Volume 9, Number 2, Summer 2001

Why do you give it so much energy, trying to get rid of it, fearing it, even hating it? Do you think your goodness ever leaves you? How can you be in touch with that goodness when all of your attention is focused on that which is negative?
The first step is to know negative thought as negative thought, to understand that it arose out of conditions, that it is impermanent and it will cease …

When you know anger as anger then you also can know that which is not angry, that which recognizes anger as anger and allows some spaciousness. Right there is kindness. The next step is to recognize kindness as kindness. You've got to recognize it right there with the anger, not separate from it. Where there is confusion, that which sees that arising of the confusion and knows it, that is clarity. The clarity isn't somewhere else, it's right there with the confusion. When there is fear it is love which knows fear and is able not to become entangled in it, not to express it into the world. Right there in fear is love, not someplace else, right there.

The beginning of your practice, then, is just to know what's what. Here is anger, here is fear, here is confusion. "This arose because certain conditions were present and I will sit with it patiently and watch it until it dissolves." Right there in the intention to be with it spaciously, kindly, non-judgmentally, patiently, you nurture the conditions which will allow the negative energy to dissolve. But when you tense and say, "I must fix this," then you nurture negativity. You nurture judgment. You nurture contraction. And upon these, fear feeds and will not dissolve.

Aaron
Excerpt from January 24, 2001, Wednesday Night Group.

Someone pointed out to me after the last newsletter the time span between when I write and when you read it. Now it's mid-February and the first thaw is just making a dent in the copious snow of this winter. When you read this in May, we'll both be living in sunshine and spring flowers. I love this change of seasons, part of the impermanence of life.

Perhaps the words that most define these Dharma teachings to me are as follows: whatever has the nature to arise has the nature to cease and is not me or mine. In this truth I laugh and I weep. We think of impermanence as threatening, but there's such hope in it. The human experiences the joy or pain of the situation. The wiser awareness, openhearted, knows it for what it is, all the passing show of conditioned reality. The harsh winter melts into spring, blossoms into lovely summer, bursts into a final brilliant array of red and gold, and freezes again into winter. In winter we may shiver, but we also know it will change. Still, the cold may be unpleasant. The trick is to not favor one space over the other. When I'm stuck in relative reality, I suffer enormously, since I can't hold on to what I love nor keep away what's unpleasant. When I'm caught in ultimate reality, I deny life experience, don't allow myself to touch it deeply, am not really alive. When I can live my life resting deeply in both relative and ultimate truth, then there is peace. This is such a simple teaching. The question is how to stay centered in both aspects of being.

Last week we had an interesting situation here: a team of four people came to make a documentary film about me and my family, deafness, Deep Spring Center and what we teach, how both personal healing and this Dharma center evolved out of the suffering around the deafness. If all goes well, this will air on television. The question put to me repeatedly was to explain the heart of these teachings briefly and in simple language.

All beings suffer. The Pali language word in the original teachings is dukkha. What is this word? Kha means the hub of a wheel; the prefix du means off center. This is the cart with an off-center wheel. It rolls smoothly for a moment and then it lurches. Rolls again and lurches. There's no inherent suffering there. People pay a lot of money to go to amusement parks and bounce and spin on rides that lurch! The suffering is when we want it to be different. Then our energy contracts and we wage a war with things as they are. That's dukkha, suffering. These are the first two Noble Truths of Buddhism, but one doesn't need to follow any special ideology to understand them. Suffering exists; the cause of suffering is craving, wanting things to be different. Just look into your own experience and see how it is.

The third Noble Truth is that there is freedom from suffering. Just that, a statement that at first needs to be taken on faith. But as we investigate the nature of our experience we see that there is indeed this suffering, and see its cause. We begin to see our grasping to get away from, or hold on to, and that there is another way to respond, which is to hold the entire situation lovingly in our hearts, with compassion and kindness. As we do that, we soften and the suffering diminishes. Then we start to know at least the relative side of this third truth from our own experience; there is an end to it.

The Fourth Noble Truth is very specific-the Buddha's clear delineation of the path out of suffering. Again, this isn't a Buddhist path. The first to teach it was a man called "Buddha," which simply translates to "the one who is awake." He was awake in that he saw how things really are, learned how to be present. We all have this capacity for awakening. What I find beautiful here is that the Eightfold Path provides a very complete map. I don't know about you, but I need that help. All the years of devotional practice never gave me tools to deal with suffering-deafness and other suffering in my life. It never gave me the tools to attend skillfully to greed, self-centeredness and anger. "Thou shalt not …" didn't cover it. Such words only led to shame when there was the commandment and I couldn't keep it. In the Eightfold Path I find those tools. They're accessible to anyone: the Jew who practices this path will become a better Jew, the Christian a better Christian. No beliefs are required.

When it's presented in this way it's very simple. Practice awareness, kindness, clarity. But of course the living of it is harder. Here's where the guidance of the path comes in. It supports a balance of moral awareness, wisdom and presence or mindfulness.

As we watch the arising of conditioned objects, as material objects, thoughts and sensations, coming into our experience, we begin to relate less from the habitual stories around these objects, and more from a spaciousness that begins to know "whatever has the nature to arise has the nature to cease and is not me or mine." But we can't hide in that truth and not allow the full experience of what is present or we can't relate to it skillfully.

Some of you have heard or read from me about my knee and the torn cartilage. Finally, 18 months ago I had surgery that was supposed to resolve the pain. After the surgery came eight months of physical therapy. Now, another fall and winter has passed and the pain is the same. When I walk any distance, it burns and throbs. After all that, how dare it be the same! But of course, that's just how it is. There is pain; there is sometimes severe pain, continuous pain. That's how it is. There's aversion to the pain, too. But there's also spaciousness. There's a softness when pain is experienced, not so much tightening around it. There's not suffering. On an ultimate level, everything changes and some things are not in my power to control. I may not have things the way I want them to be. So there's softening. But on the human level, I can't deny the real experience of discomfort in the knee. I need not to separate from this pain, not to cut off a part of my body. I don't try to "fix" my knee any more, but attend to it, respond skillfully to it. I need to stay in this balance of relative and absolute, knowing the impermanence of the body, of comfort, and yet attending to discomfort with an open heart. I find the ability to do that comes from presence, from allowing myself to be intimate with my experience. Of course, there can be a lot of resistance to that intimacy when the object is painful.

One practice I do often is to watch stories that create separation. "It should/should not be …" is a story. Fantasies of mountain climbing are stories. Ignoring the pain to walk on stoically is a story. Playing computer games or reading to escape discomfort is a story.

I ask myself to return to the direct experience. Yes, there's pain. There may be aversion, too, but there is also wholeness. It ceases to be my pain and becomes "our pain," the pain of all of us in bodies that grow older, weaker. The pain of the human condition. I can make space for that pain with an open heart. There may be sadness, but not suffering.

The direct experience is not a story. There may be a direct experience of anger, as tightness in the throat, heart beating fast, tension in the belly, mind spinning, tight, hot. This is anger. No stories of how it should be, how to fix it, who to blame, just "anger, burning, tension." With the pain in my knee there's the direct experience of burning, pulling. There's also a direct experience of unpleasantness, and often the tension of aversion. When I note these arise, without stories, there's space for the experiences.

When the stories do arise, if mindfulness is present, I know them immediately. "Craving, aversion …" Not the direct experience of aversion, which is something different, but the story of aversion which the mind and body spin out. "If only …" for example. It's like touching a hot coal. I note the story and the suffering that comes with it. I can drop it. That's an option.

Here's where the Eightfold Path comes in. Mindfulness is present and sees the arising objects. Moral awareness extends to not harming this mind and body, as well as others. No need to run into the stories still one more time. Wisdom knows, this will pass. Many other supports from practice are also there: faith, energy, lovingkindness, clarity, all of these and more nurtured through the practice.

When the stories fall away, what remains? Only the direct experience, be it pleasant or unpleasant, and a great spaciousness and centeredness that can contain it all. Once, when my leg was very painful, Aaron asked me to stop and look at my other leg, to draw attention there. "Does it burn?" he inquired. No. "Can there be gratitude for this place where there's no pain, just resting there and aware, the pain is only part of the situation?" He kept urging me to not fixate on the painful leg but bring in a wider awareness, touching all the areas of no-pain.

We can do the same thing with grief, anger and so forth. Right there with grief is that which is not grieving. There with anger is spaciousness; there with hatred is kindness. In greed there is also generosity. The stories ensnare us and prevent us from noticing.

Here is where our practice can lead us, into this direct experience of that which is inherently good, kind, spacious, right there with fear and pain, not separate from it. It's a wonderful gift to find this; it was there all the time!

I wish you a summer of spaciousness in the narrows, light in the darkness. I look forward to seeing some of you on retreats.

This talk (May 3, 2000) is already represented in the Library: Wednesday Night Group section. Please click on this link to go there.

Just over twelve years ago, while struggling with the anger around my deafness and the isolation it created, I prayed for help. The answer that came to me was Aaron, a spirit guide-and was certainly not the form I expected the answer to take. Most of you are familiar with that story. I was startled by what seemed to be the presence of a discarnate entity, but the guidance was loving and extremely helpful. Friends saw the changes in me and began to ask, "Can I talk to him?" and "Will you teach me the form of meditation he's teaching you?"

Out of those questions came the start of Deep Spring Center, although not to bear a name for several years. We began so simply. On a Wednesday night in the summer of 1989, six friends gathered in my living room. I began to teach them meditation, and they asked Aaron questions. At first the answers were short, yes or no. A more complex question brought a longer answer. Confused, I asked him to repeat it. "Just close your eyes and concentrate; repeat what you hear." With those words, Aaron began to teach me the basics of channeling.

His focus was very clear. "Be present with what arises in each moment, be it peaceful or tumultuous. Rest in the awareness that sees the arising of these mind and body states. Find out who you are beneath the surface, this angel which I perceive as the heart of you, and learn how to live the balanced truth of the human container and the angel. In silence and presence you will find the answers you seek." I kept a spiritual journal in my work with him. Preparing this talk, I looked in the 1989 journal, as close to March 24 of that first year as possible. There are two entries I'd like to share.

March 14, 1989: For two weeks most of our discussion has been around anger and emotions. He points out to me how angry I am at my anger. Finally, just now while meditating, being "present with whatever appears," as Aaron keeps requesting of me, an insight came. My anger is simply that, anger. I can just watch it and allow it with no guilt, no judgment. I don't have to use it to harm another in any way. The choice is mine. I can react unaware, and do harm, or I can relate to this painful arising with kindness. I finally understand his statement, "That which is aware of anger is not angry; rest in that awareness and let the heart open with mercy." I'm taught with so much love, so much compassion. There is such gentleness and non-judgment. Although I look at painful things, the learning is more beautiful than painful. There is level after level of forgiveness, healing and love. Thank you, Aaron, my forever teacher and friend.

March 28, 1989: Aaron has been teaching me a form of meditation which feels very familiar, just a little more precise than what I've done for years, to follow my breath and be with whatever arises. This is very different than the guided meditations of the past six weeks. I told Aaron I feel I'm not learning. He said, "Previously, we worked intensely with a lot of new information. Now there are no fireworks, just silence. You can learn as much or more from the silence; just be present with it." He reminds me not to grasp, just to be with the moment as it is. He assures me there is growth in it.

I ask how I can tell the difference between growing by sitting with the silence and simply stagnating. He says if I listen to the silence there will be growth; if I get bored and, without presence, go off into a day dream or just shift around waiting for something special to happen, then I need to catch that moment of grasping or discomfort and be with it.

He has told me in the past that stagnation is death. Now I see that I don't trust this silence. I fear it as stagnation. Aaron asks me to trust him, but more than that, to trust myself. "You have always trusted your own heart, even as a child. You have never been a follower but have chosen your own path with wisdom and with trust. Do not lose this trust in yourself. Do not look to me for all the answers. I will guide you, but you are the one responsible for choosing and knowing your own path. Everything you need is given to you, here in the silence and that which arises into that still space. Just be present with an open heart, fully present and awake. Don't try to create anything. Don't fixate on anything. Only observe and rest in spaciousness; as objects arise and pass away, tend to them skillfully and let go."

As I look back on these 12 years, this is still the heart of my practice, and of what we teach-lovingkindness, presence and, finally, liberation. That last must be a part of it. If I didn't believe liberation was possible in this lifetime, I wouldn't be teaching.

Since these teachings are so deeply rooted in Buddha-Dharma, of necessity we've picked up Buddhist terminology and deepened in the understanding of Dharma. I have much love and respect for the Buddha, and enormous gratitude for this path that he first walked and for his boundless compassion that led him to teach to others. But it feels important to me to emphasize that, while the path is described in Buddhist terms, we don't need to identify ourselves as Buddhists or as anything, just followers of this noble way to freedom. At a teacher conference last summer, when asked what he teaches, the Dalai Lama put it beautifully. He said, "Don't teach Buddhism; teach human values, human kindness." This is my hope for Deep Spring Center, that we are a place that teaches human kindness and the ways to help it manifest within the human experience, and that we offer these teachings freely to all, regardless of religious orientation.

So we gathered, and each year there were more of us. Eventually, with the living room bursting with twenty people, I started a second weekly meditation class. And every Wednesday since that first summer of 1989, folks gathered to talk with Aaron. Two years into all of this, some students came to me and asked to lift the burden of organization off my shoulders so I could focus more on teaching. Thus, Deep Spring Center was born.

Why the name Deep Spring? Over forty years ago, when I first began to meditate, one day I had a vivid image of accessing a deep spring within myself as I moved into a meditation space. It was a bottomless spring, connected to the Infinite and Eternal. From that spring I drew sustenance and insight, not my own strength and wisdom but a far deeper one to which my meditation opened me. It was a place of deepest connection, deepest love. I saw that source was in all of us, the center to which we may all come. I came to think of it as a spring. The spring was "self" but the waters were the pure energy and love of the universe. That spring had been with me all these years, and it presented itself immediately as a name.

Our full name is Deep Spring Center for Meditation and Spiritual Inquiry. As this suggests, from our start there was a two-fold focus of teaching meditation and of "spiritual inquiry," which continues today. This is one way in which we differ from traditional Dharma centers.

The walls were bursting again, and classes moved into larger rented spaces. I began to teach others to teach, to take on the newest practitioners for whom I lacked time, especially as groups like University of Michigan, the City of Ann Arbor adult education department, hospice and prisons heard of our program. The office needs grew and my laundry room, for ten years the home of our files and organizational material, became increasingly claustrophobic. I remember people folding and stamping newsletters atop the washer and dryer and counter, then stepping aside while one son or another came in to retrieve his wash. Remember, all this activity was happening in a small home where five people lived. So we created the meditation hall and office. We knew even as work started that we'd outgrow it very quickly, but Hal and I were able to offer this space and it seemed a useful interim step.

More classes formed, eventually eleven teachers plus myself, and we were all teaching. No two classes met in the same place, and no one knew each other. Two next-door neighbors told me they discovered, only after a full year, that they were in my class on different nights. When summer came, I suggested, "Invite a neighbor to sit with you." One phoned the other: "I've been meditating all year and it's wonderful. Have you ever meditated? Would you like to try it?" There were even two more neighbors on the same street in classes!

Through the years it's been very clear to me that practice must be balanced. The Dharma gives us the three facets of moral awareness-(sila), deepening concentration and mindfulness (samadhi) and growing wisdom (panna)-and describes how they support one another. It also gives us the Triple Gem. This is Buddha (which word simply means awake), the awakened nature of us all, Buddha nature, as well as the historical Buddha and the path he shows us. Second is the Dharma or deepest truth of how things are. Third is the sangha or spiritual community, not just the immediate sangha but also all sentient beings, on every plane, who travel this path, regardless of the religious container or language used to articulate it.

The teachings also emphasize the importance to nurture the wholesome qualities of mind, not just to focus on the dissolution of the unwholesome. One of my favorite scriptural lines is from Anguttara Nikaya, Book of the Twos, #10:

So if we are truly to learn, the practice at DSC needs to offer not just vipassana but also the container in which meditation may thrive and take deep roots. My question for many years was how to do this within the limitation that I met with most of you for only a few hours a month and that there was no time where we were together to create a living container for our practices. Increasingly, I've felt the need for a home where we could sit together; gather for both classes and informal, social times of conversation and sharing, work and play; and practice the generosity to make the teachings available to others.

Generosity has always been a foundation of Dharma. At many national teacher meetings we've talked about bringing the Dharma to the west and how it's translated most skillfully. In Buddhist countries people support the monks and nuns, and the monastic community, in turn, gives back to the lay people by offering teachings. Even the smallest child is taught the joy of generosity, and that this generosity is part of what keeps the teachings alive, both in our own hearts and on a wide scale.

These wonderful teachings have been passed to us, entrusted to us, really. Part of the unanimous decision I heard from the sangha several years ago was the desire to keep offering it out, to make real effort not to limit what we offer for lack of space or resources but to trust ourselves and support expansion in all appropriate ways. Then came the two years to put in place an infrastructure to support this growth. Now we're ready. The decision to go ahead will return itself so many-fold to us personally, as well as be a continued gift to all beings.

I envision a place where several classes can sit together, then go into smaller spaces with teachers; a place where people meet daily to sit together; sitting and mindfulness instruction for our children and care for the littlest ones so parents can sit with us; a kitchen table to bring us together over soup or tea and conversation with kindred spirits; informal gatherings, such as a group gathered to talk about such diverse things as relationships, dreams, books, body energy or healing; a place where those who want to volunteer in the wider community as part of their service practice can meet each other and make plans; a place where people can gather informally to discuss Aaron's teachings and share reflections with one another; a place for useful metaphysical exploration; a place where we can support each other's spiritual practice in ways we may not find such support among those who don't understand it; a garden and the Dharma of tending growing things; a place where newcomers will feel welcome and find a truly open environment, no special beliefs required, to join us in practice; a place where we can practice living the Dharma, off the cushion, through much greater interaction.

Tonight, those of you gathered here represent our local community. We are the ones who would seem likely to participate most, and benefit most. But more than half our mailing list is from people living over two hours away. People in seventeen foreign countries receive the newsletter! We get many inquiries from people who want to visit. Mostly, we can't accommodate them now. I hope we'll have some space where out-of-town guests can stay over when they come into town to hear Aaron or attend a class, to encourage this wider sangha to join us more often. A letter about this meeting and membership will go to the entire mailing list, through the newsletter. I hope many people from out of town who receive Aaron's talks by e-mail, attend retreats with me in their home communities, and value Aaron's books and teaching will choose to support this effort, too, in whatever ways seem appropriate. I want to make it clear that membership is not just for local folks.

I find Aaron's Dharma teaching to be unique, especially his focus on kindness, and on the "angel" within the "earthsuit." This side of the Dharma is not always so well represented in the world, and I find it to be the heart of all religious teaching. "Love one another." Aaron says, "Why grasp for what is already present, yet you must continue to work because that which is present is not yet fully liberated into the world. This is your work, to bring this divine presence into the world, and to help others also to discover it, so suffering may truly end on the earth plane and the enlightened heart be expressed."

Please consider the importance to yourselves and others, of a commitment to make what you have received more fully available to others. This is what membership means. I was wary of the term "member" at first because I didn't want to create separation by haves and have nots, members and non-members. But I've come to see this membership simply as a vehicle for commitment, and a reminder to support the more material aspects of that commitment which so many of us already carry-to live our lives with as much wisdom and love as is possible and help create the situations where others may do the same.

On March 24 Deep Spring Center held its first official membership drive and fundraiser. For some time, Barbara, the Board of Directors and other members of the Deep Spring community have been talking about finding a new home for our sangha: a place where folks can come together in their love of the Dharma-a place for classes, meetings, potlucks, just hanging out and (of course) regular sittings. Mostly, we all aspired to end the separation that has come with so many different groups sitting under so many roofs each week. There were several gatherings last year to discuss people's ideas and concerns, and these groups generated a lot of enthusiasm for taking the next step in Deep Spring's evolution.

One question on everyone's mind was about financing such an undertaking. We acknowledged happily that there is a rather large number of folks who love Deep Spring, and who draw spiritual sustenance from the classes, retreats and sessions with Aaron. On the other hand, we didn't really have a clear idea of how many people would wish to support the Center on a regular, ongoing basis. And that's what it would take to make our dream of a home come true. Without commitment, we knew we couldn't make it happen.

We decided to take some practical steps in the direction of our vision, so a site-search committee was formed last fall to begin investigating property in the Ann Arbor area. We needed to learn more about what kinds of places were available, for purchase or for rental, and how much they might cost. The preference was to buy a place that could be truly our own, but we decided not to rule out the rental option if we were financially unable to make such a purchase at this time.

As the site-search committee started its exploration, the Board began discussing what it would take to create a more solid financial base, and to foster a greater sense of cohesiveness and commitment among our somewhat scattered community. As a result of these Board discussions, the idea of a membership organization was born. Barbara and the other members of the Board felt strongly that a membership structure would offer people a vehicle through which to commit themselves to the work of Deep Spring in a more tangible way, and it would provide a base that we could count on to make plans.

Another committee was formed to implement the Board's ideas. We call it the fundraising committee, but that title doesn't quite capture the whole essence of what the members are trying to accomplish. They like to think of themselves as a mix of visionaries and pragmatists who are working toward turning our visions into realities. This committee planned a kick-off event for the end of March, and the Board invited a group of about sixty local people who have been involved with Deep Spring Center for some time-people who have already shown their commitment to some extent in terms of time and energy.

Everyone gathered in the clubhouse at Chapel Hill for a delightful and somewhat eclectic (!) dinner provided by various restaurants in Ann Arbor and Chef Mike. We listened as Barbara spoke of the importance of sangha in our spiritual growth, as well as the true meaning of dana, or generosity. She explained that dana is a wonderful vehicle for both giving and receiving. As we draw more fully on the resources offered through Deep Spring Center, she said, we have an opportunity to support those resources so they can continue to be available, not only to us but also to many others. In that way, we contribute to the good of all beings and enhance our own growth at the same time. We experience the true meaning of non-grasping, seeing how what we give returns to us again and again, and the growing sangha supports us as it blossoms.

In addition to Barbara's Dharma talk, Susan Weir and Leslie Desmond presented information on properties in this area, and Dave Lawson helped us understand the financial nuts and bolts of buying or renting a place of our own. Kalindi Trietley, the service coordinator, drew our attention to the very important committees that need our time if Deep Spring is to truly thrive. Dottie Coyne did a great job as Mistress of Ceremonies, and several individuals spoke of their own decisions about financial commitment to Deep Spring Center. Last, but not least, Kris Kurnit spoke from the heart about stewardship and what that really means for members of a sangha. All in all, it was a warm and wonderful evening. I think everyone learned a lot and went home with a great deal to reflect on. We also had a really good time being together.

This was just the beginning of our membership drive and fundraising efforts. Anyone who feels deeply aligned with the principles of Deep Spring is welcome to become a member. Commitment to sharing the Dharma is the only requirement. There is no special level of practice, nor is there a specific amount of money you have to donate. Our top priorities at this point are coalescing the sangha, deepening our commitment to the Dharma, and moving toward having a place to call home. Of course, membership does come with a certain degree of responsibility to support Deep Spring in ways that you feel are appropriate. If you're interested in considering membership, offering financial support or helping to further the progress of this work in some other way, please contact Deep Spring Center to receive more information. No one has to become a member to continue participating in our programs, of course, but we're hoping that a lot of folks will want to deepen their commitment through membership. These are very exciting times for us all.

This talk (February 21, 2001) is already represented in the Library: Wednesday Night Group section. Please click on this link to go there.

DSC Sangha Expresses Gratitude
to Celeste Zygmont,
Retiring Editor of DSC Newsletter

Our deepest thanks to Celeste, our retiring newsletter editor,
for all her years of creating this newsletter.
Under her guidance, we grew from a formless series of pages to a publication with style, photos and much greater readability.

Thank you Celeste, from me and all the DSC sangha.

With this edition of the newsletter, we move to a new phase, a staff of three editors with many ideas and talents. I know the newsletter is going to undergo some wonderful growth. Please tell them what you'd like to see in these pages.

With love,
Barbara