Taking Refuge...

This fall, I will take my Refuge Vows. This vow will be an expression of my freedom. Freedom as a refugee, I can let go of my attachment to basic security--which is actually illusory; there is really no basis of security in one's life. Willingly suspended in no-man's land (no-woman's land) in which the only thing to do is for me to relate to the Dharma and with myself.

This vow is also intended to be a proclamation of my 'one-pointedness'; an allegiance to my sense of discipline, ethics and spiritual path. A heartfelt yes to my Basic Goodness. I am freed from having to be a heroine to a personal success story. This has me planting my stick in the ground and stopping in my tracks, the shopping in the spiritual marketplace for what I believe in. No more sidetracks, no exits. I have chosen the Buddhist path.

There will be no more scapegoats; blaming people, places, and things, for the problems I encounter. No more collapsing into a belief of helplessness whereby I would normally hand my problems over to someone or something else. Being virtually groundless, I can entertain the problems I will most assuredly encounter, as now a reference point from which to continue to practice moving along my boddhisattva path. Somehow, ironically, this affords me a way to relate to my being lost, confused but simultaneously more tenderhearted and open. Maitri-self compassion- will be my internal compass. I am welcoming the Hinayana approach--the narrow path of simplicity and boredom.

I have spent so much of my life caught up in 'dramas'...boredom is such a welcome relief to all the drama-energy I expended or whipped up to make my life tolerable or supposedly meaningful. There seems to be a sensibility and simplicity in working with the sacredness, richness and ordinary magic of my human experience. I am a slippery fish but I am no longer calling on a bigger net than myself for salvation. By this, I do not mean salvation like that of individuals being saved from their sins, their lives and their choices. Rather, I am being saved from a life of never growing up or taking full responsibility for my words or deeds.

I have no desire to go into 'lifetime retreat' or retreat from life...no, I am committed to being wholeheartedly engaged with what crosses my path as I participate in it fully. Fully a part of the everyday ordinariness of walking planet earth. Embracing ordinariness is a far cry from where I began with believing that to not live an extraordinary life or be an extraordinary person, I was somehow betraying my purpose. Fortifying my ego with thoughts of the extraordinary served its purpose: I learned that my extraordinary efforts to maintain myself as "different from", "better than" was not only impossible but ultimately, arrogant, selfish, and isolating.

This decision to take refuge, has been a long time in coming. I have not entered into it naively or haphazardly. There will be no beatific sound track to my life after the Vow. There will be the great unknown, roads less traveled and a heart that beats with both trepidation and solace. Whatever will be, will be and I vow to take refuge in it.

Gracie Garp