Message from My Mudra

All wisdom is rooted in learning to call things by the right name. When things are properly identified, they fall into natural categories and understanding becomes orderly. - Confucius in the Zen Calendar (February 22, 2003).

Day 210. My mudra spoke to me during zazen last night. I am forgoing a witty and engaging opening line to hasten my description of it. Besides, a dinner of popcorn, chocolate chips and three cups of Chai tea has my thought processes revved up just a little bit. Clearly, I am becoming a real writer.

Zazen was especially poignant last night. I repeated the Metta meditation I learned from the guest teacher on Sunday. In summary, Metta meditation involves three specific segments of directing loving kindness to self, a benefactor of self, a neutral person, and a difficult person. On Sunday, Arpita led us through the meditation aloud, though last night I chanted the words inwardly. I began with Self, repeating internally: "May I be healed; may I be physically, emotionally, and spiritually healed. May I be happy. May I be free from suffering and the causes of suffering." Next, I repeated the three affirming statements while saying the name of a benefactor, then a neutral person, and finally a challenging person in my life. The internal words synchronized themselves with my breath, which became slow, rhythmic and effortless. I remember thinking, "I'm not a bad breather after all!" I became deeply centered and peaceful. Not a sound out of the Primates. I felt clear, focused and purposeful.

Prior to the Metta meditation, Arpita had guided us on a "body scan" visualization. She asked us to simply scan through our bodies, slowly, beginning with the crown of our head and working our way down to the tip of our toes. It was suggested that we might become aware of sensations like tight, heavy, tingling, tense, relaxed, cold, warm, etc. The beautiful thing was Arpita's reminder that we remain in a position of loving kindness and acceptance toward all of the sensations we came across. She suggested that we refrain from trying to change anything, rather that we gently register it with loving kindness and move on. Arpita is a memorable teacher. During meditation on both Sunday and Monday, the body scan was a powerful experience. I was astonished at how vividly I could mentally travel throughout my body, gently resting awareness on specific sites. Quietly directing compassionate, accepting energy to each body section was like honey flowing in my veins. A sweet, golden, viscous sensation of healing.

The sequence of a body scan followed by Metta meditation last night opened me to a significant insight. While scanning sensation in my wrists and hands, I registered a familiar, disquieting feeling in the middle finger of my left hand. On many occasions, that finger feels displaced, uncoordinated, and asymmetrical with the other fingers comprising my mudra. It won't lay flat; it curls up a little at the middle knuckle. Attempts to force it down make both wrists tight and sore. In my internal body sense, the knuckles of that finger don't align properly with the finger lying underneath. My mudra feels unnatural and wobbly. The errant finger disrupts the energy centered within that important component of my meditation posture. The breath entering and exiting through my mudra gets hung up, like dragging a shoelace through a hole without the eyelet. My whole Zen process was being interrupted by one oppositional finger.

Deeply centered within my Metta meditation, and recalling Arpita's instruction to remain compassionate toward our bodies, I halted the ridicule and judgment I have been directing toward that finger on my left hand. Without consciously directing the action, I felt the equivalent finger on my right hand shift ever so slightly. With a movement so subtle as to be almost imperceptible, the finger straightened and lifted a fraction of a centimeter. It had been the tiniest bit too relaxed, such that it was not supporting the left finger. With an infinitesimal increase in tension of the right finger as it lay underneath the left, my mudra righted itself. It felt perfect: symmetrical, strong, balanced. My breath flowed evenly again. Beautiful Zen was restored.

I was stunned. An epiphany stung my mind like a wasp in honeysuckle. My initial explanation of what was "wrong" with my mudra was utterly incorrect. I had faulted the defective left finger, blaming and judging it as the culprit for my sore wrists, sagging mudra, and frustrating cushion time. In reality, the explanation for my struggles derived from the underlying hand, my dominant hand, the supportive infrastructure on which my left hand rested. Correcting what lay underneath solved the problem. My left finger simply needed more support. It had become fatigued and crooked from trying to hold itself up alone. The finger was misaligned and bending because it lacked an adequate foundation. Strengthen the foundation, and the whole mudra was healed.

This is the exact process by which we fail to solve major difficulties in the world. We blame the wrong thing. We label people and systems that are weak, out of alignment, and struggling as the actual problem. If they would just shape up and act right, everything would be fixed. Unconsciously, by default, we accusingly point to the effects of defective foundations rather than the foundation itself. Two examples come to mind. First, the simplistic, erroneous conclusion that poverty is the result of lazy, worthless freeloaders looking for an easy handout rather than a complicated infrastructure resplendent with bias, prejudice, ignorant historical precedent, and a tendency to generalize a small percentage of malingerers to entire populations. I frequently see a second example in my practice. It is common for women with histories of sexual assault and/or abuse to sexually act out. They are subsequently labeled as whores, sluts and a host of other derogatory terms. The accurate understanding is comprised of extremely complex psychological dynamics, not the least of which is a society that blames victims rather than challenge the innumerable systemic flaws that continually allow men to perpetuate violence against women.

Too many words distracting from my mudra message, which is this: Look carefully, with loving kindness, at that which first appears to be the cause of a problem. Breathe deep. Breath deep again. Observe closely, with compassion. Chances are, something is lying underneath what you thought was the problem. Fix that, and you'll have a real solution.

Gassho,
CycleBuddhaDoc