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Guided Meditation: The Buddha's Five Daily Recollections; Death; Dharmette: The Buddha's Five Daily Recollections (3 of 5); Death - Mei Elliott

The following talk was given by Mei Elliott at Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, CA on May 15, 2024. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.

Guided Meditation: The Buddha's Five Daily Recollections; Death

Welcome. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening—wherever you are, whenever you are. Nice to see you again. My name is Mei Elliott, and we are on day three of the Buddha's Five Daily Reflections, or Five Daily Recollections.

Today we will be focusing on the third phrase: "I am of the nature to die. I have not gone beyond death."

Death is something that most of us don't spend a lot of time thinking about. By centering this reflection, we can transform fear, we can align our life with our priorities, and really become more intimate with the truth of the way things are. This is a powerful one.

As mentioned in previous days, as these phrases progress—one through four—they become increasingly more challenging. This one can have a stronger impact than the last two. Please consider for yourself whether this topic is supportive for you today. If you are a little under-resourced or feel like you don't have the bandwidth for this, that is totally fine too. It might be a little too much for today.

These recollections should be carefully titrated and administered when we actually have sufficient well-being and resiliency to take them in. So please, just take care of your own heart.

As with the previous days, we'll practice with the phrase in two ways. First, we'll sit in silence together. Then, we'll shift to dropping the phrase into our practice, just letting it ripple through the mind and heart, seeing what arises. Secondly, we'll do an engaged contemplation where I'll offer questions and you'll be invited to think about and feel into what comes up for you in a more engaged fashion.

During the meditation, I'll offer Nikki Mirghafori's version of this phrase, which is so sweet and so gentle: "Breathing in with compassion, I gently remember that this body will die." I'll offer both the traditional and her version of the phrase.

Let's get started with our meditation. Go ahead and find a posture which is supportive for you. Maybe that's sitting, standing, or lying down—something that allows you to have some energy in the mind so you're not sleepy, but also something that invites calm, invites some tranquility.

Start by softening the muscles of the body, releasing any tension. Connect with your anchor—the breath, the global sense of the body sitting, the soundscape—whatever it is for you that helps you really land here in the present.

Any thoughts that arise during this time, we're not resisting them or fighting them, nor are we getting lost in them. We are taking them and respectfully putting them on the shelf. We'll be putting them on the metaphorical altar for the period of our meditation. Setting aside anything discursive.

Go ahead and take some time now in silence to settle and collect the mind.

[Silence]

Before entering into the recollection together, we can start by warming up the heart. We can do that with a little metta¹, a little loving-kindness. The proximate cause for metta to arise is reflecting on someone's goodness. To warm up our own heart, as these recollections are about ourselves and we begin with ourselves, we can reflect on our own goodness.

Just take a moment to consider your own goodness. Maybe there's something that you did, small or large, that was generous recently. Maybe you offered a compliment, gave a gift, or listened well. Something you appreciate about yourself. Just take a moment or two.

Letting go of this reflection, send yourself some kindness. As all beings wish to be happy, may I too be happy. May I be healthy. May I be safe and at ease.

Just bringing in a little care, a little gentleness for ourselves.

We'll begin with our recollection. I'll say the phrase, and then just let it drop into your meditation like a pebble in a pond. Let it ripple through the mind and heart. Just see what naturally arises. With this, we're not calling forth thinking intentionally. There may be thoughts, words, or pictures in the mind that arise, and that's fine, but we're not deliberately contemplating this time.

So let's begin.

"Breathing in with compassion, I gently remember that this body will die."

Just noticing what arises. If there's any dukkha² there, if there's any suffering in the heart or mind, holding it with compassion.

"I am subject to death. I have not gone beyond dying."

"Breathing in with compassion, I gently remember that this body will die."

Comforting as needed. "There, there, love. It's okay."

In your own time now, dropping in the phrase and seeing what happens.

[Silence]

When you're ready, letting go of phrases, returning to your anchor, and settling back.

We will shift now to our engaged contemplation. I'll offer you some questions which you can actively think about, but keep a "short leash" on the thinking, in the sense that one thought can easily lead to another and another, and suddenly we're on a very far-off topic. Keep your thoughts close to the question, gravitating around the being.

The first question: When you consider that you'll die, how do you relate to it? Is there fear, sadness, acceptance? How do you relate to death?

If you were to imagine your death: Consider, how would you like to die? What is that moment like? Where are you? Who are you with? What can you see, hear, smell, taste?

Realizing that death will occur: What do you want to prioritize? In considering this, is there anything that you want to let go of? Or anything that you want to begin? Namely, how do you want to spend your time? How do you want to prioritize?

As we deepen this, of course, while we are inviting thinking and concepts in, also pay attention to the body. Keep a wide-angle mindfulness to feel and sense emotions and body sensations as the thoughts occur.

Knowing that you are subject to death: How do you want to be with others? Does it inspire patience, forgiveness, expressions of love? How do you want to be with others?

In daily life: Are you aware of the blessing of life and vitality, of one more day on this planet? Are you aware of the blessing of life and vitality?

Letting go of any reflection now, coming back into silence. Sensing the body, noticing what sensations are present. Noticing if there's an emotion present, or a mood. Recognizing whatever you find and allowing it to be there.

Whatever you find is a natural response to coming to terms with this recollection on death. It's okay to feel big feelings, or no feelings. Meeting whatever you find with some kindness.

We'll close with just a few metta phrases. Just as all beings want to be happy, healthy, safe, and at ease:

May I too be happy, healthy, safe, and at ease.

May the benefit of our time together support all beings in being happy, healthy, safe, and at ease.

Dharmette: The Buddha's Five Daily Recollections (3 of 5); Death

Welcome back. For those just arriving, my name is Mei Elliott.

I'll begin with the first paragraph of a book which has a title that I love. It's called Advice to Future Corpses³, and I think it was actually mentioned in the YouTube chat feed yesterday. The book begins like this:

"Right now, imagine dying. Make it what you want. You could be in your bedroom, on a lonesome hill, or in a beautiful hotel. Whatever you want. What is the season? What time of day is it? Perhaps you want to lie in sweet summer grass and watch the sunrise over the ocean. Imagine that. Perhaps you want to be cuddled in a soft bed listening to Mozart or Beyoncé. Do you want to be alone? Is there a particular hand you want to hold? Do you smell the faint scent of baking bread or Chanel No. 19? Close your eyes. Feel the grass, the silk sheets, the skin of the loving hand. Hear the long-held note. Dance a little. Smell the bread. Imagine that."

I once sat a retreat with Bhikkhu Analāyo⁴, one of the great scholar monks of our time. We spent the whole week doing an elaborate series of practices involving emptiness and compassion and all of these extraordinary Buddhist teachings. He spent quite a lot of time during this week telling us how incredibly profound these teachings were and how much they can transform us and lead to liberation. Towards the end of the retreat, someone asked him, "If you could only do one practice, what would you recommend?"

He said, "Oh, well, I actually wouldn't recommend any of the practices we're doing. I would recommend death contemplation."

Perhaps that's sufficient to describe the importance of today's recollection. Or maybe this from the Buddha:

"The elephant's footprint is the greatest of footprints. Of all the mindfulness meditation, that on death is supreme."

So clearly this is an important recollection. Here we are in the third of five recollections: "I am of the nature to die. I have not gone beyond death." This can be truly transformational.

There are many ways to engage in death contemplation. This daily recollection is just one. Mindfulness of death is called Maranāssati⁵. Within this field of practices, there are charnel ground meditations, reflecting on the stages of decay of the body, and there's a simple breath practice that can be done:

Inhale: This could be my last breath. Exhale: Let go.

Inhale: This could be my last breath. Exhale: Let go.

So there are many ways to do this; the recollections are just one. One of the core intentions of this practice is to move this conceptual understanding of death into the heart, into the belly where it can be digested. Because for most of us, we really can't fathom our own death beyond an intellectual understanding.

In the Mahabharata, a revered Hindu text, the Lord of Death asks, "What is the most wondrous thing in the world?" His answer: "That we could see everyone dying around us and think it won't happen to us."

It's simply amazing that it could be happening all around us and yet still we don't think it will happen to us. Like, we know of course it will happen to us, but there's something in us that can't necessarily come to terms with that, or struggles to.

So it can be really helpful to spend time with death, if we can really get to know it deeply so we can be changed by it. But we need to remember again and again so that we can actually bring that into our heart and really learn to live differently by it.

A few days ago I mentioned an aging app that could be downloaded on your phone. Today I have another one to share with you. I kind of love that we can turn our phones into these tools for liberation rather than nuisances. The app is called "We Croak." The intention is to remind you that you're going to die. Here's what they say on their website:

"Each day we'll send you five invitations at randomized times to stop and think about death. We Croak invitations come at random times and at any moment, just like death itself."

This, in a way, is like a modern version of the ancient Buddhist practice of remembering daily.

I spent the last eight years or so living at Zen temples. Whenever it's time for meditation at a Zen temple, an instrument is played to call the Sangha—the community of practitioners—to the meditation hall, the Zendo. The instrument is called a han⁶. It's a large wooden block about a foot and a half wide and a foot tall, and it hangs from the ceiling. This block is hit with a mallet. The instrument functions a little like a grandfather clock in that it chimes the hour before meditation, so the monks can track what time it is by listening to the mallet strikes.

The reason I mention this instrument is because of what is painted on it. In thick black lettering on the face of the instrument is this phrase:

"Great is the matter of birth and death.⁷ Life slips quickly by. Time waits for no one. Wake up! Wake up! Don't waste this life."

With each strike of the han, this teaching echoes through the monastery, reverberates through the monastery grounds. Wake up! Don't waste this life.

It imparts the sense of saṃvega⁸, of spiritual urgency. Wake up. Spend your time wisely. This is part of the function of today's recollection.

I hear this same sentiment in the last refrain of a Mary Oliver poem⁹: "And what will you do with this one wild and precious life?"

I was doing this death contemplation practice, and having done it for some time, at some point a very deep sweetness arose of just loving this being that I've spent my whole life with. This being called Mei Elliott, who I've cared for since she was small. Sometimes when resting in loving awareness, when the sense of self arises, I relate to her as a child. Realizing that this child is only on this planet for a very short time, I think about how I would want to treat her. How much more tender I would be with her. Rather than living a life based on greed, how could I be generous with her? Kind, patient, forgiving?

Just accompanying this child, this ego, to the end. No need to fix her or ask her to be different. Knowing that you too will die, and the part of you that is still a tender child will have to die, how would you take care of that one?

"Really tender here, dear one. Let me wipe your brow when you're sick. Let me stroke your hand. Lay your head on my shoulder."

So gentle. Can we be with ourselves in this way?

There are many benefits to this practice, some of which I've already named. One is that we can learn to meet death without fear, and perhaps instead meeting it with awe. Here, our final act of generosity is giving our bodies back to the earth. That's how we related to it.

Another benefit I mentioned briefly is the benefit of saṃvega, spiritual urgency—to give ourselves more wholeheartedly to practice.

Another huge one is that we're more likely to act in ways that are aligned with what we value. It helps us prioritize in a way that allows us to live more fully.

And one that Nikki Mirghafori mentions, which I really appreciate, is that this practice provides a great gift for our loved ones: they don't have to take care of your fear and your terror of death if you've already learned to work through that yourself.

So the invitation today is to stay close to this recollection. Stay close to the truth of death when you interact with others, when you take care of yourself—dressing, showering, eating. We will lovingly care for this "one wild and precious life."

I will close with a poem. This is called "For the Anniversary of My Death" by W.S. Merwin.

Every year without knowing it I have passed the day When the last fires will wave to me And the silence will set out Tireless traveler Like the beam of a lightless star Then I will no longer find myself in life as in a strange garment Surprised at the earth And the love of one woman And the shamelessness of men As today writing after three days of rain Hearing the wren singing and the falling cease And bowing not knowing to what

Thank you so much for your attention, everyone. I hope you enjoy your day, that you're gentle with your heart, and that you can lovingly care for this one wild and precious life. Take care.