A Healing Journey to the Land of Fire and Ice

I'm very excited to share that a story I wrote about one of my Icelandic adventures has just been published by elephant journal, along with some of my photos from the trip.

Here's a little preview:

“Keep some room in your heart for the unimaginable.” ~ Mary Oliver

Nearly a year ago, in October of 2014, I fell down some steps and sustained a severe spinal injury, including compression fractures in my thoracic spine, bruising in my sacrum and tailbone area, and whiplash in my neck.

Thankfully, my spinal cord was undamaged and I suffered no paralysis or permanent impairment (though I did lose an inch of height due to the compression fractures).

After many months, I have made a significant recovery, with the help of intensive physical therapy and countless other healing modalities, and yet the healing process continues. Though I have been cautious about over-exerting myself, a broken back can’t keep a good woman down, so this past June I ventured to Iceland, alone, heeding a call from somewhere in the depths of my soul.

I felt that my intuition was guiding me there, though I had no idea why.

In the Land of Fire and Ice, I experienced several everyday miracles, including a profound physical ordeal that pushed me to my limits, ultimately resulting in deep release and healing...

Click here to continue reading.

A Sacred Journey to Goa, India

Originally published in the Shambhala Times Community News Magazine, July 8, 2015

In March of 2015 I had the opportunity to travel to Goa, India, with two Shambhala friends, Whitney Hall from Austin, and Harish Rao from Los Angeles. I met Harish, whose family is from Goa, during Shambhala Art Teacher Training, and we had been talking for some time about collaborating to put together a contemplative arts retreat or workshop in India. This spring, we were able to plan a trip together to visit and start laying the groundwork for a possible program in Goa.

As Harish recently explained, “I have heard Shambhala referred to as a place where path, practice, and community come together. I have often felt this way about my native Goa, India. This stretches back to its Portuguese roots; travelers of divergent faiths and cultural backgrounds have arrived through the years to create a unique melting pot and diversity of art, spirituality, and music. It has long been a place where people have come to discover aspects of themselves they may never have known and connect with people from around the world seeking the same. It is a balance of Indian and Bohemian integration that is hard to describe, yet easy to experience. Goa, in some ways, is an untapped, secret court of riches waiting to be discovered by those who venture into its historical landscape.”

For me, the journey held a quality of pilgrimage, with the anticipation of visiting a sacred land, not knowing exactly what I would discover or experience along the way. I’ve always dreamed of traveling to India, the birthplace of so many sacred traditions and practices, including meditation and yoga, which have deeply influenced my life’s path. In addition to my meditation and contemplative arts practices, I work as a writing and creativity coach, and I am pursuing a Ph.D. in psychology, specializing in creativity studies. My dissertation research will explore how contemplative arts practices, such as those laid out in the Shambhala Art and Miksang teachings, facilitate healing, insight, and resilience in workshop and retreat settings. So for me the journey also represented a synthesis of my academic, research, and spiritual, explorations.

To continue reading the article and see some of my photos from the trip, click here.

On Pain and Healing

Five weeks ago, I slipped and fell down my side porch steps, plummeting down on my spine, and badly injuring myself. I sustained several compression fractures in my thoracic spine, as well as intense pain and bruising around my sacrum. The experience has been humbling and eye-opening, and quite an existential journey. I felt inspired to write a poem about it in an attempt to express my feelings about this twisted path of pain and healing. Here is what manifested:

Let the pain be your guide, they said.

So I opened my body and heart

to the curious sensations

of bones fractured, bruised and aching,

muscles clenching for dear life

to hold me upright--

keep me from succumbing once again

to the awful pull of gravity.

Some days the pain softened,

and I could move freely, make love,

even dance to the sweet sounds of gypsy jazz.

Other days my spine screamed in agony and

I simply could not attend to the basic necessities.

Found myself huddled

on the floor, in the pose of the child,

my nervous system frayed,

gasping for some reprieve.

But I discovered the pain was not so solid,

that my bones had become a barometer

of the cold front passing through,

the rains enveloping the earth,

of cruel words and tender acts of love,

all registering deeply within my marrow.

Walking the streets,

grateful for strong legs and supple flesh,

I drank in the vastness of the sky,

quivered with the cool caress of the wind

like never before.

Precious, precious gift, to be alive,

embodied within skeleton and tissue

that can sustain blunt trauma,

and yet heal, again to feel

the warm glow of sun on skin.

--Me

Update - 9/2/15: I am pleased to share that this poem has been published in the new compilation "Capturing Shadows: Poetic Encounters Along the Path of Grief and Loss" edited by Louis Hoffman and Michael Moats through University Professors Press. "Capturing Shadows" is now available on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Capturing-Shadows-Poetic-Encounters-Along/dp/1939686091

About the book: "Long before contemporary approaches to helping people face death, loss, and other life transitions, poetry was used by many cultures to assist the grieving process. Today, it remains an important healing art. Capturing Shadows is an original collection of poems about actively engaging one's grieving and loss with a purpose. The poems were written by therapists, counselors, educators, and others who understand and have experienced the struggle of leaning into one's pain...Whether wanting assistance with one's own grief and loss, a deeper understanding of the grief and loss, or a resource to help others in their journey, Capturing Shadows is a wonderful resource for all touched by death, loss, and other difficult life transitions."

On Love

"You shine like the sun," he said, and then...
Dreams of coming and going;
the tension of messiness and imperfection.
The old, old wounds we carry around
into every new connection...
I love you, even in your pain and your untidyness,
and I'm grateful for your love.
Terrifying as it is,
the will to open,
to love and be loved
overcomes all objections in the end.

--Me

Musings from Eastern Europe

I recently returned from a trip to Eastern Europe with my friend Jake Lorfing. We traveled to Prague and Poland to start laying the groundwork for a possible contemplative arts retreat focusing on the Holocaust. We spent time in the old Jewish quarters of Prague and Krakow, visited the former ghetto / concentration camp of Terezin in the Czech Republic, and spent three days at Auschwitz, where we stayed at the Centre for Dialogue and Prayer.

For me, it was also something of a roots journey, as my Jewish side of the family came from Poland, the Ukraine, Lithuania, and Austria, but I had never visited these places before. To be honest, in some way I viewed this part of the world as the heart of darkness, the place from which my Jewish ancestors fled. And certainly it was, for a time. But it is also a place like any other, full of good people living their lives, with a complex and tragic history, with a rich culture, and a living present...We spent a lot of time walking the camps and contemplating the enormity of what happened there. It's impossible to put it into words, of course, but I did take a lot of photos, and found myself scribbling out this poem high above the Atlantic during the long flight home:

Riding the edge of twilight
Chasing the setting sun 
Above the clouds, below the sky
Five hundred miles an hour
An arctic haze of pink and blue
Is this limbo, or just another never-ending transatlantic afternoon?

Your kiss still lingers
Even as it fades.
In fits of sleep,
I dream another universe
But awaken to my breath,
The beating of my heart.

I saw grace etched in stone
In the epic streets of Prague
And despair rendered mute
In Birkenau's rusted barbs.
Only the trees, those elegant trees,
Bear witness now.

How to return and not to forget?
To honor these few borrowed breaths
With a resounding yes
That trumps all instances of no
A love that suffuses darkness and light,
As the soft overcomes the hard,
Melting into night.

-- Melinda Rothouse

Click here to view more photos from the journey.

What Inspires You? Introducing Syncreate

I'm so pleased to share my newest venture, Syncreate, a partnership with my colleague Charlotte Gullick. We founded Syncreate to offer creativity coaching, consulting, retreats and workshops, mentoring, international study, and storytelling services to enhance creativity, foster communication, collaboration, and community, and nurture compassion. Our main areas of focus are creativity studies, writing and storytelling, public speaking and singing, and end-of-life issues.

We recently help our first half-day workshop, "The Art and Science of Creativity: Exploring the Path and Expanding Your Tools," in Austin. During this event, we explored the neuroscience of creativity, how to facilitate the creative process, and concrete tools to foster dynamic, creative learning and leadership.

One of the first questions we asked participants to think about was "What engages and inspires you?" After the workshop, we blogged about our experience and some of the exercises we explored together. Click Syncreate Blog: What Inspires You? for the full post on the Syncreate blog. 

Tahitian Dreams

I flew a quarter-span of the globe
to the middle of the South Pacific,
tracing the balms of coconut and vanilla
back to their island roots

I saw the Southern Cross for the first time
and I understood...
Tahitian dreams made real,
rendered in shades of aquamarine
no artist's palette could conceive...

Tiny rippling waves
greeting the sandy beach ~
a quiet meeting of land and sea.

I woke at dawn
as if summoned
to greet this precious new day.

The sun rises slowly
behind a huge bank of clouds
making a masterpiece of the sky.

Earth meets sea
and sea meets sky
the sun sets the water ablaze
as the wind caresses my tender skin.

All photos by Melinda Rothouse, Copyright 2013. For more images of my adventures in the South Pacific, please visit this link: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151348420937883.1073741825.593297882&type=1&l=60ff27eee1

On Death and Grieving

 My maternal grandmother, Maxine Marinelli Beach, passed away last Sunday at the age of 101, just three weeks shy of her 102nd birthday. Though I had been preparing myself for her passing for a long time, I am surprised by the depth of my sadness and grief. I wrote this poem about her life and my memories of her to read at her memorial service.

Memories of Nana Maxine

Nana Maxine moved slowly,

inching along with her cane, which

she might point at you menacingly,

if you were out of line,

with an arched eyebrow,

an impish smile rippling across her face.

There was fire behind her eyes,

always twinkling,

quick to say “I love you,

a bushel and a peck,

and a hug around the neck!”

She leaves a legacy of

beloved landscapes,

rendered in oil paint,

and hanging in gilded frames.

An appreciation of fields and fence posts,

lazy rivers and softly sloping mountains,

sparrows and seagulls,

the shimmer of light on water,

the majesty of the sea,

and the thousand shades of blue, yellow,

and crimson in the sky at sunset -

an eye for the magic and wonder

of the natural world.

She survived a stroke that left her

paralyzed on the right side of her body,

and learned to paint again, left handed.

An artful life lived in the little details ~

Silver-rimmed cat glasses and colorful clothing.

A doorstop made of a stone with a ghoulish

little face painted on it. A Christmas

ornament of macramé with a chocolate

inside, and a note saying “Squeeze me

and I’ll give you a kiss!”

I remember chasing fireflies

out in the yard at Round Hill

on a warm summer evening.

Picking herbs for soup with her

in the back yard of our house in Georgia,

Playing Hearts and Rummy Cube with

her and Papa Dave at their condo in Florida,

where she also helped me with a school

project, in the fourth grade –

a topographically accurate map of Thailand,

fashioned with artists’ clay.

I remember receiving handwritten letters,

scrawled in her unmistakable left-handed script,

relaying the little details of her daily life and travels,

and brimming with affection.

I remember driving across the Midwest,

tracing the footsteps of our ancestors,

visiting grave sites and farms, and the banks

of the Mississippi at Nauvoo, as she compiled

the family history.

The last time we saw her, we sang the old songs

together, and she still knew all the words.

Wife, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother.

Artist and matriarch. Centenarian.

She lives in our hearts,

And we carry with us her sparkling smile,

her lovely paintings, and her unwavering love.

--Melinda Rothouse 

The Tao and the Waking Dragon: A Spiritual Journey Through Modern China

The ride from the futuristic international arrivals terminal at the Beijing airport revealed pristine highways, snarled traffic, rows of tidy apartment blocks, and modern office buildings, but I felt comforted by images of the Buddha that adorned the dashboard of the cab. I had requested a hotel within one of the few remaining traditional Beijing hutong neighborhoods, characterized by narrow alleyways framed by a mix of grey, tiled-roof courtyard houses and small shops. Our young hutong guide proudly identified himself as a Christian, eager to practice his English before attending seminary in Los Angeles. He spoke passionately of the importance of having faith—something to believe in—regardless of the dogma.

Although the communist government suppressed religious practice after 1949, and destroyed or defaced many sacred sites during the Cultural Revolution, the Reform and Opening period beginning in the late 1970s eased restrictions on religious practice. In fact, traditions like Confucianism and Buddhism have been encouraged of late by the government, which now sees them as promoting social harmony. Members of the younger generation will tell you that China is a secular society, yet in the next breath they’ll relate an elaborate Buddhist fairy tale, or explain (at the Temple of Heaven, for example) that despite religious differences, most Chinese can agree on the relationship between heaven, earth, and humanity. Older Chinese tourists bow and pray before images of traditional Taoist deities, while collection boxes housing images of the Buddha or Guan Yin fill with colorful bills and coins, even at a tourist jade factory.

From Beijing, our quest led to Shandong Province, where Confucius taught his many disciples, and where Tai Shan, China’s most sacred mountain, rises dramatically from the surrounding flatlands. Traditionally, the route to the summit required a six-hour climb over a steep stone trail. But today visitors can take an air-conditioned bus to a modern cable car that lets off near the peak. A wide path carved from the mountaintop winds through a series of sacred gates, shrines, and temples dedicated to various deities, including the imperial gods, Confucius, and the Taoist fertility goddess Bi Xia Yuan Jun. Benedictions from ancient emperors painted in huge red and gold characters sparkle in the sunlight, while pilgrims burn long sticks of yellow incense in huge, open-flamed burners. The day we visited, my friend and I encountered only one other Westerner on the mountain; we were such an anomaly that a pair of Tibetan Buddhist monks asked us to pose for a photo with them as a memento of their journey. Reaching the Temple of the Jade Emperor at the crest of Tai Shan, with its flags billowing in the crisp breeze and the sweet aroma of incense wafting by in thick curls of smoke, one can easily understand why the Chinese have revered this place as sacred for millennia.

From Shandong, we journeyed by train to Luoyang, in Henan Province, which our guide described as the “Heart of China,” because of its importance as a multi-dynastic imperial capital. She noted that while Shanghai was born only a century ago, and Beijing claims a 3,000-year history, Luoyang traces its roots back eight millennia.  Indeed, many local people have unearthed ancient artifacts simply by digging a few inches into their fields. The Luoyang region hosts some of China’s most famous sacred sites, including Song Shan, Shaolin Temple, White Horse Temple, and Longmen Grottoes, a collection of spectacular Buddhist caves. To the contemporary seeker, these sites provide a marvelous window into China’s religious legacy, as well as a complex portrait of contemporary attitudes toward spirituality.

Shaolin Temple has become one of the most popular tourist destinations in China. Legend has it that Bodhidharma arrived there from India in the 5^th century CE, bringing teachings that became the foundation of the Chan (Zen) Buddhist tradition. As the story goes, Bodhidharma also developed a series of postures that became the foundation for all subsequent martial arts lineages during a nine-year cave meditation. He taught the poses, which imitated the movements of animals, to his students to support their meditation practice.

A huge entry gate welcomes visitors to Shaolin Temple, framing a promenade lined with vendors selling souvenirs. One can opt to walk or ride though the complex in small, open-air electric buses. As with many Chinese cultural sites, the elaborate tourist infrastructure, along with strict government oversight of tourism, can hamper any sense of authenticity, yet the natural beauty and serenity of the area still inspire. The temple sits in a protected valley in the shadow of Song Shan, one of the China’s five Taoist sacred mountains, and still supports a thriving martial arts community. On a given day, one can observe groups of uniformed youth practicing their Kung Fu forms in unison near the temple grounds.

The unassuming White Horse Temple, located just outside of Luoyang, is named for the steed that arrived, along with two Buddhist monks, carrying the earliest sacred sutras to China from India. Held to be China’s oldest Buddhist temple, it was founded in 68 CE by Emperor Ming of Han, who governed from Luoyang. It’s a working temple with a contemplative atmosphere, where monks stroll in orange robes and devotees pay homage to icons of the Buddha and Guan Yin. Because most Buddhist monasteries were disbanded and destroyed during the Cultural Revolution, this type of devotional Buddhism (rather than the more meditative, philosophical traditions favored in the West) is typical of modern Chinese Buddhist practitioners.

Indeed, Buddhism has traveled a complex path in China, alternately revered as a compassionate guiding philosophy or rejected as an unwelcome foreign religion by various ruling dynasties. At the Longmen Grottoes, we learned how Tang dynasty empress Wu Zetian used Buddhism as a form of social control, pressing thousands of potentially unruly peasants into labor to create the Buddhist sculptures with the promise of rebirth in a heavenly realm. The grottoes consist of thousands of stone figures set into man-made caves and porticos, painstakingly carved into the limestone cliffs that abut the Yi river. The largest statue, an image of Vairocana Buddha, looks serenely over the valley from a height of nearly 60 feet. Some of the smaller carvings have been polished to a gleam by countless fingers rubbing them for good luck over the centuries. Many lack faces and hands, disfigured by weather, political conflict, and unscrupulous collectors, yet even the faceless bodhisattvas retain a sublime grace and dignity.

A tour of religious sites in China begs a visit to Wudang Mountain, enclave of Taoist sages and Tai Chi masters, in northwestern Hubei province. Wudang earned the designation of UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1994, and the film “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” brought Wudang-style martial arts to an international audience. To accommodate the influx of tourists, the government has created a large welcome center, deployed a fleet of buses that whisk visitors around the mountain’s hairpin turns, and even installed a cable car to carry people to the summit. Propaganda signs painted on trash bins encourage environmental consciousness with pert slogans, such as “Every Lovely Plant and Flower Needs Your Priceless Love” and “Welcome to the Natural Oxygen Bar.” Yet the steep stone stairway to the Golden Shrine, perched impossibly upon the mountain’s tallest peak, offers truly breathtaking views of cascading, mist-shrouded ridges. And seemingly unfazed by the crowds, female priests still lovingly tend the magnificent Purple Cloud Palace’s Taoist shrines. A tangible sacredness permeates Wudang, drawing both curious tourists and students eager to study Tai Chi in its native setting. 

It’s not far from Wudang to Xi’an, in Shaanxi Province, home to a flourishing Chinese Muslim community. Now a formidable modern metropolis, Xi’an once welcomed Silk Road traders, and is one of the few Chinese cities that retains its traditional city walls. In addition to facilitating trade and communication between China, the Middle East, and Europe, the Silk Road also brought Islam into China, beginning in the 7^th century. Today, the city’s bustling Muslim Quarter still hums with small shops and street vendors tucked into narrow alleyways, offering everything from salted walnuts and dried apricots to freshly baked flatbreads and lamb skewers. Xi’an’s mosques feature a unique fusion of traditional Chinese and Islamic architecture, providing a welcome respite from the bustle of daily commerce in the streets just outside. Indeed, ducking into one of the smaller mosques in the neighborhood, one could easily mistake it for a Chinese temple but for the Arabic calligraphy, quiet prayer hall, and crescent moon adorning the rooftop.

My journey through China culminated in ultra-modern Shanghai, with its international character and eclectic architecture. Even in this most cosmopolitan of cities, I caught a whiff of quiet spirituality at the lotus pond in the People’s Park. In the Buddhist tradition, the lotus represents the triumph of the spirit over materialism. It blooms for only a few weeks each summer, and on a Saturday morning in June, Shanghai locals gathered around the pond, quietly cherishing the natural beauty of this sacred blossom. 

February Rains

Strange, unsettling dreams
and a deluge in the night.
Rolling thunder heralds cooler weather.
As daylight unfolds, dewdrops glisten
on plush leaves as north winds
assail the chimes.

Foggy Morning

Grey fog embraces the dawn
after a steady trickle of rain
that fell all night long,
drawing out the freshest
hues of green
and slowly coaxing
this parched landscape
back to life.

Moody Weather

Another cool fall morning ~
moist air drapes the world
in a blanket of dew that falls, lazily,
from the pecan trees in sparse droplets,
each hitting the ground with a distinct "splat,"
giving the illusion of rain.

The air feels thick and not quite hazy;
morning sun presses through
in soft rays, giving shape to space.
The squirrel's chatter is less insistent than usual.
Dogs bark, but with less urgency.
Even the traffic's hum has a gentleness to it.

I notice, with a flicker of recognition,
that even the weather has moods...

The New Year's Miracle

On January 1st we smashed pumpkins in the front yard,
dubbing them "the Baby New Year," and filling them
with our hopes and aspirations,
in an impromptu ritual of endings and beginnings.

At midsummer a vine began to grow,
lengthening with the long days of August and September,
sprouting lavish yellow blooms that nurtured the bees.

And now, in autumn, a new pumpkin has emerged,
turning from a deep green to a golden orange ~
We check its progress each day,
marveling in this process of co-creation.

Buddhist-Christian Dialogue in Austin, TX

This article was originally published on the Austin Shambhala Meditation Center's Shambhala Times News blog.

Austin Shambhala Center Hosts Members of Cristo Rey Catholic Church

On a recent Thursday evening, members of Cristo Rey Catholic Church in East Austin visited the Austin Shambhala Meditation Center for an introduction to Shambhala Buddhism meditation practice. As a professor of religious studies and proponent of interfaith dialogue, I was thrilled to hear about this event. I had the opportunity to communicate with the leaders of both congregations about their experiences of the evening, as well as their reflections on interfaith communication more generally. Cristo Rey’s pastor, Father Jayme Mathias, has been teaching a world religions course over the past year, in which the congregation’s predominantly Mexican-born, Spanish-speaking members have had the opportunity to learn about and visit a variety of religious centers, including a local Hindu temple, an Islamic Center, a Mexican Baptist church, and a Mexican indigenous spirituality center. Father Jayme’s request to visit the Shambhala Center provided a growth opportunity for both congregations. On the one had, the Shambhala Center had never before offered instruction in Spanish. On the other, as Father Jayme notes: “The course on world religions has been eye-opening for many. Because some 87% of Mexicans are Catholic, they are not so accustomed to thinking of faith traditions outside their own.” Indeed, both congregations challenged their comfort zones, opening their hearts and minds for an evening of learning and discussion. When the members of Cristo Rey arrived, Austin Shambhala Center Director Billy Boyar welcomed them and offered an introduction to Shambhala Buddhism, with assistance from Rita Ricardo, providing translation and meditation instruction in Spanish, and Luis Iglesias reading passages from Shambhala: La Senda Sagrada del Guerrero (Shambhala: Sacred Path of the Warrior) by Shambhala founder Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and Gobierna Tu Vida (Ruling Your World) by Shambhala’s current teacher, the Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche. Shambhala Center members Toby Bernal, Lynn Wolfe, Darren Dyke, and Ginny Foley also helped to welcome members of Cristo Rey for the evening. Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche, in his efforts to establish Shambhala Buddhism in the West, was a strong proponent of interfaith dialogue and study, hosting a number of interfaith conferences and gatherings, and founding Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado. Billy Boyar recalls: “I mentioned that Trungpa Rinpoche was interested in creating a dialog between Christian and Buddhist meditators. To accomplish this dialog, Rinpoche had organized the Christian-Buddhist conference on meditation in Boulder in 1985. I had the good fortune of attending that conference, where I heard a number of excellent teachers, both Christian and Buddhist. Relating this history was an attempt to find common ground.” Indeed, it seems that between these two religious communities in Austin, TX, common ground is alive and growing. Father Jayme, a frequent traveler to Asia, observed in a recent issue of the El Heraldo de Cristo Rey (The Cristo Rey Herald), his congregation’s weekly newspaper: “In Mexico, taxicab drivers place rosaries, images of saints, and other religious objects on their dashboards, rearview mirrors and visors. In Thailand, these same places are adorned with myriad buddhas and other Buddhist objects and images. Both in our Roman Catholic faith tradition and in the Buddhist traditions of Thailand, we find religious images and paintings, altars and incense, holy water and floral offerings. That is, despite our differences, there is also much that we share in common as members of the same human family.” In the spirit of interfaith exploration, I recently ventured to Cristo Rey for the 11:30 a.m. Sunday Bilingual Mariachi Mass, and what a wonderful experience it was to hear Father Jayme lead the Mass in both Spanish and English with such a lively musical accompaniment! I would recommend this experience to anyone. And, as a member of the Austin Shambhala Center I can certainly recommend the Center’s offerings of meditation instruction, public meditation, and other classes and workshops on mindfulness practice, Buddhism, and the contemplative arts. The city of Austin offers such a rich variety of religious communities and experiences, and it’s heartening to see some of them genuinely reaching out to one another. For more information on interfaith efforts in Austin, check out the: Interfaith Action of Centeral Texas (iACT)

--Article by Melinda Rothouse with gratitude to Father Jayme Mathias of Cristo Rey Church and Billy Boyar of the Austin Shambhala Meditation Center

Emerging from Sleep

A work in progress...

Tropical winds carry with them

memories of passion and longing ~

the scarlet flush of a stolen kiss and

other dreams from distant lands.

My bones lay heavy and dull,

held in place by a force stronger than gravity.

It’s hard to emerge from this dewy world

where dreams of lust and longing,

seduction and satisfaction

hold me fast with long, sticky fingers -

trapped between dream and waking.

I lay here, savoring the pleasure,

gazing out the window as pecan branches sway

and rustle, tickled by those sultry breezes.

I’ve slept so deeply these last few nights;

ambrosia for an insomniac.

It’s the same sodden slumber and deep dreaming

I experienced after moving to New Orleans,

with its enveloping, steamy air and those same southern, Gulf winds

making their way north from the Caribbean,

carrying their stories and their sorrows with them.

And these remnants infuse my dreams,

flooding the valley of my subconscious

with a pungent, penetrating musk

of jasmine and brine.

Miksang and Haiku

I recently participated in a weekend workshop called The Way of Nature: Miksang and Haiku with teacher and poet Miriam Hall. We spent two days photographing, writing, and wandering around the gorgeous environs of McKinney Roughs Nature Park outside of Austin. Here's what emerged:

Red honeysuckle
lavishly adorns the pole ~
in spring's new wardrobe

Lizard changes hue
as bees busy themselves in
opulent pink buds

Last year's spent seed pods
hanging on, not yet displaced
by this season's shoots

Feather light spring breeze
tickles skin and rustles leaves ~
Whoosh! A gusty angst

Tired bones lean in
my eyelids growing heavy
amidst the dry reeds

Pollen hangs from tree
taunting me with its graceful
plumes ~ tonight I'll sneeze

Retreating to Dzogchen Beara: Eastern Spirituality in Western Ireland

New article about my experiences at a Buddhist retreat center in Ireland, published on ReligionNerd.com! Religion Nerd is an e-magazine that offers information and a wide array of perspectives on world religions and issues related to religion, both in America and internationally, and aims to foster religious dialogue.

From the moment I stepped into the van, I knew I had entered a different world. The other passengers were already well-acquainted with the weekly O’Donaghue bus from Cork to Castletownbere, a little town somewhere far out on the Beara Peninsula in West Cork, Ireland. 

Heading home from a day of commerce in the city, many passengers carried loads of shopping bags that filled the narrow aisles while others were making a weekend commute to the Peninsula. A musty odour permeated the vehicle, smoky—dusky, an infusion of cigarette smoke and body odour, perfume and food. Aromas left behind by the countless passengers who made the trip many years past. The seats worn and threadbare, the windows smudged with breath and oil from the many heads that rested upon them...

By the time we reached Castletownbere, most of the other passengers had disembarked at various points along the roadside. “Can you stop just there, at the next crossroads?  Thank you, thanks so much! Goodnight,” passengers imparted before disappearing up wandering side roads or into neat modern homes.  Exiting the van in Castletownbere’s tiny square, I looked around helplessly for a taxi, finally asking the driver of the van where I might procure one last mode of transportation to my destination.

“Where are you headed, then?” he asks.  "Dzogchen Beara,” I reply.

Another voice joined the conversation; I turned and found the man who had sat behind me on the van, whose accent I had earlier struggled to decode as he talked on his cell phone. “Oh, yes, I’m going that way—a lad is on his way to collect me. He should be able to drop you off if he’s got room—he’ll be going right past there.” He assures me.  “Wonderful,” I reply.

As we wait, we introduce ourselves, and it turns out he’s just back from Galicia, Spain, where he completed a three-month pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela.  My impression of him shifts drastically from country bumpkin to world traveller—religious pilgrim…And so I hitched a ride with him and Gert (Gurd?), his German friend who cheerfully rearranged the back of his car to make space for me: “Feckin’ sold me other car!” he shouts.

They asked if I have previously been to Dzogchen Beara?  ”No, this is my first time.”

“Well, whatever they say, don’t sign anything,” says Gert, wryly.

“What, you think they’ll ask me to sign my life away?” I inquire laughingly.

“Just don’t sign anything!” Gert insisted, slightly suspicious of the strange Tibetan Buddhist retreat center residing in their midst.

I arrived around 9:00 p.m. at the international hostel, where, like some post-millenial contortion of Tabard’s Inn from the Canterbury Tales, the party is just beginning.  Gathered in the kitchen were a zany lot of merry Buddhist/hippies, cracking jokes about death and reincarnation, and celebrating the departure of Anna, a willowy, wise, gracefully aging and painfully kind guest. Though she’s the guest of honour, she jumps up when I walk in, welcomes me, and shows me to the women’s dormitory. Settling my bags, I returned to meet the other guests: There’s gentle Richard from Holland, who gave up his career in the theatre after his parents’ passing to come and live among the Buddhists, shrewd Cynthia from New Zealand, a widowed retired former hostel-owner (the Buddha’s Abode, it was called), three cheerful Italian students on summer holiday, waifish Clare-the-Mermaid from France, and Tim from who-knows-where, strumming the ukulele in a vintage three-piece suit with flowers in his hair, leading a call and response to: “Who’s got the love?” “We got the love!” Damien, the social worker-turned-musician from Dublin, whaling on his digerideedoo and a local Corkonian, Brona thrilling us all with her oven-rack-and-shoelaces-turned organ of the gods (just put those little loops at the end of the shoelaces into your ears while I run this fork across the oven rack, and prepare to be amazed—note to self: must try this at home; great party trick).

In the midst of all this mayhem, I craved a quiet evening curled up with a book, but soon accepted that there was nothing to do but join in. As Ross, my beloved dharma buddy back in Austin would say, “don’t hesitate; just say yes…”

Though Buddhist rather than Christian, this place seemed somehow in line with the long and storied Irish monastic tradition, or at least some 21^st century version of it.  Being at Dzogchen Beara, I felt that I had entered a living breathing community along the lines of St. Enda (father of Irish monasticism), who lived all those centuries ago on the desolate Aran Islands, an emphasis on simplicity, quietude (certainly not always observed), communal living, recycling and composting, meditation and study.  Yes, in the hostel we slept in bunk beds with ten to a room rather than in individual beehive huts, but during my long walks along the craggy hillsides, and hours spent in meditation looking out over the broad, vast sea, I felt a sense of the contemplative life.

Not only did I feel a connection with the Irish monastic tradition, but also with the worldwide Buddhist community.  Dzogchen Beara is one of the main retreat centers of the Rigpa sangha, under the direction of Sogyal Rinpoche, a Tibetan lama who fled Tibet after the Chinese invasion.  After coming to the West and studying comparative religion at Cambridge, he founded a network of Buddhist centers all around the world. Rinpoche’s international students gather at retreat centers like this one to practice intensive meditation, study, receive teachings and spiritual transmissions, and deepen their practice.  You can feel the dedication in their stories and the incredible distances they have traveled to be here. Several visitors tell me of their hometown Buddhist communities in places like Dublin, Nelson (New Zealand), and southern France, and I marvel at the flowering of this tradition of non-violence and compassion.

Chris, a longtime Rigpa member and engineer, who was helping to revamp the center’s communication systems, told me of the Rigpa center in South London, where he assisted with renovations.  In its former life, before being purchased by Rigpa, the building served as the courthouse where many of the IRA trials of the 1970′s and 80′s took place. He spoke of cells where IRA members were once held, under maximum security, while awaiting their trials.  These same cells are now dormitories and meditation rooms—talk about poetic justice.

During my last evening at Dzogchen Beara, a group of us journeyed into town for an evening of music at the local pub.  Sitting at a street side table with the cool ocean breeze nipping at our shoulders—it’s Saturday night and the whole town, people of all ages, are out to relax and socialize—my international Buddhist friends broached the topic of religion in America.  Dubliner Edward observed that Americans seem to be more religious than Europeans, who retain a post-Enlightenment skepticism about religious dogma and the intolerance it can foster.  Perhaps it is this skepticism that makes Buddhism, with its pacifist and non-theistic stance, an appealing alternative for Europeans to the religious traditions of the West.

And what of religion in Ireland today? Although religious matters suffuse the tempest of Irish history, many 20^th century Irish writers, most notably James Joyce and Edna O’Brien, have written about the oppressive nature of Irish Catholicism and searched for possible alternatives.  Both seem to be asking, can you be Irish and neither Catholic nor Protestant?  Is there another alternative?
My sense of things is that, despite Ireland’s legendary Celtic past and its staunchly Catholic identity, these days many Irish people, like Joyce and O’Brien, are skeptical, if not downright cynical, about religion.  Even people who drop into Church every now and then for good measure, don’t find much that’s “deep and meaningful,” especially among the younger generation.  Of course, that’s not always the case, as my friend who walked the pilgrimage route of Santiago de Compostela could attest.  Traversing the countryside, one sees endless ruins of ancient churches and monasteries, some lovingly restored and touted as tourist destinations, and many more slowly decaying in the middle of fields, but go to mass at a contemporary church and you’ll find it maybe a quarter full.  It makes me wonder whether religion, at least in the Christian sense, isn’t regarded as a relic of a violent and socially-repressive past that the Celtic Tiger is all too ready to leave behind.

And what of the ancient Celtic/Pagan tradition that’s so identified with Ireland in cultural imaginings?  Sure, you catch glimpses and hear whispers, especially in the odd women’s retreat advert promising a reawakening of feminine power and sexuality, but it’s not really a living, viable practice as far as I was able to observe.  What about alternative/Eastern religions?  Well, as in America, people are looking for an alternative way to connect with the spiritual without all the cultural and historical baggage of Christianity.  Yoga studios and Buddhist meditation centers are popping up all over Ireland, as a brief Google search will reveal.  And, as my experience at Dzogchen Beara attests, although they do not appear to be as ubiquitous or as mainstream as they are in America (at least, not just yet), some people claim that religion is dead, that it has no place in the contemporary world, and yet people are turning to various spiritual traditions (often not the ones with which they were raised) in record numbers, especially in the wake of 9/11, war, economic recession, and a general sense of disconnection and spiritual malaise.  If my time at Dzogchen Beara is any indication, spirituality still flows in Ireland, and indeed across the globe.  Though we may not immediately recognize it, religious traditions are crossing borders as quickly as any commodity, revealing the true depth of humanity’s interconnection.


View the full article on ReligionNerd.com here.

Miksang Photography

Photos by Melinda Rothouse

Miksang is a practice of contemplative photography that fosters a deep engagement with the phenomenal world. Like other contemplative arts disciplines, Miksang emphasizes the experience of pure perception, of opening oneself up to the inherent beauty and energy of the world itself, rather than attempting to cultivate any notion of creativity or “skill” within the individual artist. It is about appreciation rather than mastery, recalling Suzuki Roshi’s “beginner’s mind,” in which many possibilities exist, rather than attempting to achieve any sense of expertise.

Miksang in practice begins with what is called a “flash of perception,” in which the photographer encounters the world as it is, before labels or judgments, even before concepts come creeping in. It is the raw, naked moment of “seeing,” an intimate encounter between the perceiver and the perceived, which underscores the inseparability of self and other. It’s not about taking beautiful pictures (though beautiful pictures may emerge), but about dancing with the world of forms, colors, and textures. It’s about noticing, and resting in, the space around things just as much as in the things themselves. Sometimes the subjects of the photos remain unrecognizable—it’s impossible to identify "what" they are by our usual conventions of naming and labeling—and this is just the point: to get beyond our habitual tendencies of categorizing and conceptualizing experience, and to return to the immediacy and freshness of our sensory experience.

Even photographing people and landscapes becomes a new experience, as the photographer senses and communicates the energetic exchange between people and within nature; as a practice it’s a way of opening oneself to the world of experience. Often the results can be quite humorous, even ironic, as when the Miksang practitioner begins to explore the connections between seemingly unrelated images or objects, like the “orderly chaos” of graffiti, objects in shop windows, or various elements within an urban street scene.

I have had the pleasure of attending several Miksang photography workshops, and have found a deep peace in the practice of wandering around the familiar streets and parks of Austin while allowing new, surprising, and fresh sensations and experiences to wash over me. There is a great joy and contentment that arises when we simply relax and allow ourselves to open to the wonders of the phenomenal world.

Many thanks to Miksang teachers Jake Lorfing, Miriam Hall, and John McQuade.

You can learn more about Miksang practice and workshop opportunities at The Miksang Institute and Miksang Texas. There is a Miksang Level I workshop happening at the Austin Shambhala Meditation Center on January 29-30, 2011.