[from a talk given by Dantika Petriana Monize, October 14, 2005]
… of course I’d get pushback in the classroom from students who would say this isn't English class. What kind of thing is this? This isn't literature.
Of course, I was teaching from the ‘point of view’ of what literary texts were offering, but always, I would invite students to think about their own lives and the realities they saw in the characters. And I wasn't giving them answers; I wasn't telling them what to think so much. I wanted to know how they were meeting the realities of text and each other in that moment in the classroom. In that space, I also felt a little unsafe. So what I would do is, I’d close the classroom door and lower my voice. In this way, I could get away with saying things, asking questions. Create space for students to meander, explore, be ‘ridiculous’ etc.
Many of you know that I am on medical leave from work, and I am being treated for breast cancer. This now is the experience of just being in my body as much as I can. This has been and continues to be a transformative experience that is difficult.
I find myself not getting on email at all. I went for one week, last week, when I didn't look at the computer. I've absented myself quite a bit from the phone, except for messaging. And, what's happening? Seems the flavor of winter, autumn in winter, going into winter, into settling is coming in. Into a kind of holding, darkness, a rich darkness that's surrounding us now.
So what is this business of being transformed by our immediate reality? My immediate reality, by life itself? What is transformation and emptiness? Emptying out, filling up, emptying out again? It occurred to me as I was thinking about this, feeling into it, I thought, "Are you kidding?" When I ask such questions, the questions themselves imply that I am outside of transformation, I am separate from it, that I have deliberately extricated myself from its process so that I don't mostly experience a full understanding of the moment.
So … what is the thing that Dantika/ Petriana perceives as, oh, this is the illness that's gonna transform me. And there's the gap, right? The other question that came to me is, what is this self? The one that I'm in, that I hold on to mentally? And how does being sick, or having to stop one's usual way of being in the world affect being right here? How is the gap closed between this self(selves), these identities, being human, living, breathing, being ill, being well, being joyful, and back and forth?
I also began to think about how I have been in the system of education for many, many years, many decades. I have been thinking for a while about how we live in systems. There's a school system, there's the church system, there's the government, all kinds of systems. We're moving across them all the time. What happens at least, and I know that you would recognize this, is that we sometimes become so engrossed in the system (any system[s] we are attached to) that the aliveness and vitality of our lives become stultified. We participate in this, sometimes unknowingly, unwittingly. A lot of times, I think we're aware that these systems, particularly school systems, educate us away from knowing the self, the entire being. As Sensei Genyo Sprague reminds us, here we are presented with turning the light inward. Now, I'm in the great gift of that. And I want to make the distinction. I am an educator and I'm not against education; please, don't misunderstand. The danger is that education doesn't often help us to integrate into life itself, to feel the connection to all of life. It helps us to get good jobs, make a lot of money, become acquisitive because it's informed by a set of values framed by a capitalistic society. We get stuck in these systems until we are stopped by our bodies that have been ignored; yet, there's an opportunity in that to integrate mind, heart, body through breath. So I find myself laughing at myself and asking, what is this self? This self that you walk around with/in, and I ask, "Who are you?" I mean, I've been playing with it quite a bit, and I am seeing how having to be in the body, because my mind no longer wants a lot of information, is all there is.
I don't even read that much now. I tried reading Dogen's "Moon in Dewdrops” the other day, and I felt, "Oopsie, this sounds like garbly gook. Can't do it." So I tried reading J. Krishnamurti. I lasted for a little bit, but then I thought, if I do read Krishnamurti anymore, I'm just gonna vomit. So, I just left it alone. And it's so amazingly instructive to just honor that. Because I can't force it, 'cause my mind can't hold any of it. And so this is perfect because in being in this body as it heals, or as it's doing what it's doing, I begin to see where I've been stuck. You know – how judgmental I am. The way I see the world, the way I live in it, and I'm like, "Oh, my gosh, you've been stuck in those patterns all these years." What's up with that? And so what I'm recognizing is how all bets are off when we're ill.
Now illness isn't a bad thing or good thing, in any form. Of course, there's pain. And I can say this with great thankfulness and gratitude because I'm not feeling it right now. I want to appreciate the pain but I am not there yet. This is part of what happens to my mind or brain now, so I don't always know. I find myself trying to listen to my body, doing what it needs, but not knowing what the results will be; this puts me squarely in what we have been learning, being in Zen practice, not knowing. I don't know. I don't know. It is humbling to just breathe, to just be. This is potent because I can't be in control.
I don't know what's gonna happen. And there's a great relief in that, in itself; little by little I am tasting that in my body, not intellectually, not as a Zen student or a spiritual practitioner, but actually feeling. I think of Dogen's Fukanzazengi. We have been encountering it for a long time, and it's for me, the ground of practice. There are parts of it that speak to what it means to be right where I am. In the third paragraph or the fourth paragraph of the Fukanzazengi, he writes, "You should therefore cease from practice based on intellectual understanding, pursuing words and following after speech, and learn the backward step that turns your light inwardly to illuminate yourself, body and mind of themselves will drop away and your original face will be manifest. If you want to attain suchness, you should practice suchness without delay.” More and more, a lot of my movements feel like suchness. We do kinhin. Being kinhin in an ordinary, everyday way is so new for me. I have to tell you, I used to balk when people would say, uh, “you know, I'm glad I got cancer.”
I'm not glad I got cancer, but I have cancer. It's in my body. And … what I'm recognizing is that because I've orchestrated my life a certain way for many reasons, here's this illness that showed up, and there's a crack in my sense of how my body should work, how my life should work in relationships. There's an opening, and that crack, this cancer – I'm recognizing, not only lets a quality of light in. Leonard Cohen says, that the crack, the crack lets the light in, right? I'm grateful, feeling undispleased with the illness, because in it lives the medicine. That may sound weird. But I can't change it. So there's no gap. I can try to be well. (Does trying create a gap?)
I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow. I have been born, and I will die. There's more acceptance of that reality. Right? And that is it right now; I am feeling alive and appreciative and loved in ways I have not felt. My mother used to say: you got itchy feet. She used to say in Guyanese Creole: your feet are always scratching, meaning there's an itch, so you gotta move it. When I left my mother’s home, it was not welcomed. It felt like such a terrible parting. I was 28 years old. Between now and then, breast cancer is helping me to return. The returning is a calling in towards home – which is suchness.Wherever I am. However I am. And it holds the potential, hour by hour for me, day by day to integrate into this Oneness we call Life.
These days, I am interested, with whatever energy I have, in people and in ways I haven't been before. Sure I have to guard my energy. Not deliberately, not mentally; my body tells me when to stop. And I'm just delighted to be able to connect with people I would not habitually connect to. Each of those moments feel like homing. Being with family. Being with cousins, all of you. Another thing that is interesting is when there's a body-stopping or a slowing, things come more clearly into focus. I get to see parts of myself that I've been hiding from or hiding from you. These days when you visit, I feel more comfortable with you, so if you've come and I need a shower and I can't do it by myself, you can get in the shower with me and it feels completely fine. It's this. Yes, this very ordinaryness of day to day living which feels so rich; so I am thankful for this opening in myself.
I see or I'm experiencing this illness, whatever illness we have, that it holds the potential for reintegration, for going home, home to the oneness of who we are, to our very Buddha nature without any masks. To whom we have always been.
I continue to struggle with forms, and I love forms. I struggle with them, and I love them. The forms that we practice in, the forms that we take on in different contexts. I have a hard time with when forms become concretized that they appear to provide a sense of security. More and more, I'm having moments of what suchness is. In that suchness there's always transformation, movement; as experiences rise and wane, I get to see where my attachments are, and as best as I can, I deliberately practice to release myself or this self from those attachments. So, I don't know what that is by way of reflection. It is where I'm traveling, where I am now, and I am very grateful to be here with you. I feel very happy to be here with you. Um. And to know Carolyn is down in another state, and Diajo is up in another state and here we are in virtual reality. This magical, magical moment of being alive. Thank you so much.
… of course I’d get pushback in the classroom from students who would say this isn't English class. What kind of thing is this? This isn't literature.
Of course, I was teaching from the ‘point of view’ of what literary texts were offering, but always, I would invite students to think about their own lives and the realities they saw in the characters. And I wasn't giving them answers; I wasn't telling them what to think so much. I wanted to know how they were meeting the realities of text and each other in that moment in the classroom. In that space, I also felt a little unsafe. So what I would do is, I’d close the classroom door and lower my voice. In this way, I could get away with saying things, asking questions. Create space for students to meander, explore, be ‘ridiculous’ etc.
Many of you know that I am on medical leave from work, and I am being treated for breast cancer. This now is the experience of just being in my body as much as I can. This has been and continues to be a transformative experience that is difficult.
I find myself not getting on email at all. I went for one week, last week, when I didn't look at the computer. I've absented myself quite a bit from the phone, except for messaging. And, what's happening? Seems the flavor of winter, autumn in winter, going into winter, into settling is coming in. Into a kind of holding, darkness, a rich darkness that's surrounding us now.
So what is this business of being transformed by our immediate reality? My immediate reality, by life itself? What is transformation and emptiness? Emptying out, filling up, emptying out again? It occurred to me as I was thinking about this, feeling into it, I thought, "Are you kidding?" When I ask such questions, the questions themselves imply that I am outside of transformation, I am separate from it, that I have deliberately extricated myself from its process so that I don't mostly experience a full understanding of the moment.
So … what is the thing that Dantika/ Petriana perceives as, oh, this is the illness that's gonna transform me. And there's the gap, right? The other question that came to me is, what is this self? The one that I'm in, that I hold on to mentally? And how does being sick, or having to stop one's usual way of being in the world affect being right here? How is the gap closed between this self(selves), these identities, being human, living, breathing, being ill, being well, being joyful, and back and forth?
I also began to think about how I have been in the system of education for many, many years, many decades. I have been thinking for a while about how we live in systems. There's a school system, there's the church system, there's the government, all kinds of systems. We're moving across them all the time. What happens at least, and I know that you would recognize this, is that we sometimes become so engrossed in the system (any system[s] we are attached to) that the aliveness and vitality of our lives become stultified. We participate in this, sometimes unknowingly, unwittingly. A lot of times, I think we're aware that these systems, particularly school systems, educate us away from knowing the self, the entire being. As Sensei Genyo Sprague reminds us, here we are presented with turning the light inward. Now, I'm in the great gift of that. And I want to make the distinction. I am an educator and I'm not against education; please, don't misunderstand. The danger is that education doesn't often help us to integrate into life itself, to feel the connection to all of life. It helps us to get good jobs, make a lot of money, become acquisitive because it's informed by a set of values framed by a capitalistic society. We get stuck in these systems until we are stopped by our bodies that have been ignored; yet, there's an opportunity in that to integrate mind, heart, body through breath. So I find myself laughing at myself and asking, what is this self? This self that you walk around with/in, and I ask, "Who are you?" I mean, I've been playing with it quite a bit, and I am seeing how having to be in the body, because my mind no longer wants a lot of information, is all there is.
I don't even read that much now. I tried reading Dogen's "Moon in Dewdrops” the other day, and I felt, "Oopsie, this sounds like garbly gook. Can't do it." So I tried reading J. Krishnamurti. I lasted for a little bit, but then I thought, if I do read Krishnamurti anymore, I'm just gonna vomit. So, I just left it alone. And it's so amazingly instructive to just honor that. Because I can't force it, 'cause my mind can't hold any of it. And so this is perfect because in being in this body as it heals, or as it's doing what it's doing, I begin to see where I've been stuck. You know – how judgmental I am. The way I see the world, the way I live in it, and I'm like, "Oh, my gosh, you've been stuck in those patterns all these years." What's up with that? And so what I'm recognizing is how all bets are off when we're ill.
Now illness isn't a bad thing or good thing, in any form. Of course, there's pain. And I can say this with great thankfulness and gratitude because I'm not feeling it right now. I want to appreciate the pain but I am not there yet. This is part of what happens to my mind or brain now, so I don't always know. I find myself trying to listen to my body, doing what it needs, but not knowing what the results will be; this puts me squarely in what we have been learning, being in Zen practice, not knowing. I don't know. I don't know. It is humbling to just breathe, to just be. This is potent because I can't be in control.
I don't know what's gonna happen. And there's a great relief in that, in itself; little by little I am tasting that in my body, not intellectually, not as a Zen student or a spiritual practitioner, but actually feeling. I think of Dogen's Fukanzazengi. We have been encountering it for a long time, and it's for me, the ground of practice. There are parts of it that speak to what it means to be right where I am. In the third paragraph or the fourth paragraph of the Fukanzazengi, he writes, "You should therefore cease from practice based on intellectual understanding, pursuing words and following after speech, and learn the backward step that turns your light inwardly to illuminate yourself, body and mind of themselves will drop away and your original face will be manifest. If you want to attain suchness, you should practice suchness without delay.” More and more, a lot of my movements feel like suchness. We do kinhin. Being kinhin in an ordinary, everyday way is so new for me. I have to tell you, I used to balk when people would say, uh, “you know, I'm glad I got cancer.”
I'm not glad I got cancer, but I have cancer. It's in my body. And … what I'm recognizing is that because I've orchestrated my life a certain way for many reasons, here's this illness that showed up, and there's a crack in my sense of how my body should work, how my life should work in relationships. There's an opening, and that crack, this cancer – I'm recognizing, not only lets a quality of light in. Leonard Cohen says, that the crack, the crack lets the light in, right? I'm grateful, feeling undispleased with the illness, because in it lives the medicine. That may sound weird. But I can't change it. So there's no gap. I can try to be well. (Does trying create a gap?)
I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow. I have been born, and I will die. There's more acceptance of that reality. Right? And that is it right now; I am feeling alive and appreciative and loved in ways I have not felt. My mother used to say: you got itchy feet. She used to say in Guyanese Creole: your feet are always scratching, meaning there's an itch, so you gotta move it. When I left my mother’s home, it was not welcomed. It felt like such a terrible parting. I was 28 years old. Between now and then, breast cancer is helping me to return. The returning is a calling in towards home – which is suchness.Wherever I am. However I am. And it holds the potential, hour by hour for me, day by day to integrate into this Oneness we call Life.
These days, I am interested, with whatever energy I have, in people and in ways I haven't been before. Sure I have to guard my energy. Not deliberately, not mentally; my body tells me when to stop. And I'm just delighted to be able to connect with people I would not habitually connect to. Each of those moments feel like homing. Being with family. Being with cousins, all of you. Another thing that is interesting is when there's a body-stopping or a slowing, things come more clearly into focus. I get to see parts of myself that I've been hiding from or hiding from you. These days when you visit, I feel more comfortable with you, so if you've come and I need a shower and I can't do it by myself, you can get in the shower with me and it feels completely fine. It's this. Yes, this very ordinaryness of day to day living which feels so rich; so I am thankful for this opening in myself.
I see or I'm experiencing this illness, whatever illness we have, that it holds the potential for reintegration, for going home, home to the oneness of who we are, to our very Buddha nature without any masks. To whom we have always been.
I continue to struggle with forms, and I love forms. I struggle with them, and I love them. The forms that we practice in, the forms that we take on in different contexts. I have a hard time with when forms become concretized that they appear to provide a sense of security. More and more, I'm having moments of what suchness is. In that suchness there's always transformation, movement; as experiences rise and wane, I get to see where my attachments are, and as best as I can, I deliberately practice to release myself or this self from those attachments. So, I don't know what that is by way of reflection. It is where I'm traveling, where I am now, and I am very grateful to be here with you. I feel very happy to be here with you. Um. And to know Carolyn is down in another state, and Diajo is up in another state and here we are in virtual reality. This magical, magical moment of being alive. Thank you so much.