Carpe Diem Theme Week #1 episode 5 Tibetan Book of Living and Dying: Insight 4 the power of compassion is limitless

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

First I have to apologize for being this late with publishing. I hadn't enough spare time to write this 5th Theme Week episode. I was busy with work and family.

Today we are looking at the 4th Insight the Tibetan Book of Living and Dying reveals to us. This episode is about 'compassion'. I remember that w have had 'compassion' earlier here at CDHK as a prompt and it was in several other episodes a source for inspiration. Today however 'compassion' we will explore as part of living and dying.

enlightened soul

remains solid and truthful
full of compassion

full of compassion
Tara inspires her worldly followers -
lotus reaches for the sun

lotus reaches for the sun
finally enlightenment is near
Om Mane Padme Hum

© Chèvrefeuille

Introduction


Let me first look at the meaning of compassion and than I will bring t into the theme. What is compassion?

Rinpoche says the following about compassion in The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying:

[...] "It is not simply a sense of sympathy or caring for the person suffering, not simply a warmth of heart toward the person before you, or a sharp clarity of recognition of their needs and pain, it is also a sustained and practical determination to do whatever is possible and necessary to help alleviate their suffering. Compassion is not true compassion unless it is active. Avalokiteshvara, the Buddha of Compassion, is often represented in Tibetan iconography as having a thousand eyes that see the pain in all corners of the universe, and a thousand arms to reach out to all corners of the universe to extend his help."[...] (Source: The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying - Sogyal Rinpoche)


The power of compassion is limitless

The strength of The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying is that it gives you a kind of manual to handle living and dying in your surroundings especially when you are facing death or are confronted with dying and dead. Most often we don't know what to do or say. Is it possible to help someone who faces dead?
Rinpoche says: "only love and compassion" can be of help in such a situation. Compassion, as you could have read above, is something different than remorse. In compassion there is respect. It sounds easy, but compassion is not only affection and warmth, it is also an everlasting and practical steadfastness to do everything possible to make suffering more easy.
The Buddah of Compassion,  Avalokiteshvara, is often depicted as having thousand eyes and arms and gives an idea what compassion really means. The Buddha of Compassion sees all the pain in the Universe and with his 1000 arms he offers help throughout the Universe.

How to be compassionate? You can gain that through loving kindness. Look at the other as you would look at yourself. We are all the same notwithstanding spiritual or religious differences. We have all the same feelings and desires. If you were in the position of facing death, what would you like to do, what would you want that others would do for you?

Compassion is only compassion, real compassion, if you do something. Just be there, be present ... can be enough.

Credits: Buddha of Compassion, Avalokiteshvara

My response

Today we looked at Insight 4, Compassion. As I think about compassion the first thing which comes in mind is Buddha. I see his eyes in front of me and I feel how his compassionate eyes are touching me deep. Compassion ... a wonderful emotion, which we see to less in the world of today. Maybe ... maybe there will be a time, far in the future, that every living thing on Earth will be compassionate. I hope ... this will become true.

full of compassion
the Buddha looks into the world
with sad eyes
I look around in my world
dreaming of better times

© Chèvrefeuille

Again my apologies for being this late with this Theme Week episode, but I hope it will inspire you to create an all new haiku, tanka or other Japanese poetry form.

This episode is NOW OPEN for your submissions and will remain open until February 22nd at noon (CET). I will (try to) publish our new episode in this Theme Week, Insight 5 the teacher is not sacred too, later on.

Carpe Diem #921 Absurdity / Humor

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Welcome at a very delayed episode of our regular CDHK prompts in which we are exploring the senses together with Hamish Gunn.
Here at CDHK the prompt "absurdity / humor" has been listed earlier in our existence and maybe you can remember that I am not a haiku poet who uses humor and absurdity in his haiku, so I am looking forward to your responses.

Introduction

Of course I have tried to write haiku with a kind of humor in it. Before I met Jane Reichhold I would call those haiku, senryu, but "senryu" is not a broad accepted name.

it's a strange sight
like a waterfall they fall
drunken sailors

along the seashore
hand in hand with the love of my life
a seagull shits on my head

© Chèvrefeuille

 

Absurdity / Humor

 

Hamish on Absurdity / Humor

Humor comes in many flavors, any of which may appeal to one person but not to another, and which may be enjoyed in alternation or in combination. Here are names and descriptions of the different kinds of humor:

Anecdotal - refers to comic personal stories that may be true or partly true but embellished.

Blue -also called  risque or broad humor, which refers to unrestrained, unsubtle humor often marked by coarse jokes and sexual situations.

Burlesque, or Slapstick - Ridicules by imitating with caricature, or exaggerated characterization.

Deadpan/Dry - Delivered with an impassive, expressionless, matter-of-fact presentation.

Farcical - Comedy based on improbable coincidences and with satirical elements, punctuated at times with overwrought, frantic action.

High/highbrow - Humor pertaining to cultured, sophisticated themes.

Droll, or Ironic/Absurd - Humor involving incongruity and discordance with norms, in which the intended meaning is opposite, or nearly opposite, to the literal meaning.

Mordant - Caustic or biting humor

Parodic - Comic imitation often intended to ridicule an author, an artistic endeavor, or a genre.

Self-deprecating - Humor in which performers target themselves and their foibles or misfortunes for comic effect.

Stand-up - A form of comedy delivery in which a comic entertains an audience with jokes and humorous stories.

Writing a humorous haiku is no easy task. But it is worth trying, and giving your haiku humor, using perhaps one of the techniques outlined above.

My response
Humor ... not really my "cup of tea", but as you could read above I have tried to write haiku with humor in it. Here is another attempt and I think it's in the "anecdotal"  way:

proud like a peacock
the  businessman steps around
stumbles over the sill

© Chèvrefeuille

This episode is NOW OPEN for your submissions and will remain open until February 22nd at noon (CET). I will (try to) publish our next episode, sight (colors), later on. By the way, our next episode of our first CDHK Theme Week I will publish also later today, sorry for the delay.

Carpe Diem Theme Week #1 episode 4: The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying: Insight 3 "thinking about death gives life meaning"

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Until today our first Theme Week goes well, but the response are a little bit low, maybe that's because of the Theme itself or (and I can understand that very well) it isn't very easy to create haiku or tanka inspired on the posts. Well ... it doesn't really matter, I just like to share this wonderful thoughts and ideas with you all.

Introduction

finding peace of mind
the soothing sound of rippling water
the rustling of leaves
strengthens my tired mind
that's fortitude
deep inner peace, the beating of my heart,
the music of life
caught in the rippling stream -
finding peace of mind

© Chèvrefeuille

thinking about death gives life meaning

We all know that we will die some day. We also know that when this will happen we not know, or what will be happening. Most of us don't want to think about dying and in a way we hide for it. As I stated in an earlier post ... "death is part of life, it's the only certainty we have".
I can understand that talking about death isn't your daily business, but according to Sogyal Rinpoche you have to talk about living and dying, because death comes without warning. Try to live your life to the fullest and let death be a part of it. Of course you don't need to talk 24/7 about death, but it certainly must not be paralyzing to talk about it.
In my work as an oncology nurse I experience in so much different ways how people, patients and their loved ones, are talking about life. There are patients who don't dare to talk about death, and other patients talk freely about their death. They see dead as a part of their life and than you really can see and learn how life has to be celebrated.
This is what Rinpoche says about this:

You have to be busy with the things you find important. For example: if you like to read, read; if you like to paint, paint; if you like to write novels or poems, write ... enjoy every moment of your life. It's to short to leave things as they are. Experience life. If you dream about visiting countries go ... make that journey. It's similar with what people do if they make a so called "bucket-list", things they want to do.
Meditate and contemplate about your life and if your life is to busy, than set it on hold. Take a step back ... look at your life ... and thing about the things you find important. Maybe this will help.
Dare to be honest to yourself, try to imagine when will I die, in which year my life will end, in which month. What's happening in the world around you. Enjoy your life ... let dead be part of it.
Let me tell you how I am looking at my life:

I have a wonderful life, I enjoy it to the fullest. I had goals and those goals I have reached ... what do I want in the future? Do I have dreams? Of course one of them is to visit Japan and I hope it will become true, but that's not up to me. I have a family in  which children and grandchildren are the most important. I spend a lot of time with them and ... of course there is me ... the haiku poet and as you all once have said to me ... I am a sensei, a master and I ernjoy that very much. And ... yes I think about dead. Dead is part of my life, not only through my work, but also in private life. It's not something we don't talk about.

Celebrate life and let death be part of it. Life gives meaning as you think about dead without being anxious or sad ... What would you do if you knew that you are facing death ... right on this moment!

My response

Death is in my opinion part of life, without thinking about death we can not live our life, or even better ... without thinking about death we can not celebrate life. Look around you enjoy nature, enjoy the coming and going of the seasons in which life and death are each other's best friends. If you look at living and dying as being part of nature, part of being human ... than death can be giving meaning to life.

in the backyard
the old Sakura has lost his blossom
until next spring

© Chèvrefeuille

This is how I see life and death ...there will be a new beginning always ...

This episode is NOW OPEN for your submissions and will remain open until February 20th at noon (CET). I will try to publish our new episode of this Theme Week, Insight 4 the power of compassion is limitless, later on

Carpe Diem #920 Hunger (Empathy)

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

It's my pleasure to bring another episode of Carpe Diem to you. It's also a pleasure for me to announce that Chèvrefeuille's Publications soon will be publishing our new CDHK E-book by Hamish Managua Gunn. Hamish has already send me his concept and we are busy to create his E-book together. Hamish has chosen to share kikôbun with you all. In his last CD-Special you all have been introduced already to kikôbun. I am looking forward to his CDHK E-book.

Food For Thought (© unknown)

Introduction

Today I will follow the same structure as I do this whole month, but this time my introduction is different, because I love to share a tanka which I created as I saw the above photo.

This is a very touching photo, so full of pain and misery, but also full of love. As I see it ... this young boy has to take care for his younger brother or sister. They have no place to go. Maybe they have lost their parents through hunger or war. 

near starvation
living on the streets of the world
brotherly love
stronger than ever struggling together
fighting against hunger

© Chèvrefeuille

Hamish on Hunger (Empathy) 

There are 795 million undernourished people in the world today. That means one in nine people do not get enough food to be healthy and lead an active life. Hunger and malnutrition are in fact the number one risk to health worldwide — greater than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined. The good news is that hunger is entirely solvable. There is enough food in the world to feed everyone and no scientific breakthroughs are needed. Today’s knowledge, tools and policies, combined with political will, can solve the problem.

Solving hunger is a “best buy” in today’s tough economy. When nations work together to solve hunger and invest in good nutrition, they increase productivity and create economic opportunities. Conversely, studies have shown that countries lose millions of dollars in economic output as a result of child under nutrition. Solving hunger is also a contribution to peace and stability. When governments can no longer guarantee adequate food supplies, states are prone to fall. Volatility on food markets can quickly translate into volatility on the streets.

Finally, solving hunger lays the foundation for progress in many other areas of development, including health and education. Well-nourished women have healthier, heavier babies whose immune systems are stronger for life. A healthy, well-fed child is also more likely to attend school.

Good progress was made in reducing chronic hunger in the 1980s and the 1990s, but progress began to level off between 2000 and 2010. All of us – citizens, employers, corporate leaders and governments – must work together to end hunger.

Your haiku today does not need to be about the sense of hunger, but it should show empathy, which is another way of being at one with your topic or theme.

My response

Hm ... how to catch this in a haiku or tanka? Not an easy task, but here is my tanka, I think tanka is the best poetry form for this theme:

a homeless man
seeking for food
in the garbage
I invite him for dinner
sharing my meal

© Chèvrefeuille

 

 

 This episode is open for your submissions tonight at 7.00 PM (CET) and will remain open until February 20th at noon (CET). I will (try to) publish our next episode, absurdity, later on. For now ... have fun!

Carpe Diem Theme Week #1 episode 3 The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying Insight 2 "through the chinks comes the light"

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Welcome at this delayed episode of our Theme Week. I have tried to find some spare time to create this episode. Yesterday I told you something about the first Insight and today I will try to tell you something about the 2nd Insight for our daily life as can be learned from The Tibetan Book of LIving and Dying.

Introduction

What happens exactly as you die? In the Tibetan Book of Living and Dying Sogyal Rinpoche explains it through the idea/ thought of bardo. "Bardo" means "inbetween" and its a kind of transition-mode. Let us look further in the depth of the meaning of bardo, maybe than we can understand it 100%.

Through the chinks comes the light

The original meaning of bardo is, the space between the moment of dying and reincarnation / rebirth. As we 'dive' deeper into this matter than we discover more than one bardo. Let's go ...

First there is the bardo of living and dying. This is a painful bardo, but also the moment that the nature of spirit / soul becomes real and in a way breaks through the armor of the body. This we can see in, for example, the story of Easter as Jesus prays in the Garden of Gethsemane and asks His Father, God, to take away the cup of poison. Than He is arrested and indures the pain of 39 lashes and the crucifixion. As He dies He commands His Spirit to His Father. This is what we can call the bardo of living and dying.

 

 

Credits: Near Death Experience (NDE)

 

What follows is the bardo which is called the shining bardo or dharmata, the state of consciousness / mind after death. To explain this shining bardo, wasn't easy, because I could not find something to explain it with. Than I got a revelation. This shining bardo you can see as a bright light, the radiation of the pure nature of spirit / mind. It's a state of pure happiness. In a way this you can see as what is happening as you (someone) has a Near Death Experience (NDE). I ran into a few stories about NDE when I was preparing these episodes. As you read the reports about NDE than everyone sees a bright light in which shadows are moving, ancestors mostly, but angels too.
This shining bardo doesn't stay forever. Sometimes it takes / endures seven days, but it can also take seven weeks.

The next bardo is called the bardo of becoming. The consciousness / mind finds a new place, in a new body and a new life gets started. This we can also see in the story of Easter. After three days, and taht's very fast as we compare this with the Tibetan idea about living and dying, Jesus rises from the grave. He conquered dead and became an enlightened being who walks a short time on this earth and than rises to Heaven making the Holy Spirit, a kind of reborn energy, avalable to the world. With His ressurection and entering Heaven He broke the Circle of Bardo, as did Buddha.

In Tibetan tradition of bardo the songs from The Book of the Dead were recited by the monks to lead the spirit. Rinpoche goes further in this idea and describes his ideas in The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. In his book he sees life as it is as a bardo. The bardo between birth and the moment of sying, life in itself is a transition. It's a time in which we learn, contemplate, meditate and prepare on death.

Rinpoche goes even further, a period of uncertainty can also be a bardo. For example, the moment you come home and see that there has been a burglary while you were away. Or that moment between "I have bad news" and "I have to tell you ..." At that moment the concrete of your reality breaks and you feel that the ground is disappearing beneath your feet. Than the realization comes ... you see the essence. No more time for futilities. It's a moment of truth ... you can see what really is important.

This is what this Insight means ... discover the truth by tearing down the veil. This is what happened as Jesus died at the cross. The veil that hid the Holy of Holies was torn apart exposing the holiest place in the temple and the revelation that Jesus really was the Son of God.

Credits: Phoenix

My response

To write a haiku, tanka or another Japanese poetry form about this 2nd Insight isn't easy I think, but I had to try it myself (of course) and this is what came in mind, a haiku from my archives:

phoenix spreads its wings
after the dark cold winter night
finally spring

© Chèvrefeuille

I hope I inspired you. This Theme Week episode is NOW OPEN for your submissions and will remain open until February 19th at noon (CET). I will (try to) publish our next episode of this CD Theme Week, Insight 3 thinking about death gives life meaning, later on.

Carpe Diem Tokubetsudesu #70 Tibetan’s Mgur, a religious form of poetry

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

In our Carpe Diem Theme Week we are exploring the Tibetan Book of Living and Dying and I thought maybe it's a nice idea to create a Tokubetsudesu episode in which I share a kind of poetry form from Tibet.
Tibet has not a very broad range of poetry forms, but one of the most known poetry forms is in my opinion the mgur (or song with a spiritual meaning). Here is some background on this mgur and an example of a mgur.

Mi la ras pa (1040-1123) (a.k.a. Milarepa)

The mgur as a primarily religious genre, dates chiefly from the time of the greatest of all Tibetan poets, Mi la ras pa* (1040-1123). Though his hundreds of mgur were not given their definitive written form until several centuries after his death, their influence on Tibetan culture seems to have been widespread from Mi la's time onward, through their preservation in various oral versions and written recensions, and through the importance Mi la quickly assumed as a Tibetan Buddhist culture-hero. Mi la's greatness lay in his ability to compose songs that combined the imagery, structural parallelism and expressive directness of ancient glu with distinctively Buddhist themes and Indian-inspired metrical schemes. In particular, Mi la ras pa—and thus the classical tradition of mgur—can be seen as inheriting two major influences:

(1) the early diffusion traditions of songs of "positive personal experience," primarily secular in orientation and distinctly Tibetan in style, and
(2) the tradition—brought to Tibet by Mi la's guru Mar pa—of tantric songs, those often spontaneous, always richly symbolic dohās, caryāgīti or vajragīti sung by Indian mahāsiddhas to express their spiritual realizations.

The themes, moods and styles of Mi la's mgur range widely: though the Dharma almost always is the real subject, it is expressed in verses at various times simple or complex, devout or wrathful, puritanical or ribald, humorous or stern, intensely autobiographical or impersonally didactic. An example of one of this mgur (songs) composed by Mi la ras pa


Faith is the firm foundation of my house,
Diligence forms the high walls,
Meditation makes the huge bricks,
And Wisdom is the great corner-stone.
With these four things I build my castle,
And it will last as long as the Truth eternal!
Your worldly houses are delusions,
Mere prisons for the demons,
And so I would abandon and desert them.

The success of Mi la ras pa's songs in helping to popularize Buddhism, combined with the innate Tibetan love of poetry and song, helped assure that in the centuries after Mi la, mgur composition came to be a widely practiced art.

* Also known as Milarepa

Well … I hope you did like this very short Tokubetsudesu episode. For this episode I love to challenge you to write a haiku, tanka, choka or another Japanese poetry form in which you try to catch your religious or spiritual ideas as did Milarepa in his poems. Of course you may also share "mgur" (song).

 

This Tokubetsudesu episode is open for your submissions tonight at 7.00 PM (CET) and will remain open until February 19th at noon (CET). I will try to publish our next episode, hunger, later on. For now ... have fun!

Carpe Diem Theme Week #1 epsiode 2 The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, Insight 1 We are travelers

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

What a joy to write the first "real" episode (after yesterday's introduction) for our first Carpe Diem Theme Week in which we are exploring the depths of "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying" written  by Sogyal Rinpoche.

I promised you to tell a little bit more about the Insights this beautiful book can give us to use in our (daily) life. Today I love to share the first Insight: We are travelers.

Introduction

Every post here at CDHK I start with the same sentence "dear Haijin, visitors and travelers" and that last word "travelers" I think you will interpret in a slightly different way after this first Insight. We are travelers ... that's so true. We are always on our way, which fits our modern life by the way, to our work, the office, the hospital, on a holiday and so on, but have you looked at your life as a journey, a travel?

As I started this Theme Week the only thing I knew about my own spirituality is that I am on a path to fulfill the goals which life, or spirit, or the universe, has given me. And I hope to reach those goals some day ... somewhere.

We are travelers

Reincarnation is one of the central ideas of Tibetan Buddhism and The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. I hope to explain this (with the help of Soygal of course).

Rinpoche makes a difference between our "ego", our daily personality, our "I", the form / shape our psyche has in our body in which we live our life, and the deeper, natural consciousness, which is our essence.

Credits: Veil Nebula

What happens when we die? In fact only our body dies, but our consciousness "rises" to another new state of being, another dimension maybe. That is our rigpa, the absolute nature of mind (spirit), the consciousness before thoughts and emotions occur / rise. Later it will be reborn in another body.

Death is not the absolute end. Our body doesn't exist anymore, but our consciousness travels on. The idea of dying can be paralyzing, but in this vision death is just a moment of transition. That makes the idea of death lighter: we are travelers, continuous on our way from one world to another.

My response

Finally our consciousness will reach enlightenment, maybe not in this life, but maybe in another life.

ghostly nebulae
covers the old graveyard
cherry blossom blooms

© Chèvrefeuille

Well ... find your inspiration, awaken your muse and share your haiku, tanka or other Japanese poetry form with us all. (Or maybe a Tibetan form of poetry?)

This episode of our first Theme Week is NOW OPEN for your submissions and will remain open until February 17th at noon (CET). I will publish our next episode, Insight 2, later on.