Can You Gassho to Everyone& Everything?
As Buddhists we use many hand gestures, called mudra, to express our faith, reverence, and devotion. The most often used Mudra, in my opinion is the gassho. Gassho is placing the left and right hands together, as one would in prayer. The Gassho is both a greeting and an act of devotion that is done when meeting people, in front of statues of the Buddha, or upon entering a temple, or sacred space. When we Gassho, we bow to what is in front of us with single minded gratitude, Buddha recognizing Buddha. One hand represents us, the other, what/ who we are meeting. Many of us may find that when we do something so much, like making lunches for our children, changing diapers, or tying shoe laces, we are doing so absent minded. When we do things absent minded we are not showing up to our life and it’s easy to become overwhelmed, anxious, or disconnected. Even Gassho can become absent minded, that’s one of the reasons we have such a practice. Placing our hands together we take a pause and greet our life. The person or situation in front of you is your life, nothing separate. It can be easy to Gassho to a statue of Buddha, the priest, or a friend at the temple, but can you Gassho to the diaper that has a blowout, or the car that cut in front of you and took your parking space? That Buddha must have been in a hurry to take YOUR spot like that! When we don’t Gassho to every situation as our life we create likes and dislikes that separate us from Buddha. We begin to think that this narrative we are creating about our life and the universe we live in is personal and that these things are a problem for “me”. The universe is nothing personal. To Gassho is to accept the universe as ourselves. When we accept the universe as ourselves we can take appropriate action in each situation to limit suffering by practicing the eightfold path. When we see that we are responsible for our life and the situations we encounter are our very life we can connect to others in a way that is beneficial and healing. Next time you are tying your shoes, making lunch, being cut off, or changing a diaper please Gassho with gratitude, faith, and reverence.
namu kie butsu
namu kie ho
namu kie so
