Resolutions for 2016

How to get a quiet mind

Inner peace

For sale!

Santa Claus evening

Really zen

Duality

 This quote: "Love is: "solving problems together which you wouldn't have when you were alone",  hangs on the wall in my neighbours' house. I had a good laugh about it. And whomever I tell it, everybody recognizes the humor of it. Especially people with a relationship. 

I think  the thought behind this quote is that you'd better be alone or live alone. Or that you have to try to change your partner in such a way that he/she is more like you.

Many people do think: It's not because of me that we're having problems.

Also me.  I often think about my partner: Why is she making so much trouble? If she would act in a different way, it all becomes much easier.

Dualistic thinking.  Me in opposite of somebody else.

That's why I practice zen. In order to dive into the depths of my thinking. In order to learn more about my thoughts about me versus 'other'. So that I can check the reality of those thoughts. And 

that I can finally discover that those thoughts doesn't say anything about reality, and only exist in my head. 

They really do only exist in my head. They  don't tell anything about reality. And everybody who is able to take a look inside, knows that.

And still, it is so tempting to believe in these thoughts. In your relationship, at work, everywhere. 

Last week I red an article in knack.be. A belgium news magazine. This article  handled about terrorism. A dutch specialist in international relations (Peter Knoppe) was interviewed. 

He warned the western world. He says: we impose our thinking about history to the rest of the world. And that is going to become a disaster. We don't have a clou about what is going on in non-western countries. The anger, the discontentedness, the anti- western feelings.

We still think that we have to democratize, and that our secular thinking have any relevance in a world where the majority of the people have strong anti-western feelings. 

This touched me. This man has a point, I think. We have the idea that 'they', the terrorists from IS, have oldfashioned ideas and behaviors. That they are barbarians. That they have medieval opinions. That they don't know what democracy is .

Our body of thought is better.

If they would be different we would't have to fight them.  If they could be more like us, we don't have to destroy them. 

Actually it is the same as this quote. We in the western world have the feeling that we wouldn't have those problems, when they (the IS) were not there. That there wouldn't be any problem if they were more like us. Or preferably, be the same.We only want to live with our 'own people'.

I don't account the violence of IS. Not at all. They use horrible, cruel violence. And they are very convinced about that their body of thinking is right and ours wrong. So they want to destroy us too.

Where is the solution for this? In my own relationship it is possble to relativize my thoughts about my partner. In order to search for connection. In order to experience that this opposition of me and other only exist in my head. 

But worldwide? How can we ever make a connection with terrorists? 

Maybe it is idealistic, but I stll believe in the fact that I am not different from them. That love is not about  solving problems together, but that real love is about experiencing the oneness with the other one. With everybody else. 

As long as we believe this thinking about me in opposite of other, and continue to believe that if the other one wouldn't be there, we also wouldn't have this problems, than we stay in a situation of war. 

A war that will become worse and worse. 

 

 

Imagine..

Don't ask daddy

Really...?

Unbelievable

Don't worry

We all know that our planet is in danger. But still governments don't do enough to reduce co2 dismission. Economic interest seem to be more importent than saving the earth. 

So what are we going to say to our children and grandchildren? What kind of earth do we forward to them? 

Space enough...

Every third tuesday in september our king or queen in Holland gives a talk. Normally he or she speaks about the currnent situation in the country. These days the refugees are a big issue in Holland. How can we give them all a good shelter. Hopefully our king will also contribute to this. 

Happy

About a couple of weeks ago a famous writer, Joost Zwagerman, passed away. He committed suicide. 

When I red this the next morning in the newspaper, mspontaneously tears vpcame up in my eyes. 

I think because of the shock. And maybe also because I realised that Joost Zwagerman must have suffered sooo much that he decided to commit suicide.

I have to commit that I also belong too this big group of people that consider sometimes committing suicide. I know this feeling that it becomes too much for me. That I have the feeling that I can't handle life. Often I can't even describe it very clear. It's just a feeling. It's just an undertone in my existence. 

Everybody wants to be happy, isn't it? That is just a kind of ancient theme of mankind. If you are a refugee, an IS fighter or a depressed person. We actually all want to be happy, deep inside in all of us is this longing. To be happy. To be satisfied.

Some people do manage much better to be contented than others.

What intrigues me is what exactly dies. Or what exactly you want to be dead, if you commit suicide. Do you want to get rid of your body? Or do you want to get rid of your feelings and thoughts? 

Sometimes I ask myself this kind of questions. And it is difficult to answer them. Because this 'me' isn't a very clear shaped thing. Buddhists know that very well. 

You cannot grasp 'self'. Not like you can grab a glass of water. You can't get a grip on it. 

The me only can be described as a summory of caracteristics, connected to a body. And those caracteristics are also very changeable. 

This 'me' of me is a construction of thoughts, feelings, ideas, memories, successes and disappointments that I builded up during my whole life. 

When I feel asleep, then it is gone. 

As soon as I'm awake, the whole circus arises again. 

Zwagerman maybe wanted to end this circus. Because it wasn't a funny circus. 

Because he didn't manage to make it a funny circus. 

In my experience you are able as a human being to have influence on your own circus. To let your 'self' suffer a little bit less. 

But some people must do much more effort for this than others. 

Imagine..

Imagine you are a refugee.

Imagine that Holland is flooded with water. Everything is overflowed. No house is saved. Millions of dutch people flee for the water. 

Me too. The only thing I could save is a plastic bag with some clothes. And my IPhone. My wife walks beside me. Behind me walks my sister, my nefhew. My neighbours. And lots of people who I don't know. I don't know where my oldest sister is. I don't know where my niece is, that turned 11 last month. I don't know if my mother is still alive. 

We hope we can get asylum in Africa. But we aren't sure. My passport drifts somewhere. Or is already lying at the ground of the Northsea.

I am dependant of the goodwill of strangers. I can't imagine that they wouldn't help us. Before me walks a family. Young parents. Two children. Those children must eat.  There must be somebody though, who would give us some food? 

And a bed. That we can have some rest. Because I don't feel my legs anymore. I'm broken. My body hurts everywhere.

I look at my phone. I see a picture of a holiday from last year. Its unbelievable that that is me. That there was ever a time that that was me. 

My cat has surely drowned. My house, my paintings, everything I loved is gone. I even don't feel sadness. 

I just hope that there will be people who will help us. Who will give us some food, maybe a bed.

Finally...

500 likes

I can meditate already..

Real buddhist art

Mindfulness hype

Don't try to be the teacher

Beh..

A free country

Who guards the teacher?

Relationship between teacher and student

Last weeks there was a kind of scandal about a vipassana-teacher that comitted sexual crimes with his pupils. Lots of discussions about the relationship between teachers and students folowed. 

Zen exam

My nephew  is taking exam this week. Wednesday he took his dutch exam. He did it pretty well. 

I remember the time that I took exams myself, at the end of highschool. 

Half an hour before the exam we tried to learn the last facts and knowings. 

I also remember the stress during the exams, when you didn't know the answer. 

At school everything is about 'knowing'. Capitalcity's of country's where you've never been. Conjugations in french, understanding dutch textes, the wars in the past in different continents.

A lot of all those things I forgot.  I even have to unlearn to think that it is important to know all these facts.  Finally I started to practice zen.

And practicing zen goes really better when you don't know. 

 

Ever thought about making yourself a new, better person?

Is it possible to renew myself? How solid is my character? And what is it that makes me a different person, different from other persons? These are questions that I find very interesting. Because it touches something, it questions something, namely my 'me' that I often automatically assume as a matter of course. 

It seems often as if this 'me' is unchangeable.

Last week I saw on the dutch television a broadcast about 'the wondrous world of the brain'. In this broadcast they showed a part from a british documentary about a man (father of two children) that suffered from severe brain damage in the front lob of his brain because of a car-accident. 

The front lob of the brain is responsible for inhibitions. And is therefore very important for the way we act and for our character. This man was disinhibited. That was so obvious in this fragment. He shouted harsh and unreasonable to his children. It was out of normality. There was something awfully wrong in his behaviour. His wife said:'I don't know when which part of his character will appear. It is like Jekyll and Hyde. 

This man was sometimes his very self. And sometimes totally different. So....how solid is this 'self' of ours? 

Could you, if that was ever possible, give a person who (for example) suffers from depression, give that person new brains? And will this make him or her a totally renewed person? 

Before I started with (zen)meditation I had a very low self-esteem and was often quite depressed. I never saw meditation as a therapy. But nevertheless, I'm convinced that it helped me a lot to overcome these depressions. 

In zen-meditation we practice a lot with koans. Koans are like riddles that you can't solve with your logical thinking. And therefore forces you to go beyond your logical mind. And that is quite interesting. Because it enables you to go beyond the 'package' that you know so well. And I mean with 'package' the whole assembled image of who you think you are. Your name, age, profession, your uncertainties and successes, all that sort of things. Things that build  the idea/the sense of self. 

So in sitting with a koan you put this package for a moment aside. You forget it. Because it simply stands in the way when you want to solve your koan. 

For me this made my idea of the self that I am, much looser. I do see how relative it is. I do see that this package that is called 'marja timmer' , can easily change. 

I am convinced that we can define for a great part which connections our brains are making. Which paths they take. 

It is not the situation that defines our character. It is the way how we react on that situation that defines our character. 

(This is also published in the dutch buddhist newspaper) 

Modern guided meditation

Peace

Day for the zen meditation groups in Holland

Last sundag there was a day for the zenmeditation groups in Holland. Lots of people came. When Jiun roshi was introduced to all the people, I got inspired to make this cartoon.

Hiding behind the boeddha

Happy Easter, with or without gluten...

Is it because of our chemical manipulated food that we become more and more intolerant or even allergic to gluten or milkproducts? 

Or is it because of the quality of our food that the number of people that become sick from eating bread increases? 

On the web I learn that wheat is like a poison and there heas been much manipulations with it, so that it has different qualities nowadays. Qualities that are not good for our health. But on another webpage I learn that this is totally nonsense, and that there is no scientific evidence for this. 

Companies are taking advance of this aversion of people against gluten. You can buy gluten free beer. And gluten free ice or pineapples. But actually, there are no gluten in ice or pineapples. But they sell it 'glutenfree', because people want to buy it. 

I'm not a foodexpert. But I'm a cook. And that's why it concerns me. When I cook for groups nowadays it appears that there are five times as much people with a diet than three years ago. And for me, as a cook, that is becoming a little bit too much...

So I ask myself:" how is it possible that the amount of diets has increased so fast?" I don't have an answer to  that question. At the Noorder Poort, where I work, we have now the rule that we only take care of diets when it is accompanied with a disposition of a doctor. This rule diminishes the amount of diets a lot. 

This weekend I cook for a group of thirty people. Two people have a diet. I'm going to make a nice Easter brunch on the second Easter day. With homemade Easterbread. And eggs from hens that have much space to move. 

I hope it becomes a happy Easter for everybody. With or without gluten. 

A gorgeous teacher

The door of compassion

It seems like there are happening more and more  bad things in our world. Wars, refugees, terrorism, pollution in our environment, rich people that become more rich and more poor people on the other hand. Animals that suffer in horrible circumstances.

And it also seems as if we become more and more indifferent of that. As if we suffer from a collective fatigue. 

 As a buddhist I often say: " I resolve to save all sentient beings". And this means to me, that I promise myself not to turn away from all the misery. 

Off course, the philosophy behind this is that I am not separated from everything there is. So, if I save myself, I'll save also all other sentient beings. Therefore, the first thing I have to do is to look at my own misery. And also to look deeply into that little "me" that still resists to live an enlightened life. 

This little me that chooses sometimes to exclude from all the misery. The 'me' that becomes tired from all the bad things happening in this world.

And also the 'me' that can become angry and resentful on, for example, the men of Boko Haram who rape little girls. Or becomes angry to the people from Shell that destroy beautiful nature in order to earn more money. 

Because that means also excluding myself. And it means denying the interconnectedness of everything.  I reason out of 'me versus them'.

So, 'saving all sentient' beings means for me that I must not separate myself. That I have to realize that I am everything and everyone. That I am deeply connected with everything and everyone. 

That I am the pig, living in horrible circumstances in the cattle industry. But that I am also the farmer who treats his animals badly. That I am the Isis- fighter but that I am also the refugee. That I am the director of a bank who earns a salary of more than €10.000,- a month. But that I am also the mother with three children who has no idea how she will manage to feed all her children.

A very big inspiration for me is the famous poem of Thich Nath Hanh: " Call me by my true names." A poem that brings me into tears, and effects me a lot. And it ends in  this beautiful phrase: 

"........and so the door of my heart can be left open, 

the door of compassion."

Call Me by My True Names

Do not say that I'll depart tomorrow 
because even today I still arrive.

Look deeply: I arrive in every second 
to be a bud on a spring branch, 
to be a tiny bird, with wings still fragile, 
learning to sing in my new nest, 
to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower, 
to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry, 
in order to fear and to hope. 
The rhythm of my heart is the birth and 
death of all that are alive.

I am the mayfly metamorphosing on the surface of the river,
and I am the bird which, when spring comes, arrives in time 
to eat the mayfly.

I am the frog swimming happily in the clear pond, 
and I am also the grass-snake who, approaching in silence, 
feeds itself on the frog.

I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones, 
my legs as thin as bamboo sticks, 
and I am the arms merchant, selling deadly weapons to 
Uganda.

I am the twelve-year-old girl, refugee on a small boat,
who throws herself into the ocean after being raped by a sea
pirate,
and I am the pirate, my heart not yet capable of seeing and
loving.

I am a member of the politburo, with plenty of power in my
hands,
and I am the man who has to pay his "debt of blood" to, my
people,
dying slowly in a forced labor camp.

My joy is like spring, so warm it makes flowers bloom in all
walks of life.
My pain is like a river of tears, so full it fills the four oceans.

Please call me by my true names, 
so I can hear all my cries and laughs at once, 
so I can see that my joy and pain are one.

Please call me by my true names, 
so I can wake up, 
and so the door of my heart can be left open, 
the door of compassion.

Thich Nhat Hanh

Busstation, some young people and a mobile phone

Doing nothing

Coming home

Just a question

Friends of Buddhism

The dutch foundation "Vrienden van het Boeddhisme", (VvB) one of the oldest buddhist foundations, needs people who want to donate money to the foundation. I made this cartoon to support this. 

Take a seat under a tree

Also published in the dutch buddhist internetpaper. http://boeddhistischdagblad.nl/41450-een-mooie-dag-in-maart/

Little veggie-garden-moment

There's hope for men...

This cartoon isn't meant unfriendly to men..it is meant as a witticism to some eastern buddhist traditions that say that women can't get enlightened and that the highest goal for them is that they will be reïncarnated as a man. 

Also published in the buddhist internet paper:  http://boeddhistischdagblad.nl/41054-marja/#comment-48556

It"ll be there in a minute

Wise

The second day

The second day of a dai- sesshin (7-day zenretreat) is of ill repute. Most of the people suffer from bad thoughts and feelings. 

That can be really stormy. Like the weather now, today, with the wind outside. Sometimes there is anger, sometimes doubt. Thoughts like: "What sense does this make? " Me myself, I don't suffer from that at the moment. I just sit a few  sittings a day and the rest of the time I'm working in the kitchen. But I remember of other sesshins that doubt could play a big role in the second day. Not the big doubt. But the small one. 

For me, it had to do with the idea that it must make sense. That there was 'a somewhere' where I had to go to. This is such a big conditioning. And besides that, it's very frustrating. Because it witholds you from pure experiencing. 

That holiday on the beach

First day of this seven day retreat. It was soooo quiet this morning, in the early morning...

There wasn't even a sound of a bird. 

People are so beautiful when they are sitting still. They all look like buddha's. 

 Of course, I do know that everybody will have his or her thoughts. But that doesn't matter. Thoughts come and go. 

Like a thought about a nice holiday on the beach. Or me, thinking about the meal I'm going to cook. 

In the first day of such a retreat it is difficult not to cling to your thoughts. Not to make more thougts about it. 

But you musn't be that severe to yourself. Not severe, but also not too gentle..

Nico Tydeman, a dutch zenmaster says: don't cling, but live..in other words: 

If you are too attached to your thoughts, you live in the future or in the past.

With bare hands

Tonight starts a seven-day retreat at the Zencenter  de Noorder Poort, where I work as a cook and do my zentraining. Most of the time, everybody enters (including me) with our heads full.

And with a strong idea of 'I'.  Suitcases full with ideas and confirmations. 

It would be beautiful when we just leave our suitcases outside. And that we entered with bare hands. 

 

Karma

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