Awakening the Buddha Within _ Eight Steps to Enlightenment - Lama Surya Das [32]
Mingling the Dharma with your life means trying to make choices and decisions that are more enlightened and that stem from a commitment to awakening from illusion’s dreams. The Dharma of your own internal realization is where you find inner refuge—refuge in learning the truth, expressing that truth, integrating that truth into your own being. When you are authentically and totally yourself, you embody Dharma. This is the inner triple jewel. Living the Dharma means being true to yourself.
Daily meditation is the simplest means by which we stay on the essential path of awakening. In this way we can gradually and thoroughly begin to mingle the Dharma with every activity. This is done through paying attention, through practicing mindfulness rather than mindlessness, through consciously cultivating presence of mind rather than absentmindedness. This is known as awareness practice, raising your consciousness, or living a mindful life.
In one of his sermons, the Buddha spoke to Ananda, saying, “Oh Ananda, be lamps unto yourselves. Be refuges to yourselves. Hold fast to the Dharma as a lamp. Hold fast to the Dharma as a refuge. Look not for refuge to any one besides yourselves…. And whosoever, Ananda … shall be a refuge unto themselves … it is they, among the seekers, who shall reach the very topmost height.”
Following a balanced, moderate path that is honest, straightforward, and impeccable is living the Dharma. Learning to live without excessive confusion, anger, clinging, vacillation, or greed—that’s Dharma. Basic sanity means being in tune with things as they are—this is Dharma. Following a Dharma path means making your first priority your spiritual life and developing a warm, kind, and loving heart, along with a sense of empathy and friendliness. This includes developing integrity and character, not just seeking shortlived highs or mystical experiences. Truth is about getting free, not getting high.
“I GO FOR REFUGE IN THE SANGHA”
There is a Tibetan saying “Only the snow lions among us can go into solitude in the wilderness and achieve enlightenment alone.” Most of us depend upon being part of a sangha. The word Sangha is translated as “virtuous community.” It represents the spiritual community, our fellow seekers, kindred spirits, and soulful friends we rely on and trust. Historically, it referred to the ordained, monastic community of monks and nuns.
Spiritual energy is healing energy; when any group gathers with a dedication to something greater than one’s finite, individual self, the accumulated energy is almost palpable. When Jesus said, “Where two or more are gathered in my name, there shall I be also,” he was affirming the miraculous spiritual power, the delightful synergy, of sangha. When we dedicate ourselves to a cause larger or longer-lasting than our own mortal selves, we edge in the direction of immortality.
In the seventies and eighties I found living in monastic brotherhood edifying and inspirational for my own inner development. Now, as a Dharma teacher, the society of my peers is vital in keeping my priorities straight. My Dharma friends and colleagues often provide a sharp cutting edge of insight as clear and trustworthy a mirror of the truth as is provided by any elder or spiritual master. And the mirror of the Western sangha today has an additional virtue: It’s free of the cultural differences, underlying assumptions, authoritarianism, and hierarchies that a Westerner often experiences among Buddhists in traditionally patriarchal Asian societies. Of course, with any group or community, one has to be alert to the dark side or shadow side represented by insularity, conforming, herd instinct, and group-think. I think the Sangha always has to work to keep its collective and individual energies pure, sane, warm, and full of heart.
In an immediate sense, the Sangha also represents the people to whom you are close or intimately connected—in short, the people you live and hang out with. These friends,