Awakening the Buddha Within _ Eight Steps to Enlightenment - Lama Surya Das [23]
Like many of my friends and colleagues during the sixties and seventies, initially I encountered some serious difficulties with the Asian traditions and with the lamas, roshis, swamis, and masters of all sorts who are its principal exponents. As attractive as the teachings and some of the leaders immediately seemed, and actually are, there remained formidable cultural, linguistic, and psychological barriers to overcome in order to train in and develop a genuine spiritual practice in any Eastern practice-path or discipline.
The Tibetan lamas knew, and we Westerners eventually learned, that our practice had to reflect integrated lives and our own Western traditions. Kabir, the fifteenth-century Indian poet and saint, once sang, “I do not wish to dye my clothes saffron, the color of a holy order; I want to dye my heart with divine love.”
One need not travel to distant lands, seek exotic mystical experiences, master esoteric mantras and treatises, or cultivate extraordinary states of mind in order to experience a radical change of heart and inner transformation. Spiritually speaking, everything that one wants, aspires to, and needs is ever-present, accessible here and now—for those with eyes to see. It’s the old adage all over again: You don’t need to see different things, but rather to see things differently.
I have been fortunate enough to be able to visit most of the great temples of man, study in India and Tibet, and circle the globe several times in search of what I was looking for. Now I say what others have said: that one has seen nothing until one has come face to face with oneself. Then each and every moment hosts the ultimate miracle, wherever we are. Truth and love are in the palms of our hands. For when we are illumined, the whole universe is illumined. Let’s lighten up.
Intrinsic awareness is the common denominator of all sentient beings. Conscious living, contemplative self-awareness, is the means to becoming all that we are. Awareness is curative. Knowing ourselves and learning to let go is the method, the most skillful means. Spirituality is a matter of self-discovery, rather than of becoming something else. True transformation is like the legendary alchemical transmutation, in which the base metal of our limited, finite selves is, as if by magic, transformed into the spiritual gold of our transcendent original nature.
Throughout the ages, those who have heard truth’s insistent call have believed in the transformative power of spiritual illumination, combined with the illuminating power of altruistic compassionate action. The same question persists: How can there be peace in the world if we, its inhabitants, are not at peace with ourselves? As long as there is a separation—between “us” and “them,” self and other, “me” as separate and distinct from “you”—conflict remains, and self-transformation is a mere pipe dream. If we don’t love ourselves, how can we love the earth?
Self-transformation implies self-transcendence. Therefore, inner transformation is a spiritual affair of cosmic significance, including all, animate and inanimate, everywhere. Authentic self-transformation is definitely not for oneself alone. It is for all beings—for aren’t we all inseparably interconnected? Whatever befalls us, befalls one and all; harm a single strand of the web of life, and the entire web is harmed. In Africa, the Xhosa tribe has a saying which is worth remembering: “I am because we are.”
Building a Spiritual Life from Scratch
Recently I’ve been going through some old notebooks, looking at some of the things that I wrote down at Lama Yeshe’s monastery. In one notebook, I found a “To Do” list called “Daily Necessities.” If you reflect upon some of these practices and bring a few into your life every day, you will be transformed.
The living Buddha, the Sixteenth