Linda: Inspiration, April 23

Inspiration

Each day here has brought a new discovery, a new opening. There are only four not so very long streets in this town! And yet, it has taken a week to walk down all of them, finding some of the jewels hidden within. And with the discovery of one jewel, one hears of another … and another. McLeod Ganj is a little perfection. It is small and manageable. As I walk down the street day after day, I realize that some of the faces are becoming familiar, which makes it feel more like home. Second, there are 5 monasteries and one nunnery (I keep discovering more) within a 30 minute walk. The presence of monks and nuns is in every glance, on every corner, in every cafe, and the prayer beads click and the prayer wheels spin on many other people besides the monks and nuns. I walk up and down the mountain. “Namaste,” (I greet God who is within you.) is the traditional greeting, equivalent to “God bless you”. And they look in your eyes, bend their head, and you realize, they really mean it. Their greeting is a blessing and a prayer. It is a wonderful thing to give and receive blessings all day long! The presence of so many people leading an active spiritual life lends the whole town a feeling of peace, of contentment with what one has, of gratitude, of compassion.

One of the jewels is the places in the forest where one can walk. I am still discovering new trails, but they all meander through beautiful pine forests. Spring is just beginning here, and every day, more bright red rhododendron flowers emerge – cascades of rubies, falling twenty feet toward the forest floor. Wild roses, spring beauties, little budlings ripening in the sun. There is a lake nearby, sacred and hidden, as well as temples and waterfalls. There are chortans tucked in unlikely places. And there are goats – lovely, silky, long haired goats clambering up the near vertical mountain.

Another jewel is the little cafes. Here is where the tourism is an advantage, because the cafes have excellent coffee and French, Italian, and German baked goods! (And the competition keeps the prices low! One can stay in a very clean, safe, quiet room with your own bath and hot shower for $4.00 a night!) Today, I had a delicious cappuccino with a homemade pastry on the roof of my favorite café. I watched eagles soar in the valley below, winging on the wind, sweeping past pines and snow clad peaks. The town also flows steeply down the hill. It looks as if the houses are built on top of each other. (One gets very fit walking here.)

A third jewel is the lovely little shops and stalls with their kind, kind people. There is no hustling and very little bargaining, which I find to be a relief. The prices are good, far better than I’ve seen elsewhere for similar goods. I actually do not like to shop, but I do like to see the pretty things. There are prayer wheels and brass bowls, thankas (traditional Buddhist paintings) and jeweled conch shells, and stunningly beautiful turquoise, coral, and amber jewelry. Perhaps it is a good thing that one can only ship by airmail now!

But the crown jewel is the lectures. Every day, there are lectures about spiritual teachings and attitudes that are helpful to any person of any faith. The viewpoint is the Buddhist viewpoint, but the virtues and advice are perennial truths. In every lecture, I hear familiar teachings and ideas, some stunningly similar, and in every lecture I find inspiration and joy. In the morning, there is an elderly lama who is just starting a series of lectures based on the seminal text by Shantideva, The Way of the Boddhisattva. This text is an essence of all the Mahayana (a branch of Buddhism) texts given by the Buddha in his lifetime. Its theme is how to live a perfect life, with the goal being to help all sentient beings. The words come to mind, “Be ye perfect, even as your Father in Heaven is perfect.” It is practical, it is essential, it combines moral perfection with the perfection of wisdom for the benefit of all. It examines motivation for action, the perfection of action, and the goal of action. The lama reads and expounds on certain lines of the text and intersperses his talk with stories of eminent lamas who are still in hiding in Tibet. His voice rises and falls with emphasis and a touch of humor, yet is calm, compassionate, and serene at the same time. He looks at the people sitting, wanting to give. One image he gave was in speaking about the virtues and negative behaviors and attitudes. He said that one should cultivate the virtues (and he expanded on which were most essential) as if one was carving them in stone. With negative behaviors and attitudes, they should stay with us like writing on water. I found this last image immensely helpful. When I know I’m not reacting well in a particular situation (and we usually do know), I can think of having my attitude be like writing on water and watch it disappear.

It takes 35 minutes for me to walk down to the monastery each day to hear this lecture – and an hour to walk back up. I could take a taxi, but most of my life is a “hurry”. For once, I will not rush. I go back to the hotel for a half hour and lie down, then go to the little French café before walking another 15 minutes in mid-afternoon up another mountain for a two hour lecture. This, too has been a blessing and a joy. I found myself blinking back tears on four occasions today, listening to such words of hope, of practical advice, of wisdom, of truth. And the lama was really teaching to the listeners. He watched to see where the response was, where he needed to speak more, what was motivating and helpful. And the topics were both practical and metaphysical, Being and Non-Being, transcendent and immanent. The five moral perfections, the perfection of wisdom, and the need to have both – perfectly, completely. Method and Doctrine. It was all there. One doesn’t have to be Buddhist, for truth is truth and one will recognize its sweet sound in the music of whatever path you follow. This was not like lectures and writings in the west where one idea is expanded upon so that you walk away with one or two well developed ideas, like looking at part of a tapestry through a magnifying glass. (A valid possibility.) Here, it was like brushstrokes on a canvas. One idea followed another, touched upon, a key rather than an explanation. Any thread could be studied for a lifetime. When one walked away after two hours, it was as if an entire landscape had appeared before your eyes. A heavenly abode. A miracle? A promise. All within grasp. All within grasp. All within grasp.

There is so much more to say, and yet, there is not. My days will follow this pattern, perhaps for the remainder of our journey. There will probably not be much to relate, as the days will be outwardly the same. But inwardly…. And we will see what Eleanor has to say when she comes down from the mountain. Our journey is coming toward its end, and so are these posts. A few more, perhaps. And then, home. Home, where all we’ve learned must be interiorized and actualized in everyday life. To work, to give, to learn, to be. Back to those whom I love, and who, amazingly, love me. What a blessed, blessed thing life is.