A living month of listening, exploring, communing. Life exploring life in the streaming and folding hills and valleys of the Wangapeka. We (a community of cultures from all over the world) gathered in May to study, taste, embody, amongst other things a text called “Understanding Our Mind” by Thich Nhat Hanh.
Page one, day one…“Mind is a field in which every kind of seed is sown.” Day five, Tarchin “Before we can Understand Our Mind, it might be good to get a feel for what we mean when we use the words “understanding”, “our”and “mind.”” Good point! And so began a Self expanding exploration, stretching out, opening the View through the evolution that is biology, microscopes, sharings, listenings, questioning. To understand anything is not something that just arises independent of everything else, and I get the feeling that one could spend a long time studying what is meant by the word Mind, but I am not going directly there. I would rather be in the garden.
A garden is a fertile analogy (excuse the pun) for this work of maturing into an expanding view of self, it is simple and profound, open to children and adults alike. We all know gardens, we eat from them all the time, we all know that it is a place where seeds can be watered and grow. The garden can be a place of flowers, weeds, compost, unknown creatures that come out at night, weathers, seasons, cycles, elements, ground deep and dark, unknowable, all living in their own time, in their own way, separate and inseparable without contradiction. What would it mean to be in the mandala of an unfolding garden and be clearer about the watering wholesome seeds?
For all it was a valuable time, one that continues to shift, change and go out into the world. Asked if I could share one discovery from our time in the garden I would contemplate out loud the meaning of mindfulness, exploding as it seems to be into the lives of children, families and businesses. Mindfulness must have something to do with inclusivity, radical sounds extraordinary but it is heading that way. A way of being where everything is included, everything is welcome, everything is worthy of appreciation. First person and third person research of life, by life for life. Sometimes this mindfulness is the growing capacity to enter into an unspeakable presence, glimpses of a blessed union, other times perhaps it more like surrendering into patience and tenderness of self/other care. What mindfulness is not is a fight for awareness against distraction where any other phenomena other than breathing is considered a threat to progress.
Food for thought ripening in the garden, shared as merely one reflection of many from a beautiful retreat offered by Tarchin and Mary. With appreciation and gratefulness for all being, may the wholesomeness gathered bring wisdom and love to the worlds. May we contemplate deeply and realize something new of an invitation by Tarchin to “Let everything relax in its own place.”
Jaime Howell
Living Dharma
Wangapeka