Human pinballs, malai kofta and an enlightened duck

Just another day inside my mind

One of the three tenets that make up the core of what the historical Buddha taught, is that there is no separate, abiding self, directing and experiencing ‘our lives’. The Pali word for this doctrine is anattā - which literally translates as not-self. The other two; annica (impermanence) and dukka (suffering), are somewhat easier to grasp.

Anattā - not-self - on the other hand is a hard one to wrap our heads around. I’ve even heard Buddhist teachers say that they understand it conceptually but find it hard to live it from a place of experience.

Oddly, quite near the start of my deep dive into vipassana meditation 15 years ago I got it - in an experiential, enduring, unquestionable, unmissable way that lasted all day, for days on end. From that place, everything made complete sense. Since a young teenager, I had always questioned who I really was. My young mind had suggested the word ‘imposter’ as a way of pointing to how I just regurgitated and re-packaged existing ideas and past experiences. At school it seemed nothing was truly original or had its own true essence. I could see that we all did this - we are human pinballs, being bounced around by our interactions, changing from day to day depending on external forces. Anattā seemed to align with this - at the deepest level, we are more of a fluid process than a fixed entity. Cooking shows up the same patten - every idea, every recipe has influences from something prior. Nothing is wrong about this - it just seems to confirm nothing exists independently of anything else.

Anyways... On a recent ‘off the map’ retreat which I wrote a little about here, our teacher - who I’ve been retreating with annually since 2009 and who has been a beloved senior teacher in the Insight Meditation tradition for 40+ years - announced that anattā (not-self) was no longer a principle she orientated herself around in her own process / path, and hence was no longer teaching. “If I’m honest”, she said, pointing to her heart and laughing, “I feel like there is a person in here!” Seeing herself through the lens of anattā - not fully embracing and accepting her humanity, her personhood - felt limiting, she said.

What kind of cosmic joke is this?! It precipitated a massive wobble in my own process. What should I believe now?

I can still squint my inner vision, and see myself (ie not-self) operating on a moment by moment basis as a process, the sum of the parts of all my experiences, desires and fears. But my very wise teacher has blown this wide open.

Another teacher of mine constantly encourages ‘radical, fearless questioning’. I love this about him - it sounds so exciting, inviting and courageous. (And by the way, this is nothing like dismissive ‘cancel culture’. His invitation is to openness, curiosity, and bright, loving enquiry). I heard him say it again yesterday for the fiftieth time, and a realisation came; loving the idea of fearless questioning, and, actual fearless questioning, were universes apart. How radical and fearless have I truly been?!

Honestly? My questioning has been within safe limits. Carefully crafted to question that which suited me and definitely didn’t upset anyone. So finally, I sat with that invitation - what have I been unwilling, or just unable to question? What’s been hidden from my awareness? My own dharma teacher had been willing to question the Buddha for christ’s sake. What should I be questioning, for my highest good, my evolution?

The topic of anattā came back into mind, and my British education kicked in and I started to wonder who was right. On the one hand, I could suddenly see how anattā has been a convenient hiding place. It’s potentially a spiritual by-pass. If I tightly hold the view that there’s not an abiding self within me, then I’m off the hook. There’s no-one who needs to bravely step out into the unknowable vast expanse ahead.

Yet what became illumined is that I don’t need to make anything or anyone wrong. How I wish our eduction systems taught this! Because when I sit with the seeming contradiction - the buddha who taught that ‘not-self’ was a hallmark of existence that needed to be understood, and my own teacher who says that she finds that view limiting and de-humanising - I surprisingly find in me the ability to hold both views simultaneously. I don’t have to reject anattā to feel and know everything I am; my history, my fears, my stories, my dreams. It’s opening to yes / and. It’s choosing to rest in the present, in the heart, not needing answers. Not because I’m on the fence, but because the heart and mind are wide enough to hold it all. After all, how can anything be outside of ‘all-that-is’. This in itself feels like a sacred expansion.

Between my two teachers, they have blown my mind open. Again.

In the closing lines of the marvellous teaching Advice From Me To Myself, Patrul Rinpoche says:

When you’re without any worldly or religious obligations,
Don’t keep on longing to acquire some!

If you let go of everything—
Everything, everything—
That’s the real point!

Today while I’ve been unpacking all of this, or it’s been unpacking me, I’ve been preparing the food for tomorrow’s monthly Quiet Day retreat at Te Whenua. I had the idea to make malai kofta for our lunch, even though I’ve never made malai kofta before, and it’s a classic dairy-rich curry with cheesy dumplings, which I would have to veganise. It’s taken me all morning to slowly figure it out, looking at both traditional and vegan recipes online, and feeling into how I wanted to do it.

Anyway, all up I created a mountain of dishes, which added to the washing up from my earlier bright idea to also make a plant-based Millionaires Shortbread (which meant making shortbread, and caramel, and melting chocolate).

The afternoon was spent cleaning up. Then I felt frustrated and guilty that my beautiful, patient dog didn’t get a walk. This is life, and it’s all sacred. Peeling and chopping onions, mopping floors. Endless washing up. Thinking about infinite possibilities. Not having time to do everything I want.

Practising non-opposition.

I feel like sharing this beautiful poem, one of my favourites, about a little duck who makes himself a part of the boundless by easing himself into just where it touches him. We don’t need to know all the answers - we can just be with what’s closest to us.

Now we’re ready to look at something pretty special.
It is a duck,
riding the ocean a hundred feet beyond the surf.
No it isn’t a gull.
A gull always has a raucous touch about him.
This is some sort of duck,
and he cuddles in the swells.

He isn’t cold,
and he is thinking things over.
There is a big heaving in the Atlantic,
and he is a part of it.

He looks a bit like a mandarin,
or the Lord Buddha meditating under the Bo tree.

But he has hardly enough above the eyes
to be a philosopher.
He has poise, however,
which is what philosophers must have.

He can rest while the Atlantic heaves,
because he rests in the Atlantic.

Probably he doesn’t know how large the ocean is.
And neither do you.
But he realizes it.

And what does he do, I ask you?
He sits down in it!
He reposes in the immediate as if it were infinity
– which it is.
He has made himself a part of the boundless
by easing himself into just where it touches him.

I like the duck.
He doesn’t know much,
but if only I could listen
He teaches me all I need to know.

by Donald Babcock.

Update - the malai kofta was a big success! I’ll write it up soon and post it in my recipe collection.

My other small win of the week was not getting upset with my mechanic who forgot to order the brake pads for my car which was booked in to have its brake pads replaced. A part of me actually wondered if I should pretend to be more annoyed. I decided to just say oh well. This is progress!

Thanks for reading my ramble, and hope you’re celebrating some small wins of your own! Tonight there is a bright aurora - life feels magical.

Jenny

X

PS I’ve been pointed to the Ananda Sutta, where the Buddha stays silent when asked whether there is a 'self' or not. Perhaps it’s one of those imponderable, incomprehensible questions that the Buddha said is best left alone. According to the Buddha, ‘Whoever speculates about these things would go mad & experience vexation’. Let’s not do that.

Te Whenua Retreat - the last of the cherry tree leaves have gone now!

Upcoming retreats at Te Whenua Retreat

June 19-23rd: Matariki Winter retreat, 4-nights all inclusive

Sun June 29th: one-day cooking retreat, the theme is Greek Meze

Tues July 1st: Quiet Day of Meditation & Rest

July 8th - 11th: 3-night NOURISHED Cooking Retreat