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Venerable Ajahn Medhanandi -
The Freedom to
Breathe
I would
like to be wise enough, clear enough and vast enough to absorb whatever
pain arises within me or in those near me, to reflect back the beauty
and sweet taste of pure presence in which all pain ceases and there is
only peace. But when I am unable, can I cry and sit still in the
aftermath of an inner darkness, where I have been held prisoner by
despair, fear, loneliness or exhaustion, listening to the deepest roar
of the surf in my own heart? Can I feel my own breath from shore to
shore? What does it tell me? There in the breath, I discover what I
really feel, and what I need to trust and give breadth and dimension to.
And I grow able to give myself to myself.
But as we grow, we change. Things may not 'fit' any more the way they
used to. Not just clothes and shoes and jumpers, but even family,
friendships, jobs, habits, routines... change of life can be for the
good. But at first, it can be so frightening. Too frightening. And out
of fear, we contract again, we choose not to change. And not to grow.
Feeling that fear is facing it, approaching it, being still with it. And
that which is still reflects stillness. In the mirror of a silent mind,
calmed in the alchemy of pure presence and unconditional love, fear is
seen clearly, understood, and, ultimately, befriended. It is set free.
Even if the towers are burning and dissolve under our feet, we have to
realise that it is safer for us to stand, sit, watch and listen than to
run. For as we enter into the immediacy of what we are really feeling,
nothing short of, this is where connection to ourselves is conceived
together with internal joy and freedom.
Breathing free, I enter the total experience of the moment. I hear what
I say to others and what is said to me, allowing the sound to fill the
breath of this moment and to die there and then. If I can be still with
this feeling, not wanting to retaliate, just listening, I am able to
give myself more to the fullness of being without asking the past or the
future or the present for anything.
This act of giving ourselves to ourselves is our true place of
connection, our greatest compassion - the blossoming of the rose in the
flames until 'the fire and the rose are one.' And the breath is our
barometer for how connected we really are within ourselves. One true
breath, felt, listened to, touched with tenderness, can prevent us from
bargaining with ourselves in the marketplace of misery and selling the
jewels of our hearts for cheap denials and reassurances that just
recreate the dreams of our yesterdays and tomorrows.
Like a sailor steering our boat back to port, we keep the red-painted
buoys to the right: Red, Right, Returning. Navigating the storms of life
and the hell-realms of the heart, we hold to clear waters, returning
again and again to the breath. Even in the centre of where it hurts the
most, we have the freedom to breathe, and we take up that right as a
duty to ourselves. We always remember to breathe, fully here and now,
accepting honestly all that we feel, instead of escaping into ideas of
what we want or think we need, and into all our good theories about what
we are and what we are not.
When we are 'still' enough to hear that voice of Purity, the other
analytical chorus of voices will simmer down and come to a place of
peace. And it will be possible to care and not to care, to lose
everything and have lost nothing at all. For we know that what we really
are, the pure natural essence of our being, can never be lost or
diminished. And our happiness need never depend on anyone else being
anything for us other than what they are, or anything else in this world
being anything other than what it is.
We may have to be shaken up in order to break down our stubborn
resistance to hearing our own truth and honouring it, to be able to
relinquish our grasping and move out of the 'comfort zone' of our lives.
We may have to come close to pain, fear, loss, betrayal, sorrow, danger
or death.
If this were our final hour, how would we live it? Every imaginable
worldly thing or experience would suddenly seem paltry and pale. Would
we not let go of everything? Would we not let go all thoughts of control
or strategy or regret and grudge, dictated completely by events of the
past and ideas of the future? Would the heart not yield and grow soft,
and willingly, gladly persevere and endure to encounter the very essence
of the breath we are breathing?
A moment of breathing free, of non-attachment, takes us to fearless
compassion. We are like a star that twinkles and sparkles and smiles -
regardless of what it is seeing, not reaching for or rejecting any
circumstance whatsoever. And therefore, we ARE peace.
And when we have such eyes for seeing, we know the silent beauty that
lies behind and encompasses all things. This is the Deathless. We must
not fear it. We enter this space as our birthright and smile from it - a
smile so vast and benevolent, it makes all things smile.
This way of seeing, of being, IS within our power. Trusting this, we can
reject habit, accept pain, dare to grow silent, not tolerate injustice
but let it die at our ears; with brave thoughts as our guide, we stay
simple and pure. And as we honour our own truth so courageously, it will
rise up mysteriously to support us in ways we would never have dreamed
possible.
Through the practise of non-violence, total disarmament, there is
nothing left to fight or destroy. There is just the movement to accept,
to open, to awaken. Who can hate or resist the one who awakens? When the
five ascetics recognised the awakened quality of the Buddha, they could
no longer shun or criticise him. Instead, they revered and honoured him.
As we follow in the footsteps of the Blessed One, we come to the
stilling of the breath, to the knowing, to pure awareness. There arises
cessation itself, the sublime peace of Nibbana. We need not struggle to
describe that state of being for our very presence shall proclaim it in
the energy of silence, a silence that is mighty and subtle, fragrant and
redeeming.
So we learn to be still. And abiding in the stillness of the mind, our
inner and outer enemies suddenly relinquish their weapons. What will
they fight but an empty war? They too will be stopped in the noble power
of that presence, startled by seeing it, and calmed enough to honour it,
for it resonates only what is sacred.
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