Were I Perfect. A Dharma talk given 11/26/2006
As Christians are preoccupied with sin, Buddhists are concerned with delusion, or should be. Now, by delusion I mean our expectations, opinions, assumptions, wants, that sort of thing. In short, it is our grasp of reality, or what we consider reality. Bear in mind that being deluded isn’t about being wrong - or right for that matter. It is about how we experience life.
Ah, the power of delusion, take weddings, for example. I can think of no greater concentration of delusion than weddings. Weddings are awash in delusion, hopes and expectations bubbling out everywhere. It is that fleeting moment when hope and dreams triumph over experience, briefly.
Everyone has a pretty good idea about what to expect at a wedding, everyone has an opinion about weddings. Weddings are all about expectations and opinions, from the appropriateness of the whole affair to the flavor of the cake, the bride's dress, the dazed look of the groom. Most grooms look a little stupid, feeling out of control. Weddings are all about hopes, dreams, wishes; the future.
Anyone even dimly aware would never get married, could never get married. How could we know reality, and still get married. People like us get married, foolish people, limited, imperfect people chock full of blind passion. Marriage makes life fun, painful, but fun.
My wife drags me to weddings. Wives love weddings. They know that however deluded the participants are, weddings make people happy. Wives tend to be optimists, forgetting that half of these marriages end badly. Still, people like to get married, if some of us don't exactly like weddings, we like being in love. Truthfully, most people are optimists. Most people want to get married to someone, some special person. It’s a delusion I can live with.
Delusions themselves have nothing to do with right, wrong, good or bad, they are like colored light, smoke, and mirrors. Each of us colors our lives with delusions, with attitude. Maybe its only to make our lives more interesting, or pass the time more quickly, I don't know. Maybe, we’re all drama queens at heart?
The problem is in our expectations, our opinions. For example: Once, the wife and I, her sisters, mother, and various brothers-in- laws were sitting in the bleachers waiting for this wedding to start. The preacher was getting everyone situated, everyone was looking a bit awkward, nervous, pretty much as you would expect. He gets everyone set and in this pleasant lull suddenly breaks into, “Oh, what a beautiful morning.” Or something like that, some show tune. The bride stiffens, the groom rolls his eyes, my wife is biting her hand trying not to laugh and failing, slowly choking to death. A hush falls on the crowd, a silence reminiscent of a budding heart attack. No one had been expecting this musical interlude, finding it odd, painful and far to long.
I’m sure he meant well. I am sure he thought he could sing too, which may have provoked him to think he should - sing. Such is the nature of delusion. I think we gave the bride and groom one of the three crock pots we received at our wedding. A crock pot seems uniquely appropriate as a wedding gift, whimsical in its potential, yet practical, in the off chance it gets used, which is unlikely.
Ah, delusion. The world is perfectly there, yet I, being imperfect, perceive it imperfectly. It is the nature of our existence, of my existence. There is little question in my mind, but that I am a foolish, limited, imperfect person beset with blind passions. Were I not, would I behave so poorly? Yes, it is true. My wife keeps a list. I don't offer this in apology, or as an excuse, this realization is the result of a great deal of study and self reflection, representing, I hasten to add, remarkable personal progress, progress being, as it were, relative. Granted, it is not what I was hoping for, it’s certainly not what I wanted, it’s simply what I've found, though admittedly Shinran found it first. Shin Buddhism is all about coming to know delusion.
Ah, delusion, are we not all limited, foolish people. None of us are perfect though some of us we act as if we were, self-important people, full of themselves and not much else. I find such people tedious, though there is a good chance I'm one of them.
Despite the best planning, despite our best intentions, sometimes - things go awry. There are a number of reasons why this is so. There is the dependent origination the Buddha spoke of: All things change in relation to causes and conditions, nothing exists independently. This is especially true of our delusions, our blind passions, our Bonno. Where they come from I don’t know, though I suspect we create them, starting at birth.
It is said such blind desires are so named because they are easier to see in others than in our selves. It certainly seems so. As difficult as they are to see, blind passions are even more difficult to accept. Sadly, if we can not accept them, we must repeat them until we are thoroughly miserable, then we die. Such is my take on the wheel of life.
Once I thought I understood truth and built with it as if it were brick and stone, creating mansions of certainty. Now I ponder my delusions and watch my mansions crumble. I have lost faith in knowing any organic truth; truth that I have not tarnished with intent or denial. Truthfully, all I have learned, all that I know, has overcome me; casting me into a well of questions. How can I know anything of lasting meaning? All things change, most of all, answers. I pause, scratch and ponder, wondering how I could actually know anything with certainty? I know this water I drink is muddied from my standing in the stream. And yet, I continue to stand there, looking into the past, lacking the wit to turn around.
My foolishness hardly surprises me anymore – that which I recognize - I suspect much of it slips by me unnoticed. It comes as no surprise to me that I live in a state of delusion, having colored all that I have known with my opinions, stamping every perception with my presence. My saving grace is that now, sometimes, I can recognize my foolishness, with a little help from my wife and friends.
How can any of us know who we are until we know the nature of our delusions, our bonno? Which of us is perfect? Who among us has not sought truth only to settle for something more comfortable? Belief requires nothing of us. Belief makes us comfortable. How many of us deny the changing nature of reality because it is uncomfortable? All things change and yes, change is troubling. Buddhism changes, though not the truth of the Dharma.
Then there is the way delusion masks the nature of reality, hiding it in terms of duality. We label something good or bad, unaware that in doing so, we limit reality. Reality becomes this or that, a choice of one or another. In the process, we lose something very important, that openness of being that makes awareness possible. How can anyone say with certainty, who they really are, or what they are without excluding all else? To say, I am a good person is to deny or dismiss all that I am that does not fit what is considered "good." If I am not capable of being consistently “good” am I then, an evil person? Or am I simply a limited, foolish person quite incapable of consistently distinguishing one such artificial and arbitrary state of being from another?
We live in this passing moment, in an on going stream of acts, and what is done is done. What is said is said. What is broken must remain broken. There are no answers, only more questions. How can anyone know anything of importance until they know their own limits? Without true acceptance of who we are, we must push real understanding away. We all make mistakes, terrible mistakes, some of which cannot be undone. We are all, each of us, imperfect. I ask you, were we not, would we behave so poorly? Still, we fix what can be fixed, hoping that the mending is an improvement.
Each of us lives inside our delusions, our expectations, our opinions, our bonno. We act from our blind passions, from our foolish, limited, imperfect nature, and there, find reasons to explain it all away. It is difficult to accept our foolishness. It is difficult to accept our imperfect nature. Often, we fail; usually we fail; and in our failure, there is suffering and sorrow, for in failing to accept truth we must create delusion. Unexamined delusions fill our lives with sorrow, yet when questioned humbly, persistently, delusions fade to doubt, then to uncertainty, until finally they must vanish.
The light of Amida’s wisdom and compassion shines through each of us, revealing all that is hidden, all that is denied, if we dare to look. Doesn’t taking refuge in the Buddha mean accepting - as best we can -the entirety of our deluded self, our spiteful acts, our petty meanness, as well our acts of kindness and compassion? Are we not also that which we deny, our fears, our base desires, as well as our loftier aspirations? Do not our fears create our hatreds - as our cravings create our attachments? Such openness is frankly, uncomfortable, yet it is the only path from delusion. We banish our delusions by accepting them as delusions through the grace of Amida. We all have this power.
Sadly, in our foolishness, we strive for perfection, a state we can not possibly attain and thus we create our sorrow. There is no perfection in this life. We can only dream of perfection, to awake alone and empty. Perfection is an absolute, a model, a gauge by which we try to evaluate our lives. It's a goal we can not possibly attain. The perfect rose cannot exist. The ideal only represents our eternal dissatisfaction. Were an absolute to exist in reality, it would mean our surrender. It would mean accepting that we are all limited, foolish, imperfect people. It would mean accepting that only Amida is infinite, only Amida is perfect, but such is reality. Sadly, while the light of Amida Buddha’s wisdom and compassion makes self-examination possible, it remains painful and few choose it.
Humility sits coarse and uncomfortable on our western egos. We need to feel we are in control and we are not. It is hard to accept that we are simply limited, foolish, imperfect people living with our bonno in an uncertain world beset with sorrow and suffering. Living in delusion, how could we not know sorrow and suffering? And yet, we find it difficult to be grateful for the lessons sorrow and suffering teach us - to accept that what is – just is - and no more. Knowing the true nature of our limited, imperfect foolishness, how could we not take refuge in the Buddha, the Dharma, the Sangha? Namu Amida Butsu. Thank you.
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