Devotion
Devotion and faith (to the way of the Buddha) aren’t outward things. They don’t depend on the words we say, the altars we build, whether one is a monastic or a lay person or even who one prays to. In true devotion, there is no contrivance and nothing is required except a giving of the heart – and renunciation or letting go of the fierce attachment to the thoughts, fears, and appearances of this transient life. This requires no formality or ceremony. In letting go, we create space for the light of truth and liberation from suffering. What does letting go mean? The Dharma teaches that we must first see with wisdom that what we hold onto are mirages! -memories, names, false constructions, temporary feelings connected to thoughts and smells, and associations. They are built through innumerable causes temporarily coming together in a moment and then falling away… if we let them.
This heart of devotion doesn’t try to force or control or to preach. It doesn’t judge, doesn’t push, and doesn’t pretend. It completely lacks fabrication. This is love in the true sense – in the absolute sense. Bodhicitta.
We are in a battle right now. There are forces that are attempting to drag us away from that one true thing- to distract the surface mind, to steep us further into delusion, to give away agency, and to inhibit our intrinsic nature from being known and expressed through all sorts of means.
It is funny. Even as I write this I notice an irritation arise as intrusions from phone notifications push in. I notice a desire for space- – but isn’t that also what needs to be released? It isn’t the people or the notifications- it is the attachment to the thought and reaction and aversion to the “intrusion”. I can actually be here now with no push/ pull; no me/ no you; no here/ no there.
Let us be unrelenting in considering all obstacles AS path and in rooting in the truth of our being. Let us look at and really see each other with open hearts. Let us shed all that is false. Let us take refuge in the goodness and the brightness that is our essential nature.
Manjushri said, “Layman, how should a bodhisattva who is ill go about tempering and controlling his mind?” Vimilakirti replied, “A bodhisattva who is ill should think to himself: ‘Now these illnesses of mine all spring from the deluded thoughts, the upside-down thinking and various earthly desires of my past existence. They have no real existence, so who is it who suffers illness? Why? The four major elements come together, and therefore we apply a makeshift name, calling the thing a body. But the four major elements have no master, and the body has no “I” or ego. And these illnesses too all arise from attachment to ego. Therefore I should harbor no such attachment to ego.”
…”Then, in order to wipe out the thought of phenomena, the ailing bodhisattva should think to himself: ‘This thought or concept of phenomena too is a form of upside-down thinking, and upside-down thinking can lead to great misfortune. I must rid myself of it. But how to rid myself of it? By ridding myself of thoughts of I and mine, which means ridding myself of dualism.’ “What is meant by ridding oneself of dualism? It means not thinking of phenomena as internal or external, but treating all as equal. What is meant by equal? It means that I and nirvana are treated as equal. Why? Because I and nirvana are both empty. Why are they empty? Because they are mere names, hence empty. Neither of these two phenomena has any fixed nature or characteristics. Once one has acquired this kind of equal outlook, one will be freed of all other illness and will have only the illness of emptioness, and the illness of emptiness too is empty.”
Vimilakirti Sutra
