On Tuesday evening, a friend and I went to a Om Mani Padme Hum stone painting with Drepung Gomang Monastery Buddhist Monks at a wellness studio in Harrisburg. There we listened to and joined the monks in this mantra of loving-kindness and compassion. Rich deep guttural sounds swam from their throats. The room was quiet as a pin until the soft voices emerged chanting along.
All of the teachings of the Buddha, it is said, converge in these symbol words. In this tight room with budding artists, we selected our stones with the monks assisting us in what color to paint each Sanskrit symbol. I quietly immersed myself into carefully applying the red, black, blue, green and yellow paint on my stones, feeling each stroke of the thin brush was as important as the last.
When done, I sat in quiet contemplation wondering if I should ask these monks what I was too shy to ask the group at my studio last fall. I wasted my minutes gathering up the courage by looking at merchandise, finding an orange shirt for my husband, and after playing two singing bowls, settled on one for myself. Etched with symbols and buddhas, I felt called to the one my friend played, which touched my heart.
I hugged my friend good night and spoke with the interpreter, who was also the driver. "Do any of the monks speak English," I asked.
"Some of them understand English, but cannot speak well. Do you have questions" he answered back.
"Yes," I said. And then pouring into what I could hold in no longer I said, "What would Buddha say about remembering past lives? Should we remember? Why would we remember?"
As I sat there this evening, I could not forget my brief memory of being a monk in a past life and being tortured by my captors.
"Do you remember your last life?"
"I don't know about my last life, but past lives, yes. Many of them," I responded.
That folded into a question and answer session with pressure put upon me to perform a spur of the moment intuitive session of his past and future life. I gave what I could in that tight noisy room. He called over a monk who appeared to be in his forties, but with their youthfulness could have very well been in his sixties for all I knew. Sitting before me in a folding chair in rich red and golden robes he asked what his past life was. I told him what I got. "You were a monk for a thousand years. I see you living in the mountains before."
The monk said over and over, interpreted through the western-dressed interpreter, "You are special. You need to see the Dalai Lama and tell him." My thoughts on how I would get to Dharamsala were dismissive.
He then proceeded to tell me that "we cannot believe you because we don't know you. If we knew you, we might believe you. Don't tell others about what you can do. Not everyone can accept it." And once again he reiterated that I should tell His Holiness about what I could do. When he left, the interpreter kept pushing for more information. What I did get the most information on was his current life, which I shared, but from which he held little interest in.
I left with the advice of the monk confused. My question had not been answered, but instead, I was left with confusion. I called my best friend Arabella in Tampa who translated for me. "You don't need to be a 'dancing bear' for everyone. They say Buddhist monks are the psychologists of the world you know. He told you to watch your ego."
I sat in a sadness for a day as my ego did drive me to ask. It was my ego that knew this was something special I had and I did not need confirmation in that. However, it (my ego) needed approval for what I could do since I was a child. In loving-kindness, however, the monk led me to remember that we don't always need to seek approval for the gifts we are given. We don't need to be a 'dancing bear' to prove what abilities we have. Sometimes, we are meant to just be in gratitude for what we are given, using them as the moment arises naturally.
