Basic Goodness and Being Kind

'Kindness'
A4 Portrait pencil crayon & ink on bristol board
Prints and original available through www.faunawolfcreations.com

Everyone is basically good. This doesn't mean everyone can't also be a total asshole sometimes. And that also means you are occasionally a total asshole - whether you realise it or not. 

Which is rather liberating really because it means you don't have to be perfect. But you certainly can be kind and compassionate, and ultimately, that’s what basic goodness is about. 

The idea of ‘basic goodness’ as I understand it from studying the Dharma, is not ‘good’ in the sense of virtuous or correct but good as in: we all want to be happy. The best way I ever heard it put was by Pema Chodron when she said, “No one does anything because they want to feel worse.” 

When we put on a jumper because we feel cold, when we shift position so a limb doesn’t fall asleep, when we put a band-aid over a paper cut so it doesn’t sting - these are all signs of our basic goodness. Our basic compassion and care and kindness. 

It may seem easy to argue against basic goodness. We could say that the news is full of examples of basic badness. People kill each other every day. People shoot, bomb and set-fire to others. 

It might seem totally naive to say people are basically good in light of the atrocities that are committed on a daily basis. 

But saying people are basically good is not the same as saying people are basically sane or people are basically self-aware or people are basically skillful. We are all neurotic in our own ways and the discomfort we feel about our neurosis is what drives a lot of our actions. We go into a default mode to try and make ourselves feel better in a constantly changing, unpredictable world. 

We feel like, if we would just bring the world to a perfectly fixed stand-still with everything totally in balance, then we might feel sane. 

So we act foolishly, carelessly, even unkindly or outright viciously. Some more vicious than others. But these actions are still based on this basic goodness, this basic longing we have to be happy. 

The teachings on basic goodness are not saying that we are virtuous. They are saying we all have a longing to connect to happiness, to feel love and belonging. 

Cynics (And cycnism is healthy - no teaching has any value if it doesn’t agree with your own sense of reason. You don’t have to buy any of it and it’s important to test it against your own experience of the world) might say, “Someone who shoots up a school or who convinces a ten year old to be a suicide bomber is evil.” 

Verse 6.39 in the Bodhicharvatara provides a helpful contemplation in this regard: 

If those who are like wanton children

are by nature prone to injure others, 

what point is there in being angry -

like resenting fire for its heat? 

This asks us to consider - if we believe that some people are basically bad then we’re rather foolish for resenting them. Resenting someone for their supposed inherent nature would be like getting angry at a rock for being hard or fire for being hot. 

What greater proof of basic goodness do you need than our expectation that someone shouldn’t harm us? We only think people should know better because we believe they CAN know better. 

In fact, our very shock at reports of violence, our aversion and disbelief, is further proof of this basic goodness. If we truly believe that people are basically bad then we would never be surprised by the things we read in papers. 

And when we read something horrific and we think to ourselves, “I can’t imagine being angry enough to kill for my belief,” that is a sign of our own basic goodness. 

The things we do that cause harm are not born of some inherent evil within us. We are all confused beings scrambling in the same impermanent world. Not a single living creature doesn’t want to feel safe, secure and content. This is the motivation for our actions. 

When a natural disaster occurs I can’t help noticing that the first thing people do, when they realise they can’t do anything else, is reach out to help one another. 

The bodhisattva lives by this. The bodhisattva sees clearly that ultimately, every situation is unknowable and the greatest thing they can do is be there for others. They accept that the world is not a fixable place. There is no single idea of what a ‘perfect’ world would be and even if there was no war, no famine and we weren’t a threat to one another, we would still have to contend with old age, sickness and death. They realise and accept that the greatest gift we can give is to be present for others, to care for them, and to be kind. 

Nausicaa - Book Review

Last week I was laid low with a stomach bug. I don't do well with being ill in that I don't like not being able to take care of myself. I'm very aware of this and also very aware of how unhelpful it is because it generally means I over-do things and make myself worse or make an illness last longer than necessary. 

I was just reaching a 'twitchy' point in my recovery where I really desperately wanted to do something but was physically incapable of anything beyond sitting up and occasionally walking downstairs to make myself tea. Walking across my room left me utterly fatigued. 

But I've been working on the many forms of resistance I encounter in myself and recognized this as yet another. I took stock of things, told my brain that the best thing for it to do was to just be very still and let my body recover, and then I went in search of reading material to occupy it. 

I really couldn't even muster the energy for a novel and reading Dharma was definitely out - at which point I remembered some lovely Graphic Novels that had been gifted to me at Christmas! 

I jumped right in and before long I:
A) wanted a Squirrel Fox
B) was convinced that Nausicaa is one of the coolest protagonists ever created

I've made my way through two of the four volumes I have an have concluded that Nausicaa is a Tender-Heart of Sadness Bodhisattva Warrior. 

To unpack that a little - it means that she is totally aware of the pain of the human condition and willing to do whatever it takes to alleviate that pain, even though she knows it's pretty much an impossible task.

Barring one character in the series there's not a single person she meets that she in unable to relate to and find good in. In fact, it's beautifully written so we may first encounter a supposed 'bad' guy and within a matter of a few pages we suddenly see the fullness of the character in a new light. They are complex and their motivations are never inherently 'evil'.

In fact, the single 'evil' entity seems to not even be human. As armies go to war with one another the painful truth of holding onto 'me' and 'mine' is exposed in such a way that it's difficult not to view the world through Nausicaa's eyes: Everyone is worthy of care and love and we all share the planet so maybe, just maybe, we should take care of each other?

The power of an open mind

The first time I published my Manjushri piece I wrote about the power of questioning and how this piece was an exploration of that. 

(I also spelled it with the more traditional Tibetan spelling but apparently you can spell it with out without the 'h' - Fun fact!) 

But I digress. 

The Dharma is something to be constantly explored, applied and revisited. As Chogyam Trungpa said, "Live life as an experiment." 

To me this means adjust your hypothesis, try things again, change the control group, never assume and always, always be willing to change your mind. A flexible mind is one that knows nothing can be pinned down. 

A print of this piece is currently being exhibited at Oolong Tea House in Calgary, along with most of the rest of my Dharma series. The original is hanging on my bedroom wall (But available for purchase, if anyone is interested) and therefore the object of regular contemplation for me. 

I continually visit the final line of text in the piece, along with the strong imagery representing the importance of cutting through the ideas we think we have of the world. 

When we look at things as being just one way it causes a lot of grief. An example I like to use for this is eating in our favourite restaurant. 

Say there's a restaurant that we love, that we've gone to dozens, possibly even a hundred times. We enjoy it immensely but one day we go and we get food poisoning. Suddenly we write the restaurant off. We can't go back because we had a single bad experience. Regardless of the high percentage of great experiences, because we had a single negative one, and because that negative experience was our last experience, we may never return again. 

But the restaurant was never 'perfect' to begin with. It couldn't have been. Because it wasn't everyone's favourite restaurant and because not everyone might like the food they serve. Regardless of food poisoning, some people just might hate the cuisine so much they'd never consider it to be a nice place to eat. 

The value we put on things is a projection of our mind based on experience and understanding of the world. But when we think we 'know' something (or someone) we put a box around it. We stop being able to see it from different angles, different points of view. 

Using a restaurant is a rather safe example and one I feel confident in using to communicate my thoughts on the subject, but this applies to everything. No human being, no ideology, political structure, religion - is ever just one way. 

When we can see this it liberates us because it means we're getting closer to seeing things as they are and letting the fluidity of the world we live in touch us. It means we're able to experience the richness and fullness of life. 

To purchase a print or the original piece visit: 

www.faunawolfcreations.com/manjushri.html

Avalokiteshvara - Dharma Series

'Avalokiteshvara'
24X36in Acrylic on Canvas

Bodhisattvas are beings that forego their own enlightenment in order to help other obtain their's first. They are the embodiment of an idea, not a deity or mythical being, but a personification of a pure intention. 

Avalokiteshvara (pro. Ava-loke-it-esh-var-a) is the bodhisattva of compassion and one of the most commonly talked about and embraced. I've personally been drawn to Manjusri, which is why the first bodhisattva inspired piece I did for the Dharma series was on wisdom, but recently I've been listening to a lot of podcasts that talk about Avalokiteshvara and I wanted to capture the essence of what genuine compassion entails. 

In Buddhist teachings compassion is a thread that runs throughout. It may seem a simple enough concept - be kind, be genuine, be loving - but practicing true compassion is a bit like walking on a tight rope. There are near enemies masquerading as compassion which catch us up. 

Idiot compassion is when we show care and support to others to our own detriment. We put ourselves in harm's way, possibly with the best intentions, and are blind to the damage being caused by the person we're trying to show compassion for. In situations like this the most genuine approach is often to walk away - to prevent them from continuing to cause harm and to show care for oneself by removing oneself from harm's way. 

Overwhelm is when we feel like there is too much 'wrong' in the world and we have to fix it and don't know how. It is this sense of overwhelm that the words I chose for this piece are addressing. 

A closed heart is not stingy but afraid.
Open your heart.
When we let life touch us we see that we are
big enough to hold it all.

When we begin to show compassion we can also feel like we're opening ourselves up to a lot of pain. By relating to the experiences of others through knowing and understanding our own minds the amount of suffering in the world can feel dominant over joy or wonder. 

The teachings of Avalokiteshvara are showing us another way to be open to the pain in and around us by teaching us how to sit with the unfixable nature of the world. The world is not static - everything is changing and therefore illness, old age and death are inevitable. By embracing the inevitability we learn that these things are not 'bad' or 'wrong'. They are the very nature of the universe. 

Energy is neither created nor destroyed. It merely shifts to something different and the passing of time is constant. Rather than resist this, fight and struggle against it and try to 'solve' what is inherently unsolvable, we can learn to be present for it. 

This presence extends to the joyous and beautiful things in life as well. When we feel agitated because we can't take a picture that will do the setting sun justice or our words are inadequate to describe the smell of a flower, this is another sign that we are trying to 'fix' the world in a particular way. We're trying to hold onto something that is in a state of constant change, rather than relaxing into the constant change and accepting that we are as much a part of it as we are able to observe it. 

When we practice this sense of opening up we will experience a shift in the way we view the world. I feel like this is exactly what is being pointed at in the video asking Neil deGrasse Tyson to share the most astounding fact he's found about the Universe. 

We may be very small but we are interdependent on everything around us. We are and can be as big as the universe, which means we can be present and open to all causes and conditions that may arise. I have felt this sensation of my heart being big enough to hold it all. It was fleeting but profound. It was knowing I didn't have to 'fix' anything because nothing was broken. It was not a passive experience but an empowering one because there is great clarity in seeing what we can control and what we can't. 

The experience is ineffable but I believe it's one that many wise and wonderful teachers do their absolute best to point at. 

"When I reflect on that fact, I look up – many people feel small because they’re small and the Universe is big – but I feel big, because my atoms came from those stars. There’s a level of connectivity. That’s really what you want in life, you want to feel connected, you want to feel relevant you want to feel like a participant in the goings on of activities and events around you That’s precisely what we are, just by being alive." 

- Neil deGrasse Tyson

Dharma art - Manjusri

Dharma Art
'Manjusri'
24X36" Acrylic on canvas

A bodhisattva is a person who wishes to benefit others through their own enlightenment. They post-pone their enlightenment so they can be there for other beings and in traditional Buddhist teachings many of them embody specific characteristics attributed to an enlightened mind.

The bodhisattva I identify with most strongly is Manjusri, the bodhisattva of wisdom. Depicted in various ways, depending on the specific Buddhist tradition, Manjusri is most commonly shown holding a flaming sword in one hand and a book in the other. The book represents knowledge and the sword represents doubt. The sword is used to cut through the book, destroying it and the sense of 'knowing' we may think we have when we decide there is a 'right' answer.

The message is to seek questions, rather than answers. To be open and aware of the paradoxical nature of life and to doubt what we perceive to 'know' on the basis that the universe is constantly changing.

The words I used on this piece are as follows:

The universe does not lend itself to being conclusively known. 

This becomes clear when we are awake to the present moment. 

We can see nothing is ever just one way. 

I have great respect for doubt and questions. In my experience answers cause a lot of trouble because an answer assumes there is something 'right' and therefore something or someone can be 'wrong'. But dualistic concepts are subjective.

After reading 'A Brief History of Time' I have spent time reflecting on the second law of thermodynamics. In it's most basic description the idea is that there are statistically more versions of chaos than order. As Stephen Hawking so brilliantly illustrates - one can shake a box of puzzle pieces and there is a chance they will all fall into place as a fully formed image but there is a much greater chance of the pieces landing chaotically.

In short - the universe is not a 'fixable' place. It is not and cannot be static and yet most of us live as if there is a 'pause' button whereby if we get everything 'right' then we can expect smooth sailing.
The teachings of Manjusri (who may or may not have existed) and many others ask us to doubt our ability to 'know' and relax into accepting the universe as dynamic. 

I have been working on shifting my thinking to grasp this concept with greater and greater clarity and painting this piece has acted as creating a reminder.

I am working on having it imaged so prints will soon be available.

Transition

Pema Chodron is a bit of my own personal hero. She's probably the most influential Buddhist teacher in my life. I've written about her often.

She has this story she tells of when she went to her teacher early on in her career as a nun. In fact, it may have been before she became a nun:

She told him she was going through a lot in her life at that time. There was great upheaval and she was completely uncertain about the future. She asked him what to do during 'this period of transition'. He smiled and said, "As soon as you accept that we are all, always in transition, your life will become so much happier." 

When I embarked on writing Wise at any Age it was following a massive, noticeable transition in my life. We definitely all experience catalysts, things that leave us groundless and uncertain about the future. But I've come to learn that the future is uncertain - whether we see it that way or not. We're just not particularly good at accepting this basic fact.

It's one of the main things I meditate on. The idea being, if one can accept the truth of our situation - that the only thing that lasts forever is the very moment of now in which we are, and that everything is constantly changing and the future cannot be controlled - then one can find a sense of contentment in any given situation. Because there are no surprises because we expect to be surprised. If that makes sense.

Anyway - I've been doing a lot of reading on the subject and listening to a lot of talks and what-not. In all my searching I have come across the Bodhisattva of Wisdom, Manjusri. Bodhisattvas represent the elements of enlightenment within each and every sentient being. Some are more known than others, like Avalokitesvara (Try saying THAT five times fast!), the Bodhisattva of compassion, or the Green Tara, the Bodhisattva of activity and accomplishment.

Manjusri was a new one to me and it seems suitable that I would discover this Bodhisattva shortly after publishing a book about cultivating wisdom, regardless of your age. 

Manjusri is generally depicted holding a flaming sword in one hand and a book in the other. The idea is that that sword cuts through ignorance to get to the truth of the situation. The book represents knowledge and learning and the sword is like a representation of our curiosity. Our need to explore what we are told and cut through it to see clearly what is real, rather than what we project or perceive as real.

I was so inspired that I drew my own Manjusri. I'm not sure what I might do with this now that I've drawn it. I've long wanted to explore Buddhism more deeply through exploring classic Buddhist art. I love the symbolism in it and the incredible movement of the artwork. But for now, this is a start and perhaps the seed for a future project.