{"id":457,"date":"2009-02-26T15:57:01","date_gmt":"2009-02-26T15:57:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/onecity\/2009\/02\/hardcore-dharma-slogs-on.html"},"modified":"2009-02-26T15:57:01","modified_gmt":"2009-02-26T15:57:01","slug":"hardcore-dharma-slogs-on","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2009\/02\/hardcore-dharma-slogs-on.html","title":{"rendered":"Hardcore Dharma Slogs On"},"content":{"rendered":"

The other night, while discussing directing theater, my friend Peter asked\u00a0about my directing\u00a0process: \u00a0\u201cso is that how you tend to work?\u201d and I thought about it and said \u201cyou know honestly, I\u2019m only twenty seven years old and although that may seem of the age that some folks have a sense of agency about their process, I don\u2019t and all I\u2019ll say is that I don\u2019t really \u2018tend\u2019 to do anything, I have no patterns of working, and it all seems very experimental these days.\u00a0 In fact the only thing I \u2018tend\u2019 to do is not book rehearsal space promptly enough.\u201d\u00a0
\nThat\u2019s all to say what we *tend* to do in Hardcore Dharma is work with three texts from the three main Buddhist traditions, Zen, Theravaden and Tibetan.\u00a0 But as all conditioned phenomena is subject to impermanence who knows if this may at one point change.\u00a0 Last week, however, having dominated Zen and Theravada with our single pointed grasshopper minds we moved on to our Tibetan focus of this session, Lojong.
\nLojong translates to mind-training \u2013 it\u2019s a list of slogans designed to help one awaken by directing the mind.\u00a0 There\u2019s a wonderful website, www.lojongmindtraining.com<\/a> that lists all the slogans as well as commentaries on each by seven Buddhist luminaries.\u00a0 You can also sign up to get a slogan sent to you each day via email (although \u2013 for folks that have this – have you noticed that the emails are a tad wonky and sporadic?).\u00a0 Nonetheless, I recommend.
\nRipe with dharmic ambition, on the Sunday following HC Dharma class I commenced a slogan-a-day program to see what came up, starting from the beginning (last week we worked with the first seven) with the intention of working through all 59.
\nMy thoughts were so varied that I decided to simply present Julia May Jonas\u2019s Lojong Slogan Diary as practiced from Sunday the 22nd till today and the shifty-brained thoughts it inspired:
\nSunday, February 22nd, 2009: First, Train in the Preliminaries.<\/span>
\nAt first\u00a0 I thought this slogan was a vague kind of, eat right, exercise, get enough sleep, right action slogan, but it\u2019s actually referring to the Four Reminders, my favorite contemplations.\u00a0 The Four Reminders are
\n1.\u00a0Noble Human Birth
\n2.\u00a0Impermanence and the inevitability of death
\n3.\u00a0Karma
\n4.\u00a0The endlessness and vastness of samsara.
\nMy noble human birth got me and my good health to yoga, my contemplations of impermanence kept me from wasting the class by feeling irritated at the person to my left, my considerations on karma helped me to savor with careful attention the last of the delicious The Sea, The Sea<\/em> by Iris Murdoch and Samsara displayed its vast ocean of dismissal, envy, discontent, shadenfreude, aggression and apathy in that smorgasbord of aspirational living known as the Academy Awards.\u00a0
\nMonday, February 23rd, 2009: Regard All Dharma as Dreams:<\/span>\u00a0
\nToday I realized while meditating on this slogan that this is a direction for formal practice and not for life.\u00a0 Because when I was thinking about this slogan for life, I was like, \u201cthis seems like a really good way to accumulate a ton of credit card debt.\u201d\u00a0 Within formal practice, however, I realized it was an excellent mental gear shift towards yet another method to help understand that thoughts are simply thoughts.\u00a0 They are dreams, not reality \u2013 they are your mind doing the same thing it does when you are dreaming \u2013 spewing out its endless dross.\u00a0 Dharma as Dreams is a reminder of mental spaciousness and the importance of not taking your mind so seriously.
\nTuesday, February 24, 2009: Examine the Nature of Unborn Awareness:<\/span>\u00a0
\nAfter a bit of contemplation about my unborn awareness in the morning, I realized getting dressed that whilst assembling an outfit I often have the voice of Vice Magazine\u2019s Dos & Don\u2019ts in my head \u2013 which if you\u2019re not familiar is a nasty, judgmental, my-appearance-is-completely-connected-to-my-worth kind of voice (so much so that I’m not even\u00a0going to link to it).\u00a0 As I recognized the voice\u00a0I thought, sheesh, one more example of how my awareness and opnions\u00a0are empty and therefore very much dictated by my consumption of material, and how important it is, therefore, to be attentive and discerning to what I mentally consume.
\nWednesday February 25th, 2009:\u00a0\u00a0 Self Liberate Even The Antidote:<\/span>
\nThe \u201ckill the Buddha\u201d recommendations are always the trickiest for me to process but today I remembered something that Alex and I briefly discussed at the end of class last week\u00a0regarding clear seeing.\u00a0 He said Buddhism is not about changing who you are.\u00a0 Buddhism is about revealing the truth.\u00a0 When you hold on to anything, even a teaching, you\u2019re denying the truth in favor of a preconception.\u00a0 Better to be brave and step into the stream and go with the flow.\u00a0 Hence, I buy shoes.
\nToday I\u2019m working with the slogan \u201cRest in the Nature of Alaya, The Essence.\u201d\u00a0 Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche interprets this slogan as trusting your simple, indiscriminate mind.\u00a0 Like the third slogan (unborn awareness), I tend to think this happens far more easily when I simplify my mental intake and activity.\u00a0 Turn off the radio, don\u2019t refresh the email, only read the New York Times website once a day and stay the heck away from those Viceland Do\u2019s and Don\u2019ts.\u00a0 Only with a degree of quietude am I able to even recognize, let alone rest in simple awareness.
\nSo there\u2019s an all over the map post from an all over the map skin bag of conditioned phenomena today.\u00a0 Anything hit?\u00a0 Has anyone had good\/interesting\/bad\/so-so\/lame\/fascinating experiences with these slogans?\u00a0 What do they do to you?\u00a0 Is this one-a-day approach a skillful means of practice?\u00a0 How do you feel about Lojong?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The other night, while discussing directing theater, my friend Peter asked\u00a0about my directing\u00a0process: \u00a0\u201cso is that how you tend to work?\u201d and I thought about it and said \u201cyou know honestly, I\u2019m only twenty seven years old and although that may seem of the age that some folks have a sense of agency about their…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":190,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arts-and-media"],"yoast_head":"\nHardcore Dharma Slogs On - One City<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2009\/02\/hardcore-dharma-slogs-on.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Hardcore Dharma Slogs On - 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