As the final part of our series on Finding and Living Your Passion, I want to end on an important note, which is Sangha, the noble spiritual community, this group of like-minded seekers that support each other on the path. We talked a few weeks ago about asking for help. Today, I want to talk about how offering help is a way that you can better find and live your own passion. Karl sent me this fascinating article about the scientific research on how our need for group support and encouragement is actually written in our DNA.
Sangha is a Sanskrit and Pali word meaning community with a common goal, It is part of the Triple Gem, an important component of the Buddhist teachings. The Triple Gem is The Buddha and The Dharma and The Sangha—those tools that we can use to support our awakening and the awakening of others.
Historically, the term Sangha was specifically about the group of monks and nuns that lived and practiced together, but many Buddhist teachers today have expanded the description to include us lay people, people who are spiritual seekers, having a spiritual yearning. Together, we can support and encourage each other in growing spiritually. Anyone who is here today can be that person. AND Sangha can be more than even a spiritual community. Sangha can truly represent all those people in your life who you love and support, and who love and support you.
Buddhism in general might seem like a solitary practice, all this meditation in the silence and retreats, and there is certainly a component that is about training your mind, but we train our mind to be of service to ourselves AND others. The Buddhist practice is about how to be in the world but not of it. To be around others in a loving and kind way, but not getting caught up in the drama.
Anybody know anybody who loves drama? I’m sure each of us can bring to mind those people in our lives, maybe at times even ourselves, when creating conflict and turmoil seems to be the highest priority.
But the idea of Sangha is more than just CREATING A NO DRAMA ZONE. It’s about reaching out, encouraging others, having compassion, wise action towards others.
Lama Surya Das likens the encouragement that we give as creating our own immortality—the love and support that you give us lives on well beyond your life. As part of this teaching on Sangha, we can include the fourth step on the eightfold path, which is Right or Wise action. We start to see our action towards others are part of our practice
There are two apects of the Sangha teachings that I want to talk about. First, who do you spend your time with? And Second, how do you spend your time with them.
The first aspect is WHO do we spend our time with is a complicated question. We spent months on the Lojong teachings which focused on making every situation our practice, including those with difficult people in our lives. So, it might have seemed that we’re supposed to love everyone equally, and we are. But that doesn’t mean we have to spend all our time with them. The teaching on Sangha points out that there is great value in finding and associating with people who are on a similar path. So, how do we find the balance? Who are those people in your life that support and encourage you? How can you spend more time with them? And who are those people that drain your energy and test your patience? And how can you either spend less time with them or find a way to create a reasonable boundary?
Deciding who we want to spend our time with is one of the most important decisions we make in our lives. For myself, having been married a few times, I can attest to the fact that making a wrong decision can have lasting consequences. BUT, no matter where you are in relationships, you have this point in time, this exact moment, to decide who you want to spend time and work towards increasing your “Sangha” time.
The second aspect is HOW you spend your times with others. In Buddhism, we are encouraged to practice generosity and compassion with others. Think for a moment about HOW you spend time with those important people in your life.
There are many ways to help others, but here’s three ways that can be food for thought.
1. Acknowledge and praise others’ strengths and accomplishments -- Catch someone doing something good; I’ve found that if I genuinely admire someone’s actions or even beautiful jewelry or a will-put-together outfit, I can say it to them, and that can be the start of a loving and kind relationship. It truly can be that simple. It doesn’t have to wait until they cure cancer. It’s those daily little things that we notice that can add up to a big difference. And a component of this practice can be to ignore the little ways that people screw up. My daughter was visiting me last week, and after she left, I went to put something in the microwave, only to find that she had nuked something with BBQ sauce that splattered the microwave. I was irritated to no end. I was going to tell her how inconsiderate this was, I was going to read her the riot act. Luckily, she was in a time zone where she hadn’t awaken yet, so by the time I called her, I had calmed down, and realized that in the big scheme of things, she’s a really good person, loving and kind, and I was probably never going to be as clean as I’d like her to be. So, I let it go, and felt so much better for doing so.
2. Create supportive environments for learning and positive experiences. How can you create an environment where those around you are having worthwhile experiences? As parents, we have many opportunities to do so. Seeing our children as beautiful manifestations of being to which we are contributing to their unfolding. Sometimes is might feel like our children or our partners our family or friends may get in the way of our meditation and mindfulness, but I encourage us all to see them as opportunities for awakening. Encouraging our family and friends on whatever path they walk.
3. Empower others through being a role model. And lastly, being a role model. How do our actions teach others? This is a powerful part of that fourth step of the eightfold path. We do the right thing not because we have to but because it’s best for us AND others. Actions speak louder than words.
Yale psychology professor Paul Bloom did some groundbreaking research, when he and his team found that infants in their first year of life demonstrate aspects of an innate sense of right and wrong, good and bad, even fair and unfair. When shown a puppet climbing a mountain, either helped or hindered by a second puppet, the babies oriented toward the helpful puppet. They were able to make an evaluative social judgment, in a sense a moral response. This is a critical teaching in the Buddhist practice – we are innate good. We might not always feel that way or act that way, but it’s in our DNA.
In Tibetan Buddhism, there’s a lovely saying, that only the snow lion can become enlightened alone. For us humans, we need others to help us awaken.
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