness.

Ajahn Chah states that, “If you try to understand it intellectually, your head will probably explode!” (not really) It’s just a way of saying that too much intellectual understanding does not support us to move beyond the academic understanding of emptiness, because emptiness is not an enterprise of the head, it’s the journey of our heart!

Thanks

SO much to all our Mukilteo partners who have food bank donation bins at their site:

To volunteer or donate: www.mukilteofoodbank.org