Practicing of the Emptiness and the Bottom :: 2006/03/26 13:03
Recently, I have been experienced two unusual, contrasting experiences in my Pendle Hill life.
I have addicted so much religious discourse, so much talks and discussions for a long years.
But in Pendle Hill something is happened in a non-verbal way.
The one is happened in Clay meditation class.
From the clay itself: how beautiful it becomes
by the emptying space.
The rough clay comes to show the different shapes
and sizes marvelously
by the hands of students. But, it’d better to say,
these marvelous things are formed by the empty space.
The empty space makes various shapes vividly.
This clay that holds the different empty space within it
becomes the transformed feature shining through its emptiness.
Because of influence of my parents’ poverty into my identity,
I have never thought that I have a possibility to become someone good, or special.
I have just been discouraged as a shy person in all activities.
To use a symbol, I seem to be just a clay which is mean and lowly.
However, this clay meditation in studio gives a chance
to think a possibility
that can become something beautiful and marvelous—a transformed person.
……
I was touched by my emptying space
that is uncreated, unknown;
by my un-doing-ness and un-accomplish-ment.
My being is warmly embracing by gracious emptying space.
........
The other contrasting event is happened in my mopping experience.
In Chase, Main House and Brenton House, my assigned work is both mopping and washing.
I don’t know what I can say my experience exactly
( I am still poor at English expression).
Something like this:
My mopping and washing was about things.
They have no sacramental dimension, no any clue of holiness;
they are just things mundane,
that are not attractable, not beautiful, not valuable.
Trash—yes, they are called “trash,”
that is neglectful, ugly, disgusting.
I usually try to wash them right away, and to trash away
as soon as possible without looking at.
…….
Through my mopping and washing, the reality of the bottom comes closer to me, and sparks my attention.
To say correctly, the bottom grasps my perception and my heart.
The bottom of cups, the bottom of dishes, and the bottom,the floor … and so on …
The different forms of bottom, the bottom, the bottom continually approach to my attention.
I have worked 19 hours out of Pendle Hill for my living expensives per week and as a work scholar, 15 hours in Pendle Hill per week.
Because of successive works without rest, one day I felt my body was so heavy.
In Brenton House kitchen, my will cannot almost support my body and I felt my hands too heavy to wash/mop.
In this very exhausted moment, I have a chance to look down at the tiny things of the bottom slowly and attentively, with taking a time.
Then, the reality of the bottom hits my heart and perception.
……the bottom absorbs the whole of my attention…
The tiny things of the bottom:
-The lost who are regarded useless, and have no opportunity to serve others (or to fully grow up) through their existence;
-the last who stay just in the margin/the peripheral, and have no access to the center, with having no role of protagonist of their existence;
-the least who are easily neglected, and do not get any attention from others, with no any loving-kindness nor affection.
……
The reality of the bottom awakens me about where I belong to:
The life of the bottom as the urban poor family
that I have so much hated to live in more than 30 years.
I almost forgot where I belong to, when I return back to
And this reality of the bottom leads me to know where I ought to belong to:
Drives me to my decision that I will co-exist with the reality of the bottom—the lost, the last and the least.
Now is the time to embrace them with loving-eyes.
These are actually where-I-am.
……
The practice of the bottom.
to serve the bottom.
Alas,
how gracious this humble practice of the bottom is
……
Sung
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