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Poetry of Practice II (3 of 5): Guided Meditation; Poetry of Practice II (3 of 5): Patterns - Diana Clark

The following talk was given by Diana Clark at Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, CA on October 18, 2023. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.

Poetry of Practice II (3 of 5): Guided Meditation

Welcome, everybody. It's nice to be here with you all today. I'm going to continue on this theme of the poetry of practice, and today I'm going to use a poem that, chances are, you've heard. I think that I've heard it a number of times in Dharma talks. But there's something about this poem—and I would say all poems that tend to touch us—that shares something with the suttas¹, the early Buddhist literature. What they share is this depth, or maybe we could say width. That is, even though we might read them or hear them again, we find something different. We hear something different.

Certainly, in the suttas, this is true for me. Many of you know that Gil² and I have taught suttas for a number of years now. We're not currently teaching a course right now, but we often say, "Wow, we've taught this already once before, but when we look at it again, we're finding something new." It's the same thing with poems: even though they might be similar, we find something new when we look at them. Might they be the exact same poem? Yes, but maybe we're not the same.

This poem that I will drop in during our guided meditation this morning is very simple. It doesn't have a lot of complicated imagery or complicated concepts, but maybe part of the power is in its simplicity. Part of the power is the distinct imagery that's been used. I think all of us can find a part of our lives, find something that is relevant to this particular poem. I will give the name of the poem and the name of the poet after I ring the bell, because I encourage you to just allow yourself to experience it without already having preconceived ideas of whether you know the poem or not, or what it's about. Sometimes when we're on our computers there's a temptation to just Google it, but I encourage you to allow the poem to be received and experienced. Then, we can explore it together afterwards.

Okay, just taking our meditation posture. I find myself doing this long exhale as a way to shift gears, to orient towards, "Oh, now is a time for meditation." If that's helpful for you, you could take some big exhales, and as that's happening, allowing the body to adjust in any small or maybe even large ways so that you can feel balanced, upright, alert, and with ease.

It can be helpful for some people to make a very small movement where they move their chin backwards. Not up or down, but back a little, with a slight sense of tucking. This opens up the spine there in our neck and can allow for a little more balance of the head over the shoulders.

Doing a light body scan, checking in with the face. Humans are expressive, of course we are, and our face is often a place where we can hold tension around the eyes, the jaw, or the mouth. Resting awareness on those areas with an invitation to soften, relax, and open.

Resting attention on the shoulders, letting them also have some ease, the shoulder blades sliding down the back. The chest, the belly. And feeling the pressure against the body—the chair, the cushion, couch, bed, whatever it is that we're sitting on literally or figuratively.

Upper legs, lower legs, arms. Just resting our attention; nothing needs to be done, so to speak. We're just moving the awareness, scanning the body.

Tuning into the sensations in the hands. Are the hands touching? Is it smooth or rough? Is it warm or cool? Tuning into the experience of having hands, the vibrancy, this embodiment of hands. There might be a tingling sense of vitality, a sense of energy.

And expanding that attention into the vibrant experience of being embodied. Expanding that to the whole body in a relaxed, easy way. Maybe there's a way in which, in a sense, this embodiment just gets as big as it would like. This sense of aliveness. We're here now, experiencing this.

And then resting attention on the sensations of breathing. The movement of the body as it breathes. Can we do this—being present with the experience of breathing—with a sense of warmth and care? We're not trying to force ourselves; we're not beating ourselves up. If we find the mind is squirrelly, maybe bring some more curiosity to it, like petting a cat, or of course, petting a dog too.

When the mind wanders, we just very simply, gently begin again. Making a story, chastising ourselves—that's extra. It's not needed. Just allow that to be in the background.

Tuning into the experience of inhales and exhales. The embodied experience is not about thinking or concepts, but a different type of knowing.

I'm going to drop in a poem. Just allow this poem to be received. Let whatever needs to happen, that you need to do with this poem, let the words wash over you. The poem goes like this:

Chapter 1 I walk down the street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I fall in. I am lost. I am helpless. It isn't my fault. It takes me forever to find a way out.

Chapter 2 I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I pretend I don't see it. I fall in again. I can't believe I'm in the same place. But it isn't my fault. It still takes a long time to get out.

Chapter 3 I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I see it is there. I still fall in. It's a habit. My eyes are open. I know where I am. It is my fault. I get out immediately.

Chapter 4 I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I walk around it.

Chapter 5 I walk down another street.

I'll read the poem again:

Chapter 1 I walk down the street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I fall in. I am lost. I am helpless. It isn't my fault. It takes me forever to find a way out.

Chapter 2 I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I pretend I don't see it. I fall in again. I can't believe I'm in the same place. But it isn't my fault. It still takes a long time to get out.

Chapter 3 I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I see it is there. I still fall in. It's a habit. My eyes are open. I know where I am. It is my fault. I get out immediately.

Chapter 4 I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I walk around it.

Chapter 5 I walk down another street.

So this poem is by Portia Nelson³. It's called Autobiography in Five Short Chapters. Again, that's Portia Nelson, Autobiography in Five Short Chapters. I think I just love this title; it's pretty descriptive.

Poetry of Practice II (3 of 5): Patterns

Okay, so here we are talking about yet another poem that we explored during the guided meditation, and I'll read it again here. The title of the poem is Autobiography in Five Short Chapters by Portia Nelson. I think maybe if I had said the title at the beginning of the guided meditation, there'd be a little bit different understanding of the poem. But here we are.

Chapter 1 I walk down the street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I fall in. I am lost. I am helpless. It isn't my fault. It takes me forever to find a way out.

Chapter 2 I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I pretend I don't see it. I fall in again. I can't believe I'm in the same place. But it isn't my fault. It still takes a long time to get out.

Chapter 3 I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I see it is there. I still fall in. It's a habit. My eyes are open. I know where I am. It is my fault. I get out immediately.

Chapter 4 I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I walk around it.

Chapter 5 I walk down another street.

I find myself smiling when I'm saying this, partly because this poem is so simple. It's not complicated, it's not something we have to figure out. But maybe that's part of its beauty, and part of its power is its simplicity.

One thing that I appreciate very much is, of course, that this poem has a pattern. The different chapters all start the same. In the same way, for those of you who are familiar with the suttas, you know that many of the suttas have the same thing—where there's this repetition, except one little bit is changed. This is a real common theme.

Let's be honest, it's a common theme in our lives that we have patterns. Some of them are more helpful than others. But just this recognition that patterns are such a part of our life—the way that we behave and the grooves that we can get stuck in, as well as the grooves that can really support us. Regular meditation practice, coming to 7:00 AM regularly, and connecting with others in the chats or having a Sangha⁴ in some kind of way. So just this recognition of the power of patterns, both the way that they show up in our lives, but also in the way that we learn things. We learn, "Oh yeah, this is similar, but this little bit is different." Sometimes what's different is what gets highlighted.

Because in the same way, even though this poem, of course, has this pattern that's getting repeated and repeated, there's also this clear sense of progression. There's a sense of movement. Literally, the speaker is walking down the sidewalk, but also figuratively you can sense that there's more and more freedom until at the end, it's just this, "Oh, I'm going to walk down a different street."

When I read this poem and I hear this "walking down the street," what comes to my mind—it might not come to other people's minds—is when we take refuge in the Buddha, Dhamma, and Sangha. Many of you have done this; it is a tradition that we do at the beginning of retreats, and we chant, "Buddhaṃ saraṇaṃ gacchāmi"⁵. It literally means, "I go for refuge to the Buddha, Dhamma, and Sangha." But this idea of "I go for refuge" is sometimes—gacchāmi can be translated as, "I walk towards." There's a way in which this sense of movement is such an integral part of our life, and maybe there's a way in which we can influence where we're walking, the direction we're going.

Something else that I really appreciate about this poem, that I didn't understand or didn't appreciate the first time I heard this, or maybe even the second time I heard this poem, but this time looking at this, is that there's this sense of resilience. There's a sense of resolve. The speaker continues walking down the street. They didn't sit down and refuse, "Okay, I give up. I'm not going to walk anymore," or anything like this.

One way we might understand this is that the speaker has a growth mindset—a belief that a person's capacity can be improved—in contrast with a fixed mindset, which is a limiting belief that, "Oh, we can't change. Nothing's going to be different. It's always going to be like this." It turns out more and more that having this growth mindset is incredibly impactful. Just this general belief that things can change, that they can be different. Yes, there are patterns, but they're not always 100% the same. When we find ourselves in these patterns, something different is happening; maybe we're different, the occasion is different.

Of course, in this poem, part of the difference and part of the progression of this poem is the amount of awareness the speaker has. In chapter one, the speaker says, "I am lost, I am helpless." Just this kind of recrimination, kind of beating oneself up. Then the second one has maybe a little bit more awareness, like, "Okay, I see it, but I pretend that I don't." This is human nature. We often are like, "Okay, I see it, but maybe if I ignore it, it'll go away. If I look the other way, maybe it won't be there."

Then the third chapter: "I still fall in. It's a habit. My eyes are open. I know where I am." This is the recognition of, "Oh yeah, this is something that recurs in my life. This is a pattern I have." And then things begin to shift in the later chapters. After there's this recognition—"I know where I am"—they're not saying that they like it. They're not saying it's fun. It's not saying it's their preference. They're just saying, "Oh, I know where I am." And then things really begin to shift. They start walking around the hole, and then they start walking down another street.

Part of this progression and practice in our lives—maybe we can even use the word maturity—is not only about awareness, but it's also about our relationship to what's happening that starts to shift. We don't get to choose what life brings us, what kind of holes there are in our sidewalks. We don't get to choose that. But what can be shifted is our relationship to what happens to our lives.

One way is the amount of blaming. Do we have the sense of, "Okay, it's a problem with things that are out there. They have to be changed. This person has to behave differently, this institution has to behave differently." Everything out there is the problem, without looking in here. To be sure, I am not saying that people are not victims, and that things out there are perfect. Of course not. That's not helpful, nor is it accurate.

But is there a way in which we are focusing on what the speaker here in this poem says in chapter one: "It isn't my fault." Instead, there's kind of this stubbornness, like, "I don't have to do anything. Everything out there has to be different." And the speaker says this again in the second chapter. Until we get to the third chapter and we say, "It is my fault," and then they immediately get out of the hole. There's a connection here between whether we spend energy blaming—maybe blaming what's out there, or maybe we are even blaming ourselves—and when we put down the blaming, this is when things are shifting and can be different.

To be sure, part of this practice is developing our character and developing wisdom. This patient training and repeated cultivation is a part of practice. Working with the patterns of our minds and hearts, and gradually shaping the direction of our lives. Because something else that's also implicit in this poem that we don't see is this restraining from acting on impulses that cause harm. We don't see the speaker in this poem intentionally harming, thrashing out, hurting others, or hurting themselves, but maybe systematically bringing their attention back to being present, rather than lost in thought. You might say, even cultivating mindfulness.

Many of you know this, but some of the pāramīs⁶—these qualities that really support finding more freedom that we do in our daily life, often translated as the perfections—include patience, resolve, and loving-kindness, doing this with warmth. And the Factors of Awakening⁷, which also support this movement towards greater and greater freedom, include tranquility and equanimity.

These qualities are implicit in this poem. We might say that through cultivating just showing up for our lives—the good, the bad, and the ugly, right? Our lives are a mixture of things. Part of it is to just keep showing up, and then maybe allowing these beautiful qualities, these positive qualities that are already in our hearts and minds, allowing them to blossom. Allowing the wisdom to shine through. Maybe some faith, some confidence that, "Okay, I'm going to keep on walking down this street," until we realize, "Oh, there's something completely different. There's another street."

Maybe one last thing that I'll say here is, you notice that the speaker of this poem is not emphasizing that we have to be completely different. The patterns, and we might even use the word archetypes, that make up our individuality—they're beautiful. It's not something that we have to completely change. This practice, this poem, is not asking us to be somebody we are not. It's just allowing some transformation and change to arise, so that we all can find freedom. We can walk down the streets that allow us to have our best life, our best wisdom to show up. Maybe some of these other streets are a way that we can help other people. Our learning, like, "Oh, watch out, there's a hole in that sidewalk," is something we can share with others. It's not to stop walking, and it's not to become a different person, but it's to allow the wisdom to blossom inside of all of us.

Autobiography in Five Short Chapters by Portia Nelson. Thank you.