The Seed

Everyday, people on the subway stare at the pendant on the chain around my neck.  Once in a while, someone will ask me "Oh, are you a Buddhist?"  And I will say yes, mildly uncomfortably, because the answering of the question immediately creates a "difference" between myself and the person I'm speaking to.  I wear the chain as an affirmation, not a declaration. With people I know better, the pendant-stare is often accompanied by questions, interesting questions borne out of curiosity but further perpetuating some kind of imaginary divide.  I answer them as best I can, as truthfully as I can.  In recent years, the curiosity and the questions have started coming more often.  I've come to realize that it's not about people gravitating toward a difference, it's about people seeking commonality.  

As I get older, interconnectedness appears to me everywhere.  That is not to say that I feel a deep sense of kinship with everyone I come across, no.  (If you know me, you know that I am fairly routinely irritated by people.)  What I do feel, though, is an acute awareness of others -- their strengths, weaknesses, passions, fears and frailities.  I don't mean that in a new-agey psychic sort of way; I mean that in a grounded, listening, intuitive kind of way.  The way that all of us feel those around us when we take the time to. And I am fascinated by how the combination of those parts of each of us in different ratios will create the reality, and the perception, of how each person walks through the world.  I am fascinated by how we quest to fill the internal by seeking the external.  I am fascinated by our remarkable progress in tandem with our remarkable stasis.  I am fascinated by the desire for love and how that manifests in ways that run the gamut from self-actualization to debauchery. 

The name of this blog may not be familiar to you. This will make it clearer:  

In Sanskrit, bodhi means "awakened" and chitta means "mind" or "heart." Bodhichitta -- "awakened heart-mind" -- is the compassionate wish to realize enlightenment for all beings, not just oneself. Through bodhichitta, the desire to attain enlightenment transcends the narrow interests of the individual self. Bodhichitta is an essential part of Mahayana Buddhism. Without bodhichitta, the path to enlightenment is mired in selfishness. However hard we work we are still wrapped up in our own heads, our own pain, our own wants. The path to awakening opens when it becomes unselfish and compassionate.

The Bowl will not be me talking didactically about Buddhism.  I have no interest in doing that... I have no desire to convert anyone or pretend that I can teach anyone anything.  What it will be is me expressing thoughts and telling stories about instances during which I feel or have felt the most profoundly moved to walk this path, the many moments in which I fall flat on my face and get up lost, and the moments in which I find my way again through the shared experiences and brilliance of you, the aspiring buddhas in my life whose warmth and wisdom are a compass for me on many a day.  Yes, you'll likely come across some Buddhist terms that you haven't heard before in this blog -- they're a integral part of my life although you've probably never heard me speak them.  

I have no idea where this blog will go, or if anyone will read it.  I only know that to all of the people, some friends and some strangers, who've asked "Are you a Buddhist and what is it like?", this blog is an attempt at honouring, and thereby addressing, the question.  But not eliminating it - it is what it is - and not answering it.  I've surrendered to the knowledge that there is no answer.  I've surrendered to the freedom that comes from that knowledge. 

Namaste,
Tanisha