Love and Intention, Even Now

This isn’t a moment when I can pay attention all the time:
 sometimes I just need to turn away, or walk away.
 But whether I’m engaged or disengaged, 
 wisdom and love have their place.

The question I’m working with is, 
how do I meet each moment with three wise intentions:
to let go of wanting things to be different, 
because right now, they just are how they are;
to be kind and loving, no matter what; 
and to have compassion for the wild cast of characters 
living on, and running, the planet right now.
I wish I had any answers but at least that’s the inquiry right now. 

So, happy Valentine’s Day. ♥️
The classical invitation is to send some love to the beings you love.
That’s an easy one to accept.
And here’s another invitation, maybe not as easy: 
send some love – not flowers or chocolate but secretly, 
just in your own heart, or practice – 
to someone you could never imagine loving, ever.
And see how it goes. 

Transcript

Hi everyone, it’s Judi Cohen and this is Wake Up Call 478. Happy (almost) Valentine’s Day. 

I’ve been hearing a lot about survival strategies. Some people say they’re not looking at any news. Or that they’re monitoring their intake, or limiting themselves to one source or another or only looking at positive news. They’re trying to not pay attention to what’s happening to the extent they feel it will tip over into overwhelm or distress. 

Seems like there’s a lot of wisdom in that. Among the five mindful promises or precepts, which are to not cause harm, not steal, not engage in sexual misconduct, not speak unwisely or unkindly, and not consume substances to cloud the mind, the last one speaks to the wisdom of being careful about ingesting distressing news. Thich Nhat Hanh spoke to this. In his version of the five mindfulness precepts, he says the fifth, to not consume substances to cloud the mind, includes not ingesting items “such as certain T.V. programs, magazines, books, films and conversations [in case] those poisons… betray [our] ancestors, parents, society, and future generations.” He affirmed, instead, to, “…work to transform violence, fear, anger, and confusion by practicing a diet for myself and for society [because that’s] crucial for self-transformation, and for the transformation of society.” 

So maybe the choice to restrict intake is not only wise, but also self-compassionate. That said, I feel like it depends on the intention behind that choice. The ancient mindfulness texts are super clear that basically everything rests on intention: it’s not our words and actions that matter most, but the intentions that inform them. When intention is wise and wholesome, then thoughts and actions will trend towards good, wholesome, impact; towards happiness and liberation. When intention is unwholesome or unwise, then thoughts, words, and actions are likely to cause harm, point towards suffering, and create sorrow. This is how the system of cause and effect works, according to the teachings, and it’s something I can see in my own life, moment to moment, and maybe you can see in yours, too. 

Wise, wholesome, intention is one of the steps on the 8-Fold Path, so it’s part of the map pointing us to happiness and freedom. And like many mindfulness teachings, it also has its own steps or components – in its case, three. The first is something called renunciation, the second is non-ill will, and the third is non-cruelty. For me sometimes these are easier to understand and work with in their affirmatives, which are letting go, kindness, and compassion. If my intention is to let go, be kind, and be compassionate, it’s a wholesome, wise intention – one that will lead to happiness and freedom, not to sorrow and harm. If my intention is to grasp or cling or cause harm or be dispassionate or cruel, it's not, and in that case my words and actions will cause harm and lead to sorrow.

So how to tell if the choice to turn away from the news, or to turn towards it for that matter, is based on Wise Intention? 

Letting go or renunciation sounds a little like giving up all our worldly possessions, but it’s not. It’s about letting go of desire - all that grasping and wanting that’s so exhausting and drives us to crave bright shiny objects and the “perfect” person (or for the people we already have in our lives to be perfect (and also for ourselves to be perfect – that’s a big one)); grasping and craving for more and more comfort and ease, for things to be better or different because we (mistakenly) believe that if we get those things, we’ll be happy. 

Non-ill will is also a kind of renunciation. It’s a giving up of hate and of wishing for others to fail or come to harm. Its affirmative, kindness, is a practice: the practice of metta, of wishing well for other beings without discrimination, without choosing who is deserving of kindness and who is not. 

Keep in mind that this is all happening in the heart/mind, in the formulation of intention. This is not a practice that requires me to bake cookies for my abuser or to send flowers to Washington. It’s not necessarily easy to do but it’s the cultivation of internal wise intention, so that the choices I make are informed by that, and not by hate.

The same goes for the final step of wise intention, non-cruelty. Non-cruelty in its affirmative is compassion, so that’s what we’re really talking about: non-discriminating compassion, the kind Quan Yin offers with her thousand eyes and hand, compassion for all beings, including those Jesus said “know not what they do.” And again, it’s the cultivation of compassion in the heart and mind. It doesn’t require me to let an ICE enforcer rest their head on my shoulder and cry, which surely they would want to do on someone’s shoulder anyway if they only understood the consequences of their actions – although inviting them to rest their head on my shoulder I suppose would be something. 

OK, so to the current context of turning away and turning back towards current events: it seems to me that wise intention and its components are the imminently logical and practical way to go. For example, whether I’m turning towards or away, if my intention is to renounce or let go of wanting things to be other than they are moment by moment, even if all day long my work, or my life, is about creating a more just and equitable next moment, is a very practical intention. If I have the intention to let go, I can stay in my internal zone of tolerance, where I’m at relative ease, able to learn, not in fight/flight or collapse, present, mindful, and aware, and therefore nonreactive. Then when I choose to turn towards, or away, from the news, from the moment, it’s without what for me anyway can be the incredible stress of, “why is this moment like this? How did we get here? This is horrific, I feel so powerless or I feel responsible or I feel frustrated or overwhelmed,” or whatever. It’s just with, “I see, and how can I help?” 

The same seems true to me for non-ill will or kindness, the second component of Wise Intention: it’s logical and also sane, to meet this moment. If ill will, anger, and hate, are like carrying around a hot coal and expecting someone else to get burned, why walk around with painful burns on my hands and heart? Why not have the intention to take a look – or to turn away when I need to – with kindness? Remember Dalai Lama saying, “be kind whenever possible. It’s always possible”?  What if that’s true? I feel like it’s worth a try. And also, I know the work I’m doing is better when it’s coming from sanity, which for me anyway is the same as saying, when it’s coming from love. 

And finally, non-cruelty, or compassion, the third element of wise intention: it’s also practical because the truth for me is that I feel like my heart is going to literally break if I keep hardening it. It’ll just become so brittle. So turning towards or turning away, who is deserving of compassion? “All beings,” is the answer I’ve always been told is the wise one. Surely there’s something to bow to in every being, something to care about? What if we take the ancient indigenous wisdom view and cultivate compassion for the seventh generation of those who are causing harm today? Love and compassion for the great, great, great, great, great, great, great grandchildren of the whole wild cast of characters living on, and running, the planet right now? Thich Nhat Hanh, again: don’t let the “poisons… betray [our] ancestors, parents, society, and future generations.”