unlockthedoortolearning

Every religion on the planet has a set of rules for living encased in its message.  The Judah-Christian religion has the Ten Commandments. The Buddhists have several: The Three Refuges, The Three Pure Precepts, The Ten Grave Precepts and the Ten Paramitas.  Almost every non-religious organization has a set of rules that they live by as well. Many have created creeds for their members such as the Hippocratic Oath that the doctors take, or the business that takes on the Golden Rule for its employees, or the oath you may take if you are a Boy or Girl Scout.  Each one gives us a path by which to live, work, and play.

When I teach Customer Service skills to my corporate audiences the first thing we talk about is The Golden Rule: “Treat people the way you wish to be treated.” We talk about how it affects us when we deal with our customers and how living by this rule—or not—affects them and us.

Each one of these systems gives us a lot of things to work on and think about for sure!  But with this comes the ability to look within ourselves to see how we are dealing with the outside world and the inside world in which we live.  Are we focused on self, others, things, thoughts, information, deeds, words, or actions—or a combination of them all?

Sylvia Boorstein in her book Pay Attention for Goodness’ Sake, Practicing the Perfection of the Heart Sutra (2002) says, “I am, however, tremendously glad to have the Paramitas as a spiritual practice, because they are ways of behaving, and although I am not in charge of what I think, I am—most of the time—responsible for how I act.” Wow!  She is so right.  Often times thoughts appear in my mind and I wonder, “Where the heck did that come from?!”  It may be a fear thought, an anger thought, or a jealousy thought that seemed to pop up unexpectedly in the middle of an encounter with someone, or from listening to a voice mail message, or reading a text message, or e-mail—but there it is.

The power of the thought has taken over my life for good or ill.  Depending upon how “I act,” as Sylvia says, will be the crux of my relationship from that moment forward.  If I choose to respond to the thought in a negative, angry, mean, vindictive or threatening way that could end the relationship, get me fired, or cause undue harm to the person to whom this behavior is directed.  Since I am usually a caring person I might then turn that anger, sadness, guilt or shame back on myself.  Now I’ve hurt two people and it all happened in a split second!

Reading her book has prompted me to write a series of blog posts on the 10 Paramitas.  They can be listed in many different ways often different nouns are used for them as well.  I like her list and so I’ll share them with you as she has named them:

Generosity, Morality, Renunciation, Wisdom, Energy, Patience, Truthfulness, Determination, Lovingkindness, Equanimity

Oddly enough she starts her teaching with Generosity.  So will I. She quotes the Buddha saying this about Generosity:

“Generosity brings happiness at every stage of its expression.

We experience joy in forming the intention to be generous.

We experience joy in the actual act of giving something.

And we experience joy in remembering the fact that we have given.”

Fantastic!  Imagine if we worked this entire week on the Paramita of generosity how joyful we could be over and over again throughout the day and evening.  We get to feel great when we begin thinking of how we could be generous today, we get to feel great when we are acting out the generosity, and then throughout the day we get to feel great about remembering how the person responded, how it might have helped him or her in some way, large or small—and remembering the look on his or her face.  It is like being able to experience the event over and over again such as eating that delicious piece of cake or enjoying that wonderful bowl of soup on a cold afternoon or evening again and again. Without the additional calories of course…how great is that!

Herman Hesse in his poem “Steps” wrote, “But only he, who travels and takes chances, can break the habits’ paralyzing stances.”  What habits do you have among the 10 Paramitas that might be worth working on?  The list is large and the actions can be, as Hesse says—paralyzing.  I hope you’ll work on these 10 with me over the next several weeks and if you do I will promise that you will have some wonderful opportunities to awaken to your true self.

Let’s begin by working on generosity for the next several days.  Upon awakening set your intention for the day before you put your feet on the floor.  Say to yourself that today you will find every opportunity, and even deliberately make opportunities, to show generosity.  They can be as simple as giving a ride to someone you know without them having to ask.  It might be holding the door for someone, or praising his or hers work or talent, or complementing them on their attitude, outfit, or smile.   Be generous with your lunch, your time, your talent, your words, your deeds.  Then you get to experience the joy of giving over and over throughout the day! How great is that!

Contact me and let me know what happens on this great adventure through the Paramitas!