by Rio Branham

Intro

I have to be honest. I’m cheating a bit today. I’m going to share a re-write of a talk I gave at retreat last year. I was working on a different talk about stories, but, as fate would have it, I was too stuck in my own stories to get it finished. But that’s not the only reason I decided to shift gears. As I was working on my talk this last week, I was distracted by the fires and the smoke that have been enveloping our state. Particularly on Wednesday when the air was so thick with smoke and then the thunderstorm rolled in. I thought I was in the middle of the second coming! It was truly awe-inspiring and a stark reminder of our interdependence with our Mother Earth. So I felt it was more appropriate to talk about how nature teaches us dharma. 

Rivers

Rivers have become a great teacher and friend for me. Perhaps there’s some subconscious affinity because of the name that my parents chose to give me. Over the past few years I had made a habit of going up Millcreek Canyon and getting to know the river there, which I didn’t realize until recently, is the same river that flows by us right now, just outside. There is something indescribable about how I feel when I sit next to a river. The sound of the river quiets my mind and washes away my cluttered thoughts. The movement of the river also moves me. I love writing and singing next to the river. Its presence has served as inspiration for many of my songs as well as where I go to work through my Dharma talks. Rivers provide a reminder to come back to myself, an instant antidote to the chaos of daily life. Here are a few things that rivers have and continue to teach me:

Rivers remind me to go at a natural pace

And that doesn’t just mean slow down. Rivers don’t all go at the same pace, they can be both fast and roaring loud, even violent or almost imperceptibly slow, small and silent. They’re speed and intensity are not decisions that the river makes, it simply allows what needs to flow through it to flow at whatever pace is necessary. This helps me both see that slowing down can be helpful, but also at other times, that it’s necessary to move quickly and with intensity.

Rivers flow along the path of least resistance, yet they still have a defining impact on their path

We read this in our practice manual

Let us practice letting go

Let us be like water without resistance 

Let go of all pretenses, scheming, and our need to control the uncontrollable

As water flows down the mountain, it cannot determine what the terrain ahead will look like, it simply flows. At the same time water has an enormous effect, over long periods, on carving riverbeds, valleys, and canyons. A lovely teaching on the paradox of acceptance and action.

Water takes the shape of its container; a reminder to not be too rigid and adapt to circumstances.

And possibly most defining, rivers are in a constant state of change, unattached to past versions of themselves or what they might become tomorrow.

Beyond Speech

Rivers, of course, aren’t the only teacher in the natural world. Jordynn and I became members at the Red Butte gardens this year and have been visiting often to just walk around and observe what plants are blooming each month. I’m very glad that the fire above the U didn’t reach the gardens. In addition to being observant to the seasonality of plants, recently my practice has included listening to the birds. I’m told this is a tell-tale sign of middle age. I absolutely love it. I’ll drink my coffee outside in the morning and use an app to identify different bird songs and I’ve been able to start identifying some of them as I go throughout my day, which is a delight. These small moments help me see how much life is all around me that is so easy to miss and let go unappreciated.

Another great quote from our practice manual is in the section Face to Face:

Flowers, dogs, trees, sky, clouds, earth, you, me. A flower blooms, a dog barks, and the wind blows – Enlightenment beyond speech, beyond silence.

What do you think Enlightenment beyond speech, beyond silence means?

To me it means that dharma is not fully contained in words and concepts and ideas to be spoken out loud or written in a book. At one of our retreats Christopher Sensei speaking about noble silence said, “when you begin to observe noble silence pay attention to the silence that was already there”. Why do we practice noble silence at retreat, and silent meditation each Sunday? It is an invitation to the dharma that is all around us in the natural world, the dharma beyond speech, to enter our minds. It’s so easy to fill our minds with quotes and ideas and theories and content, with good intentions, but it often does not leave space for what might be the most useful or important teaching for us in any given moment. I’ll admit, I’ve been out of my mindfulness practice recently and I can tell that I often don’t even allow myself a few minutes a day to hear what my own mind and body need to be telling me.

There’s a beauty and simplicity in absorbing these slivers of wisdom that are applicable to your life through observation of our environment, that can often resonate more strongly and have a deeper effect on us than any dharma talk.

Rev. Gyomay Kubose says:

The sun is not conscious of giving benefit.
  It has never realized any altruistic motives, nor thought,
‘I am shining.’ It simply shines.

What I love about learning the dharma through nature is that it’s not trying to teach us anything, it’s simply being exactly what it is, without pretense or scheming. The learning comes simply from observation. This quote is pointing out that while we all benefit from the sun shining, the sun is not shining because it is beneficial to us. This is a perfect example of Come As You Are. The sun is not thinking about how it can best serve its solar system, it’s just doing what the sun does. Similarly, showing up as ourselves is perhaps the best way for us to be helpful to others. By finding our unique gifts and ways of being that allow us to let our own inner light out in an authentic way. Not for the intended purpose of helping others, but simply for the purpose of us realizing our own true nature. We don’t blame trees for being crooked, we can’t say a cloud is the wrong shape. We know that they are simply being true to how they are and that’s why we love them.

Interdependence

Once again, in our practice manual:

The heavens and earth and all of humankind are supporting me – and because of this I am alive.

This whole world revolves like this. I am so grateful for I know that there is no “I” apart from others. 

This section touches on the idea of interconnectedness or Interdependence. No thing exists independent of other things. We are not distinct selves separate from carbon or water and every other element that makes up our bodies and all living things. We would not exist without the elements that came together to form this planet and everything on it. It’s a humbling practice to try and recognize how dependent and interconnected we are with every single thing around us. But that comes with a difficult realization as well.

Fire

What about the difficult parts of nature? Like massive, destructive wildfires? Acknowledging our interdependence with nature isn’t just hugging trees. Nature can be brutal. What are we to learn from the death and destruction caused by the natural world? Turns out nature isn’t just a good teacher of interdependence, but also impermanence. Plants and animals and even planets and suns eventually die. And while the aftermath of a wildfire is ugly with charred trees and the many animals killed or displaced, we know that from the ashes of fire comes fertile ground for new beginnings. And that’s not to dismiss real suffering caused by natural disasters. We need to make space to grieve and acknowledge pain, heartache, and difficulties imposed by extreme conditions. But by having a wide view of the many cycles of the natural world we begin to see that even in the most dire of circumstances, life finds a way to keep going.

Something I noticed this last week was how intensely beautiful and colorful the sunsets were. Some of the most vivid and astonishing colors you’ll ever see during a sunset. This is due to the extra particles in the air from the smoke which scatters the light creating the more vivid colors. It feels almost irreverent to appreciate the beauty of something that comes from such a terrible event. You can’t help but think about the people who have had to evacuate their homes, the people who work tirelessly to fight the fires, not to mention the detrimental health effects of breathing the smoke that we all get to endure. It’s not black and white. Beauty and suffering can coexist. But these too serve as reminders of our interdependence on the earth and on each other.

Conclusion

So take some time out of your day to observe the world around you. Try to see how you are connected to the plants and animals and even buildings and cars and computers for that matter. They too come from the same natural elements as us. The dharma is everywhere, and only sometimes do we use words to help us understand it.

Namu Amida Butsu