"Regard All Dharmas As Dreams."

The slogan, "Regard all dharmas as dreams" is the second slogan out of fifty nine in the Tibetan Buddhist mind training (Lojong) practice.  My first question is what is dharma?  Today I did some online searching of the meaning of the word and discovered, as I had already vaguely knew, that the word has many, many meanings.  Wikipedia states, "There is no single word translation for dharma in western languages."  Google puts up just two meanings - "1.  Hinduism: the principle of cosmic order.  2.  Buddhism: the teaching or religion of the Buddha."  Another translation of this slogan is, "Regard all phenomena as dreams" which implies that dharma can be seen as all phenomena.  When I looked for a google image for dharma I found the Chinese religious symbol of the bagua, a yin/yang symbol in the center surrounded by the eight trigrams of the I Ching.  Then I saw the image I posted above with the word Dharma in place of the yin/yang symbol.  

Based on some of this information I could say that dharma has something to do with the basic qualities of life which include much balance and order.  If there weren't much balance and order we would not be able to orient ourselves, we would not be able to perceive, interpret and act upon life.  There would be chaos without identifiable phenomena.  The Buddha's teachings are based on an interpretation of the phenomena we call life.  Both the Buddha's teachings and life are the dharma.  So the slogan instructs to regard Buddha's teaching and life as a dream.  But what is a dream?

We know we can dream while awake or asleep.  Some of us know that dreams are not reality.  Dreams are an illusion for many and can turn into a delusion for those who lose their mental balance. Dreams can come to us while sleeping from some unknown place of conception.  How sleep dreams are created, we do not know, but they involve us in remembered elements of our daily lives and turn those elements into something symbolic.  Dreams can be powerful and can direct our thoughts and speech and actions after we wake up.  Dreams are mysterious.  We respond to dreams with all kinds of emotions from fear to anger, from sadness to joy.   Dreams can be logical and dreams can be absurd.  If we are to regard life as a dream, it would include all of this, power, mystery, logic, absurdity, the capability of stirring up emotions and questions, yet at the same time all of this would have no substance.  

We place a great deal of value on substance, on "reality".  People like myself who have for periods of time lost reality by being consumed by delusions know how precious is the balance of perceiving truly.  We see our lives as the ultimate reality.  But what if what we perceive and see, hear, feel, smell and taste is not reality?  If life is not real, then what is real?  We base our thoughts, speech and actions on our perceptions when our ability to perceive is faulty.  We misinterpret people and life situations all the time.  The worst example of this insanity is when people volunteer or are coerced to engage in war.  For too many insanity is what life is about.  

I think the yin/yang symbol and dharma point to reality.  For us, it appears to be a higher reality, some kind of Nirvana/heavenly place of peace, balance and joy.  Our "reality" has a lot of violence, imbalance and pain in it.  Because our perceptions are off, we create a great deal of the violence, imbalance and pain, but far too few are willing to claim responsibility for this.  Reality is not truly higher, it just is what it is.  But we block ourselves from it by being so adaptable.  We adapt to each other's misperceptions (which invariably lead to many illnesses) and perpetuate the illusions that we know what reality is, when we don't.  The slogan to regard life as a dream was formulated to challenge our assumptions that we know what life means, that we are in touch with reality.  If life is a dream for the human animal, the next question is how do we wake up to experience the true reality?

I have seen myself as experiencing everything with partial blindness, which is why I rely so heavily on intuition and insight, which I believe comes from a higher source.  And yet, I am not totally blind.  The Lojong slogans are other human beings' attempts to stir up our intuition which can lead us to insight which can lead to a change of perspective which can lead to waking up and clearly seeing, to enlightenment.  But first we must see and acknowledge the core of the problem and that is we do not live our lives in reality.  Yes, we have real moments, but they pass and are obscured by so many misperceptions.  We do not see truly.  Sometimes we do not see at all.  

On Death & Ignorance

My mother has been dead for a little over three weeks and my brother and I have spent the last two weeks staying with my father.  We will return home on Thursday.  My father is in mourning, but I am very glad to report that he is not devastated.  I don't think he is just going to give up; I believe he will continue and adjust to being on his own.  His friends here at this retirement community have been very kind and plan to invite him to dinner after we leave.  I have been gently encouraging him to engage in social activities and not spend all of his time in his apartment.  He appears to be willing to try and that is all that I ask of him, to keep trying.  I am glad that I have been here for him in his environment, but I also know I must return home.  I will continue to stay in closer touch with him, but I cannot live his life for him.  He must find the courage and the will to live and find enjoyment in his life.

Perhaps it is because I believe my mother's spirit lives on in some unknown dimension that I, too, am not devastated.  I am changing with the change and accepting the loss.  I am determined to continue living with as much appreciation for my life and for those still living.  I have lived through devastation several times in my life so far and this does not come close to that experience.  My mother was eighty five when she died and lived a very good life.  I celebrate her life and am in awe at the mystery hidden within death.  I see death as a transformation and not as a final, solemn ending.  I believe too many people get caught up in the horror of the dying process and in the shock of the sudden absence of a living presence.  And some do not like to encounter other people's deaths because it reminds them of their own mortality.  I don't feel this way.  To me there is meaning everywhere, be it in life or in death. I believe that there is a bigger and wonderful picture that includes us all.

I have learned several valuable lessons from Tibetan Buddhism.  They make a point of preparing for death in life through various meditation practices.  I would like to follow them and prepare now for my turn to pass out of this life and into I know not what.  One thing I do know for sure, I do not want to live the rest of my life in fear.  When my time comes, I want to let go into it and not resist.  I want to go with the flow wherever it leads me.  I consider this the joyful approach to death.  If one takes away the horror and fear, one is left with peace.  Peace is what I want most within myself, in my interaction with others and in the world we all live in.  I do think that so much of the pain we feel is self created and even glorified in so many of the stories we tell ourselves or read about or watch in films.  The deaths of characters make for high drama, for a kind of sick entertainment.  Personally I think we spoon feed ourselves a lot of bullshit.  And this basis of bullshit, this essential distortion makes so many of us walk around in a delusion believing that the negative assessment is the TRUTH when it is only lies we tell ourselves to justify our reactions and our lifestyles.

I've seen people blaming other people or their concept of "God" for all the ills in the world.  I've done some of this myself, but as I age I see that all this does is to contribute to the problems we face.  The blame game is a cop out.  It separates us when we need to unite for peace on earth.  Death is a fact of life on this planet, but, for now, so is regeneration.  And what exactly is death?  Does anyone really know?  Change your view on death and you change your world view; you change your spirit.  I stay open to the view that death is a portal into the unknown.  Within the unknown there is magic.  There's magic in the universe.  See how small you really are, but how valuable, too, and how each of us has a place in this seemingly unending puzzle.

What I'm suggesting is that our concepts of death are actually misconceptions.  I am also saying that many of our concepts of life are also misconceptions.  We live inside bubbles, dreams and we are all very stubborn.  We think we know.  We gather up knowledge to block out our fundamental insecurity and common ignorance.  Really, how can you sum up a life?  Why do you want to reduce a beautiful tapestry to one single thread?  Yes, I know some things about my own life because I exist within it. That's as close as I get to knowledge.  But it is still only partial knowledge and it will always be truer to say that mostly I do not know.  From the stance of not knowing, you stay in a beginners' mind and that is an open, receptive and, to me, a very beautiful mind.