Photography as Meditation: The Friday Flower. Sometimes just photos. Sometimes with writing. Appearing on Fridays.

sun splashed © 2009 Mahala Mazerov

How we start our morning influences our entire day.

Some of the fortunate, disciplined and/or devoted among us manage to start with meditation, yoga or some small ritual to ground the day in mindful awareness.

But most of us simply hope to take care of the needs of children, partners and pets with a minimum of stress, not gulp down breakfast and be organized enough to rush out the door without leaving anything behind. Even if we’re single or work at home, we spin our way into the chaos of the day far too rapidly.

From my experience, the influence of the day begins in our firsts fluttering moments between sleep and waking. When the alarm clock goes off, with one foot still in dream land and the other slipping out of bed to touch the floor, we’re in a supremely subtle and impressionable state.

This is a precious opportunity to infuse our day with love and awareness. A moment that can easily be lost or destroyed.

When I was an undergraduate in college, the first weeks of my freshman year were punctuated with violent nightmares just as I was waking up.

One morning I woke before my clock radio alarm and discovered I was waking, not to music, but to the local crime news report. In those moments before I was fully conscious I was hearing about beatings, break-ins and other crimes. I changed the station, as well as the time the radio played to ensure that I heard music and not reporting.

The nightmares ended instantly.

I’ve never forgotten how actively my mind is engaged, whether I’m aware of it or not.

Now my morning wake up is another way to bring meditation into my day, much like the prayers I regularly bring to mind. My clock plays dvd music as the wake-up alarm. I wake to music and familiar prayers in Tibetan.

…and I bring to mind these words by the Dalai Lama:

A Precious Human Life

“Every day, think as you wake up,
Today I am fortunate to have woken up,
I am alive, I have a precious human life,
I am not going to waste it
I am going to use
All my energies to develop myself.
To expand my heart out to others,
To achieve enlightenment for
The benefit of all beings,
I am going to have kind
Thoughts towards others,
I am not going to get angry,
Or think badly about others,
I am going to benefit others
As much as I can.”

How do you wake up on your way to enlightenment?

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Photography as Meditation: The Friday Flower. Sometimes just photos. Sometimes with writing. Appearing on Fridays.

© 2009 Mahala Mazerov

These flowers, liatris, make me think of candles. The small flowers bloom on long wands from the top to the bottom. To me it’s like flames and wax dripping down. I actually thought one name for them was candle flower, but that’s another plant entirely. Liatris are also know as “blazing stars.”

They remind me of all of the candlelight vigils I’ve ever attended — Kent State University, where I was a student not long after the 1970 shootings. Antiwar protests. Nuclear disarmament. Vigils with the local Tibetan community. Chanting for peace.

I don’t think I’ve ever been in a candlelight vigil under clear skies. There always seemed an endurance test of wind and weather to solidify calling of the heart. It was so hard to keep a candle lit.

Sweet bonds were formed in those moments when we shared our candle flames with one another. No matter how soaked or cold we were, that simple act of rekindling another candle was part of what made the endurance worthwhile.

I have the flu and my candle is flickering a little. I’m doing my practices but there’s not a lot of fire behind them.

I want to tell you something that took me a long time to realize, because I was so focused on trying to save the world.

I am a bringer of blessings, but I can also rest and be a receiver. The same is true for you.

I know you have things you care about. Causes and people that depend on you. But you are not alone. You’re not the only one.

Every day there are people working and praying for the benefit of all beings. May all beings be happy and safe. May they be healthy. May they have everything they need.

It’s so easy to forget when you’re making these prayers, doing good work in the world, that you are also part of all beings. The prayers and the work are for you, too.

Keep a tiny light glowing inside of you. It doesn’t always have to be a blazing fire. Sometimes all you can do is keep a small ember from going out entirely. And if you can’t do even that, don’t worry. Someone will come along, share their flame, and get you glowing again.

When your light is flickering, for whatever reason, know at this very moment you can drink in the efforts and aspirations for your well being.

Someone is working and praying on your behalf at this very moment.

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Photography as Meditation: The Friday Flower. Sometimes just photos. Sometimes with writing. Appearing on Fridays.

blush of compassion. © 2009 Mahala Mazerov

One of the themes you’ll hear me talk about on a regular basis at Luminous Heart is the concept of meditation beyond the cushion. By that I mean more than bringing the fruits of practice into life, and even more than trying to bring mindful awareness into our activities.

For most of us life is moving too fast. Our meditation practices (if we have them) are not established enough to be in the palm of our hands or at the top of our mental response when we most need them.

So when I talk about meditation beyond the cushion I’m referring to ways to continually train your mind in love, compassion and awareness as you move through your day.

One of my favorite practices is a brief and beautiful prayer called The Four Immeasurables. It comes from the Buddhist tradition, but the qualities it exalts are universal. Anyone, of any spiritual practice can recite this prayer:

May all mother sentient beings boundless as the sky have happiness and the causes of happiness.


May they be free of suffering and the causes of suffering.

May they never be separated from the happiness which has no sorrow.

May they rest in equanimity free from attachment and aversion.

The wish that all beings have happiness is love. The wish that all be free of suffering is compassion. Happiness which has no sorrow is joy. Freedom from bias, attachment and aversion is equanimity.

The Four Immeasurables are traditionally recited three times during meditation sessions, but I love taking them beyond the meditation cushion. I like having something memorized. I recite them when I’m waiting for something or someone, when my mind is chattering or when I’m ungrounded. In truly challenging moments, when I want to reach for some kind of spiritual support, The Four Immeasurables are right there for me.

There’s actually much more meaning than you would imagine condensed in these four lines, but I will leave a detailed exploration for another time.

I believe simply repeating the prayer (silently or out loud) will take you where you want to go, opening your heart and developing the qualities of love, compassion, joy and equanimity for yourself and others.

Recite the prayer for yourself, and let me know how it feels. I’d also like to know the prayers you take beyond the meditation cushion. (Even if you never actually sit and meditate.)

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Photography as Meditation: The Friday Flower. Sometimes just photos. Sometimes with writing. Appearing every Friday.

illumination. © 2009 Mahala Mazerov

When I take photographs, I work in a state of meditation and engagement. I’m searching through the lens for an image that goes beyond labels. Beyond peony. Beyond flower. Beyond petal. Until something new is revealed.

I believe there’s a dialog going on, but it’s not a verbal one. Even after I edit my shots and select the images that resonate I don’t usually have a story or a why.

In that respect, this image is different. I remember being drawn in to the luminous gold at the center. (A luminosity that unfortunately is not well conveyed here. I’m tempted to learn to play with Photoshop, but love the immediacy of printing as is with minimal adjustment.)

In that golden center I discovered a state of spiritual illumination, of unceasing meditative awareness.  In that moment petals turned to turned to ice and the story of the ice caves came into my mind.

My Tibetan Buddhist lineage, the Drikung Kagu, is known as the Blessing Lineage. It is also known as the Practice Lineage as there is a history of yogis immersed in meditation that continues to this day. Many great Drikung yogis are featured in the popular documentary film, The Yogis of Tibet. (Click the link to view it free, online.)

Anyone who repeats the much overused stereotype of meditation as hiding away from reality, has never spent any real time in meditation.

I’ve had the opportunity to meet and receive teachings from people who have completed a traditional 3-year meditation retreat, or have spent as many as 12 years (!) engaged in silent meditation. Invariably they are people of great humility and humor. You might easily pass them by because they make no great show of themselves in the world. But in the right conditions you catch a glimpse, or hear a story that indicates their exceptional inner power.

They are engaged in reality in ways far beyond our minds (which run endlessly like hamsters on a wheel) will ever grasp.

In the remote landscapes where yogis and yoginis meditate in caves, there are stories of hardship and harsh weather. [Scroll for photos of Lapchi meditation cave.] Food is sparse and simple; comforts and distraction are reduced to zero. Sometimes layers of snow and ice build at the entrance of the caves. You have to break through to go out and see the sky.

That’s the story that came to me in the golden center of this flower. It’s a place that calls to me now, a place to discover illumination found at the center of meditation.

Truth be told, I feel like I’ve been too much in another cave lately. Plato’s Cave. Chained with my back to what is real, seeing only shadows on the cave wall. Shadows created by others, of what they want me to see, know, believe, buy, value. I’ve held my own fairly well, but lately I’ve gotten lost in meaningless distractions (not the soul-feeding, revitalizing variety) and in business marketing programs (as I learn to bring courses and projects to you) in particular.

I choose instead the cave where illuminating awareness is born and nourished. Then I will break free to see the sky, and create blessings.

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Photography as Meditation: The Friday Flower. A new series. Sometimes just photos. Sometimes with writing. Sometimes on Fridays.

inner and outer light. © 2009 Mahala Mazerov

I had another post almost ready to go this morning, just a few tweaks needed before hitting the publish button. But after a meltdown that’s been building for days, I looked at what I’d written and it seemed too distant and controlled compared to the raw state I’m in. I offer this to you instead and promise, some day, to learn brevity.

I know without question we all possess an inner light. Our true nature is perpetually pure and unstained. But we also have thoughts, desires, emotions, egos that mask our pristine nature. Sometimes we go searching for our light, but it’s hidden behind heavy clouds and storms.

I’ve been slogging my way through weeks with my inner light almost completely obscured. I’m depleted. I’m scattered and distracted. I can’t focus my attention for any period of time. I can’t meditate. I can’t hold my center.

My acupuncturist understands and can explain all of this to me. She takes my pulse, looks at my tongue and tells me precisely why I’m experiencing this state.

That used to make me feel better. Ah, I’m not the least disciplined person on the face of the earth. Oh, this exhaustion is real and it’s not about pushing harder. Thank you, I’m not going crazy.

But it’s been too long and explanations are not helping me at all.

I believe in the absolute preciousness of this life. And every night I go to bed heartbroken and dissatisfied with myself. Another day has gone by, has been used but not used well. I am wasting my rare and precious life in meaningless distractions. All the explanations in the world can’t help me feel better about that.

I reach for the outer light that pulls me forward, the Bodhisattva path. Love and compassion so strong that one vows to free all beings from suffering. Something in my heart catches, then falls. I’ve been guiltily avoiding my meditation table. I’m not even managing the reading that fills my heart. I am failing at this, too.

All of this pours out in an unexpected call with a dear friend, Marybeth. May everyone have a Marybeth. I have never known anyone who could hold space with such love. She can find (and speak of!) the magnificence in every being. I am in awe of her.

Marybeth listens. She waits. And then she says “You’re still my role model.”

“Role model for what?” I challenge her. I expect her to come up with something that is really Marybeth in disguise. But she says…

“Grace. You carry a grace through everything you do and it is stunning.”

Because I’m just this close to self-hatred there’s no room for humility. I will own this because it’s the only thing that will save me from drowning right now.

I tell her the one thing I’ve been doing well is recognizing how completely painful this is, knowing how much others struggle, and asking to take it away from them and carry it all on myself. It’s the Buddhist practice of Tonglen, Taking and Sending. That is the grace she is seeing.

“It’s enough,” I say. “It’s everything,” she says.

It’s become so internalized through years of meditation that I don’t think about it. It’s my nearly automatic response to suffering. What continues to deepen over time is the conviction in my heart as I practice.

“I forgot. I forgot I was doing it,” I say through tears.

In that moment, outer and inner light appear in my heart. They merge. They are one and the same in essence. It’s only worldly confusion that keeps them separate. That same confusion is the cause of suffering.

May all beings be free from suffering!

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A new series is born. Sometimes just photos. Sometimes with writing. Sometimes on Fridays. (Grateful thanks to Hazel Colditz for this inspiration.)

Protection. Vulnerability. Being born. © 2009 Mahala Mazerov

As soon as the idea to create this series was formed, I knew I wanted this photograph as the inaugural image.

Something is clearly being born. Everything shimmers. We catch a glimpse of the luminous yellow that is to come.

I love the way the sepals and petals remind me of Buddhist imagery of the thousand petaled lotus. Born in the mud and blossoming in purity, the lotus symbolizes the development of individual beings towards enlightenment. In Buddhist art and in meditation practices Buddhas, deities, and sacred syllables sit on and sometimes arise from a lotus. I can easily imagine a little Buddha hovering here.

Spending more time with this image, I see vulnerability. I see the tender responsibility of wishing to protect and allowing to set free.

The sepals, the calyx as a whole whose job it is to protect the flower while it develops, are not much stronger than the petals in their care. Their menacing-looking points offer small protection. The whole bud is vulnerable. It’s easily broken or crushed. But a harder exterior would trap the flower and prevent it from blooming.

How often do we find ourselves walking this line, trying to protect and bring forward a dream, a birth, an awakening? Our natural response may be to harden some part of ourselves. What we really need is the green flexibility of the calyx and the promise of the flower.

When I’m feeling vulnerable I’ve discovered what I mostly need is some small safety that encourages me to blossom. In that way something new can be born. It doesn’t guarantee everything will go easily. Maintaining mindful awareness is hard work and the decision to stay with a raw and tender heart can make that even harder. But there are moments when true freedom is born. I catch glimpses of my enlightened heart. I discover that the ultimate ground of protection is the fully-opened flower of my heart.

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I am a shaman. I was recognized by indigenous shaman from Peru and Brazil. By the time they told me I already knew. Their confirmation was meaningful, but it came with a weight of responsibility for healing the world.

To me, being a shaman means having access to places beyond what most people call reality. And not just having access, but being able to choose to enter those worlds to create change. This change is never for the sake of power. A shaman enters alternate reality to benefit others — from individuals to communities to Mother Earth — and recognizes the interdependence of all life.

I want to share a place with you that comes from the shamanic worlds I travel. It is called The Bowl of Stars, an alternate reality that first opened itself to me in the summer 2001. I continued to journey there every day for a year following the 9/11 attacks, to hold the fabric of reality with love.

If we’re to manifest big visions of what is possible, work through our personal losses and confusions, and transform the inconceivable attacks on humanity and this planet that continue to this day, we need a better view.

One such vantage point is The Bowl of Stars. It is still a place I go to infuse the world with healing and loving-kindness. I hope that you will take a little time to enter this world through the practice of shamanic journeying or guided meditation. (If you are familiar with Tibetan Buddhist practices, you will recognize some resonances here, too.)

<><><><><> Shamanic Journey, Guided Meditation<><><><><>

To enter The Bowl of Stars is to enter sacred time and sacred space. To BE in that place where you are one with divine consciousness.

There is no right or wrong way to do this. You may begin with one expectation, only to be taken on an entirely different course. Trust that your experience is perfect for you in this moment.

To make this journey, travel beyond the far reaches of time and space. Expand your consciousness. Expand the energy field of your body. Keep moving and expanding outward until you encompass all the universes, galaxies, planets and stars.

You are like a bowl holding All That Is. You contain all beings, all time, all space and all knowledge. You hold divine light and you are divine light. There is nothing separate from you. There is no You separate from others. Everything is Oneness.

Stay in this state for as long as you can.

Try and experience it with all of your senses.

Imagine you can effect this body-cosmos with your very thoughts. You can ease pain. You can heal all the hurts. You can end suffering. You can flood The Bowl of Stars with unimaginable love.

What gifts will you offer to All That Is? Take some time to give these now.

Keeping your mind firmly established in this profound state of wholeness and love, zoom in think about your daily life. Think about your opinions and attitudes. Your pain. Your desires.

How do these change?

How would you change if you came from this place of unity, all the time?

Know this is your true Home.

To bring this knowing back into your everyday life, reconnect to the sense of your own physical body. Re-member everything you have just seen and experienced. Then, imagine everything dissolves into pure light. 

Let that light stream into you through the crown of your head.

Let the light keep filling your entire being until it overflows. Feel it flowing through you. Radiating gently, naturally and effortlessly beyond your body and energy field.

This is who you are.

You are a walking hologram, containing All That Is, filled with Light.

Take a moment to dedicate the benefit of this meditation to all beings. You may dedicate it to peace or to whatever higher purpose feels right to you.

[This guided meditation has been published before and circulated as a peace meditation. If you have any resonance with this journey, please feel free to share it with or without attribution. From my heart to yours ~ Mahala]

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In my previous post, I wrote about Pema Chodron’s brilliant response to a wildly inappropriate question that made the rest of the audience squirm.

But what if the question is mundane and you’re the one squirming?

Disgraceful questions. We all have them. They’re completely routine to everyone else, but they press on our most tender spots. Not answering feels like an evasion and a lie. Answering bears a truth we fear hurts or disgraces us.

It’s “How are you?” when you’re struggling with a chronic illness your friends and family don’t really understand. “How’s business?” if you’re a solopreneur doing everything you can to find clients and feeling like a failure. “How is X?” when your relationship is crumbling and no one really knows how bad it is behind closed doors.

What’s your disgraceful question? How do you deal with it skillfully?

In my case, I’m managing life with a brain injury along with recent unpleasantries of autoimmune thyroid illness and adrenal fatigue syndrome. Needless to say, “How are you?” ranked number one for me.

In search of a skillful answer I made space for all the ways it makes me squirm. I did this when my mind and emotions were reasonably calm since my clarity “on the spot” had been something near zero.

Well no wonder! My inner narrative, a deluge of emotions and stories, quickly flooded any semblance of a spacious mind.

Keeping my seat, returning to my breath again and again, I let the story lines wash over me. No matter how “true” they felt, I didn’t grab on. I didn’t hold the line. I let them keep coming. Let them keep going. When they finally dissipated, I felt spent, but I also had a feeling of being at rest. I looked at my mind and found spaciousness.

Now, when people ask “How are you?” I smile and say “I’m hanging in there.” I have enough lightness in my voice to move on to other subjects and enough truth for further inquiry.

I’m in search of a more elegant phrase, but results with this one have been fairly astonishing. A few people pass right over it, but mostly what I’m discovering is a lot of us are “hanging in there.” I’m entering into deep, rich conversations as the result of that simple response.

I’m usually uncomfortable talking about my health and my needs because it makes the conversation all about me. Magically, the conversation has now become about them, too. About us.

I’ve found myself in multi-layered discussions about the experience of aging as a single woman. Had a conversation with a dear Buddhist friend regarding emotional challenges of being a vegetarian who suddenly needs to eat meat for healing. A favorite waitress in a favorite cafe told me she was brokenhearted after putting her cat sleep three days before, then spoke of her father who died three years earlier. And on and on.

We’re talking about dreams and hopes and celebrations and losses. I’m touched and grateful for the intimacy. For the chance to listen and offer kindness. For the gift of receiving it.

Maybe the phrase “I’m hanging in there” lays out some unexpected welcome mat for genuine engagement. I think the real magic is in the mindfulness. I only know I’ve exchanged more love, kindness and compassion since I stopped squirming over the question.

What’s you’re disgraceful question? Can you find a skillful answer?

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Many years ago I was in the audience while Pema Chodron was giving a public talk. During the question and answer period a young man stood up to ask a question.

I don’t remember the subject, but I do remember it was so outrageously inappropriate an actual gasp rose up from the audience.

Oblivious to our discomfort, the young man continued on for several minutes. When he finally became silent, all eyes turned to Ani Pema Chodron. What could she possibly say in response?

Taking in the question, taking her time, she finally leaned toward the microphone. She looked directly at the young man. Her voice filled with enthusiasm she exclaimed “What an extraordinary question!”

Then she closed her mouth and said nothing. She held the silence for a few moments while it slowly dawned on us she had no plans to say anything further. Then she cheerfully pointed at another raised hand and took the next question.

It was a stunning response. I do not know what the young man took away from that moment, but I know I’m not the only one who received an incredible teaching.

Since then I’ve used variations of that response when it was exactly what was called for. It makes a thundering statement while saying very little, and prevents getting hooked into any ugliness. Used skillfully, it cuts through so cleanly that nothing more needs to be said.

Like anything, it can probably be misused as a tactic when genuine dialog is what’s required. But when you need a skillful answer to a disgraceful question or an inappropriate comment, it works. Even if you’re not Pema Chodron.

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First, let me offer profuse thanks to everyone who responded to my Help Wanted prayer request.

It was a huge leap for me to publish it out loud, all the more because I thought I was just tapping the universe on the shoulder. I never in a million years expected anyone to step up and say “I will help you with this.”

Whether you offered specifics or just cheered me on via email or here on the blog, I want you to know how much your responses made my heart soar.

Having said that, let this be your turn to ask. PLEASE tell me what you want or need to learn about meditation. Let me know how I and LuminousHeart.com can serve your heart’s desire for a life of loving-kindness, compassion and clarity.

I’ve set up a simple survey, 4 questions, all of them optional, plus space to add your own thoughts.

Click Here to take the meditation survey. It’s short and sweet, and I promise to listen.

FYI, your name will not be added to any mailing list if you take this survey. You’ll have the option to join my list at the end, but it’s completely voluntary. I just want to hear from readers and people interested in meditation how I can best serve you.

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