On Work

In the context of how I am thinking about the nature of work, regardless of our age, state of health, employment status, or stage of life we are all involved in it, simply for the fact that we are alive and breathing. There’s the work of household upkeep, whether we live solo or with others. The work of education. The work we do for money. The work we do on the daily to keep our self fed. The work of caretaking for others and for our self.

Applying mindfulness practice to the field and realm of work is what I consider to be advanced, next-level practice. By which I mean, tough stuff.

The question is, how do we apply our practice to our work? With whatever kind of work we do, job related or otherwise, how do we integrate our practice into it; how do we actively enable our work to be an extension of our practice?

When it comes to working for pay, I’m hard-pressed to think of a job that isn’t taxing, at least once-in-a-while. Whether we interact with other people all day or with a computer; whether we do manual labor or are sedentary, each and every job has its hardships and stresses. Its petty annoyances and large frustrations. Its routine complications and unscheduled upsets.

In the office-type job I do remotely, when I’m hip deep in emails that need responding to, a sea of phone calls that need returning, and a host of computer-based tasks that need my attention; when there’s loads to do and only so much time in the day, developing creative ways to apply my practice to my work is not only what helps to keep me grounded, but is fundamentally necessary to keep me sane.

Serious Gumption

With heavy socks and an oil lamp in tow, my green puffy coat, winter hat & gloves, and a 1lb propane bottle to twist into the Heater Buddy, I fled from our 12X14 cabin to our nearby 1989 Chevy van. Lovely as they are, I wanted space I didn’t need to share. With his loud sleep sighs and tossings & turnings up in the loft, and the four-legged’s early morning antics, I had to get up out of there.

Quietude and solitude, uninterrupted time and space, are not mere wants or basic pleasures, but needs for me.

The woods were dark and cold and the sky was clear. The thermometer inside the van was bobbing just north of 20-degrees. I knew what I was in for and I went prepared. I fired up the portable heater and sat close to its friendly warmth and mandarin glow.  On went the gloves and the thick socks that were too thick to wear with my shoes.

Then I set up my cushion and my timer and fetched the small bell that lives in the van. O how my heart delighted in doing my own soul-crafted morning chant, using a passage verse from the Discourse on Knowing the Better Way to Live Alone. How enlivening it was to sing my heart out. To end the chant, with two slight edits to the original, by reminding myself about why I sit and practice: “The sage calls the one who dwells in mindfulness night and day, the one who knows the better way to live in the world.” (It’s not a great recording but I did record myself doing this chant last year. It’s on my SoundCloud page here if you want to give it a listen.)

Chanting and sounding the bell are morning rituals I’ve been unable to do when I practice sitting meditation inside the cabin, on account of my mate upstairs and sleeping. It’s a daily routine I’ve been dearly missing since we left the monastery. Whether I do the chant and sound the bell or it’s someone else, it’s a nourishment I am learning now is more important than I realized.

Note to self: I know it takes some serious gumption to toss yourself out of the cozy cabin right now. Off and out into the dark and early morning coldness to head to the van to do your daily meditation practice. But I think it’s a thing you need to keep doing. 

The Trouble With Spontaneous Living

I think many of us spend a fair amount of our time waiting, myself for sure included. Waiting for the sun to shine so we can be outside. Waiting for something uplifting to happen to elevate our mood. Waiting for a friend to reach out to make plans to get together. Waiting to run into the right person at the right time for the purposes of connection. Waiting for joy to find us; for happiness to fall into our lap; for the stars to align in the creation of the perfect day; for the weekend to do X, Y, Z; for whatever current upswell of frantic activity we presently have to be over and done with. I think many of us are hoping that we can just sort of spontaneously fall into a good life.

I don’t think it’s a conscious undertaking. I think many of us operate this way without knowing it. It’s a learned pattern of behavior, instilled in us on the sly by our collective culture. Intentional, purposeful, choiceful living is a worthwhile endeavor to put our time, energy, and effort into. Because the thing about routinely waiting around for something good to happen or someone good to text us is our well-being is not in our own hands. The quality of our day – of our life – is out of our control, and we’re at the mercy of whatever just happens to happen, or doesn’t.

I’m not at all suggesting that spontaneous living or spontaneous joy isn’t a thing. Of course it totally is. What I am saying is maybe it’s worth considering actively investing in the things and people that are most important to us. Maybe it’s worth figuring out what our biggest values center around and what our highest priorities are, in order to make conscious decisions about how we live our life. Maybe it’s worth making a few more plans about how we will actualize what we really want in life.

The Five Remembrances

The Five Remembrances (5R) are something I stay close to in my practice. I recite and reflect on them often. Recently, I’ve been connecting with them first thing when I start my daily sitting meditation session in the morning. The 5R are as follows:

I am of the nature to grow old
There is no way to escape growing old

I am of the nature to have ill health
There is no way to escape having ill health

I am of the nature to die
There is no way to escape death

All that is dear to me and everyone that I love
are of the nature to change
There is no way to escape being separated from them

My actions are my only true belongings
I cannot escape the consequences of my actions
My actions are the ground on which I stand

When we interact with the 5R on a surface level, I think it’s quite normal to regard them as being downers. Once a month at my home sangha we read the Five Mindfulness Trainings, followed by the Five Remembrances. After the reading, we open up for sharing. Many times I’ve heard folks share about how the 5R are rather depressing. 

I think the 5R are a rather advanced practice to work with. I’m not saying they can’t benefit newer practitioners or that they should be held back from beginners for later use, but I do think that in order to interact with them more deeply, and in such a way that bears fruit, a certain foundation of practice is needed.