Being right means we cannot be humble.
—
During a recent conversation with a Quaker friend, we discussed the difference between silence for Buddhists and silence for Quakers. For me there is none, and for her, they are an ocean apart. We are all looking for some spiritual light to help us through this path of human life, and we fall into a trap of thinking we have found THE WAY.
Quality of Silence
I’ve had asserted to me many times before that there is a distinct difference, as she did, but in all my experiences of both kinds of meeting I’ve never noticed any significant difference in the quality of the silence, the nature of the energy that develops amongst a group of people sitting together. Any differences are more to do with those present than what they are or are not doing. I have felt the arrival of one person change the entire energy of a meeting in a moment, either by arriving or by leaving. But to me silence is both internal and external, the latter being the hardest one to achieve. Quakerism does not teach you how to achieve this but Buddhism does. That helps me in both forms of spiritual practice. ONe informs the other and vice versa.
Many of these naysayers are Quakers who have turned away from Buddhist practices and decide it is not for them. For me, they are both important parts of my spiritual journey. I could never choose one or the other. I’m so glad neither of them demands that I do. That openness is part of why I feel I belong in both these traditions and teachings, along with my personal sense of connection to God, the universe, the oneness of everything, or Buddha nature, whatever you want to call it.
Why only one spiritual practice?
But I’m left curious as to why some Quakers find Buddhism, especially the Plum Village tradition, via Woodbrooke, a UK Quaker retreat centre, and leave Quakerism, and why some try Quakers, find it doesn’t suit them for some other reason and become Buddhists, or return to traditional forms of Christian worship. Embrace them all. I have tried going back to C of E church but I find it just too noisy and busy, for me, but I do not think I have it right with my silence-based spiritual practice.
Why can’t we all stay open to all forms of spiritual connection?
In group / Out group
Why do we need to feel we are in ‘the right’ group, and what harm does that do across the planet? How many wars come from the need to be right? How much terrible suffering?
Torture and horrific punishing actions are taken against people deemed spiritually ‘wrong’, just for being different. This is what is wrong with ‘being right’ and this is the attitude which is probably the biggest reason for most people turning their backs on conventional religions and instead gravitating to newer more liberal spiritual traditions.
There is no ‘Other’
It all boils down to in group/out group psychology and our individual need to fit in or belong somewhere. That is our vulnerability, leading us to this immediate mistake. But we overlook one very important and fundamental truth — we all already belong to this planet. To this universe, and in this moment. We are part of the whole, just a bunch of molecules expressed as us, each as we are. We are not right or wrong. We create these divisions in order to acquire a sense of individual identity, yet this same neediness creates all these horrendous problems for other members of our species, and often for ourselves too.
Spiritual Connection
For me, spirituality is about our connection to all that is, to the world, this planet and the oneness of everything. Whatever you call that oneness, God, buddha consciousness or the universal energy that is life, it doesn’t matter. We all have that in common. We squabble about the gender of this oneness, we squabble about what it said or didn’t say to us, what is written about it, and we create these rules of sacrilege against holy words or objects in order to punish each other, to punish those who do not belong to our group. Salman Rushdie is a prime example when, even after the Fatwa official was lifted he was still attacked by a religious fanatic who believed they were doing God’s work.
It’s not that many steps between ‘our silence is different from your silence’ to death threats based on those differences. It is astonishing how quickly a society can close in like this when it feels threatened. Remember John Wyndhams’ — The Crysallids!
I want to use my spirituality to bring people together, to make connections and bonds based on similarities, and I’m glad to say that within Quakers is a group called the Universalists which do exactly that, explore what we all have in common, and write wonderful learned papers on that topic.
When I think about silence, I realise there is no such thing. I think instead about the need to go within ourselves to resolve our inner conflicts, to finally know ourselves, and from that point, we can settle and listen for intuitions, or promptings, or higher ‘knowings’. Sitting facing each other can be a distraction to this process and does not necessarily mean we are any closer or more connected as individuals, though this is often cited by Quakers as to why these meetings are superior. Learning to look deeply at oneself can be daunting but leads to the deepest connections on an emotional level, far greater than anything experienced in a Quaker meeting by this plum village tradition meditator and committed Quaker.
Humility — being wrong too.
If we all sit down and consider deeply what we have in common we can discover it is far more than we have of difference. If we base our status on highly divisive explorations of those differences, which Shia and Sunni Muslim scholars are wont to do, then we see more ‘us and them’ separation. Separation breaks down human-wide co-operation, destroys connections and makes lives harder for all other humans, even those locked into rich estates with guards and so much privilege.
In Quakers there is an ‘advice and queries’ ( our guidance shortnotes) I return to so often, to remind myself to not get arrogant about my own rightness. It suggests ‘have you considered you might be mistaken?’
In Plum Village we have similar ‘are you sure?’
These two phrases should be on the tips of everybody’s tongues. It is certainly that which makes us rigid, judgmental and unkind. That creates us and them, the right and the wrong, the in-group and the out-group. In my view that is the only ‘wrong’ way forwards.
Sylvia Clare. Author, Poet, Mindfulness Teacher in Plum Village Tradition, Member of Isle of Wight Quaker Meeting