What in my life is indestructible?

I am in this stage in my life that my therapist calls an existential crisis. I don't know what that means exactly, but I do know that I have been thinking deeply about how I want to live my life, and how I want to help my children live theirs. 

I've been thinking about how life seems to invite this:

Cynicism is defined as an attitude of scornful or jaded negativity, especially a general distrust of the integrity or professed motives of others.

And this:

Author Paul E. Miller said, "Cynicism begins with a wry assurance that everyone has an angle. Behind every silver lining is a cloud. The cynic is always observing, critiquing but never engaging, loving and hoping."

My friend recently told me about how much a book called, "Ruling Your World: Ancient Strategies for Modern Life" by Sakyong Mipham has influenced how she recognizes that cynicism in herself and what she does about it.

When I looked up the book on Amazon this was the number one review listed for it:

By The Review Revolution (janariess.typepad.com) on February 13, 2006

"Mipham, the worldwide leader of Shambhala and the son of the late Tibetan teacher Chogyam Trungpa (who wouldn't love to be a fly on the wall in that house?) argues that people need to examine the me-centered spirituality of their lives:

We think, "Will this food make me happy?" "Will this movie make me happy?" "Will this person make me happy?" . . . . Occasionally when I meet with meditation students, their questions show that they are approaching even spiritual practice as a way of making themselves happy. Is my yoga, my tai chi, my meditation making "me" feel better? They are simply using a new guise to perpetuate the old habit of putting themselves first." (pp 11-12)

He offers practical suggestions on how to change this habit, beginning with the realization that change will occur slowly and that we should begin by simply aiming for a ten percent transformation: to be ten percent more compassionate, ten percent less selfish, ten percent more aware of the karmic consequences of our anger. Subsequent chapters discuss four ways to instill compassion for a lifetime: we must strive to for the discernment of the tiger, the delight of the lion, the equanimity or the garuda, and the playful wisdom of the dragon. (And in case you're wondering, a garuda is a mythical bird that hatches fully developed. Who knew?)

I found this book genuinely helpful, and that's saying something. I'm not very forgiving of pop spirituality and the self-help genre. But Mipham is wise and unafraid to call a spade a spade. He's not out to flatter his readers or tell them how to live longer or feel invincible or win friends or influence people. He's a realist, and he only wants to prepare them for the inevitable: death is coming."

And this was a part from the beginning of the book:

"Dawa Sangpo, the first king of the ancient Himalayan kingdom of Shambhala, once supplicated the Buddha for spiritual guidance. He said, "I'm a king. I have a palace, a family, ministers, subjects, an army, and a treasury. I want to realize enlightenment, but I cannot abandon my responsibilities to pursue spiritual practice in a monastery. Please teach me how to use life in the world to become enlightened:'

The Buddha assured the king that he would not have to become an ascetic or a monk in order to attain enlightenment. Indeed, he could practice a spiritual path while fulfilling his many responsibilities. He could become a sakyong-a ruler who rules by balancing heaven and earth. Heaven is wisdom. Earth is nitty-gritty experience. When we begin to mix wisdom into our secular life, we have success-both spiritual and worldly. The Buddha said to the king, "Don't be biased. Look at the land and look at your people. If you can develop certainty in the indestructible basic goodness that lies at the heart of everything, then you can rule your world. But becoming a sakyong is a challenging path, since life in the world is full of decisions to make, as well as endless distractions:' Taking these instructions to heart, King Dawa Sangpo developed certainty in the view of basic goodness. This vision transformed his kingdom, for it brought inspiration and meaning to people's lives.

....If ruling our world stems from developing certainty in our sanity, how do we discover it? The Shambhala teachings instruct us to "put our mind of fearfulness in the cradle of loving-kindness." The most loving environment we can create is on the meditation seat. My father taught me to meditate when I was a child. At the beginning, this meant simply taking time out of my day to reflect on my feelings. Then I learned to stabilize my mind by placing it on the breath. When I had accomplished the precision of this technique, he told me to contemplate impermanence, suffering, karma, selflessness, and compassion. When I was about twelve, he instructed me to meditate and contemplate for one hour a day. He later increased the sessions to two hours, At times I meditated for several days, and eventually for weeks and even months. Since meditation was to be the mainstay of my future vocation, I had the time to do it this way.

When I was a teenager, I explained to my father that I wanted to go camping alone in the wilderness. After pondering it for a few days, he said that this would be a good time. As a parent, he was proud that I wanted to explore the world on my own, and he was concerned about my safety. He wanted to make sure I could carry a heavy backpack, so after loading me up, he had me run up and down the stairs a few times, Having satisfied his concerns, off I went, feeling exuberant.

I hiked for about a week, rarely seeing anyone and encountering all kinds of foul weather-wind, rain, hail. I felt surprisingly happy. Having grown up in situations where there were many people around, I had always been tutored, fed, and served. Feeling alone helped me appreciate what others had done for me, and I also began to discover my own strength as a Shambhala warrior on my way to becoming a ruler. Nature was an excellent teacher, never giving an inch. If I wanted to eat, I had to make a meal; if I wanted to sleep, I had to think ahead and find an appropriate camping spot.

Upon my return, people were relieved, excited, and proud. Although it had been a short trip, I had grown tremendously. Through all the dramatic weather and other challenges, I was left sitting with my mind, I had discovered my own confidence, which gave me confidence in my basic goodness.

My father also trained me in poetry and calligraphy, following the traditional guidelines for educating a future ruler. One day as we were leaning on a railing at our house in Colorado, looking out at a meadow and some pine trees, a hummingbird appeared. It fluttered in several directions and darted off. My father turned to me and said, "Today I will teach you how to write poetry." I have continued to practice and enjoy this art, as well as calligraphy. Such deepening arts teach us to express the inexpressible-love, impermanence, and beauty. Diving into our own profundity, bringing the precision of meditation into physical form, we discover the profundity of life.

In addition, my father made sure that I trained in martial arts-the physical discipline of moving meditation that helps us become less insulated within our own mind. Practicing sports or martial arts gives us natural confidence. We develop a bond of kinship and appreciation with friends.

Breathing fresh air and learning to synchronize mind and body help us develop a healthy sense of self, which allows us to further increase our confidence. We can then offer our understanding to others, I learned Japanese archery-kyudo. Initially, we were not allowed even to hold the bow and arrow. Then for the first year of practice, we shot at a target only six feet away, the idea being that if we could develop proper form, hitting the target would not be an issue. Eventually, we shot at a target seventy-five feet away.

Raising a ruler differs from the conventional approach to education, which considers the mind an empty box waiting to be filled. My father once told one of my tutors that in raising a future sakyong or sakyong wangmo-earth-protector king or queen-we are educating the sky. The sky perceives, understands, and encompasses everything. There are no boundaries-only possibilities. Educating ourselves as sakyong is therefore not a laborious undertaking. It is filled with appreciation, curiosity, and delight. We are cultivating certainty in basic goodness and developing our noble qualities. When we are connected with basic goodness, it inspires our every breath, action, and thought. With the resulting brilliance and confidence, we can accomplish whatever we wish. This is how we rule our world."

I've decided that my existential crisis will be met with a commitment to develop this certainty:

"If you can develop certainty in the indestructible basic goodness that lies at the heart of everything, then you can rule your world."

I want to do this by recognizing that "the cynic is always observing, critiquing but never engaging, loving and hoping." and choosing to put my energy and resources toward the opposite. I want to engage, love and hope more by pursing meditation, time in nature and exercising, and time creating or appreciating art, even if it is only ten percent more at a time.

Because turns out, DEATH IS COMING. Whew. I thought a lot about this reality after reading this insightful piece as well:

"We need to be clear about the background against which our discussions of religion take place. None of us are going to make it out of this world alive. And everyone of us will have to part with everything and everyone we care about most. Everyone of us will have to sacrifice everything.

As the Lectures on Faith put it: a religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things has not the power to save.

But there’s a catch here: even if your religion doesn’t require you to sacrifice everything, life will.

The basic religious question with respect to all these losses is not if you will be asked to sacrifice everything, but how you will do it. With what attitude, with what posture? With an open heart and an open hand or with a fearful mind and a closed fist?

Sacrificing everything happens more dramatically and traumatically for some, and more quietly and subtly for others. But no one gets a free pass. We will all have to face this. We’ll all have this day of reckoning when God shows up to require that we return to him what he’d previously given."

And this one: 

"Faith is not the same thing as common sense. It may be that, for you, God’s reality is so natural and so consonant with common sense that you’ve never doubted it and don’t have to work at believing in it. God is just plain given as part of how things are. This is true for many people. Believing in God isn’t something they chose any more than they chose to believe that the sky is blue. They couldn’t unchoose it if they tried. But this isn’t enough. Though this native, common sense acceptance of God’s reality can be a blessing, it can also get in the way of practicing real faith. It can lull you into thinking the hard work of losing your soul is done when, in fact, you haven’t even started.

On the other hand, it may be true that, for you, the existence of God is so unlikely and runs so counter to common sense that even an earnest kind of wishful thinking is more than you can credibly muster. God is just not given to you as part of how things are. This is also true for many people. Not-believing just is and this is not the result of sin or the product of something they chose or could magically unchoose. Though this common sense godlessness can make things harder, it too can open a path to practicing faith. It may free you from common sense idolatries.

Neither kind of common sense is faith. Whether God is or isn’t obvious to you, the work is the same: practice faithfully attending to the difficult, disturbing, and resistant truths God sets knocking at your door. Faith is a willingness to lose your soul in caring for what’s right in front of you. Faith doesn’t wish these difficult things away. It invites them in, breaks bread with them, and washes their feet. Faith gives to what is given.

Common sense theist, common sense atheist, common sense (or anguished!) agnostic: the work is the same. Each must practice faith. Each must choose to care rather than wish or run."

Every day, every moment, I am facing the inevitability of the destruction and death of everything and everyone I love. 

I keep hearing people farther along the road than I am tell me some version about how the best way to face the pain of current or future loss is to create a life where I can believe that goodness is indestructible, and that goodness is at the heart of everything. They tell me that choosing to believe that at the heart of even difficult things is goodness is choosing to stay and have faith, and that choosing cynicism in the face of difficulty is choosing to run. They tell me that this is the real choice of life.

I'm pretty sure I'm choosing faith. One moment of presence at a time, one walk around a lake at a time, and one hour at a time of... listening to a musical artist while I clean. HA! That's all I've got for you today art! 

But seriously, this ha become so real to me - this decision I want to make every morning when I wake that today I can commit to give 10% more toward believing that at the heart of everything is a goodness that can never be destroyed. I am told that this is enough, even if today is all I have. 

I believe that too.