Practices for Difficult Times: Caring for Ourselves and Others

by Andrea D’Asaro

Exchanging self for others in tonglen practice, bringing attention to small moments, creating a home retreat, and focusing our minds on feeling what we are feeling, are among the ways senior Shambhala teachers are suggesting we keep our practices going while the Seattle Shambhala Center is closed as part of the social distancing we are asked to comply with in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Our community’s leaders are working on creating online offerings so that we can continue to practice and learn together during this difficult time—you can learn about these online offerings at our website.  In addition, though, you may want to try out some of the home-based practices our senior teachers are recommending.

 

The Pause Practice: Stepping Out of the Cocoon

 “Short practices like simply pausing and stepping out of that frenzy can help us tune into the world; we can begin to see a way to help ourselves and others,” says Janet Bass, a senior teacher at our Center who led a recent Thursday evening on-line dharma talk. 

Bass recommends the “pause practice,” a way to open to the magic of the moment described by Pema Chödrön, a well-loved author and teacher in Shambhala.  Chödrön suggests that “a certain discipline is required to step outside our cocoon and receive the magic of our surroundings. Pause practice—taking three conscious breaths at any moment when we notice that we are stuck—is a simple but powerful practice that each of us can do at any given moment. If you are in a natural environment, look up at the sky as you do this,” writes Chödrön in a  Lion’s Roar article from 2017. 

“When waking up in the morning, just look out and drop the storyline and take three conscious breaths. Just be where you are when making your coffee or tea or washing your hands, with three conscious breaths,” suggests Bass. 

 

Washing Hands with Loving Kindness 

Instructions on correct hand-washing to avoid spreading the virus are all over the news. Bringing the pause practice to hand washing can help us step away from worry and “it’s another chance to check in on our emotions, whether irritated or scared, and return to the moment,” suggests Bass. 

We can also send compassion during hand washing by evoking the traditional phrases of loving kindness three times, which comes to the recommended 20 seconds:  

“May all beings be safe.
May all beings be content.
May all beings be healthy.
May all beings live with ease.”

 

Tonglen Practice of Sending and Taking

Bass also recommends tonglen compassion practice, popularized by Pema Chödrön. It’s an ancient Buddhist practice to awaken compassion. With each in-breath, we take in others’ pain. With each out-breath, we send them relief.

“When we bring our minds back and hold others in our hearts, we feel we are doing something to help in this difficult time, and we begin to feel we are not totally helpless,” says Bass. She suggests that this compassion practice can help us remain steady and caring in the face of overwhelming reports of the effects of the COVID-19 virus.

“Research shows that compassion for others, even at a distance, makes a difference in how we feel and how others feel,” notes Bass, who led this practice at a recent Thursday night online open sit. 

 

Pema Chödrön provides Tonglen Instruction in this video: 

 

“This practice reverses our usual logic of avoiding suffering and seeking pleasure. In tonglen practice, we visualize taking in the pain of others with every in-breath and sending out whatever will benefit them on the outbreath. In the process, we become liberated from age-old patterns of selfishness. We begin to feel love for both ourselves and others; we begin to take care of ourselves and others,” writes Chödrön in another Lion’s Roar article. 

 

Your Home as a Retreat Center

When work or meditation centers are closed, try a home-based retreat, recommends senior teacher Shelley Pierce.

“When a February Vajrayana retreat was canceled, groundlessness reared its head.  And Seattle itself was changing, evidenced daily with death reports, gatherings cancelled, and …much less traffic in stores and on the roads.”

Shelley, her husband Mark, and neighbor Alison Day, all members of Seattle Shambhala, set up a weeklong home retreat, using traditional guidelines. “We set boundaries to withhold usual distractions and outlined four sessions a day with appropriate chants and practices: 1) before breakfast, 2) morning session, 3) afternoon session, and 4) after supper session. We practiced at the same time although in different rooms,” explains Pierce.

The three retreatants shared noontime meals as a feast practice. They took a daily walk (or jogs) and Day, a body worker, offered Cranial Sacral sessions that further allowed meditative mind, recounts Pierce.   

As Pierce joyfully proclaims: “When the week was over, we had renewed our friendships and appreciation of our amazing Shambhala practices. All experiences of mind and situations that arose, especially during retreat, were sacred. The Dralas Never Give Up!”

We recommend contacting your Meditation Instructor for guidance prior to setting up a home retreat.

 

Remaining Steadfast in Difficult Times

Rachel DeMotts, another senior teacher at our Center, presented our first Sunday on-line discussion group on March 15, using the theme of “Steadfast in the Face of Samsara,” inspired by an article in Lions Roar.

“We need reminders and even provocations to step out of our usual habits,” she explained. “We need reminders of who we actually are.”

DeMotts described how Eihei Dogen, the 13th-century founder of Soto Zen in Japan, used the mythical blue lotus flower as a metaphor for how we can open our hearts to ourselves and others “in the midst of fire and in the time of fire,” as DeMotts described Eihei Dogen’s blue lotus image. 

“Normally we think our job is just to protect and care for only ourselves.  But suffering is a call for us to wake up. Being awake blooms from suffering. It can be a relief to get away from extremes; there’s no need to push in one direction or another in the context of difficulty. Loss and suffering cause us to seek something different, every moment is possible—nothing is disposable or left out. We begin by feeling what we are actually feeling—we observe closely what is actually happening.” 

In her talk, DeMotts suggested that we are challenged to investigate that which is troublesome and inconvenient in our world. Yet, it is only under difficult circumstances that our own hearts can bloom in the midst of the suffering around us.