Happy Wesak Day!Personally, i would think it is certainly a great wesak to start off with lots of metta! Partly due to the reignitation of the recent dharma camp. hehe. Post mortum for the camp: objektif tercapai.
A few of us actually started of with some little things that we can do at home,ie: a meditation in conjunction of the Wesak Day. Just sth like the Earth Hour where everyone switch off the lights, we just meditate at home, since everything start from within.
Upon sharing this with another group of friends are from Tibetan Buddhism, they actually do that almost every week and for each week they will radiate or share the merits with relatives or friends in need at that moment. This group do have Rinpoche that comes over to penang every 1 or 2 months to guide them with talks and mantra chanting.
Well, last night was the meditation day that kicked start.
Frankly, i actually dozed off. hahaha. can stand for only 15 minutes, then beh tahan liao. My physical body was really in a complete shut off mode, even walking meditation also like a drunken monkey liao. So i decided to call it a day and postpone the meditation to this morning since i wake up quite early most of the days. And with fresher mind, i could do it better. I guess this is the first time i have stretched my bandwidth after so many years without retreat. Normally can do till the most 15 minutes only. (better not use the word "pai seh", i think no need to feel guilty or what not, always better late than never). hehe
I was imagining the light of the Buddha that shine through from my head. And with that i wish for the metta from the Buddha to be radiated to all beings.
Was telling friends the other day that, i really like the verse that we usually see outside of the mosque which reads "Sembahyanglah sebelum anda disembahyangkan." Self cultivation and self reliance has always been the truth that i think i should do that more often. Jangan sampai i jatuh sakit then only cari doktor --- too late by then, or perhaps may need more effort to bring ourselves up.
While on the other hand, i was reading and contemplating these words by Pema Chodron ( a tibetan nun) in her book When Things Fall Apart:"On the night on which the buddha was to attain enlightenment, the Buddha sat under a tree, While he was sitting there, he was attacked by the forces of Mara. The story goes that they shot swords and arrows at him, and that their weapons turned into flowers. What does this story mean? My understanding of it is that what we habitually regard as obstacles are not really our enemies, but rather our friends. What we call obstacles are really the way the world and our entire experience teach us where we're stuck. What may appear to be an arrow or a sword we can actually experiencence as a flower. Whether we experience what happen to us as obstacle nad enemy or as teacher and friend depends entirely on our perception of reality. It depends on our relationship with ourselves.The teachings tell us that obstacles occur at the outer level and at the inner level. In this context, the outer level is the sense that something or somebody has harmed us, interfering with the harmony and peace we thought was ours. Some rascals has ruined it all. This particualr sense of obstacles occurs in relationships and in many other situations; we feel disappointed, harmed, confuse, and attacked in a variety of ways. People have felt this way from the beginning of time. As for the inner level of obstacle, perhaps nothing ever really attacks us except our own confusion. Perhaps there is no solid obstacle except our own need to protect ourselves from being touched. Maybe the only enemy is that we don't like the way reality is now and there fore wish it would go away fast. But what we find as practitioners is that nothing ever goes away until it had taught us what we need to know. If we run a hundred miles an hour to the other end of the continent in order to get away from the obstacle, we find the very same problem waiting for us when we arrive. It just keep returning with new names, forms, and manifestations until we learn whatever it has to teach us about where we are separating ourselves from reality; how we are pulling back instead of opening up, closing down instead of allowing ourselves to experience fully whatever we encounter, without hesitating or retreating into ourselves."
May our hearts be filled with loving-kindness, compassion, altruistic joy and equanimity.
Sadhu! Sadhu! Sadhu!
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