Delighted to share the news of a dear friend and practitioner of many years, Margaret Crouch’s new collection of poetry based on the Lojong, (Mind Training) teachings. Each poem is a response to one of the 59 slogans/maxims that make up the Seven Points of Mind Training from Shamar Rinpoche’s Path to Awakening. You can find the book here:
Falling back one sees The great vastness is infinite I Spring forward! – Sherab Wangchuk
The seasons can be a wonderful reminder for us of the impermanent nature of all we experience. Yet, we still seem to forget and struggle. But even the struggle, or what the Buddha described as suffering, is impermanent. In one of the early Pali discourses, Dukkhatāsutta, the Buddha described three kinds of suffering. The suffering of pain, the suffering caused by conditioned existence, and the suffering due to change. Pain is pretty straightforward.
A headache can be very painful. Straightforward pain. Conditioned existence points to the fact that everything depends on, everything. Everything is everything. If we investigate, can we find any “thing” that is independent of any other “thing”? The truth is that any “thing” is in “dependence” on other things. That is why all the great masters say we will never find true happiness in samsara, the wheel of existence.
Temporary happiness, perhaps. But its nature is suffering. Why? Because it is conditioned. Bound to change. The good news? Pain is also conditioned. And will shift, sooner or later. And that brings us to the third kind of suffering, change. Let’s look again at the change of seasons. Is the nature of winter suffering? Ultimately, no. Relatively? It depends! We might suffer (pain) from the freezing temperatures. Or we might be avid skiers and enjoy the winter wonderland! The same for conditioned existence. We might be happy that winter is a conditioned phenomenon and therefore will not last or we might be unhappy that the winter fun is over. It changed. We might think “I don’t like winter and I’m happy when it changes to warmer weather.” But we forget or ignore that the warm weather will eventually change.
So, what is it that helps us realize the truth of suffering? As my teacher would say, “Awareness, awareness, awareness!” And how wonderful, that the world is not worried that we sometimes forget. It just keeps doing its thing. Reminding us. We can embrace the change of seasons. Notice the changes in temperature. The wildflowers bloom. Notice the leaves changing colors as Autumn approaches. We can say it’s effortless. If we examine, it actually takes more effort to struggle and suffer with change. The world just does its thing. And all we have to do is pay attention. Keep the light of awareness on. Daylight savings tells us to change our clocks. Fall back, Spring forward. Awareness has room for both.
– Jampa
From the Long Beach Meditation April 2023 Newsletter
First days of Spring—the sky is bright blue, the sun huge and warm. Everything’s turning green. Carrying my monk’s bowl, I walk to the village to beg for my daily meal. The children spot me at the temple gate and happily crowd around, dragging on my arms till I stop. I put my bowl on a white rock, hang my bag on a branch. First we braid grasses and play tug-of-war, then we take turns singing and keeping a kick-ball in the air: I kick the ball and they sing, they kick and I sing. Time is forgotten, the hours fly. People passing by point at me and laugh: ‘Why are you acting like such a fool?’ I nod my head and don’t answer. I could say something, but why? Do you want to know what’s in my heart? From the beginning of time: just this! just this!
—Ryokan, translated from the Japanese by John Stevens
Pasadena Bodhi Seeds 
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