Times of great uncertainty and disruption call for an appropriate response. An Ecosattva is a being committed to protecting and serving all, including our precious Earth. We can all walk the path of the Ecosattva, responding to the cry of the earth with clarity and dedication to the interdependent well-being of ourselves, our communities, and all beings.

There are two things that any Ecosattva needs to cultivate to be able to meet the challenges of this moment: fierce compassion and equanimity. Fierce compassion means seeing the suffering of our times clearly, and being willing to take a stand, to act to relieve that suffering however we can. Equanimity is the spaciousness, the perspective to have our action come from a place of deep wisdom rather than reactivity. 

Compassion and Appropriate Action

In many temples in Asia, you see statues of a great being, the bodhisattva of compassion, Avalokiteshvara Kuan Yin. A bodhisattva is an awakened being. In this particular statue, you’ll often see many arms and many hands. In each palm, there’s drawn an eye. Sometimes the bodhisattva is male, sometimes female, transgender; it is very gender fluid. This eye on the palm of each hand, is the eye of wisdom. 

That if we look deeply into the situation, then our action will be appropriate action. But if we are caught up in our own story, and in our strong emotions, our anger, our reactivity, then we won’t be able to see the situation and its depth, and its complexity and its impermanence. Then our action may actually cause more harm than good because it doesn’t have this deep grounding in wisdom. 

It’s challenging to see a situation clearly. The Buddha said that most of our perceptions are wrong. So we need to act, but we need to try to see clearly. For this we need the skill of equanimity, which is non reactivity. It’s seeing things from all sides. 

The word in Sanskrit is upeksa. It means to be able to look and see from all around, like you’re standing on the top of a mountain. You’re not caught in any one side, in any perspective. 

During the war between the US and Vietnam, there was the School of Youth for Social Service. Thousands of youth were going into the countryside to rebuild villages, schools, roads and improve the lives of people. This School of Youth for Social Service was set up by Thich Nhat Hanh.

This was important work. It was often the difference between life and death for people. Yet every week, these young social workers would take a day of mindfulness for themselves to refresh themselves, to come together and practice and to heal, to listen to each other, to share from their hearts. 

They didn’t say the work of the war is too urgent, we have to work seven days a week. They understood that in order to sustain themselves, they had to take regular pauses to take good care of themselves. 

The peace activist A.J. Muste has said, “There is no way to peace; peace is the way.” The young social workers in Vietnam were practicing peace, not working towards peace in a frenetic or frantic way. That’s not how we create peace. We need to manifest it in every step. Not running for something in the future, but being peace in this moment, because the future is made of this moment. 

The young people in Vietnam would rebuild bombed villages. In one village in particular, they rebuilt it, and it was bombed again. They rebuilt it a second time and it was bombed again. They rebuilt it a third time. I believe it happened four times that they rebuilt that village and they didn’t say, “Hey, this isn’t worth it. Let’s just call it a day.” 

They weren’t rebuilding the village because they wanted a particular outcome. Of course they would have preferred I’m sure that the village remained unharmed, but they weren’t dependent on that as their outcome. They rebuilt the village time and again because that’s what they needed to do, not because there was any guarantee that their action was going to work, and succeed in the end. That is a deep example of “There is no way to peace; peace is the way.”  

We’re not doing something with the expectation of a particular outcome. If we do that, if we say, “I’ll only do this, if this happens,” we will burn out very soon. Because either we won’t do it at all, or we do it and if it doesn’t work, then we lose all of our energy, and we fall into despair. So it’s like the difference between conditional and unconditional love. 

It’s hard to practice unconditional love, and it’s very hard to work for change without wanting things to go the way we expect. If we want to survive with our energy, and our hope, our love, our enthusiasm intact, we have to look with this eye in the palm of our hand, which sees that no action goes unrecorded in the larger scheme and the larger flow of life. That an action done out of pure intent to bring joy or relieve suffering is never lost, even if in the immediate outcome it’s not what we want, and maybe it’s even the opposite. That eye in the hand of our action is the eye that sees that all we can do is what we deeply feel and know needs to be done. 

The only way we can be truly free and deeply powerful in that action is if we do it because we know it needs to be done. That is the power of equanimity, that we need to balance out the fierce compassion that drives us to action. 

In The World We Have: A Buddhist Approach to Peace and Ecology, my teacher Thich Nhat Hanh tells the story of a senior nun from Vietnam, who came to visit Plum Village, his monastery in France. She had been diagnosed with terminal cancer and was given three or four months to live. She accepted this and decided to put all of her energy into practicing to be fully present in each moment for the [remaining] days she had left to live. She was aware of her breathing, of her steps. She was mindful of each of her bodily movements throughout the day. Before returning to Hanoi, where she expected to die, a sister persuaded her to go get a checkup in France. The doctors found that all of the metastasized cancer had receded to just one area. She lived for more than 14 years after she was told she had just three months. 

He tells this story as a collective metaphor. We are facing a possible extinction as a species. If we can accept that things are going to change, maybe end, and we are on the brink of real collapse, we put our whole hearts knowing this is it. We live deeply, fully as a human species, with other species, and with the earth, understanding, “Okay, we’ve messed this up. Now we just have a little time. How can we live deeply with all beings on this planet?”

This is what the nun was doing when she was determined to practice. Because she said, “Well, my life is going to end in a few months. Let me give all of my attention to this step, this breath, this moment.” She wasn’t trying to live for 14 more years, that just happened. Her desire was simply to do what needed to be done, to practice with all of her energy for the few months that she was told she had left. So she was truly free. She wasn’t thinking, “I’ll do this so that I can get this in return.” 

That is really working with the mystery, the unknown, and letting life just unfold, and hold us and teach us. So that is what this practice of the Ecosattva path is, to give our best wholeheartedly, not with any outcome that we are attached to. We never know what may come of that action. 

♦

This article is adapted from a dharma talk given in November 2023 titled “Taking the Ecosattva Path: Equanimity and Fierce Compassion.”

The post Embodying the Equanimity and Fierce Compassion of Avalokiteshvara appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

Times of great uncertainty and disruption call for an appropriate response. An Ecosattva is a being committed to protecting and serving all, including our precious earth. We can all walk this path, responding to the cry of the earth with clarity and dedication to the interdependent wellbeing of ourselves, our communities and our planet. In this talk, we will explore how compassion and equanimity work together to keep us balanced, grounded and resourced. Without equanimity, we can engage to an extent that we burn out or get lost in the situation. And fierce compassion gives us the courage to stand up to injustice while also grounding our equanimity in the real suffering that is ever-present so that our hearts stay open and connected to the wholesome nectar of loving kindness and deep care.

Kaira Jewel Lingo is a dharma teacher who teaches in the Plum Village Zen tradition and in the Vipassana tradition. Living as an ordained nun for 15 years, she trained closely with her teacher, Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh. Her teaching focuses on activists, educators, artists, youth and families, and Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC), and includes the interweaving of art, play, nature, ecology, and embodied mindfulness practice.

The post Taking the Ecosattva Path: Equanimity and Fierce Compassion appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

When did you become a Buddhist and why? I began practicing Buddhism in 1997 when I first visited Plum Village in France, because I found a teacher [Thich Nhat Hanh] that was incredibly clear and inspiring, a practice that really worked, and a community that was deeply healing. 

Is your family Buddhist? I grew up in a Christian family and community. After I first went to Plum Village, my dad, a Christian minister, visited us for a Buddhist-Christian silent retreat. He then started regularly attending retreats and was inspired to cofound a local sangha that has been meeting weekly for over 25 years. He ordained into the Order of Interbeing and later became a lay dharma teacher just after I received the Dharma Lamp. So my dad has practiced wholeheartedly in both Christian and Buddhist traditions ever since I started practicing Buddhism. My mom, sister, and brother, and my nieces and nephews have all attended retreats or visited the monastery as well. 

What’s your favorite breakfast on retreat? I love oatmeal with fruit, seeds, and nuts. I also love the rice and bean congee with crispy onions and homemade pickles we would have in the monastery.

What’s your daily practice? I meditate for an hour in the mornings with my partner. Sometimes we will also practice chanting or read spiritual teachings. I also usually meditate at least one other time during the day with the online groups I lead or am a part of. 

Favorite aphorism? “Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.” –Buddha

What’s the longest you’ve gone without meditating? How do you get back on track? Probably just a few days. As a full-time dharma teacher, I offer meditation as part of my daily activities, so even if I skip regular meditation practice due to travel or illness, I can’t go more than a few days without offering it to others. I get back on track by noticing how the lack of meditation impacts my mind and body negatively, as I tend to lose perspective, speed up, and be less in touch with awe and wonder. This motivates me to return to regular practice. Having good spiritual friends who are dedicated practitioners is also a big support. 

Book on your nightstand? Ruth Ozeki’s A Tale for the Time Being.

What do you like to do in your free time? Hike, swim in a natural body of water, read, go slowly, lie in a hammock, sit in front of a fire, connect with my partner, spend time with my dog, visit with friends, cook, garden, journal, make art.

What non-Buddhist do you look to for guidance? Dr. King, Howard Thurman, Resmaa Menakem, Vandana Shiva, Bear Heart, Dorothy Day, and pretty much any mystic of any tradition or time. 

What was your first job? Teaching English in Brazil when I was 16. 

Why did you want to teach a dharma talk on the Ecosattva Path for Tricycle? Because the dharma can offer us much-needed spiritual tools to help us navigate this very precarious time of societal unraveling due to the climate crisis.

What Buddhist book has most affected your practice? While traveling in India in 1997, I read Old Path, White Clouds, a beautiful account of the Buddha’s life by Thich Nhat Hanh. I soaked it up like a sponge, reading for hours in the land where the events recounted in the book had happened millennia earlier. I was moved by the Buddha’s calm, humor, and compassion, by how human he was and by how much he loved his students. Every word on the page awoke in me the wish to follow this path for myself and touch true liberation in my own heart and in the collective mind. When I have read it again since then, I have found it just as fresh and full of new insights.

The post Visiting Teacher: Kaira Jewel Lingo appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

I spent fifteen years as a nun in the Plum Village community of Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh (whom we affectionately call Thay, or “Teacher” in Vietnamese). Often people would ask Thay what to do when facing big life decisions, like which career path to take, whether to separate from or stay with their partner, or whether to ordain as a monastic. Thay would often say, “Don’t try to figure out the answer by thinking about it.” In thinking over a question again and again, we do not generally arrive at real wisdom, but we easily tire ourselves out and get even more confused or anxious.

These deeper life questions can’t be resolved at the level of the mind but must be entrusted to a different, deeper part of our consciousness. Thay suggests we consider this big question as a seed, plant it in the soil of our mind and let it rest there. Our mindfulness practice in our daily lives is the sunshine and water that the seed needs to sprout so that one day it will rise up on its own, in its own time. And then we’ll know the answer to our question without a doubt.

But we must leave the seed down in the soil of our mind and not keep digging it up to see if it is growing roots. It won’t grow that way! It is the same with a deep and troubling question. We ask our deeper consciousness to take care of it and then let go of our thinking and worrying about it. Then in our daily lives we practice calming, resting, and coming home to ourselves in the present moment, and that will help the seed of our question to ripen naturally and authentically. This process cannot be rushed or forced. It may take weeks, months, or years. But we can trust that the seed is “down there,” being tended to by our deeper consciousness, and one day it will sprout into a clear answer.

In Buddhist psychology this part of our mind is called store consciousness. This is because it has the function of storing our memories and all the various mind states we can experience in latent, sleeping form. For example, maybe you’ve experienced trying to solve a problem or find an answer to something that perplexes you. You think hard and circle round and round in your mind, but you feel you don’t get anywhere. Then you let the question go, and suddenly when you least expect it, inspiration or helpful ideas come to you in a time of rest, and you just know what to do. That is store consciousness operating. It is working on the problem for you while your day-to-day consciousness rests. Store consciousness works in a very natural and easeful way and is much more efficient than our thinking mind. When wisdom arises from store consciousness, it feels right in the body and we no longer have doubts.

But waiting for the answer to arise can be challenging at times, because we may really want to know the answer. We may find ourselves feeling deeply insecure and fearful if we don’t know what to do, which path to choose. We worry we will make the wrong choice, and we catastrophize about what will happen if we take this or that direction. It’s hard to find our way if we continue to feed this worry and fear. We can recognize that we are not helping the situation and stop. Returning to this moment, anchoring ourselves in our body, we will find the solidity of the home inside of us, which is capable of helping us find our way, if only we let it, and if we can let go of trying to figure out the future in our heads.

Some years ago, I was trying to determine whether or not to leave the monastic life after having lived basically all my adult life, from age twenty-five to forty, as a nun. During that time, I attended silent retreats at the Insight Meditation Society (IMS) in Massachusetts for several years in a row that were six weeks or three months long. These retreats were times outside of time, weeks when I could not leave the grounds and take action but just had to “stay home” with myself. Being in silence, with limited social interaction, I had the luxury of time to look closely at myself and do nothing. It was an important time of pausing, to look deeply, to let my own consciousness take its time to find the way.

In the space of not-knowing, life could unfold in innumerable ways.

When I decided to ordain as a nun, in my heart I was making a lifelong commitment. So it was painful and confusing to find myself questioning this vow that I had assumed would carry me through my entire life. In that time of transition, I didn’t know who I was anymore and had no idea who I might become. I was in the midst of a process, like the caterpillar that must dissolve itself completely in the chrysalis to become a butterfly. It was terrifying and extremely uncomfortable when I wanted answers and clarity, when I was used to knowing who I was and where I was going.

Joseph Goldstein was one of my interview teachers on these retreats at IMS, and when I shared how distressing it was to find myself with no solid ground under me whatsoever, he mentioned Alan Watts’s book The Wisdom of Insecurity. It points out that when we are clear and sure about what we are doing, we are less open to the many other possibilities available. But when we let ourselves hang out in the space of not-knowing, there is enormous potential and life could unfold in innumerable ways. So rather than avoid and fear this place of uncertainty, we can embrace it and all its gifts.

What I found on these long silent retreats was not an answer to my dilemma of whether to disrobe or continue as a nun but rather the ability to dwell more and more comfortably in the condition of not-knowing. I learned to allow the seed of my question to rest in the deeper layers of my consciousness. I was able to touch peace, joy, and well-being in the midst of not-knowing, in the midst of awkwardness and confusion. I learned to let go of fear and resistance right in the midst of dissolving and losing my identity.

By slowing down, by choosing to rest back into the uncertainty rather than fighting it, I was able to touch into a sense of space, precisely in moments when it felt like there was no way to keep going and I would be totally overwhelmed. If we can breathe in and out, putting our mind completely on our breathing, or feel our body and put all our attention on the sensations in the body, we can create that space. We slow things down and let our nervous system recalibrate and center. The external situation may not change, but we’ve changed in relation to our external situation. If we can stop, we have the chance to touch into something deeper than feeling overwhelmed. This practice of pausing, or stopping, helps the seed of our question to mature and ripen into the guidance and direction we need.

In a sense, our culture, our society is dissolving. We are collectively entering the chrysalis: structures we have come to rely on and identify with are breaking down, and we don’t know what the next phase will be like. We are in the cocoon. Learning to surrender in our own lives is essential to our collective learning to move through this time of faster and faster change, disruption, and breakdown.

♦

From We Were Made for These Times by Kaira Jewel Lingo, © 2021. Reprinted in arrangement with Parallax Press.

The post Trusting the Unknown appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

I spent fifteen years as a nun in the Plum Village community of Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh (whom I affectionately call Thay, or “teacher” in Vietnamese). Often people would ask Thay what to do when facing big life decisions, like which career path to take, whether to separate or stay with their partner, or whether to ordain as a monastic. Thay would often say, “Don’t try to figure out the answer by thinking about it.” In thinking over a question again and again, we do not generally arrive at real wisdom, but we easily tire ourselves out and get even more confused or anxious. 

These deeper life questions can’t be resolved at the level of the mind, but must be entrusted to a different, deeper part of our consciousness. Thay suggests we consider this big question as a seed, plant it in the soil of our mind and let it rest there. Our mindfulness practice in our daily lives is the sunshine and water that the seed needs to sprout so that one day it will rise up on its own, in its own time. And then we’ll know the answer to our question without a doubt. 

But we must leave the seed down in the soil of our mind and not keep digging it up to see if it is growing roots. It won’t grow that way! It is the same with a deep and troubling question. We ask our deeper consciousness to take care of it, and then let go of our thinking and worrying about it. Then in our daily lives we practice calming, resting, and coming home to ourselves in the present moment and that will help the seed of our question to ripen naturally and authentically. This process cannot be rushed or forced. It may take weeks, months, or years. But we can trust that the seed is “down there,” being tended to by our deeper consciousness, and one day it will sprout into a clear answer.

In Buddhist psychology this part of our mind is called store consciousness. This is because it has the function of storing our memories and all the various mind states we can experience in latent, sleeping form. For example, maybe you’ve experienced trying to solve a problem or find an answer to something that perplexes you. You think hard and circle round and round in your mind, but you feel you don’t get anywhere. Then you let the question go, and suddenly when you least expect it, inspiration or helpful ideas come to you in a time of rest, and you just know what to do. That is store consciousness operating. It is working on the problem for you while your day-to-day consciousness rests. Store consciousness works in a very natural and easeful way and is much more efficient than our thinking mind. When wisdom arises from store consciousness, it feels right in the body and we no longer have doubts.  

But waiting for the answer to arise can be challenging at times because we may really want to know the answer. We may find ourselves feeling deeply insecure and fearful if we don’t know what to do, which path to choose. We worry we will make the wrong choice and we catastrophize about what will happen if we take this or that direction. It’s hard to find our way if we continue to feed this worry and fear. We can recognize that we are not helping the situation and stop. Returning to this moment, anchoring ourselves in our body, we will find the solidity of the home inside of us, which is capable of helping us find our way, if only we let it, and if we can let go of trying to figure out the future in our heads. 

Some years ago, I was trying to discern whether or not to leave the monastic life after having lived basically all of my adult life, from age twenty-five to forty, as a nun. During that time, I attended silent retreats at the Insight Meditation Society in Massachusetts, or IMS, for several years in a row that were six weeks or three months long. These retreats were times outside of time, weeks when I could not leave the grounds and take action, but just had to “stay home” with myself. Being in silence, social interaction was limited, and I had the luxury of time to look closely at myself and do nothing. It was an important time of pause, to look deeply, to return home to myself and let my own consciousness take its time to find the way. 

When I decided to ordain as a nun at age twenty-five, in my heart I was making a lifelong commitment. So it was painful and confusing to find myself questioning this vow that I had assumed would carry me through my entire life. In that time of transition, I didn’t know who I was anymore and had no idea who I might become. I was in the midst of a process, like the caterpillar that must dissolve itself completely in the chrysalis to become a butterfly. It was terrifying and extremely uncomfortable when I wanted answers and clarity, when I was used to knowing who I was and where I was going. 

Joseph Goldstein was one of my interview teachers on these retreats at IMS and when I shared how distressing it was to find myself with no solid ground under me whatsoever, he mentioned Alan Watts’ book, The Wisdom of Insecurity. It points out that when we are clear and sure about what we are doing, we cannot be open to the many other possibilities available. But when we let ourselves hang out in the space of not-knowing, there is enormous potential and life could unfold in innumerable ways. So, rather than avoid and fear this place of uncertainty, we can embrace it and all its gifts.

When we are clear and sure about what we are doing, we cannot be open to the many other possibilities available.

What I found on these long silent retreats was not an answer to my dilemma of whether to disrobe or continue as a nun, but rather the ability to dwell more and more comfortably in the condition of not-knowing. I learned to allow the seed of my question to rest in the deeper layers of my consciousness. I was able to touch peace, joy, and wellbeing in the midst of not-knowing, in the midst of awkwardness and confusion. I learned to let go of fear and resistance right in the midst of dissolving and losing my identity.

By slowing down, choosing to rest back into the uncertainty rather than fighting it, I was able to touch into a sense of space, precisely in moments when it felt like there was no way to keep going, and I would be totally overwhelmed. If we can breathe in and out, putting our mind completely on our breathing, or feel our bodies and put all of our attention on the sensations in the body, we can create that space. We slow things down and let our nervous system recalibrate and center. The external situation may not change, but we’ve changed in relation to our external situation. If we can stop, we have the chance to touch into something deeper than overwhelm. This practice of pausing, or stopping, helps the seed of our question to mature and ripen into the guidance and direction we need.

In a sense, our culture, our society is dissolving. We are collectively entering the chrysalis, and structures we have come to rely on and identify with are breaking down and we don’t know what the next phase will be like. We are in the cocoon. Learning to surrender in our own lives is essential to our collective learning to move through this time of faster and faster change, disruption, and breakdown.

***

Meditation 

To begin the practice, find a comfortable position, sitting, standing, or lying. Connect with your body and how it’s making contact with the chair or the floor. Allow yourself to rest back in some way and really feel the support of whatever is holding you. . . Every time you breathe out, let your body rest even more into the support of the earth. 

Allow your face to soften, releasing the forehead, the muscles around the eyes, the jaw. . .

Let the tongue rest in the mouth. . .

Be aware of the shoulders and as you breathe out, let the shoulders soften. . .

Bring attention to the chest and belly, allow them to release and soften on the next exhale. . .

Notice your arms and hands, with the next exhale let them grow a little heavier, releasing tension. . .

Feel your legs and feet, as you exhale release, soften and let go. . .

Feel your whole body now as you inhale and exhale, allowing the whole body to soften and release its weight even more onto the earth. . .

Now bring to mind some question or challenge you may have right now …  notice how you feel about it, and the pull that may be there to resolve it. . . Without trying to figure out an answer or solution, see this question or challenge as a seed you are entrusting to the soil of your mind, down in its depths. . . just allow it to lie there, peacefully, quietly. . . let yourself rest back into the unknown, inviting your body to just slightly, actually lean back a tiny bit. . . let yourself reconnect with the feeling of being held by the earth. . . you can rest on the earth, just as this question can rest in the depths of your mind. . . while it may be scary not to know, there is also infinite possibility here. . . take a few deep breaths. . . feel your body, settling, present. . . and give the seed permission to take the time it needs to ripen into an answer. . . trust your own consciousness to show you the way when the time is right. 

You may like to practice, 

The Buddha is in me
I have confidence

And if it’s helpful, you are welcome to practice it along with your breathing, 

Breathing in, the Buddha is in me, 
Breathing out, I have confidence

It means the capacity of awakening is your nature. You can trust in this. 

Let yourself breathe and open to this truth of your own ability to access presence, wisdom, patience, ease, even in the midst of uncertainty. You can do this. 

Trust, resilience, wisdom is my nature, 
I have confidence.

I entrust myself, I entrust myself, to the earth, to the earth, and she entrusts herself to me. —Plum Village song

***

DAILY LIFE OFF THE CUSHION 

You can bring this quality of resting back into your daily life. When you notice yourself leaning into the future, tensing up, trying to predict what will happen, straining to figure out what to do, whether on your own or with others, see if you can actually physically rest back. Open up the front of your chest, let your arms hang by your sides, and lean backwards slightly. This can support your mind to rest back, release and let be, even for a short moment and to whatever degree you are able. 

♦

Excerpted from We Were Made for These Times by Kaira Jewel Lingo (2021) with permission of Parallax Press.

The post Trusting the Unknown  appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

In 1997 I spent three months in India. A friend in Delhi had Old Path, White Clouds, a very thick, novel-like account of the Buddha’s life by Thich Nhat Hanh. I soaked it up like a sponge, reading for hours in the land where the events recounted in the book had happened millennia earlier.

Thich Nhat Hanh’s intention was to make the Buddha and his disciples come alive, and that is how I experienced them. I was moved by the Buddha’s calm and even his humor in the face of insult and slander, his compassion when he helped a serial murderer to awaken, how he was saddened by a major split in the sangha, and the way he taught through his final moments. Every word on the page awoke in me the wish to follow this path for myself and discover the liberation that this awakened individual was pointing to in my own heart.

I’ve read this book several times since. It was my bedtime reading one summer retreat at Plum Village, and I looked forward to reading it each evening by flashlight. A good story never grows old.

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