1.9 : How Did I (or Do I) Become a Buddhist Layperson?

Transcript

Welcome to the Immovable Wisdom Writing Podcast. I'm Karen A. Parker, a Black, queer, non-binary, and neurodivergent Secular Buddhist who's certified in fiction book coaching and holds an MFA in creative writing. On this podcast, I’ll be talking about how BIPOC and QUILTBAG+ fiction writers can build sustainable, decolonial, dharmic writing practice while navigating the predominantly white, cis-hetero publishing industry. And if you don't identify as either BIPOC or QUILTBAG+, but you wanna support underrepresented writers, don't worry. This podcast is for you, too. Make sure you subscribe to the show so you never miss an episode. Thanks for tuning in, and let's get into it.

How's it going, everybody? Welcome back to the Immovable Wisdom Writing Podcast. I'm your host, Karen A. Parker, and on this episode, I'll be talking about how I, or how you, could become a Buddhist. 

Basically, I'm going to, in hopefully 15 minutes or less, just talk about how I found myself upon this path and how maybe you might find yourself upon this path if your story resonates or if your story seems similar to mine. I have talked about it in bits and pieces over the course of season one of this podcast, and I've left pretty much an entire kind of text-based version of the story in my “My Story” page on my website, karenaparker.com/my-story. But yeah, I just wanted to, I just wanted to verbally relay it, so to speak, and for you to just listen to it or whatever. 

You know, podcasts are for listening, I guess. I'm just learning this now with my new podcast. But anyway, here goes nothing. 

It's different doing a podcast where it's just talking about one's story and not just talking about like a concept or education thing. So I'm gonna be putting on my storytelling hat for once, being a speculative fiction writer, even though there's no speculative fiction to my knowledge that is happening in this part. 

So anyway, that is my long-winded way of trying to procrastinate this, but here we go.

So, Buddhism was not the first thing on my mind. It was not the first religion that I was exposed to. I grew up as a Lutheran Christian. I was baptized, but I never went to the confirmation to basically say that, like, I am a Christian or I take up these practices. I like to joke that because I was never confirmed, that means I am forever, forever a pending Christian, even though there's no such term. 

But yeah, my, like most Americans and like most Black Americans, I grew up in a Christian, well not in a Christian household, that's, I wouldn't say that.  I'd say that I grew up with a Christian sense of religion and a Christian sense of culture. So heavens and hells, sins and virtues and vices and all of that sort of binary kind of thinking. 

And the, I started to poke at the walls right around like 2005 or 2006 or even 2008 when like Proposition 8 and gay rights was kind of coming into the forefront in California, and I was meeting other gay people, and I was also meeting other Christians who were like, “It's wrong to be gay.”

And I'm like, “I don't, I don't buy that.” And I also didn't resonate with some Christians who would say that global warming is not real. And I was learning about it in this, in my science classes. It just, it did not make sense. 

And for, if, if you happen to be Christian and you're listening to this podcast, I mean no offense to any of y'all. I'm not trying to make a blanket statement here. I know some of you will take it as a blanket statement anyway. You are free to stop listening to this podcast right now and go listen to a different podcast. 

I will wait.

Okay. If you're still here, great. But I know that like with talking about religion, you know, that, kind of people, people get protective and, you know, passionate about that stuff. 

So, just wanted to put in that quick disclaimer before I continue, since we're talking about religion, but we're also not going to be talking about religion, and I'll say why. 

But that's kind of the baseline of where I started in terms of spirituality and in terms of religion. And I, then, in high school, when I was like a rising 10th grader, or like high school freshman, I guess—Well, yeah, I guess it would have been a rising 10th grader—I went to the Fir Acres Writing Workshop in Oregon. That was in Lewis and Clark College. 

And I met a woman by the name of Sharon Marshall, who at the time described herself as, I mean, to my, to my recollection, a Black Zen Buddhist. And I was so, so grateful for her presence and for the presence of the other instructors at the Fir Acres Writing Workshop. And for her in particular, because she was a fellow Black person with braids, and someone I felt like I could talk to who didn't, you know, make me feel ashamed for, like, the anxious thoughts, but really just kept me grounded. 

Writing and anxiety have always kind of been bosom buddies for me. And, you know, being a neurodivergent person, of course, the mind is going to have some some chatter and some, and do some monkey mind things. “Monkey mind” being the term of Buddhism that kind of describes that and the endless chatter.

But I did not, in high school, convert to Buddhism. The seed essentially was planted, but I didn't act upon that seed. Like, the beautiful thing about some seeds is that they can stay seeds for a very long time, and just be like little, dry little kernels. And they don't grow into a tree unless they're put in soil unless they're watered, or unless like, you know, the degradation process of their, their current state begins. And so, I just had that kernel, I had that seed and there, there wasn't anything that I was doing with it for a good long time. 

So fast forward past, past high school, past the time I went to Japan as a tourist, past the time I went to Japan as a study abroad student, I come back home around 2015-2016. And I watch an episode of Steven Universe called “Mindful Education”. And I watched the clip of Garnet and Stevonnie and the song “Here Comes a Thought,” which I really have to say changed my life. 

Because it, it, there's something beautiful about how animation takes the most abstract concepts in psychology and in emotions and just puts them in such understandable and vivid terms. Like I had, I had never felt that seen before in an animated show. Like, the anxiety that I was experiencing had finally been given a name and a voice and a feeling. And I was like, “I've got to start meditating!” And so that's what I did. I, I found, I found Headspace, and I started reading all these mindfulness books. And I meditated for a good long time. And I still did not call myself a Buddhist. 

And it was not until 2020, so five years after this, where I was living and working in Japan, and seeing all of these Shinto and Buddhist, Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples, that I, I decided, like, well, you know, if I, if I, if I'm going to do this, I better do this. Because I, I distinctly remember walking back home to my, to my apartment in Japan, and I just had all this chatter going on in my mind. And I just, I was just like, “No!” I might have like, yelled it or just been like, just stopped in the middle of the street and just was like, “I'm tired of this. I'm tired of like, my mind running away from me.” 

And also, ironically, I lived very close to a Buddhist temple, and I didn't realize it until I left. So it's funny how, like, the proximity of that building, I feel like was the catalyst for it, even though I didn't know it at the time, or didn't kind of realize it. 

But, I then called myself a Secular Buddhist around February 26th of 2020, right in the swing of the pandemic. And might as well do it in a country like Japan, where there are a tons of, a tons—“a tons,” haha!—where there are a ton of Buddhists, and, you know, people that respect nature all around me. And the reason that I clung so hard to the term “Secular Buddhist at the time was because I appreciated Buddhist philosophy, and I appreciated mindfulness, but I was a little hesitant to embrace the spiritual aspects, or the aspects of, like, you know, reincarnation, and all of the other stuff. 

And I don't feel that way now. And also, like, it is entirely possible, as I say on my FAQ page, for someone to be spiritual and religious, and to have a reverence for nature and soul, without going to a church. Like, being spiritual to me is appreciating the sunlight on your face, or the fact that there is a flower that is coming up from the, from the asphalt, this crack in the asphalt that is doing its best and, you know, I, that, that we kind of, like, share atoms, and carbon, DNA, or whatever at this point. And religion, like, religion is the how. Religion is the doctrine, the way. 

And Buddhism is both a way of life, it is—well, not, not both—but it's a way of life, it's a teaching, and it is a religion. It's a spectrum. You could totally shave your head and don some robes and go with the Theravada tradition, or you could do some, you could go with the Jodo Shinshu, the Jodo Shinshu branch, and kind of, kind of integrate it in your everyday life.  You could totally do Tantric Buddhism, which does exist in the Vajrayana tradition. It's all of these different branches, just, like, there are so many branches of Christianity and all of that. Like, it's, it's possible. 

And what really kind of solidified it for me, and again, another five years later, after, like, the Secular Buddhist stuff, seems—Seems to me I like doing things in five-year, five-year batches or five-year chunks!—is that I took refuge. I took refuge online over Zoom with the Dharma (Drum) Retreat Center, which was amazing. And I went back and forth on, like, doing it live, but again, anxiety being what it is, and wanting to do it from the comfort of my own home and not to do it, like, with people I didn't know, in a space that I didn't like, it was too much. 

And I respected myself, and I did my research. And I'm very glad that I did that with the Dharma, Dharma Drum Retreat Center over Zoom, and that they offered that practice and offered it in that way, because I wholeheartedly agree that the Dharma has no, like—the Dharma has no, has no boundaries. There's no container, like, you can still be a Buddhist with an altar, without a large Sangha. And you can be a Buddhist as long as you follow the way. 

I'm very much, like, I definitely follow the, the, the Chan or the Zen tradition, or the Mahayana lineage in that way, that anyone can be enlightened, anyone can find it within themselves to, to be a better person, and to be a better human being. And to that end, if you are thinking of being a Buddhist, after hearing my inspiring story or not, I would say or encourage you to not to concern yourself too much with being a real Buddhist. 

And I use “real” with air quotes around it. Because people will come up to you and ask you, “Oh, what, what religion do you practice?” And then you might say, “Oh, I'm a Buddhist.” And then they're like, “But I saw you eat meat the other day!”

And their, their, their image of Buddhism is, is narrow, or they think it's the real image. Like a lot of—I thought I wouldn't mention colonialism in this episode, but I guess I am!—Colonialism and Western supremacy and the powers that be have this very specific image of Buddhism being, you know, being peace-loving, being full of people that have shaved heads that are monks that are, you know, walking for peace to Washington, DC. Kudos to them. They should absolutely do that. That is within their heart to do that. But Buddhism has a range. 

I mean, it's kind of like Dungeons and Dragons, if you've ever played Dungeons and Dragons, where there are rules as intended and rules as written. Or maybe like a little more, a little more strict or a little more loose with, with, like, a constitution. 

But anyway, too many metaphors, or too many similes. 

But if the path calls to you, follow that path. Like, I'm hoping to follow a path that is in, that's almost like eclectic in a way. I, I have an altar, but I also follow or want to follow an engaged Buddhist tradition in, like, the Plum Village lineage. And I also maybe in the future, maybe I'll, I don't know, maybe I could be ordained as a Buddhist priest, or just stay a Buddhist layperson. Whatever it is, I'm going to follow it. 

And yeah, just just stay curious. Be compassionate, be open, be all the things in the Immovable Wisdom Writing Framework. If you need to watch like the rest of the—well, not watch—If you need to listen to the rest of the episodes or all the episodes prior to that, you know, gather those principles of your Buddhist practice instead of your writing practice. By all means, go ahead and do that. 

But that's the, that's it, y'all. And it's certainly not the end of my story. I look forward to whatever comes and I hope to hear you or see you around in the next one. Take care.

Thanks for listening to the Immovable Wisdom Writing podcast.

You can find resources and links from this episode in the show notes at karenaparker.com/podcast. 

Special thanks to Pop Villains for the cool theme titled “The Usual Suspects” and to Amelia Hruby from Softer Sounds. 

If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe to the podcast via your favorite listening platform. Also, please consider donating to the Captured Phantoms Pay It Forward Scholarship Fund at karenaparker.com/forward. Every donation helps subsidize the cost of coaching and editorial services that I provide for BIPOC and QUILTBAG+ speculative fiction writers.

Anyway, that's it for me y'all. Stay cool out there and keep writing.