a memory that shines, sharing good things with a good and trusted friend.
[xxxxxxxxxx] Not at all, I’m the same way when things are like that for me.
[Shandala] obviously, i got moved. heh. it was a pinch though. funds are extremely tight.
[Shandala] i’m still uncertain if i will have enough to get me through to my first paycheck.
[Shandala] i’ll know more after the 29th.
[Shandala] the movers brought the rest of my belongings today…
[Shandala] so i spent much of last night unpacking.
[Shandala] not quite fully unpacked just yet. but i fell into bed about 6pm
[Shandala] worn out. heh.
[Shandala] and of course, that meant i was up at midnight or so.
[Shandala] little things. i’m so happy to have my desk chair that i could spit.
[Shandala] i’ve been using a metal folding chair for the last week or so and believe me, my hips are very thankful indeed to have this chair again.
[Shandala] i have television and cable for the first time since 2000.
[xxxxxxxxxx] haha, and how happy are you with that?
[Shandala] but couldn’t find anything to watch tonight to save my life. (chuckle)
[Shandala] i’m so happy in this moment that i’m about to cry, really.
[Shandala] i’ve spent the last week hovering on the edge of weeping. happy tears, of course… but it just seems goofy to be weepy.
[xxxxxxxxxx] I am glad to hear it, and even more glad to hear that things go well for you.
[Shandala] i start work on monday.
[Shandala] i’m really looking forward to it.
[xxxxxxxxxx] What is this job again?
[Shandala] and i met Hallus last week Friday along with two of my new co-workers. we had lunch.
[Shandala] business analyst. i’m back where the fun it. heh. workflow management, process analysis, business and cost justification, process modeling and documentation.
[Shandala] it is a small insurance company… but that’s actually a good thing.
[Shandala] all the fun and very little of the corporate crap.
[Shandala] happy fingers. heh. can hardly type.
[xxxxxxxxxx] Smaller is usually better, at least for sanity’s sake
[Shandala] i can already see that this place is going to be wonderful for me.
[Shandala] they have nothing. i get to build it from the ground up.
[Shandala] i love that. 🙂
[Shandala] my apartment is about twice the size of what i had in georgia. i didn’t realize how cramped i felt until i walked in to this place and boggled.
[Shandala] i do not usually put much stock in the material. but i have to admit, this is nice.
[Shandala] i’m five minutes away from anything. including the beach. which is a wonder.
[Shandala] and now, i’ll tell you about the really good stuff. (grin)
[xxxxxxxxxx] The beach! Such a thing exists only as myth for the likes of me…
[xxxxxxxxxx] Oh?
[Shandala] well. if the day ever comes that you’re willing to meet me…. i would be thrilled to pieces to give you a place to stay and show you that mythical beach. (smile)
[Shandala] yes. the good stuff. ok.
[Shandala] this is going to be rambly. fair warning. heh.
[xxxxxxxxxx] My chair is comfy, and I enjoy listening to you, but warning noted. *smiles*
[Shandala] the most important thing… though perhaps it won’t sound it… somewhere in this last week… i am finally ‘over’ him. woke up a few days ago and all the things i had been grieving were just… gone. i actually think that is related to something else
[Shandala] major that has happened here.. which i will get to in a moment..
[Shandala] but the ‘moment of realization’ was… kind of intense and profound. relief. like an entire building was off my back.
[xxxxxxxxxx] Wow… congratulations! That is indeed good news!
[Shandala] i had a need to roleplay that ending here. did so that night. logged it to my gallery. kind of a stone in the field, you know? marker for memory, but behind me. it is a good thing.
[Shandala] so i’m at that ‘clean slate’ moment. which is nice. everything fresh and hopeful again… which is a beautiful thing.
[Shandala] now… you know i’ve been pursuing buddhism for a while, yes?
[Shandala] part of that has been my own layman’s study. and involvement with a number of virtual communities that have buddhism as their focal point.
[xxxxxxxxxx] *nods*
[Shandala] one of them, a community with which i have felt a good amount of connection… i discovered only upon the day of the actual move is (can you guess?)
[Shandala] located very near me. here.
[Shandala] indeed, less than an hour from me.
[Shandala] and it just so happened that the day of my driving down, they were hosting a tibetan lama for teachings. from the 16th to the 19th, in fact.
[Shandala] i decided to go.
[xxxxxxxxxx] Good news follows good news. *smiles*
[Shandala] it was… well, honestly, i cannot describe fully how it was. i’ll put it this way…
[Shandala] do you know that feeling you get when you’ve been away from home for a long time? that moment when you’re just inside the doorway of home after having been away longer than you ever wanted to be?
[Shandala] i am not quite sure how it can feel so much like i’ve come home when i’ve never lived here… but that is the feeling i have.
[xxxxxxxxxx] A good feeling, that one
[xxxxxxxxxx] That’s excellent to have, in a place you’ve never lived, to feel at home right away. I am happy to hear this
[Shandala] the three days of study and community just reached right inside me… opened me up like a flower. i can’t really convey it.
[Shandala] the people. wow.
[Shandala] the act of study. the presence.
[Shandala] it was my first encounter with ‘a real buddhist monk’….
[Shandala] let alone one who is lineaged, official, and a lama.
[Shandala] (teacher, ‘certified’ so to speak, imbued with the full authority of 2500 years of tradition, etc. )
[Shandala] to have the chance to interact, question, hear…. it was like …
[Shandala] it was like finding a cool, clear stream in the middle of the desert. and not having to worry about drinking too much.
[Shandala] i have realized since about february this year that i have been buddhist all my life and simply did not know enough to know this was the case.
[Shandala] and in may or so, i was involved with a teacher/guru in georgia…
[Shandala] and thought to take official refuge in the tradition at that time…
[Shandala] but she gently told me i wasn’t ready, and that i should first take refuge in myself. which at the time, i didn’t understand.
[Shandala] but sitting there, finally, i did.
[Shandala] and on sunday, the 19th, before the sangha and with the Rinpoche (lama)… i took offical refuge and received my dharma name. (which is another story… and one i share soon)
[Shandala] this monk, he becomes my ‘root lama’… the one from whom all official instruction will proceed. it is hard to describe the connection. it’s like meeting a missing part of your soul. instant. intense. total. as odd as this may sound, i love him like a
[Shandala] brother, a son, a father… all at once.
[Shandala] and he is the same in relation to me. which is…
[Shandala] bleh. there are no words.
[Shandala] i wrote about it on my blog. but even that doesn’t do it justice.
[Shandala] i don’t think anything can.
[Shandala] i crying again. but they are happy tears.
[xxxxxxxxxx] No bleh. Trying to describe something like this is understandably difficult 🙂
[Shandala] Rinpoche told me that weeping like this, for this, is the sign that negative karma is being released and transmuted. i don’t try not to cry anymore.
[Shandala] i am so happy, my friend. if nothing else but this had happened, it wouldn’t even matter. this alone has already changed me, changed my life in ways i simply cannot put into words.
[Shandala] the sangha, the ‘congregation’ as it were… though that is not an accurate label by far, they are so much more…
[Shandala] they are the ones who give new ‘refugees’ insight to customs and culture and the like…
[Shandala] they are also the ones who explain to you what your new name means… and provide any insight toward its nature or the choices of Rinpoche in giving that specific name to you.
[Shandala] they told me that the act of taking refuge opens many doors… which i have already experienced so i know it to be true. but in that moment, i was still in system shock… hearing without registering.
[Shandala] they were telling me that crying was normal. i bawled like a baby. but no shame in it. just… homecoming.
[Shandala] he handed me a small card on which he had written my new name in tibetan/sanskrit. his translator put it into english as best he could… but i undertook my own study to better learn it…
[Shandala] their names are ‘backwards’ to our eyes… surname comes first, then ‘firstname’ and then any middle name.
[Shandala] the name he gave me is
[Shandala] kongchog ye shes bzang mo, which is written for english as yeshes bzangmo kongchog
[Shandala] the surname, kongchog, is an indicator of the lineage, drigung kagyu, tibetan vajrayana buddhism. and is generally translated as ‘of the Triple Jewel’ which is a reference to one’s being accepted by the lineage as one who has right to access the Dharma
[Shandala] in this life.
[Shandala] as it turns out, not everyone who takes refuge is given this name.
[Shandala] and i am told it is an auspicious thing.
[xxxxxxxxxx] The ‘triple’ is rather coincidental as well.
[Shandala] synchronicities abound.
[Shandala] (smile)
[Shandala] i’ll tell you more of that in a moment… but yes, i have long known that i can tell when i am where i should be, doing as i should be doing, for the appearance of the triads.
[Shandala] and interestingly, this is an aspect of buddhism with which i was unaware…
[Shandala] but in learning of it, i find a deep contentment. homecoming. things i have known all my life and felt alienated for no one else seeing or understanding… they ALL are known here, in this.
[Shandala] it is amazing to me. profound.
[Shandala] ye shes (yeshes) is sanskrit/tibetan for ‘wisdom’. and when they told me this was the name he had given me, i just broke down. i suppose you can imagine why…
[Shandala] it was a confirmation of a thing i aspire to in myself, and one that sometimes, others will confirm/validate in me… but which was seriously cut and wounded over these last months as a result of my experiences with heath and those around him. also, as a
[Shandala] result of things happening in my life, and the feeling that i had fallen so far that i would never be able to truly stand on my own feet again.
[Shandala] the middle name ‘bzang mo’ is kind of hard to explain… it can mean any of three things, depending on the context in which it is used, and any of those three could apply to me as a name.
[Shandala] it’s first meaning is ‘kindness’… in this context, the loving-kindness that is the goal of any buddhist toward all sentient beings of the world.
[Shandala] it is both a goal of any buddhist as well as a gift as an appellation.
[Shandala] it’s second meaning is hard to convey…
[Shandala] it can mean ‘mother’… but not as in your mother, or a human mother…
[Shandala] it is a reference to the concept of the ‘mother of all buddhas’… the emptiness from which all things arise, and the power of creation in the universe. as a name, it refers to the regenerative, creative power of soul to manifest positive things into the
[Shandala] world. and also is a reference to the tradition of belief that all things are one, and that we have, at some time in the overarcing spiral of our many lives, been mother to all other sentient beings… and they… to us…
[Shandala] so in this context, it is a nod and reference to interdependance and oneness, connection and unity.
[Shandala] it’s third meaning is loosely translated as ‘all goodness’… which is a poor translation, but the best one manages… it refers to the wish or aspiration to give compassion, care, and comfort to all sentient beings. a reference that points to the
[Shandala] ultimate, selfless benefit that an enlightened mind may bring to the world and all in it.
[Shandala] as a name, i am told it is highly auspicious. but i knew this as soon as i saw the root words of the translation that the translator handed to me.
[Shandala] the card i received read in translation, simply: triple gem wisdom all good
[Shandala] it took me a full day of research to draw all of this from it, and consultation with others in the sangha. the teacher/guru there being the one who was most helpful.
[Shandala] but for me, it spoke of many things… most of which i know you already see.
[Shandala] and put me in the dust. humbled me.
[Shandala] the sangha tells me that a dharma name is both a recognition of what one is, and what one can be.
[Shandala] they tell me as well that in the moment of taking refuge, the root lama ‘reads the soul’… there is a more esoteric phrase for it… but i do not know it at the moment… they say these buddhist masters have the ability to see into others.
[Shandala] and this, they do when one takes refuge, and from that, determine what their name should be.
[Shandala] what skepticism i had was just…
[Shandala] obliterated when i realized the name he had given me.
[Shandala] i can’t even begin to tell you how deep this is for me. meaningful. stars. it is a touchstone.
[Shandala] there was a part of me that wanted to be proud for it. but that would be something of a taint to it. so instead, i am simply and softly wondering… honestly, just… awed.
[Shandala] it is good to have that which i aspire to be recognized. and it is balm to wounds both old and newer.
[Shandala] but most importantly…
[Shandala] it is a reminder of all these things that i can carry as a name in the world. so it is both talisman and ward. indicator of blessing and protection against pride in it, or placing too much value in ‘self’.
[Shandala] heh. stopping a moment to catch my breath. *smile*
[xxxxxxxxxx] *smiles*
[Shandala] the welcome they have given me so far exceeds any possible thought or expectation that i weep for that, too.
[Shandala] i am going to be managing their website. (grin) i couldn’t offer fast enough.
[Shandala] i’m already rebuilding it. making it beautiful. would you like to see what i’ve done thusfar?
[Shandala] i’ll show you what it is now… and then, give you a link to what i’m working on…
[xxxxxxxxxx] Of course.
[Shandala] a moment. *smile*
[Shandala] this is the domain as it exists today: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[Shandala] here is what i have managed thusfar…. though i will likely forego the blog format even though i think it is best for them. they prefer a ‘flat text’ site… i’m not sure why….
[xxxxxxxxxx] I did, and I went and checked it out, though I think I’ll just write the next one down 🙂
[Shandala] xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[Shandala] heh. but that’s the one i wanted you to see most. *grin*
[Shandala] no worries. 🙂
[Shandala] anyway… i’m in the process of porting over the content.
[Shandala] once i get it all done in the blog format, i’m going to make them another version that is flat…
[Shandala] and then, let them choose which they want.
[Shandala] i’ll be updating/maintaining it hereonout… which i enjoy to think of doing for them.
[Shandala] now… the next good thing… (grin)
[Shandala] back around oh… 1998… just before i lost everything…
[Shandala] i had a very good friend who lived in xxxxxxxxxxx. he and his wife were people i just… adored. and they, me. i fell out of touch as a result of all the disaster. and when i found i was moving into the area, couldn’t wait to get in touch with them.
[Shandala] the last i had heard, they had just had a baby. this, happened as i was losing everything… so i never even knew the child’s name. had just received a card saying she was due next month… and then went on my tour in the valley of hell. (chuckle)
[Shandala] i called them as soon as i knew i was moving.
[Shandala] they never called back. so i was a bit disappointed. figured i had drifted so far that they’d lost interest.
[Shandala] when i got here, i decided to call one more time…
[Shandala] heh. two adults. bawling like babies over the phone.
[Shandala] within two hours, we were having dinner. stayed out until about 2am, coffee and conversation.
[xxxxxxxxxx] That’s great!
[Shandala] i was supposed to go there for thanksgiving today. but by the time i unpacked, i was wiped out. so instead, i’m going tomorrow. (later today)
[Shandala] it is beyond great. this is someone i was so incredibly close to… and still am, thankfully.
[xxxxxxxxxx] Always good to know you haven’t lost a friend 🙂
[Shandala] the good things just keep on coming. i’m shocked, really. it just seems like all of my life is converging in this one place…
[Shandala] heh. someone told me yesterday that the best is yet to come.
[Shandala] i said i wasn’t sure if i could stand much more good. i’m gurgling with astonishment even now.
[Shandala] and have missed you for wanting to share it all with you and smile.
[Shandala] though i suppose that might sound odd. i smile to know you smile for me. if that makes sense. and take enjoyment in sharing good things with you. especially since i have spent so much time moaning and weeping in your vicinity. (grin)
[xxxxxxxxxx] I am glad you share things, good and bad, and I am very happy that Hallus came into our house 🙂
[Shandala] hah. yes. the entire series of events is just…
[Shandala] mind boggling
[Shandala] poor guy. i was calling him almost every day and chattering like a magpie… and last friday, he says, ‘you know, i don’t mean this to sound like it will… but… i really don’t like the phone.’
[Shandala] lol
[Shandala] i am still blushing.
[xxxxxxxxxx] haha
[Shandala] i have curtailed my calling since then. i am not a creature of boundaries. it is hard for me to remember they exist.
[Shandala] but i felt badly that i was imposing on him.
[Shandala] especially since i was trying to share the delight that comes for his choices.
[Shandala] he is a good person. i am glad to know him.
[Shandala] and have taken a task to be more mindful and not bowl him over. (grin)
[Shandala] but i admit, i enjoy bowling people over. i wish they would let me more often. (grin)
[Shandala] heh
[Shandala] image… puppy… giddy happy licking all over your face… you’re laughing… but mostly because i won’t stop… and i’m completely without care because i like the salty taste of your cheek
[Shandala] that’s me. in a nutshell.
[xxxxxxxxxx] There are many worse things 😉
[Shandala] indeed.
[Shandala] one day, i’m going to meet someone who will just let me wear myself out on them. that will be a happy day indeed.
[Shandala] image…
[Shandala] same puppy… exhausted, curled up tight and close by someone… sides slowly rising and falling… spent… content… smiling in my sleep.
[Shandala] someday.
[xxxxxxxxxx] Wouldn’t surprise me if it was tomorrow, the way things are going
[Shandala] heh. i try not to hope too hard. but that would be wonderful. i am still very lonely. for all i am hopeful of it not being an eternal state.
[Shandala] and it is not as heavy in this moment. which is a blessing. and a relief.
[Shandala] xxxxxxx… thank you. For so many things. But mostly just for being you. (soft smile)
[xxxxxxxxxx] No need for thanks, I may as well be the very stone I sit on, for all the conversation I’m putting up. *grins*
[Shandala] you speak. but you speak with silence. blanket of care that is warm, fluffy, and constant. i wrap myself in it and rock slowly, and smile for it.
[Shandala] and try not to lick your nose too much. (softer smile)
[xxxxxxxxxx] *hug* It is a gift I am always happy to give and have accepted. I hope you know you are cherished in much the same way *smiles*
[xxxxxxxxxx] And now it is time to dream, but I will see you again soon
[Shandala] yes. i do. and that too, is a beautiful thing. sleep well. (smile)