Sadly, my uncle passed away this weekend. When I was a wee lad, we were very close, but, being the drifter that I am, I didn't "keep in touch" as well as I could have. Of course, this is always a two-way street, and this sort of separation is as normal a part of life as death is, but still...

I'm struck once again, that my culture has given me so little instruction or wisdom around the one thing that's sure to happen to all of us. As D.T. Suzuki said, we're all of us on a boat that goes out to sea and sinks. But almost all of the stock aphorisms and affirmations being passed in my family now seem to hide this fact of living. Or at least defer it.

Here's a warning: I'm going to air all my dirty death-laundry. Because I'm confused. Because I don't like to see my loved ones suffer. Because I want to know what personal truth can be found in this situation. So what have we been given to cope with death?

"He's in a better place."
"He's with Jesus now."
"He's looking down on us smiling."
"Until we meet again in heaven."

Perhaps these are compassionate and give us time to mourn. But I look at myself and at my relatives now, and I wonder if these denials do more harm than good.... First, because they obscure the truth. Do they prolong the grieving process? I don't know. Second, because they force a leap of faith. While it's nice to hold onto hope that we'll all be together again in an afterlife, what proof do I have? We're thrust into a hope/fear duality. To the degree that I can have hope, is the exact degree to which I must experience dread, that "what if I'm wrong?" hidden in the dark of the mind. And more and more leaps of faith must be added, always, to reaffirm our faith in what we cannot know. I fear what happens to us, when we ignore and wrap up human suffering in the gauze of faith....

Which is the biggest problem I see: the fundamental shift we create in reality. If death can be a temporary thing, or avoided, then death becomes an unnatural state. If "life eternal" is possible, with the purchase of the right club membership, then death becomes a tragedy. If permanence is held in the mind as a paradigm, than the natural state of impermanence becomes intolerable. And as soon as a write this, I twinge. Letting go of my uncle, the possibility of forgetting, the possibility that his essence will be forgotten, like everyone who has ever lived, should that natural state of things be seen as a problem?

So I'm going to write here over the next few days, perhaps we can have a discussion if anyone would like to participate. Perhaps we can even find affirmations that are compassionate that don't require confusing value judgments.

Anyway, if I do this, maybe I can be compassionate with my family and accept social convention, but also be compassionate with myself. I'll try to be as open and blunt as I can, in the tradition of "open-source religion" especially regarding taboos about my own insecurity over how I'm supposed to feel about death, because as soon as I accept his death as natural and start instead to celebrate his life, I feel guilty for letting go of the sadness.

I don't know if I'm even capable of finding wisdom here, but I'll look. I only know I can't look away, that I'll try to stay with the not-knowing, the off-balance, bitter-sweet and tender-hearted feeling of being human.

Namaste

Profound words on death and bereavement:

http://www.livingdharma.org/E-mail-BuddhismAndDeath.html

I am reminded of a line I said while speaking at my beautiful sister's funeral service.......

"I honor your path, even though it brings me great sadness...."

.....I am so blessed to have shared this Earth Walk with you......

Gratefully my sisters service was not Christian based, and when people gave me well meaning rhetoric like you mentioned "she is god;s hands now, she is looking down at you from heaven".....I accepted the well meaning intent behind their words, and understood that these folks were just on a different path than my own.


I do know that life is for the living. Acceptance of death doesn't mean you don't grieve, or feel a variety of emotions. It sucks, I have encountered death enough times in my life, and I find it harder when the loss of life is a young person, with a spouse, with young children.

I am sorry for your loss. (This is something I do say which makes sense to me, you have a loss, you are grieving your loss, and I am sorry you must encounter such pain.)

A death in the family should in my mind, bring the family closer together, what good is a loss of life coupled with a family who cannot connect, this does the person no honor.

I have suffered two miscarriages, these too were most shocking and painful. I guess I got through them by honoring my Spirit Child in my own way, often through art, a painting, a carving, a nature based ritual.

Not sure what my point is here, other than I am not afraid to talk deep feelings and death and I am sorry for your loss.

I am here for you, hugs.

Sorry about your Uncle and your bereavement you said "Here's a warning: I'm going to air all my dirty death-laundry. Because I'm confused. Because I don't like to see my loved ones suffer. Because I want to know what personal truth can be found in this situation. So what have we been given to cope with death?"
have at it this is the place to do it put it all up on the table

peace be with you

You know Mr Lucky i was sad but glad you posted. thought this a great so much can be said. So much that i could not say a word and because of my own pending disconnect really did not know where to start.

Sooooooooooooo i will say this your right the west has never really done overly well with death. It is the east where it is looked at from every possible angel. Buddhism and Zen in particular are the practices of inquiry the who why where what of life. it is those who burn with the great question of life and death that study, sit and contemplate the great questions.

it was the Buddha who walk outside the gate and saw the tremendous suffering for the 1st time and who could not rest until he had the answer.

this is one for all of us to consider cause sooner or later you will be there too.

Wise words my friend!

As this funeral procession paints them dark
a wedding would paint them bright
but what's under the paint?

These cars push slow through the day
seamless as jello
cold blows vapor dragons out of tailpipes
they open their mouths to roar and freeze in mid-air

None of it moves me.
None of it means a thing.






This has been a month of funerals for me. The week after my uncle Alan passed away, my partner's uncle Alan passed away. Both men the same age, both leaving behind wives and 2 children, both about the same age--too young to see their grandchildren. Statistically, everyone will experience a time above the mean, where death screams 'look at me.'


Anyway, I do plan to get back to this thread....

Thanks, Tracey, for sharing that. I think your suggestions were right on. I think that it's naturally comforting to share your sympathies as well as your personal experience. It's a gentle reminder that despite the personal narratives we weave out of death, that perhaps it's some kind of punishment or something personal, dying is natural. That seems to be the Buddha's response in the famous mustard seed story. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kisa_Gotami

When Kisa Gotami lost her only son, she fell into a desperate grief. It seemed so horrible, so unnatural to lose her only son at just two years old. She searched out India's famous yogis to help bring her son back, but none of them would help her. When she came to the Buddha, he agreed that this was a tragic thing to happen to her, and told her he could help, if she could bring him a just a single mustard seed from a house that had never known such a tragic and untimely death.

This story gives deep comfort to me, despite the hard truth it invokes; images of the difficult discussions this woman must have had with her neighbors, on her futile search: of course, we are all touched by such tragedy. It instantly shatters the myths we all seem to pile on tragedy's cart when it comes, that we are alone, that this was some punishment.

"It's a shame that times like this are the only times we can all get together." I seem to hear this at every funeral. A self-evident sad commentary on life in the modern world. But far worse when we must torture ourselves over whatever happiness we find in reunion during a "sad" time.

My personal experience is that I first respond to death with numbness and shock. Then I feel guilty about not feeling worse than I do. Because, if I, who was so close to the diseased don't feel horrible, then what did his life mean? Then finally, the chemical cocktail of grief hits the body. Should I feel obligated by love, to dwell in it? To exaggerate it? Prolong it? And in doing so perhaps make everybody around me more miserable?

I saw very clearly I was not the only person going through this self-negotiation of feeling bad about any momentary happiness. Apparently, this level of neurosis is the norm in our modern world. Someone else even admitted to me, that they alternately felt bad about feeling good, then felt bad about feeling bad, because he was supposed to be "in heaven now."

"I know we'll all be together again some day... Why do I feel so bad?"

No doubt, if we're capable of being sad about being happy, then sad about being sad, we're plenty capable of also feeling bad about feeling bad about all of these fellings too.

So being open and honest about how we feel, and about our own experiences, and then sharing that with each other might be the most compassionate and helpful thing we can do to help each other. Maybe that way, we can find our way back to a less complicated, more direct and honest way of grieving, where death is tragic and painful, but a natural part of life, not something to torture ourselves over, and not punishment for our failings.

You hear the one about the great meditation master, known for his enlightened understanding of all, who was called to visit the emperor? The emperor was very much impressed! So he says: "I called you here because I have to know! What happens after death?"

"I don't know. Ask a dead master."
------
Again, I find deep comfort in these stories of hard truth:

Won't say dead, won't say alive: http://www.mro.org/zmm/teachings/daido/teisho12.php
-------
Chuang Tzu's wife died. When Hui Tzu went to convey his condolences, he found Chuang Tzu sitting with his legs sprawled out, pounding on a tub and singing. "You lived with her, she brought up your children and grew old," said Hui Tzu. "It should be enough simply not to weep at her death. But pounding on a tub and singing — this is going too far, isn't it?"

Chuang Tzu said, "You're wrong. When she first died, do you think I didn't grieve like anyone else? But I looked back to her beginning and the time before she was born. Not only the time before she was born, but the time before she had a body. Not only the time before she had a body, but the time before she had a spirit. In the midst of the jumble of wonder and mystery a change took place and she had a spirit. Another change and she had a body. Another change and she was born. Now there's been another change and she's dead. It's just like the progression of the four seasons, spring, summer, fall, winter.

"Now she's going to lie down peacefully in a vast room. If I were to follow after her bawling and sobbing, it would show that I don't understand anything about fate. So I stopped."
-------

Lieh Tzu was on a trip and was eating by the roadside when he saw a hundred-year-old skull. Pulling away the weeds and pointing his finger, he said, "Only you and I know that you have never died and you have never lived. Are you really unhappy? Am I really enjoying myself?"

(These last two are from the Daozang translation of the Chuang Tzu.)

These are great, thank you! They speak to me of a Universal knowledge, seeing things from a birds eye's view instead of just our limited perspective. This train of thought helped me find peace when my sis died and I was left with her children, the grief still came in tidal waves, I still wept and felt great sadness, but with this, there was a deep peace, knowing that all that had happened in the grande scheme of things, was a page had been turned, just another page.

I also think I have a warped sense of humor, does anyone else laugh when reading these? Especially the one about Lieh Lzu and the hundred year old skull.

I know, I love that sense of humor! I really like the poetry of Ikkyu, like: "remember! Under the skin you fondle lie the bones, waiting to reveal themselves!" He wrote a bunch of poems with skeletons:

Quote:

Toward dawn I dozed off, and in my dreams I found myself surrounded by a bunch of skeletons, acting as they did in life. One skeleton came over to me and said: "Memories Flee and Are no more: All are empty dreams Devoid of meaning. "Violate the reality of things And babble about “God” and “Buddha” And you will never find The true Way. "Still breathing, You feel animated, So a corpse in a field Seems to be something Apart from you." I got on well with this skeleton - he had renounced the world to seek the truth and had passed from the shallows to the depths. He said things clearly, just the way they are. I lay there with the wind in the pines whispering in my ears and the autumnal moonlight dancing across my face. What is not a dream? Who will not end up as a skeleton?

More skeletons! http://www.c-pan.net/EPHU-ACADEMY23/skeletons.html

This story also shows a bit of this dark humor: Ikkyu, the Zen master, was very clever even as a boy. His teacher had a precious teacup, a rare antique. Ikkyu happened to break this cup and was greatly perplexed. Hearing the footsteps of his teacher, he held the pieces of the cup behind him. When the master appeared, Ikkyu asked: "Why do people have to die?"

"This is natural," explained the older man. "Everything has to die and has just so long to live."

Ikkyu, producing the shattered cup, added: "It was time for your cup to die."


And Ikkyu was also a famous musician. Here's a recording of one of his pieces:

http://new.music.yahoo.com/stan-richardson/tracks/murasaki-reibo--1386410

He must have been something else at a party!

Sipping my afternoon tea I read your posts and link (Unfortunately could not hear the music). Laughing quietly to myself and at times almost weeping from the sheer truth of the words as they touch my heart and then vanish, leaving not even a shadow, or a bone.

Beautiful, Tracey.

Another Ikkyu for you:

Every day priests minutely
examine the Dharma
and endlessly chant
complicated sutras.
They should learn
how to read the love letters
sent by the wind and rain,
the snow and moon.

- Ikkyu (1394-1491)

Quote:

They should learn how to read the love letters sent by the wind and rain, the snow and moon.

I love it!

I've found this whole discussion very insightful. Sorry to hear of your loss, but at the same time - thanks for sharing the experience.

Ryan

luckymortal wrote:

Beautiful, Tracey. Another Ikkyu for you: Every day priests minutely examine the Dharma and endlessly chant complicated sutras. They should learn how to read the love letters sent by the wind and rain, the snow and moon. - Ikkyu (1394-1491)

These words caress my soul. Thank you.