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Godwin Samararatne
Discovering Meditation

Retreat at the Waldhaus
Day 6: Stillness

Godwin: This morning I thought Sri Lankan weather had come back! I threw away the coat I was wearing and I was embracing the weather. I wanted to go for a walk, but I was expecting a meditator. Still I could enjoy the morning from my room. Then in the afternoon, most unexpectedly there was rain, the sky became cloudy. In the silence German weather had come. How does one relate this to our practice? When the Sri Lankan weather is there, can we learn to see the beauty in the Sri Lankan weather? Can we be open to the Sri Lankan weather? And then, can we do the same with the German weather? Can we see some beauty in the German weather as well? One can see beauty in the mist. One could listen to the sound of the raindrops. In the late afternoon sitting there was a beautiful stillness, even the birds were not singing, a complete stillness in the trees.

So being one with the German weather as well, being open to the German weather as well. No plus for the Sri Lankan weather, no minus for the German weather. They are there due to certain conditions and due to certain conditions they are passing away. So our practice is really awakening ourselves to this duality, to be one with the Sri Lankan weather, to be one with the German weather. As Thich Nhat Hanh says: Feeling one with your sadness, feeling one with your joy - learning from joy, learning from sadness.

So to see these things, to awaken our mind to this, that is why we are getting up in the morning and doing Yoga, practising silence, sitting for long hours with pain, having individual and outdoor meditation, listening to discussions: all these are tools to develop such an understanding, to awaken our mind to that state or condition. Is it not a very simple, practical model? Are we clear about our practice now? So the real challenge is whether we can do the same in relation to what is happening within us as to what is happening outside us. In relation to what is happening within us, how can we be open and awaken? As I have been saying so often: By learning to see things as they are. Whether the monsters are there or whether the monsters are not there, to learn from both conditions.

A Mirror-Like Mind

Now to describe this practice, this perspective, there is a very useful metaphor that is used in spiritual traditions and it is called: having a mirror-like mind. So let us try to understand in practical terms from our own experience what it is to have a mirror-like mind. In what way can we practice to have a mirror-like mind? I have come across this metaphor in the Theravada tradition, in the Zen tradition, in the Tibetan tradition, and in Taoism as well.

Now in the Buddhist tradition there are two aspects to meditation: one is called calm, tranquillity, and the other is vipassana or developing insight and wisdom. So in developing calm and tranquillity I would say that this is like polishing the dust off the mirror. This is what we do maybe by practising with an object like breathing, where with the help of our friend the breath we learn to develop some calm, some tranquillity, some space, clarity and awareness. And when the dust is not there the mirror reflects things just as they are.

So I would like to share with you some aspects of a mirror-like mind for you to apply to your own experience, your own situation in life. So a mirror reflects what is considered beautiful just as something that is beautiful. For example, a flower comes before a mirror and the mirror would reflect the flower just as it is. Something that we consider not so beautiful, not so pleasant, a spider - is it a good example? Not good? So a spider would be reflected just as a spider. No discrimination between the flower and the spider.

So you see how we are trying to apply this in our meditation. We have a pleasant experience: we are aware of the pleasant experience just as it is. We have an unpleasant experience, what we consider as an unpleasant experience, and we reflect it as it is. That is why I have been reminding you many times, if there is a pleasant sensation just know that there is a pleasant sensation. And if there is an unpleasant sensation, can we make friends with it? And can we relate to that without resisting it? Can we be really open to what we consider unpleasant sensations?

And that is why I was also suggesting that when the monsters are there be open to them, make friends with them. And when they are not there just know that they are not there. This is one aspect of the mirror-like mind, and this can be applied to all our life, to all our experience.

So the real challenge you have is that while you are here maybe you are having very pleasant experiences, but then when you go back to your computers in everyday life, when you are having what can be considered as unpleasant experiences, how far can you be open to them? This is the challenge we have. How far can we learn from such experiences? Like learning from the German weather!

I will be speaking more about this as we go along, because many meditators have been telling me that here it is very nice, it is wonderful, it is spacious. But going back is the problem. Monsters are more or less sleeping here, but when we are back there, they wake up with a lot of power, a lot of energy. What to do when that happens? I really wish I could create more monsters here for them to practice with! And then I could tell them: Now here are the monsters, see. Can you make friends with them? Can you learn from them? Anyway, this is the first point about what we can describe as the mirror-like mind.

Another important aspect of a mirror-like mind is that nothing is retained. Things are reflected just as they are. Nothing is taken in. Now this touches on the greatest problem we have in everyday life. Especially when we have unpleasant experiences we give them minuses and then we take them in. And we are very good at accumulating things, collecting things, and we are excellent in collecting and accumulating these unpleasant experiences. I meet very spiritual people, I meet very good people, but when I talk to them they are very unhappy because they do not see the positive side, but what they are seeing more and more is the minuses, the unpleasant experiences. So this is why I have been emphasising that it is alright that we are carrying these wounds, but let us try to heal them. Let us learn to let go of them. Otherwise we are just holding onto whatever experiences we have been having. And it is interesting to reflect why we are holding on to them, why we carrying the past as a burden in this way, and why we are using this to inflict suffering on ourselves and of course thereby inflicting suffering on others?

This matter of carrying things as a burden is shown in a very well known Zen story: There were two monks who were walking together and they met a beautiful girl standing beside a river. One of the monks realised that the girl was finding it difficult to get across the river, so he carried her across and left her on the other side. Then the following day the other monk said: You know, you did something very wrong, you should be given a big minus because you carried that beautiful girl across the water - do you not know that monks cannot touch women? And the other monk said: I have left her behind on the other shore, but you are still carrying her!

So that is what we are doing. Our experiences, we cannot just put them down. We are really still carrying them. And I think as we are still human, it is natural that we carry them, it is natural that we hold on to them. But we should learn to look at them, maybe to learn from them. They can be extremely valuable experiences. So we should see what we can learn from them. And then can we put them down? Can we heal the wounds that we are carrying? Otherwise, as I said, with these wounds you inflict suffering on yourself, and perhaps you might also be inflicting suffering on others. So you have to make a choice. You have to be clear. Do I work with this? Do I learn not to inflict suffering on myself and not to inflict suffering on others by healing these wounds? So this is the second aspect of the mirror-like mind.

A third aspect which we can relate to in our everyday life, seeing how the mirror-like mind functions, is that the mirror-like mind does not accept things nor does it reject things. Without accepting, without rejecting, it is just allowing, just being with whatever is happening.

So this is why I gave you an exercise to work with the reacting mind and the non-reacting mind. Again, as we are still human we have this tendency to accept, to reject, to like, to dislike, plus, minus - we are still human so it is not surprising that we do this. It is natural that we like the Sri Lankan weather and that we do not like the German weather. But then you realise that we have no control over the Sri Lankan weather and over the German weather. I cannot demand: I would like to have only Sri Lankan weather, I do not want German weather anymore!

You are amused, but this is exactly what we do in life. Wanting things in another way. My business should be working in this way. My girl-friend should be behaving this way. I should be behaving this way. Demanding things from ourselves, demanding things from others, demanding things from life, like demanding Sri Lankan weather. Demanding is one thing, what is happening is another thing. And after demanding Sri Lankan weather in the morning, I have to work with the German weather in the afternoon!

Supposing I was identifying with the Sri Lankan weather, I would be depressed by now: Oh, the Sri Lankan weather is gone. When will it come again? Waiting in hope for the Sri Lankan weather to come. Can we not apply this to what happens in everyday life? Again, as I am human, it is natural that I am longing for Sri Lankan weather all the time so that I can throw this coat away. This shows the importance of reflection. I have to stop and reflect: Now is my demand reasonable? When I make this demand, am I being realistic? Is it possible? Are we always getting what we are demanding?

And with this kind of reflection we realise the nature of our actions, the nature of our demands. So we need only to see this, to understand this, and from that seeing, from that understanding, realisation can come. So I have to realise I cannot make demands. I have to see how far I can make friends with the German weather. How far can I see the beauty in the German weather? How far can I learn from the German weather? How far can I make discoveries about the German weather? Then you realise that you can see certain things which you had not seen before because your depression has gone.

So do you realise that what we are doing with more and more meditation is creating more and more space in our mind, creating more and more clarity in our mind, having more and more awareness, so that we can see what we are doing? Then we come to a state where when the German weather is there it is nice, it is interesting. This is difficult, it is a challenge. If the Sri Lankan weather comes, that is fine. But if it does not come, the German weather is also fine.

Need we go further? Is the message not clear? I can speak more about the mirror-like mind, but is this necessary? Isn't this clear enough to see where you are, at least to realise what you have to do? So while you are here you are having Sri Lankan weather, when you go back you will have German weather. And when you are there please do not demand Sri Lankan weather! That's it! Any questions?

Questions concerning Stillness

Retreatant: How can I distinguish between being able to change things, and when I have to accept something as it is?

Godwin: Very good question! You should be clear what you can change and you should be clear what cannot be changed. And one area where change is possible is ourselves. Beginning from there we can also see what can be changed outside. And to be realistic as far as possible as to what cannot be changed. We have a saying displayed in this connection at the Nilambe Meditation Centre: May I have the courage to change what can be changed, the patience to bear what cannot be changed, and the wisdom to know the difference between the two.

Any other questions?

Retreatant: How can I change without denying myself as I am?

Godwin: I like examples. Please give me an example…think about it and come with an example tomorrow for an interview at 6.00 o'clock in the morning.

Paul: I did not know that you have become a Zen master!

Godwin: I'm trying to be one. Any other questions?

Retreatant: What was the conclusion of your experience of this morning?

Godwin: Aha, what is my conclusion about this issue of the Sri Lankan weather? Very good. You must ask questions of me also! So as I said, this morning I was very happy taking off my coat and waiting to go for a walk. I was still enjoying the weather from inside my room. With the same mood, with the same state of mind, I enjoyed life as it was. And usually after lunch I take a rest, a short rest. As I woke up, looking through the window - all rain. Then I realised I was not liking the rain. So this was a very good opportunity for me to reflect on what happened in the morning and what was happening to me now. It gave me an opportunity to practice what I am preaching. I realised the weather can be a wonderful teaching. And that is why I started the evening discussion with this. So I am very grateful to the German weather. Still I would like Sri Lankan weather tomorrow to be honest! Any other questions?

Retreatant: How can I change without being under pressure?

Godwin: You are quite right to ask this. I meet many people who are putting pressure on themselves to change. When I meet them I realise they are only putting pressure on, and not really changing themselves. I was telling one of the meditators, I have been meeting what I call `casualties of meditation', who have been putting the pressure on to change themselves. Casualties: they have some problem in the mind, some problem in the body, but really they are quite okay, and then the pressure to change arises and straightaway some complication develops in the mind or the body. So now I am wondering if meditation is really helping these people. Because non-meditators are much happier. I am really seriously thinking about this question, about what people are doing to themselves in the name of meditation.

I will give a simple example. Close to the Nilambe Meditation Centre there is a town called Kandy. In Kandy for people who are not meditating noise is no problem, crowds are no problem for them, seeing nice food is no problem for them. But when Nilambe meditators come to Kandy, they cannot relate to the noise, they cannot relate to the crowds, they have a problem with ice cream! Do you know what they do? They run back to the Centre! So it is good for the Centre. But I thought seriously, what am I doing here? Am I producing meditators who are worse off than non-meditators?

This is why I emphasise such a lot about working with our monsters, about making friends as far as possible with things. Because, like here, Nilambe is an ideal place for the monsters to go to sleep. So I try not to allow that situation to arise. In a way there are sometimes more challenges there than there are here. Especially when a group of Sri Lankans come. They cannot stop talking. I know some meditators hate it when they hear a Sri Lankan group is coming. The room that they have been holding on to as `their' room, they suddenly find two Sri Lankans sharing `their' room. And I hope the newcomers would start snoring in the night. I see that as the practice.

Having calm experiences, having very pleasant experiences - when you leave Nilambe, when you go to Kandy, all that is gone. So this is why I do not encourage people to go into deep states of concentration. Buddhist monks come to the Centre for meditation and when they come, sometimes I encourage them to go into deep states of samadhi, because in the type of life that they lead they can function in that situation. But for lay people like you who have to have relationships, who have to work with computers, who have to live in big towns where you hear only telephones, trams, trucks, busses, and so on it doesn't work.

One can have deep experiences in Nilambe, then come into such a situation and all of it is gone straightaway. But it is different if, while people are in Nilambe, they can work with emotions, they can work with monsters, if they can really learn to work with them - then when they are in big towns, when these things arise they are not taken by surprise.

This is why I offer many tools. This is why I am encouraging you to use the tools here. So when you learn to use the tools here, when you go back and when these monsters come, you can see how far you can apply them.

See, when I started to speak the question was not so relevant to what I am now saying, so how easily I can go on to other things! I have to be aware of my speech. Anyway I was trying to respond to the point he made, about how we pressurise ourselves to change ourselves. This is why I have been emphasising as a first step: Please accept yourself as you are, not as you should be, or as you must be. This is extremely important. Otherwise all the time we want to be different from what we are. All the time we are pushing ourselves, pressurising ourselves to be different from what we are. One person used the word ego, so we are trying to get rid of the ego. But in this process we are creating a bigger ego! This is why I am speaking about finding a way of practising without pressurising yourself. But please realise this does not mean giving in to these things.

As I was telling someone today, one has to find a spiritual life, a meditation practice, which suits the culture here. In the culture here you have to pressurise yourself to do well in life. You have to pressurise yourself to succeed in this culture. And in this culture you are pressurised to act perfectly. The model of perfection is imposed on you by the culture here. So do you see the connection? When such people take to meditation, they want to be a perfect meditator. As I said, they start pressurising themselves and demanding from themselves: I should be like this, I should be like that. And guilt is a great problem here. Then they start feeling guilty because they are not making any progress in the spiritual practice.

So poor meditators! They started by wanting to work on suffering. Now they are having more suffering because of meditation! And then they start pressurising more. I am really deeply touched when I meet such people. Because they are very sincere, genuine, highly motivated people. I think this is something for us to reflect on.

Retreatant: How can I handle the tools without putting pressure on myself to find the right one each time?

Godwin: I like such questions, it shows the confused way I have been teaching! I would like to meet you individually, but still I will say some general things about the question. The first point is why do I offer so many tools? Because I know there are different sorts of people. There are different people and they are in different situations.

In a retreat like this there are complete newcomers and there are some who have practised for many, many years. So this is why I really encourage people to see me personally, because what I try to do is to relate to people individually. And that is why I offer many techniques, and that is why I am encouraging you to experiment, to explore and find out what is most helpful to you in the place you are at.

I would like to say something about this plus and minus business. In this culture I meet many people who are used to giving themselves minuses. That is why when I spoke about meditation of loving-kindness, I mentioned that you have to develop loving-kindness towards yourselves. You have to learn to see more and more plusses in yourself. It is extremely important, as I have been often saying, that we should learn to feel happy about what we are doing. We should feel grateful for what we are trying to do. With more and more plusses you really experience more joy, more lightness and so on. Once rid of the mechanism of giving minuses, you experience these plusses, you experience this joy, this lightness, this happiness, and gratitude. Actually this state itself is wonderful.

But if you would like to go further you have to see that these positive experiences, that these plusses are also anicca, that they are also impermanent. And they are also in a way empty. That is, they are empty of any owner as I tried to indicate this morning. And then you go beyond plus and minus; you realise that both are concepts. When you realise that, you can use them as concepts when you want to, but fully realising the nature of concepts.

But let us forget about this third level and let us be more concerned about the second, where we can have more loving-kindness, more friendliness, more gratitude, more joy, more lightness. That is good enough. But while you are experiencing them, I would also like you to work with unpleasant monsters, negative emotions, so that in everyday life you are really ready for them when they arise.

This is my general answer to your question, but I would like to meet with you individually also. I have been meeting people even outside interview times; I can tell you the times if you would like to come. You can come during yoga, you can come after breakfast, and you can come after dinner. So even during yoga - I like you to do yoga, but if it is really important you can come and see me then. The only thing I would like to warn you about: when you come, it is possible there might be a person already there. It will be excellent for your practice! So I hope that happens.

Now I would like to say something about being a little more positive. There is a very positive effect in writing down everyday the good things which happen throughout the day. About this I would like to make a brief comment. When I meet meditators in Nilambe I do a very interesting exercise in this connection. I tell the meditators to draw up a list of all their positive qualities, and it is surprising to me that in most of these lists there are many omissions, many things which are not there. So when I know someone well I mention more positive things to that person, and sometimes this really shocks and surprises them. There have been instances where people have come with about five or six positive things on their list, and I have added about ten or twelve to it!

This is very interesting. It shows what a strong conditioning, what a strong habit we have, that we mostly see only our minuses. It is a most unfortunate aspect of the human condition. It is everywhere, it is universal. I think I might have mentioned this: in South Africa there was a teacher who teaches parents. And she told us that in one of the workshops for parents she asked them to draw up a list of all the bad things, wrong things, their children would do. Within a few minutes they could produce a long list! Then she asked: Now please draw up a list of the good things your children are doing. It was not easy for them. They had to think. They had to ask for ten more minutes to think about it!

Now if there are no more questions, we can do some chanting, and end with meditation on loving-kindness. The chanting is nice, it is improving every day.