what does it take to be

blissfully happy?

I met her amongst the second hand books. My hands were full when she called, ‘ hello stranger’. I raised my eyes and saw her there, looking older that I remembered, strained and drawn with a heavy hand, she tried to smile. It was an unhappy smile. She was, she explained, in pain.  An unexpected and, as yet, undiagnosed ache in the side of her head,  came and went, like heavy breathing, like bliss.  ’Stress’ I told her, and we both agreed.

And that would have been that, except you wanted to tell me something. You wanted me to know. You fed me your uncertainty and doubt. Your worries about the future. You threw your self upon me, wrapped your naked arms around me, and held me close. You promised me, nourished me, admonished and astonished me. Thank you for that, thank you for taking the time to speak. By the time you chose to release me you were no longer resigned to your suffering.

I wanted to say, and perhaps I did, I can not recall, that you don’t need to be unhappy. You do not need to be in pain. Do not turn and walk away. Close your eyes and you’ll see; see through and behind that which makes you ill.  It is a simple thing; to turn around.

Open your eyes

Look up and you will see

the light surrounding me.

I wanted to say, I wanted you to hear…

May you stay forever young

May you grow up to be righteous,

May you grow up to be true,

May you always know that truth,

And see the light surrounding you…

x bhavatu sabbe mangalum x

So I didn’t know what the time was this morning, it could have been officially 4.15, 3.15 or 5.15 when I rose. It didn’t seem to matter. I had left my time untouched. The only connection I had with time outside of my own schedule was with Caroline, and as it was I knew we were 12 hours apart. I thought it best to leave it that way, it was easy to remember.

There is a new sound this morning, I cocked my head and listened. Rain. By the time I had rolled a smoke and stepped outside it had gone. Not enough to break the drought. Not enough to heal the cracks in the earth.

Around 6.00 I start up my laptop and after about 20 minutes realize that the time on the screen is now an hour earlier than the time on my cell phone. One of them has changed automatically and I have no idea which – this is just getting more confusing by the minute (or should that be hour), and less meaningful.

Caroline texted me and wanted to know where the charger for the drill was. I was a bit gutted that I couldn’t remember. Then she asked whether I was still enjoying my own company. Good question darling. The answer I guess is yes. However it made me think about how long that could last, and what the point would be. How long would I stay here, or somewhere like here? I realize that I am fulfilling a dream I now remember. The dream of being a hermit. It has been 5 days now with only the occasional unsolicited contact with humanity and I feel no real sense of isolation. I feel no longing to communicate, to connect, to have human contact. How long would this last?

I think perhaps until I had caught up with myself, until I had expelled all of this and much more from inside me. Until I had spewed out all that seems trapped inside. It has been this way for such a long time. As a teenage I fantasized about a machine that I could plug into my head and let it all out and free me from the madness inside. That machine has never been made, instead I found meditation as a type of release valve. I learnt to let go of so many of my thoughts and in doing so I added less to the cluttered mess already inside. Still it builds up, I can’t let go of everything, particularly when there is so much going on around me. Here there is less happening, here the output is greater than the input and over time this would increase. Over time I would eventually clear out the attic, get into the corners on my hands and knees and sweep it clean. Over time I would come to be completely empty. Now that would be something.

The rain returns. The tricking of water from the guttering into a bucket near the front door sounds gentle and sweet. The tapping and sliding of the rain on the windows is an undertone to the rustling trees as another squall sweeps through. Again it does not last and soon I am left with just the trickling and a dampness waiting for me outside the door.

Late this morning I let go of my schedule, of my routines. I veered and lost my way and it was 11.30 (or was it 10.30?) at night before I realized just how far off the beaten track I’d become. I am out in the wild, lost but safe with only an amateur detective with Tourette’s syndrome as my companion. He is a big friendly bear of a man, but his compulsions scare me. My fear is not of him, but of myself. I wish I had his outlet, his open valve (although he claims it releases nothing) rather than this impenetrable layer of skin within which I live a cluttered and confused existence.

Isn’t it interesting how it can all turn so quickly, in the space of 24 hours or less, our lives can be changed forever. How it seems that one minute we are on the straight and wide and the next we are through the narrow gate and on the crooked path. Through the narrow gate that hides itself from view beside the busy highway down which we all rush. Never noticed, never even known about as we slip along in a frenzied stream of cold, bold and beautiful motorized bodies that we try to ensure never collide. To find the gate we need to stop and leave our bodies, something we seldom do as we travel along life’s motorway. We need to stop, for relief perhaps, or repair and even then we need to choose to stop in exactly the right spot. In this exact spot, and as we unzip or squat or go about opening the hood, maybe just maybe we will catch a glimpse of it. Then should our curiosity be perked, should our sense of adventure be strong enough, should our attachment to our existing journey and the beautiful body we travel in be weak enough, we may pass through the gate.

Me I wasn’t in need of repair or relief, I wasn’t even in a car or on a bike. I was simply walking along on the edge of the road. I was that lone out-of-place figure that you whisk past as you speed along, the one the evokes questions, such as what is he doing there, how did he get there, where is he going, questions that last only as long as the next beat of the window wipers.

I found the hidden gate leading down the narrow path late this morning. It is now nearly midnight and Lionel and I are done with walking in circles, we’ve had enough of browsing the ‘Mad’ and ‘Heavy Metal’ magazines he keeps in his rucksack and we are off to sleep, the campfire smoking away between us.

x bhavatu sabbe mangalum x

The dog interrupted, laughing. ”Stop, don’t tell me. Alright? Keep it to yourself. I don’t wanna know about you or any other dude been chasing their tail. I just don’t want to know anymore”.
‘What do ya mean ya don’t want to know anymore?” replied the cat, somewhat taken aback.
‘Cause life aint like that dude. Life is easy man. Relax. Chill. No need to be chasing anything. If I find myself chasing my tail these days I just enjoy it dude. Don’t sweat it. Enjoy the headrush. Anyway cats aint meant to chase their tails, its a dog thing”.

And with that he hopped off the train. The dog’s journey was over. He turned back to the cat standing  in the carriage’s open doorway.  “It’s all good man. Remember?”

Whatever the cat said in reply was drowned out by the train’s whistle. It started, ever so slowly, to pull away over the crest of the hill. It seemed like it was all over,  no more words to be said as the cat and the dog slowly drew further and further apart, until the cat suddenly shone her biggest and brightest grin and shouted at the top of her voice for all to hear, “Oh, how do we let go of nothing?”

The dog chose not to reply. He had nothing to say. He watched the train and the cat disappear into nothing and thought of nothing. He turned and looked away. At emptiness.

So the story ends, yet the beat goes on.

x bhavatu sabbe mangalum x

When I arrived at Frank’s this morning I realised that I had lost my pen. It was no longer where it always was, attached to my shirt collar. I kind of knew straight away where it was. I had taken my shirt off as I sat in the park 20 minutes earlier. I had eaten my muesli, packed up, put my shirt back on and cycled off. As I rode away I glanced back at the bench with a vague feeling that I had left something behind.

I knew where it was. It must have come off my shirt as I put it back on over my head. While at Frank’s I did not even bother to search my backpack. Instead I practised letting go of this pen given to me at my last Christmas do with the Department. Given to my by a great boss – thanks Robin – that pen always reminded me of the brief time I spent with you and your team – what a fantastic group of people they were.

So over the 50 minutes I was with Frank I kept practising letting go. Letting go of any and all thoughts of disappointment, anger, sadness and loss that came to me. This was good practice – a most wonderful opportunity to practice acceptance. To accept that this is ‘as it is’. An opportunity to simply take responsibility – I left the pen in the park, that is how it is, end of story. No feeling bad, no recriminations, no beating myself up, no “I should of’s’. An opportunity to accept that I have lost nothing as all things rise up and pass away all the time, in their own time. When they do, they do – it is as it is meant to be. To practice trust – that things happen when they happen – life is as it is.

An opportunity to practice taking responsibility and acceptance, trust and letting go – and in doing all that, an opportunity to practice simply being present. Right here, right now, with Frank.

By the time it came to leave Frank’s I was so engrossed in his ruminations on the art of printing some 30 years ago that I felt no urgency, felt even no need to return to the park, to the bench to see if the pen was there. In remembering it I realised I had forgotten about it.

I did however go back., and as I rode towards the park I remembered my meditation that morning. I had sat for about 40 minutes – and all I recall of those 40 minutes is a constant recurring of  – thinking about something – realising I am thinking about something – and letting go of that thought. I can not recall any of the thousands of thoughts I had during that 40 minutes – only the process – realising I am thinking – letting go of the thought – and (gently, without recrimination) focussing back on my breath – in and out.

I smiled as I rode – and felt gratitude for this morning’s practice. Those 40 minutes were helping me now, had helped my over the last hour as I became increasingly non-attached to the pen (which I no longer considered my pen).

Of course as I neared the park bench, I saw it – in the grass at the foot of the bench I had left some 60 minutes before. A busy bench in a well-utilised park, right next to a paved walkway upon which a legion of dog-walkers, cyclists, joggers and parents and children off to school passed back and forth every few minutes.

The pen is now once again in my possession. I am, for now, it’s guardian.

I have been wanting to learn how to make things appear. The last month has seen me become rather good at helping things disappear, keys, pens, cigarettes, people – so good in fact that some things were disappearing while I was still quite attached to them.  I realised that if I was going to make things disappear I needed to be able to make things re-appear, just in case.

And after today’s little episode with the pen (rising up and passing away and rising up again) it may be that the secret to having something reappear is to let go of it – completely. It seems to me that it was only when I had completely let go of the pen – of any claim or attachment (be it sentimental, financial, emotional or physical) that I had to it, that it was able to appear. We need to accept that once something is gone, it is gone – it has disappeared forever – we may never see, touch, smell, feel and use it ever again. We may never realise it.

I received a letter from Ireland last week. I didn’t get that job I was going for in Belfast. It took about as long as it did with the pen for me to let go of any anger, disappointment, sadness and loss I felt about that.

This is one of the gifts of meditation practice. To release ourselves from those moments of regret, frustration, disappointment, anger, rejection and loss.

To be free of such a moment as the one I experienced with the pen may seem small and insignificant in itself, yet imagine being free of all such moments, whenever they occur and whatever they may relate to. Small and big, pens and partnerships. Imagine a life without those moments – imagine how much more of a life that is. There becomes all this ‘free’ time – time that was once filled with colours and images and words and thoughts associated with anger, resentment, disappointment, sadness is now freed up. Where our minds were once busy, now they are free, empty, available.

What would you do with all that available free time?

x bhavatu sabbe mangalum x

I travelled to Belfast a couple of days ago, just for the day, just for a job interview.

The thing about job interviews I thought as I sat all suited up outside the Morning Star hotel downing my second Guinness, is that it’s hard not to reflect on them afterwards. No matter how much I told myself, ‘Just let it go, it’s over’, next second I would find my mind back, once again, worrying on ’I said this, they said that … what did they mean by that … did they seem disinterested… etc etc etc’.  It didn’t take me long to realise I was not in control of my mind.

I was not in control of my mind! That is a stark confession – surely for any one of us. I had lost control of my mind. I did not want it to be dwelling on something, and there it was, dwelling. It was as if, well, as if it had a mind of it’s own!!

Now while some people may simply say ’so what’, or ‘that’s just the way it is’, that’s not something that I adhere to. From my point of view, I practice, I work hard, to tame the crazy monkey [the image of the mind as a crazy monkey randomly hopping from tree to tree is one often used in Buddhism]. I resolutely believe that while we are not in control of our minds, neither are our minds in control of us. If I don’t want to think about something then most of the time I am able to simply let it go – release the thought from my mind and relax.

Not this time.

Now this could have potentially really pissed me off, if it wasn’t for the second rule – that’s right – never, ever, beat myself up. Thank you for the second rule!! So I would in one moment be urging myself to simply forget about the interview, the next moment replaying some part of it, and the one after that recognising that I am replaying some part of it, and round and round I’d go. And in amongst all that I managed to drink two pints of the black stuff. Great black stuff it was too.

So as I went around and around this cycle, not beating myself and trying as hard as I could to just ‘be in it’  I managed to latch onto the realisation that I was now, after the interview was done and dusted, less confident that during the time leading up to the damn thing. ‘Why is that?’ I asked myself as I checked the time to see if I could fit another Guinness in before the flight back.  No chance – not when it takes so long to pour.

It’s got something to do with being judged I think. What I was reviewing over and over in my mind was my performance. I was trying to see if I could assess whether I had given the ‘right’ answers, given off the ‘right’ signals.  Well I didn’t manage to do that, what I did discover during my replaying and reviewing was that over the course of the interview a couple of motifs kept recurring in my answers and monologues. 

• The challenge of stepping up: I recalled moments in my life when I have realised clearly what it is I wanted – and the challenge that came after those moments of realisation. The challenge to act courageously, to be open, to speak up. To give voice to my want. To speak clearly and openly especially to those I knew would be effected by my having what I wanted. One of the examples I gave in interview was when I wanted to bring mum home from the Residential Home where she lanquished, to live with us, my wife, my two sons, and her son. When we are stone-cold clear about what it is we want, then the challenge is to give voice to the want before we start to analyse all the possible consequences and scenarios in our minds. Before we start trying to second guess what those effected might say or do or feel or act.
• Accepting change. Often related to stepping up and voicing what it is we want, is the challenge to accept change. When others close to us step up and voice what they want, then sometimes the challenge is for us to act courageously and support them, knowing as we do that we are taking a step away from what is and into what may be. This courage is also critical at those times when we realise what it is we don’t want, and what that is, is what we have. I spoke at the interview of coming to this realisation about my existence within academia. In these instances our minds will often leap ahead and play out all kinds of scenarios and potential futures that cause us to stay in what we don’t want. The reduction in income, the unability to pay the debts, the children’s reaction, the embarrassment, the messy divorce proceedings, the lonely existence forever after as a spinister, solo parent etc etc etc. Thing is, in that moment of stone-cold realisation that we no longer want this none of that is real.  Which reminds me – I have discovered a new saying to have tattooed on my body - ‘Ashita wa asu no gaze ga fuku’ -  and it sums up this point perfectly, so I’ll say no more.

So there you are, that’s the sort of guy I am, and now a day and a bit after the interview, my thoughts of it have all but gone. Perhaps that is why I am considered to have quite a lousy memory (by some standards, particularly Kate’s if I recall…) And perhaps I am somewhat memorially-challenged when it comes to events, to my own past experiences, to times and moments I have shared with others - because I do not dwell on them long after all – ha.

And for those of you who want to know how the interview went – I can tell you now, it went GREAT!!

x bhavatu sabbe mangalum x