The Best Buddhist Writing 2010 - Melvin McLeod [2]
Who we are is naturally awake and joyful, and teachings by Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche and Gaylon Ferguson show us how to directly experience that enlightened mind, which is always present but usually unnoticed. Since the false belief in a permanent, ongoing self is said to be the root of our problems, Anam Thubten offers a meditation teaching that sums it up nicely: “no self, no problem.”
Of course, we’re missing the point if meditation is something we only do in formal practice. We have to take the insight we develop on the meditation cushion out into our lives. One of the most important American Buddhist teachers, Pema Chödrön, offers a powerful teaching on those key moments when we choose whether to take an open, courageous approach to our difficulties, or go down the dead-end road of denial. Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche offers a series of contemplations to start each day, and Carolyn Rose Gimian relates the advice of the late Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche to “smile at fear.”
Buddhism has all the philosophy, history, and structure of any organized religion, but meditation is its core, and in the West today there are many people who want to bring Buddhist-style meditation into their lives without necessarily adopting new religious beliefs. At the Shambhala Sun, where I am editor-in-chief, we feel that this is one of the most important developments in the growth of dharma in the modern world. We call it the “mindful living” movement, and it’s changing the way millions of Americans approach their lives.
Two examples of this approach in this year’s Best Buddhist Writing are “The Joy of Mindful Cooking,” Laura Fraser’s report on the Zen-inspired cooks who have had so much influence on the way we cook and eat, and “Mindful Eating,” in which the Zen teacher and physician Jan Chozen Bays offers a mindfulness-based system for working with eating issues. Both show the way in which people can incorporate the clarity, enjoyment, and effectiveness of meditation practice into their lives without feeling they have to adopt a whole new philosophy. That’s pretty much the way the Buddha himself first taught it, so it must be kosher.
These are some of the unique features of the Buddhist path, and they underlie all the writings in this book, in ways both lofty and down-to-earth. In Buddhism, the view is mind, not God. The ground is our inherent goodness, our buddhanature. The problem is suffering, which is caused by temporary obscurations. The path is meditation, working with the mind to reveal its original nature. The fruition is wisdom, awakening.
This is a different kind of spiritual path, one that is lonely but loving, profound but practical, sacred but deeply human. I hope you will get a good sense of it from this year’s edition of The Best Buddhist Writing. Perhaps the teachings, essays, and stories that follow will help you decide where Buddhism might fit in your own life, and in the surprising, important debate about the role of religion in our world.
There is an old saying that Buddhist practice is like walking through a heavy mist. At some point on the journey, without even realizing it, you have become wet. Buddhism in the West is like that. It is ripening, deepening, and spreading in ways we’re not even aware of.
This book reflects many people who are contributing to the maturing and spread of dharma in the West. First to thank, of course, are the teachers, writers, and practitioners who have contributed to this book. They are among the spiritual, intellectual, and community leaders of Buddhism today.
The publishers of Buddhist books are vital contributors to the development of genuine dharma in the West. Besides the mainstream publishers who continue to offer quality Buddhist-inspired books, there are the devoted people of the specialty Buddhist publishers, whose essential work all practitioners should support