Gerard Lim
Level 2 Student, Ocean Sky Chan Monastery
The smell of incense permeates the Chan Hall of Ocean Sky. I, a beginner in the practice of Chan, attended the Qingming ceremony for the first time. I hear the sound of chanting in a language I do not understand. And yet, it stirred something in me. Tears started to well up in my eyes. I held it back.
“No. Do not cry here. It is shameful.” I thought.
I did my best to fight back the urge to cry. But as I did, my chest tightened and began to hurt. The more I resisted, the more it hurt. It came to a point that I couldn’t take it anymore, so I began to cry.
Then, I hear the sound of a handbell. The emcee signaled everyone to do a prostration. Not knowing how to do a prostration yet, I slowly fell to my knees, then on my hands, until my head touched the mat, my tears falling on the image of a lotus flower.
It wouldn’t be until later that I understood why that happened.
After being in psychotherapy for the past two years, learning meditation at Ocean Sky, and experiencing the solemnity of the Qingming ceremony, all the pieces were in place. My mind finally confronted something I had been running away from for decades: trauma.
The tears were a sign that my mind had finally realized that it was holding on to so much pain. Now that it had acknowledged it, the tears flowed. They were tears of grief.
I saw how much the trauma had distorted my vision of the world for most of my life. I viewed everything with so much cynicism and suspicion because I had so much anger in my heart. It turns out that all that anger was my grief, begging to be recognized.
Now, I can mourn my past self who suffered that trauma, myself, who could have been spared that trauma, and all the selves I will never be because of that trauma. And in doing so, I can let go. In recognizing the trauma I was carrying, I realize that I am no longer in that place, that moment when the trauma occurred. Those dark memories too, are empty.
There is a popular saying in the English-speaking world: “Hurt people hurt people,” meaning those who inflict pain on others are often victims themselves. Through the continuation of my practice, I have begun the work of confronting my trauma and all the ways it has shaped me. I am noticing more and more, the habits and patterns that I’ve built up over my life because of that trauma. The question now is whether these habits and patterns are still beneficial. Now, my mind is sharper and I can better perceive which are worth keeping, and which are already harmful and best be stopped. In doing so, I can grow to be a better person, not just for myself, but also for others.
Is this part of what it means to be a bodhisattva? To end a cycle of suffering people causing others to suffer too?
What I am certain of is that I have changed tremendously. Now I am better able to recognize my emotions and thoughts without heeding them. Throughout most of my life, I would often get thoughts like: “You’re disgusting, you are fat, ugly, a failure”; “you’re a monster”; “you’re so selfish and lazy”; “you ruin everything and people want revenge on you.” But then after the event, I noticed a change. When these thoughts would arise, I would now also get thoughts like “Stay calm. You’re safe. Nobody is coming to hurt you”; “hating yourself for making mistakes won’t help you improve”; “you’ve survived a lot. You can do it.”
Could this be traces of the kindness of my inner Buddha nature slowly unfolding?
I feel like I have cleared many mental obstructions, so much so that I feel happier and peaceful. I’m able to genuinely feel happier for others too. Whereas once I got very angry at the concept of gratitude, now I find myself having moments of spontaneous gratitude towards all the people and things that have helped me, not just in my journey in the practice of Chan, but throughout my entire life.
But there is still so much work to be done. As I dive deeper into myself, I still find so much shame and self-hatred. I still struggle with my tendency to panic and berate myself when making mistakes or doing something mediocre in my eyes. The difference now though is that I have more tools to help me manage and see past them.
There are times that I will regress into old patterns. But through diligent practice, I can catch myself when I do. I have many unhealthy patterns to unlearn, and perhaps there are still many more to discover. But ultimately, all of these, my painful past, the habits and patterns that arose out of it, and all my shame and self-hatred, are not forever. And there is hope in that.