Buddha at the door: Coronavirus lockdown opportunity for spiritual practice
(OPINION) There are seasons to our spiritual path. The crisis impacting the world might feel like a season of uncertainty, but it can also be one of opportunity. Every day, pandemic or not, we’re asked to navigate challenges. Large or small, each is an opportunity to peel away our everyday perspectives and habits, in order to usher in new change.
If we can trust the seasons, we’ll experience less groundlessness— or the feeling like the sky is falling on top of us, and nothing can be counted on. In Buddhism, this uncertainty is called shunyata, and rather than be a perspective of fear or grasping, it can actually become a state of joy, one where we embrace not knowing what is going to happen next. Instead, we cherish what we do have: the infinite present moment. The one thing we can always count on.
In each instance, we’re given the opportunity to either surrender to the unknown or to grasp onto what feels like it’s slipping away. During the past few weeks, with a virus circling the world, many have had to confront this shaky-ground feeling daily, moment-to-moment. Do we give in and get swept away with fear and worry, or do we find ground through calm surrender?
One opportunity that arose for me during this groundless time was the chance to attend a virtual “Sesshin” at the Zen Mountain Monastery in Tremper, NY. Sesshin is a five-day silent retreat and meditation, one I’d wanted to participate in with a community, to be part of the collective energy and consciousness of the whole. Since the retreat isn’t within driving distance for me, attending in-person never seemed tangible. And yet here, amid the most disruptive time, I was given an opportunity unlike any other.
My choice to join the virtual Sesshin almost seemed selfish. While family, friends, colleagues and my college students were all needing me more than ever, I was about to radically change my schedule to go into a type of immediate seclusion inside my home. The Sesshin day “wake-up” began at 3:50 a.m, with the first two-hour meditation beginning 40 minutes later, followed by discussions, exercise, caretaking practice, more meditation, mindful meals and ending with zazen at 9 p.m. In total, the whole day every day subtly revolved around quiet, introspection and self-care.
And here it was! The kernel of understanding I was being asked to look at and consider, the great challenge that needed to be peeled away. Challenges are always available to teach and show us what we most need. I was being asked to look at my own patterns: in this case, I routinely put others before my own needs, almost sacrificially, instead of practicing balance, allowing my needs to be important too.
Negotiating time and adjusting my schedule was its own daring feat. On one side, I had a virtual window into a monastery with unmoving monks and nuns sitting lotus on zafu cushions before the altar of the Buddha. On the other hand, I was being called to respond to the immediacy of lockdown, which included shifting my courses online to work remotely, while also ensuring there was stock and supplies to accommodate a long-term stay at home. Ultimately, I was being asked to be less in the world.
It didn’t hit me right away, but three days into this New Unknown, where ancient bells woke me and brought me back to center all day long—amid time to grade papers, cook supper, ensure there was toilet paper to last the week, and to show up for people who needed me most—I came to the realization that Sesshin and lockdown were an awful lot alike. In a way, they were both asking me to remain and be still: one inward, one outward.
And really, our perception is what’s creating the divide that there is an in and out, spiritually. The truth is that in or out, I could live my life as if always in Sesshin, or always in lockdown, that both were offering peace of mind and calm resistance to dismantle the illusion of an outer world bound and gripped by fear. The more I hit the cushion, sitting unmoved, the more I was able to meet any challenges with a balanced, calm mind.
When we surrender to groundlessness and meet the world with trust—trust in our ability to meet whatever comes without our interference—we can welcome the challenges like gifts. For me, juggling silent meditation and everyday tasks allowed me to bring more self-awareness into each moment. It brought a renewed excitement, a feeling that something amazing was around the next corner, but not needing to know what it was—and inwardly trusting that I would meet it as another opportunity to grow.
In reality, I would’ve never believed a pandemic would create the opportunity to be a virtual member of the sangha and continue practice on Sunday morning Zazen live-streamed weekly. I didn’t have to go looking. In a moment of crisis, the Buddha showed up at the door for me. Opening to it, uncertainty faded, ushering in a wellspring of joy, enough to carry into the next infinite moment.
Hunter Liguore is a professor of writing and award-winning author, who promotes understanding our shared humanity, as an alternative to discrimination and hate. Visit her website here.