With the close of my four month monastery stay at Buddhist temples in the Philippines, I got the opportunity to go to Taiwan where the main monastery of the organization was hosting an International Youth Conference for Life Education. The Manila temple organized the trip and came up with twenty one people from the Philippines, myself included, to attend the conference as one big group. Five other students from our retreat, the “Humanistic Academy of Life and Arts” first batch, also attended.
That sounds fancy, but it was just a series of day long conferences spanning about three days with students from all over the world in attendance. About 1,000 people made the monastery come to life. Many from ivy league schools. Myself having only gone to “art school” (the Art Institute of Portland), and having graduated five years ago, felt a little out of place. That soon vanished with the first conference and the day-to-day living mirroring the lifestyle and education of the four month retreat. Can we say been there done that? Each conference felt like a repetition, but one that I appreciated nonetheless.
The first time I heard that familiar American accent I cringed. Almost six months in the Philippines without contact with other Americans and the accent had become jarring to my ears. Like, really? We all talk like airheads like, all the time? This is the accent my peers would mock me with even though I don’t even talk like that. I consciously try not to use “like” in a sentence, ever since highschool.
The trip was entirely organized and after our conferences, we were taken around Taiwan. We visited museums and Danshui Old Street near Taipei. The cute cobblestoned streets were strangely bereft of much traffic or people.
Old street is known for its ceramic arts and a music shop for the traditional Chinese flute-like instrument, called the ocarina, was selling handmade instruments in its original form or various cute animal forms.
Temple hopping in Taiwan kept us well fed. Glorious vegan food at its finest. If you’re ever at a bind for a place to stay in a foreign country, go to a temple. They will usually house and feed you, and if you’re too shy to ask or take advantage of something “free”, you can always volunteer to clean or help out in any way. Bartering is legit.
One night, we walked out to view the temple lights and it reminded me of that bonding time you have during campfires. Only instead of a fire, we had sparklers.
And I even got to see interesting things around the city.
“Good morning, baby.” My groggy eyes slowly opened to see a middle-aged Indian man carrying a tray of hot masala chai, waking me up in his personal sing-song Indian accent. “Time to wake up, baby.” Rubbing my eyes, I moaned a response. “Tea, baby? Very hot. You take,” he coaxed in his broken English.
Every morning, Rakesh would wake me in this same way. He was my host-dad as I spent the three weeks in India to volunteer at a slum school teaching English. And every morning, me and the other volunteers would eat delicious meals of ciapatti bread and potatoes. Justin, another volunteer, was vegetarian so our host family cooked all of us vegetarian meals. Who could complain? Authentic Indian food cooked by an Indian family is like going to paradise each time you take a bite. So simple and yet so refreshing. So heavenly divine.
That was the first time I tried a vegetarian diet and I found myself not missing meat. When Justin left, as volunteers continually come and go, Rakesh cooked us a special meal with chicken. Chicken is my favorite meat but even tasting this feast seemed anti-climatic. I didn’t miss it and I didn’t have to. I yearned for more vegetables. Peas. Cauliflower. Carrots. All made in a wonderful concoction of spices and curries. I yearned for coconuts and mangoes and local fruits and masala tea. I yearned for chocolate. I didn’t yearn for meat.
“Are you vegetarian because of your religion?” I asked Justin one day. He was a practicing Buddhist, with the diligence to meditate every morning. He wore his malas on his wrist and taught me about om mani padme om.
“No, it’s mostly out of compassion,” he said, after a thoughtful pause. I smiled. Nodded. Almost smirked. Compassion and Buddhism go hand in hand. There’s nothing the Dalai Lama stands for that doesn’t also involve compassion. Was this some sort of cheesy, canned, Buddhist joke?
Two months later, I found myself entering a Chinese Buddhist monastery retreat in Bacolod, Philippines. After declaring “I’m not Buddhist enough” I wanted a respite from my wandering mind. Anxieties about my uncertain future and wondering when love would happen and I knew I needed to find my center and balance my life again. Balance me.
“We are like family.” The old master said. “You’re welcome. Ask question. Do not fear.”
I had just arrived the monastery and was greeted with a warm bowl of soup and equally warm smiles. Biting into a bright baby carrot, I nodded back and felt my tongue burning hot and the sensation spreading down my throat. The baby carrot turned out to be a red pepper! First lesson: mindfulness.
We were taught how to eat. There’s a whole art to it, in Chinese Buddhist tradition. Back straight. Hands cupped to a “C” to hold the rice bowl “like open mouth of dragon”. Chopsticks delicately picked up in complete silence. No speaking. No food going to waste. Not even one grain of rice left on the plate. This was the start of eating meditation. Each bite with intention, mindfulness, and thoughtful consideration of the causes and conditions–the server to serve the food, the kitchen staff to cook the food, the vehicles to transport the food, the farmers to grow the food–that got our vegetarian meals to our plates.
When you eat in silence and complete concentration, something changes. The food becomes medicine. Nourishment. Nutrition. The food becomes reverent. Holy. Sacred. For the first time in my life, I understood the meaning of prayer and “giving thanks”. My skeptic shell of Atheism, already growing softer before the retreat, had completely disappeared.
But something else changed too. I couldn’t look at meat the same way. My taste for vegetables grew stronger since having left India. The “causes and conditions” of packaged meat–the helpless animals being commodified as if they were mere objects, the excess consumption-driven meat factories polluting our environment, the unnatural hormones pumped into beef, and the careless mistreatment of the food chain–became more apparent as I learned about thoughtful eating, slowly chewing each bite with intention. Meat wasn’t just meat any longer and I couldn’t ignore the process.
I finally understood how vegetarianism is a choice of compassion, and not of religion. Vegetarianism meets you when you’re ready to go to that level, just as religion (or no religion) meets you at the level you’re comfortable with, and God (or no God) meets you whether you’re a Bible thumping homophobic, or an open-minded bisexual.
In four months, I changed. I became more compassionate by the bite.
You’re probably thinking, well, duh, why else would I be at a Zen monastery for 4 months? Obvious, right? But It’s taken me awhile to fully realize this and take it in. When I bought my one-way tickets to India and the Philippines, I had absolutely no plans other than the 3 weeks that I spent as an experiential tourist volunteering at a slum school. The Philippines was completely open. I knew I wanted to stay here for at least a year, and eventually work towards a location independent career, but I’ve been taking my sweet time enjoying my career break/sabbatical instead. It’s not easy acknowledging I’m on a break, and I had no idea I would ever be joining a monastery to do so. After all, admitting myself to a nunnery would definitely be out of the question. I’m NOT Catholic and it takes a better person than myself to admit themselves to a religious experience other than their own (not that I’m Buddhist, but pretty close). This unexpected path has taken my pilgrimage from conceptual to reality.
Many people seem to travel on a pilgrimage. “The gap year” is the ultimate way for seekers and searchers to discover about themselves; what their passions are, what they’d like to do with life. At 27, I guess I’m taking my gap year a bit “late”, but I’ve learned to accept that I’m a late bloomer. And really, who’s to say what late is, as if there’s a specific timeline for these things? A specific set path? I knew long ago that I wasn’t going on the fast track of college, career, marriage, house and kids. Standard and traditional is just not for me.
Eat, Pray, Love
Elizabeth Gilbert took her “gap year” in her mid thirties. Her pilgrimage turned into a delightful memoir, Eat, Pray, Love, that I read after the demise of my own relationship. While I already “knew” that I would journey back to Asia before reading the book, her words inspired me to make my thoughts reality. It’s completely surreal to me that I’m now having my own eat, pray, love journey of my own, sans the foreign lover, of course.
I’m not quite sure what I’m trying to “find”. Purpose, maybe. A meaning to this insignificant speck of the universe that is my existence. Some people might say this is the quarter-life “crisis” but I refuse to believe that life is a crisis as I am having the time of my life (cue Green Day song). Some days, it can seem daunting, like when I’m thinking about becoming a freelancer. Other days, it can seem exciting, like when I’m thinking about becoming a freelancer… It depends where my mind is. Sometimes, being in limbo feels like the scariest, most unstable place to be and other times, I feel blessed to have such great opportunities for exploration. Pushing through the transition phase can be tough. Focusing on the process, moving forward each day with your goals, is a great way to take control of your life and be happy. It’s not about finding purpose, but creating it.
Walk for Peace
Adding to my Pilgrimage repertoire, I have the chance to go on a 280 mile walk around the island of Palawan with a local. Just walking. While living in a monastery is quite possibly the craziest thing I’ve ever done, walking 280 miles might top it. With nothing but the stars and night sky as our blanket, the idea would be to interact with communities and people that we meet along our travels; offering them lessons that we would share for free. Things like yoga, martial arts, meditation. I haven’t decided yet if I’ll take the plunge. It’s quite possibly the craziest and scariest thing I’ve ever thought of doing. Oh, but it would be great blog (and life) fodder! What about that business idea I’ve been thinking about? It’d be great fodder for that too…
May 29th marked the two month halfway point of my stay at the Zen monastery. It’s safe to say that I’m past the disillusionment stage, you know, if I were in a relationship. But why can’t the “5 stages of committed relationships” apply to experiences, instead of people, as well? Two months and I can already sense the impending break-up.
At first, everything was new and exciting! Look at how we get to eat yummy vegetarian meals with chopsticks everyday in silence! How about this cool chanting in Chinese thing for half an hour every morning?? You mean mopping the floor is meditation!? I finally understand why cleanliness is next to Godliness! My boobs are really sweating out toxins while I’m meditating, holy shit! What the heck are they trying to tell me in class today? Wow, I have zero concentration skills, let me doodle on my notebook and write in my journal instead.
That kind of thing.
Now it’s more like, what’s the point of all this!?
What’s the point of any of this? This whole life thing. I didn’t actually think I was going to find answers like the Meaning of Life here, did I?
When evaluating and making decisions in my life, I try to answer the question: does this add value to my life? Of course, I answered “yes” when I decided to sign myself up for this but now, I’m not so sure. While I have no doubt this experience will help me in the hectic day-to-day of society, calm me while I try to stay positive, and even help me professionally, I no longer see value in the constant rinse, repeat lifestyle. A third of the people have already quit early, and I have to admit, I’m wondering about the same. In reality, I know I’ll stick it out because I’m not one for quitting when I’ve made a commitment towards something (a quick dodge in my mind makes me think otherwise, but in this situation, lets just pretend it’s a true blanket statement OK?), but my mind has grown increasingly less present now that it’s halfway through the program. That sense of wonder and bliss and true presence is starting to escape me. I’m worrying about what’s next and trying to secure my next adventure. Once again, I’m living in the future.
Anxieties build up again about my “career”. While it’s obvious I’m on a career break/sabbatical and I should learn to own it and enjoy it, I’m still worrying about how to get a job, or design my own job entrepreneur style. I start to think if this whole monastery stint was truly a way to experience something worthwhile, or just an excuse to put off the “real world”. Shudder.
The real world. As if this life now isn’t reality?
In Real Life
“This isn’t me in real life,” one girl kept pointing out during our stay. It struck me as a funny thing to say since our life, now, is in the monastery. How real can you get? I get what she was trying to say, though. In “real life” she’s louder, more flamboyant. Wearing uniforms that remind me of really crappy made in China workout pants and polos doesn’t exactly give much room for self expression. Her life back in Manila is so vastly different from our current experience that she equates a sort of Zen detachment towards it, boldly claiming it’s “not me”. It got me thinking. Who am I in real life anyway? I’m constantly adjusting myself to new situations and surroundings that I no longer have a stable life to base my “reality” on. The only real life I’ve got is here in the present. And the real world? It’s just an imaginary concept existing in our minds to keep the status-quo going. I don’t like the “real world” and I suspect I won’t enter it again.
In real life, I am discovering I thrive in situations I never thought I could, in the unknown. I’m realizing I am an adventurer that hates complacency, and in turn, status-quo. I’m learning how to accept that and live life more freely, without borders and on the edges. The hardest part of it all is learning how to take the responsibility of leading my own life, in my own hands, and trying to figure out my own path to carve. The meaning of life IS what you make out of it. It’s that simple, but infinitely and in turn, that much harder.
Imagine being discontent with life working in X humdrum job in X corporation and deciding to leave your whole life behind, walking out the door with only $150 to your name, and never looking back. For two plus years, the only life you’ll know is the road, hitchhiking your way from place to place, friendly strangers who change your life, a mix of couchsurfing experiences and different cultures along the way.
With a dream to one day set foot in India, Artyom, a fellow traveler in the Buddhist monastery retreat, has done just that. His story starts from Russia, into the harsh, unforgiving cold winters of Siberia, crossing the border into China, and receiving $100 from a helpful stranger which would be the exact cost of a ticket to the Philippines. With details aside, his story can be echoed in the past with the beatnik generation, a la Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, or in the wanderlust and adventure of Alexander Supertramp (of Into the Wild postmortem fame). Many have felt the call of the road or the nomadic call for travel, and many will continue to as job security continues to fail and global technologies and location independent careers make long term travel more accessible. Whether you are a hitchhiker, couchsurfer, backpacker, flashpacker or location independent professional nomad, the seeds of dissatisfaction from the status-quo bind together as the impetus for change; a change of scenery, sights, sounds, smells and people.
Travel, in and of itself, has a very Zen-like quality. The impermanence of travel teaches us to be aware of our constantly new surroundings and live more easily in the moment, but travel on the road adds a whole new dimension. Leaving all wordly possessions behind, even selling all your furniture as I’ve done, marks an emptying of your self; a letting go of your past life as you once knew it. Being able to “lose yourself” to find yourself. It is a road–a journey–into emptiness.
Emptying Your Cup
A university professor went to visit a famous Zen master. While the master quietly served tea, the professor talked about Zen. The master poured the visitor’s cup to the brim, and then kept pouring. The professor watched the overflowing cup until he could no longer restrain himself. “It’s overfull! No more will go in!” the professor blurted. “You are like this cup,” the master replied, “How can I show you Zen unless you first empty your cup.” – Zen Koan
Emptying your cup means letting go of all past knowledge and perceptions and allowing yourself to look at life and experiences with fresh “new” eyes. It is not a negation of the self, but a full embracing of the self and humanity. Be like a sponge to new experiences, places, and people. Realize that all people are mostly good, and have faith in humanity. The road to emptiness is a minimalistic approach to a Zen lifestyle and the road an excellent Zen teacher. It takes a complete leap of faith to trust in the kindness of strangers, and the randomness of the Universe. Hitchhiking is the “hardest” form of travel, but in many ways can also be the most rewarding.
Sometimes You Have to Lose Yourself to Find Yourself
Getting lost is all part of the journey. When I broke up with an ex almost 2 years ago, we co-habited together and shared a mortgage. I moved out, and he kept most of our acquired furniture and possessions. For me, letting go of the possessions was liberating myself from a past life. I didn’t want to deal with “fairness” and equal splitting because I came in with little possessions and left with less. For me, It only solidified the fact that I was the drifter coming into his life. When I sold and gave away most of my remaining possessions to help get me to Asia, it was another load off my proverbial chest. I was prepared to get even more lost than ever before. I guess popular culture calls this the “quarter-life crisis” (I’m past the quarter century mark but it’s been building up since then) but for me, life is no longer a state of crisis. I’m enjoying every minute of being “lost” and I don’t want to be found!
Letting go of my possessions and of my self, “emptying my cup”, has been essential in helping me find out who I am, what my passions are and what drives me. It’s been nearly two months at the monastery. Two months of seeing transcendence in the mundane. Two months of routine in the presence. Two months of a vastly different life. Two years ago, I was living in my own house. A year ago, I was living with two gay guys and their three male cats and a whole new group of friends. Who am I? Am I lost? I don’t even know what my “real life” is anymore because each year is so vastly different. Empty my cup. Live in the moment.
The Road to Emptiness
My own journey is still at the monastery, but in August, I will be going to Taiwan for another monastery stay at their headquarter temple. After that, my wanderlust soul is tempted to walk the entire island of Palawan, Philippines with a local. The journey would be 280 miles of jungle and beaches. Since Palawan is the least developed island of the Philippines, it is also one of the most gorgeous. The vision is that we would journey on a “peace walk”. Traveling, teaching and exchanging our various skills to the people we meet along our way. He is skillfully trained in Kali/Eskrima, a Filipino Martial Art style that was most notably used for the training of Matt Damon’s role in the Bourne Identity trilogies. Learning Filipino martial arts was also part of my bucket list for the year and he’s mentioned that we could train. If this is the Road to Emptiness and learning how to let go of the self, it sounds good to me! Experiencing culture in an intimate way, on foot, with cool, clear night skies and the stars as our blanket is something no tourist rarely sees.
One thing Artyom lives by when on the road is the philosophy that asking for help is completely OK and necessary. What’s the worst that can happen when you ask for help? Either they say yes and you get what you want or they say no and you carry on as before. You don’t lose anything with the no but you gain so much with a simple yes. Faith is tested while you’re on the road. The age old rules of “do unto others what you would have them do unto you” and “you sow what you reap” is part of the exchange. Being on the road is a karmic system. Do good deeds and treat others kindly. If you give genuine kindness without expecting anything in return, situations will start turning in your favor. This is the Zen lessons of the road.
Here’s the dillio (Dealy yo? Who says that anymore!?) Imagine me. Nineteen years old and fresh out of high school. A little bit punky. A little bit riot grrl. And maybe a whole lot of emo. I had a boyfriend I wasn’t really into but was too afraid of being Alone. Picture the kind of mental instability that is your teens and early twenties, a bundle of un-confidence and raw emotion; a wanting to push status-quo, with my short pixie spiked hair and Chuck Taylor exterior, and a not-so-brave interior. I wanted to shave my head then. Own my non-conformity. I wanted to prove to myself that I could “pull it off”. But, I couldn’t do it. Would I look ugly? Would people think I was a lesbo? Dyke? Butch? Oh, the horror!
The Butch-y Buddhist
Eight years later and I am living an ascetic (as I’ll ever be) lifestyle at a Buddhist monastery for four months (3 left, and counting…). I have always wanted to shave my head at least once in my life just to try it. Why not? Consider it on my bucket list. What better way to finally shave my head than living monastically (loosely speaking) and studying Buddhism, right? Right. I mean, sex and sexuality are so beyond my current plane of existence that I might as well be little buddha (unenlightened folk don’t deserve capital letters).
The implications of a shaved head in normal society are a cause of concern for many. Butch! Dyke! Lesbo! My classmates say I look like a little boy, butch, lesbo, GI Jane, a hot lesbian (at least I look like a hot one!) and my personal favorite: Mulan (heck yeah, she kicks ass!). Shaving my head is a personal choice to detach from my hair, from the concepts of beauty, from social norms, and from the status-quo. It takes a certain kind of confidence for women to shave their head. Confidence in their sexuality; enough not to be bothered by social expectations and implications. Confidence in their gender and gender roles; enough not to be bothered by the androgynous look. The decision and outcome is completely liberating, and at least for me, completely mind blowing.
For me, sexuality is fluid. I’m more straight than gay but not quite straight, either. That’s entirely natural and entirely OK. Eight years ago, I wouldn’t have been comfortable with “what society thinks”, but now? I couldn’t care less. Buddhism has taught me the power of non-attachement. And finally being comfortable in my sexuality is mind blowing (note to self: stop thinking about the blowing part now).
If Britney Spears Can Shave Her Head At Her Worst, I Can Do It At My Best
These days, I feel (figuratively, and now, literally) lighter. Happier. More joyful. Maybe it’s this simple routine here. The meditation. The healthy, vegetarian meals. Everything and Nothing all at once. Eight years ago, I would have never done what I am now unafraid to do. It takes courage. It’s mind blowing. Exhilarating. Liberating. Heartening. And while I know that this happiness is not permanent, I’m enjoying each and every moment while I can.
There’s a sort of craziness that happens when you’re at peace and at one with yourself. Not the Britney Spears manic kind of crazy. Not the get-your-life-together-you’re-so-messed-up sort of crazy. More like a life-is-so-beautiful-and-you’re-talking-to-yourself-and-singing-like-your-life-is-a-musical sort of crazy. Or sensory overload with 11 other people who are just as crazy as you are 24/7. Or just laughing a lot for no reason, talking to bugs to say you didn’t mean to hurt them, or dancing crazy to Bjork sort of crazy.
Or you know. Shaving your head sort of crazy.
Vanity
Despite the detachment to hair, beauty, or social norms, I am still vain. The paradox of myself. I still want to be able to “pull it off” when I shave my head. Sometimes I look in the mirror and think I look like a boy, or a lesbian and think this probably isn’t the best look for me. Other times I look in the mirror and think “damn, I’m sexy!” I had a whole photoshoot full of pictures that I will share out of simple vanity. The semi-bald yogi.
When most people think of meditation, they think of sitting monks or yogi’s in half or full lotus pose.
When you sit, just sit.
Chan Buddhism?
Zen Buddhism is the Japanese version of Chinese Chan Buddhism. Buddhism started in India and then spread to parts of Asia including China and finally Japan. What the West has popularized as “Zen” has been in practice in China before Japan. The modern day Zen aesthetic and minimalistic Zen lifestyle is romanticized in Japanese culture. Chan and Zen are virtually the same thing, with slight (respective language) cultural differences but the same practice.
Zazen
Because I am more familiar with Zen Buddhism, as it’s called in Japan, the type of sitting meditation we practice is Zazen, or just sitting. This main practice of Zen is to study the self and most importantly, focus on the breath. Where do your thoughts go and how do you observe it? Count your breath and focus on true awareness. The back should be perfectly straight in posture, and your tongue should rest on the roof of your mouth, touching just behind the teeth. Practitioners are suggested to count each inhalation and exhalation of the breath from one to ten, starting over at one again and so on. This technique allows you to stay present. If any thought arises, simply observe the thought and let it go. Do not suppress the thought, for that is attachment to the thought. Think of yourself as an outside observer watching your mind wander. Do not try to control it, just see where it takes you and let it go, taking your focus back to your breath. The mind is a funny thing. It acts as if it has a mind of its own. Thoughts seem to wander as if uncontrollably.
Sometimes, meditation is physically and emotionally exhausting. My body feels like its just run a marathon! If I’m ever lost in the woods, all I’ll do is meditate and I’ll be able to keep myself warm. Beads of sweat drip down my chest, back and arms. We sit here for 30 minutes straight, trying not to move a muscle, and focusing on our breath. Tingling pain drives up my foot and into my legs halfway through the session. In full lotus pose, my foot falls asleep. The numbness starts to become euphoric.
Sometimes, my mind wanders to thoughts I thought I had buried or dealt with, but they have resurfaced. Memories I don’t want to relive. Nothing bad, but bittersweet nostalgia that I want to let go. It is like an emotional detoxing. Once my mind wanders to these emotionally draining memories, I am able to finally let them go and rid myself of the emotion. This letting go process is spiritually, emotionally and mentally draining. Sometimes, I want to cry. I don’t though.
All this detoxing is immeasurably better than how I used to deal with my emotions. The waves are only little ripples now. I observe my self and I’m gone. I exercise to feel better, to shake it off. No longer bothered by my past.
We are dressed in light blue-gray monks robes, or hai qing [hai ching], for laypeople. The tuk-tuk-tuk of a wooden block being banged by a mallet tells us that its time to eat. Gathering in a line alongside the eating table, facing eachother by gender, we wait for the monk to join us in bow before we begin seating ourselves in complete silence in front of dishes that are already served. The monk leads a prayer in Chinese that we have all, by now, memorized. The translation was given to us the first week, but still, it is a bunch of gibberish in new sounds and syllables that sound soothingly melodic and foreign.
There’s a certain way to eat, and a certain way to hold our rice bowls and pick up our chopsticks. Rules and guidelines to follow. All twelve of us in complete silence. If we want more food, we push our plates forward and use signals with our chopsticks for the servers to come and bring us more. Our posture must be completely straight for better digestion. Shoulders relaxed. We must finish everything on our plate, and if the server dishes us more than we can eat, we have to take it away at the beginning of our meal, right after the prayer. This is the monastic way of eating.
When you wash the dishes, just wash the dishes.
When you eat, just eat.
Every moment is an opportunity for meditation. Meditation, simply put, is the ability to stay present in the things that you do; being mindful of your thoughts and the task at hand.
How does the food taste? Is the rice warm, sticky, and fresh? Or cold and a day old? If you eat too fast, you might not be able to stop and enjoy it before its gone! Enjoy each flavor, and the flavors that mesh together when you mix the food on your plate and into your mouth. Feel the textures and flavor in your tongue palate. Concentrate on just eating. This is what I’m learning at the monastery. When you’re busy with chatter, or multi-tasking in front of a computer, you don’t appreciate the simple pleasures of food. You eat more than you need, blindly taking more and more before you realize that you’re full. There are so many times that I crave food, like ice cream, that by the time I eat it it’s gone in less than a minute! I realize that the craving tastes better in my mind than the actual food.
Vegetarian Lifestyle
I’m eating vegetarian. While not all Buddhists practice a vegetarian lifestyle, it is encouraged for ethical reasons due to the philosophy of not hurting any sentient beings. A typical meal–breakfast, lunch, and dinner–is three types of vegetable dishes, a bowl of rice, and a bowl of soup. Often, noodles are served, and bread instead of soup for breakfast.
Sometimes, I really miss a good ‘ole American breakfast. Hashbrowns and omelets and waffles and pancakes. But, I don’t miss meat.
The Chinese have a unique way about nutrition. Everything is colors and taste; engaging our senses. Instead of the typical “food pyramid”, we have balanced meals based on five colors of food (white, black, yellow, red/orange, and green) and five tastes (sour, spicy, sweet, etc.). It’s weird, but it works.
We aren’t supposed to eat in between meals, but the gap between lunch at 11:30am and dinner at 6:00pm is tough. Sometimes, I eat snacks that we get to buy once a week, but I am trying to control my hunger and drinking water instead. I’m trying to get by as purely as I can in this program, getting the most out of my experience as closely as possible (still working on the shaved head thing). While several rules and guidelines are set in place, it’s our own personal choice to follow them. Like the craving for ice cream, but the control not to eat it, knowing that I’d rather eat healthier than feed my body the typical junk to satisfy my huge sweet tooth. When you eat, just eat. There’s no room for emotional eating at the monastery. It would be good for my body to abstain.
Snippets of my childhood come to me throughout the day as I am meditating. Long forgotten memories I didn’t even know I had. I wonder where they’re coming from. My earliest memories are age 4. I am at daycare during nap time. I don’t know why there is designated nap time. At four years old, I never took naps. Blankly staring at the ceiling in a dark room wondering when it would be over. We’d lay on plastic cots on the floor. My mind would race. I suppose this is a four year old version of meditation. When you can’t sleep during nap time…
Another daycare memory. I am on the playground high up on a platform, next to the slide and monkey bars. I stare down at the ground covered in sawdust. I jump, fearless of falling. It’s really high up for someone under three feet, but I land safely.
I don’t know why these seemingly mundane memories stand out to me now. Maybe it’s a return to innocence. Purging all of these unhappy adult experiences, by way of bad dreams, and remembering more innocent times. When nothing really mattered and life was simpler. Maybe that’s why I want simplicity and minimalism in my life. It’s a return to innocence. Getting back to my inner child.
Today is my birthday and I am 27. It seems like yesterday I was just turning 25 and just like that, I’m in my “late twenties”. A year ago, I was living in Oregon, still trying to get over the demise of a long term relationship that I let define me; and that still defined me during my recovery process, which took a good full year, more or less.
When you get out of a five year long relationship, it’s hard not to let your life be known as “before the relationship”, “during the relationship” and “after the relationship”. You still define your life by your relationship even after you are free of the shackles. This kind of timeline is why I have stopped talking about “the relationship” and why I hesitate to go into it here. At this point, my life is so immeasurably different that I can’t even relate to the person I was in my relationship; I have changed. That part of my life seems so surreal as to be unreal. I can’t believe I used to own a house and was on a set track of mediocrity. I knew I wasn’t reaching my full potential and I’m glad I am single. I’m happy. For the first time in my life, I am not pining for anyone, much less a relationship. And that’s why I know I’m finally ready to try again. Whenever that happens, I’m ready. I’m ready for the inevitable and eventual pain and suffering.
But mostly, I’m ready to return to Innocence.
Now, I am at a monastery retreat studying Zen and practicing meditation. Each week, we have “talent” exhibition classes and we take turns sharing skills. The above was an improv dance that me and another classmate performed last week.
If Britney Spears Can Shave Her Head At Her Worst, I Can Do It At My Best
