In Retreat on Craig's List

It's Lam Rim retreat week at my Buddhist Center. At our center, retreats are structured to accommodate those of us who hold down that inconvenient obstacle to total retreat, namely, a job, so there are sessions before and after work, as well as during the day. (A job, by the way, is in no way an obstacle to meditation practice, we need other people with whom we can practice patience and develop love and compassion for. No other people = no enlightenment. (In fact, Buddha said that, one day, all living beings will become enlightened, and when there are only a few unenlightened ones left, the Buddhas will appear as ordinary beings, angry, difficult, rude, delusional, you know...ordinary, so that those who remain will have someone to practice with. So, you never know, you could be the last one. Or maybe it's me, I really don't know.))

And now I will pull my post back from the tangent, in the same way I'm supposed to be pulling my mind back from delusion, by saying that, even if my body is not in formal retreat, I can still keep retreat in my mind. I do that by avoiding distraction, and continually pulling my mind away from delusion (mainly anger/aversion and attachment), and re-placing it on minds that create happiness and inner peace.

That task, this time around, is complicated by the fact that I am looking for an apartment. And if there's anything that generates both aversion and attachment in your mind very strongly and at the same time, it's looking for a new place to live. Must have air conditioning! Can't possibly live that close the freeway! Will be blissfully happy forever if it only has a dishwasher! Who the hell would swim in that pool?

It also forces you to define yourself in ways that maybe you haven't thought of before, with the totally false promise that if you figure it all out, exactly who you are, exactly where you want to live, and if you can afford it...that you will be happy for all time.

So...am I edgy enough for Silverlake? Hip enough for Los Feliz? Urban enough to scale the Hollywood hills away from the valley, or, banish the thought, have I really become a valley girl in my heart after all? Valley hai will find you.... mmm....actual yards....plenty of parking...apartments with air conditioning... attachment. attachment. attachment.

Because, in reality, everyone, including me, is really like a turtle. We carry our happiness or unhappiness around with us like a shell on our backs. Our circumstances are only incidental.

So, I will remind myself that a one bedroom apartment, in select valley or Los Feliz/Silverlake locations, with air conditioning, remodeled kitchen with dishwasher, yard or garden, on a street where my cat can run around safely, in a quiety building where I can meditate or write without interruption, with paid utilities, for $1,000 or less, is not - even though it seems that way - is not, in fact, Nirvana.