Ceremonies

(Originally posted on July 21, 2015)

*1*

At the monastery, there are ceremonies.

I didn‘t trust them much at first. To me, they were the gateway drug to superstition and cult-iness. Ceremony is a shifty-eyed spiritual con artist; he starts out by asking you to chant here, bow there, and put your hands like so and the next thing you know your wallet is empty and your critical thinking skills are gone and you’re standing around in pairs passing out pamphlets on street corners or trolling inner city bus stations for teenage runaways.

I got over this discomfort. Between music, comedy, burlesque, and wrestling, I’ve been in some degree of show business most of my life. And what is a ceremony but the putting on of a show? There’s music and singing, costumes and props, movement and choreography. I decided the main difference between monks doing a ceremony and a Las Vegas chorus line is budget.

Also, the monks get up a lot earlier.

I thought this insight was pretty clever until one day when I realized that every person in the room was a participant in the ceremony in some way. We were giving everything we had into putting on a show…and nobody was there to see it.

I offhandedly mentioned this experience to a monk and he told me, “The interesting thing about our ceremonies is they aren’t really meant for an audience.”

And I thought, no audience.

No Audience.

No audience?

Then what the fuck are we doing them for?

*2*

A life in show business has left its mark on me.

I see everything I do as a performance. Being a comedian or pro wrestling referee, sure. But also being an uncle, son, co-worker, or partner. If there’s another person watching, then I’m onstage.

Sometimes that leads to questions. What is an Uncle’s role, exactly? I don’t have the same authority as a parent or the clearly defined role of a teacher, but I have a responsibility to be more than an adult playmate.

Similarly, how does one perform ‘being a romantic partner?’ To use just a small example, suppose my partner and I have talked about making healthier eating choices even though its something we both find difficult. Suppose we go shopping together and my partner throws a bag of cookies in the cart and looks to the other.

In that moment, what role is she looking for me to play? Am I a co-conspirator? A voice of reason? Someone who encourages her to be her best self or one who accepts her as she is and trusts her to make and live with her own choices?

I’m not saying I believe there’s a right answer. But most of the time I believe that there is a best answer, one unique to each situation and that the further I am from that best answer, the more I am failing at my role.

Many of my questions revolve around what role I am supposed to perform in any given situation. Once I find that out, I wonder about whether I am doing a good job at it.

Only recently did it occur to me to question my whole assumption that life is a performance in the first place.

*3*

An interesting thing about seeing life as a public performance is that it also affects how I see myself when I’m not in public.

I believe that the only things that “count” are the ones that somehow touch the lives of other people. When I am by myself, nothing I do makes an impact. In a solitary state, I am nothing but potential

The things I do by myself can have value but they are measured by how they impact my performances. The good things are things that will help me be a good citizen: A clean house.  A healthy body. Practicing the skills that will make me a better writer, comic, or crisis worker.

Anything is not improving me is fodder for guilt and shame: Playing video games? Wasteful. Lying on the couch? Shameful. Reading a book? Possibly acceptable…but that book better be useful.

The result is a whirpool of shame and anxiety that puports to motivate me but in reality, paralyzes me into inaction and then screams at me for not acting. Well, as much as a whirlpool can paralyze and scream, I suppose.

Fortunately, it exists only in my head. I work when I need to work. I enjoy my time off with reading or my nephews. The shame and anxiety sees that I have everything under control and slinks off, looking slightly embarrassed for having overreacted and caused a scene.

Still, there’s probably a less stressful way.

*4*

Performing isn’t always a bad thing. Sometimes it feels like a necessary part of being part of a community, a willingness to embrace my role whether or not I particularly feel like playing it.

As an introvert mostly what I want to do is read books and engage in quiet, solitary contemplation. I don’t WANT to go to family get-togethers, staff meetings, or music festivals.

There are times though, that the people I love want to do these things and they want to do them with me. Other times, it is part of my job. In any case, I know what these things mean to others and I know what they mean for myself.  So I go and do my best to smile and participate.

I worry writing this that people will read this and think that I’m talking about being insincere or fake. But there’s no pretense involved. I might want to do the activity but I do want to be there. I’m happy to be part of these things.

I suppose it might sound like a contradiction to talk about being happy doing something I don’t particularly want to do.

I think though, most people know exactly what I mean.

*5*

When it comes to Soto Zen, at least looking at the monastic tradition, I think there is a way to “perform” being a Buddhist. Certainly much of Buddhism seems to be tightly regulated--from ceremonial things like where we bow and the way we put our hands to everyday things like the way we position our utensils when we eat.

I imagine this extends outwards. There is a way to walk like a Buddhist, to sit like a Buddhist, even to speak like a Buddhist.

I don’t know what that way looks like, exactly. But I am trying to find it.

I don‘t think I’m the only one searching.

 One of the interesting things about the monastery was watching the novices perform ceremony. They aren‘t posing, not exactly, but watching them move, you get a sense of how they perceive their relationship to what they‘re doing. One novice embodies solemn dignity. Another scurries submissively across the meditation hall as if under the shadow of something incomprehensibly larger than s/he. A third powers determinedly forward, chest-first like a battleship plowing through stormy seas.

It’s a contrast to the older monks, whose movements seem familiar and comfortable without being sloppy or half-hearted. It seems less like a performance and more like the thing they happen to be doing at this moment.

It reminds me of comedy. I used to tell people I could tell how many years a comic had been in the business without hearing a single joke. All I had to do is watch how they carried themselves onstage. There is something physical in the way an experienced performer--even quirks and mannerisms have been transformed by time from distracting tics to reassuring friends.

Outside the dining room or the ceremony hall though, performing Buddhism is more vague.

On one hand, practice encompasses anything and everything. On the other hand, it is as the pointed and specific as the business end of a vaccination needle. What you’re doing now--whatever that happens to be--is where you practice. Maybe it’s typing. Maybe it’s the act of lying in bed waiting for the snooze alarm to go off. Maybe it’s as simple as breathing out.

And it happens whether somebody else is watching or not.