Setting an Intention for the Next Day

A sankalpa, or intention, is a set of words one says to one’s self before bed to feel happier the next day. Two months ago, I learned about sankalpas from Elephant Journal’s article Do These Five Things Before Bed and Wake UpHappier. According to the article, “It is suggested that you decide on only one sankalpa, and that it be quite short and phrased in a positive and not negative way. It should also be phrased to indicate that success has already been achieved. So we should try to get at the root of our deepest desires and goals, rather than focus on more superficial ones.”

                As I did this practice, eleven times over the next three weeks, I mixed it with the practice of giving thanks that the article mentioned. I also helped give myself support in finding a girlfriend, keeping up with my school work, making money, learning to be independent, and starting an autistic student group at my college, while with each night, working more to get in touch with my Buddhist values. Over the next three weeks, I said these eleven sankalpas.

November 17, 2014

May I continue forward with my life,

doing what needs to be done,

while enjoying the company of those around me,

and doing the things I enjoy.

November 18, 2014

I have continued to get a lot of work done,

while enjoying those around me and the time I have free.

I have figured out much about how to go about my pursuits,

learned more about questions probing my mind,

given care to those around me,

and put stressful tasks to do from my mind.

May I continue to go forward with the same wisdom, compassion, patience, and equanimity in my life.

November 26, 2014

I have continued to get more of my work done,

while still enjoying those around me,

and the time I have to myself,

and pursuing goals to help others.

I plan to go forward

with the same wisdom and compassion

for my education, personal life, social life, career, and community work.

November 27, 2014

I continue to get more work done,

while still enjoying those around me,

and my time to myself.

I find enjoyment in my local resources,

continue to better understand people the way they are,

and move closer to my goals for the good of others.

I plan to go forward with the same wisdom, compassion, inspiration, dedication, and discipline

for the good of my education, social life, personal life, career, community work, and spirituality,

so I may continue to find beauty in the things around me,

enjoy the full potential of the relationships I have,

and guide people through a world full of uncertainty and violence.

November 28, 2014

I give thanks for today’s bounty of family, productivity, creativity, and the ability to help others.

I continue to get more of the work I have set for myself done,

continue to find ways to build my future,

continue to be more creative in helping others,

continue to enjoy the world around me,

continue to enjoy the people I love,

better see people for who they are,

and give guidance to those around me.

I plan to keep finishing the work I have set for myself,

keep building my future,

and keep enjoying the environment around me of art, literature, nature, friendship, and love

with wisdom, compassion, present awareness, dedication, discipline, and openness.

November 29, 2014

I give thanks for today’s bounty for opportunities for productivity, outspokenness, creativity, and community.

I continue to see opportunities to do the work I have set for myself,

build more resources for my future,

speak up for other people,

find ways to better connect with the people I love,

remember every part of my life,

to give myself pleasure throughout the day,

complete the little tasks that make my life easier,

and see how the practices I have set for myself are creating the life I have today.

I plan to continue to complete the work I have set for myself,

to seek the places that give me fulfillment,

to appreciate the people and the world around me,

to do the little tasks that make my life easier,

to perfect the skills I need to build in my life,

and to take care of each thing as it comes into my life

with wisdom, compassion, present awareness, discipline, dedication, and openness.

November 30, 2014

I give thanks for today’s bounty of learning, productivity, helping others, creativity, and love.

I continue to be able to learn the things that make my life easier,

I continue to be able to do the things that make my life less difficult,

I continue to be able to do the things that make my life more enjoyable,

I continue to be able to do those things.

I continue to be able to learn to make other’s lives less difficult and more enjoyable.

I plan to go forward, finishing the work I have set for myself,

while enjoying the comforts of leisure, friendship, and love,

and bringing comfort to those in need

with wisdom, compassion, clarity, dedication, discipline, present awareness, and openness.

December 1, 2014

I give thanks for today’s opportunities for forebearance, helping others, creativity, and love,

for though I sometimes cannot find what I wish I had,

and though the things I depend on can be attacked,

and though people I’ve depended on fail to comfort me,

I have friends,

I have creativity to change my world,

I am able to change people’s minds with my words,

and bring comfort into the lives of others.

I plan to go forward finishing the work I have set for myself,

looking where I may find what I am searching for,

dealing with disappointment as I may,

and appreciating the love, friendship, and inspiration around me

with wisdom, compassion, clarity, present awareness, dedication, discipline, and openness.

December 3, 2014

I give thanks for today’s bounty of love friendship, productivity, creativity, and love.

I am able to find opportunities to finish the work I have set for myself,

keep my mind open to the possibilities of love ahead.

I know even though love is confusing,

we can always find ways to connect to people if we keep our minds open.

I plan to go forward finishing the work I have set for myself,

and realizing all I have to give to other people,

while enjoying the environment and company around me

with wisdom, compassion, innocence, dedication, discipline, present awareness, openness, an love.

December 5, 2014

I give thanks for today’s bounty of love, friendship, self-realization, productivity, and creativity.

I continue to be able to tackle to problems that get in my way,

while continuing to see who people are to me and what they mean to me,

and I continue to be able to give guidance to those around me.

I plan to go forward

and be able to relax and enjoy myself

with wisdom, compassion, innocence, openness, discipline, dedication, present awareness, and love.

December 6, 2014

I give thanks for today’s bounty of creativity and friendship.

I continue to be able to surround myself with the things I enjoy,

while being able to be productive and enjoy the people around me.

I plan to go forward and enjoy myself

with wisdom, compassion, innocence, openness, discipline, dedication, present awareness, and love.

The World Without an Autistic Woman's Contributions

This semester I have been taking an Anthropology of Food class as part of my degree in Cultural Studies.  For this class, we have been asked to keep weekly food journals that describe experiences related to food, and how they are relevant to what we are learning in class. This week I have learned many important things about food to me, both as an autistic activist and a Buddhist. After doing my last two food journals, which talk about the things I learned, I learned the importance of one autistic woman, and how the world would be if autistic people weren’t here. These two pieces below are my food journal entries, which show what these lessons are, and what together, what I learned from writing them.

The Value of Humanely Treated Animals

                When we were talking in class the other day, something a student said rang a bell. We were discussing how cobras in Thailand, fed in many restaurants, were agitated more they were slaughtered, in order to get their blood increasing, in order to add a certain value to the meat for its consumers. That makes me think back to a story in the meat processing industry that sort of relates to this story. I learned years ago that a woman named Temple Grandin, an autistic activist and professor on animal studies, once helped change the humaneness of animal treatment in slaughterhouses. I don’t know what she did (I think it was allowing the cows to be less cooped up in small spaces), but she said that the animals were stressed from the aspect to the slaughterhouses she helped change. I realized when we were discussing cobras how cows may produce more blood when they are agitated. Back when I was a kid, I used to hear a lot of scared talk over Mad Cow Disease, which can happen due to ingesting blood from sick cows. Cows perhaps can become sick due to just as humans can. Being cooped up in small spaces is also more likely to cause disease, just as stress here in the dorms at UCM we are often prone to the flu. Auschwitz and other Nazi German concentration camps were infamous for disease, which weakened people’s ability to work until soon they would be sent to the gas chambers. Being cooped up in small spaces when it is not necessary clearly seems like it is an awful way to live, and perhaps for that reason it is good that we now have free-range meats available.

To Eat Steak or Not to Eat Steak

                For many years, I have sometimes doubted my decision to eat meat.  I am a convert to Buddhism and many Buddhists are vegetarians, believing that vegetarianism best follows the Buddhist teachings of respect for all life.  The problem is my many ‘taste issues,’ that would make doing so a real challenge.  I could eat free-range meat, but even meat being free-range is not always what it seems, and still contributes to the deaths of animals.  For that reason, many Buddhists and followers of other faiths choose not to eat meat.

                However, I think, if one wanted to stop contributing to the destruction of life, there are other things one could look at.  Currently, machines that help plow fields use large amounts of energy that contribute to the destructions of animal’s homes.  Slash-and-burn, a technique used in many countries to raise farm land, also helps contribute the destruction of habitats.  Raising farm land also causes trees to be cut down, thus further endangering animal’s habitats, in addition to taking life.  Rice farms in Ghana, a great exporter of rice, have workers living in inhumane, life-threating conditions, much like China’s Apple factories, where many workers commit suicide.  Rice farmer’s children in Ghana, not having enough to live on, wander off into the cities to make a living, where crime is rampant and they often don’t have places to live.  In Southeast Asia, where great rice producers are located, indigenous people are often forced off their land to raise fields for rice for outsiders who threaten the native flora and fauna.  These in turn, such as in Burma, cause armed conflict with indigenous militias and government armies, whose families also depend on them for support.  That being said, it seems that a “vegetarian” life-style could lead to the endangerment of children and armed conflict in the Third World, and destruction of wildlife and deforestation in the Third World and elsewhere.  As I understand it, the Buddhist precept “Do not hurt the life of any living beings” does not apply in cases where it is necessary, such as where your life or the life of your loved ones is threatened.  Rather than seeing all this death and destruction, I think slaughtering cows would be more human.  Obviously we need grains in our diet, and we must treat animals more humanely.  Farmers in the Third World could be treated more humanely too, but a diet based more on grains could possibly lead to all this devastation at home in the Third World that has yet to be taken care of.

Lending My Buddhist Knowledge and Experiences to the Health Care Profession

I realize that I've been Buddhist for several years now. I’ve done much with my Buddhism (meditating every day, starting my blog, incorporating it into my work as a writer and an artist, and so forth). And this all reached a high point when I got in touch with a counseling intern at my old high school who is in a master’s program for Social Work. She Facebooked me saying she wanted to do a project on Buddhism for her class in cultural diversity, and thought I would be the perfect person to consult on that, asking me if that was alright with me, and of course I said yes. Afterwards she messaged me to thank me for my comments and said her classmates really enjoyed them. Below I have transcribed the questions she asked (copied and pasted) and provided my answers to their respective questions. For many of my Autist Dharma fans this information will probably be review, as it will for fans of my other blog, but there’s plenty new information, so keep your minds open because it’s all here at autistdharma.blogspot.com. Enjoy!

1) How long have you been practicing Buddhism?

I have been practicing Buddhism for nearly nine years, since I was sixteen. 

2) What originally drew you to Buddhism?

I loved Buddhism’s peaceful and practical philosophy.  I liked the artistic and cultural prowess of the Buddhist culture, which I was introduced to from books and the Buddha statues that I would see at grocery stores, and something about that let me think there was something about Buddhism that would be good for me.

3) How has this made a difference in any or all aspects of your life?

I have been meditating regularly for a little over two years and because of that, I notice I am much more relaxed, creative, and feel much closer to the people I care about, whether about work, school, or relationships. 

4) Do you attend services, or practice individually, or both?

Since I live in a small town without a Buddhist temple for most of the year (my college town of Warrensburg, Missouri) there aren’t a lot of chances to attend Buddhist services, so much of my practice consists of my morning meditation alone in my dorm.  However, when I’m not at school, I normally go to a place called the Pathless Land Center for Mindfulness, Meditation, and Magic (I know that’s a mouthful).  It isn’t strictly Buddhist and it draws ideas from other philosophies, but is generally compatible with Buddhism and uses Buddhist meditation and other practices that are similar to Buddhism in its practice, and is open to people of all belief systems.  It used to be called the American Buddhist Center (ABC), but it changed its name to attract people of other belief systems.  I have been going there regularly for five years. 

5) What is important for people not familiar with Buddhism to know? 

What I would think is important is that Buddhism is a belief system that has had a profound influence on the diverse cultures of the Asian continent and in the West as well.  Many if its tenet are compatible with other faiths, and it really isn’t about what you believe, but how you live your life.  It is in fact very alive in the West, though I tend to think it hasn’t had as much of an audience among the younger generation of Westerners, but truly it is compatible with people of all different cultures.  Many of its practices, such as meditation are much easier to learn than some people may think.

6) How can social workers be more sensitive in working with Buddhist clients?

One thing that is probably a great thing to know is the psychological and spiritual impact that Buddhism can have on a person’s life.  It is also important to know that even with that, good Buddhists can still feel anxiety, frustration, grief, and other unpleasant things.  Buddhism is something that really takes a lot of time to truly get the hang of and even I still struggle with it sometimes.

7)  Tell us more about your blog and how Buddhism and being an advocate for people on the spectrum intersect.

My blog The Autist Dharma is a blog I started after my first blog Ben’s Blog.  Ben’s Blog deals with my experiences at college life and from it evolved The Autist Dharma (Dharma is a word for Buddhist practice).  The Autist Dharma deals with my work for people with autism and my own experience as a person with autism, and also talks about how Buddhism has had an effect on that.  There is a long-time Buddhist trend called Socially Engaged Buddhism, which applies Buddhism to social activism.  An example would be how Buddhism can help lessen greed in people’s mind and therefore mitigate the exploitation of people throughout the world for profit.  I also believe meditation can help us be more aware of what is going on in the world, such as how people with autism may be treated by others due to their disability.  The Autist Dharma deals a lot with socially engaged Buddhism and how it relates to ways of thinking that can be detrimental to the welfare of others and may also show up in the world of autism.  Buddhism also helps me to love myself for who I am as well as others, and to be patient with other people, which in turn is positive towards my ability to reach them and work with them, and to accept people of diverse abilities, which in turn has given momentum to helping to create a more welcoming world for people with autism.  Buddhism is also beneficial to my writings and other creative works that I do to help change the public’s view of people on the spectrum.  Ben’s Blog is idea I had to help show the world what people with autism can do with the right schooling and supports, and it also talks about Buddhism in both the ups and the downs of my daily life.  These blogs can be found at benledwardsblog.blogspot.com, and autistdharma.blogspot.com.

 

Buddha Jayanti Post 1: One Dharma to Rule Them All: Teachings on Living the Dharma from Middle Earth

I have been practicing Buddhism for eight years now.  For the first six years of that time, I read several great Buddhist authors such as Robert Thurman, Jack Kornfield, Norman Fischer, James Kullander, and others. Nowadays, I have grown disenchanted by American Buddhist literature, and have hardly read any Buddhist book, except for poetry books, picture books, and novels. Another thing that has disenchanted me about American Buddhism is that it seems to be dominated largely by people from older generations, and after years of reading and collecting magazines such as Tricycle, Buddhadharma, and Shambhala Sun, I think I found the problem: most of the contributors in these magazines are older people. Not once have I seen in these magazines an article written by someone in their twenties or thirties. Moreover, when looking at these publications and Shambhala Publications Best Buddhist Writing series, I notice that these author’s experiences don’t connect very well to younger generations of Buddhists and potential Buddhists. I read chapters and articles on losing one’s spouse to cancer, unhappy marriages, disillusionment with their professional lives, aging, and other experiences that young people just don’t connect to, however important they are. Many talk about how they still suffer from time to time, indulge in bad habits, or feel slighted by people. Many of them are very bleak and confusing, and they never really say anything positive about practicing the Dharma. I currently have over a dozen Buddhist books in collector’s condition that I have never even touched. Meanwhile, one of my books, which I’ve had since my early teens, J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, is held together with loads of packing tape, with lose pages hanging out. To me, that just means it’s important to me. Its contents are still accessible and I still get hours of joy and inspiration from them and other books by Tolkien. Before my disillusionment with American Buddhist literature, I was lucky enough to come upon Buddhist psychotherapist David L. Loy’s book The Dharma of Dragons and Daemons: Buddhist Themes in Modern Fantasy, which had an amazing take on Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. Since then I found a renewed sense of enjoyment in Tolkien’s work as an artist, poet, film buff, and Buddhist. Before I got the idea for this post, I realized that yesterday was Buddha Jayanti Day, the celebration in the Buddhist world of Buddha’s birth, and thought that I ought to do a post (albeit a late one this time) for that time, like I did with Autism Acceptance Month, and I thought I’d talk about what it means to be Buddhist. Part of me was struggling from having heard accounts from my fellow Buddhists (all of them older) about what Buddhism and meditation hadn’t done for them and part of me was wondering, “Why practice Buddhism?” Earlier I had come upon an article called The 10 Best Quotes from Middle Earth to Live By by Selina Wilken, and later I thought back to the article and realized all these quotes share something about what Buddhism does well for people, and that these have been true from all my experiences practicing Dharma. While looking at articles on The Lord of the Rings quotes I found some that showed me what happens when one practices the Dharma.

“A day may come when the courage of men fails, when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship, but it is not this day. An hour of war and shattered shields in the age of men may come crashing down, but it is not this day. This day we fight!” –Aragorn

This quote was not from the aforementioned article, but it did see that it made a good Buddhist point: be in the present. There is no need to worry about the age when mankind is shattered because it is not now. Similarly, we need not dread taking tests, asking out dates, and learning to drive all the time because most of the time, it is not now. 

“All we have to do is to decide what to do with the time that is given to us.” –Gandalf the Grey

                This gets to the heart of the Buddha’s teachings, for one of the most quoted Buddhist axioms is, “Live in the present.” This simply means to put your hopes for happiness, love, and freedom by what you think, say, and do in this moment, for it is precious, and once it is gone, you can never get it back. Maybe you’re a student in college at home for the summer, and know a desired sweetheart who will be living off campus next year while you’re still in the dorms, but hey, what if you knew now that she didn’t have a car? Then you may see her in the dining hall and could hit things up with her, huh?

“If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, this would be a much merrier world.” –Thorin Oakenshield

            (Spoiler alert) Thorin Oakenshield from Peter Jackson’s Hobbit trilogy gets the ax in The Hobbit, the part that is to be covered in PJ’s third installment, yet says these beautiful parting words to Bilbo on his death bed. Perhaps dying made him see how meaningless and empty hoarded gold really is, but food, cheer, and song on the other hand? Well, food, that’s necessary to live, and cheer, well is that not our end goal in all things? Isn’t everything we do, whether getting our bottom lip pierced or holding out a box of Valentine’s box to your love interest all done in the pursuit of something that will make you happy? And song? Well, what does that have to do with Buddha? Well it’s easy to think in an age of gawdy pop music that music is tacky and commercial, but most of the world begs to differ. Song comes from within, and by coming up with songs, we can see what’s within. In Senegal, West Africa, music praise the journey to God. The Dinka of South Sudan sing songs to celebrate love or praise the cattle that their livelihoods depend on. In war-torn Somalia, songs are composed around campfires celebrating heroes who committed brave and noble acts. And hoarded gold can easily translate into the hordes of money possessed by billion dollar companies, such as Enron, Chevron, and Haliburton.  Oil companies deny responsibility in cleaning up the Gulf of Mexico, politicians bomb the Middle East while protecting major oil companies, and the CIA overthrows democratically elected presidents in Iran, Zaire (modern-day Democratic Republic of the Congo), and Latin America (note oil has been called black gold). And isn’t the whole point of socially engaged Buddhism to help alleviate greed, hatred, and ignorance-the three poisons in Buddhism-to make this world a better place.  

“It’s like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo, the ones that really mattered, full of darkness and danger they were. Sometimes you didn’t want to know the end, because how could the end be happy. How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad happened? But in the end, it’s just a passing thing, this shadow, even darkness must pass.” –Samwise Gamgee

A famous Buddhist saying goes, “This, too, shall pass.” Breakups, fear of driving, nasty professors all cause us stress but in the end we forget all about them. Intellectually disabled people find decent housing. Tragic losses make people stronger and closer to the people around them. Life is about hanging in there until change comes around, and when it does, we’re all still here. Through meditation, we’re able to see that all challenges are impermanent, and we just need to see them through. 

“Not all those who wonder are lost.” –J.R.R. Tolkien

Sometimes we all go down the wrong path: wanting a girl who’s completely egotistical, hoarding objects we think have value to us, snack cravings before we go to bed. But we eventually our able to see that this girl is very manipulative, that those things we collect aren’t always so interesting, and that we can unwind in bed from the day without food. Yet these don’t stop us from truly living because we’re in touch with our selves. 

“It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step out onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.” –Bilbo Baggins

Hobbits are particularly afraid of going out their door, particularly beyond the borders of the Shire, their home. They love creature comforts like good food, an armchair, fireplace, and well-groomed gardens. Yet Bilbo Baggins discovers that when he decides to take Gandalf and the company of thirteen dwarves led by Thorin Oakenshield to reclaim their kingdom, going out into the nasty, uncomfortable, and dangerous wild, he discovers that there is more courage and resilience in him than he previously believed. This is not to different from the story of the Buddha, who left his palace, sexy wife, and creature comforts to try and live discover how all people could truly live, into the wild, eating very little until he nearly starved to death, or the alluring, obedient women and concubines that strutted around his palace, and found that he was much happier and wiser now that he knew there was more to life than his wild, sex-crazed, drinking, party life. Today in the West, we have several safety blankets to help make us feel secure in our lives, such as our televisions, cell-phones, professional lives, material luxury, and even religion to make us feel secure in our safe predictable lives to the point where they almost enslave us, and we begin to feel disconnected to all the people around us. With Buddhism, we can take work, money, relationships, and technology with moderation so we can truly feel loved by and connected to the world.

“But no living man am I! You look upon a woman.” –Eowyn

This quote is delivered by Eowyn, niece and surrogate daughter of King Theoden of Rohan, who sneaks into battle disguised as a man after she is refused to be allowed to go to battle on account of her gender, right after the king is mortally wounded and her best friend, Merry the hobbit is critically injured by Sauron’s chief lieutenant the Witch-King of Angmar. Going back to the Witch-King’s beginnings, Sauron used the ring of power he gave his servant, which he made so no living man could kill him. However, he didn’t foresee a woman riding into battle against him, so consequently, he left a major weakness for his most valuable servant. While Tolkien did not create a lot of female characters, he left one of the most important acts to one of them. Similarly, are own differences, whether gender or otherwise, are capable of serving this world to a greater degree. Companies often hire autistic workers for their ability to recognize and perceive patterns. During World War II, many Navajo gained a place in the war for the fact that they could communicate with each other without the Nazis or Japanese being able to listen in on their plans because they didn’t understand the Navajo language. The Dharma can help us all understand that while we all have our own unique differences, we are able to use them to contribute to this world.

“It’s useless to meet revenge with revenge; it will heal nothing.” –Frodo Baggins

When people egg you on, you know longer need to respond to them. The former classmate who makes snide comments at you is really just jealous of your success and is so immature that he thinks when you share it with your high school staff that you’re out to get him. Snooty middle-age mothers engage victimize themselves for being chastised for their charity which pays more money to its executives, and then make snide comments when you tell them of more accountable charities. Yet you realize they just want to provoke you into chastising them so they can continue to indulge in self-pity, and when you don’t respond to them, they just look vindictive and snide and hurt their own cause.   

“It is not the strength of the body, but the strength for the spirit.” –J.R.R. Tolkien

Selina Wilken elucidated this quote best when she writes, “When all hope seems lost, Frodo and Sam do not give up; Eowyn fights her way through a world of men; Arwen does not abandon what seems lost; Faramir stands up to a rotten parent…” Haven’t some of us had to stand up for ourselves when we are physically smaller, been a woman who had to move up the ranks in a male-dominated profession, or pursue a dream when our parents or family aren’t supportive. Yet we get where we need to go anyway. Practicing Dharma and meditation allows us to see challenge and adversity with compassion and equanimity.  

“Deeds will not be less valiant because they are not praised.” –Aragorn

These days, pop stars, football players, and reality show stars seem to get all the positive attention from society, not to mention more money than teachers, doctors, and social workers who put more of their lives and energy into fulfilling much more noble pursuits. Yet for trainee nurses, student teachers, and engineering students, this does not have to stop them from appreciating and valuing their own hard work, for with the Dharma, one is able to see things as they are, not simply as they are valued by society.

“Even the smallest person can change the course of the future.” –Lady Galadriel

This quote may be in reference to the physical stature of hobbits, who are smaller than other races, including dwarves, yet it is a good metaphor for the potential for ordinary people to make an impact on their own world and the world beyond. Groups of teenagers are able to save local parks from being built over by chain malls, preteen girls are able to successfully petition large corporations to cut down on their use of pesticides and GMOs, and small groups of concerned citizens are capable of helping intellectually disabled people who are fired for their misbehaviors to be reoffered their jobs. One who truly practices the Dharma is fully capable of living in the face of challenge and adversity and eventually coming out successful. For when we practice the Dharma, we are able to be more proactive, humble, resilient, peaceable, and adventurous people. Regardless of whether we are Buddhist or not, Tolkien’s work has some great Buddhist wisdom, delivered in a universal, non-Buddhist package, by which we can all live by.