A rookie's reflections on the OM retreat -- by Kwok Shu Lian

Last year's OM retreat was my first - not counting a two-hour session I attended the year before by the grace and generosity of a friend who could not make it. Whew, it had a lot of impact, much of which was after the retreat itself.

Reciting the mantra

Sometimes, I get so caught up in reciting mantras without really knowing what they mean. The question has been raised whether it is necessary to understand what you are chanting. One of the answers given is, it doesn't really matter as these mantras are intrinsically blessed and pure. However, to be realized, they need pure intention unsullied by thoughts of attachment, delusion and the perennial wandering mind...

The first few sessions

Sad to say, in the beginning, I saw my defilements coming up: work, scenes and reminiscences from the past disparately flashing by like a convoluted mish-mesh. You experience the gamut of all the games the mind can play, and there is nowhere to run. At that moment, it becomes hard not to judge and blame yourself or lapse into defeat. The more you try to rationalize them, the more thoughts there are.

But this was where the powerful beauty of the mantra lay. It was like a Samatha retreat, albeit the object of meditation being the mantra, Om Mani Padme Hung. Every time the mind wandered, the mantra reminded you to come back, to be present, to be silent. Coupled with that, the mantra is the embodiment of unconditional love and compassion for all beings. What a skillful way of meditation. To put it in rather crude terms, you are killing two birds with one stone, developing concentration and bodhichitta at the same time!

The mantra in your heart

With 900 other dharma brothers and sisters chanting, you feel the communion and solidarity of the human heart with one sole intention: to purify ourselves and to chant for the tsunami victims. One would have thought it would be difficult to return to the silence within the heart because one was surrounded by sound. However, interestingly enough, one did return to the heart. It was like the mantra cleared a space in the heart and the more one recited, the more the mantra reverberated from within the heart, and not from the mouth or lungs. Then, the true power of the mantra unfolds. From the stillness and silence within, compassion, peace, ineffable joy and a deep knowingness arise.

This feeling was magnified when Drubwang Rinpoche chanted the mantra in traditional Tibetan tune. The hair on your face pricks, your heart turns and moves, and you are moved by this great living being in front of you whose boundless compassion you cannot even begin to fathom. The tears run down your face and at the same time, strong faith, strength and determination that this is your path arise in you. You are both awed and humbled at the realization of what a long way you have to go, but instead of feeling small, you are empowered to continue.

We need bouts of such spiritual oases. Most of the time, we may start off with pure and good intentions, but over time, these can be eroded by a combination of things and human frictions. The mantra teaches you not to judge, that we are all one in the heart, that compassion and love are the foundation of everything. With unconditional compassion, there is no ego-self. And it cannot be a theory.

Gratitude and compassion

At my workplace, we try to instill an ethic of gratitude in the kids. It's an indirectly skillful way of teaching them how interconnected we are, and how we depend on even the tiniest insect for the food on our table. One night, before Rinpoche was scheduled to give a teaching, teachings from the previous year's retreat flashed on the screen. It was a powerful wake-up call and I'm still trying to really realize what it means:

"We should understand that all sentient beings in the six realms have been our parents at one point in time or another. There is no sentient being who is an exception to this fact. Hence, just as we owe great gratitude towards our parents of this life, we too owe our past parents the same gratitude."

We don't practice compassion from some higher vantage point nor because we have the precious blessings of a human rebirth with all our faculties intact, meeting the teachings and the teacher (although these are important), but because we are indebted to the bodhisattvas, all other sentient beings have been to us at one point or other. It is our responsibility to repay them, but it shouldn't be an onerous burden. Rather, the more we practice, the more we want to do this and the more we see how desperately suffering beings are in need of succor.

In the meantime however, we go back to our daily lives of trying hard (or at least, I am always desperately trying to find this balance) to put to practice the teachings, to develop skillful techniques and wisdom to help, and to try to cut the hard knot of self-cherishing which keeps us away from realizing the gentle softness of unconditional love. All this, in order to truly be of benefit to all mother sentient beings.

A note of thanks...

This participant would like to thank the superbly efficient and kind organizers and co-ordinators of the retreat, Karma Choying Kunkyab Ling and KMS Phor Kark See Monastery: Helen and Andy of SEMM who were excellent, gently humorous, uplifting and compassionate at the same time; the volunteers who were so kind and patient with all of us coming in at various times, interrupting an otherwise orderly procedure; the people in charge of making sure there was enough food: the cooks who had the mammoth task of providing food for growling stomachs that would otherwise produce rumbling sounds of a not too spiritual nature; those who replenished the water, drinks, biscuits for tea-break, those who patiently poured out the requisite one spoon full of Pi Pan Kao for our sore-throats; and all the logistical hard work and late, late nights that went months and days before the retreat; the cleaners, and those at the mini-store outside who patiently answered inquiries; my other fellow-participants whose smiling and glowing faces after each session supported and encouraged me; and just about everyone who made this possible! Sadhu a million times!

Om Mani Padme Hung!