A [[book]] by [[Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche]] about his four year pilgrimage as a wandering, homeless monk.

He's surprisingly candid about the anxieties he faced in the early stages of his journey-- he's embarassed, nervous around the squalor and poverty of a third class Indian train, fearful.

It brought back [[memories]] of my experiments being a [[vagabond]] on the west coast.

He spends a lot of time discussing the [[bardos]]: periods of transition in [[consciousness]], usually focused on death and dying but applicable to any life transition. The [[dharmata]] is the explicit phase between death and another life, a particularly poetic idea.

Near the end of the story, [[Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche]] gets a bacterial infection from some leftover rice and daal. He's camped out in the city where the Buddha was cremated. After some doubt, he decides to accept death as it comes, quoting this poem by Tokme Zangpo:

If it is better for me to be ill, Give me the energy to be ill. If it is better for me to recover, Give me the energy to recover. If it is better for me to die, Give me the energy to die.

He does almost die, and is rescued by an Asian man whom he taught meditation while staying in Varanasi. On the verge of dying he has an experience of [[kensho]], comparing his previous understandings to a painting or [[reflection of the moon]].

Quotes

All I wanted to do with the parts of myself that I disliked was get rid of them, discard them as garbage. I did not understand their value as compost for my sanity.

I really like this phrase. The [[compost of sanity]].

People everywhere try so hard to make the world better. Their intentions are admirable, yet they seek to change everything but themselves. To make yourself a better person is to make the world a better place. Who develops industries that fill the air and water with toxic waste? How did we humans become immune to the suffering of animals raised to be slaughtered? Until we transform ourselves, we are like mobs of angry people screaming for peace.

I had begun to recognize that the problems that beset modern people at the peak of their family and work lives closely parallel issues that arise for people everywhere at the end of life: an inability to accept impermanence, grasping at what is not available, and not being able to let go.

I found this an interesting example of the [[decadence]] of modern societies-- death arrives at middle age.

The illness is over. I had almost died and it had set me free. Free for what? To die again, and again; free to live without fear of dying. Without fear of living. Free to die every day. Free to live without embarassment. I would no longer rely on enclosures, on shells and shields, attendants and robes. I would accept impermanence, of death and of life.

Filed in: [[Literature Notes]], [[Buddhism]], [[Spiritual Reading]]

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