Faith in An Appropriate Response

When I think of faith, it’s often faith in someone or something. But these days I’m thinking of faith in terms of believing that if I keep practicing, and we all keep practicing, then we’ll know the appropriate response, meaning, the right thing to say or do.

The right thing in our day-to-day lives, for sure. But also the right thing in a bigger sense. In other words, faith that all of this sitting in silence and filling the space with kindness, will give us the wisdom to know the appropriate response, if the courts go sideways or we’re in danger of losing the Republic entirely – a Republic, said Benjamin Franklin, if we can keep it. 

Transcript

Hi everyone, it’s Judi Cohen and this is Wake Up Call 477. It’s nice to see you.   

Last week I shared Norman Fischer’s wisdom to the Working Group for Law & Meditation, which was essentially that right now, let’s sit tight, get resourced, and be ready for battle. And my interpretation, which has to do with sitting tight being about taking refuge, finding moments of peace whenever possible. 

I’m still definitely doing that. But I’m also noticing that it’s not January anymore, and it feels like there’s some energy in the year, maybe not momentum yet but I’m definitely noticing I’m feeling busier, like there’s plenty to do. Maybe that has to do with layering on taxes on top of everything else…I don’t know.

At the same time, we’re still right here, with the leadership we have in Washington, or if not leadership then with those who are in office, in power, and with a lot of difficulty in the world, and with the weather reliably unpredictable. Still right here. 

And what I started to think about is a Zen koan I first heard from my friend AJ Kutchins, a death penalty lawyer here in California. It goes something like this: in the 10th century, Zen master Yun Men was on his deathbed and was asked, “What is the teaching of a lifetime?” To which he replied, “An appropriate response.”

Looking at this in an ordinary way, I think it’s possible to explore this by considering that in any given situation, there’s an appropriate and an inappropriate response. Someone walks into your office and needs to talk, and if you have time or they’re clearly in need or both, the appropriate response might be, “Sit, let’s talk.” If you’re up against it or they’re just stopping by to say hi and you’re heading out the door, the appropriate response might be, “I’d love to. How about tomorrow?” In either case, you’re considering the situation, the impact on everyone of whatever you’re choosing to say or do, making sure it won’t cause harm, and then speaking or acting. Discerning wisdom, even in a relatively inconsequential moment, and an appropriate response.

In a more consequential moment, discerning wisdom works the same way: in a courtroom or an important meeting, when someone says or does something that triggers you, or your client, or when you’re in the classroom and someone says something that could cause harm, there’s that split second, your discerning wisdom arises, you know the right thing to say, which is also the compassionate thing to say. The appropriate response.

Even with something bigger than you or me or the community where we live or work, it’s the same: what’s the wise, compassionate thing to say or do? And the discernment process: remembering that everything we say and do has consequences, making sure we won’t be causing harm, and after that, speaking or acting. And there’s a coda, too: checking in after speaking or acting and make sure no harm was caused, and if there was inadvertent harm, which is what it would be if we’ve gone through the first three inquiries, then make it right as best we can. As far as I can figure it out, that’s the recipe for an appropriate response, in the sense of appropriate versus inappropriate. 

But I was reading more about this same koan and came across a 2010 talk by Barry Magid on the Ordinary Mind Zendo website from New York. Barry said – or this is my best understanding of what he said -  that another way to understand “an appropriate response” is from a non-dual perspective. Meaning, instead of looking at what’s an appropriate response and what’s an inappropriate response, we can look at each moment as one in which all the wisdom available to us is always coming together. And when we do that, we can see that there’s really no possibility of an inappropriate response. We’re always just responding with the wisdom we have, and it’s always enough.

I appreciated this framing a lot. One reason I appreciated it right then, was that right after I read it, I happened to look out of a window in my office, which is on our property but which I don’t ordinarily look out of. And our small creek, which is dry in summer and a small stream in winter, had overflowed its banks and flooded a whole area of the property, down to the house and under the house. Big flood. I called out to my partner, who does the lion’s share of outdoor work, and he came hurrying out. It was absolutely pouring – it turned out we got four inches in four hours – and the dog was splashing around in the water like a maniac, having a fine old time, no problem for him (maybe a whole other talk?) and we could barely hear one another over the rain and the rushing water – we were literally shouting, two feet away. And in my mind, the thought arose: “I have to write the Wake Up Call!” And then there must have been another thought I didn’t catch because before I had consciously formed the words, I said, “tell me what to do!” And he directed me to a pile of rocks and we made a dam and got a shovel and diverted the creek and eventually stripped down and put everything in the wash and bathed the dog. And then I took a breath. And then I sat back down to write this.

And I think this is what Barry is saying: in any given moment, whether there’s a lot at stake or maybe only a little (but remembering there’s always something at stake, because everything we say and do matters) – and so it could have been a courtroom moment, or a classroom moment or even an interpersonal moment – whatever wisdom we’ve got , comes together in a flash. We’re not considering. We’re not using our discerning wisdom, or not consciously anyway. We just do what’s right in front of us. The body knows, or maybe the mind knows, or maybe both know or maybe the two aren’t different and there’s no duality there, either. There’s just a knowing of what is the appropriate response, rather than a choice between an appropriate and an inappropriate one, because we’re present, and responding. Barry says (or I think this is what Barry is saying) that this is the deeper meaning of the koan. 

I love this way of contemplating the koan of an appropriate response because of the way it points to, and honors, all of the practice we’ve all been doing for all these years: this notion, which we can check out to see if it’s true, that in any given moment, if we’ve been practicing for a while and are practicing then, meaning in the present moment then, present for that very moment, then whatever we offer is an appropriate response. 

I also love this framing as an element of faith. Meaning, in this larger moment, and as Norman said, it’s unclear what we should be doing other than resourcing ourselves. But in resourcing ourselves we are readying ourselves for the larger appropriate response. So that even though right now there’s no way of knowing yet what that is, when the moment arrives – when the Court goes sideways or a militia shows up at our statehouse – we’ll know the appropriate response in that moment. And we’ll make it.