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Reality is radically personal in that every experience in our lives IS the ultimate, is God. We do not need to leave any experience, retreat from anything or anyone in order to find or directly experience Reality, for every experience fully is Reality, beyond measure. Our friends, lovers, enemies; orgasms, STDs; organic veggies, chocolate donuts; a good night’s sleep, and a double espresso. ALL are equally ultimate reality, right there within and as each experience. We don’t have to look elsewhere, ever. No need to pick and choose experiences or people. Reality is fully, beautifully up in our spiritual grills, always. This is Love.

Reality is radically impersonal. While Reality is indeed every experience, it does not care what the flavor of that experience is, and no experience can obscure Reality from shining forth. Every experience can be seen nakedly, and in fact, Reality is always bare and nude. It does not care what we think or feel in any moment, Reality is there. Always. This is Wisdom.

It seems that I, like many practitioners, cycle through seeing one of these more at certain times and simultaneously needing to hear the wisdom of the one we are not paying attention to. And in rare moments, perhaps both are shining bright as us, if only briefly.

God neither cares nor does not care. God is beyond any of these dualities we create (yet not other than those). God is radically, impersonally and personally present. Surrender until there is no one surrendering and let Love become you. Step up, cut through the bullshit, see deeply and be Wisdom. Love without wanting, ravish without hesitation.

Avalokiteshvara gave me my first taste of progression, moving from one deity to another, and I discovered that the contrast (or complimentary nature) between Vajrasattva and Avalokitesvara was itself revealing, in addition to the practice. Whereas Vajrasattva is all about seeing myself as divinely capable as a practitioner, cultivating non-self confidence, having no hindrances as a practitioner innately, Avalokiteshvvara reveals to me a deep trust not only in myself, but in all of my experience, doing this through the cultivation of intimacy between Avalokiteshvara and I, my experience and my awareness of that experience, then to immediacy, radical subjectivity, awareness itself.

In just looking at this image of Cintamani Cakra Avalokiteshvara, you can probably get a sense of the qualities he embodies and communicates. He looks totally chill with whatever is happening, with complete openness, and his posture is that of relax attentiveness, with the willingness to respond. To me, Avalokiteshvara represents both being completely ok with whatever is happening in experience, where appearances and reality in any form is not only NOT a problem, but they/I/we are innately and equally pure, and he is ready and willing to respond to what is arising.

And this is where Avalokiteshvara is known for compassion, but as Hokai has been teaching me and as I have discovered in practice, there is so much more to compassion itself and how it arises. And for Avalokiteshvara, and when I see these qualities directly in myself, compassion arises spontaneously. If I recognize the purity of phenomena and myself, not in opposition of impurity, but from the very core are not able to be defiled, a deep peace arises, even in the face of suffering or what I might label impure. And not only that, as Cintamani Cakra Avalokiteshvara’s posture indicates, it invokes naturally the quality of responsiveness, not passiveness. Perhaps one thing that has been blowing my meditative mind is slowly recognizing that all of these qualities are ALREADY present all at once, not produced, not arising sequentially in dependence on one another, but as inseparable aspects of my own being. And in my practice, I start as seeing them as separate from myself, but in the course of one sit, I move from their through intimacy until seeing these all arising as once, as me.

And so, each time I pause a moment before taking my seat and practicing with Avalokiteshvara, I sometimes feel a sense of not being ok with things in my life, with myself, and sometimes this is subtle, and sometimes not so subtle. But when I take my seat, I practice relaxing into a deep, natural trust of my experience, and as Hokai told me, I “create a trajectory of fearlessness of trust”. And to me, Avalokiteshvara is ultimately about how I show up in the world off of the cushion, to see everything in my life as an opportunity of deep wisdom and compassion, for deep trust and responsiveness.

Vajrasattva is often associated with purification practice and the practitioner recites the mantra of Vajrasattva, visualizing body, speech, and mind being purified of negative karma and obstacles. Here, as instructed by Hokai, I am seeing Vajrasattva, and hence myself, and all phenomena as already being already purified, without obstacles as the starting point. I take my seat as Vajrasattva and practice with this awareness. In a sense, I feel that this approach is similarly purifying, but done with a different approach, qualities, and understanding. Furthermore, instead of reciting a mantra while being Vajrasattva, I am practicing shamatha, which is also held to be both grounding and stabilizing, but is also a purifying and pacifying practice in itself (which I’ll be sharing more about as well).

I have done practice with Vajrasattva in the past, but in many ways I feel this practice to be very fresh and new given the nuanced instructions of Hokai, and undertaking this practice at this particular time and point in my path. I hope that I will realize more subtle insights into Vajrasattva beyond the main qualities described here, or perhaps said better, a deeper and, most importantly, an embodied, direct understanding. Which brings me to a final point that I have so appreciated in my practice over this last year, one that the Shingon tradition holds great value in – embodiment. Enlightenment, realization, compassion, love embodied, in this physical, emotional, spiritual body I call “me”. I find this to be so important that this body is taken as a primary focus and means of realization.

Vajrasattva is the recognition of our already wakeful state, buddhahood as this body-itself. -Hokai Sobol

I like vows because they force me to be disciplined and structured, so I’m doing it again, and started day one yesterday, November 17, 2010. This time for 40 days, 30 minutes each day of practice. During this time I will be working with four different deities as understood and practiced in the Shingon tradition and instructed by my teacher, Hokai Sobol. I’ll finish these 40 days with a week-long solitary retreat. Well, semi-solitary because I’ll be doing the retreat with my dharma brother, Vincent Horn, but we’ll each be doing our own thing, kicking it buddha-licious style in a cabin up in Crestone, Colorado.

My motivation for all of this is raising the intensity and quality of my practice. The 100-day vow I did over the summer had more to do with “just doing the practice” and creating momentum. Now, I’m raising the stakes by sitting for longer periods and doing a retreat (this isn’t the first time either. I’ve done a month long solitary before, it’s just been a while. A long while:P).

I want to take this momentum that I have generated and plunge into insight. As for the specific practice, I have done some deity practices, but this will be the first time I am practicing as the deity, embodying the deity, four deities total. I will be following a fairly traditional order with the four deities, practicing each for 10 days, and in each phase I’ll share at least one post going into more detail about each deity, and following it with my experience in the 10 days.

1. Vajrasattva. In the Shingon tradition, Vajrasattva relates to our innate ability to practice, non-self confidence, purification, and is foundational.

2. Cintamani Cakra Avalokiteshvara. As usual, Avalokiteshvara is used for developing compassion.

3. Mahavairochana. Giving rise to wisdom, embodiment of Buddhahood, the totality of all aspects of awakened reality, the primordial buddha(hood).

4. Acalanatha, Immovable Mantra King. This is uniquely a Shingon deity, as far as I can tell, and as such is very new to me, unlike the first three. I’m extremely curious to practice with/as this deity. Acalanatha has to do with service, immovable in fierce compassion, ready to serve the practitioner, as if the practitioner was Buddha.

In my understanding, each deity is an embodiment and representations of different qualities and facets of reality and enlightenment, and the practice that I will do with each deity will help me to become the embodiment as well. I will be sharing more experiential posts as I practice with each deity and as the forty days unfold.

Vajrasattva

Cintamani Cakra Avalokiteshvara

Mahavairocana Buddha

Acalanatha

100 Days of Practice (kick off post)

100 Days – The Practice

Mind Accepting, Heart Embracing

100 Days Complete – My Experience (what I learned, insights, etc)

Thanks for joining me here!

Consistency

Perhaps the most important benefit I received from this vow is consistency. Let me just say this: I suck at consistency, except the sucking part. That’s consistent. I have many strengths, but being consistent and disciplined is not one of them. I’m a bit all-or-nothing. So, committing to 100 days of practice was actually quite wonderful. Once I made up my mind to do it, I did it. Without the formal vow, I probably wouldn’t have completed it.

Blending Life and Practice

Because I wasn’t going all-or-nothing, the lines between my life and practice started to blend in more than subtle ways. I started to see the relationship of my practice to everything I do and am in life. Partly, I realize that this itself is a result of deepening insight, but I think a consistent practice in the midst of life makes this even stronger. And, at one point, Hokai helped me to bring this understanding directly into the practice itself. The walls between practice and life started to dissolve, which only revealed more mysterious paradox, challenging and beautiful.

Cycling – Here We Go Again

Before this 100 day vow I had spent a lot of time cycling back and forth through familiar insights and “territory” on the path. Insight Meditators might call these: arising and passing, dark night, and equanimity. Of course, each time I cycled I would have deeper understanding with each of those, often surprising myself and delighting in the infinitely revealing nature of reality. In the 100 days, this was even stronger due to, I think, consistency, being able to return every day to the practice and continuing further. It was such a relief to actually spend time on the cushion every day with intention, not merely working with my experience in spontaneous bursts.

Finding New Edges

Cycling was not the only thing to happen in my practice. For the first time in a long while, I came up against distinctly new edges within my own awareness and embodiment. Edges are always a mixed bag for me – partly exciting, partly frightening. But this time, I was a bit more elated to feel into and breathe these edges of myself, of life, of this mystery. And now, I’m looking forward to doing that again.

Always Home

After finishing the 100 days, Hokai told me to take a week off. Not one minute of formalized practice. I was surprised, as were other people. But, it made sense to let go of the discipline and structure, to let things simmer and see what arose in myself, and to let reality spontaneously help guide the next move in my path. Yes, well, I also made that week a bit longer than a week. Hey, like I said, all-or-nothing. Emphasis on the nothing. But, I’ve returned to my practice and I noticed something: It feels like coming home each time I sit on the cushion. A strong familiarity, and an embrace almost is felt each time I sit down, even if it’s been a while since I last sat. I feel something running deep within me that wasn’t there before, or perhaps was once dull and not is coursing through my veins.

Working with Hokai

Last, but not least, working with Hokai before, during, and after the 100 days has been invaluable. It’s hard for me to put into words the gratitude I feel for his help. I have been practicing for over 10 years, but I have not felt that I REALLY started practicing until meeting and working with Hokai. I have been able to navigate my practice, to dive into practice with his years of experience, deep insight, guidance, and intuition, exploring subtleties of practice that I just haven’t been able to do on my own. For that, I am incredibly thankful.

I have more posts that I will share that contain instructions Hokai has given me, as well as some my experiences and process with practice.

The core of Buddhadharma has to do with unfolding the miracle of meaning itself. This dynamic has both a knowing (mind) and a concerned resonating (heart) aspect to it. -Hokai Sobol

I have a series of posts I’m writing this week in which I’ll share my experiences so far as well as instructions and teachings given to me by Hokai Sobol during the 100 Day Vow I’m currently doing. He has encouraged me enthusiastically to do so and I’m extremely grateful for him for taking so much time to guide me in my practice, and to share that with you as I walk this path.

As a quick note, these posts will include paraphrases from Hokai’s instructions, and I won’t always quote them simply to make things easier to read. On occasion I will quote word for word and note that for anything that I felt particularly stood out. So, basically, if you read anything that blows you away, that’s Hokai

In this post I want to provide a little context around the practice I’m doing, detailed here – why I’m doing it, how I’m doing it, and why I’m doing that way. If that makes sense.

Over the last year or so I have embraced a strong second person relationship to the divine, and in that, surrender and receiving have become important. (And even that has now started to evolve beyond itself, but I’m trying to begin at the beginning here in recounting this). At the same time, practice and my experience has become more and more subtle, and with that the form my practice takes has mirrored it, allowing me to deepen it. Hokai has been invaluable in this process since I started to work with him over a year ago, and particularly in creating this practice vow and the practice itself.

Now, I could and might write an entire post on DIY in buddhism. And it’s been happening since the original DIY-er, Buddha, started dishing out the dharma. But, I’m not going to go into that in this post. Suffice to say that the practice I’m doing, described here, is very traditional in its structure and essence, but was taken apart and put back together by Hokai and I, much like Lego blocks, in order to serve, support, and challenge me.

Refuge

One thing I brought to Hokai is that I wanted to feel the power of this 2nd person relationship in the practice, and I told him that the simple gross form of refuge wasn’t bringing the thunder and really seemed too gross in nature compared to how my experience felt in practice. And really, this is already addressed in the vajrayana having three levels of refuge: outer, inner, and secret. One of the reasons for this is to match the practitioner where they are at in deepening their practice. Slowly but surely, the form of practice and every aspect of it will become subtler in nature, and refuge, at least in the Vajrayana is important and follows suit.

Given that, Hokai gave me the refuge you see here, which he had mostly written before, but to which we also added. An important aspect for me was the refuge and practice feeling personal, so personal that even taking refuge in something that had form seemed too much. To my delight, Hokai shared that refuge originally was meant to be something very personal and a symbol so vast that it had no limitation and included itself. And in that refuge there is a tension between the personal and the vast openness, within which something profound can happen. That hit my heart and mind with a big YES! I could and still feel the paradox and truth unfolding, and I was quite amazed to see that come through in something as simple as refuge. What had once been something almost trite, was/is now something powerful in my practice.

An important line is “through this practice I realize my true nature and bring benefit to all”. This is powerful in setting an intention. The practice ITSELF is the accomplishing and the accomplishment. This was powerful for me to see and to embrace more and more, that practice is the portal to realization, is the realization, and is also the benefiting of others. No where to go but here.

Grace, Inspiration, and Buddhadharma

Reality always matches your actions when aspiration meets devotion and resolve. There’s a mirroring of authentic actions. -Hokai Sobol

When I first started exploring this practice with Hokai, he rocked my world with a deepening of what I understood grace to be. This term isn’t used in Buddhist circles, but it’s there just called b other names. What hit me the most was his explaining that grace, receiving, comes from within. Now, this sounds simple as I write this and perhaps as you read it, but I find that quite powerful. It is by my very nature of engaging practice and opening that the receiving happens, and what is received comes from what I already am. What unfolds is not a result of my actions, but the actions allow it to take place. As Hokai said, my movement forward is a proof of my openness to that response.

So, that being the case how could I SEEK inspiration or grace?? I am already moved and inspired. Hokai instructed two things with respect to this: Recognize basic goodness and purity, which means already everything is present and received and there are no obstacles, only a bright mind and bright heart. And two, this brightness is active in wanting to unfold my potential. There is a deep intimacy and trust that reality wants to unfold and recognize itself. And so, when taking refuge and doing the practice, I only need to relax deeply and to be mirrored and accommodated by the practice. For most of the first 50 days, this has been my practice. The practice within the practice.

And the practice then becomes about balancing what my mind can accept and what my heart can embrace as meaningful.

Om Ah Hum

I just briefly want to share some meaning behind Om Ah Hum which is a mantra in the practice I’m doing.

Om in Vajrayana symbolizes the vast open nature of reality. Hokai has come up with a nice western way of explaining it. O = openness. M = mystery. Through Om I recognize my mind is a field of openness and mystery, and in the practice I allow it to permeate my mind. Om is visualized as a white ball behind the forehead.

Ah is considered primordial, and in English, it is the first letter. It symbolizes the source of all manifestation. All truth, lies, whispers, shouts, communications is the nature of Ah. It allows us to share what we have discovered in this open mystery, to hear and receive. Ah is visualized as a red ball in the throat.

Hum is visualized as a blue ball in behind the chest, in the heart. It is the embodiment of the previous two, I am allowing them to become my own embodiment. It is not something abstract, but something lived and felt. It confirms this body as a vessel for realization and expression.

Holding a mudra during this takes our body, what we normally consider dull and profane, as a vehicle for subtle energies, and to bring the subtlest down to the heaviest parts of our nature.

Dedication
Lastly, the dedication is from the Shingon tradition, Japanese Vajrayana, in which Hokai is a teacher, called the Three Powers. This is by far the most meaningful dedication I have used in practice. The first line recognize my own actions as being important and having an impact on others. The second line recognizes that reality is matching my actions, that there is a response from reality that allows for this to occur. The third line recognizes that even before the other two, there is the dharmadatu, the reality expanse, as Hokai calls it, the entirety of reality. It is before I am. The last line states that there is no need to dedicate anything to anyone. Simply being the embodiment of my realization IS the offering, the practice also IS the offering. Nothing needs to be done.

The first place I want to start is to simply share the practice with you, without commentary. This will provide context in some of my other posts as the practice is the starting point for the deeper meaning contained within the practice and teachings. I hope that my experience and sharing Hokai’s teachings will provide inspiration and possible clarity for your own practice, as well as providing some insight into the flavor of Vajrayana practice. Here is the practice that I have been doing:

Refuge

Recite once while holding the vajra-anjali mudra.

I take refuge…
in the wakefulness: vast, blissful, and emanating.
in the truth: ever-present, open, and changing.
and in the congregation of all conscious beings.
Through this practice I realize my true nature, and bring benefit to all.

Purification

Recite while holding the padma-anjali mudra once at the heart, throat, forehead, and crown.

Om svabhava shudda sarva dharmah x 4.

Om Ah Hum Recitation

Vocalized while holding the vairochana mudra, slow and long, one breath each:

Om, mudra at forehead.

Ah, mudra at throat.

Hum, mudra at heart.

Repeat three times.

Om Ah Hum Quick Recitation

Keeping vairochana mudra at heart, quickly recite the manatra om ah hum for extended period of time.

Resting in Rigpa

Drop mudra and recitation, rest openly in rigpa.

Dedication – Stanza of Three Powers

Holding the vajra-anjali mudra, recite:

Through the power of my merits and virtue,
By the power of the Buddha’s grace, and
By the power of the Dharmadhatu,
I abide in universal offering to all sentient beings.

• 100 days of practice. In a row. (that last part is key)
• Practice every single day, no matter what, no matter how long.
• Do the same practice every single day.

(For those of you less skilled in math and the Gregorian calendar, I’m on day 8. It’s cool. I have to use a Mac application to remind me what friggin’ day it is).

Of course, for anyone undertaking a contemplative path, discipline and regular practice is crucial, whatever form that takes, but for me it’s particularly relevant. I have my strengths on the spiritual path. I’m good at going all-or-nothing, like doing a solitary retreat, but the discipline in daily life is a bit more challenging, so this practice vow will be immensely helpful.  Over the last year I have had some breakthroughs and have felt on the verge of another, but I have only been cycling back and forth. There has been real value in the way I have approached practice in the last year, in a more spontaneous manner, but it is time for a different approach, one that bears fruit only discipline can give.

But why do this? Intention has become incredibly important to me in practice, and connecting to these living intentions over and over is what keeps me on the cushion. So, why am I doing this?  I’m serious about waking up. It is both through the practice itself, by itself, and the resulting insights that I am of benefit to others in some way spiritually.

More specifically, there is something beautiful about consistent practice, perhaps even a little paradoxical, and I’ll let Rilke speak this truth as he so elegantly and powerfully does in this passage from Letters to a Young Poet:

…all progress…must come from deep within and cannot be forced or hastened. Everything is gestation and then birthing. To let each impression and each embryo of a feeling come to completion, entirely in itself, in the dark, in the unsayable, the unconscious, beyond the reach of one’s own understanding, and with deep humility and patience to wait for the hour when a new clarity is born: this alone is what it means to live as an artist: in understanding as in creating.

In this there is no measuring with time, a year doesn’t matter, and ten years are nothing. Being an artist means: not numbering and consuming, but ripening like a tree, which doesn’t force its sap, and stand confidently in the storms of spring, not afraid that afterward summer may not come. It does come. But it only comes to those who are patient, who are there as if eternity lay before them, so unconcernedly silent and vast. I learn it every day of my life, learn it with pain I am grateful for: patience is everything.

I cannot know when fruition will come, but it is through consistent practice that it will arise and it’s arrival will not be announced. Even though I will practice for 100 days, that number means nothing. It is only important that I do it. And so I practice in these 100 days hopefully with such patience.

I’ll be writing about my practice and experiences here. If you’re doing something similar, please share along in the comments.