Buddhist Pilgrimage - Gil Fronsdal

okay so today I would like to talk about Buddhist pilgrimage and the Catalyst for that was I just finished doing a Buddhist pilgrimage so it's very fresh in my mind and and very much a part of my heart and so I'd like to just speak what's what's up for me the simplest definition maybe of a pilgrimage um that I kind of like is that um a pilgrimage is where a outer journey and an inner Journey um intersect and support each other and so but conventionally pilgrimages are often relate uh associated with going to a sacred site and so they're spiritual nature not everyone well some people think that uh our life itself is a pilgrimage some people will call pilgrimage something which is not necessarily spiritual but that's often the association and um I've been on I've walked four pilgrimage routes in my life two of them were not a pilgrimage for me there was other people's pilgrimage routes so they were people of other religions would enter into it in a deep way because it was deeply connected to their faith and I went along those partly because they were spiritual I felt to that was an important part of why I was there but I didn't share the same spirituality as them and so the Resonance of that part wasn't that strong for me and I've been on two which were Buddhist pilgrimages and they were actually part of my faith part of my spirituality and really felt be important parts of it and um one of them just ended two days ago so so um that was quite lovely the um uh so um so pilgrimages involved kind of an inner and an outer aspect and uh and the outer one is one that uh is connected to the places we go to the out outwardly one of the kind of simple definitions of a added definition to a pilgrimage is uh walking to a sacred site to a sacred Temple sacred place and then maybe walking back is also part of the pilgrimage a pilgrimage is a time when you're we're separating ourselves from life as usual and uh work and home and all these kinds of things that we leave behind so we enter into kind of a different way of being in the world and it's little it's has a lot of overlaps with going on a retreat where there're also the that we leave our home behind we leave our work behind life as usual in order to be able to experience life experience ourselves uh independent from the how those influence us or condition us or or weigh us down or something and it takes a while both on a pilgrimage and on a retreat to let ordinary life settle away to pass away and not be so pressing on us and then something else can start happening the um uh and so the pilgrimage that I just finished uh did have a kind of a sacred site there was going to but it was both uh this pilgrimage began at a sacred site and kind of ended at one and um and so we were walking between these two places and on land that some people considered to be sacred land and um I'm happy to call it that when I walked on it so um the sacred land was um Mount Tamal payas in Moren County and um one of the people on the pilgrimage with us uh was following in the foot in other times had done a lot of following in the footsteps of a kind of a sacred pilgrimage that was started by the beatniks that um Gary Snyder and different people in the 1960s started a pilgrimage around uh Mount Tam circumambulating Mount Tam and that's been going on for years and now I think it's kind of uh an abyss but but but some of the one of the people I've been involved in has done that now a number of time and there's a book about it and she follows the route of the book so she was on the right on the pilgrimage it was there was 10 10 of us doing it together and um so and going from we went from from kind of over mount mount alayas from Spirit Rock Meditation Center to green gold Center both Buddhist centers where I've taught where I've practiced important places for me personally and and U I would consider them sacred sites and uh and uh it was a wonderful in both places uh we were uh offered Hospitality one of the characteristics often of pilgrims pilgrimages the pilgrims are guests of everybody and they're kind of uh received by the people who get along as and receive Hospitality it's not always that way but but that's often uh one characteristic of it and so the the pilgrims usually go with certain kind of humbleness um as a as you would guest into someone's house you don't go in there and demand that they you know that instead of serving you um spinach salad that should have been some other you know you know SP kind of the wrong kind of salad dressing you're using for me here I demand you know like a restaurant you might go in and demand like it's you know something but you know you're a guest someone's home there's a humility or humbleness and receptivity of being a guest so to be that kind of guest walking through the lands and uh putting aside your status for example with your work and your place and just being a kind of a humble person the word pilgrim comes from a kind of a Latin word that kind of suggests being more like a servant and um and so a certain kind of way of walking with Simplicity usually uh uh pilgrims don't go with a lot and um so it was very nice because that's we received the hospitality from Green Gulch first from Spirit Rock and uh we slept in the meditation Hall they have you know nice residence halls but they were they didn't offer us that and U it was lovely then to sleep the meditation Hall and and then uh when we came to Green Gulch Zen Center uh we also slept in meditation Hall there and um and U the difference was at Spirit Rock um no one was using meditation Hall the next morning at Green they wake up Bell starts in the meditation Hall at at quter to 5: and it's we had to be out of there by then so we had to get up early which was part of the charm of it all and then we slept two nights on Mount Tam because we took our time with the walk and it's exquisitely beautiful and um so it was um uh so that was that was the our our pilgrimage and um and in the process to that the land played a very important role uh for us certainly for me uh the land the trees we had a Bist along who told us little bit about the plants as we went along and I learned that uh the redwood trees which are a big part of that area um are Apparently one of the oldest continuously present species of living beings on the planet and that uh the redwood trees as a Genus goes back to the jurass uh Jurassic times so 200 million years ago and the species we have go back to the crustacean time which could be about 100 million years ago and and coincidentally I learned that a very big redb tree has a 100 million leaves it's kind of astounding to me and uh the scale of time the scale of kind of complexity and the these redber trees are so beautiful and so so so tall some of them that we saw and so the pilgrimage in the scale of time that we're part of the scale of um and then also to to see as we went along and botanist pointed it out so it stood out kind of wonderfully that um um uh how the plants uh are shaped by the environment they're in the way they were evolved and you can clearly see that because all the understory plants they all you know they have a problem with getting enough light so they're all flat going directly up to the sky and you can see how they were all shap created in shapes that helped them find light and but because the larger trees were kind of it didn't leave other choices for them to evolve and so this way that we're and so humans as well we've evolved uh as as a species um conditioned by the land the environment the natural world in which we've lived in and been in and so I as I was walking along the pilgrimage I thought of uh one of American one of the anthems of the United States for some people uh Woody Guthrie's uh song that uh and but I had to CH I wanted to change the last the the refrain to um this land uh made you and me this is a land that made you and me if you've been here in the United States for more than seven years probably to some degree or other you've been made by this and uh it's very nice sound and um so um so the idea of going someplace and then walking and there's something about walking the movement of walking the sematic experience of walking that loosen us loosens us up it creates a kind of different different way of being on the land than driving a car is a different way of Being Alive walking outdoors in beautiful natural environment then um and then then being um where the real estate is a computer screen you know that's a very small piece of real estate to spend the time with everything focused on which some people work that way and spend hours each day doing focusing on this little screen the little piece of real estate that calls on so little of our phys ology a little of our body and our senses and experience of life and uh and who we are in relationship to that screen is very different than how most people feel who they are in relationship to a natural world the forest the ocean the the rivers the the trees the mountains that we all went through these last days and uh for one thing I reflect on is that when I came back I did go on my laptop and I looked at my screen and wonder how am I different here and I could feel how uh how I was bigger than whatever the screen is I'm like a big thing the screen is only I don't know a square foot or something at the most and uh and it's um you know I'm big and substantial and and I'm alone there's something about the Solitude of being in relationship to a screen even though my wife was in the house there was something about those very different compared in contrast to being Out outdoors where all the senses are open and there's this huge receptivity that develops over time the walking is a lubricant or is a massage is a it kind of uh opens things up step after step after step and just you always have to take into account what's around you and uh many times the trail was not completely even so there's a constant call your whole body is being sh how it moves through space is constantly being adjusted and changed on all these little micr muscle ways you know little adjustments with the ankles and the where the foot comes down the knees and which muscles are activated and which uh what what an environment you're tuning into are you tuning into things through the ears are you tuning in through the eyes and what are you tuning to the ground the trees the sky the birds the ocean and it's a constant shifting of all kinds of things and the whole body is involved completely in a way that I'm sure your body is completely involved uh in your laptop but it's not it's probably not as fluid and and open and flowing and it's probably getting more and more tense sometimes and you know kind if you if you spend a lot a lot of time on doing the same thing with your body things begin to stiffen up so this wonderful kind of way in which a pilgrimage is built into it is is walking walking walking and hours of walking and uh uh we uh walked in silence before lunch so to walk with a group of people together there's something of bonding that happens when we spend time together in silence you get to know each other differently there's a kind of feeling of of way of tuning into people when you don't have to be figuring out what to say or or how what how to respond to what they're saying there's a kind of sense of camaraderie and commonality and something very I think for me very touching about that kind of experience not so many people are willing to spend a hours you know six hours or something in the morning or maybe not that way probably four hours that we spent um in silence as we walked we did talk occasionally like learning how old the redwood trees are and um and we had a little rituals we did very little simple rituals we did uh as we went along that involved some speech and um the um and so the because of the outer silence it affects the inner silence and it was like being on a retreat or meditating where the inner landscape became highlighted and uh became much more aware of my thoughts much more aware of my feelings my Sensations and there became an inner silence an inner Stillness started to develop being in this out this having this silence as we walked being in touch with an environment that uh I don't know if you would say was a silent environment but it was so spacious and so uh supportive that it kind of contributed to kind of a inner receptivity and inner silence and that was a very important part of this pilgrimage an outer silence that supports an inner silence an inner silence that supports an outer silence and as I went along the little slogan I had for myself that became very rich to reflect on kind of a or practice phrase was um um love teaches us to say yes to everything wisdom teaches us what to say yes to in every situation so we're not saying yes to everything just automatically there's things we shouldn't say yes to but even so even in those situations there's still something we can say yes to and so what is it we can say yes to even in challenging situations even in situations where you don't agree with someone and one one of the things was was um uh yes I'll I'll listen to you you know this isn't exactly the conversation I want to have but yes I don't know if I agree but but yes I'll listen as we walked along yes I'll listen why not the bird I listen to the birds I listen to the ocean I listen to The Creeks yes and so there's a very different orientation to have this yes knowing that I disagree knowing in certain ways you know that I would say no or something but yes you know to live with a yes that I felt that was kind of like how do I say yes here where is the yes that I can live with as opposed to the for some of us uh sometimes the automatic policy is no you know you know no no no but yes to live a life of yes I felt to me it was a wonderful piece of aill pilgrimage to do this pilgrimage route and then we had uh a Buddhist teacher at at Spirit Rock gave a little short Dharma talk to us to begin the journey and uh and that was an kushman who has spent uh years studying pilgrimages and done Buddhist pilgrimages in India and so she was you know familiar with us and then we were um uh at um Greeno one of the senior teachers there met us and gave us a short talk and both places we meditate a little bit with the teachers and then we we met and um they gave a short talk and so it's kind of like bookended the whole thing with this wonderful um you know receiving teachings as we went along and the zen teacher gave this beautiful teaching that is from a kind of a co- and uh the Japanese Buddhist tradition of um it's kind of a fable I think but you decide uh the Buddha himself was out for a walk with his students maybe he was in a pilgrimage and um and he stopped at some location and he pointed to the ground and he said this is the place to build a sanctuary a sacred site apparently the the phrase can also mean uh the way it's translated in English is sanctuary apparently the Japanese words can also mean um a place for enlightenment place for Liberation this is the place and so the Indra who is the was was I don't know if he still is uh the one of the most powerful gods in the Indian Pantheon um heard this and and was coming following along I guess on the walk and you know somehow came down from his Celestial domain and and uh and plucked a a blade of grass out from somewhere and planted that blade of grass into the spot the Buddha had pointed to and said the sanctuary is built and the Buddha smiled that's the story and so uh and the and the teacher talked about the Z teacher talked about um uh how Indra being the most powerful God in the Indian Pantheon could have just you know snapped his finger and created a huge Palace a cathedral you know real building as the sanctuary but he just took some some of the most most humble simple ordinary thing that is right there I suppose a piece blade of grass and put it in the spot and I made the sanctuary and so one interpretation of this for pilgrims is that every step is the sacred site it's not about going to a sacred site it's not about leaving a sacred site it's about finding the sacred site in every step every step is uh is something very uh precious and valuable to be present just for that and so part of the task of a pilgrim is maybe a Buddhist Pilgrim that maybe a Zen Buddhist Pilgrim but is to find what does it mean how do we discover the tremendous value you the power the spirituality the sacredness of one step of the place we're standing the place where our foot comes down this particular moment here and now and it certainly requires a certain kind of humility humbleness it requires certain receptivity it requires a certain uh quietness in the mind where we're not caught up in our thoughts and concerns so much that we miss the missed the moment we missed the footstep we're not here for it and um and it uh certainly requires some kind of feeling of the value the specialness of really being here in the place we're at and uh part of that specialness for Buddhists is to appreciate the possibility of Liberation freedom from attachments from clinging from self preoccupation self building up the self um defending the self um preoccupied with the future preoccupied by the past finding some Liberation from all that which is not an easy thing to do I think one of the characteristics of many people's lives is preoccupation with some aspect of these things but to find it with every step and there's something about walking all day along through the natural world that um that contributes to that contributes to that contributes to that uh somehow the scale of our life and what's important changes in that world so we W part of what we walked along was um the Marine Headland Cliffs and you amazing we had good weather it's amazing view of the ocean uh you know going far far out we had him uh you know the other thing that I loved about the pilgrimages was how much how friendly people were to us as we went along they were people we encountered and even if they didn't know we were doing a pilgrimage people were just friendly out there and um some of them were were uh County employees who were doing their different work that they had to do and they were just so happy to be there and meet us and walk with talk with us or answer our questions about what they were do what they were doing and um and then also uh what was nice was that we were a pilgrim group and as we walked we and through the days we started bonding together and uh becoming more and more it felt like now we're not just a group of people doing the same thing we're a group of people sharing a certain sensitivity a certain mutuality a certain sacredness a certain kind of like we've come together some of the some some of us we never met before never met each other before and um and uh but you know and the the um the the kind of peak time for that really felt like a gel was um there were um uh there were two nights we slept out um on Mount Tam and sleeping bags and Tents and um and the second night there was a picnic table we had our dinner we' finished everything the evening was coming to a close and we all just sat around the picnic table and there was a feeling as it was getting darker that we were it was a full moon uh and uh we were all kind of like we were now jelled into kind of a single kind of a single body there was you might say for a group of people kind of like we were all now on the same page sharing the same thing same same kind of sensibility and feeling very connected to each other and um so and probably partly because we had walked so much together we were sharing the sacredness of this land and this purpose that we're doing and because of the of um you know that the the strong connection we had to this to the practice that we all had everyone was a practitioner so we spend time meditating together sometimes during the day we'd come to these spots that just seem like the right place to meditate and we'd sit there and meditate there's a place called I don't know if you know some of you might know it Cataract Falls it's one of the great hikes in the Bay Area so we walked up Cataract Falls and halfway up there's a great waterfall and we we sat there on the hillside meditating and so these things can happen right here in the Bay Area and what made it a pilgrimage in a sacred pilgrimage was uh the intention the purpose and the kind of context in which it was created and um it was created last year this is the second year we've done it and um before that this pilgrimage didn't exist all Buddhist countries have uh uh pilgrimage routes as far as I know in Asia most religions like maybe all major religions have pilgrimage routes and I don't think there's been too much of this or any much of this I don't know any of this in United States yet so it was high time that we have one here in in California and so now we have one and uh the idea is to make it longer and so this year last year we did uh Spirit Rock to green gold the Zen Center and this year we actually walked a little bit further to Rodeo Beach and ended there and then uh the idea is to make slowly make it the is to try to spend as many nights in meditation halls or Buddhist temples as we make our way down the coast and maybe eventually make to um our Retreat Center in Santa Cruz or or or further make it all the way to tahara T Sahara is deep in the Los padris National Wilderness tasara Zen Center and uh so I don't know how long that would take but but it's um a lot shorter than the El Camino that people know in in Spain so maybe will get away with it so um that was what I did for my vacation kind of my for my pilgrimage so hopefully that was nice for you to hear and um if you have any questions you want to ask about it um be happy to try to respond good morning Gil um mine is less of a question but more of a comment on your uh your talk today it if uh I couldn't help but draw the analogy that uh if the sacred sight equal Enlightenment and each medit um each step was the sight uh revered a sight it would be each meditation would be the step and even more each moment of our lives would be a step and how also you said how difficult that would be yes I I completely agree with you I think that's the all you know that's definitely the conclusion of this practice is to realize that every every meditation you're sitting in the place of Awakening it's a sanctuary every step every every thing you do and um uh so that's the goal some of us need some help and uh and pilgrimage is one of the ways to get that help because it's not just going on retreat but it's you're you're living kind of a life in the world walking and encoun ing things and and so there it's really palpable that this is what you're doing and then hopefully we learn from that we imprint that becomes imprinted in us so that when we go back home that we bring that with us through appreciate that every sip of water is a pilgrimage and you're welcome to ask anything else too it doesn't have to be a pilgrimage Gil has been a long time but I've done the Cataract Trail a couple of times and it's it's a very wonderful place I was glad to hear that you've done it sure let's see if this yeah this is better uh and the waterfall there counts as a body of water you could say um and you saw a view of the ocean I think you said as well I saw in the news yesterday I just saw the headline um about what makes bodies of water so peaceful for us to um be next to I didn't read the article just saw the headline uh and I I resonated with that cuz I I myself find bodies of water to be very peaceful I just loveed to be to be there but I don't know why any thoughts on that why are bodies of water peaceful the um maybe I want answer the question directly the way he asked but uh this last year there's been a few times where I've been in situations where people had to kind of introduce themselves with a little bit about their background where they come from and there story of their life and I've told my life story or you know short version of it or so many times that I'm not that interested in it anymore so it's not like my so so I was so I I I I was I had time to reflect before I was going to do this introduction to myself and uh and um and other people were doing theirs first so it was kind of interesting to hear other people's introductions and then have that reflect back to understand myself in a different way based on what they said and by the time it was my my turn I didn't want to tell any stories or any conventional ways it just didn't wasn't really relevant for me but what was most relevant what I felt most was um at that the last I guess six months where this has been an issue is um um how how have I been shaped by places in nature uh and uh one of those ways that I feel when I was doing this reflection is bodies of water you know they I spent a lot of my life on water and it's been a really big theme throughout my life you I was born on the coast coastal town in Norway and um there's a lot of time on water and Fs and this there some of these FS can be so peaceful so calm when there's no wind and so the the calm bodies of water I feel like have shaped me there's something that lives in me in a way that that um the spaciousness the openness the expansiveness of of peace or calm that uh seems to kind of kind of um impact something in my chest where the chest becomes similar something in my chest gets peaceful and quiet and peaceful um why that is I don't know but uh so you're asking why but um the uh certainly has had a big impact so certainly water I know that was an odd question thank that's a great answer thanks so something some of you might want to reflect on is how would you tell your life story uh from the point of view of the places you lived as opposed to you know what you did and um right thanks to you hi this is Ashwin uh we just recently completed uh Everest Base Cam tracking and I wish we had thought of some of the ideas that you mentioned such as walking in silence for half day and stopping at different spots and doing the meditation and have purposeful conversations uh so I I I think it's a wonderful thing uh looks like and uh maybe IMC will organize some such either hikes or pilgrims that uh non-teachers maybe or others can participate in it and explore this further great thank you yeah there's a there is some people who have uh organized hikes and U and um Kristen uh Benson has offered a couple this last year she was trained to be an e chaplain and so she's offered hikes that that have brought together some of these things and I don't know if she's planning to she does it on the soul St or Equinox time so I don't know if she's planning to do it in um you know the summer solstice but keep keep keep an eye on the newsletter to see but it's a it is do more of it and and um and then um you know maybe with uh with um if this pilgrimage route gets developed all the way down to you know south of here some point it has to go through the peninsula and U so either either you'll have to wait till it gets that far and then you can join or maybe we'll do it develop it in sections and uh don't know if that we can just try finding sections on the peninsula to make and then we can later connect it to create a peninsula P pilgrimage I have a quick question um I just came back from a sacred Place Salt Lake City and um was um IMC came to mind in Buddhist practices because I really was challenged in different ways in terms of what I witnessed and I tried to have um a curiosity should I move um and an openness and I continued to have my challenges so I'm just curious any thoughts um in terms of my struggles with that experience of mine Al so I don't quite understand but I think what you're saying is that uh you came out of maybe maybe a religious situation that has it had problems um no I'm not I don't practice I I just went on vacation to Salt Lake City and um I I struggle with aspects of that faith I don't practice it right but just the history and the unfolding and um the hierarchy and treatment of women and um so you're um commenting on um kind of an openness a having a more of a curiosity versus a a judgmental is kind of how I interpret it um so yeah so you so again I think I I appreciate very much what's behind your question sounds like you're asking a very important question not sure my answer will respond and we can talk more later but the um um um I have I have Mormon friends and number so I know some of the you know who grew up that way and and so I know some of the challenges that they have with their own religion and or some of them have left their religion and but those challenges are not that maybe the maybe the nuances the details are a little different but almost every religion probably every religion has some of the same problems and you don't have to you don't have to you you don't have to kind of look very for long or very far to see problems with Buddhism as a religion as well Buddhism is not free of this as well um but I've uh I've in terms of this idea of you know saying yes to everything um so yes there's problems in religions and uh there's a lot of goodness in people as well so I I was i' I've noticed that there's a a lot of uh generosity a lot of friendship a lot of Ethics in among Mormons that I've met that have inspired me and I know some of the difficulties as well but I really like to orient myself around that which resonates with me and that which inspires me in it because that's that's a way of supporting more of that than the world uh to only Orient ourselves towards it to the problems is uh is kind of limits the ourselves because then we're resonating with what the problem is and the distress that causes us and I don't know if we grow from that as much as we do resonating what's good but what's what's very important is not to be polanish you know and just ignore the problems I think there's a real tremendous importance to see it clearly and then but not to be limited by it or or or in any kind of way but to actually find where where is the spiritual growth happening and um and one of the ways to be inspired that's not the right word but one motivation that I have from when I see things that are terrible in the world is that uh it inspires me to do better and it reminds me that that the world I want to live in is the world that needs to begin with me so if so so that you know rather than waiting for someone else to fix the world at least we try to fix our own world the world that born is born out of us and so if um if other people are being unethical I would like to live in a world that's ethical and so that then I have to look at myself has it come for me in the world with at War I want to live at peace at War where there's conflict I want to live with Concord so how do I live and promote Concord coming out of me rather than participating in the conflicts in the world so is does this little bit answer your question oh no it it very much answers very inspiring thank you okay great great so thank you so it's now the official time to stop he I'm happy to stay up here if you have some more comments or questions but uh I hope to see some of you at the at the picnic and um thank you for being here

Channel: Insight Meditation Center

Views: 1,548

Keywords: meditation, vipassana, buddhism, insight meditiaion, mindfulness

Id: POyAYaHaD-c

Length: 42min 11sec (2531 seconds)

Published: Sun May 26 2024