Altar, Tantra, Victimhood, Boundaries

*transcript generated by AI

Good morning.

Before I begin my Sunday tirade, quick check-in on a couple things that we’ve been doing in the service.

First off, does the Han come through the mic?

Yeah, was it okay today?

I did it inside today instead of outside.

It’s fine?

Great.

Second question, we’ve done a version of it two times now, how are we liking the Om tirade as a blessing for, yeah?

Okay, we got unanimous thumbs up.

Okay, cool.

So we’ll continue doing those things and I’ll just be part of what we do.

Delightful.

So the thing that comes to me today is I was, I became aware again of a change that I made to the altar that I’m not sure if you can even see as online participants, but so a hollow bones altar typically has fire, water, incense, a statue of Buddha, and a flower.

Okay, so the hollow bones altar has five elements on it.

Interestingly, corresponding with five elements.

That’s pretty cool.

We’ve got some tantric stuff going on here.

We’ve got some mystical stuff going on.

And this is not atypical, right?

If you pay attention to Davosatso, you’d see the same thing, right?

So this is a long standing tradition for our lineage to have our altar in this way.

Here, a couple of modifications I’ve made are that the orchid that you see is actually made of Legos.

And it was a gift from my children.

And so that’s awesome, because it means that I don’t actually have to try and keep an orchid alive.

And then I’m not constantly murdering plants to bring in fresh vegetation in here.

So that’s part of what’s going on here.

And then also, technically, you would never be walking through the space between the main altar and the center altar nearly as much as we do here.

But for practical reasons, I don’t have an extra Butsudan here between the Jiki and the Tanto seat, because I wouldn’t have anywhere to store the table when I was using the space for other purposes.

And so we walk through that and we get over the fact that this is the holy of holies and that no one should cross between it without stopping to bow all the time.

So it’s a good place for me, especially to work on my iconoclasm and my attachments.

But you’ll also notice that there’s no specific flower on the main altar.

And that’s because being in front of the window, I felt that there was no need to call in more of nature’s beauty than simply gazing past the Buddha into the broad universe that it represents.

And so that’s what we’ve got going on with altars here.

Now, there’s two other additions that are very non-traditional.

These are practical adaptations for our life here, but there’s two additions that are non-traditional.

One is that you’ll see a set of Tibetan prayer flags behind the main altar.

And that is there for several reasons.

One is we are tantric yogis.

And for those of you listening eventually to this Dharma talk one day who might not really know what that means and confuse tantra with neosexuality, tantric yogic practice in the Buddhist tradition is born of the realization that we are fundamentally energy in the liquid crystal form.

And that energy takes on different hues, tones, colors, right?

Light is the most often metaphor.

And we are all the colors of the rainbow.

And so Tibetan prayer flags represent the elements in their colors.

And they each have their own deity associated with them, which is a method of psychologically projecting those qualities outside of ourselves so we can have a relationship with them to manipulate them within ourselves.

Okay, so it’s a very shamanic form of practice.

And Junpo taught very clearly that we are tantric yogis.

And that if you actually pay attention to the emotional koan process, it is nothing but tantra in the sense of embodying the energy exactly as it is, elevating it through pure awareness to a higher liberated perspective.

And through that discerning the deeper information in that energy so that we become a hollow bone, a clear channel for spirit to flow through.

Okay, and so we honor that through the Tibetan prayer flags.

That’s the esoteric reason.

The exoteric reason is that we are engaged, we are Mahayana and human rights, what’s going on in the world, politics, the Tibetan crisis, these things, divisiveness in the world are part of our call to action.

And so if you ever wanted to have an altar like this, and you didn’t want to tell people that you were a tantric yogi, you could tell them that it means that you’re an engaged Buddhist, which is also true.

Okay, and there’s one other piece here, which again, I’m not sure if it comes through online, but I wrapped the Buddhas in bone mallas.

So no Buddha that lives on any of my altars is not wrapped in bones.

Okay.

And this is very important because the Buddha is not an object of worship, it is not a icon to replace our spiritual practice, right?

What we actually have in the Buddha is a representation of the element of spirit, or Chi, Da, Prana, right?

And any of these interrelated terms.

Now, what’s a critical realization in the Mahayana meditation is that it is an ever changing flux and flow.

Its very permanence derives from its impermanence and its ability to be adaptive.

Okay.

It is also precisely formed as emptiness and emptiness is form that brings our spiritual powers forward.

Now, spiritual powers can be, you know, knowledge of past lives, I’m not denying that that’s true.

But the greatest spiritual power is just recognizing that I am, and whatever you declare for yourself is what you will be.

Okay.

And in Zen, we do this very simply, we say, I’m already the Buddha.

And then our practice is just manifesting that truth.

And this is not dissimilar to any other esoteric tradition that you might choose to research, but in Zen, we have a very specific flavor of it.

And over time, this has constantly been confused, people constantly put Buddha on some sort of pedestal, just like they put Jesus on some sort of pedestal.

And thereby they claim that they are not Buddha by hoping to be Buddha.

Okay.

And this is the origin of many of the stories we hear about if you see the Buddha on the road, kill him.

Or the koan about this person taking a wooden Buddha statue, chopping it up and burning it because he was gold.

These koan all point to the same thing, which is that spiritual life is fundamentally empty.

Right?

Okay.

And so we wrap our Buddhas in bone mallows to remind us that even the consciousness of I am is impermanent.

It is contingent upon having a form, having a body.

And we go into a permanent state of energetic flow when this body dissolves and our consciousness is released.

But without a localizing force, I amness is far too vast for us to comprehend.

And frankly, I would imagine is rather boring.

That’s why I am created all the diversity because he was a man is boring.

And I said he because I’m a guy.

So I relate to it as a guy because it’s like my daddy.

Okay.

Now, I understand that that might not work for everybody.

So disclaimer, that was a very personal moment there.

Right?

Okay.

So I think this was really important to mention, because when we practice together, we practice together by spiritual consent.

And what that means is that no one should be here who doesn’t feel resonance with what we do.

We cannot be evangelical about the pursuit of meditative living, and the pursuit of direct relationship with the divine.

Because it doesn’t work that way.

Right?

We have to come to this place and be in this practice because it feels true to us before we even begin.

Something in us must know that it is where we belong.

And in order to truly know that, so you can feel that you can feel that very early, you can feel that the day you show up, whether or not this is something that resonates a lot or a little or not at all.

But as you deepen, and as you hear week after week after week, there comes a point where you have to actually have to apologize.

There was a there’s a moment where we have to match up our intellectual understanding of what we are as a social body as an organization as a philosophical doctrine, all of these things we have to become conscious of, to know if this is truly our home and the path we want to commit to.

Otherwise, we’re just blindly doing what other people say we should.

And if we’re blindly doing what other people say we should, then we aren’t living as gods.

We’re living as something else.

And that would be contrary to our practice.

So how can you be here on purpose if you don’t even understand what we’re doing here?

It’s the rhetorical question that prompted this kind of detailed dig into this particular aspect of our ritual.

So a little bit of a different Dharma talk today.

A little bit different, but hopefully useful and entertaining in some way.

And got about 15 minutes left for open forum.

So thank you all for your attention.

Look forward to the discussion that emerges.

I think that was beautiful.

And I would like to encourage you to take a great picture of your altars and share them on your website, maybe.

And say something to it or give the link to this talk.

And because with that, people who might join know what we’re doing here.

What we’re doing here.

I think you have a couple interesting photos, don’t you?

Facebook, I believe.

Yeah, Lindsay took various photos and stuff.

There’s more artsy fartsy stuff that we can put up there.

No, it’s beautiful.

Artsy fartsy is not derogatory in my world.

I would have a topic that I also like to give space for others.

The topic would be about boundaries and victimhood.

Sorry?

Did you say boundaries and victimhood?

Right.

I believe that’s salient to pretty much everyone here.

I just take a deep look to the others online if there is any urgent thing from them.

Okay.

So I just start.

During meditation, I did some kind of mando.

And what came to my mind was that a lot of our reactive patterns exist because of the belief that we are a victim of our circumstances.

And that in the moment, we can shift that into no.

I’m the one who takes the choice for whatever I do and whatever I think, whatever in my life.

And it’s different.

But this choice, for me, sounded like setting clear boundaries.

Because oftentimes, we know that anger is about boundaries not respected.

And so when we don’t like to react in anger and scream at somebody, then we often put this reaction internally into shame, or even worse, just disconnect from us and from others, too.

So for me, this all was about boundaries and victimhood.

And so I would like to hear some wise words from you, Seng, on my rambling of my thoughts and experiences.

Before I talk about that, whether it’s wise or not, is there anything that anyone would like to add for context to that?

So that when I’m rambling, I can try and include whatever is salient beyond what Sengshin already posed?

No?

We’re posing okay?

Three, two, one.

Okay.

So there’s a slight nuance I’d like to make in your framing, and that is there are times where we are victims of our circumstances, right?

Especially when we’re small, and we have very little power.

We aren’t cognitively developed enough to be distinct from our thoughts or our emotions yet.

And so when the world happens to us, we can only be victim to what’s happening.

Okay?

And the age by which we claim our independence has changed over time and stuff like that.

Traditionally, no one’s responsible for their karma until they’re five or six.

Okay?

And so everything that happens under that age is you being subject to your circumstances.

Okay?

And then it’s like at a certain point, we have to begin really taking responsibility for that, right?

And that’s where we are today.

That’s what drives most of us to spiritual practice.

Okay?

And so spiritual practices tend to have one of two modes.

They either try to absolve all of our responsibility by placing it to another, right?

And then those salvific traditions of certain forms, I’m specifically thinking of Christianity, but there’s also forms of Judaism and Islam that do the same thing, and in a way that we kind of do it too whenever we externalize consciousness to have a relationship with something else.

What we’re saying is that there’s something greater than me that has the power to do that, which I cannot.

And in our tradition, that’s a great starting point, but eventually we need to bring that power back within.

And so it’s just really important to recognize that this is part of the process.

And as we’re going through the spiritual journey of internalizing our own power, there are times where life happens and we have to react to it.

Life happens and we have to react to it.

And when things are really intense, and until our training is very, very mature, there’s always a level of intensity that overrides your capacity to be on the choice side of the karmic circle.

Okay?

Now, that’s fine.

It’s just that we have to recognize that the way it works is that that choiceless reaction has karma.

The response that we choose has karma, right?

This is just the law, right?

Karma is not some sort of personal thing.

And so when we’re in a victim mindset, what we’ve done is we’ve narrowed our awareness down to the point where we have forgotten that karma is a law and our actions set off new chains of events.

And we’re focused more on the effects that we’re receiving than the causes we’re putting into the world.

Okay?

And so that’s one way to put the victim mindset versus the growth mindset into a Buddhist context.

Which side of karma are you on?

Are you focusing on the effects you’re receiving, victim mindset, or are you focusing on the causes you’re creating, growth mindset?

Right?

Now, within the context of that, you’re talking about boundaries.

Boundaries are really interesting, because they’re ultimately entirely arbitrary.

Right?

And so one of the things that happens when we become fully empowered through our recognition of being fundamentally alive, and vibrationally just aliveness, is that we become rather fearless.

We have a point where we no longer necessarily need to have a lot of boundaries, because no one can do anything to us.

Okay.

And then we really start to choose our boundaries differently.

In the interim, we have to do our best.

But pretty much every boundary you set from a frame of self-preservation is reinforcing the idea of victimhood.

Okay?

So if you really want to set a boundary from an awakened perspective, it can’t be a boundary to protect yourself.

It has to be a boundary that protects universal harmony.

What is actually best for this person?

Right?

And that’s a really challenging thing to determine.

A lot of times, one of the boundaries we face is that people who are deeply unhealthy consume our lives because they can’t energize themselves.

So they have to receive their energy from outside of them.

Right?

That’s one form of boundary that we have to set, in which case, us refusing to continue to feed them forces them to either completely collapse, and maybe if they actually hit a true rock bottom that no one saves them from, then they’ll start saving themselves.

Right?

And that can feel really hard for us.

And from a self-preservation standpoint, we wouldn’t choose that.

Because to preserve ourself, we have to have a certain identity as their caregiver.

We have to have a certain identity of the one who helps, or we have to have a certain identity of the one who gives, or supports, or loves.

And that’s really an action of self-preservation, which is very different than looking at this person, looking at the total dynamic, and determining where does harmony truly lie?

And then that balance of the total cosmos that I’m aware of, what induces harmony?

Right?

Energetic balancing.

Another form of person that we often have to set boundaries with are those who are so self-absorbed and so personally empowered that they have no respect for harmonizing the world around them, because they can move through the world to get whatever they want.

And from this perspective, it’s a very easy perspective to adopt when we become the center when we become the center of the universe, both in true spirituality or in terms of narcissism, borderline personality disorder, insecurities, being masked as securities, all of those types of things.

But this type of person, we typically have to set very different boundaries with.

They’re not looking to take energy from us.

They’re looking to dominate us with their energy.

Right?

And so now we need a totally different type of thing.

A lot of times there’s more redirection involved.

There’s more challenging involved.

There’s a much harsher type of response typically required because there is a frequency that’s happening, which is so loud that the other frequencies can no longer be heard.

Right?

And so again, when we do it purely from self-preservation, we can be inclined to set very soft boundaries to avoid, to walk away, to refuse to confront, to do all sorts of different things so that we are not the victim of that strong energy.

But by consequence, we allow the world to be a victim of the strong energy.

And so again, what is the net harmonization quality?

And then when we show up in either case, when we show up looking at what is the harmonization required, what is the boundary that needs set from a perspective of energetic balance, not from self-preservation?

Well, then we end up being on the empowered side.

We end up being on the, I’m setting the causes of my world side of karma.

Right?

And that then creates a totally different dynamic from trying to manage or manipulate the effects of karma that we’re receiving.

There you go.

Thank you.

That was amazing.