Venture Fourth Weekly Work<br>Week Three

Thank you for the many journals and reports on Respect; I will begin to read through them today and to reply. This is mailing one for this week, and mailing two will address your journals where appropriate to share thoughts.

Remember to put the following as subject when you email me about VF (note abbreviation added)

Subject line:VF Journal -Week of Sunday, July 26 (changes with the weeks) -Your Name

We now are on the web, thanks to Terry Gliedt who has put endless hours into creation of the DSC archives link, and now has added; (and will continue to add) our VF material. See this link: http://archives.deepspring.org//Aaron/ClassSeries/2009/Venture/

Aug.9: Mudita (gladness for others): The near enemy is grasping at pleasant experience out of a sense of insufficiency or lack. Mudita is usually translated as "sympathetic" or "altruistic" joy, the pleasure that comes from delighting in other people's well-being rather than begrudging it. Many Buddhist teachers interpret mudita more broadly as referring to an inner spring of infinite joy that is available to everyone at all times, regardless of circumstances. The more deeply one drinks of this spring, the more secure one becomes in one's own abundant happiness, and the easier it then becomes to relish the joy of other people.

We can easily see how developing joy for others is part of honoring and respecting others. This week we will continue to work with honor and respect with a special focus on Mudita. What supports such gladness and what blocks it? How do the 3 qualities with which you have worked thus far support each other?

Begin your work with Mudita in the same way you have been trained to work with metta. Begin with a loved one, noting the joy you feel at this person's good fortune and also that you feel sadness when this person suffers. Move on to a neutral person and then to the difficult person. Finally, be sure to include yourself and to note the joy you feel at your own well-being.

Then carry the practice into your every day life.

Mudita from Barbara Aug. 9: Yesterday when I came down to the lake, I was going to swim and then go out for a while on my boat with Hal (a sort of very small flat sailboat that I either sail or paddle with a kayak paddle). People had taken our boat out from its mooring (this is a community and such "borrowing" without asking is perfectly acceptable) and were playing on it, a father with two children, swimming and jumping into the lake.I swam across the lake and back, an hour, and they were still playing on it as I swam back. Now I was still swimming; I didn't have any need for it then, but irritation arose, "my boat" will I be deprived"?" Of course I could have swum to them and asked for it. They would have returned it promptly. Instead I climbed up on the raft and just meditated and watched. I saw the contracted feelings related to feeling older, missing those times with my own children, grasping. As I sat, and practiced mudita, I was able to really enjoy their joy and play. Separation stopped and it WAS me there on the boat, playing with them.

I've been reading a new book, thanks to Alice Britt who discovered it and brought a copy out to the lake for me. I'm only 1/3 through it so I'm not making it required reading but may do so when I finish it. Meanwhile, I do want to share it with you because it is so powerful, clear and to the point of our work.

The Engaged Spiritual Life; A Buddhist Approach to transforming ourselves and the Worldby Donald Rothberg; Beacon Press, 2006.

Today I was drawn to an old journal that speaks of some of these relationships " respect, humility, mudita " and what I was learning about these topics 13 years ago. I paste it below to share. This is NOT required reading, just me sharing. It is an account of some meditation with my guru, Neem Karoli Baba. If you do read it, reflect on the meaning of the word das or servant

When I saw how ego holds on to low self esteem, and how that takes me out of egolessness (and out of humility) it was life changing for me. How do we "give it away?" In part, we just see that it is old habit and let go. It cannot be forced. The more we come back to center, the more easily this distortion of "somebodyness" dissolves.

For me, mudita and also metta and karuna are important supports here. Genuine joy for others is impossible as long as I am holding any distortion of pride or low self esteem.

...I felt his present energy as I haven't felt it in a long time. I just sat, clutched his feet and cried really hard for awhile. He kept hitting me on the head.He said in a joking manner to some people who were there. "This one is mine; see how happy she is to see me; she cries!" After awhile he added, "She thinks she lost me!"

When I stopped crying I asked him, what am I doing? I'm trying to do what spirit asks me to do but often I feel like I don't understand anything. What is asked of me?In answer, eyes laughing, he threw me an orange, threw it hard so it hit me. He looked so innocent as I fumbled to catch it. I just sat there and looked at it, so he asked, "don't you want it?" Aside to others, "she doesn't want it!" To me again, "Why don't you eat it? Eat it!"So in my meditation, I ate it.Then he threw me another and said, "eat!"I did.Another. By now I was slowing down; too much orange.I finished the third and he threw me another and said again, "don't you want it?" I said I was full. He replied, "Give it away. You're always full; give it away.Give everything away. That's what I want you to do.Give everything away.Learn that you are always full. There's always everything/ fullness/ completeness." (hard to translate this) And he threw more oranges at me."Give away everything; give it away!"

I wasn't sure what he meant and questioned, not "aloud" but in thought, does he mean my house, my money my car. What does he mean? I felt some fear that what was being asked was too much, that I'm not ready to be possessionless. I wanted to protest but he wasn't looking at me any more.I understood I don't have to give away things that are "working tools" in my life like home or computer, only not to be attached to them.If they go, I didn't really need them or if I do they'll be replaced. I really do already trust that.What Maharaj-ji was talking about was the present confusion over completeness/ incompleteness. Nothing was ever incomplete so how can there be completion? I need to empty myself so as to understand my fullness. The more I give away, the more space there is to receive, to be a flow-through.

Maharaj-ji began to talk again; paraphrased. Can't get it precisely; it was a clear, simple thought. "I told you, forty years ago, your name is Shantih Das. I said you would know what to do with that name when you learned what it meant. (This is my dressing it up. It was more like, "You, Shantih Das! Why not live your name already?" but the rest was implied)

He continued, "You've learned 'Shantih'. You haven't learned 'Das' (servant).Give away everything; don't hold back anything.Give everything until you know 'Das.'It's very simple.This is all you need to do."

I started to withdraw but felt his energy again so I sat back at Baba's feet. I felt such an outpouring of love, started crying again. He hit me on the head again a few times and said, "go away, go away." I started to get up and then he said, "come here."

He said, eyes twinkling, "Be empty and God goes through you. Das is nobody.You can't be Das and still be somebody." Then he abruptly turned his attention elsewhere. I sat there for some time, just holding that love and finally realized I didn't need to hold it, that was just what he was talking about, so I stepped back and let others near, just let his energy pour through me and let it go.Full!

Aaron and I talked a little. Aaron said, "this is about completion; for several days you reached back to that cessation experience, wanting to find a way to reenter it, rather than allowing to arise in yourself the awareness that you are already and always in that center, that the Unconditioned is your essence.The experience of resting in that utmost peace is there, was there before your first experiences of it, years ago, will always be there. Like the oranges, why would you need more of it. 'Give away everything' means just that. You cannot know completion until you let go of the idea of incompletion.Let it go.Think only of God and let go of fear."

1 A.M.:a long evening of practice, mostly looking at "give away everything." Aaron asked me to note my breath, and that I cannot draw in new breath until I release the old.There would be no point in inhaling without exhaling.I don't hoard the breath; I exhale and trust the inhale will follow.There's no self in it.Breath breathes itself. But in other areas I hoard, afraid to let go. I know that "let go" is the key

7/28 afternoon: I've been sitting since 5AM with "das is nobody" and "give everything away." This is a hard teaching but right on! ... Thoughts of feeling invisible in childhood/ old mind. ...Looking at what makes that somebodiness come up. (old memories)feeling humiliated, wanting to defend myself and knowing there was no defense.Image of self as "the inadequate one" or "bad one" and needing to fight against that, but also being that, repeatedly, as a way of being in the world. All old.

So the morning was a mix of looking at "das is nobody" and the fears that nobodiness idea brings up, old mind and "give it away." Very painful and also very wonderful.Much release. ......

July 28, 10:30 PMI've been sitting outside in the glorious light of a full moon, Venus beside her, mountains rising around me. Some agitation about ...

Slowly mind quieted. I can see how much I do serve the dharma and that if to do so is my highest priority then I have to accept the path of service life has handed me."Das is nobody."I can't start by saying "Thy will be done but only if it works out the way I prefer." Looking at the desires to control this path. Give away everything: give away thoughts of being "somebody/ fear that I'm not.Give away my conceptions of how I want it to be and work with what is.I am NOT running this show!

Servant of peace:To serve that peace, ... to serve the peace that is arrived at through the understanding of our deepest truth, ... but nobody serves anyone or there is no "service", but only manipulation.With this clarity, I briefly experienced Baba again, felt his energy embrace mine and then depart.

Venture Fourth Weekly WorkWeek Three

Venture Fourth Weekly Work
Week Three