Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.
TS Elliot
Here is where faith and devotion come into the picture. Devotion, whether to a tradition, a practice, a teacher, or an ideal, is the fuel for faith. I had practiced with devotion before, in the form of guru yoga, or union with the teacher. It’s a powerful practice, greatly valued in the Tibetan tradition, where there are numerous prayers with titles such as “Devotion Pierces the Heart.” The teacher at this retreat exemplified this. He felt such devotion for his own teacher that he could not talk about him without crying.
Faith and devotion do not come easily to me. Now, here, at this re- treat, I felt a different kind of devotion for my teachers, and with that understood that there was nothing to do but to experience whatever came through the door.
We have a choice between two very different ways to meet what arises in experience.
The first is to rely on explanation. We interpret our experiences in life according to a set of deeply held assumptions. We may or may not be conscious of the assumptions, but they are there. Even when we ex- plore our experience, we are usually looking for evidence that supports or confirms them. These assumptions are never questioned. They are taken as fundamental. A self-reinforcing dynamic develops that results in a closed system in which everything is explained, the mystery of life is dismissed, new ideas, perspectives, or approaches to life cannot enter and certain questions can never be asked. This I call belief.
The other way is to open and be willing to receive, not con- trol, whatever arises—that is, not only allow but embrace every sensation, feeling, and thought, everything we experience. In this approach, we allow our experience to challenge our assumptions. Here, there are no fundamental or eternal truths, and some things cannot be explained; they can only be experienced. This willing- ness to open to whatever arises internally or externally I call faith.
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness
comes as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
—Rumi
