Session 004: Life Is Too Short
Banner Photo Source: Ilnur Kalimullin
Today’s session started out with the talk this time and then a guided meditation. In this blog post, you will first see the video recording of the talk, then the video recording of the meditation and then the handout text.
Talk
Meditation
Handout
The 5-page handout that we gave out in today’s class is posted below as blog content for you.
This same content + an additional guided visualization is in the PDF handout. You can download it by clicking on the button below:
Life Is Too Short
Session 004: Jan 29th 2020, by Sophia Ojha Ensslin and Cristof Ensslin
A few days ago, basketball legend Kobe Bryant died in a helicopter crash at age 41. Someone else unexpectedly passed away recently. Sophia’s grandmother passed away a month ago after years of being bed-ridden. Just about five months ago, Cristof’s godfather’s fight with cancer ended in his mid-seventies.
Each person’s final breath can come at any moment, for any odd reason, whether before or after reaching an age that we would consider normal in regards to life expectancy.
One of the spiritual teachers that we like to listen to, Buddhist monk Ajahn Brahm, tells a story that his teacher Ajahn Chah, a revered Buddhist monk in Thailand, used to refer to. Imagine you’re walking through the forest. Gazing at the forest ground, you see many leaves that have fallen from the trees. Most are old and brown. But some, a very few, are of lush green color.
What he means to say with this simile is that death often happens at a somewhat expected, old age. At the same time it is the course of nature that beings die at all kinds of ages. That includes, of course, us human beings. We can try to find the reasons for it; for that seems to soothe our ruffled mind. But, in the end, the reason for death is being born - the ultimate form of impermanence.
Impermanence is one of the three characteristics of all that exists, according to the Buddha’s teachings. Because things change and are impermanent that creates suffering, quite obviously. But if we realize that it’s “just” nature taking its course, that none of it is personal, just natural processes happening, then we can deal with the ever-changing temper of this world more easily. Accepting this, we can even find beauty in it and live a happy and content life.
Mindfulness helps us with that. That’s what we practice in meditation and that’s why we practice meditation. The side effect that we feel good by relaxing mind and body into the meditation, helps us actually “doing” the practice, but is not the goal of meditation. The goal is to see for ourselves the real essence of nature and life.
Death Is Present
Even if we live healthily and happily until a very old age, we are being born and dying right now in this moment. Our cells are dying. Our cells are getting renewed. Our own bodies are impermanent, changing, fleeting. Why is it helpful to be mindful of this?
By being aware of the fleeting nature of our own lives, we will be compelled to search for what is truly important in our lives. We will make the effort to know what’s essential and let go of the rest. We will dig a bit deeper into our hearts and minds to unearth what we like, what we want, what we want to create, what we want to let go, what we want to treasure and cherish and what we want to devote our precious time towards. We will not waste time with activities, pre-occupations and engagements that end up being frivolous in the context of what’s important to us.
What’s Truly Important?
So my question to you is:
What is truly important to you right now?
What do you want to create in your life?
What do you want to let go of in your life?
What do you want to do with your time on this planet?
What path can you take to find true peace, true fulfillment?
To some, the answers to the above may be clear and will make themselves known the moment you ask these questions. But for many of us, these answers and realizations are buried deep within us. It’s buried under piles of things that we have collected over the years but don’t use anymore. It’s buried under the weight of expectations of society and family and friends. It’s buried under emotional hurt and suffering. It’s buried under what we think our bodies can or cannot do for us.
Letting Go as a Way to Finding Out What’s Truly Important
Let go of things.
Let go of expectations. Let go of hurt and burdens.
By letting go of the excess, of the unnecessary, we can get to what was lying covered, hidden, buried, inaccessible. And in this way it allows us to receive what we were unaware of, to access what we couldn’t get in touch with.
The Japanese author Fumio Sasaki writes in his book, Goodbye, Things, that minimalism is not a goal in itself, rather it is a method. It is a method for finding what’s truly important to us. Reducing your possessions can be one method of getting to the essence of finding out what’s truly important to you. Just like that, meditation helps us in the same quest. We let go of the past (regrets, angers, etc.) and the future (worries, plans, expectations, and fears) and just become aware of the present moment and how one moment fleets to the next. Not just understanding but actually experiencing that in meditation allows us to center our life to important issues and values.
Thank you! See you in class next week!
~ Sophia + Cristof
*There are affiliate links on this site such as the one above linking the Goodbye Things book by Fumio Sasaki. When you purchase via such links, I will receive a small affiliate commission without any extra costs to you.
