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Introduction

Hello everyone. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, whatever your time zone might be, joining right now live on YouTube. My name is Nikki Mirghafori. Today, Gil is teaching a retreat, so I'm holding the space for morning meditation on Sunday, and also sharing some reflections with you.

You might recognize that on YouTube I usually teach the happy hours, which is practicing metta^[1]—loving-kindness and compassion—and other brahmaviharas^[2] in the afternoon and in the evening at 6:00 p.m. every other day. Actually, for the past few months, Diana Clark and myself have been teaching every day, holding the space for happy hour on Zoom.

Before I start the few reflections this morning for your consideration, I have a few announcements to make. One announcement is that Gil will be giving a talk tomorrow evening, Monday night, addressing the current events around racism, Black Lives Matter, as well as police brutality. Another announcement I'd like to make is that the next two Sunday morning teachings will be offered by Max Erdstein and Matthew Brensilver. They will not be on YouTube; they will be on Zoom, and the Zoom address will be shared on the IMC calendar. So please look for the Zoom information to join Max and Matthew the next two Sundays. And again, for tomorrow's Monday evening talk, Gil will talk about the current events.

Meeting This Moment in Time: Practice, BLM, & Social Justice

For this morning's reflections—well, I can't quite say morning because I also see people are joining us from Europe, and it's afternoon or evening their time. For this moment's reflection, whatever the time might be wherever you are in the world, I think the theme of what is happening right now in this country, and around the world really in solidarity, is one that I'd like to offer a few reflections on.

With the theme of this meditation, as I was suggesting, we are asking ourselves: How are we showing up in each moment? How are we showing up in this moment? That question is just as valid when you are practicing, when you're sitting silently in your meditation and asking, "How am I showing up in this moment?" Am I showing up with curiosity? Am I showing up with kindness? Am I showing up with a sense of stability, with curiosity, with objectivity, with whatever might be challenging in my own heart-mind to meet?

And the same question applies: How are we showing up right now in the world? How are we showing up in this doubly tumultuous, challenging time? Both the suffering and all the challenges from living in the midst of a pandemic, and also nationally and internationally, so much injustice, so much violence really coming to the forefront, to the surface, and affecting us, affecting everyone.

How are we showing up? And how are we showing up as meditators? How are we showing up as Buddhists, if you identify as a Buddhist? Or maybe you don't, which is perfectly fine. But as a person of conscience, how are we showing up in this zeitgeist, in this time? So that might be an interesting reflection.

A lot of reflections in Buddhism—in fact, Buddhist ethics—are not "Thou shalt," or "Thou shalt not kill." It's "I take the precept," or "I take on the training." You take on the training to engage in non-harming, etc. So there is a different relationship, for example, even to ethics, of what is the appropriate response in a given moment. It's not an edict: "Okay, show up in this particular way." Well, there is an infrastructure, there is a scaffold. There is "Don't kill," but there are also questions like, "What about euthanasia? What about abortion?" There are no hard and fast rules, for example, in Buddhism. It's an invitation. How do you apply wisdom and compassion in every situation for the benefit of all beings?

So the question that I'm inviting us to ask, "How are you showing up?" is not meant to be thrown as a baton at yourself, like, "How are you showing up?!" It's more of, "How am I showing up?" with a sense of curiosity first. It's about getting a sense, the same way that we first get a sense with mindfulness of what is happening, what the temperature is. Well, how am I showing up? Am I showing up with grief? Am I showing up with anger? Am I showing up with resistance: "Oh, this is just too hard, this is too much, I just want to turn away"? Are you showing up worn down, exhausted from the grief, from the anger? Are you showing up vitalized, with energy, with a sense of wanting to make change happen? You have a sense of groundedness and vitality. How are you showing up?

We are not necessarily in any given moment privileging one versus another, because with anicca^[3]—with inconstancy, with impermanence—we know that it can change. One moment in the day you can feel energized: "Yes, I'm going to call my congressperson, I'm going to join a petition, go to a protest." Another moment your heart might be hurting, and there might be so much grief and sadness. Another moment there could be anger: "I can't believe this is continuing." So however you are showing up, first realize that and bow to that. It doesn't need to be any different in any given moment necessarily, because if you meet it the way it is, you're allowing a holding with compassion and with care to happen, so that you can show up in ways that are supportive, kind, compassionate, and wise for all beings everywhere, including yourself.

So first: How am I showing up in this moment? How are you showing up in this moment?

The Perspective of the Future

It's also helpful to bring a sense of perspective as you ask that question. First—and there's more I want to say, not ending with that question of "How am I showing up?" but starting there—what's present right now? And the perspective that would be helpful to bring in is the sense that you're in the water, you're in the flow of life. You're in the flow of your own life, and all these rivers, all these threads, or rather this ocean of humanity, is moving and shifting all the time. It is moving, not the same each moment, different, and the moments are not going to repeat.

So from the perspective of the future, perhaps a future orientation: how did you show up? I'd like to share a poem with you. This poem is by Drew Dellinger, and the name of the poem is "Hieroglyphic Stairway":

It's 3:23 in the morning and I am awake because my great great grandchildren won't let me sleep.

My great great grandchildren ask me in dreams, "What did you do while the planet was plundered? What did you do when the earth was unraveling?

Surely you did something when the seasons started failing?

As the mammals, reptiles, birds were all dying? Did you fill the streets with protest when democracy was stolen?

What did you do once you knew? What did you do once you knew?"

Consider the perspective of the future asking you—perhaps it is your great-great-grandchildren, and if not, the future generations of humans. We're all related, we're all interrelated. Asking you, what did you do in this time? How did you show up when you knew? How did you show up when you knew what was happening to your siblings, to your brethren, to your human family? How did you show up in the world? What did you do once you knew?

Wise Action and Wise Inaction

There are so many ways to show up. There is so much to do when we know, and so much not to do, I think. Both. It's wise to do and not to do—wise action and wise inaction. And it is not for me to tell you what is wise for you, what is compassionate for you, and what is wise for you to do or not to do given the circumstances of your life, and also each and every moment how this showing up is happening for you.

Our practice doesn't end on the edge of the cushion. If it was just about sitting and meditating, practicing awareness, mindfulness, wisdom, and brahmaviharas (compassion for all beings), and then we got off the cushion, forgot all about that, and went about our day not really living that compassion and wisdom, then what good would our practice really do, besides just taking time away?

And just to say also, the act of sitting and practicing, touching into the calm, touching into the beauty, touching into peace, touching into wholesomeness that might become available when we do sit—that can also be a nourishing ground for us to be more available in the world to show up for ourselves and to show up for others. For self and other, for both. So it is also very important to value the nourishing and the nurturing that our practice can provide for us.

So there are two threads that I wanted to touch on: one thread is doing in the world, actions in the world, what is wholesome; and the other thread is taking time to nourish ourselves. Because if you're running ragged, it is hard to be available and show up in the world for yourselves and for others fully. When you are nourished and you want to show up, you can show up in the ways that the poem is suggesting. How did you show up when you knew all these things were going on in your time, in your zeitgeist? What did you do?

There are so many ways to show up. In fact, I appreciate a list that I saw recently posted on Medium. It says "75 Things White People Can Do for Racial Justice," but I think everyone can do these. It's a long list, so you can Google "Corinne Shutack" or just Google "75 Things White People Can Do for Racial Justice" on Medium. If, for a variety of reasons, you are not able to go to demonstrations, there are many things you can do. You can support Black-owned businesses. You can Google whether your police department currently outfits all duty officers with body-worn cameras. Writing to your representative. Educating yourself about racial injustice. There's also the 1619 Project, which is both a book and also New York Times online videos. Watch that, educate yourself. Join a "Wide Awake" group. There are so many things you can do. Seek a diverse group of friends for your kids, for yourselves. Learn about the history of racial injustice and also what is happening in this country right now and around the world. So much we can do in so many different ways.

A Single Garment of Destiny

Together with all the doing, there's one other thing I wanted to share in terms of perspective. I'm going to share the front cover of Time magazine right now, by artist Titus Kaphar, and there's a beautiful poem that he's written on the bottom. I'll just share the top of it:

"I cannot sell you this painting. In her expression, I see the black mothers who are unseen and rendered helpless in this fury against their babies. As I listlessly wade through another cycle of violence against black people, I paint a black mother. Eyes closed, furrowed brow, holding the contour of her loss. Is this what it means for us? Are black and loss analogous colors in America?"

It continues. One thing I want to bring up about this image is when I saw this Black mother with her eyes closed, clutching her child, what came up for me is the Metta Sutta^[4]. In it, it is said that one should practice metta, loving-kindness for all beings, just as a mother protects her child, her only child. So too should you hold all beings with metta, with kindness. Protect them, love them. So this image is quite provocative and evocative for me. The same way that this mother is holding and protecting her child, her only child—protecting that Black child—all of us the same way, offering safety, offering compassion, offering kindness both in words and in actions. Both in words and in actions.

I'd like to share a couple of quotes from Martin Luther King Jr. He wrote in the Letter from Birmingham Jail in 1963 that "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." Our lives are completely intertwined.

It's also similar in a way to the post-war confession that was made in Germany in 1946 by a German Lutheran pastor, Martin Niemöller, about the cowardice of German intellectuals and certain clergy, including his own admission, that followed the Nazis' rise to power and the subsequent incremental purging of their chosen targets, group after group. Again, not saying it's exactly similar, but there's something about the ethos that I was reminded of, so I'd like to share this quote:

"First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a communist. Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me."

In a way, what I appreciate about this quote is there's the surface way to take it, but there's also a deeper way. The deeper way is really the complete interconnection of all of us beings, and offering each other safety, offering each other goodwill and safety.

In the words of Martin Luther King, the other quote I wanted to share with you:

"In a real sense all life is inter-related. All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be, and you can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be."

We are interrelated. And in our practice in Buddhism—well actually it's the Dharma^[5] with a capital D, not just the teachings of the Buddha with a small d, just the way things are. It's so random. I could have been born as you; you could have been born as me. We were not given a menu: "Oh, do you want this color? Do you want this shape? Do you want to be born in this country to these parents?" It's so random. And rebirth, for those who might entertain rebirth for just a split second—it's not necessary, but who knows? "Don't know" mind. Let's just hold it with a "don't know" mind. Who knows what we come as and we go as? Coming and going, and coming and going in this life, in this world, completely interrelated.

In the Buddhist cosmology, it is said that everyone you meet, you've been their mother, their brother, their sister, their sibling. You've been related, you've come and gone. So everyone who's coming and going, we've been related to them in different ways. We are family. We are a human family.

Conclusion

I'd like to end this morning's reflections by again sharing a quote from Martin Luther King Jr. on hope:

"We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope."

So as events erupt and arise, and there are finite disappointments, let's not lose hope, and let's show up. Let's show up to materialize justice, equality, grace, fairness, and beauty for all beings everywhere. Not just say, "May all beings be safe and well and happy and free" at the end of every practice, but how do we show up to support that? How do we show up to support that, both to support ourselves and support them? No one left out of our care and compassion. While taking care of ourselves, and if we are ragged, nourishing ourselves. Please don't forget that: nourish yourself. Nourish your heart so that you can show up.

I thank you all for showing up this morning, this afternoon, this evening, showing up and practicing meditation together. Nourishing, nurturing yourself, meeting yourself fully firsthand, and showing up for each other.

May all beings—all of us interrelated, our lives not separate—may all of us have safety, goodness, happiness, health, and ease. May all of us be free.

Thank you for your kind attention. Please be well.

And again, I'll make the announcement one more time. Gil will be talking about the current events, Black Lives Matter, and police brutality tomorrow evening. The next two Sunday talks will be by Max Erdstein and Matthew Brensilver on Zoom, not on YouTube, and the address will be on the IMC website. Thank you.