The reason I chose this story to share is it uses one of my all-time favorite contemplation methods. The method comes directly from a teaching Luang Por Thoon gave to a man named Singh that quickly led to his enlightenment.  The method is essentially asking a series of questions about objects we ‘own’ in order to better understand the nature of the objects (impermanent) and our relationship with those objects (also impermanent) and, in the process, to  weaken  our attachment to them. Basically, we have a bunch of stuff that we use while we are in this world, but it doesn’t actually belong to us, it is not stuff we ultimately own or control, it’s not like we can take it with us when we die. We work so hard to get ‘our’ things, we work hard to keep them, we mourn when they are gone. Because we are deluded, we believe these things will serve us as we imagine they will,  permanently, and our misunderstanding drives us to continue accumulating, to come back for more lifetime after lifetime and with each life, with each scavenger hunt for things, we suffer the pains of being disappointed by the limitations of these objects, the pain of getting them, the pain of trying to preserve them and the pain of their loss. . . Without further ado, the questions*:  

1. Where did the item come from
2. Think about the item leaving you
3. Think about leaving the item behind
4. How do you control the item
5. How does the item control you

The Story:

I get to the 2012 KPY retreat and on my first night I grab a cup from the kitchen. I wash it SUPER well and then I tape a note on the cup, “Alana’s Cup, do not clean, I will reuse teabag”. Sounds very eco of me right? Conserving and all, who can argue with what a great person I am being? The real reason —  I do not want to to share cups with other folks at the retreat, I don’t want their germs, their disease. So clearly, if I just take a cup and make it ‘mine’ with this simple sticky note, I will be safe from all those dirty grimey folks licking-up on my cup and making me sick. My cup is, by definition, cleaner and safer than ya’lls cups (even though I kept forgetting it outside and there is some possibility all manner of bug and vermin were crawling-up in it –wait how is the plague spread again?). Clearly, this is all very sane ;)…

So, let’s start with the idea that the cup is mine (I did label it after all) and get down to our questions:

1. Where did the cup come from? The cup came from the KPY kitchen. Someone may have donated it, KPY may have bought it, some other person whose cup it was may have brought it on retreat and left it behind. Before that the cup came from some store, before that some factory. Someone labored to make the cup, manufacture it, the clay that made-up the cup was molded, shaped. Before that it came from the ground…  When exactly did the cup become mine? In fact, when exactly did the cup become a cup instead of a lump of clay? Why would I believe that a sticky note (which was written in my super illegible handwriting, in English, at a retreat where most folk’s first language is Thai) made it mine. Made it so others would know not to use ‘my cup’ and my cup would know not to run-off with some other thirsty person…

• How can the cup leave me? The cup actually did leave me several times on retreat — I kept forgetting it outside. Sure I managed to recover it each time, but was the cup mine when it was lost? What if it broke? Would it still be mine…would each piece be mine? What if someone took the sticky note off of it — that sticky seemed to have the magical power to make the cup mine so did its removal return it to the status of KPY community cup?

1. How can I leave the cup? Clearly I could leave the retreat center, so was I going to take the cup with me? Was I actually going to steal a KPY cup because I had convinced myself, with that all powerful note and a little effort of a good scrubbing, that the cup was mine? Or, I could be out in the woods, get attacked by a bear (that was attracted by the sweet smell of my delicious tea) and die — I guess I wouldn’t really need the cup then…

• How do I control the cup? Thats easy, I can wash it, label it, carry it around, drink from it, play mini drums on it, I can do anything I want right? Because it’s just an object and an object that’s mine! Well, maybe I can’t do anything with it, I can’t make it sprout wings and fly after all, but of course I am the person and the cup is a cup, I must be in control. Right? Well, not so fast…

• How does the cup control me? Once I make that cup ‘mine’ suddenly I have a responsibility, a burden. I have to carry it around (so no one takes it — clearly even I don’t believe my note is enough), I have to wash it, I have to make sure my sticky isn’t chipping off. When I lost the cup I had to retrace my steps, one time I had to walk halfway down the mountain, to retrieve it. I felt slightly self conscious about the cup, about labeling it, so I both wanted folks to see the label but I also wanted to hide it as best I could. I had to worry –should I take the cup back to the tent? I know food in the tent is a no-no because of bears…can they smell tea?

What are the risks of all this craziness? Someone could see the label and be offended by it, I could create disharmony in the community. Perhaps I lose the cup carrying it around, or someone who needs a cup to drink from can’t find one since I have raided the kitchen for ‘mine’.  

More dangerous still though is that I feed the control monster — I reinforce this idea that I am empowered, I can control risk by having my own cup (cup=control). I can avoid all the death and disease out there that is lurking behind every corner just ready to get me.  I create a false sense of safety, built on a false understanding of the nature of ‘my cup’, rather than dealing with the fact that diseases spread and I am subject to them with or without a cup.

Plus, what does ‘after me’ really mean? Is disease after me? Is impermanence a personal affront that with enough effort (and some teacups) I can control? LP Nut helped me immensely with this contemplation…he taught me the method of  “Killing the Hope”. (Lucky luck, we have a twofer here –two methods, for the price of one story). As  he explained it,  I need to look at the world, look who out there is exempt from death and disease and loss. Gather the evidence and determine whether or not I can control or change these things, exempt myself, or whether they are realities that need to be accepted. I.e. I need to kill the hope that I can escape impermanence so that I can accept it.  So here are a few highlights of my evidence:

1. I, unlike my husband at the time, vigilantly watch what I eat and exercise — my blood sugar is a little high and his is just fine, all my control is not yielding the results I desire.
2. I was considering taking a yellow fever vaccine for some travel, my Dr. recommended against it. Why? Because a number of folks have gotten the vaccine and actually gotten yellow fever from it. Guess control wasn’t working for them either.
3. As hard as I diet and exercise I still feel fat most of the time
4. I wash my hands obsessively, but I still manage to get sick
5. I hired financial advisors to help manage and control my money and then I still lost money the last time the markets dipped
6. I went to Italy for an easy, risk free, vacation and ended up getting food poisoning
7. I went on birth control to manage pregnancy and menstrual symptoms but it caused me weight gain
8. Despite all my lotions and potions I am starting to get wrinkles and grey hair
9. Once I graduated university I had to leave all my friends and my university life behind even though I did not want to
10. My father died
11. My cat died
12. My friend Sue gained weight even though I tried to ‘help her’ avoid it
13. I lost faith in my Vajrayana practice even though I worked so hard at it, chanted hundreds of thousands of mantras and meditated every day
14. This actor I really liked, played Spartacus on TV. He was so talented and crazy fit/beautiful. He was diagnosed with a rare cancer just when his acting career began to take off. At first they said it was highly treatable and then, he died from complications
15. I tried to control my teeth, prevent pain, by getting crowns and then the crowns ended up causing me pain

Gathering all this evidence (there was actually even more, but I won’t bore you)  was what helped the pieces started coming together, when I started seeing the limitations of my control, of anyone’s control, and the fact that sometimes I can’t just fight, I need to accept.  My next few stories will take up this theme further.

I also want to say that, mostly, at the time of this contemplation my focus was on impermanence, on my wrong views regarding control and disease/unwanted outcomes. Contemplating on the cup, realizing my relationship with it and its abilities to fight disease were not fixed, were a backdoor into considering my control of death and disease more broadly. In other words, I used an analysis of my crazy view that I control the cup and use it like a talisman to ward off disease, in order to consider the broader questions of whether disease is something within my complete power to avoid . But now, reviewing and rewriting this story I see so much more fruit here sooo…. I am going to write this later addition synopsis concerning ownership, which is another potential aspect of the teacup contemplation. Though this does not follow my contemplation timeline,  I think it will help clarify and make this entry richer. So I am going to use that ‘blogger’s prerogative’ and fill-in the lines a bit more on the topic of owning (plus..this is how my practice works, back over the same stories, the same themes, getting deeper and richer over time):

We get so caught-up buying things, owning things, thinking they are ours –we don’t notice these items totally manipulate us, they bully us, they force our hands all the time. Like with the teacup, it’s easy at first to say I’m in control, the cup makes my life better, more convenient, safe from the disease I fear. Or that, with my extensive wardrobe, I can define who I am, shape my identity and make it real. But from the get-go the items are in charge. I seek them out, it’s not like the cup labeled itself or my clothes hop into the shopping cart on their own. I pay for them with money or elbow grease. I need to care for the items, to clean them, to interact with the items on their  terms if I have any desire to retain and preserve them  (if it’s breakable I have to handle with care, if it’s white fabric I have to be so careful about stains, when a part or a gear wears out I must replace it, when the car needs gas I have to stop what I am doing and feed it).

Trust this fashionista, once I have found that perfect purse I have to have it (it’s like it calls to me from across the store). I spend hard earned money on it  and then  I worry constantly about keeping it nice. When it finally does wear out, or goes out of fashion, I need one that’s just as good or better..it’s not like I’m going to go from carrying a Chanel purse to something from the Gap..I have standards after all.  And those standards, they came from the Chanel bag (my misunderstanding of it anyway), from the wardrobe I have built that matches that bag, so really, who is in charge?

Even more subtly still, these items, each one, we obtain to solve a problem. I need a cup to keep me disease free. I need a bag to carry all my other stuff, I need an accessory to match my clothes, I need a thing I wear to make other folks think I’m pretty and fashionable (that I am a person who is in control of my super buttoned-up image). And in return for a problem patch I get an item that creates a bunch more problems — gives me new responsibilities, sets new standards, makes me dependent,  plants the seed for the ‘need’ for more new items in the future. And does the item even solve the problem I think it solves? If so, for how long? Can a cup keep me disease free? Can a purse make you see me as beautiful or polished or in control?  So is an item we can’t control really ours? How much do I pay, how much do I suffer, for the privilege of fake owning it for some limited time?

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* I have actually see multiple versions of the questions that go with this story. Here I have the ones I used for this contemplation