After exercise time and breakfast, I could not stop myself from going for a brisk walk in the sun (in spite of the slippery roads). We had working meditation and I was pleased to see I was in charge of shoveling, together with a lovely nun and 2 other women. I shoveled with M, a Greek girl from Manhattan, and we did a lot! Then we had walking meditation but I had some minutes (usually they allow 30 minutes between one activity and the next one), so I was going to go for a walk. I started but the gusty wind was killing me, and I did not like the road on the opposite direction, so I came back shortly after and I saw this not-young lady –she is a lay person but has been living at the monastery for a while- trying to unbury her car out of the snow. I asked if she wanted help, and without even waiting for her to answer, I grabbed the broom out of her hands and finished the work. She was delighted and thankful all day for that. In some way she reminds me of my grandmother. Then we did walking meditation (I finally met the ‘loop’) in the woods, with the brothers. I wanted to have some siesta, since my back was killing me after 1.5 hours of shoveling, but I received a pleasant surprise by TXT. I was so happy that I was crying, tears of sheer joy, exuberant joy.
I skipped Darma sharing and later on went to Sutra meditation. The sister with whom I had shoveled snow asked me to read the second half of Sutra. Thankfully the first part would be read by another sister, since it was full of names that were difficult to pronounce even for this Asian nun!
20 minutes chit-chatting with A., the Canadian lawyer who lives in Manhattan- she confessed she is not a Buddhist or cannot define herself as such because she cannot buy yet into re-encarnation. She also told me about how she felt discriminated out of the Catholic church for her parents being divorced. Then we talked about bringing our boyfriends here. And she commended my braveness for having told my family (specially my parents) that I was coming here- the Korean loud girl, she did not tell them because they are Missionaries!
We had dinner at 6 as usual and I again managed to behave. I think that I achieved the goal of thinking or doing things for others all day long: even if it was something as basic as eating, I would commend small sacrifices for others, like not having the food I like the most, or having smaller portions. I now feel the tiredness of the day, pleasant one, not overwhelming one, but the one you feel good to surrender to.
Quote of the day:
“In giving to others, you give to yourself; in giving to yourself, you give to others because the happier you become, the more you can do for others. And the only way to create happiness for yourself is by making other people happy.”
[From “IF NOT NOW, WHEN?” by Tsem Tulku Rinpoche, www.kechara.com. Kechara is a non-profit Buddhist organization.]
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