Buddhist<\/a> I wanted to walk the path of the Zen Masters, those who sit on the mountain and dispense their wisdom to visiting students. Those great masters who are above the struggles of ordinary life and who are always quiet and calm. I don\u2019t think anyone really fits that archetype in real life, but you probably get it. I studied with Zen teachers and I read Zen teachings and I thought, \u201cMaybe some day, I\u2019ll be wise.\u201d<\/p>\nAnd that has all shifted now. By the way, at least one Zen teacher told me I was coming at it with altogether the wrong mindset in the first place, just so you know.<\/p>\n
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A funny thing happened as I entered middle age during a worldwide pandemic.<\/p>\n
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Now my practice is for connecting with others and connecting with my true self (whatever that means)<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not interested in dispensing wisdom from a mountaintop, whether that\u2019s figurative or literal. I\u2019m not even sure I\u2019m interested in being wise, let alone dispensing wisdom. I just want to open my heart.<\/p>\n
The center of my practice was mindfulness and concentration. Now the center of my practice is compassion and vulnerability. I noticed a shift happening a while ago. The spiritual path is made useful and helpful through our connections with other people. It\u2019s not about being more mindful. It\u2019s about being more loving and vulnerable.<\/p>\n
I didn\u2019t even know how to think about this or put it into words, but there it is. A big shift.<\/p>\n
Some people would say, \u201cIt\u2019s the ripening of your karma\u201d or that it\u2019s because of empowerments I\u2019ve received from Tibetan teachers like Lama Lena planting seeds in my consciousness. I don\u2019t know if I believe in that stuff but I am much more open to it than I used to be. It could just be from getting older, or where my personal life has taken me, or that pandemic thing that\u2019s affecting all of us. I was really impacted by all the isolation and uncertainty that I\u2019ve experience the last two years. And when I was really feeling low about all of that, it was those teachings I learned from the Tibetan Buddhists that helped me get through it. It wasn\u2019t the quiet calm of those stories of Zen Masters. It was the Open Heart.<\/p>\n
I just know I\u2019m not really on the Zen path anymore. I was never really that good at it anyway, if I\u2019m honest. I don\u2019t want to study Dogen and Hakuin. I want to study Shantideva and Longchenpa now. That\u2019s not to disparage any Zen teachers, but just to say there\u2019s a reason why I struggled to really connect with any Zen teachers and it\u2019s more than just proximity.<\/p>\n
Now I\u2019m on the path that takes the Open Heart as the road to awakening.<\/p>\n
This is the Bodhisattva Road.<\/p>\n
And you\u2019re invited.<\/p>\n
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