Good morning. My name is Yvonne Rand and I'd like to speak this morning about what happens to us when we have some great loss in our life and to talk together with you about some ways that arise for us from the Buddhist tradition about how to attend to loss and mourning and grief and sadness and letting go. The occasion for this focus on this lovely spring morning is that this afternoon some of us will gather to do a ceremony sometimes called the Jizo ceremony.

[01:03]

Jizo is expressed in this wonderful statue that is on my left, the Bodhisattva of Compassion, as he is articulated in Japan, as the emanation, the expression of compassion that has the particular qualities of nurturance and protection and is the Bodhisattva called upon for guidance and protection as beings are traveling into life and traveling out of life. We in this country don't spend very much time calling upon compassion, for example, when a child is in utero and being born, and so we're often taken by surprise when there is some difficulty around a birth for the mother and or the child.

[02:06]

And we don't have any container for the responses that arise when we have a miscarriage or an abortion or a sudden infant death. After a child has been with us in the world for a little while, then we have some means for using traditional containers, but for most of us these dyings are particularly difficult because we don't have any way of holding and allowing what arises in us. We have more means when we die at the end of a long life. Somehow seems easier because it seems more in the nature of things that we die when we're old. We have much more difficulty when we die when we're younger or when someone dear to us dies when they're younger.

[03:15]

My own experience in being with people around these times in their lives and around these times in my own life for the last number of years, a long time now, is that the Buddhist tradition offers a lot by way of how to develop or create a container in the form of ritual and ceremony that allows us to be present with what arises with dying. I think that what I have to say about the dying of a human being dear to us applies also to the dying of other beings and to other kinds of dyings that may not be quite so clear or articulated

[04:17]

but which we have some response to that is very similar. That sense of grief and loss that arises with the death of a marriage, the death of some work that we have put ourselves into for a long period of time, all kinds of dyings. I'm sometimes surprised and a little amused at how often I come back to appreciating the iconography of the Buddhist tradition. How many of the articulations, particularly of compassion, in the Buddhist tradition read for many, many, many of us even though we think of many of these images as coming from other cultures and other times.

[05:18]

I think for most people when they see Jizo Bodhisattva or some form of Avalokiteshvara, the regarder of the cries of the world or of Kuan Yin or of Tara, all different expressions of this emanation of compassion without knowing any of the technical information about the images they read for us. We recognize what compassion looks like. In virtually all of the compassion images in Buddhism there is the presence of one of the hands, if it's a many-handed figure, in the gesture of generosity. A very important aspect of compassion is that quality of generosity. And when we find ourselves meeting dying, it is extremely important

[06:27]

that we remember that quality of the heart of generosity, not just with others but with ourselves as well. Because, of course, we can't be generous with anyone until we're generous with ourselves. And part of that generosity includes allowing ourselves to know what is arising for us in our emotional body, in our physical body, in our breath body, in our spirit body, energetically, whatever is so. For some of us we get stuck with the response that arises within us when someone close to us dies because we don't have any vessel or container for allowing that process of being with ourselves just as we are. Over the years I've participated in various hospice programs,

[07:37]

training programs for their volunteers as one of the clergy on a panel talking about the spiritual dimensions of dying. And I've always been struck that every time, no matter who of us is gathered for these panels, from all the different religious traditions, we all agree over and over again about the importance of some container for what arises, how important it is to do some kind of funeral or memorial ceremony, some coming together and gathering for the acknowledging of a life, to express whatever it is that we still feel the need to express, to speak to the spirit of the being who has died. And then most importantly, and often neglected, to acknowledge the dying

[08:40]

as simply as to say, this being dear to me has passed over. When we do that, when we can acknowledge the fact of a dying, we then have the possibility of allowing ourselves to let go of whatever we have been holding on to around the death of that person or creature or relationship or circumstance. We as Americans seem to be somewhat ritual-phobic, I think. And we, of course, don't pay attention to the number of rituals we have in our lives. We have certain rituals about how we put the toothpaste on our toothbrush in the morning. There's a kind of ritual about whether the toilet paper goes on the toilet roll

[09:48]

with the paper over the top or under. And heaven help you if somebody comes into your house and replaces the paper incorrectly. We find small ways of giving some shape and containment to the smallest details of our daily lives. And yet we are so bereft, we are so impoverished of rituals around dying. Many years ago, I found myself in a position of having various people come to me after they'd had an abortion or a miscarriage and ask me if I could help them because they felt, they experienced a kind of lingering grief

[10:51]

and didn't quite know what to do with what was coming up. In some cases, several people who came and asked me to help them found themselves having recurring dreams, a sense of some need to have some closure around the miscarriage or the abortion. And what I knew when I was first asked to help people in these ways was the form of the funeral ceremony in the Zen tradition, which is really an ordination ceremony where the person who's died is given a Buddhist name and is given the refuges and the precepts. But in the midst of that, also a very clear acknowledgement and even celebration of the life of the person who has lived and a very clear meeting about the passing over.

[11:53]

And so we would do some simple version of this ceremony. It was only after I'd been doing this kind of practice with people for some time that I discovered Jizo Bodhisattva. When Suzuki Roshi, my first and beloved Zen teacher, said he would help me around the occasion of the death of a dear friend of mine who, when he had left to go around the world on a big life search, had left me all of his treasures, a very talented man who left me his music and most precious books and artwork, etc. So I had this trunk of his things that I didn't know what to do with after I received word that he had died as a result of being in a train accident after he had become a monk at the great training monastery in Japan, Eheiji.

[13:00]

So Suzuki Roshi encouraged me to bring the trunk with me and to go to Tassajara with him. And in his garden I had a small figure of Jizo, although at that time I didn't know much about Jizo except that I thought this little stone figure was very beautiful and clearly was about compassion. And we did a funeral for my friend. We made a big pit in the middle of Suzuki Roshi's garden. And I had the chance to speak out loud to my friend who passed over and to say all the things that I had not felt I could say during the years since I had last seen him. And we made a big fire with everything. And what I didn't see any way of using or having continue to have a life in the way that his books easily could, but all the manuscripts and papers, we made a wonderful big bonfire.

[14:07]

And we made an ashes place for my friend in the garden and put this small stone figure of Jizo on a stone on top of the place where we buried all the ashes. I learned a great deal from that experience. How completely resolved my friend's passing over seemed to me to be in a way that left me free to continue as I have to this day, remembering him and letting some of his life energy continue in my own life, but without a kind of drag line, without a kind of heaviness that we sometimes call grief. I think grief has about it the quality of holding on.

[15:08]

And to allow ourselves to participate in some ceremony that provides some container is a way of giving up, holding on, and allowing whatever is so to arise. And of course, in that allowing of whatever arises, of missing, of sadness, of longing for our friend to be here, whatever it is, rises and falls, rises and falls, rises and falls, changes. We're not sunk in a kind of stuck place anymore, or at least that's the possibility. So in Japan, Jizo is called upon as this quality of compassion that is protective and nurturing, manifest in whatever way we know in our lives,

[16:10]

guiding and protecting the subtle mind of the beings who've died to the realm of Amida Buddha. The great Buddha of the Western realm. I suppose as close as Buddhists ever get to talking about something like heaven. Jizo is often depicted in temple paintings in Japan as the one Bodhisattva who's willing to go into the hell realms to rescue beings from the suffering of the icy and the hot hells. It's pretty good to have a Bodhisattva like that. The only beings the Japanese say that he doesn't rescue are cats. Those of us who are cat lovers will have to figure this out. It's because cats kill for fun. Isn't that interesting? So they just get off the map in this particular scheme.

[17:17]

Jizo is of course called upon in all kinds of situations, not just around being born and dying. Jizo has become a kind of focal point for a lot of folk religion in Japan. Who one turns to in the time of great suffering. And so he's also associated with travelers, people who go on pilgrimages. And one of the great pilgrimage routes in Japan on Chipoko Island, which a century ago people went on foot. Now very few people go on foot because to do so you have to go along the edge of very busy highways. Eighty-eight temples on this pilgrimage route. And at every temple there is a shrine for Jizo. And you see the most amazing offerings.

[18:25]

One I remember where Jizo is in a little shrine house that has hanging from the roof beams enormous straw sandals. And then inside the shrine house itself are thousands of sandals, straw sandals of the sort that pilgrims would traditionally wear. I went on only part of the pilgrimage route some years ago and that journey left a big mark for me. In seeing how much suffering in people's lives these places where Jizo could be found assuaged. Right at the base of the Tokyo Tower is an enormous temple with a thousand Jizos. They're all made fairly recently. They look like Kewpie dolls. They're not so beautiful to my eye,

[19:28]

but for the Japanese people who go to this temple, they really love this temple. So there's one row of Jizos as far as you can see, all exactly the same, covered with hats and bibs and shawls, with children's toys, many of them with pinwheels spinning in the wind, McDonald's hamburgers, sweaters, teddy bears, anything you can imagine left as an offering. I spent one day sitting in that garden and just meditating and being with whoever came into the garden. Old grandmothers and grandfathers coming to recite the Heart Sutra to offer incense, to leave some little gift. Young couples coming after an abortion,

[20:28]

which is to this day the standard means of birth control in Japan and is consequently the source of a lot of somewhat hidden suffering. I got so immersed in Jizo and seeing Jizo everywhere that one evening as I came out of a graveyard where there were thousands of Jizos as grave markers, very old figures and very beautiful, peaceful place, not like any cemetery I've ever been to here. As I left the gate to the cemetery, I came onto the street where there were some small shops and the display windows of the shops were all lighted, although the stores were closed. And I looked across the street and I thought, oh, how wonderful, there's a store with shelf after shelf filled with Jizos. I just thought that was wonderful.

[21:31]

Of course, I went up more closely and discovered it was a tennis shoe store. And I realized I'd been fantasizing Jizos. I so wanted them to be Jizos that with my somewhat fading eyesight, they were absolutely Jizos. And they were shoes. I mean, it was perfect. You can see compassion everywhere. At the time I laughed at myself, but since then I realized that it was all right that I could see a store window full of tennis shoes as the compassion Bodhisattva. In the Tibetan tradition, the Bodhisattva who has the same function is depicted as the four-armed Avalokiteshvara. And he holds his hands in this gesture of gassho, of greeting,

[22:36]

and in his hands he holds the wish-fulfilling gem, which this Jizo has in his left hand. The second pair of hands are up like this, and the left hand is holding a lotus in bud form, fully opened and fading and becoming a seed pond, which of course represents the cycle of birth and death. And in the other hand he holds a crystal rosary, which is said to have the capacity to pull beings from the realms of suffering. So in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, four-armed Avalokiteshvara has the same function as Jizo, protective and nurturing compassion, guiding beings through the bardo states to the realm of Amida Buddha.

[23:38]

His Holiness the Dalai Lama is said to be an emanation in our human life of this aspect of compassion. I have a wonderful painting by a friend of mine who comes here sometimes, an artist whose name is Millicent Tompkins, and who has been for a number of years painting, paintings her understanding and expression of emptiness. And this particular painting that we have in our zendo now, she has what she calls little postscripts, where she will make somewhere in the painting a very small copy of an ancient masterpiece. And she has in this particular painting two Renaissance paintings of Mary with her cloak covering her arms in this gesture.

[24:48]

And she is absolutely in that gesture of her arms outspread with her cloak coming forward, this same quality of compassion, protective compassion. For some of us, we have this sense of protectiveness from different situations that we find ourselves in in the natural world, under a tree, in a grove of rocks, perhaps even the sky. I'd like to include in the ceremony that we will do this afternoon images that come from many different wisdom traditions, religious traditions.

[25:54]

Because, of course, compassion is an important feature for all of the great traditions of the world. And what will be effective and call to us as a focal point for such a ceremony will be different from one person to the other because we are all so different from each other. For some of us, a simple stone that is not specific to any tradition will be just right as our icon of compassion that has these qualities. What will be important is that we allow ourselves to make some kind of altar which can be quite simple, can be as simple as designating a place which is the focal point for the attention and energy we want to bring

[26:59]

to this moment of attending, dying. Sometimes I've had people come and talk to me about their grief with a parent or grandparents that they were not allowed to participate in the funeral of whoever it is for them important. And so they sometimes have, for decades, had this kind of dangling want of resolution with the dying of someone important to them. There is in the Buddhist tradition, in all of the traditions of Buddhism, a practice of observing someone's passing over for 49 days after they've died. And so what I often suggest is that the person who has this experience take a picture or write out the name of the person they want to do the practice with

[28:02]

or gather together mementos that they associate with the person and make a little altar, a place of remembrance. And every day, speak to that person all of the things that they have carried to talk about whatever is arising. But to also make offerings of candlelight or incense or flowers or some stone that you pick up on a walk that you find pretty. Some little gift, some little offering. And to do that practice every day for 49 days. There is a ritual, there is a container. And at the end of 49 days to then say, I have remembered you. I have acknowledged your life. I have acknowledged my own response to your passing over. And now it is time for me to let go and to say goodbye.

[29:05]

How often are we afraid to say goodbye because we think that means that we should forget the person? That's not my experience at all. My experience is that when I can let go of the holding on then when I remember someone I can delight in the remembrance of that person. I have one very dear friend and mentor who died about 12 or 13 years ago. Someone that I remember because for many, many years we would call each other whenever we had seen something we knew the other one would enjoy or to tell each other about a book or a painting or a bird. To this day, there will be certain things that I will see and I will think, oh, Nancy would love to see this.

[30:11]

And I'm always struck that to this day the thought arises in the present tense. But of course, there is no number I can call. There is no address that will receive a note. The first year after she died, I would send her a note and address it to her in care of me at my address and mail it. So to this day, when I see the blooms on the crabapple trees in front of the house where I live and my friend's face and quality of her heart, mind arises for me I can say, oh, Nancy, aren't the blossoms beautiful? Because of course, no small part of my seeing the blossoms

[31:13]

and enjoying them is the continuation of her sight and appreciation dropped into my life and continuing in my life. Having said goodbye to her, that process of remembering of being with her and what her life expressed is very present. And that is true for all of us, that possibility. There is being born and dying going on continually. And of course, at this time of the year, we are particularly struck by the evidence of the being born side. But if we are going to be born again,

[32:18]

if we are going to be born, we will die. That is in the nature of being born. And if we neglect any part of that cycle, grief arises of the sort that we find ourselves being stuck with, hindered. The hand mudra or gesture that is associated, has the meaning of generosity, is this gesture of the hand open, very often with the fingers pointing down towards the ground, but not always. And I think that that hand gesture is a very important gesture and is a very important way to remind ourselves about letting whatever arises abide in the hand without holding on to it.

[33:18]

So that when it is time for whatever rests in the hand to fall away, we allow that also. It is no accident that all of the compassion bodhisattvas in the Buddhist tradition have their hands in some form of the generosity mudra. The figures in Buddhism are meant to be a source of teaching, quite specific teaching. And this encouragement, this reminder about generosity as a quality of compassion, especially around the acknowledgement and attending to dying, is very important. So if any of you are going to come to the ceremony that we will do this afternoon

[34:26]

and would like to have a compassion figure that you might use as part of the ceremony, but that you might then take home to put on your altar or in your garden or someplace special for you. I went in just before lecture and looked in the office and there are some wonderful compassion images in there. There are some stones that have the compassion mantra carved in them, om mani padme hum. Let yourselves consider at whatever point in your lives there is a dying that you have some capacity for acknowledging that passing over even in the midst of feeling like you don't know how, you don't know what to do. For all of our being a young country, a young culture,

[35:34]

and wanting always to do what is fresh and new, we also need the ancient ways and the tap roots that they give us. We need some guidance and help for cultivating containers that allow these times of great challenge in our lives. And when we let some ancient way provide some inspiration for a container, we have the experience of discovering what we need to do to take care of ourselves and the passing over of a loved one. So we don't need to turn away from or try to distract ourselves from whatever is challenging. I remember the first graveyard that I went to visit in Japan many years ago

[36:44]

where I really got what was going on with Jizo Bodhisattva. The graveyard on Mount Koya. It's a vast graveyard, goes on for over a mile. I'd never been in a graveyard before filled with people having picnics. Do we think of going to graveyards for a picnic? Not usually. At many of the gravesites there would be extended families with picnic baskets, having a picnic, having cleaned the gravesite, having brought a fresh bib or hat or cape for the Jizo figure marking the gravesite. And the graveyard was incredibly beautiful. Incredibly beautiful. Dying is in the natural order of things.

[37:53]

And we, with all of our medical capacity and technology and ability to control our dying, have forgotten often that it is in the natural order of things. Sometimes people think Buddhists are kind of gloomy, particularly us Zen folk, our dark colors. But my experience is that for those of us who really know dying, there is a kind of joyfulness and ease that arises because we include knowing dying as part of living. So I hope for each and every one of you that you will discover that possibility also. And of course no one can take you there. You have to go yourself.

[38:56]

And find the way that is authentic for you. Thank you.

[39:03]

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