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Guided Meditation: Without Complaint

Greetings, my friends, and it's nice to be here together. It's been nice this week for me to be talking about refuge, certainly highlighting in my own heart such an important quality that I value tremendously. There is a somewhat provocative, evocative statement about refuge that goes something like this: when a person has really gone for refuge, they no longer have anything to complain about.

So, no more complaints. That's certainly a provocative statement since some people find that complaints are an ordinary part of their life. It depends a little bit on what we mean by complaints. I think there is healthy protesting. To protest is to witness against publicly—witness is the etymology of protest. Certainly, Buddhism has a very deep streak of feeling a certain unsatisfactoriness^[1] about aspects of life, especially the way in which finding happiness in external things doesn't lead to long-term or secure, stable happiness. So, there is a certain unsatisfactoriness with looking, searching, and wanting. And certainly, a protest against social injustice is hopefully a very important part of Buddhism.

But to not complain—the word complain comes from the Latin word lament, so it indicates a little bit of bewailing or self-pity. What do we take refuge in? When we sit to practice, no matter what happens in meditation, we don't complain about it; we do not lament it. It's almost the same as not having a problem with anything as we meditate. But that's not quite right either. There might be problems that need to be solved as we meditate; maybe we need to adjust our posture. But to lament, to bewail, to have pity, to somehow get caught, tense, tight, or contracted around what happens—to go for refuge is to trust that we don't have to do that. We can stay open and relaxed even as we protest, even as we problem-solve, even as we feel something is unsatisfactory. And maybe we can feel it's unsatisfactory to complain, to lament. There's a different, deeper way of being with how things are in this world.

So, to begin this sitting, perhaps if you're inclined, treat it as a complaint-free zone for these minutes. Take a posture that supports you to be alert and present, and gently close your eyes.

And without much more to do, turn your attention inward. Is there any place within, beyond the agitation, beyond your concerns, underneath it all or at the center of it all, where there might be a quiet place, a peaceful place, or a way of being open to experience? Even if it is a small corner of what is happening for you right now, pay attention, trust, and offer a deep trust to this ability to be open, calm, and peaceful. So that all the ways that you are agitated, reactive, or troubled by things are held, or related to, from a place that trusts being open and aware of what is.

The alternative is, in a certain way, to trust our agitation if we get involved in it, to trust our thinking if we keep spinning off in it, or to trust our difficult emotions if we keep getting hooked into them. For these minutes, perhaps trust a place where we just stay quiet and open to what is. Trusting being aware and mindful of what is, more than being involved with what is.

Perhaps let the rhythm of breathing be a support, a grounding for this open awareness. To be involved with breathing in a simple, direct way so awareness can stay open, relaxed, and present; so awareness doesn't get pulled into other things, thoughts, and feelings. To be open to the experience of breathing. In a certain way, the experience of breathing can rest in awareness. The experience of breathing as breathing room in awareness.

Breathing in and breathing out.

Trusting that you do not need to get involved in thoughts. Trusting you don't need to be involved with your emotions. Trusting the simplicity of being present to an open awareness of breathing, with breathing room for your breathing.

When you find yourself caught up in thoughts, you have no need to complain about that or lament it. Don't simply return to your breathing or return to the present moment; perhaps you can return to trusting awareness. Trusting being with your breathing. Perhaps you can take refuge in awareness.

Reflections

When we go for refuge, when we rely on refuge, we step away from the things that cloud our hearts. When we go for refuge, we no longer trust or take refuge in clinging or greedy desires. We don't take refuge or rely on hostility, regrets, and resentments. When we go for refuge, we no longer take refuge in being indecisive, uncommitted, or even confused. When those things are not there, when those things don't cloud the heart, then the beautiful qualities of being, the best in us, have a chance to show up. To go for refuge is to allow what's beautiful in ourselves to have a chance to come out into the light.

It's also a way of helping us to recognize those good qualities in other people, that others also have the capacity to be free of greed, hatred, and delusion. Others also have the capacity to be peaceful, at ease, and free. Others also have the capacity for these beautiful qualities of generosity, kindness, love, and integrity to come to the forefront.

So one of the aspects of going for refuge is really taking the time to appreciate other people, to appreciate what's good about them, and to appreciate their potential for freedom, peace, and love. It's in this world of trusting and appreciating what is deep in each of us that we can find a way together that is productive and useful—as individuals, as family, as friends, and as a society.

May it be that, coming out of this meditation today, you consider how you can go through the day appreciating people more. Maybe people need appreciation more than a lot of the other requisites of life. People need to be respected and seen as worthy and appreciated. May it be that out of our meditation together—the many of us that are here—we find ways of appreciating others during the day. If each of us can appreciate two people, there will be over a thousand people—twelve hundred people—appreciated. Or if we can appreciate four, twenty-four hundred people.

May it be that our capacity to appreciate and be present radiates outwards to benefit many, many people.