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Buddhism, Death and the Dharma - how do Buddhists grieve major change? Recently lost my sister :-(
The_Dharma_Farmer
Explorer
Hi everyone, I hope this finds you well.
I would like to start a discussion about what experiences people have had of Death and their practice, grief and sorrow in the context of Dukkha and Impermanence etc.
Allow me to kick it off with a brief article I wrote about it, following the death of my big sister two weeks ago. Damn, it still hurts, especially posting the finished article, but if some good comes out of it, that can only be a wonderful thing.
This is inspired by her bravery and determination to use her situation to help others. This is for anyone who is grieving, anyone who has lost someone, anyone who is looking for closure or at least an alternative way of looking at death. Click below for the link to the blog...
Remembering Jane: Buddhism, Death and the Dharma
Jane Clegg: 1970-2014. You will be missed, but thank you for the amazing times! There is a link for those who have asked about donating to Beating Bowel Cancer. They are criminally underfunded, and change lives!
Many thanks, you messages and actions of love and support over the last few difficult weeks have been out of this world, for me and my family. You know who you are, so thank you xxx
I'm interested in sharing experiences, and hope that if you have lost someone recently that you give whatever arrises plenty of space and kindness :-) Huge hugs, it gets better, I promise!
All my love and metta, Namo Buddhay!
D.F xxx
I would like to start a discussion about what experiences people have had of Death and their practice, grief and sorrow in the context of Dukkha and Impermanence etc.
Allow me to kick it off with a brief article I wrote about it, following the death of my big sister two weeks ago. Damn, it still hurts, especially posting the finished article, but if some good comes out of it, that can only be a wonderful thing.
This is inspired by her bravery and determination to use her situation to help others. This is for anyone who is grieving, anyone who has lost someone, anyone who is looking for closure or at least an alternative way of looking at death. Click below for the link to the blog...
Remembering Jane: Buddhism, Death and the Dharma
Jane Clegg: 1970-2014. You will be missed, but thank you for the amazing times! There is a link for those who have asked about donating to Beating Bowel Cancer. They are criminally underfunded, and change lives!
Many thanks, you messages and actions of love and support over the last few difficult weeks have been out of this world, for me and my family. You know who you are, so thank you xxx
I'm interested in sharing experiences, and hope that if you have lost someone recently that you give whatever arrises plenty of space and kindness :-) Huge hugs, it gets better, I promise!
All my love and metta, Namo Buddhay!
D.F xxx
1
Comments
Im 35 years old and ive been to at least 2 dozen funerals in my life, starting with my grandfather at age 10, whom i was also lucky enough to watch suffer through cancer. Then 6 years later my other grandfather died from alzheimers and parkensins, then 3 years after that i held my grandmother's hand as she died from her pancreatic cancer. Of course 6 years after that my wife died from her cancer.
My first grandfather and my wife gave me what i call their greatist gifts, to experience illness and death as a young child and then again as an adult, husband, and caregiver. These are amazing gifts of dhamma that I would never wish happened any other way.
Ive also never felt that we handle death in the right way. I have always been for treating death and grieving as a celebration of life. growing up when i started to learn about some cultures and how they handle death as a celebration of life.. To me that is how to do it. I am happy and grateful for my time here on this planet and all that ive spent part of this time with.
Ajahn Brahm talks about life being like a great concert, when the concert is over we dont feel sad and cry, but rather we feel happy that we had this wonderful time. This is how imo to view these things.
I tend to take life, in all its aspect, as a teacher. In both "good" experiences and "bad", there is the ability to learn and grow. I also feel that experiencing all that i have in life has greatly increased a sense of dissatisfaction about life ive always felt, to the point of feeling that renouncing is the next step in this learning process life brings us.
While there is almost an unlimited range of feelings that will accompany such a loss, I have found that treating it formost as my teacher is what helped everyone the most in the long run.
In Gassho
H
What I was taught when bereaved was to open completely to the grief. Not to distract myself in anyway, but to sit with it.
that day?
I would recommend, if you are interested, the maybe you read through parts of Sogyal Rinpoche's Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. There are some aspects that might not be of interest to you if you are not a Tibetan Buddhist, but there are some wonderful words and prayers and explanations that I found most helpful. I read it a lot when my grandma was ill as well.
Wishing you peace. It will come.
Drawing from the Tibetan Buddhist tradition of approaching and preparing for death, Lama Shenpen Hookham offers Westerners like herself practical descriptions of the attitudes, the practices, and the considerations that surround our own death, caring for those dying and also care-givers. Of great interest to those
About the Author
Lama Shenpen Hookham has practised in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition for over 30 years, both in India and here in her native Britain. With Khenpo Rinpoche her root teacher, she focuses on the Mahamudra and Dzogchen teachings. She is the author of The Buddha Within and Progressive Stages of Meditation on Emptiness.
Lama Shenpen Hookham is a British Westerner with a solid grounding in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. She has a gift for teaching in an intuitive style which encourages her students' independence and creativity. In other contexts, her analysis and teaching of the role of words, their meaning, and their inner resonance, brings out the inner dimension of language and its role in Buddhist teaching and practice.
This relatively brief book combines the best of two traditions of writing on death and dying: firstly, she addresses practical concerns about dying, and secondly, she addresses the Buddhist practices and beliefs around the process, including a knowledge of the so-called "Tibetan Book of the Dead" (Bardo Thodol Chenmo).
This makes for a powerful combination, giving useful and heartfelt advice. One feels as if one were sipping a cup of tea with the Lama, cozily sitting by a fire during a cold night in Wales. As a friend and a Lama, she delivers simple yet profound and practical advice, combined with heart-felt humanity and warmth. This is a book not only on death and dying, but on how to conduct one's life. It is said that if my next step is the right one, I will be at the right place in a thousand miles. This is the core message of this book. I highly recommend it for the reader now, when death does not seem so near.
"The young and old, the foolish and the wise, all are stopped short by the power of death, all finally end in death. Of those overcome by death and passing to another world, a father cannot hold back his son, nor relatives a relation. See! While the relatives are looking on and weeping, one by one each mortal is led away like an ox to slaughter.
"In this manner the world is afflicted by death and decay. But the wise do not grieve, having realized the nature of the world. You do not know the path by which they came or departed. Not seeing either end you lament in vain. If any benefit is gained by lamenting, the wise would do it. Only a fool would harm himself. Yet through weeping and sorrowing the mind does not become calm, but still more suffering is produced, the body is harmed and one becomes lean and pale, one merely hurts oneself. One cannot protect a departed one (peta) by that means. To grieve is in vain.
"By not abandoning sorrow a being simply undergoes more suffering. Bewailing the dead he comes under the sway of sorrow. See other men faring according to their deeds! Hence beings tremble here with fear when they come into the power of death. Whatever they imagine, it (turns out) quite different from that. This is the sort of disappointment that exists. Look at the nature of the world! If a man lives for a hundred years, or even more, finally, he is separated from his circle of relatives and gives up his life in the end. Therefore, having listened to the arahant, one should give up lamenting. Seeing a dead body, one should know, "He will not be met by me again." As the fire in a burning house is extinguished with water, so a wise, discriminating, learned and sensible man should quickly drive away the sorrow that arises, as the wind (blows off) a piece of cotton. He who seeks happiness should withdraw the arrow: his own lamentations, longings and grief.
"With the arrow withdrawn, unattached, he would attain to peace of mind; and when all sorrow has been transcended he is sorrow-free and has realized Nibbana.
Salla Sutta: The Arrow
'Suffering' as she does from senility, she never brought any pain, discomfort or anxiety to anyone's attention.
My cousin, keeping an eye on her mother, was giving her a bath about 2 weeks ago. My aunt needed the toilet, and my cousin noticed an abnormality in her bowel movements, took her to hospital later that day, and by the evening, discovered her mother had advanced, inoperable cancer, which could actually take her... at any time.
This saddened me enormously to hear, because this particular aunt has a long, chequered and difficult life behind her. She never had it easy, either emotionally or financially, but has a heart as big as the whole outdoors, a relentless sense of good humour and never an unkind word for anyone. She is and always has been, my favourite aunt.
I was at my father's side, when he died, and supported my mother through that grief; she now has the additional burden of seeing her beloved sister die.
Death always finds us; it is a constant and ever-present companion.
I often 'take tea with Yama'. He and I have become good friends, and I know, one day, it will be my turn to dine with him.
The "trick" is to become so familiar with the thought of death, that it becomes as great a part of your life as breathing is.
And for each person, that time period is different. But there certainly is a time to let go of the grief. Federica makes a good point -- that the individual has to decide when to remove the arrow. But there does come a time when that arrow should be removed.
May we all be free of suffering.
I know everyone is different, and you're so right, people sometimes seem to develop only an intellectual understanding of the Dharma and treat it almost as if it were a philosophy, something to be understood in a merely theoretical, abstract way. For me, I suppose looking back this painful process is actually bringing me closer to an emotion equivalent of my theoretical or scholastic understanding, closing the gap be tween 'wisdom' and simply 'knowledge'.
Insight on the other hand...? Who knows? That kind of wordless shift in the fundamental perspective, the fabled 'turning about in the deepest seat of consciousness'... Fairly ineffable, and not a concern to be honest. I suppose that it can be said to manifested as our actions thereafter? I can't promise anything on that one, lol... We wait with baited breath... ;-) As I mentioned, I seem more sensitive to the grace by which we live our lives with death over our shoulders, as Eddie Vedder said, and feel more kindly towards that heightened sensitivity, allowing it to bring a new and subtle texture to life. Things feel less fixed, more fragile, which is cool by me. I'm feeling a hell of a lot more compassionate, or is there a different nuance to it? Hard to say...
Im happy to say my other foot is arrow-free, its just giving it time and allowing the first arrow some kindly space to unfold and explain itself, or not, as it chooses. I'm also reminded of the historical Buddha, that he himself was mortal and 'died' and I feel greatly inspired by this. We too can achieve the state of the Deathless, as did he.
So much metta in my heart for you all, thank you! @federica - you are in my thoughts especially at this difficult time, if you need someone to talk to pm me on facebook or here any time. Its just our turn in the stocks, it will be someone else's tun soon enough. Does or has anyone else experienced some weird, elated feelings of gladness or happiness that this is happening to you instead of someone else? I've felt that a lot when non-Buddhists express their condolences... I'm glad my world perspective doesn't include a creator God, that's all I can say... I'd be royally pissed at him/her if it did, lol!
;-P
Big love! Stay safe xxx
The hard part is being able to tell the difference between mindless distraction versus consciously engaging with activities which will allow positive mental states to arise... When I reach for the TV remote, what is my intention..? am I running away from something, or am I acknowledging it and responding kindly to myself..? Mindfulness is revolutionary in that sense! I find that there is a release of energy when I stop running from a painful experience and instead turn towards it with compassion in my heart. Again, strike any chords with anyone? :-)
So long as I don't try and use the suttas and the Dharma as some kind of intellectual band-aid for an emotional wound, I'll be fine... Better than than, I will evolve. And that is what I believe it means to be truly human :-) xx
Pain is pain. Physical, emotional, head confusion . . .
Pain really does have the potential to increase our empathy and compassion. I feel this is where authenticity and reality comes very close to us; in our tragedy, our tears, our humanity.
How extraordinary to be human, to lose a 'punk sister', to grieve, to remember . . . incredible intense events. I really want to say wonderful.
Eh Ma Ho (how wonderful).
Of course I knew my mother was going to die. She was 85 and failing. I was sad to lose her but glad she wasn't suffering any more.
If one of my children was killed, I would not expect things to go so smoothly.
It doesn't mean those people aren't still very sad at losing their loved one no matter the reason, child or adult. Aversion to illness and death only makes the transition that much harder.
Even though I have lost loved ones myself, I'm not really helpful in situations like this, but I will say that I have offered 염불(yeombul - the Korean term for "nembutsu") for you, your family, and your sister. I hope this helps.
I recently lost my grandpa, who I was close to. It was really hard for me at first - everything I learned and understood from Buddhism over the past few years of practice sort of flew out the window... but I tried to not feel guilty about it.
Interestingly, because the rest of my family is Christian, I got to see the power that their faith had in dealing with such a difficult time. It gave me perspective on how trying to rationalize (e.g. "Well, everything is impermanent so this is just part of samsara...") sometimes twists the knife a bit more than simply relinquishing any sort of control one tries to create over the situation. The rest of my family seemed to completely surrender their grief and desire to change my grandpa's status to "God's will," and it seemed to help them cope really well.